![]() Those who seek it often experience extreme psychological turbulence, often known as The Long Dark Night of the Soul or Chapel Perilous. And that should frighten anybody, since it is the most absolute unknown possible. ![]() And what greater limitation is there in life than death?Īchieving the transformation necessary to transcend objective reality is the probably the “total goal”. The philosophers stone, or alchemical elixir, as it were. But if you study the occult history of Nazis, and Himmler in particular, there was a rejection of objective reality. There was also a belief that through strengthening of the will, humans could rise above the limitations of the seemingly objective. What he meant by a “sacred realm of dream reality” is also unclear, as there are no direct references to be found in that. ![]() It might just be that Bowie was trying to evoke a sense of that period in time. However that was actually Chaplin’s first film with sound. The “silent film” might refer to the Charlie Chaplin movie – The Great Dictator – a satire of Hitler and the Nazis. bad) is evident in his reference to Nazi icon Heinrich Himmler, who was also interested in mystical and occult knowledge. So again, in just those first three lines Bowie has referenced ideas that are opposed to the modern materialists life/death dichotomy and the nihilism that follows it, and has cast himself in the role of a magician trying to break free from that duality.īowie’s comfort with eschewing duality (good vs. The magician embodies these dualities in order to dissolve them, in the same way magic is a way of overcoming the life/death dichotomy in order to be transformed into something greater. In tarot the magician is dressed in one garment symbolizing purity and innocence, and another symbolizing experience and knowledge. An image in a popular tarot card, The Magician, is often thought to be one of Crowley. Suffice it to say the Heremetic Order of the Golden Dawn did not place as much value in the life/death dichotomy as Mirabella does.Īleister Crowley was a poet, mountain climber, philosopher, inventor and one time member of the Golden Dawn. A state that a human might aspire to become via magical means. One of the ways they did this was through communication with the ‘Secret Chiefs’ – transcendent beings who possess knowledge of all realms of existence. The Golden Dawn is a system of magic from late 19th century Britain which sought to endow it’s users with supernatural understanding and capabilities through a wide plethora of knowledge, rituals and methods. ![]() There will be an even bigger message about modern art and thought at the end. I could easily debunk that theory of the song with the examination of a single line, but what fun would that be? Instead, I am going to deconstruct the entire song for my own entertainment and hopefully yours. “I take it to mean don’t take stuff too seriously, death is final that is the knowledge.”Įven though I am only working from my own interpretation, I am absolutely certain that the song was not intended by Bowie to be a lighthearted endorsement of nihilistic hedonism as my friend had implied. “Life doesn’t matter a shit, have fun, have as much of it as you can.” “Don’t believe in yourself, don’t deceive with belief knowledge comes with deaths release.” Today I asked an online friend, who we will call Mirabella, what she thought the following lyrics from the song were about: The song Quicksand from David Bowie’s album Hunky Dory is loaded with mystical references and metaphors that reveal the musicians own relationship to mysticism.
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