A Brief Biographical Sketch

of

J. EDWARD CORNELIUS

a.k.a. Frater Achad Osher 583

Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law - AL I:40

I was born in New Haven, Connecticut in July of 1951. I come from an old New England family whose interests in the occult, ghosts, Ouija Boards and UFOs etc & etc date back quite far. Click HERE to view my genealogical history. Most of my writing interests center around the occult, ceremonial magick and the infamous magician Aleister Edward Crowley (1875-1947). I have been fascinated with this man since the late 1960's. I am my own boss; a poet, writer and artist by profession. My artwork and numerous oil paintings have always been very erotic, some claim bordering onsexual  perversity with a touch of immoral and depraved humor but to me my work is simply bathed in the beauty of that which I was not born; or the female form. There is an overbearing sense, as with everything that I do, that the underlying nature of my very existence is rooted in my quest for the opposite on every level. Although I am very religious in my beliefs toward God, I believe in no single faith. I adhere strongly to a belief in reincarnation or the transmigration of my Soul in an endless cycle of birth, life and death moving from one body into another and so forth in order to gain a multitude of experiences. I have been here before and I shall be here again and again until time is no more. I have no interest in escaping off this silly little rock that we call Earth, I enjoy it here, I take pleasure in my frivolity and experiences. I do not live a moralistic life as dictated by others in the promise of a better afterlife; I take my fill of Life here now. Yes, it is here where I commenced my earliest research; rooted in the ancient Greek axiom of ‘Know Thyself’ and I did just that, on every level.

In the mid-seventies I began corresponding with Crowley's personal student Grady Louis McMurtry (1918-1985), or Frater Hymenaeus Alpha 777. Shortly thereafter I joined Aleister Crowley’s fraternity known as Ordo Templi Orientis (OTO). I considered Grady a good friend and personal mentor. In fact, Grady spent time at my house back in Connecticut on several occasions. I quickly rose up the fraternal ranks and became one of its Inner Initiates in the Hermetic Triad of this Order. My career in Crowley’s OTO is as follows: In 1977 I was chartered to run The Frater Achad Chapter of the OTO in Connecticut which was later elevated up to Brocken Mountain Lodge OTO; with myself as Lodge Master. I was involved in founding Brocken Publications which existed for over six years and distributed Crowleyanity world wide. I also published the Lodge Newsletter, Hellspawned, A Newsletter of Brocken Spectres. In 1986 I was chartered to run a Rose Croix Chapter in Connecticut. I remained in charge of these bodies for well over ten years which is one of the longest terms of leadership for a single person in early OTO history.

I joined Aleister Crowley's A.'.A.'. in July of 1979 taking the magickal motto of Verite Sans Puer; Truth Without Fear. Under Grady McMurtry I was brought up degree by degree to the point where I swore the Oath of the Abyss in his presence in Syracuse, New York on April 22nd 1984; thus entering into the City of the Pyramids as a Magister Templi. After Grady's death in July of 1985, I assumed head of his lineage of the Order; of which I still run to this day.

In late August of 1989 I moved to Berkeley [California], where I now reside.

In 1991 I became the sixth Lodge Master of the oldest continually operating Lodge in the world, Thelema Lodge, which was actually founded by Grady McMurtry in 1977. I held this position between 1991-1993. I was also placed in charge of the Neb-Het Chapter of the Rose Croix in the Bay Area. After retiring from these positions, I worked closely with Pangenetor Lodge, OTO whose Lodge Master, Marlene Cornelius, is my now ex-wife.

I wrote, published and distributed Crowleyanity worldwide for years. A few of my most notable articles were:

Crowley's I-Ching Sticks (1991)

The Warrior Troubadour (1994)

Did Aleister Crowley Know the Identity of Jack the Ripper? (1994)

A Brief Study in The English Qabalah of Aleister Crowley (1994)

Poetical Flavours of the Beast (1995)

A Synopsis of O.T.O. Leadership (1995)

The Character Aleister Crowley, as portrayed in Novels and Short Stories (1995)

Of Beastly Illustrations, Aleister Crowley as portrayed in Comic Books (1995)

Those Beastly Limericks of Aleister Crowley (1996)

Myths of the Solar Lodge Revisited (1996)

Liber Worth Fifteen Cents, The Real Gnostic Catholic Masse of the American OTO (1996)

... etc

In 1993 I began formulating plans for a larger formatted publication titled Red Flame, A Thelemic Research Journal. Each issue is actually a book in itself, 200 pages plus, centering on a single topic. I released the first issue, The Poetry of Grady Louis McMurtry (1993), to rave reviews worldwide. Since releasing that issue my ex-wife and I have released twelve other issues. Shortly thereafter, Red Flame closed its door.

No. 1 - The Poetry of Grady Louis McMurtry (1993)

No. 2 - Mystery of Mystery, A Primer of Thelemic Ecclesiastical Gnosticism (1995)

No. 3 - The Friends & Acquaintances of Aleister Crowley (1996)

No. 4 - The Aleister Crowley Desk Reference (1997)

No. 5 - YI KING, a Beastly Book of Changes (1998)

No.6 - The Foolish Issue (1999)

No. 7 - The Magickal Essence of Aleister Crowley (1999)

No. 8 - Liber AL vel Legis, The Book of the Law (2000)

No. 9 - Aleister Crowley, In the Public's Eye (2001)

No. 10 & 11 - Jane Wolfe, Her Life with Aleister Crowley by Phyllis Seckler (2001)

No. 12 & 13 - In The Name of the Beast,

A biography of Grady McMurtry, disciple of Aleister Crowley (2002)

In 2003, after almost 27 years, I decided to official let my dues lapse and I resigned from Aleister Crowley’s Ordo Templi Orientis.

In the Fall of 2005 I released a book titled Aleister Crowley and the Ouija Board (Feral House) This book deals primarily with the history of the Ouija board from ancient China and Greece to the present day along with its corruption amongst the Spiritualists. It goes at length into Aleister Crowley's beliefs that this is the greatest and most dangerous magickal implement ever created. It explains Crowley's views on how to use the board correctly in a magickal setting.

On January 18th 2007 I released the first, of now twenty issues, of a new magazine which I titled CORNELIA, The Magazine of the Magickal, Mystical and often Personal Writings of J. Edward Cornelius and Associates. In this publication I not only began serializing a lengthy set of lessons that I had written the year before titled In Pursuit of The Holy Guardian Angel (2006) but I also included The Magickal Essence of Aleister Crowley and other earlier writings.

In 2007 I released an article titled Anthony Powell, A Friend & Acquaintance of Aleister Crowley in the ANTHONY POWELL SOCIETY newsletters, Issue No.26, Spring 2007, Middlesaex, England, 6 x 8 ¼ stapled pamphlet, white cover, 32 pgs. ... I also wrote an article titled Crowley's Physician, Dr. William Brown Thomson in ANOTHER MIRROR, at the end of the road (magazine) Volume One, Number Two, Fall 2008, 8 ½ x 11 stapled newsletter, pg. 5, Pennsylvania.

In 2008 my book Aleister Crowley and The Ouija Board was translated into Portuguese and re-released in Brazil as ALEISTER CROWLEY eo TABULEIRO OUIJA (Brazil: San Paulo, Madras Editora Ltda 2008, 6 ¼ x 9 paperback, 158 pgs).

In 2010 I privately published The Magickal Essence of Aleister Crowley as a hardback,  246pp. Black cloth with gilt titling to spine.  Full color dustjacket.  B&w frontis, appendixes, index.  Edition limited to 777 numbered copies.  This book focuses on the central philosophies and practices of Magick, in particular the "attainment of the knowledge and conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel," and the secrets that lie at the heart of Crowley's Liber Aleph and The Book of Lies.  The text has its origins in a series of instructions that Aleister Crowley gave to an American disciple, Grady Louis McMurtry, during the last years of the Second World War.  McMurtry returned to the United States, and in his later years went on to head both the O.T.O. and his own lineage of the A.'. A.'.  He became both my friend and mentor, to whom he confided the secrets and teachings that he had received from Crowley.Following McMurtry's death, Cornelius explored these insights in a series of "Epistles" that were privately circulated amongst his own students. In 1999, he made a synthesis of these teachings, which he published in the Red Flame series of journals under the title The Magickal Essence of Aleister Crowley.  It sold out rapidly, and soon became one of the most sought after modern explorations of Crowley's work.  In the decade that has elapsed since the publication of the original Red Flame edition of the book, I have carefully reworked the text, removing sections that I no longer felt to be of relevance, clarifying passages that some of my students found difficult or perplexing, and extensively revising and augmenting the rest.  In the process I added fifteen new chapters, effectively reshaping the entire publication, and filling it with new insights for those interested in the Magick of "the Beast."

My latest hardback book is titled ALETHEIA, Understanding the ‘Truth’ behind The Tree of Life and Astrology (2011).

I am also presently in the process of writing my autobiography titled I Meant Well, plus writing a book on the symbolism behind my design of the 22 Major Arcanum, as well writing a novel titled They Come In The Dark,  An occult novel, with the slight Possibility that it might be true ... I have also written book titled Roman Coins of the Cornelia, being an illustrated study of the 81 Republican coins of the ancient Roman Cornelius family (finished but unpublished)

Of note: A PARTIAL LISTING OF THE WORKS OF J. EDWARD CORNELIUS

which details my writings, books, oil paintings and art; diaries etc,

is presently 45 pages, single spaced.

Love is the law, love under will. - AL I:57

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