Category Archives: Hermetic Library Newsletter

Hermetic Library Newsletter by John Bell the Librarian of Hermetic Library. This is like following on big social media, but better for everyone. Free weekly newsletter filled with Hermetic Library related stuff! Archiving, Engaging and Encouraging the living Esoteric Tradition, Hermeticism, Aleister Crowley’s Thelema, & much more. Open Access Occultism for over 25 years. Become an ongoing supporter of my work as a Patron, Subscriber, or Member. Or, if you’ve something else in mind, get in touch!

Hermetic Library Newsletter #122

The food- and sugar-induced coma will start to wear off any day now …

Howdy everyone! Here’s a public summary of my activity this week ending May 26, 2023!

This week, tbh, I mostly recall that I stuffed my face with nostalgic mom’s recipe enchiladas, ice cream, and cake. I did some other stuff, I think. I’m sure. I must have! Right? The food- and sugar-induced coma will start to wear off any day now …

And, being serious, as always, I worked on various things mentioned below, and stuff I’ve not specifically mentioned below, on website, blog, and more … Enjoy!

Thank you for visiting and being a guest of Hermetic Library. You help me be of service and make the work of the library meaningful. Especial thanks to each and every ongoing Patron on Patreon, Subscriber at Bandcamp, and Member on Ko-Fi for making the work of the library possible!

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Hermetic Library Newsletter #121

Help me celebrate the anniversary of my birth by supporting my work and sharing the library!

Howdy everyone! Here’s a public summary of my activity this week ending May 19, 2023!

This week I did a bunch of work on creating new entries in Hermeneuticon, and improving a few existing ones.

Also, on a personal note, this upcoming week is the anniversary of my birth, so, if you’re not a supporter, consider becoming one on Patreon, Ko-Fi or Bandcamp (and I’ll give you perks in thanks!). If you’re on social media, consider sharing your good thoughts about the library and liking and sharing a bunch of library posts and post your own links to pages from the site and blog. If you know people that would like to hear about the library, let them know! That’s the best gift you could get me.

And, as always, I worked on various other things I’ve not specifically mentioned on website, blog, and more … Enjoy!

Thank you for visiting and being a guest of Hermetic Library. You help me be of service and make the work of the library meaningful. Especial thanks to each and every ongoing Patron on Patreon, Subscriber at Bandcamp, and Member on Ko-Fi for making the work of the library possible!

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Hermetic Library Newsletter #120

things will be particularly hot and wet, I’ve heard

Howdy everyone! Here’s a public summary of my activity this week ending May 12, 2023!

A couple relatively hot days this week, along with a full week of thunderstorms as the season changes abruptly, as it does. Not nearly so hot as it will get here, but it’s been a taste of what’s to come. Supposedly this year as summer hits here in earnest things will be particularly hot and wet, I’ve heard. Something nifty to look forward to!

This week, I realized I’d missed a whole directory (technically also a “namespace” in wiki terminology) of things in Norton’s Imperium, a section I thought I’d pretty much finished checking for necessary updates. I think once I finish that part I’ll have actually done it all there, actually. I also did some quality of life stuff with new information and improvements to other existing things. Plus I added an entirely new-to-the-site item of Crowley material. And so on.

Probably there’s more. I know each week I probably forget some of the stuff I’ve touched, but I do mention most of what I’ve gotten up to around the place. Anyhow, it’s a constant process, as you are aware by now! I could plow through all the recent changes, but if I were to do that here, that’s a little too OCD for the newsletter, innit? You can always check that yourself, or even follow along through the RSS, if you like or want more details.

For this week’s zine submission, I wrote a little intro article about devotional scapular, which may be of interest. I’d certainly like to hear from you if you decide to try out that idea, especially if you post images somewhere of yours.

And, as always, I worked on various other things I’ve not specifically mentioned on website, blog, and more … Enjoy!

Thank you for visiting and being a guest of Hermetic Library. You help me be of service and make the work of the library meaningful. Especial thanks to each and every ongoing Patron on Patreon, Subscriber at Bandcamp, and Member on Ko-Fi for making the work of the library possible!

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Hermetic Library Newsletter #119

I know it. You know it. We know we know it.

Howdy everyone! Here’s a public summary of my activity this week ending May 5, 2023!

This week I got postal exchange and giveaways to the post office. Everyone that’s been a supporter on Patreon or Ko-Fi in the last year or so, for whom I’ve got a postal address, will be getting something. People with the Postal Exchange perk will be getting a larger mailer with more stuff. Everyone got at least one of the Pulp Magick meme postcard merch, but I threw several extras into the mailers for those with the Postal Exchange perk. Also, I sent off some long overdue giveaway prizes from special offers that I hadn’t gotten out the door yet. Okay, okay, look … all of it was long overdue. I know it. You know it. We know we know it. But, I got it done Tuesday. So some of them may already have arrived! Of course, international destinations will take the longest, but this week they should arrive for most.

Happy Astronomical Beltane, Sun at 15° Taurus, today, May 5 at 18:19 UTC (and full moon)!

And, as always, I worked on various other things I’ve not specifically mentioned on website, blog, and more … Enjoy!

Thank you for visiting and being a guest of Hermetic Library. You help me be of service and make the work of the library meaningful. Especial thanks to each and every ongoing Patron on Patreon, Subscriber at Bandcamp, and Member on Ko-Fi for making the work of the library possible!

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Hermetic Library Newsletter #118

I am almost through the whole thing, except that I have to go back and do a whole bunch of work still

Howdy everyone! Here’s a public summary of my activity this week ending April 28, 2023!

This week I mostly continued to work through updates to Equinox I:iv, and I am almost through the whole thing, except that I have to go back and do a whole bunch of work still on The Temple of Solomon the King. ::sad trombone::

Happy May Day, Walpurgisnacht/Hexennacht, and observed and astronomical Beltane all of which are this coming week!

And, as always, I worked on various other things I’ve not specifically mentioned on website, blog, and more … Enjoy!

Thank you for visiting and being a guest of Hermetic Library. You help me be of service and make the work of the library meaningful. Especial thanks to each and every ongoing Patron on Patreon, Subscriber at Bandcamp, and Member on Ko-Fi for making the work of the library possible!

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Hermetic Library Newsletter #117

I’m planning on shaking this last week off and getting back to it in the new one.

Howdy everyone! Here’s a public summary of my activity this week ending April 21, 2023!

This week was a bit of a lost one. I basically am not sure where the week went. I got a bit of work on the site done, but I felt super burned out every time I went to post on the blog daily and ended up just posting some Omnium Gatherum stuff one day, a meme, and a new propaganda poster. I’m planning on shaking this last week off and getting back to it in the new one.

Also, happy, healthy, safe and sane wishes to you and the whole planet on this 4.543 billionth, plus another new one, anniversary of Earth Day, tomorrow!

And, as always, I worked on various other things I’ve not specifically mentioned on website, blog, and more … Enjoy!

Thank you for visiting and being a guest of Hermetic Library. You help me be of service and make the work of the library meaningful. Especial thanks to each and every ongoing Patron on Patreon, Subscriber at Bandcamp, and Member on Ko-Fi for making the work of the library possible!

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Hermetic Library Newsletter #116

We’ll see! And, I’ll watch closer, or, you know, try to.

Howdy everyone! Here’s a public summary of my activity this week ending April 14, 2023!

The hard drive for the blog server filled up again and took the blog out for about an hour as I discovered the event and then cleared space. What’s happened, essentially the same as what did previously, is that the upgraded database has a new default setting that stores a log of every DB change (as part of helping sync two or more DB servers, which I can’t imagine is actually how most people use it, instead using backups?) and has no clean up process configured. Bizarre. Well, I set it to 30 days, but, apparently, that’s still not frequently enough. So I’m trying 15 days. We’ll see! And, I’ll watch closer, or, you know, try to.

This week, today, in fact, was the first big yard work day of the year here at Hermetic Library HQ. Clearing dead plants from last year, digging up dandelions before they spread (even though I know they actually help soil remediation …), and mowing. A few more flowers from all the seeds I’ve spread have decided to show up, so I’m excited to see that finally start to pick up. For those following along for a while, I’m not going to do another set of milpa rows. Last year’s experiment was definitely not a success. But, the red twig dogwoods I added to the mix are starting to grow up, and are definitely red!

More specifically about the library, I mainly continued to work through updating pages from Equinox I:iv and added a bunch more of Tiny Tales by Laura Gibbs for the month, & c.

And, as always, I worked on various other things I’ve not specifically mentioned on website, blog, and more … Enjoy!

Thank you for visiting and being a guest of Hermetic Library. You help me be of service and make the work of the library meaningful. Especial thanks to each and every ongoing Patron on Patreon, Subscriber at Bandcamp, and Member on Ko-Fi for making the work of the library possible!

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Hermetic Library Newsletter #115

So, you know, if you know, you know, but if you don’t know, consider finding out. Or not. You do you.

Howdy everyone! Here’s a public summary of my activity this week ending April 7, 2023!

There was an upgrade to the core wiki engine this week behind the scenes. Also there were some more annoying technical issues this week, as I found that at some point a few of the useful redirects from old URLs to new locations on the site stopped working, but I fixed those. The nice tool that helped surface the various language landing pages stopped working a while a go, because of an incompatibility in the site theme, that’s fixed in the dev branch but it has been month since the last production milestone; so you may have noticed that the little flag in the top toolbar went a way and was recently replaced by direct links in the footer to all the languages. I continue to await the These are just some examples of the little annoyances that show up occasionally and have to be addressed over time.

This week is the anniversary of the Three Days of the Writing of the Book of the Law, back in 1904, at solar noon each day of April 8–10 (unless you’re one of those who think the dates were changed from April 1, for reasons; in which case it’s the observed anniversary, for you). So, you know, if you know, you know, but if you don’t know, consider finding out. Or not. You do you.

And, as always, I worked on various other things I’ve not specifically mentioned on website, blog, and more … Enjoy!

Thank you for visiting and being a guest of Hermetic Library. You help me be of service and make the work of the library meaningful. Especial thanks to each and every ongoing Patron on Patreon, Subscriber at Bandcamp, and Member on Ko-Fi for making the work of the library possible!

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Hermetic Library Newsletter #114

I went back in time

Howdy everyone! Here’s a public summary of my activity this week ending March 31, 2023!

Lots of work on the site this week, including adding books by both Ida Craddock and Ethel Archer. Lots of other news I’ll mention more specifically. This week I kinda just plowed through tons of things on the site, and I don’t have a lot else to say about that. So, you know, check out the new stuff and anything you missed on the blog this week!

Also, since April 1 is coming up, just a reminder that it’s a good week to be skeptical! So, maybe, check out Crowley’s essay The Soldier and the Hunchback!?

And, as always, I worked on various other things I’ve not specifically mentioned on website, blog, and more … Enjoy!

Thank you for visiting and being a guest of Hermetic Library. You help me be of service and make the work of the library meaningful. Especial thanks to each and every ongoing Patron on Patreon, Subscriber at Bandcamp, and Member on Ko-Fi for making the work of the library possible!

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Hermetic Library Newsletter #113

Happy Thelemic Year V:ix!

Howdy everyone! Here’s a public summary of my activity this week ending March 24, 2023!

This week I did a whole lot of work restoring most of David Richard Jones’ Invisible College pages. During the migration to the wiki engine these pages did not transfer because for a lot of them I was using special code for them, and so there was not any page to import, per se. So, I had to go back through them all and create pages and then add a bunch of links to downloadable files. And so on. Also, I’ve had some annoying technical issues, including a power outage that revealed that the site server was not properly set to reboot on power restoration, a disk full on the blog server, and my desktop had some stability problems. Anyhow, that’s a bit too much of a hint on how I made the sausage this week. I also added more of the old newsletters, finished adding all the old Write.As issues and another Revue issue. Plus, there’s new and updated Hermeneuticon entries, and a few more Sufi and Nasruddin tiny tales from Laura Gibbs.

And, as always, I worked on various other things I’ve not specifically mentioned on website, blog, and more … Enjoy!

Thank you for visiting and being a guest of Hermetic Library. You help me be of service and make the work of the library meaningful. Especial thanks to each and every ongoing Patron on Patreon, Subscriber at Bandcamp, and Member on Ko-Fi for making the work of the library possible!

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