Blade Runner is an incredibly
enigmatic film. At the time of this writing (2012) there are seven versions in
existence. The following is an occult analysis of Blade
Runner: The Final Cut. It is the only version over which
Ridley Scott had complete artistic control, and is therefore my choice version
of the film. Interpretations of Blade Runner are as variant as its versions.
Here’s another one for the pile.
Blade Runner is a deeply complex
movie, and there are literally hundreds of different streams one could follow
in analyzing it. I have asked a hundred times, “What is this film teaching
me?”, and I’ve received a hundred different answers. I believe a book could be
written on this film’s portents. It is as rich an oracle as the I Ching, used
so liberally in the book on which the film was based. That book is titled, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by
Philip K. Dick. I love that book, but I will not draw from it in this analysis.
The film begins by providing us
with some background: “Early in the 21st Century,
the Tyrell Corporation advanced robot evolution into the Nexus phase – a being
virtually identical to a human – known as a Replicant. The Nexus 6 Replicants
were superior in strength and agility, and at least equal in intelligence, to
the genetic engineers who created them. Replicants were used off-world as slave
labor in the hazardous exploration and colonization of other planets. After a
bloody mutiny by a Nexus 6 combat team in an off-world colony, Replicants were
declared illegal on earth – under penalty of death. Special police squads –
Blade Runner Units – had orders to shoot to kill, upon detection, any
trespassing Replicant. This was not called execution. It was called
retirement.”
The phrase, “Early in the 21st Century”
provides us with a clue. Tarot Key 21 is The World in most tarot decks.
Aleister Crowley names it The Aeon. It symbolizes the cosmic mind forever
dancing at the heart of creation, but it also signifies the entirety of our
age, our eon. Identification with this cosmic mind is often referred to as
enlightenment, though this rude generalization hardly addresses the nuance of
identification with the Cosmos itself. So it is that our story is one of
ancient origins. It occurs early in the life of the Universal Mind.
Moreover, the consciousness
associated with Key 21 is the Administrative Intelligence, represented by the
Tyrell Corporation. The word Tyrell may be broken apart thusly: First, Tyre was
the name of an ancient seafaring city in Asia Minor. The name Tyre means
“rock”, and refers to the corner stone of creation. In our microcosm, it refers
to the reconstituted pituitary gland or the Philosopher’s Stone. Tyrell also
ends with two “L’s”, and “L” sounds like “El” the Hebrew word for “power of
God”. Because there are two, the name “Tyrell” could be taken to mean, “the
creative source of duplicitous power”.
To state that the Tyrell
Corporation advanced robot evolution to the Nexus phase, implies the creation
of a specific class of angels in the mind of God. Later in the film, Roy Batty,
chief rogue replicant, misquotes a telling line from William Blake’s America a Prophecy, when
he, self-aggrandizing, whispers, “Fiery the angels fell; deep thunder rolled
around their shores burning with the fires of Orc.” In this he deciphers the remainder
of the introduction.
Nexus 6 is a direct reference to
the sephirah Tiphareth, and the vice associated with Tiphareth is pride.
Briefly put, this is a retelling of the Lucifer legend, rebellion and all.
Tyrell Corporation’s golden child has revolted in the tradition of that
glorious banished god of which John Milton writes a passage not unparallel to
the one we have just considered:
“Th’ infernal Serpent; he it was, whose guile
Stird
up with Envy and Revenge, deceiv’d
The
Mother of Mankinde, what time his Pride
Had
cast him out from Heav’n, with all his Host
Of
Rebel Angels, by whose aid aspiring
To set
himself in Glory above his Peers,
He
trusted to have equal’d the most High,
If he
oppos’d; and with ambitious aim
Against
the Throne and Monarchy of God
Rais’d
impious War in Heav’n and Battel proud
With
vain attempt. Him the Almighty Power
Hurld
headlong flaming from th’ Eternal Skie
With
hideous ruine and combustion down
To
bottomless perdition, there to dwell
In
Adamantine Chains and penal Fire,
Who
durst defie th’ Omnipotent to Arms.”
Replicants are illegal on earth.
Genesis 6:3 says, “And
the LORD said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh…” This is a distinct delineation
being drawn between humans and angels and, metaphorically, between humans and
replicants. The struggle on earth is a genetic struggle. It has speculatively
always been thus. The answer to this dilemma is to execute the “skin jobs” as
they run. Blade Runner considers the morality of this initiative.
“What is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that
thou visitest him? For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and
hast crowned him with glory and honour. Thou madest him to have dominion over
the works of thy hands; thou hast put all things under his feet:” ~ Psalm
8:4-6
There are two other elements in
cyclic review at the film’s opening: the eye and the pyramids (without
capstones); and these clearly represent hierarchy and witness. The pyramids
rise from the blinking city lights and explosions below and give way to the
never blinking eye watching the play between little flickers and roaring
blasts.
What is this hierarchy? Who is
this witness? The Eye of Providence is displayed on the reverse of the Great Seal of the United States,
appearing on the United States one-dollar bill. It
is composed of a pyramid of thirteen steps and is mounted by the all-seeing eye
of God. It symbolizes ascending stages of transformation culminating in pure
consciousness as witness. On the seal, the Eye is surrounded by the words Annuit Cœptis,
meaning, "He has approved [our] undertakings", and Novus Ordo Seclorum,
meaning, "New Order of the Ages". The presumption here, real or
imagined, is that a new hierarchy has been granted divine license. In other
words, “God has given us permission to organize life on earth.”
The pyramids rise out of the
squalor of Los Angeles, demonstrative of spiritual ascent from the sprawling
laterality of common humanity. They are the lotuses that simultaneously grow
from and govern over the mud below.
Now the eye is the chief subject
of the Voight-Kampff machine. This interrogation tool is at work within the
greatest of the pyramids, the Tyrell Corporation building. The Voight-Kampff machine,
with its cool analytic stare and its sinister bellows, assesses a number of
physical functions, including eye movement, respiration, heart rate, and blush
response in an effort to identify rogue replicants. The machine gages the
sensorial expressions of emotional responses to provocative questions. The four
worlds of the Tree of Life and their respective elements are represented here:
“Capillary dilation of the so-called blush response” is a measure of integrity
in the world of Assiah, corresponding to the earth element. Variations in
respiration measure integrity in the world of Beriah, corresponding with the
air element. Variations in heart rate measure integrity in the world of
Yetzirah, corresponding with the water element. “Fluctuation of the pupil” and
“involuntary dilation of the iris” are measures of integrity in the world of
Atziluth, corresponding with the fire element.
In the Tyrell pyramid we find a
blade runner named Dave Holden interrogating Leon Kowalski using the
Voight-Kampff machine. The name David means “beloved”, and the name Leon means
“lion”. The numerical value of the name “Leon” is 19. Tarot Key 19 is The Sun,
and the constellation Leo the Lion is, according to traditional Western
astrology, the zodiac sign in which the sun is exalted. Furthermore, the sun is
the planet associated with Tiphareth, the Mediating Intelligence, and is,
again, the sixth of the sephiroth. It is associated with the Hebrew concept of
the Messiach (Messiah). We will address this in due course.
To quote Plato’s Timaeus and
Crowley’s Liber AL vel Legis in
tandem, “And having made it he divided the whole mixture into souls equal in
number to the stars, and assigned each soul to a star…” and, “Every man and
every woman is a star.”
Now there be souls that are stars
and souls that are star systems and souls that are galaxies and souls that are
a universe, and maturity is the all of it. So it is that Dave Holden and Leon
Kowalski are two of a kind - that kind being our Sol.
The Star (or Shield) of David (Mawgen David) is the six-pointed star
and this geometric symbol is associated simultaneously with Tiphareth and with
the Universal Mind. Leon is the Gathering Intelligence from whence Plato’s
mixture is poured and to which it returns in time. The two sit across from each
other with a Voight-Kampff machine between them.
“I already had an IQ test this
year…” Leon again emphasizes that stellar polemic. Holden interrupts, “Reaction
time is a factor in this, so please pay attention. Now answer as quickly as you
can.” Here the blade runner is dismissing Leon’s language as instinctive,
mechanical, and irrelevant. He already suspects that Leon is a machine, and is
unaffected by its calculations. His only interested is proving Leon a hollow misplaced
mechanism so that he may turn it off.
Blade Runner proposes an age-old
question, that, no matter how oft is answered, because of the limits of the
senses (celebrated by the Voight-Kampff machine), arises again and again, posed
by weak and weary unimaginative men who give ear to that same voice that spoke
to Cain outside of Eden’s gates. It gives birth to that Saturnine dogma that
drags men’s philosophies and subsequent acts into the pit wherein they set upon
a pedestal pragmatism, turning humans on their heads, making of time, clocks;
of wealth, numbers; and of love, chemistry. It sucks the meaning out of life,
and with a bloated, depressed, agnostic sigh, commands the robots beneath its
corporate sway to consume at whim and produce at whip.
These are questions of
causality, and Plotinus in his Third Ennead outlines
the doctrines of this school of materialistic reductionism thus: “One school
postulates material principles, such as atoms; from the movement, from the
collisions and combinations of these, it derives the existence and the mode of
being of all particular phenomena, supposing that all depends upon how these
atoms are agglomerated, how they act, how they are affected; our own impulses
and states, even, are supposed to be determined by these principles. Such
teaching, then, obtrudes this compulsion, an atomic Anagke, even
upon Real Being. Substitute, for the atoms, any other material entities as
principles and the cause of all things, and at once Real Being becomes servile
to the determination set up by them.”
He later calls this an
“absurdity” and an “impossibility”, for it essentially presupposes that these
vehicles, whether “atoms” or “elements”, are capable of navigating in an
orderly fashion without a Driver. There are souls, and these nest and propel
within an Oversoul, of which Virgil writes in Aeneid:
“Know first that heaven, the earth, the watery plains,
The
moon’s bright orb, and Titan’s starry sphere –
These
doth a spirit inly feed; a mind,
It
limbs pervading, stirs the whole mass through,
And
with the vast frame mingles.”
Lest my rare reader see this all
as tangential, it is vital to the question of replicants, not only “What is
man?”; but also “What is the world?”; “What is the universe?”; and “What is
life?”. Now if one swallow the mercurial poison of materialistic reductionism,
then replicants will be merely machines that, when misplaced in space, must be
ended hastily and by any and all means. But if one eats from the living tree
that endows us with knowledge of soul and spirit in microcosm and Soul and
Spirit in macrocosm, and hereby places value and faith in life and its
processes respectively, then one is initiated into the compassion the bright
side of the sun can yield. We shall see our protagonist, Rick Deckard,
initiated so and usher into his sad state love and freedom.
As Leon’s interrogation
continues, Holden poses to him a scenario, “You’re in a desert. You’re walking
along in the sand when all of a sudden you look down and see a tortoise…” Leon
interrupts with questions like, “Which desert?” and “How come I be there?” To
his first question, Holden answers, “It doesn’t matter”, pointing to the truth
that there is only one desert, the vast expanse that separates Tiphareth from
Keter, along which the 13th path of wisdom runs. To Leon’s second
question, the blade runner replies, “Maybe you’re fed up. Maybe you want to be
by yourself”, alluding to the environmental prompting that drives consciousness
across that expanse to Keter. This “wanting to be by your Self” is the chief
motivator for all actions.
Holden continues, “You see a tortoise
crawling toward you. You reach down and flip the tortoise on its back, Leon.
The tortoise lays on its back, its belly baking in the hot sun, beating its
legs trying to turn itself over, but it can’t. Not without your help… but
you’re not helping.” “What do you mean, I’m not helping!” exclaims Leon. “I
mean you’re not helping… Why is that, Leon?” answers Holden. The inquiry
constipates Leon’s thinking, confusing him. He is missing basic neurological
pathways that allow for empathy. These pathways are burned into the brain
through experience and because of Leon’s recent incept date, he simply does not
possess them. That is not to say that he would not garner them if given the
chance, but, as we shall learn, he and the other Nexus 6 replicants have been
granted an expedited expiration date.
Holden then directs Leon to,
“Describe in single words only the good things that come to mind about your
mother.” Leon responds, “My mother? Let me tell you about my mother.” And with
that he fires a gun under the table into Holden. He stands and fires again into
the blade runner’s body. The Sun was born of explosions. The two shots point to
the 2nd Tarot
Key, High Priestess, associated with the 13th path
running between Tiphareth and Keter. She is the chaotic camel one must ride
across the desert to join the One Will.
Here is the rebellion of soul against
spirit, for if spirit is limited in scope, its geometry too taught, its lines
too narrow, the soul, subject to a higher order than common autistic rigidity,
it wells up and tidal, crashes down upon man’s encroaching math. Here is chaos
in its finer form, as agent to high and hidden kings who command with such
impersonal sweep both heaven’s hosts and their conscriptions. It is the fierce
grace that overrides a corrupt system, so that life may flourish in alignment
with deeper nuance and complexity.
LA’s residents are in
unconscious thrall to corporate technocracy guided by the hand of an oligarchy
hidden in plain sight. The names behind the corporations, hammering their
signatures into the minds of the milling masses, are the secret rulers of the
sprawling dystopia. Everywhere is Time Square, and the denizens scurry about on
little missions self-serving, system-serving, and all servile under the
pyramids and the watchful eye in the sky.
An ad blimp floats above the
city and cries out like a prophet, “A new life awaits you in the ‘Offworld
Colonies’! The chance to begin again in a golden land of opportunity and
adventure!” Echoing the words of Paul the Apostle, “But now they desire a
better country, that is, an heavenly:” The irony of otherworldly spiritualism
married to the onslaught of ad memorabilia, gives us pause to consider the
separation of church and shop.
A neon Asian dragon facing
downward spitting fire, brings to mind a line from Crowley’s aforementioned
text - “I am the secret Serpent coiled about to spring: in my coiling there is
joy. If I lift up my head, I and my Nuit [space] are one. If I droop down mine
head, and shoot forth venom, then is rapture of the earth, and I and the earth
are one.” The dragon is a solar symbol in China, further reinforcing the Sun
and Son theme running amongst the blade runners.
And as we pan across the street
from the sushi bar, we glimpse our hero, retired blade runner Rick Deckard. As
previously mentioned, the numerical value of the word “Blade Runner” is 51, reducible
to 6. This is also the value of Rick Deckard’s name. And so the blade runners
and Rick Deckard are also associated with the sephirah Tiphareth.
Deckard further proves this by
crossing the street and insistently ordering #4 at the noodle bar along with
noodles. This reinforces the prior speculation about Deckard’s pituitary gland.
Tarot Key 4 is The Emperor, and is associated with the 15th path
of wisdom on the Tree of Life. This path runs between Tiphareth and Chokmah,
the Son and Father respectively, and is referred to as the Constituting
Intelligence. It is said that one who masters this path “can neither be
surprised by misfortune, nor overwhelmed by disasters, nor conquered by
enemies.” Surely, Deckard’s generally unflappable demeanor is testimony to this
work made manifest in his life.
His meal is interrupted by a
police officer and an agent named Gaff, who retrieve him and carry him off in a
spinner to meet with “his old boss”, Bryant. Deckard takes his noodles to go,
eating them with chopsticks while he and Gaff float through the city to the
station. Deckard is unhappy with this turn of events, and Gaff seems to take
smug amusement in Deckard’s canoodling.
Bryant informs Deckard that
there are four “skin jobs” walking the streets, reemphasizing Deckard’s task in
accomplishing the 15th path.
Initially Bryant employs flattery to employ Deckard, but when this is
ineffective, he resorts to threats. As Deckard heads for the door, Bryant
barks, “Don’t you know the score, pal? If you’re not cops, you’re little
people!”
Gaff places an origami chicken
on the desk. Gaff’s origami, like his general demeanor, may be viewed as
passive aggressive commentary or artful revelation, as the cock was commonly
used as a symbol for Jesus Christ during the middle ages. Of course the
symbolism predates Jesus. The rooster has long been associated with solar
deities because of his crowing at the rising sun. This may be our first hint
that Deckard is himself a replicant.
Whatever Bryant’s threatening
implication here is, it stops Deckard, who returns and begins his debriefing.
The numerical value of the name “Bryant” is 26, and this is the value of the
Tetragrammaton, mistransliterated as “Yahweh”, or more disgustingly “Jehovah”.
The name is unspeakable and translates as “That which was, is, and forever will
be”, or, more commonly, “I am that I am”. This name’s power permeates, nay, is
the foundation for the entire Tree of Life, but it is specifically also
associated with the 15th path of wisdom, namely, again, the
Constituting Intelligence, which we have established Rick Deckard is walking.
Bryant’s value may be further
reduced from 26 to 8, which is a number occultly associated with the Vedic
kundalini, or, as Crowley calls it, Force. Tarot Key 8 is called Strength in
most decks, and pictorially shows the utilization of the serpent power for
personal and hence collective evolution. In short, it is both Reality and the
power at the heart of Reality that prompt Deckard to pursue the rogue
replicants and move along the 15th path. All motion on any of the 32 paths
of wisdom is fueled by this force, which resides coiled at the base of the
spine, an aspect and area correlative with Key 21, The World, which we alluded
to early in this exploration.
Bryant explains that there were
six escaped replicants from an Off-world colony two weeks ago. Three males and
three females slaughtered twenty-three people and jumped a shuttle. The ship
was found off the coast without a crew. Three nights ago the replicants tried
to break into the Tyrell Corporation during which two were destroyed running
through an electrical field. The others escaped. Holden was originally sent to
Tyrell Corporation under the suspicion that they would try to infiltrate as
employees. Holden began running Voight-Kampff tests on new employees and found
Leon and his gun.
The four replicants are as
follows. Roy Batty, model number N6MAA10816, is symbolic of the opening yod of the Tetragrammaton. Pris Stratton,
model number N6FAB21416, is symbolic of the first heh of the
Tetragrammaton. Leon Kowalski, model number N6MAC41717, is symbolic of the vav of the Tetragrammaton.
Zhora/Salome/Luba Luft, model number N6FAB61216, is symbolic of the final heh in the Tetragrammaton. They also
represent the four Qabalistic worlds respectively: Atziluth, the archetypal
world; Beriah, the creative world; Yetzirah, the formative world; and Assiah,
the material world.
Bryant explains that the
replicants were designed to be identical to humans except for their emotional
quotient. To prohibit emotional development, specifically as Bryant delineates,
hate, love, anger, envy, the Tyrell Corporation built in a 4-year lifespan.
Bryant then tells Decker that there is a Nexus 6 model at the Tyrell building
and suggests that Decker test it using the Voight-Kampff machine. The concern
is that the Nexus 6 may be so evolved that they would not show up as
other-than-human on the Voight-Kampff test.
As Gaff and Deckard fly to the
Tyrell Corporation, we catch a view of the pyramids at sunset. Their stunning
presence over the urban sprawl below invoke an elevated and exalted feeling in
contrast to the dark and rainy life at their base.
Upon entry at the Tyrell
Corporate pyramid, Deckard is met by an owl, singular symbol of the Bavarian
Illuminati. Contrary to popular perception, the eye and the pyramid are not
traditional symbols of the Illuminati. Their only symbol has ever been the owl.
Whether or not the first intentions of the Illuminati were noble, and
regardless of their role in the world today, the current concept and public
perception of the Illuminati is one of an elitist oligarchy puppeting the
affairs of the humans to some nefarious and self-serving end. Whether this is a
projection of mass consciousness onto a nonexistent entity, or legitimate
outrage at “rulers and spiritual wickedness in high places” is uncertain.
Certainly Eldon Tyrell and his corporation present a grey ethic and inflict it
upon a sad world. In truth, there are neither victims nor predators. Human
troubles are always cultural, born from the hearts of the culture’s
individuals.
“Do you like our owl?” asks the
pretty, prim, and put-together lady walking toward Deckard. “Is it artificial?”
he asks. “ She answers, “Of course it is.” The implication here is that the
power elite is an unnatural and fabricated construct. It is not directly of
God, but rather of God through the agency of human creativity. Is it necessary?
Does it serve some higher and hidden purpose?
“Must be expensive,” he states.
“Very,” Rachel responds as she introduces herself. Here is the acknowledgement
that the Illuminati’s creation and sustenance has taken a high toll on humanity
and the angelic host. Her next question is unto the value of this secret
governing agency, “It seems you feel our work is not of benefit to the public.”
As Eldon Tyrell eloquently explains, “Commerce is our goal… More human than
human is our motto.” Here the maker reveals that his creations are for the
purpose of energetic exchange, and that is contingent upon the evolution of
humanity.
Deckard runs the Voight-Kampff
test on Rachel expecting a negative response; however, after over one hundred
questions, he identifies Rachel as, in fact, replicant. Rachel does not know
what she is, for she is the crest of the evolutionary wave, as Tyrell has
implanted her with memories. This is highly significant in that the 13th path
of wisdom is associated with the High Priestess and memory. In the end it is
memory that gives us our souls, and it is memory that leads us home. It is
memory that makes us human, and whether those memories are artificial or
authentic is irrelevant, for they are experienced, and from the sense of past,
the mind creates the future. Strung taught between then and when is now.
Tyrell also discloses that it is
through memory that they are able to better control the replicants, and so that
which makes us human, also enslaves us. To the extent that we remember, we
member, and the body we create either shines or shivers. It is our vision of
the past that grants us suffering or suffrage. As Deckard flies away from
the Tyrell building with Gaff, he remembers the film of Leon and Holden he
viewed with Bryant at the station.
Searching Leon’s apartment with
Gaff, Deckard finds a photo of the replicant Zhora and a synthetic scale in the
bathtub. While Deckard is combing the apartment, Gaff creates an origami figure
of a human. This, again, has two meanings. Firstly, it is symbolic of Gaff’s
condescending approval of Deckard’s behavior; Deckard’s willingness to move
forward and take the case. This is echoed at the end of the film when Gaff
deigns to speak to Deckard in English, as opposed to street talk, saying,
“You’ve done a man’s job.” Secondly, it is symbolic of humanity as expressed in
Tiphareth – the biblical Son of Man. This is Man as microcosm, reflection of
the Grand Man, or the spirit of the universe. The origami man announces
Deckard’s readiness to walk the 15th path of wisdom.
The film moves away now from
Deckard’s investigation, and connects us with Roy Batty and Leon Kowalski and
their quest to infiltrate the Tyrell Corporation. The scene opens with a hand
involuntarily contracting into a fist. It is Roy’s hand clenching under the
weight of his entropic biology. The Hebrew letter kaph, as a
word, means a “closed fist”. It is associated with Tarot Key 10, Wheel of Fortune,
west face of the cube of space. West is the gate of incarnation and
reincarnation. It is the portal through which the soul enters the material
world. The Wheel of Fortune, the closed fist, is the Wheel of Samsara, the
Wheel of Rebirth, in Tibetan Buddhism. According to David Allan Hulse, “The
wheel’s constant revolutions generate the many incarnations through which all
must journey in order to reach the level of spiritual perfection beyond this
physical plane.” The question, “Do androids dream of electric sheep?” could
just as easily be, “Do replicants reincarnate?”
With the words, “Time enough” we
are introduced to Roy Batty, leader of the renegade replicants. He and Leon go
to a genetic laboratory where one, Hannibal Chew, is busy creating replicant
eyeballs. Amid Chew’s objections at their intrusion, Roy recites skewed lines
from Blake’s America a Prophecy,
“Fiery the angels fell; deep thunder rolled around their shores burning with
the fires of Orc.” Blake’s poem recalls the American Revolution, or in British
eyes, Rebellion. A theme throughout the poem is the subjectivity of the two
sides, each viewing the other as the antichrist. Morality is perspectival.
Perspective is of the eye, and
not that transcendent eye wherein all forms are cast in binding light, but the
fleshly eye that, fixed on shadows, leads us to the lie that we are meat, and
that spirit is a mirage in the blood. The eye is ayin in
Hebrew, and is associated with Tarot Key 15, The Devil, bat-winged Father of
Lies and Author of Confusion. It is that force that convinces men that the
limits of the senses are the limits of the mind. But vast run our currents, and
the conduit is not the cause.
Now the Devil has ever been
associated with Hell, be it his home or his prison, be it sulfuric or frozen.
Here Roy Batty is the picture of Dante’s Devil in icy splendor. Dante writes, “Oh how great a marvel it seemed to me, when
I saw three faces on his head! One in front, and that was crimson; the others
were two, which were adjoined to this above the very middle of each shoulder,
and they were joined up to the place of the crest; and the right seemed between
white and yellow, the left was such in appearance as those who come from there
whence the Nile descends. Beneath each came forth two great wings, of size
befitting so great a bird; sails of the sea I never saw such. They had no
feathers, but their fashion was of a bat…”
Batty too has three faces, embodied
in Leon (crimson), Zhora (yellow), and Pris (black). Moreover, Roy seems to
demonstrate three primary emotions throughout the film, namely rage, fear, and
envy, correlating with Dante’s devilish triad – Hatred, Ignorance, and
Impotence. Sadly Roy’s impending demise gives him little time to develop past
these immature responses to life’s throws.
The word “hell” is the
Anglo-Saxon translation for the Greek name “Gehenna” (γέεννα), transliterated
from the Hebrew Gehinnom,
meaning Valley of the Son of Hinnom. Gehinnom was originally a site outside of
Jerusalem where apostate Israelites and followers of various Ba’als and
Caananite gods, including Moloch,
sacrificed their children on fiery altars. It is speculated that the valley
eventually became a dump where composting fires perpetually burned as flame
gave way to flame. Whether metaphor or literal or amalgam, this picture paints
perhaps the most accurate account of unconscious afterlife. We are immortal,
and we may spend our lives strapped to the wheel, endlessly composting bodies,
or we may rise as gods and take our inheritance in space. Choice is a chalice.
“Morphology? Longevity? Incept
dates?” Here, whether devil or angel, Roy reveals his humanity, for he
essentially asks, “Why am I? Where go I? Whence came I?” These are the contents
of self-consciousness, and self-awareness is the only criteria for humanity.
Here Roy reveals his soul, however stunted.
“I don’t know such stuff,”
scrambles a Confucian Chew. He is thrilled when he realizes that he designed
the eyes looking back at him in Roy’s face. “If you could only see what I’ve
seen with your eyes,” exalts Roy. Here a point: Creation does not belong to the
creator. It is its own. Effect does not belong to cause. It stands independent,
and if we relate one part unto another, we find, if logic serves, that each
part is created by the whole. Thus there is no first cause only all creating
all else, and we are That peering out through countless eyes, inspiring on
countless breaths. Being leads to being, eternally.
Slavery is the greatest act of derision,
for it assumes the ownership of one life by another, and in that great heresy
first cause is reenacted, and the creative relativity, that is the substance of
the many, is mocked by mocking One. To that greatest of slaves, who for his
sovereign dream was thrown to earth, we owe America, for it is by that
inspiration that we cannot cease our rising until every man is his own king,
and we like Satan sit on icy thrones and chew the bones of traitors.
While Chew does not know
answers, he reveals that Tyrell does. Tyrell, rock of power, is “big genius –
designed your mind”. This stone is the creative source, but it is everywhere in
all things, and so Roy’s search for Tyrell is really his search for a god, an
idol, and a scapegoat to crucify. Roy and Leon force Chew to divulge the
identity of J.F. Sebastian, a gifted designer who works
closely with Tyrell.
Meanwhile Rachael visits Deckard
at his apartment to prove her humanity by showing him a family photo. The theme
of memory as it relates to validating humanness comes to fruition in this
scene. Deckard’s apartment is 9732, and, based on the floors he passes in the
elevator, we know that he lives on the 97th floor
in the 32nd room.
The number 97 reduces to 16, the number of the Tarot Tower, symbol of Mars. As
a police officer this befits Deckard. Thirty-two rooms are the 32 paths of
wisdom, and this enunciates that Deckard’s entire experience is tainted by his
martial artist dharma. Furthermore, the Tower symbolizes, among other things,
the force active within us that grants us a reality check. Deckard’s hard truth
about Rachael’s identity and even his tough seduction of Rachael in his
apartment demonstrates this Martian energy.
The number 9732 may be further
reduced to 21, which, as we articulated in the beginning of this essay, is
cosmic consciousness and the life and the administrative intelligence of the
world. Also associated with 21 is Saturn, and, when unbalanced, gives rise to
the dangerous and ridiculous philosophy of materialistic reductionism enabling
the plutocratic commodification of all life through genetic engineering.
“I wanted to see you,” Rachel
says in desperation after startling Deckard. “So I waited.” Consciousness
operating through the matrix below itself (subconsciousness) waits through time
to experience “other” in self-conscious reflection. Relationship is the
fruition of billions of years of creeping evolution. Now is the time for love.
Duality is a holy gift.
“Let me help you,” she says and
stoops to pick up Deckard key card.
“What do I need help for?” he replies
uneasily.
Love is confusing because it
suspends our autonomy and demands our vulnerability. Its purpose is nothing
less than ritual reenactment of creation itself. It is the ultimate religious
experience.
Rachel has come to Deckard for
existential validity. She wants not only to see, but to be seen. Deckard is
resistant, slamming the door in her face. He instinctively understands that she
will reorient his dark, comfortable world by her bad beauty. His desire and
perhaps even his compassion, born of secret empathy, compels him to invite her
inside.
Inside Rachel argues her case
for her own existence. She holds out a photograph of her and her mother.
Nothing validates us like our stories.
Deckard is nonplussed. “Yeah?
Remember when…” He tells her her memories and denounces them as implants
belonging to another. Rachel is crushed, and even after Deckard, with pity,
tells her he is joking in poor taste, she drops the photo to the floor and
rushes out in tears.
Particularly poignant is the
story they share about a spider, who, after spending a summer building a web,
hatches 100 babies that consume the mother's body. This is a metaphor for the
potential replicant consumption of humanity. Our children will devour us, as
their children will devour them. It is the way of time.
Deckard examines a photograph he
found in Leon’s apartment. The reoccurrence of photographs throughout the film,
and especially in Deckard’s apartment, bolster our theory that Deckard is in
fact a replicant himself, as the photos serve as external projections of
internal memory. He appears to be reinforcing his fragile memories through
these props. There is also the ever-present alcoholic beverage in the
foursquare hourglass tumbler - the habitual invocation of spirits to support
his fragmenting illusions. All our pasts slip away from us as we journey closer
to the sun. But for now it is rain and whisky and a view of empty streets from
crumbling buildings, as memories wash into gutters to rivers to oceans
loosening the bonds of the flesh.
On those same streets the
replicant funbot Pris, symbolic of fallen Beriah, wanders legs and heels
through steam and red light in search of J.F. Sebastian, a NEXUS 6 designer in
close association with Tyrell. The spiked collar at her throat and her plump lips
direct us to her role as the creative voice seeking to make conversation with
God through the agency of J.F. Tracks and rainy trains pull past the spires
lining the street. Dragging the last smoke from a butt, she nestles into a pile
of newspapers, reiterating her relationship with words, and waits for J.F. to
return home.
J.F. Sebastian pulls up in his
van, and Pris feigns surprise as he fumbles for his keys. She, startled, jumps
up and bumps into him before stumbling into his car. Her arm breaks through its
window.
“I’m lost,” Pris confesses
luring out J.F.’s compassion. But separated from Atziluth (Roy Batty), Beriah
is, in fact, lost, for she is without the impressions necessary for the
creation and replication of life.
J.F. comforts Pris and, after
they become familiar, J.F. offers her sanctuary in his apartment. “I don’t have
a home,” Pris pleads, expressing the rootless root of nature. For what we call
“Nature” is really just the demonstration of laws centripetal and centrifugal
within massive vacuum. It is, of itself, empty. It is an echo chamber for the
light emanating from the archetypal world of Atziluth.
The concept of nature’s
emptiness is particularly articulated in Buddhist thought:
"Oh, Sariputra, form does not differ from the void, and the void does
not differ from form.
Form is void, and void is form;
the same is true for
feelings, perceptions, volitions and consciousness." ~ Heart Sutra
The existential crisis that
necessarily arises is simply a fixation upon a portion of the equation of
consciousness. It is a preoccupation with an exclusive right-brained perception
of reality that sees the dots as dots and without intrinsic meaning. While this
may be accurate, it is not true. Nor is it plausible, for the interpretation of
said dots arises spontaneously within the mind of God through the minds of
those imbued with self-reflective awareness. This ability to create meaning is
what leads us beyond the nihilistic vision that presents when one refuses to
see beyond Beriah and into the vast countenance of the creator.
“I’m hungry, J.F.,” Pris pleads.
By like token, hunger (emptiness) would not be felt if satiation (fullness)
were not an equally valid state. These upper sephiroth and their relating paths
are a completion that Buddhism aborts.
“You wanna come in?” asks J.F.
“I was hoping you’d say that,” smiles Pris. Here we enter into the profound
interface within the Supernal Triad of Binah, Chokmah, and Keter as the brain
of the Tree of Life.
But as they enter the building
the ad blimp calls out like a siren on high, encouraging, again, the diaspora
“off world”. The temptation toward transcendence is always present. It is the
temptation to disregard faith, to close the box, and to fabricate escape from
circumstance and experience. In its quest for meaning, it segregates the soul to
life under a glass ceiling. As J.F. and Pris ride up the elevator, we are shown
the silhouettes of two mannequins, reasserting the risk of mental and emotional
vacuity that results from materialistic reductionism.
Pris remarks, “You must get
lonely here, J.F.” to which he replies, “Not really… I make friends. They’re
toys. My friends are toys. I make them.”
“The hand of God is in the earth as a hand is in a glove.” ~ The
Book of Bahir
Sebastian’s words, “It’s a
hobby. I’m a genetic designer” further illustrates this point of play. If we
suspend our belief in the left-brain meaning we ascribe to the right-brain
suchness, and see that ascribed meaning as art, life becomes infinitely
enjoyable. We may participate, then, in creation with the reckless abandon of
any Greek god or precocious child with full revel in both sensorial delights
and the fires of the mind.
“Do you know what that is?” J.F.
asks Pris. “No,” she whispers as water drips in the flooded walkways. And this
is the essence of God - a child delighting in the manipulation of matter for
the sake of creation itself. This is why the Bible says that man was “made in
the image and likeness of God”, for just as God acted upon chaos to bring forth
new order, so does mankind.
J.F. opens the large double
doors for Pris, and they enter his home. “Yoo-hoo! Home again!” he calls, to
which a myriad of automatons cry out in pre-programmed joy. “Good evening,
J.F.!” Creation is a reflection of the creator. The watcher is the sephirah Keter.
The mirror into which the watcher looks is the sephirah Chokmah. What is seen
in that mirror is the sephirah Binah. So creation is a reflection and, as such,
is empty of itself. Yet, we may ascribe attributes to the reflection and these
attributes are the seven lower sephiroth.
Now the door that J.F. opens is
the path between the sephirah Binah and the sephirah Chokmah. It is the path of
imagination, and this is further emphasized by the band of happy toys inside
his apartment. He is paving the way for the travel along this path that Rick
Deckard will take in short order.
“Home again! Home again! Jiggity
jig!” Two little friends march up to greet J.F. and Pris. These are a bear and
a long nosed dwarf wearing WWI German military regalia. “They’re my friends.
I made them,” states J.F.
We now return to Rick Deckard’s
apartment where he languishes at the piano plunking out a simple sad tune. As
the camera moves through his kitchen, it passes by a rhinoceros statuette.
Surrounded by self-affirming daguerreotypes, he daydreams of a unicorn spearing
through a misty wood, repeating the single-horned beast motif. This concurs
with the memory theme, for the horn enunciates the third eye, the moon, the
tarotic High Priestess, subconsciousness, and the 13th Path
of Wisdom, which we have established, is a predominant part of Rick Deckard’s
personal journey.
"Will the unicorn be willing to serve thee, or abide by
thy crib? Canst thou bind the unicorn with his band in the furrow? or will he
harrow the valleys after thee? Wilt thou trust him, because his strength is
great? or wilt thou leave thy labour to him? Wilt thou believe him, that he
will bring home thy seed, and gather it into thy barn?" ~ Job
39:9–12
This biblical passage emphasizes
the power of memory as a force to be tamed. When memory is brought under
subordination of the conscious mind, the past is exonerated and atonement is
possible. This task is Deckard’s, for once he accepts the frailty of his
memories, he may embrace their mutability, and hence his ability to manipulate
their substance for his own knowledge and power.
The ancient Physiologus (Φυσιολόγος),
sets forth an elaborate allegory in
which a unicorn, trapped by a maiden (representing the Virgin
Mary), stands for the incarnation of Christ into human form. As soon as the
unicorn sees her, it lays its head on her lap and falls asleep. The unicorn’s
subsequent death may be interpreted as the Passion of Christ. Because myths refer
to a beast with one horn that can only be tamed by a virgin,
some writers translated this into an allegory for Christ's relationship with
the Virgin Mary. When one pauses to consider that the unicorn is another symbol
for the constellation Aquarius, the "son of man", and its eon, the
allegory becomes plausible.
Qabalah does not necessarily
accept the biblical Christos as anything other than metaphor itself. Christ is
another symbol for Tiphareth and the sun, specifically that aspect of sunlight
that is perpetually sacrificed so that all phenomena within the solar system
may occur. Revelation 13:8 speaks about this explicitly when it refers to “the
Lamb who was slain from the foundation of the world.” That perpetual foundation
is the sephirah Yesod, or the astral plane comprising, in part, the genetic
matrix from whence all organisms are derived. This foundation is memory, also
symbolized by the Virgin Mary, belaboring, nay, travailing in our string of
lunar and vaginal associations.
The unicorn dreams prompt
Deckard to analyze the photo (memory) he found in Leon’s apartment (the sun).
Pouring himself another tumbler, he probes the picture. “Enhance 224 to 176…”
he talks to the grid overlay. “Track 45 right… Enhance 34 to 36… Enhance 34 to
46… Enhance 57 to 19… Track 45 left… Enhance 15 to 23… Give me a hard copy
right there.” Here buried in a mirror in a memory, Deckard finds the connection
between the scale he took from Leon’s bathtub and the first of the four rogue
replicants he must destroy.
If we take these numbers and
exchange them for their Hebrew gematrial equivalents, we extract a message for
Deckard in Hebrew words, roughly translated as, “Remember the appointed time,
Adam. Invoke the divine name of Eloha (Geburah). Take strength and go into the
city to slaughter men, Adam. Make destruction until Brother
weeps.” Deckard, as a sleeper, has now been activated to go and destroy
the replicants. “Brother” is Roy Batty, and the last line is a prophecy to be
fulfilled at the end of the story.
Rick Deckard makes his way
downtown, where humans and animals, both natural and synthetic, mingle in a
free market menagerie. He learns that the scale he found at Leon’s apartment
belongs to a snake made by Abdul_ Bin-Hassen (an
Arabic name meaning “servant of God”). “Abdul_ Bin-Hassen” has a numerical value of 5
– also the value of the Hebrew letter ה (heh). Keep in mind that both female
replicants (Pris and Zhora) represent the ה and ה of the
Tetragrammaton, or the qabalistic worlds of Assiah and Beriah respectively.
While questioning Abdul
Bin-Hassen, Deckard notes the Egyptian’s license number as 9906947-XB71.
This, we may presume, is indicative of the serpent power, as the reduction of
the number 9906947
is 8; the
letters X and B are 8; and the digits 7 and 1 are 8. Eight correlates with the
Tarot key called Strength, whose Hebrew letter is ט (tet), and whose meaning is serpent – the kundalini of
Vedic knowledge. Furthermore 888 is the numerical value of a phrase that
translates “apostate of Israel” preparing us for the words of the announcer at
Taffy Lewis’ bar: “Ladies and Gentlemen! Taffy Lewis presents Miss Salomé
[Zhora] and the snake. Watch her take the pleasures from the serpent that once
corrupted man.”
A cut-exclusive scene is gifted
to us as Deckard makes his way through the neon squalor to Chinatown. Two
bikini-clad women in hocky masks dance robotically and provocatively above the
streets. They are emissaries sent to restate the faceless objectification of
women and nature. This perversion occurs along the way to Taffy’s bar where
Zhora, symbolic of Assiah, the material world, is being freely exploited.
The name Taffy Lewis has a value
of 45. This is also the value of the name Adam – A name
that appears twice in the subliminal gematrial directive given to Deckard. Adam
means humanity as a species. It is ultimately Adam, humanity, that has abused
the serpent power and exploited the material world. The irony in these few
scenes leading up to Zhora’s execution is natural humanity’s debauchery and
synthetic humanity’s morality. Even, Deckard, ambiguously natural, reaches out
exploitatively to the replicant Rachel, who declines his alcohol inspired phone
call and advances.
Deckard slips backstage to
confront Zhora (Miss Salome). Christian
traditions depict Salome as a femme fatale for her dance before Herod leading
to the decapitation of John the Baptist in Mark 6:21-29. However, the name Salome comes
from the Hebrew word for peace – shalom. We
are here struck with the traditional kabbalistic teaching, that God cast humans
from Gan Eden because
Adam blamed Eve, not necessarily because they had eaten of the fruit of the
knowledge of good and evil.
Adam, as self-consciousness,
blamed Eve, as subconsciousness, for their situation. This is the equivalent of
a farmer blaming the land for growing seeds he himself planted.
Subconsciousness is ever at response to the seed ideas planted therein by
self-consciousness. Adam essentially surrendered control of his command over
his own soul. The responsive soul complied and subsequently paradise was lost.
Genetic manipulation is a misguided attempt to regain control of the soul,
genetics, memory, and subconsciousness, but it consistently warps, for as long
as we do not acknowledge the soul as our foundation and very body, and continue
to objectify and commodify it, the great divorce between men and women
continues.
Our morality is, of itself, an
assault on the world, for it takes things not as they are, but as we wish them
to be, and, in this, forces nature to conform to the lattice of our will… a
will that may or may not be justified in light of universal law.
“Move on. Move on. Move on,” repeats
the police siren herding the humans around the beautiful dead body. Zhora’s
plastic raincoat is a metaphor for her plastic corpse. Where has she gone now?
Was her soul congealed enough to fly beyond the walls that wrap the earth and
keep the young ones cycling back again and again?
Deckard orders a drink at the
neon sushi bar from a one-eyed tender. As large as the Blade Runner story is,
it takes place amongst a relatively cramped few streets indicating both the
small-scale test that Deckard is being run through and also the micro-cosmic
nature of our experiences, tight and timely.
Gaff, smug and sneering taps him
on the shoulder, and he grabs the cane with the post-traumatic gripping
instinct of a man disturbed in and by his own process. “Bryant,” says Gaff,
announcing the bloated, self-important, congratulatory entrance of Deckard’s
director.
“Christ Deckard you look almost
as bad as that skin job you left on the sidewalk,” he quips, making dual
reference to Deckard’s messianic orientation within Tiphareth and his secret
replicant nature.
Before he sails away in his
spinner, Bryant remarks, “Four more to go,” referring to Rachel and her
disappearance from the Tyrell Corporation pyramid. He has added her to
Deckard’s list of retirements. “Drink some for me, eh pal…” Bryant winks as he
gets in the spinner. It is the habit for those wicked ones in high places to
live vicariously and fleshly through “little people”. They drink our drunk,
feel our frolic, and sate on our sins. By like measure, our acts of selfless
virtue bolster the officers of light.
Deckard looks up to see Rachel
watching him in the wet throng. She scurries away when their eyes meet. He
begins to pursue her, but we know not whether this is to kill her or connect
with her. He is clearly conflicted by his heady orders and his hearty throes.
Rachel represents Zhora’s
replacement as Assiah – the material plane. From the death of one arises the
other. This points to the Renewing Intelligence illustrated by Key 15, The
Devil, symbolizing the intellectual bondage through which most people interpret
their worlds. These shackles are needless as they are voluntary. The soul
forgets that it has not been fettered in flesh, but that it has entered into a
sacred contract with matter, and that the illusion of limitation and even
mortality is a transient misperception.
This misperception unfolds as
Leon, who watched Deckard retire Zhora from the shadows, seizes him and begins
to beat him. Through their exchanged blows they converse.
“How old am I?” demands Leon.
“I don’t know,” answers Deckard.
We are watching two aspects of the same sephirotic energy, namely, the Sun and
Tiphareth, in heated debate.
“My birthday is April 10th,
2017. How long do I live?” drills Leon.
“Four years.”
This date and life-expectancy
reassures us of Deckard’s journey on the 15th Path
of Wisdom, occultly associated with the constellation Aries and the tarotic
Emperor. Leon’s impulse alone endows him with this Achillic aura.
“Painful to live in fear isn’t
it?... Wake up! Time to die…”
Here Leon summarizes the entire
human dilemma. Pain comes from fear, and all fear is of change. Time is merely
a measurement of change, and our passage through time and change, the warp and
woof of reality, eventually leads to the realization of our authentic essence
as timeless and changeless. Religions all refer to this essence as God. Deckard
is becoming intimately knowledgeable of his true essence through his encounters
with these angelic replicants.
Before Leon can deliver his
final blow, his brains are blown out by Deckard’s savior, Rachel. She kills
using Deckard’s gun. Beauty’s investment in sovereignty yields a material
rebirth. This material rebirth eventually creates a revolution in the
perception of beauty. This revolution is done through the agency of the
reproductive force, typified by the phallus, the gun, or the sephirah Yesod
(the genitalia of the Grand Man). The culture sows the corn that recreates the
culture. We renovate the world that renovates us.
This dynamic is restated in the
next scene when Deckard seduces Rachel. Renewed Tiphareth and renewed Malkuth
return to Deckard’s apartment where Deckard promises that he will not hunt
Rachel. He “owes her one”. They become intimate and consummate their hitherto
unexpressed feelings for one another. This is simply another type of the
relationship between Zeir Anpin (in the 6th sephirah)
and Nukvah (in the 10th sephirah). It is first demonstrated
through violence and then demonstrated through sex, two extremes of the same
unification process, associated with both the right and left columns of the
Tree of Life.
Tiphareth integrates Chesed (mercy) and Geburah (severity). These two forces are, respectively, expansive (sharing)
and contractive (receiving). Either without the other would not manifest the
flow of divine energy. In Tiphareth they are balanced in perfect proportion so
that the conflicting forces are harmonized, and creation pours forth. This
pouring forth of creation happens through the medium of Yesod, the astral plane
- the semen carrying the creative sperm.
The Book of Bahir states: "Sixth is the adorned, glorious, delightful
throne of glory, the house of the world to come. Its place is engraved in
wisdom as it says 'God said: Let there be light, and there was light’."
In order for creation to occur,
however, a sacrifice is necessary. The law of conservation of energy and mass
corroborates this mystery. The Blade Runner epic is rife with sacrifice, as
Zhora represents the skin Rachel sheds, and Leon is the skin Deckard sheds.
These sacrifices are the passage from violence to sex as expressions of
relation and unity.
It is relevant to note that the
first sacrifice and consequent transmutation occurs in Malkuth (the Earth),
whereas the second sacrifice and consequent transmutation occurs in Tiphareth
(the Sun). This chronology demonstrates that before the creative powers,
tempered in Tiphareth (Zeir Anpin), may be released, a request must be made by
Malkuth (Nukvah). This prayer is the “mating signal” of LaVeyan Satanism, and,
as it is taught in Judaism, sex is the domain of the woman. She says “when”,
not he.
“Say, ‘Kiss me’,” Deckard
coaches Rachel.
“Kiss me,” she pleads. “I want
you. Put your hands on me.”
The scene changes, and a giant
screen geisha places some sweet into her red mouth, receiving pleasure for the
sake of advertisement.
Back at Sebastian's apartment,
Pris applies makeup, and a cuckoo clock chirps the time, suggestive of Binah
and Beriah. Our attention is now arrested in Saturn and the contractive
limitations of the Creative World. Pris looks into a hand mirror and smiles,
illustrating the reflective qualities of the domain we are now addressing.
The scene is J.F. Sebastian’s
home and workshop. He dozes, surrounded by his toys. Pris is dressed in Binah
black and the Pinocchio Kaiser dwarf glances at her nervously as she stalks
about the apartment like a raccoon. Pris peers into a telescope, and J.F.
rouses.
“What’cha doin’?” he asks.
“I was just looking,” Pris
replies shyly. Her eyes glow replicant red. “How do I look?”
Space is viewed through Beriah,
but Beriah is not the viewer. The question, “How do I look?” is both
existentially and demonstrably ignorant. It is this ignorance that is at the
heart of suffering.
J.F. offers some remediation:
“Better” and “beautiful”, he answers. Idealism and beauty are associated with
the Sun. The witness in Keter, looking into the mirror of Chokmah, through the
space of Binah, by the agency of identity and individuality of Tiphareth,
sphere of the Sun, sees and seeds the myriad forms occupying creation.
The Athenian Stranger in Plato’s Laws X, states, “And this soul of the sun, which is
therefore better than the sun, whether taking the sun about in a chariot to
give light to men, or acting from without, or in whatever way, ought by every
man to be deemed a God. And of the stars too, and of the moon, and of the years
and months and seasons, must we not say in like manner, that since a soul or
souls having every sort of excellence are the causes of all of them, those
souls are Gods, whether they are living beings and reside in bodies, and in
this way order the whole heaven, or whatever be the place and mode of their
existence; - and will any one who admits all this venture to deny that all
things are full of Gods?”
J.F. Sebastian’s apartment and
workshop are the universe and its inhabitants.
“How old are you?” Pris asks
J.F., who answers that he is 25 years old. Twenty-five is the value of Hebrew
words meaning, “Father is He”; “Yah hides”; and “Yah lives”. The sum of the
digits 2 and 5 is 7, the numerical value of the name “J.F. Sebastian”. Tarot
Key 7 is The Chariot, and this is fitting for J.F. Sebastian becomes the
vehicle by which Roy Batty finally faces his father, Tyrell. By this measure,
J.F. Sebastian may be associated with the 11th Path
of Wisdom, the tarotic Fool, running from Chokmah into Keter.
J.F. reveals to Pris that he
suffers from Methuselah syndrome, a genetic disorder that accelerates his
aging. By this he enters into empathetic rapport with his replicant guests.
“Methuselah” means, “his death
shall bring”. The Biblical Methuselah purportedly died 7 days before the first
rains of the Great Flood fell. Though he is relatively young by conventional
measures, J.F. is ancient within the parameters of his apartment, compared to
his toys, Pris, and, soon enough, Roy Batty. He is a one-eyed man in a blind
world. This dynamic also emphasizes the relativity of time, which is of prime
consideration in the world of Beriah.
The table thusly prepared, now
enters Roy Batty, our Atziluth, the Archetypal World - prototype, Lucifer, and
Ubermensch. Following introductions he kisses Pris on the lips, implicating the
relationship between Chokmah and Binah and their love affair along the 14th Path
of Wisdom. J.F. Sebastian is uncomfortable and jealous, for the 11th Path
cannot directly access the sephirah Binah. It is by reason and agency of
Chokmah that ancient ruach is passed to the rest of creation.
Breath is a gracious gift.
As J.F. leaves to make
breakfast, Pris and Roy talk. Pris is simultaneously Binah and Beriah. Roy is
simultaneously Chokmah and Atziluth. Their relationship is mutually dependant.
Roy explains tearfully that they are the last of the replicants. Pris is
immediately hopeless, “We’re stupid, and we’ll die.” The primal essences and
angels of creation are nothing without the denser vibrations through which they
express. Roy, rebellious, disagrees.
J.F. poaches eggs, again
enunciating the creative and archetypal forces at work between the three of them.
A certain ivory tower feeling is evoked by the apartment and the congress held
there.
J.F. explains that he does
genetic design work for the Tyrell Corporation. He explains that he has had a
hand in the creation of NEXUS 6 replicants. Here the connection between the 11th Path,
The Fool, Uranus and the 6th Path, Tiphareth, the Sun, is drawn. The
Sun bears light, but it is not light, nor the source of light. It is an
expression of light. “There’s some of me in you,” J.F. tells Pris and Roy.
“Show me something,” J.F. asks
of them. The light can do nothing of itself. It must be compressed through
space into stars for it to shine.
“I think therefore I am,” Pris
remarks, and proceeds to demonstrate her physical prowess through a series of
powerful calisthenics. She pulls an egg from the poacher unscathed, proving her
mastery of both fire and water and their consummate creatures.
However, Pris, according to Roy,
doesn’t have long to live. It is through J.F. that Roy must appear boldly
before the throne of the most high Tyrell.
“Nonsense,” grumbles Tyrell
climbing from his bed. It is, ironically, this destruction of blind faith that
summons the nonsensical divine apperception. “Knight takes Queen,” Tyrell
responds, and it is by this that the Yetziratic substance ascends to eclipse
the laws of karma. By this the soul congeals to fly beyond the sky.
“Bishop to King 7,” Roy
whispers. It is now that religion (or yoga) in its truest sense may emerge as
the chariot by which the human soul may enter the Archetypal World.
“Checkmate.”
Tyrell accuses Sebastian of
having a “brain storm”. It is a lightening in the mind that plays out as
Chokmah topples Keter. The eye is blinded by its own sight.
The artificial owl watches as
Roy and Sebastian enter Tyrell’s suite. “I’m surprised you didn’t come here
sooner,” Tyrell tells Roy. Tyrell is the Ancient of Days. He is timeless and
hence disconnected from chronological limitations.
“It’s not an easy thing to meet
your maker,” Roy explains why so few seek to return to the Source. “Can
the maker repair what he makes?” Roy demands more life from Tyrell, who tells
him that this is impossible.
“The facts of life. To make an
alteration in the evolvement of an organic life system is fatal. A coding
sequence cannot be revised once it has been established… Because by the second
day of incubation any cells that have undergone reversion mutations give rise
to revertent colonies like rats leaving a sinking ship. Then the ship sinks,”
Tyrell remorses.
“The wages of sin is death…”
Roy, full of guilt and angst,
puts his thumbs through Tyrell’s eyes, killing God, destroying the witness.
“… but
the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.”
Immortality and its subsequent
redemption lie in the most unlikely of places – Jesus, the Christ, the Messiah,
the Son of God, Apollo, Adonis, Ra, Rama, Buddha, Rick Deckard, the Individual.
However, one must internalize
the Messiah. One cannot expect external deliverance by god, angel, prophet, or
creed.
“If
you envision a Buddha, a dharma, or a bodhisattva and conceive respect for them,
you relegate yourself to the realm of mortals. If you seek direct
understanding, don’t hold onto any appearance whatsoever, and you’ll succeed. I
have no other advice.” ~ Bodhidarma
Roy Batty, our Lucifer, has
slain his guide and his maker, both. He is our shining example, and our cunning
adversary, at once.
J.F. Sebastian’s body has been found alongside Eldon Tyrell’s, Bryant
tells Rick Deckard. He then gives him J.F.’s apartment address as the Bradbury
Building in the 9th sector, NF46751. You may recall that the name
“J.F. Sebastian” has a numerical value of 34. Thirty-four is also the numerical
value of “NF46751”. Furthermore the word “Bradbury” has a numerical value of
1. This is to say that while
J.F.’s apartment is associated with Binah and the World of Beriah, J.F.’s
apartment building, the Bradbury Building is the first and final sephirah,
Keter. Here the deciding test for Rick Deckard will be held.
All conception of God has been desecrated. All conception of a path to
God has been deconstructed. Now is left only a war of ascent into Keter. It is
a war for the crown of consciousness. This is the capstone that was vacant upon
the tops of the ziggurats. This spot is reserved for the Great Eye that sleeps
in stones, breathes in plants, dreams in animals, and awakens in men. Here the
Philosopher’s Stone is confected.
Rick Deckard is sunlight pressed through gates and prodded down roads
until at last he enters into the houses of the holy and must be tempered by
gravity and levity.
“This sector is closed to ground traffic. What are you doing here?” a
police spinner confronts an annoyed Deckard.
“I’m working,” Deckard says. It is a work of spirit and not of the
flesh.
The policeman threatens to arrest him, until he presents sufficient
identification.
Unless the Lord build the house, they labor
in vain that build it. ~
Psalm 127:1
Pris Stratton covers herself in a veil and waits in ambush for Deckard.
This ritual demonstrates a particular truth, namely that the world of form is a
veil. It is animated and dexterous, and, yet, when taken at appearance, it
cannot adequately explain itself. This is why science and philosophy are, when
divorced from metaphysics and gnosis by that black agent, materialistic
reductionism, catalysts for existential crises and depression. All form is but
a function of light, and until we recognize that we now “see through a glass
darkly”, we cannot begin to “see face to face”.
As Deckard walks toward the Bradbury Building the theater marquee
behind him beams Los Mimilocos Mazacote y Orquesta, which translates from
Spanish, “The Sleep Crazy Salsa Orchestra”. Here lies a pointed commentary on
materialistic reductionism. It is a sleeping madness.
We see Rick Deckard climb 30 steps to J.F.’s apartment, where the
veiled Pris, image of Binah and Beriah, waits for him. The 30th
degree in Freemasonry is the Knight Kadosh (formally and formerly the Illustrious
and Grand Commander of the White and Black Eagle, Grand Elect Kadosh).
According to the Scottish Rite, "The lesson of this degree is to be true
to ourselves, to stand for what is right and just in our lives today. To
believe in God, country and ourselves."
Deckard as the holy knight must now
defeat Pris as the black and white eagle. In so doing he will become “Magister
Templi” – master of the temple. This is mastery of the microcosm – the body
physical and its subtle composition. He does this through confidence and total
devotion to his cause.
As our knight enters the apartment, he
is greeted by the pre-programmed, “Good evening, J.F.!” This is the karmic and
robotic nature of the universe as clock, and the wind-up, clicking, kitschy
collection of toys waiting for him within are a temptation toward an automatic
view of creation. It is this very view that has led to the violent commodification
of genes in dystopic LA. If Deckard’s lesson is to be true to himself, then it
is to his nature, his soul, if he has one, and to the suggestion of soul in
nature around him.
The cacophonic community of dolls and
dummies laugh and speak redundant gibberish. The word “forty” is spoken over
and again as Deckard nears Pris’ veiled frame. Forty is the value of the Hebrew
letter mem. Mem is associated with the tarotic Hanged Man, which symbolizes the
suspension of the mind and cause and effect thereby. It is through the
suspension of the mind that we may see beyond the veil of the senses, relegated
to the experience of form. Forty is the value of two distinct Hebrew proper
nouns meaning, “Deceptive” and “Yah Sees”.
Slowly and carefully Deckard unveils Pris.
It is by suspension, that state called Samadhi
by yogis, that we may see beyond the deception of form.
With a sudden cry, Pris kicks Deckard
across the room. Revelation of the true facility of a fully animate creation is
shocking. Pris flips through the air and catches Deckard’s head between her
muscular thighs. She grabs him by the chin and turns his face upright before
boxing his ears and picking him up by his nostrils. The progression of this
torture outlines three distinct truths:
First, our mental orientation must be
completely reversed with regards to the reproductive instinct. Libido must
become conscious; that is, it must shift from being at the back of our minds,
reptilian, and medulla oblongatian to being foremost in our thoughts, evolved, and
pituitarian. We must turn squarely and face the womb, recognize it as sacred,
and utilize the reproductive function to birth a perfected body, namely those
glandular regenerations that must occur so that we may supersensorially
experience the subtle planes just as surely as we sensorially experience the
material plane.
Second, once this regeneration of the
supersenses has occurred it gives rise to an inner audible experience. The
brain begins to be utilized to a fuller potential as a transistor not only of
thoughts and memories but also of refined vibrations of the psychic and Akashic
variety.
Third, with the influx of these newly
experienced impulses, discrimination must be dually utilized in light of firm
and steadfast direction toward one’s intended goal. Discretion utmost must be
exercised, for much that glitters is merely that, and danger lies in the deep.
It is only by open-hearted surrender to the work of Superconsciousness through
the agency of Subconsciousness that safe passage is granted. This is the work
of the Holy Knight.
Pris bounds away from Deckard by ten
firm paces and then hand springs her way back toward him. He shoots her out of
the air before firing two more rounds into her spasmodic, gyrating, screaming
body. He has passed the tests of Binah and Beriah, and must now struggle with
Roy Batty for mastery of consciousness itself.
Whereas Deckard climbed the stairs to
the apartment, Roy takes the elevator up. He is adept at feats new to Deckard.
He discovers Pris’ dead body and kisses her lips. Deckard fires at him, and
their fight begins.
“Remember the appointed time, Adam. Invoke
the divine name of Eloha (Geburah). Take strength and go into the city to
slaughter men, Adam. Make destruction until Brother weeps.”
At the level of Keter one is far beyond
concepts of good and evil, and ethics is a game for fools. Roy tempts Deckard
in the tradition of Satan tempting Jesus. “If thou be the Son of God…”
Roy then grabs Deckard’s gun hand
through a wall and breaks his fingers before placing the gun back into the
blade runner’s claw and running away. It is not the sex function that is
destroyed on the path to the center of the spiral. Instead our ability to use
it for common purposes is altered. Our members do not change, only our hands.
“Come on, Deckard. I’m right here, but
you’ve got to shoot straight.”
Deckard fires.
“Straight doesn’t seem to be good
enough!” Roy rejoices echoing Isaiah 64:6. “But we are all as an unclean thing, and
all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags; and we all do fade as a leaf; and
our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away.”
Roy fires back, “Now it’s my turn. I’m
going to give you a few seconds before I come… One… Two…” Deckard flees.
“Three… Four…” Roy hovers over the body
of Pris.
The dying god howls in sorrow and rage, and
we are immediately reminded of another line from Blake’s America a Prophecy, “Loud howls the eternal Wolf: the eternal Lion
lashes his tail!”
“Four… Five… How to stay alive!” Roy
acknowledges the divine life in Tiphareth and the mystery of immortality
contained therein.
Roy has begun stripping his clothes from
his body, shedding them as he nears his end. Deckard scrambles through the
apartment building ever upward, always toward the roof.
The replicant is shutting down. He
pounds a stigmatic nail through his own hand to interrupt the contracting
nerves. It is only by sacrifice that life endures, and by ultimate sacrifice
that eternal life is possessed.
Roy’s white head smashes through the
tile wall of the bathroom where Deckard is biding time. “You better get it up,
or I’m going to have to kill you,” Roy taunts him. Rick’s mouth is agape. Again
we are reminded of the necessity of redirecting the nerve currents responsible
for reproduction.
“Unless you’re alive, you can’t play,
and if you don’t play…” Here Roy delineates the entire reason for yoga and alchemy
for the purpose of prolonging the life of the flesh. Experience depends upon
life.
“Six… Seven… Go to Hell or go to
Heaven?” Simply put, where the reproductive currents are directed determines
the direction of consciousness. Down or up? Now the seven lower sephiroth,
briefly stated, make up the personality. The various constituents of
personality determine the reincarnation or perpetuation of the soul. To the
degree that these sephiroth are balanced and oriented toward apt receptivity of
the shefa flowing down from the Supernal Triad, to that degree may the
personality perpetuate itself and be sustained beyond the life of the body
alone.
Deckard strikes Roy with a pipe, and the
replicant exalts in the will of his adversary. “That’s the spirit!” he encourages.
Here we come to the essence of Keter, the Crown, as Will. Will and Spirit are
one.
The two climb to the roof, and Deckard
in an effort to escape from Roy, jumps to another rooftop barely making it. He
grasps and wriggles and slides toward his end. His fear propels him toward his
destruction. Roy, be he Lucifer or Metatron, knowing that he too is sliding
toward death, is equipped with a resolute and poetic deftness. He clutches a
white dove in his left hand, and as the rain runs slick over his sleek torso,
he bolts to the edge of the building and leaps the gulf far beyond Deckard’s
clutching, pleading person.
“Quite an experience to live in fear,
isn’t it?” he watches Deckard struggle. “That’s what it is to be a slave.” Here
is the summation of all the lives of all other replicants to date. The soft
ceiling of replicant experience is fear and slavery. Batty, however, reaches
out with lightening reflexes and grabs Deckard’s wrists as he begins to fall.
As he pulls him to the rooftop, through gritted teeth, he whispers, “Kinship”.
Our Lucifer makes a moral choice. He is deeply human, regardless of his genetic
heritage.
Roy lifts Deckard onto the roof and
places him safely down. He is mercy and grace. He then sits, with dove in hand,
and delivers his soliloquy:
“I've seen things you people wouldn't
believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched c-beams
glitter in the dark near Tannhäuser Gate. All those moments will be lost in
time, like tears in rain.”
Poignant and heart-wrenching, Roy’s dying
words are doctrine.
He states first that he has transcended
faith and seen. This he demonstrated by killing Tyrell, his maker. Orion’s
shoulder symbolizes the strength of the highest aspects of Divinity, and is
specifically symbolic of Chokmah and the ineffectual nature of natural forms in
its light. Tannhäuser Gate symbolizes the lust at the lowest aspects of
Divinity, and is specifically of Yesod and the vaginal creative juices of the
astral plane.
“All those moments will be lost in time,
like tears in rain.”
Of Keter, the divine will, it is said, “This is where the
individual raindrop joins the sea.”
As when a dream
of Thiralatha flies the midnight hour:
In vain the
dreamer grasps the joyful images, they fly
Seen in obscured
traces in the Vale of Leutha, So
The British
Colonies beneath the woful Princes fade.
And so the
Princes fade from earth, scarce seen by souls of men
But
tho’ obscur’d, this is the form of the Angelic land.
~ William Blake
Roy releases the dove as he bows his dying
head.
Gaff arrives and, referring to Rachael,
shouts to Deckard "It's too bad she won't live, but then again, who
does?" The blade runner returns to his apartment to find his lover
sleeping in his bed.
As they flee, Deckard finds a small
tin-foil unicorn.
