OVERPOPULATION, ALCHEMY & BEER
Overpopulation.
“How about…have a neat world for kids to come to?”—Bill Hicks.
It seems that all humanity has done is create a hell on earth, a selfish abysmal existence, certainly not resembling a Divine sort of life much less a joyous one. Is this world we have created what anyone would consciously choose if he knew what his True Self desired? How is it that the masses do not understand that they are reproducing at too fast a pace? Must there be so many people on earth? Is this necessary?
Sometimes I wonder if this overpopulation is simply the will of the Almighty. I wonder if God is trying to perform some sort of alchemical experiment with humanity. Maybe that is why there are so many people on earth…because out of the many possibilities arise a few precious gems.
“Many are called but few are chosen.”
Using alchemical analogies it is easy to see the meaning of “many are called, but few are chosen” in that during an alchemical experiment, a great amount of material is ‘filtered’ and only a little of anything precious emerges from every cycle within the experiment. Perhaps it is likewise with entire populations—only a precious few learn the truth and make it out of the hell we have created on earth.
In the case of brewing beer, only a little alcohol is produced in any fermentation, and this is only in comparison to the rest of the brew. The highest percentage of alcohol that most fermented beverages can produce runs only as high as the teens. The alcohol corresponds to the Spirit that was in the plants used in the fermentation process. This alcohol is, by analogy, the ‘precious few’. It is extracted through an alchemical process.
Spiritual communities (monasteries, convents, ashrams, etc.) are like great fermenters that process human beings who feel called to voluntarily perform the alchemical process within themselves, with their very lives. Maybe when the fermentation is complete with humanity, all of us will be consumed, as though by the God that created us because He/She/It needs to drink us down as a fermented human beverage? Since humans consume fermented beverages to become one with the Soul of the plant, to communicate with it and understand it, then perhaps humanity itself will be consumed by that Creator (or whatever the heck It was/is) that put us in this earthly fermenter in the first place. Those who accomplish their Will become the Fiery part of the brew—the Divine Spirit itself. Just like the yeast in a fermenter, these humans filled with Divine Will are the ones who do the job of transformation of all that surrounds them, always desiring only to raise those who want to be transformed as well. Those who do this Spirit work will one day find liberation because their work will be done, finished. Their personal brew, their life’s work is finished fermenting. Their work is ready to be consumed by the World they left behind. But if they expect rewards, it is just like someone who drinks some alcoholic beverage and pukes up the contaminants/imperfections. What was needed was just a little more filtering or distillation before the fermentation was perfect, more filtering of the soul before one advances to pure Spirit. When no more changes can be observed, the fermentation is complete. The Red Lion has been created.
When no more changes can be observed, when all seems fixed and set in stone, then the stone is found. The student is no longer a student. He is the Magus, a living Philosopher’s Stone. He is unchangeable in his changeless state of fixity amidst the backdrop of eternal change. He is the observer and the observed at once. He is One. He is All things in One. Fully Contained. Knowing of himself, of his Self.
Yeast=Fire. Hops=Air. Malt=Earth. All are suspended in Water (obviously representing water). They are all in the Bliss of Yoga-Union when they all work together. The yeast is happy when it is using the balanced combination of the other ingredients to transform them, to raise them to another state of being that more Divinely represents their True Selves.
Maybe it is necessary to have so many people on earth in order to produce a few gems after all?
