The Magic Machine--The Golden Dawn Vault in Colour by Nick Farrell

One of the things that amuses me is the occasional outpouring of "secrets must be kept" when someone dares to publish something that is already well past its "keep secret until" date. Today, the source of my amusement was the debate on whether or not, Nick Farrell should have published pictures of the walls of the Vault of the Adepts.

My own position...well let's see...

Venus Vault Wall Study.

...I first published a set of Vault wall studies on my occult blog starting in June 2009, shortly after the Book of the Tomb was open-sourced by Nick Farrell. And I have kicked around actually doing some Vault wall merchandise...something that I may still do. After all, a quick image search on Google will yield dozens of hits, and there are some crass people already doing Rose Cross lamen merchandise (all seem to be using the same picture to boot). So I really think that secrecy on this particular subject has flown the coop. It is now time to start making sure that people are getting it right. Now that my position on secrecy and much of it still apllies to the Vault walls is out of the way, let's move on to reviewing the book in question.

As I have already said, secrecy has flown the coop on this one--it is time to make sure that people are getting it right. And this is what The Magic Machine--The Golden Dawn Vault in Colour by Nick Farrell is about, helping people get the vault colors right.

The most valuable piece of this book is the eight colored plates showing the general key to the background color of the Vault walls, and the individual planetary Vault walls. And while I prefer mixed pigments over pixels, I wish I would had this book earlier in my occult career when I was preparing to build a Vault of the Adepts.

(Before you ask, the project never got past the study stage, due to the sudden vacating of anyone who might have needed to be vaulted by the current lodge that I belong to...it was a strange summer that year.)

Comparing my first study and later ones (I have done several over the years) to the plates in The Magic Machine, I am comforted to see that I am in the general ballpark, not exactly the same colors as Farrell is using, but close enough when one accounts for the difference in methods used. It was also comforting to read that someone else stumbled upon the problem with the Vault's ceiling--something that drives me a little batty.

Now I imagine that some people in the Golden Dawn tradition will claim that he is wrong about how the colors are created. Of course, if he is wrong, then so am I--and I was initially working from the texts published by Regardie and some misc. unpublished notes from a modern Order, and not directly from the Book of the Tomb. Then again, I just shake my head about how the critics have done their own Vaults--it is like they are working from a completely different set of instructions that have nothing to do with any actual Golden Dawn material.

Besides the meat of the book, Farrell does give hints on how to use the pictures, general information about the Vault of the Adepts, and a nice set of planetary deity calls to key your work with the Vault walls to.

I recommend getting this book if you ever think that you might need to build a Vault or work with one.

Five out of five stars.

The Magic Machine--The Golden Dawn Vault in Colour is a limited edition hard-cover book available from Lulu. 

[Required FTC disclosure: This review was based on a low res electronic copy of the book given to the reviewer to ensure a timely review of the book.]

The Shem Grimoire by Nick Farrell

Table of contents page from the Shem Grimoire.

The first thing that a reader needs to know about this book is that this book is not for beginners. This is not a history of the Shem ha-Mephorash and the evolution of its associated angels, nor is it heavy on theory and philosophy. No, this is a grimoire with just enough history and theory to orient a Zelator Adept Minor (Z.A.M.) before turning them loose on actual working with the Shem Angels.

The second thing that a reader needs to know about this book is that it is meant to be used. One of its center pieces is a ritual to actually get in contact with a Shem angel (one of the 72 angels created from the so-called 72 lettered name of God...which actually has 216 letters in it, but who is counting?). There is also an interesting Middle Pillar ritual, complete with head movements inspired by Abraham Abulafia (a mystic of the Kabbalah bent).

(I might write a blog entry about the rituals contained in this book after I work with them for awhile. Or maybe not...it is always hard to tell with me.)

Having worked with some of the Shem angels previously (using a combination of techniques grabbed from Golden Dawn, the Franz Bardon school, and ancient paganism), I mainly focused on the listings for the angels--the place I start with most books that list the uses and powers of spirits that I have previously worked with...because if they get that section wrong, then I have to wonder about the accurancy of the rest of the material.

Based on Nick Farrell's descriptions of the Shem angels, I am confident that he has actually worked with them. While there are minor differences in the functions of the angels as Farrell describes them compared to my own experiences, the differences are so insignificant that one can see that they are based on differences in perception of the operators involved, and not ignorance.

But one does not have to have extended working experience to double-check the general function of the angels. One of the things that I learned while working with the Bardon system was that the angels ruling the important positions of one's birth chart has a certain amount of influence over the individual. If one sits down with their birth chart and look at the position of their rising sign and their planets, one can often see how those planets and sensitive points of one's birth chart is colored by the influence of the angels that rule those astrological degrees. (This is a point that Farrell also mentions in his book--he suggests what order one might want to work with the angesl ruling one's birth chart.)

(Important note--remember to round up when doing this. For instance, Leo 20 degrees, 33 minutes is actually the 21st degree of Leo, not the 20th.)

Take for instance, the position of Mercury in my own birth chart, Leo 20 degrees, 33 minutes. This places my Mercury, the planet of communication and writing, in the section of the zodiac ruled by the Shem angel Meheshiiah (Mem-Heh-Shin-Yod-Heh). Given that I am one of the less evolved types, the influence of this angel tends to be more dubious and negative than positive. One of the things that Farrell says about Meheshiiah is, "There is little in the way of conciliation about him and Meheshiiah is unhappy to make a peace which does not involve total capitulation." Many people who have dealt with me will nod knowingly at this point, because I will not accept partial peace offerings, preferring to remain at war with people instead--a trait that often shows up in my writing.

I am giving this book five out of five stars.

The Shem Grimoire is limited to two hundred hard-cover copies, and is available from Lulu. 

[Disclosure: This review is based on a pre-proof stage file copy given to me by the author for review purposes.]

A Modern Celt--Seeking the Ancestors (Mabh Savage)

A caution must be issued right up front about this book: this is not a book of lore or ritual/personal techniques. If that is what you are after, this book will not fit your needs. A Modern Celt--Seeking the Ancestors (Mabh Savage) is a "fire-side chat" book; it is a rather informal collection of the author's experiences, tales from her family, and accounts from her friends about experiences gained by coming into contact with the lore and deities of the Ancient Celtic people.

For those people who have experienced the fire-side chat mode, that time after a ritual or lesson when you are sitting around a bonfire (or in the case of lodge members--during the after-ritual dinner) talking to your teacher and fellow students and seekers, the style of this book will be familiar. It is a rather informal book, one that my professors in college and university would have imploded upon reading. It is a step above gossip, generally on the level of the stories that one tells when one's coven (study group or lodge) has became a familial unit of sorts.

This style may be strange to those who have been practicing and studying by themselves, or who have gotten involved in the "strict lodge" setting where students are forced to hang out only with others of their particular grade and degree of knowledge. Hint: the fire-side chat mode is the start of the oral traditions that one hears about.

This book is not heavy on knowledge or techniques. It is a retelling of personal stories. And it will be a comfort for those who have experienced similar events, and educational for those with open minds who have not. I think that the book is worthwhile reading, despite the lack of spoon-fed lore and techniques; but I imagine that there will be readers who take issue with the book because of the lack of information and detail in it (one cannot say that I did not try to warn them off).

Is the information that is given accurate? This is a hard question to answer, at least for me; I am not an expert in Celtic paganism. But I do have a benchmark to attempt to hazard a guess, and that is how the author treats the Celtic Tree Calendar. For those who do not know, the Celtic Tree Calendar was created almost completely out of thin air by Robert Graves during the "paganism has survived underground, and my wild theories is what the ancient pagans actually thought" mode of the pagan revival (the Golden Dawn of the 1880s and the Wiccan books of Gerald Gardner are other examples of that particular stage of the pagan revival). Basically, there is no evidence to indicate that the Ancient Celts used such a fixed calendar, not alone the one that Robert Graves expounded upon.

There are three modes of dealing with the Celtic Calendar: 1) insisting on the truth of it...mainly because one loves the idea that paganism survived underground clear up to the start of the pagan revival; 2) completely abandoning it...because only actual Celtic practices should be used; and 3) splitting the difference...acknowledging the fact that Graves made the Celtic Tree Calendar up, yet using the result because it serves a purpose.

Mabh Savage belongs to the splitting the difference camp. She acknowledges the fictional nature of the Celtic Tree Calendar, and then proceeds to gather some actual tree and plant lore from the Ancient Celts to illustrate that Graves was not pulling it completely out of thin air and that there might be a grain of usefulness in the Celtic Tree Calendar. As someone who belongs to a group that does much the same with the Celtic Tree Calendar, I like that approach (the group that I belong to uses the Celtic Tree Calendar because it needed a Celtic knowledge system that could be represented in diagram form...it is a lodge thing).

Overall, given the fact that book is meant to be, essentially a set of fire-side style stories about how modern Celts are interacting with the deities and practices of the Ancient Celts, I give it five out of five stars. (It would suffer a loss of at least one star if one decided to judge it based on lore or techniques--something that the book is not really about.)

[Disclosure: This review is based on a pre-publication version provided by the publisher.]

Flash review of Commentaries on the Golden Dawn Flying Rolls

Just realized that I have not posted my quick video post (flash review) of the most recent book about Golden Dawn--Commentaries on the Golden Dawn Flying Rolls by the Golden Dawn Community. So here it is.



[Full disclosure: One of the commentaries in the book was written by me; but considering that the royalties from the writers are going to the Golden Dawn Legal Defense Fund, I do not profit if you buy a copy of the book. And as I noted in my review, if you do not like the existence of the Golden Dawn Legal Defense Fund, just don't buy the book.]

Some of my occult book reviewing rules

Troll Cat gives all dog lovers one star reviews.

Yesterday on Facebook, a friend of mine was describing her latest wanker of a troll reviewer; it was someone who claimed because previous reviews did not mention what groups she belonged to, nor who she trained with, that all the previous reviews were not helpful. Now, I suspect that this particular reviewer, who gave her a review despite not buying her book, is part of the Loathing Club that another member of her occult bent has organized trying to destory this particular writer's reputation.

Now, I have been described as a troll reviewer myself--by someone (and their group) whom I saw fit to give a three star review to. In hindsight, nothing less than proclaiming this author's book "the greatest thing since white sliced bread with yummy jam" was going to make the author happy. Interestingly, he has spent more energy trying to discredit my three star review than he has spent trying to convince others that the numerous one star reviews that he got was undeserved.

The problem (for him, that is) lays in the fact that I will not change my mind about his book. Basically, I gave it my honest review based on the rules that I have decided upon for judging occult books. Here are some of the things that I judge occult books by:

Price: Is it worth the money that a person is spending on it? Is it a must-have at that price? (And in the case of an out-of-print book, is it worth the outrageous price that it is reselling for?)

Information: Is the book just a rehash of previously published information? Is there anything in the book that I cannot find in some other book, or reinvent on my own if I know the basics of occult study and practice? Does it repeat the same information over and over again? Do I have to double-check everything because your work is riddled with errors? Would I trust a Neophyte to use your book?

Authority: Is this someone's "masterwork"? (I tend to judge texts that are meant to prove that its author is the ultimate authority, one that needs to be listened to, more harshly than I do other texts; there is a difference between sharing information and declaring oneself fit to run the entire esoteric tradition.) Does the person convince me that they know what they are doing? Or do they come across as an "armchair occultist"?

Group Membership: Actually, I do not give a damn about this. It is nice to know from a community viewpoint, and helps explain certain differences between theories and practices talked about--but it really has no bearing on my review. (And my own membership do not need to be disclosed either.)

Personal Feelings about the author: I tend to admit to these upfront; there are some occult writers that I personally know or have watched that I dislike terribly--personalities of sandpaper. This tends to extend to the behavior of their followers. I try not to let it affect my reviews; but with some people, it is hard not to deduct a star from their review if they are guilty of being complete wankers.

Ability to Write: I am sorry; this one will kill my opinion of your book if you lack the ability to write a clear sentence. I understand that occult authorities are not always trained in writing, but one can find editors who specialize in editing occult material.

Usefulness: If your book is glorified paperweight with no useful context...well, you are not going to like my opinion of your work.

There are probably more things that I consider, but you get the idea.

The Ritual Magic Manual (David Griffin)

Is the Ritual Magic Manual Really Worth the Cost?

There are some books that are hard to judge properly; David Griffin's book, The Ritual Magic Manual: A Complete Course in Practical Magic, is one of them. The problem lies in the very format of the book.

This book is not a regular book; it is not meant to be read cover to cover. Instead, it is a set of instructions for several rituals with all the possible variations for them written out, so that the student does not have to work them out for themselves.

This format has resulted in a lot of bad book reviews for The Ritual Magic Manual. I must admit that I was disappointed when I brought the book sight unseen in December 2001. Most of the time since then, the book has set on the bookshelf gathering dust.

But does the book really merit such bad reviews? Perhaps, perhaps not. To say that I have mixed feelings about the Ritual Magic Manual is an understatement.

Part of the venom in other reviews of this book may be directed more at the author than the book itself. David Griffin is the Head (Imperator) of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, Ordo Rosae Rubeae et Aureae Crucis, Alpha et Omega; this Order has been one of the parties to a rather nasty set of legal and internet battles.

So is this book really bad? If you are looking for a book to read about ritual magic, this is not the book for you. As I stated it is a set of instructions for several rituals dealing with elemental, planetary, zodical and sephirothic energies.

The idea behind the book is to get people to do the rituals, and the author believes that more people will do so if they can just open up a book to the desired ritual without having to learn all the possible variations first. Unfortunately, during my first perusal of the book, I noticed several rituals that had flaws in their instructions (hexagrams and pentagrams with their lines of direction drawn wrong, etc.); if the book is judged on this standard, it must be given a failing grade.

Because of this, I must ask what the real purpose of this book is. As it stands, the student needs to double check all the ritual instructions; one must treat the book like it is "blinded."

Yet the ritual instructions are worth having provided that one knows enough to be able to spot the occasional error. Even so, the book is not worth the amount that some profiteers have tried to sell copies of The Ritual Magic Manual on the internet for.

Overall, I have to say that the book only merits two or maybe three stars out of five. As I stated treat the book as if it is blinded if you do decide to get it; double check everything; of course, if you know all the information necessary to do that, then you definitely do not need this book.

The Ritual Magic Manual: A Complete Course in Practical Magic by David Griffin (1999).

[This review originally appeared on Associated Content (Yahoo Voices) and Helium on 3/7/2009. If I was to review the book today, the review would be even harsher--one of the rituals described in the book leaks like a sieve, and I had a nasty political run-in with members of Griffin's Order which resulted in one of its members telling me openly that it was ok to destory my reputation because I was not a member of his Order which is the only true GD Order. And so it goes. The copy used for this review was brought and paid for by myself, and I have never been offered more than I paid for it.]

The Complete Magician's Tables (Stephen Skinner)

Stephen Skinner Outdoes Aleister Crowley's Liber 777.

Stephen Skinner's book, "The Complete Magician's Tables", is essentially an expansion of Aleister Crowley's "Liber 777." Skinner is not the first person to expand Liber 777, but this is the most extensive expansion of that work I have seen. Liber 777 was based on a Golden Dawn document, "Book of Correspondences"; in modern times, students of the Golden Dawn tend to consult Crowley's work (which was reprinted in 1973 along with "Sepher Sephiroth" as "The Qabalah of Aleister Crowley"), rather than the original document assembled by Samuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers and Dr. William Wynn Westcott for the Esoteric Order Golden Dawn in the Outer and its Rosicrucian Second Order, the Rosae Rubeae et Aureae Crucis (Ruby Rose and Golden Cross). Skinner quotes Gerald Yorke, who stated about Liber 777:

"Ninety per cent of the Hebrew, the four colour scales, and the order and attribution of the Tarot trumps are as taught in the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn with[in] its inner circle."

As Skinner notes, "Crowley's work was basically a light edit of the original..." Skinner's work is not a light edit. He expands the 194 columns (some of which were nothing more than place markers), keeping the essential information, into 801 columns. Much of the additional material is drawn from old grimoires and other difficult to read works. Skinner reorganizes the material that he copies from Crowley; there is actually a pattern to how the Tables are laid out, unlike Crowley's work which was based on how the information tended to be issued in Golden Dawn (it tended to be handed out piecemeal, rather than as a whole document, which is one of the reasons that students tend to consult Crowley rather than Mathers).

While The Complete Magician's Tables is organized better than Liber 777, there is one drawback that a student of Golden Dawn needs to be aware of when consulting Skinner's work. Stephen Skinner, along with Francis King, in "Techniques of High Magic", decided that the Golden Dawn attribution of the Wand to Fire and the Dagger to Air was wrong. Not only did he continue with this assumption in this current work, he changes several other "obvious blinds."

Several times while going though this book, I found myself wondering if Skinner understood Golden Dawn system of magic and initiation, and knew anything about its history. I presume that he has access to the same published sources that I do, and probably access to more of the unpublished material than I do, so I am not sure how he draws some of the conclusions that he does. For instance, he says that Mathers made changes to the planets associated with the seven double Hebrew letters (those letters that have both a hard and soft pronunciation that traditionally are associated with the seven classical planets); yet if he knew the history of the tradition, he would know that these changes were present in the Cipher Manuscript and that it is unlikely to be the direct work of Mathers.

Plus, he is willing to believe that the leaders of Golden Dawn would purposely "blind" (change the correspondences of the symbols) documents that were meant only for the eyes of members of the Order. I find it unlikely that Golden Dawn would blind its own set of correspondences in papers meant solely for its own members. For instance, the changes of the letters associated with the paths of the Tree of Life is present in the Cipher Manuscript (the Tree of Life that he shows from the Cipher Manuscript is actually for the Philosophus [4=7] ritual, the Perfected Tree, and is not the Tree of Life that the member uses in their daily magical work) he considers to be a mistake. From personal experience, I know that the changes can only be understood properly if one accounts for the fact that this non-orthodox Kabbalah arrangement is actually the plan for one of the layers of the initiation rituals, and is meant to help keep the initiate energetically balanced during the initiationary cycle.

But his lack of understanding about why Golden Dawn uses the set of correspondences it does is really the only problem I have with this sourcebook (sourcework is the term he uses). This is truly an impressive expansion of Liber 777 and the original Book of Correspondences that it was based on. The Tables are organized in a reasonable manner; it is easy to find the proper row thanks to his ZEP system (Zodiac, Element, Planet) which is easier to use than the path numbers that the original works used. Skinner brings in a score of subjects that I have never studied.

This book promises to be used as much use as Liber 777 from students of the magical arts, perhaps more due to the additional information it contains. And if the practitioner of the craft remembers that all systems of correspondences are the opinion of their creator, they will have no problem using this book in their spiritual work.

Stephen Skinner. "The Complete Magician's Tables" (Second Edition). Llewellyn (2006).

[This review originally appeared on Associated Content (Yahoo Voices) on 7/29/2008. The copy used was brought and paid for by myself.]

Inner Order Teachings of the Golden Dawn (Pat Zalewski)

Pat Zalewski's Latest Book Reveals Previously Unpublished Teachings of the Golden Dawn

One of the difficulties in studying the Golden Dawn tradition is that many of its Inner Order teachings have been lost, unpublished, or sometimes never even fully completed, forcing the modern day esoteric Orders that have been built from the Outer Order information (compiled and published by Israel Regardie) and the Adepts connected with these groups, to create their own Inner Order teachings, a major problem for some; Pat Zalewski in his book "Inner Order Teachings of the Golden Dawn" addresses this problem.

The book, not to be confused with Zalewski's earlier book, "Secret Inner Order Rituals of the Golden Dawn" (1988), mainly consists of THAM (Theoricus Adept Minor) lectures written by one of the three co-founders of Isis-Urania, the original Golden Dawn lodge (Temple), Macgregor (Samuel Liddell) Mathers, along with papers written by Pat Zalewski that supplement the Mathers' material. There is also information about the diagrams studied in the PRAM (Practicus Adept Minor) subgrade, alchemy and the Tarot, the Lunar Diagram on the Tree of Life, and the Chief Adept's (Caduceus) Wand, all of which were written by Pat Zalewski.

The importance of the material contained in this book lies both in how the original Grade structure of Golden Dawn's Inner Order, the R.R. et A.C. (Ordo Rosae Rubeae et Aureae Crucis, "Order of the Rose of Ruby and Cross of Gold", also known as Second Order), was conceived and the depth of the teachings revealed.

As originally conceived by Mathers, the creator of the Adept Minor (5=6) Grade ritual, the instructional material of the Inner Order Grades would examine the earlier Grades' rituals and their symbolism. The Adept Minor Grade was divided into six subgrades; the primary teachings for each subgrade would be based on one of the Outer Order Grade rituals. The ZAM (Zelator Adept Minor) subgrade would start the study and analysis of the Neophyte (0=0) Grade ritual, and the THAM subgrade would focus on the Zelator (1=10) Grade ritual, etc. (The Neophyte Adept Minor subgrade was primarily concerned with the creation and consecration of the Adept's magical tools [weapons].)
Pat Zalewski extended this theme to the rest of the Grades of the system. Hence the Adept Major (6=5) will study the Portal ritual while the Adept Extempt (7=4) will study the Adept Minor ritual, and the Magister Templi (8=3) will study the Adept Major ritual.

This system of determining the primary curriculum is not agreed upon by everyone in the Golden Dawn community. There are those who believe in the myth of the Third Order, and seek it out, saying that it is only by contacting Third Order as they claim Mathers did (it may just have been simply an advertising and member retention tool used by Mathers), that Golden Dawn can receive any new rituals and lectures. This curriculum scheme flies in the face of that assumption; with a clear outline of the curriculum and where it was headed, new teachings can be created by the current active members of the tradition.

The fact that this curriculum scheme implies that any active member of the tradition could work hard, research the symbols of the rituals, and develop new teachings, due to the higher teachings being based on material that is already published and available to all students of the tradition, upsets anyone who seeks to control the Golden Dawn system. This scheme democratizes the system, putting the power to grow the tradition into the hands of the many, rather than the privileged few who had access to the unpublished material contained in this book.

And that is the real importance of this book, not the publication of teachings that only a few had access to previously, but the fact that it reveals the depth that future leaders and students can strive for using material already in their possession. For example, the lecture on the Universe card of the Major Arcana shows us how deep a Golden Dawn based analysis of any of the Tarot cards can go.
This book is a twelve inch rule, a standard of measurement that we can judge our own work and the efforts of others by. It shows us a plan, and examples, for fleshing out the rest of the Golden Dawn system of esoteric philosophy and magic.

Pat Zalewski. "Inner Order Teachings of the Golden Dawn." Thoth Publications (2006).

[This review first appeared on Associated Content (Yahoo Voices) on 7/1/2008. The copy used was brought and paid for by myself.]