I wasn't suggesting that BK or the author invented the metaphor, just that they both made use of what is already a potent symbol in the language.
We can only think in metaphor and these carry connotations or parallel meanings that are not at first apparent.
I personally pity the poor sap who finds the back door to my inner life--good luck finding your way through that maze, its defeated me and I was the one who built it!
Here's a nice Robert Anton Wilson (a master of metaphor) story where he weaves in and improves on Aleister Crowley's teaching on the Soldier and the Hunchback....? ! ? !
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www.rawilson.com]
I like the mongoose story too.
Crowley apparently began to believe in his soldiers according to this chap. He's never had much appeal for me so I won't comment:
[
larabell.org]
Using Crowley's metaphor choices to gain access to his inner life:
' Crowley is emotionally driven to find a way out of questioning and into certainty, while the Pyrrhonist sees questioning as a pleasant state sufficient unto itself. Again and again in the essay he expresses his desire that questions marks should turn into exclamation points: "we may now resume our attempt to drill our hunchback into a presentable soldier," "wouldn't it be jolly if our own second ? suddenly straightened its back and threw its chest out and marched off as ! ?", and so on. Elsewhere he says that "doubt is a good servant but a bad master". He wants to have absolute conviction in a religious system yet still be a skeptic.
This desire for certainty led him to create a dogmatic religious system. The definition of his magical order A.·. A.·. contains this belief requirement:
"All members must of necessity work in accordance with the facts of Nature... So must all Members of the A.·. A.·. work by the Magical Formula of the Æon. They must accept the Book of the Law as the Word and the Letter of Truth, and the sole Rule of Life. They must acknowledge the Authority of the Beast 666 and of the Scarlet Woman as in the book it is defined, and accept Their Will as concentrating the Will of our Whole Order. They must accept the Crowned and Conquering Child as the Lord of the Æon, and exert themselves to establish His reign upon Earth. They must acknowledge that "The Word of the Law is Thelema" and that "Love is the law, love under will."
A skeptic would respond simply "maybe, and maybe not."Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/01/2010 03:18AM by Stoic.