Golden Dawn astral initiation rituals do not work magically

I am famous for being blunt and the headline statement will get a few people upset. I have said over a number of years that I do not believe that astral initiation into the Golden Dawn  work, but have not said why.

I would LOVE astral initiation to work. As the head of an order, it would mean that I could set up temples in the US or other far-flung parts of the world at a great rate. If I was charging fees for this, I could make a bomb. It would enable groups to be established without me having to bring people to Rome for training. In short, astral initiation is a tool for empire building rather than creating magicians. If MOAA used astral initiations there would be a huge temptation to empire build.

None of the people I had ever met who said they had been astrally initiated into the Golden Dawn had any experience which indicated that anything useful happened. Those who claimed mystical experiences had none of the signs in their sphere of sensation, nor did their experiences show that an astral initiation had taken place.   For example one person said that during their astral initiation, they had seen a pyramid and that was proof they had been initiated into the Golden Dawn.  However, a Pyramid is not a symbol in the 0=0 and it is not proprietary to the GD.  Others have just said new Age sorts of answers like “I felt a white light” or “I was surrounded by love.”  I get that when I eat chocolate, it does not mean that Lynd hazelnut is a self-initiation into the Golden Dawn.  If someone told me, “I felt scared shitless, I could not speak, I felt like throwing up and then I felt Horus was banging a sort on the back of my neck” I would thing you had something close to what a 0=0 is like.

Astral initiation is possible and takes place at a senior level of magic all the time. However, it does not take place at an outer order level. Firstly, because to be astrally initiated you have to be able to get up onto the astral levels, which a beginner cannot do. Secondly, it needs an initiating temple to perform a ritual on the astral plane at a correct time and to perform the entire ritual without scripts or direction.  For this reason, astral initiation is traditionally carried out by a high-level contact to a student and is not something which works in a structured group environment.

So let us look at two rituals which are being used for astral initiation. The first is supposed to involve using the Golden Dawn Z documents and sees the candidate as a talisman. 

The candidate’s name is placed on a list of those who want to be initiated, sometimes a photograph is used, or an astrology chart. This list is placed in a black bag and “initiated” as if it were a talisman. The logic is that since a talisman can be charged, then a human can be too by proxy.

Intellectually this technique could technically work. The talisman version of the Zdocs creates a thought form which is initiated with force. The thought form would then slowly transform the candidate’s sphere of sensation until it reached a standard comparable to initiation.

Practically however the Z docs do not allow a talisman to be adjusted to a candidate - it was written assuming that you were fusing a spirit to an inanimate object. If you look at the wording of the Z2 document, it is different for a talisman with good reason. You are looking to tie the spirit of a talisman to a physical object and not the complex operation of breaking down the sphere of sensation which the 0=0 is supposed to be doing. Most of the talisman ritual is focused on the talisman and the astral form of the force you are trying to attract to it. A list of names or symbol of a candidate will become charged (as a talisman) but the person will not. The best-case scenario is that your talismanic list will draw the correct experiences to a candidate over time. This is unlikely, particularly as it breaks the rule of having a talisman focusing only on one or two outcomes. Your poor talisman thought-form could be trying to reach two to ten different people at the same time and bring them an experience which is supposed to be life changing.

So what about plan b? This method involves initiating an astral form of a person using something connected to them. You create a simulacrum of a person and then perform the 0=0 ritual on that. Afterwards, you send the simulacrum to the person and fuse it to their sphere of sensation.

This requires you first to build a particularly dense astral body and then build the thought forms for the Golden Dawn ritual as normal. You could not do that for a list of people. It would have to be a two-part ritual which involved a rite to build a strong enough astral body. This thought-form would have to be built from the energy of the officers and would be quite draining. They would then have to carry out the initiation proper.

It would take a great deal of experimentation to see if this worked and there would be some problems.

The 0=0 requires the purification and consecration of the candidate. In this situation, you would be purifying and consecrating the thought form. There is nothing to make the thought form do the same thing to the candidate’s sphere of sensation. Even if there was, it is difficult to see how a thought form would manage it.

Then there is the oath which has to be administered to the candidate and tested and sealed into their sphere of sensation. In this situation, the oath is being said by a thought form and NOT by the candidate. The thought form will be bound by the oath and tested by the 42 assessors and not the candidate. Then there is the splitting of the sphere of sensation to the four sons of Horus, something that I consider an important part of the 0=0. What would be split here is the thought form’s “astral form” and not that of the candidate. This means that not all the problems of leaky spheres of sensation which plague most candidates would be fixed.

On the plus side, a thought-form could perhaps bring an awareness of the Higher Self and perhaps make some changes to the sphere of sensation but this would be nothing like the experience of a physical initiation.

I mentioned that astral initiation does exist and I can say that there have been a couple of situations where it happened to me.  Neither case involved a ritual at all, all where while the initiator, and myself were in an astral state. I was wasted for some weeks afterwards. It gave me no status in any order other than in my own personal development.

In the MOAA correspondence course, we use a form of astral self-initiation but it takes more than a year’s worth of preparation before the 0=0 grade initiation takes place. It connects the candidate to the forces behind the Golden Dawn and their Higher Self. However, it does not involve any ritual on our part at all, nor does it count as a 0=0 in MOAA. It has an effect (although it is not as good as a 0=0) because the candidate is forcing the connections and the contacts are doing all the ritual work. In the astral work, the candidate sees what happens to them and interacts with it. I think it is the closest you can come to an astral initiation, but it takes a long time to build up to that point.  One thing I find interesting about this particular method of astral initiation is that the people we have put through it soon found a source for a physical initiation.

There are some other problems with Astral Initiation. Given that most candidates either do not feel anything (or are not trained enough to feel anything) it requires a lot of trust that the group is kosher. Ten years ago I wrote how a group was making a fortune by doing mass astral initiations.  A friend who lived around the corner from the group’s house applied for a fake astral initiation. He was told that the ritual would take place at a certain time and he would have to tune into it. Instead, at the time he went around to the house where the group met. He was invited in and found the entire group drinking beer and watching Gerry Springer. In other words, they were collecting the cash and doing nothing. Not only is astral initiation good for empire building, it can be a good source of income for the unscrupulous.

Watching Dr Who will connect you to the GD better than astral initiation.

One of the excuses made for astral initiation is that it gives people a chance to experience something if you cannot get to a physical temple. However, if the thing does not work then what is the point?A candidate would be better off meditating on their own than carrying out a bogus astral initiation. In fact, I would say it would be more challenging and fulfilling for a candidate to watch a good episode of Dr Who than to pay cash for an astral initiation and have nothing happen.

Within the Golden Dawn or Stella Matutina there was no practice of astral initiation. It was used in the AO as a Mathers money making exercise to squeeze cash out of rich Americans (and it is not clear what, if any, ritual or astral work was done for this). It had the bonus that allowed them to establish US temples, but there is no indication that they worked. 

A rough guide for avoiding bad magical groups.

Joining a magical group is remarkably easy in the 21^st century. It seems strange that you can read all about magical groups on the internet and think they are as common as muck. But real good quality ones are as rare as they ever have been. Finding one good one can still be a life's work. There are many people who go from Order to order looking for something and never really finding it. Sometimes that is the universe trying to tell you that you are not ready for a real magical order. You might be looking for the wrong things, or cannot really handle the sort of training that a real magical group puts you through.  However you can save yourself some time by using some wisdom.

The idea of a coven or a magic order still has a lot of merit as they can be hot houses to learning.  But if the leadership is wrong then you could be suffering from bad experiences that you will talk about until you drop.   What follows are tips to help  work out if a Order is good or bad.

Is it too easy for you to join?

Groucho Marx once said that he would never be a member of a club who accepted him as a member.   If a group wants members, for whatever reason, they might be too keen to lower their standards.  Remember if they lower them to admit you, then there is a good chance that they have done so in the past and most of their members are not the sort of people who should really be doing magic.  Magic is not a easy path, so joining an occult group should not be easy either.  Real magical groups see people as things they have to train and a long term project. They generally should not be too concerned about getting extra people if they have enough to do their work projects. If a group seems too keen for you to join, say by paying for you to come and be initiated, you should avoid them. This means that they are desperate to boost their membership. An esoteric group should always be looking for quality over quantity. You might think that the reason a group wants you is because you are a wonderful esoteric candidate with heaps of knowledge. However to a real magical group lots of experience and pre-knowledge is a hindrance. You have to learn from scratch in any order you join so any intellectual baggage you might be carrying will have to be dropped before you join.

Does the group try to sell itself to you.

In the 21^st century many groups have a web presence or a place to contact them. However a group steps over the line when it tries to sell itself like a product.   It is mostly recognised by the overblown language on their website which is pitched to stereotypes about what Muggles think magic is.  The sort of thing which promises secrets, power, mastery of the universe, cures for cancer etc.  Here are a list of common ones:

“We are the ONLY magical school teaching the TRUE and ANCIENT TECHNIQUES”

“Orders have to receive a dispensation from the Masters on the Inner Planes who are known on in the West as the Secret Chiefs.  We have been told that our Order is the only one to receive our Contact’s dispensation in the 21^st century.”

“All others are frauds and cannot offer our secret techniques.”

“Other groups are envious that they do not have our sources of Secret Teaching and training.”

The list could go on, but you get the idea.  To get a high Google ranking you have to do a lot of shady self-promotion. This involves going onto lots of blogs and waxing lyrical about your order and encouraging all your students to mention you often on their blogs. It is possible to know who some members of magical orders are because often they are writers, but if you start to know too much you have to be careful. Self-promoting groups are trying increase their membership to make money (and sometimes sex). They are also often trying to build an esoteric cult around their actions.

Does the group block a particular group from membership and why?

Magical Groups should not stop anyone from entering on the basis that they are the wrong sex, colour, sexual orientation, physical disability, or hold different religious or political views from the members.   Magical training is possible for everyone and it does not matter what shape you are, or what you prefer to bonk (or how).

That does not mean that they HAVE to accept everyone. Some groups do not allow people to belong to other orders, or have a blacklist of groups that they will not allow members to join at the same time.  This is often not because they are bad, or evil (although it can be), it is just that they have different symbol set from the group and it would lead to some confusion.    This is particularly true of different Golden Dawn orders.  While MOAA gets on well with most of them, all emphasis different aspects of that tradition, or do some things differently.   Nor does a group want to hear “well in my other Golden Dawn order we insist on the [insert teaching here].”  

Honestly I do not believe it is possible to be a member of two different groups anyway as the workload should make it impossible. 

Does the group allow you to skip grades on the basis of your previous experience?

This is a trick to try and establish an Order as quickly and widely as possible.  The premise is that the Order will acknowledge the grades of the leaders of a forming group so that they can form a new order under their banner.    However anyone with common sense will realise that they are not getting anything from the Order that they are joining.  True they might have access to intellectual training, but they will not have experienced what the magic order is supposed to be doing!    As an idea it only works on idiots who like the idea of holding high grades in an order, preferably without doing any work for them (cough masonic types).    When you join an order, you start at the lowest level of that group and then you let it do its magic on you.  You do not do it to form another group for them, or just to have a flashy badge.   Never join an order that allows you to take several grade initiations in the same day or in a short period of time.  They do not understand how the grade system works and you will not get anything out of it.

Does a group accept you without meeting you or pay for you to visit them to be initiated?

If you meet someone you can know much more about them and know if they are going to fit into your group mind and if they are going to make it.  You cannot tell that over a Skype call, even if you have the video chat on.  The fact that a group skips this important meeting (and some even insist you turn up at several of their public meetings first) indicates they do not really care if you fit or not.  Paying for someone to travel to a place to be initiated smacks at desperation. 

Does a group offer to give you status on the basis of an “astral initiation.”

Astral initiation takes place at a high level when the person is experienced enough to go out of their body to receive it.   It is rarely given by a physical being, and only in unusual circumstances.

Lower grade initiations cannot be performed magically, because the candidate needs to experience certain things psychologically and physically.  I was fairly open minded about the idea of astral initiation at this level but I heard too many stories which showed it to be bogus. The technique involved telling the candidate to sit passively at the time of the initiation while a group of officers initiated a talisman (or astrological chart) with their name on it.   One of the tests for an Astral initiation is that the candidate picks up images or feelings from the rite.  I have not met anyone who has come up with anything which compares to a 0=0 experience.

Astral initiation performed in this manner is designed to raise funds from distant members and enable training.  There are much better techniques than passive “astral initiation” which can have a dramatic effect on the candidate, however the groups that use them always insist on a future physical initiation.

Are the leaders who interview you too young?

I started magic when I was 17 and studied really hard at it for many years.  I do not think I really understood anything until my 30s and started to teach when I was in my late-30s,  I have become a lot better since my 40s. 

 My mid-twenties were spent cramming knowledge and dealing with the fall out, I was also trying to build my career.   I cannot see how anyone under the age of 30 can be an esoteric teacher.  You can know enough intellectually in your 20s, perhaps, but you certainly cannot pull in the magic.  Even Jesus, who was supposed to be a prodigy (and apparently the Son of God) did not start teaching until he was 30. 

In your 20s you think that running an occult group is important.  In fact we find that too many younger members think that this is a priority.   Occult leaders should have their arms twisted before they form a group because it gets in the way of real work.  MOAA has enough work in it to last a lifetime, pissing around worrying about people forgetting to bring their red socks to rituals is not something a sensible person would want – unless they are too young, arrogant, and have not had enough magical experience.

Does the group attack others?

Good esoteric groups do not publically attack others.  Even a saint loses their temper in the presence of an internet troll (which is why some good teachers refuse to have an internet presence) and this does not usually mean there is something wrong with them.  As a rule of thumb, the groups that are being attacked, are usually the ones that are doing something, those who are doing the attacking have nothing to offer.  There are some exceptions.

 One group, fortunately disbanded, had an initiation test for its adepts.  This involved either attacking an ex-member’s property or “supporting the order” by setting up webpages defaming rival groups.  There was an inner circle within this group which was dedicated to making magic attacks against those who the leadership thought were trying to attack them.

Real occult orders get on with other occult orders.  They accept that they are different and are happy with that.

Does the group tell you what other similar groups do?

I have heard lots of things that apparently MOAA does from people who have talked to other groups.  I find it fascinating that they claim to know what happens in our rituals.  I don’t know (or care) what they do, so how can they know what is happening in ours?  The latest one is that Nick Farrell has “changed everything” and that the godform of the Hierophant is apparently Hermes!  It is no secret that MOAA has a Heirophant which uses an Osiris godform (when he is sitting down) just like 99 per cent of the Golden Dawn orders out there (the Open Source Order which uses a different inner structure).  All groups (even those who claim to be fundamentalist GD) have changed something.  This is because even if you had the original scripts of the GD, you would have no idea how those rituals were performed.  Nor do you have any idea how much modern thinking has corrupted that teaching. Generally saying that another group is "doing it wrong" when you can't be certain what they do, means you are trying to convince people that your way is the only way.