South African Sophian Gnostic Circle
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Winter Solstice: Gnostic Christmas / Summer Solstice: Feast of the Ascension and Pentecost
posted Sunday, 2 December 2007
In our Sophian Gnostic tradition we follow the “Path of the Sun” in our outer circles, celebrating the mysteries of the Gospel of Truth at key points in the solar year – solstices and equinoxes, and the midpoints in between them. Thus, our “Christmas” occurs on winter solstice, which is also our “New Year” celebration – winter solstice is the longest night of the solar year, and therefore the shortest day, and we begin the Path of the Sun once again.
We celebrate the Feast of the Mother and Child on winter solstice, or the Feast of the Divine Incarnation – the darkness of winter solstice as the womb of the Divine Mother in which we are conceived and gestated, and from which we are reborn as the Spiritual Sun, the Messiah of God, the Enlightened One; the Solar Sphere representing the Pleroma of Light, the Christ, which gives light and life to the world, to all people.
When we gaze upon the sun, even on the shortest day of the solar year, there is a simple truth: There is no darkness in the Sun of God, the Sun of God has never experienced the night, or the change of the seasons that represent birth, life and death; in the Sun of God sin and death have never existed – the Sun of God is the Bornless One, the Ancient of Days and the Eternal Youth.
The sun represents the Being of the Becoming, the truth of the Human One of Light in us, which comes forth from the Light Continuum, and yet has never departed from the Light Continuum; the truth of our enlightened nature, which was, is and forever shall be our *Real Being*, the “Living Yeshua” (Hayyah Yeshua).
This is the truth of our Supernal Being, and the sun is the symbol of Holy Remembrance, which is the purpose of the Divine Incarnation: To remind us of who and what we are, and to show us where we have come from, where we are now and where we are going; hence, to reveal our Supernal Being and invoke the Holy Remembrance of the Divine I Am (Christ Melchizedek).
There is Being and there is Becoming in our experience, which are represented by the reality of the sun as it is in itself, in which there is no change throughout the solar year, and the reality of the earth as the light of the sun appears to flow and ebb, in which there is an appearance constant continuum of change. As we see in the reality of the sun and the earth, the Being and the Becoming are inseparable from one another: the Pleroma of Light and the Entirety are One Reality-Truth-Continuum.
We follow the Path of the Sun, for as Gnostic Christians we seek to entertain the play of Becoming (Coming Into Being), while abiding in Being – the Risen Christ.
Already we abide in the fruition of the Great Resurrection and Ascension; yet, as one Apostle of Light has said, “We continually strive for a better resurrection” – the actualization and realization of Christ in us, the embodiment of the Truth and Light, Divine Incarnation. Here, we must say: When the transcendent is embodied there is no shadow of a body, but only Supernal Light, the True Light – immeasurable brilliance of Clear Light Nature (Christ Melchizedek).
Here we are, as in a dream, asleep and dreaming strange and fitful dreams, sometimes luminous and bright, sometimes shadowy and dark, unawareness that we are dreaming; first we must awaken in the dream to remember we are asleep and dreaming, and to consciously direct and transform the dream – then, and only then, can we awaken from the dream and abide as the real in the Real, as Christ in union with God Most High. The solar year as it transpires in the experience of earth – the incarnate state, is our awakening in the dream to transform the dream; the solar year as it transpires in the experience of the sun – bornless being, is our awakening from the dream.
If we are to speak of Christmas, *winter solstice*, it is the beginning of our awakening in the dream; if we are to speak of the Feast of Pentecost and the Ascension, *summer solstice*, it is our awakening from the dream – then, as the solar year continues, passing again into the darkness, it is the activity of the Sacred Heart, the Light Transmission, for having awakened from the dream we make take up the harvest of souls as Christ, serving in the Continuum of Light Transmission to awaken other souls from their long night’s sleep.
When a person is asleep and dreaming, unaware of the dream as the radiant display of mind, they believe themselves and all that appears to have an independent and substantial self-existence; they are bound to the illusion of separation and there is dualism – they are unaware of the Sacred Unity underlying all that appears. Thus, Christmas, as celebrated in the outer and unspiritual church, is the continuance of sleep and dream, the Holy Mother and Christ as something separate and apart from oneself – the worship of the demiurge; likewise, the Consermermas of the unenlightened society, celebrating the “great god” mammon, is the height of the same Ignorance, the depth of sleep in a strange and fitful dream.
Perhaps, if we have children, we shall entertain the play of “Christmas” and Santa Clause and all; we would not wish to deprive them of such a magical experience in their youth. Perhaps, too, to some degree, we might participate for the sake of friends and family, and perhaps we might even attend celebrations in the outer and unspiritual church; but within and behind there is something far more subtle and sublime – a *Holy Remembrance* in which we abide, through and through.
The Virgin Mary is the Mother of Enlightenment (Mother Sophia) – the nature of mind, which is ever pure, ever “virgin,” and Christ is the mind that arises with the recognition and realization of the nature of mind, the Enlightened One. The Virgin Mary is the Holy Mother of all the enlightened ones, and Christ is all of the enlightened ones – *Primordial Sophia and the Cosmic Christ*. This is the essential truth we remember and celebrate in our Gnostic Worship in the Christmas Season, the Feast of the Mother and Child; herein is our Christmas meditation.
There is a very specific psycho-drama enacted in the midst of the Feast of the Mother and Child, in whatever form it might assume, if there is a Tau in the Sacred Circle – the Sacred Tau sits enthroned, as the Holy Child on the lap of the Great Mother extending blessings and grace from the Light Realm, and we enter and offer up gifts, speaking of what we wish to manifest in spirit and life in the coming year and requesting a blessing/empowerment upon our invocation. The Sacred Tau, the Holy Tzaddik, represents the Human one of Light, the Christ in us, and the Holy Throne represents the Clear Light Nature, the Enlightened Nature in us; thus, this psycho-drama is a drawing out of the Light-presence (Christ) and Light-power (Holy Spirit) from within us, understanding this moment of dream-time as the radiant display of our own mind or soul-stream.
The Feast of the Mother and Child is a celebration of the mysteries of the Mother and Child that may assume many and diverse forms – it may focus upon any aspect of these mysteries as they occur in our Gnostic Christian tradition, and sometimes may include other images of the Divine Mother and Holy Child than those of Mother Miriam and Lord Yeshua, from other streams of Light Transmission; after all, we celebrate Primordial Sophia and the Cosmic Christ – *enlightenment and liberation*. As in all of the Holy Feasts, the Wedding Feast (Holy Eucharist) is enacted, based upon the corresponding Mystery of the Holy Gospel. If there is no Tau in the Sacred Circle, this is the Holy Rite enacted, but when there is a Tau present the Rite of Blessing is included in the midst of this High Rite. (In Sophian Circles the Tau tends to the Inner Circle and Continuum and the Elders tend to the Outer Circle and Continuum; winter solstice is the only solar rite of the Outer Circle and Continuum a Gnostic Tau attends – thus is it a union of the Inner and Outer Continuum on winter solstice, representing a deep mystery.)
According to the gospels canonized in the Bible, two indicate the Divine Incarnation transpiring at the baptism of Master Yeshua in the Sacred Jordan by John the Baptist, and two tell the tale of the Immaculate Conception and Virgin Birth. According to masters of the tradition, the story of the Virgin Birth reveals mysteries within and behind the Divine Incarnation, the embodiment of enlightenment, but the actual embodiment of Christ in the Master, actual Self-realization in Christ, occurred only after he received teachings and initiation, and enacted the spiritual life and practice through which the enlightenment experience (the Gnostic experience) dawns. Thus, the story of Virgin Birth is understood as a myth that teaches us about the enlightened nature and the path that leads to the enlightenment experience – rather than literal, it is understood as metaphorical.
Having faith in the Cosmic Christ, of course, we do not believe that the incarnation of Divine or Enlightened Being is isolate to the person of Master Yeshua, but we believe the Divine Incarnation has transpired many different times, among many different peoples, in many and diverse ways, and we believe that the Mystery of the Divine Incarnation is ongoing to this very day. Therefore, this is not a celebration of something transpiring only in the past, or separate and apart from us, but rather it is the celebration of something that continues to transpire among us, within each and every generation of humankind on earth. The appearance of a great adept or master who engages in the Light Transmission openly represents the initiation of a new stream of Light Transmission, and at times a new and higher gradation of the Light Transmission – unless this is needed, generally speaking, adepts and masters take up their spiritual labor in relative secrecy within and behind the scenes, but nevertheless the same harvest of souls is continually enacted among us. Thus, what the Mother and Child represent is a present reality – in the celebration of the Feast of the Mother and Child we seek to participate in that Divine Reality, the Divine Life.
There is something to be said for the wisdom of following the Path of the Sun in the Sophian tradition, aside from the metaphysical and esoteric implications. In previous generations, when the lineage functioned completely as a very private or “secret” society through times of great persecution and oppression, off-setting the Gnostic Holy Days from those of the outer and unspiritual church, Gnostic initiates could conduct their rites in private, and yet still attend the rites of the outer and unspiritual church – appearing as ordinary and faithful “Christians.”
For us in the Southern Hemisphere, this is of course the coming of the Summer Solstice, thus for us it is the Feast of the Apostolic Succession: Continuum of Light Transmission
When the Risen Christ appeared to the disciples in the upper room he said to them, “Peace be with you. Receive my peace.” Then he laid hands on them and breathed upon them, saying, “Receive the Holy Spirit.” The descent of the Pentecostal Fire, a Fiery Light or Fiery Intelligence, was the fruition of this Initiation, and receiving the peace of Christ and the fiery light of Christ, the disciples were empowered as apostles of light, embodying the gnostic and light Transmission. This was the beginning of the apostolic succession in the Christian stream, which is a continuum of light transmission – and it is this holy mystery we celebrate in the “Feast of the Apostolic Succession.” It is the mystery of a divine presence and power that passes person to person, and the mystery of the spiritual adepts and masters who live and walk among us, who embody something of this Divine Gnosis.
In speaking about holy apostles, of course, we are not speaking exclusively of adepts and masters within the Christian stream, but rather of the adepts and masters of all wisdom traditions, for by “apostolic succession” as Gnostics we mean lineages of realized individuals and we are speaking of a Divine and Universal Order of Enlightened Being – the Order of Melchizedek. In essence, the Order of Melchizedek is the Primordial Tradition within and behind all world-wisdom traditions, and is the basis of the Gnostic Apostolic Succession, whether in the Christian stream of light transmission or any other stream of light transmission that appears upon the Good Earth.
In every generation, among all peoples of the world, spiritual adepts and masters are incarnate, laboring in the harvest of souls, whether openly or in secret; and there are many living lineages of light transmission, many different streams of light transmission – a vast rainbow glory of Divine Illumination. Likewise, just as divine and enlightened beings incarnate among us, so also do they labor within the inner dimensions, teaching and initiating us on subtle levels, as well as in the material dimension – all for the sake of our eventual enlightenment and liberation. In the Feast of the Apostolic Succession we honor and celebrate this mystery of the Great Work – the harvest of souls transpiring in the physical and metaphysical dimensions.
Quite naturally, it is especially powerful and meaningful to celebrate this holy feast if we have experienced the blessing of encountering an adept or master, whether in the world or in the inner dimensions, and experienced something of the light transmission, for it is a holy remembrance of our initiation into the Life Divine. Yet, if we have not had such an experience it can also be meaningful and powerful, for opening our mind and heart to the possibility, it may serve to invoke an initiatory experience, one that leads to the unfolding of the Gnostic experience. In either case, as much as a remembrance of initiation or an invocation of initiation, it is also the celebration of our own eventual enlightenment – our divine destiny to become “more than human”; for in those who have gone before us we see an image of the Perfect Human One within us, so that we might consciously seek to recognize and realize this Great Natural Perfection.
Although on one level we may be celebrating the mystery of light transmission and the adepts and masters among us who serve to facilitate it, from a Gnostic perspective, ultimately, we are celebrating the generations of the Great Seth – the Perfect Human Being within all of us. As much as celebrating the Great Work taken up by adepts and masters, and remembering the divine assistance that is present for us, we are also making a commitment to take up the Great Work ourselves, for the reason we seek Self-realization in Christ is to be empowered in the Great Work. The spiritual labor of the holy apostles, the spiritual adepts and masters, is our own; for receiving the light transmission, whether or not we are called to outwardly serve as a teacher and guide, or whether or not we become realized in this life, nevertheless we all have a priestly function as Gnostic Christians and we are all meant to be conscious agents of the Great Work: every Gnostic initiate is a Light-bearer, Healer and Peacemaker, each according to their call or true will. This is the inner level of this holy feast.
Thus, this is a celebration of the Body of Christ (the Cosmic Christ) and all of its members – the Great Matrix of Light, especially as made manifest in the world.
Aside from creating the conditions in which we might have a direct spiritual or mystical experience of the mysteries, or perhaps gain some experiential insight into them, when we celebrate a sacred ritual we invoke an influx of the Divine Light and blessings into the world and serve to uplift the world – there truly is something very powerful and magical about creating and enacting sacred ritual, and ultimately it is a way of service to others, to the universe and the Divine.
When the Risen Christ appeared to the disciples in the upper room he said to them, “Peace be with you. Receive my peace.” Then he laid hands on them and breathed upon them, saying, “Receive the Holy Spirit.” The descent of the Pentecostal Fire, a Fiery Light or Fiery Intelligence, was the fruition of this Initiation, and receiving the peace of Christ and the fiery light of Christ, the disciples were empowered as apostles of light, embodying the gnostic and light Transmission. This was the beginning of the apostolic succession in the Christian stream, which is a continuum of light transmission – and it is this holy mystery we celebrate in the “Feast of the Apostolic Succession.” It is the mystery of a divine presence and power that passes person to person, and the mystery of the spiritual adepts and masters who live and walk among us, who embody something of this Divine Gnosis.
In speaking about holy apostles, of course, we are not speaking exclusively of adepts and masters within the Christian stream, but rather of the adepts and masters of all wisdom traditions, for by “apostolic succession” as Gnostics we mean lineages of realized individuals and we are speaking of a Divine and Universal Order of Enlightened Being – the Order of Melchizedek. In essence, the Order of Melchizedek is the Primordial Tradition within and behind all world-wisdom traditions, and is the basis of the Gnostic Apostolic Succession, whether in the Christian stream of light transmission or any other stream of light transmission that appears upon the Good Earth.
In every generation, among all peoples of the world, spiritual adepts and masters are incarnate, laboring in the harvest of souls, whether openly or in secret; and there are many living lineages of light transmission, many different streams of light transmission – a vast rainbow glory of Divine Illumination. Likewise, just as divine and enlightened beings incarnate among us, so also do they labor within the inner dimensions, teaching and initiating us on subtle levels, as well as in the material dimension – all for the sake of our eventual enlightenment and liberation. In the Feast of the Apostolic Succession we honor and celebrate this mystery of the Great Work – the harvest of souls transpiring in the physical and metaphysical dimensions.
Quite naturally, it is especially powerful and meaningful to celebrate this holy feast if we have experienced the blessing of encountering an adept or master, whether in the world or in the inner dimensions, and experienced something of the light transmission, for it is a holy remembrance of our initiation into the Life Divine. Yet, if we have not had such an experience it can also be meaningful and powerful, for opening our mind and heart to the possibility, it may serve to invoke an initiatory experience, one that leads to the unfolding of the Gnostic experience. In either case, as much as a remembrance of initiation or an invocation of initiation, it is also the celebration of our own eventual enlightenment – our divine destiny to become “more than human”; for in those who have gone before us we see an image of the Perfect Human One within us, so that we might consciously seek to recognize and realize this Great Natural Perfection.
Although on one level we may be celebrating the mystery of light transmission and the adepts and masters among us who serve to facilitate it, from a Gnostic perspective, ultimately, we are celebrating the generations of the Great Seth – the Perfect Human Being within all of us. As much as celebrating the Great Work taken up by adepts and masters, and remembering the divine assistance that is present for us, we are also making a commitment to take up the Great Work ourselves, for the reason we seek Self-realization in Christ is to be empowered in the Great Work. The spiritual labor of the holy apostles, the spiritual adepts and masters, is our own; for receiving the light transmission, whether or not we are called to outwardly serve as a teacher and guide, or whether or not we become realized in this life, nevertheless we all have a priestly function as Gnostic Christians and we are all meant to be conscious agents of the Great Work: every Gnostic initiate is a Light-bearer, Healer and Peacemaker, each according to their call or true will. This is the inner level of this holy feast.
Thus, this is a celebration of the Body of Christ (the Cosmic Christ) and all of its members – the Great Matrix of Light, especially as made manifest in the world.
Aside from creating the conditions in which we might have a direct spiritual or mystical experience of the mysteries, or perhaps gain some experiential insight into them, when we celebrate a sacred ritual we invoke an influx of the Divine Light and blessings into the world and serve to uplift the world – there truly is something very powerful and magical about creating and enacting sacred ritual, and ultimately it is a way of service to others, to the universe and the Divine.
May the blessing of the Holy Mother and Child rest upon you, and may the Spiritual Sun shine from within you; amen.
