The Magister 1

by Marcus Katz

  [42] The plethora of theosophical titles is beyond this present volume, but will be treated later in a section on Theosophy and related currents. Introductory titles include Kingsford, A.B. & Maitland, E. The Perfect Way, or the Finding of Christ. Cosimo: New York, 2007; Steiner, R. The Way of Initiation, and Initiation and Its Results. Theosophical Publishing Society: London, 1910, particularly Chapter V, ‘The Dissociation of Human Personality During Initiation’ and following chapters on the two ‘guardians’.

  [43] The present author has comprehensive collections of the majority of these curricula materials in print and whilst avoiding revealing ‘initiated teachings’ will attempt to make clear and accessible their deeper aims and methodologies in both conceptual and practical material.

  [44] Dowd, F.B. The Way: A Textbook for the student of Rosicrucian Philosophy. Health Research: Pomeroy, 1972. Dowd was a student of P.B. Randolph and in turn taught R.S. Clymer.

  [45] Hall, M.P. The Adepts in the Western Esoteric Tradition, Part 3: Orders of Universal Reformation. Philosophical Research Society: Los Angeles, 1949, pp.11-13.

  [46] Bryce, D. The Mystical Way and the Arthurian Quest. Samuel Weiser: York Beach, 1996; Stewart, R.J. The Underworld Initiation. Aquarian Press: Wellingborough, 1985; Dobbs, J.R. The Book of the SubGenius. Simon & Schuster, Inc.: New York, 1987.

  [47] Cooper, D.J. Mithras: Mysteries and Initiation Rediscovered. Samuel Weiser: York Beach, 1996.

  [48] Bardon, F. Initiation into Hermetics. Osiris-Verlag: Kettig Uber Koblenz, 1962; Godwin, J., Chanel, C. & Deveney, J.P. The Hermetic Brotherhood of Luxor. Samuel Weiser: York Beach, 1995; Burgoyne, T.H. The Light of Egypt: The Science of the Soul and the Stars. H.O. Wagner: Denver, 1963, in two volumes.

  [49] Greville-Gascoigne, A. The Way of an Initiate. T.B.O.T.P. Publications: North Ferriby, 1940; The Monolith (publication of the Order of the Cubic Stone); H.O.M, Lectures of the First Degree (1988).

  [50] Richardson, A. & Hughes, G. Ancient Magicks for a New Age. Llewellyn Publications: St. Paul, 1992 – a fascinating system built from two separate yet related magical diaries, dating 1940-42 and 1984-86.

  [51] Evolva, J. Ride the Tiger. Inner Traditions: Rochester, 2003; The Hermetic Tradition. Inner Traditions: Rochester, 1995; Introduction to Magic. Inner Traditions: Rochester, 2001; Blystone, W. Paenitere: An Introduction to the Occult Arts for the Neophyte. 1st Books, 2003; Weor, S.A. The Initiatic Path in the Arcana of Tarot and Kabbalah. Thelema Press: Aloha, 2006; Ophiel, The Art and Practice of Caballa Magic. Samuel Weiser: York Beach, 1977.

  [52] Dawkins, P. & Trevelyan, G. The Pattern of Initiation in the Evolution of Human Consciousness. Francis Bacon Research Trust: Northampton, 1981.

  [53] Abbot, R. with Warrington, P. The Works of Arthur H. Norris Vol. I. Natural Living Books: Northamptonshire, 2012, and Power, R. (editor) Great Song: The Life and Teachings of Joe Miller. Maypop: Athens, Georgia, 1993.

  [54] My favourite work on the nature of esoteric schools is the kabbalistic approach taken by Z’ev ben Shimon Halevi, School of the Soul: Its Path and Pitfalls. Gateway Books: Bath, 1985, although my own reading on the subject has been eclectic, ranging from group dynamics to Blakemore, L.B. Masonic Lodge Methods. Macoy Publishing: Richmond, 1953, pp.7-8 (i.e. ways of dealing with ‘Bossism in Lodges’, when someone thinks they are ‘boss’ other than the Lodge Master). One little known but extremely practical and insightful book is by the Satanist Yaj Nomolos, The Magic Circle: Its Succesful Organization and Leadership. International Imports: Hollywood, 1987.

  [55] As examples: Geldard, R. The Esoteric Emerson. Lindisfarne Press: Hudson, 1993; Roberts, A Lucid Dreamer: The Life of Peter Redgrove. Jonathan Cape: London, 2012, pp.232-8, noting Redgrove’s connections to Wicca and the Order of Q.B.L.H.

  [56] The Lamp of Thoth was published from The Sorcerer’s Apprentice shop in Leeds, United Kingdom, throughout the 1980s and this present author contributed to a number of issues under the magical name Frater AES, including letters and channelled workings such as Liber Penultima, an obscure piece in Vol. II. No.4 (1984): “When the black star rises and the hand grasps the feather, the pages of the Great Book will crumble and become like unto ash ...” etc. The 1980s were a fervent period of small press publishing as printing became more accessible. Magazines such as Sunpath were dedicated to one subject, astral projection; T.N.T. was devoted to ‘New Aeon Psychosexuality’; others were more eclectic. Earlier publishing periods produced such curiosities as the Living magazine during the 1930s, a publication of the School of Applied Philosophy, a New Thought movement incorporating “the wisdom-lore of three traditions: Christian, Hermetic, Buddhistic” (I.X., 1937, p. 3).

  [57] Insight, Issue 16 (published by D. James).

  [58] My own inspirations at that time for satanic philosophy and practice were LaVey, A.S. The Satanic Bible. Avon: New York, 1969; The Satanic Rituals. Avon: New York, 1972, and a weekly correspondence by letter with several Satanic luminaries of the time, including at least two who, unfortunately, were later the subject of disparaging United Kingdom television documentaries. See also the ubiquitous Wheatley, D. The Satanist. Arrow Books: London, 1974. There are many more varied takes on the Left Hand Path nowadays, including Webb, D. Uncle Setnakt’s Essential Guide to the Left Hand Path. Runa-Raven Press: Smithville, 1999. We will also in the Zelator volume consider the work of such groups as the Order of the Nine Angles, Order of Dagon, Temple of Set, and other ‘sinister’ orientated work. See also Baddeley, G. Lucifer Rising: Sin, Devil Worship & Rock ‘n’ Roll. Plexus: London, 1999, and Schreck, N. Flowers from Hell: A Satanic Reader. Creation Books, 2001. As an example of academic approaches, see Asbjørn Dyrendal, ‘Satan and the Beast: The Influence of Aleister Crowley on Modern Satanism’ in Bogdan, H. & Starr, M.P. (editors). Aleister Crowley and Western Esotericism. Oxford University Press: Oxford, 2012, pp.369-88.

  [59] The made-for-television movie by Gene Roddenbury, Spectre (directed by Clive Donner, 1977), also has a lot to answer for – with Robert Culp setting a role model as William Sebastian, the cursed occult investigator, accompanied by his loyal but damaged sidekick, Dr. ‘Ham’ Hamilton (played by Gig Young). The comicbook series Dr. Strange was also a surreal inspiration.

  [60] Pauwels, L. & Bergier, J. The Morning of the Magicians. Mayflower: London, 1971.

  [61]

  Hauck, D.W. The Emerald Tablet. Arkana: London, 1999. An overview of alchemical titles will be provided in the relevant section of The Magister.

  [62] Suggested first readers are for alchemy in Edinger, E.F. Anatomy of the Psyche. Open Court: Chicago & La Salle, 1994; tarot in Nichols, S. Jung and Tarot. Samuel Weiser: York Beach, 1980, and astrology in Greene, L. & Sasportas, H. Seminars in Psychological Astrology: Volume 1: The Development of the Personality. Samuel Weiser: York Beach, 1987, amongst others. See also Spiegelman, J.M. The Tree of Life: Paths in Jungian Individuation. New Falcon Publications: Phoenix, 1993.

  [63] See Chappell, V. Sexual Outlaw, Erotic Mystic: The Essential Ida Craddock. Weiser Books: San Francisco, 2010.

  [64] Williams, B. The Woman Magician. Llewellyn: Woodbury, 2011; Kaltsas, N. & Shapiro, (editors). Worshipping Women: Ritual and Reality in Classical Athens. Alexander S. Onassis Public Benefit Foundation: New York, 2011; d’Este, S. (editor). Priestesses, Pythonesses, Sybils. Avalonia: London, 2001; Stewart, R.J. Celebrating the Male Mysteries. Arcania: Bath, 1991; Bly, R. Iron John. Element: Shaftesbury, 1990, and Moore, R. & Gillette, D. King, Warrior, Magician, Lover. HarperCollins: New York, 1990.

  [65] Denning, M. & Phillips, O. The Magical Philosophy (in five volumes). Llewellyn: Saint Paul, 1974. A contemporary author of the tradition, in one of its several offshoots, is Kraft, N.R. Ogdoadic Magick. Weiser/Red Wheel: York Beach, 2001, and Osborne Phillips published specific key initiatory rituals in Aurum Solis. Thoth Publications: Loughborough, 2001.

  [66] I found myself particularly unmoved by these texts, a pastiche of which would be: “XOANO: The Guardian of the Eighth Portal, he bringeth fire to your n
ostrils and remaineth in shadow always. Speak not of that inner word of flame for it burneth the heart when the Arcanum is opened ... yet in his power is all wealth for thee.” It is actually fairly easy to channel such streams of text, and far easier to experience such grimoiric revelations than it is to sort out one’s actual life and gain any insight into the workings of the world outside your nostrils. Often these works are the particular obsession of what one esoteric shopkeeper referred to as ‘Squid Boys’.

  [67] Louth, A. The Origins of Christian Mysticism. Clarendon Press: Oxford, 1981; McGinn, The Growth of Mysticism. SCM Press: London, 1995, this latter Volume II of an invaluable four volume series on Christian mysticism.

  [68] These authors and works will be unpacked throughout subsequent volumes. For the ‘Book of the Nine Rocks’, see Kepler, T.S. Mystical Writings of Rulman Merswin. Westminster Press: Philadelphia, n.d. We will also later return to the work of Marguerite Porete (?-1310) whose Mirror of Simple Souls (Babinsky, E.L. (translator). The Mirror of Simple Souls. Paulist Press: New York, 1993) picks up on the seven stages – explicity called ‘states’ of the soul in its divine ascent, see pp. 189-194. We only know of Porete’s death as she was burnt at the stake for heresy.

  [69] Ramon Lull, in Peers, E.A. (editor). The Art of Contemplation. The Macmillan Co: London, 1925; Thomas A. Kempis, in Barton, G. (translator). The Imitation of Christ. Guidance House: 1942, and Kaplan, A. Meditation and Kabbalah. Samuel Weiser: York Beach, 1985.

  [70] For background at this initial stage in our journey, consider Tweedy, I. Daughter of Fire. Blue Dolphin: Nevada City, 1986; Roberts, B. The Experience of No-Self. Shamballa: Boston, 1984; Bubba Free John. The Knee of Listening. Dawn Horse Press: Middletown, 1978; Brunton, P. The Hidden Teaching Beyond Yoga. Rider & Company: London, 1941.

  [71] One might consider Harvey, A. A Journey in Ladakh. Picador: London, 1993, p.181: “Westerners do not believe in being ‘Western’ as much as young Easteners do ...” Also by the same author, The Direct Path: Creating a Journey to the Divine Using the World’s Mystical Traditions. Rider: London, 2000, is highly recommended as a practical synthesis of Eastern and Western practice.

  [72] On Freemasonry, highly recommended is Churton, T. Freemasonry: The Reality. Lewis Masonic: Heresham, 2009, and Hamill, J. The Craft: A History of English Freemasonry. Crucible, 1986.

  [73] Huxley, A. The Perennial Philosophy. HarperPerennial: New York, 2009; Holman, J. The Return of the Perennial Philosophy: The Supreme Vision of Western Esotericism. Watkins: London, 2008. For more individual writings on a personal philosophy, see Fowles, J. The Aristos. Pan Books: London, 1968; Wilson, C. The Outsider. Pan Books: London, 1963, or Yeats, W.B. A Vision. Papermac: London, 1981.

  [74] See Carroll, P. Psychonaut. Sorcerer’s Apprentice: Leeds, n.d.; Sherwin, R. The Book of Results. The Sorcerer’s Apprentice: Leeds, n.d.; The Theatre of Magick. The Sorcerer’s Apprentice: Leeds, n.d.; Tickhill, A. The Apogeton. The Sorcerer’s Apprentice: Leeds, n.d.; Wilde, J. Grimoire of Chaos Magick. The Sorcerer’s Apprentice: Leeds, n.d. and more recent works including Wetzel, J. The Paradigmal Pirate. Megalithia Books: Stafford, 2006; Carroll, P.J. Liber Kaos: The Psychonomicon. Antony Rowe: Chippenham, n.d.; Hawkins, J.D. Understanding Chaos Magic. Capall Bann: Chieveley, 1996. My own early attendance at Chaos magick meetings equated them to concerts for ‘Sisters of the Dammed’ fans, although one invocation of Baphomet was particularly memorable.

  [75] Baker, P. Austin Osman Spare: The Life and Legend of London’s Lost Artist. Strange Attractor Press: London, 2011. The work of Australian artist Rosaleen Norton is comparable and has been detailed by Drury, N. in Pan’s Daughter. Mandrake: Oxford, 1993, and Dark Spirits: The Magical Art of Rosaleen Norton and Austin Osman Spare. Salamander & Sons: Chiang Mai, 2012.

  [76] Carroll, P.J. Liber Null. Sorcerers Apprentice: Leeds, n.d. In the first issue of the magazine Chaos International, published in 1986, is to be found a computer program for calculating gematria – Hebrew numerology – written under my pseudonym of ‘Frater W.H.H’. I recall this was my choice from the name William Hope Hodgson, whose House on the Borderland (1908) I was working with at the time as a metaphor for the ‘in-between state’ of consciousness.

  [77] Summers, C. & Vayne, J. Seeds of Magick. Quantum: London, 1990; Hine, P. Condensed Chaos. 1992; Dukes, R. S.S.O.T.B.M.E. Revised: An Essay on Magic. The Mouse That Spins, 1974, revised 2000. In this collection of essays, the chapter on ‘Progress in Magic’, pp. 114-22, is essential reading.

  [78] Hyatt, C.S. with Willis, J. The Psychopath’s Bible. New Falcon Publications: Tempe, 2003.

  [79] Irwin, R. Satan Wants Me. Bloomsbury: London, 2000, p.18: “... I have plenty of other things to try – like the Process, or Divine Light, or Ouspenskyism, or that Witches’ Coven in Islington, or Scientology, or Esalen. I’m easy – except if I am going to stick around with the Black Book Lodge, I would definitely like to see some demons.”

  [80] Wilson, R.A. Prometheus Rising. Falcon Press: Phoenix, 1986. The exercise on pp.6-7 is one of the few mandatory exercises in the Order of Everlasting Day.

  [81] Rhinehart, L. The Book of the Die. HarperCollins: London, 2000; The Dice Man. The Overlook Press: New York, 2001; The Search for the Dice Man. HarperCollins: London, 1994.

  [82] Farber, P.H. FutureRitual. Eschaton: Chicago, 1999; Newcomb, J.A. 21st Century Mage. Red Wheel/Weiser: York Beach, 2002; Katz, M. Tarosophy: Tarot to Engage Life, Not Escape It. Forge Press: Keswick, 2016.

  [83] Henderson, J.L. Thresholds of Initiation. Chiron Publications: Wilmette, 2005, pp.175-184.

  [84] Wolff-Salin, M. Journey into Depth: the Experience of Initiation in Monastic and Jungian Training. Liturgical Press: Collegeville, 2005, particularly the pattern of ordeal, disillusionment and integration.

  [85] As background and preparatory reading, particularly recommended are Main, R. Revelations of Chance: Synchronicity as Spiritual Experience. State University of New York Press: Albany, 1997; Clarke, R.B. An Order Outside Time: A Jungian View of the Higher Self from Egypt to Christ. Hampton Roads: Charlottesville, 2005; Conforti, M. Field, Form and Fate: Patterns in Mind, Nature & Psyche. Spring Journal Books: New Orleans, 2003; Wilbur, K. The Spectrum of Consciousness. Theosophical Publishing House: Wheaton, 1979.

  [86] Jung, C.G. Man and His Symbols. Picador: London, 1978; Campbell, J. The Hero With A Thousand Faces Paladin: London, 1988, and Vogler, C. The Writer’s Journey: Mythic Structure for Storytellers and Screenwriters Pan Books: London, 1999.

  [87] See Madden, K.W. Dark Light of the Soul. Lindesfarne Books: Great Barrington, 2008, for a discussion of traumatic breakdown and its relation to spiritual breakthrough, through the analysis of Jacob Boehme and C.G. Jung. The astonishing book by O’Brien, B. Operators and Things: The Inner Life of a Schizophrenic. Abacus: London, 1976, can give some pointers to a world in which the conscious mind has been overtaken by these forces. Hollis, J. provides a useful guide to responding to the types of emotions arising from inner work (and general life) in Swamplands of the Soul: New Life in Dismal Places. Inner City Books: Toronto, 1996.

  [88] Moore, A., Williams III, J.H., Gray, M. & Klein, T. Promethea. Americas Best Comics, 1999-2005, 32 issues.

  [89] For tarot, http://www.facebook.com/groups/tarotprofessionals

  [90] Alan Moore, Fossil Angels (2002), http://glycon.livejournal.com/13888.html [last accessed 05 August 2012].

  [91] I was once sat across a pub table from members of a contemporary Golden Dawn group. One of them waited until his friends had gone to the bar and then leaned across to me and whispered, “I’m an Adeptus Major you know. What are you?” I think the ‘bemused’ look on my face answered the question.

  [92] The most popular works being such as Redfield, J. The Celestine Prophecy. Bantam: London, 1994, termed on its cover with no little irony, ‘The No.1 American Sensation’. This was followed almost immediately by Redfield, J. & Adrienne, C. The Celstine Prophecy: An Experiential Guide. Bantam: London, 1995, an ‘eagerly-awaited companion’
within the year. There is also the popular Tolle, E. The Power of Now. Hodder & Stoughton Ltd: London, 2011, which has been described as a Bible du jour. We might also consider the work and life of Bach, R. Jonathan Livingston Seagull. Scribner: New York, 1998, and Illusions: The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah. Pan Books: London, 1978; and Coelho, P. The Alchemist. Thorsons: London, 1995, as Western guides to ‘following your own dream’ or living ‘your own personal adventure’. There is of course Byrne, R. The Secret (2006) which at time of this writing has sold more than 19 million copies worldwide. It seems to me that from what I understand the ‘Law of Attraction’ has two fundamental flaws: firstly, the only people who have demonstrated that it works are those who have made their money writing that it works, rather than any other methodology; and secondly, it actually is the opposite of magical theory as stated by such as Crowley, in working without ‘lust of result’. That is neither here nor there unless a book claims that it is based upon research in such ‘secret’ or magical theory. Perhaps it all dates back to 1978 with the first publication of Harris, T.A. I’m OK – You’re OK. Arrow Boooks: London, 1995.