集合的符号 包含于:阿莱斯特·克劳利（Aleister Crowley）

阿莱斯特·克劳利（Aleister Crowley）
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阿莱斯特·克劳利是一位英国的神秘学者，但更多人称呼他是『野兽之王』或是『启示录之兽』，更有人称他是『世上最邪恶的男人』。他出生于1875年10月12日，在他出生的同时, 伊莱˙李维（Eliphas Levi）亦于这一年谢世（所以有人认为他是伊莱˙李维的转世）。他的双亲是基督教普里茅斯兄弟会的教友，也是基督教的基本教义派。因此，克劳利生活在一个完全遵守圣经的环境，但他却彻底轻蔑基督教。
阿莱斯特˙克劳利（Aleister Crowley）
mr crowley
1875--1947
他就读于剑桥大学，但并未完成他的学业，离开后他被引荐至一位黄金黎明协会会员乔治˙赛西尔˙锺斯（George Cecil Jones）处。黄金黎明是一个神秘学结社，由撒母尔˙黎德二世˙麦克逵格˙马瑟斯（Samuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers） 所领导，教导关于魔术、卡巴拉、炼金术、塔罗牌、占星术以及其他属于神秘学的学科，其中许多我们认识的知名人物都曾经出现在这个协会中（包括伟特兄，甚至是大诗人叶慈）而这个协会对近代西方神秘学思想影响至为巨大。
克劳利与金色黎明的缘分开始于1898年，并且很快地就爬上协会中的高层。但是在1900年，这个协会开始分裂，而克劳利被拒绝进入黄金黎明的更高层，原因是其中的一位William Butler Yeats说道『我们不认为黄金黎明是一所感化院』，所以克劳利便离开英国开始到处旅行。他利用瑜珈训练自己的精神和肉体，并利用东方的神秘学系统融合了西方神秘学体系。
在1903年，克劳利与萝丝˙凯丽（Rose Kelly）结婚，并到埃及渡蜜月。当他们返回开罗时（1904年），萝丝开始进入催眠的状态，并认为埃及神祗何露丝想要将神谕给他的丈夫，为了测试真实性，克劳利就带萝丝去埃及的博物馆请他指出哪一位是埃及的何露丝神，她认出了数个著名的雕像，并朝向一个丧礼用的石柱走去，这石柱描绘著何露丝收到死者献祭的祭品，而克劳利特别对博物馆中一块写上666的残片有兴趣，而他从小就对这个数字很有兴趣了。
这样的结果让他开始听信萝丝的指示。自1904年4月8日后的连续三天内，他中午就进入他的房间内，并将他背后的声音（背后灵）述说的东西写下来，这本书就是著名的律法之书（The Book of the Law）。因为这本书，克劳利开始利用他剩馀的人生建立一个新的哲学体系 。
在1906年，克劳利重新回到撒母尔˙黎德二世˙麦克逵格˙马瑟斯身边，并开始重建一个新的神秘学协会。他们将这个协会取名为A.'. A.'（Astrum Argentium，银星），而这个协会便成为克劳利传播教导他的基本哲学体系之处
在1910年，克劳利遇到德国Ordo Templi Orientis（O.T.O.）组织的领袖希欧多尔˙瑞斯（Theodore Reuss）这个团体隶属于共济会，并声称他们发现实践魔术的最高秘密，但是只有他们的高级干部才能获知这个秘密。所以克劳利就加入了O.T.O.并于1921年成为其领袖之一，同时出版了他的作品『吸毒恶魔的日记』（Diary of a Drug Fiend）。
他於1915年至1919年住在美国，并於1920年在他的西西里岛别墅建立了一间传拨他思想的修道院。1929年，他与他的第二任妻子玛莉亚˙特丽莎（Maria Teresa de Miramar）在夏威夷结婚，并同时出版了一本重要的魔术巨著『魔术理论与实行』（Magick in Theory and Practic）。
克劳利最后死於1947年12月1日。
克劳利对世人的一项贡献是它设计的塔罗牌--『克劳利˙透特塔罗牌』，在克劳利的教诲下由佛萝妲˙赫瑞丝夫人绘制（Freda Harris）。克劳利并且於1943年将他对塔罗牌的研究撰写成『透特之书』（The Book of Thoth）一书，但是克劳利˙透特塔罗牌直至1969年才出版。
克劳利最后活著的那年是非常贫困潦倒的。他的前妻罗丝死於酒精中毒，克劳利住在一间宿舍中，他死於1947年12月1日，而他的尸体后来被火化寄给了美国他的追随者。
编辑本段世上最邪恶仪式魔法师
亚历斯特.克劳力(Aleister Crowley 1875 - 1947)是一位极负盛名，将魔法理论付诸实践的仪式魔法师，在1920年代被认为是世上最邪恶的男人，克劳利宣称希特勒从他身上盗走卍字的秘密。
本世纪最具影响力的撒旦教领袖，很可能是Crowley，虽然他自己及研究他的人均否认他是个拜撒旦的人，但其言行实在具有很浓烈的拜撒旦之特征。
Crowley自小长於强烈宗教气氛的家庭中，引起他强烈的反叛，他母亲相信他是启示录预言之兽666的化身。他虽不务正业，却处处显出过人的才气。自小喜爱旅行、爬山、阅读、写诗，和与不同的女人造爱，可说每一方面均有过人的成就。在剑桥的三一学院读书期间，更专心研究秘术。
Crowley虽然反抗传统的属灵教训而倾向神秘的世界，但真正启动他朝向阴灵界探索的，却是在一八九八年之复活节，当他廿二岁的时候读了一本书《圣所上之密云》(Carl von Eckartshausen, The Cloud upon the Sanctuary)，此书暗示在属灵界是有一群看不见的弟兄在引导着人类的进化，Crowley深受此群弟兄及其能力吸引，发誓要厕身其中，且要做他们的领袖。他对属灵界秘术的渴求愈来愈深，终在同年的十一月十八日，加入了伦敦的玄秘团体“金色黎明会”(Golden Dawn)。可惜他加入不久，“金色的黎明”就解体了。Crowley归咎于其领袖未能与导引人类进化之主宰接头，他便定意要取其地位而代之，这是他在“金色的黎明”发展出“银星团”(Order of the Silver Star, 又称作 Argenteum Astrum)的原因。
此期间，Crowley周游列国，采集不同地方的秘术与当地传统之怪异性风俗来与西方的秘术混合，如锡兰、印度和中国。在中国期间，他对《易经》深感兴趣，亦把部分内容注入他的著作中。他最重要的一本书叫作《律书》，按他说是一个叫“埃华斯”(Aiwass)的秘界领袖在开罗向他传授的。这个口授笔录的过程共历三小时，每日由中午十二时开始，准一时完结，共三日，时为一九○四年的四月。书共分三小章，内容是揭露出人类进入新纪元的新律则。
《律书》要人遵行的，是一条简单的“秘界谕旨”(Law of the Thelema)：“作你要作的乃是律法的总纲”。放任的一代(如六十年代的嬉皮士)把它解作“想做就去做”，Crowley则解作“只作你必须去作的，其他则保持原状”。有学者认为这是道家“无为”的思想。
Crowley在《律书》中宣称，他就是启示录所言之兽，记号就是666，而那穿朱红色衣服的淫妇(启十七：5)亦已显现地上，那就是出现在Crowley身边的女人，其中尤以希萨(Leah Hirsig)为然。Crowley特别为她建立了“作你要作的”修院，好与她共修性秘术，和服食“古怪的药物”。希萨受了酒、毒和性的剌激，常说能与埃华斯接头，Crowley则把她得的异象记在他的《巫术日志》内。
他发展了一套影响深远的魔法理论.基于金色黎明会的基本教义,他的理论包括东方玄学实践,各类与性相关的魔法,以及一个新的宗教"力与火".
此时，Crowley已踏上通往幽冥界的不归路，他举行的巫术，以及吸毒和杂交的次数愈来愈频密。但同一时间，他亦愈发努力写作，除了许多本关於灵异界的书外，例：The Vision and the Voice, The Book of Thoth)，他亦写小说(The Moonchild)，编期刊(The Equinox)，和给世界各地的人写信。
同时，他憎恨基督教的言行亦愈来愈明显，一九一六年，他举行一个为时极久的仪式，目的是替一只代表拿撒勒人耶稣的蟾蜍施洗，然后把它钉在十字架上。但此时Crowley的言行己引起地方**的注意，一九二三年被意大利**驱逐出境，便辗转去到突尼西亚，然后到法国，他的门徒亦相继舍他而去。他又深受海洛英毒瘾的折磨，孤独与疾病叫他离开法国，曾在德国逗留了一段时间，终于返回英国度其余下的十五年。
他在晚年他号称用魔法召唤出一个没有形体的存在，他自己也不晓得那是个什么东西，在给朋友的信里说道要穷余生之力搞清那东西的本质并且把他公之于众。可惜的是还没搞出来丫就挂掉了……
但Crowley的影响力在他死后才真正发挥出来，跟随他的人透过他的作品在世界各地涌现。
Ozzy Osbourne那首超级经典——"Mr. Crowley"，歌曲中地Mr. Crowley就是指地Aleister Crowley
CELTIC FROST鼎鼎大名地专辑“To Mega Therion(致大兽神)”，专辑地名字就来自于Aleister Crowley地著作，而其贝司手Ain正是一位Crowley地狂热崇拜者
COIL地两名成员 Peter Christorpherson 和Jogn Balance 曾加入过Aleister Crowley 成立地教派金色黎明会。
Death In June地成员Douglas P.（这是Douglas Pearce喜欢用的名字）也同样着迷于Aleister Crowley地玄学
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Aleister Crowley
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Aleister Crowley

Crowley in 1906
Born Edward Alexander Crowley
12 October 1875(1875-10-12)
Royal Leamington Spa,Warwickshire, England
Died 1 December 1947(1947-12-01) (aged 72)
Hastings,East Sussex, England
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Aleister Crowley (/?kro?li/; 12 October 1875 – 1 December 1947), born Edward Alexander Crowley, and also known as both Frater Perdurabo and The Great Beast, was an influentialEnglishoccultist,astrologer,mystic andceremonial magician, responsible for founding the religious philosophy ofThelema. He was also successful in various other fields, includingmountaineering,chess andpoetry, and it has also been alleged that he was a spy for the British government. In his role as the founder of the Thelemite faith, he came to see himself as the prophet who was entrusted with informing humanity that it was entering the newAeon of Horus in the early twentieth century.
Born into a wealthy upper class family, as a young man he became an influential member of the esotericHermetic Order of the Golden Dawn after befriending the order's leader,Samuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers. Subsequently believing that he was being contacted by his Holy Guardian Angel, an entity known asAiwass, whilst staying in Egypt in 1904, he received a text known asThe Book of the Law from what he believed was a divine source, and around which he would come to develop his new religion of Thelema. He would go on to found his own occult society, theA∴A∴ and eventually rose to become a leader ofOrdo Templi Orientis (O.T.O.), before founding a religious commune inCefalu known as theAbbey of Thelema, which he led from 1920 through till 1923. After being evicted from Cefalu he returned to Britain, where he continued to promote Thelema until his death.
Crowley was also abisexual, arecreational drug experimenter andsocial critic. In many of these roles he "was in revolt against the moral and religious values of his time", espousing a form oflibertinism based upon the rule of "Do What Thou Wilt".[1] Because of this, he gained widespread notoriety during his lifetime, and was denounced in the popular press of the day as "the wickedest man in the world."
Crowley has remained an influential figure and is widely thought of as the most influential occultist of all time. In 2002, aBBC poll described him as being the seventy-thirdgreatest Briton of all time. References to him can be found in the works of numerous writers, musicians and filmmakers,[2] and he has also been cited as a key influence on many later esoteric groups and individuals, includingJimmy Page,Kenneth Grant,Jack Parsons,Gerald Gardner and, to some degree,Austin Osman Spare.[3]
Contents
[hide]
1 Life and work1.1 Early years: 1875–1894
1.2 University: 1895–1897
1.3 The Golden Dawn: 1898–1899
1.4 Mexico, India and Paris: 1900–1903
1.5 Egypt and The Book of the Law: 1904
1.6 Kangchenjunga and China: 1905-1906
1.7 The A∴A∴ and the Holy Books of Thelema: 1907–1909
1.8 Victor Neuburg and Algeria: 1910-1911
1.9 Ordo Templi Orientis: 1912–1913
1.10 United States: 1914–1918
1.11 Abbey of Thelema: 1920–1923
1.12 After the Abbey: 1923–1947
1.13 Death
2 Beliefs and viewpoints2.1 Thelema
2.2 Freemasonry
2.3 Science and Magic
3 Controversy3.1 Spiritual and recreational use of drugs
3.2 Other drug use
3.3 Racism
3.4 Views on Women
4 Writings
5 Legacy and influence5.1 Occult
5.2 Popular culture
6 References
7 External links
[edit] Life and work
[edit] Early years: 1875–1894
Aleister was born as Edward Alexander Crowley at 30 Clarendon Square inRoyal Leamington Spa,Warwickshire, England, between 11 pm and midnight on 12 October 1875.[4][5] His father, Edward Crowley (c.1830 — 1887), was trained as an engineer but, according to Aleister, never worked as one, instead owning shares in a lucrative family brewing business, Crowley's Ales, which allowed him to retire before Aleister was born.[6] His mother, Emily Bertha Bishop (1848–1917), drew roots from a Devonshire-Somerset family and was despised by her son, whom she described as "the Beast", a name that he revelled in.[7] His father, who had been born aQuaker, had converted to theExclusive Brethren, a more conservative faction of a Christian denomination known as thePlymouth Brethren, as had his mother when she married him. His father was particularly devout, spending his time as a travelling preacher for the sect and reading a chapter from theBible to his wife and son after breakfast every day.[8][9]
On 5 March 1887, when Crowley was eleven, his father died oftongue cancer. Aleister would later describe this as a turning point in his life,[10] and he always maintained some admiration for his father, describing him as "his hero and his friend".[11] Inheriting his father's wealth, he was subsequently sent to Ebor School in Cambridge, aprivate Plymouth Brethren school, but was expelled for misbehaviour.[12] Following this he attendedMalvern College and thenTonbridge School, both of which he despised and soon left after only a few terms, instead beginning studies atEastbourne College.[13][14] He became increasingly sceptical about Christianity, pointing out logicalinconsistencies in the Bible to his religious teachers[15][16] and went against the Christian morality of his upbringing, for instance embracing sex both with girls whom he met and by visiting female prostitutes, including one from whom he contractedgonorrhea.[17]
[edit] University: 1895–1897
"For many years I had loathed being called Alick, partly because of the unpleasant sound and sight of the word, partly because it was the name by which my mother called me. Edward did not seem to suit me and the diminutives Ted or Ned were even less appropriate. Alexander was too long and Sandy suggested tow hair and freckles. I had read in some book or other that the most favourable name for becoming famous was one consisting of adactyl followed by aspondee, as at the end of ahexameter: like Jeremy Taylor. Aleister Crowley fulfilled these conditions and Aleister is theGaelic form of Alexander. To adopt it would satisfy my romantic ideals. The atrocious spelling A-L-E-I-S-T-E-R was suggested as the correct form by Cousin Gregor, who ought to have known better. In any case, A-L-A-I-S-D-A-I-R makes a very bad dactyl. For these reasons I saddled myself with my presentnom-de-guerre—I can't say that I feel sure that I facilitated the process of becoming famous. I should doubtless have done so, whatever name I had chosen."
Aleister Crowley, on his name change.[18]
In 1895 Crowley, who soon adopted the new name of Aleister over his birth name of Edward, began a three year course atTrinity College, Cambridge, where he was entered for theMoral ScienceTripos studying philosophy, but with approval from his personal tutor he switched to English literature, which was not then a part of the curriculum offered.[19][20] Crowley largely spent his time at university engaged in his pastimes, one of which was mountaineering; he went on holiday to the Alps to do so every year from 1894 to 1898, and various other mountaineers who knew him at this time recognized him as "a promising climber, although somewhat erratic".[21] Another of his hobbies was writing poetry, which he had been doing since the age of ten, and in 1898 he privately published one hundred copies of one of his poems, Aceldama, but it was not a particular success.[22] Nonetheless, that same year he published a string of other poems, the most notable of which was White Stains, a piece of erotica that had to be printed abroad as a safety measure in case it caused trouble with the British authorities.[23] Part of this work, according to biographer Lawrence Sutin, "deserves a place in any wide-ranging anthology of gay poetry."[24] A third hobby of his was the game ofchess, and he joined the university's chess club, where, he later stated, he beat the president in his first year and practiced two hours a day towards becoming a champion, but he eventually gave this idea up.[25][26]
At university, he also maintained a vigorous sex life, which was largely conducted with prostitutes and girls he picked up at local pubs and cigar shops, but eventually he took part insame-sex activities in which he played a passive role during anal sex.[27] This was despite the fact that homosexual acts were illegal and punishable with imprisonment at that time. In 1897, Crowley met a man named Herbert Charles Pollitt, the president of theCambridge University Footlights Dramatic Club, and the two subsequently entered into a relationship but broke up because Pollitt did not share Crowley's increasing interest in the esoteric.[28] Crowley himself later stated that "I told him frankly that I had given my life to religion and that he did not fit into the scheme. I see now how imbecile I was, how hideously wrong and weak it is to reject any part of one's personality."[29]
It was in December 1896 that he had his first significantmystical experience, of which he would later claim that "this philosophy was born in me."[30] His later biographer, Lawrence Sutin, believed that this was the result of Crowley's first homosexual experience, which brought him "an encounter with animmanent deity."[31] Following this experience, Crowley began to read up on the subject ofoccultism andmysticism, and by the next year he had begun reading books byalchemists andmagicians.[32] In October a brief illness triggered considerations of mortality and "the futility of all human endeavour," or at least the futility of the diplomatic career that Crowley had previously considered,[33] and instead, he decided to devote his life to the occult. In 1897 he left Cambridge, not having taken any degree at all despite a"first class" showing in his spring 1897 exams and consistent "second class honours" results before that.[34]
[edit] The Golden Dawn: 1898–1899
Main article:Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn
In 1898, Crowley was staying inZermatt, Switzerland, where he met the chemist Julian L. Baker, and the two began talking about their common interest in alchemy. Upon their return to England, Baker introduced Crowley toGeorge Cecil Jones, a member of the occult society known as theHermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. Crowley was subsequently initiated into the Outer Order of the Golden Dawn on 18 November 1898 by the group's leader,Samuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers. The ceremony itself took place at Mark Masons Hall in London, where Crowley accepted his motto and magical name of Frater Perdurabo, meaning "I shall endure to the end."[35] At around this time, he moved from the elegant accommodation at the Hotel Cecil to his own luxury flat at 67–69 Chancery Lane. There, Crowley would prepare two different rooms: one for the practice ofWhite Magic and the other one forBlack Magic. He soon invited a Golden Dawn associate,Allan Bennett, to live with him, and Bennett became his personal tutor, teaching him more about ceremonial magic and the ritual usage of drugs.[36] However, in 1900, Bennett left for Ceylon (modern Sri Lanka) to studyBuddhism,[37] whilst in 1899 Crowley acquiredBoleskine House inFoyers on the shore ofLoch Ness in Scotland. He subsequently developed a love of Scottish culture, describing himself as the "Laird of Boleskine" and took to wearing traditional highland dress, even during visits back to London.[38]
However, a schism had developed in the Golden Dawn, with MacGregor Mathers, the organisation's leader, being ousted by a group of members who were unhappy with his autocratic rule. Crowley had previously approached this group of rebels, asking to be initiated into the further orders of the Golden Dawn, but they had declined him. Unfazed, he went directly to Mathers, who still held the post of chief and who agreed to initiate him into the Second Order.[39] Now loyal to Mathers, Crowley (with the help of his then mistress and fellow initiate Elaine Simpson) attempted to help crush the rebellion and unsuccessfully tried to seize a London temple space known as the Vault ofRosenkreutz from the rebels.[40] Crowley had also developed personal feuds with some of the Golden Dawn's members; he disliked the poetW.B. Yeats, who had been one of the rebels, because Yeats had not been particularly favourable towards one of his own poems, Jephthat.[41] He also dislikedArthur Edward Waite, who would rouse the anger of his fellows at the Golden Dawn with hispedantry.[42] Crowley voiced the view that Waite was a pretentious bore through searing critiques of Waite's writings and editorials of other authors' writings. In his periodicalThe Equinox, Crowley titled one diatribe, "Wisdom While You Waite", and his mock-obituary on the passing of Waite bore the title "Dead Waite".[43]
[edit] Mexico, India and Paris: 1900–1903
In 1900, Crowley travelled to Mexico via the United States on a whim, taking a local woman as his mistress, and with his good friendOscar Eckenstein proceeded to climb several mountains, includingIztaccihuatl,Popocatepetl and evenColima, the latter of which they had to abandon owing to a volcanic eruption.[44] During this period, Eckenstein revealed mystical leanings of his own and told Crowley that he needed to improve the control of his mind, recommending the Indian practice ofraja yoga in order to do so. Crowley had continued his magical experimentation on his own after leaving Mathers and the Golden Dawn, and his writings suggest that he developed the magical wordAbrahadabra during this time.[45]
Leaving Mexico, a country that he would always remain fond of, Crowley visited San Francisco, Hawaii, Japan, Hong Kong and Ceylon, where he met up with Allan Bennett and devoted himself further to yoga, from which he claimed to have achieved the spiritual state ofdhyana. It was during this visit that Bennett decided to become a Buddhist monk in theTheravada tradition, travelling to Burma, whilst Crowley went on to India, studying variousHindu practices.[46] In 1902, he was joined in India by Eckenstein and several other mountaineers; Guy Knowles, H. Pfannl, V. Wesseley, and Dr Jules Jacot-Guillarmod. Together the Eckenstein-Crowley expedition attempted to climb the mountainK2, which at that time no other Europeans had attempted.[citation needed] On the journey, Crowley was afflicted withinfluenza,malaria, andsnow blindness, whilst other expedition members were similarly struck with illness. They reached an altitude of 20,000 feet (6,100 m) before deciding to turn back.[47]
In 1903 Crowley wedRose Edith Kelly, the sister of his friendGerald Festus Kelly, in a "marriage of convenience". However, soon after their marriage, Crowley actually fell in love with her and set about to successfully prove his affections.[48] A painter, Gerald Kelly was a good friend ofW. Somerset Maugham, who after briefly meeting Crowley would later use him as a model for the protagonist of his novelThe Magician, published 1908.[49][50]
[edit] Egypt and The Book of the Law: 1904
Main article:The Book of the Law
In 1904, Crowley and his new wife Rose traveled toEgypt using the pseudonym of Prince and Princess Chioa Khan, titles which Crowley claimed had been bestowed upon him by an easternpotentate.[51] According to Crowley's own account, Rose, who was pregnant, had become somewhat delusional whilst in the country, regularly informing him that "they are waiting for you", but not providing him with any further information as to who "they" were. It was on 18 March, after Crowley sought the aid of the Egyptian godThoth in a magical rite, that she actually revealed who "they" were – the ancient Egyptian godHorus and his alleged messenger. She then led him to a nearby museum inCairo where she showed him a seventh century BCE mortuarystele known as theStele of Ankh-ef-en-Khonsu (it later came to be revered in Thelema as the "Stele of Revealing"); Crowley was astounded for the exhibit's number was 666, thenumber of the beast in Christian mythology.[52] Crowley took this all to be a sign from a divine entity and on 20 March began performing ritual invocations of the god Horus in his rented room. It was after this invocation that Rose, or as he now referred to her, Ouarda the Seeress, informed him that "the Equinox of the Gods had come".[53]
"Had! The manifestation ofNuit.
The unveiling of the company of heaven.
Every man and woman is a star.
Every number is infinite; there is no difference.
Help me, o warrior lord of Thebes, in my unveiling before the Children of men!"
The opening lines of The Book of the Law.
It was on 8 April, when the couple were still staying in Cairo, that Crowley first heard a disembodied voice talking to him, claiming that it was coming from a being known asAiwass, the true nature of whom Crowley never understood. Crowley's disciple and later secretaryIsrael Regardie believed that this voice came from Crowley'ssubconscious, but opinions among Thelemites differ widely.[54] Aiwass claimed to be a messenger from the god Horus, who was also referred to by him as Hoor-Paar-Kraat. Crowley wrote down everything the voice told him over the course of the next three days, and subsequently titled it Liber AL vel Legis orThe Book of the Law.[55][56] The god's commands explained that a newAeon for mankind had begun, and that Crowley would serve as itsprophet. As a supreme moral law, it declared "Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law", and that people should learn to live in tune with their "True Will". Although this event would prove to be a cornerstone in Crowley's life, being the origin of the religion ofThelema, at the time he was unsure what to think about the whole situation. He was "dumbfounded about what to do with The Book of the Law" and eventually decided to ignore the instructions that it commanded him to perform, which included taking the Stele of Revealing from the museum, fortifying his own island and translating the Book into all the world's languages. Instead he simply sent typescripts of the work to several occultists whom he knew, and then "put aside the book with relief."[57]
[edit] Kangchenjunga and China: 1905-1906
Returning toBoleskine, Crowley came to believe that his friendSamuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers, had become so jealous of his progression as a ceremonial magician that he had begun using magic against him, and the relationship between the two broke down.[58] On 28 July 1905, Rose gave birth to Crowley's first child, a daughter, whom he named Nuit Ma Ahathoor Hecate Sappho Jezebel Lilith, although she would commonly be referred to simply by her last name.[59] He also founded a publishing company, naming it the Society for the Propagation of Religious Truth in parody of theSociety for Promoting Christian Knowledge, and through this released more of his own poetry, including The Sword of Song.[60] Whilst his poetry often received strong reviews (either positive or negative), it never sold well, and attempting to gain more publicity, he issued a reward of £100 for whomever could write the best essay on the topic of his work. The winner of this would prove to beJ.F.C. Fuller (1878–1966), a British Army officer and military historian, whose essay, The Star in the West, heralded Crowley's poetry as some of the greatest ever written.[61]
Crowley decided to climb another of the world's greatest mountains, and for this choseKangchenjunga in theHimalayas, widely thought of as "the most treacherous mountain in the world" by climbers at the time. Assembling a team consisting of Dr Jacot-Guillarmod, a veteran of the K2 climb, as well as several other continental Europeans including Charles Adolphe Reymond, Alexis Pache and Alcesti C. Rigo de Righi, the group travelled to British India to undertake the task. Throughout the expedition, there was much argument between Crowley and the others who felt that he was reckless. They eventually mutinied against Crowley's control, with the other climbers heading back down the mountain as nightfall approached despite Crowley's warnings that it was too dangerous. Crowley was proved right as Pache and several porters were subsequently killed in an accident.[62]
Returning from this expedition, he met up with Rose and Lilith inKolkata before being forced to leave India after shooting dead a native who had tried to mug him.[63] Travelling to China, Crowley soon fell down a forty foot cliff; finding himself unscathed, he believed that he was being protected for some prophetic purpose, and underwent a religious experience that he felt bestowed on him the rank of Exempt Adept, the highest grade of the Second Order of the Golden Dawn. Devoting himself fully to spiritual and magical work, he began studying theGoetia, and recited thegrimoire's preliminary invocation daily in order to try to get in contact with hisHoly Guardian Angel. The Crowleys spent the next few months travelling around China, but it was decided that in March 1906, they would return to Britain.[64]
Rose took Lilith with her and set off for Europe via India, whilst Crowley himself decided to travel back via the United States, where he hoped he would be able to get support for a second expedition to Kangchenjunga. Before departing, Crowley visited his friendElaine Simpson in Shanghai, a fellow occultist who had been his colleague in the Golden Dawn. She was fascinated by The Book of the Law and the prophetic message that it contained, something he had been ignoring, and together they performed a ritual to invoke Aiwass once more. The ritual proved successful, and Aiwass provided Crowley with the message that he should "Return to Egypt, with same surroundings. There I will give thee signs." Nonetheless, Crowley ignored the advice of Aiwass, instead heading off to America. Stopping off at the Japanese port ofKobe along the way, Crowley had a vision which he interpreted as meaning that the great spiritual beings known as theSecret Chiefs had admitted him into the Third Order of the Golden Dawn. Subsequently arriving in America, he found no support for his proposed mountaineering expedition, and so set sail to return to Britain, arriving there in June 1906.[65]
[edit] The A∴A∴ and the Holy Books of Thelema: 1907–1909
Upon arrival at Britain, Crowley learned that his daughter Lilith had died oftyphoid inRangoon and that his wife had begun suffering from alcoholism. Heartbroken, his health began to suffer, and he underwent a series of surgical operations. He began having a short-lived sexual affair with Vera "Lola" Stepp, an actress that he would devote some of his poetry to, whilst Rose gave birth to his second daughter, Lola Zaza,[66] for whom Crowley devised a special ritual of thanksgiving.[67]
"By the burning of the incense was the Word revealed, and by the distant drug.
O meal and honey and oil! O beautiful flag of the moon, that she hangs out in the centre of bliss!
These loosen the swathing of the corpse; these unbind the feet ofOsiris, so that the flaming God may rage through the firmament with his fantastic spear."
The opening lines of Liber VII (1907), the first of the Holy Book of Thelema to be revealed to Crowley after The Book of the Law.[68]
Believing that he was now amongst the highest level of spiritual adepts, Crowley began to think about founding his own magical society. In this he was supported by his friend and fellow occultistGeorge Cecil Jones. The pair began to practice rituals together at Jones' home inCoulsdon, and for theautumn equinox on 22 September 1907 developed a new ceremony based upon the Golden Dawn initiatory rite, for which Crowley composed a verse liturgy entitled "Liber 671", and later dubbed "Liber Pyramidos". The pair repeated this ritual again on 9 October, when they had made some alterations to it. In Crowley's eyes, this ritual would prove to be one of the "greatest events of his career" during which he "attained the knowledge and conversation of his holy guardian angel" and "entered the trance ofsamadhi, union withgodhead." He therefore finally succeeded with the aim of hisAbramelin operation - as set out in the grimoire known asThe Book of the Sacred Magic of Abramelin the Mage - which he had been working on for months.[69][70] Because of his spiritual attainment Crowley came to believe that he could finally enter into conversation with his Holy Guardian Angel, the entity known asAiwass, and as a result of this, on 30 October 1907 penned "Liber VII", a text that he believed to have been dictated to him by Aiwass throughautomatic writing. Following The Book of the Law, which had been received in 1904, "Liber VII" would prove to be the second book in a series ofHoly Books of Thelema. Over the next few days, he also received a further Holy Book, "Liber Cordis Cincti Serpente".[71]
Soon, Crowley, Jones andJ.F.C. Fuller decided to found a new magical order as a successor to the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, which would be known as theA∴A∴, the Argenteum Astrum or the Silver Star.[72] Following the order's foundation, Crowley continued to write down more received Thelemic Holy Books during the last two months of the year, including "Liber LXVI", "Liber Arcanorum", "Liber Porta Lucis, Sub Figura X", "Liber Tau", "Liber Trigrammaton" and "Liber DCCCXIII vel Ararita".[73] Meanwhile, effectively separated from his wife Rose by this point, Crowley entered into a romantic and sexual affair withAda Leverson (1862–1933), an author and friend ofOscar Wilde.[74] This affair was brief, and in February 1908, Crowley was reunited with his wife as she had overcome her alcoholism, and together the couple travelled toEastbourne for a holiday. Rose however relapsed and Crowley, who disliked her when drunk, fled to Paris.[75] In 1909, when doctors stated that Rose required institutionalisation for her alcoholism, Crowley finally decided that it was time to get a divorce, but because he didn't want the proceedings to reflect badly upon her, he agreed that she could divorce him for infidelity, thereby meaning that any bad appearances would instead be reflected upon him, and he remained her friend following the proceedings.[76]
Trying to gain more members for his A∴A∴, Crowley decided to begin publishing a biannual journal,The Equinox, which was billed as "The Review of Scientific Illuminism". Starting with a first issue in 1909, The Equinox containing pieces by Crowley, Fuller and a young poet Crowley had met in 1907 namedVictor Neuburg.[77] Soon other occultists had joined the order, including solicitor Richard Noel Warren, artistAustin Osman Spare, Horace Sheridan-Bickers, author George Raffalovich, Francis Henry Everard Joseph Fielding, engineer Herbert Edward Inman, Kenneth Ward andCharles Stansfeld Jones.[78]
[edit] Victor Neuburg and Algeria: 1910-1911
In 1907, Crowley had been introduced to a Jewish Londoner namedVictor Neuburg, a poet who was interested in the esoteric.[79]
In Paris during October 1908, he again produced Samadhi by the use of ritual and this time did so without hashish. He published an account of this success in order to show that his method worked and that one could achieve great mystical results without living as a hermit. On 30 December 1908, Aleister Crowley using the pseudonym Oliver Haddo made accusations of plagiarism againstSomerset Maugham, author of the novelThe Magician. Crowley's article appeared inVanity Fair, edited then byFrank Harris who admired Crowley and who would later write the famous workMy Life and Loves. Admittedly, Maugham did model the character of his magician Oliver Haddo after Crowley himself and Crowley confessed Maugham acquiesced privately on the question of plagiarism.[80]
In 1909, Aleister and Rose divorced, largely due to heralcoholism. She was subsequently admitted to anasylum suffering from alcoholic dementia. Meanwhile, Crowley soon moved on and took a woman namedLeila Waddell as his lover or "Scarlet Woman".[81] In 1910, Crowley performed his series of dramatic rites, theRites of Eleusis, withA∴A∴ membersLeila Waddell (Laylah) andVictor Benjamin Neuburg.
[edit] Ordo Templi Orientis: 1912–1913
Main article:Ordo Templi Orientis
According to Crowley,Theodor Reuss called on him in 1912 to accuse him of publishingO.T.O. secrets, which Crowley dismissed on the grounds of having never attained the grade in which these secrets were given (IXth Degree). Reuss opened up Crowley's latest book,The Book of Lies, and showed Crowley the passage. This sparked a long conversation which led to Crowley assuming the Xth Degree of O.T.O. and becoming Grand Master of the English-speaking section of O.T.O. called Mysteria Mystica Maxima.[82]
Crowley would eventually introduce the practice of male homosexualsex magick into O.T.O. as one of the highest degrees of the Order for he believed it to be the most powerful formula.[83] Crowley placed the new degree above the Tenth Degree – not to be confused with any titlein his own Order – and numbered it the Eleventh Degree.[84] There was a protest from some members of O.T.O. in Germany and the rest of continental Europe that occasioned a persistent rift with Crowley.[85]
In March 1913, producer Crowley introduced Leila Waddell in The Ragged Ragtime Girlsfolliesreview at the Old Tivoli in London where it enjoyed a brief run. In July 1913, the production enjoyed a six-week run in Moscow where Crowley met a young Hungarian girl named Anny Ringler. Crowley went on to practice sado-masochistic sex with Ringler. According to Crowley, "... She had passed beyond the region where pleasure had meaning for her. She could only feel through pain, and my own means of making her happy was to inflict physical cruelties as she directed. The kind of relation was altogether new to me; and it was because of this, intensified as it was by the environment of the self-torturing soul of Russia, that I became inspired to create by the next six weeks." While in Moscow, Crowley would see Anny for an hour and then he would write poetry. During this summer in Moscow, Crowley would write two of his most memorable works, the Hymn to Pan and theGnostic Mass or Ecclesiae Gnosticae Catholicae Canon Missae. The Hymn to Pan would be read at his funeral thirty four years later. Certain Thelemites regularly perform the Gnostic Mass to this day. It symbolizes the act of sex as a magical or religious ritual.[86]
Upon returning to London in the autumn of 1913, Crowley published the tenth and final number of volume one of The Equinox. In December 1913 in Paris, Crowley would engageVictor Benjamin Neuburg in The Paris Working. The first ritual took place on New Year's Eve 1914. In a period of seven weeks, Crowley and Neuburg performed a total of twenty four rituals which they recorded in the 'holy' or partially holy book formally entitled OpusLutetianum.[87] Around eight months later Neuburg had a nervous breakdown. Afterward, Crowley and Neuburg would never see each other again.[88]
[edit] United States: 1914–1918

Aleister Crowley’s rendition of theUnicursal Hexagram.
During his time in the U.S., Crowley practiced the task ofa Magister Templi in the A∴A∴ as he conceived it, namely interpreting every phenomenon as a particular dealing of "God" with his soul.[89] He began to see various women he met as officers in his ongoing initiation, associating them with priests wearing animal masks in Egyptian ritual.[90] A meditation during his relationship with one of these woman, the poetJeanne Robert Foster, led him to claim the title ofMagus, also referring to the system of the A∴A∴.
In June 1915, Crowley met Jeanne Robert Foster in the company of her friend Hellen Hollis, a journalist; Crowley would have affairs with both women. Foster was a famous New York fashion model, journalist, editor, poet and married. Crowley's plan with Foster was to produce his first son; but in spite of a series of magical operations she did not get pregnant. By the end of 1915, the affair would be over.[91] During a trip to Vancouver in 1915, Crowley met Wilfred Smith, Frater 132 of the Vancouver Lodge of O.T.O., and in 1930 granted him permission to establish Agape Lodge in Southern California.[92] During the same trip in 1915, Crowley stopped over atParke Davis in Detroit for somemescaline.[93]
In early 1916, Crowley had an illicit liaison with Alice Richardson, the wife ofAnanda Coomaraswamy, one of the greatest art historians of the day. On the stage, Richardson was known as Ratan Devi, mezzo-soprano interpreter of East Indian music. Richardson became pregnant but on a voyage back to England, in mid-1916, she had a miscarriage. Just before his affair with Ratan Devi, Crowley was practicing sex magick with Gerda Maria von Kothek, a German prostitute.[94]
Two periods of magical experimentation followed. In June 1916, he began the first of these at theNew Hampshire cottage ofEvangeline Adams, having ghostwritten most of her two books on astrology.[95] His diaries at first show discontent at the gap between his view of the grade of Magus and his view of himself: "It is no good making up my mind to do anything material; for I have no means. But this would vanish if I could make up my mind." Despite his objections to sacrificing a living animal, he resolved to crucify a frog as part of a rehearsal of the life of Jesus in the Gospels (afterward declaring it his willing familiar), "with the idea ... that some supreme violation of all the laws of my being would break down my Karma or dissolve the spell that seems to bind me."[96] Slightly more than a month later, having taken ether (ethyl oxide), he had a vision of the universe from a modern scientific cosmology that he frequently referred to in later writings.[97]
Crowley began another period of magical work on an island in theHudson River after buying large amounts of red paint instead of food. Having painted "Do what thou wilt" on the cliffs at both sides of the island, he received gifts from curious visitors. Here at the island he had visions of seeming past lives, though he refused to endorse any theory of what they meant beyond linking them to his unconscious. Towards the end of his stay, he had a shocking experience he linked to "the Chinese wisdom" which made even Thelema appear insignificant.[98] Nevertheless, he continued in his work. Before leaving the country he formed a sexual and magical relationship withLeah Hirsig, whom he had met earlier, and with her help began painting canvases with more creativity and passion.[99]
Richard B. Spence writes in his 2008 book Secret Agent 666: Aleister Crowley, British Intelligence and the Occult that Crowley could have been a lifelong agent forBritish Intelligence. While this may have already been the case during his many travels toTsarist Russia, Switzerland, Asia, Mexico andNorth Africa that had started in his student days, he could have been involved with this line of work during his life in America during theFirst World War, under a cover of being a German propaganda agent and a supporter ofIrish independence. Crowley's mission might have been to gather information about the German intelligence network, the Irish independent activists and produce aberrant propaganda, aiming at compromising the German and Irish ideals. As anagent provocateur he could have played some role in provoking the sinking of theRMS Lusitania, thereby bringing the United States closer to active involvement in the war alongside theAllies.[100] He also used German magazines The Fatherland and The International as outlets for his other writings. The question of whether Crowley was a spy has always been subject to debate, but Spence uncovered a document from theUS Army's oldMilitary Intelligence Division supporting Crowley's own claim to having been a spy:
Aleister Crowley was an employee of the British Government ... in this country on official business of which the British Consul, New York City has full cognizance.[101]
[edit] Abbey of Thelema: 1920–1923

Abbey of Thelema
Main article:Abbey of Thelema
Soon after moving from West 9th St. in Greenwich Village New York City with their newborn daughter Anne Leah nicknamed Poupée (born February 1920 and died in a hospital in Palermo 14 October 1920), Crowley, along withLeah Hirsig, founded theAbbey of Thelema inCefalù (Palermo),Sicily on 14 April 1920, the day the lease for the villa Santa Barbara was signed by Sir Alastor de Kerval (Crowley) and Contessa Lea Harcourt (Leah Hirsig). The Crowleys arrived in Cefalu on 1 April 1920.[102] During their stay at the abbey Hirsig was known as Soror Alostrael, Crowley's Scarlet Woman, the name Crowley used for his female sex magick practitioners in reference to the consort of the Beast of the Apocalypse whose number is 666.[103] The name of the abbey was borrowed fromRabelais's satireGargantua,[104] where the "Abbey of Thélème" is described as a sort of anti-monastery where the lives of the inhabitants were "spent not in laws, statutes, or rules, but according to their own free will and pleasure."[105] This idealisticutopia was to be the model of Crowley'scommune, while also being a type of magical school, giving it the designation "Collegium ad Spiritum Sanctum," The College of the Holy Spirit. The general programme was in line with the A∴A∴ course of training, and included daily adorations to the Sun, a study of Crowley's writings, regular yogic and ritual practices (which were to be recorded), as well as general domestic labour. The object, naturally, was for students to devote themselves to theGreat Work of discovering and manifesting theirTrue Wills. Two women, Hirsig and Shumway (her magical name was Sister Cypris after Aphrodite), were both carrying Crowley's seed. Hirsig had a two-year old son named Hansi and Shumway had a three-year old boy named Howard; they were not Crowley's but he nicknamed them Dionysus and Hermes respectively. After Poupée died, Hirsig had a miscarriage but Shumway gave birth to a daughter, Astarte Lulu Panthea. Hirsig suspected Shumway's Black Magic foul play and what Crowley found when reading Shumway's magical diary (everybody had to keep one while at the abbey for reasons explained in Liber E) appalled him. Shumway was banished from the abbey and the Beast lamented the death of his children. However, Shumway was soon back in the abbey again to take care of her offspring.[106]
Mussolini's Fascist government expelled Crowley from the country at the end of April 1923.
[edit] After the Abbey: 1923–1947
In February 1924, Crowley visitedGurdjieff'sInstitute for the Harmonious Development of Man. He did not meet the founder on that occasion, but called Gurdjieff a "tip-top man" in his diary.[107] Crowley privately criticized some of the Institute's practices and teachings, but doubted that what he heard from disciple Pindar reflected the master's true position. Some claim that on a later visit he met Gurdjieff—who firmly repudiated Crowley.[108] Biographer Sutin expresses skepticism,[109] and Gurdjieff's student C.S. Nott tells a different version. Nott perceives Crowley as a black or at least ignorant magician and says his teacher "kept a sharp watch" on the visitor, but mentions no open confrontation.[110]

Aleister Crowley andFernando Pessoa in Lisbon, September 1930.
On 16 August 1929, Crowley married Maria de Miramar, aNicaraguan, while inLeipzig. They separated by 1930, but they were never divorced.[111] In July 1931, de Miramar was admitted to the Colney Hatch Mental Hospital inNew Southgate where she remained until her death thirty years later.[112]
In September 1930 Crowley was inLisbon to meet the poetFernando Pessoa, who translated intoPortuguese his poem "Hymn To Pan". With the assistance ofPessoa, he faked his own death at a notorious rock formation on the shore calledBoca do Inferno (Mouth of Hell). In fact Crowley left the country and enjoyed the newspaper reports of his death – reappearing three weeks later at an exhibition in Berlin.[113]
In 1934, Crowley was declaredbankrupt after losing a court case in which he sued the artistNina Hamnett for calling him a black magician in her 1932 book, Laughing Torso. In addressing the jury, Mr. Justice Swift said:
I have been over forty years engaged in the administration of the law in one capacity or another. I thought that I knew of every conceivable form of wickedness. I thought that everything which was vicious and bad had been produced at one time or another before me. I have learnt in this case that we can always learn something more if we live long enough. I have never heard such dreadful, horrible, blasphemous and abominable stuff as that which has been produced by the man (Crowley) who describes himself to you as the greatest living poet.
—Mr. Justice Swift
However, Patricia "Deirdre" MacAlpine approached Crowley on the day of the verdict and offered to bear him a child, whom he named Aleister Atatürk. She sought no mystical or religious role in Crowley's life and rarely saw him after the birth, "an arrangement that suited them both."[114]
In March 1939,Dion Fortune and Aleister Crowley met publicly for the first time. Fortune had already used Crowley as a model for the black magician Hugo Astley in her 1935 novel The Winged Bull.[115]
DuringWorld War II,Ian Fleming and others proposed a disinformation plot in which Crowley would have helped anMI5 agent supplyNazi officialRudolf Hess with faked horoscopes. They could then pass along false information about an alleged pro-German circle in Britain. The government abandoned this plan when Hess flew to Scotland, crashing his plane on the moors nearEaglesham, and was captured. Fleming then suggested using Crowley as an interrogator to determine the influence of astrology on other Nazi leaders, but his superiors rejected this plan. At some point, Fleming also suggested that Britain could useEnochian as a code in order to plant evidence.[116] It is claimed that Ian Fleming was also Crowley's controller when it came to information and dis-information sent to Germany during the war, in that Crowley was a German agent who was turned into a double agent for Britain, controlled by Ian Fleming (the future creator ofJames Bond).
On 21 March 1944, Crowley undertook what he considered his crowning achievement, the publication ofThe Book of Thoth, limited to 200 numbered and signed copies bound in Morocco leather and printed on pre-wartime paper. Crowley sold ?1,500 worth of the edition in less than three months.[117]
In April 1944, Crowley moved from 93 Jermyn St. to Bell Inn at Aston Clinton, Bucks. Daphne Harris was the landlady.[118]
[edit] Death

An older Aleister Crowley
In January 1945, Crowley moved to Netherwood, aHastings boarding house where in the first three months he was visited twice by Dion Fortune; she died ofleukemia in January 1946. On 14 March 1945, in a letter Fortune wrote to Crowley, she declares: "... The acknowledgement I made in the introduction of The Mystical Qabalah of my indebtness to your work, which seemed to me to be no more than common literary honesty, has been used as a rod for my back by people who look on you as Antichrist."[119]
Crowley died at Netherwood on 1 December 1947 at the age of 72. According to one biographer the cause of death was arespiratory infection.[120] He had become addicted to heroin after being prescribed morphine for hisasthma andbronchitis many years earlier.[121] He and his last doctor died within 24 hours of each other; newspapers would claim, in differing accounts, that Dr. Thomson had refused to continue hisopiate prescription and that Crowley had put a curse on him.[122]
Biographer Lawrence Sutin passes on various stories about Crowley's death and last words.Frieda Harris supposedly reported him saying, "I am perplexed," though she did not see him at the very end. According toJohn Symonds, a Mr. Rowe witnessed Crowley's death along with a nurse, and reported his last words as "Sometimes I hate myself." BiographerGerald Suster accepted the version of events he received from a "Mr W.H." who worked at the house, in which Crowley dies pacing in his living room.[120] Supposedly Mr W.H. heard a crash while polishing furniture on the floor below, and entered Crowley's rooms to find him dead on the floor.
Patricia "Deirdre" MacAlpine, who visited Crowley with their son and her three other children, denied all this and reports a sudden gust of wind and peal of thunder at the (otherwise quiet) moment of his death. According to MacAlpine, Crowley remained bedridden for the last few days of his life, but was in light spirits and conversational. Readings at the cremation service in nearbyBrighton included one of his own works, Hymn to Pan, and newspapers referred to the service as ablack mass. The Brighton council subsequently resolved to take all the necessary steps to prevent such an incident from occurring again.[120]
[edit] Beliefs and viewpoints
[edit] Thelema
Thelema
Category:Thelema
Core topics
The Book of the Law
Aleister Crowley
True Will ·93
Magick
Mysticism
Thelemic mysticism
The Great Work
Holy Guardian Angel
The Gnostic Mass
Thelemic texts
Works of Crowley
The Holy Books
Thelemite texts
Organizations
A∴A∴ ·EGC ·OTO
OSOGD ·TO
Deities
Nuit ·Hadit ·Horus
Babalon ·Chaos
Baphomet ·Choronzon
Ankh-f-n-khonsu
Aiwass ·Ma'at
Other topics
Stele of Revealing
Abrahadabra
Unicursal Hexagram
Abramelin oil
Thoth tarot deck
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Main articles:Thelema andThelemic mysticism
Thelema is the mysticalcosmology Crowley announced in 1904 and expanded upon for the remainder of his life. The diversity of his writings illustrate his difficulty in classifying Thelema from any one vantage. It can be considered a form of magicalphilosophy, religioustraditionalism,humanisticpositivism, and/or an elitistmeritocracy.
The chiefprecept of Thelema, derived from the works ofFrançois Rabelais, is the sovereignty of Will: "Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law." Crowley's idea of will, however, is not simply the individual's desires or wishes, but also incorporates a sense of the person's destiny or greater purpose: what he termed "True Will".
The second precept of Thelema is "Love is the law, love under will"—and Crowley's meaning of "Love" is as complex as that of "Will." It is frequently sexual: Crowley's system, like elements of theGolden Dawn before him, sees the dichotomy and tension between the male and female as fundamental to existence, and sexual "magick" and metaphor form a significant part of Thelemic ritual. However, Love is also discussed as the Union of Opposites, which Crowley thought was the key toenlightenment.
[edit] Freemasonry
He had also claimed to be aFreemason,[123] but the organizations he joined are not consideredregular by Masonic bodies in the Anglo-American tradition.[124]
Crowley claimed the following Masonic degrees:
33° of the Scottish Rite in Mexico from Don Jesus Medina.
“Don Jesus Medina, a descendant of the great duke of Armada fame, and one of the highest chiefs of Scottish Rite free-masonry. My cabbalistic knowledge being already profound by current standards, he thought me worthy of the highest initiation in his power to confer; special powers were obtained in view of my limited sojourn, and I was pushed rapidly through and admitted to the thirty-third and last degree before I left the country.”The Confessions of Aleister Crowley pp. 202–203.
3° In France by the Anglo-Saxon Lodge No. 343, a Lodge chartered in 1899 by the Grande Loge de France, a body not at the time recognized by the United Grand Lodge of England, on 29 June 1904.
33° of the irregular 'Cerneau' Scottish Rite from John Yarker
90°/95° of the Rite of Memphis/Misraim from John Yarker.
TheUnited Grand Lodge of England, whose recognition is generally considered the standard for Masonic validity, did not recognize any of the above bodies as being true Freemasonry, thus Crowley never was an “official” Freemason within the common understanding of the term.
Crowley quickly realized that the post-Yarker era meant change. He was not rebellious by reflex, at least where old British institutions were concerned. He undoubtedly believedO.T.O. had authority from Yarker to work the Ancient and Primitive Rite's equivalent to the Craft degrees in England, but once made aware of the issue of regularity when having his own French Masonic credentials declined, he was not defiant and on his own made changes to theO.T.O. to avoid conflict. He inserted notices into the last number of The Equinox to the effect that theO.T.O. did not infringe upon the just privileges of theGrand Lodge Of England
During WWI Crowley worked slightly revised English Craft rituals in America, but despite the absence of a central Grand Lodge, he met with objections from masonic authorities. He then rewrote theO.T.O. rituals for I° – III° so that they no longer resembled Craft masonry degrees in language, theme or intent.[125]
[edit] Science and Magic
Crowley endeavored to use thescientific method to study what people at the time called spiritual experiences, making "The Method of Science, the Aim of Religion" the catchphrase of his magazine The Equinox. By this he meant that religious experiences should not be taken atface value, but critiqued and experimented with in order to arrive at their underlying mystical or neurological meaning.
In this connection there was also the point that I was anxious to prove that spiritual progress did not depend on religious or moral codes, but was like any other science. Magick would yield its secrets to the infidel and thelibertine, just as one does not have to be a churchwarden in order to discover a new kind of orchid. There are, of course, certain virtues necessary to the Magician; but they are of the same order as those which make a successful chemist.[126]
He frequently expressed views about sex that were radical for his time, and published numerous poems and tracts combining religious themes with sexual imagery both heterosexual and homosexual, as well aspederastic. One of his most notorious poetry collections, titled "White Stains" (1898), was published inAmsterdam in 1898 and dealt specifically with sexually explicit subject matter. However, most of the hundred copies printed for the initial release were later seized and destroyed by British customs.[127]
Crowley's magical and initiatory system has amongst its innermost reaches a set of teachings on sex magick.Sex magick is the use of the sex act—or the energies, passions or arousal states it evokes—as a point upon which to focus the will or magical desire for effects in the non-sexual world. In the view ofAllen Greenfield,[128] Crowley was inspired byPaschal Beverly Randolph, an AmericanAbolitionist,Spiritualist medium, and author of the mid-19th century who wrote (in Eulis!, 1874) of using the "nuptive moment" (orgasm) as the time to make a "prayer" for events to occur.
Crowley often introduced new terminology for spiritual and magickal practices and theory. InThe Book of the Law andThe Vision and the Voice, the Aramaic magickal formulaAbracadabra was changed toAbrahadabra, which he called the new formula of theAeon. He also famously spelledmagic in the archaic manner, asmagick, to differentiate "the true science of the Magi from all its counterfeits."[129]
He urged his students to learn to control their own mental and behavioural habits, to the point of switching political views and personalities at will. For control of speech (symbolised as theunicorn) he recommended to choose a commonly used word, letter, or pronouns and adjectives of the first person (such as the word "I"), and avoid using it for a week or more. Should they say the word he instructed them to cut themselves with a blade on each occasion to serve as warning or reminder. Later the student could move on to the "Horse" of action and the "Ox" of thought.[130] (These symbols derive from the cabala of Crowley's book 777.) Crowley has also been labeled by someanthropologists as a practitioner ofneoshamanism and revivalist ofshamanistic philosophies in the early 20th century.[131]
[edit] Controversy
Crowley enjoyed being a figure of controversy and frequently deliberately provoked it among his peers and in the media. Author and Crowley expertLon Milo Duquette wrote in his 1993 work The Magick of Aleister Crowley that:
"Crowley clothed many of his teachings in the thin veil of sensational titillation. By doing so he assured himself that one, his works would only be appreciated by the few individuals capable of doing so, and two, his works would continue to generate interest and be published by and for the benefit of both his admirers and his enemies long after death. He did not—I repeat not—perform or advocate human sacrifice. He was often guilty, however, of the crime of poor judgment. Like all of us, Crowley had many flaws and shortcomings. The greatest of those, in my opinion, was his inability to understand that everyone else in the world was not as educated and clever as he. It is clear, even in his earliest works, he often took fiendish delight in terrifying those who were either too lazy, too bigoted, or too slow-witted to understand him."[132]

Leila Waddell (Laylah), Crowley's muse during the writing ofThe Book of Lies
In this vein many of Crowley's more audacious and outright shocking writings were often thinly veiled attempts to communicate methods ofsexual magick, often using words like "blood", "death" and "kill" to replace "semen", "ecstasy" and "ejaculation" in the yet puritanical sexual environment of late 19th/early 20th century England. Take for instance the highly repeated quote from his thickly veiledBook Four: "It would be unwise to condemn as irrational the practice of devouring the heart and liver of an adversary while yet warm. For the highestspiritual working one must choose that victim which contains the greatest and purest force; a male child of perfect innocence and high intelligence is the most satisfactory."[133] AuthorRobert Anton Wilson, in his 1977 The Final Secret of the Illuminati (akaCosmic Trigger Volume One), interpreted the child as a reference to genes in sperm. Crowley added in a footnote to the text on sacrifice, "the intelligence and innocence of that male child are the perfect understanding of the Magician, his one aim, without lust of result."
In the "New Comment" toThe Book of the Law, "the Beast 666 adviseth that all children shall be accustomed from infancy to witness every type of sexual act, as also the process of birth, lest falsehood fog, and mystery stupefy, their minds ... Politeness has forbidden any direct reference to the subject of sex to secure no happier result than to allowSigmund Freud and others to prove that our every thought, speech, and gesture, conscious or unconscious, is an indirect reference!"
[edit] Spiritual and recreational use of drugs
Crowley was a habitual drug user and also maintained a meticulous record of his drug-induced experiences withopium,cocaine,hashish,cannabis,alcohol,ether,mescaline, morphine, andheroin.[134]Allan Bennett, Crowley's mentor, was said to have "instructed Crowley in the magical use of drugs."[135]
The Cairo revelation from Aiwass/Aiwaz specifically recommended indulgence in "strange drugs". While in Paris during the 1920s, Crowley experimented with psychedelic substances, specificallyAnhalonium lewinii, an obsolete scientific name for themescaline-bearing cactuspeyote and initiated the writersKatherine Mansfield andTheodore Dreiser in its use.[136] In October 1930, Crowley dined withAldous Huxley in Berlin, and to this day rumours persist that he introduced Huxley to peyote on that occasion.[137]
[edit] Other drug use
Crowley developed adrug addiction after a London doctor prescribed heroin for his asthma and bronchitis.[138] His life as an addict influenced his 1922 novel,Diary of a Drug Fiend, but the fiction presented a hopeful outcome of rehabilitation and recovery by means of magical techniques and the exercise of True Will. He overcame his addiction to heroin during this period (chronicled in Liber XVIII - The Fountain of Hyacinth) but began taking it once more late in his life, again on doctor's prescription for his respiratory difficulties.[139]
[edit] Racism
Biographer Lawrence Sutin stated that "blatant bigotry is a persistent minor element in Crowley's writings."[140] He also calls Crowley "a spoiled scion of a wealthy Victorian family who embodied many of the worstJohn Bull racial and social prejudices of his upper-class contemporaries,"[141] noting that, "Crowley embodied the contradiction that writhed within many Western intellectuals of the time: deeply held racist viewpoints courtesy of their culture, coupled with a fascination with people of colour."[142]
Crowley's published expressions ofantisemitism were disturbing enough to later editors of his works that one of them,Israel Regardie, who had also been a student of Crowley, attempted to suppress them. In777 and Other Qabalistic Writings of Aleister Crowley (Samuel Weiser, 1975), Regardie, who was Jewish, explained his complete removal of Crowley's antisemitic commentary on theKabbalah in the sixth unnumbered page of his editorial introduction: "I am ... omitting Crowley's Preface to the book. It is a nasty, malicious piece of writing, and does not do justice to the system with which he is dealing."[143] What Regardie had removed was Crowley's "Preface to Sepher Sephiroth", originally published in Equinox 1:8. Written in 1911,[144] which contained a statement of Crowley's belief in theblood libel against the Jews:[145]
Human sacrifices are today still practised by the Jews of Eastern Europe, as is set forth at length bySir Richard Burton in the MS. which the wealthy Jews of England have compassed heaven and earth to suppress,[146] and evidenced by the ever-recurringPogroms against which so senseless an outcry is made by those who live among those degenerate Jews who are at least not cannibals.
Crowley rhetorically asked how a system of value such as Qabala could come from what "the general position of the ethnologist" called "an entirely barbarous race, devoid of any spiritual pursuit," and "polytheists" to boot.[145] As Crowley himself practiced polytheism, some read these remarks as deliberate irony.[147]
Crowley repeated his claim that Jews in Eastern Europe practice ritual child-murder in at least one later work as well, namely the section on mysticism in Book Four or Magick. Here he uses quotation marks for "ritual murder" and for "Christian" children.[148]
An article at The Cauldron: A Pagan Forum makes the following claim while speaking of the previously mentioned remark[133] elsewhere in Magick:
At first glance Crowley seems to be advocating an atrocity, the sacrifice of a child, the bugaboo of witchhunters and anti-Semites everywhere. But in fact he is claiming that the historical legend of child sacrifice, used to persecute so many "witches" and Jews, veils a sexual formula of self-sacrifice. In a secret document of theIX*, the "blood libel" against the Jews – the story that they celebrate covert rituals employing the blood of sacrificed children – is taken as a statement that certain sects of theHassidim possess this secret. The early Christians were accused of such practices by the Roman establishment, and theGnostic Catholic Church considers this to be evidence of a continuity of the sexual secret from the Gnostics.[149]
Crowley studied and promoted the mystical and magical teachings of some of the same ethnic groups he attacked, in particular Indianyoga, JewishKabbalah andgoetia, and the ChineseI Ching. Also, inConfessions Chapter 86,[150] as well as a private diary which Lawrence Sutin quotes in Do What Thou Wilt chapter 7, Crowley recorded a memory of a "past life" as the Chinese Taoist writer Ko Hsuan. In another remembered life, Crowley said, he took part in a "Council of Masters" that included many from Asia. He has this to say about the virtues of "Eurasians" and then Jews:
I do not believe that their universally admitted baseness is due to a mixture of blood or the presumable peculiarity of their parents; but that they are forced into vileness by the attitude of both their white and coloured neighbours. A similar case is presented by the Jew, who really does only too often possess the bad qualities for which he is disliked; but they are not proper to his race. No people can show finer specimens of humanity. The Hebrew poets and prophets are sublime. The Jewish soldier is courageous, the Jewish rich man generous. The race possesses imagination, romance, loyalty, probity and humanity in an exceptional degree.
But the Jew has been persecuted so relentlessly that his survival has depended on the development of his worst qualities; avarice, servility, falseness, cunning and the rest. Even the highest-class Eurasians such asAnanda Koomaraswamy suffer acutely from the shame of being considered outcast. The irrationality and injustice of their neighbours heightens the feeling and it breeds the very abominations which the snobbish inhumanity of their fellow-men expects of them.[151]
All these remarks must necessarily be contrasted with Crowley's explicit philosophical instructions in his last book Magick Without Tears. Chapter 73, which is titled "'Monsters', Niggers, Jews, etc," and which states his essentially individualistic and anti-racialist views:
... you say, "Every man and every woman is a star." does need some attention to the definition of "man" and "woman." What is the position, you say, of "monsters"? And men of "inferior" races, like theVeddah,Hottentot and the AustralianBlackfellow? There must be a line somewhere, and will I please draw it? ... Not only does it seem to me the only conceivable way of reconciling this and similar passages with "Every man and every woman is a star." to assert the sovereignty of the individual, and to deny the right-to-exist to "class-consciousness," "crowd-psychology," and so to mob-rule and Lynch-Law, but also the only practicable plan whereby we may each one of us settle down peaceably to mind his own business, to pursue his True Will, and to accomplish the Great Work.
The "Thelemic" philosophical position which he taught in this volume (which is a series of letters of direct personal instruction to a student of Magick) is clearly an anti-racist one. Even in private comments onMein Kampf, Crowley said that his own preferred "master class" was above all distinctions of race.[152]
[edit] Views on Women
BiographerLawrence Sutin stated that Crowley "largely accepted the notion, implicitly embodied in Victorian sexology, of women as secondary social beings in terms of intellect and sensibility."[153] Occult scholar Tim Maroney compared him to other figures and movements of the time and suggests that some others might have shown more respect for women.[154] Another biographer, Martin Booth, while describing Crowley's misogyny, asserts that in other ways he was pro-feminist who thought women were badly served by the law. He considered abortion to be tantamount to murder and thought little of a society that condoned it, believing that women, when left to choose outside of prevailing social influences, would never want to end a pregnancy.[155]
Crowley stated that women, except "a few rare individuals," care most about having children and will conspire against their husbands if they lack children to whom to devote themselves.[156] In Confessions, Crowley says he learned this from his first marriage.[157] He claimed that their intentions were to force a man to abandon his life's work for their interests. He found women "tolerable", he wrote, only when they served the sole role of helping a man in his life's work. However, he said that they were incapable of actually understanding the nature of this work itself.[158] He also claimed that women did not have individuality and were solely guided by their habits orimpulses.[159] In this respect Crowley displayed the attitude to women conventional for a male of his time.
Nevertheless, when he sought what he called the supreme magical-mystical attainment, Crowley askedLeah Hirsig to direct his ordeals, marking the first time since the schism in the Golden Dawn that another person verifiably took charge of his initiation.[160] In theHierophant section ofThe Book of Thoth, Crowley interprets a verse fromThe Book of the Law that speaks of "the woman girt with a sword; she represents the Scarlet Woman in the hierarchy of the new Aeon.(...)This woman representsVenus as she now is in this new aeon; no longer the mere vehicle of her male counterpart, but armed and militant."
In his Commentaries on The Book of the Law Crowley stated what he considered to be the correct Thelemic position towards women:
We of Thelema say that "Every man and every woman is a star." We do not fool and flatter women; we do not despise and abuse them. To us, a woman is herself, absolute, original, independent, free, self-justified, exactly as a man is.[161]
[edit] Writings
Main article:Works of Aleister Crowley

Crowley wrote in a wide variety of genres: here are copies of his novelMoonchild (1917) and his list of magical correspondences, 777 (1909).
Aleister Crowley was a highly prolific writer, who published works on a wide variety of topics, including his religion of Thelema, mysticism, ceremonial magic, as well as non-occult topics like politics, philosophy and culture. Widely seen as his most important work wasThe Book of the Law (1904), the central text of the Thelemite religion, although he claimed that he himself was not its writer, but merely its scribe for the angelic beingAiwass. This was just one of many books that he believed that he had channelled from a spiritual being, which collectively came to be termedThe Holy Books of Thelema.[162]
He also wrote books on ceremonial magick, namelyMagick (Book 4) (1912),The Vision and the Voice and777 and other Qabalistic writings, and edited a copy of thegrimoire known asThe Goetia: The Lesser Key of Solomon the King. Another of his important works was a book onmysticism,The Book of Lies (1912), whilst another was a collection of different essays entitledLittle Essays Toward Truth (1938). He also penned anautobiography, entitledThe Confessions of Aleister Crowley (1929). Throughout his lifetime he wrote many letters and meticulously kept diaries, some of which were posthumously published asMagick Without Tears. During his lifetime he also edited and produced a series of publications in book form calledThe Equinox (subtitled "The Review of Scientific Illuminism"), which served as the voice of his magical order, theA∴A∴. Although the entire set is influential and remains one of the definitive works onoccultism, some of the more notable issues are "The Blue Equinox", "The Equinox of the Gods", "Eight Lectures on Yoga", "The Book of Thoth" and "Liber Aleph".
Crowley also wrote fiction, including plays and later novels, most of which have not received significant notice outside of occult circles. His most notable fictional works includeMoonchild (1917),Diary of a Drug Fiend (1922) andThe Stratagem and other Stories (1929). He also self-published much of his poetry, including the eroticWhite Stains (1898) andClouds without Water (1909), although perhaps his best known poem was his ode to the ancient godPan, Hymn to Pan (1929).[163] The influence of Crowley's poetry can be seen through the fact that three of his compositions, "The Quest",[164] "The Neophyte",[165] and "The Rose and the Cross",[166] were included in the 1917 collectionThe Oxford Book of English Mystical Verse, howeverThe Oxford Companion to English Literature entry on him describes him as a "bad but prolific poet".[167]
[edit] Legacy and influence
Crowley has remained an influential figure, both amongst occultists and inpopular culture, particularly that of Britain, but also of other parts of the world.
[edit] Occult
After Crowley's death, various of his colleagues and fellow Thelemites continued with his work. One of his British disciples,Kenneth Grant, subsequently founded theTyphonian O.T.O. in the 1950s. In America, his followers also continued, one of the most prominent of whom wasJack Parsons, the influential rocket scientist. Parsons performed what he described as theBabalon Working in 1946, and subsequently claimed to have been taught the fourth part of the Book of the Law. Parsons would also later work with and influenceL. Ron Hubbard, the later founder ofScientology.
Crowley inspired and influenced a number of laterMalvernians including Major-GeneralJohn Fuller, the inventor of artificial moonlight, andCecil Williamson, the neo-pagan witch.
One of Crowley's acquaintances in the last months of his life wasGerald Gardner, who was initiated into O.T.O. by Crowley and subsequently went on to found theNeopagan religion ofWicca. Various scholars on early Wiccan history, such asRonald Hutton,Philip Heselton andLeo Ruickbie concur that witchcraft's early rituals, as devised by Gardner, contained much from Crowley's writings such as theGnostic Mass. The third degree initiation ceremony in Gardnerian Wicca (including theGreat Rite) is derived almost completely from the Gnostic Mass.[168] Indeed, Gardner liked Crowley's writings because he believed that they "breathed the very spirit ofpaganism."[citation needed]
Crowley was also an influence on both the late1960's counterculture and theNew Age movement.
[edit] Popular culture
Fictionalised accounts of Crowley or characters based upon him have been included in a number of literary works, published both during his life and after. The writerW. Somerset Maugham used him as the model for the character in his novelThe Magician, published in 1908.[49] Crowley was flattered by Maugham's fictionalised depiction of himself, stating that "he had done more than justice to the qualities of which I was proud... The Magician was, in fact, an appreciation of my genius such as I had never dreamed of inspiring."[169] Similarly, inDennis Wheatley's popular thrillerThe Devil Rides Out, the Satanic cult leader Mocata is inspired by Crowley, and in turn the deceased Satanist Adrian Marcato referred to inIra Levin'sRosemary's Baby is likewise a Crowley-like figure. Long after his death Crowley was still being used for similar purposes, appearing as a main character inRobert Anton Wilson's 1981 novelMasks of the Illuminati. Additionally, the acclaimedcomic book authorAlan Moore, himself a practitioner ofceremonial magic, has also included Crowley in several of his works. In Moore'sFrom Hell, he appears in a cameo as a young boy declaring that magic is real, whilst in the seriesPromethea he appears several times existing in a realm of the imagination called the Immateria. Moore has also discussed Crowley's associations with theHighbury area of London in his recorded magical working, The Highbury Working.[170] Other comic book writers have also made use of him, withPat Mills andOlivier Ledroit portraying him as a reincarnatedvampire in their seriesRequiem Chevalier Vampire. Crowley also is referenced in theBatman comicArkham Asylum: A Serious House on Serious Earth where the characterAmadeus Arkham meets with him, discuss the symbolism of Egyptian tarot, and they play chess. He has also appeared in Japanese media, such asD.Gray-Man andToaru Majutsu no Index, as well as thehentai seriesBible Black, where he has a fictional daughter named Jody Crowley who continues her father's search for theScarlet Woman. He is also depicted in the Original PlayStation gameNightmare Creatures as a powerful demonic resurrection of himself.[171]
Crowley has been an influence for a string of popular musicians throughout the 20th century. The hugely popular bandThe Beatles included him as one ofthe many figures on the cover sleeve of their 1967 albumSgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, where he is situated betweenSri Yukteswar Giri andMae West. A more intent interest in Crowley was held byJimmy Page, the guitarist and co-founder of 1970s rock bandLed Zeppelin. Despite not describing himself as a Thelemite or being a member of the Ordo Templi Orientis, Page was still fascinated by Crowley, and owned some of his clothing, manuscripts and ritual objects, and during the 1970s boughtBoleskine House, which also appears in the band's movieThe Song Remains the Same. The later rock musicianOzzy Osbourne released a song titled "Mr. Crowley" on his solo albumBlizzard of Ozz, whilst a comparison of Crowley and Osbourne in the context of their media portrayals can be found in the Journal of Religion and Popular Culture.[172] Crowley has also been a favorite of Swiss Avant-Garde metal band Celtic Frost. In fact, the songOs Abysmi Vel Daath from Monotheist is based partially on some of his writings.
Crowley has also had an influence incinema; in particular, he was a major influence and inspiration to the work on the radicalavant garde underground film-makerKenneth Anger, especially his Magick Lantern Cycle series of works. One of Anger's works is a film of Crowley's paintings,[173] and in 2009 he gave a lecture on the subject of Crowley.[174]Bruce Dickinson, singer withIron Maiden, wrote the screenplay ofChemical Wedding (released in America on DVD as Crowley),[175] which featuresSimon Callow as Oliver Haddo, the name taken from the Magician-villain character in theSomerset Maugham book "The Magician", who was in turn inspired by Maugham's meeting with Crowley[176]
The Italian historian of esotericismGiordano Berti, in his book Tarocchi di Aleister Crowley (1998) quotes a number of literary works and films inspired by Crowley's life and legends. Some of the films are The Magician (1926) byRex Ingram, based upon the eponymous book written byWilliam Somerset Maugham (1908);Night of the Demon (1957) byJacques Tourneur, based on the story "Casting the Runes" byM. R. James; and The Devils Rides Out (1968) byTerence Fisher, from the eponymous thriller byDennis Wheatley. Also: "Dance To The Music of Time" byAnthony Powell, "Black Easter" byJames Blish, and "The Winged Bull" byDion Fortune.[177]
His name was used for two characters in American horror/adventure/fantasy series,Supernatural, one being the self-proclaimed 'King of the Crossroads' Crowley, originally a Scotsman, and Alistair, the demon who tormentedDean Winchester whilst Dean was inHell.
Aleister Crowley is also referenced in the Canadian-produced comedy/horror TV seriesTodd and the Book of Pure Evil. Todd, Curtis, Jenny, and Hannah are students at Crowley High, the only high school in a small town secretly founded by Satanists.
[edit] References
Footnotes
^Symonds 1997, p. vii.
^Kaczynski 2010, p. Acknowledgments.
^Sutin 2000. p. 207.
^Sutin 2000. p. 15.
^Kaczynski 2010. p. 14.
^Kaczynski 2010. pp. 04-08.
^Sutin 2000. pp. 18-21.
^Sutin 2000. pp. 17-23.
^Kaczynski 2010. pp. 11-12, 16.
^Kaczynski 2010. p. 19.
^ Crowley, quoted inSutin 2000. p. 21.
^Sutin 2000. pp. 27-32.
^Sutin 2000. pp. 32-33.
^Kaczynski 2010. p. 27.
^Sutin 2000. pp. 25-26.
^Kaczynski 2010. p. 23.
^Kaczynski 2010. pp. 24, 27.
^Crowley 1989. p. .
^Crowley 1989. p. 108.
^Booth 2000. p. 49.
^Symonds 1997, p. 13.
^Symonds 1997, pp. 14–15.
^Symonds 1997, p. 15.
^Sutin 2000, p. 46.
^Crowley 1929, p. 140.
^Sutin 2000. pp. 36-37.
^Booth 2000. p. 5.
^Sutin 2000. pp. 41-47.
^ Crowley, quoted inSutin 2000. p. 47.
^Symonds 1997, p. 14.
^Sutin 2000, p. 38.
^ The Magical Diaries of Aleister Crowley (Tunisia 1923): Edited by Stephen Skinner; page 10
^Sutin 2000, pp. 37–39.
^Sutin 2000, pp. 35–36.
^Sutin 2000. p. 52-55.
^Sutin 2000. pp. 64-66.
^ IAO131Thelema & Buddhism in Journal of Thelemic Studies, Vol. 1, No. 1, Autumn 2007, pp. 18–32.Archived 2009-10-25.
^Symonds 1997. p. 29.
^Sutin 2000. pp. 73-75.
^Sutin 2000. pp. 76-79.
^Symonds 1997. p. 37.
^ Owen, Alex (2004). The Place of Enchantment: British Occultism and the Culture of the Modern. University of Chicago Press. p. 62.ISBN 0226642017.
^Colquhoun, Ithell (1975).The Sword of Wisdom: MacGregor Mathers and the Golden Dawn. New York: G.P.Putham's Sons. pp. 231–233.ISBN 0854350926.http://www.kheper.net/topics/Hermeticism/Waite.html. Retrieved 2010-11-15.
^Kaczynski 2010. pp. 83-89.
^Sutin 2000. pp. 84-85.
^Kaczynski 2010. pp. 93-98.
^Kaczynski 2010. pp. 98-108.
^Kaczynski 2010. pp. 119-123.
^ab Curtis, Anthony; Whitehead, John (1987). W. Somerset Maugham: the critical heritage. Routledge. p. 44.ISBN 0710096401. "... in Paris in 1905... At that time he got to know Aleister Crowley,..."
^Kaczynski 2010. p. 112.
^Kaczynski 2010. p. 124.
^Kaczynski 2010. pp. 124-126.
^Symonds 1997. pp. 65–66
^ Wilson, R. A. with Miriam Joan Hill, Everything is Under Control: Conspiracies, cults and cover-ups, HarperPerennial 1998.ISBN 0-06-273417-2. Kenneth Grant vsIsrael Regardie p. 134. Grant's alien claim "widely shared in occult circles," p. 212.
^ Crowley (2004:7–9)
^Kaczynski 2010. pp. 127-129.
^Kaczynski 2010. p. 129.
^Kaczynski 2010. p. 130.
^Kaczynski 2010. p. 132.
^Kaczynski 2010. pp. 131-133.
^Kaczynski 2010. pp. 136-137, 139, 168-169.
^Kaczynski 2010. pp. 138-149.
^Kaczynski 2010. pp. 151-152.
^Kaczynski 2010. pp. 153-154.
^Kaczynski 2010. pp. 155-156.
^Kaczynski 2010. pp. 159-160.
^Sutin 2000. pp. 171-173.
^Crowley 1983. p. 32.
^Kaczynski 2010. pp. 157-160.
^Sutin 2000. pp. 173-174.
^Kaczynski 2010. p. 172.
^Kaczynski 2010. pp. 172-173.
^Kaczynski 2010. pp. 173-175.
^Kaczynski 2010. pp. 173-174.
^Kaczynski 2010. p. 177.
^Kaczynski 2010. pp. 182-183.
^Kaczynski 2010. p. 183.
^Kaczynski 2010. pp. 185-189.
^Kaczynski 2010. p. 165.
^ Sutin. Do what thou wilt. p. 190.ISBN 0312288972. "But Crowley could not leave The Magician unavenged"
^Symonds 1997, pp. 132–133.
^ King, Magical World, pages 80–81
^ Newcomb, Jason (2005). Sexual Sorcery: a complete guide to Sex Magick. Weiser. p. 42.ISBN 1578633302. "...more powerful than heterosexual or lesbian acts"
^ Lachman, Gary. Turn off your mind: the mystic sixties and the dark side of the Age of Aquarius. The Disinformation Co.. p. 227.ISBN 0971394230.
^ Sutin. Do what thou wilt. p. 228.ISBN 0312288972. "Crowley also added a new degree of his own devising – an XI° magical working utilizing anal sex which was, in practice, primarily homosexual."
^ Sutin. Do what thou wilt. pp. 232–236.ISBN 0312288972. "Once arrived in Moscow, Crowley was entranced by the beauty of the city..."
^ The material AC considered holy "is inextricably imbedded in the Class B text, often without the benefit of quotation marks." The Holy Books of Thelema intro to 1984 ed, p xxiii.
^ Sutin p. 241
^ Liber ABA Part II gives this task.
^ Sutin p 251.
^ Sutin, Do What Thou Wilt, pp. 251–254
^ Knowlton, Janice; Newton, Michael (1995). Daddy was the Black Dahlia killer. Simon & Schuster. p. 129.ISBN 0671880842. "... Smith got things rolling in Hollywood by luring celebrities to special invitation-only rituals at which "sex magick" was one of the major attractions."
^ Sutin, Do What Thou Wilt, pp. 252–253
^ Sutin, Lawrence (2000). Do What Thou Wilt: a life of Aleister Crowley. Macmillan. p. 256.ISBN 0312252434.
^ Sutin p257.
^ Sutin pp260, 261.
^ Sutin p258.
^ Sutin pp271, 272.
^ Sutin p275
^ Spence, Richard B. (2008). Secret Agent 666: Aleister Crowley, British Intelligence and the Occult. Port Townsend: Feral House.ISBN 978-1-932595-33-8.
^ Spence p.6, quoting US National Archives, Record Group 165, Military Intelligence Division file 10012-112, "General Summary", Intelligence Officer, West Point, New York, 23 September 1918
^ Sutin, Do What Thou Wilt, pp.279–280
^ Levenda, Peter (2002). Unholy alliance: a history of Nazi involvement with the occult. Continuum International Publishing Group. p. 132.ISBN 0826414090. "Perhaps the most famous to Crowley's enthusiasts was the ghostly Leah Hirzig, the younger sister of the Swiss-German Alma Hirzig,..."
^ Nature of the Beast by Colin Wilson; page 73
^ Rabelais, F. Gargantua and Pantagruel Ch. 1.
^ Sutin, Laurence (2000). Do What Thou Wilt: a life of Aleister Crowley. Macmillan. p. 285.ISBN 0312252434.
^ "Heard more sense and insight than I've done in years." Quoted in Sutin, p. 317.
^ James Webb, The Harmonious Circle, p. 315. Quoted inIntroduction to Gnosis #20, online version. Retrieved 20 December 2007.
^ "If this brutal banishment did occur, then it is remarkable that Crowley, who harbored animus toward so many rival teachers, never did so toward Gurdjieff." Sutin p.318.
^ Teachings of Gurdjieff: A Pupil's Journal
^"The Encyclopedia of Thelema & Magick | Maria de Miramar". Thelemapedia.http://www.thelemapedia.org/index.php/Maria_de_Miramar. Retrieved 2010-01-08.
^ Sutin, Lawrence (2000). Do what thou wilt: a life of Aleister Crowley. Macmillan. p. 359.ISBN 0312252434.
^ "The Influence of Aleister Crowley on Fernando Pessoa's Esoteric Writings" in Gnostics 3: Ésotérisme, Gnoses & Imaginaire Symbolique (Leuven, Belgium: Peeters, 2001) pp.693–711.
^ Sutin, pp 373–374.
^ Sutin, Do what thou wilt, p. 407
^ Sutin, pp. 388–389
'^ Sutin Do what thou wilt, pp, 400–401
^ Sutin Do what thou wilt, p. 402
^ Sutin Do what thou wilt, pp. 407–408
^abc Sutin, pp. 417–419
^ Sutin pp 411, 416, initial prescription p 277.
^ "Daily Express". 4 December 1947.  and "The Winnipeg Free Press". 31 May 1969. . See also Sutin p 418.
^ Sutin:Do What Thou Wilt (p. 83)
^ E.g. Starr M P 2004, "Aleister Crowley: freemason!", Grand Lodge of British Columbia and Yukon,http://freemasonry.bcy.ca/aqc/crowley.html , BC
^ Frater SuperiorHymenaeus Beta The Magical Link Vol. IX No. 1
^ Confessions Ch. 64 para. 5
^">> literature >> Crowley, Aleister". Glbtq.com.http://www.glbtq.com/literature/crowley_a_lit.html. Retrieved 2010-01-08.
^ The Scarlet Letter Vol V no 2, December 1998,web version. Retrieved 16 January 2008.
^ (Crowley, Magick, Book 4, p.47)
^ Liber III vel Jugorum
^Shamans/neo-Shamans: ecstasy, alternative archaeologies, and contemporary pagans By Robert J. Wallis. Retrieved 9 September 2009.
^ DuQuette, Lon Milo (2003). The Magick of Aleister Crowley.Weiser Books.ISBN 1-57863-299-4.
^ab "Of the Bloody Sacrifice and Matters Cognate."Magick Book 4 Part III, Magick in Theory and Practice, Chapter 12.Samuel Weiser edition.
^ "The Confessions of Aleister Crowley: An Autohagiography" by Aleister Crowley (Arkana Publishing, 1989); "Do What Thou Wilt: A Life of Aleister Crowley" by Lawrence Sutin. (St. Martin's Press, 2000); "The Magical Diaries of Aleister Crowley" edited by Stephen Skinner (Weiser, 2003)
^ Owen, Alex (2004-04-14)."Aleister Crowley in the Desert". The Place of Enchantment: British Occultism and the Culture of the Modern (Hardcover ed.).University of Chicago Press. p. 192.ISBN 978-0-226-64201-7.http://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/642011.html.
^ Confessions, pp. 386 and 768.
^ Cornelius, 2001.
^ "Do What Thou Wilt: A Life of Aleister Crowley" by Lawrence Sutin. (St. Martin's Press, 2000) ch. 7, p. 277
^ ["Do What Thou Wilt: A Life of Aleister Crowley" by Lawrence Sutin. (St. Martin's Press, 2000)] p. 416
^Sutin 2000. p. 223-224.
^Sutin 2000. p. 02.
^Sutin 2000. p. 336.
^ 777 and Other Qabalistic Writings of Aleister Crowley edited by Israel Regardie, (Samuel Weiser, 1975), sixth unnumbered page of the editorial introduction
^ 777 and Other Qabalistic Writings of Aleister Crowley edited byIsrael Regardie, (Samuel Weiser, 1975)
^ab Equinox 1:8
^ The MS Crowley referred to in this passage was "Human Sacrifice among the Sephardine or Eastern Jews" by Sir Richard Francis Burton; it was thought so inflammatory and damaging to the author's reputation that it was never published, and in her will Burton's widowIsabel asked for it to be destroyed to protect her husband's name. References hereBBC News and hereFPP.co.uk
^ For example, by Bill Heidrick in note on Crowley's introduction to Sepher Sephiroth, retrieved fromHermetic.com, 26 May 2011.
^ Book Four Part I, Mysticism. Preliminary Remarks, fn. Samuel Weiser edition
^Crowley and Tantric Magick: The Beast Demystified. Retrieved 18 January 2008.
^"The Confessions of Aleister Crowley". Hermetic.com.http://www.hermetic.com/crowley/confess/chapter86.html. Retrieved 2010-01-08.
^ Confessions chap. 54
^ Sutin, p. 377
^ Sutin, ch. 1, p. 28
^ Facts and Phallacies by Tim Maroney (1998) (Originally published in The Scarlet Letter, Volume V, Number 2). Retrieved fromMaroney.org, 8 June 2006
^ "A Magick Life", Martin Booth, p400, Coronet,ISBN 0-340-71806-4
^ (Crowley Magick Without Tears p. 254); Aleister Crowley (1982).Magick Without Tears. Phoenix, AZ: Falcon Press.ISBN 978-0-941404-17-4.
^ (Crowley Confessions p.415); Aleister Crowley (1989). The Confessions of Aleister Crowley: An Autohagiography. London: Arkana.ISBN 978-0-14-019189-9.  Gender Bias: "There is yet a further point. My marriage taught me many lessons, and this not the least: when women are not devoted to children – a few rare individuals are capable of other interests – they take a morbid pleasure in conspiring against a husband, especially if he be a father. They take advantage of his preoccupation with his work in the world to conceive and execute every kind of criminally cunning abomination. The belief in witchcraft was not all superstition; its psychological roots were sound. Women who are thwarted in their natural instincts turn inevitably to all kinds of malignant mischief, from slander to domestic destruction." – Chapter 50
^ (Crowley Confessions pp. 95)
^ (CrowleyThe Confessions of Aleister Crowley pp. 96–7)
^ (Sutin Do What Thou Wilt pp. 282–290)
^ Crowley, Aleister (1996-10). Commentaries on the Holy Books and Other Papers: The Equinox v.4, No.1.Hymenaeus. Beta (ed.). Red Wheel/Weiser.ISBN 0877288887.
^Crowley 1983.
^"''Hymn to Pan''". Paganlibrary.com.http://www.paganlibrary.com/music_poetry/crowleys_pan_invocation.php. Retrieved 2010-01-08.
^"The Quest". Bartleby.com.http://www.bartleby.com/236/314.html. Retrieved 2010-01-08.
^"The Neophyte". Bartleby.com.http://www.bartleby.com/236/315.html. Retrieved 2010-01-08.
^"The Rose and the Cross". Bartleby.com.http://www.bartleby.com/236/316.html. Retrieved 2010-01-08.
^ Drabble, Margaret. The Oxford Companion to English Literature. Oxford University Press, 1985, p. 243.
^[1] Ecclesia Ordinis Caelestis Templum Olympicus - Thelemic Origins of Wicca
^Symonds 1997, p. 132.
^ Doyle-White 2009
^ Morehead, John W. (August 3, 2010)."Video games: Zombies Ate My Neighbours, and Nightmare Creatures". Theofantastique: a meeting place for myth, imagination and mystery in pop culture. Wordpress.http://www.theofantastique.com/2010/08/03/video-games-zombies-at-my-neighbors-and-nightmare-creatures/. Retrieved 2010-11-15.
^ Christopher M. Moreman, "Devil Music and the Great Beast: Ozzy Osbourne, Aleister Crowley, and the Christian Right," Journal of Religion and Popular Culture 5 (2003),University of Saskatchewan
^ Pilkington, Mark (2007-05-15)."Kenneth Anger: celluloid sorcery and psychadelic Satanism". Bizzare Magazine.http://www.bizarremag.com/entertainment/movies/68/kenneth_anger.html. Retrieved 2010-11-15.
^Anger, Kenneth. 2009. Do What Thou Wilt: Kenneth Anger and Aleister Crowley and the Occult.Youtube.com
^Chemical Wedding at theInternet Movie Database
^"Roadrunner Records". Roadrunner Records.http://www.roadrunnerrecords.com/Blabbermouth.net/news.aspx?mode=Article&newsitemID=79442. Retrieved 2010-01-08.
^Berti, Giordano; Negrini, Roberto; Tebani, Rodrigo (1998) (in Italian). I Tarocchi di Aleister Crowley [The Tarot of Aleister Crowley]. Torino: Lo Scarabeo.
Bibliography
Booth, Martin (2000). A Magick Life: The Life of Aleister Crowley. London: Coronet Books.ISBN 978-0-340-71806-3.
Crowley, Aleister (1983). The Holy Books of Thelema. York Beach, Maine: Samuel Weiser Inc.ISBN 9780877286868.
Crowley, Aleister (1989). The Confessions of Aleister Crowley: An Autohagiography. London: Arkana.ISBN 9780140191899.
Kaczynski, Richard (2010). Perdurabo: The Life of Aleister Crowley (Second Edition). Berkeley, California: North Atlantic Books.ISBN 978-0312252434.
Sutin, Lawrence (2000). Do What Thou Wilt: A Life of Aleister Crowley. New York: St Martin's Press.ISBN 978-0312252434.
Symonds, John (1997). The Beast 666: The Life of Aleister Crowley. London: Pindar Press.ISBN 9781899828210.
Tully, Caroline (2010). "Walk Like an Egyptian: Egypt as Authority in Aleister Crowley's Reception of The Book of the Law". The Pomegranate: The International Journal of Pagan Studies (Volume 12.1) (London).
"US Grand Lodge, OTO: Aleister Crowley". Oto-usa.org.http://oto-usa.org/crowley.html. Retrieved 2010-01-08.
[edit] External links
Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to:Aleister Crowley
Wikisource has original works written by or about:Aleister Crowley
Aleister Crowley Collection at theHarry Ransom Center at theUniversity of Texas at Austin
The Libri of Aleister Crowley Many of the writings of Crowley have been published for free online.
The Journal of Thelemic Studies "The first academic, non-partisan journal dedicated to Thelema, the psycho-spiritual religious tradition of Aleister Crowley"
Aleister Crowley: Wicked – slideshow byLife magazine
Aleister Crowley movie, a Carlos Atanes' film project.
[show]v ·d ·eThelema
Important elementsThe Book of the Law (Liber AL vel Legis) · Aleister Crowley ·Thelemic mysticism ·True Will ·The Great Work ·Holy Guardian Angel ·Abrahadabra ·Stele of Revealing ·93 ·Aeon of Horus ·Abyss ·Magick
Thelema and religionThe Gnostic Mass ·Holy Books of Thelema ·Saints of Ecclesia Gnostica Catholica
GodformsNuit ·Hadit ·Ra-Hoor-Khuit ·Aiwass ·Babalon ·Baphomet ·Chaos ·Ma'at ·Choronzon ·Ankh-af-na-khonsu
OrganizationsA∴A∴ ·Ecclesia Gnostica Catholica ·Ordo Templi Orientis ·Typhonian Order ·The Open Source Order of the Golden Dawn
PersonalitiesKenneth Anger ·Allan Bennett ·Emile Brugsch ·Mary Butts  ·Marjorie Cameron · Aleister Crowley ·Lon Milo DuQuette ·J.F.C. Fuller ·Karl Germer ·J. Daniel Gunther ·Kenneth Grant ·Lady Frieda Harris ·Leah Hirsig ·Christopher Hyatt ·Hymenaeus Beta ·Charles Stansfeld Jones ·George Cecil Jones ·Carl Kellner ·Rose Edith Kelly ·Grady McMurtry ·Victor Benjamin Neuburg ·Jack Parsons ·Israel Regardie ·Theodor Reuss ·Leila Waddell (Laylah) ·James Wasserman ·Jane Wolfe
Thelemite textsWorks of Aleister Crowley ·Libri of Aleister Crowley  ·The Book of the Law (Liber AL vel Legis) ·The Equinox ·Liber 777 ·Magick (Book 4) ·Confessions ·The Book of Lies ·Liber OZ (Liber 77) ·The Equinox of the Gods ·The Law is for All ·Konx om Pax ·The Book of Thoth ·The Vision and the Voice ·Little Essays Toward Truth ·Eight Lectures on Yoga ·Magick Without Tears ·The Blue Equinox ·Liber Aleph ·Moonchild (novel) ·Diary of a Drug Fiend (novel) ·White Stains (poetry) ·Clouds Without Water (poetry) ·Collected Works of Aleister Crowley 1905–1907 (poems, plays, essays) ·The Stratagem and other Stories (short stories)
Magick and ritualMagick ·Oil of Abramelin ·Cake of Light ·Bornless Ritual ·Eroto-comatose lucidity ·Gematria ·Thoth tarot deck ·Mass of the Phoenix ·Hermetic Qabalah ·Sex magick ·Astrology ·Yoga ·Obeah and Wanga ·Babalon Working ·Ceremonial magick
Other topicsUnicursal hexagram ·Body of Light ·Night of Pan ·City of the Pyramids ·Boleskine House ·Abbey of Thelema ·Rites of Eleusis ·Magical formula
CategoriesThelema ·Thelemites ·Thelemite texts
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Name Crowley, Aleister
Alternative names Crowley, Edward Alexander (birth); Perdurabo (motto); Therion, Master (pen)
Short description poet, mountaineer, occultist
Date of birth 12 October 1875(1875-10-12)
Place of birth Clarendon Square,Leamington Spa,Warwickshire, England
Date of death 1 December 1947(1947-12-01)
Place of death Netherwood,Hastings,East Sussex, England
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aleister_Crowley"
Categories:1875 births |1947 deaths |Alumni of Trinity College, Cambridge |Bisexual writers |British expatriates in India |British expatriates in Switzerland |English astrological writers |English astrologers |English chess players |English mountain climbers |English novelists |English occult writers |English spiritual writers |English Thelemites |Founders of religions |Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn |Hermetic Qabalists |LGBT people from England |LGBT writers from the United Kingdom |Magick |Old Eastbournians |Old Malvernians |Old Tonbridgians |Ordo Templi Orientis |People from Leamington Spa |Thelema |Western mystics |English autobiographers |English dramatists and playwrights
Hidden categories:Biography with signature |Articles with hCards |All articles with unsourced statements |Articles with unsourced statements from March 2011 |Articles with unsourced statements from November 2010
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