Welcome to spiritual studies session 69. this session focuses on the chronology the history of human thought in relation to sexuality and religion there are several points along this story several subjects several time periods several subject matters that each deserve their own focused subject their own spiritual study session however
Our focus is the development of thought throughout this and I think it will be clear by the end how we got where we are why we think what we think and what sort of battles are happening within the human psyche in regards to religion and sexuality this subject
As it immediately meets the cultural mind is that sexuality is taboo to religion even so far as an Abomination that if one was to live a religiously Pure Life they ought not practice sexuality however as we move into the past we can see that the exercising of human sexuality has great
Diversity when it comes to different belief systems this can go so far as sex worship sexual deities fertility ceremonies so on and so forth or the the more modern Sex Magic for instance an instance of this uh ancient approach can first be observed in Southeast Asia where archaeological sites dig these depictions of
Embracing couples and outright human genitalia intertwining these symbolizing growth prosperity and abundance so immediately with that just first reference we can see the contrast the juxtaposition between how our mind might have culturally immediately met this subject and how the practices of sexuality and symbolism of sexuality are
Legions far far far away from this modern conception we can begin this story thus with looking at the Venus figurines these ancient Paleolithic dating as far back as 300 000 years ago at least or you know whatever of these Buxom motherly figures these fertility deities these Ivory carvings of swollen breasts
And pregnant bellies and of course unashamed Nudity so if we were to dial it back into our ancient past this nudity this sexuality this practice has no shame there is nothing to be covered this sexuality is the source of life you came from it everything came from some sort of ceremonious Act of sexuality the absurdity of an exterior
Perspective to this as well two people get together perform some sort of very specific actions that facilitate very specific innate functions of the human body or anybody you know animal what what otherwise and then there is a whole nother a whole different person thing that just conjured from this what is that
This miraculousness this wonderment about how is that possible what this creative act and this wonderment is immediately tied to the woman of course being the bearer of this gestation the one who brings forth creation thus the goddess of fertility this miraculous aspect that she has somehow somehow and of course as the courses
Tried to elucidate several times throughout the mentality of the ancient world and the the plurality of how everything is interpreted what do I mean I mean there is the microcosmic sexuality which produces a child but then there is the macro Cosmic sexuality that produces everything that we inhabit
The the grain the mushrooms the fruits on the tree the trees the animals even things like the air and the Sun all of these things were burst somehow they were they came to be somehow and the way that things come to be is sexually so there is the mother and then there is
The great mother so there’s no shunning anywhere in this of course because it is the source so accordingly there is this immediate goddess of fertility before any seeming paganism before any systems of orientation there is first the goddess of fertility and as that evolves into polytheism and Pagan what might be called pagans
Paganism then we see that these fertility deities start to take on their own idiosyncratic deviations depending on what cultures they are within so immediately we can see those that are connected specifically with the microcosmic sexual act which is like aphroditi the goddess of love and sex but then you have Demeter for instance
That is more specifically related to that macrocosmic sexuality that produces the Agriculture and the seasons and other examples you have for instance yamanja of the Yoruba people in this case this fertility deity represents both the individual sexuality and love and the macrocosmic sexuality and love the agricultural the the worlds as other diversifications
Such as astarte which is the fertility deity of the Phoenicians this would involve not just love but also War which is interesting because is love a incentive or a catalyst for war that is a kind of ancient topic one’s mind immediately goes to Helen of Troy
This astarte as it was not just the Phoenicians extending out to Carthage Malta Sicily Cyprus and this reoccurring Trope as well in many different cultures not all but for instance a fertility deity in the Zulu tradition representing both the harvest season and the spring rains and this spring rains I think is particularly
Poignant because that is also shared for instance with dodola which is a Slavic fertility deity Earth fertility and rain and there was this reoccurring subject matter of the male fertility of the macro Cosmo macro Cosmos the sky the heavens being the lightning bolt and the female fertility being the rain
And in this case the Dola is the rain and paroon is the god of thunder and so that bolt is somewhat invocative that’s that phallus kind of stuff or Thor’s hammer [Laughter] this practice these rituals that honor dedola carry on into the modern Slavic day there are these ceremonies where
Um children and the young girls Adorn themselves with leaves and sing songs they are sprayed with water and in this ceremony it is in hopes of summoning or or Conjuring soliciting the rain and the rain that that gives fertility to all life and it’s not it’s not hard to see why
This happens in the sense that the land is growing Barren the land is growing dry the rain comes and things bloom so it there’s this immediate observation of this creation or this growth this nourishing and so since the world is like you then this is a gift from the mother
I hope that I hope that gets gets across there is of course other Slavic beliefs and other uh Slavic Goddess that is Ziva or zoeia I’ve seen a few names and I’m of course not sure if I’m pronouncing properly associated with life fertility the the the primordial mother and the major
Mother of the pantheon and this name is related to the Norse Sif goddess which of course gives Credo to the mutual ancestry through etymology of this Earth goddess as it becomes Sif over here and as it was Ziva over here this of course takes on its own connotations for instance if this deity
Is being worshiped in Belarus then it is the Earth goddess whereas if it is being worshiped in Serbia then this one is the protector of children and the bringer of life and that’s the other Trope the protector of children as it is that role is given to many different goddesses
Throughout many different traditions for instance Artemis if we go back to the Greeks so you can see with immediate observation that the roles of this initial fertility deity are being given individually to different goddesses as paganism develops it’s no longer one encompassing all these traits mother it has been it’s being
Um categora categorized it’s being fractured out and here’s the other instance there are fertility deities that are male as well and that should already be noted because as we saw with moon goddesses there were also plenty of moon Gods none of these things are ever quite solely kept um engendered
Best God uh protector of the household mothers and young children he and his wife Passat would cure infidelities this best set is also a God of War notice again war and love sexuality humor music and dancing all of these things attached to the deity of fertility during the ptolemaic era
There was a cult that surrounded bass that got taken in by the Phoenicians and the Romans this will come up later these Cults of sexuality here’s another hint for later during the time of Alexander’s Conquest he brought the Greek culture to the Middle East and by extension to those of Israel
And the Greeks as many know were very open sexually which we’ll discuss more as well this was immediately met with some concern by the Israelites because before before even uh the Greeks showed up there was this trend of thought these disasters these natural disasters that had happened to the Jews the
Assyrian conquest or the destruction of the Temple these things were thought of as punishments for idolatry now here let’s let’s break this down it goes like this idolatry leads to misguided sexual behaviors I.E pornia yeah and you’re hearing that right porn pornia which means sexual immorality idolatry leading to sexual immorality
I.E sexuality outside of a given contract and thus Collective disaster death now that’s very important this idea fostered way back in this time that we’re in of specific immoral sexual actions causing disasters is this not Conjuring some Westboro Baptist Church Vibes a little bit so of course when the Greeks show up and
They’re displaying this open sexuality the Israelites are a bit put off note note for later but but when it comes to the Greeks as we’ve discussed in the course before it’s it’s really codified by Eros and Dionysus and Eros is arguably depending if we’re following orphism or what stories we’re following
Eros could be the progenitor of all things as noted why did the gods get together in the creation story if there was not this passion or erotic drive towards each other why would anything procreate without this unification but in another case we could say Eros is
Born of Nixon Erebus or we could say Eros is born of Iris and zephyrus or just the chaos but regardless Eros is lust Eros is passion and thus fertility and here we see that interesting case that the fertility deity is male and it’s interesting just as a slight
Note because this fertility aspect is indicative of both lovers right I mean the ACT to be brought together is both masculine and feminine anyhow the offerings to the Temple of Eros would be vessels filled with oils or wine or or jewelry or sacrifices or plants or flowers all of these things in
Good conscious toward facilitating fertility or erotic Passions the word orgia means religious rituals which of course would turn into the word orgy which now has its own associations outside of the given religious context of which they were performed So within the philosophy of the Greeks and by extension Eros as as a deity
There aren’t boundaries to this sexuality Eros would uh anyone could fall into infatuation same-sex header relationships it doesn’t matter this was very free love and as the Romans took it Eros turns into Cupid and gets associated with the Cherub which is a not the right word for it there’s a
Whole story that goes into why this chubby cherub becomes uh you know Eros or Eros becomes Cupid and then becomes this chubby cherub um frequently though prior to this depicted as blindfolded because love is blind and Cupid came to represent more the god of pure love whatever that means pure love
Which you know we can go into psychoanalysis and all this too but you know as it is uh celebrated in our Valentine’s Day but of course far from the point there lust passion and fertility but then of course we also have the case of Bacchus
And in this case it’s the Ripoff of the previous Greek Dionysus and this this specific aspect of the wine the grapes and what comes to be understood as debauchery when actually this celebration whether Bacchus or whether it’s Dionysus is this practice of letting go in all the tension of life and all the
Tension and norms and taboos that Society is chronically compelling you get the chance to just let it go and this is Liberation and that’s where it was really coming from in a genuine idyllic sense that it’s it’s letting things happen as you genuinely authentically are to say what you mean
To act as you do and to do what thou Wilt which will come up later the freedom to perform say do what you feel what you feel so at this time now that we’re with the Romans we have these Cults which are previously mentioned whether it was taking on
Bess or whether it was taking on Bacchus or if it’s the the mysteries of Demeter or Dionysus or Magna Mata or bonadia these are all these kind of secret religious cults per se orientations that facilitate the open expression of sexuality as it was happening and these breakings of of norms these letting go
Ceremonies would invite women to drink wine which is against the patriarchy they would be amongst the slaves which is against the uh Power structure of society this was the time to dissolve those boundaries between peoples here we have the real uh you know party pooper and the rise of Christianity
And this this is gonna hurt a bit so it’s the second century and there is this very strong attempt that we’ve covered on the course before of Christianity attempting to separate itself from its neighbors I.E in this case particularly um the Jews which we saw this with their exercise of why they’re against
Astrology and here it is the exercise of why it’s against sexuality and not to say that it was coming out of nowhere because remember the context of Judaism the reaction of worshiping idolatry leads to sexual misconduct which leads to natural disaster mentality okay so in this case the the Christians were
Risking persecution unless they could make the claim or stake the argument that they were beneficial to society to the Roman Empire Because by the logic of the Times by the Roman ceremonies and religious orientations the Christians were atheists they didn’t believe in the gods they were atheists you see
And so they needed to prove yes that might be true by your thought but we can show that we are not damaging and so there was a series of letters and there was this really open Curtain Call to Christians to decide what do we think
What do we how do we go forward and what is our what is our stance and this was particularly provocative because in this case it was framing Rome as tyrannical that the roots of all the evil that was plaguing Rome was the same logic idolatry which creates sexual deviance
And this deviance bringing disaster and so this specific time in history shows this obsessive compulsion towards the topic of human sexuality the urge of the body towards other bodies is to be thought of as lesser and it ought not control one’s life to take from the philosophical tradition
And say that the mind is supremely man and thus that is what sets Man Apart and thus we should focus on the mind and not give way to the body because the body is animalistic and it is lesser that’s the dichotomy being set up here which is right away you know we
Already have a session on it but it’s aestheticism the idea of discipline if an athlete disciplines their body in order to get into shape a man must discipline his mind in order to get it into shape disciplining oneself against overeating over drinking or sexuality aestheticism
Which this is not the only place in the world that is going to be having this discussion which we’ll touch on a bit later but this idea of controlling the passions is is uh really the Crux of where this is gonna go way out of control
And there are some really hard to read documents from this time ideas such as when a man is at the moment of sexual orgasm he is at the heights of his deviancy you know of where the devil is effectively controlling his mind and body um of course
They didn’t go full hog in this way and what what I mean is they have to be like it’s okay if it’s under marriage which marriage had recently been invented which is a subject of its own uh session invented for the sake of political purposes of course and this ultimately serves a
Political purpose as well if you can control human sexuality and here’s the appeal if you can control human sexuality it really keeps people in line you you you’ve you put two together you force them into a closed system and accordingly there’s not going to be trouble they’re not going to cause
Trouble with people if you keep adultery to the low then you know people aren’t going to be killing each other and acting all uncivil because of these dramas that ensue from sexuality and the power of sexuality is highly charged and since it’s something of power the nature of power and humankinds is
Entropy inducing so the Christians are saying only in marriage which is great for political purposes because it keeps these things in confined and ought not in any way be indulged outside of the contract and here’s the other ideas men have hot blood and women have Cold Blood and that’s why men are active
And women are passive just like that it blends with these ideas of their current Medical schemas and the only way a woman can get pregnant is on her back and this is very important because this belief carries all the way into Christian missionaries probably still to this day for all I
Know I know of course when it comes to the missionary work in Asia or in Africa or in here in the Americas with the indigenous this is taught of as the only correct way to have sex which is why it’s called missionary position because sex is for procreation we ought
Not indulge and it is like a lesser it’s like we have to do this evil in order to perpetuate the species and the reasons for that this specific attitude are all bound up in in Genesis which is currently being Rewritten at this time um we’ll get to that a bit all the physical
Traits of the the child were believed at this time as well to come from the man was to come from the semen and that the woman was simply an incubator that facilitates this birth so you see in all these things that I’m bringing up right here I certainly don’t enjoy bringing up these
Things by the way this is just displaying the the cultural lean the the way how like an approach can facilitate not just one’s beliefs about how to treat women and and sexuality but also it extends to the medical Fields it extends to the philosophical Fields everything is tied around this specific
Approach I hope you’re getting a sense of that and and so that there is this need to damn right now when it comes to the Christians staking out their own way of approach so they’re going to resurface that idea of pornia which was brought up by you know the Israelites
Which is that immoral sexuality and the word subsequently by um by a translation fornication or foreign which is the uh the means arches in Latin which is a reference to prostitution um so accordingly the word fornication comes to mean this same extension of pornia which is that they are fornicators Heretics sexually immoral
And then of course you can point to the Bible stories of Sodom and Gomorrah these views of women don’t stop in their coercion which I did oh man I did a whole session on this the history of female philosophers oh the right the tri the the the tragedy
Of women in in society it was one of them like I think in session 20 or 30s anyway these views of women lead to this idea that they are the problem because they must be men are the big boys and they’re great and if Christianity is going to eventually sell
Itself to become the Holy Roman Empire not just this idea of close sexual behavior I.E marriage is a good selling political point but also the political point of absolutely turning on women will facilitate the political interests of patriarchy which will again really slide them in because paganism as a
General rule has better acknowledgment of women but in this case if we really lean on the power structure as Christianity is doing so aptly it’s going to be a good sell and this this is according to that women attentively all use seduction to control and dominate men the idea it extends all the
Way into the Victorian since women are thought of as weaker they have to come up with things by means of Seduction this would be a certain promiscuity a certain Behavior a certain set of makeup or clothes and that these are tools to control men and this all goes back to the Garden of
Eden and this is how it was talked about sincerely redoing the story because the story it takes on many different forms again this this would be its own session but here it is using the story of Genesis utilizing the iconography of the fertility deity pan represented through the devil the devil
Seduces Eve through the iconography of pan with his phallus rather notable size of course and through this seduction this is the fall this is before the Apple Store because the Apple comes from appropriating the Celtic as as when where I traced it at least so this intercourse by means of lust is
The idea of the originating sin and Eve uses this lust seduction and seduces Adam who would have otherwise been kept pure and so thus lust is what sent humankind into the chaotic entropy and going so far as to say that Jesus’s incarnation came to alleviate this lust
His sacrifice was to alleviate the sin of this lust this is how serious it is I have a bishop quoting here it says literally open letter it says you are the devil’s Gateway you are she who violated The Forbidden tree and broke the law of God because of the death you
Merited even the son of God had to die it was this vitriolic the sin of lust is why God had to send Christ to die it’s all women’s fault notice just I’m gonna pause notice where we began and contrast that with this okay okay there needed to be some approach though
So the second century also has these stories of Mary not just the mother but also Magdalene which is a whole other part of this to get into but when it comes to the Virgin Mary the the story or the background as it was crafted was that which she was raised by priests
In a temple and that she never encountered evil and that she never broke her virginity because it was just with God but that doesn’t really count it was Immaculate Conception virgin and thus Mary becomes the only way that women can be now this is the only way given all these
Things that we just came up with this is the only way women can be now so this idea of Chastity this idea of celibacy we’re really there is some sort of mention that we have to give to the gnostics as we’ve mentioned them before but the gnostics went so far as to never
Procreate all of the body and material existence is a sin created by a messed up deity the demiurge and accordingly we will never do anything that makes this continue so effectively they’re just gonna die out and the Christians will eventually kill the gnostics outright like genocide they’ll kill the
Cathars but for this time they’re going to take this idea of celibacy and chastity but not to its full extent you see which by the way the gnostics weren’t all like this some of them did have more free love associative acts with sexuality but
It a lot of the time the whole goal was just as long as it doesn’t produce more life foreign often most often that was the case but anyway so with the Christians they want to take this idea this virtue but not so far when there’s a little we’ll take it from
Them and we’ll bring it back a little bit and we’ll say just as long as it’s in a Christian marriage intercourse can be performed if it produces an heir but of course accordingly if women are on menopause or if women have shown that they are barren they can’t have sex
Because not to procreate so the party has officially been pooped a man it’s it’s over now because as we know the power structure grows and grows and grows from here the the idea as well of this celibacy and Chastity would be given its full extreme when it comes to the clergy and this
Idea of that is to facilitate the idea of their Holiness or of their Aura of exceptional spiritual quality the fact that they have never had sex or produced any sexuality thusly and so the expectation of the clergy would be to fully fulfill the initiatives of the Gnostic which is super interesting but anyhow
There is some debate too on whether or not Christians during this time especially the clergy would just straight up castrate themselves there is actual debate about this there is a quote Matthew 19 12. Jesus says for there are eunuchs who have been so from birth and there are eunuchs who have been made
Eunuchs by others and there are eunuchs who have been who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the Kingdom let anyone accept this who can this is interesting because obviously it plays into the part this whole thing that we’ve been crafting that I’m just you know I’m this is my sacrifice for
God I’m gonna do it myself yet the subject of asexuality in uh contemporary uh religious circles is really um wild like it goes back and forth I mean as far as I could look into it asexuality is a confusing subject and it has dealt with differently depending on
The congregation one would go as so far as completely distance themselves say that they’re not people and the other would go so far as to say that this plays exactly into you know this is great this is great the lack of sexual desire that’s amazing where can
You help everybody else do that I guess oh man oh man but given all that we can see with immediacy how this attitude that was conjured for political purposes in this in like the 200 to 300 effectively and so on still and even that approach of tragedy coming because of idolatry from sexual
Misconduct equals disaster via the Westboro Baptist Church that one Harkens back all the way to like 600 BC I mean it’s old man anyway let’s let’s change the perspective a bit because simultaneously or at least within the same couple hundreds of years we have developments in Hinduism on this
Specific subject and in Hinduism as an example there are these kind of approaches of life these basic ideas of the aims of Life which are comma which is sexuality pleasure artha which is Prosperity materially Dharma which is Duty Harmony and Moksha which is liberation in that as I listed them
They grow more and more important so the least important one is pleasure comma so here it is acknowledging let’s just say culturally because religiously and culturally are very intertwined when it comes to Hinduism sexuality is not Taboo in the same horribly aesthetic way that it came to be in Christianity
And sex is not thought of as inherently wrong there are of course uh ways that it can take one off the uh other paths right like if if your sexuality affects your material Prosperity or your duty or if it affects your ability towards Liberation it’s not good but otherwise it’s good so
In this case sexuality is sacred as well because it represents this impulse towards expansion and this goes back to that initial sexuality creation wonderment it it acknowledges that but of course hinduism’s history with Jainism and so forth is much more of a through line than the very um truncated story of General religious
Traditions in in in the let’s just say Western World in colonial Europe specifically so from this we have the Kama Sutra which is a notorious book created in the 4th century and this elaborately goes through the discussion and subject of sexuality and sexual behavior but this
Is not a religious text by any means in fact it it goes against religious beliefs in in the way that at certain parts for instance it teaches one how to seduce somebody else’s wife which would be not okay by the previous ethics that I that I painted that would definitely
Be affecting one’s Harmony that would definitely be affecting one’s material Prosperity so this is not a let’s just say even though the word doesn’t apply in a canonical text but this Kama Sutra shows hinduism’s uh Society like its availability that’s that something like this could be produced could be talked
About at length and not become this horrid heresy the Kama Sutra still exists you can go read it so it’s in the case of the Kama Sutra it doesn’t represent yet it does exist in the ancient world and it you know it was made and by extension
You have the ananga ranga which I don’t know if I’m saying that right translation is the stage of Love or the stage of the bodyless one this is another text came much later 15th 16th century and this time takes away that immorality and just focuses on the absolutely detailed discussion of
Human sexual intercourse and this this stated goal was to keep the husband and wife together because the idea was that men as as one quote says you know in reference to men they regard women only as a as in an animal point of view at this animalistic infatuation that
Meant towards women and but and I’m paraphrasing such men must be looked upon as foolish and unintelligent this book is composed with the objective of preventing such so to to investigate the art of love and love making in order for the thorough and varied enjoyment of women and men
So you can see this is getting much more plural much more egalitarian in a certain in a sense and is counter-cultural to the otherwise patriarchy hence if one does this you know facilitates the passion learns how to facilitate this passion in the closed setting in the
Good setting that it is they can acquire thus Divine knowledge and hence move forward into the transmigration of Souls which this specific text written by a poet by the way would be facilitating the greater aim of the Hinduism ethic that I painted earlier facilitating comma towards Moksha
And you do see other cases between the taking over of Christianity you know with its sexual taboo sexual sin lust is horrid Abomination you do see exceptions of that across the world in the meantime for instance in Vietnam you have lihan this princess which managed she managed to form this
Uh well there was a cult formed around her in Vietnam that was an ensemble of women this lihan was suppressed by the Communist Party when that came to be this cult was thought of as an extension to taoism and after that suppression came into popularity again
This was hard for me to find information on though but I I did want to give it some lip service because there is a lot of debate on this subject of for instance what does the cult practice what what does it look like when is this
Is this Leah Han uh an actual person is it is it a made-up story if it was a person it seems like she would be dated towards the 1400s to 1500s in actual life and was made Mythic after but these festivals these ceremonies around leahan celebrate this disposition towards
Freedom of the woman in the sense that Lia Han moved between the heavens and the Earth and was not tied down by Family by children by the expectations of husbands this idea of feminine liberation as it was again this kind of release valve for all this horrible pressure and
Of course I can’t if I were to say that you know Christianity really takes the the cake when it comes to this enforcement of patriarchy it really isn’t the case there this is a much more complex story than that but specifically when it comes to the sexual taboos it
When it comes to the greater story of the West Christianity definitely definitely was the one holding front spear let’s just say but we see here that this such as this case with this case in Vietnam where there are exceptions throughout this time to this overruling approach towards the the woman towards sexuality and
We’re really gonna see the fight back the lashing back when it comes to the idea of Sex Magic laughs I’m gonna run through this quickly because I really didn’t want to get too lost I have linked all the books for this in in the description so look through there
If you want to read a lot of these manuscripts written by these occultists that I’m going to talk about briefly are fully available to you anyhow Pascal Beverly Randolph is the first accredited one when it comes to the history of Sex Magic this he’s a very interesting character worthy of research
Beyond the limits of this subject an Eclectic physician who studied spiritualism and magnetism a part of the rosicrucian fraternity in 1846 brought allegedly brought the rosicrucian wisdom from his visit in Europe where he allegedly was in the midst of Levi which is a big name in in the history of occultism following this
Trip he brings this back starts the order or revitalizes the order here in the states through a cult ritual through Reading and uncovering these ancient manuscripts so forth Randolph would ultimately come to focus a linchpin on the idea of Will and here comes you know it’s going to come up later with Crowley
Do what thou will exercising volition through thought this this specific idea too of coming up with the idea of blending which would be to channel the soul of the deceased while also maintaining the will of the individual not giving up your body fully to the channeling act by extension
Starts to give advice on issues of sexuality which if you even brought up the subject in this day you would be thought of as one of those free love Pagan types this this belief from Randolph though as it as it blossoms out from this idea of will is to discover the great secret
About sexuality what it’s really on about without the girders of the idea of Christianity and he became infatuated on this mysterious fluid produced by both loving parties when sexually aroused and hypothesized that this fluid had some sort of exact secret tie to marital success and happiness between individuals so this fascination with
This fluid went on accordingly that if one could develop ways to unblock in every way possible the production of this fluid then ecstasy or fulfilling sexual practice would be had this is the beginning of Sex Magic this infatuation with the fluid that mysterious fluid and this goes on the
Next step is Carl Kellner rosicrucian interest in in Freemasonry interest in eastern mysticism World traveler uh learned from three adepts a Sufi the tantric traditions and the Hermetic Brotherhood of Light which is pretty obscure established the great Lodges of Freemasonry put moves so that Freemasonry could accept women into
Their ranks because prior to that purely patriarchal started making the move so that occultism would Embrace women has his own leg in on this game there are many movers and shakers when it comes to the the history of Sex Magic the big one though that I’m I feel like
Doesn’t get the credit deserved is Ida Craddock which she as she was raised was raised a fundamentalist Christian by a mother who converted after having interest in spiritualism and occultism as she was raised she was raised intensely religious and had to know everything about it
So much of the world in every kind of way was completely unknown to Ida as she grew up she was already showing signs that she was highly intelligent from a very early age and her ability to memorize and contend in religious discussions out the gates when she’s in college she right away
Would have been the first female graduate of the University of Pennsylvania but it got retracted she learned stenography she taught it in Philadelphia and wrote a textbook on the subject she was teaching women this skill in order for them to employ themselves and to exercise their own independence radical
This is the 1880s this is radical from here there’s this discovery of occultism and from here she leans fully in tending the theosophical classes at the Unitarian churches cites everything read everything knows everything there is to know about the Bible reads the Hindu uh uh both um both offshoot manuscripts upanishads Vedas
You name it Greek philosophers occultists academics historians anthropologists you name it she was on and went head first into this discourse not just academically but personally with sexual relations as the story starts she had two lovers the first man was a younger man very orthodox not a satisfying lover then she meets
The ex-clergyman the second lover and he is heretical as it’s put and he has taught himself this technique carreza which is the ability to withhold ejaculation her specific intercourse with this man blew the lid off of this taboo undiscovered Heights of sexual ecstasy as it’s put superseding transcending the conventional way
And so this experience was divine now let’s back up a bit the suppression of human sexuality had been in practice for at this point sixteen hundred years straight the absolute suppression of this genuine aspect this innate compulsion as we saw it rev reverentially in the primordial past
So when you let go this is like Dionysus Supreme once you let it go this is her experience of the Divine this esoteric sensuality and where it can be found in all the other explanations of the world through all the different religious Traditions outside of just the one that ruled the day
Accordingly her buddies too bring back the Kama Sutra the anangaranga these things previously mentioned get kind of a Renaissance outside of India because this is beginning the reproach of the subject of sexuality something long left undiscussed and so the Western World emerging from this Victorian complex is objectively trying to investigate
This sexuality and she writes several manuscripts and claimed to be the wife of an Angel this attracted the attention of Crowley and he read her book Heavenly bridegrooms and said amongst many other things that it is one of the most remarkable human documents ever produced it is one of the books of incalculable
Value for every student of occultism no magic library is complete without it quote she would also go on to produce another work called the psychic wedlock and this outlines a Three Degree system of initiation through sexual techniques squarely opposed to exactly what Christianity had always been trying to promulgate
The one put the lid on sexuality two it is run by men this right of husbands over the duties of wives this open discussion of sexual matters really was hugely offensive to people the moralists the the conventionalists the status quo there’s one habit and the open critique that she’s writing
About sexuality but she’s not married and that was a hot that was a hot take how can she know about sexuality if she’s not married because the two the two can’t be thought of as different at this time and what she does is she says that she’s married to an
Angel like I said named self and that this is the psychic wedlock and she’ll show you how she wrote this whole manuscript showing you how and that and then says is this not what the Virgin Mary did she not become yes in psychic wedlock with the Heavenly bridegroom
Isn’t this exactly what you want me to do amazingly amazing oh uh please look into her more a quote from the confessions of Crowley the nightmare world of Christianity vanished at that Dawn the detestable mysteries of sex were transformed into joy and Beauty and the obsession of sin fell from my shoulders
Into a sea of Oblivion this all of this is liberation this is the this is the Snapback it took this long to get enough Gusto to get enough inertia Sex Magic practiced through facilitated conjured through occultism Harkens back to the Pagan past Harkens back to the Paleolithic wishes to revive the innate state
Of The Human Condition this although you can consider it extreme certainly you certainly can and and it has to be because it’s dealing with polarities it must be extreme to try to work out some sort of Greater balance to this horrible oppressive seriousness that had been overtaking humankind for 1600 years
And of course Crowley would lean full in he would do anything he could to make them revile you know whether he was masturbating or making a part of this ritual acts of homosexuality just to get them to gawk because he would be anything to spite this anything to get
In the way of this anything that could be done and this act too and he he’s the one that brings up the idea of Tantra as being somehow related to this act of Sex Magic and this is a misconception I can use this Podium to clear this up
The association with Crowley and Tantra is this very loose knowledge that he had of Tantra Tantra would be utilizing the esoteric Tantra would be utilizing what would otherwise be your sexual energy or sexual motivation and to point that instead towards spiritual motivation or spiritual pattern so much of what Humanity does in
Much of what motivates us is sexuality putting ourselves in certain places to with the potential to meet certain people or putting ourselves in in subjects of Love or facilitating greater um um you know Beauty for instance or or longwithstanding relationships you know this idea of connecting sexuality can be
The central impetus towards what we do and to instead use that power because it’s very powerful point it towards something else point it towards a supreme motivation that is what Tantra does whereas Crowley’s associations are from different spaces but Tantra would be associated with Crowley so from this day forward there
Is still this conception that Tantra is is like Crowley’s Sex Magic and that’s what they do when in fact as I kept looking into this I can’t find anything that substantiates that other than Crowley’s association with bringing up Tantra and the fact that it was unknown and the previously mentioned tantric
Motivation to solicit facilitate Point Sexual Energy towards other means so that is everything I wanted to touch on that is effectively the history of uh human sexuality and religion but I want to take the time to point to a few things here so where are we at now and
This taboo still exists this taboo is still it’s weakening but it’s still pounding at the doors of people’s psyche when it comes to shame when it comes to that’s not proper and these taboos of the Christian aim have always been the same this this uh vehement Fundamentalist disapproval of homosexuality
Goes back to this idolatry leads to Ill human acts pornia and leads to natural disaster you don’t don’t Sodom and gomorrahs basically in that’s where they stand and they they’ve remained firm these innumerable people across all these years they’ve stayed firm on that but the the secular let’s just call it
That the other was brought about like this this more candid this more like hey do what thou Wilt hey you can do that we’re not gonna shame you right you can you can exercise yourself you could ex you can uh facilitate your desires right you can become of yourself
Self-actualize this was really this door that we can exercise now was broken open by Traditions like sex Magic foreign our most primordial self is unashamed and better understands the natural power and nuance that comes with sexuality not power over but Power with sexuality and the wisdom of how this
Impulse this this impulse towards expansion towards unification is magical sincere authentic deep into the very essence of our being made us something to be at all so I have no calling card here this is the history I I don’t know where it goes but this is where it’s been
And this is why the climate looks the way it looks we still have the old man and we have this revival simultaneously existing in our psyches battling for room as it’s been for about a hundred years now and specifically talking the Western World so that was fun bye for now
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