Invoking the Apocalypse

From a conversation I had in the summer of 2021. This essay was scheduled for posting at that time. It takes on new meaning in light of current events.

“Over the years I have read a great deal about people trying to invoke the Apocalypse, to force an event they believe to be inevitable forward on its time line to get it over with. We see evidence to suggest this idea with John Dee and Enochian, even the Necronomicon, and of course some Indian sects who think they can either forestall or speed up the harvesting of the Kali Yuga. Among certain Evangelical sects as well has been the idea that if things just get bad enough, then the tipping point can be reached and the Second Coming will occur.”

The reply: “The Apocalypse is first and foremost a personal event as that is how each of us experiences it. The collective apocalypse is secondary in many respects – even if by this we mean something cyclic like the Initiation of the Nadir. What some fail to grasp is that we are always bringing about the apocalypse – the revelation – regardless of what we do. Each of us goes deeper into our being and with it must confront and reconcile the various dark, destructive, and what one might even call ‘evil’ aspects of our being. The so-called Anti-Christ. That is the nature of initiation.

What is nearly universally ignored is that when we make small changes in our lives they have a ripple effect that is small. This ripple to those around us in often weak in manner so it is not terribly disruptive to the status quo. When we make big changes to our lives they have a big ripple effect on those around us. They may stretch beyond our immediate family or associates to our community, region, even country depending what it is we have achieved.

So, when we seek to make large changes in our own life we see the inertia and at times active resistance we must overcome. How others, unknowingly, push back against us, even if the change does not involve them. Now, think about the massive resistance you need to overcome to create something that will effect thousands, possibly millions of live, let alone the entire world when we are speaking of changes in awareness on an initiatic level.

When we enter into meditation and attempt to generate thoughts and feelings of goodwill towards others, pay attention to how easy it is to get distracted. How often the deepest and darkest desires of violence, pride, lust, and other vices are brought before your mind’s eye. We expect people to respond to us nicely and more pleasantly because of our practices – and often they do, but look at Jesus. He was scourges and crucified by the people he came to help: they picked Barabas. Look at the Tibetan monks, hardly a threat in the conventional sense, and they were murdered en mass by the Chinese Communists. The same happened under National Socialism and the Soviet era to various western esoteric movements. Simply look at the hurt person or animal we seek to console and they react with fear and anger.

So, when we seek peace within ourselves it is one thing. When we seek some level of regional or global change it is another. We go from engaging our personal demons to the demons – or Shadow so to speak – of a larger group of people. In fact, we are very intentionally forcing them, whether they want to or not, like it or not, to engage their own ‘shadow’ and from that powerful energies are released.

There is this naive belief among those very new to the path that since they ‘have found the light’ they can easily and with little effort share that light with others. But think of how long it takes to accustom ourselves to physical light let along spiritual light. We cover our eyes in pain if we go from darkness to a sudden flash of light. For this reason we take small step no matter we do. That is why it is said, to tell some one a truth before their time is the same as lying to them. We have no right to forcibly tear the curtain for another.

In the end, we are always invoking the Apocalypse. Ever time we visualize world peace we are evoking the forces of world conflict so that they may be tethered and restrained. There is no escaping it. The best thing to do is invoke the Apocalypse in yourself first. Bring on its powerful initiatic forces and awaken the Christ within yourself. Only then can you be a force that can assist in reconciling the Anti-Christ, or anti-initiatic energies on a larger level.

Stop worrying about it, and get on with your own awakening.”

Note: The following article appeared in the final issue of The Stone (Nov.-Dec. 1999), the bi-monthly publication of The Philosophers of Nature (PON), the American branch and successor to Les Philosophes de la Nature (LPN), a French Hermetic and Alchemical organization started by Jean Dubuis in the late 1970’s. PON ceased operation on December 31^st, 1999, however the lessons in English and French, along with back issues of The Stone, maybe found on Amazon.com and from http://www.portaelucis.fr/GB/html/textes.htm.

The Apocalypse

By Jean Dubuis

Translated by Patrice Maleze

Copyright 1999 Jean Dubuis

Generally, the Apocalypse is considered something like a prediction of catastrophes and in everyday language, it is often understood as a natural cataclysm. Yet, at the beginning of the text of the “Apocalypse of St. John” is written: “Revelation” and this word is the real meaning of the word Apocalypse.

First, we note that this revelation is made to John, apostle of the inner church, the esoteric church. In this text, we are not concerned with the outer church, the church of Peter.

One is forced to acknowledge that, on the first reading, the text does not reveal much, perhaps even nothing. If we want to get some benefit from it, we should not take it literally because “the spirit vivifies, but the letter kills”.

The apocalypse is the real book of the Bible, Bible meaning Book. The two illustrations with this paper give both a symbolic and practical principle regarding the comprehension of the text. The book is kept closed: its knowledge is occulted, inaccessible. The seals are broken, the book is open: the knowledge is accessible. The true content of the Book is the inner knowledge, necessary for man to return to “the Eternal Kingdom of his origin”.

(Editors Note: The two illustrations are of the Lamb of God resting upon the closed book of Seven Seals; and a photograph of a relief, presumably Christ, seated on a throne, with a scepter in his left hand, the open book in his right facing outward, and a ladder of nine rungs reaching from his feet to throat.)

What do these seals mean and how are we to open them? The opening can be done through Alchemy or Qabala, but other methods are also possible and we will give one here. This method necessitates three conditions”

• Preparatory work
• Meditation
• Concentration

In the text of the “Apocalypse of John” there are seven Letters to the seven Churches, the seven seals, the seven trumpets, the seven cups, etc. Each unit of seven elements corresponds to one of the Sephiroth of Qabala or the seven lower Sephirah: the seal is an energy, etc.

This is given only as a probable example. In reality each one of us must find his own interpretation of the text since the same fact, the same event, the same energy, all has a different aspect as a function of the level of the Memory of Nature where it is contacted. There is one level of Memory of Nature per Sephirah. (Editors Note: “Memory of Nature” is the Western term for the Akashic Records)

The first work consists in finding in the text the matching correspondences for each Sephirah. Take a white sheet of paper, without lines (eventually use a lined page underneath). The finished page will contain only the writing and, eventually a number from one to seven.

Start copying, by hand, the letter if the first Church, then the text of the first seal and continue for each of the first elements. If an element is named without comments, write its name on a line in the order in which the text flows. Continue the same work for the second element, and so on. We will thus obtain a series of seven texts, each on a different sheet and this for each Sephirah.

You can now open the seals but you cannot open all of them. No one on this Earth can open a level above the level of his celestial residence, but we can find in the last open seal the method for accessing the residence above one’s own.

Method for Finding the Key to Opening of a Seal

The simplest is first to arrange in the form of a book the seven manuscript pages. The symbolism of the book is very powerful to access the archetypes of Knowledge. Then do the present work if you got the uniformity of gray in the checkerboard training exercise (Editors Note: Dubuis is referring to a concentration exercise in The Fundamentals of Esotericism course. The lesson containing that exercise can be read online at Triad Publishing.) Place yourself in your oratory with the seven pages and something to write on (a new blank sheet of paper). Start by concentrating on the page of the first Church. If you have enough training, the order of the phenomena should be the following: the sides of the sheet will start taking on a brownish-blackish color. Then this color will be animated by a kind of pulsation, a rhythm based roughly on one per second of time. This kind of wave will work its way towards the center of the sheet that will become entirely black or dark brown. A few seconds afterwards, generally between three and ten, a very faint light will appear that will become stronger, then a pulsating motion starts: the light spot grows and the whole sheet becomes clear (not necessarily white). If your concentration is good you will be able to read a text, usually a phrase, which you must fix in your memory.

To protect the continuation of these experiences, it is good to let the reverse phenomena occur: the dark invades the entire sheet, you de-concentrate, and everything becomes normal again.

Immediately write the phrase on the white sheet of paper and meditate on it: it is the key or piece of the key to the seal. As long as the key to the first seal is not complete, do not start working on the second one.

This method can also be applied to other topics: we can thus look for answers to alchemical or qabalistic problems. Also, if the psychic teachings of the night cannot be brought back “to the surface” this method is often sufficient. Usually for these other uses, you do not have to write down the text: we can take a book, any book. Yet, a book of the same subject, psychically well impregnated by our work, makes the work easier.

Do not use this process for means contrary to ethics or for materialistic means even if they are generous. Such use would stop for a long time the possibility of accessing the Memories of Nature through this practice.

The method offered here uses only one part of the “Apocalypse of John”. There are chapters such as the Throne of God, the Elect, the angel with the little book, the two witnesses, the Woman and the Dragon, the two Beasts, etc. that concern the general principles of Creation. The number two is the symbol of the manifested world, the number four represents the elements, the Dragon is TALI, the intellectual and physical forces that rivet us to the Realm of Malkuth (Editors Note: Tali is the Zodiacal), etc.

The same method can be applied to each of these chapters. The important thing is to note everything and to bring together all of the knowledge received: step-by-step, a philosophy, a knowledge, will occur that will make possible the return to the New Jerusalem.

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