Abraxas

The Chimera Androgyne: The Esoteric Mystique of Baphomet and Abraxas

Part I.

The Demon Baphomet, illustrated by Eliphas Levi

In ancient and modern esoteric literature and occultism, Baphomet possesses a

great importance among occult practitioners. From its inception from Templar idol
lore to the English Magi of Eliphas Levi and Aleister Crowley’s revision and
integration into their religious philosophies (such as Crowley’s Thelema),
Baphomet has become a virtual mascot for the occult arts. I will not go too deeply
into the long and dry history of the archetype (only very briefly), but focus on the
symbolism shared by both Baphomet and the Gnostic god-form of Abraxas,
respectively as well as the many implications involved in their subsequent
backgrounds. Abraxas too has a deep and powerful history in occultism that goes
even farther back into the ancient secret halls of the initiation.

Let’s start with the ever so infamous figure of Baphomet. The origins of the name
Baphomet vary considerably. One theory is that Baphomet is a variation of
―Mahomet‖ (due to the Knights Templar campaign in the Middle East and inclusion
of some Islamic religious ideas and rumors of even a fifth-column type of support
for the Muslims), a medieval French corruption of the Prophet Muhammad, the
warrior-king and founder of Islam. It does seem rather odd that a ―whack-ass‖
attempt for a Western tongue to get around a Semitic language would become
associated with a prime symbol of the occult. The Arabic abufihamet comes out
as bufihimat, which is translated as ―Father of Wisdom‖ or ―understanding.‖
Therefore, we can’t expect Baphomet to mean exactly what it says. If only one
could consult the ―Father of Understanding‖ to really get it. There hardly is anymore
reason to suppose that there is a more complex understanding of Baphomet. Yet,
this doesn’t stop occultist-psuedo-historians from doing so.

The ―true‖ origins of the first, fetid whispers in the dark regarding Baphomet’s name
often begin with the Templars and their private rituals that included some kind of
head bust (perhaps even a real severed head of a person) for purposes of
divination which only fueled the rumors of devil worship. Indeed, it is suggested by
few that the importance of Baphomet to the Templars was often over-stated as
simply a ―tabloid smear‖ by their accusers with about as much true metaphysical
dimension as Jack Frost, May Pole, the Unicorn, the Bogey-man, Santa Claus or
the Tooth Fairy. With its ambiguous origins aside, Baphomet has indeed been
invoked out of the collective unconscious and into our awareness as a premier
figure of the occult world.

A much more popular etymology, first established by Joseph Baron von Hammer-
Purgstall can be ciphered as the ―Baptism of Wisdom‖, from the Greek words
―Baph‖ and ―Metis‖, a likely key reference to Sophia, a common incarnation of the
divine feminine replete in classical Gnosticism, the Kabbalah, the Bible (Proverbs
especially) and the Apocrypha. According to the same author, another suggestion
is given as the Hebrew ―Maphtah Bet Yahweh‖, meaning, ―The Key to the House of
God.‖ These two suggestions are brought up in the elaborate and out-of-date
pseudo-history presented in The Discovery of the Mystery of Baphomet, by which
the Knights Templars, like the Gnostics and Ophites, are convicted of Apostasy, of
Idolatry and of moral Impurity, by their own Monuments. Can you say that two-
times fast? In both instances, the meanings infer a reference to the figure of
Baphomet as a hieroglyph world of magic or the divine powers.

The 19th century occultist, Eliphas Levi’s (his real name is Alphonse Constant)
conception of Baphomet as the Egyptian ―Goat of Mendes‖ or the ―Sabbatic Goat‖
is probably the most well-known which was first published in the 1854 in the
magical text called the Dogmas and Rituals of High Magic. Eliphas Levi’s
Baphomet was portrayed as a Chimera hermaphrodite with bi-sexual features (the
female breasts and the caduceus for an erect cock, phallic symbolism and all).
There is also the kundalini (spiritual energy symbolized as a serpent located at the
human spinal column to be unlocked by the opening of the seven chakra points),
tantric images displayed by the stiff caduceus sleuthing upward for physical desire
(to replace the image of a hard-on), the ―Rod of Hermes‖. The caduceus is also
associated with eternal life and regeneration.
Baphomet’s hands also point upwards (with the words inscribed in the arm ―Solve‖)
and downwards (―Coagula‖) showing the shortened Hermetic axiom of ―As Above,
So Below‖. ―Solve et Coagula‖ is the great alchemical formula meaning ―separate
and join together‖ or ―division and union‖. The etymology of the word ―alchemy‖ is
derived from the Arabic el-kimya, Khem being the name for Egypt where magic
and ritual was rightly pursued. The figure also bears a flaming torch on its head,
symbolizing the fire of Prometheus similar to the Greek depictions of
the Chimera as a fire-breathing elemental as well as wings of a fallen angel. The
foremost common symbol of witchcraft and the occult, the pentagram is also most
apparent placed strategically on his forehead. The pentagram in this sense is
representative of the five elements (earth, fire, wind, water, spirit). Baphomet in this
sense becomes the epitome of the ―union of the opposites‖, the upper and the
lower, the balance of polarities and dualities inherent in the cosmos.

I will allow Eliphas Levi to explain the symbolism of his illustration even further,
quoted from his book, Dogmas and Rituals of High Magic:

The goat on the frontispiece carries the sign of the pentagram on the forehead,
with one point at the top, a symbol of light, his two hands forming the sign
of occultism, the one pointing up to the white moon of Chesed, the other pointing
down to the black one of Geburah. This sign expresses the perfect harmony of
mercy with justice. His one arm is female, the other male like the ones of
the androgyne of Khunrath, the attributes of which we had to unite with those of our
goat because he is one and the same symbol. The flame of intelligence shining
between his horns is the magic light of the universal balance, the image of the soul
elevated above matter, as the flame, whilst being tied to matter, shines above it.
The beast‘s head expresses the horror of the sinner, whose materially acting,
solely responsible part has to bear the punishment exclusively; because the soul is
insensitive according to its nature and can only suffer when it materializes. The rod
standing instead of genitals symbolizes eternal life, the body covered with scales
the water, the semi-circle above it the atmosphere, the feathers following above the
volatile. Humanity is represented by the two breasts and the androgyne arms of
this sphinx of the occult sciences. (211-212)

Despite the inherent esoteric and alchemical symbolism in the figure of Baphomet,
there exists a certain demonic feature to the figure. Eliphas Levi’s insistence that it
was not the same as the Devil is notable although he repeatedly compares it to the
Devil Tarot card of the Major Arcana. Baphomet also seems to be an
amalgamation of many different goat-forms including the infernal goat of Sabbath
adored by witches of the Middle Ages, the severed head of the Templars in which
they allegedly used for divination, the phallic lusty god, Pan, and finally the
Marseilles Tarot trump card, The Devil. Thehorny Horned God is one of the oldest
fertility gods in human history—taking the various incarnations of Nimrod, Mithras,
and Dionysus, respectively. Eliphas Levi recognized this repeating ―Horny god‖
archetype that eventually would become the patron saint of occultism as
mentioned in his book, Transcendental Magic:

We recur once more to that terrible number fifteen, symbolized in the Tarot by a
monster throned upon an altar, mitered and horned, having a woman‘s breasts and
the generative organs of a man — a chimera, a malformed sphinx, a synthesis of
deformities. Below this figure we read a frank and simple inscription — the Devil.
Yes, we confront here that phantom of all terrors, the dragon of all theogonies, the
Ahriman of the Persians, the Typhon of the Egyptians, the Python of the Greeks,
the old serpent of the Hebrews, the fantastic monster, the nightmare, the
Croquemitaine, the gargoyle, the great beast of the Middle Ages, and — worse
than all of these — the Baphomet of the Templars, the bearded idol of the
alchemist, the obscene deity of Mendes, the goat of the Sabbath. (288)

Notice how Eliphas Levi contradicts himself by making no bones of Baphomet

being associated with the Devil or Satan, the ―prince of the air‖ and ―lord of the
world‖, you know the dude that wants to take your soul along with him to roast in
an eternal BBQ in the infernal, ruinous fires of hell. Yes, Baphomet takes on a very
symbolic archetype or ―egregore‖ rather than an actual existing entity, yet it cannot
be denied there exists a daemonic aura it, indifferent to conventional morality or
man’s projections of good or evil. Rumor has it, the inspiration behind Levi’s
illustration is up for speculation but it is often traced back to the grotesque
sculptured illustrations of ravenous bearded demons with bat-wings mutilating,
boiling and consuming people in an orgy of hellish blood-lust that were portrayed in
Templar churches found in Saint-Merrie of Paris, France. Bingo. (Pssst: If you want
to actually see these hard-to-find illustrations, check out Illuminati 4: Brotherhood
of the Beast on Youtube.)

In The Secret Doctrine, Madame Helena Petrovna Blavatsky writes a footnote

comparing Baphomet to the Azazel:

In Demonology, Satan is the leader of the opposition in Hell, the monarch of which
was Beelzebub. He belongs to the fifth kind or class of Demons (of which there are
nine according to the medieval Demonology), and he is at the head of witches and
sorcerers. But see elsewhere the true meaning of Baphomet, the goat-headed
Satan, one with Azazel, the scape-goat of Israel. Nature is the God Pan. (406)

Although the name Azazel bears no connection to the name of Baphomet, the
goat-headed deity Pan bears striking resemblance to the symbol that would often
be associated with Azazel. Azazel was also associated with the two-fold nature of
the ―scapegoat‖ of Jewish custom called the ―Day of Atonement‖ where one goat is
slain on an altar, while a second goat is sent away into the ―wilderness‖. The priest
lays hands on the chosen goat’s head as a ―sin-bearer‖. The goat is sent away into
the wilderness as a symbol of ―removing‖ the guilt and sins of Israel.

But the goat, on which the lot fell for Azazel, shall be set alive before YHWH, to
make atonement over him, to send him away for Azazel into the wilderness. (Lev.
16:10)

In fact, ―Azazel‖ has nothing to do with being a name and everything to do with
being a noun (ayn, alpeh), meaning ―dismissal‖ or ―removal‖. This sets a precedent
for the Jewish conception of the high-priest, Messiah-King whose blood is shed to
atone for the sins of man for all time.

The other symbol associated with Azazel was of course the enemy of mankind’s
souls, Satan himself. The scapegoat was not killed just as the spirit of the Devil
was not killed. The goat represents the condemnation of Satan and his infinitely
inspired sins of humanity which is sent away into the dark, spiritual wilderness. The
―casting out‖ of the accursed goat by the returning high-priest after returning from
the Tabernacle is a symbolic prelude to Revelations 20:3, 10, where the Messiah,
Jesus Christ as the heavenly judge and redeemer casts the old serpent Satan into
the pit or the abyss after the war of Armageddon and his return from the super-
celestial Throne Room of YHWH, the Lord of Hosts.

In the apocryphal Book of Enoch, the noun is associated with the leader of the
rebellious ―watchers‖, the ―sons of God‖ or fallen angels who had a propensity for
copulating with human women. These angels are also specifically called ―stars‖.
They are called ―Watchers‖ or the (Greek) ―Grigori‖ because they look down on
Earth from Heaven, and they travel around through the 12 ―watchtowers‖, which
are obviously the houses of the zodiac. Another reason why these angelic beings
were called ―Watchers‖ was that their job was to observe primarily humanity,
lending a helping hand when necessary but not interfering in the course of human
development. Of course, they do not keep their rules, thus disobeying the ―Lord of
Spirits‖ and instead did everything in their power to contact them, and reveal to
them the ―useless secrets of Heaven‖ as hidden, occult knowledgeand of course,
have divinely inspired-swinger parties. Thus, the angels become the original
―stewards‖ of the first arcane knowledge as well as orgies of libidinous excess. This
in turn produces ―abortions‖ known as the blood-thirsty giant demonic race being
referred as being referred as the ―Nephilim‖ or the fallen, castaways.

Azazel along with several other fallen angels ―oppressed the righteous‖ through his
instruction of making instruments of war, antimony, cosmetics, and jewelry. His
actions signaled the corruption the earth and godlessness. In Gnosticism, the
myths concerning the fornication of angels were used in a cluster of similar themes
concerning the seduction of the archons, the demonic abortions and the lustful
demiurge’s rape of Eve. The fallen angels were often held as synonymous with the
archons. Azazel along with his counterpart Shemhazai (the inciter or seducer
angel) and host were cast into a hellish-like prison beneath the mountains of the
earth, enchained and punished because ―they do as if they were the Lord.‖ Again,
the Book of Enoch says of the fallen angels that ―their spirits, assuming many
different forms, are defiling mankind.‖ Azazel’s judgment consists of being bound
and cast into a deep pit in the desert as mentioned by 1Enoch, ―Make an opening
in the desert which is in Dudael and cast him therein.‖ This of course also falls in
line with the Azazel as a ―sin-bearer‖ only this time bearing the multitude of sins of
his angelic brethren. A fallen-angel Messiah perhaps?

Eliphas Levi in Transcendental Magic recognizes Azazel as a vessel for black

magic:

IN BLACK MAGIC, THE DEVIL is THE GREAT MAGICAL AGENT EMPLOYED

FOR EVIL PURPOSES BY A PERVERSE WILL. The old serpent of the legend is
nothing else than the BLACK MAGIC, universal agent, the eternal fire of terrestrial
life, the soul of the earth, and the living fount of hell. We have said that the astral
light is the receptacle of forms, and these when evoked by reason are produced
harmoniously, but when evoked by madness they appear disorderly and monstrous
; so originated the nightmares of St Anthony and the phantoms of the Sabbath. Do,
therefore, the evocations of goetia and demonomania possess a practical result?
Yes, certainly one which cannot be contested, one more terrible than could be
recounted by legends! When any one invokes the devil with intentional
ceremonies, the devil comes, and is seen. To escape dying from horror at the
sight, to escape catalepsy or idiocy, one must be already mad. (126-127)

Eliphas Levi also recognizes Baphomet as some sort of ―Universal Agent‖ that:

having equilibrium for its supreme law, while its direction is concerned immediately
with the Great Arcanum of Transcendental Magic. … This agent… is precisely that
which the adepts of the Middle Ages denominated the First Matter of the Great
Work. The Gnostics represented it as the fiery body of the Holy Spirit; it was the
object of adoration in the Secret Rites of the Sabbath and the Temple, under the
hieroglyphic figure of Baphomet or the Androgyne of Mendes. (12)

Yet, even more puzzling is his declaration that Baphomet is equated to Christ or
the Logos:
The symbolic head of the goat of Mendes is occasionally given to this figure, and it
is then the Baphomet of the Templars and the Word of the Gnostics. (156)

This is a very not only out-dated, but insanely disjointed view of what the Gnostics
actually ―worshipped‖ in light of the discovery of the Nag Hammadi Library and
even the words of the Gnostics’ enemies contained within the Church Fathers’
rants against their doctrines as iconoclast, Satanic heresies. Their theologies,
however, were distinctly different with Orthodox Christianity due to their Platonic
and esoteric influences from their Hermetic lodges of Alexandria, Egypt. The lack
thereof of any goat-head deities in any Gnostic system shows quite a bit of
creativity on Eliphas Levi’s part since the classical Gnostic groups did not revere
grotesque, chimera-like goats that would serve as a symbol for Wisdom or the
Logos. It would be completely absurd to employ such monstrous, bestial forms to
represent such higher divinities. As mentioned earlier, the ―baptism of absorption of
wisdom‖ is a common etymology for Baphomet created by Hammer-Purgstall, in
which modern occultists to this day tend to use.

Eliphas Levi created Baphomet in the 19th century for the sake of his occult vogue,
and it is not the actual historical meaning of the word. His era was a time when
sensationalism and misinformation about history and etymology was rampant.
When talking about historical movements we have to be careful that modern
versions of terms like this isn’t foisted backwards in time, an anachronism. Without
this modern reworking of the term, it loses all connection to historical Gnosticism.

Further onwards, Levi viewed Baphomet as the embodiment of an ―astral light‖ that
Levi defines as:

AZOTH, universal magnesia, the great magical agent, the astral light, the light of
life, fertilized by animic force, by intellectual energy, which they compare to sulphur
on account of its affinities with divine fire. (337)

In this sense, Baphomet serves as a symbol or primal force to express the

magician’s will or intent in a magical ritual—a force virtually identical with Azoth,
the ―astral light‖, the ―universal solvent‖ or the ―mercurial element‖ of alchemists—
as the end result of the synthesis of opposites. Baphomet in light of substance of
Azoth is largely representative of the ―subtle‖ or ―astral body of light‖ of the
magician who at will projects this semi-spiritual body into a separate plane or order
of existence which interpenetrates the world of earthly perceptions. It is this semi-
spiritual substance that also makes up the ever so famous ―astral realm‖—a world
only a step above the physical as an intermediate level.

The occult term, ―astral light‖ is in Gnostic terms, the ―psychic‖ or ―soul‖ of the
tripartite system of the pneuma (spirit), psychic (soul or in-between matter and
spirit) and hylic (matter) substances that make up the substratum of the cosmos
and the self. These substances originated from the passions of Sophia-Achamoth
who originally belonged to a vast hierarchy of immortals or ―aeons‖ in Gnostic
cosmogonies and cosmologies that detail the spiritual universe before the rise and
descent of the material. It is ―prima material‖ or primal elements of matter, the stuff
that makes up the affects of the stars‖ or to be more accurate the influences of the
planets (e.g. astral determinism, the govern-ship of the seven celestial archons as
a division of the Old Testament deity into the seven days of the week much like
various pagan gods of the old world) which were considered to be synonymous
with the fallen angels (the Enochian ―Watchers‖) and demons. They are
subsequently listed in theApocryphon of John as follows:

The names of the glory of those who rule over the seven heavens are these:

The first is Athoth, with the face of a lion;

The second Eloaios, with the face of an ass;
The third Astaphaios, with the face of a hyena;
The fourth Yao, with the face of a seven-headed snake,
The fifth Sabaoth, with the face of a dragon;
The sixth Adonin, with the face of an ape;
The seventh Sabbataios, with a face of shining flames of fire.

This is the Seven of the week; these are the ones who govern the world.

These wicked archons were also equated with the rulers of the seven visible
planets that make up the ―hebdomad,‖ a multi-layered network of prison walls with
the Earth as the core ―dungeon‖. Under this fatalistic zodiacal system, the particles
of the pneumatic seeds (spirits of light) ascend into the paradise of light after
death. Before birth, the light-soul descends from the ladder of the cosmic spheres
and in the process ―coarsened‖ by each of the planet’s influences—impressing
their negative properties on the soul thus diluting it into the dirty layers of shadowy
matter. Accordingly, the spirit of man is heavenly, but his flesh, his hylic and
psychic bodies, are both a creation of seven cosmic rulers. Their acolytes, equal in
number to the days of the year, complete the anatomy and instill the passions of
the flesh as indicated in the Book of Zoroaster as quoted by the Apocryphon of
John:

This is the number of angels: together they are 365. They all worked on it until,
limb for limb, the natural and material body was completed by them. Now there are
other ones in charge over the remaining passions, whom I did not mention to you.
But if you wish to know them, it is written in the book of Zoroaster.
To the Gnostics, the passage and ascent through the celestial spheres, present the
greatest danger since every intermediate realm or ―heaven‖ there is a ruling archon
which threatens traveling souls to seize them and ―throw‖ them back into the cycle
of ―metempsychosis‖ (the Platonic form of reincarnation) and eventually
the unconscious ―forgetfulness‖ of the world.

The astral gods of the zodiac who were the ―dwellers of the threshold‖ challenged
the adepts’ attempts to return to their paradisiacal origins. They take a leading part
in Gnosis where in their cruel, sadistic and inimical ways draws the soul to sin only
later to chastise it. The celestial lords of fate were driven away by the means of
magic formulas, passwords and various holy names to help the departed particles
of light on their spiritual sojourn to the original unity of light. One reason why
Gnosticism was criticized by their Neoplatonic contemporaries back in the day was
because their doctrines were too life denying and too transcendental. The
Hermeticists and Neoplatonists thought that the archonic influences needed to be
transformed (e.g. transmuting the black sun of Saturn into the Solar Logos); the
ancient Gnostics on the other hand thought they had to be wholly considered to be
corrupt and need to be transcended. So in this context, could Baphomet be an
animal-headed archon?

Ultimately like Baphomet, this ―astral light‖ can be assigned a whole host of
meanings. Baphomet is by in large the occult’s adaptation of the mythological
Chimera since it was made up of a variety of creatures formed into one
monstrosity. Baphomet was by in large a collective reflection of the occultist’s
various designation of meanings. Baphomet can be seen as an astral entity or
guide in the ―psychic‖. Amazingly, however, later on in Transcendental Magic, Levi
completely makes a 180 and changes his tune to suggest that the worship of
Baphomet as a false idol was indeed just that!

…let us state boldly and precisely that all the inferior initiates of the occult sciences
and profaners of the great arcanum, not only did in the past, but do now, and will
ever, adore what is signified by this alarming symbol. (288)

Despite the smoking gun, Aleister Crowley (who so happened to consider himself a
reincarnation of Eliphas Levi) had taken on the magical name of Baphomet as his
initiatory title in the order (Supreme and Holy King) that would eventually become a
driving force to spread the message of his religious mystical system known
asThelema (which is Greek for ―Will‖), the Order of Oriental Templars or more
commonly known as the Ordo Templi Orientis which is a quasi-Masonic order.
Crowley had ascended the ranks of the ―solar-phallic‖ cult, the O.T.O. and
eventually received control over the organization which claimed to hold the secrets
of the Rosicrucian’s, Freemasonry, the Knights Templar and the Medieval
Alchemists.

When Crowley would eventually become the head of the O.T.O., he would
eventually add an 11th degree which is by in large dedicated tobutt-sex and sperm
guzzling, where the group’s members would have sex with Crowley, the self
described ―Mega Therion‖ which is Greek for the ―Great Beast 666‖. High level
members of the O.T.O. are referred to as ―Most Illuminated and Most Puissant
Baphomet.‖ In The Confessions of Aleister Crowley, Crowley indeed confesses to
his affinity with the goat-demon:

I had taken the name Baphomet as my motto in the O.T.O. For six years and more
I had tried to discover the proper way to spell this name. I knew that it must have
eight letters, and also that the numerical and literal correspondences must be such
as to express the meaning of the name in such a ways as to confirm what
scholarship had found out about it, and also to clear up those problems which
archaeologists had so far failed to solve…. One theory of the name is that it
represents the words ???? ??????, the baptism of wisdom; another, that it is a
corruption of a title meaning ―Father Mithras‖. Needless to say, the suffix R
supported the latter theory. I added up the word as spelt by the Wizard. It totalled
729. This number had never appeared in my Cabbalistic working and therefore
meant nothing to me. It however justified itself as being the cube of nine. The word
?????, the mystic title given by Christ to Peter as the cornerstone of the Church,
has this same value. So far, the Wizard had shown great qualities! He had cleared
up the etymological problem and shown why the Templars should have given the
name Baphomet to their so-called idol. Baphomet was Father Mithras, the cubical
stone which was the corner of the Temple.

Baphomet is also invoked in Aleister Crowley’s Gnostic Mass, the central ritual for
the same cult through the words, ―I believe in the serpent and the lion. Mystery of
Mystery, in his name BAPHOMET.‖ In Thelemic lore, the ―Lion and the Serpent‖
was largely symbolic of thesperm as mentioned in Crowley’s Book of Lies:

The predominant influence is that of the lion-serpent, Teth, a glyph of the

spermatozoon, which is shown in the sigil in the shape of four vesicas depending
from a serpentine form attached to a beast‘s head…

In Liber Aleph, Crowley writes that pre-eminent in all sex magick ―is the Formula of
the Serpent with the Head of the Lion,‖ the semen, ―and all this Magick is wrought
by the Radiance and Creative Force thereof.‖ To Crowley the magick is man’s junk.
The woman is a necessary, respected and consecrated essential of the formula for
sex magic and creation, but only in a reflective sense as a vessel for the
manifestation of the God. The word ―mete‖ from Bapho(MET) has also been
connected by linguists to the name of the Zoroastrian solar deity, Mithras. In
Crowley’s Book of Thoth, he writes about another possibility behind the etymology
of Baphomet:

Von Hammer-Purgstall was certaintly right in supposing Baphomet to be a form of

a Bull-god, or rather, the Bull-slaying god, Mithras; for Baphomet should be spelt
with an ―r‖ at the end; thus it is clearly a corruption meaning ―Father Mithras‖. There
is also here a connection with the ass, for it was an ass-headed god that he
became an object of veneration of the Templars. (67)

The ―lust‖ card of Crowley’s Thoth deck depicts the conjoining of Babalon and the
Beast (an obvious derivative from the Whore of Babylon who rides the many
dragon-headed Beast of the New Testament’s Book of Revelation or The
Apocalypse of St. John), which produces the elixir (sperm) from the phallus into the
cup or chalice (vagina). The occult Baphomet is the ―magical child‖, the
hermaphroditic union and result of male and female forces in combination in the
senses of the occult ritual of sex magic and sacrament (the consumption of the
―elixer‖ or the mingled sexual fluids after intercourse). Baphomet is also associated
with the fabled golem-like homunculus, ―little person‖, in other words a fetus (!) is
produced in the flask of an alchemist. The occult importance often given to the
sexual act by magicians is that orgasm mystically reunites and brings the
participants mystically closer to the absolute in a holy mystery rather seen as a
―sinful‖ act of in some dark corner of depravity. The true joy of sex has little to do
with physical pleasure and more with the temporary spiritual integration of separate
individuals in the original condition of the complete human–the original androgyne.
The German Occultist Theodor Ruess, creator of the Ordo Templi Orientis had
also embraced his own versions of tantric sex magic, practices which echo the the
political accusations of sexual imppropriety of the Gnostics and Templars made by
their orthodox enemies within the Roman Catholic Church. Yet, ironically such
accusations would eventually resurface as the central teachings within the higher
echelons of the O.T.O.

You can see this sexual ―magical thinking‖ again in Crowley’s The Cephaloedium
Working:

Ayin is moreover the Devil of Lust, the Goat of Mendes, Pan, Baphomet; and spelt
fully Ayin is the Erection and Leaping and Extension of the Phallus; Yod is the
Spermatoon, the Solitary Boy Hermes, the Virgin; while Nun is the Eagle of sexual
Ecstasy, the Serpent of Life through Death, the Scorpion of Scarab of Kephra, the
Womb which transmutes through corruption, the Semen or fluid vehicle of the
Spirit, the Elixer of Magick, the Blood, Wine, and Poison in the Chalice.
According to the mystical doctrine of Thelema, Nuit, the ―Lady of the Starry
Heaven‖ who is the speaker of the first chapter of Liber AL vel Legis, interacts and
copulates with her and copulates in superconscious intercourse with her masculine
counterpart being Hadit, thus creating the manifest physical universe in a Gnostic-
like syzygy. This concept distinctly echoes the theme of copulating hermaphroditic
god-forms in classical Gnosticism, which were called ―aeons‖ which emanated from
the Supreme Father which come to act independently from the Monad’s will. Nuit is
also arguably comparable to Sophia or Barbelo of ancient Gnosticism. Barbelo
according to Sethian myth is the first reflex of the first divinity, called the Invisible
Spirit. Between the Invisible Spirit and Barbelo, they give rise to a multitude of
aeons. The concept of the androgyne is one that repeats in many alchemical and
occult traditions. In Gnosticism, however, the androgyne was linked to the
deficiency, imperfection and ―lack of form‖ or spirit, in especially in the descriptions
of the monsterous Demiurge in the Nag Hammadi texts.

In light of this ―Thelemic‖ view on sexuality, Crowley’s more candid thoughts

become more revealing as quoted by Israel Regardie in The Eye in the Triangle:

My instinct told me that Blake was right in saying ‗The lust of the goat is the glory
of god.‘ But I lacked the courage to admit it. The result of my training had been to
obsess me with the hideously foul idea that inflicts such misery on Western minds
and curses life with civil war. Europeans cannot face the facts frankly; they cannot
escape from their animal appetite, yet suffer the tortures of fear and shame even
while gratifying it. As Freud has now shown, this devastating complex is not merely
responsible for most of the social and domestic misery of Europe and America, but
exposes the individual to neurosis. It is hardly too much to say that our lives are
blasted by conscience. We resort to suppression and the germs created
an abscess. (63)

In Magick (Book 4) Crowley asserts that Baphomet was a (deficient) divine

androgyne:

The Devil does not exist. It is a false name invented by the Black Brothers to imply
a Unity in their ignorant muddle of dispersions. A devil who had unity would be a
God… ‗The Devil‘ is, historically, the God of any people that one personally
dislikes… This serpent, SATAN, is not the enemy of Man, but He who made Gods
of our race, knowing Good and Evil; He bade ‗Know Thyself!‘ and taught Initiation.
He is ‗The Devil‘ of the Book of Thoth, and His emblem is BAPHOMET, the
Androgyne who is the hieroglyph of arcane perfection… He is therefore Life, and
Love. But moreover this letter is ayin, the Eye, so that he is Light; and his Zodiacal
image of Capricornus, the leaping goat whose attribute is Liberty. (277)
In essence, Crowley was tapping into a sort of diabolical ―Dionysian‖ or ―Night of
Pan‖ savage, lustful, sexual and destructive energy to fuel his feats of ritual magic
and the supposed destruction of his ego (that didn’t really pan out well, now did
it?). This becomes rather evident in what he and his ―chela‖ Victor Neurberg was
attempting to invoke in the strangely horrific yet hilarious episode, deep in a North
African desert. Discovering one’s ―true will‖ is in Thelema, the ―true salvation‖, let
traditional ―slave‖ morality be damned:

―There are no ―standards of Right‖. Ethics is balderdash. Each Star must go on its
own orbit. To hell with ―moral principle‖; there is no such thing‖ - Crowley, Aleister.
The Old and New Commentaries to Liber AL, II,28.

According to Crowley’s own commentary on his Liber AL vel Legis or more

commonly known as The Book of the Law, the cornerstone of his religious system,
the image of the ―Lion and the Serpent‖ are also used to represent the ―dwarf soul‖
or ―secret self‖ represented by the god of silence, Harpocrates while mirroring the
line used in Liber AL:

Every man and every woman is a star.

―Hadit‖ is also called being the core of each star which is described as ―the Ego or
Atman in everything.‖ This is called Khabs and it is the house of being (Hadit), the
innermost (solar) light of the sovereign nature of each individual. Hadit, being the
true self achieves a kind of ―gnosis‖ by realizing its ―True Will‖ through the Great
Work. This higher ego is the ―seed of life‖ as a concentration of the ―phallic
consciousness,‖ in the expansion of one’s will. The ―Lion and the Serpent‖
overcomes death with renewal by creating continuity through generation. However,
invoking such an image to represent the ―pneumatic‖ self to a classical
Gnostic would have been a ghastly anathema to their religious and philosophical
doctrines. This was due to the fact that the ―Lion and the Serpent‖ was
representative of the blind, malicious and authoritative Demiurge-like demon
Ialdabaoth, which is essence a mutated caricature representative of the Gnostic
contempt for the Jewish deity, Jehovah.

The Chimera Androgyne: The Esoteric Mystique of Baphomet and Abraxas

(Part 2)

Part II. Abraxas

The ancient image of the Mithraic lion-headed serpent is first found at the start of
the Christian-era who is sometimes depicted as crowned or surrounded by a halo
or streaming rays indicating its inherent solar and magical nature. This image is
called a Khnoubis or Chnoubis, carved on old gems and amulets. Hebraic names
such as ―IAO‖, ―Adonai‖, ―Sabaoth‖ and the Gnostic corruption of ―Ialdaboath‖ are
also found on these gems for superstitious purposes. Chnoubis was also
synonymous with Abraxas, Ophis and Knuphis. Such names are ascribed to the
public, builder-god, the ―Demiurge‖ which is the Greek, Platonic term for ―architect‖,
the ―lord‖ and author of the structure of the material world.

In ancient magical texts such as the Greek Magical Papyri often invoke images of
Chnoubis which were used for the purpose of warding off malevolent demonic
influence as well as stomach aches by knowing and memorizing many different
names of spirits in life and after death in efforts to banish them and overcome the
cosmic rulers that guard each succeeding realm of the ―astral realm‖. The Greek
Magical Papyri also provides the means to summoning of demons for various anti-
social purposes of the magician (such as making thievery invisible, sending
dreams, winning favors in both men and women, inflaming lust in the person of
desire, killing, etc.) Abraxas was also known as the king of demons, a title similar
to gods of other cultures such as Shiva of Hinduism. In the Dictionnaire
Infernal (Demonographia), Abraxas was spelled ―Abracas‖ as one of the many
demons for the purpose of invocation similar to the usage ascribed in the Greek
Magical Papyri.

In many Gnostic texts, the Demiurge was also associated with the element of fire,
besides bearing many Chimeric qualities as theApocryphon of John indicates:
And when she saw (the consequences of) her desire, it changed into a form of a
lion-faced serpent. And its eyes were like lightning fires which flash. She cast it
away from her, outside that place, that no one of the immortal ones might see it, for
she had created it in ignorance.

In the Pistis Sophia, the Demiurge isn’t at all by any means a handsome fellow as
he’s depicted as a fiery yet dark lion-faced demon, residing within the Dante‘s
Inferno-like chaotic underworld of Hades where he and his forty-nine demons
tortures the wicked souls who end up in such a horrible place in boiling rivers of
pitch-black darkness. In the Gospel of Judas, ―Nebro‖ (meaning rebel angel)
Yaldaboath’s henchman and himself also dwell in Hades or hell as one of the
twelve angels to come ―into being [to] rule over chaos and the [underworld]‖. He
comes from heaven, his ―face flashed with fire and whose appearance was defiled
with blood‖.

The mythological Chimera found in the Homer’s Illiad was also described with
similar features:

…a thing of immortal make, not human, lion-fronted and snake behind, a goat in
the middle, and snorting out the breath of the terrible flame of bright fire.

The Gnostics had taken biblical theology into new, previously unknown territory
by merging it with Platonic thought. Yet after this infusion, neither biblical theology
or Platonic thought looked the same after. Plato had his benevolent Demiurge, a
creator god fromTimaeus. This Demiurge worked hard to create the best possible
world as a reflection of the the Ideal realm. For Plato, matter is neither inherently
good nor evil. It remains neutral. Matter inTimaeus is originally featureless and
passive like the darkened, still waters of an isolated pond. It’s primeval
and existent even before the four basic elements. Receptive matter is considered
to be the ―mother‖ while the ―father‖ Demiurge becomes the active agent to mold it
after the image of eternity as an imitation. The world he created was the best that
could be given the fact that it was a reflection of the higher world in the realm of
matter. The soul can work to be freed from matter by pious living, and upon death,
ascend back to the Good.

The Sethian Gnostics on the other hand conceived the world as

wholly disastrous and shitty by a retarded and spiritually blind creator, called
Ialdaboath. The Gnostics’ obessesion with theodicy or the problem of evil and its
source became reflected on their myths. Like many Jewish thinkers of their time,
the Gnostics posited a hierarchical duality between the Supreme God and the
demuirgical angel. Yet their identification of the Demiurge with Satan become a
much more radical and even ―misotheistic‖ (hatred of the gods or the belief that
god or the gods aren’t good but are in fact malevolent, bent on making the lives of
their creation as miserable as possible) interpretation of the creator
god. This malevolent demon-king was the warring, belligerent opponent to the
Pleroma, the higher collective realm of the spiritual ―aeons‖. Because he was the
one who created the world, it is a world of suffering and imprisonment. The
Sethians had linked the story of Satan’s fall from Paradise with the Demiurge.

Ialdabaoth in Gnostic literature was the aborted and accidental birth of

Sophia, creator of the sensible cosmos and was eventually relegated as the
blasted lion-faced fuck writhing within the bowels of Tartarus. The only hope for
freedom of the soul is for a redeemer to come and instruct it how to get out of the
cycle of imprisonment that contains it through Ialdabaoth’s rule and destroy
Ialdabaoth’s army of angels and demons by the means of spying, even shape-
shifting into their bestial forms and destroying their yoke over the slave race of
mankind. The Savior was essentially a betraying double-agent to the archons. No
amount of righteous living is going to free the soul from the clutches of the
Demiurge. Only a savior angel or ―Illuminator‖ more powerful than the malicious
Ialdabaoth could liberate the soul from the iron shackles of the cosmos.

This is completely different to Plato’s myth. The archons are of course, the fallen or
jealous angels who are battling the forces of the Stranger God and its emanated
revealer who seek to reveal the fruit of gnosis to mankind which is held in captivity
by the ―god of the aion‖. The daimons or demons are another inferior and
subordinate class (to the gods) of malicious creatures created from a different
substance than the angels. According to Irenaeus, the Gnostics taught that angels
and demons (including the Devil) were crystallized from the tears of the fallen
Sophia:

They further teach that the spirits of wickedness derived their origin from grief.
Hence the devil, whom they also call Cosmocrator (the ruler of the world), and the
demons, and the angels, and every wicked spiritual being that exists, found the
source of their existence. They represent the Demiurge as being the son of that
mother of theirs (Achamoth), and Cosmocrator as the creature of the Demiurge.
Cosmocrator has knowledge of what is above himself, because he is a spirit of
wickedness; but the Demiurge is ignorant of such things, inasmuch as he is merely
animal. Their mother dwells in that place which is above the heavens, that is, in the
intermediate abode; the Demiurge in the heavenly place, that is, in the hebdomad;
but the Cosmocrator in this our world. The corporeal elements of the world, again,
sprang, as we before remarked, from bewilderment and perplexity, as from a more
ignoble source. Thus the earth arose from her state of stupor; water from the
agitation caused by her fear; air from the consolidation of her grief; while fire,
producing death and corruption, was inherent in all these elements, even as they
teach that ignorance also lay concealed in these three passions.

Similarly, in the the little known text called The Paraphrase of Shem, reveals a
mythology featuring a ―cosmic‖ Womb which gives births to the cosmos, including
both angels and demons. The text is very erotic, with sexual images everywhere,
used to explain how this cosmos came into being:

And in order that the demons also might become free from the power which they
possessed through the impure intercourse, a womb was with the winds resembling
water. And an unclean penis was with the demons in accordance with the example
of the Darkness, and in the way he rubbed with the womb from the beginning. And
after the forms of Nature had been together, they separated from each other. They
cast off the power, being astonished about the deceit which had happened to them.
They grieved with an eternal grief. They covered themselves with their power.

A good example of this is the Paraphrase of Shem, which is one of the few extant
gnostic treatises which contains a three-principled system of origins as opposed to
one. The author likens the cosmic catastrophe to sex. Perhaps the author didn’t
like sex very much. Some Gnostic groups held to three originating cosmic
principles, rather than one or two. Shem is a text from one such group. The author
of Shem hypothesizes three different principles: light, darkness, and spirit.

There was Light and Darkness and there was Spirit between them. Since your root
fell into forgetfulness – he who was the unbegotten Spirit – I reveal to you the truth
about the powers. The Light was thought full of hearing and word. They were
united into one form. And the Darkness was wind in waters. He possessed the
mind wrapped in a chaotic fire. And the Spirit between them was a gentle, humble
light. These are the three roots. They reigned each in themselves, alone. And they
covered each other, each one with its power.

Most other groups such as the Manicheans and Marcionites held a two-principled
system: light and darkness, good and evil. The rooster-headed Anguepede
(chimera) under his name Abraxas was also considered to be a combination of the
seven planetary powers that consists of the archons discussed earlier. Abraxas
and Chnoubis were also considered to be roughly equivalent to the Agathodaimon,
the ―good spirit‖ of fortune and health by the ancient Egyptians and Greeks. They
were often represented as serpents.

Abraxas, according to Gnostic myth, was a redeemed archon who rose above the
Hebdomad to rule over it as an intercessionary figure between the Pleroma and the
world of matter. Abraxas became a figure of veneration for many Gnostics such as
those who followed Basilides. This astral god was feared by the ancient people
because he controlled the universe. He ruled it and our fates. He usually has a
leonine head or a cock-head, solar rays, and also serpentine form as both forms
are interchangeable for Abraxas. Abraxas was however, often depicted as a
bizarre mixture of man and beast, with the rooster’s head representing the dawn of
understanding (roosters of course being the animal that traditionally greets the
dawn) and a sense of vigilant wakefulness; the body of a man represents the
embodied logos, the human capacity for understanding and growth; the snakes
represent prudence and energy; while the whip and shield symbolize the
dynamism of the life force and wisdom (the great protector) respectively.

This fierce and terrifying astral lord goes by many other names as well. Some
Gnostics equated Abraxas with Ialdabaoth, Saklas, Samael, Nebruel, Michael,
Elieli, and Judas. He was also equated with IAO, Chnoubis, Abrasax, etc. Abraxas
appears in only a few instances throughout the Nag Hammadi codices in such
Sethian texts such asThe Great Book of the Invisible Spirit, The Apocalypse of
Adam, and Zostrianos as basically a minor Aeon or angel that works in tandem
with Sophia and the ―four spiritual lights‖ to rectify the error brought on the rise of
the ―deficiency‖ in the fetters of the material. Abraxas was also interchangeable
with the deity-archon Sabaoth (meaning host), which according to the Gnostic
mythology presented in On the Origin of the World was the son and offspring of
Yaldaboath who would eventually rebel against his father in a great war, repent of
his ―sins‖, and side with his grandmother, Sophia-Achamoth. The archon would be
elevated ―above the seventh heaven‖ or the ―Ogdoad‖ and enthroned, surrounded
by ministering angels and Cherubim within a mansion that is ―huge, magnificent,
seven times as great as all those that exist in the seven heavens.‖

According to Ireneaus in his work detailing his indictment against varies heretical
schools of thought, Against Heresies, he lays out Basilides’ (possibly the inventor
of Abraxas) system of thought pertaining to Abraxas’ domain:

They hold that their chief is Abraxas; and, on this account, that word contains in
itself the numbers amounting to three hundred and sixty-five.‖ Abraxas or Abrasax
becomes a de facto ruler of the ―364 kingdoms of spirits (plus himself)‖ due to the
fact that his name has a high numerical value that equals to 365, the number of
days in the year.

G.R.S. Mead in Thrice-Great Hermes discusses the possible connection of

Abrasax or Abraxas to the celestial spheres of the cosmic rulers of fate:

The name Abraxas, which consisted of seven elements or letters, was a mystery-
designation of the God who combined in himself the whole power of the Seven
Planets, and also of the Year of 365 days, the sum of the number-values of the
letters of Abraxas working out to 365. This mysterious Being was the ―Year‖; but
the Year as the Eternity, also conceived of in a spatial aspect, as the Spirit or
Name that extends from Heaven to Earth, the God who pervades and full-fills the
Seven Spheres, and the Three Hundred and Sixty-five Zones, the Inner God, ―He
who has His seat within the Seven Poles—ΑΕΗΙΟΥΩ,‖ as the Papyri have it, and
also without them, as we shall see. (402)

Tertullian in Against All Heresies also discusses Abraxas in the account of

Basilides’ system as his chief deity:

Basilides affirms that there is a supreme Deity, by name Abraxas, by whom was
created Mind, which in Greek he calls Nous; that thence sprang the Word; that of
Him issued Providence, Virtue, and Wisdom; that out of these subsequently were
made Principalities, powers, and Angels; that there ensued infinite issues and
processions of angels; that by these angels 365 heavens were formed, and the
world, in honour of Abraxas, whose name, if computed, has in itself this number.
Now, among the last of the angels, those who made this world, he places the God
of the Jews latest, that is, the God of the Law and of the Prophets, whom he denies
to be a God, but affirms to be an angel. To him, he says, was allotted the seed of
Abraham, and accordingly he it was who transferred the sons of Israel from the
land of Egypt into the land of Canaan; affirming him to be turbulent above the other
angels, and accordingly given to the frequent arousing of seditions and wars, yes,
and the shedding of human blood. Christ, moreover, he affirms to have been sent,
not by this maker of the world, but by the above-named Abraxas; and to have
come in a phantasm, and been destitute of the substance of flesh: that it was not
He who suffered among the Jews, but that Simon was crucified in His stead:
whence, again, there must be no believing on him who was crucified, lest one
confess to having believed on Simon. Martyrdoms, he says, are not to be endured.
The resurrection of the flesh he strenuously impugns, affirming that salvation has
not been promised to bodies.

It’s almost as if Basilides becomes a worshiper of a Demiurgical figure — that

being Abraxas. There is much speculation about the etymology concerning
Abraxas which vary from meaning ―holy word‖ or ―blessed name‖, although it still
remains cloudy at best. It is also suggested that Abraxas is derivative of the
Arimaic magical word ―Abracadabra‖ meaning ―I create as I speak‖. Like
Baphomet, Abraxas seems to be a concoction of different mythological symbols
such as the two Indian cobras for his legs as represented in the above depiction.

Irenaeus, in describing the followers of Basilides, claimed in Against Heresies:

These men, moreover, practice magic; and use images, incantations, invocations,
and every other kind of curious art. Coining also certain names as if they were
those of the angels, they proclaim some of these as belonging to the first, and
others to the second heaven; and then they strive to set forth the names,
principles, angels, and powers of the three hundred and sixty-five imagined
heavens. They also affirm that the barbarous name in which the Saviour ascended
and descended, is Caulacau.

Plotinus, the father of Neo-Platonism also maintained similar descriptions of the

Gnostics as ―magicians‖ and ―sorcerers‖ by using the barbarous names of the
Ineffable in his polemic in the Ennead 2.9,Against the Gnostics: Against Those
That Affirm the Creator of the Cosmos and the Cosmos Itself to Be Evil:

In the sacred formulas they inscribe, purporting to address the Supernal Beings —
not merely the Soul but even the Transcendents — they are simply uttering spells
and appeasements and evocations in the idea that these Powers will obey a call
and be led about by a word from any of us who is in some degree trained to use
the appropriate forms in the appropriate way — certain melodies, certain sounds,
specially directed breathings, sibilant cries, and all else to which is ascribed magic
potency upon the Supreme. Perhaps they would repudiate any such intention: still
they must explain how these things act upon the unembodied: they do not see that
the power they attribute to their own words is so much taken away from the
majesty of the divine.

Plotinus resented the Gnostics’ demonization of Plato’s Demiurge, the creator of

the material cosmos. Plotinus believed the Gnostics had corrupted the original
teachings of Plato to suit their world-views. In fact, Plotinus goes as far as to mock
the Gnostic creation story of the fall of Sophia and the aborted Demiurge as
surpassing ―sheer folly.‖ Plotinus also took issue with the Gnostic’s neglect on their
pursuit of virtue, maintaining themselves as beyond reproach of the laws of the
world which were extrapolated and fueled by hypothetical rumors of their supposed
hedonistic and libertine tendencies.

For they manufacture these doctrines as though they were not in contact with the
ancient thought of the Greeks; for the Greeks knew, and spoke clearly without
pomposity, of ascents from the cave, coming closer and closer by gradual stages
to a truer vision.

This was a problem for Plotinus, who thought these Platonizing Sethians or
Gnostics were mucking-up his philosophical circles with their static dualism, world-
hatred, and defamation of the creator. Plotinus pretty much caricatures the
Sethians as rubes for practicing magic. Needless to say, Neoplatonists didn’t like
Gnostics very much. The Sethian Gnostics themselves weren’t a unified
movement, but rather a diverse set of small cult communities — like the Borborites,
Archontics, Ophites, etc. According to the Apocryphon of John, it says that
everyone will have the opportunity to be saved, so that could mean that one
essentially becomes part of the seed of Seth by undergoing Sethian conversion
rituals.

Yet, perhaps still in these instances neither Plotinus nor Irenaeus were lying about
the Gnostics’ ritual magic tendencies since even their choice texts indicates this as
a reality. This all becomes rather apparent when one reads Ancient Christian
Magic as a catalog for superstition. It is replete with magical spells including love,
money, healing and spells for revenge. These Gnostic practitioners more than
likely invoked the name of Abraxas among other barbarous, secret names of God
for their rituals and prayers. Yet, interestingly enough, most people practicing
magic in the middle ages and the Renaissance were Catholic priests and brothers,
so magic is surprisingly close to Catholicism. The NHC text On the Origin of the
World mentions a compendium of demons attributed to King Solomon, so it’s
possible that some Gnostics practiced early Solomonic magic:

Then Death, being androgynous, mingled with his (own) nature and begot seven
androgynous offspring. These are the names of the male ones: Jealousy, Wrath,
Tears, Sighing, Suffering, Lamentation, Bitter Weeping. And these are the names
of the female ones: Wrath, Pain, Lust, Sighing, Curse, Bitterness,
Quarrelsomeness. They had intercourse with one another, and each one begot
seven, so that they amount to forty-nine androgynous demons. Their names and
their effects you will find in the Book of Solomon.

―Their effects‖ probably meant the abilities they could be compelled to use if
summoned, something like the Goetia. Another example of spells and incantations
that were employed by the Gnostics is provided and supported by Karen King
in What is Gnosticism? who has argued that the demonic correspondences to
human body parts (highlighting the inherent corruption of the human body) listed so
thoroughly is the long recension of the Apocryphon of John which was intended for
use in rituals to heal the sick or injured.

Some other of the Church Father’s (especially Epiphanius’ account in

the Panarion, literally meaning ―medicine chest‖ for poisonous heresies)
accusations of the Gnostics was much more scandalous — much of it dealt with
their alleged antinominan, lurid and pornographic-like accounts of secret Bacchic
and Dionysian-like ―swinging orgies‖ of their ―agape feasts‖. These orgiastic
rites supposedly included the sacramental consumption of sexual fluids and even
more unsavory practices that include the Eucharistic infanticide of an aborted
embryo — not so dissimilar to the ones practiced in the higher degrees contained
in the Ordo Templi Orientis (except for the cannibalism part).
Epiphanius accusingly writes:

Their very liturgy they defile with the shame of promiscuity, consuming and con-
taminating themselves with human and unclean flesh…. … [At their feasts:] They
set out an abundance of meat and wine, even if they are poor. Having made their
banquet from this and so to speak filled their veins to satiety, they proceed to
arouse themselves. The man, moving away from the woman, says to his woman,
―Arise, hold the love feast with your brother.‖ And the pitiful pair, having made
love… then proceed to hold up their blas-phemy to heaven, the woman and the
man taking the secretion from the male into their own hands and standing looking
up to heaven. They hold in their hands the impurity and pray, … And then they
consume it, partaking of their shamefulness, and they say, ―This is the body of
Christ and this is the Pasch for which our bodies suffer and are forced to confess
the passion of Christ.‖ They do the same with what is of the woman, when she has
the flow of blood: collecting the monthly blood of impurity from her, they take it and
consume it together in the same way. Although they have sex with each other, they
forbid the begetting of children. They are eager for the act of corruption not in order
to engender children, but for the pleasure … But if … the woman becomes
pregnant, then listen to something even more dreadful which they dare to do.
Extracting the fetus at whatever time they choose to do the operation, they take the
aborted infant and pound it up in a mortar with a pestle, and, mixing in honey and
pepper and some other spices and sweet oils so as not to become nauseous, all
the members of that herd of swine and dogs gather together and each partakes
with his finger of the crushed up child … They dare to do other dreadful things as
well. When they fall into a frenzy among themselves, they soil their hands with the
shame of their secretion, and rising, with defiled hands pray stark naked. (86)

That’s a spicy meatball! Epiphanius’ lurid accusations against the Gnostics as

practitioners of baby consumption and sacrifice is somewhat unique but not unlike
those made against the Jews throughout the Middle-Ages as ―blood libel‖.
Similarly, accusations of child sacrifice were made against Aleister Crowley
because to his ―Bloody Sacrifice‖ chapter in Magick in Theory and Practice due to
the fact he plainly without symbolic gesture tells us that blood sacrifice is the most
important and effective magickal technique available to the magician, and:

[a] male child of perfect innocence and high intelligence is the most satisfactory
and suitable victim.

It is often said that Crowley’s references to ―child sacrifice‖ were

ghastly euphemisms to masturbation in a magical ritual. If this is the case then, this
is indeed a ―symbolic‖ failure on Crowley’s part. Later on Epiphanius describes and
recounts the myth of the lewd Sophia or ―Prounikos‖ (it seems like Epiphanius got it
mad-confused with Sophia and Barbelo’s roles here) where she sets out to
―reabsorb‖ and collect her living sparks of power that was stolen from her retarded
son, Ialdabaoth and his legion of archons. She appeared to the archons in a
beautiful and lustful form, seduced and quite literally, fucked the ―living daylights‖
out of them, and when they had an emission she took their sperm, which contained
the power originally belonging to her. Epiphanius repeats this in further detail:

For these angels went to war over the power from on high—they call her Prunicus,
but she is called Barbero or Barbelo by other sects—because she displayed her
beauty < and > drove them wild, and was sent for this purpose, to despoil the
archons who had made this world. She has suffered no harm, but she brought
them to the point of slaughtering each other from the lust for her that she aroused
in them. And detaining her so that she should not go back up, they all had relations
with her in each of her womanly and female bodies—for she kept migrating from
female bodies into various bodies of human beings, cattle and the rest—so that, by
the deeds they were doing in killing and being killed, they would cause their own
diminution through the shedding of blood. Then, by gathering the power again, she
would be able to ascend to heaven once more.

…
But others honor one ―Prunicus‖ and like these, when they consummate their own
passions with this kind of disgusting behavior, they say in mythological language of
this interpretation of their disgusting behavior, ―We are gathering the power of
Prunicus from our bodies, and through their emissions.‖ That is, < they suppose
they are gathering > the power of semen and menses.

…
For if they say, ―Prunicus,‖ this is just a belch of lustfulness and incontinence.
Anything called ―prunicus‖ suggests a thing named for copulation, and the
enterprise of seduction. (2) For there is a Greek expression which is used of men
who deflower slave women, ―He seduced so-and-so.‖ And the Greek swindlers
who compose erotica also record the word in myths by saying that beauty is
―seductive.‖

Despite the strong erotic and sexual symbolism used in Gnostic myth, for the most
part, the accusations were often made without merit since many texts such as
the Pistis Sophia (of the Bruce Codex) explicitly condemns the literal practices
described above in the strongest terms. The caricature the Apostolic Fathers would
draw up as slander against the Gnostics isn’t exactly an original phenomena that
started with them as certain antinomian libertine currents have always existed
alongside mainstream religion so it is probable that a few of these cults embraced
these practices through sexual ritual and initiation, yet were lumped in the Gnostic
milieu by their enemies. These rituals of sexual magic were embraced by the
Barbelite practitioners (identified by Epiphanius) while condemned by
outsiders, both Gnostic and orthodox. S

ince some libertine Gnostic groups such as the Barbelites would consider the
desirable ―light-seed‖ inherent in the sperm and menstrual blood to be ingested
in obscene rites, in a similar manner like Crowley did, then it would make perfect
sense to engage in sexual ritual because it corresponded to their mythologies.
Their ―light‖ contained in their sexual emissions would be released back to the
Supreme God in order to bypass the reproductive systems that perpetuated the
materia by adding more bodies and souls under the wrath and authority of
Jehovah, the blind and insane fallen angel and slave-master of the world.

Many religious sects have been accused of perversity by their opponents yet it is
more than likely sexual rites similar to the one described above probably happened
more or less. The biggest difference however between the ancient Gnostic’s and
the neo-gnostic, occultists of today, is their rejection of the material world as a
product of corruption and evil which cannot be saved. This point of view also
distinguished them from Christians, Jews and pagans alike. Yet, many neo-
gnostics who have undertaken the label also attempt to psychologize the
Demiurge, because a central tenet of New Age is that material existence is
inherently good, so the idea that creation is the product of a lesser, flawed being is
repugnant to them.

Carl Jung in his seminal, The Seven Sermons of the Dead refers the figure as an
―emergence‖ of form from the hidden depth of the Godhead as opposing and
ultimately complimentary powers that become one in a sort of ying/yang tandem
emobdied in Abraxas:

Abraxas is the god whom it is difficult to know. His power is the very greatest,
because man does not perceive it at all. Man sees the supreme good of the sun,
and also the endless evil of the devil, but Abraxas, he does not see, for he is
undefinable life itself, which is the mother of good and evil alike…Abraxas is the
sun and also the eternally gaping abyss of emptiness, of the diminisher and
dissembler, the devil. The power of Abraxas is twofold. You can not see it, because
in your eyes the opposition of this power seems to cancel it out. That which is
spoken by God-the-Sun is life; that which is spoken by the Devil is death. Abraxas,
however, speaks the venerable and also accursed word, which is life and death at
once. Abraxas generates truth and falsehood, good and evil, light and darkness
with the same word and in the same deed. Therefore Abraxas is truly the terrible
one. He is magnificent even as the lion at the very moment when he strikes his
prey down. His beauty is like the beauty of a spring morn.

Abraxas in this sense was seen as one of the many symbols Jung would use as
the ancient doctrine of of ―Coincidentia oppositorum‖ or the ―unity of
opposites‖. Jung’s gnostic vision of 1916 with his bipolar Abraxas, which is written
in the persona of Basilides, has virtually nothing to the actual teachings of the
historical Basilides. Jung erroneously claimed that Abraxas was the embodiment of
the Monad, where as the ancient heretics viewed Abraxas as a lower aeon or
even an archon. Abraxas, like Baphomet, becomes a ―syzygy‖ of an alchemical
pair conjoined of good and evil, darkness and light, Christ and Anti-Christ, God and
the Devil to the point where the figure transcended such dualities. Aleister Crowley
also invokes the immensely complex and contradictory deity in the Gnostic Mass,
evoking a certain ancient aura in the barbarous names of the god-forms he lists:

IO IO IO IAO SABAO KURIE ABRASAX KURIE MEITHRAS KURIE PHALLE. IO

PAN, IO PAN PAN IO ISCHUROS, IO ATHANATOS IO ABROTOS IO IAO. KAIRE
PHALLE KAIRE PAMPHAGE KAIRE PANGENETOR. HAGIOS, HAGIOS,
HAGIOS IAO.

Here, Crowley perpetuates the magical tradition of orally icanting the ―voces
magicae‖ and ―nomina barbara‖ in a simliar fashion that the ancient Gnostics would
concieve in their secret rites. Abraxas in ancient, classical Gnosticism was more or
less a positive aeonic figure (minus Basilides’ version of the astral lord) while
Abraxas in the romantic occult world was a synthesis of dualities — of good and
evil. This is symbolic of the considerable discrepancy between the western
esotericism and occultism that seek a union of opposites versus ―Gnostic‖ systems
that seek to separate light from darkness. This issue is muddied even further by
the likes of Carl Jung, who erroneously creates an association between Gnosticism
through his doctrine of ―Coniunctio Oppositorum‖.

Although to be fair, there weren’t very many available ―Gnostic‖ texts during his
time in order to properly develop his views. This union of opposites when viewed
from a classical dualist mystical lens becomes in actuality a tragedy that gives rise
to human suffering and all the world’s horrors. The Classical Gnostics by several
estimates (by judging choice texts) were ―mitigated‖ or less severe in their view of
duality with spirit being the original unity while matter being a shallow imitation of
the higher forms. In this estimation, the light is seen as the only eternal principle
while the world of matter is simply a passing shadow, a temporary set-back or foul-
up in the scheme of infinity that will eventually be rectified. A more
radical interpretation of dualism would be that light and darkness existing as co-
eternal yet independent principles with their own domain in a constant dueling of
powers found in the Manichean religion.

The light-dark opposite is for the most part rejected by western occultists due to its
association with mainstream Judeo-Christian traditions which they consider
deficient (e.g. the designation of ancient dualist religions and all previous religions
in past civilizations, since they follow the supposed ―LVX formula‖ as belonging to
thetroglodytes or cave-dwellers of ―Old Aeon‖ in Thelema, for example). But the
fact remains that the ancient Gnostics and many other groups (the Medieval
Cathars, Manicheans, etc), considered themselves to be foremost as Christians
and concerned with contrasts of sin and righteousness. To embrace the classical
Gnostic tradition means to embrace their dualistic perspectives. It’s simply
impossible separate such perspectives from Gnosticism with distain as many
occult and new age practitioners do.

Aleister Crowley in Liber XC expresses the same sentiment as Jung’s ―Coniunctio

Oppositorum‖, stating:

Many have arisen, being wise. They have said ‗Seek out the glittering Image in the
place ever golden, and unite yourselves with it.‘ Many have arisen, being foolish.
They have said, ‗Stoop down into the darkly splendid world and be wedded to that
Blind Creature of the Slime.‘ I who am beyond Wisdom and Folly, arise and say
unto you: achieve both weddings! Unite yourselves with both! Beware, beware, I
say lest you seek after the one and lose the other! My adepts stand upright; their
head above the heavens, their feet below the hells. But since one is naturally
attracted to the Angel, another to the Demon, let the first strengthen the lower link,
the last attach more firmly to the higher. Thus shall equilibrium become perfect. I
will aid my disciples; as fast as they acquire this balanced power and joy so faster
will I push them.

Baphomet carries a great deal of occult significance — from its original inception in
the romantic era and even into this day, yet the origins of the enigmatic figure stem
from deficient and sensationalist misunderstandings and demonic imagery which
hardly deserves any adoration or praise. Abraxas likewise too sinks back into this
occult sensationalist mire despite its nuanced inception. Occultism is a ―hidden
practice‖ or ―craft‖ that only those who are initiated deserve to study in all its glory,
intently. Neither occultism nor its views on the ―unity of the opposites‖ are
necessarily ―bad‖, as it is simply another way of experiencing an altered state of
consciousness. The Chimeric figures of Baphomet and Abraxas both represent
these ―altered states‖ of occult consciousness to varying degrees. Everything from
the astral body, the working of aeonic angels and archonic demons, to the ―balance
of genders‖ as symbolized through the ―Androgyne‖, these two symbols carry a
great degree of esoteric importance.

Occultism does however contain a very dark, elitist undercurrent that cannot be
ignored, fostered in the bourgeoisie halls of the privileged elite.

Master everything, but give generously to your servants, once they have
unconditionally submitted. (Crowley, Magic: Book 4, 278)

Ritual magic has long since been associated with learned elites, especially with its
origins in Europe. This is especially true during the medieval era where the occult
became synonymous with unsavory and often repulsive practices involved with
―black magic‖, which goes without saying with its verbose flowery language that
makes up many of their ego-fueled rituals. Modern, ―watered-down‖ occult magic
also seems to give people a sense of empowerment in a world in which they are
powerless. That is not to say that all forms of magic are in itself useless and
authored by the Devil as many ancient theurgists and Gnostics would profess
otherwise since what is termed ―high magic‖ is aimed at recovering a perfect
knowledge of the transcendent signature left within the deepest layer of being —
the Spiritual Seed.

Posted on July 12, 2011by Aeon Eye3 Comments