FRATER TELESFOROS WRITES
TEACHER OF OASEOS ASTRAIA OF O.T.O. GREECE
The English poet, mystic, painter and writer Aleister Crowley (1875-1947) is one of the most defining figures of modern Western Esotericism. Although he grew up in a family that belonged to the fundamentalist Protestant movement of the Plymouth Brethren, in his youth he rejected their religiosity and sought a new spiritual path. His search brought him to the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn where he was initiated and received his occult training. However, the strife that broke up the Order made him move away from it and it was then that he traveled to various parts of the world, including India, Burma and Sri Lanka, where he studied Hinduism and Buddhism and practiced Yoga.
The turning point in his life was during his honeymoon in Cairo, Egypt where he received and recorded The Book of the Law (Liber AL vel laws) at the behest of a supernatural entity named Aiwass. This short text announced the birth of a new cosmic era for humanity, a "New Age" of spiritual awakening and moral liberation. At the same time, he was presenting the Law of Will to the world, which is summed up in the two phrases: "Do what you want and the whole Law will be" and "Love is the law, love under the will". The Book of the Law was for Crowley the basis on which he founded the inner movement of Thelema, both philosophically and as an initiatory path, a movement that continues to develop to this day, both through the Orders he led - his Ordo Templi Orientis and the A∴A∴- as well as in the wider inner scene.
Crowley is best known as the author of occult works that have had a great influence on modern Western Esotericism. His innovation was the combination of scientific methodology with the practice of Eastern and Western esotericism; He called this approach, which combines the goal of religion with the method of science, Scientific Illuminism. According to this, the practitioner treats his practices like scientific experiments, recording and evaluating them in order to gain a clearer picture of how they work and how they affect him. His inner works deal with ritual magic, yoga, meditation, Kabbalah, esoteric philosophy, ontology, ethics always against the backdrop of the initiatory system of Will.
He lived a tumultuous life that often provoked the snobbery of his time, causing the yellow press to stigmatize him with a black rumor that accompanies his face to this day, although more limited as there are now several biographies that clear the rumors from the truth. Indeed, if one reads his works honestly and without prejudice one discovers not an exhortation to hedonism and licentiousness but a message of personal responsibility for self-realization that embraces every side of man, his heights as well as his depths. Of course, problematic elements are not absent from his character, but they are exactly what make him stand out from other spiritual teachers who are usually depicted as figures of pure light and moral perfection. Aleister Crowley's flaws make him human and help the scholar of his work to focus on the message rather than the messenger, thus advocating not the idealization but the global integration of man. So the question for everyone who approaches his work is ultimately not what Aleister Crowley once said or did, but what he can accomplish in the here and now.
His ideas and his Dionysianism inspired the so-called counterculture of the 60s and 70s. His embrace of art, poetry and theater in the practice of magic has inspired many artists and we see his influence subtly present in various aspects of pop culture today. The fields he explored in more hostile times can now be studied on a friendlier and more fertile ground, while his message of social and spiritual liberation remains more relevant than ever.
SEE THE BOOK OF LIES