Phallus
(Revision as of 23:29, 23 Jan 2005)
The phallus most often refers to the physical male gentalia, although in some cases it can refer to the clitoris, labia majora and labia minora of a female during fetal development, or the term may refer to the organ before sexual differentiation is evident. In its symbolic sense, it is an expression of the active generative power which is inherent in both men and women. It is often represented as an erect penis, although other possible symbols are the cross, the winged globe, the Sun, and the wand.
Arguably, the most Thelemic attribution of the phallus is Will. Aleister Crowley stated it most clearly in "The Gun-Barrel" in The Book of Lies:
Mighty and erect is this Will of mine, this Pyramid
of fire whose summit is lost in Heaven. Upon it
have I burned the corpse of my desires.
Mighty and erect is this [Phallus] of my Will. The
seed thereof is That which I have borne within me
from Eternity; and it is lost within the Body of
Our Lady of the Stars.
I am not I; I am but an hollow tube to bring down
Fire from Heaven.
Mighty and marvellous is this Weakness, this
Heaven which draweth me into Her Womb, this
Dome which hideth, which absorbeth, Me.
This is The Night wherein I am lost, the Love
through which I am no longer I.
Crowley also identified the phallus with the dying god, such as Osiris, Dionysus, or Jesus. This is based on the nature of the physical male penis, which becomes flacid (or "dies") after it has reached ejaculation. On the symbolic level, this can be interpreted as a god giving life followed by his own death. As Crowley wrote in The Vision and the Voice, "[The Pyramid] is also the phallus, which dies itself to communicate life to others."
He states this poetically in "The Sabbath of the Goat," also from The Book of Lies:
I
O! the heart of N.O.X. the Night of Pan.
PAN: Duality: Energy: Death.
Death: Begetting: the supporters of O!
To beget is to die; to die is to beget.
Cast the Seed into the Field of Night.
Life and Death are two names of A.
Kill thyself.
Neither of these alone is enough.
And Crowley explains:
- The shape of the figure I suggests the Phallus; this chapter is therefore called the Sabbath of the Goat, the Witches' Sabbath, in which the Phallus is adored.
Quotes from Crowley
Some instances when Crowley used the word:
- "The Holy Guardian Angel is the Unconscious Creature Self—the Spiritual Phallus." ("Liber Samekh," Pt.II, Sec.A)
- "And Teth means a Serpent, the symbol of the magical Life of the Soul, lord of "the double wand" of life and death. The serpent is royal, hooded, wise, silent save for an hiss when need is to disclose his Will; he devours his tail—the glyph of Eternity, of Nothingness and of Space; he moves wavelike, one immaterial essence travelling through crest and trough, as a man's soul through lives and deaths. He straightens out; he is the Rod that strikes, the Light-radiance of the Sun or the Life radiance of the Phallus." (The Equinox of the Gods, Ch.7)
- "The caduceus contains a complete symbol of the Gnosis; the winged sun or phallus represents the joy of life on all planes from the lowest to the highest." (Confessions, Ch.74)
- "...the only rational God is the Sun, who is in the Macrocosm what the Phallus is in the Microcosm." ("The Gospel According to Saint Bernard Shaw")
See also
References
- Wikipedia. (2004). Phallus (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phallus). Retrieved on January 20, 2005.
- Helena and Tau Apiryon. (1998). The Creed of the Gnostic Catholic Church: an Examination (http://www.hermetic.com/sabazius/creed_egc.htm).
- Crowley, Aleister. (1997). Magick: Book 4. "The Formula of I.A.O." 2nd ed. York Beach, Me. : S. Weiser.
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