Typhonian Peaks

[Nalyd Khezr Bey]

Actual thread title that wouldn't fit: Typhonian Totems, Teratomas, Tangential Tantra and Other Themes of Thelema in Twin Peaks

There appears to be a Typhonian interest in Twin Peaks so I thought a dedicated discussion of it was in order.

Through the darkness of futures past
The magician longs to see;
One chants out between two worlds
"Fire, walk with me."

Just in that little poem you can already find the basic magical formula of the show and evidence of the themes in question: inbetweenness or liminality, the Aeons, the firesnake, atavistic resurgence, etc.

Outside of hearing about how it paved the way for and/or influenced later shows like X-Files (which is actually pretty grounded and mainstream in comparison) and Northern Exposure, I never knew much about Twin Peaks. I do remember it being on when it first came out but never watched it. It was only in the later 1990's while reading a book called Alien Impact by Michael Craft that my interest in the show was piqued. How Craft related its themes to the subject of UFOs and aliens and, in turn, to occultism and folklore, is what got me going. The show was harder to come by back then but I managed to find what I could of it and was blown away by what I saw depicted. I was only able to see the first season and then the movie Fire, Walk with Me which doesn't make much sense without seeing both seasons.

Later I finally saw the second season and it all came together. It was only when the big gold edition of the complete series came out a few years back that I finally saw the pilot episode as it was intended to be seen with the rest of the show (was never included on original releases). I was used to the "international version" (the only one available for a long time) of the pilot that was meant as a stand alone movie and doesn't tie easily into the second episode; i.e. Cooper's dream of the waiting room in the future and the solving of the murder were just tagged on the end in a rather incoherent way which are only semi-related to how the events unfold in the show.

I only mention all of that just to demonstrate the lack of luxury in watching this show back then compared to now. I had to see it in a rather convoluted, roundabout way over a period of several years. Very similar to how many of us may have actually spent years piecing together a personal system of Magick from disparate nuggets of Gnosis scattered around the wasteland known as occultism.

To the general audience the original airing of the show probably just registered as a murder mystery with some paranormal themes even if it may have activated certain archetypes in some. But to an occultist this show was almost on the borderline of revealing too much. The presentation of the themes in this show are evidence of an initiated understanding. However one looks at it, it's definitely a hotbed of archetypal symbolism.

So with that, feel free to discuss any angle of the show here in light of the Typhonian Gnosis.

[Marc]

Nalyd, this thread is going to be highly addictive! Thanks for starting it up
\

[Vadge Moore]

Unfortunately, I have Fire Walk With Me in storage and have not seen the TV show since it aired. The things I recall today are- Bob...as clearly a lycanthropic/Forgotten One from the Black Lodge. The Black Lodge is a perfect analogy for the back side of the Tree as the White Lodge is of the Front of the Tree. If I recall correctly, at some point the idea is expressed that the White and Black Lodges are one Lodge...or a Double Current.

Agent Cooper, throughout the series, is extremely influenced by Tibetan Buddhism and the Bon Pa in particular...and we all know how often Grant cites the Drukpa and Bon Pa Tibetan lineages as representing the ancient Gnosis of the Old Ones.

That's all that comes to mind for now...but Nalyd, you are 100% correct in your estimation of this series, "The presentation of the themes in this show are evidence of an initiated understanding. However one looks at it, it's definitely a hotbed of archetypal symbolism." Couldn't have said it better myself.

[movebywillalone]

A few months back me and my wife watched both seasons and the movie on a whim. At the same time I was reading the nightside of eden for the first time and thinking that Lynch had to definitely be into Grant. Not to mention the soundtrack is great theres something to that theme song.

[Marc]

I've just finished the movie and both seasons. I probably would have to watch it all at least another time to get more insight. Here's a question: In the context of Black Lodge and White Lodge, what would the waiting room represent? I was thinking Mauve Zone. It's kind of an inbetweeness. Would that be the reason why agent Cooper could speak normally but all others would speak in that strange metallic voice?

[Nalyd Khezr Bey]

Regarding the inbetweenness of the waiting room, I was always under the impression that it was itself the Black Lodge and the White Lodge relative to whether one approaches it with love or fear*. So the place does represent a dual current as depicted on the black and white, zig-zag floor pattern (Aquarius?). Most of the characters in the show tend to cross over into it out of fear which is why it takes the form it does. I am not sure the White Lodge aspect of it was ever portrayed in the show. Then there is that other place where its denizens seem to meet above the convenient store as you see in the movie Fire, Walk With Me when Agent Jeffries (David Bowie) appears and recalls where he has been. Perhaps that is the Black Lodge proper? Or perhaps just another threshold place? Hard to say.

*This could also be love (what do we live for?) or death (what do most people fear the most?) as in Eros and Thanatos.

[Marc]

Interesting. The zigzags were black and white right? I guess that could also hint at your above comment. There is definitely something symbolic about the oil and (possibly) the show's obsession with black coffee (and cocaine...). I've been also trying to pinpoint Kenneth Grant's three states (waking, dream, and dreamless sleep) but the show is very puzzling. I also noticed some sigils in the sheriff's office on the wall. I'm sure there's quite a bit of interesting material to be found on the map in the cave.

I noticed that many of the characters in the show had massive changes occur to them (Ben Horne is the most obvious example)in almost a lightning flash kind of way.

I am also wondering what is behind the whole shaking hand thing. Remember all of a sudden Dale Cooper's hand began to shake and then it happened to two other people (I think the Major was one of them).

[Vadge Moore]

I think I have to agree with Marc. The waiting room seems like an inbetweeness state, or the Mauve Zone. It would be at the point of Daath...the portal between Universe A and Universe B. Crap...I feel like some sort of Treky type, now.

[Vadge Moore]

Marc- I seem to recall reading somewhere that the sigils in the Sheriff's office are from the Goetia. Damn...I wish I had the series Dvd here.

I also seem to recall...upon first seeing the shaking of the hand...that I thought it represented the effects of kundalini, but kundalini not flowing fully. I was thinking this because, at the time, I was reading Gopi Krishna's book on Kundalini as well as the book The Kundalini Experience both of which described strange physiological events on one who had raised the fire snake.

[Nalyd Khezr Bey]

The sigils in Truman's office were definitely from the Goetia. When I first saw them in the show I looked them up to see which demons they represented to see if there was a clue there. It's been some years since then and I don't remember which they were but I think they did somehow seem to correspond to the events surrounding that part of the show. I'll have to watch the show again myself soon just to freshen up my memory of it all.

Also, just to be clear, I was not disputing that the waiting room may be a kind of Mauve Zone but only that it becomes either the Black or White Lodge relative to ones state of mind upon entry. I'd have to go watch again but I thought something like this was actually stated in one of the episodes towards the end of season 2. Obviously the easiest way in is through fear and violence or pain and suffering which would be the accumulation of "garmonbozia" in the context of the show. The waiting room would definitely be a threshold or liminal realm between not only this world and the Other but also between the two lodges. This idea, or one similar to it, is also explored by Peter Levenda in his Sinister Forces trilogy. There he puts the acts of the serial killer in the context of shamanistic practices and experiences. The act of killing in a ritualistic way (as well as various other taboos that are broken by many of these types) makes the veil between this world and the Other thinner; it effectively puts one in the liminal state. 

[Vadge Moore]

Sorry Nalyd...I was reading your post too quickly. Trying to do too many things at once, but I had to respond to this thread...love it!

Wow...I'm going to have to pick up Levenda's trilogy....it sounds great.

[Marc]

If fear and violence are direct paths to the Black Lodge, then in this case we have to analyse the characters that crossed over and those that did not. Of particular interest to me is Leo Johnson and the things that happened to him and the Major as well. I think each character is a whole mythos in and of itself. The fear/love subject came up with Benjamin Horne I believe. Then again, if we throw a Lovecraftian spin on this, all of the things we fear are nothing more than the masks of our cosmic initiators and once we realize them for what they really are, the fear disappears.

With regards to the black coffee and black oil, for some reason, this made me think of the black mirror of evocation. Any clues?

[voudongnostic16]

Firstly, thanks for creating this fun and informative thread!

For now I only have one small thing to perhaps add to the conversation. When I was watching the Film version Fire, Walk With Me
just the other night, I noticed that at the end of the film, it is while she is inside of the Black Lodge that Laura faces her fear and suffering and the White Lodge is revealed to her. Here is where she smiles with tears of profound love and an Angel from the White Lodge appears. Now, this particular observation I have may perhaps have something to do with the fact that I am currently in a Nietzsche class where we just read and evaluated Thus Spoke Zarathustra, but this resonates with me a comparison here of Zarathustra traveling to his own Abysmal darkness and through his gateway of his "most silent hour" into his Light of Gnosis into his realization and acceptance of the Eternal Recurrence. Just a thought. 

[voudongnostic16]

According to that Twin Peaks Mythos site, the shaking hands "occurs when the gateway is breached with the near conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn. With the gateway partially open, Bob attempts to 'try on' different hosts."

[Marc]

I agree voudongnostic16, as I just also watched Fire Walk With Me the other night as well. I am also familiar with some of Nietzsche's work. I think this is a theme that is found in many places (especially in Grant's work)that all of these terrifying things that interact with our fears are initiations - chambers within ourselves. Most people spend their entire lives running from such initiations or simply pretend they don't exist but there are some of us who decide to pursue these initiations and therefore seek to "find the Black Lodge" in a way so that we may face these vistas and understand them. It is in essence choosing to ascend the backside of the Tree in order to gain access to the divine - The White Lodge...or perhaps the purpose is to transcend both the Black and White Lodge? Perhaps what we are looking for is that space of inbetweenness between the White and Black Lodge.

[Deleted]

Well, I have never seen 'Twin Peaks' but I must say that you guys have just inspired me to order the Dvd Box set

[msledespencer]

Fantastic post! I'd also call to  attention the film "Picnic at Hanging Rock" which also delves into concepts of liminality, time, and the uncanny. Picnic was a  definite influence on Twin Peaks and both stories share many elements with Machen and his unsettling explorations of "rending the veil" between worlds and the breakdown of ego and self in the transition across.

Great stuff!

Maddie

[Marc]

Maddie, thanks for your post. I will order this movie today...which leads me to create a seperate thread for movies/TV Shows that have strong Typhonian or occult elements in them.

[Sloejinn]

The seal of Astaroth is on Trumans wall.

[N0T 2]

Nov 21, 2013 22:22:37 GMT msledespencer said:

Fantastic post! I'd also call to  attention the film "Picnic at Hanging Rock" which also delves into concepts of liminality, time, and the uncanny. Picnic was a  definite influence on Twin Peaks and both stories share many elements with Machen and his unsettling explorations of "rending the veil" between worlds and the breakdown of ego and self in the transition across.

Great stuff!

Maddie

I spent a week near Hanging Rock a few years ago, visiting the location itself, alas, only once. There is an almost theatrical, direct effect upon the senses before you're even near it, before it's even in sight, as you approach it through the virgin bush - without warning, your hackles on end, skin goose-pricked, without any real reason, at midday, track dotted sparsely by tourists/pilgrims. The word "eerie" is comic when you think about what you're trying to pin it to. The sense of inconceivably dark, cosmic antiquity is rank. The ascent on foot is unforgettable once you're at the base of the spiral track, simply seeing the form of the place which is genuinely terrifying for reasons you can't pin down, the sense of being Watched, not by the stones, but by sentient things you cannot begin to imagine that are there to watch and not be seen.   Despite my habitual occultism I expected none of it when I went - it was a box to be ticked whilst in the area, as a tourist, but the "summit" (which is actually a crazed depression) is a true No-Man's Land which does in fact bend your perception and mind, and removes your orientation. Within seconds of entering (the summit, which takes some climbing to reach), your point of entry (to the summit) is lost, even though the actual space involved is only a few metres across. The realisation that, stone cold sober, you've completely lost your bearings in such an absurdly short space of time (and in such a limited space), in broad daylight, under an open sky, does things to a man. It's particularly horrifying when you realise how corny what you're experiencing is, but this simply adds to the sense of a rug being pulled from Under you. A truly impressive experience which I would very much like to repeat when there is nobody around to save me.

[Invoke Often]

I'm loving this post. I have been profoundly affected by the Twin Peaks mythos. I don't think there is a White Lodge per se, one that opposes the Black Lodge. I think there is just a crossing point that one usually reaches by trauma but can also reach by inspiration, integration, and desire. I don't mean here to propose an all dark and no light cosmology but I think it rather relates to how things really break down even in the occult world itself. There is generally recognized 3 paths one can take; the white path, the grey (or yellow if you prefer), and the black path. Whilst it would be intuitive to infer that these denote good- good and evil- evil. This really does not prove to be the case under closer scrutiny. What we seem to find is rather a spectrum of in the white path: mediated and socially acceptable morality (which validates both moral and immoral actions deferring more to what will earn acceptance from external/ social forces- in the grey path: detachment/ disinterest/ divorce from one's desires- and in the black path: good and evil present/ not present in equal measure/ unmediated desire and impulse. The id, ego, and super-ego and the r-complex- limbic system, neo-cortex divisions suggest themselves as well though if it does violence to the model it is really besides the point to infer them, they are worth mention here though.

The blazing cue that definite occult influence is present in the series for me came with Major Briggs dream account, prominently featuring in it the symbol of choronzon (and it's connection with alien activity! A connection that has been both made before and personally experienced by me). I think it goes without saying that the show was made with conscious occult knowledge given the presence of Goetic seals, among so many other pieces of evidence but the view that a full disclosure on the part of the show's writers will reveal all would be mistaken. This series is a visual grimoire akin to Kenneth Grant's books and I believe was influenced unconsciously in ways beyond the writer's of the show awareness as is suggested by many (Kenneth Grant especially) was the case with the "Cthulu Mythos" of H P Lovecraft.

One moment that stood out to me particularly is the scene in which Wyndham Earle (symbolically here a Black Brother) attempts to black mail Cooper in the Black Lodge and in exceeding his remit of authority is destroyed by Bob (possibly Choronzon). This to me symbolized how unrefined ego's might suffer in the Qlippothic realm.

[Sloejinn]

There are 3 sigils on the walls in the office.

Asmoday on the far left,by the window.
Belial on the far right, by the door.
Astaroth left of the map to the Black Lodge.

[Marc]

Interesting...I'm sure they weren't randomly put there in that exact order by chance, has anyone looked into this?

[equinoxofthegods]

I recently posted something in the "Symbols of the Typhonian Tradition" thread that should have been posted here, not knowing there was a "Typhonian Peaks" thread. I will re-post it here as it is the biggest sign of Lynch's familiarity with the ideas of Daath, the Tree of Death, Nightside magick etc...

Nov 7, 2013 at 11:30pm artilect said:
Grant frequently mentions reversal, as well as a hidden link or gate between Yesod and Daath. When examining this, the Tree of Life nested within a Vector Equilibrium is useful, along with a superimposition of an inverted Tree over the traditional structure. Frater Achad did some work in this domain...


March 31 equinoxofthegods said:
This just jogged my memory. In Twin Peaks when they are trying to find the mode of entrance to the Black Lodge before Windom Earle they are looking over a bunch of different symbols etc...I found it really intriguing that the point of entrance was related to an alignment of Saturn and Jupiter (IE: The 3rd and 4th spheres on the tree of life, and the non-existant path connecting them which would cross through the abyss and Daath)

Just some food for thought

[triveni93]

Does anyone understand the significance of the North East? Doesn't Agent Cooper say he always sleeps facing that direction?