Purgatory, Gurdjieff, and Meister Eckhart: Part 1

Illustrations are from the Tympanum of Conques Cathedral in Conques, France.

An esoteric abstract on the details of the Tympaum is available for free, on request from the author.

 In this essay, we will focus only on the narrow scope of Gurdjieff’s comments about the collapse of the original evolutionary condition of the universe and its potential implications as allegory, comparing it to Meister Eckhart’s discussion of the action of the soul.

In order to do so, we’ll need to interpret Gurdjieff’s comments as comments about man’s inner state; not comments about the external cosmos in general as it has existed since time immemorial. 

Let’s for the purposes of this brief study presume that what Gurdjieff is describing is what a properly ordered inner cosmos looked like before human beings fell into internal disorder; and what it looked like afterwards.

Gurdjieff’s “special word” for the collapse and rearrangement of the original cosmic state is the “chootboglitanical” period. 

 "And thus it continued right up to the time of that terrifying cosmic event which, as I have already told you, is now called the 'chootboglitanical period '  

The word “choot” in Russian means to sense or to feel intuitively, and the word litany is related to processionals; so one interpretation is that this is about the inner flow of the psyche in mankind. This is borne out by the next passage, which explains how things were arranged before this terrifying change took place:

"Before that common-cosmic misfortune, all the 'highest being-bodies' that arose and were perfected in certain tetartocosmoses and in their first descendants were immediately united with the Most Most Holy Protocosmos itself, because their common presences were still actualizing the results fully corresponding to it.  “

Let us take this to mean, for the purposes of our discussion, the conditions under which a human being’s impressions come into alignment with the inflow of the divine. The establishing of contact with one’s higher principles of being or, to put it in Ouspensky’s terms, the higher centers. 

All of the parts of a man or woman’s being that arose — came into the field of consciousness —and were perfected— became whole —in certain tetartocosmoses— what Gurdjieff calls three brained beings — reunited immediately with God.

Translating this into an inner description, we understand that a person’s being and awareness arose as a result of three centered being, and was thus passed directly into contact with God. This is because the outer — their common presences — was functioning according to proper three-brained being, which corresponds in Christian terms to the action of God in the Holy Trinity.

We might mention here in passing that Gurdjieff’s descriptions of the various cosmoses are thereby to be understood as a direct analogy for the human inward arrangement, casting human beings as miniature versions of the cosmos. This is a commonly agreed-upon premise of Gurdjieff’s cosmology in the largest sense; by simple logic, the analogy has to hold water.

In this way, the following passage from The Holy Planet Purgatory is not a description of actual planets and suns, but the way that human beings are constructed within the limits of their own cosmos. It furthermore forms an enneagram:

 "Our cherubim also gave names, still existing today, to the emanations and  radiations issuing from all these cosmoses of different scales, by means of  which the Most Great Cosmic Trogoautoegocrat proceeds.  

1. "The emanation of the Most Most Holy Sun Absolute Itself, as I have  already told you, they called 'Theomertmalogos,' or 'Word-God.' 

Represents the note do, the absolute.

2. "The radiation of each separate second-order sun they called  'mentokifezoin.'  

Represents the note re, material creation as a whole. The body.

3. "The radiation of each planet separately they called 'dynamoomzoin.' 

Represents the note mi, desire. Emotion.

4. "That given off from the microcosmoses they called 'photoinzoin. ' 

Represents the note fa, power. Intelligence.

Do, Re, Mi. 

Taken together, these first three elements compose three brained being and describe to outer functions in man. They correspond to what ME called the powers; the outer part of the soul and their agency in regards to the natural world.

Fa, Sol, La. 

When three-brained being functions correctly, it creates a cosmically lawful whole awareness which is functional on the astral level and has the potential to contact the higher centers. This corresponds to the inner functions of man; in ME’s terms, the ground of the soul.

5. "The radiations issuing from the tetartocosmoses they called 'hanbledzoïn.' 

Represents the note sol, being. Consciousness. Known to be connected with the astral body. This engenders potential to come into contact with the next two notes:

6. "The radiation of all the planets together of each solar system they called 'astroluolucizoin. ' 

Denotes the note la, representing purification (contacted through remorse and intentional suffering.) Higher emotion. “Light from all the inner planets.”

7. "The radiation of all the newly arisen second-order suns taken together  they called 'polorotheoparl. '  

Represents the note si, wisdom. Higher intellect. “All things radiating from God.”

By the way, it seems likely that in Gurdjieff’s allegory these first two substances represent the “spiritual body and blood” of the Communion. First the body of Being (Ouspensky’s man number four, a new physical or astral body formed of the first three); second, a new body of feeling, formed in higher emotional center; and finally, the “new man,” the wisdom body. 

If both sides of the enneagram are completed, a new “second order” sun (the Son of the holy gospel) emerges at this note, which participates as a whole in the comprehensive unity of both the inner and the outer cosmos:

May you be well within today.

Lee

Lee van Laer is a Senior Editor at Parabola Magazine.