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This Essay examines certain psychological foundations relative to

Liber AL vel Legis, The Book of the Law
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The Fourth Matrix

The fourth and final matrix, BPM IV, the "Death and Rebirth Experience," is related to experiences when we actually leave the mother’s body.

BPM IV is the release, the death-rebirth experience. If it is uncomplicated, it gives rise to feelings of physical and spiritual rebirth, rejuvenation, and emotional renewal. Full of excitement and energy, yet centered and peaceful, one perceives the world as though through cleansed senses with an added zest for life. If complicated, one has a feeling of impending catastrophe of gigantic proportion.

Note that BPM III was the "death-rebirth struggle." BPM IV is the culminating "death-rebirth experience."

(Grof's Definition) BPM IV: "This perinatal matrix is meaningfully related to the third clinical stage of delivery, the actual birth of the child. In this final stage, the agonizing process of the birth struggle comes to an end . . . The symbolic counterpart of this final stage of delivery is the death-rebirth experience . . . The transition from BPM III to BPM IV involves a sense of annihilation on all imaginable levels - physical destruction, emotional debacle, intellectual defeat, ultimate moral failure, and absolute damnation of transcendental proportions. This experience of "ego death" seems to entail an instant merciless destruction all previous reference points in the life of the individual . . . [after which] the subject experiences a deep sense of spiritual liberation, redemption, and salvation."

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Note that each of the three chapters of Liber AL ends with a release from the visions of the chapter and with a positive note of hope and salvation. For example:

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Chapter 1 (Nuit, the cosmic mother): "But to love me is better than all things: if under the night-stars in the desert thou presently burnest mine incense before me, invoking me with a pure heart, and the Serpent flame therein, thou shalt come a little to lie in my bosom…"
– Chapter 1, Line 61.

Chapter 2 (Hadit, the cosmic father): "Lift up thyself! for there is none like unto thee among men or among Gods! Lift up thyself, o my prophet, thy stature shall surpass the stars..."
– Chapter 2, Line 78.

Chapter 3 (Horus, the cosmic son): "To Me do ye reverence! to me come ye through tribulation of ordeal, which is bliss. The fool readeth this Book of the Law, and its comment; & he understandeth it not. Let him come through the first ordeal, & it will be to him as silver. Through the second, gold. Through the third, stones of precious water. Through the fourth, ultimate sparks of the intimate fire.

"Yet to all it shall seem beautiful. Its enemies who say not so, are mere liars. There is success.

"I am the Hawk-Headed Lord of Silence & of Strength; my nemyss shrouds the night-blue sky. Hail! ye twin warriors about the pillars of the world! for your time is nigh at hand. I am the Lord of the Double Wand of Power; the wand of the Force of Coph Nia - but my left hand is empty, for I have crushed an Universe; & nought remains ... There is a splendour in my name hidden and glorious, as the sun of midnight is ever the son."

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Chapter 3, Lines 62-74.

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Analysis – BPM IV

This final stage of childbirth is the death-rebirth experience; it represents the termination and resolution of the death-rebirth struggle. Paradoxically, while only a small step from liberation, the individual has a feeling of impending catastrophe of enormous proportions.

This experience of ego death seems to entail an instant merciless destruction of all previous reference points in the life of the individual. The ego death and rebirth is not a one-time experience. During self-exploration, the unconscious presents it repeatedly with varying emphasis and increasing proportions until the process is completed.

According to Freudian psychoanalysis, the ego is associated with one's ability to test reality and to function adequately in everyday life. Individuals who share this limited point of view see the perspective of the ego death with horror.

However, what actually dies in this process is a paranoid attitude toward the world which reflects the negative experience of childbirth and later life. It involves a sense of general inadequacy, a need to be prepared for all possible dangers, a compulsion to be in charge and in control, and constant efforts to prove things to oneself and others.

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