P-16


The Esoteric Record [of the Ninth Working]

_Die _{u} . Jan. 19, 11:45
      The Rites of Juppiter were duly performed on this and the next two days.
With regard to the Ceremony of Wednesday, I have to add to the esoteric record
that Fra. O.S.V. was at one time a consecrated prostitute in the Temple of the
sun at Agrigentum. this Temple had a `long square' (2 _+_ 1) outer court. In the
upper square was a square Temple -- with facade and pillars. O.S.V., whose name
was at that time Asteria (or something similar), used to sit on the steps and
receive sacrifices. I think the name was Astarte, but am afraid of having been
rational.*
      The great sacrifice of Spring was to cut open a bull, and lay a virgin in
the hot carcase, there to be violated by the High Priest. She was finally choked
in the bull's blood _(in orgasmo)._
      Within the Temple was a circular domed shrine about 40 feet across. The
priestesses used to carry their offerings to the altar of Incense in the East,
while the blood of the victims went to a big font in the West. (The door of the
shrine was in the North; in the South was a statue of a Sun-God of a Syrian type
-- rather more like Bacchus than Apollo. In the centre was a light movable couch
rather like one sees in pictures at Naples. It was used in the midnight ceremony
to obtain oracles.)
      The secret of the Temple was thei _Midnight Sun._ Globes of fire used to
gather on the font, and from the other altar, and begin to revolve in the
shrine. They would coalesce and then become one, which stood single and unmoving
all night, only fading with dawn. Astarte surprised the secret, and penetrated
into the shrine at the midnight sacrifice and adoration of this globe. She was
slain instantly by the priests, who passed their swords again and again through
her body. This death was extreme pleasure. The body was then thrown out upon the
court at the foot of the Temple steps, and made tabu, so that it might be
`devoured by the Sun'.
      She had incurred this incarnation as the result of various misdemeanors in
Greece about an hundred years before. Her incarnations had always been at short
intervals. It appears that in the beginning most people cannot bear frequent
incarnations, and need long restorative periods of rest and peace. But superior
spirits take a great oath, and get on faster. They suffer more in proportion.
You can recognise them by sensitiveness, which is sometimes in the painful or
morbid degree. This is the case when the Great Work has been forgotten for an
incarnation, or a part of it; the idea is to impress the fact of the oath upon
the sufferer. Astarte in her Grecian avatar had been a rather worldly priest.
      Her childhood was one of great misery. She had been taken by pirates and
ill-treated -- she came from Leghorn or its neighbourhood. A ship-wreck left her
on the coast of Sicily. People found her, and finding her an excellent
prostitute (she was now 14), put her in a brothel. She hated the life. At a
spring festival she was lucky enough to attract a young priest who took her, put
her through a year's purification, and added her to the Temple staff But she
only saw a dull routine, though applying herself to advancement in her
profession by the skill of her embraces. However, by the age of 20 or there-
abouts she `got religion', and began to act _con amore._ From this time she was
rather the terror of the Temple. She used to do strange things, excesses,
record-breaking acts, and so on. In fact she was a little mad; she had a _touch_
_of the Sun_ as it were. However, she got the name of being inspired now and then,
and was used in some of the public ceremonies.
      She made a young priest fall madly in love with her on one such occasion,
and they violated their vows by carnal copulation of an irreligious character.
In this way she made him tell her the secret of the Temple; she then killed him
the same night, so that he should never betray the fact that he had betrayed the
Mysteries.
      She was a slim, lean, nervous girl with a long face, a Roman nose, rather
full lips, very strong from constant exercise, a habit of wriggling as if
consumed by an inward itch, abundant and very wiry black hair which she
sometimes dyed, very sharp and white regular teeth, deep violet eyes, very wide
apart, and set obliquely like Chinese eyes. Her cheek-bones were high, and her
body like a man's, or rather, like a boy's. Her vulva was lean and muscular, the
nymphae hardly developed at all. Astarte was her Temple name; her own was
Felicia. Her parents were peasants, vine-dressers, in winter woodcutters.*