Chapter 21: The Leviathan and the Shekinah

The Leviathan⁠¹ is a symbol within which we find Moses, because Moses is the real Leviathan that comes out from the upper and lower Eden, the gift (Esh אש “fire”) of the Holy Spirit.

Moses descends from the upper Eden into the lower Eden, as it is written:

The Leviathan לוי אתן gives one the power to dive deep into the oceans of Mitzrayim מצרים (Malkuth, the physical body)—that is, into the Mayim מים (waters) of the earth—and to fly out from Malkuth towards the very fiery waters of Heaven, the Shamayim שמים. Why? Because Jehovah-Elohim-Binah relates to Ha-Shamayim השמים, the heavens. Binah is Mayim (water), and Moses is the name of he who has the wings to fly and the scales to swim.

The Leviathan works in the third triangle, the triangle of Magic, of priesthood, which on the Tree of Life is Netzach, Hod and Yesod. The Leviathan, as Moses, can go down and up; only with Thelema (willpower, Tiphereth, Moses) can we go from the Nile to the top of Sinai, and from the top of Sinai to the bottom of the Nile.

In order to become pure and complete, the Sephirah Netzach, the solar mental body, or Aaron⁠² (symbol of the solar mental body), has to work very hard in order to annihilate all of those defects and vices, that which are esoterically called Baalim⁠³ and Ashtaroth,⁠⁴ that we have in the den of the mind.

How do we name the solar mind that is completely pure and self-realized? We call it Eliao. Eliao אליהו is what is translated in the Bible as Elijah, and means, “My God is Jah.” This is related with the Sephirah Netzach (Aaron), because in Netzach we find Iod-Hei-Vav-Hei-Sabaoth or Jehovah Sabaoth, or “the host, army of Jehovah.” The army of Jehovah (Jehovah Sabaoth) are all the parts of Israel, already purified in the mind; Elijah, in other words, or as we say in Hebrew, Eliao, the God IAO, which relates to the three primary forces above in the world of Yetzirah.

When we talk about Aaron, we talk about Elias; when we talk about Elias, we talk about John the Baptist; when we talk about John the Baptist, we indeed are talking about the Terrestrial Man. The Bible states:

People who think shallowly say, “Oh, yes, I have the image of the terrestrial man. This man means me, physically speaking.” No! This is not true! Remember the four rivers of Genesis in the Sephirah Malkuth? The terrestrial man is the sephiroth Malkuth, Yesod, Hod, and Netzach. These Sephiroth are ruled by Binah, whose center of gravity is the letter Mem (water), the Sephirah Yesod. Thus, the Sephirah Binah sends the river to the Sephirah Daath, the upper Eden, and from it into the Triangle of Magic, which is ruled by the Sephirah Yesod, the Lower Eden, and from there into the Sephirah Malkuth. This is how we understand the two Edens, the two gardens. There is one garden above, which is heavenly, in which Elohim-Binah abides; there is one garden below, which is us, physically speaking.

Berith Esh ברית אש means the “pact of fire.” Berith also means, “Briah, creation, human being.” It has many translations. Berith is also related with circumcision. Importantly, Berith Esh also has the same letters one uses in order to spell Bereshith בראשית, “In the beginning.”

The Nile esoterically represents the waters above and below, because when we address Moses, we have to speak about the waters above and below, because Moses is born in Mizrahim (Egypt, the physical body), in the waters of the Nile, and eventually he ascends in order to talk to Jehovah Elohim in Heaven.

Jehovah Elohim tells Moses to go down to Malkuth and liberate my people. Then, after having liberated the people of Jehovah Elohim—the spiritual archetypes within each one us—Moses again speaks face to face with Jehovah, in the wilderness. Thus, we see through the story of Moses how he ascends and descends, ascends and descends, over and over. This is because he possesses the power of the Leviathan; the one who can swim in the waters of the earth, and in the waters of Heaven.

In Hebrew, Shamayim שמים is spelled: Shin ש, Mem מ, Iod י, final Mem ם. In order to say “the heavens” we add the letter Hei to the beginning: Ha-Shamayim השמים. So, the words Moses משה and Ha-Shamayim השמים enclose the fire and water. The waters above are Shamayim שמים, and the waters below, Mayim מים: the Leviathan is capable of swimming in both, a very terrifying being.

So, in order to enter into heaven, Sha-mayim ש-מים, we have to learn to work with the Shin, the fire in our sexual waters. Indeed, Genesis is very clearly talking about the alchemical pact of fire, Berith Esh ברית אש. When we work alchemically in ourselves with the mystery of transmutation, we create the Heavens in us. What is the Heaven in us? It is the sephiroth Chesed, Geburah, Tiphereth, Netzach, Hod and Yesod; these six sephiroth are related with Heavens in us. The Earth is always feminine, and is the physical body.

This statement,“And the Earth was without form,” indicates that the Heavens, our spiritual archetypes, are not yet activated within use, and the Earth without form is our physicality where those archetypes are yet in potentiality. The archetypes are “in chaos and without form” or Tohu ve Bohu, as it is said in Hebrew. Formless and void, physically and psychologically speaking, is precisely how we enter into the sexual act. But, we, Gnostics, are aware that Genesis states:

The Spirit is the Sephirah Chesed, the Ruach Elohim, our Innermost, that emerges from the Sephirah Binah, the river of Eden. Binah is the letter Mem (water), and the water is always feminine.

So, Elah-Im אלה-ים, the Sea Goddess, is the mystery of the Shekinah, because she is above and she is below. Remember, that, in our physicality, our head is “heaven” and our sex is Earth below (Malkuth), with the waters below in us, which are related with the four river heads of Eden.

As we stated previously, in Hebrew the name of the Sea Goddess, the Divine Mother within, is Shekinah שכינה. This word Shekinah derives from:

• Shekel שכל, “brain, intelligence”

• Minah מין, “sex”

So, brain and sex are in the word Shekinah; in other words, the upper and lower waters.

So, with these two polarities we form Shekinah, which is precisely that divine fire (Shin ש) or force of the Divine Mother within the fluids (Mayim מים) of sex and brain.

Daath is the mystery of the Sea Goddess, the Shekinah. Daath is the Shekinah, the Sea Goddess, which is the very essence of fire and water (Shin-Mayim ש-מים).

Moses is the son of the water, the child of the water, and that water is feminine above and below. Water is always feminine. So, the Genesic water is the Divine Mother, which in Hebrew is Elah (the Goddess) and Im (the sea), because that sea is above and below. Elohim is Elah-Im, the Divine Mother; here we see how there are many layers hidden within the Hebrew language and words, and why it is necessary to study Hebrew, if we want to understand the Bible in its depth.

We have to remember God. That is the Ruach Elohim, Chesed, which the book of Genesis translates literally as the Spirit of God. We Gnostics say that it is that Spirit of the Sea Goddess that is the Monad, the Spirit, inside of us. Chesed controls the fire of the water, because that fire is the Holy Spirit. The Ruach Elohim is fire; it descends into the sexual act, and works with Shekinah. This is how we find that fire within the Sea Goddess (Elah-Im), who said, “Let there be light,” and she replies “and there was light.” Thus, when she awakens, the Divine Mother says, “What is here for you, Eliao,” and he says, “Let there be light,” and she answers, “and there was light,” because Shin is the same light, Aur אור. This is how the prophet becomes illuminated and a guide, a shepherd.

The Ruach Elohim, the force of the wind that comes from above, is the one that took Eliao (Elijah) into Heaven. It is written:

Yet, that wind is not the wind that is in the beginning of the sexual act, because Jehovah is not in the passional wind. Jehovah is in the Ruach Elohim, which is that gentle wind that descends when the couple is still retaining that fire within in order to transmute it. This, which is written in the Bible cryptically, is called sexual alchemy.

“Good” is the right side of the Tree of Life; good is the Sephirah Chesed.

This is the very beginning of the work to make light in ourselves. Remember that the one who evokes the light is Chesed, the Ruach Elohim, the Spirit within you. He is the one that works with the Divine Mother Kundalini, with the Goddess Elah-Im, Adonia.

So, Chesed is the one that receives the initiations, according to Genesis. The personality is not the one that receives initiations or degrees, but the Innermost, the Monad inside of us.

Chesed is the Spirit of Elohim that moves upon the face of the waters. We compare him with the god Narayana, the god of the water from the Hindu pantheon, in order to illustrate the point that god is related with the Innermost.

Alchemy is also related with Taoism. In Taoism, the goddess Kuan-Yin, the goddess of the water of creation is the Shekinah. Kuan-Yin is one of the most beautiful symbols of the Divine Mother, Elah-Im, in Taoism.

By studying the great invocation of the wise Solomon, we can better understand what this Shekinah, the Divine Mother within us, is. One of the parts of the invocation says:

Chasmalim חשמלים means, “Brilliant ones.” In this day and age, in Hebrew the word Chasmalim is used to describe electricians, because they work with electricity. Well, when we work with the forces of the Shekinah, the divine fire within, we are working with the electricity, with the electrons, with the forces of the Divine Mother. This is why the invocation is directly addressing Chesed, because the Chasmalim are related to Chesed in the Tree of Life.

In other words, when we pronounce that we are praying to the Ruach Elohim, the Spirit of God, our Innermost, to come down from Heaven, in order work in our sexuality, in order to awaken our fires, our electric forces, which are the forces of the Shekinah, because the fire is the electric force called Kundalini, the Shekinah in us. That is why, when we are performing Alchemy we are working with willpower, and that is the beginning of the creation of Moses inside of us, because the splendors of Elah-Im the Shekinah were shining on the head of Moses.

The second day of Genesis states:

So, as you see, here is the Goddess Kuan-Yin again on top of the Leviathan, because both of them work together. The Leviathan is that sea monster of the water that appears very clearly in the second day, but mixed with the passional forces, the boisterous waters, the animal forces that we have within. That is why the second day of Genesis is the only day where it is not written, “And God saw that it was good.” In all of the other days, we read, “And God saw that it was good,” but it does not say for the second day, because there is something passional mixed there, when we are working with Yesod, the second Sephirah from the bottom to the top, it relates to the Leviathan. At that level of development, there is still too much Nephesh (the animal force) in us. But, as you see, Kuan-Yin is on top of the Leviathan; the second divine serpent has to be on top of the animal force in order for us to continue performing the days of Genesis.