...and Crowley be thy Name

Rosanne

Thanks jmd! That was an enlightening article and I will re-focus through this subject. Great to find a path just before the New Year- I am grateful. ~Rosanne

ravenest

Abrac said:
The purpose for the working when it was originally written would have been to conjure the evil beings for the purpose of subjugating them for some higher purpose, though the logic behind conjuring an evil being for the purpose of doing good escapes me. *scratches head*

Really? You surprise me Abrac. Don't you see this all around yourself and in yourself?

Have you never used your anger or any other negative emotion by controlling it and directing it towards good.

Poison, in some cases can be medicine. And lets not even start about deadly radiation, nuclear medicine and power.

Conjuring can mean to bring forth and next comes control.

Check the whole spiritual history of the introduction of Buddhism to Tibet and the transformation and conversion of local demonic forces into believers of the Sutras and enacting helpful works.

I believe this is a much healthier force and method than suppression where 'evil' beings and things are left to stew in their own devices and our unconcious and emerge in ways we might not have any control over or awareness of.

ravenest

jmd said:
Also, I am in disagreement with ravenest's statement regarding Steiner ("[...] Rudolf Stiener wrote some very interesting stuff about Lucifer [...] but later runs of their books and their own organisations have censored them [...]" see post 38 above for the full quote). I'm not sure which of the many lecture series by Steiner, or which books and papers, are being referred to, but his usage of the name 'Lucifer', and, for that matter, 'Ahriman', and 'Christ' have been retained and, importantly, republished. The terms are too clear to be altered, and need not be (on the contrary!).

Yeah, sorry I didn;t quote it. Most of my books are packed away in storage and I couldn't be bothered to rumage through them to see if the book is still there. Unfortunatly I cant give you a title (I'll have a rumage in a day or two and see if I can find it) It had a title and in the insdie of the book it had a note that said something like 'formerly published under .... 'with a German or Austrian (?) title with the word Lucifer in it.

I'll try to find and quote titles and publisher and print dates. of course the publisher could be responsible for changing a title of a re-print, but in this case I thought the publisher was the Theosophical society.

jmd said:
On that reading, Crowley is very much a satanist, who sees in the Satan a being who delivers humanity from the shackles of ignorance and makes of Man a God.

Any 'Satan' that does that is a okay in my book.

jmd said:
This can be further evidenced by pointing to his bolded section on the next page, whereby he writes (p 194) that ""Obedience and faith to Him that liveth and triumpheth [...]" is your duty to your Holy Guardian Angel [...]" - in this case, given who he claims as his own HGA, his duty is obedience and faith in satan.

But if the 'Devil' is actually Pan. And Pan is the god of all animals, but specifically the god of the animal nature in Man, or the Deva of humanity (as each flower, plant animal and mineral has a deva, the human race has one too. Pan, in his incarnate nature and beings like Adam Kadamon to represent the celestial nature) and Crowley was an avatar of his age then it makes perfect sense that his HGA should be Pan or the 'Devil'.

jmd said:
I fail to see why, if one is very much into Crowley, this would not be taken on board as part of this man's chosen path.

Because one can take on board or not whatever one wants. Can I not study and get benefeit from Thoth with out mainlining heroin? Why do I have to accept the whole show. I might adhere to some of Tycho Brae's cosmology but I don't keep a dwarf in my downstairs dungeon.

Crowley, more so than others, warned about the futility and danger of copying his or anyone else's path other than forging your own.

jmd said:
...one needs to of course choose one's own path, but also would suggest that for some, an insight into Crowley's inclinations is sufficient to ward off further study into his views and system - without needing to read his whole corpus, nor take on board his suggested lines of study.

Unless one had similar inclinations of character, wanted to explore and shed light on those dark areas of the unconcious and was already interested in and undertaking those lines of study. Then A.C. is a boon.

Myrrha

Crowley, after his University days, didn't believe in Satan. He was a rationalist. All through his works you will find statements like:

"There is no God but Man" (Liber Oz and elsewhere)

"spirits...spheres... and gods... may or may not exist. It is immaterial whether they exist or not. Students are most earnestly warned against attributing philosophical valididty to any of them... it is essentail that [he] remain the master of all he beholds, hears or conceives, otherwise he will be the slave of illusion and the prey of madness." (Liber O)

The guardian angel and Hadit, that he speaks of in JMD's quote are philosophical principles, aspects of what you could call a solar "life force".

At times AC chose to express himself in the most shocking terms possible. (partly to get attention, to attract more people to his ideas. Bait and switch. Expedient means.) Magic in Theory and Practice was almost entirely written during one of the most extreme of these times, his Cefalu period.

If you feel that you are doing your intellect justice by deciding on the basis of some scary words in a single quote taken out of context that you don't need to look into it further, well, OK.

There might be good reasons not to be a Thelemite and there might be good reasons not to be comfortable with AC's personality. If someone who has actually read some of his works chooses to reduce the whole complex philosophy as it developed over many years to "Satanism", well OK

. I can't see it myself.

--Myrrha

Lillie

Definition of Satanism.

The BAD people in 'The Devil Rides Out'.

(do I hear a AC reference in there somewhere?)

Lillie's opinion on Crowley.....

When he was young he was really good looking.
But when he got older he looked like a toad.
*Sigh*

kwaw

Myrrha said:
If you feel that you are doing your intellect justice by deciding on the basis of some scary words in a single quote taken out of context that you don't need to look into it further, well, OK.

--Myrrha

"I have been taxed with assaulting what is commonly known as virtue. True; I hate it, but only in the same degree as I hate what is commonly known as vice...

"...Kwaw felt tired, after refreshing himself with sake and soda he continued:"The men who are willing by this means to become the saviours of their country shall be called the Synagogue of Satan, so as to keep themselves from the friendship of the fools who mistake names for things. There shall be masters of the Synagogue, but they will never seek to dominate. They shall most caefully abstain from inducing any man to seek the Tao by any other way than that of equilibrium. They shall develop individual genius without considering in their opinion its fruition will tend to the good or evil of their country or of the world; for who are they to interfere with a soul whose balance has been crowned by the most holy Tao?

Thien Tao; or, The Synagogue of Satan by Aleister Crowley

kwaw

Rosanne said:
..to aspire with increasing fervour and concentration, for six months, towards the obtaining of the Knowledge and Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel. Once He has appeared, it is then necessary, first, to call forth the Four Great Princes of the Evil of the World; next, their eight sub-princes; and, lastly, the three hundred and sixteen servitors of these.[/i]
~Rosanne

"And the last thing I shall say is that one begins to see that there isn't really quite a Wide-Wide-Wide-Wake-World till the Serpent outside has finished eating up his tail, and I don't really and truly understand that myself. But it doesn't matter; what you must all do is to find the Fairy Prince to come and ride away with you, so don't bother about the Serpent yet. That's all."

Lola Daydream in The Wake World by Aleister Crowley.

Lillie

Yeah, but the wake world is just weird.

Crowley writing in the voice of a twelve year old girl.

Really, really odd.

kwaw

kwaw said:
Lola Daydream in The Wake World by Aleister Crowley.

"I was telling you how we started from the Green Palace. There are three passages that lead to the Treasure House of Gold, and all of them are very dreadful. One is called Terror by Night, and another the Arrow by Day, and the third has a name that people are afraid to hear, so I won't say.

"But in the first we came to a mighty throne of gray granite, shaped like the sweetest pussy cat you ever saw, and set up on a desolate heath. It was midnight, and the Devil came down and sat in the midst; but my Fairy Prince whispered: "Hush! It is a great secret, but his name is Yeheswah, and he is the Saviour of the World." And that was very funny, because the girl next me thought it was Jesus Christ, till another Fairy Prince (my Prince's brother) whispered as he kissed her: "Hush, tell nobody ever, that is Satan, and he is the Saviour of the World."

We were a very great company, and I can't tell you of all the strange things we did and said, or of the song we sang as we danced face outwards in a great circle ever closing in on the Devil on the throne. But whenever I saw a toad or a bat, or some horrid insect, my Fairy Prince always whispered: "It is the Saviour of the World," and I saw that it was so. We did all the most beautiful wicked things you can imagine, and yet all the time knew they were good and right, and must be done if ever we were to get to the House of Gold. So we enjoyed ourselves very much and ate the most extraordinary supper you can think of. There were babies roasted whole and stuffed with pork sausages and olives; and some of the girls cut off chops and steaks from their own bodies, and gave them to a beautiful white cook at a silver grill, that was lighted with the gas of dead bodies and marshes; and he cooked them splendidly, and we all enjoyed it immensely. Then there was a tame goat with a gold collar, that went about laughing with everyone; and he was all shaved in patches like a poodle. We kissed him and petted him, and it was lovely. You must remember that I never let go of my Fairy Prince for a single instant, or of course I should have been turned into a horrid black toad.

"Then there was another passage called the Arrow by Day, and there was a most lovely lady all shining with the sun, and moon, and stars, who was lighting a great bowl of water with one hand, by dropping dew on it out of a cup, and with the other she was putting out a terrible fire with a torch. She had a red lion and a white eagle, that she had always had ever since she was a little girl. She had found them in a nasty pit full of all kinds of nasty filth, and they were very savage; but by always treating them kindly they had grown up faithful and good. This should be a lesson to all of us never to be unkind to our pets.

"My Fairy Prince was laughing all the time in the third path. There was nobody there but an old gentleman who had put on his bones outside, and was trying ever so hard to cut down the grass with a scythe. But the faster he cut it the faster it grew. My Fairy Prince said: "Everybody that ever was has come along this path, and yet only one ever got to the end of it." But I saw a lot of people walking straight through as if they knew it quite well; he explained, though, that they were really only one; and if you walked through that proved it. I thought that was silly, but he's much older and wiser than I am; so I said nothing. The truth is that it is a very hard Palace to talk about, and the further you get in, the harder it is to say what you mean because it all has to be put into dream talk, as of course the language of the wake-world is silence.

Kwaw
My name is Lola, because I am the Key of Delights, and the other children in my dream call me Lola Daydream. When I am awake, you see, I know that I am dreaming, so that they must be very silly children, don't you think?

Lillie

Yeah. That's what I mean.

The sweetest pussy cat you ever saw...

And everything is either horrid or silly.

But it's good. I just wish someone would cut out all the weirdy twee bits for me.

Did kids really talk like that back then?