The Summer 2013 / An IVxxi issue of Wand, the journal of Coph Nia, a local body of Ordo Templi Orientis in the valley of Eugene, OR, whose body master is Hermetic Library fellow David Richard Jones, has arrived courtesy of that body and is now part of the collection at the Reading Room.
Cover: Frater Achad, Charles Stansfeld Jones from An XV, Sun in Aries
The Dark Lord: H.P. Lovecraft, Kenneth Grant, and the Typhonian Tradition in Magic by Peter Levenda, from Ibis Press, may be of interest.
“One of the most famous — yet least understood — manifestations of Thelemic thought has been the works of Kenneth Grant, the British occultist and one-time intimate of Aleister Crowley, who discovered a hidden world within the primary source materials of Crowley’s Aeon of Horus. Using complementary texts from such disparate authors as H.P. Lovecraft, Jack Parsons, Austin Osman Spare, and Charles Stansfeld Jones (‘Frater Achad’), Grant formulated a system of magic that expanded upon that delineated in the rituals of the OTO: a system that included elements of Tantra, of Voudon, and in particular that of the Schlangekraft recension of the Necronomicon, all woven together in a dark tapestry of power and illumination.
The Dark Lord follows the themes in the writings of Kenneth Grant, H.P. Lovecraft, and the Necronomicon, uncovering further meanings of the concepts of the famous writers of the Left Hand Path. It is for Thelemites, as well as lovers of the Lovecraft Mythos in all its forms, and for those who find the rituals of classical ceremonial magic inadequate for the New Aeon.
Traveling through the worlds of religion, literature, and the occult, Peter Levenda takes his readers on a deeply fascinating exploration on magic, evil, and The Dark Lord as he investigates of one of the most neglected theses in the history of modern occultism: the nature of the Typhonian Current and its relationship to Aleister Crowley’s Thelema and H.P. Lovecraft’s Necronomicon.” [via]
The Fenris Wolf No 6, edited by Carl Abrahamsson, cover art by Fredrik Söderberg, published by Edda Publications, Sweden, is available directly or, in the US, from Weiser Antiquarian
“Edited by Carl Abrahamsson. Cover art by Fredrik Söderberg. The sixth issue of The Fenris Wolf touches upon topics as diverse as occult London, Tantric quests, rune magic and neurology, Cannabis, LSD, entheogenic influences on culture, the Mega Golem, Aleister Crowley in China, Bogomil Gnostics, decadent French author Josephin Péladan, the birth and death horoscopes of the Great Beast 666, Liber AL vel Legis, the psycho-sexual surrealism of Hans Bellmer, healing, death, the extraterrestrial origins of language, Ernst Jünger’s psychedelic approaches, recent Satanic cinema, the occult potential of contemporary physics, “Babalon” as a magical formula, the mystical art of Sulamith Wülfing and a never before published poem, The Litany of Ra, by Charles Stansfeld Jones a.k.a. Frater Achad. And more…
Contents
Carl Abrahamsson – Editor’s Introduction
Frater Achad – A Litany of Ra
Kendell Geers – Tripping over Darwin’s Hangover
Vera Nikolich – Eastern Connections
Carl Abrahamsson – Babalon
Freya Aswynn – On the Influence of Odin
Marita – Runic Magic through the Odinic Dialectic
Aki Cederberg – Afterword: The River of Story
Shri Gurudev Mahendranath – The Londinium Temple Strain
Gary Dickinson – An Orient Pearl
Derek Seagrief – Aleister Crowley’s Birth & Death Horoscopes
Tim O’Neill – Shades of Void
Nema – Magickal Healing
Nema – A Greater Feast
Philip Farber – Sacred Smoke
Robert Taylor – Death & the Psychedelic Experience
Michael Horowitz – LSD: the Antidote to Everything
Alexander Nym – Transcendence as an Operative Category…
Carl Abrahamsson – Approaching the Approaching
Renata Wieczorek – The Secret Book of the Tatra Mountains
Sasha Chaitow – Legends of the Fall Retold
Sara George & Carl Abrahamsson – Sulamith Wülfing
Robert C Morgan – Hans Bellmer
Genesis Breyer P-Orridge – Tagged for Life
Carl Abrahamsson – Go Forth and Let Your Brain-halves Procreate
Anders Lundgren – Satanic Cinema is Alive and Well
Anton LaVey – Appendices” [via]
You may be interested in Weiser Antiquarian Book Catalogue #110: Aleister Crowley: New, Used and Rare Books and Ephemera. Including a Selection of Books from the Library of Wilfred T. Smith.
“Welcome to the one hundred-and-tenth of our on-line catalogues, this being another of our specialised Aleister Crowley lists.
The catalogue begins with three interesting new releases: signed copies of Marlene Cornelius’ Liber AL Vel Legis: The Book of the Law. An Examination of Liber XXXI & Liber CCXX; and David Shoemaker’s Living Thelema: A Practical Guide to Attainment in Aleister Crowley’s System of Magick, and the always-interesting and beautifully produced AMeTh Lodge Journal. Vol. I, No. II from AMeTh Lodge of the O.T.O. in London. The next item is “Dark Halo,” a signed and numbered Limited Edition Print of a portrait of Aleister Crowley by California artist Heather McMillen, with an accompanying hand-written poetic “homage to Aleister Crowley” by Blair MacKenzie Blake, author of The Wickedest Books in the World and other works.
The third section of the catalogue is devoted to books and ephemera by Aleister Crowley himself. Amongst the rarities included are a copy of the Cambridge University magazine Granta which includes an anonymous poem by Crowley, a copy of the vellum bound first volume of The [Collected] Works of Aleister Crowley with an extraordinary double inscription, and Nicholas Bishop-Culpeper’s personal copy of Magick In Theory and Practice, beautifully bound in full vellum. There is also a group of four autograph letters, signed by Crowley; each is significant in its own way, with topics ranging from Crowley’s alleged share holdings in Australia, to a defense of Aubrey Beardsley! A selection of copies of The English Review, each with a contribution by Crowley, are followed by a varied group of books and journals that in one way or another relate to “the Beast.” Included amongst the journals are a copy of Esquire Magazine from March 1970 with a detailed and heavily illustrated series of essays on Californian occultism, that also reproduces a newsclipping concerning the famous “Solar Lodge” “Boy in the Box” debacle; a complete set of Sothis Magazine from the 1970s, a collection of the first seven issues of the Typhonian magazine Starfire; and 3 consecutive issues of Picture Post Magazine from 1955 which serialised a well-illustrated but breathless account of Crowley’s life. Amongst the books in the same section are a first edition of The Macedonians by Mary Butts, the English novelist and serious occult practitioner who spent some time at Cefalu with Crowley, the very uncommon first edition of Tiger-Woman by Betty May, in which she recounts her own time at Cefalu, and Nina Hamnett’s Laughing Torso, a book which eventually led Crowley into bankruptcy after he sued it’s publishers for libel, and failed.
A selection of the rather abstruse “Ming” booklets by one-time Crowley acolyte C. F. Russell is followed by the first three volumes of his also often-baffling Znuz is Znees, Memoirs of a Magician. A link, to a separate page, leads to listings for a collection of 26 books that were formerly in the library of Wilfred Talbot Smith (1885-1957), founder of “The Church of Thelema,” head of Agape Lodge of the O.T.O. in California, a long term associate of Aleister Crowley, and subject of Martin Starr’s biography The Unknown God. The collection includes a copy of the First US edition of Aleister Crowley’s Diary of a Drug Fiend, and copies of a number of works that Crowley is known to have recommended to his disciples, including The Canon; three books by Sydney T. Klein; the James Legge, translations of The Tao Teh King and The Yi King; etc. Some of the books have presentation or other inscriptions by well known people within the Thelemic community, including C. Stansfeld Jones; Frederic Mellinger; and Helen Parsons Smith. Most of the books are stamped with the personal lamen, with phallic design, of W.T. Smith, which he used as an ownership stamp, and a few also have his ownership signature. Included in the collection are several books that are quite scarce in their own right; notably the works by the obscure American alchemical author Delmar DeForest Bryant and the First Edition of the Pancham Sinh, translation of The Hatha Yoga Pradipika. Returning to the present page, the catalogue finishes with a group of copies of the Cincinnati Journal of Ceremonial Magick, a magazine published by a small Thelemic group in Ohio known as the Bate Cabal in the late 1970s and 80s.” [via]
The Progradior Correspondence, Letters by Aleister Crowley, C. S. Jones, & Others, edited and introduced by Keith Richmond, the 2009 hardcover edition from Teitan Press, is part of the collection at the Reading Room.
“The Progradior Correspondence comprises the text of ninety letters and other documents that were exchanged between “Frater Progradior” (that is Aleister Crowley’s Lancashire-born follower Frank Bennett), and members of “the Beast’s” inner circle, including Crowley himself, Charles Stansfeld Jones, Leila Waddell, Leah Hirsig and others.
The correspondence began in 1910 when Bennett wrote to Crowley seeking his advice on the performance of “The Sacred Magic of Abra-Melin the Mage.” It continued through the years of The Equinox, through Crowley’s residence in the United States during the First World War, and on past the heydays of the Abbey of Thelema at Cefalu in the early 1920s. The exchange finally drew to a close in 1926, by which time Crowley had dropped or otherwise lost contact with most of his associates of the preceding decade and a half.
A third of the letters were written by Aleister Crowley. Like the rest of the correspondence, these focus largely on the efforts that he and his followers were making to promote his occult fraternities, the A∴ A∴ and the O.T.O. As such they offer valuable first-hand accounts of the development of Crowley’s creed of Thelema during this important period. The letters are highly revealing on a personal level as well, and provide considerable insight into Crowley’s character and the influence that he had on the people around him. In broader terms they give a fascinating impression of the lives and activities of all those involved.
The Progradior Correspondence is edited by Frank Bennett’s biographer, Keith Richmond, who has also contributed a short Introduction and added footnotes to elucidate some of the more obscure names, words and passages in the letters.” [via]
The Hermetic Library Reading Room is an imaginary and speculative future reification of the library in the physical world, a place to experience a cabinet of curiosities offering a confabulation of curation, context and community that engages, archives and encourages a living Western Esoteric Tradition. If you would like to contribute to the Hermetic Library Reading Room, consider supporting the library or contact the librarian.
Commentaries on the Holy Books and Other Papers (Equinox), containing commentaries on the Class A libri by Aleister Crowley and other papers, including work by H P Blavatsky, J F C fuller and Charles Stansfeld Jones (Frater Achad), is part of the collection at the Reading Room. This is both a paperback and hardcover published as Equinox IV 1 by Weiser.
The Hermetic Library Reading Room is an imaginary and speculative future reification of the library in the physical world, a place to experience a cabinet of curiosities offering a confabulation of curation, context and community that engages, archives and encourages a living Western Esoteric Tradition. If you would like to contribute to the Hermetic Library Reading Room, consider supporting the library or contact the librarian.
The fifth number of The Ruby Tablet is now available. The Ruby Tablet is a periodical compiled and edited by Darcy Kuntz, under the auspices of the Golden Dawn Research Trust, which may be of some interest. So, check it out and consider helping with a donation to keep new issues of this periodical coming.
“The Ruby Tablet is a periodical featuring reprints of articles from esoteric magazines and journals from the past. The subjects covered in each issue are drawn from the esoteric genre such as Alchemy, Hermetic, Enochian, Kabbalah, Tarot, Martinism, Masonry, Rosicrucian, etc.
The fifth issue of The Ruby Tablet features a number of articles on the Zodiac. We are also printing a five-part article on The Rosy Cross in Russia by A Russian. This issue has parts one and two and it will be concluded in the next issue. We have reprinted Frater Achad’s interesting ritual on the Conjuration of Kronos. Also featured are esoteric papers on Abracadabra, Pasquales and his Elus Cohen, Astrology, Kabbalah, and the Laws of the Brotherhood of the Rosicrucians.
Contents:
The Rosy Cross in Russia Part 1 by A Russian
Abracadabra
Golden Dawn Research Trust
The Rosy Cross in Russia Part 2 by A Russian
Kerubim Press
The Conjuration of Kronos by Frater Achad
The Twelve Angels of the Zodiac
Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn Books
Laws of the Brotherhood of the Rosicrucians
The Mystery of the Lords Prayer
Rosicrucian Order of the Golden Dawn
Pasquales and his Elus Cohen by Sendivogius
Skylight Press
Astral Origins of the Zodic Signs
The Ineffable Name by A[lexander] W[ilder]” [via]
“The Ruby Tablet is sold without a set price and is on the honour system. We will let you decide what to donate, based on what you feel The Ruby Tablet is worth. We propose a minimum donation of $5.00. Below is a button that will take you to our donation page.”
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You may be interested in Christ and the Mega Therion a book compiled by T Allen Greenfield, and that includes materials by Greenfield and Frater Achad, Charles Stansfeld Jones. It’s not clear what unpublished materials are in the contents from the description, but this may be worth checking out.
“Being a shocking attempt to reconcile the visions of enlightenment from one age into another, including a previously little-known essay by Frater Achad, some tales of the Aeon of Osiris and others of the Aeon of Horus, that the Son of Righteousness shall shine in the Mythos of the Aeon of the Crowned and Conquering Childe. Contains previously unpublished material from Frater Achad (Charles Stansfeld Jones) and T Allen Greenfield.” [via]
“Ordo Adeptorum Invisiblum” is a post over at the Occult Chicago blog (which is a blog by Hermetic Library visual pool contributor Rik Garrett), and the name of a specifically feminist Thelemic order founded in England in 1979 with headquarters for the US in Chicago in 1981. According to the article “Western Esoteric Family III: Magick” in Melton’s Encyclopedia of American Religions, the OAI was inspired by the “proclamation of the magical Aeon of Ma (or Maat) [made] in 1948 by Frater Achad (Charles Stansfeld Jones)” [via, also]. Occult Chicago also discusses how the OAI was influenced by the works of Aleister Crowley, Jack Parsons [also] and Nema, author of Maat Magick: A Guide to Self-Initiation and co-founder of Horus Maat Lodge. If you were a member of or know more about that order, you may consider getting in contact with the Occult Chicago blog and sharing your story. [HT Sarah Veale]
“The OAI also adopts feminist principles and practices—not the anti-male separatist variety—but in its non-sexist androgynous philosophy. Women are not the vehicle of a male seed, a male High Priest. They are magickal people in their own right. The history of female magickal energy is far older than that of the male, but it has been overshadowed by the masculine principle. The OAI seeks to rectify this by balancing the imbalance through women seeking to rediscover and reassert themselves, while male members minimize as far as possible their aggressiveness and dominance. In turn, this will lead to a more directly visible equality and non-hierarchical structure within the group and in rituals.” [via]
As an aside, Nema’s Liber Pennae Praenumbra, and a number of other works by Horus Maat Lodge members appear in the Received Wisdom section of the library and in the archives of Beast Bay.
In Thelema Coast to Coast #04: May 14, 2005, which you can listen to via Episode #4, there’s an interview with Tony Stansfeld-Jones, the son of Charles Stansfield Jones, Frater Achad. You can read quite a few of the works by Frater Achad over at The Qabalistic and Thelemic Works of Frater Achad.
I’ve also gone ahead and added a stub entry for Charles Stansfeld Jones at the Hermeneuticon wiki. Yeah, and I’ve also tried to fix a few places where I’d spelled “Stansfeld” wrong on pages in the library, even on pages in the Frater Achad section.
