ARARITA

A detailed breakdown of the Star Sapphire ritual, this is not a book for the novice. Detailed associations are drawn to the Tree of Life and the Tarot. The author, 'a Traveller in Darkness', ascribes the ritual to the general arena of 'crossing the abyss', giving large amounts of space to describing why that is so. For my taste, perhaps a little too much so, but then, to write a book about a one-page ritual, its necessarily going to go into a lot of detail.

Nevertheless, this book does what far too few others do: delve into the technical details of HOW the ritual works. It's not sufficient to say that a certain ritual is a "banishing" ritual, one should explain how it banishes, and, in fact, exactly what banishing is. How the material on the page is designed to affect the operator and why. Anyone attending a catholic mass, for example, comes out transformed, refreshed (depending on the skill of the priest), and that is because various elements in the mass were designed to create specific effects on the mind (perhaps also on reality, but as we cant know reality except through the mind, its irrelevant - if the mind has been changed, everything has been changed).

Anyone looking to put this ritual into practice is given specific recommendations as to how to perform it, whereas Crowley only gave veiled hints. These practical elements may go beyond what Crowley himself intended and performed, but they certainly appear congruent with Crowley's intentions, and if they do go beyond Crowley, I would suggest that the author has done a valuable service.

I concur with the author that various groups that claim to have inherited from Crowley may beg to differ, but if that us their position, the answer would be to develop their own expansion.

Blocked in genuine gold on purple cloth, this limited edition (250) book will also look somewhat grand on the shelf, all the more because its not draped in some crappy dustjacket that cant be thrown away because it would halve the value in years to come. Not for children.
8/10

Brother Curwen, Brother Crowley

A new book by the Teitan press, BCBC is an account of correspondence between Netherwood Crowley and a 50-yr-old Jewish Furrier who had some experience of his own under his belt. Like many, Curwen had read many books, but wanted to 'see some magic' as it were, so he wrote to Crowley: "I want someone to show me practical magic.."
After a life of reading and some instruction in the Vama Marga under an Indian Swami, he was anxious to see whether it was all a waste of time. Being Jewish was bad enough, but to demand Crowley to perform his profession in front of him had expected results. Nevertheless, Curwen managed to maintain a fairly long and somewhat friendly (if testy at times) relationship with Crowley by massaging his ego at times, by hinting at hidden knowledge of his own, and by either appearing or being a dupe to Crowley's moneygrubbing. Hard to tell on the latter. He paid some money to find out Crowley's "supreme secret" of ingesting sperm, but paid in installments, and refused to pay after the first, when he had been told what it was. Of course, Crowley felt gypped. But so too did Curwen, not considering the secret worth the first installment.

For anyone wishing to see what was probably a typical interaction between Crowley and a 'seeker', and to get further insights into Crowley's character and what he was or was not able to show to Curwen as an example of his magickal skill, this is an interesting book. It didnt take long to decide where this went in my library: right next to "the progradior correspondence" and "magickal diaries of Aleister Crowley".

A good read, fairly easy, enjoyable. Three stars out of Five.