The Western Left Hand Defined

I'm going to just post this here and leave it, it is my opinion as I feel it adequately defines everything succinctly.
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The Western LHP does not involve heterodoxy practices and in no way integrates the ego / psyche / soul etc. into anything divine outside of one's higher Self, which is all the Western LHP adherent recognizes . . . Self. The Western LHP does approach non-union with the objective universe through antinomian practices.

While in Western LHP traditions there is no integration into the divine, in fact there is separation from anything perceived as such and the strengthening of one's isolate intelligence. The Western LHP seek to be their own gods without the need for personal instructions or permissions.

Perennial philosophy is the understanding that all the world's 'RHP' religions share a single, universal doctrine. This doctrine posits that the highest good that human life can achieve is through the union with a Supreme Being / Energy of the Universe or some divine derivative of.

The way in which this is achieved is through what the Western LHP recognize as White Magick, which is a deception of one's conscious awareness into believing that one has been accepted by this Supreme Being / Energy otherwise known as the objective universe.

This is not the stance one takes on the Western LHP, the objective universe is seen as it plainly is, a non-conscious, unintelligent memetic mechanism composed of Time, Space & Matter. To absolve one's self into this is antithetic to the Western LHP goals of individuation and autotheism.

Some Left-Hand Path believe in these ideas, some don't. I find it strange that you must think in these terms of absolutes. You think the union is something you have to work at, but it's already there. Maybe you aren't to the place where you feel the connections. Personally, I do, and I find it irrelevant to determining whether someone is LHP.

What advantage does being isolate from the rest of the universe give you in your mind? Would it make your life terrible or drastically different if you knew of the interconnectedness of things? Better yet, could you be LHP and still know of this?

I think you're LHP regardless of all of this intellectual mumbo jumbo or your ability to see the connectedness of things. I predominately consider someone LHP when they reject dogma, practice forbidden or taboo practices (necromancy, black magick, tantra, etc), and are into making their own way vs following others. Extra points for working with demons or Satan (or other dark God/ddess's) himself in a ritual sense.

I know this wasn't addressed to me, but I would like to throw my pair o' dimes in here.

Mindmaster said:

Some Left-Hand Path believe in these ideas, some don't. I find it strange that you must think in these terms of absolutes. You think the union is something you have to work at, but it's already there.

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Well yeah, the union is there. However, there may be crossed wires that need to be fixed in order to optimize the operation. In order to fix them, you have to examine them, understand how they work, figure out how they would work better, and then figure out a way to fix it.

Maybe you aren't to the place where you feel the connections. Personally, I do, and I find it irrelevant to determining whether someone is LHP.

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There is a strong urge for humans to repress crossed wires and other psychological hang ups. LHP seeks to understand these crossed wires in order to fix them, rather than sweeping them under the rug/repressing them, allowing the problem to get worse.

What advantage does being isolate from the rest of the universe give you in your mind? Would it make your life terrible or drastically different if you knew of the interconnectedness of things? Better yet, could you be LHP and still know of this?

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• First of all, the very definition of sentience is having a subjective mind (separated somewhat from objective reality,) where you can process information and run simulations before you act objectively. (It's a handy survival tool!)
  
  
• Second of all, knowing the separation between objective reality and subjective mind is a skill required to avoid delusion. (Delusion being the mistaking of subjective mind for objective reality.)
  
  
• You can experience the interconnectedness of all things easily. However, can you actually know it for what it is without a subjective mind that is somewhat separated from everything else in order to process, recognize, and understand the concept?

I think you're LHP regardless of all of this intellectual mumbo jumbo or your ability to see the connectedness of things. I predominately consider someone LHP when they reject dogma, practice forbidden or taboo practices (necromancy, black magick, tantra, etc), and are into making their own way vs following others. Extra points for working with demons or Satan (or other dark God/ddess's) himself in a ritual sense.

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I'm more into antinomianism, such as feminism's exposing the ingrained patriarchal cultural nomos, than into breaking taboo just for the sake of maintaining a taboo against holding taboos.

Mindmaster said:

Some Left-Hand Path believe in these ideas, some don't.

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All the Western Left Hand Paths believe in these tenets.

I find it strange that you must think in these terms of absolutes.

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I find it strange how you are allowed to debate what WLHP is while in a DIR when you yourself admit you are not LHP

You think the union is something you have to work at, but it's already there. Maybe you aren't to the place where you feel the connections. Personally, I do, and I find it irrelevant to determining whether someone is LHP.

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What 'union' are you referring to? Maybe you assume to know something about me, in which case it seems you are mistaken.

I predominately consider someone LHP when they reject dogma, practice forbidden or taboo practices (necromancy, black magick, tantra, etc), and are into making their own way vs following others. Extra points for working with demons or Satan (or other dark God/ddess's) himself in a ritual sense.

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Your idea of the LHP is weak and you have no understanding of the WLHP. This is exactly why these posts / threads are being created, there are far too many people that are mistaken as to what both Easter & Western LHP is.

Mindmaster said:

I predominately consider someone LHP when they reject dogma, practice forbidden or taboo practices (necromancy, black magick, tantra, etc), and are into making their own way vs following others. Extra points for working with demons or Satan (or other dark God/ddess's) himself in a ritual sense.

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I agree with parts of your statements and I also primarily disagree. I do think that whether or not you are in an LHP organization or sect such as the Church of Satan you would of course follow the tenets and principles of the organization. Some people of the LHP are able to synthesize their rituals and their own systems and ways independently, some people in the LHP might follow the principles and the belief systems of an organization. The RHP has followers the LHP has independent thinkers and followers such as following LaVey's philosophy.

EtuMalku said:

The Western LHP does not involve heterodoxy practices and in no way integrates the ego / psyche / soul etc.

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I might sadly disagree with you here on this, some of the systems of the Left Hand Path be it Satanism does compose of heterodoxy especially heterodoxy practices. Some of the systems of the Left Hand Path including LaVey's Satanism does compose and integrates the ego. I am guessing with your own systems and beliefs you might disagree on integrating the ego and the heterodoxy practices. I myself tend to have the heterodox mentality I tend to go the opposite way on society at times I tend to not like to be controlled by parts of the herd or that of conformity.

Sutekh said:

I might sadly disagree with you here on this, some of the systems of the Left Hand Path be it Satanism does compose of heterodoxy especially heterodoxy practices. Some of the systems of the Left Hand Path including LaVey's Satanism does compose and integrates the ego. I am guessing with your own systems and beliefs you might disagree on integrating the ego and the heterodoxy practices. I myself tend to have the heterodox mentality I tend to go the opposite way on society at times I tend to not like to be controlled by parts of the herd or that of conformity.

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What are they integrating their ego into if they don't believe in an external deity?

crossfire said:

I know this wasn't addressed to me, but I would like to throw my pair o' dimes in here.
Well yeah, the union is there. However, there may be crossed wires that need to be fixed in order to optimize the operation. In order to fix them, you have to examine them, understand how they work, figure out how they would work better, and then figure out a way to fix it.

There is a strong urge for humans to repress crossed wires and other psychological hang ups. LHP seeks to understand these crossed wires in order to fix them, rather than sweeping them under the rug/repressing them, allowing the problem to get worse.

• First of all, the very definition of sentience is having a subjective mind (separated somewhat from objective reality,) where you can process information and run simulations before you act objectively. (It's a handy survival tool!)
  
  
• Second of all, knowing the separation between objective reality and subjective mind is a skill required to avoid delusion. (Delusion being the mistaking of subjective mind for objective reality.)
  
  
• You can experience the interconnectedness of all things easily. However, can you actually know it for what it is without a subjective mind that is somewhat separated from everything else in order to process, recognize, and understand the concept?

I'm more into antinomianism, such as feminism's exposing the ingrained patriarchal cultural nomos, than into breaking taboo just for the sake of maintaining a taboo against holding taboos.

Click to expand...

Oh just for clarity: I do consider subjective mind/sentience to be divine and seek to integrate ego with that: I follow Thich Nhat Hanh's association of being filled with Mindfulness as the same thing as being filled with Holy Spirit. The Divine does not seek to overcome your mind. Retaining your own mind and integrating it
is Divine.

crossfire said:

Oh just for clarity: I do consider subjective mind/sentence to be divine and seek to integrate ego with that: I follow Thich Nhat Hanh's association of being filled with Mindfulness as the same thing as being filled with Holy Spirit. The Divine does not seek to overcome your mind. Retaining your own mind and integrating it
is Divine.

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How is 'the divine' being defined here?

EtuMalku said:

How is 'the divine' being defined here?

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crossfire said:

Oh just for clarity: I do consider subjective mind/sentence to be divine and seek to integrate ego with that: I follow Thich Nhat Hanh's association of being filled with Mindfulness as the same thing as being filled with Holy Spirit. The Divine does not seek to overcome your mind. Retaining your own mind and integrating it
is Divine.

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Let me highlight for you.

crossfire said:

Let me highlight for you.

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"Sentience" ?

EtuMalku said:

"Sentience" ?

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lol! typo! (So much for "mindfulness")

Sutekh said:

I might sadly disagree with you here on this, some of the systems of the Left Hand Path be it Satanism does compose of heterodoxy especially heterodoxy practices. Some of the systems of the Left Hand Path including LaVey's Satanism does compose and integrates the ego. I am guessing with your own systems and beliefs you might disagree on integrating the ego and the heterodoxy practices. I myself tend to have the heterodox mentality I tend to go the opposite way on society at times I tend to not like to be controlled by parts of the herd or that of conformity.

Click to expand...

I don't primarily care about heterodoxy because I don't recognize the orthodoxy. It's just about as real as morality, being a figment of the imagination. I don't bother with resisting that which is imaginary. It's pretty much over when you realize the jig is up, right?

I probably would have considered LaVey Satanism closer to the LHP in my youth, but twenty years later no way. I mean, to be on a path you have to be seeking something and LaVey presumes he already has all of the answers.

Mindmaster said:

I don't primarily care about heterodoxy because I don't recognize the orthodoxy. It's just about as real as morality, being a figment of the imagination. I don't bother with resisting that which is imaginary. It's pretty much over when you realize the jig is up, right?

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There is the crux right there. Humans are social animals, however. What you are left with is separating the herd mentality out from the society of individuals. Herd mentality is based on passion, often with little or no reasoning. Heterodoxy itself is also sometimes based upon passion with little reasoning, and when this is the case, it breaks down individual reasoning even more quickly than the orthodoxy alone.

The alternative is antinomianism--bringing cultural/social nomos into consciousness so they can be examined and subjected to reason--which develops individual awareness and reasoning and dispels the herd mentality.

Mindmaster said:

I don't primarily care about heterodoxy because I don't recognize the orthodoxy.

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This pretty much sums it up . . . the WLHP does not recognize any dogmatic tenets / philosophies therefore there is nothing to get all heterodoxical about!

EtuMalku said:

This pretty much sums it up . . . the WLHP does not recognize any dogmatic tenets / philosophies therefore there is nothing to get all heterodoxical about!

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What about the mentality of some of the LHP religions and philosophies, such as Satanism being heterodox in general?

Sutekh said:

What about the mentality of some of the LHP religions and philosophies, such as Satanism being heterodox in general?

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Heterodox or contrarian? (Yes, there is a big difference.)

Sutekh said:

What about the mentality of some of the LHP religions and philosophies, such as Satanism being heterodox in general?

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They are Theistic Satanists and not of the WLHP

EtuMalku said:

They are Theistic Satanists and not of the WLHP

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I can understand what you perhaps mean, but what about LaVeys philosophy on being against conformity and not conforming to the social mentality? I am pretty certain that crossfire might perhaps put this as contrarian. Or what about going against the grain and indulging in every taboo that's perhaps looked down upon? Or what about LaVeys unorthodox rites and challenges upon the mainstream white light religions? You may not perhaps agree but I do primarily consider Satanism or LaVeys Satanism to be heterodox in general.

Sutekh said:

I can understand what you perhaps mean, but what about LaVeys philosophy on being against conformity and not conforming to the social mentality? I am pretty certain that crossfire might perhaps put this as contrarian. Or what about going against the grain and indulging in every taboo that's perhaps looked down upon? Or what about LaVeys unorthodox rites and challenges upon the mainstream white light religions? You may not perhaps agree but I do primarily consider Satanism or LaVeys Satanism to be heterodox in general.

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The difference between Eastern (which is a RHP anyway) and Western LHP is exactly that. There is 'nothing' to go against to a WLHP'er . . . except themselves.