Tale of Two Brothers

MBM  Two lectures, March 1933

One of the Friday evening background courses

first lecture – March 10, 1933

Ms. #10,800 in the British Museum.  From the 18th dynasty of Old Egypt.  Containing this story.  Written in hieratic, which is the script way of writing hieroglyphs, and became the priestly reporting writing until a very late period.  Some of the books contain this story.  They speak of this story in various ways.  One of the conclusions about the tale (in the later books in which it has been mentioned) is that it is a fairy tale.  In another that it is a mere narrative.  Says it is based on a myth.

Our story is of peasant life, in outer form.  It concerns Anpu and his wife.  Also Bata and the cattle.  It starts out rather simply.  The setting apparently is out on the land.  Anpu and his wife dwell in the country.  The other brother dwelt with them as Anpu’s son.

I superimposed this story on the pattern of involution and evolution when I gave it previously.  (Here HBM referred to her series on this Tale given in 1928).  Tonight you will have the chance of seeing how flexible great stories are.  I am going to superimpose it on a shorter aspect of human life.  The story is not a fairy story but one which has sickered out from the great Teachings.  It is on the boundary line between myth and saga.

It is a story in allegory and code on aspects of the human evolution, and it occurred to me that since last year, when we had the allegorical figures of the Old Testament, and saw them all as being one person, one process in many, it would be helpful to those who were in the class on the classic figures of the Old Testament to observe certain relations with this story.  We should remember, too, that the Hebraic tradition is rooted in the Egyptian, which may account for some of the similarities.  Two brothers appear also in the Hebraic story.

Outline of the story: The brothers are tillers of the soil.  Bata is the younger brother.  He makes clothes, tills the fields, and takes of the cattle.  Later Anpu and Bata go out together to prepare the soil and seed it with corn.  Little is said of Anpu’s wife in the beginning.  She comes forcefully into the story later – not unlike Eve in the Old Testament.

When we take up the story of the evolution of man, he is not yet wholly in the dense planes, but coming down further.  Anpu is a name shortened for Anubis.  He is that side of man which comes down, the first aspect, is older, but presently will be replaced by Bata, the younger.  For the second shall become first later on.

Bata has to do with the dynamic of the soul, which pushes out from time to time to those experiences which are necessary that the entire being shall have.  So, please remember that all the figures of the story, including the cattle, which are not beings but are dramatized, separate as in your dream state, so here in our story all these faculties are dramatized, yet are one.

So Anpu, who begins the ways in the descent, like Adam, falls behind in our picture, and is replaced by the dynamics of Bata, the soul, which is working all the while for the development of the totality.  Just as your soul is, though don’t know it.

Bata works out in the fields, those areas, or regions, where presently new life will be set up.  The cattle, which are cows and oxen, are in the allegory, aspects of the spiritual plane which at this stage still contribute through the soul to the sensitivities by which the soul steers its course.

So Anpu has the house and wife, where he stays, and Bata goes out to do the work.  Bata sleeps with the cattle, that is, during sleep he is rapport with spirit.  And in that state the cattle, or the remnant of spiritual sensitivities from which the soul is moving, are still able to direct the soul where to go.  They tell him where the pasturage is good.  He follows their advice.  They multiply rapidly.

The time for plowing is at hand.  Beginning of a new cycle.  At this time there is a drawing together again of those aspects which have been separated.  So Anpu and Bata set out together to the fields to plow them.  So they are very happy, Anpu and Bata, two aspects of man that are to unfold, the animal side, Red Adam or Cain, and the Abel-Seth side.  And as they have worked for awhile plowing, Anpu, who takes the initiative, like Cain, says to Bata: “Go back and get more grain.”

Bata returns to the farmyard.  Now our story draws in the wife.  The wife, like Eve in the Hebraic picture, represents that which is desire, and which makes effort from time to time, to draw that which is moving forward back; or to hasten the development of that which is going forward.  Desire is in between the lower world of the body and the higher world of the mind.  It works both ways, both down and up.  So does Anpu’s wife.  So, when Bata back to get the grain, she is brushing her hair.  As Bata passes by she says; “What are you coming for?”  He tells her, for grain.  She says: “Go to the bin and get it.”  On passing by she stops him again.  She has not wanted to let down from holding her hair.

Hair is power, of one kind or another, depending on where it is.  Hair on the head is frequently a symbol for the faculties of the mind, namely intuition.  It is necessary that the psychic force of the Old Testament shall remain too, in rapport with the Pattern, as Bata remains in rapport through the cattle.

You all know about the cow in the ancient symbology, again and again.  It is a symbol for the plane of spirit, not the ectoplasmic, vital, psychic or mental, but the Cosmic, the place from which man has descended, through the other areas.  The wife in the story does it through her hair.  And through her hair she knows that she must stimulate Bata — to do what?  To forget the corn.  So she induces him to desire on a lower level.  But he does not belong yet on a lower level.

Bata becomes filled with wrath.  He speaks to her in very certain terms: “Thou hast been to me as a mother.  I shall not speak of what thou hast done unto me.”  And he goes off.

He has taken a curious proportion of material from the stable — three measures of barley and two of wheat.  Barley represents the affectional side of life, the heart-warming side, which is an element necessary in this process of involution and evolution; and wheat, which makes bread, that cooperation with nature, which most of you have already learned about here at Pojodag.  Three measures of one, two of the other.  Bata flees back to where Anpu is awaiting him.  Says no word of what has occurred.  Bata follows Anpu home at evening.

Now the wife has become frightened by the anger of Bata, and does not quite trust that the husband won’t know.  Moreover, now she is filled with vengeance against Bata for refusing her advances.  So she makes herself ill.  Swallows fat, so it appears she is sick to her stomach.  Her garments and hair are in disorder.  She does not greet Anpu as usual.  Anpu says, “What has occurred?”  (She says) “Thy younger brother has approached and I denied him.”  Now Anpu is filled with what is called, in most of the translations, “like a panther of the south” with wrath.  South, the country of the heat, the equator.  He lays for his younger brother.  Presently Bata is on his way back, but the cattle tell him of his brother awaiting him, first one (of the cattle) then the other.  Bata sees the feet of Anpu (under the barn door).  He drops his load and runs.  Both run.  Bata calls to Ra.

There springs up a river filled with crocodiles.  One of the brothers is on each side of the river.  They rest through the night.  The next morning the sun rises and gives judgement.

This is not a fairy story.  It remains an allegory.  The story has again to do with the processes following on the new cycle.  It was necessary that a division take place.  And therefore necessary that the wife of Anpu test Bata.  Had Bata gone to Anpu’s wife it would have been regression.  That is what Bata meant when he said, “Thou hast been to me as a mother.”  Represents a stage from which the soul was passing.  With the beginning of the new cycle, that was so imminent, that the test has to be applied as to whether Bata, or the new outpouring of the soul, is to go further or go back.  In conscious evolution the choice rests on the figures of the story, as it rests on each one of us virtually every hour of the day.

Bata proved the fitness of the soul to go further; and the division of the river filled with crocodiles, is very much as the angel of the flaming sword at Eden.  Or, from time to time in the Old Testament allegories, where a stage is completed, and a marker is set up.  It would be not a bad test for those of you in the class on allegories of the Old Testament.  See it in the Old Testament.  Sometimes it is a division of land, sometimes a river, sometimes altars; but they are there.  So the river filled with crocodiles divides Anpu from Bata; and these two until the close of our story remain separated.  For the earlier stage of man remains in abeyance until the final recapitulation, the summing up, when all aspects are drawn together, as in the process of at-one-ment.  For the time being, Anpu is put aside.

When Ra gives judgement that Bata’s story of it is correct Anpu is in turn filled with wrath against his wife, and goes back and slays her, and throws the bread of her body to the dogs.  A violent story.  But we are not dealing with people but with forces, and these act according to the rights of the power in them, without regard to the effect, which would appear to be disastrous.  Like steam, or other explosives on things around them.  That aspect of stimulus, like an aspect of the serpent in the garden of Eden, has done its bit, and is now destroyed.  An example from modern life: theaters destroy their sets — no more use for them on the road.

Anpu’s wife reappears in another form a little later, as Eve reappeared in the allegorical figures of the Old Testament, until she comes as Mary in the New Testament.  The death of the old for the birth of the new.

Bata gives some strange advice to Anpu.  If you are analyzing this story, one of the things that strikes you strangely is that Bata as the younger brother, now takes unmistakably the initiative; speaks with authority over Anpu, telling him what to do.

Bata says, before the new stage, “I am going to the valley of the Acacia.”  There were two great woods in the ancient literatures — Acacia and Sycamore.  In the BOOK OF THE COMING FORTH INTO DAY it is often said that one part, or the bough of the boat is made up of one kind of wood, and the rear of another.  Acacia wood is the wood of life.  The forepart of the boat is made of Acacia, the aft part of Sycamore.  The whole boat represents both, two kinds of life combined — goodness and truth.  It is into the valley of Acacia, where the new octave is to be carried out, that he (Bata) is to move.

But it seems that the fate of Bata is woven up with the activities of Anpu.  So Bata tells Anpu to watch out for certain experiences; “Return to thy house.  Tend thy cattle.  But nevertheless thou shalt seek me.  And if certain things occur, you will know certain things are occurring to me.”

The invisible dice, in the ether, or rather, all things as they are, between those aspects of the soul going further, and the old man, Anpu.  “I shall draw out my soul and put it on top of the flowers of the Acacia.  Seek it seven years.  Persist, for thou must find it.  When you find it you may take it.”  He means the nucleus of his being, like a seed from the tree.  And he says to Anpu: “Put it in a cup of cold water.  When you do that it shall live, for I must make answer for those things which have been done wrong.”

Bata, as the soul, must make account for all things that have been done wrong by any part of the entire being.  And as Anpu is the first stage of the being Bata must give account for Anpu.  Bata is like the center of things, from which emerge, from time to time, different stages, as branches from the stem of a tree.  So you, doing this or that in your human lives, forget it, or think it is of no account, and make mistaken judgements, like Anpu.  But your souls must give answer for that sometime, in their ultimate nature, because the process is to be worked through.  The measuring of such a soul is, for instance, what is recorded on the mural of the Judgement Scene.

When the soul is put in cold water the soul is put into a new test, much as Bata was put to a test by Anpu’s wife.  Now another test, — which means truth that has become dispassionate, there is no fire in it, it is serene.  It needs to be seen whether the soul has come that far.  That is a test which the Anpu side will need to do for the Bata side.  Just as we, in our work here at Pojodag,           that life consists of the relation, and the joint activity, between the conscious and the transliminal, or between the waking state, in its relation to the third dimension, and other aspects, which also are awake in relation to larger matters.  So Bata and Anpu, right leg and left leg.  The process of walking consists of the reciprocal movement of the right and the left leg.  So the process of the soul’s evolution depends on the reciprocal activities of, now, Anpu and Bata.  Or their derivatives.

You will know, says Bata, that the time has come to search, by certain signs.  One sign is when the cup of beer froths over.  Or the wine, and it becomes sour.  Signs, instill more hidden language, of certain stages of what we might call fermentation.  At that stage certain processes take on a new lease of life.  Anpu and Bata are not two persons but two aspects of one entity, and when the outer man, Anpu, notes certain changes, which we may call fermentation.  At that stage certain processes take a new lease on life.  Anpu and Bata are not two persons but two aspects of one entity; and when the outer man, Anpu, notes certain changes, which we may call fermentation, then he knows that the time has come to again seek his soul.

And then comes the implication that he must watch through seven years.  In a period of seven times 365.  It represents a period of totality of all the influences of the seven — whether the seven principles, or many other aspects of the seven, is not here indicated; but an influence of the seven comes in.  You will see it a little later in the story.

Now comes the period for parting, for Bata is to go to the Valley of the Acacia.  Anpu, who is deeply devoted to his younger brother, is in deep grief.  There is a temporary separation between them.  Something like Prometheus and Epimethius in the Spitteler Epic.

They seem to be happy for a time, separated, but later must come together, for harmony.  But the Spitteler story is short in regard to the eternal territory it covers.  The two Brothers story is vast, covers aeons of time.

So Anpu returns to take care of his own barns.  For a time he is separated from his soul, but he must needs wait, for he serves the soul, to when the wine turns sour or the beer froths up.  Bata passes on to the valley.  Days pass, that is, aeons of time.  Bata lives alone, hunting wild animals, and returns at night to the Acacia, a particular tree at the top of which he had put his soul.

Now note, Bata in turn is becoming complex; split off, divides, becomes two, and more little shoots; even as your souls subdivide in their movement of development.  He lives alone and hunts wild animals.  Gilgamesh and Ea.  Ea on the mountain, with the wild animals, and Gilgamesh has sent for Ea to get him down.  In the same way, Bata is at that stage of rapport with the animal life, but he is separating from his soul.

Bata has built himself a house in this valley, and filled it with good things.  He delights in beauty.  The soul is more responsive than the outer man to the things that are fine.  The soul at this stage is not so far removed from spirit.

One day, while in this valley and this house, he met the company of the gods.  They spoke to Bata and said: “Hail, Bata, Bull of the Nine Gods, are thou remaining alone?  Behold, thy brother has killed his wife and thou hast given him answer for his transgression.”  The nine gods who are saluting Bata, and calling him the Bull of the Nine Gods, are, as it were, the stimulus of the hierarchies above; and there are gods who are watching over the processes of the soul — who will watch over your soul when you have reached this stage, for it is the pattern of your life as well as Anpu-Bata’s.  The bull is the fruitful animal, that has the power to fructify much.  And Bata, who has been going the way of the great pattern outlined (?) is therefore carrying on superbly this scheme of things; for this is the ideal picture, and is therefore rightly called the bull, the fructifying animal of all that is to be.  Just as from another point of view, in our work the soul is the source of all that you do in life — the acorn, seed, from which the oak tree springs.

Another part of this being has eliminated the earlier drives, called the wife of Anpu.  So Anpu-Bata, the one being, have paid for that stage, and the time has come when the fruitful power of Bata required a companion.  Therefore, as the old companion of an earlier stage, the wife of Anpu fades out and a new feminine aspect — not a female but that which is receptive and productive, is to appear in the picture.  Because the Bata side is rightly following the pattern, and is full of seed to impregnate the next stages of the process.

That is why, as soon as he is hailed as the Bull of the Nine Gods, the gods had concern that this should be accomplished.  They spoke to Ra-Horakhty, the creative power, what we would call the sun-god.  And in turn, Ra speaks to Vulcan, the one who forms.  In the Egyptian tradition that is called Khemenu, that is, the power who forms.  As Jehovah in the Hebraic is the formative deity.  Christians do not know it.  The gods call on that particular group which forms what is called the lower stages of life, and a beautiful being was made by the call of the nine to Ra, and from Ra to Vulcan, in the Greek, and there is made this companion for Bata.  “More beautiful than any in the land, and the essence of every god was in her.”  The seven Hathor goddesses came.  Hathor, the name by which the Egyptians called the cow.  That is the symbol of that stage of life which is fed by milk.  It is young.

If out of a hole are good particles, like the eyes of the potato, so, in those early stages, particles that we call light sparks, or that the ignorant Christian calls souls, are broken off and scattered, just as the potato pieces are scattered, in them potentially, are all the things that they need.

In those early stages these light sparks or souls are feeble, just little points.  They are you and me as we were in that early stage.  We cannot then eat solid food.  The babe is nourished first by milk.  Milk therefore become symbolically the food of the child stage.  And the food of the light sparks, when they are cared for by the mothers, the seven Hathor goddesses, are fed milk.  That is why these forces are represented as cows. They give to the evolving light sparks those things which it can digest in these incipient stages.  Therefore milk, and the cow, become the sign, the glyph, of spirit, or spiritual watchfulness over that drama which is going on below spirit.  Below the Firmament.  Hence, the seven Hathor goddesses appear.  They say quickly, knowing the great beauty of this new being: “she will die a sharp death.”

Bata, being the bull of the nine, has to have a correspondingly beautiful syzygy, counterpart, but no figure remains until it has gone through its complete evolution, just as Eve gives way to many other figures in the Old Testament, until the Mary stage, according to the allegory, is achieved.  Therefore, this not being the final stage, this being or stage, also would have to go, and in proportion to its quality, go sharply.

Bata loved her exceedingly.  He hunted and brought the beasts of the desert to her.  She lived in his house.  Not the usual things, but active things of the forest, field and desert.  It does not say he slew them.  Like Adam “naming the animals” who are there brought in.

Bata says to her, “Go not out of the house, lest the river carry thee off.  I could not rescue thee for my soul is in the Acacia, and if another find it I must fight him.

A curiously incongruous statement.

What is a river?  Something which flows, and on which go boats, or are carried things which get into the flow of that river.  Rivers are often as in the previous part of our story, dividing lines, separating lines, here, the separating line is not the major motif, but if this river carries the the beautiful maiden it will also act as a separator.

Why should not Bata be able to go down the river to catch her?  Because the forest and the desert, as described in the story, are within the region where the soul is operative.  It has its node, as I have put it, in a certain place; and where that soul is on the tree is very much as we place it on our charts.  (Upper psychic)  The soul node is there, and it stays there throughout that particular cycle.  Therefore Bata cannot at this time go beyond the region within which he is to be operative.  If the other side of him, the female figure, goes away, there is again going to be that tearing asunder.  But the female figures are the source of movement, or “the mother of all living” and the female figure of our story.  So in this story it is the place of enlightenment, to culminate in right living and wisdom, again a syzygy.

So Egypt is the place of culmination, and the tress is carried down the river.  What is happening in Egypt?  Another aspect of the drama is the place where those who are washing the clothes of Pharaoh are by the side of the river.  We all wash our clothes symbolically, in one river, the river of Truth.  So the Egyptians, with their one river, were singularly close to the one river which washes all things and makes them free.  “The truth shall make ye free.”  So this river shall make you free.

The clothes of the ruler of the country are being washed here, the linen.  Now, curiously, the odor of this tress of hair got into the linen of Pharaoh.  You can’t get it (the meaning) by taking it literally.  The hair, as I suggested to you before, when we had the picture of Anpu’s keeping up her hair, so here the tress of hair is the token of the spirit forces which are in this being.  Remember, the nine gods and the seven Hathor goddesses, all of whom had looked upon and contributed to this being certain powers and qualities, so that the essence of all the gods were in her.  The essence of that essence would be in the hair, and that hair being carried down the streams would be a sign to those who are sensitive enough to catch it.  That is the perfume.  The perfume is that irradiation from what we may call the rapport with spirit which one who is sensitive to it will quickly perceive.  So this odor was noted down in the land of Egypt.

Now I will take you back for a few minutes to the beginning.  Read the second part of the story which is more complicated.  This the completest story out of ancient times that we have anywheres.

How did it happen to be written?  Erman says we may congratulate ourselves that the young scribe Enna copied so completely an unliteral story.

Our story was very popular in the 19th dynasty, but it was current long beforethat.  How have stories been kept intact so long?  Partly because of the manuscript, but partly because of the tradition of holding to a code was strong in Egypt.  These things are written in code.  They would cease to be code if it were changed.

The Papyrus (of this story) has a colophon.  Written for an officer of Pharaoh’s treasury.  “The man who shall speak against this book shall have Thoth for a foe.”  Thoth, the Logos, or Word, manifesting.  And if you spoke against the content of this book you are an enemy to truth and it made you an outlaw to the realm of Thoth.

 

 

Second and last of the series of two lectures

on the Tale of Two Brothers

given by MBM.  March 17th, 1933

Bata could do nothing, as he was involved in other business.  The more you see the details, the more are the mysteries implied.

The Lady has escaped the pull of the river but the tree took a tress from her head, and the river carried it down.  The perfume affected the clothes of Pharaoh, and the people were discussing on the banks of the river, indeed complaining that the washers of the garments of Pharaoh had not cleaned them.  Hence, conflict backward and forward.

It is sometimes that way in life, that it is impossible to tell whether these signs from above are from above or from below.  From excitation of the soul in a mystical ritual, from below up, or whether they come from profundities outside of the persona or self in evolution.  So the other aspects of the self argue.  The overseer is getting fed up as to which was it.  So the overseer, who is like the servant to Zeus, the “I” principle, goes to the river bank himself and waits to see what sign shall be given him.  And presently he himself sees the tress floating in the river, and he sends for those who can to bring in the tress.  It is brought in and the overseer takes it to Pharaoh, for the perfume is strongly in it.  Perfume is the radiance, in this case, that which pours out from the power which is in the Lady.  Her intuition from the lower point of view.  From the higher, the wisdom of spirit.

Pharaoh calls in all the enlightened ones of his kingdom.  They say, “look to it well, for the essence of every god is in her to whom this air belongs.  Send for her, for we should have her in our kingdom.

You will remember, each of the nine gods had given of their power to make this lady, the counterpart of Bata.  The magicians, the wise ones of Egypt knew this and so did Pharaoh.  Pharaoh is the king of Egypt and Egypt is the code which I am using, to the story tonight, represents, not as in the Hebraic tradition, the lower Egypt, but out of the wisdom teaching where Egypt represents the quintessence of earthly power — powers in the earthly evolution.  The place of all places where the wisdom traditions was to unfold.

So it is here that Pharaoh represents the priestly one, the anointed, by that strange saying: “the divine right of kings.”  He rules in that fashion in this allegorical land of Egypt.

So he sends messengers to watch for this lady.  They discover it is not easy to gain this lady for Egypt.  Pharaoh has to send a corresponding figure from Egypt to get her.  Many dispatched for that purpose.  Also a young woman who carried beautiful ornaments.  She represents the feminine side evolving in the land of wisdom in earth, which moves up and out toward the wisdom which comes from above.  That was the necessary key to get the counterpart of Bata to come to Egypt.  Whereupon the lady comes readily.  No longer any need to evade the pull of the river, for the river represents the normal pattern along which evolving life must move.

So the Lady arrives in the country of Pharaoh.  She is welcomed by all.  Her radiant presence brings great happiness everywhere.  His Majesty loved her exceedingly.  He did not take her as wife — nothing of that sort is implicit in the story.  He paid her great homage.  Bade her tell him of her husband.  He knew she had a masculine counterpart and asked about him.

And now a strange Lady replies: “I pray your Majesty to cut down the Acacia tree and then to destroy it.”  The ways of wisdom are strange.  There is always conflict in involution and evolution.  Be careful in reading old stories to read rightly this rebuke, or criticism, or challenge, for it is not as it appears on the surface, but the logical conflict between winter and summer, light and darkness, good and evil.

On that Acacia tree rests the heart and soul of Bata, for here heart and soul, especially in this early stage, and especially in the translation, are mixed up.  It really means the soul, or seed of Bata, is on the Acacia tree.

The flower and the tree are cut down, and Bata fell dead.  For a time the state of Bata is over.  For a moment he passes out of the picture, but death is only one aspect of birth, so he quickly reemerges as another figure.

The next day Anpu notices this change.  Remember the two signs.  So now someone gives him a cup full of beer, and it froths over, and the wine becomes sour.  So he knew Bata was undergoing a change.  Anpu put on his sandals, and took his staff and went into the valley of the Acacia.

The story in its entirety is the method      to those stages when atonement (at-one-ment) is to be accomplished.  Anpu and Bata and Pharaoh, supported by the overseer, are the three masculine high points which are to meet, to be at-oned, and will be in the land of Egypt, or wisdom.  Only in wisdom can they be assembled.

The signal has now come to Anpu to make the journey toward the place where the assembling is to be done.  So he takes all his weapons.  He goes to the house of Bata, and finds him dead.  Inert.  Why should you suffer pain when you know what has caused your pain?  Make a difference between your understanding of the thing and the phenomenon that goes on in your household.  Anpu weeps.  Weeping is therefore a logical part of the picture.  Jesus wept.

Now Anpu starts out to find the soul of Bata, and he sought for three years.  That has a meaning.  At the fourth year he experienced a peculiar longing to go to Egypt.  That is, after the three, which you might say corresponds in this case to three-fold man being completed, in the fourth, or state of spirit, he feels the longing to move to spirit.  Very much, as in a humbler way, you, as you are getting through with the things of the body, heart, and lower man, hunger to come into contact with the things of spirit.  So the longing in Anpu, showing he was coming to a state where he could be assembled.  So, turning his steps in that direction.

Next day, walking, he came to the Acacia tree.  Found a seed.  That represents the essence of Bata, the soul.  Remember, what Bata had told him to do: put it in a cup of cold water.  And the soul sucked up all the cold water.  An interesting occult point.  The seed draws into itself water.  Water is the source from which life springs.  Therefore, in order to have a rebirth to take place, the seed, or germinal essence of Bata had to draw into itself the necessary moisture.

At this juncture Bata trembled in all his limbs.  And presently Anpu, knowing what to do, gave him the cup in which the seed had drawn up the water.  So that the dead Bata which is there, the seed which has drawn up the water, is assembled.  Bata became as he had been.  The two brothers embraced.  A big step accomplished.

Bata says: “I do not remain at this state.  I am going to become a great bull, and you are going to climb on my back to-morrow, and together we will descend to the land of Egypt.  For there I must give answer to the Lady who is my partner.”

So the next day — new cycle, Bata becomes a great bull.  Bull is here the symbol of pregnant life, that is, life that has the power of impregnating vigorously, dynamically, new stages.  It did not mean that Bata became a bull, but rather, power, potency.  The bull is mighty, with the power of stopping, impregnating.  Therefore this new stage of Bata, or the soul, is at the point again of having all its essences regathered.

On the next cycle, (the regathering).  Anpu mounts on the back of the bull, and they go forth to the place where Bata’s syzygy is….

Bata’s answer is really the reciprocal movement, between the pairs of opposites; so the answer Bata gives is.             the Lady down in Egypt.  As the female causes again, Mother Aisha, now comes the time for Bata to give answer to her.  There is a rhythmical movement of the two throughout the story.

As they journey Bata says,”the King of Egypt, Pharaoh, will be greatly happy to see us, and will give great treasure, for I shall be a mighty treasure in the land of Egypt.”  That is, the fruitful power hidden in the bull, which will start the next octave of development.  Really assembling, will cause enormous well-being throughout the land.  So it was.  Pharaoh loved him greatly.  Above all that was in the land.  That is important, for if it had not been so, the story could not have been continued.  Because Bata superseded even the lady.  She was the most beloved in the land in her day.  Now, when the next step has come, it was honored and serves more than the lady.  These are not men and women but mighty forces written in allegory.

Then, on his bull, go into the house of purification — a kind of temple, in the true language.  Really, went into the stage when all that was not essential was again shorn off, deleted.  So that, though he went down into Egypt, many things accrued to him, as every day in your lives, in a lesser cycle.  So, with the bull, discrimination now, and we are to be shorn.

There he meets the Lady.  Now she is termed the august one, regal.  He speaks to her and says, “I am living again.”  And she says, in the story, “Who art thou?” as if she did not know: and he says “I am Bata.”  That is a little code of gesture, which is used at the initiation of all new octaves — even here in earth.  It is so in baptism, marriage, the lodge.  “You knew you would kill me when you caused the Acacia to be destroyed, nevertheless, I am in the form of a bull.”  The drama between the two forces is being carried out.  Don’t bring it down.  Do as science does, make things that go down naturally go up by man’s skill.  So on a higher level, when we begin to have occult insight, we take these stories as the key and move upward toward them against the natural law.

So then, the august lady knows the time has come for her to take the next step.  She must give answer to Bata.as he went down to Egypt to give answer to her.  And so, when the next day Pharaoh came to dine with her — came to eat of the wisdom which she was — it is only as you eat of wisdom that you know the august lady — she says to Pharaoh: “Wilt thou do what I ask of thee?  Do it for my sake,” as wisdom.  And he answers, yes.

She says, “I beseech thee give me the liver of this bull to eat, for he is wholly useless for labor.”  These are stages in evolution.  The bull was now to fade out of the picture, as did the Acacia tree.  The lower man does not understand.  Here we have an illustration of the ways super-rational power — irrational to the wisdom growing up, to man at his best in earth.  Compare the Koran, 18th sura, when Moses asked to be taught of Al-Khidr, and cannot understand.  Only when the higher and the lower mind have mated that the completion is there, the end of the story.

Pharaoh at this stage is not wholly reconciled to the strange demands of the lady.  Nevertheless, the bull is sacrificed.  Pieces all gathered.  The bull is slain.  The liver is to be given to the lady.  The liver represents the last stages of the lower life, which the soul has stored up within it.  This must be completely transformed by wisdom.  For the august lady is wisdom, but in a sense belongs to none, though from time to time she seems to be the syzygy of this soul or that soul.  She serves that soul, as Isis served Osiris, but Isis at no time belongs to Osiris.  So with the August lady.  She is the symbol of the great power of wisdom, serving, like the Holy Spirit in the Christian tradition, all those who are ready to profit by her service.  This she does not even say.

So, through the process of the power of wisdom, the lower elements of the soul, now coming into its final stage before coming into spirit, must be destroyed by the power of wisdom.  Wisdom alone.  Heaven’s fire which destroys all lower forces.

As the bull is carried off and sacrificed, garmented, surrounded by those who in the household of the self must gather in the great sacrifice, there spring from the neck of the bull two drops.  He shakes them off and they fall into the ground near the entrance to Pharaoh’s house, and swiftly there spring up from these two drops two mighty Acacia trees.  You see, another cycle, two powers of life — double powers of life, in two worlds, like the two eyes we have had in some other stories recently.  This marvel is told to his majesty, for to the regal one, even though it is there, we.go through the form of announcement.  Therefore, though Pharaoh it is said, was standing there, it is announced to him.  An occult reason.  There is rejoicing in the land.  Why?  Because that was the sign that the next octave was fruitfully under way.  Just as when the bull first came to Egypt.

The king how does a curious thing.  He leaves his palace and puts on his blue crown, and goes into a chariot of gold and silver.  The august lady follows in another chariot.  Also with proper garments.  They ride swiftly to the place where the two trees have grown up.  When they get there they sit under the two trees, one under one tree and one under another.  Which sat under which and why?  After a time the tree spoke and said to the august lady: “Strange woman, thou art full of power.”  Compare, “Wise as the serpent,” with the capacity of moving the life force, which the serpent has.  This is a cognition of her power — the resourceful one, the serpent force throughout the human evolution.

“I know what thou hast done.  Between thee and me there are no secrets.  Thou hast done well.”  According to the outer story she has done evil.  According to the wisdom story she has done well.  Always the serpent force, (up to) where the uraeus about the head is a sign of the highest wisdom.  Wisdom of the holy spirit can do no evil, for it is wisdom.

Now she must again give answer.  Responses are growing swifter.  Comes to a mighty climax hastening the end of the story.

The next day, or a few days later, the august lady again speaks to Pharaoh.  She says, “Cut down these two trees.”  The work of the serpent is the garden of Eden.  And again the king harkens to her and cuts down the two trees.  They are made into great beams. Another transformation.  We will expect to swiftly find a birth.  We do.  For while the king sends his woodsmen to quickly cut down these trees the august lady and the king himself are about, and as they are chopping this mighty double tree, there are bits of wood that fly off.  And a splinter, it is said, from this cutting of the trees, flies into the mouth of the august lady, and she knew that she had conceived.  And the king did for her what her heart desires.

Where did the splinter enter?  The mouth.  Now a little digression into psychoanalysis.  It has a dominance of sexual motifs and sex organs play a large role.  On the inside, these two organs are lifted up to a higher power.  As though they were the only kind of creation, of starting life.  In psychoanalysis, there is much reference to impregnation through the mouth and anal passage.  Children think of birth through the mouth and anus.  Childhood of the individual corresponds to childhood of the soul.  There are two ways of creation or production, one via the genitals and one via the mouth.  And that tradition became again prominent when the Greeks began the work of externalizing what we have come to know through them as the Logos doctrine, the doctrine of the Word.

Word is creation through the mouth, and the receiving through the mouth.  It is the way of the mind.  So that there are two ways of creation.  And when, even in case histories, you run across the ideas, among perhaps very wick souls of misconceptions about birth through the mouth or anus realize that it is a little of the old idea speaking through; because the immaturity corresponds in a remote way, with the infancy of the soul.  Like is known to like alone.  Whenever there are distortions in the organism of the human being — a thing that even Jones has recognized, the ubiquity of cosmic symbols, it is because in them there is temporarily an oblique, so that the immensities can come through.  Otherwise, we are so stiffly organized that we close up these ancient memories.

Here is a sign of its true nature, with the splinter from the cutting down of the trees.  So, as the trees die, again life comes.  Pharaoh does a11 that she could desire.  We are told that days pass, and she brought forth a man child.  And Pharaoh was told that his son was born.  Born to Bata.  How can it be to Pharaoh?  The time for the fullest, or complete, assembling of all aspects is coming closer and closer.  Bata and before him Anpu and Pharaoh, are all one being.  For all things are working together for the making of the perfected being.  We are seeing it in some of its final stages in our mystery story.  Therefore, though it is the splinter from Bata, via the Acacia trees, the tree of life, it is really the child of the king of Egypt.  For the stage is now set for the completion of the Son of Man.  And the wisdom which has grown from below up, the king of all that belongs to the wisdom of earth, in its finest sense, is evolved.

When, therefore the essence of the life going through its various stages — the one acacia tree, the bull, and the two acacia trees – when those stages in the drama of other dimensions are also continuing, that is those elements which never come down to earth but are profiting by the conditions wrought out below, and the two are working together, then is the meeting, via Bata and what is above, and the fulfilling of the earth evolution through our king.  Therefore it is really the work of the king, though it seems to be Bata and the august Lady, it is the son of the king of Egypt.

Again there is great rejoicing throughout the land.  It is toward this that the whole drama was moving.  The king loved her, the august Lady, greatly.  And the king loved his son greatly, and lifted him up to be heir of the entire land.  Thus he venerates wisdom who has served these stages, though he never makes her his wife, for you cannot possess wisdom in that way.  Yet the fruits of wisdom are lifted up to be king.  And so you suspect, rightly, that the son of Pharaoh will presently rule the land.  This ruler is not his heir, and in due course of the cycle Pharaoh, as we have known him, is replaced by the new Pharaoh, the fruit born of the august Lady, wisdom.  When that Pharaoh who is the follower — still the same being but at a later stage, takes the throne, it is now the stage where life born of the wisdom of earth mated with the fruit of the soul’s evolution through Bata, nurtured by wisdom in the womb of the august lady, gives birth to the ruler who has the perfected “two eyes of Horus.”  So when the king passes out of the picture, as in earlier stages have these others, the “last shall be first and the first shall be last.”  Now a curious twist to our story.  For a time this new being reigned, and the heir of the king said “let all nobles be brought before me.”  And he judged with her, the august Lady, beside him.  All agreed.  You remember what the seven Hathor goddesses said: she shall die a sharp death.  Wisdom has served now, is recognized, and, with the fiery means by which she came, so also she passes out of the picture.  She is no longer needed.  For the soul, replaced by the full god-man (?), the fruit of it all, judges through wisdom, with wisdom beside him, and knows that her service is over.  He brought to him his older brother Anpu, and he was made the heir, in turn, to all that was.

When this child of the august Lady had reigned thirty years, he too passed, and Anpu reigns in his place.  And the first shall be last.  For it was all for Anpu’s sake – Anpu who is the beginning of the opening of the ways of the human evolution.  Therefore, when the period of thirty years, the cycle of completion, is achieved, the fruit of the august Lady, like the previous, leaves, and Anpu reigns as the one ruler in the place of all of them.  Because now, in Anpu, are assembled all that has gone before.  All the power is collected in him, of the bull, of the subtlety of the wise lady, of the resource of Bata, and finally of the son of the august Lady, who represents the octave just preceding. Anpu, their consummation, is thus the fruit of man, the wisdom of earth and the wisdom of heaven completely mingling — the fullest mingling to the life that belongs to the cosmic plane.

The light-spark which begins the opening of the ways, and when the ways have been completed throughout the tuat, the gaining of the wisdom in that tuat, and the power is at-oned, and rules co-heir with those who have already made that process, as the Christian tradition would put it.  All those who have been anointed, for there are many sons of god who have accomplished that way.

Tale of Two Brothers

The dilemmas of a particular time seen up close appear arbitrary, unnecessary, the result of bad faith, and will to power on one side or the other or both – or they may be seen as exclusively economic or social.

A great allegory shows inevitable steps in involution or evolution, the way of unfoldment either for this planet or for man individually.

It aids then in seeing a little slice of earths history in perspective, outlines underlying problems – shows that they must inevitably be, and that if we know, we go with, not against.

Here a teaching concerning larger facts – concerning the ultimates.

All the characters are to be seen as forces, energies, great beings on their way into functioning on the earth plane.

Anpu is the hu-man, who like Anubis, opens the ways.  Bata is the soul side or really spirit or nous to whom all the values of experiences will be returned.

Anpu’s wife is the desire side – that which draws down further into manifestation – from one point of view greater will, from another that which holds or stops the forward movement – would hold the soul captive – challenge – the choice.

Fear follows, her house is dark, she temporizes, misrep — betrays the soul, seemingly

Not understanding, not seeing, Anpu would slay Bata, but Bata, more sensitive, senses the intention of the human self.

Through Bata, the soul, more seeds will be sown, but.desire must be with him.  Desire makes the cleavage between the two brothers – this is the role of desire – though disguised.

Now for a time the brothers, the soul and the human will be separated. Ra- the ever-living one, the dynamic: for the next stages.

Bata knows that this separation must take place- knows what the challenge is- that the soul must be about its business and that in good time Anpu will know too.  He puts his trust in Ra.

The problem of good and evil is the problem of the separation into the opposites as part of the inevitable way – they seem as good and evil for each has its role to play

The soul tells the human that it is an abomination to try to slay the soul, and that he is not seeing in truth, and that now the human must watch over its own sensitivities, for the soul will not be with him, but he must continue to seek the soul, and give him signs by which he will know that it is time.

The soul will be in the top of the tree of life, where it flowers.  The tree will be cut down, and for 7 yrs he will seek it.

The soul will be safe in the high reaches of the inner being, when he finds it he is to put it in a cup of cold water

the soul must answer for the wrong done – but for sign Anpu will when the beer foams up which will be a sign of transformation – after which Anpu will find Bata

The human then slays his desires, and mourns the soul

So the soul lived alone, slaying wild animals, resting by the tree of life, among the flowers, building for himself those things of beauty he loved, then come the gods who say that the soul needs his syzygy- and Khumu made her with the beauty of every god in her- the great powers, activities which are of the mother of heaven

The 7 Hathor goddesses say that she will die a sharp death

The soul wanted her to stay close, for he feared the sea might carry her off while his soul which he must watch was in the Acacia

(The soul about the great business of Life) he must fight first for the soul.

The sea tried to cast its wave over her but she fled to the inner core of the self- the great water cried of the tree of life- take her for me- and so Life took a tress of her hair- a single thread of relationship, down to the body, or the world of matter, and there its odor is sensed even in the Pharaoh’s linen.

The cutting down of the acacia- the end of a rhythm for the soul the beginning of transformation for the human-

The period of seven- in the search for the soul- Anpu will have to go through the period of “seven” growing those qualities for which each one stands

The bull which Bata becomes- means that powerful fecundity for which the bull stands-

The soul knew the steps- so consciously slew the ambassadors of the Pharaoh- consciously played the role of resistance to the further coming into matter of his Syzygy

The cutting down of the Acacia must be that the soul too must die— the human must reach that stage of necessity where it must seek throughout its rhythm of threeness for the soul, having received the sign that is time for the beginning of this reunion.

At the end of each rhythm and the beginning of another there must be a purification- the dropping of all that is not pure essence of what has been.

The queen of heaven understood the king- and used her guiles and skill with him.  She knew that it was she who must take on the fleshes and desires of the lower nature- (Liver)

The bull was slain- again that dismemberment motive- the sacrifice, for greater differentiation- two drops of life blood grew to be two trees and then the princess asked that the two Acacia trees be cut down- a chip flew up into the mouth of the princess- she was impregnated- Of Bata- through the bull, the trees, and she bore a son, the son of God born of herself, wise, strong, and the soul tempered by sacrifice

The princess- serves both earth and the soul- the double face

This son becomes the heir of the land and rules for the earth

span of 30.  Anpu is brought to him, and when he dies, Anpu takes his place

Tale of Two Brothers

1941

Interests and desires quite, shallow- rarely ask great questions

Christianity has not provided deep roots- reaches into the ways of the Ultimate only, not into the Ultimate

There is a teaching and Tr of larger facts which are the foundation of all things

This tale classified as fairy tale- copied in 19th Dynasty- 1200 B.C

Must see speakers as forces, energies, great beings

Portrays the involution of a kingly soul – the progressive steps of functioning in Earth plane

Anpu- form of Anubis- opener of Ways like Castor/Pollux, Cain/Abel but richer

Bata- lived together

Theme throughout– last shall be first, first, last

Bata like young son – soul in essence- all values of experience gathered

Anpu– first phase of human self- body- red Adam

Wife– potential desires- exerciser, that power-

Cattle– higher emotions, potentials not yet active

(clothes effect stature of soul)

Get ready the seed corn– preparation for further involution

Fields– areas for next activities

Anpu- return to farm- need more seed corn

Bata- 3 measures of barley- two ofwheat- through Bata more seed rele wife-, consent of potential desire nature has to be won.

Barley-for drinks- fiery nature- flame of soul- served by it— love, rev, searching- ‘

Hair combing– stages in relation to process about to begin-

greater will, directing this process

Wife, made  cleavage- role of desire- intended that process break off into new octave.

Challenge that Bata become fixed at this stage- Edenic stage—

Went forth to plow- new octave

Vomit– yield things in her.

cattle– sensitivities of psychic, serving soul

Stream between Bata and Anpu- one on each side- work of night of separation

Every living One- Ra- the sign- dynamic from which destiny is derived-

Stream– done certain things for the last time – barrier erected

burned bridges

Tale of two Brothers

November 27

 

Esoteric approach, to the question of evil

calm serene compensatory factors

He who would find soul must do what Bata does

Acacia- the way of truth hangs high

soma, whuoma, wine, beer, dissociate the habitual associations

with intoxication

Every actor knows his role and plays it wisely

Tale of two Brothers

III

Pattern of series being given

1- Philosophy of number.  Order, pattern, design, the absolute

2- Involution of the life forces in their totality, including the soul

and nous

3- Requirements for the soul in the flesh to free itself from earth.

4- Tests given to advanced beings as they complete the stages of life as humans, by means of the pattern.

5- Description of the completion and liberation and attainment of soul-(Gautauma)

How this can be seen through various traditions- let it be known what is being given at the School.

Tonight

Tree– acacia- symbol of the pattern- not in Egypt- how could it be—

soul of Bata, not really soul, but spirit- nous at top of tree

Eagle, hawk, Yggdrasil- Norse

Flower- basis of higher life

Lotus- calyx, inside of which the higher is resting

Life of the higher plane closed to this aspect henceforth

Desire as volition, initiates action, role of feminine aspect—

Seedpod– essence of Bata to unfold in lower planes-

Bata and lady know throughout what is to take place

Bull all seeds of all that is to be

Rituals preparation for great experience- make self ceremonially free from mixings

Persuade the King to yield that most dear to him.  Bata understands ladys skill

(Kings always Initiates)

Acacia Trees- Mystery legend Coming forth

cat- Seknet- symbol of soul- overcomer of serpent under Acacia tree

Two trees, soul and spirit

Bata- power which is the trees, enters into Syzygy, called lady and it bears fruit.

This life applied everywhere- in all sections of daily life- applied power of spirit descending-

Like Jesus- born of Virgin soul, immaculate, of will of God- Son of man.

A mystery truth must be shadowed forth again and again

god born of higher will, will someday be that of you also.

Mystery story of Egypt told only to the Nobles.

To set on fire that which is in earth so evolution can follow evolution.

THE TALE OF TWO BROTHERS

an occult allegory from ancient Egypt, copied by the scribe Inena

in the 19th dynasty.  Papyrus in British Museum

(full text: vol. 13, World’s Best Literature. ed, Ch. D. Warner)

There were two brothers, children of one father and one mother.

Anpu, the elder; Bata, the younger.

Anpu had a house and wife.  His little brother is as a son.

Bata makes the clothes, tends the cattle in the fields, brings back the produce.  The power of a god is in him.

Anpu remained with his wife, – eating and drinking,

Bata sleeps with the cattle.

The cattle tell Bata where the pasturage is good.  He follows their word and they thrive and multiply exceedingly.

The season for ploughing is at hand.

Anpu speaks to Bata, “Come, let us get our teams and implements ready.

Bring seed corn.  At daybreak tomorrow we will plough.”

Bata did as Anpu bade him.  The next day both went to the field, and labored mightily.  They were both exceedingly happy.

Once there was a need for more seed corn, and Anpu requested Bata to return to the farm for it.

There Bata found his brother’s wife combing her hair.  He said, “Give me corn, for my elder brother asked me to hasten.”

She replied “Go thyself to the grain shed and take to thy desire, that I may not drop my hair.”

Accordingly he went to the stable and took barley and wheat.  Anpu’s wife asked him what he had taken.  “Three measures of barley, – two of wheat.”

She arose and said, “Come stay with me.  It will be well for thee, and I will make thee a beautiful garment.”

Bata became filled with fury.  “Thou art to me as a mother, thy husband as a father.  Thou hast said what thou shouldst never have said.  Tell no one of it.  Neither then shall I.”  And he departed.

Anpu and Bata labored diligently in the fields.  At evening they returned.

Anpu’s wife, smitten with fear, prepared herself as a woman who had been assalted.  She did not welcome Anpu in the light, nor did she light the house.

Anpu said, “Who hath spoken to thee?”  “None, but thy younger brother.  When he returned, I was sitting alone.  And he approached me, and I replied “am I not thy mother?”  He beat me that I should not report to thee.  If thou lettest him live, I shall die.”

And the elder brother became like a leopard of the south.  He sharpened his knife and stood behind the stable door to slay his brother when he came in.

When Bata returned to the stable, the cattle warned him of his brother, and told him to flee.  He saw his brother’s feet beneath the door, whereupon he cast down his load and fled swiftly.  Anpu pursued him with a knife.

Bata cried to Ra-Horakhty, “Thou art he who divideth evil from good.”  Ra heard his cry and made a great stream to divide them, and the water was filled with crocodiles.  Anpu is now on one bank and Bata on the other.

Anpu is filled with wrath that he cannot slay Bata.

Bata called across the stream, “Stay where thou art until Ra arises.  I will enter into judgment with thee before him, for he setteth right what is wrong.  I shall not be in the place where thou art.  I go to the Valley of the Acacia.”

The day dawned.  Ra-Horakhty shone, and the two brothers looked upon one another.

Bata told the story of the wife to Anpu, “The story was turned over to thee upside down.  Thy coming to slay me with a knife is a thing of abomination, for we are brothers in truth.”

Then Bata took a knife and mutilated himself.  He cast the flesh into the water and the silurus (fish) swallowed it.  He became faint.  And Anpu on the other bank cursed his own heart and stood weeping.

Then Bata called to him, “Whereas thou hast contrived an evil thing, wilt thou also devise a good thing? even that which I would do unto thee?  When thou goest to thy house thou must look to thy cattle, for I shall not stay in the place where thou art.  I am going to the Valley of the Acacia.  And this thou shalt do for me, – thou shalt seek me, and if thou perceivest certain things thou wilt know certain matters are occurring to me.

This shall come to pass.  I shall draw out my soul and put it on top of the flowers of the Acacia.  The Acacia will be cut down, and it will fall to the ground.  Thou shalt seek it, and if thou passest seven years in the seeking, do not let thy heart be wearied, for thou wilt find it.  Put it then in a cup of cold water and it shall live.  For I must make answer to what has been done wrong.  Thou shalt know these things by certain signs.  When thou hast a cup of beer in thy hands, and it shall foam up, – or wine in thine hand shall become sour, – then there is no tarrying.  Stay not then, but seek me speedily.”  And Bata departed to the Valley of the Acacia.

The elder brother went into his house and slew his wife,.and cast her to the dogs.  He sat in mourning for his younger brother.

Days passed.

Bata lived alone in the Valley of the Acacia, hunting the wild animals, and returning at night to rest under the Acacia where his soul rested in the flowers.

He built himself a tower in the Valley and filled it with good things, for he delighted in beauty.

One day as he came forth he met the Company of the Gods (nine) who were laboring in the labors of their realm.

They saluted him and spoke “Hail Bata! bull of the nine Gods!  Art thou remaining alone?  Behold thy brother has slain his wife, and thou has given him answer for that which was transgressed against thee” and Ra-Horakhty said to Khnumu, “Behold, frame thou a woman for Bata, that he may not live alone.”

And Knumu made her.  She was more beautiful in her limbs than any woman of the land, and the essence of every God was in her.

The Seven Hathor Goddesses came unto her and said with one mouth, “she will die a sharp death.”

Bata loved her exceedingly and she lived in his house.  He hunted the beasts of the desert and brought them to her.  He spoke to her “go not out of the house, lest the Sea carry thee off.  I could not rescue thee for my soul is in the Acacia, and if another find it, I must fight him.”  And he opened unto her his heart.

Bata continued to hunt in his daily manner.

Days later the maiden went out of the house and walked under the Acacia.  The Sea saw her and cast its waves after her, but she fled and entered the house.  And the Sea spoke unto the Acacia, “Oh, catch hold of her for me.”  And the Acacia brought a tress of her hair, and the Sea carried it unto Egypt to the place of the washers of Pharaoh’s linen, and the odor of the hair entered into the linen.  And they were wroth with the washers, saying, “The smell of ointment is in Pharaoh’s clothes.”

The overseer was angry at their daily quarrels.

One day he stood opposite where the tress of hair lay in the water and he had it brought unto him.

He found in it an odor exceeding sweet.  He took it unto Pharaoh.

Scribes and wise men were summoned and they spoke, “This tress of hair belongs to a daughter of Ra-Horakhty who has the essence of every God in her.  It cometh to thee from a strange land as a salutation.  We pray thee therefore to send ambassadors to every land to seek her.  And with the ambassador who goeth into the Land of the Acacia, let there be many men.”

And his majesty spoke, “Excellent is the word that hath been spoken unto us.” And they were sent.

After many days they returned with their report – all save those who had gone to the Valley of the Acacia, for Bata had slain all but one, who was permitted to return to give report unto the king.

Thereupon his majesty dispatched many, – foot soldiers, house men, charioteers, but also a young woman who carried beautiful ornaments.  And the young maiden came back with her, and there was rejoicing throughout the land.  His majesty loved her exceedingly and paid great homage unto her, raising her to high estate.

Moreover he bade her tell him of her husband and she said, “I pray your majesty to cut down the Acacia tree, and chop it up.”  And the king so ordered and his men with their weapons cut the flower upon which was the soul of Bata, and he fell dead on the instant.

And the next day came, the earth was lightened, and the Acacia was cut down.

And now Anpu was washing his hands in his house, and one of his servants gave him a vessel of beer and it frothed over.  And another gave him a vessel of wine and it was sour.  Thereupon Anpu grasped his staff and put on his sandals and with all his weapons, went out to the valley of the Acacia.

And when he came into Bata’s house, he found his young brother lying dead on his bed.  And he wept.

And now he set out to seek the Soul of Bata and he sought three years.  When he began the fourth year, he longed to return to Egypt.  And he thought, “I will go tomorrow.”  And when the next day came he was again walking under the Acacia seeking.  He found a seed pod.  Behold, this was the soul of his younger brother.  He cast it into a cup of cold water, and sat down as was his wont.

And when night came, the soul sucked up all the water.  Bata trembled in all his limbs and he looked at Anpu, while his soul yet remained in the cup.  Then Anpu gave the cup unto Bata and he drank it.  Thereupon his soul again took its place, and he became as he had been, and the two brothers embraced and spoke to each other.

And Bata said unto Anpu, “I am to become as a great bull, with all the right markings.  When the sun rises, thou shalt mount my back and we will go to the place where my wife is, that I may make answer to her.  And thou shalt take me where the king is.  He will bestow great favors and gold and silver upon thee, because thou bringest me.  For I am become a great marvel, and they shall rejoice throughout the land.

And it was as Bata said.  The next day Bata appeared in the form of a bull and Anpu sat upon his back and they came to where the king was.  And the king rejoiced exceedingly and made a great festival saying “This is a great wonder that hath come to pass.”  There were rejoicings over him in the whole land.  And Pharaoh loved him above all men that are in this land.

When many days had passed the Bull entered the House of Purification and stood in the place where the princess was and said, “Behold I am alive indeed.”  And she said, “Who then art thou?”  And he said unto her, “I am Bata.  Thou didst cause the destruction of the Acacia which was my abode so that I might not live.  Nevertheless I am alive indeed in the form of a bull.  Behold.”  And the princess feared because of the words which her husband had spoken to her.  And the Bull departed from the House of Purification.

And his majesty and the princess were making a good day.  She ate and drank with him, and the king was exceedingly happy with her.  And she spoke to him saying, “Swear to me, by God, what thou shalt say, that will I do for thy sake.”  And he hearkened unto her.

She spoke, saying “I ask thee, give me the liver of this Bull to eat, for he is useless for labor.”  And the king was exceedingly vexed at her words.  His heart grieved him exceedingly.

And when the next day had come, a great feast was proclaimed and offerings made to the Bull.  And the king sent one of his chief butchers to cause the Bull to be sacrificed.

And when he was sacrificed and on the shoulders of the men, the Bull shook his neck and threw two drops of blood upon the double doors of Pharaoh.  One fell to each side of the great doors.  They grew as two mighty Acacia trees, and each of them was excellent.

And this marvel was told unto his majesty, “Two great Acacia trees have grown, as a great marvel for his majesty in the night, by the side of the great double doors of his majesty.”  And he rejoiced exceedingly.  There was gladness throughout the land, and offerings were made unto the Acacia trees.

And after many days, the king put on his blue crown and hung garlands of flowers about his neck.  He mounted his chariot of electrum and went out to behold the trees.  The princess went likewise in another chariot.  And the king sat down under one Acacia and the princess under the other.

And the tree spoke and said, “Oh thou who art full of guile, I am Bata, and though I have suffered violence, I am alive.  I know who caused the Acacia to be cut down.  I then became a Bull and thou hadst me slain.”

Many days after these things had occurred the princess stood at the table of the king, and he was happy with her.  And she said, “Swear to me that what I say, that thou wilt do for my sake.”  And he hearkened unto her.

She entreated that the two Acacia trees be cut down and made into goodly timber.  When the days were multiplied, the king sent his skillful craftsmen and the princess, the royal wife, stood by and watched.  They did all that was in her heart unto the trees.

And as they chopped, a chip flew up and it entered into the mouth of the princess.  She perceived that she had conceived, and while her days were being fulfilled, Pharaoh did all that was in her heart.  After these days she bore a male child, and a messenger went to tell the king, “there is born to thee a son.”  They brought him and gave him a nurse and servants and there was rejoicing throughout the land.

They performed the naming of him and the king was filled with joy, and loved him exceedingly and made him the royal son of Kush.

Now when the days had multiplied after these events, his majesty made him heir of all the land.  And when he had fulfilled his years as heir, his majesty flew up to heaven.  And the heir said, “Let all the nobles be brought before me, that I may make them to know all that has occurred to me.”

And they brought him his wife, and he judged with her, and all agreed in his judgment.

Then they brought unto him his elder brother, and he made him hereditary heir of all the land.

Then was he king of Egypt for thirty years, and when he died, his elder brother stood in his place on the day of burial,

Fini.

Signature of the Scribe:-

“Excellently finished in peace for the Ka of the scribe of the treasury, Kagabu, of the treasury of Pharaoh and for the scribe of Hera, and the scribe Merenapt,   Written by the scribe Anena, the owner of this roll.

He who speaks against this roll, may Tehuti be his opponent.”

. . . . . . .

This magnificent allegory is an “escape” from the sacred (secret) Lore of evolutionary processes.  I know of no other allegory comparable to it, either in scope or in detail, – or in the mysteries it unfolds to a qualified reader, trained to occult insight.  Though mutilated and distorted by unenlightened scribes, it contains the unmistakable evidence of its sacred Source, and contains secrets which the seeker of gnosis yearns to know. These secrets are obviously beyond the allegorical key.

 

 

MBM

The Tale of Two Brothers

(Egyptian)

MBM   Friday, December 7, 1928

(Background course)

One of the oldest stories in the world.  Manuscript in the British Museum.  Hieroglyphics, from 19th century B.C., about 1370 BC.  About the same time as the Exodus of the Semites from Egypt occurred.  Written as a full fledged story, showing it was known long before.

Egypt unique in its records.  Manuscript of the Opening of the Mouth. . . . . Other areas of consciousness.  Written in the Fifth Dynasty, and intact for 4,000 years.  Contents full of symbolism, and story so packed with accurate symbolism that it could not permit distortion.  The hierophants had it in their charge to see that neither stories nor symbols were changed.

The writing of this story antedates Genesis in the Old Testament of Moses.  Moses was initiated in the Mysteries of Egypt because he was brought up as a son of Pharaoh.  This accounts for much of the language used by Moses, which we find in the Old Testament.  Te-hut (Great Mind) Mos — Great Mind and Moses.  Moses followed all the teachings of the Great Mind in Egypt, so we have a right to believe that the name indicates something of the background Moses had before he began his own great career.

The story starts simply but in the course of its development grows complex — a further sign that the civilization of Egypt was already highly developed.

Anpu and Bata, the Two Brothers.  Had one father and one mother.  Anpu, the older, is married and has a house.  Bata lives with the older brother, almost like a son, and does the work.  Anpu and his wife at home, drink….. Bata, in the field, is told many things by the cattle.

The story is of cosmological significance.  The two brothers are points of life setting out from the same Source.  Stages of involution into the vestures of matter.  Anpu means Opener of the Ways — germ of the self which works on the lower evolution.  Bata works on the higher phases, which are not functioning in the lower, but in the early stages.  Anpu is that part of the self which develops the personality and all the pulls that arise after the personality.  Bata is more akin to what we think of as the spiritual plane state, or Garden of Eden — the state before the physical bodies were put on.  A relatively early state.  That is why Bata goes out to labor.  Cattle represent the values of the higher, or spiritual, planes.  They advise Bata where there is good pasture. These values are the source from which further growth is made.

Anpu is clothed and nourished by Bata, for Anpu is really man potential, – not yet in activity.  Hence Anpu sits at home with his wife.  She symbolizes something akin to Eve in the Garden of Eden, – represents the desire which animates later stages, just as Anpu does.

The power of God is said to be in Bata, because in this state, before the human involution is begun, the power of the energizing forces function much more simply and straight than at a later period.

When the time for plowing is at hand we come to the place where the Anpu germ is taking its first hand at activity.  It only begins.  Anpu is a germinal man — that which will become man.  Anpu says: Let us get our teams ready — factors in the self, needed for the next stage in involution.

When the next cycle of involution begins Anpu and Bata work together, and are happy.  For there is nothing at this stage which is incompatible between them.  (These are) regions wherein the new cycle of activity is to take place.  Anpu sends Bata back for more seed corn.

(Quote from the manuscript omitted)

Wife of Anpu says: No, lest I let go of my tresses.  Beginning of the involving of the feminine principle.  Hair is the symbol of true intuition.  Relates to the Cosmic planes.  The wife of Anpu is not yet ready to disconnect with the Cosmic regions, hence must still hold up her tresses.

But Bata has gone by (?), and that has been just enough stimulus to incite the next movement.  He goes in to get the grain, and the rub is now stronger — after many ages.  The wife lets go her tresses, and uses the lower nature, to continue the processes of involution.  A stage, or link, in the process.  Incites the desires of Anpu, so that the river appears later.

Bata, whose nature is of the spiritual plane, and cannot go below that, must, of course, resist the reaching of the lower to tear down the higher.  Each activity remains true to its own octave, or area.  Hence Bata rebukes the wife of Anpu, although this is essential to the process.  Says he will tell no one of it, and she must not.

In the meantime, this leaven of the lower interest, or desire, which is to make the human evolution, is working in the aspect of the self called the wife of Anpu.  So she prepares to draw down the Anpu principle into a lower activity.  She tells the story the reverse of what it actually was.  First, that which belongs to the lower nature, or which is the beginning of the psychic, is the opposite (down, or tune) of that which belongs to the Cosmic.  One reason why it (the psychic) is so dangerous.  Second, it is full of unknown pitfalls.  For when man descends into it he is not yet intelligent.

Bata returns to the field and works happily with Anpu.  That is, the process of preparing the ground in which the evolution is to take place, continues.  There has been no deception.

Now the day comes to an end – that is, the end of a cycle.  They return at evening.  Anpu’s wife does not go to meet him with light or with water.  Light represents the nature, or quality, which is inherent in the self when its tresses are still in connection with the higher world.  Neither is there any more water — the cleansing water of truth, with which to receive Anpu, because she has already prepared the preliminary stages of the descent into the very regions which Anpu and Bata are plowing.  She is doing the very thing for which Anpu and Bata have been working.  Hence, no water and no light.

Anpu comes to the door and asks what has occurred.  She answers: None but Bata, which is a fact.  The stimulus of the conflict between Anpu and Bata is now at work.  There must be something to accomplish the division in the Anpu and Bata nature.  Anpu is furious against Bata, whom he loved and on whose labor he was nourished.

The first step in the cleavage is now made.  Sharpens his knife.  Stable door is the place where the cattle are.  Cattle, in the old symbology, represent that which is obedient — no will — and yields nourishment; that is, the values of the higher planes. These cattle and their stable are the boundary line here between what will be the Anpu side and what will be the Bata side.  The cattle speak because they are powers, qualities, functions.  They tell Bata that the hour has come.  The first cow and the second cow says it.

Bata sees his brother’s feet beneath the door, and puts down his load and flees for his life.  Because that which belongs to the higher plane must go back to it.  Moreover, the part that Bata plays in this will presently be over.  Anpu pursues with raised knife.  Anpu, a new cycle in incipient humanity; Bata, who must return to the spiritual plane.

Bata cries to Ra: Fair Lord, thou knowest these things, and canst divide one from the other.

A river is set up, dividing the two brothers.  That is the boundary between the regions belonging to the Bata, or spiritual aspect, and can never come down into earth; and that which is the beginning of the human involution.  Crocodiles represent the lower desires.  It lives in the muddy water and draws its prey down.

Three measures of barley and two of wheat: old symbols of what becomes, in the lower man, knowledge and affection, but which, at this stage, is something preliminary to that.  Love and wisdom far off.  Barley, affectional; wheat, source of experience, or knowledge and wisdom.  At this stage, more barley necessary than wheat.

Bata and Anpu are now separated.  Anpu is filled with wrath that he cannot kill his brother.  Bata says: Wait till Ra decides, and I shall be no more with thee.  Ra, the symbol in Egypt corresponding to the First Logos.  Anpu, the new cycle as the day dawns.  New consciousness.  Now Anpu is open to the understanding of the facts: His first lesson, the first time he gets the sting of pain and his thinking faculty begins to function.

Anpu continues that faculty in himself which is known as the “Opening of the Ways.”  Now he begins to be active.  Bata takes out his knife and cuts off his flesh, – cuts off the form he had.  Death, or transitional stage.  Brings to Anpu a new consciousness.  Weeps that he cannot go across the stream to his brother’s side.  But he has already partaken of the apple — has already partaken of the appetites that draw incipient humanity lower.  Crocodiles are in the way.  He has already become infected with the desire to continue involution, or descent.  Nevertheless, no separation without great grief.

Then Bata calls to him and says: “Thou hast contrived an evil thing” – this change – “and now wilt thou contrive something else.”  This indicates that from now on Anpu is to become active.  Now Anpu will have to serve the cattle.  Bata says: Do it, for I wish thee to do it.  I am going to the Valley of the Acacia.  The acacia, a symbol, known from China to Egypt, as a holy wood — acacia boat, and sycamore woods which will take it on.  These (trees, or woods) related to Goodness and Truth.

Bata, as the germ of the spiritual, or cosmic, nature, returns to that nature, where only goodness is known; whereas the Anpu nature must continue its involution apart from Bata, or the higher nature, down into what later becomes earth.  Bata says: “Return to thy house and tend thy cattle; but nevertheless thou shalt seek for me.”  Anpu will remain in that valley till man wants to go up.

Bata says: “I shall draw up my soul and put it on the flowers of the acacia.  When it is cut down thou shalt seek it for seven years.  When you find it put it in a cup of cold water, and it will live.”  He also speaks of certain signs that will be given Anpu.  Bata then departs.  Anpu puts dust on his head, and slays his wife, and mourns for Bata.

These instructions sink into the deeps of the consciousness, or transliminal.  That is where we find it.  One of the signs to which Bata refers is the cup of beer running over: “Then you will know that the acacia on which my soul is resting is cut down.” — beginning of another cycle.  (Another sign) the cup of wine turning sour.  (Meaning) Earthly pleasures, for a time, fill the soul.  When the cup is fulfilled then that cycle is completed and you know there is the beginning of the next cycle.  Then you begin the cycle of search, or the pilgrimage.  Seven years.  When the wine turns sour, and is no longer sweet, – when you have no longer a craving for wine, – symbols of the desires that hold man to the dense world.

“When you find me put my soul in a cup of cold water, and it will live.”  Water cleansing — higher water; cold, – that is, free from the feelings of the lower state. Then the thing that is the soul, or rather, spirit nature, will live.

Anpu is now stung into consciousness.  The dust on his head is analogous to the thick coats of skin — still lower state.  Is now hampered by this state, and sits down.  Slays his wife.  The first service of the wife of Anpu is over.  Eve, as Eve, is no more.  Eliminated Eve state is cleared for the next development.  In understanding, he now consigns that part of his nature to that which is still lower, the dogs, and mourns for his brother.

Humanity is now at the stage of coming into physical form.  Separated from the higher nature.  The lower consciousness must develop the personality, – this becomes the Opener of the Ways — consciousness, or understanding, which is impossible in the Garden of Eden state, or in the upper regions where Bata lives.  You only get it through a pilgrimage in earth.  Bata, the higher nature, returns to the Valley of the Acacia, and abides there till the time comes for the next cycle, and Anpu begins his search for Bata.

(in ans. to question: the sycamore symbolizes goodness.)

 

 

Tale of Two Brothers, continued

MBM  December 14, 1928

(Relation of sun to earth.  Einstein coming back to the theory of corpuscles instead of just the wave length theory.)

. . . . . . .

(Re balance of story.)  The first section concerns Bata in the land of the Acacia; the second, in the lower realm, where Pharaoh rules; and in the third part we have again the activities of Anpu and the way they are related in the final conclusion of the story.  It is an extraordinary story.  All meet at the conclusion.  All parts of the evolving self.  At the last comes at-one-ment, as seen from a cosmic level.

First part.  Khnemu and the counterpart for Bata: a being made for Bata with the assistance of the gods of every essence.  She is beautiful indeed.  The two dwell together.  Bata brings to the woman the treasures which he found on his travels.  He says: “Be careful that you don’t leave my house, or the river may catch you and I will not be able to rescue you.  For, if anyone finds my soul I shall have to fight with him.”

She did walk out one day, after many cycles, from the house by the acacia tree.  The river leaped after her.  The acacia tree drops a tress of the lady’s hair into the stream, which carried it down into the land of Egypt.

Second part.  The washers of the linen of Pharaoh at the bank of the river.  Something from this tress of hair entered the linen and made it smell sweet.  The lower people protested at the perfume of the ointment.  The Overseer saw it, and was angry at the people.  The tress of hair floats opposite him, and he commands it to be brought in.  He noted its sweet odor and took it to Pharaoh.

Pharaoh called the wise men.  (They say) “This is a tress from the daughter of Ra-Horakthy.  The essence of every god is in her.  Send for her until you find where she is.”  Pharaoh is happy at the word of his scribes, and says: “It shall be done.”  He sends ambassadors to all countries to find the lady from whom came the tress of hair.

Some time passed, and all the ambassadors returned except those who had gone to the Land of the Acacia.  (Of these) only one returned.  The rest were slain by Bata.  That one brought back the word that made Pharaoh at once equip an expedition, – soldiers, and so forth, and a lady who brought most beautiful gifts into the land of the Acacia.  And they brought back the Lady who had been made for Bata.  Pharaoh received her with great honor.  They dwelled together happily.

Pharaoh commanded that she tell him of her husband, and she did.  She says: “Do thou that which I command unto thee”.  And he said Yes.  She said: “Cut down the acacia tree.”  Pharaoh marveled, but he did as she asked.  And the soul of Bata fell dead to the ground.

Third part.  Anpu had been living according to the instructions of Bata.  But now, one day, when the tree was cut down, someone handed him a cup of beer, and it frothed over; and the wine was sour.  And Anpu girt himself with his sandals and set out on a journey.  Three years he traveled, and sought.  And at the beginning of the fourth year his heart turned again to Egypt; and as his heart turned again toward Egypt he found the acacia which had been cut down, and beneath it the soul of Bata.  He wept, but took it up and put it in a cup of water, as Bata had said; and the soul of Bata soaked up the water, and presently he stepped forth; and the two brothers embraced.

Bata said: “I am become a great bull.  Mount on my back when the sun rises and take me to Pharaoh, for he will be glad to see me.”  And it was done.  When the bull and Anpu arrived: “Now is a great wonder come to pass!”  And he (Pharaoh) loved the bull above all things in his land.

And again the Lady was dining with Pharaoh.  And she said: “Do what I ask.  Slay the bull and give me the liver to eat.”  Pharaoh grieved, but the bull was slain.  When the bull was slaughtered two drops of blood fell from his neck, and on that spot there sprang up swiftly two acacia trees.  The Lady and Pharaoh went to sit under the two trees, each in his own chariot.  Pharaoh with a blue crown and garlands of flowers.  And they sat under the tree of the acacia.

The bull who had been Bata came into the chamber of purification and said: “I know what thou hast done.”  “Who art thou”, asked Pharaoh.  “I am Bata.”

Again the Lady asks Pharaoh to do something: “Cut down the two acacia trees and make them into planks.”  And it was done, and the Lady stood by.  A splinter entered her mouth, and she knew she was bearing a child.  A messenger (came) to Pharaoh: “Unto thee is born a son.”  Pharaoh loved the child, and made him his heir.  Pharaoh goes to the higher gods, and Bata, re-born, was born.

Bata calls to himself the August Lady, and with her judged all who were before him, and told the story of his life.  He summoned Anpu.  And, having ruled thirty years, Bata rose to the Celestial Heights, and Anpu ruled.

Bata is that aspect of the self which had withdrawn to the spiritual planes, its first activity over.  The gods, led by Ra-Horakhty, recognized him, and required a counterpart for him.  The female principle is that which arouses desire.  On this plane, greatly beautiful.  That phase of the self which is to be next in activity remains at home, quietly, for a time.

Bata warns her against going near the stream; that is, the channel along which flows the force of life from above down.  The movement of descent is so strong that that which came near might easily be drawn in.  Bata, withdrawn from the lower planes, could not go down.

The stream of life feels her near, like a magnet.  (It is) part of the Pattern that she should go near it.  The river thinks: “Would that I could get some of this essence from above.”  It belongs to the Pattern that the tree should drop the tress and carry it down into the land of Egypt — the world of the making of the perfected man.  The time having come when some of the values of the higher plane could be carried down.  The river conveys them to the lower planes, where lived Pharaoh and Anpu.  Pharaoh represents that phase of the development of the self which is ruler in the household.

The Overseer is the intelligent phase – not intellectual, but the whole range of intelligence which man has accumulated in the course of evolution, and which serves the mind, Pharaoh.  The washers are those selves which are busy cleansing, and keeping cleansed, those faculties which have become soiled in the evolution, and need constant revision to keep them in order.  Represent the attitudes, the appearances, which the developing light spark manifests in these higher states.  The Overseer is angry at the conflict between the washers and the people.  The people are not yet at the level of the washers.

Seven days: Like the hair of the wife of Bata, represents the intuitional function, beyond reach of which (?) is another level, where a bond can be made between it and the growing man.  The “sweet odor” — since it is unknown, – not rational, – super-rational; and the rational minds are ill at ease in the presence of intuition.

The Overseer, the mental faculties, knows enough to convey the tress to the highest thing in man’s being at this stage, namely the king.  Pharaoh, now maturing, – showing he is ready for intuition, sends for his scribes and wise men.  They immediately state: “This tress is from the head of a daughter of Ra-Horakhty.” Re-cog-nized.  Ra, the high level, the Source from which all things have come, the First Logos.  “The essence of every god is in her.  Bring her into thy realm.”  All that is wise in you, and understands principles and scriptures, report to the king to swiftly attain this.  Don’t keep it outlawed.

An anguishing thing to do: Bata slays the ambassadors.  Always the resistance of the greater to the less.  But the word of the one (ambassador) was sufficient for Pharaoh to understand.

The preparation of the expedition is filled with symbols of the powers which the lower self had obtained.  As a token to the August Lady that he was ready for her to dwell in his land . . . . Send also a young woman, who carries beautiful gifts.  The female principle must also be recognized, and carry those beautiful gifts which have been won in the course of evolution.  Pharaoh had also to give token of them to the August Lady.

These brought her to Pharaoh.  He set up a great place for her; that is, the king recognizes the greatness of this function of intuition, and sets it up high in his household.  And, because he does that, Pharaoh is happy.  Values emanated from his being.

Now come the harrowing tests — what she asks him to do.  Through intuition, the August Lady, he learns about Bata, or the spiritual planes; and then she asks him to cut down the acacia tree.  Bata falls dead.  That is, the period over which that aspect of the self called Bata, which had been relatively quiescent, is over, and must go through a transformation.  No growth without transformation, and no transformation without some degree of pain, or loss.

Why does the story now shift?  Because the juxtaposition of these two aspects of the self has come to a state where they undergo, first, death then the beginning of a new cycle.

In the meantime we know Anpu has been growing through this entire cycle.  Anpu now receives the signal which Bata had given him as the cue, many cycles before — the beer.  Anpu is ready to draw up his tail.  Like tail of the worm, to be drawn up, – or the serpent.  True of progress on higher levels.  Anpu recognizes, or responds, quickly to the signal, grasps his staff, binds his sandals, and so forth, to journey forth.  That is, the lowest part of man, the lower personality, has now deliberately to set forth to find the higher.

He travels three years.  At the beginning of the fourth he is drawn toward Egypt — the land where the perfected man is to be made, – where the transformations take place.  As he moves toward Egypt, or the condition where the transformation is to take place, he simultaneously comes to the place, or condition, where is the acacia tree.  When you come to the higher mental, or fourth, cycle you come near to intuition, and meet there again that from which you have been separated when the descent, or involution, took place.

At this stage Anpu weeps.  Unless you experience in terms of pain you do not experience at all.

He remembers swiftly the word of Bata to take his soul and put it in water.  The soul of Bata draws in the water and, reanimated, he stands before Anpu.  That is, as the aspects of the water of truth which Anpu has gathered in his pilgrimage of earth are bound together and held in a cup, that which is of the spiritual plane draws that water into itself.  Commingling.  And Anpu and Bata are again at the same place, – meeting, because Anpu has arisen to where Bata went.  The tail of the serpent has been drawn up.

Bata then says: “Lo and behold!  I have become a great bull.”  Bata has grown, in a sense, by all that Anpu, Pharaoh, the Overseer and the others have done.  The values of the soul being returned to spirit.  Spirit grows as the result of the values won by the self in the lower development.  Then Bata says: “Mount on my back, and tomorrow thou shalt take me to the Land of Pharaoh, and he will be glad.”  The interrelation between Anpu and Bata.  Bata speaks, but Anpu is to do the guiding – that aspect of the self which has been groomed, made conscious by evolution in earth, leads.

Pharaoh is glad to see them.  The bull is treasured by Pharaoh, for Pharaoh is the one whose intelligence, growing ever more, cognizes that which he had known before.

The Lady requires that the bull be slain.  In order to bring about transformation there must be death to the old form.  The part played by Bata must go through radical changes.  She knows it, because she is intuition herself.  She speaks, and the lower self, the king of the whole lower man, obeys.  This is eons beyond psychism and psychic tests, but a supreme experience.  And Anpu follows the dictates of intuition.  The bull is slain, and carried on the heads of the people.

Two drops of blood and two acacia trees grow up — the beginning of a new cycle, to which the death of Bata, the bull, is necessary.

The king puts on his blue crown, and garlands and flowers, and mounts a silver chariot, and rides to the place of the two acacias.

Then the Lady requests that the two trees be cut down and made into planks: Bata, the bull, acacia trees, planks.  When the planks are made the August Lady is standing by.  A splinter enters within her, and she knows she is bearing a child.  Impregnation.  The splinter indicates the values which have been won, which bring about a re-birth, through the mother principle – which is now, however, on the spirit level.  The values which have grown up in the household of the self are kingly — a true child of Pharaoh.  They may be spiritual values, but they are born to your earthly manhood.

Pharaoh, the perfect king, does all the things needed for the child.  Pharaoh makes him heir; because the evolving self, which has become spiritual, surrenders, in due season, to spiritual leadership.  That which is born as the result of the higher activities uniting with the lower shall reign, rather than the highest which had been before.  Hence Pharaoh makes this child his heir; and Pharaoh is gathered unto the gods, and the child, now grown to manhood, reigns.  He calls unto himself his counterpart, the August Lady.

Now Bata and his beautiful counterpart, whom the gods had made, are together; and together they judge and rule the world.

But once more the serpent has to draw up his tail.  The child born of the mother is Bata.  She is wife and mother.  Bata now calls unto him Anpu, that which comes from below, and Bata, in turn, makes Anpu his heir.  Why?  Because the whole story, the whole process of human evolution, was to bring Anpu to this place.  Just as Anpu can come up to this place, so the qualities known as the August Lady, as Bata, move to an octave still higher.  Modulation, or transformation.  A new key.  Bata withdraws to the gods, still active to that from which they worked before.  And Anpu, the completed human, whose becoming was consummated in Egypt, now rules instead.

A contrast to the beginning of the story, where he rested on the values stimulated by Bata.  Now he is ruler, like Pharaoh (?) of the solar system.  Once nebulae, yet the beginning of the making of worlds.  Presently bits break off and go on a development of their own, – yet are held perfectly within the grasp of the solar system.  The lowest has come to a level beyond where the highest was.

No one can go in terms of his head alone.  When we go we do it like the serpent.  We move forward by our heads, and presently, having stretched itself, it draws up its tail, and accomplishes its first octave.  The perfect economy in the movement of the serpent.  One part of the self profits by the other.  In Egypt, the land of the perfecting, there is no failure in any part, no strain or limitation anywhere.  When the spiritual economy is consummated — hence after thirty years – Bata is withdrawn to the gods and Anpu reigned in his place.

The bull represents the powers which have come out of activity – the profit by what has been done by the lower self, and has entered again, as the positive, but not necessarily active, side on the higher spiritual planes.  The bull represents the powers on the spiritual to which Bata can move up when the Anpu stage has been accomplished.  Anpu, the Overseer, the king are all related — active aspects of the household of the self in Egypt.

In the meantime, Bata, the bull, waits up above.  Shifts its center like a point, when the lower changes are consummated.

The two acacia trees — Goodness and Wisdom.  Bata is transformed as the result of the activity of Anpu and his highest part, the king.  These values effect transformations in Bata.  After Bata has become the bull, and this stage is behind, the bull must be slain.  The blood, which represents the vitality of the bull at this stage, the life force, impregnates the earth.  Fruit and values as the result.  Spiritual values.

The two trees: the double values of Goodness and Truth, which have grown up as the result of this evolution.  You stand on those two.  You cannot grow up any other way into the higher.  Honesty and kindliness are remote earth shadows of these.  They have still to be applied.  Here they are hewn into beams, – cut, – applied – goodness and wisdom.

When you have done that you become pregnant and become re-born yourself.