The Treasure-House of Pearls

To live is to change; and to oppose change is to revolt against the law which we have enacted to govern our lives. To resent destiny is thus to abdicate our sovereignty, and to invoke death. Indeed, we have decreed the doom of death for every breach of the law of Life. — Crowley

The blog has been a bit dead lately. This is because I am very busy with my course work. This isn’t going to change anytime soon and will only get worse as next semester I begin teaching classes too. Thus I have come to the conclusion that the blog must be put on hiatus. To succeed in tasks one must focus the will. Right now my focus needs to be my school work. Having the blog languishing is a subtle mental burden, always longing to be updated, counting from day-to-day the time of the last entry. Similarly, I will probably be less available online. Those close to me, I am sure, have noticed the lack of “online time” and this is not likely to change anytime soon. Graduate school is intense and while the master’s level is challenging, the PhD level is doubly so. Over the next few weeks I’ll be changing the website. I will not be deleting the blog. I will find a way to archive it, probably a subfolder. The main page will become a static information page though.

Change is inevitable. Decisions must be made, priorities sorted, and work done. It does not mean I am done blogging. For now, though, it is time for a period of silence.

Aum Ha.

Tags: Blogs, Graduate School, Personal

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Recently I was reminded of an email I sent last May. I was asked what I thought of Congregational Illuminism. My reply, given in full below, did not paint a rosy picture for the movement. In fact, in rereading the email, it occurred to me I was actually asking the wrong questions about Congregational Illuminism and viewing it from an erroneous position. It is not that I have not changed my position on anything I say in the email, I just realized I was being too narrow in examining Congregational Illuminism. Part of the problem was mine, my expectations and biases, and part was the movements, the way it markets itself within the Thelemic paradigm. Over the last month, based on my reading for classes, I have been able to come to an appreciation for Congregational Illuminism and what it does for those involved.

For the remainder of the essay, I will be directly or indirectly referring to both Congregational Illuminism and Thelema as religious movements. I understand that this label, religious movement, is contentious and debatable. Is use does not mean I am saying that these movements are religions. That depends greatly on how religion is defined at any given time. I use the label for convenience and to place the movements within categorical structures necessary for comparison. Whether Thelema or Congregational Illuminism are religions must ultimately be decided by each individual based on their approach and viewpoint.

In the email from May I stated, “As for Congregational Illuminism, I am not convinced that it is a viable Thelemic system.” I think this is true, but I have come to realize that despite claims that the movement came from Crowley’s idea of Scientific Illuminism, Congregational Illuminism has little to do with Crowley’s ideas. This is where I think part of the problem comes from in my reply below. I ask for the ‘scientific results’ and complain there are none.  I ask for these because someone using Crowley’s model would have something to show for their work, even if it is just a journal of detailed information, observations, and reflections. The Congregational Illuminists lack these. Yet, on further reflection, this lack is because the participants are not interested in ‘scientific’ results, instead they have other motivations. Continue Reading »

Tags: Crowley, Discourse, Egalitarianism, Judeo-Christianity, Modernity, Morals/Values/Ethics, O.T.O., Personal, Religion, Thelema, Thelemic Community

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The house was physically filthy and as the day wore on she [Jane Wolfe] became aware of a foul miasma enveloping the place that steamed to high heaven. […] Several years later she discussed this situation with O.P.V. (Norman Mudd), and he explained to her that Crowley was going through the “mystery of filth”. He recited to her the lines in Liber LXV, Chapter I, vv. 44-46.

Red Flame 10: Jane Wolfe—Her Life with Aleister Crowley, Part I

I have recently read Mary Douglas’ Purity and Danger. It is a structualist examination of the way cultures use taboo, designations of filth and dirtiness to circumscribe behavior and indoctrinate societal members. What I found interesting is how she notes that holiness and dirtiness are conceptual opposites, that when the sacred becomes dirty, defiled, it ceases to be sacred.

On the surface level, cleanliness seems to be natural and obvious. We clean our environments to eliminate health dangers and make our living spaces safe. But exactly what is and is not clean is quite variable. It is only in the last century that pathogens that cause disease have been known. Yet, cultures as far back as thousands of years ago have had designations of what is and is not clean, many of which actually created environments that we now know were conducive to disease dissemination. Some might say that what “primitive” cultures did before we know of pathogens is different than our behavior today. We congratulate ourselves and proudly state we now know of bacteria and viruses and how to deter their spread. But is this difference that significant? Douglas points out that what is really involved are symbolic systems of control and ideological structuring. She argues that “our ideas of dirt also express symbolic systems and that the difference between pollution behavior in one part of the world and another is only a matter of detail.” She continues, “If we can abstract pathogenicity and hygiene from our notion of dirt, we are left with the old definition of dirt as a matter of place. […] It implies two conditions: a set of ordered relations and contravention of that order.” Continue Reading »

Tags: Books, Cefalu, Crowley, Discipline, Graduate School, History, Magick, Modernity, Morals/Values/Ethics, Religion, Thelema, Thelemic Community

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About a week ago, someone emailed me asking about the Amsterdam program I received my master’s degree from. I scanned it briefly with the intent of replying to it later. However it seems I screwed up and deleted the email without noting the person’s name or email address. If you sent the email and read this, please resend your email and accept my apologies.

Tags: Amsterdam, Graduate School, Personal

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Recently I co-authored a review of the video The Psychic City (Voodoo City) by the group YACHT. In the course of the collaboration, I described, to my co-author, the representation of occultism and paganism in the video and the groups ‘philosophy’ as shallow. In reply he asked what I meant by shallow—how can someone’s spirituality be shallow, assuming for a moment that the esoteric representation in the video is somehow indicative of the group’s views? I did not have a good answer at the time, but I have been thinking about it since.

This label, shallow, applied to someone’s religious practice is not new. I have used it in regard to esoteric practitioners before and others have used it too. In fact, many people in occultism and other esoteric movements have been described as shallow in their engagement of religion. This label is also applied to people who practice mainstream or normative religions. But what does it mean to have a shallow religious or spiritual engagement? What do I mean when I label someone’s spirituality as shallow?

After thinking about it, I have been able to articulate, to some degree, what I mean by calling someone shallow in regards to their engagement. It has four components. The first is intellectual; the second is historical; the third is emotional and the forth, experiential. Those who are shallow are generally not interested in many of the expansive thoughts and ideas related to their professed religion or spirituality. Each religion or ‘path’ has a large number of ideas intrinsically associated with it. These ideas are often in conflict with other ideas, or they have major and minor implications. Those who are shallow don’t care about these ideas or their implications. They are not interested in reading about them, writing about them, or exploring the implications of the intellectual foundation of their religion. They just accept it as it, no questions asked and are frequently befuddled or upset when other people make probing inquires about their religion in ways they cannot answer. Even more disappointing is that their frustration does not motivate them to find the answers to the questions people ask. Instead they just want the people to stop asking. Continue Reading »

Tags: Blogs, Discourse, Modernity, Music, Personal, Religion

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This evening while coming home, I drove past an intersection that had Christians on each corner carrying signs proclaiming various aspects regarding Jesus and his second coming. With my cell phone I took a picture. One gentleman saw me take it and so he turned his sign around for me. I took a picture of the other side too. It made me smile so I gave the guy a thumbs up! Continue Reading »

Tags: Judeo-Christianity, Religion

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Today I attended my first class that examines the role of region and the connection between space and religion. One of the more interesting categorizations was looking at region, not based on geography, but functionality and relationships. At the fore front of this was the urban/rural dichotomy. The urban “region” spawns different relationships and religions than the rural “region.” These also manifest in relationships between a person and place and the development of identity. We have all heard people describe themselves as a “city person,” or a “country” one. In this complex mix of place and identity are ideas of build space versus natural space. Religion is connected to all of this.

I was particularly fascinated at how buildings often represent aspects of collective identity. What do the mega-churches and their massive buildings say about the believers who attend those churches? How do they collectively engage their religion? Is religion experienced in the spectacle that the service becomes? What does it say about the protestant churches, often non-denominational, that rent whatever space they can find? Do their “whatever we can get” buildings reflect their “whoever we can get” collective identity? What about the buildings of old churches in New England? Do their old and established buildings, one who have changed little over the years, reflect an ossified doctrine and community identity? I worked in the largest Presbyterian Church in the country; it had 14,000 members. The church building itself was massive, complex and diverse. I would say these labels reflect the church member’s too. Continue Reading »

Tags: Crowley, Graduate School, Leadership, Modernity, O.T.O., Personal, Religion, Thelema, Thelemic Community

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For good or bad, I rented an apartment close to campus so that I could walk to classes. It will save on gas and has the added benefit of making me get off my ass and walk a little. Unbeknownst to me at the time I rented it, the apartment building is also on the corner of sorority row. There are half a dozen sorority houses within a stone’s throw of my building. On the corners of stone walls near campus and the sorority houses are various girlie murals painted by the sorority sisters. All of them contain the same catch phrase:

No matter what path you take, your values always lead to home!

I thought about this the other day while walking past the murals. The phase actually has a very profound message in it, although I would wager that most of the young ladies don’t get how deep this message can go. I began to wonder how this phrase relates to Thelemites. Because few people grow up in Thelema, almost all modern Thelemites are converts. When someone converts to another religion, they often find their old values challenged and to really convert to the new religion, they have to actually change their value system, a process fraught with difficulty and conflict. Continue Reading »

Tags: Modernity, Morals/Values/Ethics, O.T.O., Personal, Religion, Thelema, Thelemic Community

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Amsterdam is the home of over three hundred museums. In May of this year I went to the Tropenmuseum, Amsterdam’s ethnographic museum. They had an exhibition on voodoo and it was close to leaving. I have always been fascinated by voudon. I have had the fortune to visit Sallie Ann Glassman three times in New Orleans, and each time was quite an event.

This exhibit, of about three hundred pieces, was from the collection of Marianne Lehmann, a Swiss woman who moved to Haiti in 1957and began collecting various ritual objects in an attempt to keep them in Haiti and preserve the Haitian culture. There are problems of local Haitians selling real ritual objects to tourists. By purchasing these ritual objects, Lehmann preserves living Haitian practice. While the items are taken out of their original context, she maintains them with the help of locals, including different mambos and houngans, who give offerings and propitiate the spirits. One of the most significant acquisitions was a collection of Bizango soldiers. Not surprisingly, Haitian religious practice has a number of facets and one facet is the use of magic to attack and battle with enemies. The Bizango were a collection of fire warrior spirits belonging to a secret society. In 1990s the secret temple closed and in an attempt to keep all the spirits together, Lehmann purchased the lot. The exhibit of the Bizango, which went to Switzerland, the Netherlands and Germany, is the first time they have ever been seen outside of Haiti. Continue Reading »

Tags: Amsterdam, Art, History, Modernity, Personal, Photography, Picture of the Week, Travel

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