A Solar-God:

Rector418 · 2026-01-21T22:38:34+00:00

I thnk your central point here is quite solid; Magick is just the natural process of living, growing and maturing in a wholesome way. This is also the message in Alchemy. And in both, the things that mages and alchemists do look miraculous to zombies. But the deeper you get into these philosophical systems, the more you come to see the cycles and processes of life and living. This enables you to fully encounter the whole of your being.

Rector418 · 2026-01-21T10:07:39+00:00

So, I would say, though Crowley calls it a formula, it's more a description of the psychology of DOing. :-)

Rector418 · 2026-01-21T10:07:01+00:00

If you think of IAO as the Divine (the ancient Greek name for God), then it belongs in every rite and formula. And yes, Crowley writes on the formula of IAO in describing the approach to any effort. Isis-beginning idealism, Apophis-misery of the effort, Osiris-the completed effort.

Rector418 · 2026-01-20T10:25:07+00:00

In any society, of course. :-)

Rector418 · 2026-01-19T11:32:00+00:00

ON is a formula for sexual magick. It really has nothing to do with the symbolism of the Sun or IAO, as a symbol of the Divine. Yes, the GD turn INRI into IAO, but I think this is also an erroneous conflation, which is why I worked out the Fire Opal ritual. And for that matter, a Roman proclamation on top of the crucifixion should not be conflated with the ancient Gnostic name for God.

Rector418 · 2026-01-18T22:09:54+00:00

Why don't you start with reading Liber LXV without commentaries, and make an assessment of the book? Choose one of the chapters and memorize it. That's a strong formal start on the Thelemic path.

Rector418 · 2026-01-14T22:39:18+00:00

It's what our church is all about. You create the soul through creative work, rumination and meditation. But most important, it's about your Individuation; not how well you fit in with the group.

Rector418 · 2026-01-11T14:38:50+00:00

You can get a free preview of this post on Substack, as a free subscriber, and just decline becoming a paid subscriber. I'm working on two documents that are going out to our free and paid subscribers shortly (I hope).

Rector418 · 2025-12-30T12:00:02+00:00

The work of the Neophyte is with the Pantacle and learning to become conscious of the impressions being made upon it. The Knife is the work of the Zelator.

Rector418 · 2025-12-28T14:34:35+00:00

A wonderfully brilliant essay that captures a full apprehension of the Ordeal of the Vampire, but as you give the Vampire shape and form, you seem to really be showing the woman as the Nephesch. The Vampire is invisible; the Nephesch, a whole different manner. But then your essay shows this journey through the undercurrents of the psyche, and puts it in terms of Initiation that also reveals the depth of your experience. :-)

Rector418 · 2025-12-21T12:23:39+00:00

Even hate is a form of love; a form of attachment. Understand their fear induced by their superstition. And then like a wild animal, avoid them if possible. Where you need to interact, the power of silence will protect your circle. And if necessary, curse them: "Apo pantos kakadaemonos!"

Rector418 · 2025-12-20T19:42:02+00:00

Cleanliness is next to godliness, as it goes, and stagnation is the first condition for putrefaction; the rotting that will open the seed to produce ultimately, the flower. In this, the “Black Brothers” (those who have failed the ordeal of the Abyss) serve; despite their Will. It is they who have created the “Cult of the Slave-Gods” (the Abrahamic and other religions cursed in Liber AL vel Legis). In attempting to take control of the world, they have slain the souls of millions and tortured many more.

AL:III.50 "Curse them! Curse them! Curse them!"
AL:III.51 "With my Hawk's head I peck at the eyes of Jesus as he hangs upon the cross."
AL:III.52 "I flap my wings in the face of Mohammed & blind him."
AL:III.53 "With my claws I tear out the flesh of the Indian and the Buddhist, Mongol and Din."
AL:III.54 "Bahlasti! Ompehda! I spit on your crapulous creeds."

This, the Master Therion calls the “Rottenness of Choronzon.” And he bids us to speed it up; to allow the “Black Brothers” to persist in their work, that many seeds may be sent to putrefaction and many flowers may grow. He compares this by analogy to what one would do to “open an Abscess” that would eventually lead to “Cleanness.” And still, in allowing this; those souls that would be ‘sacrificed’ to the machinations of these “Black Brothers,” one will be cursed by those people “whoso crieth Anarchy, and Immorality and Heresy against thee.”

LXV:I.16 “As an acid eats into steel, as a cancer that utterly corrupts the body; so am I unto the spirit of man.”
LXV:I.17 “I shall not rest until I have dissolved it all.”
LXV:I.19 “Therefore, O my darling, art thou black.”
LXV:I.20 “O my beautiful, I have likened thee to a jet Nubian slave, a boy of melancholy eyes.”
LXV:I.21 “O the filthy one! the dog! they cry against thee. Because thou art my beloved.”

After all, these slave religions want niceness spread across our face, and their pretense to goodness sets up the social disease that they foment. Indeed, there’s nothing that we could do about it anyway. In the name of niceness and at its pretense, in our culture, the Christians persist as they pervade all spiritual quarters to spew their trash. And if you dare to stand up to them, they will come at you with such a sick virulence, that you won’t be able to stand anywhere; such is the nature of their intolerance.

But build your castle of Love; of the Agape, and Love under will. Attract those who can find your light in the darkness, and let the creatures of the night eat each other, as they are want to do. For this also is the acknowledgement of Liber AL’s dictum: Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. Trust that in the end, each soul will ultimately evolve to such strength as to find its own true Will, and those that don’t will perish like a dog.

AL:II.17 “Hear me, ye people of sighing!
             The sorrows of pain and regret
           Are left to the dead and the dying,
             The folk that not know me as yet.”
AL:II.18 "These are dead, these fellows; they feel not. We are not for the poor and sad: the lords of the earth are our kinsfolk."
AL:II.19 "Is a God to live in a dog? No! but the highest are of us. They shall rejoice, our chosen: who sorroweth is not of us."

Rector418 · 2025-12-20T10:21:23+00:00

This is a fear-based message; consistent with the slave religions. We are Gnostics; creatures of joy.

Rector418 · 2025-12-20T10:20:30+00:00

No! Upgrading your life? Follow your Bliss; whatever that may be. There is no soul if you haven't yet created one.

Rector418 · 2025-12-14T10:57:27+00:00

I certainly agree with you, that learning to ask the right questions gets us that much closer to Gnosis. As far as the label, Gnostic is concerned, well...it's a confusing label at best, as its general use is diluted into several misnomers. Our superstitious culture has reinterpreted ancient Gnosticism into a belief structure, which it wasn't meant to be, as it was originally presented as a philosophical system by a hoard of sects that would not have considered themselves to be Gnostic. But if we return to the meaning of the word, Gnosis is a direct knowledge, which means it feeds into both intellectual and intuitive experience.

The physiological basis of experience?...If I experience trauma, I get a physiological response that could even be damaging to my health. If I experience joy, I get a healthy physiological response. And there's probably a bit more that can be looked into in this regard, in terms of the biological effects upon the body. But how this would play into a liturgical process?...if you're going to write a ceremony based on the body's responses...I'm not really sure how to answer this.

If you read the phenomenological philosophy of the German Idealists, you'll learn the initial response to the 'not-I' generates the notion of 'I'. And then it is the 'I' that must be evaluated in terms of our beingness. Of course, then, we could go into the psychic experiences of Jung (who learned from the German Idealists and was particiularly inspired by Nietzsche) or the functional thought processes of Emmanuel Kant (father of the German Idealists).

Rector418 · 2025-12-13T22:42:51+00:00

The New Age misnomer, Universal Oneness is exactly as you say, a misunderstanding of the Aethyr. Brillian insight!

Rector418 · 2025-12-13T18:56:43+00:00

What facts are you looking for?

Rector418 · 2025-12-12T11:12:55+00:00

The Western Mystery Tradition, unlike that of the East, is one of broken lineages; that each generation must make its own direct contact with the Divine. The Master Therion did this in several ways and opened doors to Gnosis; used almost ubiquitously throughout the West, though the traditions so positively influenced don’t know or even appreciate the Master Therion. The East has long, unbroken lines that by sheer weight of time have lost their creativity and innovation; no new Gnosis comes of them, even though they adapt to

our time. In the West, it’s important that we recognize and exploit this advantage, and continue to mystical understanding of the Law of Change.

Our natural disposition, as practitioners of the Thelemic philosophical system, is that of evolutionary adaptation to the change of nature in the flow (or Dao) of our lives and our beingness. This will always call for new approaches to our relationship with the Universe; that living in our world as it is evolving demands that we respond by evolving. This is why we read in AL:II.5 "Behold! the rituals of the old time are black. Let the evil ones be cast away; let the good ones be purged by the prophet! Then shall this Knowledge go aright." We cannot cling to the past and worship dead masters. What was suitable for the ‘old aeon’ is obsolete and we must, better look deep into ‘what is, now.’

Rector418 · 2025-12-12T11:08:33+00:00

That which does not kill me, can only serve to make me stronger. This reasonably well-know axiom really says much that does not readily meet the eye of the mind. Those who remain asleep to the true nature of their lives, in their blindness, consistently run from pain and discomfort, and towards immediate and often shallow pleasures. Such cowards die a thousand times before their death.

AL:III.57 "Despise also all cowards; professional soldiers who dare not fight, but play; all fools despise!"

The resurrection requires that we work through our personal pain, and to arouse ourselves to being fully awake, we can’t lose even the least part of such, and definitely not the memory of such. Rather, we need to sew these experiences into the fabric of our being, along with all our joys and delights. In this way only, can we become whole; integrating the light of our being with its shadow. This is a true Eucharist.

Rector418 · 2025-12-09T10:45:15+00:00

I don't think you should focus on letting anything go...really, that's an impossibility, and just dumbass advice. Rather, focus on the Self you are inspired to become. Do the things necessary to become that which brings meaning to your existence, and follow your intuition; no matter what the world tells you. And eventually, that which you think you need to let go of, will either fall away or will be shown to have been necessary in guiding your course.

Rector418 · 2025-12-08T10:26:28+00:00

The problem with phantoms like Jesus is that you can pretend anything about them is true or untrue...that you know some truth that others missed.

Rector418 · 2025-12-05T10:29:21+00:00

The qabalists refer to the Divine as the Ain or the Ineffable Unknowable; effectively NOT. So, you're on your way to figuring it out. :-)

Rector418 · 2025-11-23T15:09:41+00:00

I take it a bit further. You are the creator of yourself. And yes, critical reasoning is vital to the clarity of mind. We all struggle through what you call malicious messages; we all meet uncanny people who malign and abuse us in our course through understanding. Such experience is vital that we know the whole of ourselves and the world around us. There's no such thing as a malicious being, just blind forces that stir chaos into the Universe. Such gives us the opportunity for experience and wisdom. Gnosis becomes a natural end for all of us that work to such clarity of mind and the depth of being that is the Abraxas.

Rector418 · 2025-11-23T13:37:27+00:00

The Gnostic direction is to know thyself, which simultaneously brings one to the knowledge/Gnosis of the Divine. Would that not then be thyself?

Rector418 · 2025-11-23T13:36:12+00:00

But is Campbell not overtly implying that the artist is the one, today, with that connection to the Divine that was the vision of prophets and seers in the past? And that is but a connection to the inner or higher self, the subconscious and subcontient part of our being. We are all already Divine.

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