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To: alt.magick,alt.magick.chaos From: tim@toad.com (Tim Maroney) Subject: Introductions to Thelema Date: 10 Dec 95 18:38:03 GMT devnull@bethl.edu (Bethel Student) writes: >For what I have found to be a great beginning intro to Thelema >(the religion/philosophy founded by Crowley), I recommend >_New_Aeon_Magick:_Thelema_Without_Tears_ by Gerald del Campo. It's a >skinny book, a quick read, and fairly cheap (under $10 US). It might be a >good idea to get some idea of what Thelema is if you're planning on >studying magick, because it seems to crop up _everywhere_. And I think it >contains some useful insights that can be useful even if you're not a >Crowley fan. I disagree strongly. Both the del Campo and Duquette books are horribly oversimplified, doctrinaire, and unoriginal rehashes of Crowley. There is no freshness of insight, but there is a slavish repetition of errors and a general air of "Crowley said it, that settles it, and I believe it!" A much better introduction has just come out from Rodney Orpheus. The book is titled _Abrahadabra_, from Looking Glass Press in Stockholm. Unfortunately it does not have the distribution of the Weiser and Llewellyn books and you may have to special order it. Orpheus is quite original and witty in his presentation. The chattiness of the style is reminiscent of Crowley's best-written, least ponderous prose book, _Magick_without_Tears_, and the rituals are examples of what a true Thelemite does with Crowley: not simply follow ploddingly in his footsteps, but use his system as a treasure-trove of symbols from which to create new and personal approaches to the divine. _Abrahadabra_ is still too doctrinaire for my tastes, repeating uncritically the flawed aeonic model and True Will theory which Crowley developed in his interpretations of the Book of the Law. One wishes he would at least _try_ to answer some of the hard questions about the Crowley interpretations of history, psychology and ethics. Orpheus also sometimes repeats Crowley's errors of fact, such as the Resh (mis-)attribution of Egyptian deities to the stations of the sun. These minor failings are more than made up for by his creativity, humor, and insight. I recommend the book to both experienced and novice students of Crowley's work. -- Tim Maroney. Please CC all public responses to tim@toad.com.
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