Correct political thought does not equal magical skill and ability (and vice versa)

On any given day, you can find some self-declared Big Name Occultist (or Magician, or Witch, or Shaman, or Mystic, or...I could go on for hours) loudly proclaiming that some respected or better known occultist said something that is politically wrong, and therefore is a Offender. This is followed by the BNO's own beloved supporters declaring that they will never buy another book by said Offender, will defriend them on Facebook, defollow them on other social media sites, and leave any forums moderated by such an evil Offender. And this is how it should be because the Offender cannot be a real occultist if they hold such erroneous political views.

How a numpty thinks Adeptship works vs the harsh reality.

Quite simply, there are some numpties that believe that Adeptship (or their tradition equivalent) means that one has the correct political views, is of the correct religion and virtue, and has a certain level of perceived magical skill (which can range from none at all to being able to raise the dead) that is always heavily advertised by those who have it.

In other words, as far as the Numpty is concerned, Adepts think exactly like they do. And that Adepts will give them cookies for being as brilliant as the Adepts are (if not fall over themselves bowing down to the Numpty's superior wisdom--for all numpties know that they are the most advanced magician and mystic in the world).

It is just too bad that it is easy to fake all three requirements if you are a sociopath. Just like voters fall for politicians who are not anything like they claim to be, numpties fall for and support occultists who are faking their political beliefs (or at least radically relabeling them for public consumption), would not know the mysteries of religion if they got bit in the butt by one, have vastly overstated their magical ability and knowledge, and have all the virtues of a Mars bar without all the tasty sugar.

Numpties prefer to have Adepts defined by these requirements, mainly because they themselves might be able to claim Adeptship someday if they only have to master their talking points, parroting the "correct" answers that their own future followers will go ape over.

Never mind the fact that there are some a**h***s who believe that Adeptship is rooted in actual initiationary experiences (such as actually undergoing the initiation rituals), arcane lore, and at least enough magical ability to hex one's way out of a wet paper bag. The opinions of a**h***s don't count, only the howling of the courageous wolves of occultism, who should never be mistaken for sheep, not alone the lemmings that the more dubious occult leaders treat them as.

Remember that real Adepts think exactly as you think they should.

Big Name Occultists would not be so upset about the Offenders, if they would only shut the f**k up and quit breathing. And the numpties would not be so upset if they did not desire one day to lead their own horde of lemmings. Because if there is one thing that an Offender is good at, it is not recognizing the true occult geniuses in their midst.

This lack of recognition is why Big Name Occultists have to tell you all the evil stuff that Offenders do, such as misreading the Bill of Rights, voting for the wrong politician, believing that sexual offenders have no place in the esoteric Orders (or politics for that matter) and deserve a good binding.

If the Big Name Occultists don't do this, the Numpty might accidentally start believing the other falsehoods that such Offenders spread, such as: pointing out that certain parties did not actually undergo the initiation rituals of their tradition, only know the mysteries of using a photocopier and bovine end-product generators, and quite frankly could not hex their way out of a wet paper bag if they had to.

If the Offenders were true occultists, they would totally agree with everything that the Big Name Occultist did. Sue your competition into extinction--fine. Rebel and claim that your teacher had no ethics (or rather the wrong ones)--excellent. Make up a totally bogus lineage and set of teachings--good god man, I must have some of that; take my money please!!!

Annoy someone important--buy this banned by BNO book.

The evil of Offenders is so dangerous that if the numpties don't scream bloody murder on their own, the Big Name Occultists would have to create lists of banned books, magazines, blogs, podcasts, videos, and websites that their followers are not allowed to read. And you can tell that the Big Name Occultist is protecting you because hey, if the Offender can't get their political ideas and religious beliefs in order, how could they possible know anything about the occult?

Or you could just presume that you already know everything.

And numpties are quite happy with this, for they know that they already know everything. There is nothing that an Offender can teach them. In fact, the only reason that the Numpty puts up with the Big Name Occultist is that they recognize the greatness of the the Numpty.

I am not saying this is why the occult world can't have nice things...

Now, I can hear you say, "Dear Uncle Morgan, you express political ideas all the time; surely you think people should agree with you."

Yeah, but they don't--that is why I have to keep repeating myself. Besides occasionally I am wrong about politics...because my magical skill and ability and evil magical lore gives me the exact level of knowledge about politics as it does about gasoline engines; in other words, none at all. Everything I know about politics came from watching my parents volunteer and canvas for political candidates and listening to my dad's comments about what we heard on talk show radio on long trips. That and watching Nixon announce that he was resigning (sad when your first memory of a President is of the forty-fourth worst President)...which made me believe that all politicians are corrupt in one fashion or another. And reading and watching stuff about politics. I had to work hard to know as little as I do about politics unlike Big Name Occultists who get a completely perfect and correct set of political and religious ideas in the same Cracker Jack box that they received their Grade of Most Advanced Occultist Ever from. 

Just like you should not judge my magical ability based on my politics, you should not judge my politics on how much I have suffered in the name of magic and the mysteries. I would still be a nasty evil witch even if I agreed with your political and religious opinions.

Besides I wanted to make a living as a newspaper columnist--but somehow ended up making jokes about occultists instead. (Honestly, I have no idea how it happened--one day, I realized that I had spent an hour comparing a Big Name Occultist to a novelty condom and was too lazy to hit Delete.) You wouldn't deny me my dreams, would you? If Emma Bombeck could make jokes about suburban life and raising a family and still have political opinions,  why can't I make jokes about the esoteric traditions and the strange people that I encounter while pursing the mysteries and still have political opinions? It is not like I am asking to be the Head of your esoteric tradition...that would be the job of your favorite Big Name Occultist--all I am asking is to do is to be allowed to tell funny stories, to convince you to care enough about politics to get involved and at least vote, and teach you to be suspicious of anyone who claims to be the True Head of All of the Mysteries and Esoteric Traditions.

Obligatory apology about how we are misjudging you for the Numpty that you ain't.

Of course, it should be noted that I am on a few Banned lists. Because of my politics? Because I think numpties can learn? Because I mock Big Name Occultists and their traditions? Who knows?

And as such, I should be apologizing for my Offending Ways. Not that I am good at apologizes. The last one I write read something like this:

"On the behalf of the group, I would like to apologize for not recognizing that you are the most important person in the world. You see, we are bitter old hags who had to work hard for the little bit of recognition that we have received. We were not allowed to walk in with a sweet a** story, and declare ourselves the most important person in the world. No, we had to kill someone, and help someone else hide a body or two. This makes us happy little cynics. So when you walk in with your special snowflakish, all we want to flush your various body parts down a toilet. It is nothing personal--it is just how the world works. As a sign of apology, let me buy you a drink of poison."

Now imagine that I am apologizing for my wrong political and religious ideas.

Do you feel better?

No.

Well, I guess you are going to have to agree with your Fearless Leader and fire me as an occult authority.

Remember that you have to think exactly like your Fearless Leader if you want to become an Adept.

Creating an egregore

What do the egregores of political parties, Amway conventions, and esoteric traditions have in common? They are all constructed and strengthened though the use of ritual. 

There are two types of rituals that you can use to build up an egregore--one is what is commonly thought of as magic; the other is pomp and ceremony. Considering that I plan on dealing with ritual magic later in this series of posts, let's focus on the pomp and ceremony route tonight--the route used by non-magicians. 

My first experience with a constructed egregore was during high school. Feel free to make a Hellsmouth joke at this point--I do it all the time...but mine tend to end up with the demons dying of boredom. At the time, I had no idea that an egregore was being built, strengthened, and generally dying from a lack of interest in the proceedings at hand. But there was definitely an egregore being built in the gym of the high school that I attended. 

How did a bunch of high school kids build an egregore? Simple, they had cheer leaders. 

I probably should point out that I went to high school in a very small town. During my last year of high school, the senior class only had eighty-four students in it. Everyone knew everyone--not only in the high school, but the entire town knew everyone else. And considering there was very little to get excited about, high school football was a big thing. 

There was a definite ritual involved to amp up the support for the team. 

The day of the game (or the Friday before for weekend games), the football players and cheer leaders would show up to school in their uniforms. Teachers would ask for predictions of how the team was going to perform. The football players were especially annoying that day--pretty much getting away with anything that they wanted to that day. 

And then came the pep rally. There were pep talks, cheers, and ritualized dance movements. Oh, and lots of cheering. A central symbol to focus on--the team colors and emblem. Plus there was a common enemy that we all had to stand together against. 

It was at these pep rallies that I learned one of the most valuable lessons that I know about egregores--how to avoid getting sucked into one. To this day, I can pretend to be excited while wondering if anyone would notice if I went home early. 

After high school was over for me, I joined the military...for about two seconds, just long enough to be exposed to their system of egregore construction, a technique that one of the finer GD leaders like to use. Uniforms, instructors, pep talks, ritualized dance movements, err, I mean military drills, and an enemy that had to be fought against. Just like high school, but with bullets, bad food, and a general lack of sleep. And we had a central emblem to focus on--the flag. 

Upon leaving high school, I worked in fast food restaurants. Uniforms, schedules, a rank system, bad food, silly chants, and a general lack of sleep. Just like the military, except that you were not supposed to kill anyone. And we had enemies, the district manager and the more annoying customers. Our central emblem--the logo of the company. 

In my exit out of food service, I got involved in selling stuff. Not necessarily Amway, but I am drawing a blank of other company that everyone would know that uses the same techniques that I saw being used. Uniforms (ahh, the special blazer), pep talks, lecturers, ritualized dance movements (I kid you not), and a common enemy--the customers who said no to our sales advances. And for a central emblem, the logo of the product that we selling. 

I have seen the same techniques used by politician parties. Uniforms (oh, the holy power suit), pep talks, keynote speakers, ritualized clapping and cheering. And yes, there is a common enemy to band against. Central emblem—the flag, of course. 

And just to drive the point home, in the esoteric traditions that use the lodge system, there are uniforms, lectures about how the work is going to improve us, bad food, ritualized movements and cheers, and in more than one esoteric Order, a common enemy that the membership must band together against. And a central emblem--some symbol of the mysteries. 

Of course, viewing pomp and ceremony though this lens, and the group think that one sees resulting from such manipulations, one wonders why anyone would ever submit to such mechanisms of control--the answer is simple, your average magician stands to gain enough power over their own lives that giving up a certain amount of freedom of thought is worth it. 

Much like, fitting into high school, getting a college education on the slim chance that you might get shot, getting a paycheck, increasing your sales, getting political favors, make all the other manipulations worthwhile. 

What is an egregore?

One of the terms that you hear tossed around in esoteric circles, especially those circles manned by the lodge system, is the term "egregore."

But what is an egregore?

Quite simply, an egregore is a "group mind" of a group of people. Well, perhaps calling it a group mind is being too generous. In all honesty, an egregore is like a hotbed of neurosises that is transmitted from one member to another--well, at least, it is when the egregore has taken ill from taking in an excess of unsuitable members.

So why use such a dangerous tool? In part, because we have no choice in the matter. No esoteric system that wants to escape the one-on-one single master teaching a single student method can avoid the effect of egregores.

Egregores are a natural occurring phenomenon. Every human being has encountered an egregore, and is part of at least one egregore. The only way to escape the effect of egregores on humanity is to grow a single human being in a test tube and raise them with only the aid of machines on a planet far, far away from the rest of humanity. Only a human completely isolated from the rest of humanity would be able to escape the effects of egregores.

(At this point, a student might ask, "What about sociopaths and psychopaths?" No, even those types are affected by egregores, even if they themselves are not as deeply connected to them though the recesses of their own minds as the rest of humanity, as long as they live among other human beings.)

Egregores occur naturally; they do not need to be created. For instance, sport fans at a bar will create a low level egregore. As the moods of the fans gathered wax and wane, the emotions felt by each fan in the room affect the other people in the room. Given the right input, the fans can spill out of a bar and turn into a mob looting and pillaging.

It is the ease that an ordinary crowd can turn into a mob that makes Adepts avoid crowds when they can.

And egregores form from all types of human gatherings: families, Amway conventions, crowds of shoppers, protestors, churches--all generate an egregore. Many of these egregores are short-lived, breaking apart quickly when the gathering is over. We have all experienced the high from a conference, feeling like we could take on the world, only to have our confidence rapidly fall apart as soon as we got home.

Now, the quick esoteric student will point out that they are not in lodge that much, therefore if egregores exist (and we have not proven that they do), then they would only affect the student for the duration of the ceremonies and meetings which they attend. And that would be true if the egregores of the esoteric traditions were ordinary egregores. Unfortunately, the egregores of the esoteric traditions, due to the rituals of their systems, are bigger, stronger, and longer lasting than most egregores that spontaneously arise in society. Only the egregores that influence the natives of nations, the steadfast members of religion, and of ethnic cultures can rival the egregores of the esoteric traditions.

And that is because they all share something in common--the use of ritual.  

(Some students will say that no amount of evidence will prove that the egregores exist--after all, it is not like you can weigh an egregore on a scale. The student might also argue that the occult theory of egregores can be replaced by social theories or psychology models instead. And they are right. No one can prove that the egregores exist. And other models of reality provide models that can account for the same behavior that the occultists credit the egregores for. But egregores are how the members of the esoteric traditions are taught to think about the behavior of groups of human beings, and therefore it is what I chose to use here in this series of posts--a gold star for such a student, who will probably leave the esoteric traditions in a blaze of intense pride that they are smarter than the assembled Adepts and Masters of the esoteric traditions...while the esoteric traditions breathe a deep sigh of relief that another know-it-all decided that the halls of knowledge were beneath their notice.)

Structure of esoteric egregores. 

Structure of esoteric Order and lodge egregores

Structure of the Egregores of Esoteric Orders & Lodges

One of the things that I am doing this summer, besides cobbling together collections of previously written fiction (such as Shakespeare's Monkey) and hacking out more fiction, is slowly cranking out the material necessary to get the Three Officer Version of the Golden Dawn Neophyte Ritual back in print. As many of you know, at a certain point, Lulu decided to change the rules for the type of cover I had on it, and I suddenly needed to add 46 more pages.

Part of the additional material I am thinking of including is a brief summary of the energetic structure of egregores. Or maybe, it will be a stand-alone article (really short ebook). I haven't decided yet.

Of course, there will be a horde of people saying that I know nothing about the subject, but what else will be new? Oh, the fact that they will point out that I only write about the occult to make money. Sadly, I have yet to figure out how any occult writer actually makes money writing about the occult. Maybe, I am little slow in the head.

Anyway, I thought that perhaps my regular readers would like to see the (oh so bad, gee, I do not know one side of the pencil from the other) illustration I was thinking of using for the material that I am writing on the structure of esoteric egregores. Click on the picture to embiggen it.

Yes I am resigning

Yes, I am resigning from Golden Dawn. I have no choice.

David Griffin and the membership of his Order, the HOGD/AO demand an apology for something I wrote. Actually several things. And Griffin says I used the vilest language to describe his membership. Honestly, the man has not worked construction if he thinks that my language was that bad.

Several times over the last few years, Griffin has told me that my fellow members, the good people of Bast Temple, are getting tired of my bad-mouthing of him. I am sick and tired of him trying to shut me up as a blogger, book reviewer and a writer. I do not agree with all the man's opinions, and I think that I have a right to speak my mind.

He believes that as a member of Golden Dawn that I do not have that right. Therefore, I am going to resign from Golden Dawn to keep my right to continue saying what I believe to be true.

I believe that it is wrong to ask one's membership to give a writer a whole bunch of negative one-star reviews on Amazon. If I did something like that, I would be voted out of office. But then again, I am not really Golden Dawn, am I? After all, I was elected to the office that I hold.

I was taught that you look after the health of the egregore first and foremost. My resignation protects the egregore of my group, prevents it from being poisoned by the fact that I think that Griffin has crossed a line. It does not matter what Griffin intended; the actions that he and his group have taken raises alarm bells on the cult evalution scales. And once you start down that slope, it is hard to hit the brakes.

I am not going to apologize for opinions that I hold. I would rather resign from the tradition I love rather than to tell the lie he wants me to tell. Apologizing for saying something that I believe would be telling a lie. It would poison the very heart of the egregore that I am charged with protecting.

Therefore, I chose to leave Golden Dawn. But do not think that I am going to shut up.

How much difference does changing an Order name make

Yesterday, VH Soror FSO announced that the Grand Temple of Ptah (Chicago), Temple of Thoth-Hermes (Denver), Temple of Het-Heret (Seattle), Sanctuary of Isis (Los Angeles), and Sanctuary of Maat (San Francisco) were now officially under the banner of The Order of the Golden Dawn: Collegium Spiritu Sancti.

Let's be perfectly honest: Changing the name of their Order was absolutely necessary. Between the fact that Robert Zink seems to be as deeply dug in as he was before, the fact that Zink is the bearer of the license for the use of the name Esoteric Order of the Golden Dawn, and the amount of sludge and bad feelings associated with the EOGD (most of which is connected with Zink), a name change was so needed---if only to give themselves a chance to develop their own reputation in the Golden Dawn community without being constantly confused with the EOGD.

But there are actually a deeper magical issues involved.

One of the theories about the egregore is that the name of an Order actually serves as one of the keys to being able to tap that group's energies. I am not sure how much I buy into that theory. It seems to have developed from the fact that the Order name is one of the things that you promise to keep secret---it seems to be a wild guess about this clause of the oath without taking in account the history and mythology of the lodge system.

But here is the rub: Any group that is using their Order name as part of the security of their energy bank has two names---their public name and a hidden name (often only known to the Inner Order and officers). The name that you are actually pledging to keep secret is the hidden name, not the public one.

The argument that the various name changes of the Golden Dawn groups have undergone represent security updates can go either way when you start to look at what was going on historically. For instance, do you really want to continue to use the name Golden Dawn in 1902 after its association with the Horos? (It is ironic that the modern Golden Dawn groups have actually used the name Golden Dawn for longer than the original Order did.) So on one hand, you have the bad PR; but you also have the fact that the rituals are now public knowledge (large hunks of the ritual published in newspapers no less---where everyone can read them).

(Sidenote: There is some indications that Mathers was planning on reclaiming the name Golden Dawn in the rituals recently published by Nick Farrell. I would quote the exact lines from the ritual, but I have misplaced my copy of the book.)

Ultimately, one must look at the names of the Orders much like one looks upon the various mottos of the members. Depending upon the Order you study, there are times that you change your motto. My most used motto is actually my second Golden Dawn motto. A significant life event happened between the time I took my Neophyte motto and the time that I entered Zelator---so significant that changing my motto was completely in order. I also have multiple mottos because of various group membership (new group=new motto). Interesting enourgh, the modern custom of changing your motto upon Inner Order entry is not observed by all Orders; and in fact, when examining the original Order, one discover few members who actually changed their motto at Inner Order.

If you look at the history of what directions the various Orders went after changing their names, you will notcie that the various Orders are not clones of one another (even when they are sharing communications with one another). Now if you buy into the esoteric fact (or theory) that names have power and vibration, one has to consider that changing the name of an Order changes its vibration (or at least, part of it).

Now, I am not going to analysize what the EOGD to OGD-CSS change really means. For one thing, it is complicated. For instance, what is the real name of the EOGD? I tend to refer to it as HOMSI (Hermetic Order of the Morning Star International) because that is the name that Order had when I first encountered information about it. But the EOGD seems to have a dozen names over its history. I am not sure that any of the name changes mattered---I think that the birth name of that Order remained the same.

Another reason for me not to analysize the names is that it is not a simple operation. Do we use English numerology? And if so, how do we deal with the non-English parts of the new name? Or does the entire name need to be put into Latin? And do we count every "the" and "of" in the name?

But for those who want to experiement with analysizing the names and what to use English numerology, I leave you with the following information. The planets and elements for the numbers one to nine (according to one system) are as follows:

One: Sun---Fire
Two: Moon---Water
Three: Jupiter---Fire
Four: Uranus---Air
Five: Mercury---Air
Six: Venus---Earth
Seven: Neptune---Water
Eight: Saturn---Earth
Nine: Mars---Fire

Group founders as cornerstones and keyholes

One of the things that I always find fascinating is how the egregores of the various esoteric traditions were [are] developed. In the Bible, we are told that at first, there was the WORD. In esoteric traditions, at first---there was the FOUNDER.

The founder of a system, or esoteric group, is the cornerstone upon which the entire system develops around; they are the keyhole, or first gatekeeper, that stands between the other members and the energy of egregore.

Think of the founder of a group as the initial programmer that creates a new computer program or operating platform. (Operating platform is probably more descriptive of the tradition in general; while the individual Orders and "Churches" are probably more akin to individual programs that run on the operating system.)

Except that not only is the founder the initial creator of ideas behind a group, they are also part of the very structure of the group.

In Hollywood myth, we are told that computer programmers always leave a backdoor into the systems that they create. In esoteric tradition, and religion for that matter, the founder does not have to create a backdoor, for they are a door into the system---in fact, they are the primary DOOR into the system.

Now, there are some implications to this, for instance you can't get rid of Jesus from Christianity---but you can get rid of Paul (vide gnostic literature). You can't remove Buddha from Buddhism (I am unaware of any attempts to do so). And you can't get rid of the creator of the Cipher Manuscript in Golden Dawn.

But note that you can build new structures upon their system once the founder is gone. I doubt that Christ or Frater Cipher would recognize the various multitude of structures that later people built on their ideas, and I really doubt that they would consider the "Bibles" of the various groups to be true statements of what they intended.

There are implications to this idea...if you think about them long enourgh, certain occult statements start to make sense. Of course, you do not have to worry about me being right---after all, the esoteric tradtions and religions are not like computer systems at all. *wink*

When does it become a different tradition?

A thought that I occasionally kick around in our polarized tradition---exactly when does a group or style of working become a different tradition? At what point, are so many changes made that a system of working simply ceases to be what it started out as and becomes something completely different? At what point in time does the teachings and beliefs of a group become so different that it is no longer recognized by its parent tradition?

Given that every group (coven, lodge, Order, etc.) has an egregore which taps into an energetic current, and the keys of tapping into the energies that the egregore guards are encoded in the rituals and procedures used by a group, sooner or later enourgh changes to the rituals and teachings would prevent a group from tapping into a current and force it switch to another current---in essence, enourgh changes creates a new system.

This set of questions is very close to the surface of my thoughts today. The workings and beliefs of the system that I work have been declared "dead-ends" by another group, and they have changed their code-keys. Are we different traditions yet? They are going back to a style that pre-dates the system that I work (and have been for years). At a certain point, the two styles became different systems---and despite this other group's efforts to drag us all back into that style, the rituals of my tradition still have power; they still have a purpose.

At certain point, the egregores of the two styles started to obey different rules. From my viewpoint, there are two traditions sharing the same name, but who are on completely different paths. And it has been this way for years---I wonder if I am the only one that sees this?

Still mixing Wicca with Golden Dawn

There are moments I can tell that I am my mother's son; today is one of those moments. Yesterday, I was told by a couple of people that, in their humble opinions, I should not be mixing Wicca with Golden Dawn. In their opinion, the traditions need to be kept separate.

I tried a subtle "Gee, I guess that I am going to have to resign from one or the other." My friends probably caught the tone I used. No one else did.

This morning I realized that the only way to keep a tradition pure is to create separate communities for the traditions. Outside influences must be banned.

"Here is your copy of Regardie big book. This is the only book that you are allowed to read and use during your entire esoteric career. No reading of books by other writers, no talking to members of other groups or traditions, and do not ever shake hands with anybody."

The reason for such extreme measures? Simply, the "physical" body of the traditions (egregores) are human beings. Unfortunately, human beings cannot isolate experiences in separate files like computers do.

Human beings are organic computers that always have all their files open. Every experience we have touches all our other experiences. We are a holographic computer, reflecting everything that we have ever experienced.

And the only way to keep the traditions pure is to isolate its members (perhaps from birth) from the members of all other traditions. No TV, no books, and no internet. If someone is interacting with people who are not of your tradition, then you are going to have corruption of your tradition. The only way to keep a tradition pure is to make sure that your membership never deals with the information contained in the other traditions.

Radical? Yes. True? Hell yes.

I do not believe in pure traditions. I am a Global Rosicrucian. I am still mixing Wicca with Golden Dawn, Runes with Geomantic Glyphs, Chaos with Discordianism, alchemy with paints. I am a citizen of the planet Earth. I am not a nationalist, not a purist, not an isolatist.

And if you are a believer in maintaining a pure tradition, a pure egregore, you really should not be reading my blog or any of my writings.

Differentiation of egregores

(Note: Some readers may have read this already. I thought that the issue is important enough that I shared it on one of the Golden Dawn forums.)

A common event during the birth years of Orders, especially those which arise out of schisms, is the founder of the Order writing a document(s) that states why their Order is different and better than the other Orders that one could join. Part of the reason for this is economical politics (all Orders of a certain type and style tend to draw off the same possible membership pool), and partly is due to ego issues (the founder of a new Order is normally doing it because he thinks that he is more capable of running an Order than the people he just broke away from).

That is what we see happening on the surface level; but there is something else going on that many people may not be aware of, which is how this is affecting the egregore of the group.

Now the term “egregore,” in the oldest references that I have been able to trace it to, referred to the occult theory that each nation had an angel (god) which was its patron and guardian. This term and concept later ends up being applied to a mystery of the esoteric Orders.

Now the truth of the matter is that any group of people that gathers together will generate an egregore. Book clubs, businesses, military units, soccer fans, football fans, in fact any gathering of people will create an egregore. Most egregores are temporary things; unfortunately, they are the most primitive and the most dangerous in many ways. Riots tend to be caused by primitive egregores which is why trained Adepts tend to avoid large crowds.

It is possible for Initiates to keep themselves out of spontaneous egregores, and to be able to stand back and observe the effects of the larger ones. It is a skill like any other and can be taught; the base line information on how to do it is hidden in basic lodgekit.

Now in Golden Dawn, we use our egregore all the time. We use it for extra power during ritual, use it to help guide us, and to store excess energy for later. Call it a god, call it an angel, call it an energy bank. Except that we are not all using the same one.

Each Order has its own uber-egregore (I am open to suggestions for revision of this term, but it says what I want it to say) which acts as a template for the egregores that its daughter lodges create. This is one of the first things that an Order creates, knowingly or unknowingly. (This is not to be confused with the Arch-egregore that sits above all of them, and supports the tradition itself.)

And the founders of Orders do their part to differentiate their uber-egregore from the others. In part, this is done though changing the name of the Order, its rituals, and teachings, so that it doesn’t match other Orders.

The reason for this differentiation is that every time a member of the Order generates excess energy in a ritual, the egregore absorbs it. Think of it as a direct deposit device. It knows what energies to absorb and which to ignore by how the energy was generated. And members of Orders learn to generate energy in very specific ways.

(This is by the way one of the reasons that lineage and hierarchy is important; lineage is the wiring of an initiate to send excess energy to a specific egregore based on a specific uber-egregore, and one’s position in the hierarchy helps determines how much access that one has to the energy that has been previously stored.)

So for instance, when Paul Foster Case issued his statement that Enochian led to bad things, that statement helped led to the BOTA egregore ignoring the energies raised by Enochian methods (provided of course, that all the Enochian has truly been removed from the system) and not storing that energy. It would lead to a certain amount of paranoia about the energies in later members (which makes me wonder about Case himself).

You can also see differentiating statements in the works of Mathers, Fortune, and Crowley. I, myself, wrote a couple of statements at the beginning of Bast Temple that ended up affecting the system.

The differentiation of the egregores and the Orders leads to all types of interesting effects. But the most important is that the energies raised by my lodge do not flow into the energy bank of another group.

Now, I would like to explain why I have been thinking of this lately. There has been a lot of noise about differences in techniques and ethics practiced by different groups (in fact, the Denver community now has three lodges, all with a different opinion about the matter). And some people think this is a bad thing.

It is not. I am grateful for these differences. As long as these differences exist, everyone interested in Golden Dawn can find a group suitable for them. It is only when these differences disappear that we will end up with a monolithic single Order, and a whole bunch of people will be excluded from the tradition. Ironically, I would be one of the ones excluded, due to my pro-gun, pro-militia, pro-choice, and semi pro-death penalty opinions. There is also the issue of my big mouth. And quite honestly, I like being part of Golden Dawn.

Hierarchical backlash

Lately, I have been watching a lot of bickering between some of the Golden Dawn leaders, teachers, and writers. It is pretty normal as far as I am concerned. And when one got nasty, it merely pointed out that he was the type of Adept that I came up the ranks surrounded by.

(For those who do not know my background, I do not believe in the saintly Adept, who believes in thinking that kind thoughts will change the universe. Why? Because the Adepts in my mother lodge were not of that kind, rather they were people capable of great anger who thought that members of the RC occasionally have to roll up our sleeves and get our hands dirty if we want to see changes in the world.)

For me, the reactions were normal when you account for human nature and politics. There is also one other thing that I am accounting for that many people may be overlooking.

And that is that if you hold an active place in the Hierarchy, you suffer a certain amount of backlash when things impact your egregor. If people attack your branch of the tradition's way of doing things, and your egregor reacts as if it is being attacked, then you react as if you are being attacked. It is one of the side-effects of being part of the system, and something you have to watch constantly as an officer. And there are certain officers of the system that are almost guaranteed to react when changes happen to the egregor of their group, and when it is criticized.

I know this from personal experience. I have, on occasion, occupied one of those offices.

Unfortunately, not a lot of people seem to be aware of this side-effect. So when an officer reacts badly, they rack it up to them being a jerk. Before racking it up to that, one should step back and ask if it is completely their reaction, or could part of it be the egregor acting like a drunk in a bar.

(I am sorry, but personal experience has taught me that the egregores of the various Golden Dawn groups act like mentally unstable drunks on the bad days. I don't like the imagery any more than you do. It is just that one needs to be aware of this.)

When I start acting badly, and most people have seen me explode for no apparent reason, I have to ask myself:

1: Is this my bad upbringing? Could this be my mother talking?

2: Is this the egregor, the group mind, of my branch and lodge reacting?

3: Or is this me?

In most situations, it is always best to count to ten kabbalistically before firing off a response.

And having experienced this side-effect first hand, I have to wonder how much of this latest spat is politics, backlash, and personal reactions. I have my bets, but can't prove anything.