Theos-Talk Archives (May 1996 Message tl00828)

>I noticed the mentioning of Aleister Crowley in a recent posting.
>This reminded me of the famous order of the Golden Dawn.
>Does anyone know what has become of it? I mean, I've read their homepage,
>but am not sure whether this order has regenerated itself from the many
>troubles in the past or not. Is this a truely spiritual order - a true
>mysteryschool - like they claim - or not?
	I am not, and have never been, a member of the OTO
or GD, so I can't speak from experience, but only from what I have
heard. The OTO is reasonably alive and well in the US today, thanks
to its leader, Hymenaeus Beta.  The GD is very fragmented, and
apparently has groups all over the place.  I am not aware of any
GD claiming to be a mystery school.  It is, as far as I know,
a magical school, period.

>What about the Enochian Magic? The GD has a little file on this subject.
>Only, after reading it, I wonder why people need to evoke
>the elementals from the four Elements, including spirit as a guiding principle,
>by some ceremonial magic. Leading a spiritual life seems enough to me.
>But I don't like rituals, so I may be biased.
	In the late 70s, only a few people knew about Enochian Magic,
and fewer still who practiced it.  I wrote a book about it in 1980, which was
finally pubished in 84.  Since then, I have had 6 books published
on the subject, and have a 7th coming out in a month or so.  So, I
pretty well single-handedly made the subject popular, and available
to anyone who is interested in such things.  For those not interested
in rituals, I developed Enochian Yoga, which uses yogic techniques
to do pretty much the same things.  My new one coming out, for
example, uses mandalas to serve as either magical or yogic focus
centers in order to pathwork the planes and worlds of Enochian
Magic.
	Leading a spiritual life, as you say, is enough for most
people.  However, some people want to do a bit more, and experience
the subtle invisible worlds around us directly.  There are dangers
involved, as with all forms of yoga and magic.  There are also
benefits.  These mostly take the form of knowledge that goes beyond
what you can learn in books.  The goal of this kind of stuff is called
initiation, and every time you visit one of the inner worlds and meet
the inhabitants, there is an initiation of some kind, and therefore a
growth.

> Another issue is this: do
>fraternities like this order hold public lectures, etc.? In my opinion, all
>orders who possess real wisdom should do some public work in order to help
>humanity.
	I do not think so, although they might on occasion.  If this
is your opionion, then you will probably only be happy with theosophy.

	Jerry S.
	Member, TI