The Equinox (Volume I, Number I)

THE TEMPLE OF SOLOMON THE KING This particular method of Rising on the Planes is an exceptionally interesting one to study, not only because it is most intimately connected with the Eastern methods of Yoga,* but because we have many practical results to hand, many actual facts from which we can generalise and construct atheory. Two of such examples we will give here, the first a poem by Mr. Aleister Crowley called ‘‘The Ladder,” in which the projection is vertical, that is to say, directed along the central column of the Tree of Life; and the second, which is called “The Ascent unto Daath,” by V. H. Frater I. A. In the first of these ‘“Risings” the goal of attainment is Kethgr, and the various headings of the poem point out clearly enough the different stages the Skryer has to pass through. From the darkness of Malkuth he passes the various symbolic colours, which will be discussed in a future chapter, as well as many of the symbols we have described, to arrive eventually at Kether. In the second, Fra. I. A. leads us as far as Daath, the head of the Old Serpent, the Knower of Good and of Evil. * The whole theory and practice of Raja Yoga is the awakening of a power named the Kundalini, which is coiled up in what is called the sacral plexus, and then forcing this awakened power up a canal called the Sushumna, which runs through the centre of the spinal column. “When the Kundalini is aroused, and enters the canal of the Sushumna, all the perceptions are in the mental space or Chittakasa. When it has reached that end of the canal which opens out into the brain, the objectless perception is in the knowledge space, or Chidakasa.” As in the Ascent of the Central Column of the Tree of Life, there are certain centres, such as Malkuth, the Path of Tau, Yesod, the Path of Samech, Tiphereth, the Path of Gimel, Daith, and Kether; so in the Sushumna are there certain centres or Chakkras, viz., Muladhara, Svadistthana, Manipura, Anahaba, Visuddhi, Ajna, and Sahasara. For further attributions See 777. 325