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When the popular press of the 1930s dubbed Aleister Crowley the 'wickedest
man in the world' they started a smear campaign that is still taken seriously by
in the same tradition as Crowley, who often finds himself tarred with the same
brush. In this talk he will argue that it is impossible to move beyond Crowley
unless one has first reached a mature understanding of the man's weaknesses
magick that has grown out of researches of Crowley and which is part of the
ancient tradition of hermetic magick. He will argue that this magick has to be
Anarcho-tantrik-Thelema
Crowley, in case you've not heard, died in 1947. I mention that in case you are
I first encountered the myth of Crowley when I was at school. I friend of mine,
very much into rock climbing, suggested I take a look at an interesting book
he'd picked up, about an Edwardian mountaineer who was also a 'Satanist.'
I was at the time, browsing my way through the books in our local (Newport)
reference library's 'private case'. Every library seems to have one of these, In
the Bodleian, where I know live in Oxford; it’s called the Phi collections,
(presumably Phi for phallus). Incidentally, they still keep a copy of the Kama
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Sutra in the Phi cabinet, although that seems a little unnecessary in these post
sixty's days). In the British Museum it’s the private case. Librarians consign
books to these cabinets that are not for the casual reader. In Newport library
they weren't even catalogued and you could only borrow one if a) you had
who looked alarmingly like my mother to ask for the Kinsey Report on Human
Sexuality or Masters and Johnson etc. The doors of the case were flung back
and the literary incendiary extracted and handed over 'under the seal'. I made a
point of peering over the librarian's shoulder to see if there were any other titles
I ought to ask for. It was then that I saw a copy of Crowley's masterwork
The next time I went to the library I asked for that book. I took it to be seat
and remember being mesmerised by the magick circle and sigils reproduced ion
It begins:
'Existence, as we know it, is full of sorrow. To mention only one minor point:
execution. This is unpleasant for every man. Consequently every man does
everything possible to postpone the date, and would sacrifice anything that he
has if he could reverse the sentence. Practically all religions and all philosophies
have started thus crudely, by promising their adherents some such reward as
immortality.'
'No religion has failed hitherto by not promising enough; the present breaking
up of all religions is due to the fact that people have asked to see the securities.
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Men have even renounced the important material advantages which a well-
organised religion may confer upon the State, rather than acquiesce in fraud or
falsehood ...being more or less bankrupt, the best thing we can do is to attack
Crowley's assessment about the origin of religion seemed to me true then, and
still does. Religion is basically the quest for immortality. And magick, is part of
Such clear statements of the aims of magick are rare in the many other books
For example, Pat Crowther was giving a well-honed lecture at Leeds Occult
Society once, she went though the history of Wicca, the basic techniques,
raising power, the supposed law of three fold return etc. etc. And in the
She was strangely lost for words, perhaps she'd never thought of the question,
then or since. I not getting at her, such a question would probably put most of
For Crowley there was only one reason for studying magick or as he put it 'one
meaning of life and the way of achieving immortality in it. The end was gnosis
Crowley used many different techniques to prepare himself for gnosis. Some of
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Crowley that lives even to the present day. Many modern pagans do not like
Crowley or his disciples for this reason. I myself have been told I am arrogant,
self centred, etc. Some of the criticism may be true, but I also thing Crowley
greeted by his host with a long face. 'He broke the sad news as gently as he
could: Queen Victorian was dead. To his amazement, he saw Crowley fling his
hat into the air and dance for joy. To Crowley and, as Crowley believed, to
many others - certainly artists and thinkers - Queen Victorian was sheer
suffocation, a vast thick fog that enveloped them all. "We could not see, we
could not breathe,' he said; and although he admitted that under her Britain had
advanced to prosperity, 'Yet, somehow or other, the spirit of her age had killed
Crowley lived in the period of the backlash caused by the Oscar Wilde trial.
During Crowley's youth figures such as wild must have appeared to lead a
charmed life. Suddenly it was all over, and the careers of anyone associated
with Wild were guilty by associations, and their own careers were finished.
E.G. Aubrey Beardsley for one. Crowley and Neuburg another, blacklisted by
literary mags of their day, not because their poetry any worst than anyone
else's. It is surprising how many modern pagans still take their cue from the
To Crowley, the ends justified the means, or as he put it, he used the methods
of science to achieve the aims of religion. Perhaps we could say that the means
Abra melin.
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Crowley, as I'm sure you know, was a member of the Victorian occult sodality
called the Hermetic order of the Golden Dawn. In this order, he was what
many head of order most dread, a talented student. But apart from his basic
training in this Order, details of which are available in many printed books
If you look at the rituals he was doing, it could make your blood run cold, or at
least it did mine when I first read of them, several years ago back in a library in
Newport.
At the age of 23-24 he built himself an isolated oratory overlooking Loch Ness
and attempted to invoke his Holy Guardian Angel using a medieval grimoire.
Accounts say the house filled up with all manner of elementals and automata,
drawn to the ritual. Such rituals were well know from classical sources, and the
things are stirred up when you try to contact the holiest part of yourself. Our
they should be integrated. In this Crowley in tune with our modern manner of
as saying 'when you cast out your demons, be careful you don't cast out the
best part of yourself.' Crowley, knew the works of Nietzsche well and would
Crowley broke off from the Abra melin. A storm had broken out in his Order,
the Golden Dawn, and he was involved. With hindsight this could be seen as a
tangible effect of the ritual. It unleashed a demon that led to the destruction of
the GD. Perhaps the same demon that is still occasionally spotted swimming
The GD, as is fairly well known was founded on a fraud. Fraud is in fact a
venerable magical tradition, alive and well even amongst the present
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whose secret magical books was found in a set of cipher manuscripts. The
three founding members knew these were fake, because they had faked them,
however, this was a means to an end - a Platonic lie that would help get things
going. The funny thing was, the rituals worked, fake or no fake, and the order
But someone might let the genie was let out of the bottle. Macgregor Mathers,
the head of the order, became a victim of his own success. The Order grew and
after a few years the available course work was completed and initiates began
to filter through to the upper grades. At that time, Mathers who was the
needed to move up to make room for further promotions below him. But
much research amongst long forgotten texts in the British Museum. What he
really needed now was a real contact with what occultists sometimes call the
inner planes.
He tried and failed: In one account of his trying to cross the abyss, he says the
effort left him physically drained, even injured. Of course he would have
difficulties convincing himself that it was possible to make such a leap. He was
one of the few that knew the system he was working to be largely the work of
his own hand, a fake if you like. Magicians are more aware now of the pitfalls
of the negative inner voice. Austin Spare, clarified this, and developed a
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want to do, that a little voice will appear criticises and saying, oh you can't do
that. On the Late Show (Monday 2nd May) there was an interesting report
from the rock group New Order, now working with Andy Marr. He suffers
from depression and self doubt, especially about his ability to write lyrics.
Almost as soon as he writes a line, he hears an inner voice telling him, that's
crap.
Mathers may not have had the benefit of modern psychological and magical
techniques for transcending his negativity, even using it. Perhaps this is why he
moved away from the high pressure magical scene of Edwardian London, to
Paris. To give himself time and space to make the magical contact he knew the
order needed. Perhaps when he still didn't get it, he resorted to an Autocratic
manner in Order to retain control and at least prevent someone else making the
Eventually, failure, disaster (i.e. Madam Horus) and Aleister Crowley overtook
him. In a fit of pique, he let out the true origin of the GD Order to someone
outside of the original inner circle. This was the catalyst that blew the whole
thing apart.
But for Crowley, this exposure of the truth about the GD, must have come to
The knowledge he gained was that the rituals worked whether or not they were
the authentic rituals of some dusty old Rosicrucian order. You would think
Mathers was like someone sitting on the edge of a branch, furiously sawing
away at its base. But Crowley saw, that he was more like a fakir, performing
the Indian rope trick, the magician climbs the rope then pulls it up after himself.
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Order with links going back to the year zero. He freed us because there is no
such Order -
'Some years ago a number of cipher MSS were discovered and deciphered by
from the Rosicrucian. You will readily understand that the genuineness of the
claim matters no whit, such literature being judged by itself, not by its reputed
sources.'
Now you think this was a lesson so clear, that all Thelemites coming after
Crowley would have got it. But no - fraid not. Here is a recent statement by
Kenneth Grant, head of one of the OTO fragments that resulted from
Crowley's death.
The Ordo Tempi Orientis (OTO) is the name applied to an arcane tradition
known as the Stella Wisdom, which has its roots in Lemuria. After the
South America,
the Current surfaced again when Jacque de Molay (c. 1993) concentrated it
into the Order of the Knights Templar in connection with the mysteries of the
Holy Graal....
In the 18th century the tradition appeared under the leadership of Adam
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Grant seem to be trying to turn the clock back, and in doing so has missed the
point:. Incidentally this was a issue that earned me an expulsion from Grant's
Crowley.
Even before he died, Crowley knew that the magical reforms he had instigated
during his lifetime had not gone far enough. He was contemplating plans to
completely revise the nature of his magical order the OTO. Unfortunately he
died before he could do so. I was recently told by the editor of Starfire, that to
all intents and purposes, the OTO died when Crowley did. But of course, it did
not stay dead. Like a zombie it rose from the ashes and continues to haunt the
The reason I like Crowley is because he avoids all this crap. Indeed a recent
the whole edifice of bogus scholarship by pointing out that [for instance] the
true origins of the Tarot are entirely irrelevant for those who wish to use them
BM Press 1994).
However, one cult that can make some kind of claim to historical continuity, is
the Tantrik cult of the Indian Subcontinent. Crowley and other occultists before
and after him have borrowed freely from this cult, even though it guarded its
inner traditions quite closely. Crowley went to India for the first time in 1902,
just after the GD fiasco. He went to visit the nearest thing he ever had to a
guru - Allan Bennett, who was studying Buddhism in Sri Lanka. Crowley's
Symonds describes Crowley canoeing down the Irrawadi (in Burma) take pot
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But the influence on him of tantrik kundalini yoga is immense - and takes up
many chapters of his book of magick. In fact the first line of the book,
Buddha.
I broke off here to show some slides - the second part of the talk describes
'what Crowley did next' in terms of the influence on him of Tantrik ideas.
The term Tantra is normally applied to a group of Hindu and Buddhist mystical
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texts that have a great deal to say about the spiritual value of 'Carnal
Knowledge', which taken literally means that gnosis obtained through the
have a purpose or use, they do not value pure knowledge in the way we are
sometimes said to do. The value of this gnosis is that it leads to freedom and
immortality.
Tantriks study and practice magick and thus they find a great deal of common
ground with western magical adepts. Tantra is also a religious inclination and
pre-eminent amongst the deities worshipped within Hindu Tantrism are Shiva,
1 The earliest uses of the term 'tantra' are much broader than this. It
also means treatise and thus some medical treatises are called tantras eg:
temple practice.
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different guise: Kali, Lalita, Kundalini, Also important is the child e.g. the
Even though the Tantrik way is quite sexual in orientation, it is possible for the
adept to renounce all human ties and still achieve enlightenment and
immortality through its methods. Followers of the Tantrik way believe that our
psychological make-up has male and female components and attempt to realise
the full potential of this bisexual nature with their own lives and bodies. The
Tantrik attempts to unify the male and female sides the mind/body and thus
Tantrik texts almost always begin with a dialogue between Shiva and Shakti.
One can infer from this that the human worshipper, whatever their gender,
participate anew in the flow of knowledge from the divine. This is what makes
wherever there is a magician with the necessary skill. This undermines the
entrenched priesthood and also the caste system, where revelation was said to
further some elements of Tantra can be found even amongst more orthodox
Catholic mass or the rites of orthodox Judaism. However there are eight
practices which when found together are pretty well characteristic of Tantra:
These are dîkshâ, sâdhanâ, mantra, Mandala, mudrâ, nyâsa, dhyâna, and pûja .
viii. Dîkshâ.
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This means initiation and in the past great importance was given to the need for
tradition (sampradaya) and has the right to confer the desired initiation
Tantrik practice, in for instance many chapter of his books Magick, I think it
unlikely that he was ever initiated. But there again, given what he experience
with the supposed initiated tradition of the GD, he is unlikely to have valued
written sources for his yoga and tantrik idea, and he often gets them wrong.
i. Sâdhana/practice
yoga of the kind described in the Serpent Power (q.v.). What has been termed
The Vinashikha tantra (q.v.) has more for details of this aspect of Tantrism and
also includes a typical sectarian practice to the god Tumburu, who has been
identified with the Shiva cult. Devotees of Tumburu are supposedly skilled at
ii. Mantra
with 'twilight' language although there is some overlap. The word comes from
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'man' to think and 'tra' instrument. According to Alain Danielou mantra literally
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or sung in a special manner. Some, older authorities thought that mantras were
meaningless and irrational; Bharati rejects this contention. For example the
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well come from the Indian root 'Hrî' meaning modesty. Some mantras are
onomatopoeic e.g. Phat, the tantrik means of driving away negative energies.
Others may be derived from animal sounds as for example three of the seven
notes in the Indian musical scale are so named. There is an elaborate theory,
based on the analysis of the Sanskrit alphabet to account for their phonic
power. In common with many other Eastern religions, Tantra maintains that
sound has a magical quality and is one of the fundamental creative principles of
the cosmos. Furthermore, it is widely held in Hinduism that the Gods do not
'the gods are fond of obscurity.' Closely related to this is the idea that any
to the methods of the pharmacist who attempts to isolate the active principle in
bija. For example the seed mantra of the elephant headed god Ganesha is gan.
A seed mantra can be created by taking the first letter of a deity's name and
adding nasal m e.g. Dum for Durga etc. Further reading see Mircea Eliade
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Typical of Tantrism and indeed of other magical traditions, is the extended use
able to generate their own kind of gnosis. Many examples are reproduced in
for magical use and not hung up behind an altar. Mandala means diagram, a
iv. Mudrâ
The use of mystical hand gestures and postures such as those found in yoga. It
would take a whole book to described them all. The 'horned god' mudrâ of
modern wicca is also a Tantrik mudrâ. Pointing fingers, raised hands and
intricate interlocking of the fingers as in the yoni mudrâ all play their part. This
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also raises the subject of the Tantrik predilection for euphemisms or so-called
'twilight language'. Mudrâ is also the name for one of the five strong
enjoyments found in Tantrik worship and may be a euphemism for sex without
reproduction, i.e. for its own sake. The breaking of taboos is another
characteristic of Tantrism.
v. Nyâsa
This is a very distinctive part of Tantrism and one that is often overlooked.
Nyâsa means placing and takes many forms for example the 'installation' of the
sacred power of a deity into a mystical drawing or mandala. This same energy
can also be placed by one participant in a ritual into the body of the another.
There are also elaborate and sometimes secret methods of touching parts of the
body together, such as the fingers and intoned the appropriate mantra. This is a
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and vivifies his or her Mandala by 'taking' the personal god energy (istadevata)
from the region of their heart and placing it on the altar. Here we can detect the
The body is viewed as a miniature version of the cosmos, and thus by installing
the appropriate deities and elements, the body becomes a living mandala.
vi. Dhyâna.
This can be translated meditation but Tantrik meditation soon passes beyond
the more austere variety set forth in for example Patanjali's Yoga Sutras and
meditation uses the senses, rather than suppressing them. Dhyâna also means
the image of the god or goddess as handed down from previous practitioners.
Closely related to this is the typical Tantrik practice called internal pilgrimage,
and in which worship and magick occurs. In some instances whole landscapes
are created and the Tantrik with sufficient mental stamina is able to undertake
vii Pûja.
Tantriks are magicians and experience shows that the magick needs the
external rituals with other Tantriks in which, traditionally, special regard was
given to the Shaktis or female participants. For example the of the five m's or
powerful enjoyments:
Meat,
Fish,
Wine,
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Sexual Intercourse,
Non-reproduction.
system. The tantrik way of magick would have very much appealed to Crowley
and we can find many examples of it in his system. And through Crowley, these
ideas have passed into general magical practice. They are the essence of
magick, and would have underlined for Crowley a lesson he had recently learnt.
Magical rites do not need to be authentic for them to work. Crowley was also
James said a similar thing, he described religious rituals from all over the
world, and thought there was no way to distinguish which mystical experience
as true and which wasn't. They were all equally valid. So no one religious
tradition could claim a monopoly on truth. The only way to judge what a
mystic says was pragmatically - did it work for them. All these trends
sustained its adherents with minimal bureaucracy (i.e. Order) for hundreds of
years. Where Crowley failed was in not completely leaving behind the old GD
and OTO model. He seemed to vacillate between the two, one time assuming
the grand titles of Baphomet etc. etc. Whilst for instance at his experimental
community in Cefalu, he acted more like a oriental guru. Toward the end of his
know, there are no absolutes in this world, and Crowley is now a success story.
His blend of western and eastern magick is widely used, not just by Thelemites.
The Thelemic idea of make up your own system, create your own gods,
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magick has a reputation for being very urban and temple based. I.e. as having
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