ANALYSIS OF THE RING

ANALYSIS OF THE RING

(Editor’s note: This fragmentary outline survives in MS.)

(In Order)

  1. Rhinemaidens (3). Guardians of the fountain. The passions, essentially feminine, which keep the pyscho-sexual energies in essentially biological patterns.
  2. Alberich (the Nibelung). Unresolved narcissistic elements in the ego, which, thwarted in the basic love drive, forswear love & transmute the drive into power & conquest. Only he who forswears love can achieve the Nibelung gold – i.e. it is only by the damming up of the love drive that a super power drive is generated.
  3. Wotan – Yod He Vau He – the natural Father. Authority – Power – Law – Energy. Masculine energy expressed as authority – True Emperor – but bound rigidly by his own law.
  4. Frieda – The Empress. Here manifested as a guardian of clan totem & exogamy customs – womanly incest.
  5. Valhalla. The Home of the Gods.

A. The Realm of death.

B. The Human mind.

Freia [Freya] – Goddess of Spring & Beauty – the intermediary […]

GENERAL FIELD THEORY

GENERAL FIELD THEORY

I.

1. A living organism may be regarded as a field which is the resultant of various forced.

2. In order to function, the organism must be able to resolve these forces in terms of directed activity.

3. In non-intelligent organisms, the resolving factor is instinct. Instinct is the inherited ability to cope with the environment without much forethought Instinct is the regulator of:

a. Automatic life processes.
b. Aggressive reaction to hunger, sex, and danger.
c. Recessive reaction to danger.
d. Protective reaction to young (sometimes).
e. Recessive reaction to sex (sometimes).

4. Intellect probably arises as an adjunct to instinct in learning process. Improvement of instinctive functions with experience is noted in many species.

5. In homo sapiens, intellect has grown to the point where it is equal to or even more powerful than instinct in regulating certain basic forces.

6. Since neither one of these controls is completely dominant in man, a conflict exists in certain areas. When this conflict cannot be dealt with by either intellectual or instinctive means, it is projected as a symbol. Religion arises as a means of dealing with such symbols.

COMMENT ON LIBER AL I, 31

COMMENT ON LIBER AL

For these fools of men and their woes care not thou at all! They feel little; what is, is balanced by weak joys; but ye are my chosen ones.
Fools of men – that is, worldly men, men of society, church goers, good citizens, average men, Rotarians, babbitts; their woes attendant upon their folly. The conflict of their desires, vanity, ambition, money, power, fame, the monkey morals, the barnyard babtistry.
They feel little – they are little, petty in mind, petty in spirit, puny in their pilfering, rabbity in their rutting habits, their love a piddling perversion of a castrated biological urge, seasoned with saccharine sin and slop bucket sentimentality.
What is:
While displaying an abject ass-licking servility to their superiors, they manifest all the feeble ferocity of a yahoo towards anything showing any difference in mentality, color, or physiognomy, so long as that thing be bound, chained, and completely hopeless.
Weak joys:
A $10 raise, a model home, kiddies, a crack at somebody weaker, a bit of gossip, and accident, something newer and shinier than someone else has, weddings, funerals —
but ye are my chosen ones.
Thank God!
Jack Parsons

 

ARCANUM DCCXXXV

ARCANUM DCCXXXV

(The Ritual of the Shrine)

1. The Adept, removing his sandals, shall approach the Shrine in a mood of reverence
2. He shall kneel and invoke the lunar Gods (and enter the door of the lunar temple)
3. He shall invoke the Gods of Wisdom
4. He shall become inflamed with adoration
5. He shall evoke the star of Light
6. He shall receive the power of heaven
7. He shall worship the shrine and star
8. He shall see the face of God
9. He shall rule over the animals and the elements
10. He shall receive the blessings of Light.

 

ESSAY ON THE WITCHCRAFT

ESSAY ON THE WITCHCRAFT

We are as old as man. A million years ago we sang the first cradle song. Against the first fear, our power. Against the first evil, our spells. Against the first illness, our remedies. We are the oldest religion in the world and the strongest. We were with the first men, we shall be with the last. Under our protection, with our encouragement man dared the universe, conquered the forest, conquered the beasts, mastered the elements, for a time, even himself.
For hunting and crops we knew spells that gave man the belief, the faith to avail. Against the terror by night we raised a barrier, against the demons in the soul of the tribe, we made availing rituals. Under our guidance man came up from the beasts. There was no other force strong enough to mold him, and to protect him from himself.

Long ago on a catastrophic time man became separate from us, from the forces of his secret nature. He threw himself upon his intellect, upon the sterile gods of authority and reason. From our religion, that was living, as only life and love are alive, he turned to dead gods, dead creeds, dead dogmas. In his agony and terror he built terrible cities, temples to the death he let into his soul. He made demons, infused them with the breath of his life, enticed them into his heart, and then did a devil dance across the pages of history. Now his demons put on the mask of all the virtues, and took to themselves all the crowns, until in his whole world he knew nowhere to turn.

We waited. When the flames of the stake, upon the rack, under the lash, we waited, and carried in our hearts the secret seed that can in its hour, redeem the world. We waited, because although we have the power, it is unlawful to use power where only love can avail. Man cannot be forced to his heritage. He must come to it freely, of his own will.

In the weary centuries where love was denied and trampled, truth hunted and hounded, and beauty twisted and distorted, we kept the old ways alive. On mountains and secret heaths, in lonely and desolate places we gathered the covens of the witchcraft. We held the Agape, the love feasts. We danced and lived and loved in the old, wild ways of freedom and joy. We communicated the secret knowledge of the sources of life. We communicated and we guarded.
In fairy tales and playing cards, in myths and legends and rumors, in strange poems and old songs we hid the secret knowledge. And now and then an adventurer into dark ways and lonely lands of the soul has come amazed upon the pearl of great price, upon the wonder and the power, the secret glory that has made him one of us.

But for the vast majority of men, the secret knowledge is lost. Lost of you, do not know our world and the world you know is only a fragment, a shadow, of the great world where we adventure. It is as though scholars, pedants, would speak of love or hate saying, it is thus, or it is so. But the man who loves or hates knows, and his knowledge is of a different world.

Now the great Western drama of pretense and evasion draws finally to a close. Man is trapped in hos own lies, betrayed by his own gods. And the hand of science has torn the veil from the face of the god that men worship, and behold, it is death. For man needs above all things love, and for him now there is not love, but only the face of death, that he has worshipped. Demons in the shape of monstrous machines rule his nightmares. Incubi bestride his marriage bed and give poisoned suck to his children. His virtue is a lie, his honor is a lie, his marriage is a lie, his works are a lie, and in these lies he is caught like a silly and pitiful spider in the web of his own weaving.

But it is not our task to castigate men, or catalogue his follies. Man himself knows now that he is trapped. He knows that he is fooled, loveless, betrayed. We do not need to tell him this. It is our task to show him the way to wisdom to love and to freedom.

For a little time, between now and Armageddon, we are loosed in the world. We have the freedom to speak, the opportunity to instruct, so that those who have ears can hear. We are come to make a door out of hell, to gather the elect before the days of wrath. We have power, the power to reach anywhere and touch any man – a power greater than armies, empires, nations – if we will to use it. We have knowledge, knowledge that will save a damned soul out of the lowest hell – if he wills it. But no power and no knowledge can avail in the absence of will and love.

We offer these instructions in the knowledge that any person who is able to use them – who will use them – will be able to awaken the powers of his will and his love. We do not ask faith, we ask only trial and from trial will come success, and from success knowledge that is stronger than faith.

It is difficult to explain the working of the secret forces in man, and his true relationship with the total universe. Man is hypnotized by his training, by the vicious circle of lies handed down from generation to generation, and he cannot see beyond the evil dream he calls reality into the real world. Therefore it is not possible for the uninitiated man to fully understand the reasons and object of our training in the beginning. To start, he must act on faith, proof and knowledge will come. The Power works. It avails. Let him demonstrate this fact first. Understanding will come with his own growth.

The theoretical background furnished with our instructions goes about as far as possible a complete grasp can only come with individual growth, aided by private instructions which we provide for advanced persons. The way that we show is not easy. It is hard, because to know oneself is always hard. To break through the shell of the little world, to undo the hypnotization of generations, that is difficult. We have no soothing syrup. We do not come in the masks of morality, sentimentality, or lying virtue, with techniques designed to lull the soul into its final death. We call men to danger, to adventure, to dare the universe, to know the terror of the pit.

Man is a radical being, with the capabilities of a god. His powers are not developed by inhibition and repression, but by courage and in freedom. It is a terrible world that men has made. Only his blindness prevented him from knowing how terrible. Now that he is beginning to see, his soul is struck with terror. It is only with the greatest determination and high courage, aided by knowledge and technique, that he can leave this false world and find the great world that is his true home.

All men have a sense of this. In their hearts they know the futility of life in the little world. Sometimes they feel the stirring of the old freedom and the old joy – the promise of spring and summer, of the mountains, the forests and the stars. The promise in their own hearts calling them to go forth – to keep faith. But they are constrained by convention and fear, by false sentiment and false responsibility. This is the incredible cruelty of men to themselves and to their fellows, that they deny beauty, and love, and freedom for the sake of a convention that is the mask of death.

We have the courage to affirm that these things are true, and have the power to show them to have eyes to see. To those that can follow we will show the laws of the ego, of love and hate, of life and death. We will explain the origin and nature of religion and morals, and the true relation of man with himself and with the universe. We will explain the laws, formulas, and techniques whereby men can develop his own powers, and cause all changes soever to occur in conformity with will. We will show man how to become the master of change and illusion, and how to discover and move and live and love in the great world, whose name is eternity.

In the name of God and Christ, in the name of morality and patriotism, men have made a hell on earth. These, as we have said, are the masks for demons. No man and no god can exist against nature, and the alternative, however palliated is always demonic.

We come in our own name, in the name of the Witchcraft. Fools, looking upon the surface, will be amused. Cowards, looking beneath, will be appalled. But those who are of us, looking deep within, will see that which was from the beginning, and which is to the end.
Try, and see.

I

The ego is founded upon the need to be loved, and is thus easily poisoned at its source by fear and hatred. Lacking the knowledge of how to obtain love, it is overwhelmed by fear, and fearing the loss of love, it is obsessed by hate. For the ego, the expression of love is a technique to obtain love, and hatred is intended to conceal love. Therefore hatred is at the root of its love, and love is at the root of its hate. This the law of bipolarity can be formulated for the ego. For every expressed desire, feeling, emotion, or attitude, an exactly equal and opposite force is concealed. Under certain circumstances these forces can quickly change polarity. The centre of rest is, of course, indifference.

This is what is meant by the saying of Buddha, that the end of desire is sorrow. For the ego, as Nietzsche points out, desires everlasting gratification, everlasting repetition of pleasurable stimuli; and the nature of the universe is change. Therefore this desire is doomed to frustration, and the ego hates the desire on which it feeds.

The child desires the love of the parent, and will only get this by showing love. In abnormal cases, where love isn’t present it will at least get attention by showing hatred, by misbehaving. This is the root of hypnosis, and the hypnotic basis of our training. The hypnotist, the schoolteacher, any person symbolizing authority is relate to the parent, and we literally knock ourselves out in obeying, or, by the law of opposites, by disobeying, in order to obtain the needed love.

The standard ego, then, is formulated in terms of the mores, customs, conventions, and religion of the tribe, in conformity to which it believes that it will obtain the needed love, approval and security. But a man is more than a standard ego. He is a being, an individual, a star that has his own course to follow, and his own destiny to determine. Therefore he also hates the conformity which stifles his individuality and paralyzes his will. He is always ready for the programs of war, exploitation, revolt and persecution in which he can project upon and punish in others the fear, guilt and hatred he feels towards himself and his own tribe. The more brutal and restrictive his mores, the more he will praise his own ‘culture’ and ‘civilization’ and seek more savage vengeance on others for the wrongs he does to himself. Examples are not lacking, and hardly need to be pointed.

The ego can be educated, and this is perhaps the first step on the path to the larger world. It is quite possible to obtain all the love needed, and thus overcome fear and hatred, if one has the courage to apply the proper formula and techniques. In order to obtain love, it is only necessary to first show love (of the kindly, gentle, interested sort): then to show love only to reciprocated love, and indifference to continued indifference or hatred. This mans is certain and will never fail. No matter what amount of inhibition, repression or neurosis is present, the instructed will be able to solve any human problem with this technique. He must understand that whatever he may feel or think on the subject, love is the thing that he needs and wants more than anything else in the world. Love is the essential and fundamental power of the universe, and all effects and changes whatsoever are wrought by that power.

The will to power and the will to submit are equal and opposite expressions of the desire to be loved. All good and all evil, all construction and all destruction are made possible by the power to love. Therefore have we said love all men? No, not unless this is natural to you. But know how to obtain the love of all, or else their hatred, for this is wisdom.

How easy it is to make the love spells and charms we know. For it is only necessary to tell them that we command their love, or easily to impress this upon their astral body or unconscious mind by appropriate links and symbols of our will, and they must love. The power is absolute. Also to move men to do anything whatsoever by these means, even to go mad or die, is also possible. But knowing the root in love, one should go easily in these matters.

The powers of men are limited by ignorance, by repression, and by infantile conscience. Ignorance may be overcome by knowledge, and repression by devotion to the Witchcraft, whose good and evil are not the good and evil of the little world.

This law is applicable to any emotional problem of the ego, but its detailed working in particular cases is beyond the scope of this work. Particularly problems should be referred to us for individual consideration. When, either through the failure of the standard ego on a major front, or through the growth of the individual in knowledge, the values of the little world are seen to be inadequate, several things may occur. The true self may, upon this opportunity, begin the promptings that should lead o explanation and further growth. But the individual, misunderstanding these promptings, may formulate a neurosis, which effects a pseudo compromise. If the neurosis is stable his progress will stop at this point. If it is unstable, he becomes further confused by the doubts and terrors liberated by his conflict, and ends in a complete breakdown. In these cases, psychiatric treatment can do little more than patch up the ego, give it some “safe” neurosis in the form of false or partial explanations of its problems, and return it as nearly as possible to the standard base. In all such cases the love which the patient believes he is receiving from the psychiatrist is the principle therapeutic agent, except in the instances where the treatment is so unpleasant that the patient is convinced that he will get no love whatsoever by his behavior. The mechanisms involved in the cause and cure of the major diseases are much the same.

If, however, the individual has the knowledge and the courage to listen to the voice of his true self, and to heed its promptings, he will win through the love that is beyond the symbols of terror and doubt, he will meet the terrible mother, the serpent woman, the sphynx, and hear again the awful question asked of Oedipus, while his life hangs in the balance. He will meet the demon father, the crusty idiocy, malice, and horror that lies on the threshold of the little world. He will find his alter self, the equal and opposite of all that he thinks he is, as a shining beauty and a desolate terror in the unknown night of his soul.
In these experiences the ego will be totally altered or completely destroyed in the death that must precede a rebirth into life. The terror, agony and despair that accompany this process cannot be minimized. They are made doubly awful monstrous by the abortions created by man in his folly that infest the gateways of life.

But this is the adventure for which man was created. Man is a being who in the little world is no more than a see, whose incredible flowering in eternity cannot be dimly imagined by the denizens of the pool world.

In the abyss of desolation and corruption, in the womb of Babalon, where the soul seed lies fallow at the heart of darkness, the secret self moves and works and gives birth to itself, to its total self on the glorious stellar body of our Lady Babalon. And behold, a star is born in the firmament, the grave cerements of the awful mother fall away, and we see the immortal beloved. The mask of the demon father cracks, and reveals our lord the sun that is ourself, son of the father and father of the sun, and we go forth under the covenant, beyond the Law and the Doctrine, to the upland meadows of forever, even to the radiant City of the Pyramids.

And this is the process, beyond thought or description or imagination, dimly previsioned in the inadequate symbol of our language. For we, even we have accepted the restriction of the law and the doctrine, in order that we may act as guides to the greater world that is Our Kingdom.
Now we have spoken perhaps untimely of the last step, infinitely far away, but it is with the first step, immediate and practical, with which we should concern ourselves here.

Consider that you have allied yourself with a living organization that is as old as man, and of whose nature and aims you now have some conception. To this degree you have already removed yourself from the standard concepts of the little world.

In the next step, formulate as best you can what you believe to be the sum total of your will, your true nature, your purpose, and your principal object in life. Ask yourself, and you will receive an answer. Write this down, reduce it to a sentence, and if possible, to a word. Make this your motto for the time and check it again after a sufficient period has elapsed.

Memorize and make a daily practice of the banishing ritual of the pentagram. This will assist in dispelling the illusions and restrictions of the little world, and in affirming and strengthening the link with the true self.

Make up a list of the problems and questions that are most important to you, and submit them to your coven, they will assist us in determining the course of your instruction.

II

When fools wish to demonstrate the truth of the most obvious sort of pragmatic they are wont to refer to the fact that one and one always make two. This is of course untrue. There is only one , one of the same sign, and in order to differentiate and obtain another or different one, we must indicate the sign this: plus one and minus one. But plus one and minus one do not equal two, they equal zero. This fact may also be expressed in the equation 2=0. This is a fundamental law of the universe. In the union of any two equal and opposite forces, both are annihilated. The universe is in a state of strain between the desire to love and desire to be loved, to pass and to be passed, in short to unite analogous concepts exist in toto of the space time continuum, the master-energy relationships, and the universe as an interplay between the yin and the yang, or the Lingam and the Yoni. All possibilities and all phenomena whatever exists and manifest along this strain, whose true name is love. Existence swings between systole and diastole, action and rest, life and death in the cosmic beat that regulates alike starts and atoms, man and the milky way, all that is, has been, all that was, will be, everything expressed in the now. Only resistance to change creates the illusion of change – the only death is the fear of death. Whoso realizes his place in the heart of love, in the centre of the eternal interplay that changes ever and never changes… [unreadable]…are, he has passed into the great world that is beyond that men call death.

Love is the key to all gates and in every kind of live and every sort of union progress and initiation is possible. Therefore the nature of love must not be limited or restricted, but rather must it be explored and experienced in every kind and degree, for thereby alone man comes to Babalon, whose name is understanding. For each love there is a barrier guarded by a demon, and beyond that barriers lies a sanctuary that yields only to courage and will, therefore to assert that only one sort or condition of love is lawful or is to thwart nature and the possibility of human progress. This is the root of the western neurosis, for the frustration and restriction of love leads ultimately to the mania of despair, homicide, and suicide.

The brute laws and mores that regulate, or pretend to regulate sexual conduct place a premium on pretense and hypocrisy and underlie the twisted and broken lives, the ruined children the neuroses, mania and sorrow that are men’s shameful statistics. In marriage, that stinking farce, society has sentimentalized the sex relation, and browbeats parent and child with the bludgeon of duty. Marriage is based on mutual mistrust, creating a legal and moral bond on love, that fear would shackle and grasp against all reason and experience. Upon restriction followeth hatred, and the inevitable frustration of the sentimental and infantile concepts of the movie versions of life; and these forces combine together to make a hell on earth, and what a hell. Love is trust, to deny trust is to deny love, and love is both denied and defiled by this infernal sacrament.

There is a marriage that is beyond the corruption and malice of the little world, but it is not made by priests and lawyers. It is possible to free men and women of high courage who can meet and mete and beget and create in love, in a union of body, mind and spirit that is beyond morality or law. Chastity, in the large world, means purity, fidelity means purity; a passion unalloyed by the lickspittle virtues that piddle off their powers in masturbation wet dreams. Love here is an ultimate devotion, even to the total union that destroys both the lover and the beloved, the known and the unknown, in the opening of a sanctuary that is not of this world. The fear, the doubt, the mistrust, and desire to hold and possess, the terror of change and alteration are exactly the shackles, the barriers, and the demon guardians that prevent the culmination of love, the attainment of the sanctuary.

Another of the murderous illusions that frustrates and destroys love is the over-valuation of one aspect of or attitude towards the love or the beloved, and the depreciation or denial of other equally or more real attributes. Both in the self, and in that which is seen as the not self are all the opposites to that which is expressed. It is essential to know, to understand and to love these opposites equally with their bipolar manifestations. Unless the seeds of fear and hate understood, they cannot be transmitted. Unless the roots of lust, of both the normal and the so-called abnormal types, are accepted, they cannot be freed to take their rightful place as joyous nymphs and satyrs in the Garden of Pan. Otherwise these things, disguised, distorted, denied, are the demons and monsters of a private hell. If it cannot do this cleanly and freely in the open, expressing the total nature of man, then it will unite with devils to create monsters and abortions.

This is not a question of a theoretical morality, of what should be right or wrong in accordance with the fuzzily self-righteous concepts of preachers, lawgivers, or scholastic philosophers. It is a simple matter of what works, and what does not work, in terms of life and common experience. The so-called ‘breakdown’ of morals following a pseudo moral ear is simply the realization that the morals are false and unworkable. The reaction into an equal and opposite pattern already established by the prior system is often appalling but is of course no more than the open acceptance of what has gone on underneath all the time.

A solution cannot be found in Christian morals or in the looking glass pattern, a reaction that is conceived in terms of sin. The solution lies in the rejection of the entire Judeo-Christian system, and the acceptance of a system based on love, understanding and freedom. Only in this sense can love be free. For one, love may be conceived in terms of polygamy, for another monogamy, for another, homosexuality, and another bisexuality. We cannot assert that one is more right than another, or better. We can only assert and assure his freedom in his own way, to explore, to experience, to know, and to come to his own conclusions in his own time a free man.

Therefore let the candidate envision the mystery of Babalon, whose name is Understanding. Let him imagine that Love which partakes of all love, and meditate upon every sort of love, until he perceives the equal holiness of each. And let him visualize the Star Goddess, whose worship is love and who accepts every sort of love and the love of every sort of being, as Her worship, and whose love is towards all that lives, and let him understand that every object of his love is Her altar.

(Note. Although this is literally true, the altar and that which consecrates it, that is Babalon, should never be confused. For the one is the servant, and the other the Goddess.)

And that in all love he has ever known or felt She has been incarnate. Then, performing the ritual of the pentagram, and the ritual of the hexagram that is the opening of the sanctuary, let him evoke. Let him enflame his heart, that thereby he may partake somewhat of the Sacrament that is her body.

III

When two opposites unite they are annihilated in the creation of a third, which contains elements of both, and yet is different from either. For every question that is answered a question is implied. The union of opposite ideas creates another idea which has an opposite. Thus a creative formula in nature, and the impossibility of giving a simple and final answer (in terms of logic) to any question, are illustrated. This is the formula IAO which was of such significance and to use the Egyptian adepts. I is Isis the Mother. O is Osiris, the Father. A is Apohis (or Horus) the destroyer – the equilibration between the primal forces – the Child. On the surface, the formula is catastrophic, the cycle is not closed, but of course regeneration is implied. The formula describes a secret technique of high magick, and also represents three ages or evolutionary stages of man.

The first age is the age of Isis, the Mother. This is the primal matriarchy, of which vestiges may still be observed in truly primitive cultures. In this culture, the female goddess is supreme, and decent is matrilinear. The king or priest is the consort of the goddess, and wins his position by trial, ordeal and initiation. The child is raised as a ward of the tribe without competition with the parent for the love of the child and with the assurance of an adequate amount of mother love. The child thus matures in full security and with a qualified faith in an adequate and satisfactory love life. The nature of the culture is magical and experimental and artistic. There is a lack of crystalized forms organization or social regimentation. Conceptions of the aggressive ego are not very well formulated.

This culture began its decline some seven thousand years ago concurrently with the rise of the patriarchy, and the beginnings of modern civilization. Interesting aspects remain in the history of religions, where the decline or regression of the female goddess, as of the Shekinah of the Hebrew religion, or in the Arab system, may be observed.

This state is described in Genesis as the fall, that is, the fall from innocence, instinct and naturalness concurrent upon the development of self-consciousness and intellect. The statement of the Elohim – “lest ye eat of the fruit of the tree of life and become as one of us” is the most significant. In the tree of knowledge, a sexual mystery is concealed, and in the concept of the fall of a certain defilement of this mystery is suggested. The Elohim is bisexual, hence us, and the barrier is raised against a future profanation in the direction of the direction of a mono sexual system.

The patriarchy was primarily launched by the male with secondary sexual characteristics, who aspired to abrogate to himself the feminine prerogative, concealing his tendencies under a guise of excessive masculinity, he proceeded to establish the authority, the law, the military power and the regimentation that was the basis of civilization.

With the male assumption of social paternity, the male child was regulated to the rule of a minor competition for the mother’s love, and this in turn begin the castration fear and father hatred that is the basis for the aggressive age.
It is no coincidence that the real rulers, the religious leaders, politicians-priests and spell binders are men with secondary female characteristics, while the second estate, the military men, empire builders and criminals who make their work by killing and pushing other men out of the way are intense father haters.
In the process of depreciating the goddess, she was reduced first to the status of a minor consort of her male counterpart and finally to an enemy or demon. But the victory of the priest was sterile, of and by himself he could not create, of and by himself he was nothing, and he had banished and denied the one possible partner that would fulfill his nature and crown he creative will. Thus the most terrible of all human institutions…

[Page 14 missing]

…the death cult was evolved. Since, man reasoned, he was supreme in nature, and yet sterile, unless he consorted with the demon woman, then nature and life itself was sterile. In this case death was the desired object, death and some hopeful paradise beyond death, and all life must be sacrificed to death. The philosophy of ascetism is not phrased in these terms, but these are its basic tenets, the roots of every ascetic system, including Christianity. In these terms, the doctrine is too obviously sterile to stick. But Christianity, by adopting a spayed and degraded Isis rechristened Mary, by concealing the identity of the Holy Ghost, and by insulting women with the calumny of the virgin birth, took the imagination of the multitude of slaves.

When this would have petered out had not the rulers of the empire seen the tremendous advantage of a religion that put a premium on resignation, sacrifice, and humility. It is true that early Christianity did not quite do that – particularly the Christianity of Clemens, Valentinus and the Gnostics. But it was soon altered until it did. Books of the old and new testament that contained sexual doctrines and revolutionary ethics of all true religion were thrown out bodily, and in someone totally obliterate. The world began by Constantine was continued by Charlemagne and the night riding Vehm, culminating in the great betrayal that impressed the free men of Europe into the hopeless series of the feudal system; and the Church preaching sin and damnation terrorized the souls of men, while their racks and fires agonized their bodies. The old mysteries, the secret doctrines, the ways to life and love were kept and guarded by Us. We organized the serfs into a secret underground, at a time when they were hunted with hounds, for sport. We taught them hope and joy when Church and state conspired to quench all hope and forbid all joy. We, as the Vaudois, the Bulgars, the Troubadours, the Alchemists, the Rosicrucians, the Illuminati, and in our own name, the Witchcraft, carried the fire when all the lights of Europe were extinguished, and it was not to god, nor Christ, nor the king, nor the pope that men turned in their extremity, but to us. Because we alone availed. We were the hand behind the Jacquery and the Free Masons. We raised up Cagliostro and Rasputin, all to sweep down the network of terror and falsehood that bound the soul of man.

But man was not ready, and we withdrew to our own place.
Freed from the tyranny of kings and popes, man turned again to the worship of his own intellect, of his material powers. He sought for love in the barren symbols of money and power and prestige, and hid the bareness of his soul in the lip worship of false morality and pseudo religion.

Then in the dawn of the twentieth century, signs of the breakup of the patriarchy, and the beginnings of the new eon, the age of Horus, began to appear. Recognized at first only by adepts, these signs are now becoming manifest to all, amid increasing confusion and terror. The betrayal of nations, the breakup of the home, the incidence of two terrible wars, the atomic bomb, and the tremendous increase in childish, epicene and homosexual tendencies are a few of the major physical indications of the birth of the new age. The nature of the new age was predicted and has been greatly clarified by the great adept Aleister Crowley, who was also instrumental in its inception. It was foreseen by Shelly, Byron and Swinburne (briefly) and predicted in some tremendous passages by Nietzsche.

But the great event of the eon, which will bring with it the possibility of redemption to the whole western world, has not yet been made manifest. (Note. Refers to Parsons’ belief that he had brought about the incarnation of Babalon) We, who contain the knowledge of this event among Ourselves until the time is ripe, and who were in fact the instruments of its gestation, give these present indications.

The Aeon of Horus is the nature of a child. (Horus is in fact called the Crowned and Conquering Child, and may be related to the Child described in Enoch). To perceive this we must conceive of the nature of a child without the veil of sentimentality. Beyond good and evil, perfectly gentle, perfectly ruthless, containing all possibilities within the limits of heredity, and highly susceptible to training and environment. But the nature of Horus is also the nature of force, blind, terrible unlimited force. That is why the west stands in immanent danger of annihilation. That is why the west also stands in the possibility of the most rapid and tremendous evolution that the world has ever known. The balance must be love and understanding, or all else fails. Now we have said enough for this place.

Then let the student read and meditate upon the ritual of Horus, constructing the total nature of Horus out of the polyphony of the component concepts. And, if he dare, let him invoke Horus and partake of the power and energy that is his right under the New Aeon. And let him also consider the love whereby Horus may be fulfilled and dignified, and mediating on this, let him prevision and invoke that which is to come.

IV

The name of God has been a body often used to frighten children and slaves into submission. It has also been a source of comfort and inspiration to many in their greatest need, although the price they paid, in terms of guilt sense and sin complex, may have been inordinate. Beyond this the name of God contains a great mystery and a secret source of ultimate power. Like all ancient mysteries, it is concealed beneath a face of deceit and corruption.
The theory has been advanced that the idea of god originates in the child from early concepts of the parents as punitive and protective, all power and all loving. These gradually transfer, as obvious discrepancies manifest. To more remote beings easily identified with tribal religious concepts. This in the matriarchy a mother goddess, in the patriarchy a father god, and so on. There is much to be said for the theory so far as it goes. But if it is easy to see that the patterns of love and sexual attraction are set by the mother for male children contain within themselves the patterns which went to produce the observed result. Then the parent and the tribal concept may pattern the idea of god, but the basic idea of god may also be part of man’s natural equipment.
Religion is one of the many things that isolated cultures, over wide reaches of space and time, have in common. There are numerous confections and virgin births, sacraments and eucharists, surprisingly similar miracles and myths, and ceremonies, rituals, spells and charms that can be reduced to a common denominator. It can certainly be said that man functions religiously, or that he has a religious function. What then is the purpose of this function? To explain the unexplainable and deal with the impossible? To preserve the unity of the tribe? To assure the power of Chiefs and priests? These are partial answers. In one sense, religion is the soul of the tribe. What then of Christianity? But Christianity is not the religion of the West, it is its observance. Machiavelli knew the religion of the west.

In another aspect of the same sense, religion is the repository of certain secret techniques, whereby worthy persons may come to initiation, and there by benefit the tribe, as for example Moses in the secret tradition of Israel. Then what are these secrets and how are they guarded. Well, they are guarded I none way by the fact that they cannot be communicated, they can only be learned. IT may be stated that every god, spirit, angel, demon, myth, ceremony or ritual of a true religion indicates, symbolizes, or is in face a process or state relating to individual initiation. They are the common property of every member of the tribe, and exist equally in his individual and private world and in his concept of the cosmos. Further, every taboo covers occult, the world taboo also means holy. In Christianity, where the principle taboo is sex, the religion is obviously a sex cult in the most indecent sense of the word, since any religion which forgets the nature of its god is a degraded superstition.

Among the ancient Hebrews the name of God is IHVH (pronounced Yod He Vau He). This is perhaps the most magnificent formula ever devised for symbolizing at once the whole process of nature, and the highest secrets of magic. Yod symbolized God as the primal father, the solar-phallic creative will, or fire. He symbolized God as the mother, the feminine generative principle, the passive will, or water. Vau symbolizes God as the son, the male child of the father and the mother (the apoapsis or Horns or IAO), the will to go, air. He symbolizes God as the daughter, Babalon, She who is to come, earth, the virgin who unites with the father, stimulates him to reactivity, and begins the generative process over again. The cycle is closed, the process is eternal, and contains within itself the seeds of all possibility.

Much nonsense has been written about the true pronunciation of the tetragrammaton, or name of God. The true pronunciation is the true understanding of the cycle, and its application to produce change in the universe, both material and immaterial. This formula is the basis or root of our system of teaching, and its importance cannot be underestimated… It is indeed all powerful as he shal have occasion to demonstrate to the advanced student. For the time being, it will suffice to apply this formula to the derivation of the magical weapons, with which it will be our students next.
The wand relates to Yod, and corresponds with the creative will, Fire, the Magus of the Tarot, BITOM in the Enochian Tablets, and Chokmah on the tree of life. As a weapon it symbolizes the Will of the adept, his creative imagination and phallic force. It is this which wakes his secret self into life, and begin his adventure on the path. Here he will meet with the ordeals, among which are fear and disgust, which are the revulsion and the terror of the known and false self against the intrusion of the unknown and tue self. Doubt will be there and pride and false humility, self-righteousness, pseudo success, craven sentimentality and unbridled lust, and all the other illusions, sinister or seductive, that beset the path, and mind, that old dragon, ever whispering, ever doubting, ever mocking, the very father of illusions, emperor of the shadows in a shadow land. And against all these terrible powers the apprentice magician has only will, (for how should he yet know of love) that root and axis upon which he is incarnate, the purpose that is he from the beginning. Even the first step summons monsters from far and wide, for well the partial selves know that they will be mastered and rule in anarchy no more, in that path is followed. This slender plank, this dim and unknown way that vanishes in darkness, is indeed the fulcrum that moved the universe. For at the further end awaits his true and total self, the star master, that is Lord of all night and all the power of his being. (Note. After ‘the night and’ there are probable several pages of the ..is missing) This way is most natural and easy to those who are themselves natural, which purity sufficient to perceive something of the being inherent in all phenomena. But of this more in its proper place.
A third method of elemental working is that of invocation, of which examples are given in the practices accompanying this text. In invocation, as in any other scientific procedure the essential requirements are the knowledge of the operation, the quality of the equipment, and a painstaking attention to detail. An invocation, to use a vulgar and none too accurate analogy, is a means of ‘tuning in’ on that which is desired and ‘tuning out’ all that which is superfluous or antagonistic to the operation. This is the purpose of the circle which is formulated, either physically or by the preliminary banishing ritual of the pentagram. The altar represents the consecrated body of the magician.
The ritual of the hexagram corresponds to the opening of the temple to the force desired. A preliminary invocation, such as the Bornless One, invokes the four powers under the rulership of the spirit. The symbol, talismans, weapons and names selected are those which correspond to the particular power invoked, so that the entire work is actually a focusing operation. In this sense it is proper to say that the ritual acts upon the magician, tuning his being to a particular idea. The magician, in turn, reacts upon the universe, bringing this idea into materialization by virtue of his own power. In all cases the problem is one of the formulation and release of energy of the right amount and proper nature in the right direction.

The opposition or hinderance is in the nature of fear, repression, inhibition or ignorance whereby energy is divided against itself and wasted in interior conflicts. Under the Christian system it was believed that the exercise of spiritual powers was only proper and possible to the saint or the sorcerer. The saint gained these powers by austerity and asceticism. The sorcerer, in accepting the sovereignty of Satan, reverse his values of good and evil, and this allayed his conscience and conflicts to the point where a release of power was possible.

The values of the magician are based on understanding. They spring from a knowledge of the law of bipolarity, the relationship of planes, and the laws of correspondences. He will this be able to separate the true values of a given plane from the false values, which are actually true values in the wrong place, and this avoid the two mistakes of asceticism and inversion. Through his progress in understanding he will eliminate false conscience and futile conflicts, exactly as they are symbolically and temporarily eliminated by the techniques of invocation.

Remainder – which is incomplete, not typed.

MANIFESTO OF THE WITCHCRAFT

MANIFESTO OF THE WITCHCRAFT

The breakup of the home and family, the confusion in problems of morals and behavior, the frustration of the individual need for love, self-expression and freedom, and the immanence of the total destruction of western civilization all indicate the need for a basic reexamination and alteration of individual and social values. The attempts of economic, political and social movements, of scientific and intellectual constructions, and of the Christian churches to meet and solve these problems have been most notable failures. It is not enough to point out the problems and criticize the situation. The individual and social solution must be simple and workable. Mature investigation on the part of philosophers and social scientists have indicated the existence of only one force of sufficient power to solve these problems and effect the necessary changes, and that is the force of a new religion. New that is in the sense of releasing man from the bonds of pretense, inhibition, frustration, and false morality into which he has fallen, and in helping him to attain the freedom, self-expression, and ability to love and be loved that are his most basic and vital need. The failure of the Christian religion, and of the pseudo religions and state cults which stem from it by imitation or inversion, have left man without roots and without a soul, without the spiritual and religious force of understanding to face and solve his problems.

We, the Witchcraft, are such a religion. In our sanctuaries we have kept alive the light of true religion, that means joy, happiness, love and freedom for mankind. Through the centuries man has done terrible things to himself, things which we were helpless to prevent. Man has needed these experiences and was not ready for our truths. In the face of such calumny, torture and death we maintained our watch against the time a new eon opened, and a man was ready to receive us.

That time has come, Man has at last proved to himself the futility of his false religion, false morals, and false values. He knows his need for love and freedom, and is ready for the word of power that will make him free. In our sanctuaries, we contain the great secrets of life, love, freedom and power than can redeem mankind. One of these secrets is nearly ripe for revelation to the world, the others we reserve for those whose progress in understanding makes it possible from them to receive and use these truths.

In our name we have been cursed, reviled, and persecuted. But man has only to look within and then to look at the lying masks which conceal only a corruption within. We are the religion of nature, of man as he is in his true self. We are come to aid man in destroying his false gods and false beliefs, and in aiding them to attain the knowledge and the power of this true and glorious self. This is our sole purpose.

And to this end we invite every man and woman to join with us, to study our teachings, to participate in our works and aims, and to aid us by allowing us to aid them.

In the first step of our activity we offer instructions in the laws of the ego and the nature of love, and the relations of man with himself and the universe. We show the origin and function of religions and morals, of magic and witchcraft, we teach the basic aspects of the nature, purpose and techniques f the practices which will aid man to the attainment of freedom, power and love. This course is open to all. In further courses for selected students, we offer instructions leading to the understanding and use of the basic secrets of power, the fundamental nature of reality, change and illusion, and the keys which lead to the consciousness of the great world, that is called eternity.

We contain the secrets of alchemy, magic, metaphysics, yoga and all occult science, and the understanding of the ultimate nature of things, and offer these to those who are able to accept them. This is only possible to courage, freedom and love. It is for the sake of these that we now manifest and invite all mankind to the great adventure.

 

By the Witchraft

Issued June 15, 1950 4000 Y.B.

In the name of BABALON

 

THE WITCHCRAFT

Registration for course P-1 and application for probationary membership in the Witchcraft.

I hereby apply for probationary membership in the Witchcraft and registration in the Basic Course, P-1. I understand that this application places me under no obligation other than that to study and practice the basic course with the object of knowing and extending my own powers. I further understand that the Witchcraft is a religious, benevolent and fraternal organization pledged to the ideals of love, of liberty and universal brotherhood, and having no other religious, social, or political associations or commitments. I understand that the Witchcraft is under no obligation to me, other than that of furnishing a basic course of instruction, consisting of fourteen sections. I enclose 10 dollars for these instructions and for probationary membership in The Witchcraft.

Signed….

Age…. Sex…. Occupation….           Religious affiliation….            Organizations….

Reason for application….

Approved….

___________

Course P-1. Basic Magick, Fundamental Theory and Practice. Fourteen sections with assignments. 10 dollars.

Introduction to The Witchcraft, Laws of the ego, the nature of love, the new eon, the origins of religion, basic rituals, magical weapons, equipment and symbols, the nature of man and the gods, angels, demons, and elementals, invocation and evocation, the understanding and expression of the true self.

For registration in class instruction or extension courses write The Witchcraft . P.O. Box

____________

 

THE GNOSTIC CHURCH

THE GNOSTIC CHURCH

Advertisement for the Gnostic Catholic Church in Pasadena

The Gnostic Church offers a unique and comprehensive course in witchcraft and magic, including material and methods of presentation of a completely new and unusual nature. The inmost secrets of the arcane schools and mystery cults, magical colleges and of the Witchcraft are correlated with the most modern studies in anthropology and psychiatry.

The nature and function of magic is traced from prehistoric times through every major primitive and ancient culture, through the orient and mediaeval world unto the present time.

The origins of religions and religious beliefs, of morals and ethics, customs and taboos, and social and sexual attitudes are presented with clarity and detail. The problems of the individual in the modern world are analyzed against this illuminating background, and methods of practical solution, indicating paths to the utmost attainment in love, wisdom and power are presented to the student.

There is nothing else like this course either in the occident or orient. It is only made possible by the cooperation of initiates and scholars in a completely new method of teaching. Experimental methods are included, and their use is encouraged.

The avowed purpose of the Gnostic Church is the stimulation of individuality and of independent thought and experiment leading to individual attainment. A complete series of courses is offered leading the student from the basic background and concepts through to the ultimate goal of all initiation.

Enroll today in the Basic Course 1A. Basic Magic, Religion and Witchcraft from Prehistory to the Present (See enclosed prospectus). This is a prerequisite to all other courses of instruction of the Gnostic Church. Fill out the enclosed form and return it at once to the Gnostic Church, P.O. Box 21140 Pasadena, California, U.S.A.

The cost of the course is 10 dollars, payable in advance. Send your cheque or money order with your application. There are no hidden fees, charges or obligations in connection with this course. No salesmen will call, and you will not be importuned to continue. Advancement in instruction depends entirely upon your own interest and efforts.

Act now, and begin a most unusual and interesting experience in the adventure of your education in life.

THE GNOSTIC DOCTRINE

THE GNOSTIC DOCTRINE

    1. The Holy Ghost is the feminine counterpart of Christ – the Sophia
    2. God is manifest in the union of Christ and Sophia. This is the Trinity – both in the Universe and in man.
    3. The golden rule supersedes all other commandments and laws. It teaches love as a way of life and this love includes sexual love.
    4. In the teachings of Christ there are no prohibitions of the enjoyment of life and the world, of eating, drinking, merrymaking and sexual love.
    5. Christ wanted against undue attachment to material things, against selfishness, avarice, and against prostitution of the body and spirit.
    6. He taught the immanence of God and the Kingdom of Heaven.
    7. The consciousness of immortality and the state of blessedness is attained by the union of the Christ in man the Sophia in woman.
    8. Brotherhood in Christ is attained by the practice of unattached love in all human relations.
    9. All worldly attachment is futile save in this, that it leads to redemption through suffering.
    10. Virtue does not consist in self-sacrifice, chastity and renunciation of the world, it consists in the sacrifices of the infantile self, of purity in love and friendship, and in the renunciation of undue attachment to worldly possessions and inordinate desires.
    11. Therefore attainment does not consist in the denial of desire and avoidance of temptation; but in the whole hearted acceptance of all experience and all changes as initiations in the way of love.
    12. Formal Christianity has distorted, perverted and misinterpreted the teachings of Christ. Mankind can only find happiness by rejecting the false doctrines of sin, guilt, hatred and intolerance; and in accepting the gospels of Love.

THE GNOSTIC CREED

The Gnostic Creed

There is no god but love, and his ways are love, and there is no way to God but love. The way to God is not alone in the love of God, but also in the love of man, and in the love of all created things, and in the love of friends and of the beloved, and in the love of the self, and the body that God made, and the mind that God made, and the spirit that God made, and of all their ways and thoughts and desires, for in the love of all these is the way to God.

For God abides forever in the union of love, in the love of Christ that is the Son of God and of Sophia that is the Daughter of God, and Their union, that is God.
And these our bodies are the temple of God, and therefore we may put on eternity in the love of one another, and celebrate the union of God, that is forever.

Therefore, let us celebrate our love for God and for one another; let us celebrate the seasons and the changes, the sowing and the harvest, the coming and the going, the beginning and the end, for all these is love.

Let us worship in the seed and the blossom and fruit, in the bridal chamber and the banquet, in the marketplaces and in secret, that we may partake if the sacrament of love, that is forever.

Let us celebrate in singing and in dancing, in friendship and lovemaking, and in all manner of joyous and bountiful and beautiful things that are fitting to the love in the worship of God who made all things.

Let is put away fear and envy and hatred and intolerance and all thought of guilt and sin out of our hearts, that we may worthily celebrate our brotherhood in joy and in love.

In the name of Christ, that is the Son of God, and of Sophia that is the Daughter of God, and of their union, that is God – Amen.

THE CUP, THE SWORD, AND THE CRUX ANSATA

THE CUP, THE SWORD, AND THE CRUX ANSATA

The Witchcraft by Jack Parsons

Introduction

If it is possible to characterize an age with a word, ours might be called the age of need. In the midst of riches, there is not satisfaction or content, before the mightiest science and technology the basic questions go unanswered, the basic problems unsolved. With every possibility of sexual qualification, there is a lust that is unquenched, a desire unfulfilled.

Religion and old truths in robes gaudy or severe, struggles in vain against a spiritual sterility, speaks windily in empty words that fall on empty hearts, cults flourish, and grow ridiculous, and fall away – social philosophies, conceived in the loftiest idealism, are twisted, distorted, aborted before birth.
All, all withers before the flame of an awful desire, inarticulate and unapprehended, that is like to burn up the world. And all over the world there is despair for the present and fear for the future, because of a need, a desire that is not known.

And what is this desire? It is the desire to know ourselves, to know our brothers, and to know God. Not in the barren reaches of intellectual speculation or sterile webs of metaphysical logic, but in the warm understanding depths of human emotion, and in the gold heights of spiritual communion.

To know ourselves – the wonderous microcosmic creation – to dare the abysses and the hell: to span the oceans, explore the continents, scale the mountains and achieve the constellations that shine within our own being, To know our brothers, to love and be loved – to understand, oh God, to understand, to dislove the malice and fear and in laughter and in tears to embrace and cry my brother, oh my brother.

To know God, to know that awful serenity ( severity?) that makes even the flowers to blossom and the birds to sing; to stand naked before the terror and ecstasy of eternity, before the total love that is God.
What is the enormous curiosity and the insatiable list that has made gods and kings…

It is written that Oedipus gave a banal answer to a riddle propounded by the Sphinx, and thereafter went down disastrously into Thebes. And here is the whole history or man. That being that is half beast and half goddess cries out “what is man?” and the answers, oh the answers.
“It is a slave, an ape, a machine, a damned soul”.

What indeed is man, this portent that has appeared among us? What is his origin, and what his destiny? Was he not formed from the star dust, from the nebulae, out of the suns? Is he not born of the ocean, with the wind and the rain and the shout of thunder in his voice? Do not all deeps and all heights meet in him, abyss unto abyss? Is there not fire in his heart and laughter and terror about him who is beloved by life and death?

What is the enormous curiosity and insatiable lust that has made gods and kinds and creeds, and unmade them – broken toys on the dump heap of time?
What is this, who can go so high, and so very low – who has grubbed in all gutters, cried out on all crosses, terrorized on all thrones – this god from the depths, this beast from the stars, this wonder and terror called man?
Where shall we seek the answer? Why, it is everywhere in everything he does, in what he makes, in what he thinks – assuredly – but in these things his back is turned. But when we look into the secret heart – the symbols, into the passion of sorcery and sanctity and the passion that transcends both of these – then we may see the “stuff that dreams are made of,” the matrix of the maker of gods.

The Trinity

What pitiable nonsense veils the face of this enormous mystery. With one great sweep let us brush away the trash of the centuries, and behold the unveiled wonder; for here is the apotheosis of man. The Cup, the Sword and the Crux Ansata, Isis, Osiris, Horus, Holy Ghost, Father, and Son, the veritable name of God.

The Cup, the holy grail, the Cup of Babalon, WOMAN, and the eternal force embodied in woman, the heart of nature – dark womb of stars.
The Sword, solar phallic emblem of the demon-angel – the beast – god that is man.

The Crux Ansata, looped cross of life, symbol of the two combined in the creative ecstasy that is God, and prefiguring the child that is the perfect fruit of that union.

Here is the basic trinity. Upon its splendid structure have been hung all ornaments of shame and folly, of trickery and self-deceit. For it is only with clear and unselfconscious eyes that we may look on the forces that made and move us. That which is God is eternal and changeless, but truly we have made its images in our own image, distorting in partiality and prejudice, in fear and greed, even as these things distort the light within.
This is my thesis – that by knowing and understanding of these two forces we may unite them in ourselves into a third, which is God.

This is the hidden knowledge, the secret doctrine known to almost every savage, preserved in the occult schools of history, and well night lost to modern man. And I believe that this knowledge properly applied, will not be without some value. I believe that we have taken refuge from a religion that was intolerably corrupt and sanctimonious, in a materialism which, without spiritual values, is equally barren. It is my desire to indicate an approach, based upon a very ancient concept, whereby a mature and healthy minded person – even a skeptical person – may find spiritual and emotional significance.

I am aware that such an approach must be simple, and I have chosen fundamental concepts may be offensive in certain quarters. It is certainly not my intention to offend, but I must point out that persons unable or unwilling to see the wonder and beauty of sex, and that which lies beyond sex, are mainly responsible for the confusion and ultimate destruction of the religious ideal.

I
THE CUP

BABALON the beautiful, the Great Whore BABALON, riding the star beast, and drunken on the blood of saints. Genetrix – Matrix – Mother of Stars – what an image of fear and wonder! Scorn not – mock not – for the Cup that she beareth is the Holy Graal, and the name Whore is also holy.

For is not BABALON the whole of nature – and is not the Cup she beareth that in which all things are conceived? Verily She is the star goddess, “maiden most perfect, lady of light”, the “sea born and star begotten” of whom Sappho hymned? And is not BABALON Woman, the beloved Whore, who gives all that she is, and uses all of a man? Verily, she is that accursed angel in whom is all damnation and all redemption, for in her is all power given.

And from that Cup flow the rivers of life, and its foam is the foam of the milky way, that bears the wonderful seed of the stars. And from these waters rises tall and eternal the tree of life, the world ash.
What scurrilous blasphemy, what incredible affrontery, that would insult the whole of nature with a doctrine of immaculate conception, a degraded sneer at woman, and the wonderful process by which men are born. What foul conniving mind would stoop to forge such chains for woman!

In the beginning was the matriarchy – the age of Isis, age upon age slowly unfolding in which woman, recipient of the mystery of creation, was also the Priestess of the tribe. Sorceress, seeress, keeper of the keys of birth, healing and death, her architype is Isis, veiled upon a throne. I do not think she was that clubwoman, mother of weeping little boys, who is the ferocious would-be matriarch of today.

I see her ample breasted, large thewed, black maned, eyes flashing with battle, tender with love and withdrawn in mystery as she fulfilled the needs of herself, her mate, her children, and her tribe. I do not think she was frigid, or sterile, as are the modern priestesses of the free life.

It was she who sat at the temple gate by the waters of Babylon and gave herself to a stranger. Not to one man did she give herself in that rite, but to all men, and therefore to God. And how much greater is her service that that of those nuns who deny man and therefore God in their lack of charity.

Look upon her now in her nakedness, this glorious whore called woman. Behold her chanting a war cry, riding a steed of the Sagas – Semiramis, Vicingatorix – Bruinhil. Is she not admirable?

Behold her in the chambers of the night, her cheeks flushed, her eyes large, her mouth moist with honey and sweet with fire, giving the ecstasy and anguish of her body utterly in love. Is she not magnificent!

Follow her into the temple of the forest, and see what wonderous rites she invokes the godhead upon the tribe. Where is pale, sad, chaste Mary in comparison with this vision? Why if they came to crucify her son, she would seize a sword and slay until men ran screaming before that fury. That, or of need be nail him up with her own hands. Who has conjured up this meek, mewling, pipsqueak of a woman, from what pot of cabbage soup? Surely some tradesman with the soul of a piss cart.

For there is a woman that will suck a man’s soul down to hell, and utterly destroy him, save he be a man indeed. Is she not a demon. Verily she is a demon from the deepest pit, and non but the Magian King, master of the sword of will, shall ever call her mate. It is a subtlety of the Cup that it conquers by yielding, and yields to conquer, and this for every goddess there is a demon adverse. Even as high as the head in heaven, thus far down go the roots in hell, and this is the blessedness of the true saint, the lover of BABALON, that has achieved the marriage of heaven and hell.

 

There is the law for the little ones of earth, and it is written, “Thou shalt not transgress”. But BABALON is beyond the Law and assembly, and who would win her muse transgress the low, and win to the solitude of anarchy and darkness. For it is also written “thou shalt spill out thy blood to the last drop”.
Oh woman, into what dark and awful bondage have you gone down – the dupe of priests, the tool of knaves, the slave of fools – in the name of propriety – of virtue – of male superiority. What fires have lighted your shame – the stakes, the chains, the whips; what gutters have known your degradation, and what gilded breeding pens! And, worst shame of all – you yourself have maintained what rotten tissue of pretenses, to the enslavement of yourself and your sisters. And what a terrible revenge you have taken – you, who hold the keys of life and death. How blind was man in his folly and how he has suffered for it.
But all these things, degradation, vengeance, folly, are but cloud shadows across the face of the eternal woman that is BABALON. It is she who reins in the heart of every woman and who is the desire of every man. Therefore I say, Invoke Her!

Envision her, this mighty woman – this goddess – this “circle of stars whom our Father is but the younger brother”. Imagine her, whose song is the song of the sea, whose heart is the heart of the earth, she at whose laughter the flowers blossom in the spring, at whose touch the earth is made fertile. All to her – fear her not – for is she not woman – tender mysterious – alluring – she is the essence of woman-raised to her own power, set loose in herself.

II
The Angel and the Sword

I. How Paradise is made of what is.

a. Love being an overflowing of fulness, receiving a sort of giving, and happiness a measure of adequacy
b. Youth being a period of exploration of what is, with due consideration for the mysteries.
c. Maturity being a period for enjoying what is, and to hell with the mysteries.
d. Age being a period for the enjoyment of the mysteries.
e. And paradise consisting of being altogether what we are.

II. How Hell is made of what is not.

a. Hate being a yearning of emptiness, fear a sort of premature rejection, and misery a measure of inadequacy.
b. Youth being a period of rejection of what is in favor of what should be, or reaction against the same.
c. Maturity being the deepening conviction that it is not worth the price, and the determination that others shall pay this price in full.
d. Age being the period of hating and being hated.
e. End Hell consisting of being other – less than we are.

III. The Angel being the image of God.

a. Our parents being the only Gods we know.
b. And in ourselves we deeply desire to please.
c. The Jews have made an image of God that speaks, saying “Thou shalt not”.
d. This is our God.
e. Being our parents God.
f. And shall be our children’s God.
g. Saying “In swear thou shalt labour, in sin take thy pleasure, in sorrow bear and bring forth. Thou shalt hate thy seed, thy seed shall hate thee. In unlove shalt thou be thy not self. Men. Hell.

IV. The sword being the law set everyday against the gate of paradise.

a. Man being set against himself, the law is also set against itself.
b. The law of nature is the law of man.
c. The law of matter against the law of spirit.
d. (missing)
e. Some saying that if Life = Death, then not life = not death. This shows the formula of the Christians. (Victim).
f. Or that if God is crucified, then to be crucified is to be God. This being the formula of the Jews (Scapegoat).
g. That matter = mother, and spirit alone avails. The formula of mysticism. (Priest of God = fem daughter)
h. That spirit = father, and matter alone avails. The formula of science (Priest of nature = M. Son)

V. The gate of Paradise being so narrow that only one at a time may pass through.

a. Though it is by two that an entrance is effected
b. Still it is the total self only discovered by the self which must pass into many mirrors.
c. So those who would lead the multitudes to Paradise, and those who would save the many are deluded.
d. They see themselves in others, but fail to see the others in themselves.
e. As one crying peace, unknowing that his own concealed hatred is war.
f. Or one crying war, and thereby seeking to slay the night monsters of his dark self.

VI. Yet again, the angel is death, and his sword time

a. Death being no man’s servant, or time shut up in any place
b. Neither is death cozened or propitiated, not time tricked or forgotten.
c. Yet they will mask for fools, and walk in dreams
d. But for the whole self death is a guard against not life, and time a guard against unchanged.
e. When the bowl is broken, and when the cord is loosed, all selves rejected and renounced put off their averse masks and sit in judgement
f. This is the judgement; all are beautiful, and no payment was necessary. This is the last of the hells.

VII. Pasturing upon the upland meadows of eternity

a. Come unto me, my demons, at last we will take off the masks.
b. Unmasked there your names were need and desire. Here there is no need nor desire and your names are being and going, the two transitives of love.

III
Wormwood Star

What becomes of the star that burns so fiercely in some adolescent horizons? It falls surely, but is it extinguished? Passionate and maudlin, ambitious and naïve, egotistical and selfless, criminal and transcendental, it burns beneath the waters, and these waters are exceedingly bitter.
And what is this star but the human passions energized by the heroic myth until they burn with an abnormal light – imagination fueled by passion until it coruscates in the octave scale – an ultra violet as spiritual passion, in the visible range as genius, and in the infra-dark a criminality, psychosis and disease.

Passion roused to the pitch of the heroic can be tolerated in our own culture, only when it is sublimated, (and even then considerable diluted, in art). The heroic is anti-social in every sense of our use of the word. It is anti-collective, anti-democratic, anti-communal. It is dangerous, disruptive, often disastrous in terms of our social values.

Siegfried, Arthur, Gawain, even Jesus would rightly be treated as criminals in our culture, simply because they would be so unsafe, so unsocial.

IV

If the knowledge of Lucifer is the knowledge of Hell, then the essence of damnation is the belief that hell is not hell, and the continual disappointment and frustration of discovering anew that it really is; and of having somehow to explain the fact with palliative platitudes. The damned find hell where they seek paradise, and find paradise only where they fear hell.

Then the only possible comfort to the damned is this knowledge, squarely faced and never forgotten; that hell is Hell. The transcendent and quixotic paradox that Hell is also Paradise pertains only to the Heroic.
Hell consists of the submission of the heroic ideal to convention or security, to fear or self indulgence, or to any illusion of the partial self which is inferior to the total self.

The heroic ideal is the aspiration to transcend limitations – by love and understanding – by passion and violence, by will and discipline – by all and any means that will achieve the knowledge and liberation of the total self.

 

V

WE ARE THE WITCHCRAFT. We are the oldest organization in the world. When man was born, we were. We sang the first cradle song. We healed the first wound, we comforted the first terror. We were the Guardians against the Darkness, the Helpers on the Left Hand Side. Rock drawings in the Pyrenees remember us, and little clay images, made for an old purpose when the world was new. Our hand was on the old stone circles, the monolith, the dolmen, and the druid oak. We sang the first hunting songs, we made the first crops to grow; when man stood naked before the Powers that made him, we sang the first chant of terror and wonder. We wooed among the Pyramids, watched Egypt rise and fall, ruled for a space in Chaldea and Babylon, the Magian Kings. We sat among the secret assemblies of Israel, and danced the wild and stately dances in the sacred groves of Greece.

In China and Yucatan, in Kansas and Kurdistan we are one. All organizations have known us, no organization is of us; when there is too much organization we depart. We are on the side of man, of life, and of the individual. Therefore we are against religion, morality and government. Therefore our name is Lucifer. We are on the side of freedom, of love, of joy and laughter and divine drunkenness. Therefore our name is Babalon.

Sometimes we move openly, sometimes in silence and in secret. Night and day are one to us, calm and storm, seasons and the cycles of man, all these things are one, for we are at the roots. Supplicant we stand before the Powers of Life and Death, and are heard of these Powers, and avail. Our way is the secret way, the unknown direction. Our way is the way of the serpent in the underbrush, our knowledge is in the eyes of goats and of women.

It is our own force that sometimes shifts jeweled coils and […] mighty pinions in the breast of man; our Power is one with the Power that causes the God to stir in the heart of the seed, and the bud to burst into blossom and fruit; and whenever a man and a woman are united in one substance, our power is that substance.

Merlin was of us, and Gawain and Arthur, Rabelais and Catullus, Gilles de Retz and Jehanne d’Arc, De Molensis, Johannes Dee, Cagliostro, Francis Hepburn and Gellis Duncan, Swinburne and Eliphas Levi, and many another bard, Magus, poet, martyr known and unknown that carried our banners against the enemy multiform and ubiquitous, the Church and the State. And when that vermin of Hell that is called the Christian Church held all the West in a slavery of sin and death and terror, we, and we alone, brought hope to the heart of man, despite the dungeon and the stake.

II.

We are the Witchcraft, and although one may not know another, yet we are united by an indissoluble bond. And when the high wild cry of the eagle sounds in your mind, know that you are not alone in your desire for freedom. And when the howl of the wolf echoes in the forests of your night, know that there are those who also prowl. And when the ways of your fellows about you seem the ways of idiocy and madness, know that there are also others who have seen and judged – and acted.

Now know that the power that we serve lies in the heart of every man and woman as the tree lives in the seed. And to be with us, you have but to call upon that Power, and you are as one of us. And when our Power and Joy have come upon you, you may go forth and do your will among men, and none shall say you nay. And if it be your will, you shall do your will secretly, and if it be your will, you will do your will openly, as your will.

Therefore lift up your hearts saying, “I am a man” or “I am a woman, and the Power of Life is mine!” And in the Power of Life you shall live and love, accepting no restriction and placing no restriction, freely and granting freedom. And it may be in the bounty of life you shall see the love of life shine in the eyes of another, and the lust of life burn upon his brow, and thus you shall take great joy together. And it may be in good fortune you may find a number such; and share your joy in secret feasting and rejoicing and all manner of lovemaking and festival. Or it may be that at hazard and danger you will teach the joyous power to men; as your wills move you.

And this is well so long as you remember one thing. There can be no restriction. The Power of Life is not restricted; it knows its own way, but no mind knows that way. Therefore in yourself practice all the giving and taking of freedom that is consistent with life, for thereby alone can you remain in our joy.
Pain is. Terror is, loss and loneliness and agony of heart and spirit, even unto Death. For this is the gateway to the kingdom of Pan.

Our way is not for all men. There are those who are so constricted and sick in themselves that the thought of their own freedom is a horror, and that of others a fierce pain; so that they would enslave all men. And these you should shun, or, if you must, destroy them as you will know how, for this also is bounty.
Nor think the life power should manifest in those who have no trouble or turmoil, for these may be mere dumb cattle, innocents out of season. Rather does the power often show the most where conflict rages, since at any time, and especially in a false civilization, the way must be won through. Surrender is disaster. The other side of the coin is a song in the sunlight and a dance in the moonlight, where all mists are dispersed. But the way must be won.

IV

In dealing with the public from an initiated viewpoint, one furious dilemma always presents very strange norms. The truth, that is, the truth about the immediate aspect of some culture, is always different from the accepted values and alleged truths of the culture. This truth is then irritating, annoying, upsetting and highly dangerous.

The dilemma then is this; should one tell the truth, invoke the hostility of the public and the possible destruction of oneself and ones hopes, or should one disguise and palliate his truth, taking the equal risk that is will be obscured to futility, or even utterly lost.
Further, in his analysis, the adept must ask if, in his desire to tell an unpleasant truth, there is an element of sado-masochism that moves towards martyrdom and massacre.

Equally, in his desire to hedge, he must enquire if there is a secret desire to propitiate, to conform, to suck the golden tit of the world, and to hell with truth. In either of those extremes there is much precedent and considerable company, none of which appears to have accomplished much either in terms of human betterment or of real self-improvement. History is a long testament to the fact that men will not tell the truth about themselves and will not listen when it is told.

Of course, the ideal is a balance between the two extremes; but how to achieve that balance when we ourselves are the unbalanced products of an unbalanced culture? Through suffering, experiment, analysis, and the exercise of will, we can come to a knowledge and understanding of ourselves, and of the things that have thwarted and distorted us. But we cannot so easily undo that thwarting and distorting.

Even in our attempts to attain balance in ourselves and out environment, we find ourselves tempted and trapped by the hatred, the fear, and the desire for the disastrous effects of our won training. Learning most bitterly the dangers inherent in romantic idealization and projection in religion and life, we react into the structures of scientific materialism, only to find that we have simultaneously destroyed the romantic-creative impulse that gave us spiritual life. Worse – arising from this grave like a troll’s ghost we see the malignant pseudo religions of state and science, and the arid moralities of freethinking and liberalism.

Here, then, is our impasse. The enormously dynamic forces within us will always continue to create and destroy. If they do not function under our understanding and will they will create monsters and destroy our most beloved hopes.

The recurring problem of the adept is then exactly this – to discover adequate forms in which these forces can function constructively. Above all else he must recognize the magnitude of the forces, and of the forms required to contain and direct them.

The great error of society lies in this fact, that these forces, being strong and dangerous, are therefore the evil things that should be ignored or destroyed, usually to the tragic cost of innumerable persons. Being ignored, they accumulate force underground until they break out in ravening chaos, and in the futile attempts to destroy them, cruelty and terror are loosed upon the world.

It would seem obvious that forms of the western world are inadequate to cope with the forces of the human psyche. One after another they have broken down with ever accruing dividends of violence, deceit and human misery. Man seems unable to contain either his love or his hate – they turn monstrous and rend him.

So the adepts must turn again to the fountain of life, and its veiling magick from whence come all religion, all science, all philosophy, and all creative force.
Thus we, The Children, offer Magick in its essential form as a way of life, bipolar, multivalued, containing and transcending all forms and all noumena.
Not a church, a dogma, an organization, a form a cult, magic contains within itself all these things a partiality of the whole. It is therefore that system in which each man discovers his own individual creative godhead, and which yet embraces all men in universal brotherhood and love.

If, in this view, old, cherished truths, dogmas, creeds and forms appear only as partialities, or even malignant because of their overvaluation or distortion, that is the price that must be paid for the wide horizon needful for growth and life.
It is a fundamental of magick that every force and every act stems from love. Once this is fully understood, there is simply no room for hate, which is itself the type of love felt for things that are incompletely experienced. But in the view of love as self sacrifice, abnegation, and propitiation this truth is distorted and obscured. It will be seen that sham values and overemphasized partialities have a most malignant life of their own, since they are based on fear of exposure. But it is essential that we expose ourselves to this malice if we are to attain the living truth for ourselves and our race. It is equally essential that we explore and transmute the seeds of the malice in ourselves, lest like calls to like, and we are destroyed in our own nightmare.

Being in love we create love, being in hate we create hate and, in the image of the universe being in ourselves, the love or hate we create acts equally upon us. This is the great pragmatism of magick. Being truly in love we can act determinedly, in will and joy, we can even fight at need, without fear or malice and guilt, since fighting itself is a form of love.

We, the Children, love as children, seeking the means whereby we can give our love to everyone. We are, it is true, destroyers, but only the destroyers of unlove, loneliness and fear. Beyond that we are the creators of a world of magick, or the revealers of a magical world that is always. So we say love and fear not, in love there is no fear. Also in the service of the image of love may true love come to dwell, even the love of which all known loves are as shadows to the sun.