To Max : Aleister Crowley the Aghori!

[Guest guest]

Dear Max,

Well, to tell you the truth, only a few years ago I

would have completely agreed with you. I absolutely

refused to have anything to do with AC for the first

part of my magickal career because I thought exactly

the same thing. It was not until I had my kundalini

awakening in 1994 that I was forced to change my mind.

Kali Ma requested that I take up my Western magickal

studies again in good earnest, rather than focus on

Indian methods, so that's what I did. I read what was

available on the topic of Western Tantra, and was led

straight to Aleister Crowley. I was completely

gobsmacked to discover that the work I was engaged on

and the work he described in his "Confessions" and

other autobiographical tidbits as being engaged on was

so similar to mine, as to be clearly a parallel type

experience! I found I understood exactly what he was

talking about and that his observations on his

ordeals, etc. were very helpful in sorting out what I

myself was undergoing! Thus I disagree with you: he

was clearly very much an adept! There are adepts and

adepts; they do NOT all fit the same mold, just like

some sadhus are gentle and sweet, and others are

hostile and frightening! The chaos that surrounded

A.C. was at least partly due to the times in which he

lived. The Victorian age was breaking up, and humanity

was in the process of massive change. He was very much

a man ahead of his time, and such people tend to have

strong effects on those around them, who are still

caught up in old patternings. Certainly there was much

wrong in his attitudes, but men who are larger than

life tend to "live large". Most of what he got up to

would hardly raise an eyebrow nowadays! I see people

behaving all the time in exactly the same ways as he

did everywhere; the thing that excuses A.C. is that

underneath it all, he was out to overcome his human

limitations in his own individual way in order to

become more than human, which is exactly the goal of

the Initiate. The people I speak of, however, who

behave in exactly the same ways, such as taking drugs,

having indiscriminate sex, etc, are seeking absolutely

nothing at all. They use and abuse people for their

own trivial, selfish, petty, narcissistic purposes,

with no idea or concept whatever of a greater reality

beyond. They are given completely over to their

animalistic appetites and ego-drives with no thought

of spiritual attainment or going beyond any

limitations. Thus, AC lived his life with a greater

goal in mind, that of attaining to the knowledge of

the reason for his existence, and linking himself up

with a much greater Reality...this he succeeded in

doing, no doubt about it! There are precious few who

can make such a claim! True, he WAS a disruptive

influence in the lives of many, but I would personally

rather be disrupted by someone like AC, than live a

complacent, stagnant, limited existence. I have

mentioned numerous times the "Aghora" trilogy by

Robert Svoboda in my postings. I can say that it

struck me very hard, reading about AC after reading

about "Vimalananda", how startlingly similar were the

attainment methodologies of "Vimalananda" and Aleister

Crowley! Thus I would say that it is plain that AC was

an adept of the "Aghora" school of thought. It might

also be pointed out that AC studied in India and was

something of a Tantric initiate! His Hindu name was

"Shivaji" or "Little Shiva", so it is plain that

anyone holding a name like that is definitely going to

have an unsettling effect on the people around him,

since Shiva is the Destroyer of Illusion. His book

"Yoga" is absolutely brilliant, and I recommend it,

although those that enjoy obscurely circuitous methods

of attainment will be disturbed at how he "cuts to the

chase", and those that enjoy pompous platitudinizing

will be disturbed at how funny and seemingly

irreverent the book is. With all this discussion

lately of grahas and upayas on this site, I recommend

his discourses on "Yama" and "Niyama" as referred to

planetary energies. In fact I may even post it to the

site, in "Files" for anyone who wishes to take a look.

 

In any case, anyone who reads even the introduction

to the Book of the Law can only be struck with how

accurately he pinpointed and predicted the future

course of world events; Nostradamus PALES by

comparison! If nothing else, this startling accuracy

of prediction should command our respect and our

attention, even if his personal standards of conduct

don't come up to our standards. Another person who

commands my personal regard in this way was Carl Jung,

and his personal life was hardly regular, either! If I

have learned anything at all, it is to not let

personal prejudices stand in the way of a worthy fount

of teaching. Jung himself said, "New points of view

are not, as a rule, discovered in territory that is

already known, but in out-of-the-way places that may

even be avoided because of their bad name" Had I

continued to avoid the writings of Aleister Crowley

because of his "bad name" as I had been doing, I would

have missed out on a tremendous lot of learning,

insights, and inner knowledge that literally CANNOT be

found anywhere else!! I must say "Jai Kali Ma!" for

Her insistence on my taking up the trail in this

direction! Thus does the Mother destroy illusions in

Her devotees!

Lilith M.

PS.In his "Confessions" he describes at one point

making a sacrificial offering to Kali in a secret

temple in India, and obtaining a manifestation of Her

as Bhavani, which he commemorated in a poem. He speaks

of devotion to Nuit, who is represented by a

blue-black woman arched over the earth, jeweled with

stars. It was quite clear that he was a devotee of

Her, and that Nuit and Hadit are simply variant names

for Shiva and Shakti.

 

--- Max Dashu <maxdashu wrote:

> No one who is as massively self-centered,

> ego-driven, even

> megalomaniac, as this man was, can be considered an

> adept. Siddhas are

> not the ultimate measure of realization! He was

> gifted, no doubt, but

> created disorder and misfortune wherever he went. By

> their fruits ye

> shall know them...

>

> Max

>

> > Alistaire Crowley, the Western occultist,

> hedonist, racist and

> > misogynist

>

>