In Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn ritual, this is the name of the guardian of the East where the initiate will be presented to receive enlightenment. The role played by the Hierophant in the Neophyte ceremony of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. The Hierophant guards the pathway into the light in the East. The initiate is challenged when threatened with a sceptre to admit the Hierophant’s name and the Hegemon answers on behalf of the initiate’s own soul:
“Light dawning in Darkness, the Light of a Golden Day”
Later in the same ritual there is a reference to the East (where the guardian of the east was met) being the place where the Guardian of the Dawning Sun is. This is likely the same guardian.
I am often left with the impression that this writing has a connection to Florence Farr or that it felt powerful to her and filled her visions. In her own writing, she often used words like “the Great One of” and used adjectives as nouns, but most of the order’s initiation rituals should have been written before she joined since she was around the 88th member.
I cannot explain why but my own intuition leads me to feel that these were some of the guardians that the women who wrote so little of the orders notes were able to communicate with in their visionary states. This guardian guarded the Eastern path where the initiate might be able to access their own inner light. Please understand however this is mostly speculation.
The opposite guardian is that of the West, Darkness, the Great One of the Path of the Shades.
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