The Gnostic Academy of Chicago

A lecture on the nature of temptation, spiritual tests, and psychological ordeals in Arrigo Boito’s opera Mefistofele. Beginners welcome!

Lecture Topic: Divine Tests, Temptation, and Holy Negation in Mefistofele (Prologue and Act I)

Like Beethoven, Arrigo Boito composed only one opera (Mefistofele), yet whose mystical allegory, musical power, and masterful lyricism continues to resonate, inspire, alarm, and, quite frequently, amuse. Based on medieval legends and Goethe’s play Faust, this work depicts the famous and jaded scholar who makes a bet with the devil: to acquire occult knowledge and faculties at the cost of his soul, or to conquer temptation in the service of the sacred. If Faust can overcome passion, power, and desire, he can enter the divine mysteries and spiritual hierarchies where true peace, realization, and understanding is to be found. Surprisingly, all of this occurs under the auspices of the Transcendent, for without divinely-sanctioned temptation and adversity, there is no development, mastery, or faith, like Jehovah approving of Satan’s afflictions upon Job to prove his candidacy to sainthood (Job 1:12). Or as described by Samael Aun Weor throughout his writings, “Temptation is fire. Triumph over temptation is light.” Discover how an initiate enters the secret path to liberation by facing the necessary forces of opposition and resistance—the mysterious and instructive tests of Lucifer (“the light-maker”)—so as to acquire profound self-knowledge and the wielding of esoteric powers with ethics, purity, and wisdom.

To prepare for this event, we recommend you listen to or study the following lecture, since it provides much background knowledge that will deepen your understanding of this opera:

A lecture on the realities of black magic, witchcraft, and demonic arts in Arrigo Boito’s opera Mefistofele. Beginners welcome!

Lecture Topic: Seduction, Black Magic, and Witches’ Sabbaths in Mefistofele (Act II)

Through the gifts of his newfound diabolic companion, Faust recuperates his vitality and youth, capitalizing on his new abilities in the effort to seduce Margherita, a beautiful but naive young woman from town. To assist in the magician’s sensual escapades and dangerous liaison, Mefistofele provides him with a sleeping potion to drug Margherita’s mother and therefore avoid detection during the lovers’ tryst. The couple declares their love despite the rocky foundations of their infatuous and hastened affair. Afterward, the devil transports Faust to the top of a dark (and bald) mountain (sparsely populated by trees) to partake in a Witches’ Sabbath: a Satanic ritual characterized by discordance, chaos, violence, lust, and power. Such dramatizations reflect the tremendous reality of and relationship between seduction and black magic: how the passionate fulfillment of lust and desire are the gateway to spiritual destruction and the development of egotistical powers. While modern people laugh and mock such metaphysical phenomena as the consequence and cause of blind fear, superstition, and ignorance, the truth is that such symbols demonstrate how anyone who cultivates lust with mystical devotion ends up as a demon, a being divorced from the eternal but awakened with powers in, of, and for evil. Such powers are driven by selfishness and produce terror and pain, emotions that are so masterfully depicted in Boito’s terrifying music and choruses in this act. Learn how to conquer lust and to comprehend the essential nature of witchcraft, sorcery, and the machinations of the Black Lodge (the congregations of infernal entities) so as to enact spiritual self-defense and the protection of our spirituality from dark forces.

Light refreshments and snacks will be served before and during the viewing of Act II. Afterward we will have a short break and reconvene for the lecture.

Listen to the previous Mefistofele lecture in this course:

A lecture on the ordeals, antidotes, and methods for overcoming suffering in the alchemical work (within Mefistofele). Beginners welcome!

Lecture Topic: The Fool, Lust, Insanity, and Pain of the Ninth Sphere in Mefistofele (Act III)

Margherita (the trapped and conditioned feminine consciousness), has lost her reason due to Faust’s abandonment and the death of her (divine) mother, since the sleeping potion had deleterious effects. Driven to insanity, the distressed Margherita, having born Faust’s child, drowns it in a pond to spite her absent lover. Faust is driven by remorse to seek her in the bowels of a prison with the help of Mefistofele, who provides the key to the initiatic mysteries and the means to unlock wisdom from the well of the world, the bottomless pit or abyss where knowledge must be found, discerned, and consciously integrated. Such a descent into the lower worlds is a common trope within mythological narratives, whereby the warrior (human) soul (Tiphereth) must face the terrors of hell and redeem the fallen consciousness (Sophia) from perdition. Such allegories reflect what Samael Aun Weor called the Ninth Sphere, the transformed and divinely-inspired sexuality between husband and wife who conquer desire and practice alchemy, chastity, or sexual transmutation. However, such a path is fraught with pain and hardship, since lust is difficult to extirpate, and “Bitterness”—(which defines many marriages)—“lies in the (alchemical) cup of even the best love: thus it arouses longing for the Superman; thus it arouses your thirst, creator (alchemist)” (Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra). Learn how to transmute the pain of the Ninth Sphere through a study of the 21st Arcanum of the Tarot, known as the Fool in conventional decks, whereby Margherita, the Essence trapped in our defects or ego, can be liberated towards the higher worlds of the initiatic path.

Light refreshments and snacks will be served before and during the viewing of Act III. Afterward we will have a short break and reconvene for the lecture.

Listen to the previous Mefistofele lectures in this course:

A meditation for all levels. Beginners welcome!

Join us for a Gnostic holiday and celebrate through a group meditation. To learn more about this event, you can read the following article from our website: