On the Pagan Traditions I Follow.

I’d like to examine in this short essay the two currents of spiritual thought in the modern Pagan revival.  I follow two spiritual paths.  The first is Thelema, which is the revival of Greco-Egyptian and Greco-Roman Paganism.  These are the Southern Pagan mysteries.  The second is Asatru or the Troth (Truth), which is the revival of the Northern Nordic-Germanic Pagan mysteries.  The Celtic-Druidic system is considered a part of the Nordic-Germanic mysteries due to the Germanic ethnicity of the British Isles.  For brevity I’m going to focus on Thelema and the Troth. 

            Thelema is a Greek word that means “Will.”  This is one’s force of will, or the will of nature as manifest in the consciousness of man.  Schopenhauer’s concept of Will is an applicable description.  This unthinking, unconscious manifestation of desire through magickal workings and meditation becomes one’s “True Will.”  This is the “Higher Self” of the Gnostics, the manifestation of desire and power in the temporal world guided with supranatural consciousness from above.  It is beyond faith or believe and is in essence pure Being.  One is in constant give and take communication with their gods and the Universe.

            The revival of the Greco-Egyptian-Roman Pagan Tradition occurred in Cairo in 1904 when Aleister Crowley channeled “Liber AL Vel Legis” or “The Book of the Law” from a preternatural, extraterrestrial entity named Aiwass who called himself the “Minister of Hoor-Paar-Kraat.”  The Egyptian Hoor-Paar-Kraat or the Greek Harpocrates, is the child Horus, deaf and dumb.  He represents the initiation into the mysteries, which occur with mental silence in the act of meditation. 

            “The Book of the Law” is three chapters with numbered verses.  Aiwass speaks as three different godform for each chapter in this order: Nuit, Hadit, and Ra-Hoor-Khuit.  Nuit is the goddess of the night skies, depicted in Egyptian art as a female figure bending over the Earth, her breasts symbolizing the stars in space.  Nuit represents all of time, space, and the stars, with all the possibilities of action as dictated from the spirit in the material plane.  Hadit is symbolized by the winged globe often seen in Egyptian hieroglyphs.  He symbolizes all the possibilities in the Universe honed into a single action of Will.  This is symbolized by the dot in the circle.  The forward motion of Hadit is the manifestation of the True Will in the life of the Adept.  Ra-Hoor-Khuit is the active, mature, warrior Horus who crushes the head of the Apep Serpent in revenge for the death of his father Osiris.  He is the Star or Khabs in the Astral Body or Khu, which is the encasing for the Soul, called the Ka.  The formula of Nuit, Hadit, and Ra-Hoor-Khuit is the formula for the attainment of congress with the Daimon.  This is similar to the concept of Samadhi in Hinduism and Buddhism which is the union with the Divine on Earth in the focusing of the mind in absolute concentration.  It is the Atman of Advaita Vedanta. 

            The formula of the Attainment of True Will is contained in the 11-word phrase “Do What Thou Wilt Shall Be the Whole of the Law,” 11 being the number of magick or the energy tending to change.  This command not to be taken as a call to hedonism or to “do what you want.”  It is the ultimate act of virtue and responsibility.  “Do What Thou Wilt” is a call to follow one’s True Will in life, meaning one’s life calling.  This can take many forms.  It could mean being an architect, a poet, an engineer, a software developer, a spiritual teacher.  The concept of True Will is centered around the Adept finding union with his or her Daimon or “Holy Guardian Angel.”   Finding one’s True Will aligns one with the “Holy Spirit” whom in the Greco-Egyptian system described here is Sophia.  In the Sumerian form, she is Babalon or Inanna.  The Star of Babalon is the Light of Nuit that is the power in the Sacred Point of Hadit that enflames the magickal power in the star or Khabs of the Adept. 

The Tradition of Thelema uses Greek and Chaldean Qabalah, Tantric meditation and Yoga, sexual magick, and divination such as Tarot for spiritual initiation.  The spiritual philosophy of Thelema I practice is not associated with the Ordo Templi Orientis or the A:. A:., orders that practice a form that is rigid and dogmatic.   The version I follow is influenced by the ideas of Julius Evola and Rene Guenon, along with Kenneth Grant.  This version of Thelema is called the Typhonian Tradition. 

            The godforms of Nuit, Hadit, and Ra-Hoor-Khuit correspond to the Greek godforms of Nyx, Dionysus, and Apollo.  The Roman equivalent of these godforms are Nox, Bacchus, and Apollo.  In the Nordic Germanic, the Godforms are Nott-Freyja, Wotan, and Baldr.  In the Hindu Tradition these would be Shakti, Shiva, and Ganesha-Krishna.  These godforms represent the core trinity of the religious cults of the West. 

            In the modern West is in the final years of the Indo-Aryan Age of Darkness called the Kali Yuga. In this era, the European peoples have lost all connection with the world of Tradition.  This corresponds to what the Nordic-Germanic culture called Ragnarok or the Twilight of the Gods.  The Thelemic equivalent is the Aeon of Osiris which is vanquished by the cycle of time known as the Twin Aeons of Horus and Ma’At.  The Satya Yuga or the Golden Age, which is the next cycle of cultural growth, corresponds to the Aeon of Ma’At. 

            The revival of the Nordic-Germanic Tradition of Asatru or the Troth, has been happening for about 150 years.  This Tradition never really went away, much in the same way the Greco-Egyptian-Roman Tradition was hidden in esoteric orders such as the Knight’s Templar and the Order of the Rose Croix but with a Christian façade as to avoid persecution.   The Elder Edda of the Nordic-Germanic Tradition was mostly an oral Tradition until it was written down in the 13th century.  The Prose Edda was written by Snorri Sturluson around 1220, though the stories are much older.  These texts tell the stories of the gods, and initiation into the mysteries.  Wotan or Odin is the God of magick, communication, and war.  He is associated with Hermes and Thoth in the Greek and Egyptian Traditions. 

            The Germanic Tradition is shamanic in nature, and is similar to the Traditions of the Native Americans.  It has two schools of magick.  One Tradition is called Galdr which means “song.”  This is a form of chanting and singing and are associated with the solar mysteries.  The other form is Seid, which includes meditation and sexual magick which is associated with the lunar mysteries.  It also includes trance and astral journeys.

            The Priest of this Tradition is called a Godhi and the Priestess is a Gythia.  They are the masters of the Runes, the Elder Futhark magickal alphabet.  These letters are similar to the Greek and Hebrew letters in that they act as a Qabalah as power pathways between the Nine Worlds of the Yggdrasil Tree as they manifest in our reality.  This is similar to the Tree of Life in the Hebrew and Chaldean Traditions. 

            These two Traditions, Thelema and Asatru, are the twin currents of the modern revival of the Pagan Tradition of Europe.  This is the revival of the Apollonian Nordic consciousness in the West to replace the dying religion of Christianity, the Middle Eastern cult which, along with Islam, is the religion of the Dark Age of the Kali Yuga.  It is the goal of my work to bring these European Traditions to my fellow Westerners as a revival of their culture.