31 Mar 1950 – Church of Thelema status

31 March 50

Care Frater Saturnus

Greetings of the Vernal Equinox.

After considerable study, thought and actual investigation in accordance with your advice, I have decided to work with 132 (W.T. Smith T) for a probationary period of the next three months. In this connection I have prepared a course of lectures which will begin in two weeks, and have memorized the Gnostic Mass, which is now ready for public performance. I am not without reservations in the matter, but it seems to me perhaps the best effort I can make in the circumstances.

At present we will be operating as the Church of Thelema, which is incorporated in California. This seems a good idea, from the standpoint of religious freedom guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution, and from the standpoint of the 15% gross income tax deduction allowed for religious donations.

Since there are so few of us, and the job is so big, I hope that we can all work together if not as members of one group, then at least in deserved mutual trust, respect and cooperation.

I called to see Jane (Wolfe. T) in regard to the Letters to Probationers, and she indicated that she is waiting to hear from you before she takes any action.
I believe that I owe you some thing for the copy of Khaled Khan and the reprints of the three sacred writings. I should also like to obtain a copy of the Book of Lies, if one is available. If you have not read it, I should like to recommend a most unusual and stimulating book by Joseph Campbell “The Hero with a Thousand Faces”. Best regards and best wishes for you and Sascha

Love is the law, love under will. Fraternally

210

11 May 1943 – Finances, Leadership of Agape Lodge

1003 S. Orange Grove ave
Pasadena, Cal.
May 11, 1943

Dear Brother Germer,
93,

Enclosed find $75 for this month’s contributions. I have been late in arranging this month’s finances, hence the delay.
Have been working night and day, and am taking a breathing spell to write in haste. Wilfred, Helen and the baby have left for the ranch. There is much clearing of the atmosphere, and a happier spirit. Am working on four new prospects.

Fredric has been informing all and sundry (by implication) that he is a far superior man to run the Lodge. Something went to his head, He is entirely objective in regard to everything that does not affect him, and completely subjective in regard to everything that does. I am a little amused, since he has given less in efforts or contribution than anyone now present. However, he has his good points and his uses. If I can only keep him from boring people. I am enclosing part of a letter which I started last week, which takes up some details. This is all I can write at present. Will let you know of developments.

93 93/93

P.S. Helen is still Treasurer of the Church of Thelema. If I send my donations through the church, I can benefit in income tax. This will be quite a saving, I would like your advice. I should think that the Church of Thelema would be brought under the Jurisdiction of the Order, or else that the Order should be incorporated here and the Church disbanded. I do not like the idea of separate organization handling our finances. I should like to handle finances directly here. The Church is now practically inoperative. However the religious liberty angle should also be considered.

J.

I know what you mean when you say you are over-burdened. I am in the same situation. In a way I like it, but it results in inefficiency. You simply cannot hold down 24 stops with 10 fingers. But its fun trying.

I misworded my last letter in regard to Wilfred’s position. What I was thinking was that Jane could not accept the responsibility of the position, and I did not have the authority to do so.
Your appointment makes my present position quite clear, and I will make every effort to justify your confidence.

Wilfred has an entirely changed attitude in regard to yourself and Baphomet. He sees the necessity of leaving and is, in fact, anxious to go. There is a great improvement in the general atmosphere, and I am much encouraged and hopeful for the future.

Recently Brother Culling offered Wilfred the facilities of his ranch, a small place near San Diego. He can occupy it after may 7, next week. I believe this would be an excellent arrangement.

Personally, I do not believe that he should get a job, unless it were something extraordinary. He is perfectly capable of establishing another routine, and driving down the rut of an ordinary job from now till doomsday. His great difficulty is that his drive controls him and paralyses his higher faculties, rather than he controlling the drive. He must somehow break the rationalizing that leads him ever to the same cul-de-sac.

His small stature and unhappy childhood have produced in him the automatic reflexed of defenses and negative aggression. He takes refuge in a petty routine in which he can find some relief from the torment of his mind, and at least pretend that he is doing something effectively. All this is only a cloud over his tremendous devotion and real ability. When it is removed, he will really shine. He now realizes some of this, and that is half the battle.

If he took an ordinary job, he would come to work late, put his feet on the desk, and slap the boss on the back, He should strike up acquaintances in bars, hire halls and give lectures, stand on his head in public, anything to get over his lack of confidence and dear of people.

But that will take readjustment, and I think a period at the ranch with his new point of view and vital intention to really accomplish something, is the best start. I will, of course, want your opinion on this.

In regard to the brethren who qualified the pledge, I think some time on my part and a word from you will change their point of view. Let me know when you write.

Forman has spoken often you, he says that he sees things more clearly since his visit, I can understand this.
I wish you were here, and I hope you are right in your hunch that A.C. will come over soon. If I could only see him once. Otherwise I may try to arrange my business so that I can get to England late this year.


I should like your advice as to how I might arrange my insurance and will so that the Order would benefit to best advantage. I am not clear on this. We are not incorporated in this country, and the world future seems very uncertain.
I have been seriously considering asking Brother Max to visit here and possibly attend Lodge. What is your opinion?

 

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

 

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.

FREEDOM IS A LONELY STAR

FREEDOM IS A LONELY STAR_

Three Essays on Freedom Jack Parsons Ch.1 (Audiobook)

ONE TIME, IN AMERICA, there was a dream. It was a dream of man. Through the long night, through two thousand years of bondage, the dream was born. Out of agony and terror. Out of poverty and misery. Out of secret thoughts, in the heart of despair. Out of whispered words, in the shadow of death. Out of love, in an empire of hate. Children, chained to work carts. Women whipped through the streets. Men and women, and children too, burned alive in the public square, because they dared to think of freedom.

Lonely, and difficult, and dangerous, through ages and ages of night the star of freedom was born. Nursed with blood. Nurtured on agony. Carried, at length, to a new world, and planted there, in the fresh soil. Nourished, until it shone with an awesome light, a winged thing so high, so pure, so beautiful that it struck all the world with wonder. A dream of free men, working together in dignity and significance of honorable representatives, who cherished freedom and honor beyond their own interest and welfare. Of the inviolability of individual freedom, beyond kings and priests, beyond politicians and judges, beyond money or power or prestige. And all over the world men in tyranny and ignorance and oppression responded to that dream. “At last,” they said, “at last.”

Fragments of the dream come down to us now – “We hold that all men are born free and equal; and endowed…with certain inalienable rights, among which are the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” “I shall guard even my enemy from oppression.” “Give me liberty or give me death.” Fragments and strands, echoing emptily in empty hearts.
For the dream is dead now, or in a sleep that is like unto death. It has been sold out, denied and betrayed.

It has been sold out by cheap and venal politicians, by benevolent authoritarians, by “loyal” party men, by shrewd and greedy capitalists, by wise guys and smart guys that know all the answers. It has been sold out by the great middle class that prefers its false sense of security and false freedom, by the labor leaders that put power first, and the little man who prefers – at last with at least a decent reason – a full belly, or the promise of a full belly, to freedom turned dangerous and hungry.

It has been sold out by America, and for that reason the heart of America is sick, and the soul of America is dead. It is for this reason that we cannot instruct our children with a significant morality, or elect honorable men to office, or conduct our own affairs with a sense of dignity and significance. That dream itself was the soul of America in which there was no cause by man, no religion but man, and no goal but man. The betrayal of his dream is the one thing that man cannot forgive himself. The pompous oratory, the brave show, the frantic search for scapegoats and traitors – all attempts to conceal from himself the thing that cannot be concealed, his cowardice, his failure.
Having failed freedom at home, we engaged in sick and fevered attempts to impose it abroad, with all the panoply of futility. Out of the First World War, national prohibition, the income tax, Mussolini, Franco, Hitler, and the benevolent dictatorship of the New Deal. Out of the Second, Stalin, the enslavement of sciences, and the suppression of freedoms in the Great Red Scare. After the Third, what will be left to suppress? Heroic Crusades for Freedom. Advances to the rear. For what? Survival? To what end? To the end that we must ape the enemy in order to defeat him on the grounds that our ends justify our means? To the very end, where all our freedoms are gone, the betrayers themselves betrayed, and freedom again rediscovered and reconsecrated in agony and blood? To what their end?

Perhaps we could face the world as conquerors, in the name of power and right, if we had the guts, which we do not. We could face the world as heroes if we had the courage of our own dream; which we do not. But as champions of freedom abroad who have sold out freedom at home, willing to sell out the freedom of anyone else where our own ends are served, we make a sorry show. Pretentious hypocrites, lacking even the shrewdness of a sound ego, we make ourselves ridiculous in the eyes of the world. And underneath the pretense: shame – the shame of the booby that has sold his dignity, his individuality for conformity, for money, for the prestige of the pigsty.
The principles of freedom are forever the same, but its issues are constantly shifting. George III is not the tyrant today, nor Madison the arch-reactionary, nor are we asked to surrender our liberties and persecute those who think differently because of the menace of Danton, Maurat and Robespierre. It is now safe to enshrine those persons whom once it would have been very dangerous to know – neither Washington, nor Jefferson, nor Henry nor Paine would have been “safe” or “secure” associations in the days of the revolutions.
Now there is a theory that our fathers fought and died for our freedom, and this bought it for us. So now there is no need for us to concern ourselves with that for which they paid with discomfort, hunger and blood. We can leave this to those who are hired or drafted to protect our liberty.

We are assured on every hand that we are a free people – in fact, we have it in writing. Our fathers were not content with such assurances, but rather, by act and deed, assured these freedoms for themselves. That is the difference.
We are a savage culture. Our emotions and our attitudes, our needs and our drives, are all savage. Our religions and our morals, societies and creeds, cults and taboos; all are those of the savage.

But we are savages who have assumed the pretense of civilization, and this is our greatest disaster. This miserable pretense has closed at once both possibilities of stabilizing our culture. The one, or the non-pretentious savage outlet, would allow us the expression of our savage needs and drives in a set of acceptable mores and expectations. The other, an acceptance of our savagery together with an aspiration to true civilization, might allow us to face and know ourselves, and in the slow, painful laboratory where all natural process are wrought, in time effect some upward change.

But in our blindness to our savagery we are trapped – we refuse to see the facts until it is too late – until in our private lives the impossible attention undoes our fairest hopes and fondest dreams, and in the public scene the idiot and criminal nations play holocaust with all our world. And now, as by a joke of the gods, a power that is sublime has been put in the hands of our most ruthless criminals and our most appalling idiots. It thus becomes clear that we must stoon choose openly the most abysmal savagery without the least vestige of further pretense, or we must renounce savagery to an undreamed of degree. And in this renunciation we must accept two propositions of true civilizations: the individuality of the individual, and the absolute necessity for a world state.

No conceivable conquest, save the conquest of the individual of an by himself, can assure us against destruction in the conflicts to come. And if this conquest cannot be total, it must be sufficient to produce the requisite number of adequate and civilized individuals.

At present, I cannot conceive of a workable world state, and I know that it cannot be conceived and ordered in a world of savages. But I can conceive that individuals, sufficiently evolved, and working towards the understanding, knowledge, and self-control that defines freedom, could achieve this. It can only be done by free men, and these men must be equally free of the pretense and self-deception, and the success and conformity cults that have made our society culture a slough of despond. The inane and illogical restrictions that repress all individuality and creative spirit, the savage cruelty and hostility to ourselves and our fellows, the terror and guilt that ride us like nightmares, must be understood and relieved.

That such an undertaking would be popular is hardly to believed. That it would succeed in one generation, or ten, is perhaps too much to expect. But it is the only way. The wars, revolutions, crimes, the social and economic disorders and inequalities, which the ignorant regard as causes in themselves, are only the manifestations of the savage fact behind the civilized pretense – outbursts made more furious by evasions and repression. I know of no other answer than to cry a last crusade, a crusade for freedom, for the freedom to know and be ourselves before it is forever too late. If there is a hope, that hope is in man, and it is only in free men that the hope can be realized.

It is my aim to offer an examination of pretenses whereby they can no longer be concealed by institutions and names, and a definition of freedom that will, once and for all, place it beyond equivocation and deceit.

The conditioned reflex response of the standard ego is formulated in terms of the cross, the flag, the home, the church, the school God, mothers and American womanhood. These things have a purely reflexive value, without any rationale whatsoever. No standard ego has ever examined them; it would be heretical to do so. He simply responds. Behind these mechanical values, the necessities of life are met with rationalization processes that are often almost sublime. The crooked business and political deals, murder and pillage, seductions, rapes and visits to prostitutes are all conducted by the man who isn’t there, in another world whose doors are guarded by the most marvelous network of hypocrisy, pretense and downright lying ever invented by the mind of man.

Occasionally some venturesome soul, dissatisfied with the standard ego formulations, breaks out and wanders around in reality awhile, until he is frightened back into the dream again or guided back by some psychiatrist.
The first view of truth is terror – the knowledge is as old as time – all the myths show it. From alcoholism to paranoid psychosis, from the mildest neurotic syndrome to schizophrenia, the escape from the terror of the true self and the true world. Dalua and Dermot, Pan and Persephone, Mayan and Mixitli, Janicot and Jehovah, each showed a visage of horror before the true face – the total truth – was revealed. Truth, in short, is not for fools and cowards, but for this the will that acts, the wisdom that knows, and the courage that dares the first terrible impact.

Beyond the fanged serpent are the immortal meadows, behind the skull face lie the stars. Only the free man shall pass that portal, and walk out into the total world that is eternity.

In a world where a precocious romance is set above reality – where He is a God and She is a Goddess in a springtime, where all endings are happy, plain John Smith and Mary Jones have short shrift. Morality cannot endure the comparison – a clumsy overture, a cold in the nose, an unexpected monthly ruins the enchantment, and the movies assure us that our mate, odious comparison, is somehow a miserable exception to the gold rule.
But whether we seek the dream in an escape from reality, or whether we cynically deny it, we are equally damned. True marriage, that rare estate, is as close to paradise as humanity can come. But it cannot be attained only by keeping the vision of beauty constantly before us and by transmitting, by constant effort and courage, by faith and love, the hard matters of reality into the shape of the beloved dream. And that marriage attained is the garden of paradise, whereof happy children are the “fruit.”

It is not easily come to – it is possible only to courage, to maturity, to intelligence and high idealism. But it can be attained, “and if it can it must,” for that marriage is the sure foundation of a free world.

Police, like the military, are a necessary evil that requires constant surveillance and rigid control in order to keep them within the bounds of constitutional law and democratic procedure. In most large American cities, police are little more than agents of a corrupt political machine, acting as collectors and supervisors for organizing prostitution, gambling, dope and protection rackets. For these gangsters, the collection of revenue and the terrorization of opposition is of far greater importance than the suppression of crime. The police mind is usually of a sadistic and homicidal trend, and the office, as it now exists, offers an ideal opportunity for the expressions of the urge, and the ruthless punishment of symbolic scapegoats in the form of prostitutes, derelicts, Negroes, radicals, drunks, and other helpless and insignificant members of the nation indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

The traditional American distrust and dislike of police stems from a remembrance of police states of Europe. But the modern American has abrogated, along with his other freedoms, his freedom from police interference in his private life, unwarranted search and seizure, wiretapping, suspension of constitutional immunity (the sole guarantee against intimidation and torture), and all the other trappings of a police state. His present resentment is about as mature, as courageous, and as effective as that of a small, broken-spirited boy against a brutal and tyrannical father. This gutless specimen is now engaged in selling out each liberty that someone else gained for him, as fast he can make the deal. He is buying security, protection, prosperity – the fine futile freedoms – and all the other gangsters goods at a bargain price. All that he pays is his right to call himself a man.

The methods by which politicians achieve their ultimate ambitions, that is, to become tyrants, are obvious, and exceedingly stale. But however old the trick, it seems that there is always a fresh crop of suckers. Foremost among the public plans and promises of Mussolini, Hitler and Stalin on their way to power were not the establishment of concentration camps. The murder and torture of free citizens, and the annihilation of all freedom.

As hard as it may seem to believe, by some sort of anachronistic plagiarisms these plans and promises included increased prosperity, fewer slums, social security, more jobs, and defense against enemies without and traitors within.
There were also among the foremost plans and promises of Sulla, Caesar, Robespierre and Napoleon. The bait is so old and obvious one suspects that repetition must have given it prestige. The first step is the discovery of an emergency. Any emergency will do – a depression, a plot, an enemy without, and enemy within, the second coming of Christ, witches – anything whatever which can be used to whip fear, hatred and hysteria for fever pitch.

The nest step is the program to meet the emergency. Whatever the program may be, increase taxation is its inevitable first-born and best beloved. Taxation – that is, for the Great Cause – taxation to create bureaus which create bureaus that require taxation for the support of bureaus. Taxation for the support of more politicians, police, charities, public works, et cetera. Taxation, in short, for anything and everything. Purely, of course, as a temporary measure. Ah, these temporary measures. How permanent they are. The Republican procedures of Rome were suspended, just temporarily, so that the politicians could fight a war and save the country in “this great and terrible emergency.” But somehow the emergency lasted through Sulla and Caesar, and Augustus, and Tiberius, and Caligula, and Claudius and Nero and in fact, clean through the collapse and final dissolution of the Roman state.
The next step is the discovery that the emergency is much worse than anyone thought. Revolution is on the verge, collapse is imminent, the world is going to end tomorrow.

So naturally we will act now and in order to do this it is necessary to have a dictatorship. Harsh word? Shall we say – organizations to meet the emergency temporarily, of course. The sophistries by which this putsch is justified, palliated, honey coated, are among the most ludicrous in the politician’s bag of tricks.

The church, for example, burnt heretics from motives of most terrible mercy. Since this was the only way to save their souls from hell, of course the church didn’t really kill, she only tried, convicted and sentenced to execution. The state did the dirty work, just to keep the church’s hands clean. Execution was by fire, because the church could not of course condone the shedding of blood.

The dictatorship of the proletariat is merely temporary – the state will gradually wither away like a snark hunter, leaving us all free as birds. Meanwhile it may be necessary to kill, torture and imprison a few million people, but whose fault is it if they get in the way of progress? Socialism – the greatest good of the greatest number – how can you argue against it? That only proves you are in the minority, in the wrong.

When the rights of labor interfere with the public good, the national need, the emergency – then to hell with their rights. What does the freedom of a few radical university professors, scientists, teachers, government workers matter when our country is in danger? Sign or be fired. And whose freedom tomorrow, fatheads, fools? Whose rights when the masks are down and the gloves off, and a spade is the thing you dig your grave with? When a man can be fired, hounded, persecuted, jailed in America for the opinions he holds, for his refusal to have his privacy violated, then it is time to publicly burn the Bill of Rights and the Declaration of Independence, and call this country by its right name – a tyrant state.

How can we cope with these predators, politicians and their moronic dupes? We can examine their emergencies, for what they are worth. Predators are not confined to one party or one nation. There is always the real need to be well armed, well informed and well prepared against all enemies of freedom. Well meaning fools, appalled by the predators within, clamor to throw down their arms and welcome the predators without. This is plain suicide, but the fear of predators without can also drive fools to the same suicide within. Arms and armies are necessary, but it also necessary to watch them, to control them, and to keep them subservient to the private citizens whom they serve.
We can reduce political sophistries to their basic elements, and examine them in the light of reason and necessity. Politicians need some graft – some excitement, some opportunity for hysteria; it is their life blood. A certain degree of criminality and psychosis goes with the breed. But easily, easily, gentlemen. Within limits, and under control.

Taxation, however, is a major root of the politician’s power, and it is here that he can best be regulated. The first new limit on potential power must be the abolition of confiscatory taxation, and of punitive taxation in all forms. Taxation should exist for the sole purpose of raising reasonable revenue, and must in no case exceed a fixed and minimum percentage of income, profit, value, or sales. The moment it does, it becomes a weapon of dictatorship superseding and replacing due process of law.

Taxation must be open, not hidden and secret. The process of withholding taxes from wages is a violation of individual and corporate rights, a dodge to dupe employees into blaming employers for the piratical raids of government on income. The income tax itself was the opening wedge in a conspiracy to build a vast politico-economic empire, wielding an absolute control over the income, business and private life of every citizen. Augmented by social security and old age and a multitude of hidden taxes, its success is now reasonable apparent to all except the chronic paupers and welfare dupes that are its dubious beneficiaries. Its such fun to soak the rich. But not so much fun when a rich man, from a tax standpoint, is anyone with an income over fifty dollars a month. Let the common man pay his taxes in the open and he will soon see that his “security,” at that price, could be sold by any insurance company, engraved on tablets of pure gold, at a handsome profit.

Any successful confidence fame must be played in stages; the sucker is not hooked all at once. The first issue must be one in which we all believe, the first victim someone we all hate. A rich man, a radical, and atheist, a Negro, a Jew – some no good bastard. We are all together, on the other side, until we take the bait. Then we are on the hook, and it is too late. The Nazi party was the government, the government makes the law, and good citizens always obey the law. Q.E.D. concentration camps = good government. That is the lesson of history, fresh, this time from Germany. One day it may be very well said of us also, “it is too bad they could not learn.” On the basis of the present trend, I would give this country fifteen years, at the outside, to turn into something that that is in essence a socialist or a fascist state.

History is curious. A few of the right men might stop it – the old dream still burns in America, if deep down and dimly. But they have not yet appeared.
The advent of psychoanalytical sciences and the publication of the Kinsey Report have indicated a true state of culture morals previously unsuspected in western history. The impact of these events on society is a moment comparable to that of nuclear physics and the advent of the atomic bomb. The significance of these revolutionary findings in the field of morals has not yet reached the point of practical application in terms of large scale individual and social adjustment. Confusion in regard to proper and significant attitudes and behavior appears to have reached an all-time high.

In addition to the tremendous burdens of self control imposed by culture and civilization, man now sees himself restricted by moral concepts which now appear savage, pretentious and archaic. In the face of ever-increasing social complexity, this burden becomes intolerable and he is tempted to throw the whole thing over at the first clean opportunity. This danger is particulary great because of lack of discrimination between what is essential and what is superfluous in the field of morals. The need for cooperation and renunciation exists as never before; as a corollary, the need for freedom and individuality, wherever these are possible, is od the same magnitude. It is in the field of sexual morals that unnecessary restrictions are most severe, and it is in this field that a process of revision and liberation can go furthest, and serve the most immediate purpose.

It would be of little value, and perhaps almost a disservice, to further demonstrate the barbarous nature and the failure of western sex morals, to develop a further philosophy of sexual freedom and stay at that. This would only serve to increase the awareness of frustration and unhappiness, without indicating any way out of the morass. In addition, it is necessary to clearly show a practical, individual solution to the moral problem, and that is the object of our work.

And you, man, put off this longing for your mother, put away these childish things and come into your manhood. She is not won by small devices and petty conceits, nor by crying, nor by beating on the chest, nor by roses or by gold, but by the clean, bright steel of the sword of freedom. Freedom of yourself, in yourself.

If you have manhood she will look to you for guidance, if you have courage she will find security with you, and if you have freedom she will come with you to liberty in all the spheres. On these three points you will win and hold her and not otherwise, the woman whom your manhood desires.

And from this marriage and not otherwise will come the children who will make a new world, the redeemers of prophecy, the conquerors of darkness and fear.

And this and not otherwise, in freedom, in love, in brotherhood and in the marriage of true minds, will we come finally, unobstructed, to the stars.

 

Chapter Two: The Sword & The Serpent

Of all the strange and terrible powers among which we move unknowingly, sex is the most potent. Conceived in the orgasm of birth, we burst forth in agony and ecstasy from the Center of Creation. Time and again we return to that fountain, lose ourselves in the fires of being, unite for a moment with the eternal force and return renewed and refreshed as from a miraculous sacrament. Then, at the last, our life closes in the orgasm of death.

Sex, typified as love, is at the heart of every mystery, at the center of every secret. It is this splendid and subtle serpent that wines about the cross and coils in the bloom of the mystic rose.

The sexual perversion of Christianity becomes obvious when it is realized that “The Holy Ghost” (The Sophia) is feminine. The very Tetragrammaton, Yod He Vau He, means: Father-Mother-Son- Daughter and asserts the splendor of the biological order. How could life proceed from a strictly masculine creation? What miracle could possibly be superior to the miracle of copulation, conception and gestation? In the corrupt and demonic Jehovah, the priesthood blasphemed nature in order to perpetuate a tyrannical and superstitious patriarchy. Woman was insulted and affronted with the calumny of immaculate conception — then, by this mystery mongering, a premium was placed on moral and spiritual sterility. This sublimation of the sex-urge has been the basis of the power of the church and is the source of much of the psychosis rampant in the modern world.
It has been asserted that the church has been a champion of progress and freedom; nothing could be more fallacious. Organized Christianity has been inevitably allied with tyranny, reaction and persecution. No organized dogma can contribute to progress except by occasional accident. The church’s main contribution has been to unintentionally foment revolt against its bigotry. It could hardly be otherwise with an organization founded on a double fallacy: the sin of sex and the infallibility of man. No religion can hope to benefit humanity while it preaches love and reviles the root of love. Anyone hoping to understand and cope with human relations must understand both the importance and over-emphasis of sex in society.

Sexual concepts and symbolism underlie all the world’s religions. As I mentioned above, sublimated sex has been the source of power for the Christian church. Sex and sex neurosis are fundamental factors in the attitude of modern men. These three facts give sex a place of prime importance in our liberal examination of society.

Our sex attitudes are largely characterized by pretense. The majority of people under fifty today have, at one time or another, engaged in what is termed illicit intercourse — and yet we pretend, publicly, that we have not done so. Some of us go so far as to state that we don’t do it, never would do it and disapprove of the criminal types who do.

Policemen arrest and judges convict persons discovered in a pursuit which they themselves indulge in. The enjoyment of a natural urge is defined as a crime. Young persons thus enjoying the urge in the wonder of the beginning are burdened with a sense of guilt and shame. They are classed with common criminals — why?

The shameful answer is that back in the Middle Ages, under conditions of squalor, ignorance, superstition and oppression, the sex taboo became a prime instrument of power in the arsenal of a band of brigands known as the Christian church. This is the reason that young people in love are classified as criminals. Venereal disease thrives and abortionists prosper as an inevitable result. The superstition which fostered this shameful condition is no longer absolutely dominant but the institution that promoted the belief that the human body was obscene, that love was indecent and that woman was forever made foul by original sin remains to mold our thoughts and shape our laws. It is most significant that the spiritual and physical inheritors of that church, both catholic and protestant, vigorously and effectively oppose birth control, venereal disease education, divorce law reform; i.e., anything which would limit the power of their weapon.

If the Christians enforced these taboos only among their believers they would be within their rights. Man has the right to any personal stupidity however monstrous it may seem but this is not their principal concern. They seek to impose this nonsense on everybody, by every method of legislative, moral and economic intimidation at their command. The success of their efforts can be judged by the reflection of such attitudes in the press, the radio, the motion picture industry and our legal statutes. True to fascist form, the censor utilizes his moral victory to impose political and social censorship in all fields. Bigots and demagogues invoke the divine right of religion and of morality in order to gain extraordinary power. Freedom of religion and of the press should not afford a justification for giant propaganda campaigns to suppress freedom! We must not only have freedom of religion, we must have freedom from religion.

The concept that sex in art, literature and life is subject to criminal law is based entirely on this superstitious sexual taboo. The censorial power of the church, the state and established press is founded solely on this one assumption: that the taboo of a particular religion should have universal legal sanction. This sanction, once established, is then subtly extended to imply that all the other dogmas of that religion are now the “unwritten law” of the land. Such a religion, always respectable and conservative, forms alliances with fascist and capitalist cliques, thus gaining a privileged position from which to persecute liberalism in all its forms. Superstition, taboo, reaction and fascism augment one another most effectively. The fact that one type of totalitarianism persecutes another– or appears to do so — is hardly a palliative.

Modern man must recognize the source and nature of his sexual taboos and discredit them in the light of truth. Only thus can he achieve sanity in sex and a healthy outlook on life in general.

In our society early marriages are often prevented by economic considerations, therefore pre-marital sexual relations are natural and often desirable. Contraceptive techniques, available to any intelligent young person from a druggist or doctor, can minimize the problem of venereal disease and unwanted pregnancies. The development of sexual technique, the determination of the qualifications of one’s partner and the gratification of the youthful urge to experiment all assure a far more lasting and stable marriage than one begun in ignorance and prudery. In marriage itself the social contract is biding.

Property acquired by the joint efforts of husband and wife belong to both jointly. Where any two persons have pledged their love together, no outsider has the right to interfere. Either party is justified in resisting such interference by force if necessary. But neither party, whether the relation be in or out of wedlock, has any right or jurisdiction over the love, affection or the sexual favors of another for longer than that person desires.

Where children are concerned a separation presents a serious problem. Broken homes are hard on children but a loveless and bitter home is worse. No state can assure a child the affection of his parents but it can guarantee his physical welfare and security, thus insuring him against many of the frustrations of childhood and adolescence which develop into unstable and maladjusted adult behavior. The laws against mutually agreeable sex expression must be repealed, together with the laws prohibiting nudism, birth control and censorship. We must emphatically deny that love is criminal and that the body is indecent. We must affirm the beauty, the dignity, and joyousness and even the humor of sex.

Indeed there are obscene things in the light and in the darkness; things that deserve destruction: — The exploitation of women for poor wages, the shameful degradation of minorities by the little lice who call themselves members of a ‘superior race’ and the deliberate machinations towards war. Nowhere among these genuine obscenities is there a place for the love shared by men and women. There are sins but love is not one of them and yet, of all the things that have been called sins, love has been the most punished and the most persecuted. Of all the beauties we know, the springtime of love is closest to paradise. And as all things pass, so love passes — too soon. This most exquisite and tender of human emotions, this little moment of eternity, should be free and unrestrained. It should not be bought and sold, chained and restricted until lovers, caught in the maelstrom of economics and laws, are hounded like criminals. What end is served and who profits by such cruelty? Only priests and lawyers. Let us adhere to a strict morality where the rights and happiness of our fellow man is concerned. Let us call our true sins by their right names and expiate them accordingly — but let our lovers go free.

If we are to achieve civilization and sanity, we must institute an educational program in love-making, birth control and disease prevention. Above all we must root out the barbaric and vicious concepts of shamefulness and indecency in sex, exposing the motives and methods of their proponents.

Happy are the parents who, as a result of sexual experimenting, are well mated, taking joy in each other’s passion, seeing beauty in their nakedness and not fearing to expose their bodies or the bodies of their children. They would never shame their children for their natural sexual curiosity.

Jesus told the “fallen woman”, “Go and sin no more” but I, who am a man, say to you who have given your body for the need of man’s body, who have given your love freely for his spirit’s sake; “Be blessed in the name of man. And if any god deny you for this, I will deny that god.”

The ancients, being simple and without original sin, saw God in the act of love and therein they saw a great mystery, a sacrament revealing the bounty and the beauty of the force that made men and the stars. Thus they worshipped. Poor ignorant old Pagans! How we have progressed. What was most sacred to them, we see as a dirty joke. From this sordid joke we have played on ourselves only Woman Herself can redeem us. She has been the ignominious butt of the joke, the target of malice and arrogance and the scapegoat for masculine inferiority and guilt. She alone can redeem us from our crucifixion and castration. Only woman, of and by herself, can strike through the foolish frustration of the advertisers’ ideal. She must elevate her strong, free and splendid image to take her place in the sun as an individual, a companion and mate fit for, and demanding no less than, true men.

Let there be an end to inhibition and an end to pretense. Let us discover what we are and be what we are, honestly and unashamedly. The rabbit has speed to recompense his fear, the panther strength to assuage his hunger. There is room for both even though the rabbit would probably prefer a world of rabbits (dull and overpopulated). All traits are useful wrath, fear, lust and even laziness — if they are balanced by strength and intelligence. If we lie about things we call our weaknesses and sins, if we say that his is “evil” and that is “wrong”, denying that such faults could be part of us, they will grow crooked in the dark. But when we have them out in the open; admitting them, facing them and accepting them, then we will be ashamed to leave any vestige of them secret to turn crippled and twisted. Fear can sharpen our wits against adversity. Anger and strength can be welded into a sword against tyrants both within and without. Lust can be trained to be the strong and subtle servant of love and art.

It is not necessary to deny anything. It is only necessary to know ourselves. Then we will naturally seek that which is needful to our being. Our significance does not lie in the extent to which we resemble others or in the extent to which we differ from them. It lies within our ability to be ourselves. This may well be the entire object of life; to discover ourselves, our meaning. This does not come in a sudden burst of illumination; it is a constant process which continues so long as we are truly alive. The process cannot continue unobstructed unless we are free to undergo all experience and willing to participate in all existence. Then the significant questions are not “is it right” or “is it good” but rather “how does it feel” and “what does it mean”. Ultimately these are the only questions that can approach truth but they cannot be asked in the absence of freedom.

There was a time when these questions were whispered in the shadow of the stake. That Christian instrument of conversion is not sanctioned at present but the will and the malice remain and will continue until the power of the superstition-mongering tyrants is finally broken. Meanwhile religious dogmatism continues to support the sexual jealousies of neurotic parents for their children and neurotic marriage partners for their mates. It is not because of economic desperation and greed that crime and war wash over the world in ever-mounting waves. It is only necessary to look back on the Middle Ages when St. Vitus’ Dance, epidemic flagellation and the Witchcraft Persecutions, all spawned out of Christian guilt and shame, swept the Western World. It was the tone set by these fearful events, reinforcing the divine right of reactionary monarchs, that produced the liberal revolutions of the 18th century. But the root, the sexual taboo, was unfortunately not destroyed. It remained to revitalize the power of religion over the new bourgeoisie.

The frenetic hatred of Jews and Negroes (symbols of illicit sexual freedom) and the lust toward the blood-and-fire baths of warfare are the very aberrations of sexual frustration. They are the nightmares of souls in a hell of guilty desire, laboring like madmen over their instruments of destruction in order to destroy the world which has denied them satisfaction. It is only in the unobstructed exercise of sexual function, by a generation trained from youth in contraception and the technique of love, that it will be possible to achieve mature social relations.

In this childish folly of sexual possession each man and each woman hates and fears every other man and woman as the potential despoiler or some joke by the ever-present specters of jealousy and suspicion. It is possible that the application of two old axioms; “that you love one another” and “that you do unto others as you would have others do unto you” might go a long way in helping us solve our sexual problems. The application of these maxims in sexual relations is easy and pleasant. If firmly established the principles might spread to other areas of human intercourse.

The sexual revolution will not produce any instantaneous paradise nor will it be accomplished without tears. The way to racial maturity is long and painful but it is at least possible to attain the maturity and richness that comes with full and satisfactory sexual expression in private life. It may be that other considerations become more important in one’s later years but I would hesitate to say at what age to set the mark. It does not seem possible to grow old gracefully unless one has known something of a graceful youth.