Nick Farrell challenges the Secret Chiefs to a duel!

I suspect that the Secret Chiefs are too lazy to go to an important meeting.

The big news of the week is that Nick Farrell has challenged the Secret Chiefs to a duel. Go on, read his challenge to them (right here at this link). I will wait until you are back. You are back. See, I told you that Nick challenged the Secret Chiefs to a duel.

What do you mean?! That is not a duel challenge...are you sure? Because it sounds like one to me.

And we all know what is going to happen--no Secret Chief is going to show up to chat with Nick. Because he is a secret dog lover. I mean you can't have a real conversation with someone that is guilty of kissing dogs. (And this explanation of why the Secret Chiefs did not show up might not be the most silly one that results from this challenge...if you see a sillier one, please post the link in the comment section for my readers to amuse themselves with.) Seriously, my cats are too lazy to go prove to Nick Farrell that they are also his superiors; besides his head would explode being in the presence of so much cuteness.

Now, seriously, seriously, the problem is that Nick Farrell wants what he considers true independent verification of the existence of the Secret Chiefs. Independent as in not coming directly from the mouth of a gatekeeper, or from the people that the gatekeeper has blessed with their teachings.

The closest that Nick is ever going to get on that front is one gatekeeper declaring another gatekeeper a villain, and electing themselves as the one true gatekeeper to the Secret Chiefs.

This is the closest we ever got of independent proof of their existence.

Go though the historical records of the Secret Chiefs, including the primary documents being generated by the current round of gatekeepers and supporters, and all that you will find is declarations by gatekeepers that they are the one true link to the Secret Chiefs, advertising endorsements by their followers, symbolic and un-provable theories about why the Secret Chiefs only reveal themselves to the gatekeepers, declarations that other gatekeepers are frauds and liars and that the accuser is the only true gatekeeper (or at least, their close personal friend), and attempts to use the idea of the Secret Chiefs and connections to them as a means to control members of esoteric societies.

We would be better off if the whole lot of them just sat down and played a game of Magic the Gathering to figure out who was the gatekeeper of the hour was.

As for instruction being proof, that requires an element of faith even if the material is completely new and unknown. I have seen too many con-artists use the Secret Chiefs and secret knowledge as proof, and then use this proof to justify the mistreatment of the membership of their groups. I have in the past been presented with "new" information to prove the Secret Chiefs, only to later discover the same information in a relatively unknown document.

Of course, that type of experience is why even if the Secret Chiefs (in human or astral form) showed up on my doorstep, I would not believe and trust their information and stories completely. Basically, I am a happy little cynic that mistrusts everyone to a lesser or greater extent.


Of course, when I think of dueling, I think Magic the Gathering.

[Update--July 25 2013: Interesting note about the picture in the middle--the official statement (by DG) is that Jean Pascal Ruggui made the statement in error (and removed his statement at the request of the Secret Chiefs...it took them a month to make the request, I guess), and at the time one of the Secret Chiefs was living at Griffin's house transmitting the supplemental traditional Golden Dawn teachings and magic, of which the 0=0 level was transmitted at the April 2013 International Golden Dawn Festival. The Secret Chief had spent four months at Griffin's house doing this work. Griffin was unable to admit this openly until July 25, 2013 when the Secret Chief left for Europe. What is most interesting about this statement is the fact that one of the Secret Chiefs was in the United States, living with Griffin at the time of the conference and no one met them other than Griffin and his wife. I guess that is why Hathoor Temple used to say that a Secret Chief could even be a Neophyte (because you think that the other attendees would have figured out that the person was a Secret Chief if they did not come across as a complete knee-biting Neophyte). I also guess that Secret Chiefs are immune to assassination and death because we all know that Griffin had numerous death threats in the last year, and quite frankly the thought of living with him and his wife for four months gives me a bad case of the screaming willies.]

Want to be a real GD writer?

Given the fact that the Golden Dawn forums and blogs are knee-deep in so-proclaimed experts, one needs to have a way to separate the good from the bad. One of my ways of doing this is whether or not, the expert has ever got past an actual editor.

Yes, the method is not ideal...because there is that whole debate about what an actual editor is. And this is one of those times that one will be sure to hear someone say that there are no actual editors involved.

Nevertheless, today I read on Donald Michael Kraig's blog that Hermetic Virtues is looking for submissions for a planned hardcover book called The Book of Rituals. Submissions must be original and unpublished ceremonies that are well-written and ten thousand words or less, preferably focused on the Inner Order (Adept) level (Outer Order rituals will be considered also). The deadline for submissions is June 1st, 2013. For more information, or to make a submission, contact vic@hermeticvirtues.org

This project is non-profit, as in all proceeds go to the HOGD Legal Defense Fund. This last fact means that certain people will not be submitting to, or buying copies of this collection. And they may decide that everyone who does decide to submit something is a traitor to the Golden Dawn system. Of course, this fact may just make one want to submit something to spite them.

So would I consider you a good expert if you get something printed in this collection? Maybe. Maybe not.

(I used to read Hermetic Virtues--and will probably try to catch up with the back issues after my wallet recovers some more from college [my income is slowly increasing now that I have time to focus on it]--so, it is more of a "maybe.")

Is it worth tossing out the entire batch to get rid of some bad apples

As my regular readers know, I have been tracking comments about the recent eBay policy change that removes all fortune telling, spell-casting, and healing services from the eBay site. One of the comments I saw yesterday was that "We finally got much-hated and loathed master crook XYZ off of eBay--how is this a bad thing?"

Well, I am not going to argue that it is a bad thing that those types of readers and advisors are no longer allowed on eBay, but look at how they were removed from eBay. In order to remove the bad apples from eBay, the company removed ALL readers, spell-casters, and healers from eBay. Both the good and the bad are affected by this policy change.

So how many bad apples does it take to justify getting rid of the whole bushel? One, a hundred, a thousand? In the case of the paraphased commentor, one was enourgh to justify eBay's action. Whatever the magic number is for eBay, there were that many bad apples on eBay.

Now, back in February, I kicked around the bad apple threshold question when Paypal decided that it was no longer going to allow its service to be used by erotica writers who were writing the Forbidden Four. A couple of sites, to conform with Paypal's policy, ended their relationships with ALL indie writers, not just those who were involved in writing erotica and the Forbidden Four.

(Paypal, by the way, is owned by eBay. Are you surprised by their parent company's actions?)

The interesting part is that one of the sites allowed their own "bound by contract" writers to continue writing the Forbidden Four. So basically, it looks like they merely got rid of the toublesome indie writers as a token effort to appease Paypal. (One wonders how much, or how little, money they were collecting from indie writers.)

Of course, to answer the bad apple threshold question, one must figure out what a bad apple is in the first place.

The extreme answer that I keep running into in the local community is that a bad apple is any occultist or writer who charges. So if you do readings for money, or charge fees for classes, or collect royalites off your writing--you are a crook and a bad apple. And this seems to be the answer that eBay has embraced--all Tarot readers, psychics, magicians, witches, and healers are bad apples.

So yes, we got evil master crook XYZ off of eBay--but we also got to see the whole field declared a bunch of crooks by a major corporation. And I doubt that it going to prove to be a good thing in the long run.

Screenshots of the eBay discontinued offerings

In light of the doubt that some have expressed about eBay getting rid of fortune tellers and miracle workers, I present the following screenshots from eBay's 2012 Fall Seller Update. (And because I can foresee myself blogging more about this subject tommorrow.)

Discontinued eBay categories--Sept 2012.

It says spells and potions are a no-no, along with readings.

 

"Items that will be prohibited include: advice; spells; curses; hexing; conjuring; magic services; prayers; blessings; Psychic, Tarot, Reiki, and other metaphysical services; magic potions; healing sessions...."

 

For some reason, the policy page on eBay has not been updated yet to include these services, but I assume that it is only a matter of time before eBay does so. As of this point, you can still see listings of these services on eBay...because it is not the end of the first week in September...yet.



Attention Colorado Voters

It just came to my attention that Colorado has purged a lot of voters from its list of registered voters. It is not just Democrats either--I am a Republican (it is family tradition--one that I continue simply because...I have no idea why)--and I was purged from the list (and I did vote in last year's election).

To check if you are still registered to vote in Colorado, visit the Go Vote Colorado page on the Colorado government page---here is the link to Go Vote Colorado.

Remember that if you were purged, you have to re-register by October 7th to vote in the upcoming Presidential Election.

Golden Dawn peace and harmony in Nevada 2013

[Full disclosure--This is NOT an endorsement. This post is merely sharing news and information of possible interest to the Golden Dawn community.]

For those of you who are unaware of the official HOGD/AO blog and its leader David Griffin, or have stopped reading that particular blog for one reason or another, Griffin's Order is going to be doing another peace and harmony gathering next year. It will happen March 29-April 9, 2013--outside of Las Vegas, at the HOGD/AO Isis-Hathor Temple in Pahrump, Nevada. And at this one, the Third Order is releasing new magic for the Outer Order. Everyone in the Golden Dawn community is invited.

If you are interested, please go to Griffin's blog for more information.

[Full disclosure--Repeat, this was NOT an endorsement. This is merely me doing my job as a Golden Dawn blogger, nothing more.]

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.]

Rash of occultists sending out spam

The only good spam is the sandqwich meat that kitty loves. Yes, my cat loves spam---he might be Hawaiian.

There are three big news stories today. And two of them are not really important.

To the first one, I say, "That old news has been around the soap opera sewer for ages."

To the second one, "Promise that I do not have to read your comments ever again?"

And finally, the one I chose to blog about---Darcy Kuntz is not sending out spam. It just looks that way.

One of the things that has reared its ugly head in the pagan and Wiccan communities is that sometimes you recieve a piece of spam from someone that you are surprised is sending you spam. It has now moved to the Golden Dawn and ceremonial magic communities.

So while I have recieved several spam emails from "Darcy Kuntz," I seriously doubt that it is Darcy doing it.

Either they have hacked into Darcy's current email account, or they discovered and hacked into an abandoned email account that he used to have.

The earliest way to determine if you have been hacked secretly and sending out spam to all your occult friends---put yourself into your address book. In my case, my other email address is in my address book---if I recieve a spam email from the other account, I know I have been spammed hacked. (And I check both accounts every day.) If you are sending out spam thanks to a hacker, change your password quickly.

And whatever you do---don't use "secret" or "password" as your secret password; that is just begging for someone to hack into your email account.

Sanctuary of Maat officially closed

A few months ago, as many of my readers know, the Golden Dawn community lost a valuable member, GH Frater Imhotep. He was the founder and prinicipal mover behind the Sanctuary of Maat, an online Hermetic school that used the Cicero's Self-Initiation into the Golden Dawn Tradition as their primary textbook.

And as most of my readers know, between his death and a rather ugly server crash, the website of the Sanctuary of Maat has been inaccessible for months. Basically, everyone including Proctors and Co-Chiefs, were locked out of the site. 

Today, it was announced that the Sanctuary of Ma'at was being officially closed, and was no longer going to be accepting applications for SoM memberships or study groups. The decision was made because of the loss of all the school's data in the server crash, the death of Imhotep, and the need to focus on the growth of the physical Order.

Part of the official announcement for the closure, made by GH Frater Odo Caosg (Imperator, Ordo Stella Matutina) included the following statement:

If you currently have an ongoing subscription to the SoM [Sanctuary of Ma'at], please cancel it. The current Chiefs of the Stella Matutina have no access to Frater Imhotep's accounts, so we can not remove you or offer refunds, nor can we access any funds that are paid into it. Likewise, we have no access to the existing SoM website, and cannot even post this announcement there. It is our hope that these accounts will close of their own accord now that our Frater has passed on.

For those who are involved in the process of self-initiation into the Golden Dawn tradition, the Magical Working Group (MWG) yahoo group is still available for answering questions about the system. Most, if not all, the former Proctors of the SoM are active on the MWG. And many are members of the Ordo Stella Matutina or other lodge based Golden Dawn Orders, as are many former SoM members. In fact, the trend for SoM members to move on to take physical initiations was one of the reasons that the Ordo Stella Matutina was formed.

(Yes, one of the members of Bast Temple--VH Frater H.K.Aa.L.A.H.R.--was a proctor for the Sanctuary of Maat.)

Long time members of the SoM will remember this picture.

Sock Puppet Master says Meow

Your master will eat you dear sock puppet.

Oh c'mon now people of the Golden Dawn blogosphere---someone has to make a joke about the pending breaking dark news story. And if not me, then who?!

Of course, it is easy for me to make jokes about puppet masters being revealed. I know who my puppet masters are---my wife and a small pride of cats. The most common things I hear from them is "You are not doing anything important, go fetch me something to drink and eat" and "Meow." I trust that my readers can figure out who says which statement---well, maybe.

And I am betting that we are about to be served another round of "Golden Dawn students and leaders are communicating with one another without my consent, therefore it is a conspiracy that has been going on for two decades." That smelly sock odor is merely a bunch of people who had the balls to communicate with one another without the Secret Chiefs' permission---the great unwashed masses of Golden Dawn. Tasty sock puppets they are.

Remember I am here all week, bringing you bad humor and cat jokes. Next show is tomorrow at ten. Good night everyone!

BNW: Farrell is started his own Order

Well, the big news of the week is that Nick Farrell is starting his own magical Order, The Magical Order of Aurora Aurea. I have nothing else to add to this, other than to say it will be interesting to watch how it unfolds. Personally, I will be only watching from the sidelines---I have my plate full between university classes, maintaining a relationship and a couple of friendships, and the Inner Order course that I am taking. Oh, and the occasional freelance writing and lodge meeting that I engage in. I just do not know where I would be able to hack out another hour or two a day (every day of the week) to do yet another course.