Thelema: Encyclopedia II - Thelema - Critical Study and Diverse Practice

Thelema - Critical Study and Diverse Practice

Different organizations and persons (predominantly from Germany) do not see Thelema as originating from Crowley. Rather they see Crowley's Thelema as only one of many forms of Thelema. Different orders who accept the Book of the Law have their own guidelines for putting it into practice. In German Thelemic thought the most widely-known skepticism against Crowley's version is found in the Fraternitas Saturni order. The role of other Thelemic writings, each with their own significance, changes greatly for each of these groups. The Law of Thelema itself eschews orthodoxy, forbids intellectual dogmatizing concerning the "proper" interpretation of the Law, and demands that those who do so be anathematized. As a result, there is little secondary literature on the Law of Thelema of any interest, one notable exception being the controversial works of Kenneth Grant. In the United States, J. Gordon Melton and other scholars of New Religious Movements, as well as some scholars of Hermeticism have begun to address "Thelema" in some capacity. Martin P. Starr has also published valuable scholarly work on the history of contemporary Thelema, primarily as it has manifested in the Ordo Templi Orientis.

As an example of diversity in practice, "The Thelema Society," a Thelemic community founded by Michael Dietmar Eschner, is based entirely on "Liber AL vel Legis"--under the original title "Liber L vel Legis"--and rejects all other teachings and writings of Aleister Crowley.

While Thelema has not yet attracted much attention in the field of comparative religion, a somewhat unusual attempt was made by the Mariavite catholic bishop Federico Tolli, in his German book "Thelema- Im Spannungsfeld zwischen Christentum, Logentradition und New Aeon" (Leipzig, 2004.) For Tolli, Thelema is to be regarded as the dialectical consequence of Christianity. Christianity for Tolli exists as a community in Christ, whereas Tolli sees Thelema as a necessarily individualistic response to the world.

In a 1938 theological dictionary to the New Testament the concept of salvation history has a great effect on Tolli's thought. Tolli interprets from this that it is clear for Crowley that the whole Universe (ergo the Will of God) is to combine (analagous to the Alchemical formula 'coagula'). "Love," in the form of combinatory attraction ("Love is the law, love under will"), is a universal principle--therefore akin to the concept of Natural religion. The main difference (for Tolli) is that in Christianity salvation of the entire Universe ("Ganzheit") cannot be made by 'solipsistic' man. The bishop sees Crowley as a failed--however talented--artist or “Mystagogie,” but not as a "Satanist." However, the merit and contribution of bishop Tolli to Thelemic studies lies in the fact that it was he who first expresses that the genuine meaning and idea of Thelema does not necessarily contradict the teachings of Jesus, as Crowley himself affirms.

However, this is very much at variance with how most Thelemites regard Christianity, which is generally seen as a manifestation of the superseded Aeon of Osiris, rather than the New Aeon of Horus (to be followed in several or twenty centuries by the future Aeon of Maàt). While only fundamentalist Christians would regard Crowley as a literal "Satanist," many would agree that he directly challenges much of the ethical and religious basis for Christianity, especially in his work "Liber OZ." Crowley himself tended to advocate the progressive study of all major world religious scriptures and mystical traditions, as well as a special focus on the Empiricist movement in Modern British philosophy, even as he strenously argued against the ultimate claims of these institutional religions. Crowley and Thelema show much philosophical influence from not only Rabalais, but also from sources as diverse as Lao Tzu, Joachim of Fiore, and Friedrich Nietzsche. In the ritual structure of the Gnostic Mass (a major group ritual practice) , the influence of Eastern Orthodox Christianity is evident, leading to accusations of the Gnostic Mass as a "Black (Satanic) Mass."

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Critical Study and Diverse Practice", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki