Here I would like to take my cue from the recent film Dracula Untold, which tells the genesis of the legendary figure of Dracula, to tell what hidden background there are in this story, and what initiatory symbols are hidden there. Certainly the observer who has knowledge of the spiritual science, will have some suggestions that I will try to explain here.
Since the present Epoch of the Conscious Soul, which began in 1430 (and ended around 3500), the way of feeling has separated from that of thinking, religion and science have been progressively divorced. The beginning of the same era marked the progressive decrease of the possibility of being initiated through the way of esoteric Christianity, a way almost impossible to practice today, and which required mystical asceticism outside the world.
But in order for the conscious soul to flourish towards the light of the astral body transformed by the I, the Spiritual Self, in the future sixth post-Atlantic epoch, it was necessary to create a way that would lead religion and science back to the original unity, now fully conscious. This is the Rosicrucian way, prepared by the individuality incarnated as Christian Rosenkreutz. The Rosicrucian Way stands as the highest way of white magic, later flourished in all Western esoteric schools, up to the New Mysteries founded within the Anthroposophical Society by Rudolf Steiner.
But just as there is a way of white magic, so there is a dark, black magic counterbalance. So there is a counter-initiation mirroring the Rosicrucian one and yet it has undoubted parallels: the inverse mirror of Christian Rosenkreutz's personality is that of Vlad Tepes, known as Dracula. Every scientist of the spirit can see the spiritual realities behind the alchemical allegory of the Chemical Wedding, but at the same time he must see his counter-image in the history of the undead par excellence, Nosferatu, the vampire.
The origins of Dracula
Bram Stoker in 1882
In fact the author of Dracula, Bram Stoker (1847-1912), in his short stories and novels shows a great knowledge of the occult. As proof of this, we know that Stoker was a member of the Ordo Templi Orientis and had close contacts with at least two members of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn: J. W. Brodie-Innis and the most famous designer of the Rider-Waite Tarot, the artist and occultist Pamela Coleman Smith.
Dracula's novel is a compendium of the spiritual war between the forces of Christ and those of the obstacle. Stoker became acquainted with the legend of the Romanian prince "Vlad Tepes Dracul" through Professor Armin Vambery, a Hungarian explorer with extensive knowledge of the Dervish mystical way. Stoker was so fascinated by the story of the Nosferatu that he collected the Slavic legends about vampires over seven years. Putting them together with his knowledge of the occult, he found Dracula and his counterpart, Van Helsing.
The historical figure of Vlad Tepes
Vlad Tepes
The historical figure of Vlad Tepes is controversial. His father, Vlad II, was a member of the Order of the Dragon, a military order founded in the early 15th century to fight the Hussite heresy, doctrinally close to the Waldensians (and of which the Rosicrucian philosopher Comenius was part in the 17th century). From the name of this order derives the patronymic "Dracula". In Romania he is venerated as a hero protector of national blood, nevertheless his nickname "The Impaler" (tepes) was given to him by the habit of impaling defeated enemies at the border of his kingdom to frighten the invaders. Already during his life, throughout Europe, word spread of how he impaled his prisoners, impaling them to death. His cruel nature was at the origin of several legends, which Stoker used to create the figure of the vampire Dracula.
This aura of ferocity extended even after his death: among his descendants there is also Elizabeth Bathory, also known as Countess Dracula, a Hungarian serial killer dedicated to black magic, also accused of being a vampire already alive and who spent more than a hundred lives to satisfy her "thirst". Legend has it that she used to bathe in the blood of the virgins she sacrificed to rejuvenate.
Initiation and Counter-Initiation
Christian Rosenkreutz
In order to avoid misunderstandings, I will immediately clarify that what we want to highlight in this article is not a historical comparison but a symbolic-esoteric one: it is the symbolic inversions that place the Chemical Marriage and Dracula's Legend at the two poles of the same Western esoteric tradition, the Roses+Crosses. Therefore, just like Cristiano Rosacroce we read the alchemical allegory in the Chemical Wedding and not in his historical journey to the East; in the same way we read its symbolic inversion not so much in the historical character of Vlad Tepes, but in the legendary one of Dracula by Stoker. It is also interesting to note that the Rosicrucian current passes from the East to the West through the southern Mediterranean (Arab countries and Morocco), while Dracula's current passes from the North.
The initiation of Christian Rosenkreutz (1378-1484) consists in a resurrection that crosses the astral world and ascends to the higher worlds. The higher nature of Christian Rosenkreutz's initiation is indicated by the initiatory name itself, Christian Rosicrucian (abbreviated as C.R.C.), from which the Rosicrucian initiatory school will take its name. The public appearance of the Rosicrucian Way dates back to the three original posters published in the 17th century: Fama Fraternitatis (1614), Confessio Fraternitatis (1615) and finally in The Chemical Marriage of Cristiano Rosacroce (1616).
Mystical death
Dracula rests during the day in a coffin, as Christian Rosenkreutz observes during his initiation into the Chemical Wedding:
Now, after the Old King sat in his chair, his head was immediately cut off, and wrapped in a piece of black cloth; but the blood was placed in a large golden chalice, and placed with him in his coffin, which was covered. So it happened to the others, and I thought I would die in the end too, but I was wrong.
Mystical death is a fundamental step of initiation. In the ancient mysteries, before the Mystery of Golgotha, the master placed the disciple in a deep sleep, so deep that he was similar to death, so many that not only the ego and the astral but even the etheric body emerged from the physical body. Through that detachment induced by the master, the etheric body of the disciple relived the great events of the history of cosmic evolution, so that after a period of three and a half days, it emerged from the coffin and returned to the waking consciousness, but as initiated.
On a higher level, Jesus Christ truly lay dead for three and a half days in the tomb, during which time he visited the Underworld, as we shall see later. The Word made flesh was to live on the stage of the world's history all that was previously held in the ancient mysteries as an initiation ritual. Everything that was a foreshadowing of the incarnation of the Spirit of the Sun within the Earth must now truly take place. From this divine paradigm comes the Rosicrucian initiation in which the mystical death of the Old King precedes the actual mystical wedding.
C.R.C. upon his physical death, will be placed in a tomb that will be found 120 years after his death in 1604. The discovery is recounted in the first manifesto, the Fama Fraternitatis (1614). Dracula will be awakened from his own coffin. In the coffin is also placed the Masonic Companion who is initiated to the rank of Master, the third and last of the Blue Freemasonry in which the experience of Hiram's death is relived.
Table of the Master Mason: in the ritual of the Master Mason Hiram dies and rises again within the Master Mason himself who is called to complete the work of Master Hiram within the lodge.
Legend has it that the coffin of C.R.C. was made of a very pure material, such as crystal, diamond or salt. These materials all indicate the making of the Philosopher's Stone from which the Elixir of Lungavita is extracted. Crystal is in fact a transparent mineral, which appears just as it is, a characteristic of the body transformed by the light of the inner Christ. More precisely, crystal is a diamond, a pure carbon element in crystalline form: human flesh itself is formed by carbon compounds. All organic chemistry is the chemistry of carbon. The transformation of carbon into diamond is a prefiguration, within the mineral realm, of the metamorphosis of the human physical body into Man-Spirit through the action of the I. This is the first and last Philosopher's Stone, the completion of the Great Work of Cosmic Evolution.
C.R.C.'s coffin is the same one where Snow White is placed in her initiatory sleep. Snow White is in fact a fairy tale steeped in gnawing esotericism. Snow White (the human soul, the Moon), falls victim to the Luciferic spell, eats the apple (the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil) and loses her spiritual powers. When Snow White is placed in the crystal coffin she is alive in the material world, she is incarnated, but she is dead to the spiritual world. The seven dwarfs who watch over her are the metals or chakras, the influence of the Seven Planets on Earth, which from the Earth's crust where they fell (the physical body) wait to be redeemed by the soul that has found the spirit, that is, the Prince (the Sun), the only one who is able to awaken (initially) Snow White. Snow White falls in love at first sight (spiritual) with the Prince and marries him, thus regaining the lost state of grace (the kingdom): the human soul awakens now consciously understanding the spiritual world. Thus the (chemical) marriage between the human soul and the human spirit takes place.
In the same context is also mentioned the beheading of the Old King, a necessary step for the production of the Mysterium Coninunctionis of alchemy. It can be said instead that Dracula is an "Old King", the "King of Vampires", who does everything as long as his head is not cut off, so that he remains on Earth by virtue only of the forces of his head, of his brain that works only through the reflected thought of lunar nature and not through the thinking of the solar heart.
The "beheading of the King" is part of the sevenfold alchemical process of the "Martyrdom of Metals" in which metals are the inferior nature of planetary archetypes that must be dismembered (analyzed) in order to extract the archetypal essence.
The dragon and the astral ego
Dracula's counter-initiation, as presented in Stoker's original novel, is a death that sinks into the lower astral worlds. The black magician thus definitively renounces his soul and becomes an undead, a nosferatu. These lower spheres are the underground reflection of the celestial spheres, the nine circles of hell ruled by the Irregular Hierarchies, the Obstacles. Among them are the Arcons that govern the shadow of the Seven Heavens.
Already starting from the "counter-initiatic" name of "Dracula". The word "Dracula" comes from the Latin "Draco": the name was chosen at the foundation by the Order of the Dragon because it was inspired by the events of St. George. The symbol chosen is therefore the dragon won by the saint and its tail is shown rolled up at the head, as in many alchemical allegories. However, due to the ferocity of Vlad Tepes, a symbolic reversal takes place, making Stoker's Dracula assume the opposite value.
Symbol of the Order of the Dragon: the dragon that forms a circle refers to the alchemical Uroboros, the subnatural forces tamed. Symbolically it is also marked by having a sword placed above its wings.
By comparing the Rosicrucian initiation with the astral counter-initiation, the dragon assumes the utmost importance. Overcoming the dragon are the Archangel Michael, the herald of Christ, and Saint George, a Christian knight: the spiritual event marks the defeat of the darkness of materialism by the light of the spirit. The dragon is in fact an Ahrymanic spiritual being, the one who opposes the Solar Spirit at all levels of the Staircase of Being, taking different names in different ages and epics of peoples: Ahriman against Ormazd in Ancient Persia, Seth against Osiris in Ancient Egypt, Python against Apollo in Greece, Satan against Christ in the Mystery of Golgotha.
Tintoretto: Descent to Hell (1568)
Ahriman or Satan is the jailer of souls, the one who prevents souls from coming out of Hell to ascend to the heavenly spheres and continue on the otherworldly journey. Christ, as a psychopomp, during his journey to Hell frees the souls of the dead and leads them to the heavenly spheres at the moment of his resurrection. On the contrary, the victims of a vampire's bite become undead, forced to live a vampire life and whose only liberation is death.
Imagine that the dragon is the lower ego, an astral crystallization that replaces the higher I. The I is the result of the luciferic influence on the astral body. The I seeks first of all to preserve itself and satisfy its own cravings, the seven deadly sins, exploiting its neighbor and attacking anyone who opposes it. Only the solar spirit, through the gratuitousness of love, is able to dissolve this astral sediment and return the I to reign within the human being.
Stephen Hawks: Rose Cross (2013)
For this reason we find on the rosicrucian rose the seven red roses that correspond to the seven deadly sins redeemed by the luciferic influence of lust. The blood in which desire dwells becomes the sap that accepts the sacred spear of the light of the Sun, giving free oxygen. From the black cross of the mineral these seven roses bloom, each one saving the archetype of the seven planets that govern the astral world.
But if the seven roses, instead of redeeming the luciferic red blood, get darkened in the black of the mineral cross, we have as a result an Ahrymanic forgery of the rosicrucian: the black rosicrucian. Lucifer and Ahriman ally themselves: the seven deadly sins thus reign over the cross, signifying the winter of resurrection or the non-death. Instead of the resurrection body of Christ Jesus, the true philosopher's stone, one's heart hardens until the soul is "lost". The vampire, through counter-initiation, obtains an elementary physical body that is incapable of suffering and that needs the blood of its neighbour to subsist: the more pure this blood is, the more it benefits from it by making it decay into sin.
It can be said that the seven red roses on the Rosicrucian cross are replaced by seven black roses on the cross of Dracula: the red cross rose of spiritual initiation against the black cross rose of astral counter-injection. From this initiation reversal derives the legend of the only weapons that can kill an undead person such as the vampire. In each of these methods is contained an alchemical allegory: they are the antidote to one of the seven deadly sins. Imagine that each of the seven black roses can be redeemed in a red rose through these seven sacred weapons that can make the undead dead.
The figure of Van Helsing
In Coppola's Bram Stoker's Dracula, Anthony Hopkins plays Van Helsing, including a gnawing apron.
The figure of the traveler Armin Vambery, provided Stoker with the inspiration for Professor Van Helsing: he is a traveler, scientist and esotericist at the same time. Van Helsing holds science and magic together in a whole capable of acting for the good of humanity by defeating occult evils, in other words a true Rose+Cross.
Van Helsing, however, is not called "vampire expert" but rather as a skilled doctor able to recognize the mysterious illness that afflicts Lucy, in body and soul. As we know from the Rosa+Croce Posters, his members were first and foremost thaumaturges capable of recognizing and healing illnesses of the soul. Stoker shaped Dracula and Van Helsing as the two antagonists par excellence, complementary and engaged in a struggle that crosses the destiny of all the other characters. Although his surname suggests a Dutch origin, Van Helsing speaks with a heavy German accent, often exclaiming "Mein Gott", to underline his connection with Germany: we know the spirit of the Germanic people to be the bearer of the conscious soul within Europe by developing the relationship between man and spirit, and it was there that in the late Middle Ages the current Rosa+Croce was born, combining science and magic. On the contrary, when Dracula moved to England, he arrived in the other country that was the bearer of the conscious soul, the part that would develop man's relationship with matter through natural science.
The being of the Vampire
In the novel, Van Helsing describes Dracula's mind as that of a young boy, so stuck in his puberty age, just in the third seven-year-old (14-21) takes place the development of the astral body that inserts the animal lust within the human being. The vampire's astrality is aggravated by the fact that, not being able to lay the body formed in an incarnation, he escapes karma which therefore can never be overcome. He escapes from space-time not through the spiritualization of matter but through the Ahrymanic counterfeiting of the spirit. The vampire has blocked the wheel of destiny with violence, and therefore he is out of the regular evolutionary path. In other words, he is the physical counterpart of an Obstacle Spirit. Dracula is blocked at that stage of development and his intelligence is completely animalized, as demonstrated by his most famous transformations: in the wolf (= lust) and the bat (= the thought of death). His three brides are the allegory of the three deviated forces of the soul (thinking, feeling and wanting), now completely exteriorized and directed to the pleasures of the world of matter.
Moreover, Dracula's hunger not only serves to feed him, but also has in itself a form of bestial sensuality. The most basic instincts of survival, hunger and lust, are therefore Dracula's main motives along with his duplicity: he is formal, polite and kind in front of others but becomes brutal as soon as an obstacle stands between him and his goal, changing his behavior in a way that today's psychologists would call "bipolar". Another maniacal trait of his mind is arithmomania, the compulsion to make calculations on everything and order objects in an alphanumeric way. A means to temporarily stop a vampire is in fact to spread rice on the ground, a bundle of twigs or a deck of cards that the vampire will be forced to rearrange. This is another trait of reflected thinking, which transforms the quality of things into an aspect of quantity only, i.e. Ahriman's realm of quantity.
Dracula recovers his energies only if in his coffin is placed some earth from the place where he was buried (Transylvania): this means that his body is bound to the earth. The vampire, being soulless, is filled by a multitude of spiritual beings, demons of the obstacle, who bind him both to blood (for nourishment) and to earth (for strength). The supernatural powers of the vampire are therefore linked to the physical relationship with the solid element of the world of matter. This further testifies to the counter-initiatic value embodied by Dracula, who appeals to the bond of blood and sub-natural spheres, placed under the earth's surface to perform his black magic. The bond of blood and earth brings back to the anti-Christic nature of the vampire, which represents a reversal of the spiritual brotherhood brought to Earth by Christ, without distinction of nation (earth) or race (blood).
The lack of reflection in the mirror: the mirror, made of silver, reflects to the extent that it receives sunlight. Silver, the lunar metal, possesses a fundamental reflecting characteristic that allows it to act as "the Sun's substitute" in the night sky. Apollo, Greek god of the Sun, and Diana of the Moon were twins. Now, the mirror represents the soul while the light of the Sun represents the spirit: being the vampire a soulless being, he cannot let through it the light of the spirit that makes his figure visible. Moreover, since the vampire possesses only the physical body, he is a walking corpse, which is reduced to ashes by direct contact with the spirit without the mediation of the soul's mirror.
The impossibility of visiting a house without being invited: the house has its own eggregore, in the form of a genius loci, which is sacred and cannot be violated except by the inhabitants of the house themselves who constitute it through their own etheric (life) and astral (feelings) bodies. Dracula, and vampires in general, are usually invited beyond the spiritual threshold of the house by the inhabitants who cannot recognize the dark nature of the vampire.
The symbology of weapons
Kit to kill vampires. All the symbols of life beyond the death of the resurrected Christ within his phantom, become the way to the liberation of the vampire; the one who should have died and not resurrected through the elementary physical body, in a blasphemous way. In fact, the physical death of the undead is a liberation of the soul that originally inhabited that body when it was human. Through the destruction of the undead, the demons who animated the body can no longer harm the souls of the living and the dead.
One must see these "weapons" as powerful symbols capable of neutralizing the effects of astral counter-initiation. In revealing the symbolic associations to the seven planets, all the means traditionally useful to fight an undead will be taken into account because, although not originally present in Bram Stoker's novel, they're present in vampire folklore:
Moon: silver is associated with the minor luminary. It is the noble metal that contains within itself the spiritual force of the Sun. Being lunar, it is a feminine metal, which is able to hold and reflect, and is the "twin sister" of the Sun's gold. Silver weapons are capable of hurting the undead because they contain within themselves the spiritual strength of the Sun. Drowning is also a method that can kill vampires, and since the Moon is associated with static pools of water, it can suffocate the vampire with a catharsis given by the reflection of all other planetary spiritual influences.
Mercury: although it is not among the best known weapons, living silver or mercury, it is capable of hurting the undead because of its resonance with the soul, which the undead do not embody. In essence, Mercury accelerates physical decomposition because the bodies of the undead should already be decomposed. Running water, which is fatal for vampires, is also a symbol of the soul and is particularly associated with angels whose reflection in the body manifests itself in the movement of water.
Venus: holy water can be associated with Venus, since its waters are those of the etheric, the sea of life, which is capable of generating new life from itself also on the spiritual plane. Holy water blesses the physical bodies it touches and therefore destroys the corrupted bodies of the vampire's subnatural astral.
Sun: the light of the greatest luminary is counted among the most powerful weapons against vampires who can be weakened or even reduced to ashes. The Sun, allegorically, contains within itself the essence of the spirit and solar thought, which therefore destroys the body of the vampire without a human spirit, but instead inhabited by spirits of darkness, who disappear like shadows under the rays of the Sun. The ash stake is also solar, both because the tree is associated with the diurnal luminary and because it is usually directed to the heart which, in occult physiology, represents the very Sun of the human and animal organism.
Mars: the crucifix is the symbol of Christ's sacrifice and therefore of the renunciation of the ego in the world of matter in favor of a higher self-awareness, which is one with the Divine will. For this reason, from being a symbol of physical death, it becomes a symbol of spiritual resurrection. In Paradise, Dante places the archetype of the crucifixion perpetually observable in the spiritual world, right in the sky of Mars. Moreover, in the Templar and Rosicrucian tradition, the crucifix is an upturned sword, thrust into the ground or rock. The sword in turn is the Logos that is capable of animating even stones: the vampire is horrified by it because his prerogative is to satisfy any selfish lust, without any self-sacrifice but rather, literally taking the blood of his neighbor.
Jupiter: the image of the "Old King" being torn to pieces is one of the most constant allegories in alchemy. This Old King is the astral ego, now excessively crystallized, and that in order to give birth to the true Self must be torn to pieces and buried. Beheading kills a vampire and is often associated with cutting up the body and dividing or cremating its parts to prevent it from resurrecting.
Saturn: Saturn's fire is the heat that brings creation back to its spiritual origin by dividing matter into the respective Tria Before Paracelsus: flame (sulfur), smoke (mercury) and ash (salt). In this way the physical body is brought back to its original spiritual form, stripped of the physical elements. The vampire, which is governed by an astral ego, cannot resist the fire, symbol of the I that acts on the physical body reducing it to a pure supersensitive form, an archetype without the elementary component.
On top of that, we can add salt and the consecrated host, whose planet can be considered the Earth:
Salt: in the sphere of creation, salt, being a crystal of action, is under the direct action of the First Hierarchy (particularly the Thrones). It is a pure body that embodies a geometric archetype in an almost direct form. In the alchemy of the First Tria of Paracelsus the salt (Sal) divides the inside from the outside deriving from the union of mercury (Mercur, the median part) and sulfur (Sulphur, the inner fire), and they are the archetype behind the chemical reactions of neutralization between acids and bases that give precisely the "salts". Paracelsus himself attributes to salt a christic nature, as crystallized light in the "salt of the Earth". So legend has it that vampires are forced to stay out of places surrounded by salt. Salt represents a barrier against demons who want to take possession of a body, creating a space purified and neutralized from external astral influences. In the next incarnation, the Future Jupiter, the physical matter purified and emptied of its mineral substance, is symbolized by a pure transparent cube (called "crystal sea" in the Apocalypse) salt belongs to the cubic crystal system.
Consecrated Host: In Catholic ritual, the consecrated host literally becomes the body of Christ during Mass. In esotericism the host, which is bread, is the purest distillate of Christ because it is produced from wheat: wheat is a vegetable that grows in spring and is harvested in summer, from green (etheric) to golden (spirit). Therefore, the wheat accumulates solar power and from the vegetable kingdom almost ascends to the human kingdom, transforming itself into a golden ear. But it is man himself who creates bread from flour: bread is therefore the equivalent of the flesh of the human body in Nature. From the earth, therefore, the food that gives life to man is created. The Sun-Christ penetrates the body of Jesus at Baptism and transforms it from within, etherizing his blood. The etherized blood penetrates the earthly organism and the Spirit of the Sun becomes the Spirit of the Earth. Just as the Earth is literally the body of Christ, so bread is the harmonious synthesis of the body and spirit of Christ himself. Thus, bread becomes the "body of Christ," as it is produced by the sacred marriage of the solar and earthly forces. It is therefore understood how sacred it is and how it can be contrary to the vampire's being desecrated and desecrating.
Anti-vampire plants
In the field of weapons and remedies against vampires, some plant species deserve a mention. Their external and internal characteristics, according to the relative planetary associations, are symbolically active in counteracting the vampire's being. The Plant Kingdom, as a whole, is the manifestation of the etheric forming forces, that is the vital forces of the Earth. Therefore, plants have the privilege of being bearers of life, when the vampire is anti-life.
Ash: The aforementioned tree has a solar nature. Its verticality is imposing, making it an etheric bridge between the high and the low, between the spiritual world and the material world. Its wood is so hard that in ancient times it could be used to build light weapons. The druids used to carve their magic sticks and wands in ash wood, capable of channeling etheric forces. The Romans instead made bonfires out of it to keep away the spirits of the dead with malicious intentions. Manna, with its purifying properties, is also extracted from the engraved wood of some species of ash (the ash tree).
Rosehip: tradition has it that the crown of thorns placed on the head of Jesus Christ during the Passion was made of dog rose. The crown of thorns had the function of drawing blood directly from the head of Christ so that the forces of the head could also participate in the Mystery of Golgotha. The dog rose is therefore a symbol of solar thought, living and etherized, freed from the lunar-astral yoke that characterizes the vampire. Dog rose wreaths were placed on the tombs in order to quiet the soul of the deceased, accompanying him with good thoughts in the spiritual worlds.
Hawthorn: the stem is associated with Mars, because of the thorns, while the flowers with Venus and the Great Mother for the purity of the flowers. Thus, the plant as a whole, being hermaphrodite, is considered a marriage between Venus and Mars, a reference to the Rosicrucian "Alchemical Wedding", able to mediate between male and female nature. Its thorns are magical, able to give an incorruptible sleep that protects magicians: legend has it that Merlin the Wizard fell asleep under a hawthorn. Containing also substances able to regulate the heartbeat, it is flanked by ash as a choice of wood for the stakes.
Garlic: garlic is symbolically associated externally to the Moon, for its round, white shape, while internally to Mars, for its characteristic smell and taste. The substances contained in garlic, such as garlicine and allina, form an essential oil with antibiotic and antiparasitic qualities. For this reason it is considered a good luck charm. The "martial" components of garlic remain in the blood even after ingestion, making the breath smell and being expelled by sweating. Garlic therefore purifies the body of man from the astral impurities that accumulate in the blood, the vehicle of the I: the vampire fears garlic precisely because it is contrary to its extreme astral corruption. A blood purified by garlic is poison for the vampire.
The reversal of symbols
In an age when it is easy to come across the overturning of symbols, which from negatives are turned into positives and vice versa, it is necessary to pay attention to the history from which these symbols derive so that we can grasp their meaning. The vampire has recently been "rehabilitated" as a symbol of the "beautiful and damned" almost justifying its characteristics.
I'm talking about the Twilight saga by Stephenie Meyer, who despite trying to show the positive points of vampires, falls for this very intent in a myriad of misunderstandings and contradictions that the vampire figure unequivocally carries within itself. One for all the ability to feel love and the absence of the soul. But the Meyer saga is only the latest product of this reversal. It is not the first to have paradoxically given a human interiority to the vampire, the Chronicles of the Vampires by Anne Rice are an example of this less recent and more traditional.
Throughout the allegory of the genesis of the vampire we must read the warnings of the initiates not to fall into the trap of false astral initiation, as well as indulge in the seven deadly sins. In the allegory of the death of the vampire we must instead read the methods to redeem the initiatory path and bring him back on the path of the spiritual world.