AdamOSheikh
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Allow me to reintroduce myself! The name is Adam Sheikh, from Saudi Arabia. Having grown up in the society into which I was born, I learned to be a muslim by conformance in an attempt to fit in and survive. After a while I found that I've actually gotten used to and bought into the ideas of islam and became a believer, willfully. But, having been a skeptic by nature, I begun to question and have doubts as to the validity of the religion of the geographical region in which I was born. At the age 16 I officially became an agnostic, a year later a full blown atheist. I am 22 years old now and I still think about religion a lot more than the average atheist does. Perhaps it is due to the fact that in a country like Saudi Arabia, I am exposed to much more religion than the average atheist that I have been somewhat unable to be fully comfortable with not having a religion. Therefore, I began to think of going for substitutes as I am fully convinced that islam is false and I've reached the point at which I've debunked many of its ideas and found flaws in its holy book. I started viewing the fact that I am sort of lost as a good thing. I started feeding my interest in religion by reading a lot about different belief systems and surprising as it was to me, I found that the parallels between islam and those other religions, even the non-Abrahamic ones, were astonishing. One of the main observations that I found was that all the abrahamic religions stole bits and borrowed others from religions they had fought over the course of their evolution. Judaism and christianity had stolen bits and pieces from ancient Egyptian religion and Islam from the stolen bits of both its predecessors. my search finally lead me to Thelema. I found after I read about Thelema that it was a rather interesting religion and even though I did not know much about it, I learned few things from the basic knowledge I had. I learned that Aleister Crowley was certainly not the man depicted by the Judeo-Christian advocates and scholars which lead me to want to learn about the man and his religion more and more. About a year ago, I stumbled upon this forum in my last attempt to learn about Thelema and I almost took the attempt seriously, but I ended up abandoning the site as I took a slightly different direction in life and decided that I needed to focus a little more on my studies as a materials scientist and an engineer. This year, however, I am back and determined to finish this task and am willing to give the process as much time as it needs until I become a thelemite indeed and finally understand what it means to be one and experience how it truly feels to be one!
I apologize for this extremely long thread but I felt like I owed you guys this much explanation. I am now trying to start somewhere and find a path after which I walk I'd become a thelemite. Could anyone point me to a good start? I noticed that Thelema, unlike many religions I've read about, is based on the writings of Aleister Crowley, which are all over the place and that understanding the religion entirely is a lifelong process. I am willing to take the journey just as long as I see progress at some point as far as my understanding of the religion, the life transformation it does me and the betterment of the way I perceive the world and existence. Thank you very much!
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Adam, did you read Liber L vel Legis?
If not - it would be the best place to start
If yes, my next suggestion is The Equnox (all volumes). -
Thanks a lot, Danica! I have actually read The Book of the Law. I've read it at least five times and read reviews about it and I'm not gonna lie, I am still lost! It is a riddle to me and all the explanations I've read online were not any more meaningful than the book itself was! Would you still recommend that I move on to The Equinox even though I have not fully grasped the content of Liber Al Vel Legis?
Thanks again!
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1 - Welcome! And thanks for the detailed intro. While I grew up surrounded by Catholicism rather than Islam, our early paths were not too dissimilar and it's always nice to find a kindred spirit out there in the world.
2 - Don't beat yourself up over "not getting" Liber AL. I can't imagine anyone on here really "gets it" all. As long as you choose to walk this path, it will be there constantly revealing new and unexpected from the strangest quarters. Just as with the good parts of the Qur'an, Torah, Gospels, Tao Te Ching, Bhagavad Gita, etc., as you understand more, it teaches more.
3 - I second Danica's Equinox suggestion with the addition that "The Soldier and the Hunchback" (Equinox I:i) was my own entry point and remains one of my foundation texts. IMHO, once you've integrated those instructions for a true skeptical approach into your being, all of the other instructions begin to make a lot more sense.
4 - Another path in would be via Book 4. This was written by Crowley via the pen of Soror Virakam as a way to ensure that the concepts were comprehensible to the beginner on the path. This is not to say in any way that this is a dumbed down approach... but it is very clearly presented and certainly helped me to get all the various concepts in order when all they seemed to wasn't too do was confuse. -
AdamOSheikh,
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law.
Welcome to the forums and the beginning of your own adventure!
@AdamOSheikh said"I apologize for this extremely long thread but I felt like I owed you guys this much explanation."
For once I was given something to read. I kind of like when people tell me their story.@AdamOSheikh said
"understanding the religion entirely is a lifelong process."
I hope that this preconceived idea that you carry creates relaxation within yourself, instead of the tension of wanting to perform. We have too many hypocrites in this world celebrating themselves, thinking that their seriousness and greed for knowledge, is a testimony of their faith and closeness to God, thus making religion to be some kind of stupid competition. Life doesn’t have to be such a struggle if people would just relax a little and not take it so seriously. Work hard by all means, but don’t forget to be joyous, what else would be the purpose of our work? The books of OSHO here comes to mind, he’s all for love, joy and the celebration of life, and that is truly what Thelema is about. Which is something I’m still trying to understand…I’ll give you a link to a lot of reading (though not directly thelema-related)…
oshosearch.net/Convert/Articles_Osho
@AdamOSheikh said
"I have actually read The Book of the Law. I've read it at least five times and read reviews about it and I'm not gonna lie, I am still lost!"
Let me tell you a bit of a story:I had been aware of the Book of the Law, since I was about 16 years old, perhaps becoming more intimate with it the last seven years from being initiated into the O.T.O. in 2003, but I had never felt anything, cared anything about it. I never read it – never! It simply didn’t speak to me at all until I was 30 years old:
I then started reading it…
Daily and loudly, not understanding it, I found it better to read it loudly from the heart without interpretation. I figured the “intelligence” (Oh my playful Lord Hadit!) within understands it perfectly anyways, why bother about what “reason” has to say about the Holy book? I still feel it has to be read “prayer-like”. To be read from the heart to be of any use… “But what is the use?” asks reason. Shut up you dog! let us just read and feel – oh man just feell it! That is enough…
@AdamOSheikh said
"I am back and willing to give the process as much time as it needs until I become a thelemite indeed and finally understand what it means to be one and experience how it truly feels to be one! "
I feel that everything in life has to be done from the heart – through paying close attention to feeling. Getting in touch and connecting with life (Thelema embraces life, not death like the old aeon religions.) and to have a religious-experience is only possible through the heart, using whatever means (ritual, prayer and meditation etc.) that somehow “speaks” to you personally. Books and a lot of reading by all means, I’m all for that if it makes you happy, but they will never awaken the heart and get you in touch with the Lord within.Thelema to me is about creating a love-affair with oneself, as the Buddah said, “be a light unto thyself”. It might sound like a paradox but through self-knowledge we will also start to understand others and begin to feel unconditional love and compassion towards our neighbor. Knowing oneself is indeed a humbling experience... We therefore, no matter how selfish it might seem, start with focusing on pulling out the big beam in our own eye, creating all that darkness of ignorance within ourselves.
From my own experience I therefore would recommend reading Liber Al vel Legis “prayer-like” as much as you will. If truly a “holy book” (which is my honest experience) and since you don’t understand it, the most intelligent way of creating a relationship to it would therefore be to have the book itself doing all the work!
Reading it “prayer-like” thus letting it work its magic upon the heart and your subconscious mind, without the interference of reason, will transform you in a speechless way all for the better.It’s also important to understand that we begin to pray with our “lips” (but trying to be as sincere as possible), and one day we will be praying directly from the depths of our hearts. Then as Jesus said, you and the Father will be one.
In the end I’m quite ignorant myself not having much knowledge about anything, but we are both especially blessed coming to these forums, since it’s also the abode of an really knowledgeable and enlightened Master, ready to answer the calls of our struggling hearts.
Love is the law, love under will.
Peace
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Sheikh of the burning sands,
As one who has studied much of Crowley's work and would like to believe I live my life with Thelemic thinking, one point I would express is that it is in an initiate's best interests to attempt to interpret everything studied qabalisticly. That is, to never take anything at face value. There is a delicate web of truths that flow through our most expansive trees.
Our parents tell us Santa is not real. Athiests tell us Angels aren't real. Taoists would say the Great pumpkin isn't real. But all have backgrounds with interesting origins. Even the ones who deny them.
Good luck on your quest, fellow traveler.
I have work to do that I promise is legal where I live.
Love is the Law,
Frankie