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[from http://www.trapezoid.org/statement.html ] Subject: Order of the Trapezoid MISSION STATEMENT INTRODUCTION Consecrated by the Prince of Darkness, in his image as Wotan Hollenjaeger of the One Eye, the Order of the Trapezoid is a chivalric order of knighthood within the Temple of Set. Its members are adept black magicians who have sworn fealty beyond death to the spirit of their higher selves. These knights are dedicated to the quest for the Grail by seeking the angular mysteries of the Trapezoid, partaking of the Black Flame, and achieving a highly dynamic state of development known as Walhalla! The Order of the Trapezoid is the most culturally diverse order in the Temple of Set. A full account of its specific areas of focus, ranging from the magical traditions of Northern Europe and Southern Asia, to mad lab experiments and the martial arts, would fill a dozen volumes. The sections that follow give a brief outline of the Order of the Trapezoid in terms of its history, essential elements, organizational structure, and criteria for membership. HISTORY The history of the Order of the Trapezoid is that of a formula for the emergence of an unknown entity into the world of humankind. Many attempts have been made at this formula. Yet while the formula has yet to be fully realized, our Knighthood has developed it to its furthest manifestation thus far. This section will trace its development through the contributions of Howard Phillips Lovecraft, Anton Szandor Lavey, Dr. Michael A. Aquino, and Dr. Stephen E. Flowers. Our history begins with the most ancient artifact of intelligent life, the human unconscious. It is from this primal landscape that H.P. Lovecraft found inspiration for his fantastic tales. Otherwise conservative and staunchly materialistic, Lovecraft allowed his deeper fears of water, dark places, and strange animals to come alive in his writings. In this, his work was much like that of many other expressionists of the time. Unlike his contemporaries, however, Lovecraft was well read in the natural sciences. He was among the first authors to explore the new physics of Planck, Einstein, and Schroedinger, and express the human implications of their works in fiction. By combining depth psychology with cutting edge cosmology, Lovecraft had stumbled upon the primal dreams of another world. The world of Lovecraft struck a deep chord among his readers, reminding people of something that they would rather forget; a world so real that people have been searching for the "real" Necronomicon ever since. Forty years after they were written, Lovecraft's tales would inspire a creative and iconoclastic showman, a Magus who proclaimed himself the "Black Pope" and gave the late sixties and early seventies a name: Indulgence. Anton Szandor LaVey ushered the Lovecraftian mythos into the ritual chambers and postmodern culture of the Church of Satan. Seeing the correlation between the "strange angles" of H.P.L., and the "negative architecture" described in Lafforrest's Houses That Kill, LaVey formulated the aesthetic function of this geometry in the Greater and Lesser Laws of the Trapezoid, in which certain angles that were harmful to most people, would be beneficial to those who were properly initiated into their mysteries. The latter was visually demonstrated in the photographs of Mortensen's The Command to Look, and verbalized a century earlier when Immanual Kant likened the experience of the sublime to standing atop a high cliff that simultaneously attracts us to move closer to its ledge and repels us to scramble for safety. Further inspired by a Lovecraftian tale that introduced the Order of the Shining Trapezohedron among its protagonists, LaVey formed the Order of the Trapezoid within the Church of Satan. As stated in a 1970 issue of The Cloven Hoof: "The O.Tr. is the 'board of directors' and security staff of the Church. Its functions are many, and its members are chosen by appointment, according to the special abilities and attributes of each. All Priests and Priestesses are automatically admitted into the Order, although identities of most members of the Order are unknown even to each other. Members of the Governing or Grand Council of the Trapezoid are known only to the High Priest, who solicits their aid when required." Although LaVey grasped the aesthetic correlates of the trapezoid in Lovecraft, and the Weimar-era expressionism of pre-war Germany, the LaVey-centered political organization of the O.Tr. kept it from becoming a proper order within the Church of Satan. The formula remained a thought experiment throughout the demise of the Church, and the ascension of the Temple of Set, where it was alternatively used to designate the Council of Nine and the Magistry. On October 19th, 1983, Dr. Michael Aquino, Magus of Xeper, High Priest and founder of the Temple of Set, took the thought experiment to Walhalla, the inner sanctum of the Wewelsburg Castle in Westphalia, Germany. This was the site where another experiment had gone awry: where the positive aspects of German romanticism - dynamism, life-worship, irrationality, artistic alchemy, and xenophilia - had tragically become the tools of totalitarianism, negative tribalism, and brutal acts committed on a mass scale. Dr. Aquino performed the rites at Wewelsburg to recapture the positive elements of this romantic stream from the place where the dark arts of the North were last attempted. There, he combined this stream with that of Lovecraftian expressionism, a genre with which he was familiar having previously served as LaVey's "lefthand man" in the Church of Satan, and written the "Ceremony of the Nine Angles". The marriage of German romanticism with Lovecraftian expressionism was a powerful one indeed, perhaps even too powerful. To insure that the arts which emerged from this marriage would never be misused again, Dr. Aquino reestablished the Order of the Trapezoid as a chivalric order of Knights sworn to uphold standards of honor and ethical conduct. The formula had come alive. For the first time since it was conceived, the Order of the Trapezoid had become a working organization with a working formula. Four years later, the Grandmastership of the Order was passed to Dr. Stephen Flowers, Yrmin Drighten of the Rune Guild, scholar of Germanic magical traditions, and author of numerous books on European magical systems. During his nine year tenure as Grandmaster, Dr. Flowers developed the IndoEuropean Northern roots of the Order, articulating its historical sources, and establishing a rigorous methodology for awakening traditional systems. Organizationally, he established a system of lodges and houses, and an inner council of advisors within the Order. The work of Dr. Flowers gave rise to a particular school of mysticism within the order. This school linked concrete accomplishments in objective reality to the knowledge of deeper mysteries which transcended rational thought and sense perception. This combination of objective and subjective endeavor became known as the two-fold path of initiation. From the deeper mysteries of his own work, he became the Magus of Runa, the seed of all Runes and essence of mysteries represented by a geometric yantra comprised of the nine angles of the trapezoid, and articulated in the formula, Reyn til Runa. CENTRAL ELEMENTS The specific interests within the Order of the Trapezoid are too diverse to be generalized and too broad to be sufficiently rendered in an introductory text. Yet despite this, all works within the O.Tr. share four major elements which are central to the Order: The Black Flame is the central source of the Order. Every Knight of the Trapezoid, male or female, is an Initiate of the Left Hand Path. That is, every Knight is engaged in self-directed self-deification through liberating antinomianism. The Black Flame is the dark source and inspiration of the individual's own psyche as a uniquely developing deity; a kindred spirit of the Prince of Darkness. The Black Flame is signified by the ninth angle of the trapezoid, which at a collective level, functions as the central pivot which binds the O.Tr. to the Temple of Set. The Grail Quest is the central activity of the Order. Each Knight must find his or her own path of becoming, and swear to its realization. The Grail is the ultimate truth of one's ultimate endeavor. It is a truth which is ever sought yet never found. Yet there are ways to partake of that which cannot be fully grasped. The keys can be found in the seeking. The Trapezoid is the central mystery of the Order. Runa, the essence of mysteries, is represented by its ultimate example. The trapezoid functions to link objective and subjective realities, just as it beckons its initiates to explore worlds where the arrow of time no longer points in a single direction. The trapezoid is a two-dimensional representation of a three dimensional shadow. It is a prism and a gate. Most importantly, it is a mystery. Walhalla is the central state of becoming within the Order. The universe of the Black Magician is marked by major periods of time called Aeons. We are currently living in the Aeon of Set, guided by a philosophy of self-deification that is encapsulated in a Word, Xeper, meaning "become." Walhalla, the Hall of the Fallen where great heroes live in a highly dynamic state beyond death, describes a qualitatively distinct state of self-transformation that transcends the notion of change through time. ORGANIZATIONAL STRUCTURE The Order of the Trapezoid is the first among the orders of the Temple of Set, subject to the by-laws therein. Internally, it is owned and operated by its Knighthood, who are also members of the Temple. The O.Tr. is led by a Grandmaster, a spiritual monarch charged with overseeing the Order according to his or her vision for a period of time not to exceed nine years. The Grandmaster is a Master of the Trapezoid appointed by a previous Grandmaster subject to confirmation by the Knighthood. The Trihedron is the inner council of advisors whom the Grandmaster appoints to delegate the duties of his or her office. The members of the Trihedron include a Chancellor in charge of internal affairs, a Herald in charge of communications and insignia, and a Marshall in charge of external affairs. In addition to the Trihedron, the Grandmaster is advised by previous Grandmasters, and other Masters of the Trapezoid. Founded by Masters of the Trapezoid, the Houses of the Order are autonomous schools for specialized training in trapezoidal Initiation. They are not geographically local, and their interactions may extend beyond the Order and the Temple. They can be joined by any Knight according their respective criteria. The Temple of Set is represented among these Houses as the House of the Ninth Angle, which is overseen by the High Priest of the Temple of Set. Lodges are geographically localized groups within the Order of the Trapezoid. They are led by Lodgemasters who are Knights of the Trapezoid, and conduct their internal operations according to their own criteria. Lodges may or may not be defined according to specialized activities. Only one Lodge, Munsalvasche, is not geographically localized. The Munsalvasche Lodge is the banner representing the Knights Errant of the Order of the Trapezoid. The O.Tr. is an Order of leaders. Hence, it is up to the individual Knight to affiliate with a Lodge or a House, or conduct his or her affairs according to Knight's own will. Half the Knighthood conducts their work without any affiliation beyond those of the Order and Munsalvasche. The Order recognizes that individual Knight is the highest authority for his or her own initiation. Ultimately, we must each conduct our quests alone. ENTRY The standards for entry into the Order of the Trapezoid are as follows: * The candidate must be a member of the Temple of Set who has been recognized as an Adept, second degree. * The candidate must be sponsored by a Knight of the Trapezoid who is also a Priest or Priestess of Set. The candidate is usually well-known to the sponsor, because all subsequent actions and nonactions of a Knight reflect, not only on his or her own honor, but the honor of the sponsor as well. * The candidate must participate in an induction ceremony conducted in the presence of a Master of the Trapezoid or Lodgemaster. * During the induction ceremony, the candidate must take the Oath of the Order, to which he or she will be bound beyond death. For more information on the Order of the Trapezoid, contact the Herald of the Order [mailto:herald@trapezoid.org]. copyright ©1997-8 Temple of Set. All rights reserved. ____________________________________________________________ EOF
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