~ SEPT. 11th - 20th, 2008 ~

(the latest entries are always added to the top)

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

Saturday September 20th 2008 – Check out my RECOMMENED MOVIE page; I added info about the movies Noriko's Dinner Table and Stranger Circus but more important, go to the very bottom of the page and check out the picture that I added! If you've seen the Japanese movie Audition, you know what it is!

6:55am For the history buffs:  The writer therapist Dr. Joyce Brothers was born on this date in 1928. She was a popular talk show guest on the subject of psychology who gained national attention as a quiz show celebrity in the 1950s, winning both the $64,000 Question and the $64,000 Challenge in, of all categories - “boxing.” …...…. And Annie Wood Besant, social reformer and freethinker, died on this date in 1933. She wrote many articles on issues such as marriage and women’s rights and even wrote a book advocating birth control titled The Law of Population. Annie Besant introduced International Co-Freemasonry into England with the consecration of the Lodge Human Duty No.6 in London on September 26, 1902. She was also co-founder of the Order of the Temple of the Rosy Cross (OTRC) in London in 1912 and was even elected president of the Theosophical Society from 1907 until her death. ……..... and on September 20, 1930 the foundation stone was laid for the Goetheanum by Rudolf Steiner. Years later the structure would be burned to the ground by the Nazis but fate would have it that the arsonist did not escape the blaze and his charred corpse was found in the ashes with his payment of gold coins still in the remains of his pocket. …..…… and finally, on September 20, 1956 David Scriven was born in Hemet, California. He's a Virgo, with a Scorpio Rising and an Aries Moon; need I say more? Anyway, he would later become Xth Degree of the Ordo Templi Orientis for the United States and is now known as Frater Sabazius; arguably, as one person put it - “he'll go down in history as the single most person who destroyed the Order’s magickal credibility.” 

Friday September 19th 2008 – 9:30pm Luna writes, "J 93! I can't wait to not-watch "Suicide Club". I googled it after reading your blog and found this image...which I peered at through the spaces in my fingers as I held my hand

up to my face! This is too good ...a

Suicide Circle made of human skin that

looks like a firehose???!! Thanks for the

cool film info. Hope you are happy. See

you in dreamtime. Love and 93s  )O(."

...... Reply: The really scary part of the

movie are these adorable twelve and

thirteen year old year Japanese girls doing

a pop-culture type of wholesome

singing and dance routine throughout the

movie and you know, these cute little girls, are some how responsible for convincing people to kill themselves but how? And how are these little girls collecting the role of human skin sliced off in such perfect strips? Now that part even freaked me out!  Click HERE for details and let your imagination flow but don't click on it if you think it'll spoil the movie.

12:40pm I took a walk to the local music & video store called Rasputin's, only a few blocks from my house and discovered that just this week they got in copies of Noriko's Dinner Table and Strange Circus. Considering this to be an omen, as if the Gods are snickering, I had to buy them! Still, I've yet to find a copy of Ab-Normal Beauty ... but I'm still looking!

11:50am Carol writes, "Jer 93 Out of curiosity, do you let your son watch these 'recommended' movies? Luv 93s C." .... Reply: Absolutely not ... in fact, I won't even let myself watch them. I have to sneak behind my back, or wait until I go to sleep, in order to see them  :)-

11:00am Mick sent an email. He writes, "Hi Jerry 93, Poetry is always for the sharing. In my life I've made a practice of passing poems along to friends. Things written or even half-written by me, or written by others I've found along the way. To me poetry is a quintessentially subversive medium. We need (much) more of it in our lives. >:-) Thanks, Mick." ... Reply: I agree ... and then Mick adds a P.S. writing, "Suicide Club rocks. There's another Japanese film that runs parallel to Suicide Club. It's kind of a tangential plot that includes the same subway mass-suicide of cute uniform girls - but it's more of a bizarre comedy (if that's possible)." Mick then adds, "Have you seen Strange Circus? Recommended!" .... Reply: I have not seen yet it but I'm looking for a copy and of another film called Noriko's Dinner Table (2006) both were written and directed by Sion Sono who also wrote and direct the now classic Suicide Club. Of note: the plot behind Noriko's Dinner Table takes place before, during, and after the Suicide Club antics in hopes of explaining some of the lingering mysteries that this film left behind. As for Strange Circus, and for my readers amusement, this film is a surreal shockfest about a teenage girl named Mitsuko who is forced to watch her parents' lovemaking through the peephole of a cello case. Soon she is involved in her father's wicked sex acts along with the death of her mother and of suicide attempts. Yet all of this is apparently just a novel being penned by reclusive wheelchair-bound author named Taeko about a fictional character named Gozo, or that is until his assistant, a young man named Yuji, sets out on a mission to uncover the terrible truth behind Taeko's "story"... yes, it sounds amusing.

6:10am I saw a delighfully charming Japanese family movie last night titled the SUICIDE CLUB (2002); I posted a review at the bottom of my movie page. To check it out; click HERE. I liked the movie alot, and I highly recommend it with popcorn and beer!

6:00am Here is a poem written from Mick Roche, enjoy:

Still Life in Birth Canal

all all and all the wet world’s urn

to the city spring the governed

flowers yearn an earthly turn

anarch the mighty sky

how now my flesh my naked fellow

how black the inland sea

o glanded morrow fat and fallow

all all and all

star of day the corpse's lover

sun of night the mourning worm

flesh the seer’s muscled lever

monstrous engine of the dream

don’t fear the waking world mortal

nor the burnished bowl of blood

not to tread the seeded milling

the trigger thorn the bladed bridle

not the heart nor ribbing metal

flesh's lock and vise

the jawbone cage

the scythe-eyed raver

know o bone the jointed lever

await the tide that turns the tune

face the driven lover

all and all

gristled nexus ghost to blossom

riven thought of shapeless womb

shades of dread upon the river

zenith splendid coupled flame

flesh's frisson from the water

cord of blood and shock of time

thunder voices vast and human

call the flesh to mortal forge

the flames to caul and suckle

all and all

         ~ 20080917-2323 ~

5:50am Kath, remember, in the Tantra we learn that sexual activity naturally leads to loss of vitality and that all sexual desires are merely states of tension that demand an outlet. The key lies in finding a ‘matrix’ in Nature which doesn’t lead to ‘death’, death is forbidden!

5:45am For the history buffs: Paul Anthony Hudson was born on this date in London in 1942. He wrote the book Mastering Witchcraft: A Practical Guide for Witches, Warlocks and Covens (1970). …….. and it was on September 19, 1961, while driving home in New Hampshire, Betty and Barney Hill were kidnapped for over two hours and held hostage aboard a UFO. They became subject to all kinds of physical examinations, tests and questions. Their story was made famous in a book titled The Interrupted Journey.

Thursday Sept. 18th 2008 – 5:20am For the history buffs: Cecil Hugh Williamson was born into a fairly well to do family on this date in Paignton, South Devon, England in 1909. He was a noted researcher, occultist, witch and founder of the Witchcraft Research Centre and the Museum of Witchcraft on the Isle of Man in England. He was acquainted with Gerald Gardner, although their relationship was often strained at times and ended on bad terms. He also claims to have met Aleister Crowley shortly before his death. During World War II he not only helped M16 Intelligence collect information about Nazi occult interest but he claimed to also be involved in the famous witches’ ritual that was done to curse Adolf Hitler and prevent him from invading England. Cecil Hugh Williamson died in 1999. …….. and the Earl of Clancarty was born on this date in 1911 but he was more widely known to UFOlogists as Brinsley Le Poer Trench. He was an open-minded skeptic who first wrote how ridiculous the idea of a hollow earth was, then after doing his own research, admitted in print, that he was wrong. One of his earliest, if not most famous books was titled The Sky People (1960), although other titled included The Flying Saucer Story (1966), Operation earth (1969) as well as his last book Secret of the Ages: UFOs from Inside the Earth (1974).  The later voiced his growing opinion that an ancient race had obviously colonized our Earth in ancient times and now lives inside our planet through a network of secret tunnels In 1967 Brinsley Le Poer Trench founded ‘Contact International’ which was an organization designed to prepare the world for the reappearance of the space people. Brinsley Le Poer Trench died on May 18, 1995 at the age of 83. …….. and on September 18, 1924 Ada Waite, wife of Arthur Edward Waite died. She always remained a curious nebulous figure throughout his life. It has been written that there is “...no assignable limit to her capacity for sleeping and when awake she was such ‘unassailable taciturnity” that “she never spoke willingly, and seldom answered anyone except upon extreme pressure, this silence became itself a kind of eloquence.” ………. And how can I forget to mention that on September 18, 1951 Pamela Colman Smith, the struggling artist, illustrator, and writer whose chief claim to fame was designing the Tarot deck used by Arthur Edward Waite and later referred to as the Rider-Waite deck, died. .…….. and finally, on September 18, 1964 the strange, macabre, but somehow amusing cartoon characters of The Adams Family created by Charles Addams for The New Yorker magazine made their live-action TV debut on ABC, on a Friday night, at 8:30pm. The cast of characters included Morticia, who was the beautiful long black haired somber lady of the house while her husband Gomez Adams had strange eyes and rather destructive instincts, as did Uncle Fester. Their children, Pugsley and Wednesday Thursday also had a rather ghoulish quality about them. Grandmama, although a witch, was the most normal-looking one of the bunch. Lurch, the butler, was a seven-foot-tall Frankenstein look-alike whose dialogue usually consisted solely of the two words, “You rang?” They all lived in a musty, castle like home full of strange objects, such as a disembodied hand, called “Thing,” which kept popping out of a black box. The last show aired on September 2, 1966. Who can ever forget the theme song which began, “They’re creepy and they’re kooky, Mysterious and spooky, They’re all together ooky, The Addams Family. Their house is a museum, Where people come to see ‘em. They really are a scream, The Addams Family.”

Wednesday September 17th 2008 – 8:45am Ed Wormuth writes, "I wanted you to know I enjoyed Saturday's get together very much. Your talk was great and I abandoned the idea of taking notes, because I didn't want to be distracted from absorbing all you were saying in real time. The only thing I missed was a hard copy of the chakra diagram. Can you suggest a source for that as I would Like to put it with the info packet you distributed at the previous lecture." ....... Reply: Some of my favorite books on Kundalini Yoga are J.F.C.Fuller's little gem simply titled Yoga; and Nik Douglas & Penny Slinger's Sexual Secrets (1979) along with Ajit Mookerjee's The Tantic Way; the first two can easily be purchased used on ABEBooks.com for about a $1.00 apiece; Mookerjee's is a little more expensive, it might cost yoou $5.00. ... also, if you have a copy of Crowley's THE EQUINOX Vol.I, check out Issue No.4 the Illustration on pg.90 titled 'The Yogi' which lays out AC's Chakras. In J.F.C.Fuller's private edition Crowley scribbles in notes, or arrows pointing to each chakra and listing which OTO initiation opens up which chakras. Very interesting. ....  and before I forget HAPPY BIRTHDAY to you too! So you just turned 63! You and I are almost pre-dating rocks!

6:15am and I’d like to extend a great big Happy Birthday to Benjamin Hance who was born on this date in 1964. He is the founder of ‘Leaping  Laughter Clerk House' in Grady Louis McMurtry’s AA.

6:12am Dave from Oakland writes - "Hello Jerry, I was your 50,000th person to hit you BLOG. Congratulations on a successful website!   Where will it go next ??? Inquiring minds always check Jerry's Blog :)  David." ....... Reply: I'm actually thinking about adding a column off to the left with photos of people who write, next to their comments .... and then the ads that are off to the right of this blog now will be dropped to the bottom of the page. What do you think?

6:00am For the history buffs: Hildegard von Bingen, medieval saint and metaphysician, died on this date in Rupertsberg near Binge nom 1179. She was born at Böckelheim on the Nahe, 1098. As the tenth child, she was considered as a tithe and was became dedicated to the church. She was a remarkable woman, a first in many fields. At a time when few women wrote, Hildegard, known as “Sybil of the Rhine,” was a ‘visionary’ who produced major works of theology and visionary writings. Her first and greatest work is called Scivias or Scire. …..…. And Cassandra Peterson was born on this date in Manhattan, Kansas in 1951. She was a television ‘film’ hostess known as ‘Elvira, The Mistress of the Dark.’ Elvira always displayed a complete lack of interest in the movies that she was hosting, with skits before and after each commercial focused on totally unrelated subjects like that of an obscene phone caller. Despite the eventual cancellation of her film series, the character, like other noteworthy vampires, has kept coming back from the grave again and again. She starred in her own film, Elvira, Mistress of the Dark (1988). …….. and I should point out that on September 17, 1964 the TV show titled ‘Bewitched’ made its debut on ABC. …...…. And Paul Twitchell, the ‘971st Spiritual Master’ of the planet Earth, founder of the Eckankar movement in 1964 and the author of such books as In My Soul I Am Free, died on this date in 1971 of a fatal heart attack. …....… and finally, on September 17, 2000 the news media reported that witnesses had seen a UFO over San Francisco, California. One witness stated, “A couple of minutes later, another UFO came next to the first one. I saw two of them floating there. I was sitting down and watched them hover from about a 900-foot elevation. The UFOs were very high. The UFOs were just a little southeast of the Mount Sutro Tower and Twin Peaks, well over the air traffic - I’m guessing 8,000 feet or more.” He also claimed to have seen a Boeing 747 coming in from the north and heading toward San Francisco International Airport, adding: “Those UFOs had to be at least as twice as high” as the big jetliner.

Tuesday September 16th 2008 – 7:00pm Luna writes re: my 5:10am posting - "93! When I returned to my art, magick, and my Great Work three years ago...I was appalled by what I saw on a visit to San Francisco.  It is said that one can never go home, and I was prepared for some changes, but not for what I saw...and see....in the general mundane of today.  I see a self regulated psychiatric prison where everyone is reading everyone elses beads, and in the same alley ways that they now shun....those "alley ways" that were portals to otherworlds, they pull out amber colored plastic bottles and share their prescribed behavior meds. ... It took me about a year to find my elders...a visit to Dark Carnaval led me to the Grady biographies....and my memories flooded in.  Sitting as a teenager, learning tarot from one of the first published Thoth decks....the memories of my legacy flooded in.  I was happy.  A few months went on when the Mundane Bardo hit me like a freight train.  This Bardo of criciticisms about Grady and the Old School drunken druggies is Alive and Active...much like an akashic record that one can reach...this bardo is alive and active and is being fed daily by the droning on about the drunks and the druggies from the mouths of babes in a chemical daze of recovery medicines and way too much caffeine. ... It took me months to make my way through this bardo of gossiping madness....not because I couldn't get through it faster, but because under every mound of bullshit I found a nugget of wonderful magick.  Under every story about how 'he did this", or "wasn't he awful"...there lies a portal of wonderfulness.  Everytime someone, now, wants to trash Grady, or me, or any of us....I dive right down under it, find the nugget that they are trying, in vain, to cover up with their mountains of trash.....and I take it.  I take it and manifest it onto paper. ... I thank the idiots for standing on these nuggets and yacking away with their constant recovery madness and mundane do nothingness......for the more they trash....the more the Shell Mounds of garbage get higher.....and under those shell mounds of discarded paper coffee cups and behavioural medicine containers, under those huge heaps of bullshit they have created....are nuggets..... I see the Kuksu Secret Society dancing under them.... I see Grady, and you, Jerry, and myself, and Dragon and all the rest of the old farts.....our secrets.....our wonderful nights when we would open portals and create a meeting of minds....and magick happened. ... So, I say.....let them keep trashing us....let them make mountains of trash over our old akashic records.....and maybe some of the new kids on the block will take the time to see that under those mounds....real magickal akashic records are buried. Go dig them up, go dumpster dive into them...for in there, you may see some discarded bottles of Jack...but what you will find beside them are the records of me and others who stayed up long hours creatively collaborating on wonderful things....look close and see that which happened between, let's say, Dragon and I one night or on a binge in the meat locker for three days....look close and you will see how Dragon and I created a portal....a place where we went into .. and left our shells .. maybe we looked like two drunk kids sitting in the same place for 72 hours at a time...but look again...look again. .. And..to you little peanut brats...what the hell do you care? It's my liver, not yours...and those psychiatric meds have more side effects than you now know! .. so there! .. Look a little closer kids. ..  Much Love to you Jerry and Friends of Grady. I love you guys. OK!?....93s )O( "  ....... Reply; Great big astral hugs go out to ya!

3:35pm Paul Hohlt writes, "Great lecture on Saturday."

1:05pm Here is a quote from Aleister Crowley's diaries on November 19th 1938 ... "The day was curiously peaceful. One must not have women about."

1:20pm Mick Roche writes, "Great lecture Saturday. The ideas were coming so fast I could barely make notes. Finally I gave up trying in the hope I could magickally reconstruct the whole from the few parts I was able to record."

12:45pm The psychologist James Hillmen has an interesting observation about a person's need to create an alias to represent their creative talents. In his book The Soul's Code, In Search of Character and Calling he writes, "If the 'other name,' other than the one in the civil records, indicates the 'other one,' then about whom is the biography? Is this the appeal of biography; that it is the genre for connecting the two souls, called by biographers the life and the work, the human and the genius? Is that why we are fascinated by biographies? They expose the intricacies of the relation between the two names, and we, reading, might gain an insight into our own genius and how to live it by studying how others did so notoriously, successfully, and also seeing their pitfalls, their tragedies." He is, of course, correct. Here are a few more quotes from The Soul's Code, the first : "Suppose instead of this humanizing comfort that reduces the genius to pet turtles and pet rocks, we consider personality 'Number Two,' as Jung called it, or the daimon, as Socrates called it, to be a distinct image, which, having a life, also has or needs a name." (pg 181) and then consider this one : "If the 'other name,' other than the one in the civil records, indicates the 'other one,' then about whom is the biography? Is this the appeal of biography; that it is the genre for connecting the two souls, called by biographers the life and the work, the human and the genius? Is that why we are fascinated by biographies? They expose the intricacies of the relation between the two names, and we, reading, might gain an insight into our own genius and how to live it by studying how others did so notoriously, successfully, and also seeing their pitfalls, their tragedies." (pg.183) … Basically, in psychology we learn that often a person's childhood nickname contains tidbits of inner truth as to what is manifesting, long before one's True Will becomes known in adulthood. It is as if our divine genius, or the daimon, as Socrates calls it, unconsciously is telling its mortal shell that it is a distinctly different entity, which, having a life of its own, also has or needs a name. Creative people almost unconsciously know this to be true. How many authors and actors shed their birth names in quest of a new image which might best represent their character? In magick we try to consciously duplicate this process by choosing a Magickal Motto which we feel might best represent our True Will. The distinction between the life behind the name given at our birth and the new incarnation that we've chosen with a Magickal Motto is often a gulf spanning an eternity and as different as night and day. When I was trying to write a biography about a person like Grady McMurtry, who's Magickal Motto Frater Hymenaeus Alpha is equally recognizable and which has taken on a life of its own, it was very difficult. In truth, his biography is about two different people woven together in one incarnation. One is a mere mortal, full of foolishness and earthly bravado. While the other is a shell of that individual driven by True Will, or genius.

5:32am & to answer Carol's question ... 42.

5:10am To answer a question about why I am bad-mouthed by some of the locals OTO initiates here in the Bay Area; especially around Keith St and the old Thelema Lodge; yes, not all is a pleasant journey on ever level. What is most annoying about people who dislike me, or even Grady McMurtry is that their attacks upon our character are usually in areas where sufficient knowledge has often been lacking in order to make proper judgment. As an example: it seems some individuals simply love to trash Grady's drinking or his drugs in order to imply that his magickal attainments are equally faulty. Their attacks often portray a lack of understanding regarding the magickal planes by judging the accomplishments of other spheres according to a person's actions in reality. This same attitude is often directed toward Aleister Crowley by his critics. However, only a practicing magician can truly appreciate the subtle differences. A person who wallows in mundane thought often fails to comprehend that someone like Aleister Crowley or even Grady, who claimed a certain magickal degree higher than most, were not always living within those degrees every moment of their waking day. They were simply capable of being within the "head space", as Grady would call it, when they focused their mind. No matter how high we climb the sacred spiritual mountain, known as Mount Abiegnus, we still have a foot planted on Earth. We must deal with things appropriately thereon without crossing the planes. As an example. Thelemites, who tend to be followers of Aleister Crowley as the prophet and savior of humanity in this Aeon, often see the Beast as doing little wrong. They're quick to make excuses for his outrageous antics under the guise of it being his Thelemic Rights. They simply dismiss many of the outrageous stories as being unimportant to his over-all mission upon Earth. But this impartial attitude or tolerance is rarely offered to others Thelemites who have followed in Crowley's footsteps. ... So many people, many who never personally knew Grady, or even myself, love dumping all the ills of today's Thelemic societies upon us. Yes, some locals love to blame me for all the ills of the Bay Area but in truth the problems began long before I came to California and some of the locals are simply in quest of a scapegoat rather than facing their our drug-induced phantoms.

5:00am For the history buffs: On this date in 1692 Giles Corey was crushed to death in Salem Massachusetts for refusing to plead to the indictment of witchcraft, as did wife Martha.  Since he died during the ‘treatment’ he died uncondemned; his goods were not forfeited to the state and his Will could be executed. He was 80 years old. ……….. and Anna Kingsford was born on this date at Maryland Point, Stratford, Essex, England in 1846. A woman whose early influences on MacGregor Mathers and Wynn Westcott, through her ideas and views of Women’s Liberation, made them realize that both sexes should be admitted as Hermetic students on equal terms in any fraternity, including The Hermetic Order of The Golden Dawn. On 17 November 1887 in Paris she spent  hours in the rain in an abortive attempt to see the operations of the  Pasteur Institute ( it was closed at that hour of the day), and  caught pneumonia  which developed into pulmonary consumption. For the next fifteen months Anna was in very poor health. She went to the Riviera and Italy without benefit then returned to London.She died at noon on 22 Feb. 1888. Age 41 yrs. ……….. and on this date in 1926 the lake monster known as Ogopogo was watched by some 30 cars of people along an Okanagan Mission beach of Lake Okanagan in British Columbia. ……... And on September 16, 1963 the Outer Limits debuts on ABC TV on this Monday night at 7:30pm. It began with making your TV picture seemingly do strange things. Then a voice intoned: “There is nothing wrong with your television set. Do not attempt to adjust the picture...” The first episode was called The Galaxy Being. It was about an inventor, and manager of a radio station, who creates a 3-D monitor device in order to communicate with alien beings from outer space. He receives a signal from the galaxy of Andromeda and a creature uses the signal as a super highway to descend to Earth. Of course the alien’s mere presence sends frightened citizens running in terror and leads to a  confrontation between the alien and all those people with guns. ………. And finally, on September 16, 1996 near Nazareth, Israel, when 62-year old Uri Sakhov was walking to a local post office when he suddenly heard a loud whizzing sound and felt hands grab his hair and shoulders. In an instant he found himself being pulled into an egg shaped UFO. Inside he claimed to have found himself in a strange crystal chamber surrounded by several small humanoids, who he described as being about three feet tall, with heads shaped like light bulbs and skinny limbs. They were making unintelligible noises. The leader was described as taller and green colored; wearing a long flowing robe. He was very slender and had a narrow vertical head, with eyes located on either side of it. One of the small humanoids then stepped forwarded toward Sakhov and sprayed him in the face with a yellowish powder and then began conducting numerous medical tests on him, which made him feel “horrible” and very uncomfortable. Midway through the tests Sakhov blacked out. When he came to he found himself lying flat on his back in the middle of a soccer stadium half a mile or so from his house. Feeling dizzy he staggered home where he noticed that he still had some of the yellow powder on his face. The powder was later analyzed at a local hospital and it was discovered that it was about 60 percent aluminum and different form any soil found in the area.

Monday September 15th 2008 – 2:30pm Every now and then I read a phrase which simply makes me shake my head and smile; like - "He was as tall as a six-foot-three-inch tree" or "They lived in a typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy Kerrigan's teeth" ... and then this morning I came across this gem written by Aleister Crowley - "Saturn is the most distant from the Sun of all the planets, with the exception of Uranus and Neptune." ... This is like saying Earth is the closest planet to the Sun with the exception of Venus and Mercury. ... Is it just me, or do other people see the folly?

6:00am Frank from Nebraska, obviously an OTO initianut, took great offense by my joke that I published on my blog last Thursday at 6:12am … I can’t repeat what he wrote but you’d think that someone claiming maturity might learn how to write a courteous criticism without using foul language. But to address his over-all intent that I, being a “@%?&!, should forthwith cease to mention OTO on my @%?&! blog” because it “offends him.” ... I answer with one sentence - “Forget it. I live by Liber OZ"

5:45am John from New York sent a lengthy email, part of which he asks - “Jer 93. What can you tell me about Crowley’s astrological piece Liber 536, Batrachophrenoboocosmomachia?” ….. Reply: This Liber is for the Practicus 3=8 in the AA who is working out of Hod-8. It begins by stating, “Let the Practicus study the textbooks of astronomy, travel, if need be, to a land where the sun and stars are visible, and observe the heavens with the best telescopes to which he may have access. Let him commit to memory the principal facts, and (at least roughly) the figures of the science.” … It was first published in The Equinox Vol. I:10, pg.35. Regarding this Liber, Crowley further writes that it is an “instruction in expansion of the field of the mind" and "This is the only text-book composed on scientific lines; by classifying observed facts, instead of deducting from a priori theories.” … DXXXVI or 536 is the number value of the Hebrew word ‘Masloth’מסלות) ) which signifies the Sphere of the Fixed Stars, i.e. the Zodiac, also attributed to Chokmah.

5:30am For the history buffs: Gengis Khan, who was born on this date in 1162, after conquering the city of Nishapur is said to have slaughtered all its inhabitants and then wanting to know the total slain ordered a count of each and every body. It took twelve days and the final tally was (about?) 1,747,000 people, give or take a dozen. …...….. and it was on this date in 1440 that a body of men, under the command of Jean Labbe, read a warrant to Gilles de Rais which ordered his immediate arrest to answer charges of witchcraft, murder and sodomy.  He surrendered without a struggle. …....... and Ben Fernee was born on this date in 1959. In 1989, ignoring sound advice that he “should go get a proper job” he founded Caduceus Books in England. He has stated that “It is run as an absolute dictatorship with myself as sole employee. I sell  journals, manuscripts etc. and also occult art work but mostly occult books. Books are ideas incarnate, talismans of thought, so there is something very special about them. Long ago I made a pact with the Universe. I gave up any attachment to owning a few such items, in exchange for the privilege of having far more pass through my hands.” …....…. And I should point out that on September 15, 1970 Eileen  J. Garrett, medium, psychic, author and founder of the Parapsychology Foundation, died quietly after a long bout of bone cancer. She originally developed her PSI abilities under the spiritual guidance of James Hewat McKenzie while attending the British College of Psychic Science (1924-1928). After coming to America she participated in the experiments conducted by Dr. J. B. Rhine at Duke University (1932-1938) and has worked with such psychic researchers as Dr. Herewood Carrington and Nandor Fodor, to name only a few. Years earlier, while still in England, she had the opportunity to meet Aleister Crowley. She described him as “a rather rugged, athletic man with an undeniable force of personality.” Once, while she was sitting with friends in the Café Royal, she was approached by the Beast who leaned over her table, took hold of her hand, looked into her eyes and said, “You are a pythoness ... and a strong one.” Miss Garret further elaborates that Crowley “looked at me intently with half-closed eyes. I remember that his eyes were protruding and his mouth betrayed a sensual nature. He may have been anywhere between thirty-five and forty at the time-but in those days everyone over thirty looked old to me!” He then took off one of his rings and gently slipped it onto her finger. She quickly took it off and gave it back to him. “My giggling companions were somewhat surprised, and I, too, was startled not knowing what a pythoness was.” Crowley apparently “just walked away slowly to another table and joined a few companions.”

Sunday September 14th 2008 – 7:00am I want to say that yesterday’s lecture here at Love’s Sake Clerk House went very well. Good attendance, great questions and over-all a joyous time. Some in attendance were Ed Wormuth and Dale Gowin; both of whom I took Minerval initiation with me that faithful night in Syracuse back in 1977. Also Dragon and Ed Grey showed up, a fun duo ... also in attendance was an old OTO Brocken Mountain Lodge initiate named Janet ‘Planet’ who happen to be visiting Berkeley; and many of the usual like Arden, Mick, Ben, Jay and Paul etc were here too and if one of two more showed up we would have been literally packed in like sardines in my tiny apartment. Afterwards we all went to the bar/restaurant KIPS and it was a miracle we weren’t thrown out as a loud a rowdy group of revelers we became. Next month’s possible lecture might be – ‘On the social behavior of Thelemites in public’ or ‘There’s no dirt like old dirt to talk about’ or maybe we’ll just sit downstairs on my front porch near Berkeley Campus and discuss the finer points of cute Asian girls who walk by?  That way I can be heard saying - "She had cute eyes" followed by Ben's traditional reply -"She had eyes?" ... Any other lecture suggestions? ... Anyway, check out these websites. In Dale's archive section there are alot of HTMLs of Grady McMurtry original stuff.

1. Dale Gowin’s website is THE LUMINIST LEAGUE : http://www.luminist.org/

2. Dragon’s website is THE KINGDON OF THE PICS :  http://pictdom.org/

3. Arden Shaffer’s website is ARDEN’S SHORT BIOGRAPHY …

http://users.lmi.net/arden/lang/en/a/arden.html

6:45am For the history buffs: Henry Cornelius Agrippa von Nettesheim was born on this date in Cologne in 1486. [although others give his birth date as September 15, 1486] He was a famous French physician, soldier and occultist. He often faced the suspicion of having a ‘familiar’ simply because he owned a black dog, named Monsieur. Agrippa supposedly died in Grenoble or Lyons on February 18, 1535, no one is really sure but they did record the fact that at his death his dog disappeared, which only fueled the legends that it was a ‘familiar’ and that Cornelius Agrippa had been in league with Satan all along. Agrippa’s Magnum Opus is The Occult Philosophy, which defends magic as a composite of scientific knowledge, religious doctrine, and occultism. ………. And on this date in 1927 the famous dancer Isadora Duncan died. It came as a shock to the artistic community in Europe. It seems, as she was waving good-bye to her close friend, Mary d’Esti Sturges, the long flowing scarf around her neck became caught in her Bugatti sports car’s rear wheel, strangling her and then breaking her neck. Ironically, the shawl had been knitted by Mary who had, at one time, been Aleister Crowley’s lover and Scarlet Woman. Isadora Duncan was cremated and her ashes were placed in the Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris.

Saturday September 13th 2008 – 6:50am For the history buffs:  Aleister Crowley wrote The Soldier and The Hunchback in Gibraltar on this date in 1908. ……… and on September 13, 1932 Leila Ida Nerissa Bathurst Waddell died from uterine cancer at the young age of 52. She was an accomplished violin and orchestral player. Of all Aleister Crowley’s Scarlet Woman, Leila Waddell aka Soror Agatha, is without doubt the most unique. Waddell, with a thick Australian accent, used to call Aleister Crowley, “I.C.” According to her friend Gwen Otter, Crowley used to say to Waddell, “Oh, Mother, I wish you’d get rid of your Australian accent. It sounds so bad in ceremonies.” To appease the Beast, Waddell once asked Gwen, “Will you tell me when I sy anything in Austreyelian?” Some of Crowley’s best work was inspired by Waddell’s presence, including The Book of Lies, and many wonderful short stories and works of poetry. …….... and how I can I not mention that Andrew Drylie was born on this date in England in 1947. Although he considers himself “a Br'er Rabbit sort of guy, lie low and say nuffin' that's my motto”, he is a noted Crowley scholar who, along with Will Parfit, released one of the most infamous research pamphlets in the history of Crowleyanity known as the Crowley Cross-Index in 1976. …..…… and also, Louis Umfreville Wilkinson who was born in 1881, the only son of a clergyman, died on this date at the age of 84 in 1966. Throughout his life Wilkinson wrote autobiographical and satirical novels and publishing them under the pseudonym Louis Marlow, like such books as Forth Beast! (1946) and Seven Friends (1953) amongst many others. Wilkinson was a friend of Aleister Crowley and, about him, he once wrote: “The pity is that his nose was too small; otherwise he would, I believe, have been indisputably a great man, both as a writer and as a religious leader.” At the Great Beast’s funeral he read Crowley’s Hymn to Pan. Later, when Wilkinson, being Crowley’s literary executor, was approached by a gentleman who was planning to write a biography of Aleister Crowley. The young man remarked to him, “You know, I would like to write the Life of Crowley now he’s safely dead.” Wilkinson slowly turned to the young man and asked, “Ah ... but what do you mean by safely dead?” ………. And finally, on September 13, 1974 the classic show titled Kolchack: The Night Stalker debuts on TV. The very first episode was called The Ripper and it dealt with Kolchack, who is an investigative report, discovering that the serial killer responsible for the murders of young women across Chicago is none other than the original Jack the Ripper.

Friday September 12th 2008 – 5:50am For the history buffs: I’d like to start out by mentioning that Henry Louis Mencken was born on this date in Baltimore, Maryland in1880. He was a reporter, columnist and editor for Baltimore’s Sun and was considered one of America’s foremost men of letters during the first part of the 20th century. He was also one of the editors of the magazine called the Smart Set, from 1914 to 1923.  Many writers contributed short stories and articles to this publication, one such writer was none other than Aleister Crowley. In September of 1916 he submitted a short story entitled The Stratagem, which had been previously published in the English Review of June 1914. Mencken describes Crowley as “something of an eccentric” and further states that “I never met him until I visited London in 1922. He had by that time taken to mysticism and was surrounded by a group of idiots who regarded him as inspired and almost, indeed, a god. Inasmuch as it was whispered in London that a certain amount of homosexuality was intermingled with the devotion of these disciples, I avoided him as much as possible, but after I got home he began bombarding me with mystical literature, all of it elaborately printed and brought out at his own expense, or that of his followers. He became, in the end, the recognised head of all the English occultists, and a figure of some consideration in the life of  London.” Mencken wrote many profound statements throughout his life, like: “The objection to Puritans is not that they try to make us think as they do, but that they try to make us do as they think.” ……… and Georg Lomer was born in Loosten near Wismar on this date in 1877. He was a noted German occultist, astrologer & rune scholar A true believer in the forgotten Aryan heritage, a member of the List Society and the author of a remarkable work entitled Seven Hermetic Letters. He died in 1957.  …...….. and it was on September 12, 1952 while four boys, were playing football on the school ground in the small in West Virginia town of Flatwoods, that they saw a spherical object land on top of a nearby hill. Frightened but curious, they decided to check it out. As they headed out the night was getting foggy and there was a mist in the evening air, others joined them. However, when climbing the hill, the dog that had run ahead soon came running back with his tail between his legs. That is when everyone in the group saw it; a huge round glowing, hissing object. Then, just to the left, something moved and one of boys shined a flashlight in its direction. Fear gripped everyone as they saw a creature about 10 feet tall with what they later described; “… a bright red face, bright green clothing, a head which resembled the ace of spades, and clothing which, from the waist down, hung in great folds.” The creature then slowly moved toward them but no one stuck around to greet it. The frightened group fled back down the hill. ……… and finally, on September 12, 1958 the  movie The Blob opened in theaters.  It is about a mysterious blob-like creature that comes to Earth in a meteor. It is discovered by teenagers who witness the blob’s destructive power but the people of a nearby small town refuse to listen to them and, in the meantime, every time the blob eats someone it just keeps getting bigger and bigger; just like a girl I use to date.

Thursday September 11th 2008 – 6:25am My Crowley quote of the day - “And he says to me, quite disconnectedly: The man of earth is the adherent. The lover giveth his life unto the work among men. The hermit goeth solitary, and giveth only of his light unto men.” – The Vision & The Voice; 13th Aethyr (1909)

6:12am Here is a joke and before you bitch at me, let me explain that I'm not responsible for it:

Q:  How do you make an OTO Initiate's eyes twinkle?

A:  You shine a flashlight in their ear.

6:05am Here is a reply to a question I received about secrecy and why I feel it is OK to openly discuss sex magick and other topics on this blog. I wrote, "If you became a student in Crowley’s AA you entered into one of many outer vehicles which disseminate portions of Wisdom and Understanding as a means of guiding humanity toward spiritual self realization. In the Outer Schools we strongly feel that everything which has ever existed upon Malkuth should be openly embraced with utter Joy if it aids you in understanding your Star. There should be nothing concealed or held secret in your noble quest. Our prophet Aleister Crowley clearly wrote in his Confessions, “One of the reforms which I introduced into the AA was the abolition of all obligations of secrecy.” ... He goes on to tell us, “They were never useful except as temptations to people to break them. The secret knowledge has quite adequate warders. I have learnt that I have only to tell the truth about almost anything to be set down at once as a liar. It is far better to throw dust in the eyes of the animals whose faces are turned to the ground, by casual frankness. If you have a secret, it is always dangerous to let people suspect that you have something to hide.” [Crowley, Confessions, p.592] and I completely agree with our Prophet and this is why I embrace so many diverse teachings, hiding nothing from anyone in this blog. Yes, some people may consider their teachings ‘secret’ and consider me a profaner for revealing so much but they believe this because they’re still bathed in the rules, regulations and the bylaws of the old Aeon which attempt to enslave and restrict their membership." 

6:00am My dear friend Andy, in Japan, writes - "Jerry 93! Just recently, the College of Thelema of Northern California has released Jane Wolfe's diaries from her period at Cefalu with Crowley's comments penned in there. I thought that you and your blog readers might be interested. There's a post about it at lashtal.com.  (http://www.lashtal.com/nuke/Article1097.phtml) I actually just ordered a copy myself, thinking that it'd be a nice addition/resource for my library. Anywho, keep up the good work on Cornelia and your blog and as long as you give your old ticker something to beat for, I'm sure it'll keep going for years to come :) My and Ophelia's (and Gabe's too) best wishes are coming your way. 93 93/93 Andy." .... Thanks for the info. I have xeroxes of the originals, they're quite interesting.

5:50am For the history buffs: Fitz Hugh Ludlow was born on this date in NewYork City in 1836. In 1856 and published his first article titled Apocalypse of Hasheesh, the following year he released his most famous work titled The Hasheesh Easter. He also served as the editor of Vanity Fair from 1858-1860. He studied law and passed the bar in 1859, but chose to write rather than practice law. He lived only thirty-four years but possibly far more in the subjective eternities of time that he experienced under the addiction and influence of hashish which encompassed most of his brief live. Today we know only the scaffolding of events over which his life was draped, but this gives a hint at least of the man behind The Hasheesh Eater. He died on September 12, 1870. …..…. And David Herbert Lawrence, more commonly known as D. H. Lawrence, was born on this date in Eastwood, Nottinghamshire, England in 1885 to an illiterate coal miner father and a refined, educated mother. Lawrence was a teacher for awhile in a London suburb when his poems and short stories brought him to the attention of Ford Madox Ford, editor of the influential English Review. Lawrence went on to become one of the most influential and controversial writers of the 20th century; best known as the author of Lady Chatterley’s Lover. In 1910 he borrowed Miss Grace Crawford’s copy of Aleister Crowley’s book of poetry titled Ambergris. In a letter back to Miss Crawford he wrote, “If Ambergris smells like Crowley, it is pretty bad. Civet cats and sperm whales – ugh!” He later added, “I didn’t like it.” Toward the end his health continued to decline due to tuberculosis and in February of 1930 he entered a sanatorium in France. He died there on March 2nd 1930. …..….. and the Wiccan Priestess, Silver Ravenwolf, was born on this date in the heart of Pennsylvania in 1956. She claims to have been interested in the magickal arts since her childhood and she once commented, “York, Cumberland, and Lancaster counties are alive with magick.” She is a Wiccan in the tradition Head of the Black Forest Clan and is an Elder of Family of Serphant Stone. She wrote such books as; To Stir A Magick Cauldron, To Ride A Silver Broomstick, American Folk Magick, Angels, Beneath A Mountain Moon, Witches Runes (book and set), Teen Witch, Silver’s Spells For Prosperity and Halloween. ……… and it was on September 11, 1995 when well over 1,500 gathered at an airfield in northern Bulgaria in the town of Shtraklevo; lured there by three self-styled mediums, Radka Trifonova, Zdravka Krumova and Ekaterina Nikiforova. The mediums, wearing identical dresses they had sewn for the occasion, claimed they had received communications from the planet Krissi which stated that eight spaceships piloted by extraterrestrials would arrive on this date at 11am to help humanity. One of the pledges that the Krissians promised, besides fixing the Earth which was supposedly cracking in half, was that they would help this poor Balkan country pay its $12.9 billion foreign debt. However, thirty minutes after the scheduled arrival, the three told the crowd that warplanes flying in the region were scaring off the aliens and their spaceships would not be able to land. After about an hour had passed, the mediums then proclaimed that they had received a message from the aliens who said that they weren’t coming because President Zhelyu Zhelev had declined to meet with them. In the end Police had to usher the women away from the angry crowd.

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