47 lines
2.2 KiB
Plaintext
47 lines
2.2 KiB
Plaintext
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BAPHOMET Xø
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Preface
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to the Revised
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Rituals of the O.T.O.
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As Presented to
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Frater Superior Merlin Xø
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What follows is Baphomet XIø's Preface to his revised rituals of 0ø-n-
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IIIø O.T.O., which were subsequently adopted by Frater Superior Merlin
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Xø and the Supreme Council of the O.T.O. This document probably dates
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from circa 1914 E.V.--H.B.
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WHEREAS THE INSTITUTION of Free Masonry has fallen to complete and
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deserved contempt among all men, but especially among true Masons, and
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whereas the traditional knowledge which it was designed to guard has
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been lost, degenerated, prostituted, or exploited, and whereas,
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especially in America, the institution serves as little else but a
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cloak for the operations of various gangs of swindlers, be it resolved
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by Us, the authorized representatives of its highest degrees and the
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faithful depositories of its ancient secrets, that the present
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machinery for communicating those secrets, be declared obsolete and
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the work of all who may unlawfully attempt to usurp Our authority be
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declared void and of no effect. Be it further resolved that Our own
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powers be, during the period of reconstruction, concentrated in a
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single dictator. Be it further resolved that the whole symbolism of
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Free Masonry, and its name, be disused, that the true traditional
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knowledge be communicated in hieroglyphs unmistakably significant,
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although with the proper guards, in Rituals of first rate literary and
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dramatic merit, and so constructed that they shall require neither a
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gathering of many men nor expensive elaborations for their operation.
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The Rituals, herewith submitted, are offered, subject to modifications
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made by the author in such sense as the Council may deem necessary, as
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illustrations of the proposed work up to the Third Degree. It may be
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added in explanation, that the Minerval Degree represents the
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attraction of a wandering God, or `Ego', within the Solar System--that
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the Fourth Degree, of which the Ritual is not yet complete, represents
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the glorified state of the initiated Man--and the Degree of Perfect
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Initiate, which closes the series, His ultimate Perfection. The
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Degrees from the Fifth to the Ninth are comments upon the Second, a
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progressive instruction in how to live.
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