Buddha in the Flames
A statue of the Buddha from Sarnath, 4th century CE
Although I am not the son of the God myself I represent him nevertheless as one who was a mother to the God, and one there-fore to whom in the name of the God the freedom of the binding and loosing has been given.
The binding and loosing take place in me.
But insofar as it takes place in me, and I am a part of the world, it also takes place through me in the world, and no one can hinder it.
It doesn’t take place according to the way of my will but in the way of unavoidable effect.
I am not master over you, but the being of the God in me.
I lock the past with one key; with the other I open the future.
This takes place through my transformation.
The miracle of transformation commands.
I am its servant,just as the Pope is.
You see how incredible it was to believe such of oneself.
It applies not to me, but to the symbol.
The symbol becomes my lord and unfailing commander.
It will fortify its reign and change itself
into a·starry and riddling image, whose meaning turns completely inward, and whose pleasure radiates outward like blazing fire, like a Buddha in the flames.
Because I sink into my symbol to such an extent, the symbol changes me from my one into my other, and that cruel Goddess of my interior, my womanly pleasure, my own other, the tormented tormentor, that which is to be tormented.
I have interpreted these images, as best I can, with poor words. ~The Red Book, Page 250.
