Manifest Thy Glory. NOTOCON. 2011. Ordo Templi Orientis. O.T.O.

Manifest Thy Glory. NOTOCON. 2011. Ordo Templi Orientis. O.T.O.

I'm Enjoying "Manifest Thy Glory"

Manifest Thy Gloryoffers a selection of papers from the eighth biennial National Ordo Templi Orientis Conference (NOTOCON) of the United States Grand Lodge of O.T.O., held in the Valley of Detroit, Michigan, in 2011 EV. The papers cover diverse topics including the Holy Guardian Angel, talismans in magick, spatial orientation in ritual, and other magical methods; occult history and biography, including the Stele of Revealing and Ida Craddock; promulgation of Thelema through publishing and podcasts; textual analysis from Catullus to “Liber Trigrammaton;” a touching reminiscence from the incomparable Lon Milo DuQuette; and even space, the final frontier. Other highlights include a street guide to Thelemic historical sites in Detroit, and the address given by U.S. National Grand Master Sabazius. They represent some of best modern practical and scholarly work on Ordo Templi Orientis, Thelema, and the magick of Aleister Crowley.

The first NOTOCON conference took place in 1997 EV in Akron, Ohio, and has since been held on alternate years in different cities around the United States. Manifest Thy Gloryis the third collection of papers from the national conference to be made available, following the inaugural volume Beauty & Strengthfor the 2007 EV conference.

Ordo Templi Orientis is an international fraternal order of men and women devoted to the pursuit of individual liberty, the study of magick, and the promulgation of the Law of Thelema. Founded in the early twentieth century, it has been shaped by such leading lights as Carl Kellner, Theodor Reuss, Aleister Crowley, Karl Germer and Grady Louis McMurtry.

https://amzn.to/3KOQKf5

The Sword of Song. Aleister Crowley. Edited by Richard Kaczynski

The Sword of Song. Aleister Crowley. Edited by Richard Kaczynski

Several months ago, I was fortunate enough to aquire one of the limited release copies of "The Sword of Song" by Aleister Crowley (edited by Richard Kaczynski). I looked through most of it at the time, but decided to pick it up again for a cover to cover read. Originally published in 1904, this is a pivotal early work by Crowley. 



The Sword of Song (1904) is the most important of Aleister Crowley’s early works. His first talismanic book, it synthesized his interests in poetry, religion, mysticism and magick into a work that is at turns witty, profound and baffling. It would serve as the template to his celebrated Konx Om Pax (1907), and his unsurpassed mix of profundity and absurdity in The Book of Lies (1912/3). Significantly, it also offers insight into his mindset around the time of his received text, The Book of the Law, in 1904.

This edition follows the layout of The Sword of Song’s rare first edition, while incorporating subsequent revisions and additions from its republication in volume 2 of Crowley’s Collected Works (1906). The introduction by Crowley biographer Richard Kaczynski’s documents this book’s genesis and extensive revisions, while editorial footnotes illuminate obscure references, kabbalistic riddles, altered or deleted passages, and much more.


From the introduction
Crowley arrived in Ceylon armed with a library of books printed on India paper and custom-bound with silk ties to help withstand the elements. Among these were works by Robert Browning (1812–1889). The Victorian poet loomed large in Crowley’s thinking about the craft of poetry, as revealed by his letters from this period. Responding to a critique of Browning by his friend, painter Gerald Kelly (1879–1972), Crowley wrote, [E]very body knows that I live with R[obert] B[rowning]. I do not find a “pungent weight of thought in each sentence” of R.B.’s, not in his best lines, except perhaps the very best. You get this concentrated thought by dropping out articles, auxiliary verbs and such trifles: “why cumber they the ground?” e.g., “Aischulos’ bronze-throat eagle-bark at blood.” This is very fine.
But I find generally he is too diffuse as to his central meaning—too thin—“diluted presentation” a scientist would say: but too concentrated on his own parentheses. And above all you must read him again and again. You know I cannot read Sordello: when I know from a history-book all his characters I shall become able to, perhaps. With Fifine also, the mental strain is too great: though each paragraph is superb, I cannot read straight through. When I have worked at Fifine in detail till each detail gets familiar, then only shall I for the first time read that poem. Read with a big R.
Within a month of finishing “Ascension Day” and “Pentecost,” Crowley wrote to Kelly,
You know my idea that all poetry should suggest its subject by its sound, as music does. Perhaps Wagner’s leit-motif is even more allowable in poetry. Rosetti utterly misunderstood the refrain and destroyed its use. See Browning, “Sucked along in the flying wake / Of the luminous water-snake” in Xmas Eve; Pippa’s appearances (the use of lyric rather) in that play; the word “Porphyria” in “P[orphyria]’s Lover” thrice used. And look how Aeschylus will harp on μεγας, μελας, τελος, βροντος, θανατος and such words using them in this very leitmotif way—that very repetition which the ordinary fool tells you to avoid. Many other examples will occur to you.
Crowley would employ this technique in Sword of Song. Seizing upon a statement in Mansel’s Encyclopædia Britannica article on metaphysics—
If, in any mode of consciousness whatever, an external object is directly presented as existing in relation to me, that object, though composed of sensible qualities only, is given as a material substance, existing as a distinct reality, and not merely as a mode of my own mind

—Crowley echoed “a mode of my own mind” as a refrain throughout “Pentecost” (cf. lines 370, 545, 644, 780, 812). Also, Crowley’s words

Aum! let us meditate aright
On that adorable One Light,
Divine Savitri! So may She
Illume our minds! So mote it be!

form lines 519–522 of “Pentecost,” and repeat at the end of the poem.


From “Ascension Day,” lines 98-111:

Yet by-and-by I hope to weave
A song of Anti-Christmas Eve
And First- and Second-Beast-er Day.
There’s one who loves me dearly (vrai!)
Who yet believes me sprung from Tophet,
Either the Beast or the False Prophet;
And by all sorts of monkey tricks
Adds up my name to Six Six Six.
Retire, good Gallup! In such strife her
Superior skill makes you a cipher!
Ho! I adopt the number. Look
At the quaint wrapper of this book!
I will deserve it if I can:
It is the number of a Man.

Panic in Detroit. The Magician and the Motor City. Aleister Crowley. Ordo Templi Orientis. by Richard Kaczynski

Panic in Detroit. The Magician and the Motor City. Aleister Crowley. Ordo Templi Orientis. OTO. Richard Kaczynski

I just finished "Perdurabo", Richard Kaczynski's definitive biography of Aleister Crowley. I'm now moving on to his "Panic in Detroit", which focuses on the drama and scandal that surrounded Crowley's efforts to bring Ordo Templi Orientis to Detroit in the early 20th Century.



“Is Detroit heaven?” Aleister Crowley asked his field organizer, Charles Stansfeld Jones. It certainly seemed so at the time: Bookman Albert W. Ryerson was selling Crowley’s books and publishing the latest installment of The Equinox. Several prominent Masons were interested in establishing the Lakes Region of Ordo Templi Orientis. Jones was in high demand teaching classes on magick and Thelema. But things turned suddenly sour. When slow sales dragged the Universal Book Stores into bankruptcy, the activities of the O.T.O. were luridly thrust onto the front pages of the daily news. The Equinox was declared obscene and all copies impounded. The O.T.O. love cult was blamed for everything from broken homes and Hollywood’s wild parties to the mysterious murder of film director William Desmond Taylor. The revised and significantly expanded blue Equinox centennial edition of Panic in Detroit chronicles this chapter of Thelemic history through an original historical essay by Aleister Crowely biographer Richard Kaczynski; over forty previously-unpublished letters from Crowley and his circle; never-before-seen transcripts of the Universal Book Stores' bankruptcy trial, in which Crowley, The Equinox, and O.T.O. figure prominently; fifty newspaper article transcripts documenting what was later dubbed the "mess in the press"; a street guide to Aleister Crowley's Detroit; an essay on the unlikely disappearance, recovery, and preservation of Crowley's "rariora" in years after his death; and much, much more.

The Weiser Concise Guide to Aleister Crowley. by Richard Kaczynski. Edited by James Wasserman

The Weiser Concise Guide to Aleister Crowley. by Richard Kaczynski. Edited by James Wasserman

"The Weiser Concise Guide to Aleister Crowley" by Richard Kaczynski is one of the best introductions to the subjects of Crowley, Thelema and Ordo Templi Orientis.



In addition to the fascinating biographical sketch drawn by Richard Kaczynski, author of the classic biography Perdurabo, this book offers Crowley's teachings in his own words. A carefully chosen series of his instructions for concentration, meditation, magick, invocation, even sex magick are included. Crowley's descriptions of the teaching Orders A:.A:. and OTO are presented, along with the Creed of EGC. In addition, a suggested reading list of Crowley's "top-eleven" most important books is enhanced by an extensive bibliography for further in-depth research. This is the first and only introductory book that does not pretend to "improve" upon the Master's writings, but attempts to showcase them into a coherent introduction to his spiritual system.
.A practicing occultist whose mastery of western magick and eastern mysticism was unsurpassed by any of his contemporaries, and who continues to be an icon for many of today's practicing magicians.
.The founder and prophet of the new religious movement of Thelema, best known by its oft-misunderstood catchphrase, "Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law."
.A prolific poet whose Collected Works, by age thirty, filled three volumes, and whose last published work, Olla, was subtitled Sixty Years of Song.
.A maverick mountaineer whose numerous innovations and world records in the sport are acknowledged by even his most vocal critics.
.An adventurer whose exploits in the far east were serialized by Vanity Fair magazine as "A Burmese River."
.An impresario who took the violin troupe, the Ragged Ragtime Girls, on a tour of Russia.
.A British secret agent who marshaled his literary and occult connections to the service of his country, including (reputedly) the invention of the "V for Victory" sign as a magical antidote to the swastika.
.A ranked chess master who could trounce many players without even looking at the chess board.
.A pioneering entheogenic explorer who conducted psychedelic experiments with mescaline.
.Producer and star of The Rites of Eleusis, a series of ritualistic plays featuring an innovative blend of magick, drama, music and poetry.
.One of the most unjustly vilified men in the history of journalism, garnering headlines like "The Wickedest Man in the World" and "A Man We'd Like To Hang."
More mistruth and rumor has circulated about Aleister Crowley than perhaps any other figure in recent history. When the reporter Henry Hall introduced him to readers of the New York World Sunday Magazine, he wrote, "Some said that he was a man of real attainments, others that he was a faker. All agreed that he was extraordinary." Crowley openly defied social conventions, challenging people to examine what they really believed, and why they believed it. He confronted blind faith with rational skepticism. Yet he likewise challenged the skeptic with scientific illuminism, a systematic approach to spirituality that he described as "The method of science, the aim of religion."

Myth, Magick and Masonry. Occult Perspectives in Freemasonry. Jaime Paul Lamb

Myth, Magick and Masonry. Occult Perspectives in Freemasonry. Jaime Paul Lamb

Jaime Paul Lamb friended me on Facebook about 5 years ago. At the time, he was writing articles for the Grand Lodge of Connecticut publication as well as the Knight Templar magazine. He's a friendly and very knowledgeable Mason.

He published this book back in 2018, but I'm just getting around to it now. I was further sold on the book when I saw quotes of praise on the back cover from Lon Milo DuQuette and Richard Kaczynski, two authors whom I hold in high regard.



"In MYTH, MAGICK & MASONRY, Jaime Paul Lamb develops four thought-provoking interpretations of the symbolism and allegorical content of Freemasonry and some of its appendant bodies. By viewing the craft through the interpretive lenses of ceremonial magick, solar and astrological lore and symbolism, classical mythology and the Roman Mystery cult, Mithraism, Lamb establishes four distinct vantage points from which to survey Freemasonry. Thereby, Jaime Paul Lamb enables Masons, new and old, to develop a more nuanced appreciation of the Craft and a deeper understanding of the Fraternity's priceless initiatory heritage."

Perdurabo: The Life of Aleister Crowley. by Richard Kaczynski

Perdurabo: The Life of Aleister Crowley. by Richard Kaczynski. Thelema Ordo Templi Orientis

     Lately, I've been enjoying some online lectures by Richard Kaczynski, and his definitive biography of Aleister Crowley is certainly in-depth. I'm looking forward to getting into it soon. This will be amongst my winter reading.



"A rigorously researched biography of the founder of modern magick, as well as a study of the occult, sexuality, Eastern religion, and more
The name “Aleister Crowley” instantly conjures visions of diabolic ceremonies and orgiastic indulgences—and while the sardonic Crowley would perhaps be the last to challenge such a view, he was also much more than “the Beast,” as this authoritative biography shows.
Perdurabo—entitled after the magical name Crowley chose when inducted into the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn—traces Crowley’s remarkable journey from his birth as the only son of a wealthy lay preacher to his death in a boarding house as the world’s foremost authority on magick. Along the way, he rebels against his conservative religious upbringing; befriends famous artists, writers, and philosophers (and becomes a poet himself); is attacked for his practice of “the black arts”; and teaches that science and magick can work together. While seeking to spread his infamous philosophy of, “Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law,” Crowley becomes one of the most notorious figures of his day.
Based on Richard Kaczynski’s twenty years of research, and including previously unpublished biographical details, Perdurabo paints a memorable portrait of the man who inspired the counterculture and influenced generations of artists, punks, wiccans, and other denizens of the demimonde."