Page Content (OCR)
RATER Achad, as much as Crowley and later Frater Lamed, is responsible for cracking the cipher. His gnostic view of reality has been summarized by his fol- lowers thusly: “The Qabalists tell us that the Sephiroth were emanated by means of the Flaming Sword, or Lightning Flash, which descended from Kether to Malkuth. They also say that this was followed by the ASCENT of the SERPENT OF WISDOM who thus formed the PATHS. They showed his head at the top of the Tree, in the path leading from Kether to Chokma, which is the first path of the FLAMING SWORD. “All the known authorities have then continued to number the remaining 22 of the 32 Paths of Wisdom from Path 11 (joining Kether to Chokma) to Path 32 (Joining Yesod to Malkuth). “One may now question how it was that the SERPENT who formed the Paths by ASCENDING the Tree could possibly have started at the top, and why previous com- mentators have never taken this vital idea into consideration.” - The Sword and the Serpent [Official QBLH text] Charles Stansfeld Jones is an enigmatic historical figure for orthodox Thelemic Ma- gicians. Proclaimed by Aleister Crowley to be his magical child, a ranking member of the A:.A:. and a National Grand Master of the Ordo Templi Orientis (OTO), he is inherently a force to be dealt with seriously. Crowley tells us in his autobiography, “What I had really done was therefore to beget a Magical Son [in a magical opera- tion]. So, precisely nine months afterwards, that is, at the summer solstice of 1916, Frater O.1.V. (the name of C. Stansfeld Jones as a probationer) entirely without my knowledge became a Babe of the Abyss.” Crowley goes on to citea number of proofs, relying upon the expected child in Zhe Book of the Law. “It is further predicted,” Crowley goes on, “that his ‘Child’ shall discover the Key of the interpretation of the Book itself, and this I was unable to do ... in actual fact he did so discover that Key.” Of the Key in question there can be no doubt that it is the building block of all New Aeon Cabalistic interpretation. The present OTO Grand Master, Hymenaeus Beta, for example, acknowledges that “... his Liber XXXI held the key to The Book of the Law ... While his Qabalistic teachings are sometimes ‘unorthodox ... they are unfailingly self-consistent.” Indeed, in recent years, there has been some effort by or- thodox Thelemites to posthumously rehabilitate Achad whose decidedly unorthodox views led to a permanent break with Crowley in 1919 ev. In 1948 ev. Achad further alienated conservative Thelemites—and endeared himself to radicals—by proclaiming the Aeon of Ma, which superseded the Aeon of Horus proclaimed by Crowley in 1904. Achad’s proclamation, be it noted, was a quiet one, made to a few individual friends and initiates. Some of these quietly formed a Fellowship of Ma-Ion including high-level A:.A:. initiates following upon 53 Frater AcHAD