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CHAPTER 6
NEW AEON INITIATION

The True Self contains Good & Evil, Upright & Averse

Initiation in the New Aeon is “the Child Growing to Maturity” by
the slaying of the ego-self whose “death is life to come” for the True Self.
But what is the nature of that True Self? Essentially, the True Self
transcends dualities. Specifically, the True Self transcends the moral
duality of Good and Evil.

People have a common tendency to imagine their goal as their
“Higher Self” which they imagine as Absolute Good, caring, benevolent,
et cetera. In short, many people construct an ideal or an abstraction of
their highest ideals and believe that to be the goal. Crowley asserts, “He is
not, let me say with emphasis, a mere abstraction from yourself; and that is
why I have insisted rather heavily that the term ‘Higher Self’ implies a
damnable heresy and a dangerous delusion.”80 The term “Higher Self” is a
delusion because the aim of Initiation in the New Aeon is to bring the
individual to identify with the “Total Self” or “All-Self,” not the “Higher
Self” (or “Lower Self”). We must explore and conquer both the “good”
and “evil” sides of ourselves: in terms of modern psychology, we cannot
neglect our own Shadow. As Crowley advises, “every magician must
firmly extend his empire to the depth of hell.”81 As Nietzsche says, “The
great epochs of our life are the occasions when we gain the courage to
rebaptize our evil qualities as our best qualities.”82

80 Magick Without Tears, chapter 43.
81 Magick in Theory & Practice, chapter 21.
82 Nietzsche, Friedrich. Beyond Good & Evil.

Much of Thelema’s imagery may be seen as “sinister.” Examples
include the “Beast” and “Babalon” from the Book of Revelations (where
they do not appear in a favorable light), the experience of divinity as “evil
kisses corrupt[ing] the blood… as an acid eats into steel, as a cancer that

utterly corrupts the body”83 and “poison,”84 “the concealed” within oneself
wherein “all things are in thine own Self”85 is called Hell or Satan,86 et
cetera. These could all be considered as attempts to bring the psyche of
the individual to acceptance of both the upright and averse aspects of
existence. One might even say it is the “darker” side of the self emerging
because of its neglect in Old Aeon systems which focus on Good, Virtue,
Grace, et cetera, and exclude their opposites. In the New Aeon we assert
that the True Self contains (and thereby transcends) both Good and Evil.
“Less than All cannot satisfy Man.”87

83 Liber LXV, I:13,16.
84 Liber LXV, III:39, IV: 24-25, V:52-53,55-56.
85 Liber Aleph, chapter 124.
86 Who is identified with the Sun in Liber Samekh.
87 Blake, William. There is No Natural Religion.

This idea of the True Self as containing both Heaven and Hell,
Good and Evil, Upright and Averse, is captured succinctly in our Holy
Books:
“I reveal unto you a great mystery. Ye stand between the abyss of
height and the abyss of depth. In either awaits you a Companion;
and that Companion is Yourself. Ye can have no other
Companion. Many have arisen, being wise. They have said ‘Seek
out the glittering Image in the place ever golden, and unite
yourselves with It.’ Many have arisen, being foolish. They have
said, ‘Stoop down unto the darkly splendid world, and be wedded
to that Blind Creature of the Slime.’ I who am beyond Wisdom
and Folly, arise and say unto you: achieve both weddings! Unite
yourselves with both! Beware, beware, I say, lest ye seek after the
one and lose the other! My adepts stand upright; their head above
the heavens, their feet below the hells… Thus shall equilibrium
become perfect.”
88

88 Liber Tzaddi, lines 33-42.

As mentioned in the previous section of this essay, the True Self
transcends the duality of Life and Death. In this section we see that the
True Self transcends the duality of Upright and Averse, Good and Evil.
The True Self is even “beyond Wisdom and Folly.” We must unite both

with the Upright, “the glittering Image in the place ever golden,” and with
the Averse, “that Blind Creature of the Slime.” Only thereby may man
come to knowledge of his true Self: otherwise the individual will have a
lopsided perspective of the self. One must remember that it is only
because of its roots deep into the dark ground that a tree is able to
produce fruit. As the psychologist Abraham Maslow noted, “Man’s higher
nature rests upon man’s lower nature, needing it as a foundation and
collapsing without this foundation.”89

89 Maslow, Abraham. Toward a Psychology of Being.

The method of Initiation in the New Aeon is therefore one of
Union of Opposites and Equilibrium. The equilibrium is not that of
moderation, the Middle Path of Buddha (or the Doctrine of the Mean of
Aristotle), where we seek to avoid extremes and remain in the center. The
equilibrium of New Aeon Initiation is understood as the balance attained
by pushing to both extremes of any duality. “Go thou unto the outermost
places and subdue all things.”90 We don’t take the upright (“white light”)
or averse (“satanic”) of the Upright/Averse duality and aim for that alone,
we aim for both the heavens and the hells. One might say, symbolically,
the Old Aeon is like a pole or a tree, where the vertical section is straight
and narrow, avoiding extremes. The New Aeon is then like a large
building or a pyramid where the base is expanded horizontally. This
symbolically shows that, by pushing towards the extremes (expanding the
base horizontally in this metaphor), we enlarge our foundations which
thereby allow us to withstand the “winds” of experience better. As it says
in The Book of the Law, “Wisdom says: be strong! Then canst thou bear
more joy. Be not animal; refine thy rapture! …But exceed! exceed! Strive
ever to more!”91 William Blake also enigmatically stated, “The road of
excess leads to the palace of wisdom.”92

We can look again to Horus (with the Infinitely Contracted Core of
Flame as His Heart and the Infinitely Expansive Space as His Body) as a
symbol of That which transcends the dualities of Good and Evil, Upright
and Averse. In uniting with both the “glittering Image” and the “Blind
Creature of the Slime,” we come to know ourselves as the All which
contains but transcends both: “For two things are done and a third thing is

90 Liber LXV, I:45.
91 Liber AL, II:70-72.
92 Blake, William. The Marriage of Heaven and Hell.

begun… Horus leaps up thrice armed from the womb of his mother.”93
Again, as Horus says in The Vision and the Voice, “I am light, and I am
night, and I am that which is beyond them. I am speech, and I am silence,
and I am that which is beyond them. I am life, and I am death, and I am
that which is beyond them.”94 We might add, “I am good, and I am evil,
and I am that which is beyond them.”

Horus, the Sun, is a symbol of That
which contains & transcends dualities, an image of our True Selves,
identical in essence yet diverse in expression for each individual; other
cognate symbols include the point in the circle (the Solar glyph), the Rose-Cross, seminal and vaginal fluid combined (two live, generative fluids
combined into a third which “is one substance and not two, not living and
not dead, neither liquid nor solid, neither hot nor cold, neither male nor
female”95), the Heart Girt with the Serpent,96 the cross in the circle, the
circle squared,97 the Sun and the Moon conjoined,98 the Lion and the
Eagle, the word ABRAHADABRA, and infinite others. In a certain ritual
where the individual comes to identify with Horus, we proclaim our
transcendence of the moral duality: “There is no grace: there is no guilt: /
This is the Law: DO WHAT THOU WILT!”99
“For Perfection abideth not in the Pinnacles, or in the Foundations,
but in the ordered Harmony of one with all.”

93 Liber A’ash vel Capricorni Pneumatici, line 8.
94 The Vision & the Voice, 1
st Aethyr.
95 Magick in Theory & Practice, chapter 20.
96 See Liber LXV.
97 Liber AL, II:47.
98 Called “the Mark of the Beast” in Liber Reguli and “the secret sigil of the Beast” in
the 1st Aethyr of The Vision & the Voice.
99 The Mass of the Phoenix.
100 Liber LXI vel Causae.

Embrace of the World

“Enjoy all things of sense and rapture…”

101

101 Liber AL, II:22.

We found the True Self with which we come to identify in
Initiation is beyond the duality of Life and Death (part 1) as well as the

duality of Good and Evil (part 2). Now we unite yet another divide with
an embrace of the physical, “mundane” world. Another common
dichotomy (at least in the West) that has split the psyche of man is Spirit
versus Matter, or Sacred versus Profane.

In the ancient and medieval world, the predominant conception of
the universe was of an earth below and the heavens above. People
conceived the law of the Heavens as perfect and the Earth as degraded.
Isaac Newton was one of the main figures who helped bridge the gap
between Heaven and Earth. He said that the same force which makes
objects fall on earth is the same force which makes the celestial objects in
heaven move in their orbits: gravity. Symbolically and literally, Newton
said the heavens and earth do not have separate laws but abide by one
law. Also, we now know that the heavens are not above us but surround
us on all sides. There is no separation between the “mundane” Earth and
the “spiritual” Heavens: Earth is literally immersed in the Heavens.

In the New Aeon we assert that “Every man and every woman is a
star.”102 On the physical level, we are all literally made of star-stuff (or
“stardust”), as Carl Sagan was fond of noting, but there is a more
important meaning here. Nuit – who says of herself, “I am Heaven”103 – is
a symbol of the Infinite Space in which we are all immersed. Each star –
each individual – is the center of self-awareness & expression of Heaven
on Earth. Crowley writes, “Know firmly, o my son, that the true Will
cannot err; for this is thine appointed course in Heaven, in whose order is
Perfection.”104 In an important sense, this asserts that we too are in a
perfect course through Heaven just as the celestial stars are. In the New
Aeon there is an “unveiling of the company of heaven”105: every man and
every woman. We are each Gods, Stars going our unique Ways in
Heaven. Crowley comments, “[The] Pantheism of AL: The Book of the
Law shows forth all things as God”106 and “The ‘company of heaven’ is
Mankind, and its ‘unveiling’ is the assertion of the independent godhead of
every man and every woman!”107

102 Liber AL, I:3.
103 Liber AL, I:21.
104 Liber Aleph, chapter 13.
105 Liber AL, I:2.
106 Djeridensis Working, I:2.
107 New Comment to Liber AL, I:2.

From all these considerations it is easy to see that in the New
Aeon, not only does the True Self transcend the duality of Heaven and
Earth/Spiritual and Mundane, but there is essentially no distinction
between them at all. The Earth is not a prison, but a Temple where the
sacrament of Life may be enacted; the body is not corrupt, but a pulsing
and thriving vessel for the expression of Energy; sex is not sinful, but a
mysterious conduit of pleasure and power as well as an lmage of the
ecstatic nature of all Experience.

In fact, the embrace of the world, and even an ecstatic embrace of
the world, naturally comes from cosmological perspective of the New
Aeon. “Existence is pure joy”108 in the New Aeon (and not pure sorrow as
some hypochondriacs and many pessimists since have suggested). We are
also told, “the Truth of the universe is delight.”109 This is because the
Cosmological Picture of the New Aeon is that all Experiences are acts of
Love between Infinite Forms (“Nuit”) and Infinite Forces (“Hadit”).
“Hadit, who is the complement of Nuit [‘the infinite in whom all
we live and move and have our being’]… is eternal energy, the
Infinite Motion of Things, the central core of all being. The
manifested Universe comes from the marriage of Nuit and Hadit;
without this could no thing be. This eternal, this perpetual
marriage-feast is then the nature of things themselves; and
therefore everything that is, is a crystallization of divine ecstasy.”
110

Therefore, in the New Aeon we see every experience as the joyful
union between Form and Force, Infinite Space and Infinite Motion. The
world itself is an expression of Divinity, and therefore there is no reason to
retreat from it in New Aeon Initiation. Just as we must transcend the
dualities of Life & Death and Good & Evil, we must transcend the duality
of Heaven & Earth, Sacred & Profane. We are told, “Worship all things;
for all things are alike necessary to the Being of the All.”111 This idea of
worshiping all things and not making a distinction between “spiritual” and
“mundane” leads to the Formula of the Scarlet Woman.

108 Liber AL, II:9.
109 The Vision & the Voice, 17th Aethyr.
110 Liber DCCCXXXVII: The Law of Liberty.
111 The Vision & the Voice, 19th Aethyr.

“The Formula of the Scarlet Woman” refers to a certain attitude to
the world. The Scarlet Woman is traditionally associated with the image of
a whore, who symbolically represents “that which allows anything and
everything into itself.” The opposite image is that of a chaste woman who
shuts herself up and does not allow any intimate contact with anything
around herself. Crowley writes, “The Enemy is this Shutting up of things.
Shutting the Door is preventing the Operation of Change, i.e. of Love… It
is this ‘shutting up’ that is hideous, the image of death. It is the opposite of
Going, which is God.”112 The whore is an image of Change and the
embrace of all things without distinction, and the chaste woman is an
image of Stagnation and the separation from all things.

The chaste woman
is also therefore an image of the ego which refuses to give up its claim to
be “King of the Mountain” (the True Self is the rightful “King” and the
ego its minister, but the ego insists on claiming this title). Just like a chaste
woman will not “let herself go” to have intimate relations with others, the
ego will not “let itself go” to dissolve in the non-ego, the rest of the world,
so that the individual may become One (beyond dualities).

As mentioned
in the first section of this essay, the work of each person is the release of
identification with the ego and the consequent identification with Horus,
That which transcends Life and Death (and all dualities). We are therefore
a “chaste woman” if we refuse to release identification with the ego and
insist on a world of division (i.e. ego vs. world/non-ego). This is another
example of the “averse” or “sinister” symbolism that is often used in the
New Aeon: the symbol of stagnation is a chaste woman (chastity being a
“virtue” in the Old Aeons) and the symbol of growth & change is a whore
(promiscuity/sensuality being a “vice”/“sinful” in the Old Aeons).

In summary: the Formula of the Scarlet Woman applies to every
individual (not just females) and refers to the attitude of accepting all
things into oneself, refusing nothing, and growing through their
assimilation. Crowley writes, “[this is] a counsel to accept all impressions; it
is the formula of the Scarlet woman; but no impression must be allowed to
dominate you, only to fructify you; just as the artist, seeing an object, does
not worship it, but breeds a masterpiece from it.”113 Therefore, we accept
all things but we do not thereby become a passive, lifeless receptacle
which is buffeted by external forces; instead we must allow all things “to

112 New Comment to Liber AL, III:55.
113 The Book of Lies, chapter 4.

fructify” us. We all accept all things but we also turn these things towards
the accomplishment of our Wills. Here is an illustration of this point: a
musical composer does not neglect C# as “profane” or “not worthy” but
accepts all notes as worthy and beautiful in themselves, but that does not
mean his song will consist of hitting all the keys at once. On the contrary,
he selects among the possible notes, arranges them in accordance with his
vision, and produces a particular composition. The same idea is true for
the Scarlet Woman, for the Formula of the Scarlet Woman is the
acceptance of all things no matter if they are “unclean” or “mundane.”
Crowley insists, “I urge you to beware of the pride of the spirit, of the
thought of anything as evil or unclean. Make all things serve you in your
Magick [causing Change in conformity with Will] as weapons.”114

In short, in the New Aeon we do not avoid the things of the world
or the world itself in fear of it being “un-spiritual,” “profane,” or
“mundane.” On the contrary, each individual is immersed in Heaven
itself, as a Star among Stars. In the New Aeon, each individual proclaims,
“All things are sacred to me”115 and enacts “the Formula of the Scarlet
Woman,” refusing nothing and accepting all. Thereby does each
individual come to embody the union between (and the fruit of) Heaven
and Earth.
“Behold! these be grave mysteries; for there are also of my friends
who be hermits. Now think not to find them in the forest or on the
mountain; but in beds of purple, caressed by magnificent beasts of
women with large limbs, and fire and light in their eyes, and
masses of flaming hair about them; there shall ye find them. Ye
shall see them at rule, at victorious armies, at all the joy; and there
shall be in them a joy a million times greater than this.”
116

114 Djeridensis Working, I:51.
115 Liber A’ash, line 29.
116 Liber AL, II:24.

Self as Redeemer

“There is no god but man.”

117 Liber OZ.

One common attribute of the Old Aeon systems is their insistence
on the baseness, sinfulness, and helplessness of humanity. In this view,
mankind is naturally in a state spiritual blindness, deafness, and dumbness;
we don’t know what is best for ourselves, and we’re aimless when left to
our own devices. This often translates into the necessity of giving oneself
up to a higher power outside of oneself: to the priest class, to the guru, to
God, to the State, and (most recently) to advertisers.

In the New Aeon, we
place no faith on the grace of any god or guru; we assert no need to
become an Initiate beyond oneself.

As was mentioned in a previous section of this essay, each person
must unite with both the “lower” (“the abyss of depth,” “that Blind
Creature of the Slime”) and “higher” (“the abyss of height,” “the glittering
Image”) Companion – those “Upright” and “Averse” aspects of themselves
beyond the current awareness of the ego, which must be released,
explored, and assimilated. A very important facet of this “great mystery” is
that, “that Companion is Yourself. Ye can have no other Companion.” 118
Although we seek to unite with those abysses beyond our selves (insofar as
“self” is here considered as the ego-self), those abysses are parts of
Yourself. In terms of psychology, they are the unconscious aspects of the
human psyche, which isn’t just “below” the ego (i.e. just “lower,”
“animalistic” drives, the qliphothic in Qabalistic terms; “that Blind
Creature of the Slime”) but is also “above” (insofar as it contains the
“higher,” “divine,” the Neschamah in Qabalistic terms; “the glittering
Image”).

We realize then that Initiation does not consist in “coming to God”
or receiving “the grace of God” insofar as we consider a God separate or
“above” ourselves, but rather, in the New Aeon, each person coming to a
fuller, truer understanding of the Self is what constitutes Initiation. This is
because “Initiation means the Journey Inwards,”119 and the Godhead we
seek is not something other than our True Selves. As Crowley writes,
“Behold! the Kingdom of God is within you, even as the Sun standeth
eternal in the heavens, equal at midnight and at noon. He riseth not: he
setteth not: it is but the shadow of the earth which concealeth him, or the
clouds upon her face.”120 Again, we assert that this Self is always present,
118 Liber Tzaddi, lines 34-35.
119 Little Essays Toward Truth, “Mastery”.
120 De Lege Libellum.
67even at the beginning of the Great Work of coming to know it, although
we normally function in and revert to the state of identifying with our
minds and bodies (i.e. our normal ego-conception of the self).

This Work of coming to reveal and identify with the True Self does
not require the blessing of priests, the empowerments of gurus, the
presence of a “Master,” the grace of God, or the funding of the State. Each
person must “Lift up thyself!”121 In one sense, it is only by the individual’s
own courage, persistence, and hard work that the Great Work can ever be
accomplished. In another sense, Truth – the realization of one’s True Self
beyond dualities – cannot be communicated.

It is as futile to try to communicate the experience of Unity with
All Things as it is describing red to a blind person. We can use metaphors
or analogies but they will never actually understand until they have
experienced it themselves. As Crowley says, “all real secrets are
incommunicable,”122 and this is because “truth is supra-rational” and so it
is therefore “incommunicable in the language of reason.”123 Therefore, if
there is any “faith,” it is the confidence conferred by the “consciousness of
the continuity of existence.”124 This perception of Truth can only be
partially communicated in poetics, metaphors, symbols, and analogies: it is
the direct, individual experience of the True Self which brings real
understanding of the Truth as That which is beyond dualities.

One can imagine the perception of Truth as a flower unfolding in
the heart of every man and every woman: it is something inherent in the
individual which is revealed. Humanity is not sinful, degenerate, empty, or
untrustworthy but, rather, each individual is a Star, each a fountain of
Godhead, and each inherently Divine.

It is the work of the individual to realize this Divinity in themselves,
coming to know themselves not as the ego but as the True Self which
transcends all opposites: “ye [shall] look upon yourselves, and behold All
Things that are in Truth One Thing only.”125 This “consciousness of the
continuity of existence” is no supernatural, extraterrestrial, supra-mundane, posthumous fantasy: each person can attain to this awareness

121 Liber AL, II:78.
122 Magick in Theory & Practice, chapter 9.
123 Postcards to Probationers.
124 Liber AL, I:26.
125 De Lege Libellum.

here on earth, during this life.
“Every man must overcome his own obstacles, expose his own
illusions.”
126

126 Liber LXI vel Causae.

No Perfecting of the Soul

“The soul is, in its own nature, perfect purity, perfect calm, perfect
silence… This soul can never be injured, never marred, never
defiled.”
127

This idea is related strongly to the ideas in the last section of the
Self as Redeemer. We assert there is no reliance on God, guru, priest, or
any external authority, but it is a misnomer to say we “redeem” ourselves
for there is nothing to redeem. Crowley writes, “Redemption is a bad
word; it implies a debt. For every star possesses boundless wealth; the only
proper way to deal with the ignorant is to bring them to the knowledge of
their starry heritage.”128 The “soul” does not need to be redeemed for it is
perfect and pure in itself, it only is because of ignorance of our own
Divine Birthright that we think ourselves imperfect and transient. This
“soul” isn’t the personality of the individual – the ego-self which identifies
with the mind and body – but rather the Self which is coterminous with
All Things.

The True Self never dies as it is beyond all limitation, containing
all things and relations within Itself. The body along with the mind surely
will expire but it is only through the mysterious mechanisms of this mind
and body that the Self, beyond all limits and opposites, may become self-aware and consciously experience the rapture of existence. This Self does
not need to be redeemed or perfected: there is no Fall of Man to be
rectified (Abrahamic religions) nor a Wheel of Suffering to be liberated
from (Dharmic religions).

There is even no sense of the soul incarnating to attain to higher
and higher “spiritual states” or towards “enlightenment.” In the New
Aeon, the “starting point” is not a fallen, suffering, and sinful state, but

127 “The Soul of the Desert” available in The Revival of Magick.
128 The Book of Thoth.

rather we are all Royal and Divine, Divinity-made-manifest, and “existence
is pure joy”129 if it is seen with eyes that “Bind nothing!”130 i.e. eyes that see
the unity underlying apparent dualities. As it is said, “Since all things are
God, in all things thou seest just so much of God as thy capacity affordeth
thee.”131 The essential symbol-metaphor is that the Star of Unity is always
shining, potentially conscious, but we identify with the ego-self and are
therefore mired in duality and limitation (once you identify with the ego,
you are immediately not the non-ego or the world and therefore the world
becomes Two instead of One). Crowley writes:

“We are not to regard ourselves as base beings, without whose
sphere is Light or ‘God’. Our minds and bodies are veils of the
Light within. The uninitiate is a ‘Dark Star,’ and the Great Work
for him is to make his veils transparent by ‘purifying’ them. This
’purification’ is really ‘simplification’; it is not that the veil is dirty,
but that the complexity of its folds makes it opaque. The Great
Work therefore consists principally in the solution of complexes.
Everything in itself is perfect, but when things are muddled, they
become ‘evil’.”
132

The important point is that “everything in itself is perfect” but our
minds inevitably “muddle” the situation which ends with us identifying
with the ego instead of the True Self. Because all things are perfect in
themselves, we obviously do not need any kind of God or guru to bestow
redemption, liberation, or initiation upon us: the aspirant need only clear
away the cloud-veils of ignorance around her Star, and the True Self will
leap up within her awareness and burn away all division and limitation.
As Crowley explains:

“This ‘star’ or ‘Inmost Light’ is the original, individual, eternal
essence….we are warned against the idea of a Pleroma, a flame of
which we are Sparks, and to which we return when we ‘attain’.
That would indeed be to make the whole curse of separate

129 Liber AL, II:9.
130 Liber AL, I:22.
131 The Vision & the Voice, 17th Aethyr.
132 New Comment to Liber AL, I:8.

existence ridiculous, a senseless and inexcusable folly… The idea
of incarnations ‘perfecting’ a thing originally perfect by definition is
imbecile. The only sane solution is… to suppose that the Perfect
enjoys experience of (apparent) Imperfection.”
133

In the New Aeon we go even further than one might expect: the
“ignorance” of duality is not inherently evil or bad at all either. In short,
duality is “ignorance” for one who still identifies with the ego, but once
one has dissolved the ego and identified with the True Self one recognizes
duality as the necessary means for self-awareness. For the individual mired
in duality and identification with the ego, “coition-dissolution” is her
formula, but one who has dissolved the ego and identified with the True
Self has the formula of “creation-parturition”… and “The All, thus
interwoven of These, is Bliss.”134 The body and the mind, with its
inherently dualistic conceptions, are a prison of ignorance for the
uninitiate and a temple for performing the Sacrament of Life for the
initiate.

It takes the experience of the dissolution of the ego to overcome
the morbid fear of death and accept duality, not as the condition of our
suffering, but as the opportunity for us to rejoice in the uniting of diverse
elements (self and world in each experience, along with the Supreme
Union of ego and non-ego/subject and object). The world is both “None…
and two”135… None, the continuous, is “divided for love’s sake, for the
chance of union. This is the creation of the world, that the pain of division
is as nothing, and the joy of dissolution all.”136 In this conception, duality
and the “creation of the world” as we know it (i.e. the normal dualistic
world which we commonly inhabit) is actually the condition of “the
chance of union.” Only if two things are separate can they unite and have
the possibility of “the joy of dissolution” wherein the self becomes “all.”
Crowley explains, “Nuit shews the object of creating the Illusion of
Duality. She said: The world exists as two, for only so can there be known
the Joy of Love, whereby are Two made One. Aught that is One is alone,
and has little pain in making itself two, that it may know itself, and love
133 New Comment to Liber AL, I:8.
134 The Book of Lies, chapter 3.
135 Liber AL, I:28.
136 Liber AL, I:29-30.
71itself, and rejoice therein.”137 Thereby does one embrace both unity and
multiplicity (duality) in a higher Unity.

This perception of “the consciousness of the continuity of
existence”138 is not something given by a god or a guru but a natural
birthright of each individual. It is, as described in the first section of this
essay, a natural step of Growth towards psychological-spiritual Maturity.
And this also leads us to the final point: even this is a step along the Path.
It may be the “End” in one sense (the end of the dominance of the ego,
for once thing) but it is also the beginning, for “death is life to come.”139
One still has to live one’s life. One might say, “Before initiation: work, live,
and play; after initiation: work, live, and play,” for coming to identify with
the True Self doesn’t mean the end of one’s mind and body along with
their normal needs. In fact, the mind and body – the ego-self – are not
destroyed permanently but rather they are reborn with renewed energy,
the veils of ignorance (of duality as well as the falsity of the doctrines of
the Fall of Man and the inherent Suffering of the world) having been torn
away. One does not suddenly obtain the earthly power of a king or have
the intellectual power of Einstein, but the change is something largely
“internal,” for in initiation, “nothing is changed or can be changed; but all
is trulier understood with every step.”140 It is this understanding of our
True Selves, beyond the veils of mind and body, which we each strive to
attain so that we may more effectively and joyfully manifest our wills in the
world. The task is then simple yet difficult: each individual must dissolve
the ego and their identification with it to identify with the True Self, always
shining though we are unaware, which is beyond dualities and all
limitation. In the end, “All you have to do is to be yourself, to do your
will, and to rejoice.”141
“No star can stray from its self-chosen course: for in the infinite
soul of space all ways are endless, all-embracing: perfect.”
142
137 Djeridensis Working, I:30.
138 Liber AL, I:22.
139 The Book of Lies, chapter 18.
140 Little Essays Toward Truth, “Mastery”.
141 Liber DCCCXXXVII: The Law of Liberty.
142 The Heart of the Master.

CHAPTER 5
FUNDAMENTALS OF INITIATION
IN THELEMA

The basics of initiation are explained fairly succinctly in a text
called Liber LXI vel Causae or simply Liber Causae. It reads:
“In all systems of religion is to be found a system of Initiation,
which may be defined as the process by which a man comes to
learn that unknown Crown.”
This establishes that all systems of religion have some form or
another of approaching the same Truth. They all contain some form of
“the process by which a man comes to learn that unknown Crown,” which
is here called “Initiation.” The “unknown Crown” is a Qabalistic reference
to the first Sephirah on the Tree of Life, Kether, which literally means
“Crown” and represents the Unity of Godhead to which man may attain.
Some have called this “unknown Crown” the term “God,” some have
called it “liberation,” or “unity,” or “Truth,” and countless other names.
Ultimately, it is “unknown” and nameless because it is beyond the
dualities of knower and known, beyond the dualities of the subject and
object of language, and therefore cannot be accurately named. It is, to use
the language of the Gnostic Mass, always “beyond speech and beyond
sight.” Initiation is defined as the process whereby one may come to learn
That.

Liber Causae continues:
“Though none can communicate either the knowledge or the
39power to achieve this, which we may call the Great Work, it is yet
possible for initiates to guide others.”
Here we are told what was mentioned above as a general principle
of initiation: Initiation cannot be bestowed from others through words,
symbols, rituals, or any other way. “None can communicate” does not
mean there is not anyone smart or enlightened enough to communicate
this Truth, but it is a Truth whose nature is simply incommunicable by
virtue of it being beyond all names, forms, signs, and symbols.

Here we also see the process of “Initiation” being equated with the
term “the Great Work,” as mentioned previously as well. We also learn
that initiates may not communicate “that unknown Crown” but they can
guide others toward it.

Liber Causae continues on this theme:
“Every man must overcome his own obstacles, expose his own
illusions. Yet others may assist him to do both, and they may
enable him altogether to avoid many of the false paths, leading no
whither, which tempt the weary feet of the uninitiated pilgrim.
They can further insure that he is duly tried and tested, for there
are many who think themselves to be Masters who have not even
begun to tread the Way of Service that leads thereto.”

Related to this way of understanding “the Way of Service” is the
fact that, especially within Thelema, there is an emphasis on “coming back
to the world” once one has attained. This is virtually identical to the
bodhisattva vow in Mahayana Buddhism whereby one swears to return
from nirvana (liberation, attainment, et cetera) back to samsara (the
mundane world of ignorance) in order that all beings may be liberated.
There are plentiful examples within the Western tradition of this same
idea, often involving the symbolism of someone who has attained
returning from a distant and/or isolated place; prominent examples
include returning from a mountain (e.g. Moses, Muhammad, and
Nietzsche’s Zarathustra) as well as returning from the wilderness (e.g.
Jesus). That is, becoming a Master is tied up in the Way of Service for one
does not become a Master solely for enlightening oneself but also to help
others attain to the Light.

The Mysteries in the New Aeon

It is understood that there is a single Light, “the Absolute Truth,”
“the Unutterable,” et cetera, and the diversity of expression are simply
different ways to symbolize and veil that Unity. In Thelema, there is a
further understanding that there are different “formulas” of initiation or
attainment that are efficacious in one time but that need to be updated for
a new era or “aeon.” A virtually identical notion is held in the Hindu
doctrine of the “yugas” or epochs (e.g. the Kali Yuga) where the
39 Liber LXV, I:2.
40 Liber Porta Lucis sub figura X, line 19.
42requirements to attain liberation change with each “yuga.” This is the
essential meaning behind the idea that we are in a “New Aeon.” Let’s look
into this idea in more depth:

In the world of Western esotericism or “occultism,” there is a
certain symbolic way that the “Mysteries” of the path of initiation are
explained. In general, there are a series of ceremonial rituals which each
candidate undergoes, symbolizing the stages of illumination and offering
guidance on the Path. Most importantly, there is a “Hierophant” (literally
meaning “one who reveals sacred things”) whose purpose is to serve as the
dispenser of the Mysteries. Ultimately, this Hierophant represents or
reflects the God within each individual who is the true Hierophant of
every initiate.

Now Horus sat in the East as the Hierophant
and a new formula of attainment was put in place: “the word of the Law is
Thelema.”41 This is the symbolism at work in The Book of the Law when
it is written, “Abrogate are all rituals, all ordeals, all words and signs. Ra-Hoor-Khuit hath taken his seat in the East at the Equinox of the Gods…
41 Liber AL, I:39.
43Hoor in his secret name and splendour is the Lord initiating.”42 In
Thelema, this Equinox of the Gods is said to have occurred on the Vernal
Equinox of 1904, with the new Book of the Law – a new Law for a new
aeon – being received a few days afterward.

Crowley comments on this
verse of The Book of the Law:
“This verse [AL I:49] declares that the old formula of Magick — the
Osiris-Adonis-Jesus-Marsyas-Dionysus-Attis-et cetera formula of the
Dying God – is no longer efficacious. It rested on the ignorant
belief that the Sun died every day, and every year, and that its
resurrection was a miracle. The Formula of the New Aeon
recognizes Horus, the Child crowned and conquering, as God. We
are all members of the Body of God, the Sun; and about our
System is the Ocean of Space. This formula is then to be based
upon these facts. Our ‘Evil’, ‘Error’, ‘Darkness’, ‘Illusion’, whatever
one chooses to call it, is simply a phenomenon of accidental and
temporary separateness. If you are ‘walking in darkness’, do not try
to make the sun rise by self-sacrifice [i.e. the formula of Osiris], but
wait in confidence for the dawn, and enjoy the pleasures of the
night meanwhile. The general allusion is to the Equinox Ritual of
the G[olden] D[awn].”
43

Death/Attainment as Non-cataclysmic

The basic idea associated with the last, Old Aeon is an obsession
with death. The symbolic proponents of the Old Aeon paradigms – Osiris,
Dionysus, Jesus, Adonis, et cetera – are all bound by the central motif of a
(painful) death. Death is seen as catastrophic and a ritual act must be
performed for the dead to be resurrected (or avenged). The cosmological
parallel with this initiatory viewpoint is the idea that the Sun dies each
night and the priesthood must perform a ritual for the Sun to rise again in
the morning. Crowley often writes of the switch from the Old Aeon to the
New Aeon view as paralleling the switch from a geocentric to a
heliocentric view of our Solar System. Now we know that the Sun does not
“die” each night, nor does any priest need to perform any kind of ritual
for the Sun to rise in the morning. We know the Sun is constantly shining
and it is only the turning of the earth which creates the succession of day
and night: the apparent sight of the Sun “dying” and being “reborn” each
night has changed to the understanding that the Sun is never born nor
dies. Frater Achad, or Charles Stansfeld Jones, encapsulated this idea in
his essay “Stepping Out of the Old Aeon Into the New”:
“You know how deeply we have always been impressed with the
ideas of Sun-rise and Sun-set, and how our ancient brethren, seeing
the Sun disappear at night and rise again in the morning, based all
their religious ideas in this one conception of a Dying and Re-arisen God. This is the central idea of the religion of the Old Aeon
but we have left it behind us because although it seemed to be
based on Nature (and Nature’s symbols are always true), yet we
have outgrown this idea which is only apparently true in Nature.
51 Liber AL, II:9.
49Since this great Ritual of Sacrifice and Death was conceived and
perpetuated, we, through the observation of our men of science,
have come to know that it is not the Sun which rises and sets, but
the earth on which we live which revolves so that its shadow cuts
us off from the sunlight during what we call night. The Sun does
not die, as the ancients thought; It is always shining, always
radiating Light and Life.”

Crowley reiterates this view and explains the spiritual significance
when he writes:
“…When the time was ripe, appeared the Brethren of the Formula
of Osiris, whose word is I A O; so that men worshipped Man,
thinking him subject to Death, and his victory dependent upon
Resurrection. Even so conceived they of the Sun as slain and
reborn with every day, and every year. Now, this great Formula
being fulfilled, and turned into abomination, this Lion came forth
to proclaim the Aeon of Horus, the crowned and conquering
child, who dieth not, nor is reborn, but goeth radiant ever upon
His Way. Even so goeth the Sun: for as it is now known that night
is but the shadow of the Earth, so Death is but the shadow of the
Body, that veileth his Light from its bearer.”

Assimilating this idea of the Sun, in reality, never setting goes a
long way to help the aspirant understand the spiritual truth of Thelema
that this mirrors. In short, death (both of the ego and of the body) is no
longer seen as cataclysmic in the New Aeon. This is because of two
connected ideas: Death is complementary with Life, and Death is actually
Change (“life to come”).

Let’s start with the first idea that Death is complementary with Life.
“Death is the apex of one curve of the snake Life: behold all opposites as
necessary complements, and rejoice.”53 Life and death are the two
complements that constitute existence, and all things are formed from the
interplay of Life and Death. All things in the universe, including the mind
and body of the aspirant, are subject to Life and Death. One might

52 The Heart of the Master.
53 The Heart of the Master.

visualize existence as an undulating serpent, where the crest of a wave is
Life and the trough is Death.

This leads into the idea of Death as Change. We often think of Life
as constituting change and Death as constituting stagnation: death implies
a stop or an end. The New Aeon views Death not as an end but as the
possibility for new Life. Just as the Winter brings “death” to plant life, it
also gives nutrients to the soil to allow for the inevitable new Spring. (As a
note, “Death” refers to the death of the physical body, but more
importantly to the “death” or “dissolution” of the ego which can and does
occur during an individual’s life). Crowley explains this idea that Death is
Change very succinctly:
“Verily, love is death, and death is life to come. Man returneth not
again; the stream floweth not uphill; the old life is no more; there is
a new life that is not his. Yet that life is of his very essence; it is
more He than all that he calls He.”
54

The succinct idea that “death is life to come” is expounded here
along with the idea that in the life that arises from death, we become
“more ourselves.” The Life which arises from Death “is more He than all
that he calls He.” This is because “all that he calls He” is his ego and in
the death of the ego, we come to identify with the True Self which
contains both Life and Death (and is therefore Eternal and Infinite). This
death is not cataclysmic, but even equated with “love.” In the Tarot, which
symbolically mirrors the initiatory paradigm of its age, traditionally has
“Atu XIII” (or the 13th Trump) as “Death.” In the New Aeon, we may
understand this card not as “Death” but “Transformation” or “Change.” In
The Heart of the Master, Crowley writes short, poetic stanzas to describe
each Tarot card. For “Atu XIII: Death” he writes, “The Universe is
Change; every Change is the effect of an Act of Love; all Acts of Love
contain Pure Joy. Die daily. Death is the apex of one curve of the snake
Life: behold all opposites as necessary complements, and rejoice.” This is
the fundamental paradigm-shift of the New Aeon: not only is Death
actually Change (and “life to come”), but it is a form of Love, and “all
Acts of Love contain Pure Joy.” There is no trace of cataclysm, sorrow, or
suffering in this conception of Death in the New Aeon.

54 The Book of Lies, chapter 18.

Symbolically, this means Initiation (the myth-drama of each
individual’s Path) is no longer portrayed as “The Man performing Self-Sacrifice” but as “The Child Growing to Maturity.” On this Crowley
writes, “What then is the formula of the initiation of Horus? It will no
longer be that of the Man, through Death. It will be the natural growth of
the Child. His experiences will no more be regarded as catastrophic. Their
hieroglyph is the Fool: the innocent and impotent Harpocrates Babe
becomes the Horus Adult by obtaining the Wand.”55 The idea is one of
coming to maturity, specifically of “obtaining the Wand” which represents
the creative, generative power: this experience constitutes “spiritual
puberty” for the individual, one might say. The process is not a cataclysm
that needs rectifying (although puberty often seems cataclysmic!) but a
natural process of growth and fulfillment of human potential.

Each person must destroy their ego self and come to identify with
the True Self. Every man and woman must “break down the fortress of
thine Individual Self, that thy Truth may spring free from the ruins.” 56 This
necessarily involves the death or dissolution of the ego (“thine Individual
Self”) to which many people are strongly attached. This is why death is
seen as catastrophic: people view losses as catastrophic and the greatest
loss to people is the loss of their personal ego-identity. In both the Old and
New Aeons, the ego must experience death in process of Initiation. The
difference is the view of this phenomenon: the Old Aeon views death as a
cataclysmic event whereas the New Aeon views it as a necessary step in
the progress of Growth. As Crowley explains, “The Ego fears to lose
control of the course of the mind… The Ego is justly apprehensive, for this
ecstasy will lead to a situation when its annhilation will be decreed…
Remember that the Ego is not really the centre and crown of the
individual; indeed the whole trouble arises from its false claim to be so.”57
Before the individual personally experiences the dissolution of their own
ego, they must assimilate this New Aeon idea that “there is that which
remains” after this death. Each person then must come to directly
experience and even embody this truth – that is, each individual must
come to know this truth through their own experience. “Faith must be

55 Liber Samekh.
56 The Heart of the Master.
57 Commentary to Liber LXV, I:60

slain by certainty,”58 as Crowley wrote. We might even say that each
person is psychologically stuck in the Old Aeon paradigm until they have
this experience of the death of the ego. Only then can they be “freed of
the obsession of the doom of the Ego in Death.”59 Only then can the
individual identify with “that which remains,” which transcends but
contains both Life and Death. In the New Aeon, each person “Let[s] the
Illusion of the World pass over thee, unheeded, as thou goest from
Midnight to the Morning.”60 The New Aeon is the Aeon of the Crowned
& Conquering Child: Horus, Heru-Ra-Ha, Ra-Hoor-Khuit, and many other
names. Horus is a symbol of the True Self which transcends Life and
Death just as the Sun is a symbol of that which constantly shines even
though day (Life) and night (Death) pass on earth, and just as the Child is
a symbol of that which contains but transcends both mother (Life) and
father (Death).

In the The Vision and the Voice, Horus himself says of his
nature:
“I am light, and I am night, and I am that which is beyond them. I
am speech, and I am silence, and I am that which is beyond them.
I am life, and I am death, and I am that which is beyond them. I
am war, and I am peace, and I am that which is beyond them. I
am weakness, and I am strength, and I am that which is beyond
them. …And it shall be unto them a grace and a sacrament, and ye
shall all sit down together at the supernal banquet, and ye shall
feast upon the honey of the gods, and be drunk upon the dew of
immortality — FOR I AM HORUS, THE CROWNED AND
CONQUERING CHILD, WHOM THOU KNEWEST NOT!”
61

As mentioned in later sections of this essay, in the New Aeon we
view each individual as God Him/Herself. Therefore the work of each
person is the release of identification with the ego and the consequent
identification with Horus, That which transcends Life and Death (and all
dualities). This is expressed symbolically by Frater Achad (and Crowley)
by the idea of switching one’s perspective from Earth (the geocentric

58 The Book of Thoth.
59 Little Essays Toward Truth, “Mastery.”
60 The Heart of the Master.
61 The Vision & the Voice, 1
st Aethyr.

viewpoint where we experience day/life and night/death; the perspective of
the ego) to the perspective from the Sun (the heliocentric viewpoint where
we experience perpetual shining through day and night; the perspective of
the True Self)

This paradigmatic change from Old Aeon to New, in the sense of
no longer seeing Death as cataclysmic, is captured symbolically in
Crowley’s changes to old “formulae” to conform with the New Aeon
point-of-view. Specifically, the change from IAO to VIAOV and the
change from AUM to AUMGN62 exemplify the paradigm shift from Old
Aeon to New Aeon.

On the formula of IAO, Crowley writes, “This formula is the
principal and most characteristic formula of Osiris, of the Redemption of
Mankind. ‘I’ is Isis, Nature, ruined by ‘A’, Apophis the Destroyer, and
restored to life by [‘O’] the Redeemer Osiris.”63 The basic idea is that I =
Life which is ruined by A = Death/Chaos which must then be redeemed
by O. Existence is therefore a process of endless cataclysms which require
redemption from this point-of-view. How is this view changed from the
point-of-view of New Aeon Initiation? Crowley continues, “THE MASTER
THERION, in the Seventeenth year of the Aeon, has reconstructed the
Word I A O to satisfy the new conditions of Magick imposed by
progress.”

Now, no one would deny that all things change, that “all things
must pass,” but from the point-of-view of physics, energy is never created
nor destroyed. It is simply transformed into different forms. If we identify
with any of these partial phenomena which inevitably must be
transformed, we are subject to death. If we “die daily” to our ego-self, to
our sense of division or separateness from the world, then we come to
identify with the Whole Process. “The many change and pass; the one
remains.”64 The All contains all opposites within itself, it is the symbol of
the Serpent itself whose undulations are Life and Death, and therefore is
eternal. This True Self, the All which knows no division, is Horus and
“that which remains.

It is with these ideas in mind we can understand why, in the

62 Magick in Theory & Practice, chapters 5 and 7.
63 Magick in Theory & Practice, chapter 5, which should be consulted for a more full
examination of VIAOV.
64 Liber Porta Lucis, line 20.

Aeon, IAO has become VIAOV. Basically, IAO has been surrounded by
two “V”s.65 What does this mean?

Essentially, the “V” represents “that which remains.” There may be
processes of creation, destruction, and reconstruction (IAO) but there is
always “that which remains.” The “V” remains unchanged through the
various “IAO processes” one might say. Even though the phallus of the
father must “die” in ejaculation, it is a necessary step for new Life – the
Child – to emerge… And the Semen, the Quintessence, remains
unchanged (“that which remains”) throughout the entire process. This
symbolic process exemplifies the ideas of the New Aeon, especially
because the “death” in this case is ecstatic: the death is literally orgasmic.
Further, Crowley writes, “the snake is the hieroglyphic representation of
semen”66 and so the semen which is “that which remains” is identified with
the snake or serpent which, as explained above, represents That which
contains the complements of Life and Death (being the crest and trough of
His undulations).

There is another interesting idea which this symbolic formula,

65 These refer to the Hebrew letter “Vav” or the Greek letter “Digamma” for various
reasons which can be investigated in chapter 5 of Magick in Theory & Practice.
66 The Book of Lies, commentary to chapter 8.

VIAOV, conceals: One might consider the original “V” as ignorant man,
i.e. man as ignorant of his True Self/his identity with All Things, and the
final “V” as man conscious of his own Divinity. It is through the process of
IAO, or death of the ego, that each individual becomes consciously aware
of him or herself as Horus, “that which remains,” for since all things are
contained in the All-Self, it cannot be created or destroyed. Also, the “V”
or the True Self was always there, except the individual was simply
ignorant of this fact: “The series of transformations has not affected his
identity; but it has explained him to himself.”67 Crowley explains, “…the
’Stone’ or ‘Elixir’ which results from our labours will be the pure and
perfect Individual originally inherent in the substance chosen, and nothing
else… the effective element of the Product is of the essence of its own
nature, and inherent therein; the Work [then] consists in isolating it from
its accretions.”68 As it is written in our Holy Book Liber LXV, “Thou wast
with me from the beginning.”69

Moving onto AUM becoming AUMGN, Crowley writes:
“The word AUM is the sacred Hindu mantra which was the
supreme hieroglyph of Truth, a compendium of the Sacred
Knowledge… Firstly, it represents the complete course of sound…
Symbolically, this announces the course of Nature as proceeding
from free and formless creation through controlled and formed
preservation to the silence of destruction… We see accordingly
how AUM is, on either system, the expression of a dogma which
implies catastrophe in nature. It is cognate with the formula of the
Slain God.”

The formula of AUM therefore suffers from the same attitude
problem as the formula of IAO: nature is catastrophic. Moving beyond
this idea of existence as catastrophic is, as explained above, one facet of
New Aeon Initiation. Crowley explains:

67 Magick in Theory & Practice, chapter 5.
68 Magick in Theory & Practice, chapter 20.
69 Liber LXV, II:60.
70 Magick in Theory & Practice, chapter 7, which should be consulted for a more full
examination of AUMGN.

“The cardinal revelation of the Great Aeon of Horus is that this
formula AUM does not represent the facts of nature. The point of
view is based upon misapprehension of the character of existence.
It soon became obvious to The Master Therion that AUM was an
inadequate and misleading hieroglyph. It stated only part of the
truth, and it implied a fundamental falsehood. He consequently
determined to modify the word in such a manner as to fit it to
represent the Arcana unveiled by the Aeon of which He had
attained to be the Logos. The essential task was to emphasize the
fact that nature is not catastrophic, but proceeds by means of
undulations.”
71

The essential idea appears in the final sentence. As we have gone
over above, the New Aeon point-of-view conceives existence as a Serpent
whose undulations are Life and Death. The word AUM ends in “M”
which symbolizes the fact that, “the formation of the individual from the
absolute is closed by his death.”72 Again the idea is one of Death as a stop
or an end instead of “life to come” or one instance of Change. Now, how
would “GN” be added to the end of AUM “fix” the word? Crowley writes,
“The undulatory formula of putrefaction is represented in the Qabalah by
the letter N, which refers to Scorpio.”73 Both of these (the letter N and
Scorpio) are traditionally attributed to “Atu XIII: Death” in the Tarot
which was spoken of above (when it was suggested it might be more
accurately titled “Change” or “Transformation”). Basically, “N” represents
the idea that, “Death is life to come;” that is, Death is not an end but one
apex of the curve of endless undulations. Crowley continues, “Now it so
happens that the root GN signifies both knowledge [gnosis] and generation
combined in a single idea, in an absolute form independent of
personality.”74 The idea is basically that AUM does not accurately describe
the course of nature because existence does not end in cataclysm.
Therefore, by adding “GN” to AUM to form “AUMGN,” we assert that
the process of nature is not cataclysmic. In fact, it does not end at all but

71 Magick in Theory & Practice, chapter 7, which should be consulted for a more full
examination of AUMGN.
72 Magick in Theory & Practice, chapter 7.
73 Magick in Theory & Practice, chapter 7.
74 Magick in Theory & Practice, chapter 7.

instead “proceeds by means of undulations”: Death is not the end but
simply one trough of the endless winding of the Serpent of the All-Self.

Essentially, “all the sorrows are but as shadows; they pass & are
done; but there is that which remains.”75 It is the work of each individual
to dissolve and de-identify with the ego-self and identify with “that which
remains,” the True Self which transcends all division (especially between
Life and Death) in that it contains All. The death of the ego is not
cataclysmic because we know the Sun of the True, All-Self which “is more
He than all that he calls He,”76 is always shining regardless of our
ignorance (our “darkness”). In short, in the New Aeon we give the advice,
“If you are ‘walking in darkness’, do not try to make the sun rise by self-sacrifice, but wait in confidence for the dawn, and enjoy the pleasures of
the night meanwhile.”77
“With courage conquering fear shall ye approach me: ye shall lay
down your heads upon mine altar, expecting the sweep of the
sword. But the first kiss of love shall be radiant on your lips; and
all my darkness and terror shall turn to light and joy. Only those

75 Liber AL, II:9.
76 The Book of Lies, chapter 18.
77 New Comment to Liber AL, I:49.

who fear shall fail.”

78 Liber Tzaddi, lines 16-18.

“My adepts stand upright; their head above the heavens, their feet
below the hells.”
79

79 Liber Tzaddi, line 40.

CHAPTER 8
THE PHILOSOPHY OF THELEMA

METAPHYSICS

Ontology: None & Two

Ontology is the study of being, existence, or reality. Thelema’s
ontology is stated simply as “None and Two.” The world is understood as
“Nothing” or “Naught,” which is something completely beyond all

description and limit. In Liber AL I:27, it is written “Then the priest
answered & said unto the Queen of Space, kissing her lovely brows, and
the dew of her light bathing his whole body in a sweet-smelling perfume of
sweat: O Nuit, continuous one of Heaven, let it be ever thus; that men
speak not of Thee as One but as None; and let them speak not of thee at
all, since thou art continuous!”

Many mystics have called it “Unity” but even this, some may
argue, implies something as “not-One.” Crowley writes, “All Things that
are in Truth One Thing only, whose name hath been called No Thing.” 152
From this comes the necessity of explaining the appearance of duality.
Instead of a “Fall of Man” or an imprisonment of the soul in matter,
Thelema explains the appearance of duality in this fashion: “None… and
two. For I am divided for love’s sake, for the chance of union. This is the
creation of the world, that the pain of division is as nothing, and the joy of
dissolution all.”153 In this way, the many or divided are in such a position
so they may become one and unite. This is given further explanation
when Crowley writes, “The Many is as adorable to the One as the One is
to the Many. This is the Love of These; creation-parturition is the Bliss of
the One; coition-dissolution is the Bliss of the Many. / The All, thus
interwoven of These, is Bliss.”154
…see also the essay “Berashith” by Aleister Crowley; Magick Without
Tears, chapter 5; and The Book of Lies chapters 3, 12, and 46.

Cosmology: Nuit, Hadit, Ra-Hoor-Khuit, and Stars

Thelema understands Nuit as Infinite Space which is “Heaven” that

152 De Lege Libellum.
153 Liber AL, I:28-30.
154 The Book of Lies, chapter 3.
155 New Comment to Liber AL I:1.

is occupied by various Points-of-View, or Hadit. Each star - “every man
and every woman”156 – is in the Body of Infinite Space and has Hadit as its
core, who is “the complement of Nu, my bride,”157 “the flame that burns in
every heart of man, and in the core of every star,”158 as well as “Life, and
the giver of Life.”159 These together create the Universe as we know it. ”In
the sphere [Hadit is] everywhere the centre, as [Nuit], the circumference, is
nowhere found.”160 There are many interpretations of Nuit and Hadit – for
example, with Nuit as matter and Hadit as motion and their interplay
being the universe but the basic idea remains the same.
…see also Liber AL vel Legis, chapters 1 and 2; The Book of Lies,
chapters 0 and 11; the Creed of Liber XV: The Gnostic Mass.

Eschatology: The destruction of the self & the dawning of the
Aeon of Horus

Another interpretation of eschatology is the “destruction of the
world by fire” (which can also be interpreted in the former sense of the
destruction of the self), which Crowley gives symbolically in “Atu XX:
Aeon” of the Tarot. In this other interpretation, the world was “destroyed
by fire” with the reception of Liber AL vel Legis in 1904. Crowley writes
in The Book of Thoth, “The old card was called The Angel: or, The Last
Judgment. It represented an Angel or Messenger blowing a trumpet,
attached to which was a flag, bearing the symbol of the Aeon of Osiris…
The card therefore represented the destruction of the world by Fire. This
was accomplished in the year of the vulgar era 1904, when the fiery god
Horus took the place of the airy god Osiris in the East as Hierophant.”
…see also The Book of Thoth, “XX. The Aeon”.

Teleology: Will

Teleology deals with the purpose or the understanding of the
design of the universe. In Thelema, the teleology is clearly one of “Will.”
One might contrast the teleology of Thelema with that of Schopenhauer’s
Will-to-Life and Nietzsche’s Will-to-Power, where Thelema understands it
as a Will-to-Love. All experiences and events are occurrences of two things
uniting into a third. The necessary formula of each star is then “love under
will” – to find that Will and do it.

Just as each star has its particular orbit in the macrocosm of space,
every man and every woman has their particular Way on earth. As
Crowley writes, “Each action or motion is an act of love, the uniting with
one or another part of ‘Nuit’; each such act must be ‘under will,’ chosen so
as to fulfil and not to thwart the true nature of the being concerned.”161

EPISTEMOLOGY

There are two stances on reason that are expounded in Liber AL
vel Legis. The first stance is that reason must be subservient to Will and
the second stance is the importance of direct experience over reason.
These ideas about reason intertwine and support one another.

First, the Will is “supra-rational” or beyond reason. The section in
Liber AL that deals with this comes from chapter 2:
“There is great danger in me; for who doth not understand these
runes shall make a great miss. He shall fall down into the pit called
Because, and there he shall perish with the dogs of Reason. Now a
curse upon Because and his kin! May Because be accursed for
ever! If Will stops and cries Why, invoking Because, then Will
stops & does nought. If Power asks why, then is Power weakness.
Also reason is a lie; for there is a factor infinite & unknown; & all
their words are skew-wise. Enough of Because! Be he damned for a
dog! But ye, o my people, rise up & awake!”
162

161 Introduction to Liber AL.
162 Liber AL, II:27-34.

Here we have a curse upon “Because,” “Reason,” and “Why.”
There is no “Why” or “Because” to Will: it simply GOES, it simply IS.
Because we inhabit a world of Infinite Space and since reason can only
work with finite ideas and quantities, then reason cannot express the
Infinite purely and accurately. It is a “lie” because of this “factor infinite &
unknown.” Crowley writes, “There is no ‘reason’ why a Star should
continue in its orbit. Let her rip! …It is ridiculous to ask a dog why it
barks.

Note: nature does not need a reason to exist. It just is

One must fulfil one’s true Nature, one must do one’s Will. To
question this is to destroy confidence, and so to create an inhibition.”163
Therefore, reason should attend to its own business (solving problems of
rationality) and allow the Will to flow uninhibited; otherwise, “One risks
falling form the world of Will (‘freed from the lust of result’) to that of
Reason.”164 Crowley continues:
“We must not suppose for an instant that the Book of the Law is
opposed to reason. On the contrary, its own claim to authority
rests upon reason, and nothing else. It disdains the arts of the
orator. It makes reason the autocrat of the mind. But that very fact
emphasizes that the mind should attend to its own business. It
should not transgress its limits. It should be a perfect machine, an
apparatus for representing the universe accurately and impartially
to its master. The Self, its Will, and its Apprehension, should be
utterly beyond it.”
165
“When reason usurps the higher functions of the mind, when it
presumes to dictate to the Will what its desires ought to be, it
wrecks the entire structure of the star. The Self should set the Will
in motion, that is, the Will should only take its orders from within
and above.”
166

163 New Comment to Liber AL, II:30-31.
164 Djeridensis Working, II:30.
165 New Comment to Liber AL, II:27.
166 Djeridensis Working, II:31.

Another claim is made in Liber AL, “I give unimaginable joys on
earth: certainty, not faith, while in life, upon death; peace unutterable, rest,

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ecstasy; nor do I demand aught in sacrifice.”167 The Will does not require
articles of faith to be accepted but rather asks that the individual rely on
their experiences. It is the faith conferred by the direct experience of the
“consciousness of the continuity of existence”168 that is offered.

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Rational precepts are not proposed, debated over, accepted, and
rejected but rather one attains various realizations or trances and learn
from one’s experiences. When one attains the “consciousness of the
continuity of existence”169 and becomes “chief of all,”170 the unity of this
perception is not explainable by the duality of reason. In relation to this
experience we find “there could be no reality in any intellectual concept
of any kind, that the only reality must lie in direct experience of such a
kind that it is beyond the scope of the critical apparatus of our minds. It
cannot be subject to the laws of Reason; it cannot be found in the fetters
of elementary mathematics; only transfinite and irrational conceptions in
that subject can possibly shadow forth the truth in some such paradox as
the identity of contradictories.”171

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Crowley also says, “To have any sensible meaning at all, faith must
mean experience… Nothing is any use to us unless it be a certainty
unshakeable by criticism of any kind, and there is only one thing in the
universe which complies with these conditions: the direct experience of
spiritual truth. Here, and here only, do we find a position in which the
great religious minds of all times and all climes coincide. It is necessarily
above dogma, because dogma consists of a collection of intellectual
statements, each of which, and also its contradictory, can easily be
disputed and overthrown.”172 This perception of the world as continuous
and unitary is not offered on faith but can be achieved and recognized as
a certainty by those who attain thereto.

100

167 Liber AL, I:58.
168 Liber AL, I:26.
169 Liber AL, I:26.
170 Liber AL, I:23.
171 Eight Lectures on Yoga.
172 Eight Lectures on Yoga.

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One other doctrine relating to reason that appears in Crowley’s
writings but not explicitly in Liber AL is the idea of the circularity of
reason. Reason can only manipulate and work with articles of reason; this

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relates to what was said above because the problems in the sphere of
reason should not usurp the power of or dictate actions to the sphere of
Will. We have an example of this doctrine of the circularity of reason
when Crowley writes, “All proofs turn out on examination to be
definitions. All definitions are circular. (For a = bc, b = de … w = xy, and y
= za.)”173 In this sense, reason deals with relations between illusion. This is
certainly useful – science is a good example of this – but it doesn’t give us
any powerful facts of the way things truly are.

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In a deeper sense, reason works within the realms of duality while
the Will must remain one-pointed and therefore not mired in the relations
of reason. Crowley writes further, “All knowledge may be expressed in the
form S=P. But if so, the idea P is really implicit in S; thus we have learnt
nothing… S=P (unless identical, and therefore senseless) is an affirmation
of duality; or, we may say, intellectual perception is a denial of Samadhic
truth. It is therefore essentially false in the depths of its nature.”174 Reason
is understood as simply the relation of words which point to other words,
ad infinitum. Further, as mentioned above, because reason works with
relations between ideas (the relation between “S” and “P” above), it
affirms duality in the world. Two things can only be related in reason if
they are distinct and therefore separate.

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Again, all of these ideas about reason intertwine to give us a
general picture of Thelema’s approach to the place of knowledge and
reason. Essentially, the Will of the individual is beyond reason, or supra-rational, so one cannot ask “Why” of it or justify it with “Because.” The
individual must then constantly go forward and experience new and
various things, not depending on articles of faith. Reason is a human
faculty that allows us to manipulate & find the relations between finite facts
and ideas. Because of this it must work within its own sphere (i.e. deal with
problems of rationality like mathematics, science, et cetera) while leaving
the Will to act uninhibited. With this understanding, one can be guarded
against reason when it asks “whence camest thou? Whither wilt thou go?”
with the response “No whence! No whither! …Is there not joy ineffable in
this aimless winging? Is there not weariness and impatience for who would

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173 “The Antecedents of Thelema” available in The Revival of Magick.
174 Little Essays Toward Truth, “Knowledge.

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attain to some goal?”175

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ETHICS

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Since “There is no law beyond Do what thou wilt,”176 the only
“right” action is that which fulfills that Will and the only “wrong” action is
that which thwarts that Will: “The Word of Sin is Restriction.”177 Crowley
explains, “[This] is a general statement or definition of Sin or Error.
Anything soever that binds the will, hinders it, or diverts it, is Sin.” 178
Essentially, any form of morality that works in absolutes, saying any
quality is a priori “right” or “wrong” (or “evil”) is anathema to Thelema.
“To us, then, ‘evil’ is a relative term; it is ‘that which hinders one from
fulfilling his true Will.’”179

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The attitudes toward oneself and others are necessary outgrowths
of “Do what thou wilt.” Since “Thou hast no right but to do thy will,” 180
the value of self-discipline helps one do one’s Will with one-pointedness.
As Crowley explains, “What is true for every School is equally true for
every individual. Success in life, on the basis of the Law of Thelema,
implies severe self-discipline.”181 Further, since ”Every man and every
woman is a star”182 and each star has its own unique path, each “star” is
must pursue their own Will and avoid interference in the affairs of others.
In short, mind your own business. “It is necessary that we stop, once for
all, this ignorant meddling with other people’s business. Each individual
must be left free to follow his own path.”183 This consequently means there
is total moral freedom, including sexual freedom. “Also, take your fill and

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175 Liber LXV, II:21-22, 24.
176 Liber AL, III:60.
177 Liber AL, I:41.
178 New Comment to Liber AL, I:41.
179 New Comment to Liber AL, II:5.
180 Liber AL, I:42.
181 Magick Without Tears, chapter 8.
182 Liber AL, I:3.
183 New Comment to Liber AL, I:31.

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Aside from moving the locus of morality to the individual, making
the Will the measure of what is “right” and “wrong,” Thelema does
emphasize certain moral traits over others and views certain experiences
as “good.”

103

One course of action that Thelema encourages is towards the
attainment of Knowledge & Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel,
Union with God, the dissolution of the ego or any other metaphor used in
mysticism. Crowley explains, “A man must think of himself as a LOGOS,
as going, not as a fixed idea. ‘Do what thou wilt’ is thus necessarily his
formula. He only becomes Himself when he attains the loss of Egoity, of
the sense of separateness. He becomes All, PAN, when he becomes Zero
[see the ‘Ontology’ section of this essay].”186 Crowley puts it plainly when
he writes, “There are many ethical injunctions of a revolutionary character
in the Book, but they are all particular cases of the general precept to
realize one’s own absolute God-head and to act with the nobility which
springs from that knowledge.”187 These attainments are understood to be
available to anyone and to help one understand the world, oneself, and
one’s will more completely.

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Another common moral theme in Thelema is strength over
weakness.
“Beauty and strength, leaping laughter and delicious languor, force
and fire, are of us.”
188

103

184 Liber AL, I:51.
185 Liber Aleph, chapter 38.
186 “The Antecedents of Thelema” available in The Revival of Magick.
187 Confessions, chapter 49.
188 Liber AL, II:20.

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“My disciples are proud and beautiful; they are strong and swift;
they rule their way like mighty conquerors. The weak, the timid,
the imperfect, the cowardly, the poor, the tearful — these are mine
enemies, and I am come to destroy them.”
189

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Consequently, Thelema has a different view on “compassion”:
“This also is compassion: an end to the sickness of earth. A
rooting-out of the weeds: a watering of the flowers.”
190
“We have nothing with the outcast and the unfit: let them die in
their misery. For they feel not. Compassion is the vice of kings:
stamp down the wretched & the weak: this is the law of the strong:
this is our law and the joy of the world.”
191

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That is, “compassion” is not understood to be the support of the
weak but rather the opposite: the “rooting-out of the weeds” or the
destruction of the weak and the “watering of the flowers” or the promotion
of the strong. This is compassion because it is “an end to the sickness of
earth.”

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A different view of pity is also held in light of Thelema’s view that
“Every man and every woman is a star.”192 Crowley writes:
“Pity implies two very grave errors — errors which are utterly
incompatible with the views of the universe above briefly
indicated. The first error therein is an implicit assumption that
something is wrong with the Universe… The second error is still
greater since it involves the complex of the Ego. To pity another
person implies that you are superior to him, and you fail to
recognize his absolute right to exist as he is. You assert yourself
superior to him, a concept utterly opposed to the ethics of
Thelema — ‘Every man and every woman is a star’ and each

104

189 Liber Tzaddi, lines 24-25.
190 Liber Tzaddi, line 26.
191 Liber AL, II:21.
192 Liber AL, I:3

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being is a Sovereign Soul. A moment’s thought therefore will
suffice to show how completely absurd any such attitude is, in
reference to the underlying metaphysical facts.”
193
“The Book of the Law regards pity as despicable… to pity another
man is to insult him. He also is a star, ‘one, individual and eternal.‘
The Book does not condemn fighting — ‘If he be a King, thou
canst not hurt him.‘”
194

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This leads to another view, which is that Thelema embraces
conflict:
“Despise also all cowards; professional soldiers who dare not fight,
but play; all fools despise! But the keen and the proud, the royal
and the lofty; ye are brothers! As brothers fight ye!”
195

Note: fight for the sake of it?

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“Lo, while in The Book of the Law is much of Love, there is no
word of Sentimentality. Hate itself is almost like Love! ‘As brothers
fight ye!’ All the manly races of the world understand this. The
Love of Liber Legis is always bold, virile, even orgiastic. There is
delicacy, but it is the delicacy of strength.”
196

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Thelema also enjoins the individual to rejoice because of life. A
general theme of embracing and seeing the joy in all facets of life
permeates Thelema:
“Remember all ye that existence is pure joy; that all the sorrows
are but as shadows; they pass & are done; but there is that which
remains… They shall rejoice, our chosen: who sorroweth is not of
us… But ye, o my people, rise up & awake! Let the rituals be
rightly performed with joy & beauty! …a feast for life and a greater
feast for death! A feast every day in your hearts in the joy of my
rapture! A feast every night unto Nu, and the pleasure of uttermost

105

193 “The Method of Thelema” available in The Revival of Magick.
194 Confessions, chapter 49.
195 Liber AL, III:57-59.
196 Liber II.

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delight! Aye! feast! rejoice! there is no dread hereafter… Write, &
find ecstasy in writing! Work, & be our bed in working! Thrill with
the joy of life & death!”
197
“There is joy in the setting-out; there is joy in the journey; there is
joy in the goal.”
198

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This view of the world arises out of the metaphysical ideas [see the
’Cosmology’ section of this essay] that Thelema entertains:
“[Nuit] is the infinite in whom all we live and move and have our
being. [Hadit] is eternal energy, the Infinite Motion of Things, the
central core of all being. The manifested Universe comes from the
marriage of Nuit and Hadit; without this could no thing be. This
eternal, this perpetual marriage-feast is then the nature of things
themselves; and therefore everything that is, is a crystallization of
divine ecstasy.”
199

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In the end one must remember “There is no law beyond Do what
thou wilt.”200 All of these ideas are subservient to the central law of “Do
what thou wilt.” This is the beauty of the word Thelema, that it implies
such a succinct and sublime answer to the problems of morality while also
having complex and intricate implications.

106

197 Liber AL, II:9,19,34-35,41-44,66.
198 Liber Tzaddi, line 22.
199 Liber DCCCXXXVII: The Law of Liberty.
200 Liber AL, III:60.

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CHAPTER 9
THE WILL IN THELEMA

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At the very beginning of The Book of the Law, there is one of the

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most important statements in Thelema:
“Every man and every woman is a star.”
203

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By this is meant that “we are all free, all independent, all shining
gloriously, each one a radiant world”204 and further that “the Individual is
the Autarch.”205 In the same sense that the sun, as a star, is center of the
solar system in the physical macrocosm, every man and every woman is
understood to be a sort of microcosmic star and center of his or her own
system. “A star is an individual identity; it radiates energy, it goes, it is a
point of view. Its object is to become the whole by establishing relations
with other stars. Each such relation is an Event: it is an act of Love under
Will”206 – Each individual is “an aggregate of such experiences, constantly
changing with each fresh event, which affects him or her either consciously
or subconsciously.”207

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Certainly, from a psychological standpoint, it can be easily
understood that we are all centers of our own universe208 and also
“aggregates of experience” as our own memories show. Further, stars are
self-luminous implying that we derive power and strength from within
ourselves and not an outside source, and also stars are constantly in
motion interacting with the gravitational pulls of the infinite other stars and
systems.

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Thelema posits that Hadit is “the flame that burns in every heart of
man, and in the core of every star.”209 Crowley writes, “He is then your
own inmost divine self; it is you, and not another, who are lost in the
constant rapture of the embraces of Infinite Beauty.”210 In fact, Nuit tells us

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203 Liber AL, I:3.
204 Liber DCCCXXXVII: The Law of Liberty.
205 Magick Without Tears, chapter 48.
206 “The Antecedents of Thelema” available in The Revival of Magick.
207 Introduction to Liber AL.
208 This also attests to the universal import of mandala-like art pieces across cultures, for
they are all expressions of that central point of consciousness and the apparent
unfolding and expression of the psyche & universe around it. This was a subject of
study for Carl Jung.
209 Liber AL, II:6.
210 Liber DCCCXXXVII: The Law of Liberty.

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“Be thou Hadit, my secret centre, my heart & my tongue!”211 showing that
we are intimately interconnected with divinity, mirroring the general
Eastern sentiment of the soul’s link to God and the sentiment seen in the
West in mystics like Meister Eckhart and Miguel de Molinos:
“Thou art to know, that thy Soul is the Center, Habitation, and the
Kingdom of God.”
212

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In a word, by saying “every man and every woman is a star,” we
assert both the individual’s sovereignty and their divinity. Just as physical
stars each have their unique course in the span of space, each individual is
understood to have their own unique Will. In fact, “Thelema” itself means
“Will” and this is the foundation of the entire philosophy of Thelema. It is
said:
“Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.”
213
“There is no law beyond Do what thou wilt.”
214

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These two statements clearly establish that everything in Thelema
revolves around the dictum of “Do what thou wilt.” As Crowley often
noted, this does not mean, “do what you like” but is a command to
perform one’s “true” or “pure will” and nothing else. Liber AL proclaims,
“Thou hast no right but to do thy will. Do that, and no other shall say
nay.”215

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Now we can see the general point-of-view of existence formulated
in Thelema: each individual is considered as a “star” whose sole right or
duty is to perform their Will. In the core of this star is Hadit and about the
star are the infinite space & possibilities of Nuit. We have established that
each individual is at the center of his or her own universe, a “secret centre,
heart, & tongue” of the divine, each performing their unique Will amidst
Nuit, Infinite Space.

110

Since the Will is considered absolutely paramount in Thelema, we

110

211 Liber AL, I:6.
212 The Spiritual Guide of Miguel de Molinos.
213 Liber AL, I:40.
214 Liber AL, III:60.
215 Liber AL, I:42.

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must understand how a Thelemite is supposed to “Will” things. Liber AL
asserts something distinguished as “pure will” and explains its conditions:
“For pure will, unassuaged of purpose, delivered from the lust of
result, is every way perfect.”
216
Therefore, for will to be considered “pure” and “every way
perfect” by the conditions set forth in Liber AL, it must be:

“unassuaged of purpose” and
“delivered from the lust of result”

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The first consideration, “unassuaged of purpose,” has two
meanings to be considered. The first is the more obvious, which is that
will is impeded or weakened by “purpose” and it is meant to go on its way
unrestricted by these notions of “purpose.” The mind and reason are
generally an obstacle to the full expression of a person’s Will in many
ways and this idea is treated in a later section more fully. The next
consideration is simply that it means “with purpose unassuaged” or “with
tireless energy.”217

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Secondly, to be “delivered from the lust of result” means to be
unaffected by or unattached to the results of one’s actions. This doctrine is
a central tenet to the Eastern system of karma yoga where it is generally
called “non-attachment to the fruits of action.” It might also be said that it
is known to the West under the aphorism of “Art for art’s sake.” The
Bhagavad Gita succinctly describes this doctrine of being “delivered from
the lust of result” when it says,
“Those whose consciousness is unified abandon all attachment to
the results of action and attain supreme peace. But those whose
desires are fragmented, who are selfishly attached to the results of
their work, are bound in everything they do. Those who renounce
attachment in all their deeds live content in the ‘city of nine gates,‘
the body, as its master.”
218

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216 Liber AL, I:44.
217 Liber II: The Message of the Master Therion.
218 Bhagavad Gita, chapter 5.

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Essentially, this line from Liber AL vel Legis means that to perform
our “pure will” which “is every way perfect,” we must do our will with
tireless energy, without regard to purpose, and without concern for results.
Crowley wrote:
“Thou must (1) Find out what is thy Will. (2) Do that Will with
(a) one-pointedness, (b) detachment, (c) peace. Then, and then
only, art thou in harmony with the Movement of Things, thy will
part of, and therefore equal to, the Will of God. And since the will
is but the dynamic aspect of the self, and since two different selves
could not possess identical wills; then, if thy will be God’s will,
Thou art That.”
219

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In Liber AL, Nuit declares, “Invoke me under my stars! Love is the
law, love under will.”220 Crowley explains that this means “while Will is the
Law, the nature of that Will is Love. But this Love is as it were a by-product of that Will; it does not contradict or supersede that Will; and if
apparent contradiction should arise in any crisis, it is the Will that will
guide us aright.”221 Therefore the method or modus operandi of Thelema
is “love under will,” which means the assimilation of experience in
accordance with one’s Will.222

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It must be recognized that “Love” in the context of Thelema and
Liber AL is understood in a very universal way. It is not what most would
consider the emotion of love or kindheartedness. Crowley writes, “Lo,
while in The Book of the Law is much of Love, there is no word of
Sentimentality. Hate itself is almost like Love!”223 for even hate is an
experience worthy of our assimilation and integration. Instead, it

112

219 Liber II.
220 Liber AL, I:57.
221 Liber II.
222 This harkens back to the Christian mystic Meister Eckhart who wrote, “The place
where love has its being is only in the will; the person who has more will, also has
more love. But no one knows about anyone else, whether one has more of it; that lies
hidden in the soul, so long as God lies hidden in the soul’s ground. This love lies
wholly in the will; whoever has more will, also has more love.” –excerpted from
Counsels on Discernment (Counsel 10).
223 Liber II.

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essentially refers to all acts whatsoever, any “Change in conformity with
Will,” for all actions are lawful and necessary. Crowley explains “Every
event is a uniting of some one monad with one of the experiences possible
to it,”224 and further that “Each action or motion is an act of love, the
uniting with one or another part of ‘Nuit’; each such act must be ‘under
will’, chosen so as to fulfill and not to thwart the true nature of the being
concerned.”225

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Therefore, while “love” may refer specifically to acts of “union” (in
the sense that sex is union on the physical plane, and samadhi
226 is union
on the mental plane), all experiences are understood as acts of “love” in
the more universal sense that “every event is a uniting of some one monad
with one of the experiences possible to it,” including acts of what may be
perceived to be acts of “division.”

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Now we can understand that “There is no law beyond Do what
thou wilt,”227 and “love under will” is essentially the assimilation of
experience in accordance with the nature of the individual. The
conception mirrors Carl Roger’s228 propositions which are the assertions
underlying his system of “client-centered therapy.” He writes as his sixth
proposition,
“The organism has one basic tendency and striving – to actualize,
maintain and enhance the experiencing organism.”
229

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These acts of actualizing, maintaining, and enhancing the
experiencing organism are what Thelema terms acts of “love.” The one

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224 Introduction to Liber AL.
225 Introduction to Liber AL.
226 “Samadhi” is the Hindu term used in the practice of yoga for the psychological
phenomenon of the disappearance (or “union” or “cessation”) of subject and object
known in various forms under different names in various cultures. This subject is too
extensive to go into depth in this essay.
227 Liber AL, III:60.
228 Carl Rogers (1902-1987) was one of the founders of the “humanistic” approach to
psychology, he was one of the founders of psychotherapy research, he was the
founder of the person-centered approach to therapy, and he was awarded by the
American Psychological Association (of which he was the 55th president in 1947) with
the Award for Distinguished Scientific Contributions in 1952 and the Award for
Distinguished Professional Contributions to Psychology in 1972.
229 Client-Centred Therapy, chapter 11.

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condition that is important from the standpoint of Liber AL is that acts of
“love” must be done “under will,” or in accordance with the nature of the
particular circumstance and the individual (or the “organism” if we are to
use Rogerian terminology). An act of “love under will” performed
properly is what Carl Rogers would term “psychological adjustment” as
opposed to “psychological maladjustment.” Rogers writes as his fourteenth
and fifteenth propositions:
“Psychological adjustment exists when the concept of the self is
such that all the sensory and visceral experiences of the organism
are, or may be, assimilated on a symbolic level into a consistent
relationship with the concept of self.
Psychological maladjustment exists when the organism denies
awareness of significant sensory and visceral experiences, which
consequently are not symbolized and organized into the gestalt of
the self structure. When this situation exists, there is a basic or
potential psychological tension.”
230

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“Psychological adjustment” consists in proper “assimilation” of
experiences being equivalent to the “love under will” method of Thelema,
whereas “psychological maladjustment” consists of the improper
“assimilation” of experience, which creates “psychological tension.”
Essentially, we can see that Thelema coincides with, and in a certain
fashion anticipated, the Rogerian “propositions” that form the basis of his
“client-centered therapy.”
“All love is expansion, all selfisihness is contraction. Love is
therefore the only law of life. He who loves lives, he who is selfish
is dying. Therefore love for love’s sake, because it is law of life, just
as you breathe to live.” –Swami Vivekananda

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The Will: Absolute & Relative

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There are two “planes” that one must consider the Will on for it to
be understood completely. The first plane will be labeled the

114

230 Client-Centred Therapy, chapter 11.

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“theoretical/absolute” and the second will be labeled “practical/relative.”
As Aleister Crowley warns in many places, we are not to “confuse the
planes” – that is, we must keep the considerations of each plane within its
own sphere and not let the judgments that pertain to one be confused as
pertaining to the other.

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On the theoretical/absolute plane, everyone and everything is
already doing its “true” or “pure” Will.
“Know firmly, o my son, that the true Will cannot err; for this is
thine appointed course in Heaven, in whose order is
Perfection.”
231
“There are much deeper considerations in which it appears that
’Everything that is, is right’…”
232
“The uninitiate is a ‘Dark Star’, and the Great Work for him is to
make his veils transparent by ‘purifying’ them. This ‘purification’ is
really ‘simplification’; it is not that the veil is dirty, but that the
complexity of its folds makes it opaque. The Great Work therefore
consists principally in the solution of complexes. Everything in
itself is perfect, but when things are muddled, they become
’evil’.”
233
“…Each of us stars is to move on our true orbit, as marked out by
the nature of our position, the law of our growth, the impulse of
our past experiences. All events are equally lawful – and every one
necessary, in the long run – for all of us, in theory; but in practise,
only one act is lawful for each one of us at any given moment.
Therefore Duty consists in determining to experience the right
event from one moment of consciousness to another.”
234

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This last quotation touches on the pertinent issue of this short
essay: “All events are equally lawful – and every one necessary, in the long

115

231 Liber Aleph, chapter 10.
232 Magick in Theory & Practice, chapter 1.
233 New Comment to Liber AL, I:8.
234 Introduction to Liber AL.

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run – for all of us, in theory.” This is the Will perceived from the
theoretical/absolute plane – Crowley himself uses the terminology of “in
theory” to describe this aspect. In an “absolute” sense, or from an
“absolute” perspective, “all events are equally lawful – and every one
necessary.”

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He then writes, “but in practise, only one act is lawful for each one
of us at any given moment… Duty consists in determining to experience
the right event from one moment of consciousness to another.” This is the
Will perceived from the practical/relative plane. In a relative sense, there is
discrimination needed.

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The first and most common “confusion of the planes” occurs when
one perceives the truth of the theoretical/absolute plane of Will. In this
sense, all events are lawful and necessary and there is no “wrong” or
“evil.” This means in the world that no actions are to be restricted
whatsoever because all things “work out in the end,” you might say. This
will literally be the death of you if one decides to adopt the
theoretical/absolute perspective as a practical/relative philosophy.
Although the Will is “perfect” and “necessary” on the theoretical/absolute
plane, there is a “Duty” that is the practical necessity of determining the
action that is “right.”

116

The theoretical/absolute plane of Will is virtually useless on a
practical level, although knowledge of the fact that Will cannot truly ever
err may give rise to a certain confidence, detachment, and carefree
attitude. It is on the practical/relative plane of existence that we normally
function on, therefore a practical/relative understanding of Will is needed.

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In Thelema, the practical/relative application of this is stated as,
“Love is the law, love under will.”235 Love is the modus operandi of the
Thelemite, and it must be “under will”:
“Each action or motion is an act of love, the uniting with one or
another part of ‘Nuit’; each such act must be ‘under will,’ chosen so
as to fulfill and not to thwart the true nature of the being
concerned.”
236

116

Therefore, the “Will” of Thelema must be considered as

116

235 Liber AL, I:57.
236 Introduction to Liber AL.

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simultaneously operating on two planes: the theoretical/absolute and the
practical/relative. On the plane of the theoretical/absolute, all events are
perfect, pure, & necessary; on the plane of the practical/relative, the
Thelemite operates under the formula of “love under will,” assimilating
experience in accordance with their unique nature.

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The Will: Finite & Infinite

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The central goal of Thelema is the discovery and accomplishment
of one’s Will. It can be said that there are two aspects of the Will which
must be discovered: the finite will and the infinite will, and both are
necessary.

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Aleister Crowley writes in De Lege Libellum:
“The great bond of all bonds is ignorance. How shall a man be
free to act if he know not his own purpose? You must therefore
first of all discover which star of all the stars you are, your relation
to the other stars about you, and your relation to, and identity
with, the Whole. In our Holy Books are given sundry means of
making this discovery, and each must make it for himself, attaining
absolute conviction by direct experience, not merely reasoning
and calculating what is probable. And to each will come the
knowledge of his finite will, whereby one is a poet, one prophet,
one worker in steel, another in jade. But also to each be the
knowledge of his infinite Will, his destiny to perform the Great
Work, the realization of his True Self.”

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The infinite will is therefore tied up with the Great Work, in going
beyond the body (Nephesh) and mind (Ruach) to reach the Secret Self in
the Supernal Triangle (Neshamah-Chiah-Yechidah). It is entirely removed
from one’s earthly position, proclivities, and ambitions and the perception
of this Truth is open to all people. It is the goal of Yoga – complete
dissolution in the Infinite, in the Beloved – and it is also the end of all true
Magick, being directed towards Knowledge & Conversation of the Holy
Guardian Angel and eventually the dissolution of the self in crossing the
Abyss.

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Whereas the infinite will unites us with that identity which one in
essence and diverse in expression in each star, the finite will defines us as

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a particular star in relation with other stars and the entire expanse of
Space. Crowley writes in Liber ThIShARB, a book dedicated to the
practice of magical memory: “This book is not intended to lead to the
supreme attainment. On the contrary, its results define the separate being
of the Exempt Adept from the rest of the Universe, and discover his
relation to that Universe.” The finite will therefore refers to the karma of
the particular individual – their specific point in space & time – where
each person has their own different, unique will to follow out. This is the
aspect of oneself where one discovers if poet, prophet, steel worker, or
anything else, so to speak.

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To find our will completely we must then both perform the Great
Work of coming to know our True Selves beyond all manifestation along
with understanding our particular star’s manifestation. To become truly
One, we must become both None and Two.

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The Will: Positive & Negative aspects

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One of the most common misconceptions of Thelema is that “Do
what thou wilt” is interpreted or promoted as “Do whatever you want.”
Why is “Do what thou wilt” different from “Do what you want?” Is it also
similar in some respects? To understand more clearly, we may examine
the “positive” and “negative” aspects of Thelema/Will insofar as positive
means affirming and negative means denying.

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The negative aspect of “Do what thou wilt”

118

The negative aspect of “Do what thou wilt” and Thelema/Will in
general refers to those tenets and suggestions which we may answer with a
“No” or negatively.

118

The foremost idea that Thelema says “No” to is the idea of an
absolute, binding morality and any kind of moral pronouncement. In this
sense, “Do what thou wilt” is nearly identical to “Do what you want”
because both deny that pronouncements of “You should/ought to do this
or that” are irrelevant to our concerns. This is explained succinctly by
Crowley when he writes:
“The formula of this law is: Do what thou wilt. Its moral aspect is
simple enough in theory. Do what thou wilt does not mean Do as
you please, although it implies this degree of emancipation, that it

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is no longer possible to say a priori that a given action is ‘wrong.‘
Each man has the right – and an absolute right – to accomplish his
True Will.”
237

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Here Crowley asserts that “Do what thou wilt” “implies [the same]
degree of emancipation” as “Do as you please” insofar as “it is no longer
possible to say a priori that a given action is ‘wrong.‘” This is the crux of
the “negative aspect” of Thelema/Will – that one cannot argue against a
certain action as bad, evil, not useful, unholy, et cetera. Crowley also
writes:
“There are no ‘standards of Right.’ Ethics is balderdash. Each Star
must go on its orbit. To hell with ‘moral Principle;’ there is no such
thing; that is a herd-delusion, and makes men cattle.”
238

119

Again, each individual must have their own unique standards of
what is right and wrong for them. The fact that there are no objective,
external standards firmly allows us to do whatever we Will.

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The positive aspect of “Do what thou wilt”

119

Insofar as morality and dogma are burdens upon the free exercise
of one’s unique and individual Will, they are restrictions, and “the word of
Sin is Restriction.”239 To this we may add the “dogs of Reason” with its
questions of “Why” and “Because” for the Will is supra-rational and not to
be limited by it. Again, the pressing question once one has discarded the
fetters of restriction in their many forms is “What is my Will?” This comes
to the aspect of Will to which we may say “Yes”…

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The most succinct command in this “positive aspect” is that ancient
aphorism and command to “Know Thyself.” This is where “Do what thou
wilt” splits apart from and is superior to the simple notion of “Do what you
want” or “Do as you please.” Most people do not even know what they

119

237 “The Method of Thelema” available in The Revival of Magick.
238 New Comment to Liber AL, II:28.
239 Liber AL, I:41.

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really want – what they really Will – and this requires an intense,
continuing process of exploration and introspection. Traditionally, this is
done by the methods of Magick and Yoga in Thelema. This allows us to
not only control our body and mind but also explore the hidden regions
and expand the understanding of ourselves to the uttermost. Crowley
writes:
“The value of any being is determined by the quantity and quality
of those parts of the universe which it has discovered, and which
therefore compose its sphere of experience. It grows by extending
this experience, by enlarging, as it were, this sphere.”
240
Therefore we must use Magick, Yoga, and whatever methods we
Will to explore ourselves and therefore manifest our Wills more fully,
freely, purely, and perfectly.

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With these considerations of both the negative & positive aspects of
Thelema/Will, we may better understand the proclamation of the Master
Therion when he says:
“From [this], it should be clear that ‘Do what thou wilt’ does not
mean ‘Do what you like.’ It is the apotheosis of Freedom; but it is
also the strictest possible bond. Do what thou wilt – then do
nothing else. Let nothing deflect thee from that austere and holy
task. Liberty is absolute to do thy will; but seek to do any other
thing whatever, and instantly obstacles must arise. Every act that is
not in definite course of that one orbit is erratic, an hindrance. Will
must not be two, but one.”
241

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The Will: The Will is Supra-Rational

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“Our own Silent Self, helpless and witless, hidden within us, will
spring forth, if we have craft to loose him to the Light, spring lustily
forward with his cry of Battle, the Word of our True Wills.”
242

120

240 “On Thelema” available in The Revival of Magick.
241 Liber II.
242 New Comment on AL, I:7.

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The first question one might ask when embarking upon the quest
to understand the philosophy of Thelema is “What is my Will?” or “How
do I know what my Will is?” The answer to this questions might initially
be presumed to be answerable in the form of a sentence such as “my Will
is to be a doctor” or “my Will is to eat this sandwich,” but this is not so,
for this is to restrict the Will to the trappings of language and reason. The
Will is the innermost Motion of one’s being, an individual expression of
the Eternal Energy of the cosmos.
“The Way that can be named is not the Eternal Way.”
243

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To confine the Will to logical expression is to inherently assert a
limit. Further, it assumes that one must have a logical reason for acting
such-and-such way, but to do so would make one “fall down into the pit
called Because” to “perish with the dogs of Reason.” 244 As Crowley
remarked, “It is ridiculous to ask a dog why it barks,”245 for this is simply
an expression of its nature, not determined by any kind of rational
process.
“One must fulfil one’s true Nature, one must do one’s Will. To
question this is to destroy confidence, and so to create an
inhibition… There is no ‘reason’ why a Star should continue in its
orbit. Let her rip! Every time the conscious acts, it interferes with
the Subconscious, which is Hadit. It is the voice of Man, and not of
a God. Any man who ‘listens to reason’ ceases to be a
revolutionary.”
246

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Again, to express one’s Will in terms of reason is to assert a limit.
This is because of the inherently dualistic nature of not only logic & reason
but language & thought themselves. To do this would be to drive a cleft
into one’s being, fracturing it into multiplicity.

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243 Tao Teh Ching, chapter 1.
244 Liber AL, II:27.
245 New Comment to Liber AL, II:31.
246 New Comment to Liber AL, II:30-31.

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“Thoughts are false.” 247
To experience and manifest one’s pure Will, one must not act out
of notions of purpose nor out of desire for some pre-formed result or
outcome.248 Both of these things are manifestations of the dualistic mind
and restrict one unnecessarily to the trappings of logic. The Will can only
be the genuine and spontaneous manifestation of one’s inmost nature, the
united whole of one’s being.

Note: this is why I hate majors. They force me to pick some kind of pursuit that I’ll have to limit myself to for years-not just months-to come. With majors I cannot be who I am in the moment and allow my curiosity to direct me without expectation of where it will take me

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Since “the word of Sin is Restriction,”249 the Will is certainly not
deduced from the workings of the mind which, by its very nature, asserts
division & separation and therefore restriction. When we clear away the
morass of morality and the over-contemplated categories of metaphysics,
the Will may more easily spring forward uninhibited.
“In logic there is a trace of effort and pain; logic is self-conscious.
So is ethics, which is the application of logic to the facts of life…
Life is an art, and like perfect art it should be self-forgetting; there
ought not to be any trace of effort or painful feeling. Life… ought
to be lived as a bird flies through the air or as a fish swims in the
water. As soon as there are signs of elaboration, a man is doomed,
he is no more a free being. You are not living as you ought to live,
you are suffering under the tyranny of circumstances; you are
feeling a contract of some sort, and you lose your independence…
Not to be bound by rules, but to be creating one’s own rules…”
250

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And this last point is important because Thelema is not illogical in
that it wishes reason to be entirely abolished, but rather it wishes that it be
put in its rightful place, under the governance of the Will. The mind is a
harsh master and a good mistress, for once one realizes that one’s Will is
not amenable to the dualisms of thought, once freed from one’s earlier
bonds of logic, one may again employ reason to one’s benefit in those
circumstances that call for it.

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247 The Book of Lies, chapter 5.
248 A reference to Liber AL, I:44, “For pure will, unassuaged of purpose, delivered from
the lust of result, is every way perfect.”
249 Liber AL, I:41.
250 Suzuki, D.T. Intro to Zen Buddhism.

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“It is not the object… to look illogical for its own sake, but to make
people know that logical consistency is not final, and that there is a
certain transcendental statement that cannot be attained by mere
intellectual cleverness… When we say ‘yes,’ we assert, and by
asserting we limit ourselves. When we say ‘no,’ we deny, and to
deny is exclusion. Exclusion and limitation, which after all are the
same thing, murder the soul; for is it not the life of the soul that
lives in perfect freedom and in perfect unity? There is no freedom
or unity… in exclusion or in limitation.”
251

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Here – outside logical dualisms, outside notions of ethics, purpose,
and metaphysics – the Will can be known. This knowledge is not that of
the mind which asserts duality – a knower and a thing known – but the
experiential knowledge, the gnosis, of immersion in the flow of the world.
Here the Eternal Will runs through oneself, is oneself, for “…mind, never
at ease, creaketh “I”. This I persisteth not, posteth not through generations,
changeth momently, finally is dead. Therefore is man only himself when
lost to himself in The Charioting.”252 Therefore, one “knows” one’s Will in
doing one’s Will. The Will that is not restricted by mental formulations
springs freely from one’s innermost Self, crowned & conquering.
“Life is fact and no explanation is necessary or pertinent. To
explain is to apologize, and why should we apologize for living?
To live – is that not enough? Let us then live!”
253

123

251 Suzuki, D.T. Intro to Zen Buddhism.
252 The Book of Lies, chapter 8.
253 Suzuki, D.T. Intro to Zen Buddhism.

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The Will: Thought Experiments

123

Here are a couple of thought-experiments to ponder the intricacies
of what many people take to be simple on the face of things… There is no
“right” answer to any of these but are meant to bring some subtle
complications to light

123

Addiction:
a) Suppose that someone is addicted to a substance or some

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behavior. Does this mean that they are a priori NOT doing their
Will?
b) If you answer yes: Suppose that this person conquers their
addiction and therefore learns more about themselves - they learn
about their limitations and the extent of their willpower. Now are
they doing their Will?
c) Is the person doing their Will “better” or “more completely”
because of this ordeal? If yes, then wouldn’t this imply that going
through addiction is beneficial to the development of Will?

Note: a fool who persists in his folly will become wise

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The problem of other Wills:
a) Suppose that person A does not enjoy what person B is doing.
Does person A have a right to say that person B is not doing their
Will?
b) Suppose that person A feels he is being infringed upon by what
person B is doing, but person B feels she is doing their Will. Does
person A have a right to say that person B is not doing their Will?
c) Suppose person A thinks person B is being irrational. Does
person A have a right to say that person B is not doing their Will?
Can person B point to the doctrines of Reason, Why, and Because
being hindrances to assert her their position?
d) Is there any circumstance where person A can be sure about
their right to tell person B that they are not doing their Will?
e) Is there any circumstance where person B can prove to person
A that they are doing their Will?

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Lust of result:
a) Suppose Person A wants circumstance X to come about (for
example, getting an A on a test, retrieving groceries, getting a
paycheck, wooing some person, et cetera). Does this mean this
person A suffers from “lust of result”? If so, should all desires for
anything be destroyed?
b) Suppose Person A does not achieve circumstance X. Is Person
A’s lamentation of this fact “lust of result”? Conversely: Suppose
Person A does achieve circumstance X. Is Person A’s celebration
of this fact “lust of result”?

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Pure will & duality:
a) Suppose Person A has not attained to a Trance of Non-Duality/Unity. Is Person A a priori not doing their Will? Not doing
their Will to the full extent? Are there different extents of doing
one’s Will or is it simply Doing your Will & Not doing your Will?
b) Suppose Person A has attained to a Trance of Non-Duality/Unity but has “come down” from it - back to duality. Is
Person A not doing their Will while in duality? Does the Trance of
Non-Duality/Unity help this person to do their Will “better” or
“more completely”?
c) Suppose Person A enjoys a constant Trance of Non-Duality/Unity. Is this person necessarily doing their Will?

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Killing others:
a) Suppose Person A kills Person B. Was Person A a priori not
doing their Will?
b) Suppose Person A kills Person B out of self-defense. Was Person
A not doing their Will?
c) Suppose Person A kills Person B because Person B is infringing
on their rights (a la Liber OZ). Was Person A not doing their Will?
Was Person B a priori not doing their Will even if they think they
are doing their Will?
d) Suppose Person A kills Person B because they believe Person B
is infringing on their rights. Was Person A not doing their Will?
e) Suppose Person A kills Person B in a fit of ecstasy. Was Person
A not doing their Will? Can Person A appeal to the ideas of
Reason, Because, Why, et cetera, being hindrances in justifying this
act?
f) Suppose Person A decides to have an abortion. Was Person A
not doing their Will? Suppose Person A knows that they do not
have the means to support their baby. Was Person A not doing
their Will in having an abortion?

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A priori Will:
a) Is it possible to say a priori that anyone else is not doing their
Will in any circumstance? What circumstances?

139

CHAPTER 11
THE RADICAL RE-ORIENTATION
OF TRUE WILL

139

Wanting versus Willing

139

To Will and to want. These are not simply two ideas. To Will and
to want are two fundamental ways of existing in the world. Our Law as
Thelemites is “Do what thou wilt”; it is our sole duty and right to find and
do this Will.
Aleister Crowley often distinguished Will – often called True Will
– from want. For example, he wrote that the purpose of each individual is:
“…the discovery of his True Will (as opposed to his conscious
ideals or wishes) by each individual.”
278
“It should be clear that ‘Do what thou wilt’ does not mean ‘Do
what you like.’ It is the apotheosis of Freedom; but it is also the
strictest possible bond.”
279
“Do what thou wilt does not mean Do as you please, although it
implies this degree of emancipation, that it is no longer possible to
say a priori that a given action is ‘wrong.’ Each man has the right—

139

278 The Constitution of the Order of Thelemites.
279 Liber II.

140

and an absolute right—to accomplish his True Will.”
280
“It will be seen that the formula – ‘Do what thou wilt shall be the
whole of the Law’ has nothing to do with ‘Do as you please.’ It is
much more difficult to comply with the Law of Thelema than to
follow out slavishly a set of dead regulations.”
281

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To Will and to want are two modes of existence. They are
paralleled in the contrast between “to Be” and “to have.”282 In ordinary
life, we are dominated by the mode of wanting or having at the expense of
losing touch with Will or Being.

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Wanting/Having

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This ordinary mode of existence, wanting and having, can be
likened to a horizontal line: we are always trying to achieve our desires, to
have more things. This is everyone’s natural, “un-initiated” state of
constant striving after possessing more and more. Society bombards us
from all directions with the message that fulfillment is found through
possessing more. Our wants are endless – there is always more to amass.
We see this most evidently in the frenzy over the accumulation of wealth
and material objects; we want the latest gadgets, the fastest cars, and the
fanciest clothes. It can also be seen in wanting social status or authority, so
we seek to have labels and titles that reflect our authority… “I am a CEO,”
“I have a PhD,” “I am a 7th degree,” or “I am a High Priest.” The attitude
of wanting extends into relationships: the more friends on Facebook, the
better! Our possessiveness shows itself in our intimate relationships – it is
even embedded in the language we use such as, “I have a boyfriend” or “I
have a wife.” Wanting/having can be seen more subtly in the accumulation
of knowledge. We want to have wisdom, so we accumulate facts – the
person who can list the most correspondences of the Tree of Life is surely
the wisest! Even our spirituality is not protected from this nefarious mode
of existence. We amass (and occasionally read) shelves of books that
could easily crush us under their combined weights, we strive to get the
most ornate and beautiful ritual implements for our temples, we

140

280 “The Method of Thelema” available in The Revival of Magick.
281 Eight Lectures on Yoga.
282 See Erich Fromm’s To Have or to Be?

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accumulate a giant encyclopedia of knowledge of rituals and spiritual
dogmas… we even speak of the goal of religion as a possession! They are
the ultimate “wants”: We seek to obtain the Holy Grail or to find the
Philosopher’s Stone, and we say that we “have” a True Will. Our
absorption in this horizontal dimension of existence knows no bounds in
terms of the unfathomable plethora of “wants.”

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The modern age of technology has provided us the means to get
more and more of what we want – friends through social networking sites,
information through search engines, and all the food we could ever want
at a supermarket (et cetera, ad infinitum). In spite of this, a fundamental
characteristic of our modern era is widespread dissatisfaction and
disenchantment. We have houses with heating and plumbing that kings
could only wish for in past epochs, yet we are not content. We have 500
friends on Facebook, yet we are lonely. We sail through the air in metal
contraptions at unfathomable speeds, yet we are impatient. When we get
down to it, what do we all hope to gain from this relentless pursuit of
wants and accumulation of possessions? It stems from this deep,
underlying sense that there is something lacking in our lives despite all the
things we have. There is a hole and this hole is filled with stuff, whether
material objects or knowledge or whatever else. We are looking for a
sense of true fulfillment but the pursuit of our wants has left us no closer to
our goal. In fact, all of our striving towards “having” makes us more
dissatisfied: for everything we have, we also gain a fear of losing it.

141

We have everything backwards: our very preoccupation with
wanting is the source of our lack. It is the source of our anxiety, our
loneliness, our emptiness, our meaninglessness, and our sense of
inauthenticity that we strove to extinguish by obtaining the objects of our
desires. We want to be truly and authentically alive, yet – paradoxically –
we have our hands so full with our “wants” and “haves” that we are left
completely empty-handed.

141

Willing/Being

141

In the face of this delirious engrossment in the mode of wanting, it
may seem that there is no other possible way of existing in the world. In
contrast to this horizontal mode of preoccupation with wants, there is the
vertical dimension of True Will, of Being. It is of note that the word
“being” in Greek is “to on,” giving us the word “ontology” (the study of

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being), and an ancient name of the sun was “On,” as is mentioned in the
Gnostic Mass.283 The effulgent glory of Solar light is an apt symbol of the
way of Being or True Will in contrast to the confused groping-in-the-darkness of the way of wanting.

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To find a sense of self that is not empty and inauthentic, we do not
need more desires and more possessions nor do we need more beliefs or
knowledge. We need a radical re-orientation of our way of being in the
world, one where we become who we are. This is what we of Thelema
call the True Will. It is also of note, at least to occultists and Masons, that
the word “reorient” means to get one’s bearings and etymologically means
“to face the East,” i.e. to re-orient. We reorient ourselves to the East, the
place of the rising Sun, which is a symbolic way of saying we reorient
ourselves towards the way of Being or of True Will, remembering our
starry nature, so to speak.

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This vertical mode of being shows us symbolically that we are not
simply striving towards more and more as in the horizontal mode of
wanting. Instead, we extend upwards towards a loftier expression of
ourselves and downwards towards a deeper understanding of ourselves. In
our Holy Books it is written, “My adepts stand upright; their head above
the heavens, their feet below the hells.”284 Instead of seeking after
abundance through wanting and having things, we seek abundance in
Being ourselves more fully, our True Selves. When we operate in this
vertical dimension of True Will, religion is not something we adopt or
“have,” our entire Being is religious. To be present in the vertical
dimension of True Will is to be authentically religious.

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The futility of Wanting

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The fatuousness of our attempts to gain satisfaction through the
pursuit of our conscious desires is illustrated by the Freudian model of the
psyche as an iceberg. Above the water there is the tip of the iceberg: our
sense of self or ego and our conscious desires. Beneath the water lies the
immensity of the rest of our psyches, the unconscious. In our engrossment
with our conscious wants, we let the mere tip of ourselves dictate our
direction. The majority of the self that lies underwater, the unconscious, is
left unheeded and unsatisfied. To reorient ourselves to Will instead of

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283 “…our Lord and Father the Sun that travelleth over the Heavens in his name ON.”
284 Liber Tzaddi, line 40.

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want, Being instead of having, is to seek to encompass and express the
totality of the self. It is to actualize the vast power and potential that lies
dormant and untapped as long as we remain on the horizontal dimension
of want and have. In fact, Crowley himself likened the Holy Guardian
Angel285 and the True Will286 to the unconscious. He wrote, “Good sense is
in reality common to all men: it is the property of the Unconscious whose
Omniscience matches its Omnipotence. The trouble is that in practically
every particular case the Intellect insists on interfering… Remember that
the Ego is not really the centre and crown of the individual; indeed the
whole trouble arises from its false claim to be so.”287

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It might be said that, psychologically, the mode of wanting or
having keeps us in a perpetual state of conflict between the ego/conscious
and the unconscious. The mode of Willing or Being involves a
harmonious alignment between conscious and unconscious. Crowley
writes, “A Man whose conscious will is at odds with his True Will is
wasting his strength. He cannot hope to influence his environment
efficiently. A Man who is doing his True Will has the inertia of the
Universe to assist him.”288

143

Crowley’s life as archetypal

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Aleister Crowley’s own life serves as an archetypal template of this
radical reorientation from a mode of wanting and having to that of Willing
and Being.

145

Crowley wanted to become a great poet, a great
diplomat, a great chess master… yet all of these things were found wanting,
so to speak. He turned his eyes away from the possession of these titles
and towards spiritual attainment, and the rest is history. In embarking
upon the vertical path, he was led to the discovery of his True Will.

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A parallel can be found in the life of Siddhartha Gautama who –
upon seeing an old man, a sick man, a dead man, and then a yogi –
renounced the possibility of being a king and having all the material
comforts of the world and turned his attention toward becoming
awakened. He found the answer to his gnawing dissatisfaction with the
suffering of the world in enlightenment, in the vertical dimension of
becoming who he really was, an awakened one, a Buddha. These two
particularly good examples because they were men – not transcendent
gods or demi-gods or mythical heroes – who represent the possibilities the
actualization of potential that is available to all of us as men and women.
William Blake described this attitude concisely when he wrote, “All deities
reside in the human breast,”289 and, as it says at the top of our declaration
of the rights of man, “There is no god but man.”290

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To summarize, there is a horizontal dimension of being of “want”
that is characterized by preoccupation with “having” or possessing,
whether material objects, knowledge, or other people. We strive to
assuage our anxiety about our sense of emptiness through pursuing our
“wants,” which ironically leaves us feeling more empty and inauthentic. To
transcend this condition, we do not need more “wants” or a new and
specific “want,” but instead we need a radical reorientation of our very
being towards the vertical dimension of “Will” (or True Will) that is
characterized by a focus on “Being” rather than having. The process of
shifting from want to Will, having to Being, horizontal to vertical, is shown
symbolically or archetypally in the life of Aleister Crowley, specifically his
experience of the “Vision of Sorrow.”

145

“It all depends on your own acceptance of this new law, and you
are not asked to believe anything, to accept a string of foolish
fables beneath the intellectual level of a Bushman and the moral

145

289 The Marriage of Heaven and Hell.
290 Liber OZ.

146

level of a drug-fiend. All you have to do is to be yourself, to do
your will, and to rejoice.”
291

146

291 Liber DCCCXXXVII: The Law of Liberty.

The Radical Re-Orientation of True Will.

Thelemic Values: A New View of Morality.

146

The Paradox of Human Existence:
Our Simultaneous Independence and Interdependence

146

It has already been stated that there are two fundamental modes
of existing in the world, (1) wanting, characterized by an attitude of
“having” and (2) Willing, characterized by an attitude of “Being.” Wanting
and having is inauthentic and the source and cause of perpetuation of
anxiety. Willing and Being is authentic and the source of fulfillment. By
“authentic” I mean that being in the mode of Willing is a state or process
that is true to the totality one’s self, the actualization of one’s full potential.
Conversely, “inauthentic” means we are limited in some way, as illustrated
in the iceberg metaphor of the psyche mentioned previously where the the
conscious ego is split from the unconscious potencies. To be inauthentic is
therefore to avoid or limit the actualization of the full range of one’s
possibilities; as it is written, “The word of Sin is Restriction.”292

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These are two modes of existing in the world, but I want to turn
our attention to the nature of our existence in the world. It is here that we
encounter the paradox of human existence: we are always alone in the
world and we are always with others in the world. There is a both an
“Alone-ness” and “With-ness” that simultaneously characterize our
existence in the world.

146

Crowley speaks to the paradoxicality

147

and inseparability of our simultaneous Independence and
Interdependence when he writes, “It is not true to say either that we are
separate Stars, or One Star. Each Star is individual, yet each is bound to
the others by Law.”293

146

292 Liber AL, I:41.

147

293 New Comment to Liber AL, I:52.

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This dualistic unity is paralleled in the first two chapters of The
Book of the Law and, by extension, in the symbols of Hadit and Nuit.
Hadit characterizes the quintessence of Alone-ness and even states “I am
alone.”294 Nuit characterizes the quintessence of With-ness. She discloses
that we are all stars in “the company of heaven”295 and counsels us to
“Bind nothing! Let there be no difference made among you between any
one thing & any other thing; for thereby there cometh hurt.”296 The
ultimate unity between Alone-ness and With-ness is paralleled by the
identification of Nuit with Hadit.297

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The Independence / Interdependence duality can also be seen
reflected in the two primary statements of our Law. “Do what thou wilt
shall be the whole of the Law” is a statement of Alone-ness or
Independence, i.e. that we each have an individual Will that is unique
from all others. “Love is the law, love under will” is a statement of With-ness or Interdependence, i.e. that in every thought, word, and act we
establish some kind of relation or union with the world. The ultimate unity
between Alone-ness and With-ness is also paralleled by the identification
of Will and Love.298

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CHAPTER 12
THELEMIC VALUES:
A NEW VIEW OF MORALITY

166

Ye Olde Morality

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Old morality consists essentially in the belief that there is
an absolute law of conduct, often rewarded with promises of heaven or
some kind of pleasure and punished with verdicts of various types of
suffering, even eternal suffering in a fiery “Hell.”

166

insistence on sin and the
punishment of hell following sinful actions.

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Now, this old morality being by definition founded on a notion of
“absolute moral conduct,” is also necessarily quite inflexible. Not only did

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Moses invoke God as the source and authority of his commandments, but
they were set in two gigantic tablets of stone.

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In the course of history, one might say that these commandments,
Jewish and otherwise, were necessary for that particular time. It can be
agreed that many of these guidelines were (and still can be) effective if
employed in the right circumstances, in the right cultures. For example,
“keeping kosher,” a practice in Judaism, might be a highly effective way of
being healthy in a certain part of a world, in a certain time-period. The
fact is that these old moralities, as discussed above, emphasize the
absoluteness of their rules and are therefore inflexible in their adaptation
to individual circumstances. Nietzsche described this old morality, cognate
with the Freudian “superego,” as “the great dragon” that plagues each
person in their development:
“What is the great dragon which the spirit is no longer inclined to
call Lord and God? ‘Thou-shalt,’ is the great dragon called. But the
spirit of the lion saith, ‘I will.'
'Thou-shalt,’ lieth in its path, sparkling with gold—a scale-covered
beast; and on every scale glittereth golden, ‘Thou shalt!’ The
values of a thousand years glitter on those scales, and thus
speaketh the mightiest of all dragons: All the values of things glitter
on me. All values have already been created, and all created
values do I represent. Verily, there shall be no ‘I will’ any more.
Thus speaketh the dragon.”
342
This dragon is contrasted with the lion, a symbol of a certain stage
of the “metamorphosis of one’s spirit,” which corresponds with the
discarding of this old morality.

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Discarding of Old Morality

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342 Nietzsche, Friedrich. Thus Spoke Zarathustra.

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“Anthropologists, archæologists, physicists and other men of
science, risking thumbscrews, stake, infamy and ostracism, have
torn the spider-snare of superstition to shreds and broken in pieces

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the monstrous idol of Morality, the murderous Moloch which has
made mankind its meat throughout history… Moral philosophy,
psychology, sociology, anthropology, mental pathology,
physiology, and many another of the children of Wisdom, of
whom she is justified, well know that the laws of Ethics are a chaos
of confused conventions, based at best on customs convenient in
certain conditions, more often on the craft or caprice of the
biggest, the most savage, heartless, cunning and blood-thirsty
brutes of the pack, to secure their power or pander to their
pleasure in cruelty.”
343

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The 18th and 19th centuries signaled the slow demise of the
conventional views of an Absolute Law of morals. This is epitomized in
Nietzsche’s proclamation that “God is dead.” The essential realization that
had crept in was that moral judgment of things is entirely relative.
Amazingly, Einstein announced the relativity of space-time itself less than
half a century later. Nietzsche also summarized this relativization of morals
in one aphorism: “There is no such thing as moral phenomena, but only a
moral interpretation of phenomena.”344 In this, we come to see that
morality as we know it lies entirely in our particular interpretation of
phenomena, it does not reside in the phenomena themselves.

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Thelema was surely the first religious philosophy to adopt – or
rather incorporate – this new notion of the relativity of morality. This idea
is more fully expanded in various other essays.345
It is proclaimed in Liber AL vel Legis, the central text of Thelema:
“Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.”
“There is no law beyond Do what thou wilt.”
346
The will being unique to each individual, their different Laws are
essentially not going to be identical. This most definitely states that each
person is to do their own Will and not follow out the various laws and
mandates of others. Naturally, moral sanctions imposed from without are

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343 Liber V vel Reguli.
344 Nietzsche, Friedrich. Beyond Good and Evil.
345 See, for example, chapter 5 of this book.
346 Liber AL, I:40, III:60.

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discarded. The discarding of old morality during the last two centuries is
also reflected into the microcosm of each human individual. Each man
and woman must go through the various stages of human development,
and a large part of this development is one’s continually changing
approach to values. In the process of all of our lives, we have each
adopted values and many of us, especially during adolescence, begin to
question our adopted values that we took initially to be true.

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This questioning of values is what Nietzsche discusses in his classic
Thus Spoke Zarathustra. He declared there were three metamorphoses of
the spirit, the first of which is the camel that essentially takes on the values
of the society it was born into. Next, through necessity, the lion emerges,
symbolic of the discarding of introjected values. On this symbolic lion of
the spirit Nietzsche writes:
“My brethren, wherefore is there need of the lion in the spirit?
Why sufficeth not the beast of burden [the camel], which
renounceth and is reverent?
To create new values – that, even the lion cannot yet accomplish:
but to create itself freedom for new creating – that can the might of
the lion do. To create itself freedom, and give a holy Nay even
unto duty: for that, my brethren, there is need of the lion.
To assume the right to new values – that is the most formidable
assumption for a load-bearing and reverent spirit. Verily, unto such
a spirit it is preying, and the work of a beast of prey. As its holiest,
it once loved ‘Thou-shalt’: now is it forced to find illusion and
arbitrariness even in the holiest things, that it may capture freedom
from its love: the lion is needed for this capture.”
347

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The prime characteristic of this lion-like attitude is “to create itself
freedom” by rejecting the “Thou-shalts” of values imposed from without.
Modernly, the old morality is represented to the modern individual in the
form of “society” or “the State,” which are imposed from without. This
lion symbol Nietzsche speaks of is essentially the breaking free of old
perspectives of value. These include any imposed values acquired

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347 Nietzsche, Friedrich. Thus Spoke Zarathustra.

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throughout one’s development in modern society, especially those of old
morality.

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In the field of psychology, Carl Ransom Rogers – an influential
psychologist who founded the client-centered form of therapy and was
president of the American Psychological Association – delineated the
progress of our approach to values throughout our individual
development. To understand the transition to what Rogers terms a
“psychologically mature” outlook on values we must first understand
completely his model of the development of values. He first of all
distinguishes between “operative values” which refers to “the tendency of
any living beings to show preference, in their actions, for one kind of
object or objective rather than another… [which] need not involve any
cognitive or conceptual thinking,”348 and what he calls “conceived values,”
which are “the preference of the individual for a symbolized object…
[where] usually in such a preference there is anticipation or foresight of the
outcome of behavior directed toward such a symbolized object.”349 For
operative values, Rogers gives the example of a worm navigating a maze
by choosing the directions through it; for conceived values, he gives the
example of the value-statement “honesty is the best policy.” With this
subtle distinction in values we may return to the subject of becoming a
psychologically mature adult.

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Rogers suggested that there are three distinct perspectives or stages
of value: the infant, the psychologically immature, and the psychologically
mature adult. The infant’s view of values is inborn - it has “at the outset, a
clear approach to values. He prefers some things and experiences, and
rejects others. We can infer from studying his behavior that he prefers
those experiences which maintain, enhance, or actualize his organism, and
rejects those which do not serve this end.”350 This infant stage of values is
entirely composed of operative values, for conceived values require
symbolic thought of which infants are not even capable. The fact that is
asserted is that infants are inborn with a sense of valuing things, which
corresponds to what Rogers calls elsewhere the “actualizing tendency,”

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348 Rogers, Carl R. “Toward a Modern Approach to Values: The Valuing Process in the
Mature Person” from Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, Vol.68, No.2, pg.
160-167.
349 Ibid.
350 Ibid.

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which is that tendency of all humans (not just infants) to inherently move
towards “those experiences which maintain, enhance, or actualize his
organism,” as previously mentioned. Rogers continues, explaining that the
infant’s approach to values “is first of all a flexible, changing, valuing
process, not a fixed system… What is going on seems best described as an
organismic valuing process, in which each element, each moment of what
he is experiencing is somehow weighed, and selected or rejected,
depending on whether, at this moment, it tends to actualize the organism
or not. This complicated weighing of experience is clearly an organismic,
not a conscious or symbolic function. These are operative, not conceived
values.”351 The last aspect of the infant’s approach to values is that “the
source or locus of the evaluating process is clearly within himself. Unlike
many of us, he knows what he likes and dislikes, and the origin of these
value choices lies strictly within himself. He is the center of the valuing
process, the evidence for his choices being supplied by his own senses.”352
Essentially, the infant’s approach to values is what Rogers terms the
“organismic valuing process,” wherein each phenomenon is weighed and
rejected depending on its potential for actualizing the individual in
question, and the source of the evaluating process is clearly within the
individual.

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One would think that this soundly based and highly efficient
valuing process would not be worth giving up. The fact is that all of us
exchange this apparent effective valuing process for a more “rigid,
uncertain, inefficient approach to values which characterizes most of us
adults.”353 The reason for this, Rogers posits, is essentially the need for love
from others, especially the parents. “The infant needs love, wants it, tends
to behave in ways which will bring a repetition of this wanted experience.
But this brings complications.”354 Each child is scolded for doing things the
parent sees as unacceptable and rewarded for things viewed as acceptable.
These various value judgments become adopted by the infant as if they
were his own, which is called the “introjection of values.” Rogers explains,
“He has deserted the wisdom of his organism, giving up the locus of
evaluation, and is trying to behave in terms of values set by another, in

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351 Ibid.
352 Ibid.
353 Ibid.
354 Ibid.

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order to hold love.”355 It this new stage, when the infant begins to start
introjecting values from outside as if they were his own, which
corresponds with Nietzsche’s notion of the camel. The camel is that which
delights in bearing heavy loads, in this case the burden of introjected
values. On this Nietzsche writes:
“What is heavy? so asketh the load-bearing spirit; then kneeleth it
down like the camel, and wanteth to be well laden. What is the
heaviest thing, ye heroes? asketh the load-bearing spirit, that I may
take it upon me and rejoice in my strength… All these heaviest
things the load-bearing spirit taketh upon itself.”
356

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These introjected values in the individual corresponds as a
microcosm to the old morality, discussed earlier, that has appeared in the
course of human history. Rogers writes that “because these [introjected]
concepts are not based on his own valuing, they tend to be fixed and
rigid, rather than fluid and changing.”357 Like introjected value concepts,
the old morality is inherently fixed and rigid. Our lives as children,
through when we are adolescents, up until we become adults, we are
constantly introjecting values from around us. Rogers notes that, “in this
fantastically complex culture of today, the patterns we introject as
desirable or undesirable come from a variety of sources and are often
highly contradictory in their meanings.”358 This assimilation into society
with its values creates this “highly contradictory” feeling within each
person. Most adults are at this stage of tension between their various
conceived values that they have introjected, and more importantly Rogers
describes the “wide and unrecognized discrepancy between the evidence
supplied by his own experience and these conceived values.”359 This is
because his experience no longer dictates his values as they did as an
infant when his locus of evaluation was still within himself. Now, this
source of evaluation lies outside of himself in most matters because of
these fixed introjected values that he has adopted. One consequence of

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355 Ibid.
356 Nietzsche, Friedrich. Thus Spoke Zarathustra.
357 Rogers, Carl. “Toward a Modern Approach to Values.”
358 Ibid.
359 Ibid.

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these introjected values being fixed is that “he must hold [these
conceptions] in a rigid and unchanging fashion. The alternative would be
a collapse of his values.”360 Rogers believed that this picture of the
individual, that of one with a large discrepancy between their experience
and their introjected, conceived values, “is the picture of most of us.” 361
On this fundamental discrepancy Rogers wrote:
“By taking over the conceptions of others as our own we lose
contact with the potential wisdom of our own functioning, and lose
confidence in ourselves. Since these value constructs are often
sharply at variance with what is going on in our own experiencing,
we have in a very basic way divorced ourselves from ourselves,
and this accounts for much of modern strain and insecurity. This
fundamental discrepancy between the individual’s concepts and
what he is actually experiencing, between the intellectual structure
of his values and the valuing process going on unrecognized within
him - this is a part of the fundamental estrangement of modern
man from himself.”
362

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It is at this point in development, where there is a fundamental
discrepancy and dissonance in ourselves, that Nietzsche’s lion is needed
“create itself freedom” by discarding the old values of “the great dragon”
of “Thou shalt not”s. Before, as a camel, the individual takes on and
introjects the values of his society at large, moving his source of evaluation
from a fluid center within himself to a fixed set of values outside of
himself. This process is most likely necessary for all humans to go through,
even though it has “divorced ourselves from ourselves.” It is at this point
that the lion is needed, which is essentially symbolic of the discarding of
old values. This lion in its rejecting of introjected values is a symbol of the
transition from this psychologically immature outlook of values to
becoming what Rogers called a psychologically mature adult. Rogers said
that “some individuals are fortunate in… developing further in the
direction of psychological maturity.”363 Being a therapist he naturally

173

360 Ibid.
361 Ibid.
362 Ibid.
363 Ibid.

174

recommends the therapeutic climate for this further development but also
admitted that this development can also happen in life where various
conditions are similar to therapy.

174

The Birth of a New System of Values

174

If we discard our own introjected values, what do we have left?
This dimension is what many other essays on Thelemic morals have
neglected. Once the lion has found the old set of values ineffective and
useless, what takes the place of this new void? Is “Do what thou wilt”
simply just a call to complete chaos and anarchy?

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As we begin to discard these introjected values, we come again to
an approach to values that is similar to the infant’s perspective treated
earlier. In this sense, “it is fluid, flexible, based on this particular moment,
and the degree to which this moment is experienced as enhancing and
actualizing. Values are not held rigidly, but are continually changing.”364
This return to a fluid and flexible approach to values can only happen
when we relinquish our attachment to various conceived values that have
been introjected. The experience of our organism, which is constantly
changing, becomes more important to the evaluation process than the
thought structure of our values. Also in similarity with the infant’s
perspective, this new mature approach establishes, “the locus of
evaluation… firmly within the person. It is his own experience which
provides the value information or feedback. This does not mean that he is
not open to all the evidence he can obtain from other sources. But it
means that this is taken for what it is - outside evidence - and is not as
significant as his own reactions.”365 Further, “there is also involved in this
valuing process a letting oneself down into the immediacy of what one is
experiencing, endeavoring to sense and to clarify all its complex
meanings”366 just like in infancy. Essentially, one returns largely to the
infant’s point-of-view insofar as one’s values are more fluid & flexible, the
locus of evaluation is re-established within oneself, experiential evidence
trumps outside evidence, and a sort of letting go to be “in the moment.”

174

364 Ibid.
365 Ibid.
366

174

Amazingly enough, as Carl Rogers says this new psychologically

175

mature look has much in common with the infant’s perspective, Nietzsche
designates the stage after the discarding of values by the lion as that of the
child. He writes:
“But tell me, my brethren, what the child can do, which even the
lion could not do? Why hath the preying lion still to become a
child?
Innocence is the child, and forgetfulness, a new beginning, a game,
a self-rolling wheel, a first movement, a holy Yea. Aye, for the
game of creating, my brethren, there is needed a holy Yea unto
life: ITS OWN will, willeth now the spirit; HIS OWN world
winneth the world’s outcast.”
367

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The child is “innocence” because he does not reference his own
actions against the values of others (whereby one feels guilt, shame, et
cetera, for not complying) but of his own, he is “forgetfulness” because his
values are not a fixed system but a fluid, ever-changing process, and he is
“a new beginning” and “a first movement” because his values are always
renewed in each moment, each calling a new judgment from his being.
The child is “a game” because he does not take the following of
introjected values so seriously anymore – in fact, finds those following
them quite ignorant (Rogers writes that, “[the infant] would laugh at our
concern over values, if he could understand it”368), he is “a self-rolling
wheel” because his locus of evaluation has been relocated to within
himself, and he is “a holy Yea” because in this bringing of valuing into the
locus of oneself naturally brings one into being more accepting of
experience in general.

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This image of the mature child appears in an injunction by Christ
to “become as little children,”369 and also Blavatsky’s injunction, “The
Pupil must regain the child-state he has lost,”370 and finally Nietzsche’s own
injunction “Maturity in a man: that means having found once again that

175

367 Nietzsche, Friedrich. Thus Spoke Zarathustra.
368 Rogers, Carl R. “Toward a Modern Approach to Values.”
369 Matthew 18:3.
370 Blavatsky, Helena P. The Voice of Silence.

176

seriousness which man had as a child, in play.”371

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Rogers emphasizes that similar to the infant, “the psychologically
mature adult trusts and uses the wisdom of his organism, with the
difference that he is able to do so knowingly. He realizes that if he can
trust all of himself, his feelings and his intuitions may be wiser than his
mind, that as a total person he can be more sensitive and accurate than his
thoughts alone.”372 As emphasized in Thelema,373 reason cannot
adequately be the guide of the Will. Rogers offers this “organismic valuing
process” as a solution to not only what may guide our actions when we
discard reason as the sole arbiter, but also it fills the vacuum created by
our questioning and discarding of values. The “child” of Nietzsche who
creates his own values is one who has adopted this psychologically mature
“organismic valuing process.” Like Rogers, we assert that “there is an
organismic base for an organized valuing process within the human
individual… It is part of the functioning life process of any healthy

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371 Nietzsche, Friedrich. Beyond Good and Evil.
372 Rogers, Carl R. “Toward a Modern Approach to Values.”
373 See, for example, the section on “Epistemology” in chapter 8 of this book.

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organism. It is the capacity for receiving feedback information which
enables the organism continually to adjust its behavior and reactions so as
to achieve the maximum possible self-enhancement.”374 This natural
inclination is with us since birth and consequently covered over with our
adopted of various conceived values in our need for love and esteem.
Now as we being to question and discard our various conceived values
that have been imposed from without, we are re-adopting many facets of
this natural organismic valuing process yet with the psychological maturity
and insight of the adult.

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Finally, some often question whether relocating our valuing process
within ourselves will result in widespread anarchy. Carl Rogers assures
that although this process of organismic valuing is entirely individual, the
values that are created share a large degree of commonality across
humanity. He asserted that “where individuals are valued, where there is
greater freedom to feel and to be, certain value directions seem to emerge.
These are not chaotic directions but instead have a surprising
commonality… this commonality does not seem to be due to the
influences of any one culture… I like to think that this commonality of
value directions is due to the fact that we all belong to the same species…
As a species there may be certain elements of experience which tend to
make for inner development and which would be chosen by all
individuals if they were genuinely free to choose.”375 In fact, Rogers was
able to identify various common themes, or “value directions,” that arise
when individuals are accepted and left free to choose their own values:
“They tend to move away from facades… pretense, defensiveness,
putting up a front… they tend to move away from ‘oughts’… they
tend to move away from meeting the expectations of others…
being real is positively valued… self-direction is positively
valued…one’s self, one’s own feelings, come to be positively
valued… being a process [as opposed to being fixed] is positively
valued… sensitivity to others and acceptance of others is positively
valued… deep relationships are positively valued… perhaps more
than all else, the [individual] comes to value an openness to all of

177

374 Ibid.
375 Ibid.

178

his inner and outer experience.”

178

376 Ibid.

178

Although these may be general trends of “value directions,” in
Thelema it is recognized quite firmly that “There is no law beyond Do
what thou wilt.” Instead of dogmatically imitating these apparently
common stances on values, we may recognize that the very fact of a
commonality of value directions among all humans who are relatively free
and esteemed shows us that this process of understanding values that we
all go through does not end in complete anarchy as some criticize.
Essentially, “a new kind of emergent universality of value directions
becomes possible when individuals move in the direction of psychological
maturity, or more accurately, move in the direction of becoming open to
their experiencing.”377

CHAPTER 3
YAMA & NIYAMA:
WHAT IS THE “IDEAL THELEMITE”?

What is the “ideal Thelemite”? In short: There is no such thing as
an “ideal Thelemite.” The Law of Thelema is “Do what thou wilt,” which
means that every individual is sovereign. Every man and every woman has
their own individual Law, their own unique Will. As William Blake said,
“One Law for the Lion and the Ox is Oppression.”15

The fact that “There is no law beyond Do what thou wilt”16 is
precisely why there are no standard or universal ideals. Each individual
has their own Will, and each Law must have its own, unique “ideal.”
Regarding the fact that there are no standards or universal ideals, Crowley
writes:
“What is necessary is not to seek after some fantastic ideal, utterly
unsuited to our real needs, but to discover the true nature of those

15 The Marriage of Heaven and Hell.
16 Liber AL, III:60.

needs, to fulfill them, and rejoice therein.”
17
“Know then, o my Son, that all Laws, all Systems, all Customs, all
Ideals and Standards which tend to produce Uniformity, being in
direct Opposition to Nature’s Will to change and to develop
through Variety, are accursèd.”
18
“Each child must develop its own Individuality, and Will,
disregarding alien Ideals… Let children educate themselves to be
themselves. Those who train them to standards cripple and deform
them. Alien ideals impose parasitic perversions… Standards of
education, ideals of Right-and-Wrong, conventions, creeds, codes,
stagnate Mankind.”
19

One might argue that Thelema is itself a “universal ideal.”
Thelema is a universal Law insofar as “Do what thou wilt” states that each
individual must find their own unique Will, their own particular Law. The
universal ideal is therefore that there are no universal ideals: each must
“discover the true nature of [one’s real] needs, to fulfill them, and rejoice
therein.”20 The only absolute is that there are no absolutes; the only
constant is change.

In a way, then, we can say that the “ideal Thelemite” is one who
does their own Will and lets others do their Wills. This “ideal Thelemite”
follows their own Law and others follow their own, different Laws; there
are no universal ideals of “what is best” or “what is absolutely Right and
Wrong” beyond this. This is what is sometimes called the “Yama and
Niyama of Thelema.”

We borrow the terms “Yama” and “Niyama” from the Hindu
system of raja yoga as explained, among other places, in Patanjali’s classic
treatise called the Yogasutras. Yama and Niyama are words that mean
opposite things, similar to “Thou shalt not” (Yama) and “Thou shalt”
(Niyama). Unfortunately, translating them into English is not easy, but
their real meaning in the context of Thelema becomes clear with just a

17 Magick Without Tears, chapter 8.
18 Liber Aleph, chapter 31.
19 On the Education of Children, available in The Revival of Magick.
20 The Constitutions of the Order of Thelemites.

little explication.

The Yama of Thelema is to have the self-discipline to find one’s
own Will and to do that Will. As it is said, “Thou hast no right but to do
thy will.”21 The Niyama of Thelema is to mind your own business or, in
other words, to allow others to find and do their Wills. The Niyama is to
extend the same absolute liberty to do your own Will that you rightfully
claim to all other individuals. In short:
• The Yama of Thelema: Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the
Law. Thou hast no right but to do thy will.
• The Niyama of Thelema: Mind your own business.

Yama: Crowley mentions that Yama means something similar to
“control” or “the word ‘inhibition’ as used by biologists.”22 Basically, Yama
means the self-discipline to remain on the “track” or “path” of one’s True
Will and not swerving from it. “Thou hast no right but to do thy will,”23
which shows that you are by definition outside of your sole right when you
deviate from your Path. This requires the self-discipline to remain true to
one’s own Law. As Crowley writes, “What is true for every School is
equally true for every individual. Success in life, on the basis of the Law of
Thelema, implies severe self-discipline.”24 Crowley gives a succinct
summary of the Yama of Thelema when he writes:
“I wish to thunder forth once more that no questions of right or
wrong enter into our problems. But in the stratosphere it is ‘right’
for a man to be shut up in a pressure-resisting suit electrically
heated, with an oxygen supply, whereas it would be ‘wrong’ for
him to wear it if he were running the three miles in the summer
sports. This is the pit into which all the great religious teachers
have hitherto fallen, and I am sure you are all looking hungrily at
me in the hope of seeing me do likewise. But no! There is one
principle which carries us through all conflicts concerning conduct,
because it is perfectly rigid and perfectly elastic: — ‘Do what thou

21 Liber AL, I:42.
22 Eight Lectures on Yoga.
23 Liber AL, I:42.
24 Magick Without Tears, chapter 8.

wilt shall be the whole of the Law.’ That is Yama.”

Niyama: There is no “opposite term” of Yama, or self-discipline, to
adequately translate “Niyama.” We might say that the complementary
term of “self-discipline “is, in this case, something like “other-discipline.” If
Yama is the discipline we have toward ourselves in remaining true to our
own Law, Niyama is the discipline we have toward others in allowing
them to remain true to their own Laws. This “other-discipline” can be
summarized as “Mind your own business.” Crowley says as much in
several places:
“Mind your own business! is the sole sufficient rule.”
26
“I will have thee to know, moreover, my dear Son, the right Art of
Conduct with them whom I shall give thee for Initiation. And the
Rule thereof is one Rule: Do that thou wilt shall be the whole of
the Law. See thou constantly to it that this be not broken;
especially in the Section thereof (if I dare say so) which readeth
Mind thine own Business. This is of Application equally to all, and
the most dangerous Man (or Woman, as has occurred, or I err) is
the Busy-body. Oh how ashamed are we, and moved to
Indignation, seeing the Sins and Follies of our Neighbours!”
27
“Every Star has its own Nature, which is ‘Right’ for it. We are not
to be missionaries, with ideal standards of dress and morals, and
such hard-ideas. We are to do what we will, and leave others to do
what they will. We are infinitely tolerant, save of intolerance.”
28
“It is necessary that we stop, once for all, this ignorant meddling
with other people’s business. Each individual must be left free to
follow his own path.”
29

25 Eight Lectures on Yoga.
26 Magick Without Tears, chapter 15.
27 Liber Aleph, chapter 96.
28 New Comment to Liber AL, II:57.
29 New Comment to Liber AL, I:31.

The name Crowley gives for someone who fails to uphold the
Niyama of Thelema is a “busy-body.” A busy-body is someone who is
concerned about what other people are doing, how other people are
doing things, and why other people are doing things. A busy-body is
concerned about someone else’s True Will rather than being concerned
with their own. They are indignant about the “sins and follies” of their
neighbors rather than focusing on themselves, and generally meddle in
others’ affairs. A busy-body, in short, does not mind their own business.

We are all busy-bodies to some degree or another whenever we
impose our standards, expectations, or ideals on others, whenever we
think that “we know best” for anyone other than ourselves. This can be
anything from the most mundane and concrete such as criticizing
another’s choice in clothing to the more subtle such as expecting others to
perform the same spiritual practices as oneself or insisting that people who
believe something different from oneself must be “corrected.”

When put into practice, we quickly see that the Niyama of
Thelema – that of minding one’s own business and allowing others to do
their Wills – is not simply a limp passivity. It is not “grinning and bearing
it,” which implies that – deep down – you actually don’t want them to do
their Wills (let alone that you obviously aren’t rejoicing in it!). The Niyama
of Thelema is an active, positive thing: we actively affirm the right of each
individual to know and do their True Will. When we greet one another,
we look fearlessly into each others’ eyes and say, “Do what thou wilt shall
be the whole of the Law.” This is to say to everyone you meet, as Crowley
writes, “Look, brother, we are free! Rejoice with me, sister, there is no law
beyond Do what thou wilt!”30

Some might say that it takes strength to control everything, but it is
a much greater strength to not need to control everything and everyone. It
is a symptom of being unsure and anxious to feel the need to control
people by insisting that it’s your way or the highway. That is: Being a busy-body is a symptom of weakness and fear, although it will inevitably mask
itself in the “virtue” that essentially comes down to “knowing what is best”
for someone else (let alone all other Thelemites!). That is where
“compassion” and “altruism” and even “teaching” teeters into the realm of
folly.

We will all inevitably hear (or probably have already heard) some

30 Liber DCCCXXXVII: The Law of Liberty.

self-avowed Thelemite question why others are not doing this or that,
insisting they are complaining about others because they “really care”
about Thelema. Many of us have fallen prey to this ourselves (“Oh no!
Definitely not me!” … Yes, you especially!). This “care” – this “noble
cause” of ours – is nothing but the demands of a busy-body cloaking itself
in guise of “virtue.” We all should remember to “veil not your vices in
virtuous words.”31 This “care” basically comes down to insisting that
everyone else must have the same values as yourself, which is exactly
opposite to affirming “Do what thou wilt.” If you ever find yourself asking,
or hear someone else asking, something that amounts to “Why doesn’t this
other person/these other people think that this is important?” The answer
is most likely “Because it isn’t important to them, nor does it need to be”…
or, more pointedly, “Mind your own business.” This is why there is no
“ideal Thelemite.” This is why “One Law for the Lion and the Ox is
Oppression.” Any insistence otherwise will quickly fall into the same trap
that characterized the Old Aeon, the tyranny of a single standard or ideal
for all people, rather than a multiplicity of Laws, each uniquely suited to
the individual.

Again: The Niyama of Thelema is not a limp, passive, “grin and
bear it” quality. On the contrary: It takes an active, almost virile quality to
say to every individual, “I don’t know what your Will is, I don’t know
what your ‘good’ or ‘bad’ are, I don’t even know how your Will may
interact with and effect mine, but I grant you the absolute right to do your
Will and I claim the equally absolute right to do my Will.” This is far
from a passive “letting things happen”; the Niyama of Thelema is an active
affirmation, an enthusiastic encouragement, a joyous battle-cry for each
and every man and woman to discover their real needs, to fulfill them,
and to rejoice therein. To believe otherwise is the essence of tyranny; to
act otherwise is the essence of oppression. This requires the strength to
stand in the midst of uncertainty and ambiguity, of accepting variety and
difference of style and opinion, of not knowing “how everything should
be” for everyone or anyone else. Any concern arising about others “not
doing it the right way” should be a reminder to us all to re-focus on our
own Will: this should be a reminder of the Yama of staying true to our
own Path and the Niyama of affirming the right of others to be true to
their Paths.

31 Liber AL, II:52.

This is the simplicity and the beauty of the Law of Thelema: There
are no absolute standards or universal ideals. Every man and every
woman has the indefeasible right and duty to know and do his or her
True Will. Each has their own standard, their own Law. Any occurrence
of someone imposing their Law on another, or anyone accepting a Law
imposed on them by another, is a distortion and deforming of a star’s true
nature. It is our Yama to adhere to this Law of our own True Will, and it
is our Niyama to affirm the right of every other individual to adhere to the
Law of his or her own True Will. This is real Freedom, the perfect order
on Earth as the stars move seamlessly in the perfect order in the Heavens;
this why our Law of “Do what thou wilt” is the Law of Liberty itself.

CHAPTER 2
THE MANIFESTO OF RA-HOOR-KHUIT

The knight-monks – the prince-priests and the hermit-soldiers – are
the body of Ra-Hoor-Khuit’s Army. They are not the cloistered and
emasculated hermits of old.
Although we too attain to the truth of Mystic Solitude wherein All
is One and we proclaim, “I am alone: there is no God where I am” (AL,
II:23), we immerse ourselves into the fecundity of the world instead of
retreating therefrom. Work your jobs, do your duties, raise your children,
laugh with friends, but let all these things, from the most important to the
most trivial, be to the Glory of Ra-Hoor-Khuit!
“Behold! these be grave mysteries; for there are also of my friends
who be hermits. Now think not to find them in the forest or on the
mountain; but in beds of purple, caressed by magnificent beasts of
women with large limbs, and fire and light in their eyes, and
masses of flaming hair about them; there shall ye find them. Ye
shall see them at rule, at victorious armies, at all the joy; and there
shall be in them a joy a million times greater than this.”
– Liber AL, II:24

Note: “AMASS GREAT WEALTH. NEVER BECOME ATTACHED TO WHAT YOU OWN. BE PREPARED TO DESTROY ALL THAT YOU OWN”

We are not to shun material objects, wealth, and power. They are
not inherently evil nor are they “un-spiritual.”
Express your overflow of joy and beauty with fine robes, wine,
headdresses, or whatever you will.
Feel no regret, guilt, or shame in your reckless expression of being
Drunk with the Glory of Ra-Hoor-Khuit!
“Be goodly therefore: dress ye all in fine apparel; eat rich foods
and drink sweet wines and wines that foam! Also, take your fill and
will of love as ye will, when, where and with whom ye will! But
always unto me… Ye shall gather goods and store of women and
spices; ye shall wear rich jewels; ye shall exceed the nations of the
earth in splendour & pride; but always in the love of me, and so
shall ye come to my joy… Be strong, o man! lust, enjoy all things of
sense and rapture: fear not that any God shall deny thee for this.”
– Liber AL, I:51, 61; II:22

Every man, woman, and child who consciously accepts the word of
the Law, “Do what thou wilt,” is certainly a warrior in the Army of Ra-Hoor-Khuit. Simply by existing and enacting the Law of Thelema in every
circumstance, the stars of Force & Fire (each one of you) will spread the
Law by their own example.
We must see the sublime beauty in Thelema’s answers to the
conundrums of ethics, reasons, and metaphysics. Therefore must we
constantly study the Holy Books of Thelema, especially Liber AL vel
Legis, the Book of the Law.
The most important thing is to exude your overflow of strength,
beauty, force and fire in a natural way. Do what thou wilt and let all
around you see the joy you have in doing so!
“The excellence of the Law must be showed by its results upon
those who accept it. When men see us as the hermits of Hadit

described in [The Book of the Law], they will determine to
emulate our joy.” – Khabs am Pekht

One must make Thelema the center of one’s life, the locus of all
meaning and motion. We may remind ourselves through rituals and feasts
of all sorts.
But a truly effective Warrior of Life & Light must be strong and
healthy in both mind and body.
“Wisdom says: be strong! Then canst thou bear more joy. Be not
animal; refine thy rapture!” – Liber AL, II:70
Every warrior of Ra-Hoor-Khuit needs to exert themselves
physically and mentally. We have no room for arm-chair dwellers who
manipulate intellectual facts endlessly. Therefore every person should
regularly exercise their bodies.
“Establish at thy Kaaba a clerk-house; all must be done well and
with business way.’” – Liber AL, III:41
Your Kaaba, your starry heart and essence of consciousness, must
be established within a mind of great power and conciseness, arranged
like a business with orderliness and detachment. Therefore practice
meditation to make the mind a perfect instrument of the Will: perfect the
skills of concentration and non-attachment.
Exercise your body and your mind with diligence but always strive
unto higher goals and ideals. Never tire of competition and exceeding
your own perceived limits.
“But exceed! exceed! Strive ever to more!” – Liber AL, II:71-72

Every person must be a pyramid: flawless from base to apex,
sufficient unto themselves. Yet each Star is part of the Body of Infinite
22Space. Therefore make friends and enemies as ye will.
Our attitude to one another must be one of great respect like the
chivalry from the West or bushido from the East. Thrill with the joy of
vigorous competition and conflict yet always out of overflow of Will,
strength, beauty, love, and rapture.
Therefore do not cover yourself to mask your true brilliance. Let
the Sun of your Will shine effulgently on all things: care not that it will
inevitably nourish some and destroy others.
But also do not fear losing your supposed “freedom” by banding
together with other stars. Verily, a galaxy is an inconceivably potent
source of gravitational force although it is, in reality, made up of individual
stars…
Therefore make camps and lodges and groups and propagate the
Spirit of Freedom, enshrined in the Word of the Law: Thelema.
“But the keen and the proud, the royal and the lofty; ye are
brothers! As brothers fight ye!” – Liber AL, III:58-59

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