Liber XC, v. 38
I who am beyond Wisdom and Folly, arise and say unto you: achieve both weddings! Unite yourselves with both!
Now the speaker of the book (its own angel, or messenger) "arises," i.e. he arrives at the Threshold, the majma' al-bahrayn which is the interior site of the commencement of the Mystery (see v. 33). But he also describes himself as beyond Wisdom and Folly, thus evoking the coincidentia oppositorum which definines the perspective of the Master of the Temple and the attainment to Understanding. Crowley annotates Liber 418 to the effect that "This is the most important of all the doctrines that concern the Supernals, for the Student of the Mysteries."It is shown me that this heart is the heart that rejoiceth, and the serpent is the serpent of Death for herein all the symbols are interchangeable, for each one containeth in itself its own opposite. And this is the great Mystery of the Supernals that are beyond the Abyss. For below the Abyss, contradiction is division; but above the Abyss, contradiction is Unity. And there could be nothing true except by virtue of the contradiction that is contained in itself.
The Vision & the Voice, 5th Aethyr
This union of opposites is no tame median or compromise, it is an active reconciliation that restores the original formlessness of spirit by dissolving crucial and polar differences. This doctrine is adumbrated in the person of the mediating angel Sandalphon in the old G.D. Zelator ritual, as well as the refrain of the Hegemon in the Ritual of the Equinox: "I am the Reconciler between them." But "between" is misleading, in that what is required is a transcending of the division, rather than the mere occupation of its frontier. For the more explicit and enlightened version of the equinoctial litany, we may consult the ultimate aethyr of The Vision & the Voice, wherein the Crowned and Conquering Child declares:I am light, and I am night, and I am that which is beyond them.
I am speech, and I am silence, and I am that which is beyond them.
I am life, and I am death, and I am that which is beyond them.
I am war, and I am peace, and I am that which is beyond them.
I am weakness and I am strength, and I am that which is beyond them.
This idea of the coincidentia oppositorum has a long history in profane Western philosophy, with an important contributor in the 15th century German theologian Nicholas of Cusa, who is often cited as having held that God is the coincidence of opposites. But that is the pale paradox of his later readers, whereas the Cusan himself claimed both in Deo contradictoria coincidunt and Deus super coincidentum contradictoriorum est, after the manner of Ra-hoor-khuit in the First Aethyr. The true attainment is thus beyond Wisdom and Folly, as it is beyond life and death, yet enfolding and embracing these contraries as its own "self-realization through projection in conditioned Form" (Liber Samekh, II:A).I began, Lord, to behold thee in the door of the coincidence of opposites, which the angel guardeth that is set over the entrance into Paradise.
Nicholas of Cusa, The Vision of God
The Cusan quote corresponds interestingly to remarks from a later thinker, the Romantic aesthetician Johann Georg Hamann (1730-1787), who attributed the idea of a divine coincidentia oppositorum to Giordano Bruno. Hamann, known as "the Wizard of the North," was an early modern champion of the augoeides idea, zealously proclaiming the daimonic nature of human creativity. In 1950 Martin Heidegger quoted Hamann as having said, "I am still waiting for an apocalyptic angel with a key to this abyss."
Henry Corbin, who translated Hamann's Aesthetica in Nuce, also employed the coincidentia oppositorum as a device signalling theophanic expressions. He preferred to encode the opposites in a nominative phrase, two examples of which form the title of his work Spiritual Body and Celestial Earth. Corbin also cited Swedenborg's "real apparitions" (apparentiae reales) as an example of coincidentia oppositorum.
Of course, to be beyond Wisdom and Folly is evocative of one of Nietzsche's most renowned works, Beyond Good and Evil, in which he heaps scorn upon the fact that "The fundamental faith of the metaphysicians is the faith in opposite values." (Section 2, emphasis in original) Crowley later wrote "Chinese Music" in The Book of Lies, following in Nietzsche's footsteps:"White is white" is the lash of the overseer; "white is black" is the watchword of the slave; the Master takes no heed.
Affirmations and denials of distinctions equally maintain them; they shore up the same fence from opposite sides. And yet another quote from Nietzsche brings us back to this verse of Liber Tzaddi:Whatever is done from love always occurs beyond good and evil.
Beyond Good and Evil, 153
The union or wedding is an expression of love under will, and whether the partner is drawn from the abyss of depth or the abyss of height, the act transcends and elevates its parties. Thus the angel of the book exhorts the aspirant to join himself to both the aright spirit and the averse, to become the coincidentia oppositorum, and to come to Understanding as a function of Love under will.
Now the speaker of the book (its own angel, or messenger) "arises," i.e. he arrives at the Threshold, the majma' al-bahrayn which is the interior site of the commencement of the Mystery (see v. 33). But he also describes himself as beyond Wisdom and Folly, thus evoking the coincidentia oppositorum which definines the perspective of the Master of the Temple and the attainment to Understanding. Crowley annotates Liber 418 to the effect that "This is the most important of all the doctrines that concern the Supernals, for the Student of the Mysteries."It is shown me that this heart is the heart that rejoiceth, and the serpent is the serpent of Death for herein all the symbols are interchangeable, for each one containeth in itself its own opposite. And this is the great Mystery of the Supernals that are beyond the Abyss. For below the Abyss, contradiction is division; but above the Abyss, contradiction is Unity. And there could be nothing true except by virtue of the contradiction that is contained in itself.
The Vision & the Voice, 5th Aethyr
This union of opposites is no tame median or compromise, it is an active reconciliation that restores the original formlessness of spirit by dissolving crucial and polar differences. This doctrine is adumbrated in the person of the mediating angel Sandalphon in the old G.D. Zelator ritual, as well as the refrain of the Hegemon in the Ritual of the Equinox: "I am the Reconciler between them." But "between" is misleading, in that what is required is a transcending of the division, rather than the mere occupation of its frontier. For the more explicit and enlightened version of the equinoctial litany, we may consult the ultimate aethyr of The Vision & the Voice, wherein the Crowned and Conquering Child declares:I am light, and I am night, and I am that which is beyond them.
I am speech, and I am silence, and I am that which is beyond them.
I am life, and I am death, and I am that which is beyond them.
I am war, and I am peace, and I am that which is beyond them.
I am weakness and I am strength, and I am that which is beyond them.
This idea of the coincidentia oppositorum has a long history in profane Western philosophy, with an important contributor in the 15th century German theologian Nicholas of Cusa, who is often cited as having held that God is the coincidence of opposites. But that is the pale paradox of his later readers, whereas the Cusan himself claimed both in Deo contradictoria coincidunt and Deus super coincidentum contradictoriorum est, after the manner of Ra-hoor-khuit in the First Aethyr. The true attainment is thus beyond Wisdom and Folly, as it is beyond life and death, yet enfolding and embracing these contraries as its own "self-realization through projection in conditioned Form" (Liber Samekh, II:A).I began, Lord, to behold thee in the door of the coincidence of opposites, which the angel guardeth that is set over the entrance into Paradise.
Nicholas of Cusa, The Vision of God
The Cusan quote corresponds interestingly to remarks from a later thinker, the Romantic aesthetician Johann Georg Hamann (1730-1787), who attributed the idea of a divine coincidentia oppositorum to Giordano Bruno. Hamann, known as "the Wizard of the North," was an early modern champion of the augoeides idea, zealously proclaiming the daimonic nature of human creativity. In 1950 Martin Heidegger quoted Hamann as having said, "I am still waiting for an apocalyptic angel with a key to this abyss."
Henry Corbin, who translated Hamann's Aesthetica in Nuce, also employed the coincidentia oppositorum as a device signalling theophanic expressions. He preferred to encode the opposites in a nominative phrase, two examples of which form the title of his work Spiritual Body and Celestial Earth. Corbin also cited Swedenborg's "real apparitions" (apparentiae reales) as an example of coincidentia oppositorum.
Of course, to be beyond Wisdom and Folly is evocative of one of Nietzsche's most renowned works, Beyond Good and Evil, in which he heaps scorn upon the fact that "The fundamental faith of the metaphysicians is the faith in opposite values." (Section 2, emphasis in original) Crowley later wrote "Chinese Music" in The Book of Lies, following in Nietzsche's footsteps:"White is white" is the lash of the overseer; "white is black" is the watchword of the slave; the Master takes no heed.
Affirmations and denials of distinctions equally maintain them; they shore up the same fence from opposite sides. And yet another quote from Nietzsche brings us back to this verse of Liber Tzaddi:Whatever is done from love always occurs beyond good and evil.
Beyond Good and Evil, 153
The union or wedding is an expression of love under will, and whether the partner is drawn from the abyss of depth or the abyss of height, the act transcends and elevates its parties. Thus the angel of the book exhorts the aspirant to join himself to both the aright spirit and the averse, to become the coincidentia oppositorum, and to come to Understanding as a function of Love under will.