The Doctrine Of "The Pure Ones" - Conclusion

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The Cathars explained the Fall of Lucifer, the origin of the Earth, and the birth of man with the following mythological formula:

Seven heavens. The purest and most brilliant was the Kingdom of God and the celestial Spirits. Each one of these heavens had special superior angels, whose hymns of praise rose incessantly to God's throne in the seventh heaven. Beneath the celestial regions four other elements existed, immobile and without form, but separate one from the other. Beneath heaven: the air, with clouds; further down, the ocean with its endless rolling waves; further down still, the Earth, and in the interior of the Earth, fire. Air, water, earth, and fire: the four elements, each one presided over by an angel.

Commanding the celestial armies was Lucifer, to whom God had entrusted the administration of the heavens. Flying high, he visited all the regions of the infinite celestial world, from the deepest abyss to the throne of invisible eternity. His privileged position sparked rebellious thoughts in him; he wanted to be like his Creator and Lord. First, he seduced the four angels of the elements and then a regiment of the celestial army. Then God expelled him from the Kingdom of the Heavens. The Light that until then had been soft and pure was taken from him and was replaced by another, reddish, similar to incandescent iron. The angels seduced by Lucifer were stripped of their finery and and crowns and were expelled from the heavens. Lucifer fled with them to the outer limits of the firmament. Tormented by remorse, he said to God, "Have patience with me, I will return everything to you".

And God, having compassion for His preferred son, gave him seven days -- which meant seven Days of Manifestation -- to do everything that he thought was proper. Then Lucifer established his residence in the firmament and ordered the rest of the angels who had followed him to shape the Earth. He took his crown, which had been broken since his expulsion from the Kingdom of Heavens, and with half of it formed the sun, and with the other half, the moon. Then he converted his precious stones into the stars. From the primitive mud he fashioned the first terrestrial creatures, animals and plants.

The supreme angels of the third and second heavens desired to share power with Lucifer and pleaded with God to allow them to descend to Earth, promising to return immediately afterward. God read their thoughts, but He did not deny their wish. He wanted to punish them for their lie, but He advised them not to fall asleep during their voyage, because if they did, they would forget the way to return to the Heavens. If they fell asleep, He would not call them before 7,000 years had passed. The two angels began their journey. But Lucifer put them into a deep sleep and locked them in bodies that had been shaped from the original clay. When the angels awoke, they were the human beings Adam and Eve.

To get them to forget Heaven, Lucifer created Earthly paradise. But he decided to cheat them with a new strategy. He wanted them both to sin in order to make them his slaves forever. When he put them in paradise, he forbade them -- to give more encouragement to their natural curiosity -- to eat from the tree of science. He transformed himself into a snake and seduced Eve, who in turn induced Adam to commit the original sin.

Lucifer knew very well that God had also forbidden the first pair to eat the wretched fruit. Because God would never want to see the multiplication of Lucifer's nature, Lucifer acted as if the prohibition of eating the fruit came from himself, to triumph in this way with greater certainty.

Humanity had to reproduce, because Lucifer needed fresh souls, In the new bodies produced by Adam and Eve, he confined all the angels who had abandoned the celestial regions with him.

And then, with the death of Abel, murder entered into the world.

After a while, God had compassion with the fallen angels who had been expelled from Heaven and transformed into humans. So He decided to reveal Himself to them, and sent His most perfect creature down to the Earth. His supreme angel, Christ, who would assume an outwardly human appearance. The Christ came into the world to indicate how they could return to Heaven, to the Kingdom of the Eternal Light.

I am come a Light unto the world, that whoseoever believeth on me should not abide in darkness. While ye have Light, believe in the Light, that ye may be the children of the Light. John 12:46, 36

The Christ did not become a man, a creature of Lucifer; He only appeared as one. He only gave the impression that He ate, drank, taught, suffered and died, revealing to humans a sort of shadow of His real body. This is the reason He could walk on water and transform Himself on Mount Tabor, where He revealed to His disciples the real substance of His body. Since the Fall of Lucifer, the Christ was the greatest of all angels, and for this reason He is called "the Son of God". When the Christ said that He wasn't of this world, but rather from above it, the Cathars applied this passage of the New Testament not only to the spiritual nature of the Savior, but also to His body. With this ethereal body, the Aeon Christ entered the body of Maria, like the "Word of God", through her ear. He left her as pure as He had entered her, without taking any of her matter. For this reason, he never called her "mother", and this is why he said to her, "Woman, what have I to do with you?".

 The Cathars did not recognize the reality of the miracles of Jesus. Why would He cure physical illnesses when He considered the body an obstacle to the redemption of the soul? When He cured the blind, He was curing men who were blinded by sin and allowing them to see Reality. The" bread" that He divided among the five thousand was His Word, the Bread of the Soul that gave real Life. The storm that He calmed was the storm of passions unleashed by Lucifer. In this respect, it is possible to apply the written words of the Christ: the written word kills, but the Spirit breathes Life.

Because the body of the Christ was not of an earthly nature, His crucifixion was only an apparition; this was the only way possible He could rise to Heaven. A heavenly ascension with a body of flesh and blood appeared absurd to the Cathars. A human body cannot go to heaven; an Aeon (such as the Christ), cannot die.

From "The Pure Ones" and Their Doctrine - Crusade Against the Grail - Otto Rahn

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