Anthony Testa - The Key of the Abyss.pdf

After all, the magician has just been expelled from the Abyss and the
fallen from the Tree of Life so clearly, he cannot re-enter the Abyss.
Further we may ask the same regarding those who refuse the Ordeal
entirely. By definition, the Adepts become Black Brothers because the
will not enter the Abyss. Therefore, as we have defined the fallen as
those that are within the phenomenal universe and have worked to
retain their ego-self at the expense of their True Self. Neither are these
Adepts in the Abyss but they need never have entered. In fact, as
Crowley himself doubts the possibility of a failed crossing resulting in
the attainment of “towers of the Black Brothers” it might be said that
the true Black Brother is one who has NOT entered the Abyss but is
an Adept that has sought to hold back from the Abyss by means of the
most vile sorceries 135 .
It is the final possibility that resolves the issue. Here we find that the
magician has remained in the Abyss (or seems to) as the consequence
of his failure to perfectly annihilate his ego-self prior to his entry in to
Abyss. Basically, then we have two definitions that are contradictory.
Recall what Grant said concerning Da’ath: Daäth being the Gate of the
Abyss is the point both of ingress into noumenon and of egress into
phenomena: in other words it is the gateway of the manifestation of
non-manifestation. 136
We find the key to the solution of the problem in the concept of
Da’ath. If those who refuse the Sacrifice of the Ordeal are Black
Brothers, and this is a proper interpretation, then it follows that the
Adept who remains (or appear to, from Malkuth) in the Abyss are not
Black Brothers. We see that there is a confusion of two different
phenomena. It is Grant’s insight that the Abyss is also a gate that
proves the point. The Adept of the Great White Brotherhood
renounces the universe and subsequently destroys it based upon his
understanding that the phenomenal universe is a product of his mind
and contains no discernable reality 137 within it. The Black Brother
135
This is, in any case, Crowley’s interpretation of Orthodox Christian Soteriology which
believes that Christ was a blood sacrifice to the Father, and that only blood could gain the
remission of sin.
136
Kenneth Grant, Nightside of Eden, Skoob
137
There has been much cause for misunderstanding regarding this concept, particularly what
it means to say the universe is unreal. The sense in which this is true is the product of Time.
Anything that is bound in time will eventually be destroyed. Therefore, if the definition of real
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