The Equinox: Tarot Divination
By Aleister Crowley
Published by Samual Weiser
The Equinox Series, Volume I #8
1979 Third Printing, Paperback
Very Good Vintage Condition. The book is clean, covers attached, secure stapled binding, previous owner signature and date on inner cover and embossed ownership stamps on several pages, otherwise unmarked, no internal writing or notes, no highlighting, crisp inner pages, no fading, no stains, no ripped pages, no edge chipping, no corner folds, no crease marks, no remainder marks, not ex-library. Some light surface and edge wear from age, use, storage and handling.
Free USA Shipping
>>>>
Aleister Crowley (born Edward Alexander Crowley; 12 October 1875 – 1 December 1947) was an English occultist, philosopher, ceremonial magician, poet, painter, novelist and mountaineer. He founded the religion of Thelema, identifying himself as the prophet entrusted with guiding humanity into the Æon of Horus in the early 20th century. A prolific writer, he published widely over the course of his life. Born to a wealthy family in Royal Leamington Spa, Warwickshire, Crowley rejected his parents' fundamentalist Christian Plymouth Brethren faith to pursue an interest in Western esotericism. He was educated at Trinity College at the University of Cambridge, where he focused his attentions on mountaineering and poetry, resulting in several publications. Some biographers allege that here he was recruited into a British intelligence agency, further suggesting that he remained a spy throughout his life. In 1898, he joined the esoteric Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, where he was trained in ceremonial magic by Samuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers and Allan Bennett. He went mountaineering in Mexico with Oscar Eckenstein, before studying Hindu and Buddhist practices in India. In 1904, he married Rose Edith Kelly and they honeymooned in Cairo, Egypt, where Crowley wrote down The Book of the Law, a sacred text that serves as the basis for Thelema, which he said had been dictated by a supernatural entity named Aiwass. Announcing the start of the Æon of Horus, The Book declared that its followers should "Do what thou wilt" and seek to align themselves with their True Will through the practice of ceremonial magic.
After the unsuccessful 1905 Kanchenjunga expedition and a visit to India and China, Crowley returned to Britain, where he attracted attention as a prolific author of poetry, novels and occult literature. In 1907, he and George Cecil Jones co-founded an esoteric order, the A∴A∴, through which they propagated Thelema. After spending time in Algeria, in 1912 he was initiated into another esoteric order, the German-based Ordo Templi Orientis (O.T.O.), rising to become the leader of its British branch, which he reformulated in accordance with his Thelemite beliefs. Through O.T.O., Thelemite groups were established in Britain, Australia and North America. Crowley spent the First World War in the United States, where he took up painting and campaigned for the German war effort against Britain; his biographers later revealed that he had infiltrated the pro-German movement to assist the British intelligence services. In 1920, he established the Abbey of Thelema, a religious commune in Cefalù, Sicily where he lived with various followers. His libertine lifestyle led to denunciations in the British press, and the Italian government evicted him in 1923. He divided the following two decades between France, Germany and England, and continued to promote Thelema until his death.
Crowley gained widespread notoriety during his lifetime, being a drug user, bisexual and an individualist social critic. Crowley has remained a highly influential figure over Western esotericism and the counterculture of the 1960s and continues to be considered a prophet in Thelema. He is the subject of various biographies and academic studies. Aleister Crowley (12 October 1875 – 1 December 1947) was an English writer, not only on the topic of Thelema and magick, but also on philosophy, politics, and culture. He was a published poet and playwright and left behind many personal letters and daily journal entries. Most of Aleister Crowley's published works entered the public domain in 2018.
Crowley published the following books during his lifetime:
>>>>
The occult, in the broadest sense, is a category of supernatural beliefs and practices which generally fall outside the scope of religion and science, encompassing such phenomena involving otherworldly agency as mysticism, spirituality, and magic. It can also refer to supernatural ideas like extra-sensory perception and parapsychology. The term occult sciences was used in 16th-century Europe to refer to astrology, alchemy, and natural magic, which today are considered pseudosciences. The term occultism emerged in 19th-century France, where it came to be associated with various French esoteric groups connected to Éliphas Lévi and Papus, and in 1875 was introduced into the English language by the esotericist Helena Blavatsky. Throughout the 20th century, the term was used idiosyncratically by a range of different authors, but by the 21st century was commonly employed – including by academic scholars of esotericism – to refer to a range of esoteric currents that developed in the mid-19th century and their descendants. Occultism is thus often used to categorise such esoteric traditions as Spiritualism, Theosophy, Anthroposophy, the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, and New Age. Use of the term as a nominalized adjective has developed especially since the late twentieth century. In that same period, occult and culture were combined to form the neologism occulture.
>>>>
Magic, sometimes spelled magick, is the application of beliefs, rituals or actions employed in the belief that they can manipulate natural or supernatural beings and forces. It is a category into which have been placed various beliefs and practices sometimes considered separate from both religion and science. Although connotations have varied from positive to negative at times throughout history, magic "continues to have an important religious and medicinal role in many cultures today". Within Western culture, magic has been linked to ideas of the Other, foreignness, and primitivism; indicating that it is "a powerful marker of cultural difference" and likewise, a non-modern phenomenon. During the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, Western intellectuals perceived the practice of magic to be a sign of a primitive mentality and also commonly attributed it to marginalised groups of people. In modern occultism and Neopagan religions, many self-described magicians and witches regularly practice ritual magic; defining magic as a technique for bringing about change in the physical world through the force of one's will. This definition was popularised by Aleister Crowley (1875-1947), an influential British occultist, and since that time other religions (e.g. Wicca and LaVeyan Satanism) and magical systems (e.g. chaos magic) have adopted it.
Magick, in the context of Aleister Crowley's Thelema, is a term used to show and differentiate the occult from performance magic and is defined as "the Science and Art of causing Change to occur in conformity with Will", including "mundane" acts of will as well as ritual magic. Crowley wrote that "it is theoretically possible to cause in any object any change of which that object is capable by nature". John Symonds and Kenneth Grant attach a deeper occult significance to this preference. Crowley saw Magick as the essential method for a person to reach true understanding of the self and to act according to one's true will, which he saw as the reconciliation "between freewill and destiny."
In various cultural worldviews, witchcraft is the use of magic or supernatural powers, usually to cause harm and misfortune to others. Someone who practices witchcraft, or is accused of doing so, is called a witch. In medieval and early modern Europe, where the term witchcraft originated, accused witches were usually women who were believed to have attacked their own community. Witchcraft was seen as immoral and often thought to involve communion with evil beings. It was believed witchcraft could be thwarted by protective magic or counter-magic, which could be provided by the cunning folk or folk healers. Suspected witches were also intimidated, banished, attacked or killed. Often they would be formally prosecuted and punished if found guilty. European witch-hunts and witch trials in the early modern period led to tens of thousands of executions - almost always of women who did not practice witchcraft. European belief in witchcraft gradually dwindled during and after the Age of Enlightenment. Contemporary cultures that believe in magic and the supernatural often believe in witchcraft. Anthropologists have applied the term witchcraft to similar beliefs and occult practices described by many non-European cultures, and cultures that have adopted English will often call these practices "witchcraft", as well. As with the cunning-folk in Europe, Indigenous communities that believe in the existence of witchcraft define witches as the opposite of the healers and medicine people, who are sought out for protection against witches and witchcraft. Modern witch-hunting is found in parts of Africa and Asia. In contemporary Western culture, most notably since the development and popularization of Wicca in the 1950s, the term witchcraft has been redefined by some adherents to refer to harmless or helpful practices such as divination, meditation, and the self-help practices found in the modern Pagan and New Age movements.