{Christ and the Circle}[27th September 1989]

[Redbook6:273][19890927:2051]{Christ and the Circle}[27th September 1989]

19890927....

.2051

Christ is not exactly on the Circle: he is above the Circle of Angels, and among the Archangels his place or degree is is represented by I~.

‘Christopher’ is the designation given to one who bears Christ supreme within him around the Circle (including, I guess, +C†I~) – for Christ is not bound to any degree.*

**

*[in the sense of location, station or radial angle, not in a quantitative, qualifying or modifying sense]

**{cf [[Redbook6:270][19890923:2059]{The C~ Card}[23rd September 1989],] 270}

[& [Redbook6:266-267][19890918:1015c]{Evil (5): The Devil and A~}[18th September 1989], para 1 (parenthesis) <20200601iib>]

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{A Dream: Inappropriately Undressed}[26th September 1989]

[Redbook6:272-273][19890926:2135]{A Dream: Inappropriately Undressed}[26th September 1989]

19890926.2135

A curious and rather embarrassing – in more ways than one – experience the night before last (I think): on warm nights, which it was, I generally sleep naked.  While still asleep, I became aware of myself lying in bed, with a feeling related to that sense of integrity which I used to experience in dreams of a particular significance:* almost describable as a feeling of grace, as though I was in a real (not just an actual) Church in an inner sense.  But I was also embarrassed to be naked, in bed: I did know that I was in bed.  The embarrassment was not so much social, as a feeling of spiritual inappropriateness.  I awoke, wide awake and rather hot, as I often used to after dreams of a particular significance. 

This is fascinating.  I never used to bother about sleeping naked while dreaming those dreams, nor did I think of myself as naked in the dreams.  Nor did I – nor do I – believe that nakedness is, in itself, wrong.  Can it be that what is appropriate then, is simply no longer appropriate?  – See Michelangelo’s Putti on the Sistine Chapel ceiling.**
***


*[ref eg [Redbook2:176-177][19801126:0050a]{(A Dream of Teaching [continued]:) ...and the Vehicle.}[26th November 1980];
[Redbook2:222][19820215:2340]{Integrity}[15th February 1982];
& cf [Redbook5:302][19880817:(am)]{Integrity}[17th August 1988]]  

**[There does not seem to be any other reference to this in these Journals;*** but it presumably refers to the point made by commentators that the state of dress/undress of the attendant genii tends to progress from one end of the ceiling to the other, and may be symbolic of spiritual progress or condition.]

***In fact, as a symbol it is at a particular stage appropriate ((ie J~-G~-R~-C~ increasingly, and (perhaps decreasingly, perhaps not) c-r~-g~→?). Although I have always imagined (S~)[xA](s~) as more fully clothed than anyone else – only face and hands showing, and a garment like a monk’s habit; hood usually down – I suspect that the dream has more to do with actual (and absurd) concerns about the appearance of being a parish priest: I had previously checked myself from wondering (ridiculously) whether a p[arish] p[riest] ought to be naked in bed! There is an after-echo, of this dream having been in a church; I do not know whether that is contemporaneous. <891002>
{cf IV [[Redbook4:221-222][19871213:2005e]{Walking with the Fair-haired Girl [continued (5)]}[13th December 1987],] 221}

****[But see [Redbook8:122][19901208:1843a]{Ritual Nakedness}[8th December 1990], fn=*<20221101>]

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{Insanity of the Right}[25th September 1989]

[Redbook6:271][19890925:0000]{Insanity of the Right}[25th September 1989]

19890925.

The two men interviewed on ‘Everyman’* yesterday, **who had both killed their wives (one with her lover), showed interesting parallels: both were highly self-controlled men (showing how self-control and self-discipline are not adequate definitions of Temperance*** at r~); both wives were clearly lively characters (one French, the other Irish), and both wives had cancer. One murder occurred on, or just after, Christmas Day.

Saul’s progression, described to me recently by someone, from envy of David through melancholic depression to murderous rage, suggests a slight revision of the circle of insanities:

****

[Text extracted from ms diagram reproduced above:]

	(Sloth)		(& Paranoia)****	C			(Pride)
		R~		Epilepsy?		S~
			Schizophrenia		Over-inhibition
G~				+				M~
(Envy)			Nervous Breakdown		Depression#			(Avarice)
		J~		Manic Depression &c		U~
	(Gluttony)			A~			(Lechery)
				(Anger)

This is by no means necessarily a dynamic progression: rather, a static pattern. But Saul’s movement from Envy could have been checked at C and turned round towards loving kindness, instead of passing through pride and melancholy to murderous black rage.

*BBC1 TV ‘Everyman’.

**{cf earlier Vol (IV?) [] ?}

***[T.XIV]

****Paranoia is often considered a variety of schizophrenia (E[nyclopaedia] B[ritannica] 9:767.

#& per [[Redbook6:208-209][19890815:1405c]{The Circles of the Spirit [continued (3)]}[15th August 1989],] p209

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{The C Card}[23rd September 1989]

[Redbook6:270][19890923:2059]{The C Card}[23rd September 1989]

19890923.2059

A likely reason* why no card was inserted between T.XIII and T.XIV at the C degree of the Circle, is that the only possible figure for the card, Christ, would have led to producers and users probably being burnt at the stake – in the era when these cards first appeared.

19890925.1245

The Fool, [T.]0, being numberless, may move anywhere; on the other hand, his position at C~ fills this gap, and Christ is indeed the Holy Fool; not through being foolish, but through his perception and deliberate lack of diplomacy: as the Jester or Joker is the King’s Fool, and as the small boy was to the Emperor who had no clothes.

*{(But see [[Redbook6:273][19890926:2135#]{Christ and the Circle}[26th September 1989],] 273)}

{cf V. [[Redbook5:209][19880717:1610d]{Tarot Jokers}[17th July 1988],] 209}

[& [Redbook4:28-33][19870709:2358]{The Invisible Cards}[9^th July 1987]ff,

& esp [Redbook4:31-32][19870710:0855d]{The Invisible Cards [continued(6)]}[10^th July 1987];

& [Redbook4:253][19871221:1955d]{The Tarot Pack [continued (6)]}[21st December 1987]]

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{Deuteronomic Circles today}[18th September 1989]

[Redbook6:270][19890918:2235]{Deuteronomic Circles today}[18th September 1989]

.2235c

Why don’t I try to account for sequences in detail, * instead of just establishing patterns?

– Years and years ago, being of a rather right-wing inclination, I remarked how one generation would forget the lessons which led its predecessor [generation] to act with discipline against the problems of its own inheritance.

This is, of course, quite inadequate; but at the same time, so far as the outer circle is concerned, there is not much more to be said.

*{cf [[Redbook6:159-160][19890718:1601]{Deuteronomic Circles and Fertility Rites}[18th July 1989],] 159,

[[Redbook6:206-207][19890814:1600]{Deuteronomic Circles and the Voice of Conscience}[14th August 1989],] 206}

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{The Dark Night of the Soul (2)}[18th September 1989]

[Redbook6:269][19890918:2030]{The Dark Night of the Soul (2)}[18th September 1989]

.2030

[I have] r[ead] ‘The Dark Night of the Soul’.* (I had in the past** been unable to read past Book II, Ch[apter] III*** owing to a kind of psychological block – perhaps because I had not myself passed that point).

I now fit St. John of the Cross as follows:

#

[The layout of the text in the ms diagram reproduced above is too complex to be represented in a text table.]

Note that per [St] John [of the] Cross, on the 10^th step the soul has left the body, and departed from this life (ie the body is dead)#

The Dark Night of the Senses is a gradual process, but marked. The Dark Night of the Spirit is accurately described, if you can get through all the verbiage. I sometimes think, though, that St. John [of the] Cross misses the point of many of the phenomena which he describes so precisely.

#**

In other words, his cast of mind is mediaeval.

Thank God I’ve finished it at last!

#***

*St. John of the Cross, ‘The Dark Night of the Soul’:James Clarke, Cambridge, 1973.

**ref [[Redbook6:226-227][19890908:1619]{The Dark Night of the Soul (1)}[8th September 1989],] 226-7{→}

***([ibid] p78)

****cf Vol III? [See fn#*** below]

#For details of ladder see [[Redbook6:226-227][19890908:1619]{The Dark Night of the Soul (1)}[8th September 1989],] 227, and

D[ark] N[ight of the] S[oul] II: XIX-XX

For Colours, D[ark] N[ight of the] S[oul II: XXI

For imperfections of [… unfinished note]

#*– D[ark] N[ight of the] S[oul], II:XX:5-6

#**{There is also a strong vein of suppressed eroticism.

(Look who’s talking!)}

#***{cf III. [[Redbook3:37-38][19870326:1543r]{Corruption and Aridity: The Dark Night of the Soul}[26^th March 1987],] 37-8,

V. [[Redbook5:109][19880320:2300]{The Dark Night}[20th March 1988]] 109}

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{Love and Sex (7)}[18th September 1989]

[Redbook6:268][19890918:1534]{Love and Sex (7)}[18th September 1989]

.1534

*Cultures can be divided, I’ve no doubt, in many ways, and one of them is this: by which a man,|** wandering alone in the forest, comes across a moonlit or a sunlit glade, and within it, intent upon her own affairs (as it might be, bathing in the stream) and utterly unconscious of him, a young woman, naked and perfectly lovely – lovely, that is, to perfection.

In one culture – the high culture: of Greek mythology for the most part, of mediaeval chivalry, I believe of Edwardian Britain – he watches, spellbound, for a moment of pure enchantment; and then, recollecting himself, silently steals away: either to court her, without ever telling her, or at least until his courtship is successful, of his vision; or alternatively, never to see her again except in a treasured memory.

The point is what he would do, not so much in actual life, but in fiction: and what he would be expected to do in actual life, by the norms of acceptable behaviour.

In the other culture, – the low culture, our culture – he, with a cry: ‘Worrrr! Getta bitta that then!’ leaps on her. Even in fiction.***

*{[[Redbook6:212-213][19890818:1554c]{Love and Sex (6)}[18th August 1989],] 212→}

**(long interruption)

***{→ [[Redbook6:280-281][19890929:1727#]{A Dream: Of Following xS}[29th September 1989],] 280,

[[Redbook6:281-283][19890929:1727#]{Love and Sex (8)}[29th September 1989],] 281}

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{(Extract: Wisdom through the Love of the Holy Spirit)}[18th September 1989]

[Redbook6:267][19890918:1353]{(Extract: Wisdom through the Love of the Holy Spirit)}[18th September 1989]

.1353

*‘First, this dark contemplation is called secret, because it is, as I have said before, the mystical theology which theologians call secret wisdom,[#] and which, according to St. Thomas,** is infused into the soul more especially by love.*** This happens in a secret hidden way in which the natural operations of the understanding and other faculties have no share. And therefore, because the faculties of the soul cannot compass it, it being the Holy Ghost*** who infuses it into the soul, in a way it knoweth not, as the Bride saith in the canticle,**** we call it secret.’

*John Cross, D[ark] N[ight of the S[oul], II, XVII:1

**St. Thom.2^da 2^dae qu. 180, art. 1

***NB [linked by arrows; & NB also #]

****Cant. VI.11

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{Evil (5): The Devil and A~}[18th September 1989]

[Redbook6:266-267][19890918:1015c]{Evil (5): The Devil and A~}[18th September 1989]

19890918.1015

- - - -

*It is unwise to assume too easily that the Devil is evil, and the source of all evil. Evil is found in ourselves: wilful separation of ourselves from God. The Devil’s function, I suspect, is to bring out the evil in us: hence his degree at the bottom of the outer circle, anti-Christ, where A~, Angel of Separation and Death, is to be found (They are the same and yet not the same, much as Christ and +C†I~ are the same and yet not the same). Hence also he is not only named the Adversary, but also the Accuser.

We like to suppress the evil in ourselves, to pretend, like the hypocrites we are, that it does not exist; the Devil’s job, in fact the job of all devils, is to uncover it. Unless it can be uncovered, and our selfish centres fragmented and overturned in the following degrees,** there is not much chance of repentance, death of the selfish centre, transformation in Christ, and re-birth through Love.***

*{←[[Redbook6:140-141][19890630:2308c]{Evil (4)}[30th June 1989],] 141[→]}

**[ie the degrees following]

***{cf{→} [[Redbook6:273-275][19890926:2051]{Evil (6): The Devil, and A~}[26th September 1989],] 273-4}

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{Dream: Of a Fair-haired young woman}[18th September 1989]

[Redbook6:266][19890918:1015b]{Dream: Of a Fair-haired young woman}[18th September 1989]

19890918.1015

A curious snatch of a dream this morning in which two of us looked over the edge of a river bank and saw, (rather to our surprise) on the foreshore, a fair-haired young woman, naked but spattered with pale mud (a pale yellow-brown clay colour only just distinguishable from the slightly paler colour of her own skin), walking around a little bent over and with her head down in an attitude suggestive, not of looking for something, but in some way of having just found her feet and of being still, perhaps, a little disoriented. She did not seem to notice us; and after a moment, I think we moved away.*

*{ie the Soul having just ?crossed the river of rebirth (r~) but still very slightly staining the Spirit – a little darker than the colour of the Soul. (Presumably the unveiling [of the Soul] is a more-or-less continuing process – I hope!}

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{The Reception of Truth}[18th September 1989]

[Redbook6:265][19890918:1015]{The Reception of Truth}[18th September 1989]

19890918.1015

‘It is a philosophical axiom that all that is received is received according to the condition of the recipient.’*

Exactly.

*St John of the Cross, ‘The Dark Night of the Soul’, Jas Clrke, Cambridge, 1973.

II:Xvi, s6 (p149) [presumably from the preliminary introduction]

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{The Hope Anchor*}[17th September 1989]

[Redbook6:265][19890917:0957]{The Hope Anchor*}[17th September 1989]

19890917.0957

‘Anchor: symbol of stability in the classical world, adopted in Christian iconography of 2^nd century as a symbol of hope.’**

[Text extracted from ms diagram reproduced above:]

		|
		|
(Charity)	G	+	M~	(Faith)
		|
		A~
		Hope

*{A pub in Rye [, Sussex]: when taken there from [primary-level boarding school], [the writer] used to think of it as ‘The Ho Panchor’}

**N[ew] J[erusalem] B[ible] Heb[rews] 6:20, note g.

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