Here’s a secret: if you look at the oldest myths, from all parts of the world, you see Darkness at the beginning. Whether in the Rig Veda, the Torah, the Avesta, or Egyptian texts and Babylonian tablets, or Celtic or Greek or Roman creation myths — it’s all Darkness: that vast, acausal realm, full of chaos and possibility.
And there are Things in that Darkness.
This is the part that organized religion doesn’t want you to know. Sure, we have stories about Jehovah, Jupiter, Indra and Thor helping to shape the planet and establish government, or Nebo giving us writing, or Manitou giving us corn. But those gods are young, newcomers to the world, second and third generation grandchildren of Other Beings.
Take Egypt, for example. When the Ennead came into being and helped shape the cosmos, Ammit and Apep already lurked in the quiet shadows of the Duat. Or take the Vedic Hymn of Creation – before the first deities awoke, the dragon Vritra swam in the dark uncreate (asat). In Sumer and Babylon, Tiamat and Absu personified the dark, cosmic oceans from which the rest of life emerged. The Greeks believed that Chaos bore Night, who then bore the other gods.
What’s interesting is that all these ancient Beings are monsters, really. None of them even appear human – in fact, we don’t really have descriptions for most of them, because the Dark Gods are beyond description. If anything, the oldest legends suggest that their forms were a matter of convenience, and changed with Their whim.
What is interesting is that many cultures have the Dark Gods in common. It doesn’t impress us that most cultures have a sun god, since anyone can look up in the sky and see the sun and come up with a story of some kind. Storm gods are all similar too, since we can all hear the thunder, and imagine some cloud-grey patriarch armed with a lightning spear. But the first gods are different – neverborn, uncreated, yet very much a crucial part of mythology. How is it that multiple civilizations – all of them ancient – conceived of a group of primordial, dark, shapeless-and-shape-changing beings that ruled over a dream realm of undefined time and space? There is nothing to point at and say “there’s your origin.”
Campell and Freud would say that these are myths based on the “collective unconscious”, that there was some point where humans were scared of the Dark because there were lions and tigers and bears that made it dangerous to leave the dim glow of the campfire. Sure – that makes sense, and explains why we’re scared and fascinated by the Dark for that reason. But does that explain why Darkness is our Origin story? No, it doesn’t … unless there is some truth to it. Common memories usually do point to source event or phenomenon, although the memory of the event will become distorted with time or re-telling. But when multiple mythologies of similar age tell us that there were Things that predated the gods and creation, then there’s probably a good reason for that belief. If multiple mythologies also tell us that those Things were inhuman, monstrous, chimeric — there’s probably a reason for that too.
Equally interesting is that multiple myth systems equate those Things with the origin of our species. Sure, the younger gods get the credit for making us servile, attentive, obedient. Civilized, if you will. We invented them, gave them names and titles, built temples for them – and gave them the keys to our chains. The funny thing is that no two (unrelated) myths agree on those gods – because they are cultural constructs. In other words, you can find versions of Thor in Europe, but not in China or Egypt. But you do find the Things in all of those places, quietly swimming in the Darkness. We constructed Thor — but we remember the Things.
So I’m saying that the Beings who brought this world into being, and lifted us out of the mud — They’re the ones that deserve a second look.
A lot of magical systems want to deal with the gods that people created – and that’s ok. They have a certain kind of power, though that power changes with the passing of time, and from one geographic region to another. The Nasrani and Yehudi gods have power today – you see it in politics, media, global conflict. But that’s a power that humans invented and invested. That power is dependent entirely on the believers (read: prisoners) of those belief systems, and is limited by the constraints of those systems.
But the Dark Gods are real. We know that they’re real because we remember the Dark Gods. We can pretend that They are fiction or folklore or popular culture, but deep down inside we know that there is more to it that than. Modern attempts to make movies about monsters who walk among us isn’t just wish fulfillment – it’s a kind of racial memory. Humans have a connection to the Dark Gods, and you can feel it – that tug at the back of your skull, that shadow at the corner of your eye, that strange shape in your dreams that never quite comes into the light. You know what I mean. Not everyone can feel it strongly, some try to deny it or repress it or ignore it. But others hear Them calling and feel a connection, a kinship, a curiosity to know more. If you’re reading this, you’re probably one of those who feels the lure of the Darkness a little more strongly than others.
There are answers out there, and there are systems that can help get those answers. Not all systems are equally good, and not all work equally well for everyone. In my years of study and travel, I’ve met a lot of people who claim to have answers, and read a lot of books that pretended that Answers are easy, that Change is easy, that Becoming is easy. Nonsense. Real change is hard – and it takes blood, sweat, and tears (and most of it yours, in case you wondered). If a system or school promises you change but asks nothing from you in the real world, then they are lying or stupid. If you genuinely think that you can commune with the Things in the darkness and not be changed, then you are playing games.
I think the best system out there is that of the ONA, because it is *real*. You read Naos, for example, and you see a methodology that will make you suffer, but as an athlete who suffers to improve. But beyond that, in reading the work of others touched by the ONA (L316, WSA352, Temple of THEM) you see a glimpse of people who have been changed, who have gone beyond mere humanity. It’s different in each case, but there is something there – cold, predatory, brilliant. These people are active, adaptive, transformative. These people have each, in their own unique way, reached out to the Darkness and been changed by what they found.
You might wonder what kind of answers the Gods in the Darkness can give you. It’s impossible to say, because everyone’s experience is different. Some find their answers inside, through self-study and personal insight into the unconscious, which is our own built-in small piece of the Abyss. Some engage in social and mimetic engineering, actively pushing the sinister dialectic with deeds that are visible in the causal world. Some pursue a more arcane approach through the Sevenfold Way, gaining insights in the acausal Darkness through more esoteric means. I’m a traditionalist myself, though that is a personal choice, and no more valid than anyone else’s, and you can find example of all these types online, if you look long enough.
What I’m trying to say that is if you’re really looking for answers in mythology or folklore, it will always be easier to relate to gods that look human and act human, or even become human. If you’re looking for easy answers, your life may be long and happy, in service to the Machine. But if you’re interested in truth, then look to the Darkness, because the real answers are there.
- Rex
