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The Light of Sex

Initiation, Magic, and Sacrament

Foreword by Hans Thomas Hakl / Introduction and notes by Donald Traxler / Translated by Donald Traxler
Published by Inner Traditions
Distributed by Simon & Schuster

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About The Book

The first English translation of Maria de Naglowska’s essential treatise on the spiritually transformative power of sex, La lumière du sexe

• Reveals mystic sexual practices for growth of the soul and enlightenment

• Explains the inner workings of the sex magic rituals of La confrérie de la Flèche d’Or [The Brotherhood of the Golden Arrow], the notorious occult order of 1930s Paris

• Translated from the original French with an Introduction and Notes by Donald Traxler

Never before available in English, The Light of Sex expounds the tenets of the revolutionary religious system conceived by Maria de Naglowska--Russian mystic, occultist, esoteric high priestess, rumored lover of Julius Evola, and self-styled “Satanic Woman” of 1930s Paris. Centered on what she called the Third Term of the Trinity, in which the Holy Spirit of the classic Christian trinity is recognized as the divine feminine, her practices aim to bring about a reconciliation of the light and dark forces in nature through the union of the masculine and feminine. Revealing the spiritually transformative power of sex, she shows how--through mystic sexual practices and veneration of the feminine spirit--growth of the soul, regeneration of the world, and enlightenment of humankind can be achieved.

This mystic treatise and guide to the sexually charged rituals that were a cause célèbre in 1930s Paris was required reading for those seeking to be initiated into Naglowska’s magical group La confrérie de la Flèche d’Or [The Brotherhood of the Golden Arrow]. It reveals Naglowska to be a powerful visionary, whose psychic powers were legendary, and an important figure in the continuing evolution of the Western Mystery tradition.

Excerpt

Chapter 6
Sex


When balance reigns within you, and “your left is as your right,” climb the initiatic Mountain, and search out the mystery of Life.

Seek out the woman--Eve--and ask her for the apple that grants the Knowledge of Good and Evil.

Definitely do not address yourself to the blind woman who, silently, accomplishes her task as mother. That one obeys God (= Life) and cares little about the Human Revolution. Don’t bother her! Let her tend to her children.

Address yourself to the other--she exists!--to whom Satan has confided his secret.

Since the beginning of the world, she has been waiting at the very heart of God (= Life) for the morning hour when she will be permitted to speak.

And now meditate upon this:
When God (= Life) opposed to Adam, in the biblical Paradise, the immaculate spouse, the virgin Eve, and when the bridegroom found her beautiful, Satan took the form of a serpent (symbol of wisdom) and murmured into the ear of the woman:

“Oh Eve, splendid creature! Why has God, the Lord of Life, forbidden you to offer yourself to the man, your husband? Why must Adam content himself with admiring your beauty, without biting into the fruit hidden in your charming forest? Isn’t it an injustice to condemn you to eternal sterility and deprive you of the best of the fruits of this garden?”

Then Eve answered:

“The Lord of Life has permitted the man, my husband, and me, his wife, to feed ourselves from all of the fruits that decorate and cheer this garden, but he has said that the fruit hidden in my forest was the fruit of Death.”

But Satan, wrapping the woman in his serpentine caress, murmured this to her:

“Oh Eve! Adorable woman! The Lord of Life deceives himself and deceives you. For that I reproach him day and night. What he calls the ‘fruit of Death’ grants, on the contrary, immortality, science, and omnipotence to him who nourishes himself from it. It is undoubtedly to keep your husband in his state of slavery that he has hidden the best of you in your depths.”

And, slipping through the warm moss of the troubled beauty, Satan deposited there his acid venom.

Eve knew the first shudder of love and revealed the secret of it to Adam.

The Serpent, Satan, the Will to Die, these three that are only one, taught voluptuousness to the woman, who from that time became the lover who attracts the man to his woman not for the Victory of Life (= God), but for the Victory of Death (= Satan), and Eve, that Second Triumph, that living symbol of the Third Hypostase, in which Intelligence replaces Reason, became the arena of the struggle between Life and Death.

Satan introduced the will to die where there had only been the will to live!

Make no mistake about what we are teaching you here, oh disciple, and note well that in the beginning the woman was without reason, which in the man only opposed human to divine, the satanic spirit of the will toward liberation by domination of the visible world, to the divine spirit of the will to live in eternal harmony with God (= Life). The man only knew the name of everything, every plant, every animal.

In the beginning the two hearts--that of the man and that of the woman--being in perfect balance, and sex not yet having spoken, only the head of Eve opposed the head of Adam, and the charming smile of her lips and of her eyes chased away the boredom of the man who felt lost in the middle of the silence of the animals whose names he knew too well.

In that brief paradisiacal period, on that Second Morning of the divine Triangle, Satan was vanquished and God (= Life) triumphed.

But after the sin, the voluptuous fall of Adam and Eve, the struggle of the Day and the Night recommenced.

Since that time this struggle has been within the human couple. The head of the man belongs to Satan (-), the head of the woman to God (+), the sex of the woman to Satan (-), the sex of the man to God (+).

That is why the sin committed by the first couple involved cerebral punishment for the man (“thou shalt gain thy bread by the sweat of thy brow”), and punishment of the womb for the woman (“in pain shalt thou give birth”).

But the very thing that was a fault can become, must become, redemption.

It is said: “The woman will crush the head of the serpent and give back to the visible world the Son of God, the Son of Man, who will chase Death away from Life.”

It is also said: “I will separate the woman from the serpent and I will put hatred between the two.”

The woman who will vanquish Satan within her womb, that one will regenerate the World, for “just as Death entered into everyone and everything through one who was following the woman, it will be withdrawn from everyone and everything thanks to the victory of One, through the woman.”

And since that day, since the day of the Origin (which never was!), the feminine sex has been searching through all women to find the way to vanquish Satan. Attempt after attempt, the generations pass.

Oh disciple! Today the Woman has found the way.* The key of the Great Secret has been unveiled to Her who has been able to reject the malefic gift of Reason in order to let shine in Her only the pure light of Intelligence.

If you encounter Her, She will prove to you what you do not know.

For you must not accept anything without palpable proof. It is to this that you have been condemned.

_______________
*to vanquish Satan

About The Author

Maria de Naglowska (1883-1936), also known as the Sophiale de Montparnasse, was a Russian occultist, mystic, and founder of the Brotherhood of the Golden Arrow, whose conferences in Paris in the 1930s were attended by many now-famous individuals, such as Julius Evola, Man Ray, and André Breton. She is also known for her translation of P. B. Randolph’s Magia Sexualis, the classic occult text that has survived only through her translation.

Product Details

  • Publisher: Inner Traditions (April 11, 2011)
  • Length: 144 pages
  • ISBN13: 9781594774157

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Raves and Reviews

“A legendary psychic and visionary, she was [Maia de Naglowska], and is, an important figure in the Western Mystery traditions, who has been little noticed until now by the English-speaking world.”

– Anna Jedrziewski, New Age Retailer, January 2011

The Light of Sex is a fascinating historical record of the philosophies and rites of the Golden arrow, as conceived by Maria de Naglowska . . .”

– SpiralNature.com, July 2011

The Light of Sex is worth considering for anyone who wants to understand another angle to the spirituality of sexuality.”

– Midwest Book Review, October 2011

The Light of Sex is a fascinating historical record of the philosophies and rites of the Golden arrow, as conceived by Maria de Naglowska”

– Psyche, Facing North, July 2012

“...that it is fresh and thought-provoking look at metaphysical issues that should be of interest to all, and a point of entry into a chapter of modern occult history that has been largely and notably obscure.”

– Frater Lux Ad Mundi, Behutet, October 2012

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