Malkuth

1. I AM the Clarion call of the Beyond,Reverberating myselfthroughout the Garden of Delight.I am thy Breath of Life,O child of Eden,Pervading thee with the perfumed fragrance of my Spirit.Thy very Self am I,O Israel,And Self of ALL THAT IS.

   Deluded by the illusion of personal independence,The uninstructed mistake the descent of My Powerfrom the Life Breath of RUACHFor an ascent of power from my manifestations in MALKUTH.

   Know ye that never does powerHave its beginning in that which is below.It doth ascend from earth to Heaven,Even as Hermes saith,And from Heaven it descendeth again to earth,As also he hath it.Yet remember, that whatsoever the Sages write,Is always veiled,Lest the profane burn themselveswith the fires they know not how to direct.Thus canst thou seeThat they who read the words of the Sageswith the outer eye alone,Mistake the inner import.Dost thou aspire to, the heightof the Sphere of the Sun ?Worthy is thine aspiration.But many are called and few chosen,For only if thou canst understand the written wordwith thine heart,Canst thou perceive that even thy aspirationCometh not from the levels of GUPH and NEPHESH,But is truly the reflectionof My descending power from RUACH.

   Always then is aspirationLike the reflected image of the Sun in a glass,Which, if it striketh straight into the eyes,Seemeth to be the Sun itself.No man riseth to RUACH by his own power.Yet many delude themselves concerning this,And from that delusion spring up many weeds of error.Know ye that the least of thine impulsestowards what seemeth to be Above,Hath its source in that same Above.Avoid error by keeping fast to this.Nothing in the levels of YESOD and MALKUTH,Ever can or doth set power into operation.These are but as glasses,And the feelings and interpretationsof the Spheres of Desire and Intellectdirected downward toward YESOD and MALKUTH,Are as spectators watching a mirrored reflectionWherein all is the reverse of the true images.

   In the physical universe of GUPHIs the breaking up of the ONE into the fourwhich are the basis of the many.And to MALKUTH is the GUPH attributed,Because the GUPH cometh not to perfectionbut by the formation of bodies.

   It is written that 'KETHER is in MALKUTHand MALKUTH is in KETHER,but after a different manner.'In KETHER I am the ONE, the Indivisible,But in MALKUTH that same ONE,Which I AM,Appeareth as four and cometh into manifestationAs the ten which returneth unto the ONE.But to enter the Kingdom there must always be two,For the Wheel turneth notbut by the alternation of opposite forces.Yet my Kingdom of ADONAI is not the kingdomof this world's illusion;And the bodies of the servants of ADONAIMust be freed from that illusionEre they may serve as transparent channelsFor the Light which descendeth from Above.The law of ADONAI is other than the laws of men;For in the laws of men hath entered confusion.This must needs be,Since mankind still remaineth a work unfinished.Yet be on guard,Ye who seek to be numbered amongstthe sons and daughters of the true Israel,Lest ye mistake the half-formed conceptsof an earlier stage of growth for final truths.

   The Great Work directeth itself alwaystoward the building of the Temple of ADONAI,And in its earlier stages there are needswhich do not continuethroughout the building process.Yet men mistake the scaffolding for the building itself,And thus pay idolatrous reverence to old ruleswhich have no longer any useful purpose.Watch therefore, O ye who would ruleas the Lord ruleth,Lest ye usurp the rights of the Lord.His and His alone, is the Temple,And ye who are concerned with the buildingare not its owners.Not thine but Mine is the work.Not thine but Mine is the Temple;For Me and Me only is it planned and built,And Mine are the ordinances establishedFor thy guidance in the service of the LightFor truly is KETHER in MALKUTH,And in KETHER I dwell solitary without a second.What think ye then,Hath any man or womanA right of ownership higher than Mine?Mine is thy body,Thou who seekest to find Me.Mine and Mine alone.

   Mine is the Substance of all that cometh intomanifestation through the thought, orword or action of any of Mine instruments.Never shall they who remain deludedby the illusion of separatenessbecome clear channelsfor the Outpouring of My Will,Until all the follies of 'thine' and 'mine'are cleared out by theirresistible downpouring of My Power.

   In the numeration of GUPH,Canst thou see the spiralling Light-powerWorking through the mouth of the Eternal,When lightning flashes, thunder roars,And thunder hath beenfrom time immemoriala symbol for the voice of God.So is thy body, O aspirant,More, far more, than an earthen clod.It is GIMEL, token of the Intelligencethat uniteth thee with the Crown;It is VAV, the nail that joineth theeto the Paternal Wisdom;And it is truly PEH, the mouth of the Lord,For in GUPH are the letters which uniteth theeforever with the Kingdom.

   Yet is all this naught but words.Without the key suppliedby the understanding heart.Love is that key.Love, not reason;For reason followeth after love,And when reason would enslave love,Then is reason but a tyrantPunishing itself with what it trieth in vainto enslave.Love cometh first as thou mayest see in Tarot,Where the Empress cometh before the Emperor.Without love reason is sterile,For love is the generatrix of true imagery.Reason can arrange, reason can harvest;But the harvester weareth alsothe mask of death.

   So this thy body is the instrumentWhereon may be played the Song of Life.Nay, it is more than this;For on this harp of ten thousand strings,The wind of the Spirit moveth ever,And soundeth night and day the melodiesand harmonies of that Eternal Song.

   Yet few there be with ears to hear,For that hearing is too often dulledby the noisy clamor of the world's illusion.Yet he who hath eyes to see, and mind to remember,May see in the very word GUPH,That the heart of its meaninghath to do with Hearing,For what else is VAVbut the heart of the word?And is not VAV at once the special letterOf Ben the Son and the sign of Hearing?

   This thy body, O child of earth and sky,Is truly the heavenly Vision of the Goodnessof the Eternal.This thy body is the Palace of the King;This thy body is the manifested worldof God and man;This thy body is the seamless robe of ADONAI.For I am thy Lord,And the Lord and His Temple are ONE.