Take a mad ride past the event horizon of sanity

Take a mad ride past the event horizon of sanity with the band Babylon, in the final days of the American Empire. First in the psychedelic occult, myth and fairy-tale laced urban fantasy series, the Fallen Cycle.

"Grant Morrison's The Invisibles meets Fight Club, with ...a completely unique take on what makes myth tick," said Underground Reviews, and that's exactly what you get with this lean book, no choice but look the void right in the eye. As Nietzsche famously said, "When you look into an abyss, the abyss also looks into you." He knew the storm is coming. The fabric of the self, the fabric of a society, of a culture, of a species, all may reach the point of rupture without recognition. Is that not even more true in the psyche that wishes to distract, to look elsewhere, to numb out the terrible truth, that we live in that void already. It is an absence, the myth of no myths, no meanings.

Which sounds fucking awful, doesn't it?

Who could have predicted it'd be a band on the road that set it all off, the mad Bacchae and their rock apocalypse?

So don't be sad. The party is going to be a blast, drinking and fucking to the edges of oblivion; riding off with Lilith and Ariadne, Dionysus, transexual Jesus and Artemis into that sunset, (because who wants to remain virginal at the end of the world?) They offer polyamory and LSD instead of jealousy and fear, spiritual transformation instead of a 9-5 grind. When they pull into your town and open the door, who in their right mind wouldn't hop aboard? The feds say "these kids have to be crazy to go with 'those people.'"

Machines shouldn't speak for men. You'd have to be crazy not to go.

The joy, the release, at the end of all things is absolute. It's the getting there that's Hell. We must find our way out together, or not at all.

Those who wander through life without knowing who they are: No more. Unlock the Fallen God within your sleeping self. All it takes is the right story. Contact the Order of the Hidden Path, begin your initiation now. There is no time to waste.

-Gabriel De Leon, 2012. OHO, OHP.

Party At The World's End

The Appearance of the Horned God / Dionysus in True Blood

There seems to be a lot of confusion circling around the use of the horned God in conjunction with Dionysus and the Maenad in True Blood- the most recent outcropping of this meme in mainstream media. This should be neither a surprising nor a new connection, although the Christian association with the devil falls more in line with the bastardization that occured with most heathen (e.g. non-Christian) mythologies after Christianity lost its Gnostic edge, and turned from a revolutionary cult to a traditional one. Would it come as any surprise that in fact the "horned God" and the mythic image of Jesus have a great deal in common?

Dionysus is commonly billed as the "God of wine," however, it is the intoxication that wine brings that is more closely linked to Dionysus- it is the means by which mortals can touch this divinity, though merely drinking wine doesn't bring you to him any more than holding a guitar makes you a guitarist. Wine is also commonly a metaphor for blood, (think of Jesus at the last supper), and this too is a useful key for understanding his "divine madness." Dionysus is not the "God of wine" so much as a god of divine intoxication, creativity, a force that smashes all social order, imposed rules, and restrictions. The wrath of Dionysus is only incurred, in the original sources, when it is restrained, or when he is not properly respected.

Looking at the additional meanings of his epithets - the other names he has been known by - also provides some insight. Zagreus, Sabazios, Tammuz. All of these make connection with air/thunder Gods like Zeus, who in the Greek rendering of this image is his father, even though his Mother's identity changes depending on the story. Zeus is also identified with the bull, as is Tammuz. Additionally, all of these images save Zeus are slain and resurrected gods. Note this: "...Some scholars, beginning with Franz Cumont, classify Jesus Christ as a syncretized example of this archetype."

Yes, Osiris, Tammuz, Dionysus, Orpheus, all re-appear, in a modified form, in Jesus Ben Panther - Jesus Christ. (Note also, the panther and leopard are sacred animals of Dionysus.)

There is much more on this topic in the notes I've gathered for the forthcoming Immanence of Myth book, though they are certainly in need of updating. Some of the background on some of the personal experience that led me to study this particular grouping of myths is in this post.