When did Thelema become the Westboro Baptist Church?

For those who want the background of what I am commenting on have a look at the watchers of the dawn site.

Thanks Wikicommons

As I started to work with underworld deities I started to warm to some of Crowley’s material and was starting to care less about some of the doubts I had about Thelema.  But recently the antics of three “high profile” Thelemites have led me to question where that religion is going.

I know that the behaviour of three does not define a religion, but these three have managed to come up with something which is nothing short of an atrocity based on their no doubt deep conviction that is what Thelema says.

My main focus is really the point which was posted on the LVX/Nox blog that contains this quote:

“Liber AL clearly instructs Thelemites to display strength and not care for the weak. To try and add a humanistic tint to the second and third chapter of the book is folly, as they are as clear as day to the true meaning.”

In other words, the three people who attacked Don Kraig while on his death bed were doing so because their religion was instructing them not to care for the weak. Somehow caring for the weak means that strength is being shown.

However, such a creed is anti-evolutionary. It is the philosophy of the wolf-pack where the weak are left to die because they will slow the rest down. Humanity has moved past the point where strength is defined as the primary reason to rule. As a result, we have inventions and technology which have been created by people who would have been left for dead by societies that are more primitive. If this really is Thelema then it is clearly not a modern religion, in fact is on a par with those other Bronze Age religions that it claims to replace. It calls on people not to “waste money” on the Stephen Hawkings of this world when we should be giving it to more healthy football players.

The idea that “might is right” has been discounted as anti-evolutionary by most civilisations – its last paragons were the Germans, Russians and Italians in world war two and the colonial powers before that.  Just because someone is strong does not make them right, nor does it mean the weak should have been euthanized.

On that point, if these three Thelemites had a “right” to say what they did about Kraig because “he was weak and they were strong” surely they should have had said the same thing to the founder of their religion Alistair Crowley. While Crowley was fit at one stage of his life, his health declined rapidly in middle age. He was a drug addict and suffering from severe asthma. He was weak, and so, by the book of the Law as interpreted by these three he should have simply died.

This idea of being strong while others are weak, of forcing your ideas onto others at the expense of common decency is the hallmark of the fundamentalist Christian. Westboro Baptist Church considers itself presenting its truth even when common decency suggests they should shut up. What is the difference between picketing a funeral because dead soldiers “are faggots” and defaming someone while they are on their deathbed. Both acts are ennobled in the minds of their perpetrators based on their own interpretation of scripture.

In the case of Christianity there is a reason for its evolutionary backwardness – at its fundamental level it was drawn up 2000 years ago and re-interpreted several times to make it fit into the politics of the time.  Thelema lacks that excuse -- it is a new religion; free from politics, a pope, or anything external to itself which can cause anti-evolutionary behaviour. So why then has it generated followers whose attitude would be welcome in the ranks of Westboro Baptist Church? That something Thelemites need to worry about.

Humanity does not need another religion which calls for another people to dominate or be unpleasant to another.  We had those and they always lead to genocide and intolerance.  Therefore if that doctrine is not what Thelemites consider as being part of their faith, then they have to do their best to distance themselves from them.  Just like Westboro  is a problem for Christians, these three should be a problem for Thelema.

What was telling in the Kraig incident was that the Thelemites were surprisingly quiet – the antics of these three were upsetting only to people outside their religion. The three became convinced they were right and went on the attack. Posting more of their hatred publically and attacking those who disagreed with them.

Where were the Thelemites who disagreed? If these three are wrong in their interpretation of the Book of the Law then why aren’t people pointing out their error?  Why is it left to outsiders to be horrified that a modern religion can go this way?  If they continue to permit this sort of anti-evolutionary thinking, they will end up in same position that Christianity is.  

When Westboro stands up with its hate placards it re-enforces what many people believe about Christianity anyway – that it is a bunch of right-wing conservative nutjobs who have nothing to say about real life.  Too many like Paul Joseph Rovelli, Leilah Publications and surgo at Lux Nox and your religion will die out as outsiders like me realise that they really do not believe in such horrible things in the 21st century.,

Don Kraig has died

It is with great sadness that I announce that Donald Michael Kraig took his last breaths last night (3/17/2014) and died. He has crossed over to Summerland and is finally no longer suffering. The type of cancer he had was just too aggressive for us to do any more treatments and his body finally gave way. He did not suffer. He simply slipped away in his sleep.

In lieu of flowers or cards, please consider donating to the fund below to help offset medical expenses and, now, funeral expenses.At a later date to be named, there will be a memorial service celebrating his life and what he meant to all of us.Namaste,Holly Allender Kraig 

Last night Don Kraig lost his battle with pancreatic cancer. He went out fighting with a large number of his friends, students, and legions of readers alongside him. This is the way it should have been. Not only do occultists fight for every inch of life, what ever the odds, but Kraig’s books inspired many to start magical work and there are many of which owe their magical careers to him

There will be some who feel that the magic that they did to keep Don on this planet failed and they would be partly right. The magical reservoir which helped him through the last stage of his illness appeared to allow him to have a peaceful end unlike many who suffer from pancreatic cancer. It seemed that it really was his time and the fates had spoken and it was not a situation that magic had a right to change.

However, there was something more at play here. More than 1000 people that I know of were regularly doing regular healing workings in many different traditions, for a variety of different reasons.  All that energy sat on the astral helping him through what was a very painful illness.  It was there in such a supply that as he stepped into the Astral he would have known it and felt it.

 It was a magical send off for a modern occult hero. Over the weeks that Kraig’s friends fought for him, he knew that he was loved, wanted and appreciated.  You cannot want more from a life than that.

This is the sort of exit that few in the occult world have received. Many die unknown, unmourned and unappreciated; their books yellowing on second-hand book shops. The fact that so many gave their power to help him, is a sign that they wanted him to stay.  The fact he went out fighting with so many alongside him was a sign that this was a special person.   Someone who is more than human does not go “gently to that last good night” if they feel that they have work to be done. Don did not.

Kraig wrote a book which has been in every occult bookshop and most occultists bookshelves for more than 20 years. It will remain an occult classic he probably had more inside him which will be up to his students to bring through.

We do not learn about how important individual sparks are until they are gone. The collective grief already appearing on Facebook is mourning that vacuum inside ourselves that the departing spark leaves. We all did our best to try to change that, but it was time that Don left this story to go on to a new one. At least he knew that he was wanted.

MagickAll

If you are living across the pond you might what to look up the MagickAll (April 5 to 13, 2014) gathering hosted by David Griffin's HOGD/AO. You can read all about it here 
It will be held  on the outskirts of Las Vegas Nevada and will feature speakers on Wicca, the Golden Dawn and General Magic.

Heal the Sick and that freely

There are moments when I find myself out of sync with the rest of humanity and the occult community.  I heard that Don Kraig was sick and I thought, lets rally occultists to do a regular healing ritual for him. Someone else thought raise some cash for him so he that he does not have to worry about medical costs.  A group started on Facebook and all seemed quite reasonable.  It seemed normal.  It struck me the world was better off with Don Kraig in it.

But apparently in this modern world this attitude is wrong.  The head  of the Gnostic Church of L.V.X  Paul Joseph Rovelli  said Don Kraig was a fraud.  Since Rovelli could afford expensive medical insurance, so Don Kraig should be able to.  Instead people should be giving money to his Gnostic church which was “giving money to the living.”

 A publisher of what appeared to be “right on” books Leiah Publications said that we should have been giving money and healing to Steve Hyatt who was dead a long time ago and never asked for any.

All of the above people were American and suffering is not part of the American dream. Suffering is a reminder that their system really does not work and only helps a handful of people who are lucky. At the other end of the scale you have people who think that everything is divided into race and whatever race you are not in is somehow privileged.

But what is lost here is someone is sick, help him out in whatever way you can. Magic or money it does not matter. It is what you do for a fellow human, even if they are not your friend. Now I do not know Don Kraig. In fact, I must be one of the few magicians on the planet who have not read his books. He knows a few friends of mine and has been decent when I have written to him and he asked for help generally. It seemed natural to help.

After all, you cannot claim that you do not know, because you have been told.

The Bible talks about a “sense of rightness” and that the Torah is really written on the tablets of your heart. In Ancient Egypt they talked about about the rule of Maat and “rightness.”

This is not saying “ I am right” and these “other guys are wrong.”  It is that there is a rightness in helping people when they need it. Sure, there are times when it is best not to help, and there can be some real moral dilemmas here, but when someone is physically sick and they can’t do to help themselves, which is when others HAVE to step in. 

Occultist are supposed to be developing themselves so that they can help the universe. By helping themselves they are supposed to improve live for everyone else.  They are aware of the illusion of separateness and realise that they are helping themselves by service to others.

This is not some “leftist wishy-washyness” this is obeying a law which is written on the tablet of your heart.  

It is possible that while emphasizing the individual we have lost side of the other. We have become narcissistic. In doing so we have lost the reason why we do all this. We are sparks of an infinite being and the sum is always greater than the whole.  In helping others when they are helpless we are assisting evolution. 

It was that which was the idea behind the Rosicrucian idea of "healing the sick and that for free."  

Or maybe that is just old fashioned, maybe we should be just giving cash to occult organisations or investing in our new shallow Apple inspired consumer culture religion. Maybe we should be only doing magic for ourselves while inspiring others to join our Orders to uphold our fragile egos upon blankets of grades, and lineages.  Or maybe it is time to say, fuck it, others are a manifestation of me I will help them in what ever way I can, when I can.

I should end with a pithy quote here, and all I can think of are the words Peter Gabriel ended his Sofia concert with:

"The rest is up to you."

That is the Magicians creed.... what do you want the story to be?  

More on Don Kraig's illness here