Related Texts •Transcendental Magic •Seeking the Master •Egyptian Book of the Dead Related Subjects • Thelema • Ritual Magick • Tarot

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The beatitude of the Justified KHOU was by no means purely contemplative. The inscription on the obelisk of Queen Hatshepsut (sometimes spelled Hatshepsut) speaks of them as holding converse with the un generated souls during the one hundred and twenty years that the latter circle round the Sun. They had the power to take all imaginable forms, or to move hither and thither as they pleased. We find in the Ritual of the Dead elaborate formulas for the assistance of the KHOU of the deceased. The Justified KHOU was obliged to pass many tests; it had to cultivate the gardens of heaven, destroy monsters, take on certain obligatory forms, escort the Gods in their Heaven-traversing ships, take part in the ceaseless struggle between the two contending forces, cross burn ing and desolate zones, suffer in the regions of hunger, thirst, and terror, submit to proofs, reply to questions, and pass the armed and hideous Deity who guarded the Portals of Wisdom.

Now, if an Egyptian failed in standing such tests as these, in the ceremony of his initiation, he was regarded as a man liable to become an evil KHOU if his power was developed: and in their Wisdom the Priests rejected him and left him in that ignorance which led to oblivion and the annihilation of the incarnating Ego. Not only this, but if he, by underhand means, found out magical formulas and was able to use them effectively, the punish ment was death.

Details of this kind are given in the supplement to M. Chabas' translation of the Harris Magical Papyrus. The period was that of Rameses III. Compare this quotation: "HAI, the evil man, was a shepherd. He had said :

"'Oh! that I might have a book of spells that would give me resistless power.' " He obtained a book of the Formulas of Rameses Meri-Amen, the Great God, his royal Master.

By the Divine Powers of these, he enchanted men. He obtained a deep vault furnished with implements. He made waxen images of men, and love-charms. And then he perpetrated all the horrors that his heart conceived."

Now on the face of the matter it is very easy to see that a great part of Egyptian Magic lay in a species of Hypnotism, called by later magicians, Enchantment, Fascination, and so forth. Anybody with intelligence and charm can hypnotise an innocent person that interests him, but such a practice is derogatory both to fascinator and fascinated, even when it takes place in matters of ordinary passional life. How much more so when it leads to debauchery of the soul. In this way we ,perceive the possibility of an Uninitiate successfully performing the spells he had discovered.

Rituals or Ceremonies now simply regarded as a waste of time by those who have to assist at their celebration, had a potent effect when the symbolism of each action was fully recognised, and when the imagination was extended and ultra-sensitive, and the Will concentrated firmly and repeatedly, on the object to be accomplished. The KA of the Ritualist was thus at high tension acting upon its counterpart the concave germ in the AB (heart) or vessel of conscious desire; this reacts upon the HA TI (Instinctive habit) or unconscious executant. The whole human Ego then being in a state of theurgic excitation the BAlE (spirit) descended and the whole being became a luminous KHOU or Shining Body of super-human potency, the Augoeides of the Greek Mystics.

This glittering being established in the midst of the SAH U (Elemental Body) then by its radiation can awake cor responding potencies in nature. For this purpose the KHAIBT was used.. as a link between the Ego and the non-Ego, and the spiritual body or ZET was established.

When this condition was brought about, a man became in the eyes of the Egyptians, Osirified. That is to say, a Microprosopus, or Perfect copy of the Macroprosopus. But he who, ignorant and unpurified, performed these rites, became the habitation of an illusive and fatal force, ever dragging him down to the deep abysses of blind potency.

We may now perceive dimly how the Egyptians conceived the seed of the Tree of Life-Eternal to be implanted in the heart of each man or woman born on earth; how it can wither and fade; how it can be cultivated until the man becomes either an Evil Demon or a God.

To the high initiate there was no question of choice in this matter. He knew that the heart turned inward on itself was a very poor alternative for that expansion of being that belongs to the development of the whole latent Divine Powers of the Microprosopus. In other words, the perfect formulation of the Osiris soul, the Holy Spirit of the Divine, made manifest and eternal. Now the Egyptians had elaborated a marvelous system of symbolism. The forms of the universal powers or Gods, stood, each complete, behind a human or animal mask; his Divinity symbolized by his headdress, his powers by his Staff and the Symbol of Life which he bore in his hands. MM. Chabas and Textor de Ravisi have told us that the most potent magical formula was the identification of the Ritualist with the God whose power he was invoking. So increasing himself to an immeasurable greatness he leapt beyond all bodies, and transcending time became eternity. He became higher than all height, lower than all depth. He knew himself part of the great chain of Creation at once unbegotten, young, old, dead. He felt within him self latent, unfolding faculties, and retained the memory of experiences gained in time long past and dead. His feet to-day stood in the place that yesterday his eye could scarcely see, and beyond him in the Invisible was his next day's resting place.

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