THE EQUINOX
“ From where I had been standing
I was led to the Northern
entrance, where crowded a great concourse of people, and as I
approached them they gave way before me. Then a voice
whispered to me ‘Smite’; thereupon, drawing my sword with
fury I smote three times, upon which a great wailing arose.
“Having smitten down many with those three blows, I
descended among them, but left my sword behind me.
Thinking I had forgotten it, in vain I tried to return, and
in my strivings was of a sudden armed with many potent
lightnings; then at my feet there fell away a great hollow
column of rolling smoke. Seeing it, I approached it and
gazing down it, beheld at its furthermost extremity the earth,
dark and strong. As I watched it rolling below me, a great
desire possessed me to expand my consciousness and include
All. This took me a vast time to accomplish, and even then
my success was but moderate.
“From the column of smoke I returned to the outside of
the temple and re-entered it by the Western door. Finding
a gold crown upon my head, I held it up, and in the white
vapour it glowed like a white light. Then an angel
approached me and pressed it on to my brow, and as this was
done, a feeling possessed me as if a cold shower of gold
was falling through me. Then of a sudden was I carried
upwards, and found myself in a second temple. Here I was
conducted to the South, where stood a glittering shrine, and
the light which flashed from it pierced me through and
through. Blinded by the effulgence, I was led to the North
to another shrine (Binah) where my eyes were anointed with
cold molten silver, and immediately I saw vaguely before me
a female form.
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