College of Thelema: Thelemic Education

"Now let it be first understood that I am a god of War and of Vengeance. I shall deal hardly with them."

How does this interface with game theory, e.g. Nash equilibrium and Prisoner's Dilemma?

Each man and woman pursuing his and her own interest, doing his and her own will, yet punishing those who restrict his and her will through collective action (War) and individual retaliation (Vengeance). This is exactly what game theory would suggest for many real life situations - they call it a tit-for-tat strategy.

You know some people do this as part of a kink scene, using chastity belts and what not. They often report similar results.

The amount of cinnamon in Crowley's recipe in well in excess of what is generally considered "safe" for liberal application of oil. So it is not surprising that there are unusual results from the cinnamon. However, that does not necessarily have anything to do with the Galangal vs. Calamus issue.

Rather there are two separate issues in which Crowley differs from the oldest extant manuscript. One is the Galangal vs Calamus issue. The other is using a recipe of essential oils that rather than a recipe by weight of original materials, which gives a higher concentration of cinnamon. You could vary these two issues independently and have 4 distinct recipes total.

I have now experimented with Calamus tea, and although it seems to have some odd mind altering effects in the short term, I find that I accenuates my mental accuity and concentration in the long term. Any negative or intoxicating effects seem transitory. I plan to use Calamus exclusively in individual private ritual, and only use Galangal as others happen to provide it for group rituals.
"Success is thy proof: argue not; convert not; talk not over much!"
"Yea! deem not of change: ye shall be as ye are, & not other."

Although this is not my top priority right now, the way I'm trying to change on this issue is to use my job as a sort of meditation exercise, while using my money to get to a place where I have more resources, rather than more expenses, should I lose my job. That way, a difficult job with high pay just helps me all around.

Actually the recipe in the Liber AL vel Legis calls for "oil of Abramelin", which is different in both meaning and gematria than "Abramelin oil". If you do some google searched, you will probably find that sources that use the phrase "oil of Abramelin" more often explain the mistranslation issue than those sources that use the phrase "Abramelin oil".

"Abramelin oil" = 1+2+18+1+13+5+12+9+14+15+9+12 = 111 = "one, one, and one".

"My prophet is a fool with his [galangal]; [...]".
"My prophet is a fool with his [Galangal], [Kether], and [Malkuth]; [...]".
"My prophet is a fool with his [Abramelin oil]; [...]".

I certainly would not presume to limit the meaning of this verse. And I don't mean any of this as an insult to Crowley. To me it is more of a confirmation that he was a human in contact with a "higher intelligence" than himself.

Obviously the word 'fool' has a multiplicity of meanings. Based on the tarot, it could be a complement of sorts, implying innocence ... See Morecombined with providence, although also implying naivety. Based on the Hebrew/Christian Bible, what comes to mind is Psalm 14:1, "The fool has said in his heart 'There [are] no [higher authorities]'". In any case, it all applies particularly to his mistake with the recipe of Abramelin oil. He made the mistake innocently and naively, was apparently protected by providence from negative conseqences, having attained the knowledge and conversation of his HGA or something like it anyway. He never discovered the error quite possibly because he never looked for a higher authority than himself or Mathers.

The vowels in 'galangal' are 'a'=1, 'a'=1, and 'a'=1.

Crowley said, "The Galangal represents both Kether and Malkuth [...]" (Crowley, Magick, Book 4, Ch. 5 )
'galangal' = 7+1+12+1+14+7+1+12=55 -> 5+5 = 10 -> 1+0 = 1.
Kether key scale is 1.
Malkuth key scale is 1.

"My prophet is a fool with his one, one, one; [...]" (AL 1:48)

Calasmus or Galangal?

It means you need more women in your membership roles.

This poem by Yeates would seem to tie in with both Crowley and Phillip K. Dick, as it referenced the "beast" and "twenty centuries of sleep":

The Second Coming
Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight; somewhere in sands of the desert
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

What I mean is, I might be interested to see channeled writings with the original manuscript reproduced. I don't really care if it is automatic writing or otherwise.

But alas perhaps you are right, and this particular document is just the aftermath of one person's obsession with the imagery of Liber AL vel Legis.

Personally I think that people should make such automatic writing public, including their doubts about it. What annoys me the most about Liber 440 is that he doesn't make a scan or copy of the original handwritten manuscript available to the public. According to the document, he was instructed to send the original to the OTO, but regardless of such an instruction a copy should have been made and included in order to parallel Liber AL. Without such a handwritten manuscript, even the claim of having used automatic writing is called into question, unnecessarily. So in order to avoid being hoaxed, I must suppose that this is a deliberate forgery.

Anyway, on Monday I did a Google search for the phrase "Megathon Tiribillium" from page 79 of Liber 440, which at the time Google interpretted as misspelling. When I do a Google search for that phrase now, less than three days later, its does not interpret it as a misspelling. Anyway, on Monday Google redirected to an article that contained the words "megaton" and "Tribolium". Namely, this article:
www.entsoc.org/pubs/periodicals/ae/ae-2001/fall/busswords.pdf
Which states:
"Probably the first study done to determine
the effects of radiation on insects dates
back to 1919 when W. P. Davey tested the
effects of small doses of X-rays on the longevity
of Tribolium confusum; surprisingly,
Davey found that chronic exposure to Xrays
at a dose of about 60 rads actually prolonged
the life of this flour beetle. This finding
evidently languished in the literature for
about 37 years until a dubious J. M. Cork
(1957) repeated the study under more controlled
conditions and to his dismay obtained
essentially the same result (concluding
his paper with the remark, “It is hoped
that the results reported on a simple structure
of this kind will not be construed as a
license for X-ray practitioners to become less
critical of recognized safety factors in dealing
with the human organism”)."

So one of the beetles most likely to eat cake (a flour beetle), has some mysterious resistance to radiation, such that radiation actually prolongs its life. Being quite surprise by this, and also finding out that they are edible, I suddenly became interested in actually carrying out the ritual of slaying and eating them, even if I need to deliberately introduce them to the cakes of light. Partly, I am also curious whether eating them confers to humans some of the beetle's resistance to radiation or other envrionmental contaminants. But partly, just the fact of having been surprise at this account, makes me more willing to carry out the magickal experiment commanded by Aiwass in the original transmission of Liber AL vel Legis.

So I was curious whether anybody had any other such accounts about Liber 440, that they may be holding back because they are still skeptical of its authenticity, as I am? What I am thinking, to be more clear, is that Aiwass may not be allowing the hoaxer to use his name in total vanity, but may have slipped in some original information, in a way that only a higher intelligence could, without really validating the hoax per se.

The Jews say that when their ancestors only accepted the Torah because God held a mountain over their head. Hence under the old Aeon religions love and law were held over the people by an angry God, who imposed his own will upon them.

In the New Aeon, love is the firm ground below our feet, or the subconscious foundation for the conscious individual Will. It is not a mountain over our heads, nor an overwhelming tidal wave that washes away our own Will, but a foundation.

(Alleged) Self-description of Aiwass to an (alleged) channeler other than Crowley:
"18. Thou wonderest at the fierceness of my expression, the icy blueness
of my skin — where there should be gold, the spinning kaleidoscope
of my eyewells, the sky-hewn cape I have wrapped about me, snapping
and glittering with electricity and wisdom unrevealed.
19. A wind arises from within the circle, unfelt, but perceived.
20. My hair is uplifted into the clouds, which are my hair.
21. I shall strike up a storm therewith such as the world has seen never.
22. A hammer for my chosen — an anvil for the wicked."
~ Liber 75 vel Luciferi, available at aiwass.com

Has anybody read this book Liber 440, The Book of Perfection, available on www.aiwass.com? I would be interested in discussing it, but only with people who have taken some time to read it and consider it. I found that it grows on me.