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 #150

very entertaining and getting better every day

Howdy everyone! Here’s a public summary of my activity this week ending December 8, 2023 and reminders about some things upcoming!

The big news, of course, is that I’ve released Magick, Music and Ritual 18, the Anthology Album for 2023! I hope you check it out, and consider following along with all the other work by the artists who participated. I’m now, suddenly, also getting ready now for the last three anthology releases leading up to the library’s 30th birthday anniversary in 2026 …

Like Satan Claws, I’ve made a list, and I’m checking it twice; for an upcoming postal exchange! I’m getting things sorted, but I will be sending things to ongoing supporters with a Merch perk, anyone that’s sent me things, and I’m also going to be mailing out the four books to the winners from November’s Weiser Books giveaway. It’s going to be a lot, and I should be getting it all out in the next week, I hope.

With all the stuff around a new anthology release, I didn’t have as much time to do work on the library site, but I did get some things done; also, the usual Sisyphean work on blog and socials continues …

Other than that, the Library Cats and I continue to check in on Gävlebocken every morning, and, for added spice this year, the expanding labor resistance across Scandanavia against Melon Tusk, which is very entertaining and getting better every day.

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 #149

This year’s War on Christmas is an Act of God

It’s the anniversary of Crowley’s Greater Feast today! So, I posted that meme I was workshopping. It’s also Bandcamp Friday, but if you get music there you’ll already have heard about that from the deluge of email. Today was also the day I randomly selected winners for the Weiser Books giveaway, and I’ll be getting those shipped out at the next postal mailing. Hey, I’d better start getting that sorted, eh? By the way, in just a couple days, Magick, Music and Ritual 18 will release! And, on the same day as MMR18 releases, this year’s Gävleboken is prepared for either sacrifice or survival … who knows which?!

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 #148

avoiding the recurrent socioeconomic Torment Nexus that forms on this day

Howdy everyone! Here’s a public summary of my activity this week ending November 24, 2023 and reminders about some things upcoming!

Mostly, I’m hoping that all of you are staying safe and warm, eating leftovers, and avoiding the recurrent socioeconomic Torment Nexus that forms on this day, annually on the calendar, in all the shops. I feel like that’s plenty enough to hope for, isn’t it?

Also, hey, I’ve released This Is Not An Hermetic Library Anthology Album -5 on Bandcamp and Itch for supporters on US Thanksgiving, in, um, thanks for, yeah, giving their, you know, support, pretty much what it said on the tin, so … I’ll just go ahead and repeat my thanks to all participants and supporters! Hip hip huzzah! And, in a little over a week, Magick, Music and Ritual 18 will release for everyone!

As a reminder, I’m still running that Patron and social media book giveaway through the end of this month, so don’t forget to participate in that if you’d like to put your name in the hat for the random drawings.

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 #147

Great to actually reach people with something

Howdy everyone! Here’s a public summary of my activity this week ending November 17, 2023 and reminders about some things upcoming!

I’m feeling a bit frazzled with all the anthology stuff needing to be done for the release of TINAHLAA-5 in a week and MMR18 in a couple weeks. But, it is coming together and, not to jinx it … it’s all on track.

Of other special note, beyond the usual work on all the things, this week I coded a new PGM-related daily oracle, and had one old book review by T Polyphilus that I just posted to the blog kinda blow up a bit on Facebook, at least as close to viral as I ever get; and it’s a bit mystifying! Great to actually reach people with something, of course, but … it all is so random, IDEK.

By the by, just a random geeky note that on November 14, 2023 at 22:13 GMT, the Unix “epoch” ticked over to 1700000000 seconds since 1 January 1970. Kinda cool! Welcome to the new Unix epoch!

As a reminder, I’m still running that Patron and social media book giveaway through the end of this month, so don’t forget to participate in that if you’d like to put your name in the hat for the random drawings.

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 #146

I used to forget about it, like literal clockwork

Howdy everyone! Here’s a public summary of my activity this week ending November 10, 2023 and reminders about some things upcoming!

Hope you had a great astronomical Samhain, and don’t forget that this coming week would be a good time to start up a year-long sequence of the Thelemic Tephiliah.

Also, hope in $current_year you didn’t have any issues with changing the clocks an hour, other than, you know, the dumb practice of having to change the clocks an hour. I used to forget about it, like literal clockwork, absolutely every time it happened, in the old days of mechanical time keeping devices. I no longer have any time devices that don’t handle this automatically for me, but it’s still dumb to being doing it, innit?

This week I got MMR10 in all the places, and prepped MMR11; and I have a sneak preview peek at TINAHLAA-5 for you! I fixed a bunch of secondary stuff behind the scenes that weren’t working after the recent server migration. I also removed the Patreon plugin from the blog, as it was really serving no purpose anymore, which makes all the old OG posts public now, not waiting until their year is up to make that change manually each month. I also had to remove the feature where I displayed an Enochian webfont on some pages, because it wasn’t working well and causing higher than acceptable page loading times for pages where it isn’t even used. A lot of that might be TMI or sound like tech geek talk to you, but suffice to say there was a lot of duck paddling going on beneath the water this week as I sorted some of those things out; in addition to my usual more visible work on website, blog and so on.

As a reminder, I’m still running that Patron and social media book giveaway through the end of this month, so don’t forget to participate in that if you’d like to put your name in the hat for the random drawings.

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 #145

some kind of thirsty for Satan Claws freaks

Howdy everyone! Here’s a public summary of my activity this week ending November 3, 2023 and reminders about some things upcoming!

This coming week is astronomical Samhain, in the Northern Hemisphere when the sun is at 15° Scorpio on November 7th, so I hope you have a great rest of your official spooky season, even if spooky season really is everyday, in our hearts, no matter what those damned retails seem to think with their yule shit out before Thanksgiving, like some kind of thirsty for Satan Claws freaks.

This week, I’ve got news about a book giveaway, MMR9, 10 and TINAHLAA, and all the rest of the usual work on site, blog, and so on.

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 #144

Well, it finally happened.

Howdy everyone! Here’s a public summary of my activity this week ending October 27, 2023 and reminders about some things upcoming!

This coming week is observed Samhain, in the Northern Hemisphere, and next week will be the astronomical point when the sun is at 15° Scorpio, so I hope you have a great rest of your official spooky season, even if spooky season is really everyday, in our hearts.

This week, I’ve got news about MMR8 and 9, a new podcast from Sitting Now, a new social profile to follow on Bluesky, and all the rest of the usual work on site, blog, and so on.

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 #143

Now that camp is ending, and we are heading back to our lives, I hope we stay in touch!

Howdy everyone! Here’s a public summary of my activity this week ending October 20, 2023 and reminders about some things upcoming!

On the music front, MMR7 has shown up everywhere and I already submitted MMR8, which is great! Only one more after that and I’m caught up; and have to decide if I’m actually waiting for actual anniversaries for the rest … I’m kinda feeling like I shouldn’t. But, I’ll decide soon. However, I’ve also got some bad news about Bandcamp that has led me to in a total rush set up MMR1–8 over on the library’s Itch profile. So I spent way too much time this week doing that … but I also did some other stuff on library, blog, and so on for you to check out.

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 #142

it’s all around you! You’re soaking in it. I swear! I hope.

Howdy everyone! Here’s a public summary of my activity this week ending October 13, 2023 and reminders about some things upcoming!

I did indeed continue to migrate all the things, and then spent a ton of time optimizing them in their new places. So, this month, already, I’ve said goodbye, and thank you, to both Crocell and Beleth (“you are free to depart, but be ever ready if I require you again”). Greetings Uvall, may you serve us all with alacrity and constancy! Though, to be honest, Uvall is wearing a Crocell skin suit, as far as the world is concerned; though, in reality, you and I, and Uvall, all know who’s under the mask. (For some purposes the host name “crocell” still exists on the Internet, but the boxen that knows itself as “uvall” answers instead.) Yeah, that’s pretty much most of what I’ve been doing. It’s been a lot to do and get done! What started as an emergency finished as an opportunity. There’s still a few little fit and finish to do, but, for the most part, we’re fully migrated!

And … I’m exhausted. Yeah, this newsletter feels a bit thin, but I can’t really point to what I did this week here, except, you know, ::waves arms around at everything:: it’s all around you! You’re soaking in it. I swear! I hope.

Still waiting for MMR7 to be distributed everywhere, but I’ve pretty much got the playlists for TINAHLAA-5 and MMR18 ready to go. I’ll listen to them a couple more times through to be sure, of course, but I’ve started to get them ready. There’s a little bit of time still, but I’m already excited to share them with the world. Or, you know, since TINAHLAA-5 is supporter-exclusive, I’m excited to share that with supporters for Thanksgiving; then, in December, MMR18 will release for everyone to listen.

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 #141

Might do it in spite of my misgivings

Howdy everyone! Here’s a public summary of my activity this week ending October 6, 2023 and reminders about some things upcoming!

It’s been a busy week of all kinds of things. The main site is running on a new server, both MMR5 and MMR6 available in all the places, Bandcamp sold (again) and the worker union needs some solidarity, I mailed a round of postal exchange, and, along with anything I’ve forgotten to mention, I still did work on the site, blog and so on, as well.

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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