Hiya /co/,
I just read Nameless issue 6 and found it to be great, the best thing Morrison has done since The Filth and We3. However, many people take issue with how esoteric it is. I'm into shit like that, so I thought I'd try and decipher as much as I can for people. I'm by no means an expert, but I know a little about Rosicrucianism, Freemasonry, Golden Dawn, Crowley etc.. Bits and pieces here and there, but it helped understand SOME of Nameless. This is not going to be a thorough deconstruction, I'll just put helpful references and links here for those interested.
>>78427920
First off: In esoteric thought, by which I mean OLD esoteric thought (not angel-channelings, unicorns and shit), individual thought is something we acquired in relatively young times. Before, we perceived the world and OURSELVES and our thoughts moved by outside agencies, because we did not consider ourselves to be movers. So the different pantheons, little cults here and there are expressions of a very real and very literal belief that did not require active imagination (like you would need in church) because it was right before our eyes. It did not need to be questioned.
>>78427931
Xibalba and Ixaxaar: This mode of cognizing was complemented, not abolished, by a new development. Lucifer brought us rational thought and individuality, the possibility to do things FOR OURSELVES and CAUSE THOUGHTS by ourselves for that purpose alone. Before that, this was not possible. Take a look at this:
http://www.gematrix.org/?word=the%20sixty%20star%20stone%20ixaxaar
and this:
http://itsallintheegg.blogspot.de/2013/08/dragon-blood.html
Malkuth is the sphere of the material world. Ixaxaar is the crown jewel on Lucifers head and it fell to Malkuth when Michael hit it off his head, essentially completing the Fall and separation Satan had begun in the Beginning, where Satan as Darkness made the concept of „category“ as he separated the Light of the Seven Rayed God. This God will be relevant later.
>>78427950
Now that we have this out of the way, look at Nameless. Ixaxaar is a key to open up the prison Xibalba, where the thing we called God is imprisoned. This is another concept of old esoteric thought. Lucifer gave us individuality and individual thought. But at that moment in history there was no way for us to control that. From a state of, well, not bliss, but at least union with everything else, we became lonely and couldn't control ourselves. Everyone against everyone. No social world possible.
>>78427973
How do you fix that? The Seven Rayed God(s) made „everything“ as a union. They are adressed in plural as „Elohim“ in the bible. That switches to singular later. The God of Abraham is something different that The Maker. Where The Seven Rayed God(s) and Jesus as their worldly incarnation represent The Sun, Jehovah represents The Moon, the reflection. The Moon and his power of reflection is our power to question our behaviour and evaluate and restrict it. Back then that meant to have a set of laws to follow, like The Ten Commandments.
>>78427997
By now you should see a few possible connections. These are not necessarily the exact connections Morrison intended, but we are on a terrain that is so abstracted and all-encompassing, that it should fit to a degree. Xibalba is crashed into The Moon, which could be a reference to Masonic thought (I'm aware that there is no single Masonic thought), the one I just outlined. Real deal esotericism is concerned directly with the planets as representation of the divine. You may have heard the phrase „As above, so below“ The movement and attributes of the planets reflect the godly realm which reflects our internal movements etc.. This is exactly what we have in Nameless.
>>78428017
I know, I know, I|m treading water. But this is exactly what you are SUPPOSED to do in esoteric thinking, making ridiculous but somewhat sensible connections to transform and loosen you frame of reference. So let's continue. Xibalba is of course the Mayan underworld, but maybe it being a Mayan underworld is not THAT important. Xibalba is a six-staged domain of tests for the dead before they go further.
>>78428044
In esoteric thought, after death, the soul ascends to the Dark Side of the Moon, where, of course, demons reside. These demons are evil and not-evil, in that they fulfill their function of slowly and painfully ripping your life and experience away from you, so that you are cleaned from everything that is Malkuth and can further ascend (just to be sent on the next Malkuth-ride).
>>78428072
In Nameless, Xibalba is „a nested tesseract, turning through the rolled and twisted space-time dimension inside your skull.“ It is between Malkuth and Yesod, the sphere of the unconscious and dreams and abstractions, where everything is soft and malleable and not-defined („Everything passes. Nothing is real.“).
>>78428123
Yesod is a gateway to the rest of The Tree of Life and thus, abstract aspects of Creation. In the last issue, we see that the Titans made war with The Outsiders. Who is Outside? The Demons and Devils of The Negative Tree and the Qlipoth (which are flaws in Creation). Perversions and antithesis. Apparently the conflict reduced Mars to blood red slime. Mars is associated with natural desires, as is sometimes Yesod, so maybe this is a perversion of the Gateway to The Tree and an invitation for The Outsiders.
>>78428194
That's all I got for now. I guess you could say this is happening: The whole story is in the dreamtime of Yesod, which is why one thing is expressed in a multitude of ways. The unifying factor is this: We have come to a time that is so postmodern and nihilistic, that the old blockades (read: justifications for restraint) for our „evil“, uncontrolled aspects are no longer in place. This accumulates and leads to a sort of apocalypse, represented by that Crossed type epidemic in Nameless. The Outsiders come, Lucifer's is on a roll, and his stone will let them in to seal the deal and complete The Separation that Satan has set in motion.
>>78428231
This isn't evil. Same way the lion that will probably eat you isn't evil. It's their (our) nature. Nameless couldn't figure a way out, so what he did was reinforce the old barrier, Jehovah. He let them crash into it, essentially showing them „what is human“, which is restraint for the sake of society. Which is what Jehovah represents in esoteric thought. It is a higher level of consciousness that overrides our „animal soul“ and restrains us through self-reflection. That evil god that we are has his place. But only on the Dark Side, as ONE SIDE of a TWO-SIDED coin. Thank you, that is all.
>>78428260
Huh. Yeah, that makes some sense.
Cosmic bump for interest.
