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"Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law "
On this website I start and end all the posts with the law of Thelema. At the beginning I post 'do what thou wilt...' and at the end 'love is the law...'.But for casual correspondence, as well as for the comments fields i use the number 93. I have been asked twice in the last few weeks so Perhaps i should explain why 93 is used amongst thelemites as an informal greeting (if you haven't already googled it). The number 93 is often used as a short form of the law of thelema which is a standard greeting amongst Thelemites. This is 'Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law'. 93 is the number value of the word thelema meaning will. The standard ending is 'Love is the law, love under will. Here there are two words with the enumeration of 93, thelema (will) and agape (love) therefore 93/93. 93 is also sometimes used as a verbal greeting. Thelema is often referred to as the 93 current as Aiwass, Crowleys higher guardian angel's name also enumerates to 93. It becomes a bit of a cultural thing though for lodge, ritual and formal stuff the longform is used. It also allows the sneaking of such a greeting into less esoteric correspondence and opens the question of 'what's the 93 for?' I can then explain if people are interested without cramming the law in word down their throats.So in case you've been one of those wondering, thats why!
"Love is the law, love under will"
The case of the West Memphis Three may have happened nineteen years ago, but as this latest bizarre story shows the the media is still going completely crazy over any crime that appears to involve occultism. According to initial reports, two young women got together with a man they met over the Internet, then tortured and stabbed him to death in a Satanic sexual ritual. No, wait, actually there was no murder, the supposed "ritual" involved no occult or Satanic components, the stabbing was apparently consensual cutting that got out of hand, and the man is not pressing charges. Wow. That went from "batshit insane" to "poorly executed BDSM scene without safewords" in about two seconds. But of course the news media outlets prefer the former fabricated account.
While at the apartment building, police were approached by Rebecca Chandler, 22, who stated, "I think you are here looking for me." Chandler told cops that she had engaged in sexual relations with the Arizona man "and that the cutting was consensual but that it got quickly out of hand."
Chandler claimed that her roommate--whom she identified only as "Scarlett"--was "the one who did the majority of the cutting" during the incident. Chandler, police reported, "also made reference to 'Scarlett' possibly being involved in satanic or occult activities."
Chandler was placed in custody at the scene. During a subsequent search of the apartment, investigators seized copies of "The Necromantic Ritual Book" and "The Werewolf's Guide to Life," a humor book. The former book promises to enable a reader to "share consiousness with the Angel of Death." Paperwork seized from the home was described by police as the "7 Pentacles" of planets. Additionally, a black folder was described as an "Intro to Sigilborne Spirtits," an apparent reference to "The Sigil-Born," metaphysical entities that are "occultic practitioners" of necromancy, the purported ability to contact the dead.
As an aside, in the Thoth Tarot the Seven of Disks is titled "Failure," which in this case seems about right.
It's clear to me that Chandler's roommate is no occultist. For those of you who were practicing magick in your twenties, think about it - how many occult books did you own? If it was less than a dozen I would be surprised, since by the time I was in my mid-twenties I probably owned hundreds. In my experience this holds true even for many practitioners who aren't well-off, since there are plenty of places you can find heavily discounted books on magick. But what did the police find when they searched the apartment? One Leilah Wendell book on necromancy, a humor book about werewolves, a folder with some spirit sigils, and paperwork referencing the aforementioned "Failure" Tarot trump. That's it. This young woman may have had an interest in necromancy, but from these limited materials "an interest" looks to be as far as it went.
Salon also has an article up by the auther of the aforementioned werewolf book discussing his feelings about being drawn into this case. I read it as a cautionary tale, because I know that if I sell enough of my own books on magick the day is going to come when somebody involved in a crime will own a copy and police will seize it as evidence. Then I'm sure the media will do the same thing as they did here and try to link my books on "evil Enochian magick" with devil worship or who knows what else, completely ignoring that "Mastering the Mystical Heptarchy" is about conjuring angels and the prayers of John Dee included as part of that process would not sound even remotely out of place at a Christian revival.
When I posted on the release of the West Memphis Three back in August I wrapped up that article by expressing my hope that it would represent the last gasp of the "Satanic panic" of the early 1990's. From the reaction to this case, though, I now realize that was a vain hope on my part. Sensationalism sells, so the media is going to keep blowing this stuff out of proportion as long as they can get away with it. I'm glad to see that the real facts surrounding this case came out fairly quickly, but at the same time I'm sure that the original made-up story is going to be set in a lot of peoples' minds for some time to come. It's not the sort of thing one easily forgets.
Suggested ebooks:
Aleister Crowley - The Drug Panic
Starhwak - The Spiral Dance
ENTRY INTO FAERIE, THE DEVA REALM
Hail Psilos, Guide and Guardian along the path between Binah and Kether.
Hail Tehuti, Master of the stylus, the knowledge of mathematics and the arts.
Hail Thoth, Teacher of Wisdom, magick, and the symbols of Tarot.
Hail Hermes-Trismegistus, 'Thrice-great' messenger of the gods
Son of Maya and Zeus Master Thief Trainer of the Way of the Thief
Father of Pan, the Wild Goat God Wielder of the Caduceus
Patron to the Magi, the line of ancient adepts Inscriber of the Emerald Tablets Mercurial escort, bearing Psyche to the palace of the gods, where she partakes of the ambrosia of immortality
Master Servant, Hanuman, bringing the Key of Solomon, the Egyptian Ankh of Life.
Hail Merlin, Otherworld Guide,
Arch-Seer and Prophet of the Druids
Wizard and Founder of the Order of Istari,
Dweller of the Island of the Blessed, Aman
Mithrandir of the People of the Stars, and friend to all free ones
We welcome an initiation into your Mysteries,
a glimpse of your wonderful magick
that is the essence of consciousness.
Let the Dolmen-shape of the umbrella fungi
soften the rain of your teachings
as it gathers these waters of life
in its sponginess.
Allow our safe passage through your netherworld.
Show us the fruit of our labors and ready us for
the lessons we may approach.
We would take your hand as you lead us
down the spiral path into Faerie.
We look to you for advice and encouragement
as we will this transition.
Let your spore-seeds inflame
our awareness and self-understanding
just as this return-offering
burns to the ash of shed skin.
May our journey through and out of the Underworld be pleasant yet fruitful.
May we remember to trust our inner being as the source of manifestation and the center of existence.
Thank you for your patience.
Thank you for your compassion.
Thank you for your humor.
Thank you for your awareness.
The flesh of the gods
The blood of the gods
Absorbed and encompassed,
we enter the womb only to exit
from the cave of our abandoned shell-self.
In love, peace, and trust in all things
we begin this adventure in a spirit of bright joy
and tender blessings.
Suggested ebooks:
Howard Phillips Lovecraft - The Beast In The Cave
Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu - The Child That Went With The Fairies
Liber A'ash vel Capricorni (CCCLXX) by Saint Aleister Crowley
0. Gnarled Oak of God! In thy branches is the lightning nested! Above thee hangs the Eyeless Hawk.
1. Thou art blasted and black! Supremely solitary in that heath of scrub.
2. Up! The ruddy clouds hang over thee! It is the storm.
3. There is a flaming gash in the sky.
4. Up.
5. Thou art tossed about in the grip of the storm for an aeon and an aeon and an aeon. But thou givest not thy sap; thou fallest not.
6. Only in the end shalt thou give up thy sap when the great God F. I. A. T. is enthroned on the day of Be-with-Us.
7. For two things are done and a third thing is begun. Isis and Osiris are given over to incest and adultery. Horus leaps up thrice armed from the womb of his mother. Harpocrates his twin is hidden within him. Set is his holy covenant, that he shall display in the great day of M. A. A. T., that is being interpreted the Master of the Temple of A.'.A.'., whose name is Truth.
8. Now in this is the magical power known.
9. It is like the oak that hardens itself and bears up against the storm. It is weather-beaten and scarred and confident like a sea-captain.
10. Also it straineth like a hound in the leash.
11. It hath pride and great subtlety. Yea, and glee also!
12. Let the magus act thus in his conjuration.
13. Let him sit and conjure; let him draw himself together in that forcefulness; let him rise next swollen and straining; let him dash back the hood from his head and fix his basilisk eye upon the sigil of the demon. Then let him sway the force of him to and fro like a satyr in silence, until the Word burst from his throat.
14. Then let him not fall exhausted, although the might have been ten thousandfold the human; but that which floodeth him is the infinite mercy of the Genitor-Genetrix of the Universe, wher he is the Vessel.
15. Nor do thou deceive thyself. It is easy to tell the live force from the dead matter. It is no easier to tell the live snake from the dead snake.
16. Also concerning vows. Be obstinate, and be not obstinate. Understand that the yielding of the Yoni is one with the lengthening of the Lingam. Thou art both these; and thy vow is but the rustling of the wind on Mount Meru.
17. Now shalt thou adore me who am the Eye and the Tooth, the Goat of the Spirit, the Lord of Creation. I am the Eye in the Triangle, the Silver Star that ye adore.
18. I am Baphomet, that is the Eightfold Word that shall be equilibrated with the Three.
19. There is no act or passion that shall not be a hymn in mine honour.
20. All holy things and all symbolic things shall be my sacraments.
21. These animals are sacred unto me; the goat, and the duck, and the ass, and the gazelle, the man, the woman and the child.
22. All corpses are sacred unto me; they shall not be touched save in mine eucharist. All lonely places are sacred unto me; where one man gathereth himself together in my name, there will I leap forth in the midst of him.
23. I am the hideous god; and who mastereth me is uglier than I.
24. Yet I give more than Bacchus and Apollo; my gifts exceed the olive and the horse.
25. Who worshippeth me must worship me with many rites.
26. I am concealed with all concealments; when the Most Holy Ancient One is stripped and driven through the marketplace I am still secret and apart.
27. Whom I love I chastise with many rods.
28. All things are sacred to me; no thing is sacred from me.
29. For there is no holiness where I am not.
30. Fear not when I fall in the fury of the storm; for mine acorns are blown afar by the wind; and verily I shall rise again, and my children about me, so that we shall uplift our forest in Eternity.
31. Eternity is the storm that covereth me.
32. I am Existence, the Existence that existeth not save through its own Existence, that is beyond the Existence of Existences, and rooted deeper than the No-Thing-Tree in the Land of No-Thing.
33. Now therefore thou knowest when I am within thee, when my hood is spread over thy skull, when my might is more than the penned Indus, and resistless as the Giant Glacier.
34. For as thou art before a lewd woman in Thy nakedness in the bazaar, sucked up by her slyness and smiles, so art thou wholly and no more in part before the symbol of the beloved, though it be but a Pisacha or a Yantra or a Deva.
35. And in all shalt thou create the Infinite Bliss, and the next link of the Infinite Chain.
36. This chain reaches from Eternity to Eternity, ever in triangles -- is not my symbol a triangle? -- ever in circles -- is not the symbol of the Beloved a circle? Therein is all progress base illusion, for every circle is alike and every triangle alike!
37. But the progress is progress, and progress is rapture, constant, dazzling, showers of light, waves of dew, flames of the hair of the Great Goddess, flowers of the roses that are about her neck, Amen!
38. Therefore lift up thyself as I am lifted up. Hold thyself in as I am master to accomplish. At the end, be the end far distant as the stars that lie in the navel of Nuit, do thou slay thyself as I at the end am slain, in the death that is life, in the peace that is mother of war, in the darkness that holds light in his hand as a harlot that plucks a jewel from her nostrils.
39. So therefore the beginning is delight, and the End is delight, and delight is in the midst, even as the Indus is water in the cavern of the glacier, and water among the greater hills and the lesser hills and through the ramparts of the hills and through the plains, and water at the mouth ther when it leaps forth into the mighty sea, yea, into the mighty sea.
Reading 2: Liber Aleph (CXI), Chapters Wq-Wr, by Saint Aleister Crowley
Wq
SEQUITUR DE HIS VIIS.
Now the Path of Ayin is a Link between Mercury and the Sun, and in the Zodiac importeth the Goat. This Goat is called also Strength, and standeth in the Meridian at the Sunrise of Spring; and it is His Nature to leap upon the Mountains. So therefore he is a Symbol of true Magick, and his Name is Baphomet, wherefore did I design him as an Atu of Thoth, the Fifteenth, and put his Image in the Front of my Book, The Ritual of High Magick, which was the second Part of my Thesis for the Grade of Major Adept, when I was clothed about with the Body called Alphonse Louis Constant. Now the Goat flieth not as doth the Eagle; but consider this also that it is the true Nature of Man to dwell upon the Earth, so that his Flights are oft but Phantasy; yea, the Eagle also is bound to his Eyrie, nor feedeth upon Air. Therefore this goat, making each leap with Fervour, yet all Times secure in his own Element, is a true Hieroglyph of the Magician. Mark also, this Path sheweth One continuous in Exaltation upon a Throne, and so is it the Formula of the Man, as the other was of the Woman.
Wr
DE OCULO HOOR.
I say furthermore that this Path is of the Circle, and of the Eye of Horus that sleepeth not, but is vigilant. The Circle is all-perfect, equal every Way, but the Vesica hath bitter Need, and seeketh thy Medicine, that is of right compounded for High Purpose, to ease her Infirmity. Thus is thy Will frustrated, and thy Mind distracted, and thy Work lamed, if it be not brought to Naught. Also thy Puissance in thine Art is minished, by a full Moiety, as I do esteem it. But the Eye of Horus hath no Need, and is free in his Will, not seeking a Level, or requiring a Medicine, and is fit and worthy to be the Companion and the Ally of thee in thy Work, as a Friend to thee, not Mistress and not Slave, that seek ever with Slyness and Deceit to encompass their own Ends. There is moreover a Reason in Physics for my Word; study thou this matter in the Laws of the Changes of Nature. For Things Unlike do in their Marriage produce a Child which is relatively Stable, and resisteth Change; but Things like increase mutually the Potential of their particular Natures. Howbeit, each Path hath his own Use; and thou, being instructed in all Ways, choose thine with Discretion.
