The Future of Thelema from where we stand

[kylefite]

I was listening to a podcast earlier today on Taoist Alchemy with Jason Reed. It was quite interesting-and, of course, AC regarded Thelema as a type of development of Taoism.


During the talk (it is the most recent one on the What Magic is This? podcast), Mr. Reed alluded to a simple picture entailing Earth, Man and the Heavens. He described this as akin to a Venn diagram in which Earth and the Heavens are the two circles and Man is the "fish" or vesica in their overlap. The problems in our life, according to Taoism, emerge from us being out of alignment with Earth and Heaven. Once we get into alignment, the powers are available to freely flow and these power will handle everything that needs handling.


This felt, to me, like an apt description of Thelema of which Crowley remarked its essence was to "bid the stars to shine" etc.


During my early excited Crowley years, I felt that "True Will" was synonymous with "MY Will." After joining and becoming a participant on our now sadly lost Lashtal.com, I'd meet many luminaries with a diversity of insight into Thelema. One of these was our Webmaster here at The Primal Grimoire, Michael Staley, who would emphasize time and again that his view was that Thelema is Cosmic and not Individual. Manifest in the individual, perhaps, but not individual in essence.


I am bringing up some of these ideas from Reed, Crowley and Staley to point toward Thelema as something which Crowley weaves into his system and religion-but which precedes and outlives it. One might observe that a modern Taoist is also a Thelemite with a tradition that antedates Crowley's Thelema by thousands of years-and can get along just fine without it. However-and regardless of AC's words, not every Thelemite may be regarded as a Taoist.


With the recent dialogue spinning off from the interesting introduction by baghdasar93 (see the "Cheers from New England" thread), I wanted to steer the conversation into its own thread.


How do folks here understanding Thelema? To what degree are Crowley and his Teachings helpful and necessary-or, conversely, cumbersome and problematic?


How will the future of Thelema relate to AC's work?

[parsifal]

How will the future of Thelema relate to Aleister Crowley’s work? This strikes me as the million-dollar question, particularly today with the closure of LaShTal. The site has been an internet presence for as long as I’ve been engaging with the subject, along with sites like Koenig’s Ordo Templi Orientis Phenomenon and, well, this one, the Primal Grimoire. As a point of departure, a familiar quotation from Kenneth Grant’s Nightside of Eden, which, in my view, is as succinct a manifesto for the New Aeon as one is likely to find:

Unless occultism becomes creative in the sense of opening up new approaches, modifying and developing traditional concepts and generally revealing a little more of that Supreme Goddess whose identity is hidden behind the veil of Isis, Kali, Nuit, or Sothis, there will be stagnation in the swamp of beliefs rendered inert by the recent swift acceleration of humanity’s consciousness, which is little short of miraculous. If the science of the unmanifest is not to remain grounded at a pre-pubescent stage, while the manifested sciences soar into space, the mature occultist must put aside the toys of superstition and face fearlessly the Trees of Eternity whose trunks and branches glow with solar fire, but whose roots are nourished in the dark.

At the risk of sounding like a partisan on LaShTal, to my mind, the Typhonian Gnosis is Thelema. But this perspective, of course, is but one among many, and while it allows for a “big tent” interpretation of Crowley’s ideas, it admittedly overlooks the historicity of Thelema as a cultural movement reflecting a particular time and place. I see value in pursuing Crowley’s system as codified by him and interpreted by organizations like the US OTO and its A∴A∴ lineage. For me, though, such practice would be a fixed exercise of entering a subjective condition objectively, similar in a way to the bhakti-like practice Crowley lays out in Liber Astarte. I believe one could gain much from clothing oneself in an orthodox tradition for a time and either shedding it at the conclusion of the Work or make it one’s life project if it resonates deeply enough. One could conduct a similar exercise with other traditional paths as well. While immersive, however, I’ve found that such undertakings eventually wither in the vine, as they tend to me leave me feeling that I’ve sequestered myself from a much wider reality. But for a time, they can be exhilarating and instructive.

I see Crowley as being comparable to Charles Darwin or Karl Marx, whose writings established a new paradigm of thought that would see diverse branches of inquiry sprout from them. How many people today still read On the Origin of Species or Capital, or study the lives of their authors to better understand the context from which their ideas emerged? Evolutionary biologists certainly still read Darwin, and political theorists and economists still return to Marx. In a similar way, Crowley’s work, and the remarkable life that created it, is there for us to return to as we pursue our own investigations and practices. Yes, Marx and Darwin were products of their day, and like Crowley, they were not infallible. But even perceived errors can open new paths of inquiry.

[purplepiepete]

During my early excited Crowley years, I felt that "True Will" was synonymous with "MY Will." After joining and becoming a participant on our now sadly lost Lashtal.com, I'd meet many luminaries with a diversity of insight into Thelema. One of these was our Webmaster here at The Primal Grimoire, Michael Staley, who would emphasize time and again that his view was that Thelema is Cosmic and not Individual. Manifest in the individual, perhaps, but not individual in essence.
As Crowley was at pains to point out "Do what thou wilt" does not mean giving in to your id/impulses and do just anything you feel you'd like to do, and mentioned that the "Thou" really referenced Ateh - and in this sense the injunction meant "Do as the Creator/ Architect/ Preserver/ Destroyer/ 'God'/ Tao / etc. wills.  Or in other words always align your subjective will so that it is coincidental with the divine.

One might observe that a modern Taoist is also a Thelemite with a tradition that antedates Crowley's Thelema by thousands of years-and can get along just fine without it
Gnosticism as a philosophical belief as well as Taoism is not averse to the outlook and practices of Thelema either, in my opinion. But these are all labels and subject to the capricious flirtations of Tahuti/ Hermes/ Mercury/ Loki/ etc. and can vary widely (wildly) in their subjective semantic range and orientation at any moment.

How do folks here understanding Thelema?
By laughter there don't folly following wisdom?

How will the future of Thelema relate to AC's work?
Where it (the work) is correct, it will resonate sympathetically.  Where it is not, and incorrect, there will be a jarring discord, in the sense of ideas and speculations which are slightly or majorly askew and off-course. It will surely recognise and celebrate the fact that he was one of the pioneers who - with whatever degrees of success - attempted to pin matters down in writing in a (sometimes lucid) all-touching & all-penetrative form, I would imagine. 

[baghdasar93]

"This felt, to me, like an apt description of Thelema of which Crowley remarked its essence was to "bid the stars to shine", etc."

In that sense, Thelema truly IS both universal in essence, but manifest in the individual (as you pointed out was Michael Staley's argument - and if that's a misinterpretation, I hope he'll respectfully correct us.) But there are two chief dilemmas, IMO.

The first is defining WHAT exactly Thelema IS. Is it a religion? Put aside any notion of Thelemic Pentecostalism for a second and consider religion in its truest sense - as a binding together of doctrines. Doctrines being plural. There are only two doctrines which seem innate to it, which are (big surprise) "Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law" and "Love is the law, love under will." IMO, those are not necessarily contradictory but transcend seeming opposites, which are after all, temporal (Martin Buber's "I and Thou" gives some remarkable insight into that seeming contradiction of... well, the 'I' and the 'Thou.')

Is it a philosophy? Any philosophy needs to have internal coherence and consistency, and again - those two phrases aren't as inimical as they might seem. But their ramifications are subject to personal interpretation - and I for one have seen some fairly noxious interpretations. Is it a system of spiritual illumination? The trouble with that is that we cannot quantifiably measure either spirit or illumination, much less create a system based upon it. Certain methods MAY bring certain results, but systems generally restrict universal applicability in favor of a closed and doctrinaire focus.

But let's get down to the nitty gritty. We all have to live in the real world where conflict invariably arises. The word of Sin might be "Restriction", but what happens when personal interpretations of Thelema become co-opted into a viewpoint that are inimical to that universal essence? I think most of us have seen individuals attempt to graft Thelema onto allegiance to race, gender, nation/state, superseding *WHATEVER THELEMA IS* in favor of some pretty backwards ass ideologies. That might be incongruent to the idea of Thelema as being the essence that "bids the stars to shine" but can we embrace sectarian divisions "for love's sake?" We certainly can't rely on ol' Bullet Head's writings. After all, not only did he live in an entirely different era, his own writings contradict themselves quite staggeringly in multiple places.

(Just in case you can't tell, I'm about as fond of Fascists and racists as I am of child leukemia.)

If Crowley WAS a prophet, he may be the first example we have whose foibles and strengths can be attested to through numerous writings. If Thelema is to evolve, we need to reevaluate not only the role of what a prophet entails, but again defining WHAT Thelema is in the first place. That means we can (hopefully) shed the Demon Crowley and focus on the ESSENCE of the Book of the Law. And that is going to have to be subject to personal interpretation. But its applicability to the real world is also going to have to be on a case-by-case basis.

None of the above probably answers your questions, Kyle. But thank you for allowing me to rant.