Aleister Crowley and Dion Fortune: The Logos of the Aeon and the Shakti of the Age

109 Pages·2009·15.889 MB·English

by  Alan Richardson

ALEISTER CR.CWLEY
AND
DICI{ FCRTU}TE
.l < :. -.ffreL n
* ., -!*;!i:6*Li*dqs&diiA,
About the Author
Alan Richardson is the author of more than fifteen books, includ-
ing magical biographies of Dion Fortune, Christine Hartley, and
\7i11iam G. Gray. He is also an expert on earth mysteries, mythol-
ogy, Paganism, Celtic lore, and ancient Egypt. Alan does not belong
to any occult group or sociefy, does not take pupils, and does not
give lectures on any kind of initiation. He insists on holding down
a full-time job in the real worid like any other mortal. That, after
all, is part and parcel of the real magical path. He is married with
four children and lives very happily in a small village in the south-
AI,EISTER. CR.OWI, Y
E
west of England. Please visit his website at http://www.alric.pwp
.blueyonder.co.uk.
A}TD '-
-' DIO}T FORT U}TE
The Logos ofthe Aeon and the Shakti of the Age
ALAN RICHARDSON
Llewellyn Publications
tVoodbury, Minnesota
f
.., .,,,"".&;ril&ltlE&!i&.,,., ....*
Aleister Crowley and Dion Eorlune: The Logos of the Aeon and the shakti of the Age @ zoog by Other books by Alan Richardson
AIan Richardson. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced
in any manner whatsoever, including Internet usage, without written permission from Dancers to the Gods
llewellyn Publications, except in the case ofbriefquotations embodied in critical arti-
cles and reviews. Earth God Rising:The Return of the Male Mysteries
-Flrst -hclltlon Gate of Moon: Mythical and Magical Doorways
First Printing, 2oo9 to the Other \(rorld
Book design by Donna Burch The Giftie (fiction)
Cover art @ Brand X Pictures
Cover design by Kevin R. Brown The GoogleTantra: How I Became the First Geordie
Editing by Brett Fechheimer
to Raise the Kundalini (autobiography)
llewellyn is a registered trademark of Llewellyn Worldwide, ltd.
Photo of Aleister Crowley courtesy of Vrilllam Breeze of the Ordo Templi orientis Inner Celtia (with David Annwn)
(o.r.o.)
The Inner Guide to Egypt (with B. \Talker-John)
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Richardson, Alan, r95r- Magical Kabbalah
Aleister Crowley and Dion Fortune : the logos of the Aeon and the
Shakti ofthe age f Alan Richardson. - rst ed. The Magician'sTables: A Complete Book of Correspondences
' p.
cm.
Includes bibliographical references. The Old Sod:The Odd fife and Inner'S7'ork of rilTilliam G. Gray
ISBN 978-o-738 7-\ S8o-3 (with Marcus Claridge)
r. Crowley, Aleister, fi75-1947. z. Fortune, Dion. 3. Magicians-England-Biogra-
phy 4. occultists-England-Biography LTitle. Priestess:The life and Magic of Dion Fortune
BFr598.C7R53 zoog
828'.9rzo9-dczz Spirits of the Stones: Visions of Sacred Britain
tBl
zoo9o3o635 2oth Century Magic and the Old Religion: Dion Forrune, Christine
llewellyn \Torldwide does not participate in, endorse, or have any authority or respon- Hartley, Charles Seymour
sibiliry concerning private business transactions between our authors and the public.
A11 mail addressed to the author is forwarded but the publisher cannot, unless specifi-
cally instructed by the author, give out an address or phone number.
Any Internet references contained in this work are cuffent at publication time, but the
publisher cannot guarantee that a speci{ic location will continue to be maintained. Please
refer to the publisher's website for links to authors'websites and other sources.
llewellyn Publications
A Division of llewellyn'Worldwide, I,td.
zr43 \?'ooddale Drive, Dept. 978-o-7387-tS8o-j
Woodbury, Min nesota S Stz 5-2989, U.S.A.
www.llewellyn.com
Printed in the United States of America
l
....
Aleister Crowley
Dion Fcntune
Contents
AboutThisBooh xv
Prologue
3
one: Deaths and Afterward 7
Two: The\Wars ofTheirlforlds z9
Three: Priests and Priestesses 59
Eour: Temples andTheirTruths 85
Eiue: Initiations and OtherAwakenings rr9
Six: Falling to Earth and OtherTrauma L+7
Seuen: Past Lives and Similar Futures 163
Afterword 69
A
Appendix r77
AppendixB r87
Selected Bibliography ry3
.^ ...
'-
-'
AtsCUT THIS BOOK
I
,--
his is a comparative biography of the two most important ma-
gicians of the twentieth century. It will show how they have
influenced us all today, whether we realise it or not.
It is not meant as an exhaustive biography so much as a series of
essays on patterns. Aleister Crowley and Dion Fortune were bound
together by a single beam of hght-Magick-and their lives curved,
looped, and crossed on either side of this like the twin serpents of the
caduceus. Often they rnirrored each other, sometimes they conjoined;
they always balanced. N(rhat I have done is look at that explosion at
the top of the caduceus which was so splendidly visible at the end of
their lives, and try to track down the central column of magickal light
to see where it was rooted in the soil of theirbirth.
In rgrr Crowley wrote a book called LiberThisarb. Thisarb, he ex-
plained, is B erashith transliterated backwards is the fi rst word
-which
of the Bible, meaning'In the beginning. . .'In it he showed how to
train what he called the Magickal Memory using a conscious reversal
of the order of time, remembering events in reverse sequence like
watching a film run backwards. So this present book on both Crow-
ley and Dion Fortune uses the same technique. The biographical and
historical details are therefore not given in the usual sec';uentinl way,
*_,. -
l
xui
AboutThisBooh AboutThisBooh xvii
and it tells the story of their lives from their deaths, back toward their Yorke-plus those others who preferred that f didnt mention their
births-and beyond. By learning about them in this way the reader names. Finally, most of all, to my wife, Margarer, and my daughters,
will find his or her own mind being stretched as much as informed. Zoe,Kirsty, Jade, and lara. My thanks to everyone for their patience
The rhythms will startle, and occasionally jolt, but they will also and kindness.
stimulate in ways that any serious student of Magick will recognise
and appreciate. By the time it is finished the themes and images will
come alive within the readers'psyches, and their own potential for
Magickal Memory will be developed to no small degree.
In other words, as Dion Fortune might have said, this book is
meant to train the mind as much as inform it.
It is impossible to be objective when writing about any individ-
ual. Instead I have tried to be evenhanded. Nevertheless, despite my
deep fascination and admiration for many aspects of that phenom-
enon known as Aleister Crowley', my lifelong love affair with 'Dion
Fortune'might just inclri.n e me toward1 a certai.n 1b.i as i.n hI er d1i.r ect.i.on.
There is always the danger of me putting two and two together and
making 93. Readers must adjust their own scales of truth and judge
me accordingly.
As L. P. Hartley once wrote: 'The past is a foreign country'. So it
should be noted that the country we will look at in this book extends
not only through time, but in different dimensions, and the inhabit-
ants have customs, attitudes, laws, and ways of thought that might
strike us as odd or even repellent today. But it is their country' and
they were simply living in their own way, and we should respect
that.
Finally, a lot of people have given me a greatdeal of help in find-
ing obscure facts and information for this project, even though they
may not have agreed with my use of the same, or even' it seems,
agreed very much with each other: Simon Buxton, Gareth Knight,
David Young, \7illiam Breeze, Nick Farrell, Maria Babwahsingh,
Clive Harper, Jerry Cornelius, Kenneth Grant, Dolores Ashcroft
Nowicki, Jo Barnes, R. A. Gilbert, Peter Yorke, and Laura Jennings-
I
I ..';*;
'-
-'
PR'.OLCGUIE
1
-.---