WARNING: Close-in conflict upon us

"As above, so below" is an aphorism so popular with satanic secret societies that it has its own Wikipedia entry.

The site informs, "The Message, intended as a "version of the New Testament in a contemporary idiom",^[2] uses the maxim in its translation of the Lord's Prayer from Matthew 6:10. (The prayer's phrase is traditionally rendered "on earth, as it is in heaven".)

Our Father in heaven,
Reveal who you are.
Set the world right;
Do what's best – as above, so below.^[3]

Wikipedia reveals, "The phrase derives from a passage in the Emerald Tablet (variously attributed to Hermes Trismegistus or Pseudo-Apollonius of Tyana). The 16th-century scholar Chrysogonus Polydorus provides the following version translated from the original Arabic into Latin:

"A translation by Isaac Newton is found among his alchemical papers that are currently housed in King's College Library, Cambridge University.^[8]

Tis true without lying, certain and most true.

That which is below is like that which is above
and that which is above is like that which is below
to do the miracles of one only thing

And as all things have been and arose from one by the mediation of one:
so all things have their birth from this one thing by adaptation.

The Sun is its father,
the moon its mother,
the wind hath carried it in its belly,
the earth is its nurse.
The father of all perfection in the whole world is here.
Its force or power is entire if it be converted into earth.

Separate thou the earth from the fire,
the subtle from the gross
sweetly with great industry.
It ascends from the earth to the heaven
and again it descends to the earth
and receives the force of things superior and inferior.

By this means you shall have the glory of the whole world
and thereby all obscurity shall fly from you.

Its force is above all force,
for it vanquishes every subtle thing and penetrates every solid thing.

So was the world created.

From this are and do come admirable adaptations
where of the means is here in this.

Hence I am called Hermes Trismegist [sic],
having the three parts of the philosophy of the whole world

That which I have said of the operation of the Sun is accomplished and ended.

*****

Here's an article from Washington Monthly that was published in 2017:

Hermes wears winged sandals because he’s in a hurry. Messenger of the gods, he is a communicator. The Lord of Liars, Hermes is patron of both merchants and thieves because all sales contain a bit of thievery, right? Liar, merchant, thief, improviser, media-savant. Sound familiar?

But Hermes is a culture-bearer who brings fire to humanity and invents rituals to honor the gods (creating Hellenic culture). The more extreme Trickster Dionysus doesn’t just push, he shreds the envelope. He promises a new order but mostly brings chaos. In Euripides’s Bacchae, Dionysus incites his followers to tear limb from limb the hyper-rational Theban king Pentheus—Obama? Hillary?—and the play ends without order restored.

Trump clearly enjoys his role as culture destroyer. As Rebecca Solnit writes, “Trump was supposed to be a great maker of things, but he was mostly a breaker.” Thus, as bringer-of-chaos, Trump seems also to be channeling Hermes’s more destructive cousin Dionysus. The god of intoxication and ecstasy, Dionysus embodies and offers his followers the transformation of individual identity. Worshiped directly in nature without the mediation of a priesthood, he is the god of the people (and hence of demagogues). Dionysus fulfills our longing for transcendence, or, in political terms, our longing for change. Sound familiar?

While shredding our political norms, Trump nevertheless is following patterns associated with the cult of Dionysus. The cult flourished for a thousand years until the triumph of Christianity, but Dionysian longings for transcendence have outlived his cult. When Trump’s followers assert their indifference to his (many) imperfections and, despite all evidence to the contrary, trust he will deliver on his promises, that’s Dionysian intoxication. We can hardly ignore the resemblance of Trump’s red-capped supporters to Dionysus’s followers, the priapic satyrs.

As an enemy to autocrats like Pentheus, Dionysus’s initial appeal is democratic and egalitarian. But as a matter of historical fact, Dionysus is associated with tyranny. Aspiring tyrants in antiquity aligned themselves with Dionysus to challenge the reigning hierarchies: in other words, to drain their swamps. All Rome welcomed Mark Antony as Dionysus who then transformed Rome’s oligarchy into an autocratic empire. Caligula and Nero, renowned for their sadism, extravagance, and sexual perversity, paraded as the “new Dionysus.” Perhaps tweeting is the new fiddling. Trump’s “identification” with the Dionysus archetype explains his allure and rise to power. Like Dionysus, Trump seems determined to break every rule and overturn every norm. In 2014, he imagined apocalypse as the solution to the country’s ills: “When the economy crashes, when the country goes to total hell and everything is a disaster. Then you’ll have a [chuckles], you know, you’ll have riots to go back to where we used to be when we were great.”

*****

"Ephesians 6: [11] Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil.
[12] For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.

"When he talks about high places, he's not talking about state government; he's talking about the heavenly places," explains Jordan.

"Four times in Ephesians the phrase 'heavenly places' occurs and this time it's translated 'high places.' There's a reason for that even though they're talking about the same thing.

"We're fighting against the principalities and powers in that invisible realm of the heavenly government because those are the ones we're going to dispossess and they don't want to give up their positions; they're going to fight against the people designed to take their position.

"Appreciate as we get into this the reality of it. Paul believed in a personal prince of evil; a real policy of evil that the Adversary has. Satan is not just an evil force like Darth Vader. Most of Christendom doesn't believe there's a real personal Satan.

"Satan is a supernatural spirit being who has a mind that plots and strategizes. He's 'the god of this world,' but he's a little 'g' god. He's just a pretender; he's not omniscient. However, there's a real, highly strategized plan by an Adversary who wants to take over and destroy your life and what God wants to do with you in the ages to come.

"Ephesians 6 goes on, [13] Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.
[14] Stand therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of righteousness;
[15] And your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace;
[16] Above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked.
[17] And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God:

"It's always struck me--if you got a breastplate, how do you wrestle? The idea in a soldier is, 'If I can kill the enemy over yonder, I'd like to do it, because the further away I can kill him the safer I am.' That's why they bomb from artillery 30,000 feet up.

"Wrestling is close-in conflict; it's not remote. It's an up-close, hand-to-hand struggle against a cunning opponent who knows the tricks of the trade of warfare. He knows how to use you against you. It's not just a battle in the physical realm; it's a battle in the spiritual realm."