Gustav Meyrink and "Petroleum, Petroleum"

An obscure book written in 1903 has suddenly resurged into a best seller with a bullet. OK, it's making the internet rounds, which these days, is the same thing. It is called "Petroleum, Petroleum" and it was written by Austrian Gustav Meyrink.  In it Meyrink says (google translate)

"If the oil to the extent in, as far as my calculations are in for 27-29 weeks all oceans of the earth be covered in future for it, and no more rain, as no more water to evaporate - at best it is only then Petroleum rain." Essentially, the short book says that an oil eruption in the Gulf of Mexico would taint the Gulf and then kill all the seas on earth, changing the climate so that it will not even rain, or if it does, it will be acidy oil rain.

Much is being made of this lately because Meyrink's prediction seems to so closely match the events that are occurring now in the Gulf. However, he did not get his information from the bible, quite the opposite. He was an occultist.

Meyrink was most famous for his 1914 novel The Golem. The Jewish Virtual Library entry on golem says, "In Jewish tradition, the golem is most widely known as an artificial creature created by magic, often to serve its creator. The word "golem" appears only once in the Bible (Psalms139:16). In Hebrew, "golem" stands for "shapeless mass." According to tradition, to make a golem come alive, one would shape it out of soil, and then walk or dance around it saying combination of letters from the alphabet and the secret name of God. To "kill" the golem, its creators would walk in the opposite direction saying and making the order of the words backwards." Meyrink was experimenting with kabbalistic and Tarot-induced mystical experiences when he wrote "Petroleum Petroleum" and later "The Golem". Later as Meyrink became more proficient in the mysticism to which he was drawn, he gave Kabbalistic tarot readings to his circle of friends.

Speaking of Meyrink's circle of friends, they were members of The Golden Dawn (including Yeats, and at the same time as Meyrink, too, but more on Yeats in a moment). Let's look at the background of the circumstances Meyrink was involved in when he received his "prophecy."

Wikipedia: "The Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn (or, more commonly, the Golden Dawn) was a magical active in Great Britain during the late 19th and early 20th centuries, which practiced theurgy and spiritual development. It has been one of the largest single influences on 20th-century Western occultism." The Golden Dawn group was very influential and had members from upper echelons of society. Bram Stoker was a member, he of the Dracula fame. Mysticism was all the rage those days, as it is now.

You can imagine Yeats and Meyrink and all the rest at their London Victorian Clubs holding seances and Tarot readings and drinking absinthe and calling up spirits and then being infused with verses and images, which they later wrote down as novels and poems... and prophesies.

We in the here and now are explicitly warned that the end time and the Tribulation will be rife with false signs. Mark 13:32 says "for false Christs and false prophets will arise, and will show signs and wonders, in order to lead astray, if possible, the elect." 2 Thess 2:9 says "The coming of the lawless one is according to the working of Satan, with all power, signs, and lying wonders." From this and all the other verses too numerous to list, we know that the end time will have the potentiality for false miracles, AND that previous ages power was given to satan to perform these false signs too. He even appears as an angel of light, and his henchmen as ministers of righteousness. So it is not far-fetched that they can come into the heads of these Golden Dawn occultists, and monkey with their minds and give them "prophesies."

Now, the gulf oil disaster is not false prophecy, it is a real event. But the source from Meyrink got the information was false. This of course happens with present day occultists too, and those who call the demons better watch out for deception, including false prophecy, but remember that such deceptions always have a grain of truth in them!!

As an example, take a look at fellow Golden Dawn member W.B. Yeat's poem The Second Coming:

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: a waste of desert sand;
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Wind shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

I used to love that poem until I discovered it was demonically inspired and from the point of view of Satan! Re-read it now, knowing it was inspired by a vision that came during an occult practice and see what a difference it makes knowing it is from the point of view of satan. There is no doubt of Petroleum, Petroleum and The Second Coming's inherent prophetical insights and images closely mirror the bible. There is no doubt that told from the demonic perspective, the Second Coming has, through Yeats's depraved and corrupt mind, been turned into something less than glorious and totally hopeless. It is the same with Meyrink's. Sure, perhaps the demons planted images in his mind of an event 100 years in the future, but who knows where and at what point the demons twisted the information to further their lying-thieving-destructive proclivities?

[Above, some of the badges still in use from the Golden Dawn-era and lineage at a temple in Arizona.]

Not every angel you see is one of the good ones, even if he is showing off with white light! Not every prophecy is from God, even if they seem to come true later! Demons are angelic beings who can course through realms from below the earth to highest heaven in the blink of an eye, who can defy the laws of gravity, who can take on the form of men or dispense with flesh at will, who live outside of time and enter into it when they want, and they may very well be able to travel though a time-space continuum and skitter into the future to view events and come back with prophesies to give corrupt men who call on demons for insight.

I would not touch Meyrink's prophesies with a ten foot pole, knowing its source. Petroleum, Petroleum may have a germ of truth at its core, but the germ is in the middle of a big, fat, crap sandwich.