Frater_Jullianus-Beginners_Guide_to_Crowley.pdf

A B EGINNER ’ S G UIDE TO C ROWLEY B OOKS

by Frater Julianus

The author would like to dedicate this Guide to his three Cats, in

recognition of their constant Efforts to distract him from his Work.

This is a work in progress. The author welcomes

comments and suggestions at julianus@kiva.net.

Aleister Crowley (1875 - 1947) is certainly the single most influential occult practitioner of

the last century, as well as being the most controversial. His literary output is astonishing in both

volume and variety, including poetry, drama, and fiction in addition to his core Magical writings.

Since his writings have been drawn upon, often without acknowledgement, by nearly every

occultist in the English-speaking world it behooves any person interested in Magick or occultism to

have some direct acquaintance with Crowley’s work. The problem is that so many of his more

famous books are notoriously difficult for the reader, often despite Crowley’s own attempts to

clarify his ideas for the general public. Another problem is that in the course of one book he often

makes reference to several others, which leads to the impression that you can’t understand one

Crowley book until you’ve read them all. Considering how much stuff is currently in print this is

pretty daunting, to say the least!

I am more than familiar with the frustrations involved in exploring Crowley’s writings. The

first Crowley book I ever got— indeed one of my first books on Magick of any kind— was the old

Dover edition of Magick in Theory and Practice and almost nothing in it made sense to me at

the time. It wasn’t until about four or five years later, around the time I joined the Ordo Templi

Orientis (O.T.O.) in fact, that I was able to get much out of the book. Now, nearly two decades

after buying it, I find it to be the single best book on Magick ever written and a constant source of

inspiration.

One of the main reasons for my initial difficulty was simply the lack of basic information

about the book. Even today most people still don’t know that Magick in Theory and Practice

( MTP for short) was never intended to be a stand-alone work . It is in fact the third part of a four-

part magnum opus simply titled Book Four . Had I known that simple fact I could have started

with the earlier sections and saved myself a lot of puzzlement. It was my new brothers and sisters

in the Order who provided this and many other useful pieces of information, which illustrates one

of the principal obstacles for the beginner in many esoteric schools: the written tradition is of

limited use without the oral tradition that explains it.

But not everyone interested in reading Crowley is part of a Thelemic order, or wants to be,

and this Guide is intended to partly eliminate that difficulty. This is by no means a primer on

Thelema (authors such as Lon Milo duQuette, Rodney Orpheus, and Gerald del Campo have all

written fine books in that category) nor does it cover the whole of Crowley’s writings. My

intention is merely to suggest a handful of books that will be most useful to someone approaching

Crowley for the first time, to clear up some of the complexity of his publishing schemes, and to

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address the matter of multiple editions of the same book. This is especially vital since the O.T.O.

has been issuing new and improved editions of many texts under the editorship of Hymenaeus

Beta, the present Frater Superior of the order. Improvements range from useful Introductions and

better proofreading to substantial restorations of material ‘mislaid’ by Crowley’s printers. Many

texts have also been expanded with additional material not included in the original publications.

The new Book Four is the most extreme example of this: not only does it have all four parts in

one volume for the first time but the restored passages make it far closer to the Crowley’s original

intentions than his own editions ever were.

So whether your intention is to ally yourself with the Master Therion or simply to have a

better understanding of his books than you do at present, read on!

M AGICK W ITHOUT T EARS

motto was Fiat Yod. Additional topics were proposed

by others from the old Agape Lodge of O.T.O. to help make the book as broadly comprehensive as

possible. The resulting collection ranges from profound philosophical issues, such as sex morality

or the existence of the gods, to a comparatively trivial account of what might have been Gnomes on

a Swiss glacier. A glance through the table of contents will give a fuller idea of the breadth of

subjects addressed. Here I will only note that the tone of this book is not just informal but

downright chatty: the reader sees Crowley at his most concerned, helpful, and on occasion brutally

honest about himself and his own failings. This alone is reason enough to interest the student, but

in addition the book is full of practical advice on everything from improvising your magical Temple

to astral travel— indeed it was originally going to be called Aleister Explains Everything !

Even if the Old Boy doesn’t quite do that he still comes about as close as he ever did.

The book did not actually see print until the 1950s, years after Crowley’s death. The

current edition, which first appeared in 1973, was edited by Israel Regardie, who made some

substantial cuts in the text. On the other hand, he gives us an index. There are plans to publish a

fully-restored edition in the future but, as usual in Thelemic publishing, there is no firm date.

So Magick Without Tears , Crowley’s last book, is by itself sufficient to show that his

mind was as sharp in his last years as it had ever been, despite the popular image of him as a

‘drug-ravaged wreck’. Even in the somewhat abbreviated form we presently have it is probably the

best place for the beginner to start investigating Crowley’s work.

T HE B OOK OF THE L AW

Technically called Liber AL vel Legis or Liber Legis , this short book is the

fundamental Holy Book of Thelema, the religious/philosophical/magical system for which Aleister

Crowley is the Prophet. Whether you believe that he took it down from the direct voice dictation of

a superhuman intelligence named Aiwass in 1904 (and interestingly enough many serious

Crowley was well aware of his tendency to write over the heads of his readers and he tried

out several different strategems for correcting this fault. His last and, to many people, most

successful tactic was simply to make a book out of correspondence with his students. This format

actually is one of considerable antiquity: for example, On the Mysteries by the fourth century

adept Iamblichus is ostensibly a letter from an Egyptian priest. The essential idea is similar to a

‘FAQ’ on the internet, except that Iamblichus and Crowley both run on for several hundred pages!

Magick Without Tears (the title seems to derive from a popular schoolbook called

Reading Without Tears from Crowley’s youth) was begun in 1943 and consists of Crowley’s

answers to questions from an unnamed female pupil. The primary correspondent was Anne Macky

of Hertfordshire, England, whose A

Thelemites don’t) is immaterial. All Crowley’s later work is dependent on the three chapters in this

book and therefore you need at least some acquaintance with it if you want to understand his ideas.

There are any number of stand-alone editions of Liber AL by itself. Most of them are

fairly small if not actually pocket-size, making them convenient to carry about with you. Actually,

there is no urgent reason to pick it up separately since it is also included in several of Crowley’s

other books, such as the complete Book Four and several numbers of The Equinox . You can

also find it in some of the recent ‘primers’ on Thelema by other authors, such as Lon duQuette’s

Magick of Thelema . Ideally, according to instructions in the text itself, any proper edition of

Liber AL should include a facsimile of the original manuscript in Crowley’s not-terribly-legible

handwriting. Beyond any possible esoteric meanings embedded in Crowley’s scribbles, you can

think of this as a way of preventing later editors from altering the text to suit their own agendas.

T HE L AW IS FOR A LL

Any work as perplexing as the Book of the Law simply cries out for some sort of

learned commentary and Crowley attempted several over the course of his life. The only one he

regarded as completely successful is a one-page ‘inspired’ Comment , now included in most

editions of Liber AL , whose primary injunction is that people should interpret the book for

themselves.

This still leaves Crowley’s more extensive commentaries, with which he was never

satisfied to the end of his life. Some thirty years after he died no less than three separate editions of

these long commentaries appeared in print from three different editors each making different cuts in

Crowley’s text so that all were different and none were complete. John Symonds and Kenneth

Grant teamed up to produce Magical and Philosophical Commentaries on The Book of

the Law (1974) while Marcelo Motta published The Commentaries of AL (1976) and Israel

Regardie called his version The Law is for All (1975). Motta and Grant were motivated largely

by a need to legitimate their respective ‘pseudo-O.T.O.s’ which they were promoting at the time

and added their own commentaries to Crowley’s. In Motta’s case at least this probably did more

harm than good, since his commentary displayed his notable paranoia, intolerance, ignorance and

vicious diatribes against his supposed ‘enemies’ for all to see. The Symonds and Grant version is

the most complete of the three, although Regardie’s was the only one to remain in print for any

length of time.

Lost in all this was the fact that, far from being hostile to any abridgement of this work,

Crowley had actually commissioned one himself . While not a Magician in any formal sense, Louis

Umfraville Wilkinson (1881 - 1966) was a talented writer and close friend for many years. His

lack of formal occult training made him the ideal person to edit Crowley’s own commentaries

down to something both manageable and accessible to the average person. Crowley’s instructions

were essentially to ‘cut out anything that doesn’t make sense to you on the first reading,’ and

Wilkinson set to work. The result, which was never quite finished after Crowley’s death in 1947,

languished in typescript until 1996 when Hymenaeus Beta completed the project and issued it as...

The Law is for All .

Now there is a certain inherent confusion in having two very different versions of the same

book out by the same author with the same title... and from the same publisher to boot! It was felt

that the title was appropriate to a commentary designed for the newcomer, so essentially the

Regardie edition was allowed to go out of print and the Wilkinson edition just replaced it. This

does leave the potential buyer with the problem of determining which version is being offered for

sale at any given time, especially if you’re buying through a catalogue or on-line. Naturally the full

bibliographic data will settle the matter seeing as the editors are different and, if all else fails, you

just need to ask on which side of 1996 the particular copy is copyrighted. Thankfully, those so

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old-fashioned as to do their shopping in a store have an even simpler option: the Regardie edition

has a white cover while the Wilkinson version is clad in dark purple. It is thus easy to distinguish

between them even across a crowded room.

Incidentally, there are plans to publish Crowley’s complete commentaries on The Book

of the Law . However, considering the agonising process that is Thelemic publishing, there’s no

telling how long it will take before that happy tome will reach store shelves. So, on the whole, I

recommend you get the Wilkinson version. Aside from being the abridgement Crowley actually

wanted to publish, it features a full photographic reproduction of the manuscript of Liber AL , an

up-to-date bibliography of Crowley’s works, and a good index. Naturally you also get the full

printed text of Liber AL itself. It is also, by design, the best suited to the beginner.

T HE E QUINOX

The Equinox represents the largest and most involved publishing scheme Aleister

Crowley ever devised: the series now includes over twenty large books and is still growing! Some

of these books (which are technically called ‘issues’— we’ll get to that in a minute) are rare and

expensive, one has never actually been printed, and then there are a number of unauthorised

‘pirate’ additions to the whole thing. Before you panic, let me assure you that I am definitely NOT

suggesting that you run out and buy the lot— I still don’t own the whole thing myself for that

matter. The reason I am covering it in a guide for the beginner is that there is a substantial amount

of confusion over just what The Equinox is, and I felt that this Guide is a good place to clear

things up. This is especially needed because Crowley often cites material from this series in his

other works. Another reason is that some of the books in the series may very well be useful to you

depending on your individual needs and interests. So bearing those caveats in mind we will

proceed.

So just what is The Equinox anyway? It really begins in 1904 when Crowley received

The Book of the Law and was charged, so he said, by the Secret Chiefs with beginning a New

Æon in human history and with preserving the wisdom of the old. This second goal was due to

Crowley’s belief that the change of Æon would involve the collapse of civilisation followed by a

chaotic ‘dark age’ and he wanted to be sure that important knowledge would survive. (Don’t

discount that idea; considering how young the Æon still is, we can’t say that he won’t be right.)

Crowley’s solution was to publish a journal, beginning in 1909, which would also serve as the

official organ for his new order, the A

Volume I , Issues 1 - 10 (published 1909 - 1913)

This is the original series published under the title The Equinox and, as the title

suggests, they appeared every six months on the Vernal and Autumnal Equinox. In many

cases when people refer to that name they mean only these ten books, though sometimes

. Later on, around 1912, it also became the official

organ for the British section of the O.T.O. Many occult groups, before and since, have published

their own periodicals of course, but Crowley determined that his would be the best ever. Being

independently wealthy and having published a good deal of his poetry himself, he could do exactly

that: each ‘issue’ of The Equinox is itself a hardback book of at least a few hundred pages on

excellent paper. Accordingly they look more like separate volumes of a distinguished

encyclopaedia than individual issues of a magazine. In this context, Volume refers not to the

individual books but to the sets of ten into which the whole series is divided. If you find this is

confusing now, so did booksellers back then. Many wouldn’t stock the thing, not because of the

content, but because they couldn’t decide if it belonged with the magazines or the books! Dilbertian

logic is nothing new it seems. Anyway, I will now cover the different books making up The

Equinox , going Volume by Volume.

they include the first issue of Volume III as well. Despite the lavish production these do

follow a magazine format to some extent, including a good deal of fiction, verse, and very

pointed book reviews by Crowley and his friends in additon to the purely occult material.

There are even advertisements. He included these things in an attempt to broaden the series’

appeal and thus ensure better distribution: remember the idea was to provide for the long-

term survival of esoteric knowledge. The amazing thing is that Crowley did indeed write

the majority of the contents himself even while writing several other books not part of this

series. Add in some extended trips around Europe and North Africa, continued Magical

workings, some experimental theatre, and several love affairs and you start to wonder if he

ever slept. These five years certainly mark the most sustained productive period of his life.

I won’t discuss the contents of each individual issue here. Suffice it to say that they

include much instructional material for the A

, Crowley’s ‘inspired’ writings, The

Book of the Law , a serialised biography of Crowley called The Temple of Solomon

the King , the first publication of the Golden Dawn rituals, excerpts from his Magical

diaries, many original rituals, and some O.T.O. material. Some of these items are book-

length in their own right. Thus Volume I contains a tremendous amount of valuable

material, but is it worth getting?

The original edition of Volume I is naturally quite rare and valuable by now and is

worth several thousand dollars for a complete set. Samuel Weiser has occasionally printed

limited facsimile editions (which also include Volume III, Number 1 ) that sell for

upwards of $400. There are a few condensed paperback editions that are cheaper if more

fragile. Fortunately in 1974 Israel Regardie edited a one-volume anthology titled Gems

from The Equinox that remains in print and includes most of the important Magical

texts. Finally, you can find the whole thing for free on the internet.

While it is useful to have all this material in one place— and it sure looks good on

the shelf— you should be aware that much of it has been reprinted elsewhere by Crowley

himself. For example many of the rituals and instructions form appendices to Magick in

Theory and Practice . Many of the individual items which can fill a book by themselves

have been reprinted as such, while the new Volume IV includes many items in a revised

or expanded form that makes them superior to their original publications. For these

reasons, Volume I proper is more the province of the serious student or collector rather

than the beginner.

Volume II (1914 - 1918)

Crowley dubbed this a ‘volume of Silence’ and the joke is simply that there is no

Volume II . By this time Crowley was basically broke: not only had he published all his

books at his own expense but, so that he could not be accused of making money from

Magick, he deliberately priced them so he took a loss! Besides there was the small matter of

a World War going on at the time and, quite honestly, you can’t blame Crowley for

wanting some sort of break after those last five years. All things considered, it’s somewhat

surprising that no enterprising swindler has come out with a fake ‘secret’ Volume II .

Certainly recent years have seen some spurious Equinox volumes V and VII. Crowley did

a good deal of writing and Magick during the War (which he spent mostly in America) but

there would be no new Equinox until 1919.

Volume III (1919 - 1986)

After the War, Crowley tried to start a new series of The Equinox , a project

which was only partly successful. While the first issue retained the same format as the

original Volume I lack of funds scuttled the second issue before it could be printed and

the old semi-annual schedule with an anthology format became impossible. For the next 67

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