Prologue The Ritual of the Law could also be called »The Ritual of Marriage«, »The ritual of Divorce« or »The Ritual of Mediation«. At the beginning we need to stress that the purpose of the ritual is not to devalue the traditional form of partnership – on the contrary, it aims to ennoble it with new understanding and to bestow this nobility, legitimacy, legality and freedom upon other forms of Love in no lesser measure. Commentary to the introductory part of the Ritual of the Law Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. (AL I 40)1 The saying »Do what thou wilt« does not mean merely some wilfulness of the ego/personality, but acting/moving in accordance to the highest, holiest and the most noble principles of Man as well. Acting by his inner insight of his true Being! But she said: the ordeals I write not: the rituals shall be half known and half concealed: the Law is for all. (AL I 34) The ritual is adapted to the time, space and people enacting it in accordance with their understanding of the matter. In the first version of the Ritual we attempted to put forth some guidelines for the Ritual's enactment. Later we discovered we are only putting limits on performers. The Ritual should be enacted in accordance with the nature and will of the performers themselves. One can, for example, demand of the Registry Office official or a priest to include the Ritual in the marriage ceremony, or one may suggest to one's beloved that it be enacted before the first sexual intercourse,… The Law put forth in the Book of Law is the Law for everyone, regardless of race, creed or gender. The Law is in no way reserved solely for the chosen ones dealing with exotic practices. …So with thy all; thou hast no right but to do thy will. (AL I 42) This verse refutes the common belief of the ignorant who interpret the verse »Do what thou willt« arbitrarily, thinking they can do anything they feel like doing! No, never! The law dictates we have no right doing anything except enacting our will. Of course, certain skills are necessary to recognize our true will, daring and the power to implement it. It is often difficult to distinguish between our true will and the will imposed upon us and presented as the true one by various propaganda apparatuses, philosophies, dogmas, etc. For at the very start of our educational process we are taught and dictated what to do, how to think, instead of being encouraged to discover who we are. In short, at the very beginning of the personality development they destroyed the apparatus for recognizing our true will, for the global systems known to us are based on distorted values. Therefore, the entire educational system must be reorganized in the future. The mode of passing on knowledge, especially grading with marks is utterly flawed. The entire humanity has lost contact with the spiritual world. Institution in charge of education bring about the very opposite. We like to think humanity has progressed on the evolutionary scale without being aware what evolution is, for we have lost the spiritual note of being and deal solely with the material world. Cavemen are ahead of us in these matters! Do that, and no other shall say nay. (Al I 43) As we enact our true will the entire army of righteousness and power stands with us and nothing can stop us. Of course, sometimes that pits us against everyone who is knowingly or unknowingly on the wrong path trying to persuade us that they are right. Here we have the slaves of false beliefs and their masters, none of them should not and cannot stop us. Righteousness is on our side, and if we are strong and determined enough in the enactment of our true will, the slavish spirit of our opponents flees. For pure will, unassuaged of purpose, delivered from the lust of result, is every way perfect. (AL I 44) The gist of journeying is not only the arrival at a certain place, but also the journey itself. We can choose the goal by navigating correctly or for some other reason. Once achieved, the goal may lose its meaning and become a stop-off on the way, whereas if the goal has been transcended during the journey it was but a mere sign post. Let the rituals be rightly performed with joy & beauty! (AL II 35) Beauty is harmony of form, balance of things around us which assumes the central place on the tree of life. Being is pure joy and all sorrows are but shadows that wither and disappear. To act against these two principles brings us to disharmony and sadness. We need to be aware of the fact that theatre and hence the entire movie industry originates from the enactment of the Eleusinian rituals of the Greek when people still lived in tune with and worshipped the spiritual principles of being. Today we view it as a kind of superstition because we “scientifically” explained the workings of thunder symbolised by Zeus. This is what is called modern primitivism! Commentary to each verse of the Ritual of the Law a) Bind nothing! Let there be no difference made among you between any one thing & any other thing; for thereby there cometh hurt. (AL I 22) Every commitment, bonding, attachment, vow, conditioning, trading, extorting…..has no place in Love and is destined to failure. Love sets you free and love that does not is not Love but slavery using love as pretence. The only bond that can bind us is Love, all other bonds are “Damned!” Above all else, the Ritual must contain a statement that we shall not limit our beloved partner in their freedom. Should it happen that our beloved grows to love another, we shall not play the game of jealousy and possessiveness, as this has a very harmful impact on children if the lovers have any. If we cannot properly process, transform the pain of separation and are looking to blame it on our partner who has left us, how much more difficult must it be for the children to bear and understand it who are the fruit of their love. Too often we witness the violence of the abandoned partner/parent who in his agony of pain ad abandonment takes it out on the children (most often completely unconsciously, by self-torture, etc…), or takes revenge on the partner by economic or any other means. Let us also remember all the men and women punished by backward societies in every possible way for “fornication” or some other unconventional form of expressing love. b) Also, take your fill and will of love as ye will, when, where and with whom ye will! But always unto me. (AL I 51) The verse dictates that in the act of love we rise above the social standards imposed upon us by the ossified tradition. Please take note that it says “whomever we will”, which means not with anyone, but with those who suit our Will, Will of the Law, which is Love under Will!... and nobody else who is not aligned with out Will, of course! c) The word of Sin is Restriction. O man! refuse not thy wife, if she will! O lover, thou wilt, depart! There is no bond that can unite the divided but love: all else is a curse. Accursed! Accursed be it to the aeons! Hell. (AL I 41) It is interesting to note how long we were subjected to the explanation of sin which is in fact contrary to it. Immaculate is the one who does not limit himself in enacting his true will and not vice versa. The only bond that can truly bind us and through which we are truly “bound” is Love. All other commitments, attachments, pledges are false, for Love is of an infinite dimension and any limits are inevitably bound to fail. Should we feel that our romantic relationship is putting constraints on the enactment of our true Will, it is our right and duty to leave! d) For I am divided for love’s sake, for the chance of union. This is the creation of the world, that the pain of division is as nothing, and the joy of dissolution all. (AL I 29,30) It is stupid and sinful to renounce the temptations of love because of the pain it causes. Over thorns to the stars, and once we reach them the thorns are forgotten. Too many people turn away from romantic relationships because of the pain-hurt they have experienced in the past and carefully guard their hearts lest someone might break them for life is unpredictable and cruel. They do not want to understand, let alone accept, the simple truth expressed by the old poet, namely, that the heart will continue to break until it opens! The romantic relationship includes coming together and separating just like life includes birth and death. Despite the fact that the dying of human cells is the only certain thing in life, we spend tons of energy in an effort to forget this. Similarly, when in the vortex of love, we are not inclined to think about the love’s end (this is completely logical from a certain perspective as Love has an endless dimension and in fact never ends, but perhaps only changes its focus). In love we commit ourselves to death in too many times we would prefer to see our loved ones die to watching them in the arms of another. And this is what we call Love? Too many times we treat a person that has been abandoned as if they have been subjected to some unspeakable injustice, for we do not want to understand the dynamics of love which is separating for the sake of coming together, and sometimes our partner really has to die before we can leave – ah, what tragedy in all these customs. e) Love is the law, love under will. Nor let the fools mistake love; for there are love and love. There is the dove, and there is the serpent. Choose ye well! (AL I 57) Love under will, not occasional love or even love in the grip of fear, but magically directed love used as the supreme spiritual formula, the joining of the Snake and the Dove or, to put it differently: there is no higher without lower and vice versa. A starved body must be fed, a body that is too fat will be cured by fasting. It is stupid to dissimulate your primary lust because of the “higher” (the opposite is also true)! f) Beware lest any force another… (AL II 24) Every coercion, forcing, imposing our will on another is outside the Law, must be especially avoided in romantic relationship and never allowed. We must stress that this is utterly inappropriate and criminal behaviour, especially toward children who are not yet able to defend themselves and understand! g)…if thou love, exceed by delicacy… (AL II 70) Important guideline for lovers! We must always aspire toward gentleness and subtlety in the act of lovemaking. If we have power and sharpened senses crudity ruins the game for us. No force is necessary for a perfect and transcendental act. It is our duty to equip ourselves with all the practices of the art of lovemaking and elevate the act itself into a supreme spiritual work. h) There is a veil: that veil is black. It is the veil of the modest woman; it is the veil of sorrow, & the pall of death: this is none of me. Tear down that lying spectre of the centuries: veil not your vices in virtuous words: these vices are my service; ye do well, & I will reward you here and hereafter. (All II 52, also see: AL III 55-57!) The veil of a seemly woman is exactly what caused the unorgasmic nature of nations and through this the dark ages we are in. Unorgasmic woman is a curse for society. She is followed by dissatisfied man seeking to find fulfilment in plunder and wars. Recently a survey has been conducted in Slovenia about the sexual life of elderly women2 born between 1902 and 1935. More than 1600 women participated and not one of them had ever had an orgasm in their lifetime. This data almost defies belief and provides a clear example of how false social beliefs resulting from corrupted and perverted religious dogmas crippled women and society. For example, a woman maimed for fanatical reason gets her clitoris cut off, but she is still able to experience other types of orgasm, whereas false and perverted moral torture crippled our women to such an extent that castration befell almost 100% of them. As if they had removed from a woman everything that leads to orgasm. This resulted in an unorgasmic woman (and therefore man as well) deprived through the centuries of the true and genuine spirituality. As a result, entire generations of nations remain crippled. Hence all the global corruption, false morality, slavery, wars and poverty. In the same vein an unorgasmic mother cannot raise a “real man” but a boy afraid of the true battle (against his own self) who prefers to play and deal with the problems of others. i) There is no law beyond Do what thou wilt. (AL III 60) ! Commentary to the final part of the Ritual of the Law Behold! the rituals of the old time are black. Let the evil ones be cast away; let the good ones be purged by the prophet! Then shall this Knowledge go aright. (AL II 5) All the rituals originating before the date of the writing of the Book of the Law (1904) are not aligned with the law itself and/or are obsolete, harmful, unadapted to the time of the new age. They are like old computer programs, utterly useless on contemporary computers. »All who have ever taken part in the preceding "black ritual of the law" and were therefore "married", that is "bound", or live in the "bond of marriage" due to social mores based on the old/black ritual, should be aware that their marriage/bond is illegal, illegitimate and void until the statements of the "Ritual" given above are accepted.« This is the central statement and the main commentary to the Ritual itself. This, of course, refers to the universal law of Love and has no relation to the law currently officially enforced by marriage which we enter in accordance with the currently known rituals, that is, we cocreate according to these “patterns” the romantic relationships in our society regardless of whether we are married or not. This, of course, does not mean there is something wrong with Love we nurture for our beloved partner, only its frame is usually “skewed”. At any rate, in some cases due to social adaptation we are forced to marry by the currently enforced (black) ritual, but now we are given a chance to neutralize its falseness! »From now on it is also clear that there is no form of illicit Love (except, of course, love that is not under Will), for Law made it clear that “Love is the law, love under will.” (AL I 57) « Well, this should be clear by now as it was clear to us that no child in no way can ever be illicit, for he is the fruit of love which is the Law and is above all laws written by man! »It is the end of stressing innocence, for we are aware that is a mere lie just like all the other so called “sins”, which gain quite the opposite meaning: “The word of Sin is Restriction.” (Al I 41)« This statement heralds the end of hypocrisy. »We declare that the “the evil rituals of the old time are cast away” and in Light of the new Law the Ritual became clear and pure. « Upon all that this day unite with love under will let fall success; may strength and skill unite to bring forth ecstasy, and beauty answer beauty. (Liber XV/v/ Marriage) »Love is the law, love under will.« Epilogue to everything Love is the Law and within Love is the key! But how do we become acquainted with Love if it is forced into a fortress or we are already born in one. True Love does not claim but belongs, protects and encourages Love in its Infinity! Of what use is all the knowledge, power, wealth, magic skills, if we do not know and experience Love. We are nothing and less than nothing, caught in the noose of time and space, slaves of our box, trembling that it will fall apart with the first inrush of true Love. »Get out of your box!« Do not bind anything except your shoes to make your walking easier. Love is not rational, linear or within grasp of a scholar. Love is always infinite, a message above the abyss separating time from Not-time. It does not behove us to speak of it if we have not experienced it, we cannot understand it if we have not seen it. Binding, tying her picture, is at the same time the destruction of her image. To claim it from below means to lose it from above where it truly dwells. This is not about some morality, tradition or spitefulness, but pure metaphysics of supernals (higher dimension, higher states of consciousness), even though morality and earthly laws are shaped after them. The purpose of the Ritual of the Law is to tear the bonds of the old age, annihilate unlawful laws, liberate Love from the fortress and set up new values. This is not about laws that can be grasped by human reason or emotions, for we talk about Love. Just like blood feud in the past appeared as something necessary and logical, we look upon it today as something of utmost primitivism. In the similar vein all forms of attachments and limitations in our Love life will drop away! Let this suffice, for a more detailed understanding dive into the »Ritual of the Law« itself as it is »The Manifesto of the True Love«. Contents: - Prologue - Commentary to the introductory part of the Ritual of the Law - Commentary to each verse of the Ritual of the Law - Commentary to the final part of the Ritual of the Law - Epilogue to everything Supplement: - Ritual of the Law – Love Manifesto Cover picture: Shri Yantra Title: Ritual of the Law or Love Manifesto with commentary to each verse Written by: Matjaž Žabjek Translated by: David Preželj © Ibis Publisher http://www.telema.si Slovenija – Maribor CIP - Kataložni zapis o publikaciji Univerzitetna knjižnica Maribor 133.1(0.034.2) ŽABJEK, Matjaž Ritual of the law or Love manifesto with commentary to each verse [Elektronski vir] / [written by Matjaž Žabjek ; translated by David Preželj]. - E-knjiga. - Maribor : Ibis, 2022 Način dostopa (URL): http://www.biblos.si/lib/book/9789619548332 (dostopno v sistemu Biblos lib) ISBN 978-961-95483-3-2 (ePub) COBISS.SI-ID 110793987 The Ritual of the Law3 The Manifest of the Law of Love »Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.« 4(AL I 40) So with thy all; thou hast no right but to do thy will. Do that, and no other shall say nay. For pure will, unassuaged of purpose, delivered from the lust of result, is every way perfect. (AL I 41, 44) Let the rituals be rightly performed with joy & beauty! (AL II 35) The Ritual: a) Bind nothing! Let there be no difference made among you between any one thing & other thing; for thereby there cometh hurt. (AL I 22) b) Also, take your fill and will of love as ye will, when, where and with whom ye will! (AL I 14) c) The word of Sin is Restriction. O man! refuse not thy wife, if she will! O lover, if thou wilt, depart! There is no bond that can unite the divided but love: all else is a curse. Accurséd! Accurséd be it to the aeons! Hell. (AL I 41) d) For I am divided for love’s sake, for the chance of union. This is the creation of the world, that the pain of division is as nothing, and the joy of dissolution all. (AL I 29, 30) e) Love is the law, love under will. Nor let the fools mistake love; for there are love and love. There is the dove and there is the serpent. Choose ye well! (AL I 57) f) Beware lest any force another 5... (AL II 24) g) ...if thou love, exceed by delicacy... (AL II 70) h) There is a veil: that veil is black. It is the veil of the modest woman; it is the veil of sorrow, & the pall of death: this is none of me. Tear down that lying spectre of the centuries: veil not your vices in virtuous words: these vices are my service; ye do well, & I will reward you here and hereafter. (AL II 52, also see: AL III 55-59!) i) There is no law beyond Do what thou wilt. (AL III 60) This is the second clarified statement of the Ritual of the Law. Behold! the rituals of the old time are black.6 Let the evil ones be cast away; let the good ones be purged by the prophet! Then shall this Knowledge go aright. (AL I 5) Every individual, who had in any way been involved in the old/black ritual of marriage by law and was thus »married«, that is »bound«, or who still lives in such a »marriage« due to general habits/laws of the society, that are based on the old/black ritual, should be aware that their marriage/bond is unlawful, illegitimate and invalid7 insofar as it is not fulfilled by the principles given in the statements above. It has also now become evident, that there is no such thing as “illegitimate” Love (except love that is not under Will), since the Law has revealed to us that “Love is the law, love under will.” (AL I 57) The exposure of innocence has come to an end, since we are now aware that it is a mere lie, as well as all other so called “sins”, which are hereby shown as their opposite: “The word of Sin is Restriction.” (AL I 41) We proclaim that “the evil rituals of the old time are cast away” and that the “Ritual” has been rendered clear and evident in the Light of this new Law. Upon all that this day unite with love under will let fall success; may strength and skill unite to bring forth ecstasy, and beauty answer beauty. (Liber XV/v/Marriage) “Love is the law, love under will.” (AL I 57) Commentary to the Ritual of the Law We consider Making Love to be one of the holiest pursuits of any human being. It is nowadays conditioned by human customs, culture or any religious community or ideology to which one belongs. In the society we live in, every act of Making Love is conditioned by a number of social norms and in nearly all known cultures, it is conditioned by a “rite of marriage”. What the Rite of the Law represents is a Lawful principle by which lovers, man and woman, are to be joined in Love under will. Its purpose is to prevent the general faults in human thought and habits; to imprint into the matrix of our unconscious minds that liberating formula. Use of the Ritual:8 (The Ritual has many uses.) 1.) It is foremost a protection against misunderstanding the physiology of our bonds in love and partnership. It would be best if one carried it out every time before/during/after every love-sexual relationship. 2.) It is also intended and empowered to neutralize the black “rite of marriage” as it has so far existed, that is based on the false understanding of the Law of Love, as well as “sin” in general, and that can direct a relationship along the right guidelines. 3.) It can entirely replace the act of so called “divorce”, that is, it has the power to devaluate completely the old black “rite of marriage” because, we repeat, there is no bond that can unite the divided but Love! We should be aware that virtually the entire human race to this day remains under a “spell”, an erroneous conviction and misunderstanding of Love, whether or not involved in actual act of a traditional “marriage”. It would be wrong to assume that our intention with this ritual is to propagate promiscuity, or attempt to convince anyone that there is anything wrong with a life-long love affair – to the contrary, we consider such a bond Noble, entirely possible, wholly legitimate, most desirable to some and ultimately most welcome, especially when it adheres to the principles of the Law. “Animal jealousy”, a human need to possess, “false security”, bonding and general belief in the cause of various institutions of love and partnership is so deeply incorporated in human Being that we are rarely able to rid ourselves of such layers of medley, especially when our Love is driven by strong passion. Insofar as we are unable to share or leave our “Beloved” with others when their true will is such, we have already failed the trial of “sin”, that is restriction. “In many respects, no doubt, the Law of Thelema is revolutionary. It insists on the absolute sovereignty of the individual within the limits of his proper function. And this principle will be resented by all those who like to interfere with other people's business. The battle will rage most fiercely around the question of sex. Hardly any one is willing to allow others their freedom on this point. Sometimes it is a personal matter; false vanity makes men try to enslave those whom they desire. They cannot understand "There is no bond that can unite the divided but love: ... ", and they outrage others in every way in order to obtain the outward show of affection. It is the most hideous error conceivable, yet nearly all men make it, and nine tenths of the misery caused by wrong sexual relations is due to this determination to enslave the soul of another. It seems impossible to make men see what to me is obvious; that the only love worth having or indeed worthy of the name is the spontaneous sympathy of a free soul. Social conventions which trammel love are either extensions of this stupid selfishness, or expressions of the almost universal shame which results from false ideas on the subject. Mankind must learn that the sexual instinct is in its true nature ennobling. The shocking evils which we all deplore are principally due to the perversion produced by suppressions. The feeling that it is shameful and the sense of sin cause concealment, which is ignoble, and internal conflict which creates distortion, neurosis, and ends in explosion. We deliberately produce an abscess, and wonder why it is full of pus, why it hurts, why it bursts in stench and corruption. When other physical appetites are treated in this way, we find the same phenomenon. Persuade a man that hunger is wicked, prevent him satisfying it by eating whatever food suits him best, and he soon become a crazy and dangerous brute. Murder, robbery, sedition and many meaner crimes come of the suppression of the bodily need for nourishment. The Book of the Law solves the sexual problem completely. Each individual has an absolute right to satisfy his sexual instinct as is physiologically proper for him. The one injunction is to treat all such acts as sacraments. One should not eat as the brutes, but in order to enable one to do one's will. The same applies to sex. We must use every faculty to further the one object of our existence. The sexual instinct thus freed from its bonds will no more be liable to assume monstrous shapes. Perversion will become as rare as the freaks in a dime museum.” (The Confessions, A.C., 87.) Such erroneous human conviction, which has been following us for centuries (nearly entire human history as we know it), has by some of us (most of us) been entirely appropriated and comes naturally. We are unable to imagine a “free Love”, that is not restricted and are not even aware of the fact that this is the main source of a “Black Plague” threatening humanity. It would be wise to nail (pin or post) this Ritual at the door of one’s Laboratory of Love. We should be aware that in a restricted love affair, slavery pertains to both sides. Just as in old times a slave owner would simply be unable to conceive the idea of any right or duty his slave might have to pursue an individual True Will – after all, he “bought” the slave with his own money, people nowadays, when they are caught in such a relationship of mutual “enslavement” simply cannot imagine that every human being (for example, one's “lawful” partner) should have a right and duty to take their “fill and will of love as ye will, when, where and with whom ye will,” with none other and in no other way! Human laws, behavior and convictions change continuously in our consciousness and there will not be long before people begin to be aware of their enslavement in restricted love; just as homosexuality was persecuted by law until not so long ago, it is now discrimination that is punishable and frowned upon (unfortunately still only in the modern world). We can expect a similar development in partnerships in the future, when a bond between us, that is not Love, will be as despised as are nowadays acts of pedophilia, that mainly product of the said restrictions in Love! (See the quote from Confessions, A.C., as well as AL III 55!) Separation, changing lovers, various forms of joining in Love will be as normal and spontaneous as it now seems “normal” for us to spend our lives with a single person of opposite sex, without the need for any “traumatic drama” over the matter. We should not be under an impression that this Ritual defends extremism, obscenity, sensuality, debauchery, injustice or perfidiousness. It is the opposite: we wish to resolve the “wrong of the beginning”, to grant Love it's proper place in the Law in general in the spiritual, social and in legal9 aspect! We wish Love to be understood and not to be confused with its opposite; we demand that you “choose well”; that you understand and accept the pain it brings, rather than enclose yourselves in fortresses, convert and pervert or deny yourself Love, for any reason (especially not due to erroneous social norms), for there is nothing in the universe more important to a Human Being! To understand this ritual further, one should study the Law in "Liber AL vel Legis" as well as Commentaries to the Book of the Law, especially the verses here quoted! Finis April 13, 2020 (Anno Vvi), Ibis10 Opombe [←1] Notations of verses in parenthesis refer to the chapter and verse of the Book of the Law (Liber AL vel Legis). [←2] Ogenj rit in kače, niso za igrače: Documentary portrait of Milena Miklavčič, RTV SLO. [←3] "But she said: the ordeals I write not: the rituals shall be half known and half concealed: the Law is for all." (AL I 34) You could also say The Ritual of the Law is: "Marriage Ritual", "Divorce Ritual" or "Mediation Ritual". [←4] To say: “Do what thou wilt” is not a mere personal whim or a display of personal Ego. It also denotes such conduct as is directed along the highest, most holy and most noble principles of Humanity; to act in accordance with one’s internal insight into one’s true, divine Being! [←5] Every compulsion in Love, especially paedophilia, where the child is not yet aware of abuse, is prohibited by the Law! [←6] All such rituals as were created before the writing of the Book of the Law (1904 e.v.) and/or are not in accordance with the Law, are outdated, harmful, unadjusted times of the age of civilisation. [←7] Of course from the perspective of the new Law, the Law of Theléma! [←8] The rite is most recommended to all who have accepted the law of Thelema, especially before they had begun with any other »practice«, since the consequences of such practice, given the erroneous understanding of Love and profaning Love with its restricted counterpart will in any case be traumatic-dramatic, especially when children are involved in such »drama«. [←9] This Ritual is also intended toward institutional authorities, who would see to it that they adjust the legislation in a way that will »legitimize« Love! [←10] © Ibis Publisher