26

INITIATIC DEATH

 
     Another question, which seems as little understood by those of our contemporaries who claim to treat of such things as that of initiatic trials, is that of ‘initiatic death’. Thus we have often come across expressions like ‘fictive death’, which bears witness to a complete incomprehension of realities of this order. Those who express themselves in this way obviously see only the outwardness of the rite and have no idea of the effects it must produce on those who are truly qualified; otherwise they would realize that on the contrary this ‘death’, far from being ‘fictive’, is in a sense even more real than death understood in the ordinary meaning of the word, for it is obvious that the profane person who dies is not thereby initiated, and the distinction between the profane order (including in this not only what lacks a traditional character but also all exoterism) and the initiatic order is truly the only one that goes beyond the contingencies inherent in the particular states of the being, and consequently the only one that has a profound and permanent value from the universal point of view. In this regard it will suffice to recall that all traditions stress the essential difference between the posthumous states of the profane and of the initiated; if the consequences of death, taken in its usual meaning, are thus conditioned by this distinction, it is because the change that gives access to the initiatic order corresponds to a higher degree of reality.
 
     Of course the word ‘death’ must here be taken in its most general sense, according to which we may say that every change of state whatsoever is at once a death and a birth, depending on whether it is considered from one side or from the other: death with respect to the antecedent state, birth with respect to the consequent state. Initiation is generally described as a ‘second birth’, which indeed it is; but this ‘second birth’ necessarily implies a death to the profane world and follows so to speak as an immediate sequel to it, since these are strictly speaking only the two faces of one and the same change of state. As for the symbolism of the rite, it will naturally be based on the analogy which holds good for all changes of state; by reason of this analogy, death and birth in the ordinary sense themselves symbolize initiatic death and birth, these borrowed images being transposed by the rite into another order of reality. It is appropriate to note in particular here that every change of state must be considered to be accomplished in darkness, which explains the relevance of the symbolism of the color black to our subject:¹ the candidate for initiation must pass through total darkness before reaching the ‘true light’. It is in this phase of darkness that what is called the ‘descent into hell’, takes place, of which we have spoken more fully elsewhere;² it is, one could say, a kind of ‘recapitulation’ of the antecedent states by which the possibilities relating to the profane state are definitively exhausted in order that the being may thenceforth freely develop the possibilities of a superior order that he bears within himself and the realization of which belongs properly to the initiatic domain.
 
     On the other hand, since similar considerations apply to every change of state, and the later and successive degrees of initiation also correspond naturally to changes of state, it can be said that for accession to each of these latter degrees there will be a death and a birth, although the ‘break’, if one may put it so, will be less sharp and of a less fundamental importance than for the first initiation, that is to say for the passage from the profane order to the initiatic order. Moreover, it goes without saying that the changes undergone by the being in the course of its development are really indefinite in number; the initiatic degrees ritually conferred, whatever the traditional form may be, can thus correspond only to a sort of general classification of the principal stages to be traversed, and each of these can itself epitomize a multitude of secondary and intermediate stages. But in this process there is a point that is particularly important, where the symbolism of death must reappear in the most explicit way, and to this we now turn.
 
     The ‘second birth’, understood as corresponding to the first initiation, is, as we have said, what can be properly called a psychic regeneration; and it is indeed in the psychic order, that is to say in the order where the subtle elements of the human being are found, that the first phases of initiatic development must take place. But these phases do not constitute a goal in themselves, for they are still only preparatory to the realization of possibilities of a higher order, by which is meant the spiritual order in the true sense. The point in the initiatic process to which we allude is therefore that marking the passage from the psychic order to the spiritual order; and this passage can be seen more particularly as constituting a ‘second death’ and a ‘third birth’.³ It is appropriate to add that this ‘third birth’ will be represented rather as a ‘resurrection’ than as an ordinary birth because it is no longer a question of a ‘beginning’ in the same sense as on the occasion of the first initiation; the possibilities already developed and acquired once and for all will be found again after this passage, but ‘transformed’ in a way analogous to that in which the ‘body of glory’ or the ‘resurrected body’ represent the ‘transformation’ of human possibilities beyond the restrictive conditions that define the mode of existence of the individuality as such.
 
     Brought back thus to the essentials, the question is rather simple; what complicates it, as almost always happens, are the confusions introduced by mixing in considerations that really relate to something else altogether. This is what happens especially regarding the ‘second death’, to which many, because they cannot make certain essential distinctions among the diverse cases where this expression can be employed, attach a meaning that is particularly inopportune. According to what we have just said, the ‘second death’ is nothing other than the ‘psychic death’; for the ordinary man this can be envisaged as occurring sooner or later after the bodily death, apart from any initiatic process; but then this ‘second death’ will not give access to the spiritual domain, and the being, leaving the human state, will merely pass to another individual state of manifestation. This is a dire eventuality for the profane who have every interest in remaining in what we have called the ‘prolongations’ of the human state, which, moreover, in all traditions is the principal reason for funeral rites. But it is otherwise for the initiate, since he realizes the possibilities of the human state only to pass beyond them to a higher state, which moreover he must do without awaiting the dissolution of his corporeal appearance.
 
     In order not to omit any possibility, let us add that there is another, unfavorable aspect to the ‘second death’ which relates properly to the ‘counter-initiation’. This latter, in effect, imitates true initiation in its phases, but its results are as it were the reverse of initiation and obviously can in no case lead to the spiritual domain since, on the contrary, it only leads the being further and further away from it. When the individual following this path comes to the ‘psychic death’, he finds himself in a situation not exactly like that of the merely profane person but much worse because of the development he has given to the most inferior possibilities of the subtle order. But we will not dwell on this any further and will be content to refer to the allusions we have already made to it on other occasions,⁴ for in truth this is a case that can hold no interest except from a very special point of view, and, in any case, has absolutely nothing to do with true initiation. The fate of ‘black magicians’, as they are commonly called, is their own concern, and it would be useless to say the least to supply fodder for the more or less fantastic ramblings which this subject only too often provokes. Our only concern must be to denounce their misdeeds when circumstances require and to oppose them in the measure that this is possible; and in an age like our own these misdeeds are notably more widespread than those who have had no occasion to note them directly can imagine.


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[1] This explanation applies equally to the phases of the Hermetic ‘Great Work’, which, as we have already said, correspond strictly to those of initiation.
[2] See The Esoterism of Dante.
[3] In Masonic symbolism this corresponds to initiation to the grade of Master.
[4] See Reign of Quantity, chaps. 35 and 38.