Consciousness of Salt
Benefits of salt
China’s Thorium molten salt reactor
Although Salt just seems to be an inert white powder, it is one of the great mysteries of initiation. Salt symbolizes a sacred, not to be broken, initiate’s covenant entered into with the master & school.
As mentioned in Matthew 5:13, the initiated elect are the Salt of the Earth. They would sit in the place of distinction ‘above the salt’, for they had conquered the salt within themselves. Nowadays it is usually referred to as simple people.
In ancient literature, Sal also meant ‘cunning’ and ‘wit’. A good Fool was always a Fool, worth his salt, and paid in relation to his worth. Thus, he was no fool in the ordinary sense of the word.
Paracelsus: “when the inner salt has gone, gold will be found in the liquid’. It describes the initiation process, removal of the dross, + the retrieval of the sacred, hidden within.
Thus, the formula does not make for a Water of Salt, but a Water bereft of Salt, which is to say, an initiate who can no longer cry. ‘Before the eyes can see they must be incapable of tears’, reads the arcane text.
An alchemical sigil for salt is Ï´, derived from the Greek letter theta, of the word ‘Thanatos’, which meant ‘death’.
Dead Sea Salt Crystals
In alchemical texts, salt represents a process of death, the residue of the spiritual activity, rational thinking, which takes place in the head.
The dross is the white powder left behind when the gold is extracted. It is the ash of thought.
When this mental activity reaches a point where the universal order appears to break down, because the rational mind lost understanding, at that moment, the head issues salty tears.
Nowadays, we could argue that human thinking and surface rationalism is our salvation, and the key to Paradise. However, any initiate worth his inner salt would challenge such a view.
For the Adept, there are 2 Salts:
- born of the activity of Fire,
- the ‘ash’ after the burn,
itself ‘a potential Fire’.
In this perpetual interaction of Fire and Salt, which lies at the basis of the phenomenal world, Salt represents the inert state of Death, an interlude between lifetimes.
Azoth:
The Way to make the Philosopher’s Gold
Upper triangle:
the 7 planets attached to
the branches of the Tree of Knowledge
Lower triangle:
the 3 principles of Alchemy:
Salt, Mercury, Sulphur
The union of the 7 + 3 = Azoth
