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A∴A∴
The A∴A∴ ( ) is a magical organization described in 1907 by occultist Aleister Crowley. Its members are dedicated to the advancement of humanity by perfection of the individual on every plane through a graded series of universal initiations. Its initiations are syncretic, unifying the essence of Theravada Buddhism with Vedantic yoga and ceremonial magic. The A ∴A∴ applies what it describes as mystical and magical methods of spiritual attainment under the structure of the Qabalistic Tree of Life, and aims to research, practise, and teach "scientific illuminism". A∴A∴ is often held to stand for Argenteum Astrum, which is Latin for Silver Star, however, see section on ''Name'' below. History The A∴A∴ claims to have been present in all societies and epochs, although not necessarily under that name.''The Equinox'' Volume 1 No 1 The A∴A∴ is composed of two orders, known as the inner and outer college. The outer college in its modern form was formulated in 190 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Charles Stansfeld Jones
Charles Robert Stansfeld Jones (; 1886–1950), aka Frater Achad, was an occultist and ceremonial magician. An early aspirant to the A∴A∴ (the 20th to be admitted as a Probationer, in December 1909) who "claimed" the grade of Magister Templi as a Neophyte. He also became an O.T.O. initiate, serving as the principal organizer for that order in British Columbia, Canada. He worked under a variety of mottos and acronymic titles, including V.I.O. (Unus in Omnibus, "One in All," as an A∴A∴ Probationer), O.I.V.V.I.O., V.I.O.O.I.V., Parzival (as an Adeptus Minor and O.T.O. Ninth Degree), and Tantalus Leucocephalus (as Tenth Degree O.T.O.), but he is best known under his Neophyte motto "Achad" ( he, אחד, "unity"), which he used as a byline in his various published writings. Early life Jones was born in London on 2 April 1886. He became an accountant. Prior to joining the A∴A∴, he investigated Spiritualism, as recounted in the notes of his magical progress, "A Master of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Aleister Crowley
Aleister Crowley (; born Edward Alexander Crowley; 12 October 1875 – 1 December 1947) was an English occultist, ceremonial magician, poet, painter, novelist, and mountaineer. He founded the religion of Thelema, identifying himself as the prophet entrusted with guiding humanity into the Æon of Horus in the early 20th century. A prolific writer, he published widely over the course of his life. Born to a wealthy family in Royal Leamington Spa, Warwickshire, Crowley rejected his parents' fundamentalist Christian Plymouth Brethren faith to pursue an interest in Western esotericism. He was educated at Trinity College at the University of Cambridge, where he focused his attentions on mountaineering and poetry, resulting in several publications. Some biographers allege that here he was recruited into a British intelligence agency, further suggesting that he remained a spy throughout his life. In 1898, he joined the esoteric Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, where he was trained i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Phyllis Seckler
Phyllis Evalina Seckler (18 June 1917 – 31 May 2004), also known as Soror Meral, was a ninth degree (IX°) member of the Sovereign Sanctuary of the Gnosis of Ordo Templi Orientis (O.T.O.), and a lineage holder in the A∴A∴ tradition. She was a student of Jane Wolfe, herself a student of Aleister Crowley. She was a member of O.T.O. Agape Lodge, the only working Lodge of the O.T.O. at the time of Aleister Crowley's death. Seckler was also instrumental in preserving important parts of Crowley's literary heritage, typing parts of his Confessions, and the complete texts of The Vision and the Voice and Magick Without Tears during the 1950s. Seckler was also instrumental in re-activing the O.T.O. with Grady Louis McMurtry, during the early-mid 1970s, following the death of Crowley's appointed successor, Karl Germer. Seckler continued her lifelong work with the A∴A∴, founding the College of Thelema and co-founding (with James A. Eshelman) the Temple of Thelema, and later warran ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jane Wolfe
Sarah Jane Wolfe (March 21, 1875 – March 29, 1958) was an American silent film character actress who is considered an important female figure in magick. She was a friend and a colleague of Aleister Crowley and a founding member of Agape Lodge of the Ordo Templi Orientis in Southern California. Early life Wolfe was born in the tiny Pennsylvania borough of St. Petersburg in Clarion County. She came from Pennsylvania Dutch stock. Her name at birth was Sarah Jane Wolfe but when she later went on the stage, she adopted the single name of Jane. She was the middle child, her older brother John was born in the previous year and her sister, Mary K., was born a year and a day later, the same year that their father died. John spent many years in Montana but Wolfe and Mary K. were closely associated through much of their lives. Wolfe loved her grandfather Bill and snuggled him whenever she could. He was a very busy man as he raised nearly all the family. Her grandmother worked hard in the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Karl Germer
Karl Johannes Germer (22 January 1885 – 25 October 1962), also known as ''Frater Saturnus'', was a German occultist and the United States representative and later a successor of author and occultist Aleister Crowley as the Outer Head of the Order (OHO) of Ordo Templi Orientis from 1947 until his death in 1962. He was born in Elberfeld, Germany and died in West Point, California. Early life Germer studied in a university, worked as a military intelligence officer in the First World War and received first and second class Iron Crosses for his service. In 1923 he sold his Vienna property and founded the publishing house Pansophia Verlag in Munich. Germer stayed with his first wife at the Abbey of Thelema from the beginning of January until February 1926. Immigration to the United States: 1926–1935 In 1926, Germer got married for the second time and immigrated to the USA, his wife being an American citizen. By 1927 Germer and his wife Cora Eaton were living in New York whe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Marcelo Ramos Motta
Marcelo Ramos Motta (June 27, 1931 – August 26, 1987), also known by his magical names of Parzival X°, and Parzival XI°, was a Thelemic writer from Brazil, and member of A∴A∴. Early life Motta was born at the city of Rio de Janeiro (Brazil). Very little is known about his childhood, only that he was born into a family with Swiss-German ancestry and received a very strict education, amplified by his admission at the Military Academy of Rio de Janeiro (''Colégio Militar do Rio de Janeiro''). His father was a follower of the doctrine of Allan Kardec and his mother was Catholic. At eleven years of age he became interested for the first time in the mysterious "Rosicrucians", after reading ''Zanoni'', the novel by Sir Edward Bulwer-Lytton, He also read works by Papus, Blavatsky, Patanjali, Paracelsus and Arnold Krumm-Heller. He "decided to search for them and to become one of those mysterious Adepts". But his first contact with a self-proclaimed Rosicrucian society, the Brazilia ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ceremonial Magic
Ceremonial magic (ritual magic, high magic or learned magic) encompasses a wide variety of rituals of magic. The works included are characterized by ceremony and numerous requisite accessories to aid the practitioner. It can be seen as an extension of ritual magic, and in most cases synonymous with it. Popularized by the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, it draws on such schools of philosophical and occult thought as Hermetic Qabalah, Enochian magic, Thelema, and the magic of various grimoires. Ceremonial magic is part of Hermeticism and Western esotericism. The synonym magick is a archaic spelling of 'magic' used during the Renaissance, which was revived by Aleister Crowley to show and differentiate the occult from performance magic. He defined it as "the Science and Art of causing Change to occur in conformity with Will", including "mundane" acts of will as well as ritual magic. Crowley wrote that "it is theoretically possible to cause in any object any change of which ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Book Of The Law
''Liber AL vel Legis'' (), commonly known as ''The Book of the Law'', is the central sacred text of Thelema. Aleister Crowley said that it was dictated to him by a beyond-human being who called himself 'Aiwass'. Rose Edith Kelly, Crowley's wife, wrote two phrases in the manuscript. The three chapters of the book are spoken by the deities Nuit, Hadit, and Ra-Hoor-Khuit. Through the reception of the ''Book'', Crowley proclaimed the arrival of a new stage in the spiritual evolution of humanity, to be known as the "Æon of Horus". The primary precept of this new aeon is the charge, " Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law." The book contains three chapters, each of which was alleged to be written down in one hour, beginning at noon, on 8 April, 9 April, and 10 April in Cairo, Egypt, in the year 1904. Crowley says that the author was an entity named Aiwass, whom he later referred to as his personal Holy Guardian Angel. Biographer Lawrence Sutin quotes private diaries tha ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Secret Chiefs
In various occultist movements, Secret Chiefs are said to be transcendent cosmic authorities, a spiritual hierarchy responsible for the operation and moral calibre of the cosmos, or for overseeing the operations of an esoteric organization that manifests outwardly in the form of a magical order or lodge system. Their names and descriptions have varied through time, differing among those who have claimed experience of contact with them. They are variously held to exist on higher planes of being or to be incarnate; if incarnate, they may be described as being gathered at some special location, such as Shambhala, or scattered through the world working anonymously. History One early and influential source on these entities is Karl von Eckartshausen, whose ''The Cloud upon the Sanctuary'', published in 1795, explained in some detail their character and motivations. Several 19th and 20th century occultists claimed to belong to or to have contacted these Secret Chiefs and made these ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Magical Organization
A magical organization or magical order is an organization created for the practice of ceremonial or other forms of occult magic or to further the knowledge of magic among its members. Magical organizations can include Hermetic orders, Wiccan covens and circles, esoteric societies, arcane colleges, witches' covens, and other groups which may use different terminology and similar though diverse practices. 19th century The Hermetic Brotherhood of Luxor was an initiatic occult organisation that first became public in late 1894, although according to an official document of the order it began its work in 1870. The Order's teachings drew heavily from the magico-sexual theories of Paschal Beverly Randolph, who influenced later groups such as Ordo Templi Orientis (O.T.O.), although it is not clear whether or not Randolph himself was actually a member of the Order. The Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn has been credited with a vast revival of occult literature and practices and was ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
George Cecil Jones
George Cecil Jones, Jr. (10 January 1873 – 30 October 1960),''Who's Who in Science'', 1913 was a British chemist, occultist, one time member of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn and co-founder of the magical order A∴A∴. According to author and occultist Aleister Crowley, Jones lived for some time in Basingstoke, Hampshire, England, working at a metallurgy there. Association with Aleister Crowley Born in Croydon, Jones was educated at City of London School, Central Technical College and Birmingham University. He was the son of George Cecil Jones, Sr. He studied analytical chemistry at Central Technical College in South Kensington and Birmingham University and became employed in the profession upon graduation. On 12 July 1895 he became a member of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. He is perhaps best known for the pivotal role he played in the life of British Aleister Crowley, stoking Crowley's youthful enthusiasm for magick. Jones introduced Crowley to the Golden D ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Aiwass
Aiwass is the name given to a voice that the English occultist and ceremonial magician Aleister Crowley reported to have heard on April 8, 9, and 10 in 1904. Crowley reported that this voice, which he considered originated with a non-corporeal being, dictated a text known as ''The Book of the Law'' or ''Liber AL vel Legis'' to him during his honeymoon in Cairo. The dictation According to Crowley, Aiwass first appeared during the Three Days of the writing of ''Liber al vel Legis''. His first and only identification as such is in Chapter I: "Behold! it is revealed by Aiwass the minister of Hoor-paar-kraat" (AL I:7). Hoor-paar-kraat (Egyptian: Har-pa-khered) is more commonly referred to by the Greek transliteration Harpocrates, meaning "Horus the Child", whom Crowley considered to be the central deity within the Thelemic cosmology (see Æon of Horus). However, Harpocrates also represents the Higher Self, the Holy Guardian Angel. Crowley described the encounter in detail in his 193 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
