What makes BIORC different?

Truth in advertising strikes the Hogwarts House system.

One of the difficulties about trying to decide what Golden Dawn Order to join is that it is nearly impossible to tell the difference between the Orders. Their advertising looks the same; as soon as one group makes a claim, everyone else also claims to provide the same service...with one exceptation (c'mon--I do not need to point out the one claim that no one else wants to make). In the end, often it boils down to who is leading the group, and if you know any other members of the group, and if they have a local lodge or correspondence course, which determines what Golden Dawn Order that you join. Their advertising footprint might also be a factor.

We could label the main Golden Dawn groups as "The Amway Golden Dawn," "The False Humility Golden Dawn," "The 'We can't be bothered to have a correspondence course' Golden Dawn," "The Freemason Golden Dawn," and "Those freaks of nature Golden Dawn."

Oh, and then there is the group I belong to--"The 'Who are you again?!' Golden Dawn."

Here in Denver Colorado, we have three Golden Dawn lodges...and rumors that a fourth one is going to be organized. And honestly, I bet that you can not tell the difference between them. The fact that there was overlapping membership for awhile...and this may still be true for two of the lodges...does not help any (all the shinies got shared).

So the question of "What makes your group that you belong to different from all the other Golden Dawn groups?" is a difficult one to answer. Even my answer that "We are the pagan/Wiccan friendly lodge with the smallest membership" does not really create a distinction. Nor does the statement, "We are the least likely to be married to the exact ritual script that the other Golden Dawn lodges use."

Yet, both of those statements are actually the statements that you want to pay attention to. For they are the statements that hint that something is going on behind the scenes...something that makes Bast Temple more BIORC than strict Golden Dawn.

Earlier this year, a cascade change was introduced into the Neophyte ritual of the BIORC.

For those of you who are relatively new to the Golden Dawn system, a "cascade change" is a small change that leads to more and more changes in the rituals and lessons of an esoteric system. Golden Dawn is actually a series of interconnected and interlocked rituals and magical techniques. The smallest changes and corrections occasionally end up changing the system so drastically that a group that starts changing things often finds themselves ceasing to be Golden Dawn. For the most part, groups do not like this possibility, so they cling to the strict version of the published rituals and teachings.

Awhile back, the cornerstone members of the BIORC ceased to care if the group remained Golden Dawn. Therefore, some small changes have started to be introduced...including what promises to be a cascade change.

The change that threatens to remove BIORC from the Golden Dawn system?

Simple, the Neophyte prayer to the Lord of the Universe got changed to a prayer to "The Lord and Lady of the Universe."

Yes, something as simple as that could end up being a cascade change. For one, it upsets anyone who believes that only a male one-god religion is correct. For another, it opens up the door to having to change all the Elemental Prayers. It also opens up the door to the esoteric mysteries being explained not in Christian and Jewish symbols, but rather in symbols from British Traditional Wicca and other modern pagan religions.

The change in the ritual was made because the membership of Bast Temple (which is the Mother Temple of the BIORC) is once again composed of just pagans and Wiccans. The ritual acknowledgement that the divine has been god and goddess aspects is long overdue as far as the membership of Bast Temple is concerned. But it is the type of change that may result in BIORC ceasing to be a "true" Golden Dawn Order.

Personally, it is exactly the type of thing that makes me remain a member of the BIORC, rather than joining another Golden Dawn Order. For it is the one group that I do not have to mentally apologize to the Goodess to every time when the Lord of the Universe prayer is said.

Someone is going to be upset



Fuck you---I am Cat.

[This post was originally written in April 2012, and was not posted because I decided to be nice. It is being posted today because David Griffin and his Order will be demanding an apology from me in the future because of a project that I had in the pipeline for a couple of years that they will claim is ripping off their ideas because they openly stated that they are mixing science with the esoteric mysteries before the first part of my project was ready to be published. So I am just going to state the fact that I will not be apologizing for that project...or any other thing that I might do that upsets them in the future. The stuff in red was written today.]

There are days when you know that someone is going to be upset with you...and your friends...and your lodge...and your Order. This is one of those days. I imagine that they are also going to be upset with my cats.

Why?

Because my lodge looked at my notice of resignation, heard why I had to resign (because Griffin and company thought my opinion of them and their actions in the great book banning of 2012 were the "vilest"), and then proceeded to point out that my oath was not to Griffin's HOGD/AO, but rather to the BIOGD/BIORC and the IIOGD (which had given a previous HOGD/AO version the bird).

[Yes, there were groups calling themselves HOGD/AO before Griffin took out his trademark---shocking, but true. Even more shocking is the fact that my lineage may actually trace to Mathers. There are days I pray that it doesn't.]

Therefore, given that my oath was not to Griffin and his Order, and my duties likewise, the membership of the lodge did not see how the opinion of people outside our Hall had anything to do with whether or not I should remain a member of the lodge and Order. At that point, they set fire to my notice of resignation.

And you know that there is going to be a horde of people upset about this.

[For some reason, the members of Bast Temple do not consider the members of the HOGD/AO to be their brothers and sisters in the Work, I wonder why that feel that way.]

I am not really surprised by this. The people who join Bast Temple who do not like me and my actions tend to rapidly leave and join another Denver Golden Dawn lodge. My fellow and lady lodge members are used to my "in-your-face" opinions. In fact, they pointed out that the "vilest" language I used was actually polite compared to some of the things that I have said over the years.

They also did not think that I owed Griffin and company an apology over my honest opinion. In fact, it turns out that the lodge's opinion of the situation and the players would really upset some people.

The angry horde is going to be appalled that I am the polite, rational member of the lodge.

Furthermore, the members of the lodge want Griffin to know that they do not care about what I say about him and his. They understand that Griffin has appointed himself (or is it the Secret Chiefs and the Third Order?) judge and jury over all things Golden Dawn, but they would like to point out that they voted a long time ago not to join Griffin's Order. (Long story, mostly boring---and sad because they decided that they preferred a different devil in charge---it recently came back up with the revelation of new superior teachings which they voted not to learn.) And they want Griffin to know that his opinion is not welcome in matters concerning the actions of the membership of Bast Temple.

The angry horde, armed with pitchforks and flaming torches, want my head on a platter. And they are going to have to settle for calling me bad names. And that is really going to make them upset.

[Furthermore, I would like to add that my lodge knew about my bringing science into the esoteric mysteries project for the last two years, therefore I am quite sure that they not consider my project to be ripping your Order off.]

[One of the results of this demand for an apology is a new "tradition" where I am not allowed to bring myself on charges based on demands from Griffin's group. The membership of Bast Temple have stated that they will only consider bringing me up on charges on things that they discover on their own; by the way, they do not read Griffin's blog or forum...so demands for my head will be met with indifference by me.]

Ongoing Bast Temple website problems

As some of you know, Bast Temple has been experiencing some major website issues.

The issues started during the worst part of semester...and considering that this turned out to be the worst semester ever for me, well, I could have just plotzed. Now that the semester is over, and I have two seconds to try to fix the problems, I realize that the problems are going to take some time to fix.

Therefore, for awhile, Bast Temple is not going to have a regular website. Well, we have one, it is just that the problems prevent anyone from actually getting to it...even if they know the exact address of it.

So my temporary solution is to put up a blog for Bast Temple. I figure that way people (eventually after the search engines find it) will still be able to find information about the lodge and be able to contact us if they are interested in Denver membership.

It is time like these that I wish that I belonged to one of the Big Name Orders who could throw money at problems like these.

So if anyone is interested, the new Bast Temple blog is located here (click).

The Official BIORC stance on Secret Chiefs

Another thing I realized reading the internet today is given the wide views about the Secret Chiefs, that it would be useful for some to know the official Bast Temple (BIORC) stance on Secret Chiefs. Straight from the bylaws of the group, we have:

The lodge does not recognize the authority of the Secret Chiefs. The Secret Chiefs have been used to justify the abuse of power and authority in other groups. If the Secret Chiefs do contact a member of the lodge (Order), we will try to keep an open mind, but their suggestions and commands will not become law in the lodge unless approved by the voting members of the lodge. (Passed on 16 Sept 2001.)

By the way, this was in the bylaws long before any Bast Temple member heard of David Griffin.

And that is all the Bast Temple officially says about the Secret Chiefs. Sad, isn't it? You would think that we would be knee-deep in lore about the Secret Chiefs---after all, the Secret Chiefs have been behind all the important stuff in the system. But no, we merely note that we do not recognize their authority.

After I leave, I imagine that the bylaw will be rewritten to include "their representatives from other Orders." I will be the last member of the BIORC that Griffin can use the "your fellow members must be upset at your actions towards me and my Order" ploy against.

Website moving to a new hosting service

Awhile back, I was informed by Microsoft that they were ending their Small Business Live web hosting and replacing it with another web hosting service. Basically, they want to charge more money and quit tracking traffic and keyword information and the easiest way to accomplish this is to kill one web hosting service and create another instead.

So today, I am starting the process of tranferring the Bast Temple website to the new hosting service. It is going to take several days. Of course, this forced move has to take place during my busiest semester ever.

By busy, I mean that I have been spending at least one day (typically two or three) at the library doing historical research. And falling ever further behind on the homework for my other classes.

Initially, I was hoping that no one would be able to spot the difference between the sites once I transfered the domain to the new hosting service. That is not going to happen---I am having all types of formatting issues as I copy pages. Even stripping out the previous formatting does not seem to help. There will also be slight navigation and color changes in the new site.

And the editing of the pages is going to have to wait until after my semester is over...because once I get the basic pages moved, I have to get back to work on my Honors Thesis for Literature and my Senior Seminar in History pages---both are supposed to be thirty pages when they are done.

Wish me luck to finish all my projects by the time they are due.

Correspondence Course Delayed

Looking around I realized this morning that the long-promised Bast Temple (BIOGD/BIORC) correspondence course is going to suffer another delay. Not that this changes anything for the first set of people who are going to see the course (aka the beta-testers)---they are still going to see the most important parts of the course around the first of the year.

Reasons are all on my end: This semester is kicking my ass (the light at the end of the tunnel is beginning to look like a train); I have been devoting time to my wife's business (and ignoring both the Order and my own business); I have not caught up with my foundational course work (ironically, this semester course work relates to it in a strange way).

There is also the fact that I do not like the current round of Golden Dawn politics going on. It doesn't take a cracked crystal ball to realize that the quickest way to be called an ignorant con-artist is to publish a Golden Dawn book or run a correspondence course. And if the upcoming books of mine don't get me called this, the course would sure would succeed in getting me this "esteemed" title. It is a sad field of study that only allows one honest expert to exist, with all the rest automatically being labeled frauds. Oh well, I knew what I was getting into when I decided that this work needed to be done.

And someplace, a horde of monkeys laugh.

Golden Dawn or Not

One of the things about being a writer is that (in theory) one becomes aware of the fact that labels are important; people think of names and terms in little bits, not in tangled string balls. Occasionally, a writer will switch labels on some subject just because they are sick and tired of confusing people.

One of the labels I sometimes wonder about is "Golden Dawn." Or to be more exact, I wonder where the limits are of the term "Golden Dawn" lay. I also wonder about the terms "RR et AC" and "RC."

The root of this confusion lies in the fact that a reformation happened, but the reformers continued using the name despite the fact that non-reformers were still using the name. It has made the terms as useful as "Christianity," "wicca," and "magic," especially if you are concerned with being accurate with the way you are using them.

I generally tend to *sigh* before trying to figure out a way to point out the weirdness of the way I think of the terms. And yesterday, events made it just that much harder to be able to make sure people know what I mean when I say "Golden Dawn."

Unfortunately, I have yet to find a better term for the system that I am working. By goddess, I am looking forward to that day, just so that I can be free of the nonsense of having to spend an hour saying "We do this like side A, but this like side B, and this like side C, etc. etc." when I use the term "Golden Dawn."

Bottom-line, one should not need a score-card to figure out what someone is talking about unless you are talking sports or test scores.

BIORC Outer Order Voting Rights Oath

When Robert Zink got "expelled" by a vote of the Adepts in his Order, I knew it was only a matter of time before he would issue a statement that the Adepts did not have the right to make that vote. This precognition annoyed me. But it wasn't all that marvelous of a prediction when you know the history of Golden Dawn.

I understood my annoyance. It was caused by another annoyance---I was about to have to refight an old battle.

One of the things that has always annoyed the leaders of the current Golden Dawn Orders is the fact that I openly support the membership having voting rights. Not only do I support voting rights, I believe that the members of the Outer Order should have voting rights and not just the highest level of the Inner Order.

My reasons for believing such nonsense will have to wait another night (I got a paper to write tonight for my Urban History class); but just to start getting people aware of the work that I have done to support this idea, I present the Outer Order Voting Rights Oath from the BIOGD (BIORC) Zelator 1=10 ritual.

As always, free feel to leave your offerings of hemlock in the comment section.

Outer Order Voter Oath



Hierophant: My dear brother/sister, _____ Temple, Golden Dawn in the Outer is pleased to offer you the privilege and duty of holding Outer Order Voting Rights. Because of the increased influence over the members of the lodge that such a privilege necessarily confers, the lodge requires you to take a further pledge of your fidelity to the well-being of the lodge.


As with the previous oath(s) that you have taken in the presence of the higher powers and in the presence of your brothers and sisters of this lodge, this oath contains nothing contrary to your civil, moral or religious duties. Are you willing to take this pledge?


Zelator: (affirms)


Hierophant: Then place your left hand upon the symbol of the Order from which we draw our lessons, and your right hand upon the statue (icon) of ____, which represents the lodge of which you are a member of.


Zelator: (does so)


Hierophant: Do you promise to regard the privilege of having Outer Order Voting Rights as a trust given to you, not for your own selfish gain, but rather as a service to this lodge, so that our lodge and our tradition may be kept pure and undefiled, and the Light kept safely for those who seek it on this Path?


Zelator: (affirms)


Hierophant: Do you promise to uphold the right of the members of the Second Order, especially the (Co-)Chief(s) of this lodge to decide on issues of the curriculum and upon issues of advancement in this lodge, so that our high standards of knowledge may be maintained?

Zelator: (affirms)


Hierophant: Do you promise to allow members of the Second Order to override any Outer Order vote, provided that they CAN truly justify their actions as being in the best interests and well-being of this lodge?


Zelator: (affirms)

Hierophant: Do you promise that you will neither recommend a Candidate for admission into First Order, nor for advancement without due judgment and assurance that they are worthy of such a great confidence and honor, nor unduly press any person to be a Candidate?


Zelator: (affirms)


Hierophant: Do you furthermore promise to support the admission of both sexes to our lodge, on a perfect equality, and that you will always display brotherly/sisterly love and forbearance towards the members of this lodge and Order, neither slandering nor evil-speaking, nor repeating, nor tale-bearing, whereby strife and ill-feeling may be engendered?


Zelator: (affirms)

Hierophant: Do you promise to exercise your vote with conscientiousness and loving care, not alone towards this Temple and Order, but unto every individual member?


Zelator: (affirms)

Hierophant: Finally do you promise that if during your travels that you should meet a stranger who claims to be a member of the same Order from which we draw our inspiration, that you will examine them with due care before acknowledging them as such?

Zelator: (affirms)

Hierophant: (addressing the lodge) Brothers and Sisters of _____ Temple, you have heard the pledge of Brother/Sister , do you accept it and grant onto him/her Outer Order Voting Rights?

Lodge: (affirms)

Hierophant: Brother/Sister , you are now a voting member of _____ Temple. Remember always that it is only through the wise exercise of secrecy and our voting rights that we maintain the resources that this lodge has gathered for the use of its members in accomplishing our common goal, which is to accomplish the Great Work, the Union of the Sun and Moon, the Uniting of the Macrocosm and Microcosm, the attainment of the Philosopher’s Stone, the SUMMUM BONUM.

Copyright 2000-2011 Morgan Drake Eckstein.