The Middle Pillar Exercise of Israel Regardie

The Middle Pillar is a meditation in which the practitioner imagines five spheres of light along the central axis of the body, each corresponding to a sefirah on the "middle pillar" of the Qabalistic Tree of Life, and intones a Hebrew divine name at each. It was published by Israel Regardie in 1938, drawing on the teaching of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, and was presented as a means of balance, vitality and psychological integration. It remains one of the most widely practised exercises of modern ceremonial magic.

How to do it§

The divine names are the traditional Hebrew names attributed to the sefirot in Golden Dawn teaching; vibrate them slowly, in a low, sustained tone.

1. Prepare. Sit upright with feet flat, or stand. Many begin with the Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram. Breathe slowly and evenly for a few minutes, letting the body relax.
2. Kether, above the head. Imagine a sphere of brilliant white light, about the size of a hand-span, just above the crown. Vibrate Eheieh ("I am") several times, feeling the light grow brighter.
3. Daath, at the throat. Imagine a shaft of light descending from the crown to the throat, where it forms a second sphere. Vibrate YHVH Elohim (often pronounced "Yeh-ho-voh El-oh-heem").
4. Tiphareth, at the heart. Let the shaft descend to the centre of the chest and form a sphere of golden-white light. Vibrate YHVH Eloah ve-Daath.
5. Yesod, at the genitals. Draw the light down to the pelvis and form a fourth sphere, often seen as violet. Vibrate Shaddai El Chai ("Almighty Living God").
6. Malkuth, at the feet. Draw the light down to a sphere at or beneath the feet. Vibrate Adonai ha-Aretz ("Lord of the Earth"). Pause and perceive the whole column of light from crown to feet.
7. The circulations. Regardie added three movements of light. First, imagine light flowing from the crown down the left side of the body to the feet and back up the right side, several times with the breath. Second, imagine it flowing down the front of the body and up the back. Third, draw it up from the feet through the central column to the crown and let it fall like a fountain around the body, gathering again at the feet.
8. Close. Let the images fade, return attention to the breath and to the weight of the body on the chair or floor. Many end with the Qabalistic Cross. Write a few lines in your notebook, then eat or drink something simple if you feel light-headed.

Origins and history§

Israel Regardie (1907–1985), born in London and raised in the United States, was Aleister Crowley's secretary from 1928 to 1932 and in 1934 joined the Stella Matutina, a successor order of the Golden Dawn. Disillusioned with its leadership, he published the order's teaching papers in four volumes as The Golden Dawn (1937–40), a decision still debated among occultists. The Middle Pillar appeared in 1938 as a practical manual.

The exercise rests on Golden Dawn doctrine that the Tree of Life is mirrored in the human body, with Kether above the head and Malkuth at the feet, and that the central pillar of mildness balances the pillars of severity and mercy. Daath, strictly not one of the ten sefirot, is used for the throat. The divine names are those that Golden Dawn tables, following Renaissance Christian Kabbalah and earlier Jewish lists, attach to each sefirah. Regardie acknowledged that he had arranged the material into a single exercise; how much of the sequence existed as an order practice before him, and how much he composed, is uncertain.

Regardie was also a trained psychotherapist with an interest in the work of Carl Jung and Wilhelm Reich, and he presented the Middle Pillar partly in psychological terms, as a way of releasing tension and integrating the personality. He compared the centres with the chakras of Indian yoga and the circulations with Chinese teaching on the circulation of light, comparisons that historians now treat as modern syntheses rather than evidence of a shared ancient system. Later teachers, notably Chic and Sandra Tabatha Cicero, expanded it, and it is now taught across Golden Dawn, Thelemic and eclectic groups.

Variations§

Some practitioners assign colours to each sphere according to Golden Dawn colour scales; others keep all five white. A shorter form omits the circulations. Regardie also described using the exercise to direct attention to a particular region of the body as a support for healing, always alongside, never instead of, medical treatment.

Safety and good sense§

The Middle Pillar involves no candles or incense. Keep sessions modest in length to begin with, and stop if you feel dizzy; avoid forced or rapid breathing. People with a history of psychosis, dissociation, panic attacks or trauma-related symptoms should approach intensive visualisation carefully and ideally with the knowledge of a clinician, since vivid inner imagery can sometimes heighten distress. The exercise may support relaxation, but it is no substitute for medical, psychological, legal or financial help.

Sources and further reading§

• The Middle Pillar — Israel Regardie, 1938
• The Golden Dawn — Israel Regardie, 1937
• The Tree of Life: An Illustrated Study in Magic — Israel Regardie, 1932
• A Garden of Pomegranates — Israel Regardie, 1932
• Self-Initiation into the Golden Dawn Tradition — Chic Cicero & Sandra Tabatha Cicero, 1995
• Kabbalah — Gershom Scholem, 1974