THE DEGREE OF KNIGHT OF EAST AND WEST (K.E.W.)
Reconstructed by Basileus O.T.O.
1. Opening:
“I, the Perfect Initiate, who has finished the Earth Cycle, who was conceived and born, who lived and died, who was elevated and annihilated, hereby name myself the Knight of East and West and set forth to journey the world, to the East and to the West, as well as upwards and downwards on the Axis Mundi, to propagate my law and do my will. I shall find my star and coalesce with it.”
2. The utmost saturation of the Macrocosm with the outer Sun, actualization of the inward current from the outside. This may be performed as an invocation with ceremonial circumambulation of the temple and drawing of relevant invoking hexagrams. Visualize and feel the light entering you.
– East (Fire):
O Sun of the Dawn, manifesting with might and power, granting the scepter and the globe to the Kings of Earth! Sun manifest and animating, mighty and wrathful! Consecrate my Body and Spirit with rays of thine Power! (The Emperor, Aries, Fire)
O Sun, manifested in actions and ordeals, granting wealth and wisdom to any worker! Sun creating and incarnating, saturating and feeding! Consecrate my Body and Spirit with rays of thine Works! (The Hierophant, Taurus, Earth)
O Sun, revealed in color and inspiration, granting joy and glory of Life! Sun playing and emanating light, caressing with iridescence! Consecrate my Body and Spirit with rays of thine Glory! (The Lovers, Gemini, Air)
– South (Earth)
O Sun of Day, appearing at the very height, granting stability and maturity! Sun preserving and leading to summits of Happiness! Consecrate my Body and Spirit with rays of thine Persistence! (The Chariot, Cancer, Water)
O Sun manifested in might and lust, granting love and endurance! Sun triumphant and fierce, invincible and coveted! Consecrate my Body and Spirit with rays of thine Triumph! (Lust, Leo, Fire)
O Sun manifested in chastity and innocence, granting intelligence and foresight! Sun tender and humble, frugal and patient! Consecrate my Body and Spirit with rays of thine Purity! (The Hermit, Virgo, Earth)
– West (Air)
O Sun of Evening, manifesting in measure and justice, granting balance and destiny! Sun merciless and beneficent, stern and flawless! Consecrate my Body and Spirit with rays of thine Truth! (Adjustment, Libra, Air)
O Sun manifested in the accomplishment of all accomplishments, granting redemption by death! Sun baneful and showing the secret path, hidden, impartial, overtaking beggars and kings! Consecrate my Body and Spirit with rays of thine Redemption! (Death, Scorpio, Water)
O Sun manifested in Knowledge and Secrecy, granting that which is beyond life and death! Sun burning the boundaries between dream and reality, revealing the eternity without landmarks! Consecrate my Body and Spirit with rays of thine Mystery! (The Constellation of Ophiuchus)
O Sun manifested in the union of opposites, granting fruit and ecstasy! Sun revivifying and slaying, melding and transmuting! Consecrate my Body and Spirit with rays of thine Transformation! (Art, Sagittarius, Fire)
– North (Water)
O Sun of Night, manifesting in revealing and unexpectedness, granting the torch and the cup! Sun being born and returning, raping and dispersing, blinding, sublimating, impregnating matter with spirit! Consecrate my Body and Spirit with rays of thine Penetration! (The Devil, Capricornus, Earth)
O Sun manifested in equilibrium and immortality, turning hard to liquid! Sun warming and clearing, showing paths and melting snows, gazing at the high and the low, the outer and the inner! Consecrate my Body and Spirit with rays of thine Aspiration! (The Star, Aquarius, Air)
O Sun manifested in reflection and concealment, granting mirages and experiences! Sun hiding and wandering, enduring and anticipating! Consecrate my Body and Spirit with rays of thine Return! (The Moon, Pisces, Water)
Make the Sign of Silence. Light enters your body to its very depths, awakening the foundation, and rises through the spinal column – upwards.
3. Actualization of the outward current from the inside, the light rises through the spinal column. Focus on emotions and feelings awoken by the text.
Earth/Muladhara
I am the risen mighty and ancient snake, spirit and blood! The heart pulsating with life! Conceived in chaos! I am instinct, and I am god! I am the affect! Since the beginning of times! I have conquered the past! I am the ritual! I have shackled the future! I dwell in the deepest chasms, in the darkest depths! I am succession itself! I am savagery! The predatory killer! Dissolving myself, I assemble myself! Assembling myself, I dissolve myself! I am immortal, for I am nothing! I am the lord of death and revival! I am within them and without them. I slay and I am slain. I have conquered fear! I am speech and logos! I bind and kill! I devour myself on the right and revive myself on the left! I revive myself on the right and devour myself on the left! But there is no right and no left, no front and no back, no top and no bottom. I entangle space and time in my embrace. I show the paths leading nowhere! As a lightning I appear in the East! As pits, hollows, as lava of volcanoes and roaring of monsters, in the South! As whirlpools, storms, and hurricanes, in the West! As a rainbow I twist in the North! A scream of a wild Beast! Ruthlessness of incinerating fire! I am the link above the chasm! I am the chasm! My poison flows as rivers of terror! I tangle time; I bind the knots of memory! I breathe the aromas of sacrifice and offerings! I am the rage of great rages! Madness! Fury! Wild heat of ecstasy! I rip everything to pieces! Sight of an eagle! Fury of a lion! Rage of an ox! Snake and lion! The mound amidst waters! Fountains of blood of all times! Aggression, of which the only escape is death! Primeval cruelty, risen from the depths! I satiate myself with blood and blind the world with poison! I am power, force and will! Will without limit! I am the Sphinx that shall become the Phoenix! The Beast liberated!
Moon/Svadhisthana
Hecate filled me with dazzling caresses of the virgin, limitless love of the mother, and wanton cough of the crone! I devoured her whole in rage of my desire! Cursed be waiting, wandering is futile! Now I am she! Killed and desired! She was cursing me as I was awaking, she begged for mercy, but my love and hatred tore her womb asunder. From now on, my phallus is pregnant with pure and dazzling death! I know: the waters of Styx shall carry me from caves to the ocean!
Venus/Svadhisthana
Venus wanted to lull me to sleep with her embrace, luring me to decaying lodges of my weakness. She was devouring my strength and multiplying my weakness, but I turned her into a toad and fully sated myself with her. I gave birth to her child and sacrificed it to future accomplishments. O how its bones were crunching on my teeth! O how its blood was boiling in my bosom! And there was nothing left, for not the two are destined to ascend, but one! Nay, none!
Mercury/Svadhisthana
Mercury made me choose between one and one, but I devoured his alternatives. I united myself with every idea, accepting the image of its opposition. In my ecstasy, waters of birth and flame of destruction are one! Force without resistance! Will without coercion! Choice without hesitation! Unconditional ascension!
Sun/Manipura
Sun was showing me a place and telling that it is mine. Its rays pierced my heart, and blood of life outpoured from it, flooding all things with my love and compassion, being soaked in disgust and contempt of all things towards me. Hot miasmata of earthly creatures rose like snakes to the source of light, intoxicating the birds of heaven and making them cry in joyful fervor: “Arise! Arise! Pierce! Pierce! Wrap us with your warmth!
Desiccate and incinerate! Kill! Kill! Grant us death! Exceed! Exceed!” Blood ran dry; there was no more love, nor disgust, nor compassion, nor contempt, nor life, nor death. Sun faded, and darkness reigned, and I became nowhere, everywhere and anywhere.
Mars/Anahata
Mars was setting me on enemies. He filled my ears with fierce roar and calls to rape them and hack them to pieces with the sword of my wrath and the axe of my hatred, to cut their heads off on the block of my mercilessness. I was choking with bloodlust mixed with wild terror, hearing their nearing war-cry and their insults. And I renounced from everything, and threw the remains of my life to the fiery gulf of passion, letting them burn completely. And then I became the fury of warring sides, and ascended.
Jupiter/Anahata/Vishuddha
Jupiter endowed me with everything: wealth, health, harems, and all kingdoms of earth, heaven, and hell. There was no limit to his generosity, magnanimity, and mercy. Yet I gazed upon these generous gifts and saw nothing that did not belong to me already. I saw everything like myself in a reflection. Spasms of roaring laughter shackled my throat. The miserable godling attempted to show what was mine as belonging to another, and was slain, for he was simply trying to pass as myself.
Saturn/Vishuddha/Ajna
Saturn caught me in the snares of reason. He cut me between the eyebrows and said that time is up. I saw sands of time surrendering to waves of infinity on the bed of holy marriage. The waves tore the boundaries, they tore differences and landmarks! And I, blinded by darkness of their unfathomable depths, went toward them to let the memory of me be washed from chronicles of the world. I slew myself and soared as the Phoenix!
Neptune/Ajna/Sahasrara
Neptune sent intoxicating storms upon me. I wandered in their labyrinths, obtaining visions and grasping the essence of all things. The unknowable became known, and knowable drowned in gloom of absurdity. The old god himself had to be pulled by the beard and drowned in his own vomit. And then I drank the waters of Neptune – the true elixir of life and death – and in their fathomless depths the dazzling light of infinite heights was revealed to me.
Pluto/Sahasrara
Pluto wanted to bare me to fulfill my ultimate destiny, but when I shed my clothes, my hides and covers, there was nothing left. The Secret of Secrets! The Ecstasy of Ecstasies! The Sun of the Abyss has risen!
Uranus/Sahasrara
I was reproducing myself, replenishing myself, I commanded, loved, enjoyed and coalesced in holy marriage. I rose to the highest heaven of Uranus, and could not discern it from the deepest abyss. For there are no differences anymore! All is one; all is none! The light above! The light below! The light in all directions! The light limitless! I dissolved in it and disappeared, and only the silent echo of my ecstasy fills the world and calls after me and beyond – there is no limit!
4. “I have embraced East and West, and now my star lights the world shaken and turned inside out!”
© Fr. Aumgn & co, Basileus O.T.O., 2017