"The Crowley 'Joke' & My Allergic Reaction to Occultism"

[guruilla]

2002 BBC poll of 100 greatest Britons; AC is 73. No Huxley, Orwell, or Keats.

Sir Winston Churchill
Isambard Kingdom Brunel
Diana, Princess of Wales
Charles Darwin
William Shakespeare
Sir Isaac Newton
Elizabeth I
John Lennon
Horatio Nelson, 1st Viscount Nelson
Oliver Cromwell
Sir Ernest Shackleton
Captain James Cook
Robert Baden-Powell
Alfred the Great
Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington
Margaret Thatcher
Michael Crawford
Queen Victoria
Sir Paul McCartney
Sir Alexander Fleming
Alan Turing
Michael Faraday
Owain Glyndŵr
Elizabeth II
Stephen Hawking
William Tyndale
Emmeline Pankhurst
William Wilberforce
David Bowie
Guy Fawkes
Leonard Cheshire
Eric Morecambe
David Beckham
Thomas Paine
Boudica
Sir Steve Redgrave
Sir Thomas More
William Blake
John Harrison
Henry VIII
Charles Dickens
Sir Frank Whittle
John Peel
John Logie Baird
Aneurin Bevan
Boy George
Sir Douglas Bader
Sir William Wallace
Sir Francis Drake
John Wesley
King Arthur
Florence Nightingale
Thomas Edward Lawrence
Robert Falcon Scott
Enoch Powell
Sir Cliff Richard
Alexander Graham Bell
Freddie Mercury
Dame Julie Andrews
Sir Edward Elgar
Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother
George Harrison
Sir David Attenborough
James Connolly
George Stephenson
Sir Charles Chaplin
Tony Blair
William Caxton
Bobby Moore
Jane Austen
William Booth
Henry V
Aleister Crowley
Robert the Bruce
Bob Geldof
The Unknown Warrior,Westminster Abbey
Robbie Williams
Edward Jenner
David Lloyd George, 1st Earl Lloyd George of Dwyfor
Charles Babbage
Geoffrey Chaucer
Richard III
J. K. Rowling
James Watt
Sir Richard Branson
Bono
John Lydon (Johnny Rotten)
Bernard Law Montgomery, 1st Viscount Montgomery of Alamein ('Monty')
Donald Campbell
Henry II
James Clerk Maxwell
J. R. R. Tolkien
Sir Walter Raleigh
Edward I
Sir Barnes Wallis
Richard Burton
Tony Benn
David Livingstone
Sir Tim Berners-Lee
Marie Stopes

[norton ash]

He qualifies as a historian, anthropologist, translator and religious scholar... eminently.

[Agent Orange Cooper]

Robbie Williams??

I suppose Crowley has his (minor) place in cultural history. I just don't yet see why it should be any larger than the place occupied by, say, The Crazy World of Arthur Brown, who was at least quite funny.

Arthur Brown was the shit, but I don't see his numerological/magickal system on full display in the occult structure of 9/11 (for example):

http://intothefaerywoods.blogspot.com/2 ... atrix.html

[guruilla]

The infamous chapter, with footnotes (response to contentions at the CERN sacrifice thread):

Of the Bloody Sacrifice: and Matters Cognate.

It is necessary for us to consider carefully the problems connected with the bloody sacrifice, for this question is indeed traditionally important in Magick. Nigh all ancient Magick revolves around this matter. In particular all the Osirian religions — the rites of the Dying God — refer to this. The slaying of Osiris and Adonis; the mutilation of Attis; the cults of Mexico and Peru; the story of Hercules or Melcarth; the legends of Dionysus and of Mithra, are all connected with this one idea. In the Hebrew religion we find the same thing inculcated. The first ethical lesson in the Bible is that the only sacrifice pleasing to the Lord is the sacrifice of blood; Abel, who made this, finding favour with the Lord, while Cain, who offered cabbages, was rather naturally considered a cheap sport. The idea recurs again and again. We have the sacrifice of the Passover, following on the story of Abraham's being commanded to sacrifice his firstborn son, with the idea of the substitution of animal for human life. The annual ceremony of the two goats carries out this in perpetuity. And we see again the domination of this idea in the romance of Esther, where Haman and Mordecai are the two goats or gods; and ultimately in the presentation of the rite of Purim in Palestine, where Jesus and Barabbas happened to be the Goats in that particular year of which we hear so much, without agreement on the date.

This subject must be studied in the Golden Bough, where it is most learnedly set forth by Dr. J. G. Frazer.

Enough has now been said to show that the bloody sacrifice has from time immemorial been the most considered part of Magick. The ethics of the thing appear to have concerned no one; nor, to tell the truth, need they do so. As St. Paul says, "Without shedding of blood there is no remission"; and who are we to argue with St. Paul? But, after all that, it is open to any one to have any opinion that he likes upon the subject, or any other subject, thank God! At the same time, it is most necessary to study the business, whatever we may be going to do about it; for our ethics themselves will naturally depend upon our theory of the universe. If we were quite certain, for example, that everybody went to heaven when he died, there could be no serious objection to murder or suicide, as it is generally conceded — by those who know neither — that earth is not such a pleasant place as heaven.

However, there is a mystery concealed in this theory of the bloody sacrifice which is of great importance to the student, and we therefore make no further apology, We should not have made even this apology for an apology, had it not been for the solicitude of a pious young friend of great austerity of character who insisted that the part of this chapter which now follows — the part which was originally written — might cause us to be misunderstood. This must not be.

The blood is the life. This simple statement is explained by the Hindus[1] by saying that the blood is the principal vehicle of vital Prana.[2] There is some ground for the belief that there is a definite substance,[3] not isolated as yet, whose presence makes all the difference between live and dead matter. We pass by with deserved contempt the pseudo-scientific experiments of American charlatans who claim to have established that weight is lost at the moment of death, and the unsupported statements of alleged clairvoyants that they have seen the soul issuing like a vapour from the mouth of persons in articulo mortis; but his experiences as an explorer have convinced the Master Therion that meat loses a notable portion of its nutritive value within a very few minutes after the death of the animal, and that this loss proceeds with ever-diminishing rapidity as time goes on. It is further generally conceded that live food, such as oysters, is the most rapidly assimilable and most concentrated form of energy.[4] Laboratory experiments in food-values seem to be almost worthless, for reasons which we cannot here enter into; the general testimony of mankind appears a safer guide.

It would be unwise to condemn as irrational the practice of those savages who tear the heart and liver from an adversary, and devour them while yet warm. In any case it was the theory of the ancient Magicians, that any living being is a storehouse of energy varying in quantity according to the size and health of the animal, and in quality according to its mental and moral character. At the death of the animal this energy is liberated suddenly.

The animal should therefore be killed[5] within the Circle, or the Triangle, as the case may be, so that its energy cannot escape. An animal should be selected whose nature accords with that of the ceremony — thus, by sacrificing a female lamb one would not obtain any appreciate quantity of the fierce energy useful to a Magician who was invoking Mars. In such a case a ram[6] would be more suitable. And this ram should be virgin — the whole potential of its original total energy should not have been diminished in any way.[7] For the highest spiritual working one must accordingly choose that victim which contains the greatest and purest force. A male child of perfect innocence and high intelligence[8] is the most satisfactory and suitable victim.

For evocations it would be more convenient to place the blood of the victim in the Triangle — the idea being that the spirit might obtain from the blood this subtle but physical substance which was the quintessence of its life in such a manner as to enable it to take on a visible and tangible shape.[9]

Those magicians who object to the use of blood have endeavored to replace it with incense. For such a purpose the incense of Abramelin may be burnt in large quantities. Dittany of Crete is also a valuable medium. Both these incenses are very catholic in their nature, and suitable for almost any materialization.

But the bloody sacrifice, though more dangerous, is more efficacious; and for nearly all purposes human sacrifice is the best. The truly great Magician will be able to use his own blood, or possibly that of a disciple, and that without sacrificing the physical life irrevocably.[10] An example of this sacrifice is given in Chapter 44[11] of Liber 333. This Mass may be recommended generally for daily practice.

One last word on this subject. There is a Magical operation of maximum importance: the Initiation of a New Aeon. When it becomes necessary to utter a Word, the whole Planet must be bathed in blood. Before man is ready to accept the Law of Thelema, the Great War must be fought. This Bloody Sacrifice is the critical point of the World-Ceremony of the Proclamation of Horus, the Crowned and conquering Child, as Lord of the Aeon.[12]

This whole matter is prophesied in The Book of the Law itself; let the student take note, and enter the ranks of the Host of the Sun.

II

There is another sacrifice with regard to which the Adepts have always maintained the most profound secrecy. It is the supreme mystery of practical Magick. Its name is the Formula of the Rosy Cross. In this case the victim is always — in a certain sense — the Magician himself, and the sacrifice must coincide with the utterance of the most sublime and secret name of the God whom he wishes to invoke.

Properly performed, it never fails of its effect. But it is difficult for the beginner to do it satisfactorily, because it is a great effort for the mind to remain concentrated upon the purpose of the ceremony. The overcoming of this difficulty lends most powerful aid to the Magician.

It is unwise for him to attempt it until he has received regular initiation in the true[13] Order of the Rosy Cross, and he must have taken the vows with the fullest comprehension and experience of their meaning. It is also extremely desirable that he should have attained an absolute degree of moral emancipation,[14] and that purity of spirit which results from a perfect understanding both of the differences and harmonies of the planes upon the Tree of Life.

For this reason Frater Perdurabo has never dared to use this formula in a fully ceremonial manner, save once only, on an occasion of tremendous import, when, indeed, it was not He that made the offering, but ONE in Him. For he perceived a grave defect in his moral character which he has been able to overcome on the intellectual plane, but not hitherto upon higher planes. Before the conclusion of writing this book he will have done so.[15]

The practical details of the Bloody Sacrifice may be studied in various ethnological manuals, but the general conclusions are summed up in Frazer's The Golden Bough, which is strongly recommended to the reader.

Actual ceremonial details likewise may be left to experiment. The method of killing is practically uniform. The animal should be stabbed to the heart, or its throat severed, in either case by the knife. All other methods of killing are less efficacious; even in the case of Crucifixion death is given by stabbing.[16]

One may remark that warm-blooded animals only are used as victims: with two principal exceptions. The first is the serpent, which is only used in a very special Ritual;[17] the second the magical beetles of Liber Legis. (See Part IV.)

One word of warning is perhaps necessary for the beginner. The victim must be in perfect health — or its energy may be as it were poisoned. It must also not be too large:[18] the amount of energy disengaged is almost unimaginably great, and out of all anticipated proportion to the strength of the animal. Consequently, the Magician may easily be overwhelmed and obsessed by the force which he has let loose; it will then probably manifest itself in its lowest and most objectionable form. The most intense spirituality of purpose[19] is absolutely essential to safety.

In evocations the danger is not so great, as the Circle forms a protection; but the circle in such a case must be protected, not only by the names of God and the Invocations used at the same time, but by a long habit of successful defence.[20] If you are easily disturbed or alarmed, or if you have not yet overcome the tendency of the mind to wander, it is not advisable for you to perform the Bloody Sacrifice.[21] Yet it should not be forgotten that this, and that other art at which we have dared darkly to hint, are the supreme formulae of Practical Magick.

You are also likely to get into trouble over this chapter unless you truly comprehend its meaning.[22]
...

1 Air is the principal vehicle of vital Prana in the Hindu system, blood in the Cabbalist. See Deuteronomy, ch. XII, v. 23: "Only be sure that thou eat not the blood; for the blood is the life."

2 Prana or "force" is often used as a generic term for all kinds of subtle energy. The prana of the body is only one of its "vayus". Vayu means air or spirit. The idea is that all bodily forces are manifestations of the finer forces of the more real body, this real body being a subtle and invisible thing.

3 This substance need not be conceived as "material" in the crude sense of Victorian science; we now know that such phenomena as the rays and emanations of radioactive substances occupy an intermediate position. For instance, mass is not, as once supposed, necessarily impermeable to mass, and matter itself can be only interpreted in terms of motion. So, as to "prana", one might hypothesize a phenomenon in the ether analogous to isomerism. We already know of bodies chemically identical whose molecular structure makes one active, another inactive, to certain reagents. Metals can be "tired" or even "killed" as to some of their properties, without discoverable chemical change. One can "kill" steel, and "raise it from the dead"; and flies drowned in icewater can be resuscitated. That it should be impossible to create high organic life is scientifically unthinkable, and the Master Therion believes it to be a matter of few years indeed before this is done in the laboratory. Already we restore the apparently drowned. Why not those dead from such causes as syncope? If we understood the ultimate physics and chemistry of the brief moment of death we would get hold of the force in some say, supply the missing element, reverse the electrical conditions or what not. Already we prevent certain kinds of death by supplying wants, as in the case of Thyroid.

4 One can become actually drunk on oysters, by chewing them completely. Rigor seems to be a symptom of the loss of what I may call the Alpha-energy and makes a sharp break in the curve. The Beta and other energies dissipate more slowly. Physiologists should make it their first duty to measure these phenomena; for their study is evidently a direct line of research into the nature of Life. The analogy between the living and complex molecules of the Uranium group of inorganic and the Protoplasm group of organic elements is extremely suggestive. The faculties of growth, action, self- recuperation, etc., must be ascribed to similar properties in both cases; and as we have detected, measured and partially explained radioactivity, it must be possible to contrive means of doing the same for Life.

5 It is a mistake to suppose that the victim is injured. On the contrary, this is the most blessed and merciful of all deaths, for the elemental spirit is directly built up into Godhead — the exact goal of its efforts through countless incarnations. On the other hand, the practice of torturing animals to death in order to obtain the elemental as a slave is indefensible, utterly black magic of the very worst kind, involving as it does a metaphysical basis of dualism. There is, however, no objection to dualism or black magic when they are properly understood. See the account of the Master Therion's Great Magical Retirement by Lake Pasquaney, where he "crucified a toad in the Basilisk abode". [N.b. This ritual is printed in full in The Great Beast, 1971, by John Symonds.]

6 A wolf would be still better in the case of Mars. See 777 for the correspondences between various animals and the "32 Paths" of Nature.

7 There is also the question of its magical freedom. Sexual intercourse creates a link between its exponents, and therefore a responsibility.

8 It appears from the Magical Records of Frater Perdurabo that He made this particular sacrifice on an average about 150 times every year between 1912 e.v. and 1928 e.v. Contrast J.K. Huyman's Lá-Bas, where a perverted form of Magic of an analogous order is described.
"It is the sacrifice of oneself spiritually. And the intelligence and innocence of that male child are the perfect understanding of the Magician, his one aim, without lust of result. And male he must be, because what he sacrifices is not the material blood, but his creative power." This initiated interpretation of the texts was sent spontaneously by Soror I.W.E. [N.b. The initials of the motto of Martha Küntzel, a member of the A∴A∴], for the sake of the younger Brethren.

9 See The Equinox (I, V. Supplement: Tenth Aethyr) for an Account of an Operation where this was done. Magical phenomena of the creative order are conceived and germinate in a peculiar thick velvet darkness, crimson, purple, or deep blue, approximating black: as if it were said, In the body of Our Lady of the Stars.
See 777 for the correspondences of the various forces of Nature with drugs, perfumes, etc.

10 Such details, however, may safely be left to the good sense of the Student. Experience here as elsewhere is the best teacher. In the Sacrifice during Invocation, however, it may be said without fear of contradiction that the death of the victim should coincide with the supreme invocation.

11 Liber 333 is The Book of Lies; 44 is the number of the Hebrew word DM, "blood".

12 Note: This paragraph was written in the summer of 1911 e.v., just three years before its fulfilment.

13 It is here desirable to warn the reader against the numerous false orders which have impudently assumed the name of Rosicrucian. The Masonic Societas Rosicruciana is honest and harmless; and makes no false pretences; if its members happen as a rule to be pompous busy-bodies, enlarging the borders of their phylacteries, and scrupulous about cleansing the outside of the cup and the platter; if the masks of the Officers in their Mysteries suggest the Owl, the Cat, the Parrot, and the Cuckoo, while the Robe of their Chief Magus is a Lion's Skin, that is their affair. But those orders run by persons claiming to represent the True Ancient Fraternity are common swindles. The representatives of the late S. L. Mathers (Count McGregor) are the phosphorescence of the rotten wood of a branch which was lopped off the tree at the end of the 19th century. [N.b. A typical Crowley exaggeration; he is referring to the Golden Dawn.] Those of Papus (Dr. Encausse), Stanislas de Guaita and Péladan, merit respect as serious, but lack full knowledge and authority. The "Ordo Rosae Crucis" is a mass of ignorance and falsehood, but this may be a deliberate device for masking itself. The test of any Order is its attitude towards the Law of Thelema. The True Order presents the True Symbols, but avoids attaching the True Name thereto; it is only when the Postulant has taken irrevocable Oaths and been received formally, that he discovers what Fraternity he has joined. If he have taken false symbols for true, and find himself magically pledged to a gang of rascals, so much the worse for him!

14 This results from the full acceptance of the Law of THELEMA, persistently put into practice.

15 P.S. With the happiest results. P.

16 Yet one might devise methods of execution appropriate to the Weapons: Stabbing or clubbing for the Lance or Wand, drowning or poisoning for the Cup, Beheading for the Sword, Crushing for the Disk, Burning for the Lamp, and so forth.

17 The Serpent is not really killed; it is seethed in an appropriate vessel; and it issues in due season refreshed and modified, but still essentially itself. The idea is the transmission of life and wisdom from a vehicle which has fulfilled its formula to one capable of further extension. The development of a wild fruit by repeated plantings in suitable soil is an analogous operation.

18 The sacrifice (e.g.) of a bull is sufficient for a large number of people; hence it is commonly made in public ceremonies, and in some initiations, e.g. that of a King, who needs force for his whole kingdom. Or again, in the Consecration of a Temple.
See Lord Dunsany, The Blessing of Pan — a noble and most notable prophecy of Life's fair future.

19 This is a matter of concentration, with no ethical implication. The danger is that one may get something which one does not want. This is "bad" by definition. Nothing is in itself good or evil. The shields of the Sabines which crushed Tarpeia were not murderous to them, but the contrary. Her criticism of them was simply that they were what she did not want in her Operation.

20 The habitual use of the Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram (say, thrice daily) for months and years and constant assumption of the God-form of Harpocrates (See The Equinox, I, II and Liber 333, cap. XXV for both of these) should make the "real circle", i.e. the Aura of the Magus, impregnable.
This Aura should be clean-cut, resilient, radiant, iridescent, brilliant, glittering. "A soap-bubble of razor-steel, streaming with light from within" is my first attempt at description; and is not bad, despite its incongruities: P.

"Frater Perdurabo, on the one occasion on which I was able to see Him as He really appears, was brighter than the Sun at noon. I fell instantly to the floor in swoon which lasted several hours, during which I was initiated." Soror A∴. Cf. Rev. I, 12-17. [N.b. Soror A∴ was probably Soror Achitha or Roddie Minor, "the Camel", with whom Crowley worked during his American period. She was, in fact, the Scarlet Woman of that time. See The Confessions.]

21 The whole idea of the word Sacrifice, as commonly understood, rests upon an error and superstition, and is unscientific, besides being metaphysically false. The Law of Thelema has totally changed the Point of View as to this matter. Unless you have thoroughly assimilated the Formula of Horus, it is absolutely unsafe to meddle with this type of Magick. Let the young Magician reflect upon the Conservation of Matter and of Energy.

22 There is a traditional saying that whenever an Adept seems to have made a straightforward, comprehensible statement, then is it most certain that He means something entirely different. The Truth is nevertheless clearly set forth in His Words: it is His simplicity that baffles the unworthy. I have chosen the expressions in this Chapter in such a way that it is likely to mislead those magicians who allow selfish interests to cloud their intelligence, but to give useful hints to such as are bound by the proper Oaths to devote their powers to legitimate ends. "...thou hast no right but to do thy will." "It is a lie, this folly against self." The radical error of all uninitiates is that they define "self" as irreconcilably opposed to "not-self." Each element of oneself is, on the contrary, sterile and without meaning, until it fulfils itself, by "love under will", in its counterpart in the Macrocosm. To separate oneself from others is to destroy oneself; the way to realize and to extend oneself is to lose that self — its sense of separateness — in the other. Thus: Child plus food: this does not preserve one at the expense of the other; it "destroys" or rather changes both in order to fulfil both in the result of the operation — a grown man. It is in fact impossible to preserve anything as it is by positive action upon it. Its integrity demands inaction; and inaction, resistance to change, is stagnation, death and dissolution due to the internal putrefaction of the starved elements.

[guruilla]

RECALLING ALEX SANDERS
by Jack Pleasant

I was in for a surprise when Alex Sanders offered to show me his Wiccan temple. I was visiting the famous magician and self-styled King of the Witches at his cottage in the Old Town at Bexhill-on-Sea, in Sussex, in 1978, to interview him for a national magazine. He was pleasant and amusing and we'd already had a couple of drinks at his favourite nearby pub, The Bell.
‘This is where it all happens,’ he said with a mischievous smile as he opened the door to the temple. Remarkably, I found it was furnished almost completely with Christian items, including statues of Christ and the Virgin Mary.

‘Even some witches have told me it’s blasphemous to practise witchcraft in what looks like a Christian chapel‚’ he said. ‘But for me, Christ represents the Sun God and Mary the Earth Mother. Christianity and witchcraft may seem very different, but underneath they have a lot in common. I didn't deliberately gather all these Christian objects, I might add. It was quite strange. Soon after I moved in here, over a short period various people suddenly started offering them to me. Others were mysteriously left in the garden. It was as if some higher power had decreed that's how my temple should be.’

At the time, Alex, then aged 52, had a partner who was a young male civil servant.

'I love him utterly,’ he maintained. 'He was married to a beautiful girl, but she didn't stand a chance against me. He was dressed as a skinhead when I first met him four years ago, with the regulation shaven head, bovver boots and turned-up jeans. Today, he is a presentable young man. Women give me fulfillment, but I find happiness with men.'

His well known bi-sexuality, it's suggested, may have resulted from an experience as a boy with the infamous occultist and reputed 'Wickedest Man in the World', Aleister Crowley. Sanders had been initiated as a witch, he claimed, at aged just seven, by his witch grandmother, Mary Bibby, whom he had chanced on standing naked in the kitchen in a circle drawn on the floor.

'She ordered me to strip naked and enter the circle,’ he recalled. ‘She carried out a ritual and then on her instructions, as I bent down with my head between my thighs she nicked my scrotum with a knife and said “You are one of us now.” She later gave me her Book of Shadows to copy into my own and taught me all the rites'.

At ten, she took him to London to meet Aleister Crowley, whom she knew.

'She left me with Crowley for the night and he carried out some of his sex magic with me,’ said Alex. 'It wasn't a very nice experience. To me, as a young boy, he was just a horrible, smelly, old man. Before I left he tattooed his “mark of the beast” on my hand. It's still there. It hardly turned me off sex though. At one time when I was still in London with my second wife, Maxine, I also had two mistresses and nine male lovers. It's a much quieter life here in Bexhill-on-Sea. My current coven is only five-strong and just one of them is a woman.'

Outrageous and a born showman as he was, Alex Sanders has to be credited with publicising modern witchcraft and, indeed, founding in the 196Os its flourishing Alexandrian branch of Wicca to rival the existing Gardnerian of Gerald Gardner. Although some of his magic was 'grey’, he insisted to me that most of it was 'white’, often aimed at healing people. He told me that while at Bexhill he had helped a number of drug addicts to get off heavy drugs and cured a woman of cystitis by simply placing his hands on her head and 'willing her illness away'. He also claimed to have used magic to help women with fertility problems and people just having trouble getting a job.

But with a wicked grin he did admit that on occasion he got rid of people's warts by magically transferring them to somebody else he didn't like. His favourite targets for this, he revealed, were passing traffic wardens! And friends maintained that he had only to whistle the funeral march at someone who had upset him to have them in hospital within the week.

(*Jack Pleasant adds: ‘I came to be fond of Alex Sanders and to consider him an entertaining friend. It pleased him when on occasion, I called on him bearing a bottle of the appalling, to my taste, cheap, sweet, white Spanish wine that he enjoyed. I missed him when he died in 1988, choosing the significant Wiccan date to pass on to the Summerlands of April 3Oth -
Beltane Eve.')

https://web.archive.org/web/20080509101 ... anders.htm

Alex Sanders: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alex_Sanders_(Wiccan)

[Burnt Hill]

Strength and Support: How They Can Be Opposites

I recently went through one of those life experiences where you lose several important things at once. In my case, it was a very close friend, my only employee, and my only volunteer for a charity I administrate, all in the same day. Back when I was a young woman, I once lost my fiance and my career job within days of each other. In both these instances, I felt initially absolutely devastated. And to my great surprise, shortly after, I felt not only better than before, but absolutely wonderful. I felt like I had returned to connection with a deep level of myself, like I was once again living from there after a long time away.

In the most recent case, I not only felt better, but noticed that all my irritability had gone. Impatience is an inherited trait that I feel is one of my main personality flaws. But when I was stranded two weeks ago, with nowhere to turn for support, I was left with only one resource, myself. I was forced, so to speak, back on myself, and when that happened, suddenly small things that normally irritated me didn’t anymore. I felt serene, lighter, more competent. I got more done. I felt like a better person. And problems I’d been dealing with somehow got resolved, without the struggle I had been accustomed to.

That the losses made things better came as a great surprise. I’ve spent considerable meditation time focusing on the mystery, looking within to understand what I just went through. Why did I lose the friend, the employee, and the volunteer? What did I contribute that influenced their leaving? And why did I feel better with their being gone, even though my outer burdens had greatly increased by the loss?

Insights come to me in packets, not in linear reasoning – the kind of thing Robert Monroe described in his books as “thought balls.” I’ll try to unravel the thought ball that exploded on me regarding this situation, because the information in it makes sense of so much more than just the isolated experience. I think it explains a lot about how the universe works.

The ancient Hindu holy books (such as The Bhagavad-Gita) teach that the core flaw in the human make-up is desire. They teach that to be spiritually free, we must be and act without desire, that we must want nothing that exists in the outer world, that we must only value the transcendental divine. We are told to renounce the things of the world in order to please God, to sacrifice ourselves and our desires to God, in order to become worthy of liberation. The Indian gurus teach that the physical world is an illusion, a quagmire for souls wandering away from their original home in the infinite. To get back home, we must extricate ourselves from the quagmire, we’re told; the more we renounce the things of this world, sacrificing personal desires to the gods, the more direct our homeward journey.

This philosophy is riddled with lies to waylay the human spirit, but like most popular religious doctrines, it contains within it the distortion of a truth – a truth so powerful and empowering that the religions must cloak it in heavy disguise to keep people from discovering it and becoming free of their system of control. For years I have been repelled by the Indian teaching that desires are bad and that we must give up material things to be spiritual, and I’ve lived in quite the opposite direction. But only with the arrival of this thought-ball did I perceive the truth beneath the “desires must be renounced” lie, the truth the controllers are so worried we’ll discover.

That truth is that it is not desires that lead away from spiritual freedom; rather, the problem is looking outside ourselves for the source of our support. So long as we cling to people and things in the belief that we need them to survive, we live in the illusion that we don’t have what it requires to take care of ourselves through our own spiritual power. Desires are not damaging per se; they only weaken us if we desire in the spirit of neediness, as someone who must have the support of a particular person, place, or thing in order to be safe, well, abundant, or happy. By contrast, when we have desires that come from joy, from self-expressiveness, from creativity and happiness, those desires shine the infinite within us out into the world, making the world a more beautiful place. They do not weaken us; rather, they brighten existence.

By getting people to think that desires are the enemy, Eastern religions have succeeded in destroying the creativity and gumption that are needed to transform the Earth into something wonderful. By telling us the outer world is just “Illusion” and therefore of no intrinsic worth, they get people to stop caring, doing, desiring, solving problems, and making things better. In fact, desires are treasures if they come from the place deep within us. They are the channel through which the infinite continually creates, expressing itself in the universe.

The artist desires to make a beautiful painting; the lover desires to develop a tender relationship; the builder desires to build a fantastic mansion; and the entrepreneur desires to build a vibrant business. There is nothing innately wrong with those desires – they are divine in their origin. The problem only comes in when the artist thinks he can’t survive without a patron, the lover thinks he must have his beloved in order to live, the builder believes construction depends on things outside of his control, and the entrepreneur thinks he’s at the mercy of the market.

In all these examples, the problem is one of looking in the wrong place for support: the problem is not with the desire itself. When we go through a devastating loss and feel better than we did when we had the thing we wanted, it’s because the loss has freed us from our false belief that we must have the support of that thing or person in order to thrive. Our desire was of the dependent kind, not the joyous self-expressive kind. We started out with a joyous desire most likely, but then forgot where the happiness was coming from: our inner self. We forgot that the art comes from a glorious inner vision that is dependent on no one, that the beloved was drawn to us on account of the inherent attraction in who we are, that the mansion was born in the mind and can only spring from there – nowhere else – into reality, and that the business runs on the natural gravity/attraction between people of kindred interests.

It’s not that support does not come to us from the outer world (the environment) or that it shouldn’t. Things around us naturally are drawn to us in accord with the workings of our mind and heart. The things we focus on do indeed gather around us, and if we’re in tune with ourselves, thinking in a way that is joyous and centered, then the things we attract are good, and the support we need for our dreams and desires manifests in our life in the form of magnificent outer phenomena. The money comes just when we need it, the love is there for us that we long to experience, the material resolution to a problem we are dealing with naturally appears.

Things and people come to us as support, but the source of the support is not the things and people: it is the mechanism of desiring in an integrated way, of desiring from the level of our inner font of infinity. It is our inner font of fullness that draws to us the things we need when we need them, that fulfills our desires. So long as we’re in touch with this, we don’t rely too heavily on the manifestation of support that appears. We know it comes from the inner source of infinite supply, so we’re not too attached to how things play out. We know if a person who supported us leaves or changes, someone or something better will appear – someone or something more resonant with our needs, attracted to fulfilling them because doing so fulfills their own desires of joyous expression.

In other words, so long as we are in touch with the miracle of where things really come from – the inner divine – we will always have the outer support we need without being overly dependent on it. We will have needs and desires, the environment will support them, but we’ll know it is the infinite that supports the things and people in the environment that is providing for us. We’ll know to go to the infinite within us when we are in need, rather than begging or manipulating people to help us when they don’t want to, and rather than grasping for things that belong to others. We’ll navigate the outer world with a song in our heart, gracefully moving among our brethren, attracting to us everything we wish for in a way that supports at the same time as we are supported.

It’s easy to get off-kilter when things are going well, and to find ourselves forgetting where the good in our life came from. We start to think we’re happy because so-and-so is there, and how would we ever get by without her? The valued employee comes to be seen as irreplaceable. The job that pays our bills starts to seem like the reason we have the things we do. In fact, good things are there because we first desired them (in the harmonious, empowered state of consciousness that attracts), and it is the inner infinite – the source of all desire and fulfillment – that sustains us, not its expressions in the world that appear when they are needed.

Suffering is not caused by having desires. It’s caused by desiring things in a wimpy, helpless way. And by believing that something outside ourselves (something other than the infinite source within) is responsible for making us happy.

When we get off-center and start to get stuck in the physical manifestations of life, people we depended on tend to pull away from us, because we get needy and put pressure on them to stay with us. They no longer feel they are there because they want to be, but because we insist we can’t do without them. The joyous desire they had to support us fades into resentment, and they start to look for a way of leaving. No one wants to feel they are our main life support, because that calls them away from living their own life based on their own inner callings. Because we get desperate, they feel perhaps they are duty-bound to stay with us forever, but their resentment builds at that, because our desperation interferes with their need to take direction from the desires within, not from someone outside themselves.

When we’ve gotten ourselves into a dependent situation, I think it is the divine within both ourselves and the other person that maneuvers to destroy the bond, because the bond has become suffocating. Suddenly we’re irritated all the time with the person we think we need so desperately, and we don’t know why we’re acting that way. The “needed” person stops having fun being with us. And eventually something explodes to blow the relationship to bits, and both people sit in their aloneness wondering what just happened.

What happened, I think, is that our inner infinite self worked subconsciously to break us free of a relationship that had become unhealthy, of an illusion we were developing that we were dependent on something outside for our contentment or success. Our inner divine nature felt confined by the small shapes we were boxing ourselves into, and rebelled. It blew the thing up to get back in control, to regain its seat in our awareness as the ordainer of our life. Our deepest self rebelled, and kicked out the intruder who had usurped it as god. We’re stunned, we weep, but we feel better. We had become spiritually sick; the fever finally broke, and we are well again.

Addendum:

Hinduism teaches that by renouncing desires we regain our connection with our inner infinity. That is the explanation behind the doctrine that celibacy and poverty embraced through monastic living lead to spiritual liberation (enlightenment). In fact, cutting off our desires maims us spiritually. We cease functioning as a vibrant expression of the infinite in this world.

But there is a kernel of wisdom inside this admonition for withdrawal from pleasant sense experiences: by pulling ourselves back from the pleasures of the senses, we encourage our attention to go inward, reconnecting with its unlimited source. The mind constantly directed outward into the world of matter through sense experience tends to get overshadowed by the world. It forgets who it is: its heritage as a child of infinity, eternity, that field of all possibilities.

By withdrawing the senses from the world sometimes, we’re able to restore our experience of our inmost selves. That’s what meditation is supposed to do (and does, if we don’t allow gods and mantras to interfere with it). That’s what fasting is supposed to do. That’s what alone time is supposed to do. We all need to touch base with base camp regularly in order to remember the way back there and to keep the flow of supplies coming from there into our life.

When we overindulge in eating, eating more than we need to, eating for sheer pleasure, being “decadent” as we call it with a laugh, we are doing action that takes us away from consciousness of our power. We overindulge because the soothing pleasure of food makes us feel supported, nurtured. We overindulge with “comfort food.” But this is a dangerous practice because by taking in more than we need, we contribute to the illusion that we rely on food to feel comfortable and happy. With habitual overeating, this belief deepens in our psyche. We really think we can’t survive without oodles of cookies, or without lots of steak. This belief disconnects us from the glory and power of our inner selves, and makes us more dependent on something outside ourselves for our happiness and survival. In time, such a belief leads to overweight and health problems, which further limit our easy expression of the infinite source.

How much of the need to eat is the belief in the need to eat? How much of it is bad habit? The good thing is that by withdrawing ourselves from constantly indulging in pleasurable tastes, we can break the dependence. By eating less, by rejecting the option of eating certain delightful bites of food, we step back into ourselves, the power of our spirituality, and out of the illusion of the need to constantly taste.

Eating takes the life away from something else, from the entity we are eating. I often think the need to eat is the essential flaw in the universe. It has us dependent on taking the life of others in order to live ourselves, when in fact, being made of infinite energy, we should – in theory – be able to survive just fine on our own inner infinite power supply. Because we don’t know how to do that, we all are engaged in stealing or destroying the life of other things in order to prolong our own. Surely the Infinite, in creating the world, had a better idea in mind. Surely we’ve gotten lost somewhere. Spiritual adulthood surely must include learning to live on the light of God within rather than constantly needing to take life from others. The door to learning how to live on God’s light is surely approached by choosing to eat less compulsively, less automatically, less mindlessly. By saying no a lot of the time to pleasant taste experiences, just to develop our spiritual muscle. To break the powerful connection between ourselves and our food, the deep conviction that we must take life in order to survive. It seems to me that by withdrawing from unnecessary food, we should be able to slowly build up the power to live without taking life.

It would be stupid, of course, to suddenly stop eating. To withdraw from the support of food without first building up our skill in sustaining ourselves on the infinite energy supply within – that would kill most if not all of us. I say “most” because I’ve heard of people who claim to have done it, but why risk your life finding out if it’s possible, when you can find out safely by making gradual, healthy changes in your eating habits? Research shows that most permanent improvements in lifestyle are made not by radical reversals but by gradual introduction of better habits. That certainly would be a wiser approach to dietary change than something extreme and potentially life-threatening. Our lives are precious, and it’s wrong to carelessly gamble with them. I’ve added this paragraph for any reader who might get the idea that Bronte thinks it’s good to just stop eating in order to develop spiritual power. That’s nonsense. You can’t do much with your spiritual power in this world if you’re dead.

But I do think pulling back from the excesses of eating, and sometimes withdrawing from the pleasures of taste for a period, redirects the mind to remember and connect with its spiritual source. It’s a valid practice, just as is the kind of genuine meditation that simply focuses the attention back on itself, attaining the primordial state of alert, serene stillness. By consciously experiencing our inner nature through meditation, we naturally start acting from that deep, powerful level in our daily life. This is spiritual empowerment, and the secret of success in the world.

Bronte Baxter

© Bronte Baxter 2010 – all rights reserved.

Anyone may print or republish this article so long as they include a link or tagline pointing back to this website address.
https://brontebaxter.wordpress.com/2010/09/18/strength-and-support-how-they-can-be-opposites/

[guruilla]

Ritual Violence: Sold Out Catholic Church Conference in Germany vs. ‘LICENCE TO KILL’ in the UK
Kurz (2015) TPF Presentation – Politics and the Psychology of Abuse and Cover-up

I just returned from the conference ‘Rituelle Gewalt’ organised by the Catholic University in Muenster. 250 delegates attended with a waiting list of 50. The 2013 conference helped me come to terms with the chilling realities of the extreme abuse scene but references to Alestair [sic] Crowley and associated satanist/luciferian ideologies were rather ‘hushed’. This time however most presenters tackled these and made overt reference to ‘Human Sacrifice Murder’.

In the opening contribution organiser Brigitte Hahn bravely laid out what kind of abuse, torture and murder disclosures are made (in total confidence) to pastoral personnel. She explained the ideological background and also touched on recent ‘Terrorist’ events (e.g. McDonalds shooting in Munich) and disasters (e.g. German Wings tragedy). She shared the following definition:

‘Ritual Violence’ is planned and systematic physical and psychological violence in the context of an ideology or view of the world.

Dr Brigitte Bosse talked about the issues from her experience as a medical practitioner and trauma specialist including discovery that two long-standing clients had been ritually abused.

Prof. Dr. Adelheid Herrmann-Pfandt provided a religious science perspective with rare insights into the reward and punishment emotions evoked through criminal acts in ritual violence groups.

Thomas Werner, Christiane Hobbie and Manuela Wasmann shared their forensic experiences in investigating Ritual Violence cases and provided valuable advice e.g. to first discuss matters with a victim support organisation and/or solicitor before contacting police.

Brave survivors talked about their exit from destructive cults who use ‘secret service’ style methods such as mind control, surveillance and intimidation to run their strictly hierarchical organisations. ‘Nicky’ described how a cult baby was sacrificed in a ritual – seemingly on the Wewelsburg which is a hot spot of German right wing mythology. She was one of the self-identified survivors who had come forward for the TV program ‘Hoellenleben’ (Life in Hell) broadcast by ARD in 2001 which raised awareness of the issues in Germany:

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xd55qg ... uch-1_news

This broadcast lead Journalist Claudia Fisher to turn her attention to extreme violence. A few successful prosecutions in Germany were mentioned in her lecture:

https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mordfall_ ... dershausen Murder of a youngster by three right wing musicians

https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mordfall_von_Witten Satanic couple murdered a work colleague

https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Dietmar_Eschner
Proponent of ‘Thelema’ ideology based on Aleister Crowley sentenced to 6 years for sexual abuse

The latter seems related to the ideology of Ordo Templi Orientis (O.T.O.) and the associated ‘Ecclesia Gnostica Catholica’ (EGC) or Gnostic Catholic Church which are organised around the ‘Law of Thelema’ as the central religious principle. The law is expressed as “Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law” and “Love is the law, love under will” and was promulgated in 1904 with the writing of The Book of the Law.

A Therapist shared with me how we had to read up on matters when a former client returned with colourful account of abuse under this ‘Thelema’ ideology.
...

https://psychassessmentblog.wordpress.com/

[semper occultus]

...there's that famous story about him leaving people to die on a mountain climbing expedition that basically saw him drummed out of the "club" of top mountain climbers.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1905_Kanchenjunga_expedition

People in Camp V heard "frantic cries" and Reymond immediately descended to help, but Crowley stayed in his tent. That evening he wrote a letter to a Darjeeling newspaper stating that he had advised against the descend and that "a mountain 'accident' of this sort is one of the things for which I have no sympathy whatever".

..the story is usually couched in terms of some sort of upper-class callousness but one wonders if he wasn't sat in his tent channelling the expiry of his fellow climbers for some bit of on-the-fly magick-ritual....

[RocketMan]

I don't know where else to put this, anyone who has a better thread in mind, do speak up... This just popped up in my Facebook feed.

http://disinfo.com/2016/09/thou-wilt-sh ... -campaign/

In total WTF news, apparently Arby’s has decided to invoke everyone’s favorite preternaturally vague Thelemite motto in a recent social media marketing campaign

[guruilla]

Who was it saying AC was culturally negligible?

Is the eight pointed star on the phone usual or is that another Thelema nod?

[Edit. Never mind. Curious juxtaposition tho.]

[PufPuf93]

Who was it saying AC was culturally negligible?

Is the eight pointed star on the phone usual or is that another Thelema nod?

[Edit. Never mind. Curious juxtaposition tho.]

"Do what thou wilt" was specifically borrowed from Rabelais by Crowley (as was Abbey of Thelema) and also could be sourced from Saint Augustine. The phrase is used by some Wiccans (that probably way out number Thelemites) at present.

The intertwined ouroboros is a symbol not foreign to Crowley but a common symbol from hermeticism, Egyptian or Greek magic, Gnosticism, or Carl Jung among others.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ouroboros

[dada]

[dada]

I'll tell you, guruilla, I've been putting some thought into my views on Crowley since the discussion on that 'CERN' thread. (I haven't come around to your view, but my opinion has definitely changed)

I still think his more 'shocking' statements were probably just that; he was doing it for the shock value. Maybe he was speaking 'poetically,' but in those cases he still chose those metaphors deliberately to shock. To the extent he was aware that he would be misinterpreted (assuming he was doing this purposefully, and wasn't actually a monster) he was being irresponsible, at the very least.

I think if everything he'd written was all blood sacrifice, black magic, shock value crap, I'd never have been remotely interested. But as he wrote on a variety of subjects, and much of his writing is of a high quality (my opinion, of course) I took the time to look into it. And I got something out of it. Maybe what I 'got out of it' has more to do with me than him. There is something there, though. Or I wouldn't have bothered at all.

So I've gotten something out of it. Now as I step back and look critically from where I am now, I see some things I don't like. And I'm certainly free to do that. I don't 'owe' him or his writing anything.

First, pushing and encouraging his reputation as the 'most dangerous man in the world.' There's a sense of desperation to that. As if he's just another fame-chaser, working an angle to get his name in the paper. Working the 'Crowley brand' angle undermines anything worthwhile in his writing, making his whole oeuvre look like just an act. Any creativity looks contrived, any genuine cleverness appears as artifice. All he really wants is just to be famous, so he can sell some books.

This leads to seeing Crowley's 'magic' as being very gimmicky. Ceremonial Magic is a big part of his brand image, he knows that it's what sells, so he sticks to it. What he feels is his biggest selling point ends up being his biggest limitation. To get anything out of his work you have to fight around the mystery school magic shtick. Even his most creatively inspired writing, however dense, rich, playful, is always marred by self-consciousness. He never grows out of it. He plays it safe. As I said somewhere before, he's clearly a failed magician.

Trying to make money on magic reaches its lowest, blandest form in theatre performances of 'rites of eleusis.' Maybe this is a matter of personal taste for me. I imagine I'd be embarrassed watching it. Only someone caught up in the 'aura of the new age' would see something in it. It makes me think that I only see anything redeeming in Crowley because I'm looking back, contemplating a dead object. If he were my contemporary, I'd most likely think he were an idiot.

Lastly, I have to wonder how much he bought into his own sell. Getting others to buy into your 'school,' buying your books, maybe paying to join your abbey is one thing, but falling for your own racket is just plain dumb. I'm thinking about Gurdjieff, who in his last book makes it clear that he didn't buy his own bs. Maybe that's why he was a more successful businessman than Crowley. I wonder.

So there's my new critique of Crowley.

One other thing; just because we're both critical of Crowley now, don't think we're on the same side here, guruilla. I still haven't gotten over that Chick-tract vampire guy you linked to. 'Typhonian tunnels.' It's gonna take some time for me to get beyond that one.

[Sounder]

dada wrote...

First, pushing and encouraging his reputation as the 'most dangerous man in the world.' There's a sense of desperation to that. As if he's just another fame-chaser, working an angle to get his name in the paper. Working the 'Crowley brand' angle undermines anything worthwhile in his writing, making his whole oeuvre look like just an act. Any creativity looks contrived, any genuine cleverness appears as artifice. All he really wants is just to be famous, so he can sell some books.

To me, Crowley was/is a con man by virtue of his job in govt. People who lie for a living can get very good at it.

I looked into Crowley and the occult in general and found the truths to be well twisted, IMO because of the elite bias of the 'seekers'.

If you really want the jizz, go directly to source.

[guruilla]

@ dada: Thanks for the reach out. A few points to clarify my own position, which is not a “side,” so much as an orientation, an orientation to investigate as thoroughly and impartially as possible the possibility (in this case) of Crowley’s involvement in organized sexual abuse and the overlap between occultism as a belief system and these same said practices. To start with your last point, I don’t have the prophylactic approach to research that many RI posters seem to have; I’m not especially worried of contracting strange beliefs by exposing myself to unhygienic materials, et cetera. I follow the leads wherever they lead, and gather material which I consider relevant wherever I can find it. What counts for me is not where I gather material but the cleanliness and order of the space in which I am analyzing it, which mostly relates to my own (ever-developing) ability to discern true from false.

I have also been impressed and influenced by Crowley’s writings in the past, to the extent that I corresponded with Kenneth Grant for a period in 2002-2003. Grant endorsed several of my books and provided me with some significant validation for my research back then, including research into Crowley, and yes, Typhonian tunnels. While I doubt Grant would be so ready to validate my present researches, I also doubt he would have dismissed any of them out of hand, including the things “the Chick-tract vampire guy” wrote, simply out of a distrust or dislike of the source. The reason I say this is because I think Grant was aware of many of these aspects of Thelema and Crowley’s magical system, and even that he himself disapproved of them~ though the latter may be no more than a guess.

(Most of Grant's letters to me from this period are online here)

I think the main reason for the disagreements around Crowley, besides some people’s conscious or unconscious affiliation with/affinity for the man, have to do with the different worldviews which provide context for the evidence being presented. The context in which I am exploring Crowley’s possible complicity with organized ritual abuse is that of my own knowledge of the widespread nature of organized abuse within the ruling classes, within government factions, within the intelligence community, and within at least some occult groups (which I think are generally impossible to separate from intelligence networks anyhow, even going back to the very inception of both).

Crowley was from an aristocratic background and his entire life trajectory indicates a close entanglement with these elite factions, whether cultural, mystical, government, or intelligence. This makes it (for me) undeniable that he would have been aware of these long-term, widespread, and fundamental practices of organized sexual abuse, being as how they are, in my opinion, the very backbone of so-called “civilization,” and most specifically of the hidden machinations of the cultural, religious, and political elite. So, if Crowley knew about these practices, then this raises the question of why he did not write about them directly or ever attempt to expose them, if, as many have argued here, he was not himself complicit with them. And if he knew about them and chose not to expose them, then how does this not in itself constitute complicity?

For me it requires a kind of doublethink to get around this. If we acknowledge the reality of the cultural and political apparati through which Crowley was moving, and to which he was a significant asset, and if we examine Crowley’s own occultic and political philosophies and what little is known of his private magical practices (outside of his own written testimonies), how is it possible not to see a very clear continuity between these things? The primary method seems to be to continue to return the discussion to Crowley as an individual: his personality, his creative abilities, his moral integrity, even his sanity, all of which seem to me, though relevant of course as evidence, very minor in comparison to the clear correlation between Crowley’s cultural influence and the culture that made him influential.

This kind of discrepancy or disagreement of worldviews is also in evidence at the Joe Biden discussion, which is another case of the context making clear (or not) the meaning of the evidence. By this I mean that, since I already believe that anyone in a high position of power within the US political system is at the very least complicit with pedophilia (among other things), behavior such as Biden’s has to be seen in this context, not in the context of somebody’s uncle at somebody’s graduation ceremony acting a bit weird. If I’m honest, even in that comparatively benign context Biden’s behavior would scream out “ongoing abuse” to me, and perhaps I’ve been over-sensitized to this, though I really don’t think so. It is difficult, and continuously disorienting, for me at this particular forum, because I actually encounter more skepticism and denial around these subjects here than I do at a seemingly less informed forum such as Facebook. I tend to come to RI with the assumption that everybody here knows about the reality of organized child abuse including ritualistic elements and pertaining to the structures of power in our world, et cetera, et cetera, and that we can proceed from that shared understanding. Clearly this is very far from being the case. But then, even for myself, these ideas have only recently moved from the realm of intellectual theories and beliefs and started to become a lived-in reality. This shift of perspective does make all the difference in the world.