The Eloquent Blood: The Goddess Babalon and the Construction of Femininities in Western Esotericism [1 ed.] 9780190065027, 0190065028

Citation preview

The Eloquent Blood

OXFORD STUDIES IN WESTERN ESOTERICISM

Series Editor Henrik Bogdan, University of Gothenburg Editorial Board Egil Asprem, University of Stockholm Jean-Pierre Brach, École Pratique des Hautes Études Dylan Burns, Freie Universität Berlin Carole Cusack, University of Sydney Gordan Djurdjevic, Simon Fraser University Christine Ferguson, University of Stirling Peter Forshaw, University of Amsterdam Olav Hammer, University of Southern Denmark Wouter Hanegraaff, University of Amsterdam Ronald Hutton, University of Bristol Jeffrey Kripal, Rice University James R. Lewis, University of Tromsø Jesper Aa. Petersen, Norwegian University of Science and Technology Michael Stausberg, University of Bergen CHILDREN OF LUCIFER The Origins of Modern Religious Satanism Ruben van Luijk

RECYCLED LIVES A History of Reincarnation in Blavatsky’s Theosophy Julie Chajes

SATANIC FEMINISM Lucifer as the Liberator of Woman in Nineteenth-Century Culture Per Faxneld

THE ELOQUENT BLOOD The Goddess Babalon and the Construction of Femininities in Western Esotericism Manon Hedenborg White

THE SIBLYS OF LONDON A Family on the Esoteric Fringes of Gregorian England Susan Sommers

GURDJIEFF Mysticism, Contemplation, and Exercises Joseph Azize

WHAT IS IT LIKE TO BE DEAD? Near-Death Experiences, Christianity, and the Occult Jens Schlieter

INITIATING THE MILLENIUM The Avignon Society and Illuminism in Europe, 1779–1822 Robert Collis and Natalie Bayer

AMONG THE SCIENTOLOGISTS History, Theology, and Praxis Donald A. Westbrook

IMAGINING THE EAST The Early Theosophical Society Tim Rudbøg and Erik Reenberg Sand

The Eloquent Blood The Goddess Babalon and the Construction of Femininities in Western Esotericism MANON HEDENBORG WHITE

1

3 Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and certain other countries. Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press 198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016, United States of America. © Oxford University Press 2020 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, by license, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reproduction rights organization. Inquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above. You must not circulate this work in any other form and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer. CIP data is on file at the Library of Congress ISBN 978–​0–​19–​006502–​7 1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2 Printed by Integrated Books International, United States of America

For the scarlet women, whores, and femmes, who were, and are, and are to come.

Acknowledgments The help and encouragement I  have received throughout the writing of this book has been integral to its completion. The Department of Theology, Uppsala University, funded my PhD research on which this book is based. My fieldwork was partly financed with grants from the Birgit and Gad Rausing Foundation for Research in the Humanities and the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. The staff of the Warburg Institute Library, the Harry Ransom Center, and the Getty Research Institute provided valuable assistance. Mattias Gardell, Henrik Bogdan, and Ulrika Dahl offered immeasurable support throughout the process. Egil Asprem and Lena Gemzöe both offered thorough readings and insightful feedback on versions of the manuscript, and David Thurfjell, Ulla Manns, and Lena Roos posed astute questions. Bill Breeze has shown consistent generosity, offering his time, valuable comments, and access to archive materials. Scott Hobbs kindly made archival materials from the Cameron Parsons Foundation available. The many people who have participated in my research—​devotees of the red goddess—​are the reason this book exists. Your hospitality has been exceptional, and your eloquence has continuously humbled me. Numerous others have provided practical and emotional support at various stages:  Amodali; Carrie Sealine; Carl Abrahamsson; Justine Bakker; Keith Cantù; Alkistis Dimech and Peter Grey; Gordan Djurdjevic; Erik af Edholm; Michelle Guillory, Joann Guillory, and Chris Lane; Magnus Hedelind; Lou Hotchkiss-​Knives; Conrad Hurtt and Ellen Nadel; Richard Kaczynski; Stian and Tai Kulystin; Ernils Larsson; Sofia Linse; Evelina Lundmark; Marita and John; Johan Nilsson; Madelene Persson; My Schaffer; Melissa and Paul R.; Mark Shekoyan; Venetia Robertson; and Erik Östling. Perceptive comments on draft chapters were offered by Malin Ekström, Per Faxneld, Chris Giudice, Kennet Granholm, and Magnus Hedelind, as well as the Seminar on Western Esotericism at the University of Gothenburg. My gratitude is extended to the Higher Seminar on History of Religions at the Department of Theology, Uppsala University, 2013–​ 2017:  Gabriella Beer, Nils Billing, Birgitta Farelius, Rune Hjarnø Rasmussen, Ernils Larsson, Dan Långström, Leif Nordenstorm, Paulina Partanen, Kristian Pella, Kristian Pettersson, Tomas Poletti Lundström, Therese Rodin, Lena Roos, Sofia Rosshagen, and Ferdinando Sardella. I am forever thankful to my family, and especially Susanna Hedenborg, Aage Radmann, Damian White, Ingvar and Gunilla Hedenborg, Margaret White (née

xii Acknowledgments Doyle), Rebecka Theve, and Bernadette White. Finally, Fredrik Gregorius has shown exceptional understanding and empathy throughout the process. Thank you for our strange adventures, all the way from the “city of Antichrist” to the one that sits on seven hills.1

Notes 1. John W. Parsons, “The Black Pilgrimage,” n.d. [ca. 1948], OTO archives.

1

Encountering the Scarlet Goddess On the mountainous island of Patmos in the Aegean Sea, in the first century of the Common Era, the Jewish Christian prophet John enters a cave. In the darkness, he is assaulted by visions—​vivid imagery foretelling the imminent end of the world. John witnesses the opening of seven seals, the sounding of seven trumpets, and numerous celestial and infernal apparitions. Finally, an angel appears and leads the prophet into the wilderness. The resulting vision is described as follows: 3. So he carried me away in the spirit into the wilderness: and I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet coloured beast, full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns. 4. And the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet colour, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication. 5. And upon her forehead was a name written, Mystery, Babylon The Great, The Mother Of Harlots And Abominations Of The Earth. 6. And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus: and when I saw her, I wondered with great admiration.1

In the biblical Book of Revelation, the Whore of Babylon, also known as the “Mother of Abominations,” appears as a majestic and libidinous woman clad in opulent scarlet garments and elaborate jewelry, sitting astride a great beast. In Revelation’s narrative of the early church under threat from a decadent, greedy, and wrathful worldly power, the Whore of Babylon represents a feminized and remarkably sexualized vision of evil. Drunk on “the blood of the saints,” she has historically often been interpreted as a metaphor for a despotic, pagan Rome persecuting Christians.2 Before the return of Christ, Babylon the Great meets a fiery death, torn upon the horns of the beast that carried her. In 1909, the British occultist, poet, and mountaineer Aleister Crowley (1875–​1947) ventured—​literally—​into the wilderness of the Algerian desert, accompanied by his lover and magical apprentice, the poet Victor B. Neuburg (1883–​ 1940). An experienced magician and self-​ proclaimed “Beast 666,” Crowley was determined to explore the Enochian magic and visionary cosmology of the Elizabethan magicians John Dee (1527–​1608/​1609) and Edward Kelley (1555–​1597). Almost every night, Crowley recited an incantation aimed The Eloquent Blood: The Goddess Babalon and the Construction of Femininities in Western Esotericism. Manon Hedenborg White, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780190065027.001.0001

2  The Eloquent Blood at entering a particular Aethyr or otherworldly realm. Gazing into a topaz stone, he described to his scribe, Neuburg, the resulting visions, which featured a dizzying array of natural landscapes, castles, ruins, and supernatural beings. On December 4, Crowley beheld a charioteer in golden armor, who bore a cup radiating a powerful, reddish glow. The charioteer solemnly spoke: Let him look upon the cup whose blood is mingled therein, for the wine of the cup is the blood of the saints. Glory unto the Scarlet Woman, Babylon the Mother of Abominations, that rideth upon the Beast, for she hath spilt their blood in every corner of the earth, and lo! she hath mingled it in the cup of her whoredom.3

Far above him, Crowley beheld Babylon, the Mother of Abominations, astride the Great Beast. Shortly thereafter in the transcriptions, he changed the spelling of her name to “Babalon,” and she appeared repeatedly in his visions over the next few weeks. In 1904 Crowley had transcribed the key sacred text of his religion of Thelema, Liber AL vel Legis (colloquially known as The Book of the Law). He subsequently integrated Babalon into Thelema as one of its central deities, a goddess symbolizing the magical formula of passionate union with all of existence and the initiatory goal of ego death through ecstatic communion with the divine. In Crowley’s mystical system, this process is construed in both violent and sexual terms as draining one’s blood into Babalon’s cup and surrendering individuality in erotic union with one’s beloved. More concretely, Babalon represents the sacredness of the sexual impulse, and especially of liberated female sexuality. Openly bisexual and harshly critical of the bourgeois nuclear family and Victorian-​Edwardian sexual morals, Crowley viewed himself as the prophet of a new aeon of social and sexual liberation. Protesting the fin-​de-​siècle ideal of feminine chastity and passivity, Crowley posited the shameless Scarlet Woman—​a title first appearing in Liber AL, and which he ascribed to some of his most important female lovers and magical partners—​as the quintessentially Thelemic woman. After 1909, the notion of the Scarlet Woman was increasingly intertwined with the mystical doctrines surrounding the goddess Babalon. In 1920, the Swiss-​American schoolteacher Leah Hirsig (1883–​1975), Crowley’s scribe, deputy, and Scarlet Woman, claimed the role of Babalon incarnate, and together they engaged in a series of erotic rituals aimed at furthering the new aeon. Throughout the twentieth and twenty-​first centuries, Thelema has attracted a small but dedicated cadre of adherents from across the globe, and Babalon has drawn further devotees. In 1946, the rocket scientist, Thelemite, and pulp fiction enthusiast John Whiteside “Jack” Parsons (1914–​1952) conducted a series of magical rituals aimed at incarnating the goddess as a physical woman, aided by his lover and future wife, the former naval cartographer and artist Marjorie

Encountering the Scarlet Goddess  3 Cameron (1922–​1995), and L. Ron Hubbard (1911–​1986), prolific sci-​fi author and future founder of Scientology. Lauding Babalon as the goddess of witchcraft and female emancipation, Parsons’s early demise led him to be mythologized as the “James Dean” of the occult. After the death of her husband, Cameron became an icon of the countercultural art scene of 1960s Los Angeles, starring as the Scarlet Woman in avant-​garde filmmaker Kenneth Anger’s Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome (1954). Like Hirsig before her, she claimed to be an avatar of the goddess. Cameron attracted the admiration of the British occultist Kenneth Grant (1924–​2011), a Tantrist and adherent of the nondualist philosophy of Advaita Vedanta, who served briefly as Crowley’s secretary. In Grant’s dazzlingly eclectic vision, Babalon appears as synonymous with the goddess Kali; she is simultaneously a cosmic force linked to the magical power of the female sexual organs and the trained sexual priestess capable of producing a particularly potent, magical substance. Today, these historical views of Babalon are interpreted and critiqued by occultists of all genders, who bring the goddess to life in magical practice using lipstick and garters, knives and floggers, drinking and dancing, and study and sex work. The title of this study, The Eloquent Blood, is derived from Percy Bysshe Shelley’s (1792–​1822) “Alastor, or The Spirit of Solitude” (1815), a poem beloved by Crowley.4 Blood is pertinent to the symbolism of Babalon; Crowley describes her as drunk on the blood of the “saints” who have slain their egos in order to unite with her. Blood is red, which is also the color of the Scarlet Woman’s robes. In Shelley’s poem, the “eloquent blood” of a beautiful female initiatrix tells “an ineffable tale.”5 Crowley’s and later interpretations of Babalon attempt to verbalize the ineffable—​the blurring of the personal and gendered self in the encounter with the numinous. Throughout the twentieth and early twenty-​first centuries, Babalon has been interpreted in terms of love and annihilation, death and initiation, and blood and sex. She is envisioned variously as divine lover, whore, mother, leader, warrior, daughter, and dominatrix. Although alternately described as brutal and gentle, carnal and maternal, incomprehensibly cosmic, and intimately anthropomorphic, Babalon is (nearly) always construed as feminine—​as a goddess. The discourse around her is gendered, and questions of the meaning of femininity and feminine sexuality are and have historically been central to it. She is often related to concepts of what women are or should be, the changing roles of women in the twentieth and twenty-​first centuries, and the feminine role in occult magic. Babalon’s femininity is arguably her most distinctive trait. However, her femininity is not single or static, but shifting and multivalent. This book is concerned with interpretations of Babalon, as declared in theological tracts; diarized by hands shaky with numinous experience, mind-​ altering substances, or sexual release; whispered between friends and lovers;

4  The Eloquent Blood tempestuously felt in bodies, boudoirs, and temples; and soberly recounted to me, minutely recorded through tape recordings and notes. In order to delineate the source material for this study, I have elected to define all such utterances (verbal and nonverbal) as part of a “Babalon discourse.”6 This study aims to analyze the changing construction of femininities and feminine sexuality in the Babalon discourse. It seeks to understand how the discourse around the goddess both reproduces and challenges hegemonic notions of femininity and asks whether the Babalon discourse suggests alternative ways of inhabiting gender and sexuality. The time period under study spans from the fin-​de-​siècle and the early emergence of Crowley’s religion, Thelema, until the present.7 As previous research has indicated, fin-​de-​siècle occultism did not so much deviate from or reject modernity as emphasize some of its core themes of individualism and free will, as well as entering into the gender and sexual politics of its time.8 The historical trajectory of the Babalon discourse throughout the twentieth century strikes at the core of a number of such tensions, including the relationship of femininities to sexuality; the sexualized virgin–​whore dichotomy; feminist critiques of gender essentialism; quests for a concept of femininity not defined in relation to masculinity; queer femininities; the meaning of feminine adornment; the search for a theory of feminine sexuality that engages seriously with both pleasure and danger; and the “recurring link between sexual liberation and the larger goals of social, political, or psychological liberation.”9 That which is seemingly marginalized, deviant, and dissenting reveals much about the dominant culture, and changing interpretations of Babalon bring some of the most contentious issues regarding femininity and sexuality in Western late-​modernity into sharp relief. This book makes three key contributions. Firstly, it explicates how an ancient, misogynist symbol of feminized evil was elevated to a goddess and a soteriological symbol in the twentieth century, along with the gendered implications of this refiguring. The study will analyze what it means when a transgressive symbol of sexualized femininity is constructed as representative of an active threat to the (gendered) social order, and a symbol of the idea of spiritual ascension through ecstatic receptivity. Femininity has occupied a troubled position in feminist theorization, frequently being conceptualized as a debilitating mask, defined by the male gaze, which women must discard in pursuit of liberation.10 This study instead assumes that femininities are plural, that they are neither exclusively heterosexual nor limited to women, and that they can be inhabited and reworked in ways that challenge the gender system.11 By analyzing how femininities are constructed within the Babalon discourse, the present study explores gendered agency beyond simplistic binaries of repression and resistance. As such, it is a contribution to what anthropologist and gender studies scholar Ulrika Dahl

Encountering the Scarlet Goddess  5 has called “critical femininity studies,” which analyzes the relationships among femininities as positionalities that do not relate in any uniform fashion to biology or heterosexuality.12 Feminist theorists such as Dahl, Rosi Braidotti, Luce Irigaray, Donna J. Haraway, and Catherine Waldby have argued for the necessity of figurations or “political fictions” indicating new ways of doing gender and sexuality. I will analyze my source material inspired by their work, returning in the concluding chapter to the question of whether the Babalon discourse opens up new ways of conceiving and inhabiting femininity and sexuality. While the thousands of people who relate (or have related) to Babalon as a goddess are few in comparison to the world’s larger religions, this question has broader implications for the understanding of gender subversion in religion and how religious symbols can generate new ways of envisioning gender. Secondly, this book contributes to the study of Western esotericism and occultism by analyzing and contextualizing the legacy of one of its most influential and controversial proponents in the twentieth century. Aleister Crowley’s magical system and his religion Thelema present a colorful example of how esotericism was transformed as a result of modernity. Although he has frequently been accused of sexism by critics and adherents alike, Crowley contributed a theological concept to the history of Western esotericism that—​especially in late modernity—​has been articulated as part of feminist strivings to challenge the hegemonic gender system. Moreover, I will argue that the Babalon discourse destabilizes the ideal of bounded, rational, and implicitly masculine subjectivity by linking sex and death, ecstasy and annihilation, in ways that suggest a feminized, erotically undone self as soteriological ideal. By tracing the development of a theological concept through published and unpublished written sources, interviews, and ethnographic fieldwork, this study complicates notions of gender and resistance in Crowley’s system and its later interpretations, thus contributing to the understanding of Western esotericism as a lived and evolving religious phenomenon. Thirdly, this book contributes to the study of gender in Western esotericism. From the 1980s onward, an increasing number of feminist researchers have brought attention to women’s roles and issues of gender in religion. Studies have highlighted female agency, challenging the notion of women as peripheral to religious life.13 With some notable exceptions, however, gender has remained undertheorized in the study of Western esotericism.14 This study seeks to indicate how constructions of gender shape esoteric movements, both on social and institutional levels in terms of how roles and status are ascribed and on the level of symbolism and cosmology. By tracing understandings of femininity over time, this book illustrates how esoteric worldviews reinscribe and challenge dominant understandings of gender, and how shifting notions of gender can fuel the transformation of esoteric beliefs and practices.

6  The Eloquent Blood

Western Esotericism, Occultism, and Magic Crowley, Thelema, and the Babalon discourse belong to the family of religious and philosophical currents referred to in academic scholarship as “Western esotericism.” This complex umbrella term has evaded universally accepted definitions, and a number of phenomena are generally included in scholarly overviews of the category:  Renaissance Hermeticism, alchemy, and magic; German Naturphilosophie; the Tarot; some branches of Freemasonry; Rosicrucianism; Theosophy; ceremonial magic; Spiritualism; and nineteenth-​ century occultism.15 Many scholars include a number of related currents such as late antique Neoplatonism and Hermetism, contemporary Satanism and Neopaganism, and New Age movements.16 Although differing widely in size, trajectory, and worldview, many of these phenomena emphasize an experiential and transformative knowledge, or gnosis, related to an understanding of the hidden secrets of the universe and the relation between humankind and divinity.17 Scholars within the field have demarcated Western esotericism differently. For the purposes of this study, I will rely on Wouter J. Hanegraaff ’s conceptualization of Western esotericism as the “wastebasket of modernity,” comprising a set of worldviews and epistemologies construed as other by dominant European intellectual culture in its conceptualization of true religion, sound science, and Enlightenment rationality. Hanegraaff identifies Western esotericism as “rejected knowledges,” initially constructed through polemical processes of othering out of the epistemologies and knowledge systems that Protestant anti-​apologists first rejected as heresy or sin, and Enlightenment thinkers later denounced as irrational or superstitious.18 This model, which is less concerned with identifying what characterizes esotericism as an object than with studying its reception throughout history, provokes the question of what—​if anything—​the various expressions of “esotericism” have in common.19 However, Hanegraaff stresses that the contents of the “wastebasket of modernity” were not rejected at random, but share important characteristics—​ specifically, what Hanegraaff denotes as cosmotheism or panentheism and the notion of salvational gnosis.20 These notions play a strong role in Crowley’s worldview and teachings as well as in the Babalon discourse. During the Renaissance and early modernity, many proponents of these “heretical” or superstitious beliefs would not have recognized each other as part of a cohesive movement. Through this aforementioned process of cultural disjunction, however, adherents of these “rejected” epistemologies increasingly came to understand themselves as part of a countercultural tradition. Thus, esotericism coalesced into a self-​conscious and distinct religious subculture in the nineteenth century. This movement, which can be identified as a distinct branch of

Encountering the Scarlet Goddess  7 esotericism, is generally referred to as occultism, and its emergence is strongly associated with the French ceremonial magician Alphonse Louis Constant (1810–​ 1875), alias Eliphas Lévi.21 In congruence with Hanegraaff, I view occultism as comprising “all attempts by esotericists to come to terms with a disenchanted world or, alternatively, by people in general to make sense of esotericism from the perspective of a disenchanted, secular world.”22 This definition indicates specific articulations of Western esotericism in modernity, neatly encompassing Thelema and related phenomena. In this study, I view the historical and contemporary religious practitioners whose words and works are analyzed from ­chapter  3 onward—​beginning chronologically with Crowley and proceeding through those who have later interpreted his ideas—​as esotericists in general and occultists in particular. For stylistic variety, I will occasionally use the terms interchangeably when referring to modern esotericism. In recent years, the qualifier “Western” in the term “Western esotericism” has come under scrutiny.23 Recognizing the problems inherent in this concept, I feel it is possible to retain the qualifier “Western” while acknowledging the “West” as a shifting and amorphous entity whose definite boundaries cannot be decisively defined and that is entangled with other parts of the world.24 This is evident in the source material for this study, which—​while Anglophone and socially produced in the geocultural “West”—​incorporates concepts and symbols deriving from outside of it. Nonetheless, further research on esotericism outside of Europe and North America, which accounts for the colonial and racist dynamics that have been fundamental to the emergence of categories such as irrationalism and superstition, is warranted.25 Crowley designated his initiatory system “Magick,” defining the concept as “the Science and Art of causing Change to occur in conformity with Will.”26 Nearly all of the occultists discussed in this study use some variation of the term “magic” self-​referentially, in reference to both an overarching worldview and concrete practices including formalized ritual, divination, invocations, astral projection, and meditation. The conceptual history of magic, a notoriously elusive category, overlaps with that of Western esotericism. Nineteenth-​ and early-​twentieth-​century anthropologists, such as E. B. Tylor (1832–​1917) and James G. Frazer (1854–​1941), distinguished qualitatively between magic, religion, and science, though this tripartite model has since been abandoned as dubious and ideological. As a constructed category, magic intersects with colonialism and denigration of the social practices of women, poor people, and people of color.27 However, self-​referential use of the term “magic” in the West dates back to late antiquity. Religious studies scholar Bernd-​Christian Otto thus suggests the term “Western learned magic” as a label for a historically and culturally situated and specialized tradition in the West, which he sees as one of the foundational discourses of Western esotericism.28

8  The Eloquent Blood In modernity, the socially constructed division between religion, science, and magic has had productive effects.29 Many of the occultists I have spoken to draw implicitly on an inverted Frazerian distinction of magic as separate from religion. However, most of those I have spoken to are not particularly concerned with decisively demarcating the concepts. The present study will thus define the term in congruence with emic usage in my source material, utilizing the term “magic” to denote both a set of (primarily noninstrumental) practices aimed at producing numinous experience or effecting change, whether material or spiritual, in accordance with the magician’s will, as well as an underlying epistemology that questions hegemonic demarcations between nature and culture, agents and objects, descriptive and performative language, and subjects, which emphasizes the potential of the individual subject for spiritual self-​transformation.30 I do not seek to define magic as substantially or functionally different from religion or Western esotericism but rather to stay as close to emic usage as possible. Whereas I will use the conventional spelling when discussing magic (as defined in the preceding discussion) more generally, I will use Crowley’s preferred spelling “Magick” in reference to the system he designed to hone and refine the individual self toward union with divinity.

Notes on Methodology My study comprises several varieties of source material. Firstly, I have analyzed historical writings, both published and unpublished, and contemporary occult writings that include descriptions and scripts for ritual. I have evaluated what constitutes relevant written source material for this study based on the thematic content, richness, and relative importance of a specific text for the subsequent development of the Babalon discourse, which also involved analyzing which texts were most frequently referenced in other texts that I studied. For instance, some texts by Crowley are implicitly or explicitly referenced in nearly all later texts dealing with Babalon, and these have been scrutinized more closely. I have analyzed texts produced up until June 30, 2016. A qualitative content analysis has been applied to written source material and transcribed interviews.31 Accordingly, my method has consisted in reading and rereading (as new thematic elements and questions emerged) the relevant texts and noting similarities, discordances, central themes, and points of tension. Secondly, I  have conducted semistructured interviews with 18 occult practitioners.32 These interviews, all of which have been recorded and transcribed verbatim, lasted between approximately 40 minutes and 2 hours and 30 minutes. My interviewees are cited in this study as Alan, Alkistis Dimech, Amodali, Amy, Ash, Charlotte, Erica M Cornelius, Freyja, Helen, Henry, IAO131, Mary, Mike,

Encountering the Scarlet Goddess  9 Peter Grey, Sam, Sandra, Sophie, and Steve. Ten of my interviewees identify as female, seven as male, and one as genderqueer. At the time of the interviews, their ages spanned between 26 and 59 years. Ten were affiliated with Ordo Templi Orientis (OTO), and three were former members.33 Several of my respondents either were or had been previously affiliated with other Thelemic or esoteric groups. The most common affiliation besides OTO was with groups claiming descent from Crowley’s order A∴A∴.34 Others practiced magic with informal groups of friends or partners or (less commonly) alone. Most of my interviewees had what appears to be a deeper-​than-​average involvement in occultism and/​or Thelema.35 At the time of the interviews, at least five of my interviewees were ordained clergy of Ecclesia Gnostica Catholica (EGC), the ecclesiastical arm of OTO. One was a bishop. A  number of my interviewees have since been ordained.36 Among the OTO initiates, several hold or have held governing positions at their local bodies. As of 2018, more than half of my interviewees had been active esotericists for over a decade, with a small number practicing for 20 years or more. Several are authors or publishers of written esoteric material. Nearly all have—​or have previously had—​romantic partners who are occultists, and almost all attest to performing some manner of magic daily. A majority have some university education, with almost half holding postgraduate degrees. My interviewees are, variously, students or professionals working in mental and physical healthcare, education, the arts, publishing, IT/​ programming, and sex work. Approximately a third of my interviewees are or have previously been involved in consensually nonmonogamous relationships, and at least as many do not identify as exclusively heterosexual. I have anonymized nearly all of the interviewees and all of the people whom I  have spoken to under more informal circumstances (see subsequent paragraph). The exceptions are, firstly, Amodali and IAO131, both of whom publish occult writings under these “magical” names (which are not their legal names) and who requested being quoted as such. After obtaining explicit consent, I have also made exceptions for three interviewees, all of whom are open about their status as occultists and have published numerous occult writings under their proper names. These are Erica M Cornelius, Peter Grey, and Alkistis Dimech. My interviews with these persons expounded on themes discussed in their written work, and I have therefore analyzed the respective interviews and the interviewees’ written works in conjunction with each other. Thirdly, I have conducted five months of ethnographic fieldwork in the U.S. Thelemic milieu, involving participant observation and informal conversations with countless Thelemites. My fieldwork was principally based in Northern California, where I  interacted with members from six Thelemic groups, including three OTO local bodies and three independent groups. The longevity, geographic proximity, and prevalence of Thelemic groups in the area rendered

10  The Eloquent Blood it fruitful for fieldwork.37 During my visit, I attended rituals, classes, workshops, talks, and social events up to several times per week, and I lived periodically in Thelemites’ homes. In ethnographic research, the scholar’s own social positionality is widely acknowledged as a factor in the gathering of source material. I am a Swedish-​ Australian (cisgendered) female, feminist, and university-​educated historian of religion from a middle-​class background. My social positionality is thus close to that of the people I have interviewed and otherwise conversed with and also to what previous research has suggested is typical of contemporary occultism.38 I conducted my fieldwork as an outsider and did not seek initiation in any of the groups I encountered. For ethical and practical reasons, I have consistently been open about my intention to do research.

Technicalities and Demarcations In this study, the terms “transgender” and “trans” will be used interchangeably to denote persons who do not identify with their birth-​assigned sex, including those who desire, or have undergone, gender-​affirming hormonal and/​or surgical treatment aimed at altering their appearance or constitution to match their gender identity, as well as persons who have not undergone these treatments nor wish to do so. The term “cisgender” will be applied to persons whose gender identity matches their birth-​assigned sex. I will use the term “genderqueer” to denote persons who do not identify as either male or female.39 I will apply the term “queer” more broadly to configurations of gender and sexuality that displace and “trouble” (dominant concepts of) heterosexuality and binary gender (while acknowledging that social configurations may both reproduce and subvert dominant gender logics). However, I deliberately refrain from demarcating the term “queer” more precisely, as this defeats its purpose of challenging hegemonic categories.40 The central sacred text of Thelema, received by Crowley in 1904, refers to itself as “the Book of the Law” or the “threefold Book of Law.”41 It was first published in 1909 under the title Liber L vel Legis sub figura CCXX as Delivered by LXXVII unto DCLXVI.42 The facsimile manuscript was first published in Crowley’s periodical The Equinox I, no. 7, in 1912.43 In 1919, Crowley changed the Latin title of the work to Liber AL vel Legis, following a discovery by his disciple and “magical son” Charles Stansfeld Jones (1886–​1950), alias Frater Achad.44 For clarity, I will be referring to this work as Liber AL, or simply AL, throughout this study, including when referencing the text before 1919. Liber AL has been published in numerous editions that vary in pagination but remain consistent in verse

Encountering the Scarlet Goddess  11 numeration, and I will therefore quote the work by chapter and verse (e.g., AL III:43).45 For my own reference, I have used the 2004 centennial edition of Liber AL, published by Weiser/​Red Wheel.46 The visionary record of Crowley’s Enochian explorations is preserved in The Vision and the Voice (abbreviated herein as Vision). The original manuscript is preserved in the Harry Ransom Center of the University of Texas at Austin.47 The text was first published as a supplement to The Equinox I, no. 5 in 1911.48 It was first reprinted with Crowley’s commentary in 1952 and, subsequently, in 1972.49 All quotations in this study are drawn from the 1998 Samuel Weiser edition, edited by Hymenaeus Beta, which remains the most accurate version.50 Key passages have been compared to the original manuscript to ensure accuracy. As mentioned above, Crowley did not use the name “Babalon” in reference to a goddess before 1909. In the record of the Enochian 12th Aethyr, where she is first mentioned by name, it is conventionally spelled as “Babylon,” with Crowley altering the spelling to “Babalon” after scrying the 10th Aethyr.51 As Crowley clearly identified the Babylon of the 12th Aethyr with Babalon, and thus to avoid confusion, I will use the latter spelling throughout my discussion of Vision in ­chapter 3. In numerous texts, Crowley uses masculine pronouns in a generic fashion with reference to humanity, a hypothetical person, or a spiritual seeker.52 This is consistent with a long tradition in the English language of treating masculine pronouns as unmarked and feminine ditto as marked. Feminists have indicated that this linguistic convention privileges masculinity by positioning the latter as normative and the feminine as marked by difference. The Babalon discourse exists within a religious context in which sex or gender identity is occasionally ascribed great importance. Thus, it is relevant to distinguish between the generic use of masculine pronouns and when an author or practitioner specifically references a male seeker. Throughout this study, I will use the singular they/​them/​theirs when the gender of the referenced individual is unclear or irrelevant.53 This book analyzes occultism and the Babalon discourse principally in the United States and United Kingdom. All analyzed source texts are in English. My findings may have differed with an alternate geocultural focus, and I hope that variances among esoteric movements across the globe will be further explored in future research. Although I  refer sparingly to online material, I  have not conducted a systematic survey thereof. Finally, the Babalon discourse emerged from and overlaps with the Thelemic milieu, in which numerous conceptualizations of divinity, including the divine feminine, circulate. Focusing on another Thelemic goddess would likely highlight different issues and tensions that may be further explored in future research.

12  The Eloquent Blood

Outline of the Book Chapter 2 delineates the theoretical framework of this study. Chapters 3 through 6 proceed to trace historical interpretations of Babalon more or less chronologically, with some overlap due to the lifespans of the people discussed. Given that Crowley is easily the most prolific occult writer discussed in this study, along with the centrality of his writings to the later Babalon discourse, two chapters (3 and 4) are devoted to Babalon in Crowley’s system. These chapters highlight the period 1898–​1947, with a particular emphasis on the period 1909–​1924. Chapter 3 concludes in 1909, a year that marks the penning of Vision and Crowley’s first explicit references to the goddess.54 Chapters 5 and 6 analyze the two most important historical occultists in the Babalon discourse after Crowley: Jack Parsons and Kenneth Grant. The first of these chapters focuses mainly on the period 1946–​1952, and the second primarily highlights a series of literary works produced during the period 1972–​2002. Chapter  7 provides background information on contemporary Thelema and the Babalon discourse. Chapters 8–​11 analyze my present-​day source material, scrutinizing texts, ethnographic findings, and interviews. Although demarcating the contemporary period is problematic, I follow historian of religion Egil Asprem in marking its beginning in the 1990s, when the end of the cold war and the emergence of the digital age revolutionized communication, including that of occult ideas.55 The chronology is somewhat ruptured: most material analyzed in these chapters was produced after 2002, but a small number of writings discussed were written in the second half of the 1990s, before the end point of ­chapter 6. Chapters 8–​11 are not structured chronologically, but thematically, according to areas of tension and significance that I uncovered in the contemporary Babalon discourse. These are the idea of (feminine) receptivity (­chapter 8); the gender-​critical renegotiation of femininities (­chapter  9); feminine sexuality (­chapter 10); and the body and technologies of gender, based on four ritual descriptions (­chapter 11). Chapter 12 concludes this study by analyzing the trajectory of the Babalon discourse in relation to shifting notions of femininity and sexuality from the fin-​de-​siècle until today.

Notes 1. Rev. 17:3–​6 (KJV); emphasis in original. All Bible quotations are from the 1769 King James Bible or King James Version (KJV); this is the Bible translation studied by Crowley. 2. Richard Bauckham, “Revelation,” in The Oxford Bible Commentary, ed. John Barton and John Muddiman (Oxford:  Oxford University Press, 2007), 1287–​1305; Paul

Encountering the Scarlet Goddess  13 Brooks Duff, Who Rides the Beast? Prophetic Rivalry and the Rhetoric of Crisis in the Churches of the Apocalypse (Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 2001). Protestant antipapalists have associated the Whore with the Church of Rome. Ellis Hanson, “Oscar Wilde and the Scarlet Woman,” Journal of Homosexuality 33, no. 3–​4 (1997): 121–​137. 3. Aleister Crowley, The Vision and the Voice: With Commentary and Other Papers: The Equinox, Volume IV Number II, ed. Hymenaeus Beta (York Beach, ME:  Samuel Weiser, 1998), 149. 4. Percy Bysshe Shelley, “Alastor, or the Spirit of Solitude,” in Percy Bysshe Shelley, The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley, ed. Thomas Hutchinson (London; New York; Toronto; Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 2014), 18. The phrase originally figured in John Donne’s (1572–​1631) “Elegy on Mistress Elizabeth Drury.” 5. Aleister Crowley, The Confessions of Aleister Crowley:  An Autohagiography (London: Arkana, 1989), 228, 334, 415, 653. 6. I  will use a minimal definition of discourse as “a particular way of talking about and understanding the world (or an aspect of the world).” Marianne W. Jørgensen and Louise Phillips, Discourse Analysis as Theory and Method (London:  SAGE Publications, 2002), 1. 7. The year 2016 was the end point for my data collection. 8. E.g., Hugh B. Urban, Magia Sexualis: Sex, Magic and Liberation in Modern Western Esotericism (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2006); Alex Owen, The Place of Enchantment: British Occultism and the Culture of the Modern (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004). 9. Urban, Magia, 257. 10. Susan Brownmiller, Femininity (New  York:  Ballantine Books, 1985); Catharine A. MacKinnon, “Feminism, Marxism, Method, and the State:  An Agenda for Theory,” Signs 7, no. 3 (1982): 515–​544; Sandra Bartky, “Foucault, Femininity and the Modernization of Patriarchal Power,” in Feminism and Foucault: Reflections on Resistance, ed. Irene Diamond and Lee Quinby (Boston:  Northeastern University Press, 1988), 61–​86; Iris Marion Young, “Throwing Like a Girl: A Phenomenology of Feminine Body Comportment Motility and Spatiality,” Human Studies 3, no. 2 (1980): 137–​156. 11. Mimi Schippers, Rockin’ Out of the Box: Gender Maneuvering in Alternative Hard Rock (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2002); Mimi Schippers and Erin Grayson Sapp, “Reading Pulp Fiction: Femininity and Power in Second and Third Wave Feminist Theory,” Feminist Theory 13, no. 1 (2012): 27–​42; Mimi Schippers, “Recovering the Feminine Other: Masculinity, Femininity, and Gender Hegemony,” Theory and Society 36, no. 1 (2007): 85–​102. 12. Ulrika Dahl, “Turning Like a Femme: Figuring Critical Femininity Studies,” NORA—​ Nordic Journal of Feminist and Gender Research 20, no. 1 (2012): 57–​64. 13. Cf. Ursula King, “Gender and Religion:  An Overview,” in Encyclopedia of Religion, ed. Lindsay Jones (Detroit:  Macmillan Reference, 2005), 3296–​ 3310; Lena Gemzöe and Marja-​ Liisa Keinänen, “Contemporary Encounters in Gender and Religion:  Introduction,” in Contemporary Encounters in Gender and

14  The Eloquent Blood Religion: European Perspectives, ed. Lena Gemzöe, Marja-​Liisa Keinänen, and Avril Maddrell (Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016), 1–​28. 14. Cf. Jay Johnston, “A Deliciously Troubling Duo:  Gender and Esotericism,” in Contemporary Esotericism, ed. Egil Asprem and Kennet Granholm (Abingdon; Oxon.: Routledge, 2014), 410–​425; Jay Johnston, “Gender and the Occult,” in The Occult World, ed. Christopher Partridge (Abingdon, Oxon.; New York: Routledge, 2015), 681–​ 691. See Owen, Place; Urban, Magia; Joy Dixon, Divine Feminine: Theosophy and Feminism in England (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2001); Siv-​Ellen Kraft, The Sex Problem: Political Aspects of Gender Discourse in the Theosophical Society 1875–​1930 (PhD diss., University of Bergen, 1999); Gibbons, Gender in Mystical and Occult Thought; and Timbers, Magic and Masculinity. 15. E.g., Antoine Faivre, Access to Western Esotericism (Albany:  State University of New  York Press, 1994); Arthur Versluis, Magic and Mysticism:  An Introduction to Western Esotericism (Lanham:  Rowman & Littlefield, 2007); Kocku von Stuckrad, Western Esotericism:  A Brief History of Secret Knowledge (London; Oakville, CT: Equinox, 2005); Nicholas Goodrick-​Clarke, The Western Esoteric Traditions: A Historical Introduction (Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 2008); Henrik Bogdan, Western Esotericism and Rituals of Initiation (Albany:  State University of New York Press, 2007), 5. 16. E.g., Wouter J. Hanegraaff, New Age Religion and Western Culture: Esotericism in the Mirror of Secular Thought (Leiden; New York: E. J. Brill, 1996). 17. Wouter J. Hanegraaff, “Introduction,” in Dictionary of Gnosis & Western Esotericism, ed. Wouter J. Hanegraaff (Leiden: Brill, 2005), ii–​xiv. 18. Wouter J. Hanegraaff, Esotericism and the Academy: Rejected Knowledge in Western Culture (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012). 19. Cf. Olav Hammer, “Deconstructing ‘Western Esotericism’: On Wouter Hanegraaff ’s Esotericism and the Academy,” Religion 43, no. 2 (2013): 241–​251; Marco Pasi, “The Problems of Rejected Knowledge: Thoughts on Wouter Hanegraaff ’s Esotericism and the Academy,” Religion 43, no. 2 (2013): 202. 20. Hanegraaff, Esotericism. 21. Wouter J. Hanegraaff, “Occultism,” in Dictionary of Gnosis and Western Esotericism, ed. Wouter J. Hanegraaff (Leiden: Brill, 2005), 887–​888. 22. Hanegraaff, New, 422. 23. E.g., Kennet Granholm, “Locating the West: Problematizing the Western in Western Esotericism and Occultism,” in Occultism in a Global Perspective, ed. Henrik Bogdan and Gordan Djurdjevic (Durham; Bristol, CT: Acumen, 2013), 17–​36; Egil Asprem, “Beyond the West:  Towards a New Comparativism in the Study of Esotericism,” Correspondences 2, no. 1 (2014): 3–​33; Wouter J. Hanegraaff, “The Globalization of Esotericism,” Correspondences 3 (2015): 55–​91. 24. Cf. the use of “Western” in Bernd-​Christian Otto, “Historicising ‘Western Learned Magic’: Preliminary Remarks,” Aries: Journal for the Study of Western Esotericism 16 (2016): 161–​240. 25. Cf. Stephen C. Finley, Margarita Simon Guillory, and Hugh R. Page, “Introduction: Africana Esoteric Studies. Mapping a New Endeavor,” in Esotericism

Encountering the Scarlet Goddess  15 in African American Religious Experience: “There Is a Mystery,” ed. Stephen C. Finley, Margarita Simon Guillory, and Hugh R. Page (Leiden: Brill, 2015), 1–​22. 26. Aleister Crowley, Magick: Liber ABA, ed. Hymenaeus Beta (York Beach, ME: Samuel Weiser, 1994), 128. 27. For an overview of the history of magic, see, e.g., Michael Stausberg and Bernd-​ Christian Otto, eds., Defining Magic:  A Reader (Sheffield; Bristol: Equinox, 2013); Randall Styers, Making Magic:  Religion, Magic, and Science in the Modern World (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004); Henrik Bogdan, “Introduction: Modern Western Magic,” Aries: Journal for the Study of Western Esotericism 12 (2012), 1–​16. 28. Otto, “Historicising.” 29. Cf. Bogdan, “Modern Western Magic,” 11–​12. 30. Cf. Styers, Making. 31. Cf. Alan Bryman, Social Research Methods (Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 2016), 694. 32. My interview methodology is based on Steinar Kvale, Den kvalitativa forskningsintervjun (Lund: Studentlitteratur, 1997). 33. The history and significance of OTO is explained in ­chapters 4 and 7. 34. See c­ hapter 3 for an overview of A∴A∴’s structure. 35. See ­chapter 7. 36. The historical roots of EGC are traced in ­chapter 4 in the section “Cup, Grail, and Eucharist.” 37. See J. Edward Cornelius, ed., “In the Name of the Beast: A Biography of Grady Louis McMurtry, a Disciple of Aleister Edward Crowley: Volume One, 1918–​1962,” Red Flame 12 (2005). 38. See ­chapter 7. 39. For contextualization of these terms, see Julia Serano, Whipping Girl: A Transsexual Woman on Sexism and the Scapegoating of Femininity (Emeryville, CA:  Seal Press, 2007). 40. Cf. Michael Warner, ed., Fear of a Queer Planet:  Queer Politics and Social Theory (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1993). 41. AL I:35; II:38; III:39. 42. Aleister Crowley, ΘΕΛΗΜΑ [Thelema], vol. 3 (London: privately printed, 1909). 43. The facsimile was included in Aleister Crowley, “The Temple of Solomon the King (Continued),” The Equinox I, no. 7 (1912): 355–​400a. 44. For Crowley’s account of the reception of the text, see Aleister Crowley, The Equinox of the Gods (London: OTO, 1936). The word “AL” is discussed in Crowley, Magick: Liber ABA, 422–​425. See also Frater Achad, Liber 31 and Other Related Essays (San Francisco: Level Press, 1974). 45. Cf. Richard Kaczynski, Perdurabo:  The Life of Aleister Crowley, 2nd ed. (Berkeley, CA: North Atlantic Books, 2010); Henrik Bogdan and Martin P. Starr, eds., Aleister Crowley and Western Esotericism (New York: Oxford University Press). 46. Aleister Crowley, The Book of the Law:  Liber Al vel Legis:  With a Facsimile of the Manuscript as Received by Aleister and Rose Edith Crowley on April 8, 9, 10, 1904 E.v. Centennial Edition (York Beach, ME: Red Wheel/​Weiser, 2004).

16  The Eloquent Blood 47. Aleister Crowley and Victor B. Neuburg, “The Vision and the Voice, Being the Cries of the Thirty Aethyrs,” 1909, Aleister Crowley Collection, series 1, box 5, folders 1–​3, Harry Ransom Center, University of Texas at Austin. 48. Aleister Crowley, “The Vision and the Voice. Liber XXX Aerum vel Saeculi sub figura CCCCXVIII, Being of the Angels of the 30 Aethyrs,” The Equinox I, no. 5 (1911). 49. Aleister Crowley, The Vision and The Voice: Liber XXX Aerum sub figura CCCCXVIII Being of the Angels of the 30 Aethyrs (Barstow, CA: Thelema Publishing Company, 1952); Aleister Crowley, The Vision and the Voice, ed. Israel Regardie (Dallas: Sangreal Foundation, 1972). 50. Aleister Crowley, The Vision and the Voice: With Commentary and Other Papers: The Equinox, Volume IV Number II, ed. Hymenaeus Beta (York Beach, ME:  Samuel Weiser, 1998). 51. See “The Cry of the 10th Aethyr, That Is Called ZAX” in Aleister Crowley and Victor B. Neuburg, “The Vision and the Voice, Being the Cries of the Thirty Aethyrs,” 1909, Aleister Crowley Collection, series 1, box 5, folders 1–​3, Harry Ransom Center, University of Texas at Austin. See also Crowley, Vision, 170. 52. See, e.g., Aleister Crowley, “Liber B vel Magi sub figura I,” The Equinox I, no. 7 (1912): 5–​9; Aleister Crowley, “Liber Cheth vel Vallum Abiegni sub figura CLVI,” The Equinox I, no. 6 (1911): 23–​27; Aleister Crowley, “Liber Nu sub figura XI,” The Equinox I, no. 7 (1912): 11–​20; Aleister Crowley, “Liber V vel Reguli,” in Aleister Crowley, Magick: Liber ABA, ed. Hymenaeus Beta (York Beach, ME: Samuel Weiser, 1994), 561–​571; Aleister Crowley, “Liber LXXVII, OZ,” in Aleister Crowley, Magick: Liber ABA, ed. Hymenaeus Beta (York Beach, ME: Samuel Weiser, 1994), 677. 53. Cf. Anna Livia, Pronoun Envy:  Literary Uses of Linguistic Gender (Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 2001). 54. It also coincides with a formative period in Crowley’s magical career, during which he transitioned from a stronger focus on his personal initiation to his self-​proclaimed role as prophet and founder of Thelema. Cf. Marco Pasi, Aleister Crowley and the Temptation of Politics (Durham, UK: Acumen, 2014), 26. 55. Egil Asprem, “Contemporary Ritual Magic,” in The Occult World, ed. Christopher Partridge (Abingdon, Oxon.; New York: Routledge, 2015), 382–​395.

2

Divine Women, Femmes, and Whores The Theorization of Multiple Femininities

The purpose of this chapter is to outline the theoretical framework of the study, rooted in critical research on femininities. Simone de Beauvoir’s declaration that “[o]‌ne is not born, but rather becomes, a woman” reflects a predominant paradigm within gender studies and adjacent fields, namely that concepts of masculinity and femininity are socially constructed rather than timeless manifestations of natural essences.1 As noted by Ulrika Dahl, femininity “has a bit of a bad reputation in feminist theory; far too often tied to phenomena feminism seeks to eliminate; subordination, sexualization, objectification, commodification, vulnerability, and so on.”2 In 1982, influential American radical feminist and legal scholar Catharine MacKinnon defined femininity thus: Socially, femaleness means femininity, which means attractiveness to men, which means sexual attractiveness, which means sexual availability on male terms. What defines woman as such is what turns men on.3

In MacKinnon’s interpretation, femininity is equated with attractiveness to the male gaze; socialization into femininity denotes the process through which women come to see themselves as objects for male sexual enjoyment. MacKinnon contends that (hetero)sexuality conditions men and women to be aroused by feminine passivity. Thus, she construes consensual, mutual heterosexuality as a logical impossibility in a patriarchal society. Building on different epistemological frameworks but arriving at similarly pessimistic conclusions, feminist theorists such as Sandra Bartky and Iris Marion Young also have indicated feminine embodiment and adornment as primarily restrictive and artificial.4 Some feminist movements in the 1970s and 1980s were, conversely, invested in the revaluation of “feminine” activities, values, and behaviors, producing schools of thought such as care ethics, ecofeminism, thealogy, and goddess feminism.5 These approaches have frequently been associated with the term “cultural feminism.” This label, somewhat tenuously, is often applied to feminist movements claiming that male supremacy espouses the “devaluation of feminine characteristics” and which endeavor to revaluate “feminine” traits, grounded in the concept of an “essential female.”6 Cultural feminism has been described as equating The Eloquent Blood: The Goddess Babalon and the Construction of Femininities in Western Esotericism. Manon Hedenborg White, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780190065027.001.0001

18  The Eloquent Blood “women’s liberation with the development and preservation of a female counter culture.”7 Cultural feminists have been accused of perpetuating a romanticized and biologist notion of womanhood that obscures power differentials between women. However, not all thinkers associated with cultural feminism provide essentialist conceptualizations of womanhood.8 The notion that femininity is always oriented toward the male gaze, or equates to sexual attractiveness and availability to men, implies that desire is always heterosexual and negotiated in a timeless and transcultural relationship between one masculinity and one femininity, marginalizing queer female desire.9 This approach renders relationships between femininities, as well as racialized and classed power differentials, as underexplored territory.10 Conceptualizing femininity simply as the materialization of a socially subordinate position obscures the fact that femininity can be inhabited and inscribed in multiple ways. What is construed as appropriately feminine is mediated not only through male-​female relations but also through a complex intersection of norms that privilege white, heterosexual, binary gender-​conforming, able-​bodied, and upper-​or middle-​ class respectable femininity in relation to other varieties. These intersecting power structures do not simply repress a hypothetical, prediscursive feminine or female culture but also have productive effects. Furthermore, lesbian femmes, trans women, drag queens, and “bad girls” are often perceived as embodying femininity wrongly or excessively without being seen as masculine. Finally, the notion that female emancipation must entail a departure from femininity is problematic in its assumption of the possibility of a gender-​neutral subject position or that masculinity is closer to this neutral standard.11 However, the breadth and variety of feminized roles in human history put paid to the hope of a natural, universal female culture that can be recovered. The present study instead seeks to theorize femininities beyond simplistic understandings of the latter as either completely subordinate or exclusively “agential and emancipatory.”12 I am indebted to feminist theorists who have sought to understand femininities as positionalities that are essentially linked neither to women nor to heterosexuality and that are both implicated in the existing gender system and contain the possibility for disrupting it. Further, I am inspired by scholars of religion who have shown how religious systems have sometimes offered women the possibility to challenge dominant logics of gender.13

Feminism and Sex: Passion, Prostitution, and Pleasure Like femininity, feminine sexuality has constituted a fundamental dividing line within the feminist movement. A point of contestation has concerned how to define the core issue of sexual oppression: does (hetero)sexuality perpetuate female

Divine Women, Femmes, and Whores  19 subordination by making women the victims of male desire or vice, or does patriarchal society restrict women’s sexual freedom? Is oversexualization and objectification of women the defining factor of sexuality in patriarchy, or have women been denied the right to be sexual? Whereas first-​wave feminism—​with some notable exceptions—​fell largely in the former camp, this question divided feminists during the so-​called sex wars of the 1970s and 1980s. Radical feminists such as Catharine MacKinnon, Robin Morgan, Andrea Dworkin, and others also favored the former position, indicating pornography, sadomasochism, and the sex industry as heightened forms of patriarchal exploitation.14 Contrastingly, sex radical or “sex positive” feminists, such as Carole S. Vance, Cherríe Moraga, Amber Hollibaugh, and Ellen Willis, argued against what they saw as the essentialism, moralism, and prescriptivism of radical feminist perspectives on sexuality, stressing that a feminist theory of sexuality must engage with the dangers posed to women by male abuse while taking seriously female sexual desire and pleasure. Anthropologist and sex radical theorist Gayle Rubin argued that feminism is insufficient for analyzing dynamics of sexual oppression, as sexuality is governed by other stratifying logics besides male-​female oppression.15 The present study is indebted to sex radical feminism in the assumption that a theory of sexuality must account for both pleasure and power. While I concur with historian of religions Hugh B. Urban that sexual liberation “does not by itself magically bring social or political freedom,” I am inspired by feminist writers who have indicated sexuality as a potential source of (feminine) creativity.16 Following sex radical feminist warnings against sexual prescriptivism within feminism, I am wary of assumptions that consensual sexual practices are inherently oppressive or liberating. Instead, I will assume that phenomena such as heterosexual, same-​sex, and queer desire, sadomasochism, sex work, penetration, and pornography are not monolithical but are intertwined with power as well as the possibility for agency. Sexuality is structured by numerous factors besides male-​female oppression, and an exclusive focus thereon obscures queer desire as well as dynamics of race and class. It is vital to consider how hierarchical valuation of different sexual practices or proclivities as more or less healthy, beneficial, or egalitarian produces other forms of sexuality as deviant. Such stratification can deliberately or inadvertently support the regulation of a culturally appropriate femininity, producing other expressions of feminine gender or sexuality as undesirable.17

Difference, Divinity, and Multiple Femininities Aligning myself with Judith Butler and other queer theorists, I  am critical of assertions to the effect of a neutral, pre-​or extradiscursive gendered modality to

20  The Eloquent Blood which subjects can take recourse, whether or not this potential flight-​line is conceptualized as the recovery of a “lost origin or forgotten land” of natural womanhood or as an escape from femininity toward masculine or “neutral” modes of being.18 I am inspired by scholars who have suggested that a robust concept of feminine subjectivity lies in futurity, and especially the French feminist psychoanalyst and philosopher Luce Irigaray’s theorization of sexual difference. Irigaray’s work unites a critique of the idea of masculinity as neutral and femininity as other, with an antifoundationalist approach suggesting the necessity of looking for new rather than old ways of envisioning gender. One of Irigaray’s basic points is that phallocentric language only offers the possibility of a male subjectivity; women are denied subjectivity as women, as femininity is consistently defined in relation to masculinity. Irigaray contends that phallocentric culture lacks a concept of true sexual difference; whereas male subjectivity is represented and symbolized, woman is figured as the inferior other, lack, or mirror of the male. While Irigaray supports public movements for women’s rights, including the struggle for abortion rights, access to contraceptives, and protection from violence, she contends that current demands for equality are ultimately limited in that the standard for equality is set according to men. True equality between the sexes, Irigaray contends, is impossible without a concept of sexual difference, which defines femininity in relation to itself and independently of masculinity.19 In striving to develop a concept of sexual difference, Irigaray posits a number of strategies, such as the creation of a feminine language and a revalorization of woman-​to-​woman relationships, especially that of mother and daughter.20 In phallocentric culture, Irigaray writes, sexual desire and pleasure are construed as male properties. Women, in contrast, are to represent the passive, beautiful objects of male desire. Irigaray notes that the stereotypically feminine roles of mother, virgin, and prostitute are all characterized in patriarchal language as holding different positions in the exchange between men, all symbolizing the values phallocentric culture valorizes in female sexuality:  “reproduction and nursing; faithfulness; modesty, ignorance of and even lack of interest in sexual pleasure; a passive acceptance of men’s ‘activity’; seductiveness  .  .  .  without getting pleasure herself.”21 Irigaray stresses the importance of moving beyond the division of labor that holds that men produce and women reproduce, limiting women to a restrictive function in which they are neither fully women nor full citizens. She underlines the importance of women’s productivity in the areas of “love, desire, language, art, the social, the political, the religious.”22 Irigaray implies that the universalization of motherhood as the supreme feminine virtue obscures women’s roles in the creation of culture, history, and society, casting women as passive reproducers of male creativity. In order to move toward a conceptualization of feminine subjectivity, Irigaray stresses the necessity of

Divine Women, Femmes, and Whores  21 acknowledging the genealogy of women who have shaped history, as well as the importance of women discovering their sexuality.23 In the essay “Divine Women,” Irigaray draws on German philosopher Ludwig Feuerbach, who has argued that man has realized his subjectivity through identification with (a male) God. Irigaray argues that traditional Christian theology lacks a conception of female divinity and only offers women the possibility of identifying with the virgin mother who gives birth to the son of the male God. “In order to become,” Irigaray writes, “it is essential to have a gender or an essence . . . as horizon.”24 Irigaray therefore stresses the importance of developing feminine concepts of divinity. This horizon for feminine subjectivity should encompass the illusory dichotomy of “mother and lover as well as the union between the two.”25 Through identification with this female god, Irigaray suggests, women will be able to develop their subjectivity as women. Importantly, Irigaray asserts, feminine divinity should reflect “the infinite that resides within us and among us . . . not a transcendent entity that exists outside becoming.”26 Irigaray’s ideas on the reshaping of language and creation of a feminine symbolic overlap with the concerns of works in thealogy and feminist theology.27 However, her ideas about feminine divinity have also been critiqued.28 I  am skeptical of normative declarations, such as Irigaray’s, that feminism requires images of feminine divinity, and the history of religions provides ample examples of concepts of feminine deities coexisting comfortably with patriarchal power structures. Conceptualizations of feminine divinity may present a static and limiting view of feminine potential, sacralizing female roles that support hegemonic gender relations, and this study will pay attention to such possible implications of the Babalon discourse. However, notions of the divinity of self are central to Thelema and many forms of contemporary occultism. Many occultists articulate their understandings of deities, including Babalon, through complex embodied frameworks where the distinction between human and divine potential is, at the very least, permeable. For this reason, it is relevant to explore whether a symbol such as Babalon may serve a function analogous to that of Irigaray’s divine feminine, supporting the development of more robust forms of femininity. Irigaray’s concern with sexual difference has been read as essentialist, a charge that has especially been leveled at her later work.29 However, I concur with Tim R. Johnston, who argues that Irigaray is neither necessarily essentialist nor heterosexist, as her utopian vision of sexual difference is not “business as usual” heterosexuality but points at radically new modes of being. Her notion of a feminine divine is linked to her utopian vision of a future society that reflects sexual difference, indicating ways of being that are yet unimaginable, rather than a romanticization and sacralization of current concepts of gender. Irigaray does not espouse the reification of present notions of masculinity and femininity but articulates the hope for entirely novel ways of inhabiting gender that exist and

22  The Eloquent Blood are valuated independently of each other. More problematically, as Johnston highlights, Irigaray’s vision of irreducible sexual difference overlooks transgender, intergender, and genderqueer experience.30 Recognizing the validity of this critique, I will draw selectively on the aspects of her thinking that are useful to the subject at hand, namely, her problematization of phallocentric thinking and theorization of how notions of divine femininity may support new ways of thinking about femininity. I am inspired by attempts to revaluate Irigaray from queer perspectives, which have highlighted how her concept of sexual difference can be seen as something not originating from a “natural” body but rather, as argued by Danielle Poe, as a culture—​currently in futurity—​whose realization will offer opportunities for all, including transgender and genderqueer persons, to inhabit gender in radically new ways. Thus, Poe writes, Irigaray’s work can be widened to include transgender and genderqueer experience.31 Lynne Huffer persuasively reads Irigaray through a Foucauldian lens, emphasizing the antifoundationalism common to both thinkers as something that can resolve tensions between feminist and queer studies. In Huffer’s view, Irigaray’s concept of the heterosexual couple in a culture that affirms sexual difference represents a sort of “queer heterosexuality” that extends beyond concepts that are currently imaginable.32 Irigaray’s work provides analytical tools for thinking about how femininity is constructed in interpretations of Babalon beyond simplistic antinomies of essentialism and anti-​essentialism.33 Her critique of phallocentric culture, and the idea of masculinity as more neutral than femininity, is valuable in challenging utopian conceptions of women’s departure from femininity into androgynous or masculine gender performances, underlining that current concepts of masculinity are equally a product of the gender system that subordinates women.34 Simultaneously, Irigaray’s work cautions against nostalgic romanticization of traits, activities, and modes of being that are currently coded as feminine, indicating how contemporary perceptions of femininity are implicated in a phallocentric logic. Her emphasis on the importance of an independent concept of femininity as something in itself, which is not defined in relation to masculinity, can fruitfully be combined with feminist and queer perspectives on how femininity can be reworked in ways that destabilize the existing gender system. Rather than merely analyzing the ascription of specific traits or roles to Babalon as part of a circumscription of difference that services an existing hierarchical and complementary gender order, I will explore whether such utterances contribute to the development of alternative femininities (I will explain this term in a subsequent section)—​as positionalities not solely inhabited by persons read as female at birth—​beyond lack or absence. In my interpretation of Irigaray and her theorization of feminine divinity, I am indebted to feminist philosopher Rosi Braidotti’s concept of feminist figurations.

Divine Women, Femmes, and Whores  23 Braidotti argues that feminism is currently in greater need of hopeful images indicating different ways of doing gender and sexuality than of further theoretical systems, and she conceptualizes the feminist figuration as a “politically informed account of an alternative subjectivity.”35 Braidotti stresses that figurations are not only abstract thought figures but also embodied through flesh and emotion. She emphasizes that the point is not “glorification of an authentic, archaic feminine power or of a well-​hidden ‘true’ essence,” or to recover “a lost origin or a forgotten land,” but rather to move forward. She underlines the urgency of producing “a form of representation that would take the fact of being a woman as a positive, self-​affirming force.”36 With the caveat that this study focuses on femininity rather than womanhood, I find Braidotti’s concept of figuration—​which, as expressed by Nina Lykke, aims to enable the “opening up to a dynamic process that can create space for the unfolding of diversity and multiplicity”—​useful for my material and for reading Irigaray’s concept of the divine feminine.37 In exploring the question of whether the Babalon discourse generates alternative ways of envisioning and inhabiting femininity, the concept of figuration will be an important touchstone. In this endeavor, I am inspired by the work of other scholars who have developed the notion of feminist figurations, and especially that of Ulrika Dahl, who has suggested femme as a political fiction or metaphorical “trickster” that enables new and different ways of thinking about femininities.38

Fem(me)ininity and Vulnerable Subversion As noted in the previous chapter, I am inspired by Dahl’s call for “critical femininity studies,” proceeding beyond the idea of femininity as lack and theorizing the construction and interaction of multiple femininities.39 Theorization of queer femininities, and perhaps especially femme, has made important contributions to problematizing reductive understandings of femininity as singular, inherently oppressive, and determined by a heterosexual logic. Deriving from 1940s lesbian, working-​class bar culture, the term “femme” (also spelled “fem” or “fam”) has conventionally been used to denote a “feminine” lesbian woman whose desire is oriented toward the “butch” or “masculine” lesbian.40 During the feminist sex wars, some branches of feminism viewed butch/​femme relationships as a replication of heteronormative relationship patterns, and femmes were accused of being mired in heterosexuality.41 In response, many femmes allied themselves with sex radical feminists, arguing that (queer) femmes engaged deliberately with a radical and exaggerated femininity that was fundamentally different from—​and at odds with—​white, heterosexual, bourgeois femininity. Heterosexual women were conversely viewed as victims of the gender order.42

24  The Eloquent Blood This dichotomization of active, subversive, and queer femme-​ininity and passive, subordinate, and heterosexual femininity has been problematized.43 Today, Dahl observes, the term “femme” need not only designate persons who are female, lesbian, or who desire butches (although it often does) but also can encompass a broad range of queerly feminine modalities.44 Importantly, Dahl suggests viewing femme as part of a broader genre of femininity that is neither fully determined by the dominant gender system nor completely free from it. Dahl argues that the notion of femme-​ininity as inherently more subversive than “normative” femininity, based on the idea that the femme has deliberately chosen femininity, hinges on a liberal ideology of intentionality. She questions the strategy of rereading the (seeming) passivity of stereotypically feminine modalities in terms of activity, stressing that this may inadvertently end up reinforcing the reductive binaries it seeks to subvert.45 In my analysis of the Babalon discourse, I am inspired by Dahl’s engagement with femme-​inine embodiment and vulnerability and what I read as her endeavor to conceptualize agency beyond dichotomies of active and passive. Instead of viewing feminine vulnerability in terms of susceptibility to male violence, Dahl writes that vulnerability in its “queer feminine” forms signifies the “difficulty and persistence of vulnerability as an openness in and to the world.”46 Dahl’s understanding of vulnerability overlaps with the concept of receptivity, an important trope in the Babalon discourse.47 Receptivity in its sexual and social dimensions has often been associated with passivity, marking a stereotypical femininity that is acted on rather than agential in itself. However, I am inspired by Dahl’s work on vulnerability in claiming that feminine receptivity may signify something more multifaceted, which is neither completely determined by nor entirely free from hegemonic gender relations. In her work on vulnerability, Dahl draws on femme scholar Ann Cvetkovich, who has used narratives of butch/​femme sexuality to challenge normative perceptions of the experience of penetration, or “being fucked,” as feminizing, humiliating, and passive. Being penetrated, Cvetkovich contends, has conventionally been seen as equivalent to passivity, and she views homophobic fears of anal penetration as a potent expression of the stereotypical connection between feminization and pregnability.48 With femme experience as a starting point, Cvetkovich challenges stereotypical conceptualizations of receptivity as passivity, emphasizing the “power and labor of receptivity,” which entails actively communicating, responding, and returning the desire of one’s lover.49 Cvetkovich stresses that this femme-​theoretical understanding of penetration can be applied to the experiences of heterosexual women and gay men.50 In seeking to do so, and to understand the implications of how receptivity and sexuality are articulated and understood in the Babalon discourse, I am inspired by Australian social scientist Catherine Waldby’s concept of “erotic destruction,”

Divine Women, Femmes, and Whores  25 which she uses to designate the experience of dispossession through sexuality and to describe “the tender violence and the terrors involved in sexual practice and relationships, the kinds of violence this does to any sense of self as autonomous.”51 Waldby conceptualizes this experience as a form of “ego destruction” entailing “the breaking down of resistance.”52 Although she sees the erotic as inherently linked to this potential for dispossession, Waldby highlights how prevailing narratives of subjectivity and embodiment are gendered. According to hegemonic gender logics, erotic destruction is inflicted by men onto women, rather than the inverse. The dominant image of the masculine body is “phallic and impenetrable . . . a war-​body simultaneously armed and armored, equipped for victory,” while the female is seen as “permeable and receptive.”53 Phallocentric culture manages the fear of erotic destruction by rejecting women’s ability to enact this tender violence, and by socializing men to seek to inhabit the position of “destroyer, to refigure their women in their own interests but to resist such refiguration themselves.”54 The equation of masculinity with the phallic potential to inflict destruction, and imperviousness to reciprocally being destroyed, is exteriorized in dominant narratives around penetration and homophobic fears thereof. It is also reflected in the recurrent narrative of heterosexual intercourse as something done to women by men, linguistically reflected in binary oppositions of active and passive such as fucking and being fucked or taking and being taken. Phallocentric discourse seeks to deny the masculine desire and propensity for erotic destruction, that is, the potentially pleasurable, temporary breakdown of bounded self-​perception. However, Waldby stresses that not all masculinities or femininities are equally invested in this logic of “non-​reciprocity,” and she indicates that the narrative of destroyer and destroyed is unstable. Importantly, Waldby indicates “fantasies about the receptive erotic potentials of the male body” and the “phallic woman” as having the power to challenge this narrative.55 A sexual symbolic that indicates the possibility of reciprocal erotic destruction may involve imagery related to masculine erotic receptivity and “passive” desire, as well as femininities enacting the position of destroyer. Waldby suggests that feminist theory, rooted in academic sobriety, is hampered in its potential to produce such imagery, and instead suggests drawing on “resources of perversity and fantasy.”56 I suggest religion may similarly serve this function. Waldby’s work provides analytical tools for discussing, among other issues, what a “queer heterosexuality” might look like. I will analyze the gendering of erotic destruction in the Babalon discourse, both in terms of physical sexual acts and metaphysical metaphors. In analyzing agency, I am not only interested in the deliberate and agential reworking of femininities but rather how all expressions of gender and sexuality are intertwined with the potential for undoing. As powerfully argued by Judith

26  The Eloquent Blood Butler in Undoing Gender (2004), gendered subjectivity is relational as part of that which constitutes the subject is always located outside of it. More simply put, our gender and sexuality are negotiated, articulated, and become intelligible to us through our relationships with others—​relationships that are constitutive of who we perceive ourselves to be. Neither sexuality nor gender are “precisely . . . possession[s]‌, but . . . are to be understood as modes of being dispossessed, ways of being for another or, indeed, by virtue of another.”57 Similarly, gender studies scholar Margrit Shildrick argues that sexuality is linked to the fear and desire of the breakdown of the self-​contained, autonomous body that defines modern, Western (masculine) subjectivity. Physical touch, in Shildrick’s view, entails a compromised individuality, as the person touching—​regardless of intent—​is always also touched themselves.58 Shildrick argues that erotic touch signals the porosity of the boundary between self and other, writing that “[s] exuality is paradigmatically a site that invokes feelings of vulnerability . . . an engagement which we are accustomed to regard as the site of both pleasure and danger.”59 This anxiety is mitigated through extensive networks of regulatory and normative practices governing sexuality and the projection of monstrosity onto those whose bodies appear to destabilize the boundaries of autonomous, embodied selfhood.60 Shildrick asserts that this process is always unsuccessful, given the vulnerability of all bodies, and her explication of erotic touch suggests that sexuality highlights the instability of the fiction of the liberal, autonomous subject. In different ways, Butler, Shildrick, and Waldby all indicate the phallocentric tendency to project vulnerability, or erotic destruction, onto femininity. Combined with Cvetkovich’s and Dahl’s expositions on receptivity and vulnerability, I  will be guided by their work when analyzing the Babalon discourse and how these concepts relate to hegemonic notions of femininity and sexuality. Babalon is frequently portrayed in ways that connote both agency and permeability. The work of the aforementioned scholars is helpful in theorizing these narratives and moving beyond the notion that relationality, openness, or willingness to be affected by others are inherently oppressive modalities.

“The Sex That Is Not One”: The Concept of Plural Femininities In the preceding sections, I have traced my understanding of how femininity—​ while implicated in the existing gender system—​can be reworked and used in ways that destabilize it. The mutability and polyvalence of gendered positions, and the idea that femininity is not the (singular) embodiment of subordination, is linked to the assumption that femininity is not one. Australian sociologist

Divine Women, Femmes, and Whores  27 R. W. Connell suggested the concept of multiple masculinities in the landmark work Masculinities (1993). Critiquing the idea that male-​female relationships are negotiated in tension between one masculinity and one femininity, Connell proposed that any given social system contains multiple masculinities that relate hierarchically to each other as well as to femininity. Connell posits hegemonic masculinity as the most culturally privileged form of doing maleness, which encapsulates the legitimization for male dominance over women. In Connell’s view, femininity can never be hegemonic in the way that masculinity is, as all femininities are subject to male domination. Instead, Connell suggests the concept of “emphasized femininity” as a form of femininity that is oriented toward accommodating male desires and that embodies characteristics such as nurturance, sweetness, and passivity.61 Connell’s framework has inspired theorization of multiple femininities, including that of American sociologist Mimi Schippers. Following Schippers, I understand configurations of masculinity and femininity as located at the level of meaning—​as symbolic constructions tied to clusters of characteristics and traits that are perceived as manly and womanly. Schippers argues that masculinities and femininities “provide a legitimating rationale” for “embodiment and behavior,” as well as for the regulation and construction of social practice.62 Focusing on the relation between masculinities and femininities, and based on the notion that hegemony serves the interests of the ruling class, Schippers argues that those (ascribed) gendered qualities or characteristics are hegemonic that structure male-​female relationships as complementary and hierarchical.63 She defines hegemonic femininity thus: Hegemonic femininity consists of the characteristics defined as womanly that establish and legitimate a hierarchical and complementary relationship to hegemonic masculinity and that, by doing so, guarantee the dominant position of men and the subordination of women.64

In Schippers’s view, the dominance of hegemonic masculinity is preserved through the circumscription of specific characteristics as only available to men, such as physical strength, authority, and desire for women. Other “configurations of feminine characteristics” are stigmatized and marginalized.65 Women who desire other women, or who are promiscuous, “frigid,” or aggressive, constitute a refusal to embody the proper complementary relationship to hegemonic masculinity, thereby threatening male dominance.66 Thus, Schippers posits that hegemonic femininity is elevated above “pariah femininities,” such as the “slut,” lesbian, and “bitch,” which are so deemed as they are seen as contaminants to the proper relation of masculinity and femininity. Pariah femininities are thereby “actually the quality content of hegemonic masculinity enacted by women.”67

28  The Eloquent Blood Conversely, Schippers defines “male femininities” as the qualities of hegemonic femininity enacted by men. Schippers observes that some characteristics associated with masculinity or femininity in a specific context may not legitimize a hierarchical, complementary dynamic between men and women. She refers to such configurations of gender as “alternative” femininities and masculinities. Though building on different assumptions, Schippers’s idea of alternative femininities has parallels to Irigaray’s notion of a femininity defined in relation to itself. In suggesting courses of research on the multiplicity of femininities, Schippers suggests asking which characteristics and/​or practices are understood as womanly in a given context, and which of them serve to situate “femininity as complementary and inferior to masculinity.” This helps answer which features of masculinity and femininity are not hegemonic—​that is, which are associated with gendered positions without legitimizing a hierarchical male-​female relationship—​as well as which pariah femininities are in operation.68 Crucially, Schippers stresses, the traits and roles associated with hegemonic, pariah, and alternative femininities and masculinities are contextual. In highlighting the symbolic level of traits and characteristics, Schippers’s model is helpful in analyzing my heavily textual and verbal source material. Situating masculinities and femininities in configurations of roles and characteristics associated with the constructed categories “man” and “woman,” Schippers provides a framework for understanding how masculinity and femininity are symbolically associated with, but do not emerge from, these categories. I will assume that subjects who inhabit or are ascribed femininity are not always women (whether cis-​or transgendered); in other words, male and genderqueer subjects can also embody femininity. I do not understand the term “femininities” as referring primarily to specific types of people, but rather as symbolic configurations associated with clusters of traits and roles that are perceived as womanly and that structure, legitimize, and give meaning to (embodied) social practice. While it is possible to identify with, inhabit, or be ascribed femininities such as mother, dominatrix, slut, or daughter, these configurations also exist as thought figures or discursive constructs independently of subjects performing them In focusing on gender as relational, Schippers’s framework lends itself to the theorization of localized hegemonies, alternatives, and pariahs. Throughout this study, I will question which characteristics and traits attributed to Babalon and the Scarlet Woman legitimize a hierarchical and complementary relationship between masculinity and femininity and which instead destabilize this dynamic. The concept of pariah femininities is illustrative, as I will argue that Babalon is often ascribed qualities associated with hegemonic masculinity. Simultaneously, she is frequently associated with labels Schippers connects to pariah femininity, namely those of slut, harlot, and whore. These labels are understood in particular

Divine Women, Femmes, and Whores  29 ways within the Babalon discourse, and I will draw on Schippers’s framework to understand the implications of pariah femininities being reworked. I will explore whether the Babalon discourse provides opportunities for women to engage with pariahlike or alternative femininities and, if so, whether the localized lauding of Babalon contributes to the production of other localized pariah femininities. This book is analytically focused on the intersection of gender and sexuality, although I will touch on how factors of race and class impact the articulation of femininities. As narratives of female sexual repression and liberation are recurring themes in the Babalon discourse (see especially ­chapter 10), it is significant that the sexual agency of white middle-​class women and women of color have historically often differed.69 Feminized interpellations such as virgin, whore, slut, good girl, and bad girl have diverging histories among different groups of women, which affects the implications of identification with Babalon as “harlot” or “whore.” Class and race as well as gender are significant factors in who has been able to appropriate and subvert culturally stigmatized and sexualized symbols and worldviews, and this has often been more problematic for poor and racialized women.70 In analyzing the implications of deliberate reappropriation of feminized, sexualized slurs, I will consider how such positions are not necessarily equally feasible—​or desirable—​for all groups of women.

Notes 1. Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, trans. Helen Parshley (Harmondsworth, UK: Penguin, 1984), 267. 2. Ulrika Dahl, “Queering Femininity,” Lambda Nordica 21, no. 1–​2 (2016):  7–​20. See also Catrine Andersson, “Om queer femininitet och iscensättande av kön,” Kvinnovetenskaplig tidskrift 2–​3 (2006): 19–​28. 3. MacKinnon, “Feminism,” 531. 4. Bartky, “Foucault”; Young, “Throwing.” 5. See, e.g., Carol Gilligan, In a Different Voice:  Psychological Theory and Women’s Development (Cambridge, MA:  Harvard University Press, 1982); Sara Ruddick, Maternal Thinking: Towards a Politics of Peace (London: Women’s Press, 1990). The terms “ecofeminism” and “goddess feminism” are discussed in Magdalena Raivio, Gudinnefeminister, Monica Sjöös och Starhawks berättande—​ subjektskonstruktion, idéeinnehåll och feministiska affiniteter (Karlstad: Karlstad University, 2014). 6. Linda Alcoff, “Cultural Feminism Versus Post-​Structuralism: The Identity Crisis in Feminist Theory,” Signs 13, no. 3 (1988): 407–​408. 7. Alice Echols, “The New Feminism of Yin and Yang,” in Powers of Desire:  The Politics of Sexuality, ed. Ann Snitow, Christine Stansell, and Sharon Thompson (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1983), 439–​459. 8. Alcoff, “Cultural,” 411–​414.

30  The Eloquent Blood 9. Cf. Ulrika Dahl, “Ytspänningar:  Femininiteter, Feminismer, Femmefigurationer,” Tidskrift för genusvetenskap 1 (2011): 12; Andersson, “Queer.” 10. Cf. bell hooks, Ain’t I a Woman: Black Women and Feminism (Boston, MA: South End Press, 1981); Patricia Hill Collins, Black Feminist Thought: Knowledge, Consciousness, and the Politics of Empowerment (Boston: Unwin Hyman, 1990); Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, “Can the Subaltern Speak?” in Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, A Critique of Postcolonial Reason:  Toward a History of the Vanishing Present (Cambridge, MA; London:  Harvard University Press, 1999); Chandra Talpade Mohanty, “Under Western Eyes:  Feminist Scholarship and Colonial Discourses,” Boundary 2, no. 12.3–​13.1 (1984): 333–​358. However, Clare Hemmings (2005) challenges narratives of second-​wave feminism as oblivious to race and class. Clare Hemmings, “Telling Feminist Stories,” Feminist Theory 6, no. 2 (2005): 115–​139. 11. Cf. Beverly Skeggs, “The Toilet Paper—​Femininity, Class and Mis-​Recognition,” Women’s Studies International Forum 24, no. 3 (2001): 295–​307. 12. Dahl, “Queering,” 14. 13. E.g., Caroline Walker Bynum, “‘... And Woman His Humanity’:  Female Imagery in the Religious Writing of the Later Middle Ages,” in Gender and Religion:  On the Complexity of Symbols, ed. Caroline Walker Bynum, Steban Harrell, and Paula Richman (Boston:  Beacon Press, 1986), 257–​288; Lena Gemzöe, Feminine Matters:  Women’s Religious Practices in a Portuguese Town (Stockholm:  Dept. of Social Anthropology, Stockholm University, 2000); Owen, Place; Kelly E. Hayes, Holy Harlots: Femininity, Sexuality, and Black Magic in Brazil (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2011). 14. See, e.g., Andrea Dworkin and Catharine A. MacKinnon, Pornography and Civil Rights:  A New Day for Women’s Equality (Minneapolis:  Organizing Against Pornography, 1989); Robin Morgan, “Theory and Practice: Pornography and Rape,” in Take Back the Night, ed. Laura Lederer (New York: William Morrow, 1980). 15. Carol S. Vance, ed., Pleasure and Danger:  Exploring Female Sexuality (London: Pandora Press, 1992); Cf. Gayle Rubin, “Thinking Sex: Notes for a Radical Theory of the Politics of Sexuality,” in Pleasure and Danger:  Exploring Female Sexuality, ed. Carole S. Vance (Boston: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1984), 267–​321. 16. Urban, Magia Sexualis, 265. Emphasis in original. For such feminist approaches see, e.g., Audre Lorde, “Uses of the Erotic: The Erotic as Power,” in Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches (Trumansburg, NY: Crossing Press, 1984), 53–​59. 17. See Angela Willey, “Constituting Compulsory Monogamy:  Normative Femininity at the Limits of Imagination,” Journal of Gender Studies 24, no. 6 (2015): 621–​633. See also Mimi Schippers, Beyond Monogamy: Polyamory and the Future of Polyqueer Sexualities (New York: New York University Press, 2017). 18. Rosi Braidotti, Nomadic Subjects:  Embodiment and Sexual Difference in Contemporary Feminist Theory (New York: Columbia University Press, 1994), 130. See also Judith Butler, Gender Trouble:  Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (New York: Routledge, 1999). 19. Luce Irigaray, “Equal or Different,” in Luce Irigaray, The Irigaray Reader, ed. Margaret Whitford (Oxford: Blackwell, 1991), 30–​33.

Divine Women, Femmes, and Whores  31 20. Luce Irigaray, Speculum of the Other Woman (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1985); Luce Irigaray, This Sex Which Is Not One (New  York:  Cornell University Press, 1985). 21. Irigaray, This, 186–​187. 22. Luce Irigaray, “The Bodily Encounter with the Mother,” in Luce Irigaray, The Irigaray Reader, ed. Margaret Whitford (Oxford: Blackwell, 1991), 43. 23. Irigaray, “Bodily,” 34–​46. 24. Luce Irigaray, “Divine Women,” in Luce Irigaray, Sexes and Genealogies (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993), 61. 25. Irigaray, “Divine,” 63. 26. Ibid. 27. See, e.g., Carol P. Christ and Judith Plaskow, eds., Womanspirit Rising: A Feminist Reader in Religion (San Francisco:  HarperSanFrancisco, 1992); Mary Daly, Gyn/​ Ecology: The Metaethics of Radical Feminism (London: Women’s Press, 1979); Gloria Anzaldúa, Borderlands: La Frontera: The New Mestiza, 4th ed. (San Francisco: Aunt Lute Books, 2012); Irene Lara, “Goddess of the Américas in the Decolonial Imaginary: Beyond the Virtuous Virgen/​Pagan Puta Dichotomy,” Feminist Studies 34, no. 1/​2 (2008): 99–​127. 28. Cf. Marsha Aileen Hewitt, “Do Women Really Need a ‘God/​ess’ to Save Them? An Inquiry into Notions of the Divine Feminine,” Method and Theory in the Study of Religion 10 (1998): 149–​156. 29. Toril Moi, Sexual/​ Textual Politics:  Feminist Literary Theory, 2nd ed. (London; New York: Routledge, 2002); Alison Stone, Luce Irigaray and the Philosophy of Sexual Difference (Cambridge; New York: Cambridge University Press, 2006). 30. Tim R. Johnston, “Questioning the Threshold of Sexual Difference:  Irigarayan Ontology and Transgender, Intersex, and Gender-​Nonconforming Being,” GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies 21, no. 4 (2015): 617–​633. 31. Danielle Poe, “Can Luce Irigaray’s Notion of Sexual Difference Be Applied to Transsexual and Transgender Narratives?,” in Thinking with Irigaray, ed. Mary C. Rawlinson, Sabrina L. Horn, and Serene J. Khader (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2011), 111–​128. 32. Lynne Huffer, “Are the Lips a Grave?” GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies 17, no. 4 (2011): 517–​542. 33. Cf. Alcoff, “Cultural”; Hemmings, “Telling.” 34. Cf. Skeggs, “Toilet.” 35. Braidotti, Nomadic, 1. 36. Ibid., 130. 37. Nina Lykke, Feminist Studies:  A Guide to Intersectional Theory, Methodology and Writing (New York; London: Routledge, 2011), 37. 38. See, e.g., Braidotti, Nomadic; Rosi Braidotti, “In the Sign of the Feminine: Reading Diana,” Theory & Event 1, no. 4 (1997); Donna J. Haraway, “A Cyborg Manifesto:  Science, Technology, and Socialist-​Feminism in the Late Twentieth Century,” in Donna J. Haraway, Simians, Cyborgs, and Women: The Reinvention of Nature (New York: Routledge, 1991); Ulrika Dahl, “Notes on Femme-​inist Agency,”

32  The Eloquent Blood in Sexuality, Gender and Power:  Intersectional and Transnational Perspectives, ed. A. G. Jónasdóttir, V. Bryson, and K. B. Jones (New  York:  Routledge, 2010), 172–​188; Dahl, “Ytspänningar”; Ulrika Dahl, Skamgrepp:  femme-​inistiska essäer (Stockholm: Leopard förlag, 2014). 39. Dahl, “Turning,” 61–​62. 40. See, e.g., Elizabeth Lapovsky Kennedy and Madeline D. Davis, Boots of Leather, Slippers of Gold: The History of a Lesbian Community (New York; London: Routledge, 1993). 41. See, e.g., Sheila Jeffreys, “Butch and Femme: Now and Then,” Gossip 5 (1987), 65–​95. 42. See, e.g., Lisa Duggan and Kathleen McHugh, “A Fem(me)inist Manifesto,” Women & Performance: A Journal of Feminist Theory 8, no. 2 (1996): 153–​159. 43. Sue O’Sullivan, “I Don’t Want You Anymore:  Butch/​Femme Disappointments,” Sexualities 2, no. 4 (1999):  465–​473; Elizabeth Galewski, “Figuring the Feminist Femme,” Women’s Studies in Communication 28, no. 2 (2005): 183–​206; Lisa Walker, “The Future of Femme: Notes on Femininity, Aging and Gender Theory,” Sexualities 15, no. 7 (2012): 795–​814. 44. Dahl, “Ytspänningar,” 9. 45. Dahl, “Notes.” Cf. Walker, “Future.” 46. Ulrika Dahl, “Femmebodiment: Notes on Queer Feminine Shapes of Vulnerability,” Feminist Theory 18, no. 1 (2017): 35–​53. 47. See ­chapter 8. 48. Ann Cvetkovich, “Recasting Receptivity: Femme Sexualities,” in Lesbian Erotics, ed. Karla Jay (New York and London: New York University Press, 1995), 129–​130. 49. Cvetkovich, “Receptivity,” 130–​131. 50. Ibid., 128. Cf. Christine Cassidy, “Walt Whitman: A Model Femme,” in The Persistent Desire: A Femme-​Butch Reader, ed. Joan Nestle (Boston: Alyson Publications, 1992), 392–​393. 51. Catherine Waldby, “Destruction:  Boundary Erotics and the Refigurations of the Heterosexual Male Body,” in Sexy Bodies: The Strange Carnalities of Feminism, ed. Elizabeth Grosz and Elspeth Probyn (New York: Routledge, 1995), 266. 52. Waldby, “Destruction,” 267. 53. Ibid., 268. 54. Ibid., 267. 55. Ibid. 56. Waldby, “Destruction,” 275. 57. Judith Butler, Undoing Gender (New York; London: Routledge, 2004), 19. Emphasis in original. 58. Margrit Shildrick, “Unreformed Bodies:  Normative Anxiety and the Denial of Pleasure,” Women’s Studies 34, no. 3–​4 (2005): 327–​344. 59. Shildrick, “Unreformed.” 60. Ibid., 330–​331. 61. R. W. Connell, Masculinities, 2nd ed. (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2005). Connell notes that other femininities are characterized by “resistance or forms of non-​compliance,” or “combinations of compliance, resistance and co-​operation.”

Divine Women, Femmes, and Whores  33 R. W. Connell, Gender and Power:  Society, the Person, and Sexual Politics (Cambridge: Polity; Blackwell, 1987), 183. 62. Schippers, “Recovering.” 63. Ibid.,  90–​91. 64. Ibid., 94. 65. Ibid.,  94–​95. 66. Ibid., 95. 67. Ibid.. 68. Ibid., 100. 69. Cf. Rennie Stinson, “The Afro-​American Female:  The Historical Context of the Construction of Sexual Identity,” in Powers of Desire: The Politics of Sexuality, ed. Ann Snitow, Christine Stansell, and Sharon Thompson (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1983), 229–​235. 70. Cf. bell hooks, “Madonna: Plantation Mistress or Soul Sister?” in bell hooks, Black Looks. Race and Representation (Boston: South End Press, 1992), 157–​164.

3

The Scarlet Goddess and the Wine of Her Fornications Crowley, Babalon, and the Femme Fatale 1898–​1909

The year 1875 was formative to the history of modern occultism, coinciding with the advent of the Theosophical Society and the birth of Aleister Crowley. Crowley’s interpretation of Babalon and the Scarlet Woman reproduced and reworked prevalent cultural motifs of the fin-​de-​siècle, implicating societal anxieties surrounding sexuality and obsessions with sexually licentious and depraved femininity. The aim of this and the following chapter is to trace and discuss which roles and traits Crowley attributes to Babalon and the Scarlet Woman, and how these relate to hegemonic notions of femininity and feminine sexuality in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. This chapter will be structured around a chronological overview of Crowley’s engagement with the theme of transgressive sexual femininity from 1898 until 1909, beginning with his early Decadent poetry and culminating with the visions of Babalon recorded in 1909 in The Vision and the Voice (hereafter Vision). The next chapter traces Crowley’s subsequent writings on Babalon until his death in 1947. My attempt at a chronological account is complicated by the fact that Crowley, endeavoring to systematize his sprawling textual production, returned repeatedly to many of his key works, producing commentaries in which he quoted from and referred the reader to both older and newer material. For instance, Crowley wrote at least four significant commentaries to Liber AL, three of which are of interest to this study: the “Old Comment,” written in 1911 and first published in 1912; the “New Comment,” mostly composed between 1919 and 1922; and the “Djeridensis Working,” also known as “The Comment Called D,” written in 1923.1 He also produced a commentary to Vision. I  will alternate between treating Crowley’s commentaries as stand-​alone works and in conjunction with the original texts they refer to, but I will take care to distinguish between them. This chapter begins with an overview of the cultural context of the fin-​de-​ siècle, with a specific emphasis on anxieties related to gender and sexuality, especially pariah femininities. I then proceed to trace Crowley’s engagement with the artistic and literary trope of the femme fatale in his early poetry. While not dealing with Babalon or the Scarlet Woman specifically, I view these poems as The Eloquent Blood: The Goddess Babalon and the Construction of Femininities in Western Esotericism. Manon Hedenborg White, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780190065027.001.0001

36  The Eloquent Blood relevant for the subsequent development of the Babalon discourse as they foreshadow Crowley’s later views on pariah femininities, female sexuality, transgression, and redemption through erotic destruction. I  subsequently discuss the appearance of the Scarlet Woman—​indebted to the pariah femininity of the femme fatale and strongly related to Babalon—​in Liber AL in 1904, after which I analyze Crowley’s preoccupation with transgressive femininity in both poetic and magical works. Babalon’s role in Vision, the first work in which she appears as a goddess, is scrutinized at length. The chapter concludes by discussing how Crowley’s early writings dealing firstly with the femme fatale trope, secondly with the Scarlet Woman, and thirdly with Babalon constitute a gradual reworking of fin-​de-​siècle fears of pariah femininity threatening rational masculine subjectivity, culminating with the lauding of the latter as a soteriological goal through the framework of erotic destruction.

Good, Bad, and Scarlet: Femininities of the Fin-​de-​Siècle As highlighted by Michel Foucault, the fin-​de-​siècle was not characterized by sexual silence but rather by intense discussion, scrutiny, and preoccupation with classification and pathologization.2 In nineteenth-​century medical literature and sexual handbooks, sexuality was conceived as a supremely potent force, which, channeled correctly, strengthened the bonds of the bourgeois nuclear family.3 Reproductive, marital heterosexuality was perceived as the foundation of a healthy social body and the self-​realization of the bourgeois individual, while nonreproductive, extramarital sexuality—​especially masturbation, prostitution, and homosexuality—​was seen as a threat to societal wellbeing. Uncontrolled, carnal promiscuity was consequently associated with disease, social unrest, and racial degeneracy.4 The late nineteenth century coincided with the so-​called first wave of feminism, and women’s rights advocates participated in discussions about the dangers of unregulated sexuality. Some utopian socialists posited sexual freedom as integral to social liberation, and radical voices emphasized a more positive valorization of female sexuality.5 However, women’s vulnerability to genital disease, uncontrollable pregnancies, and maternal death compelled many first-​wave feminists to strive primarily to restrict men’s sexual access to women, winning significant victories with regards to rape and the age of consent by emphasizing women’s supposedly lower libido and superior spiritual nature.6 Industrialization, urbanization, the growth of capitalism, and exacerbated class tensions resulted in fundamental challenges to the gender order during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The emerging women’s rights movement, the advent of evolutionism, and decreasing nativity generated pervasive anxieties. In the growing middle class, women’s place was increasingly relegated

The Scarlet Goddess and the Wine of Her Fornications  37 to domesticity. What was considered appropriate in masculine and feminine social roles was frequently phrased in terms of biological complementarity. The passive and angelic wife and mother was upheld as the bourgeois feminine ideal, a Victorian hegemonic femininity. Paraphrasing fin-​de-​siècle novelist Laura Marholm (1854–​1928), historian of ideas Karin Johannisson notes that the idealization of the pure, chaste, and married lady of the house represented a new cult of the Virgin in increasingly secularized modernity.7 While all nonmonogamy was seen a threat to the bourgeois family, feminine promiscuity was especially despised. Literature scholar Bram Dijkstra identifies the cultural stereotype of the libidinous and predatory femme fatale as the dark shadow of Victorian hegemonic femininity. Frequently, nineteenth-​century art and literature projected the femme fatale onto imagined pagan antiquity or non-​Western others, with biblical or classical villainesses such as Salome, Jezebel, and Circe playing the part of the feminine threat to the European Christian male.8 In Schippers’s terms, the femme fatale constitutes a stereotype of pariah femininity, viewed as a contaminant to hegemonic masculine-​feminine relationships by inhabiting aspects of masculinity such as autonomy, sexual desire, and access to the public sphere. In fin-​de-​siècle culture, decadence, religious idolatry, and pariah femininity overlapped discursively and often evoked each other by simple association.9 Babylon was a vital cultural motif in the late nineteenth century. From antiquity until today, the civilizations of ancient Mesopotamia have been associated with wealth, vice, and exotic sensuality.10 This mythologized image of the ancient Near East manifested in the fifth-​century historian Herodotus’s (484–​425 bce) writings on the alleged practice of cultic prostitution in ancient Babylon, where he suggests that women sold their bodies in service of a great goddess.11 Although dismissed by most contemporary scholars, Herodotus’s narrative informed a highly pervasive fantasy in Western culture, recurring in the writings of nineteenth-​century Assyriologists and anthropologists.12 The British historian and armchair anthropologist James G. Frazer (1854–​1941) claimed that sacred prostitution was practiced across West Asia up until the second century ce in honor of a great goddess variously named Astarte, Ishtar, and Aphrodite. Frazer identified this goddess and her cult of sacred prostitution with the mythical Babylonian queen Semiramis.13 The Whore of Babylon was a recurrent symbol in anti-​ Catholic rhetoric during this time. Fin-​de-​siècle England witnessed an intense debate over renewed interest in Catholic ritual and dogma within the Church of England and the reestablishment of the Catholic Church in Britain. The No Popery movement, which principally attracted evangelicals, generated countless leaflets, pamphlets, and sermons warning against the decadence and corruption of the “Scarlet Woman.” The term originated as a pejorative euphemism for the Roman Catholic Church, and later came to connote a sexually immoral woman

38  The Eloquent Blood or prostitute. The significance of femininity for the Whore of Babylon trope is evident in this anti-​Catholic discourse, and Catholicism was conceptualized as a sort of femme fatale—​a feminized, sexualized, and seductive force threatening to pervert both piety and nation.14 Within the Plymouth Brethren, which Crowley’s parents belonged to, the symbol of Babylon was frequently used to represent corruption.15 The conflation of feminized temptation with religious contamination through the Whore of Babylon is exemplified in Presbyterian theologian Alexander Hislop’s The Two Babylons, first published as a pamphlet in 1853 and released in a revised and expanded version in 1858. Widely read in the Plymouth Brethren as well as by Crowley himself, The Two Babylons argues that Catholicism is a veiled continuation of Babylonian paganism and that the word “mystery” on the Whore’s forehead referenced a Chaldean mystery cult.16 Hislop traces the “Chaldean” mysteries to Queen Semiramis, “a paragon of unbridled lust and licentiousness.” Similar to Frazer, Hislop believed Semiramis founded a cult in which she was worshipped as Rhea and Venus, and that she ruled her city as “the grand seat at once of idolatry and consecrated prostitution.”17 Hislop identifies Semiramis as the prototype for the Whore of Babylon, viewing the goddesses Ishtar and Astarte as deified forms of the queen and interpreting Catholic Marian worship as a continuation of her cult.18 In linking the Whore to Semiramis, Hislop enhanced the femme fatale and pariahlike connotations of the trope, building on classical texts that presented Semiramis as a sexually insatiable murderess.19 The references to Ishtar, Astarte, and temple prostitution indicate the continued importance of the cultural memory of Babylon to conceptualizations of the Whore. Fin-​de-​siècle Britain was the home of a vital occult milieu, where formalized orders such as the Theosophical Society and the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn competed with popularized movements such as Spiritualism. Ongoing debates around gender and sexuality were reflected in the occult milieu, which produced a number of alternative concepts of gender. The utopianism of the Theosophical Society attracted women’s rights advocates seeking social change, and many Spiritualists in the United Kingdom and United States supported suffragist and abolitionist ideas.20 Several feminist advocates with a more positive outlook on feminine sexuality were occultists, such as Ida Craddock (1857–​ 1902), Florence Farr (1860–​1917), and Annie Besant (1847–​1933).21 A number of occult writers, Craddock among them, came to believe that sexual energy could be harnessed for magical purposes. The African American doctor, Spiritualist medium, and abolitionist Paschal Beverly Randolph (1825–​1875) designed a system of sexual magic based on the idea of male and female as opposing polarities and the magical use of orgasmic energy. Despite having a utopian view of sexuality, Randolph favored its regulation, holding that only heterosexual

The Scarlet Goddess and the Wine of Her Fornications  39 married couples should practice sexual magic together.22 While a more detailed discussion of sexual attitudes among fin-​de-​siècle occultists exceeds the scope of this chapter, Crowley was a product of his time. One of several occultists in the Victorian-​Edwardian period who sought alternative approaches to sexuality, he went further than most in his celebration of free sexuality for both men and women and of counternormative sexual practices.

Scripture and Scourging: The King James Bible and Pariah Femininities before Babalon Born in 1875 to parents who were members of the Plymouth Brethren, a Christian dispensationalist movement espousing a literal interpretation of the Bible, Crowley was obsessed with Revelation from an early age. Recounting his childhood in his so-​called autohagiography, The Confessions of Aleister Crowley, Crowley attests to the great importance of the Bible to his parents. Recalling that the Bible was “his only book” as a young child, Crowley asserts that he was quickly drawn to Revelation, sympathizing with “the opponents of heaven.” Bored with the heavenly forces, the boy Crowley preferred “the Dragon, the False Prophet, the Beast and the Scarlet Woman,” and he began identifying as the Beast 666 from an early age.23 In his own words, Crowley did not doubt the literal truth of the Bible, but simply “went over to Satan’s side.”24 The King James Bible in general, and Revelation in particular, strongly influenced many of Crowley’s written works. This is certainly true of Liber AL, which borrows the characters of the Scarlet Woman and the Beast.25 A further, probable influence on Crowley’s personal universe from his Plymouth Brethren background is Hislop’s The Two Babylons, which Crowley may have encountered during his childhood.26 Although Crowley clearly read Hislop’s theories contrary to the author’s intentions, it is plausible the constructed link between pagan polytheism, unbridled sexuality, and the Whore of Babylon (through the figure of Semiramis) would have appealed to him. As I will highlight later, Crowley connected Semiramis to female power and autonomy, an association he may have gleaned from Hislop.27

“Fresh Blossoms from the Heart of Hell”: Jezebel and the Influence of Decadence Crowley became familiar with the literary movement of Decadence during his years at Cambridge University, where he made the acquaintance of a literary circle centered around the publisher Leonard Smithers (1861–​1907). He also

40  The Eloquent Blood befriended Herbert Jerome Pollitt (1871–​1942), an enigmatic character who worked as a female impersonator and was acquainted with Oscar Wilde and Aubrey Beardsley. Crowley likened Pollitt—​with whom he appears to have had a romantic relationship—​to Jean Des Esseintes, the protagonist of Joris-​Karl Huysmans’s À Rebours (1884), and he claims that Pollitt introduced him to “the work of Whistler, Rops and Beardsley in art, and that of the so-​called decadents in literature.”28 Crowley became well versed in both British and French Decadence, and his early writings incorporated common Decadent themes such as religious irreverence, hedonism, sexual transgression, and moral ambiguity.29 Sinister, lascivious, and often supernatural femmes fatales—​a prominent theme in the Decadent genre—​appeared frequently in Crowley’s works.30 In 1898, Crowley was initiated into the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. Although he advanced rapidly through the degrees, he was expelled in 1900 following a series of controversies. The year 1898 also witnessed the publication of Crowley’s epic poem “Jezebel” (1898), which reads the Hebrew Bible’s story of the idolatrous queen, the titular female antihero of the poem, through the lens of the femme fatale. Crowley describes Jezebel as his favorite character from Scripture.31 A  recurring motif and emblem of the femme fatale trope in fin-​ de-​siècle art, the biblical Jezebel compels her husband, King Ahab of Israel, to erect a temple to Baal.32 Crowley’s poem elaborates on the queen’s character by drawing heavily on the femme fatale trope, but it departs from most contemporary treatments of the latter as well as the biblical narrative by hinting at the initiatory potential of transgressive sexual acts. The narrator of the poem, a prophet who seeks out King Ahab to punish him for his wrongdoings, describes Jezebel as both evil and irresistible: She, for whose blood my veins thirst; /​The blossom of a painted mouth /​and bare breasts tinctured with the south. /​For lo! the harlot Jezebel! Her hands dropped perfume, and her tongue /​(A flame from the dark heart of hell, /​The ivory-​barred mouth, that stung /​With unimaginable pangs) /​Shot out at me, and Hell fixed gangs, /​Her purple robes, her royal crown, /​The jewelled girdle of her waist, Her feet with murder splashed, and brown /​With the sharp lips that fawn and taste.33

The description of Jezebel and her attire is reminiscent of John’s account of the Whore of Babylon from Revelation; the pagan queen, like Babylon, is robed in purple and covered in rich jewels, and she is similarly associated with harlotry.34 The prophet expresses a mixture of contradictory feelings: burning desire for Jezebel, provoked by her obvious physical beauty and confidence; deep self-​loathing caused by his lust, which hinders him from acting against the royal couple; and consequent hatred for the object of his guilty longing. Jezebel’s

The Scarlet Goddess and the Wine of Her Fornications  41 hyperfeminine adornments—​her painted lips; bare, tinctured breasts; heavy perfume; purple garments; and golden jewelry—​are simultaneously intertwined with her polluting power and the prophet’s agonized longing for her. The body of the queen is made synonymous with damnation and death, her scent described as “[a]‌steam of poison through the air.”35 The narrator of the poem declares his desire for carnal union with Jezebel: That she and I with deep delight /​Suck from death’s womb infernal pains, /​ Whose fire consumes, destroys, devours /​Through night’s insatiable hours. /​And altogether filled with love, /​And altogether filled with sin, /​The little sparks and noises move /​About the softness of her skin. /​ . . . Fresh blossoms of the heart of hell /​And secret joys of Jezebel.36

Finally, the narrator succumbs to temptation, losing himself in Jezebel’s embrace.37 Later, he watches in horror as the prophet Jehu, unimpressed by the idolatrous queen, throws Jezebel to her death.38 The narrator of the poem seeks out his love as she lies dying, longing to surrender his soul to her. Jezebel vampirically bites his lip and drinks his blood before life leaves her. The prophet subsequently feasts on her dead body, leaving her head, palms, and feet to worship and kiss as he hears her spirit whisper: “My sin is perfect in thy blood, And thou and I have conquered God.”39 Finally, the prophet in Crowley’s poem lies down to die himself, seeking to blend his soul with hers and be united with his beloved in death. He declares: “Now let me die, to mate in hell /​With thee, O harlot Jezebel.”40 Jezebel in Crowley’s poem appears superficially as a perfect encapsulation of the fin-​de-​siècle pariah femininity of the femme fatale. Inconsiderate of the holy man’s righteous calling, she acts as the desiring sexual subject who incurs erotic destruction, luring the prophet into moral damnation and death through her voracious sexuality. Additionally, she threatens the hierarchical complementarity of hegemonic masculine-​feminine relations by acting as a more decisive party in her marriage to Ahab. By endangering the sanity and morals of two men, she embodies the theme of polluting pariah femininity. However, more unconventionally for the time, Crowley alludes to sexual transgression as initiation. Through the framework of erotic destruction, Jezebel’s hyperfeminine body appears as the gateway to transcendence, where the boundaries of heaven and hell and redemption and damnation are intertwined. The prophet’s cannibalistic consumption of Jezebel’s flesh, through which he becomes one with the queen and her sin and conquers God, appears as an act of (un)holy communion, through which the queen effectively penetrates the prophet. Nineteenth-​century interpretations of the story of Salome, a prototypical symbol of the pariah femininity of the femme fatale, are a possible intertext

42  The Eloquent Blood for “Jezebel”.41 First-​century historian Flavius Josephus identifies Salome as the daughter of King Herod II and his wife, Herodias.42 However, the modern narrative of Salome as femme fatale is based on the New Testament, in which Herodias’s unnamed daughter dances before Herod on his birthday, as part of Herodias’s scheme to procure the decapitated head of John the Baptist.43 While the Bible portrays Herodias’s daughter as an innocent pawn, many modern renditions focused on Salome’s own desire for the Baptist, portraying her as an icon of feminine decadence and lust threatening masculine wellbeing. Oscar Wilde’s eponymous tragedy is one of the most famous treatments of Salome from this period (and the source of the term “Dance of the Seven Veils” in reference to Salome’s performance before Herod). In Wilde’s Salome, the titular character lusts for the prophet Iokanaan, who spurns her advances. Upon receiving his decapitated head, Salome kisses and bites the cold lips, declaring that “the mystery of love is greater than the mystery of death,” before being slaughtered by the king’s army.44 In “Jezebel,” the roles are reversed: Crowley’s unnamed holy man is tormented by desire, and his worship of the dead Jezebel’s head recalls the climactic scene in Salome. In contrast to Wilde’s tragedy, however, Jezebel and her lover find transcendent union in death, sought willingly by the unnamed holy man. Tellingly, Crowley later wrote that “Jezebel” explores the idea of “justification by sin,” foreshadowing his subsequent realization that “every act is a sacrament and that even the most repulsive rituals might be in some ways the most effective.”45 This idea would later become central to Crowley’s personal magical practice. The femme fatale has been interpreted as a misogynistic stereotype embodying a perceived threat toward bourgeois, rational masculinity, linked to nineteenth-​century anxieties surrounding women’s changing roles in the social sphere.46 In “Jezebel” and other works from the same period, Crowley explores obsessive longing and loathing for a demonic yet intoxicating woman as well as the idea of initiation through ostensibly sinful acts.47 Although Crowley’s early poetry reproduces the association between assertive feminine sexuality and moral corruption through the pariah femininity of the femme fatale, he reworks the trope. Whereas the unnamed prophet is ostensibly swayed from his spiritual calling by Jezebel’s hyperfemininity, this apparent transgression brings him to numinous experience through the loss of self in union with the monstrous other. The theme of the femme fatale posing the threat of erotic destruction, or the (at least temporary) eradication of autonomous, bourgeois masculinity, is thus retained in the poem, although Crowley hints at annihilation as a spiritual goal. The prophet’s erotic self-​sacrifice, resulting in the deathly erasure of difference between himself and his lover is significant, foreshadowing Crowley’s later writings on Babalon, the Scarlet Woman, and sexual magic.

The Scarlet Goddess and the Wine of Her Fornications  43

“The Work of Wickedness”: The Scarlet Woman in Liber AL vel Legis (1904) In 1904, on honeymoon in Cairo with his first wife Rose (née Kelly, 1874–​1932), Crowley received what he perceived to be a divinely inspired text, dictated to him by a discarnate entity named Aiwass. The text heralds the inception of a new aeon in the spiritual evolution of humanity, with Crowley as its prophet. It introduces the central maxim of the new age: “Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law”—​epitomized by the word “Thelema” (ancient Greek for “will”)—​and the related phrase, “Love is the law, love under will.”48 Crowley did not interpret “Do what thou wilt” as an injunction to act on impulsive whims, but instead he connected it to what he would later call the “true Will”—​the unique purpose of each individual life. Crowley later wrote that the injunction of “Do what thou wilt” represented the essence of his own message.49 He summarized the goal of each individual life as finding and carrying out one’s will.50 Crowley wrote that the love construed as equivalent to the law is “a thing which the eye of the bourgeois hath not seen,” and that it is not “Love in the petty personal sense,” but rather “the meaning of Change.” In Crowley’s view, “Love that makes two One is the engine whereby even the final Two, Self and Not-​Self, may become One.”51 Crowley thus interprets love as related to continuous change, associated with the yearning for union with that external to the self. Liber AL comprises 220 verses, divided into three chapters, that are attributed, respectively, to the deities Nuit, Hadit, and Ra-​Hoor-​Khuit. Nuit represents Crowley’s adaptation of the Egyptian sky goddess, Nut, and is identified with infinite space or the cosmic feminine principle; Hadit is the infinitely condensed life-​force of each individual, or the masculine principle; and Ra-​Hoor-​Khuit, their divine offspring, is the heralded lord of the new age, conceptualized as the active component of Heru-​Ra-​Ha (Horus).52 The first chapter of the text introduces the characters of the Beast and the Scarlet Woman, as follows: Now ye shall know that the chosen priest & apostle of infinite space is the prince-​priest the Beast; and in his woman called the Scarlet Woman is all power given. They shall gather my children into their fold: they shall bring the glory of the stars into the hearts of men.53

The title of Scarlet Woman as well as the adjacent reference to the Beast indicates Revelation’s influence on Crowley, who interpreted the title of the “prince-​priest the Beast” as referring to himself.54 Whereas in the biblical narrative these figures signify religious and worldly corruption, however, Crowley reinvented them as messianic forces of the new aeon. The Scarlet Woman, described as “Scarlet Concubine of his [i.e., the Beast’s] desire” in the third chapter of AL,55

44  The Eloquent Blood also appears later in the third chapter, which provides a lengthier—​and more bombastic—​exposition of her role: 43. Let the Scarlet Woman beware! If pity and compassion and tenderness visit her heart; if she leave my work to toy with old sweetnesses; then shall my vengeance be known. I will slay me her child: I will alienate her heart: I will cast her out from men: as a shrinking and despised harlot shall she crawl through dusk wet streets, and die cold and an-​hungered. 44. But let her raise herself in pride! Let her follow me in my way! Let her work the work of wickedness! Let her kill her heart! Let her be loud and adulterous! Let her be covered with jewels, and rich garments, and let her be shameless before all men! 45. Then will I lift her to pinnacles of power: then will I breed from her a child mightier than all the kings of the earth. I will fill her with joy: with my force shall she see & strike at the worship of Nu: she shall achieve Hadit.56

This excerpt implies dual concepts of femininity. Significantly, the text later states: “Let Mary inviolate be torn upon wheels; for her sake let all chaste women be utterly despised among you!”57 Here, the chastity of the Virgin Mary is upheld as a negative image of femininity, contrasted with the shameless and adulterous ideal of the Scarlet Woman. Compassion, tenderness, and sentimentality—​which the Scarlet Woman is warned from showing—​are aspects of an early-​twentieth-​ century hegemonic femininity. These feminized traits legitimize a hierarchical and complementary relationship between the sexes when compared with (imagined) masculine rationality and strictness. In contrast, the Scarlet Woman is encouraged to behave as wickedly and shamelessly as any textbook femme fatale. She is prompted to wear her opulent garments and adornments with pride, and it is emphasized that she will arise to glory through iniquity, continuing the theme of transgression, sin, and violation of (gendered) social taboos as a pathway to spiritual attainment. Thus, the above excerpt from Liber AL reads as a paean to a fin-​de-​siècle pariah femininity, epitomized by the biblical Whore of Babylon and reconceptualized as the concubine of the prophet of the new aeon. In his turn to “Satan’s side,” and in reinterpreting a Revelation antagonist as a goddess, Crowley engaged in what has been referred to as counterreading, protest exegesis, or the hermeneutical principle of revolt. There are numerous examples of such interpretive strategies being applied throughout history. However, they were particularly prevalent during the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, when a number of prominent intellectuals, particularly in England and France, reinterpreted the Devil in a positive light based on a counterreading of John Milton’s (1608–​1674) Paradise Lost (1667, 1674). Critique of religious and worldly authorities was a recurring theme among these so-​called Romantic Satanists.58 Counterreadings of the Whore of Babylon appear to have been sparser, but they

The Scarlet Goddess and the Wine of Her Fornications  45 were not unprecedented.59 The poetess Christina Rossetti (1830–​1894) explored Babylon in lyrical form, alluding to the redemption of the Whore through the unveiling of heaven.60 A later, esoteric interpretation of Babylon is presented in the American Theosophist James Pryse’s (1859–​1942) The Apocalypse Unsealed (1910). Pryse writes that the unchaste Babylon represents the degradation of spirit into matter.61 She signifies the “lower world-​soul . . . saturated with sexuality.”62 Pryse laments that, for the time being, Babylon “remains enthroned” and will only fall when humanity learns to “loathe the lusts of the flesh.”63 Rossetti and Pryse depict Babylon ambivalently, and Pryse clearly connects sexualized pariah femininity to spiritual corruption. Crowley, under the pseudonym Nick Lamb, recommends Pryse’s book in a review published in The Equinox I, no. 6 (1911), calling it “one of the best of the kind” and pointing to aspects of Pryse’s work that Crowley felt validated Vision.64 Although Crowley built on existing cultural motifs in his initial articulation of the Babylon motif as the Scarlet Woman of Liber AL, his writings on the subject evince considerable originality in highlighting the sexual connotations of the figure as indexical of her sacredness. Here, the Scarlet Woman’s path to redemption is not—​as in Rossetti’s poetry—​through renunciation of her wicked ways, but rather through engagement with pariah femininity. Crowley’s reworking of the Whore of Babylon and the pariah femininity of the femme fatale in messianic terms can, in my view, be linked to his disdain for Christian orthodoxy and Victorian sexual morals. His upholding of the Scarlet Woman as a feminine ideal is part of a disavowal of the ideology of marital monogamy as the fundament of social stability and widespread fears of unregulated female sexuality.65 Returning to Johannisson’s point about the chaste and passive feminine ideal of the Victorian bourgeoisie as representing a secularized cult of the Virgin, it is perhaps unsurprising that Crowley, strongly opposed to Christianity, lauded a cultural symbol that represented one of the strongest threats to the bourgeois family: unrestrained feminine sexuality. Years later, he designated the family “Public Enemy No. 1.”66 In inverting the conventional dichotomy of virgin and whore, however, Liber AL reproduces the tendency of construing feminine value along sexual lines. Crowley connected Babalon and the Scarlet Woman in later works, sometimes describing the Scarlet Woman as a worldly office—​connected to the goddess—​that can be held by human women.67 Thus, although the goddess is not mentioned by name in the original text, Liber AL and its commentaries are relevant to the Babalon discourse. Crowley later identified several passages of AL as pertaining to Babalon, including an excerpt from the first chapter, spoken by Nuit, who declares that Crowley will learn a secret name for her when he knows her fully. Crowley later deemed this prophesized moniker to be Babalon.68 The third chapter comprises the statement “Let the woman be girt with a sword

46  The Eloquent Blood before me,” which Crowley later interpreted as a reference to the Scarlet Woman and female emancipation more generally.69

“Into Unguessed Abysses”: Lola of the Infernal Bliss Although Crowley was initially unconvinced of the message of Liber AL, his magical experiments continued.70 In 1907, Crowley cofounded the initiatory order A∴A∴ with his former Golden Dawn mentor George Cecil Jones (1873–​ 1960). Although its degree structure is based on the Golden Dawn, A∴A∴ centered on the private relationship between master and disciple. Within the A∴A∴, which combined yoga with ceremonial magical techniques, Crowley would systematize his Magick and develop the model for spiritual attainment of which Babalon subsequently became an integral part. A∴A∴ consists of eleven grades, whose initiatory structure is designed as an ascent up the kabbalistic Tree of Life, with each degree corresponding to a sephirah.71 The lowest degree, Probationer (0°=0), is considered to be outside of the order and the Tree of Life, and its associated work consists solely of preparation for initiation into the degree of Neophyte (1°=10). The degrees of A∴A∴ are divided into three orders: the Order of the G∴D∴ (Golden Dawn), the Order of the R∴C∴ (Rose-​Cross), and the Order of the S∴S∴ (Silver Star). The initiatory ascent beyond the degree of Neophyte in the first order is as follows: Zelator (2°=9), Practicus (3°=8), Philosophus (4°=7), and Dominus Liminis, which constitutes a link or bridge to the second order. The Order of the R∴C∴ begins with the degree of Adeptus Minor (5°=6), associated with the attainment of Knowledge and Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel, followed by Adeptus Major (6°=5) and Adeptus Exemptus (7°=4). In the historical Golden Dawn, the third and innermost order was more or less reserved for the so-​called Secret Chiefs, who were believed to have ascended to a higher plane of existence, and Adeptus Exemptus was mostly considered the highest attainable grade for a mortal human.72 In Crowley’s system, however, the task of the Adeptus Exemptus is to prepare for the initiatory ordeal of crossing the Abyss, annihilating their mundane personality in order to be mystically reborn as a Master of the Temple or Magister Templi (8°=3). Crowley links the Abyss to the sephirah Daath.73 The grade of Magister Templi is followed by that of Magus (9°=2) and Ipsissimus (10°=1), the highest degree.74 Crowley’s engagement with the femme fatale motif and the notion of liberation through sexual transgression did not cease after 1904, nor did the Scarlet Woman immediately become the principal embodiment of this concept in his work. Inspired by his mistress Vera Snepp (1888/​1889–​?) and the sculptress Kathleen Bruce (1878–​1947), Crowley further explored this theme in a series of poems written in 1907.75 Describing Bruce as possessing great beauty

The Scarlet Goddess and the Wine of Her Fornications  47 “complicated with a sinister perversity,” Crowley writes that she delighted in luring married men to be unfaithful to their wives, and “initiated [him] into the torturing pleasures of algolagny [i.e., masochism] on the spiritual plane.”76 Published in the collected volume Clouds without Water (1909), many of the poems center on the ambiguous character Lola, who is varyingly described as heavenly and demonic. Similar to “Jezebel,” the poems frequently allude to erotic investment in pain and debasement and indicate the possibility of spiritual ecstasy through physical mortification. Ostensibly a farce, Clouds without Water is published under the pseudonym of a reverend seeking to warn the world of Satan’s temptations. However, the author’s true identity and the sincere tone of the poems suggests that Crowley may have intended the book as a Trojan horse—​ a femme fatale in lyrical guise designed to lead the pious astray by hinting at the idea of ecstasy through transgression. The poems are full of biblical and mythological references, and Crowley in his introduction to the volume satirically proclaims: Unblushing, the old Serpent rears its crest to the sky; unashamed, the Beast and the Scarlet Woman chant the blasphemous litanies of their fornication. Surely the cup of their abominations is nigh full!77

Although a reader unfamiliar with Crowley’s background may have interpreted this excerpt as a lament, his identification with the Beast and the messianic roles stipulated for him and the Scarlet Woman in Liber AL indicate an inverse reading of the volume as a panegyric to deviance. The first piece, entitled “The Augur,” continues the theme of erotic sin and salvation thereby. Crowley addresses himself to a female lover, with a curving red mouth that deals out bloody kisses, as follows: “Mingle a cup from those our common pains /​To intoxicate us with an extreme pleasure /​Keener than life’s, more dolorous than death’s /​Till these infernal blisses pass the measure.”78 The intoxicating cup could be interpreted as an allusion to the Whore of Revelation. As the poem continues, love and pain as well as exaltation and damnation become increasingly intertwined, and Crowley states that he and his lover will be upraised through sin: “We tread on earth in our divine disdain /​And crush its blood out into purple wine, /​Staining our feet with hot and amorous stain, /​The foam involving all the sensual shrine.”79 The poem indicates the popular mythology of witchcraft, which is unsurprising given the partial overlap between the femme fatale trope and the figure of the witch in fin-​de-​siècle culture.80 Crowley describes anointing his and his lover’s bodies with “nightshade, monkshood and vervain” that will “waft [their] wizard bodies to the plain,” where they will attend the Sabbath within “the circle of unholy stones.”81 He recounts the proceedings at the Sabbath, where the

48  The Eloquent Blood participants engage in frenzied moonlight dancing, and “from the bitter dregs of Hell’s own wine /​Distil a liquor utterly divine.”82 Similar to Crowley’s earlier Decadent work, the poems in Clouds without Water intertwine obsessive desire and intoxication, damnation and redemption, and sin and salvation, drawing on biblical, mythological, and folkloric references. Crowley again hints at the spiritual potential of erotic bliss—​or, indeed, erotic destruction—​in union with an ostensibly polluting femininity. Crowley repeatedly likens his feelings for Lola to drunkenness, emphasizing pariah femininity as that which threatens rational subjectivity. He builds on Satanic themes, not least in the poem “The Black Mass,” which references human sacrifice. This poem blends Crowley’s obsession for Lola with themes of ecstasy through pain, such as in the following passage: You stand away—​to let your long lash curl /​About this aching body, fiery rings /​Of torture, o my hot enamoured girl /​Whose passion rides me like a steed and stings /​ . . . /​Whip, whip me till I burn! Whip on! Whip on!83

The poem suggests Lola as an embodiment of a “phallic” femininity and indicates the masculine desire for erotic destruction at her hands. It prefaces themes of eroticized pain, dominance, and submission that are present in many of Crowley’s later poems as well. Years later, he would explore these ideas more concretely, in pursuit of spiritual attainment.84 In many of the poems, Lola appears as a cruel yet irresistible woman, Crowley’s accursed “comrade in the uttermost abyss” who has drained his blood and controls him.85 He describes her as a bloodthirsty vampire whom he tries in vain to escape, with whom he has “drain[ed] that cup of bitterness.”86 However, he also portrays her as a sweet maiden who soothes him with tender caresses.87 As mentioned previously, scholars have interpreted the femme fatale as a reflection of the perceived threat to the autonomy of the bourgeois masculine subject, caused in part by shifting gender roles at the time. In Clouds without Water, as in “Jezebel,” the polluting and hypersexual femininity of the female lead characters indeed lures spiritually minded men away from their mission.88 However, this ostensive similarity with dominant portrayals of the femme fatale clashes with the underlying theme in Crowley’s work: that enlightenment is found in transgression of bourgeois Victorian-​Edwardian sociosexual norms, and that erotic destruction is spiritually desirable.89 Over a decade later, in his Confessions, Crowley writes: Love was a challenge to Christianity. It was a degradation and a damnation. Swinburne had taught me the doctrine of justification by sin. Every woman that I met enabled me to affirm magically that I had defied the tyranny of the

The Scarlet Goddess and the Wine of Her Fornications  49 Plymouth Brethren and the Evangelicals. At the same time women were the source of romantic inspiration; and their caresses emancipated me from the thraldom of the body.90

Crowley’s reference to the Decadent writer Algernon Charles Swinburne (1837–​ 1909) is telling, indicating a concern with inversion of dominant religious and sexual taboos. In Crowley’s writings, the femme fatale constitutes a gateway to the numinous, albeit terrifying experience of the erotic destruction of the rational masculine ego. While engaging with the Decadent trope of the femme fatale, Crowley departed from contemporary literary renditions by ascribing soteriological value to pariah femininity. While the Scarlet Woman is a less ambiguous character than Lola or Jezebel, the motif similarly challenges fin-​de-​siècle fears of unrestrained female sexuality.

“I Was Really Being Married”: Pain and Erotic Submission in Crowley’s Early Work Crowley’s early femme fatale-​themed poetry frequently draws on notions of erotic pain, submission, and dominance.91 Similar themes are present in the essay “The Wake World,” published in the collected volume Konx Om Pax: Essays in Light in 1907. The essay is an allegorical account of initiation building on kabbalistic and Tarot symbolism, telling the story of ascent up the Tree of Life. While the narrator of the tale is also named Lola, her character is not a vampiric femme fatale but a 17-​year-​old girl, deeply in love with a Fairy Prince who is identified as her Holy Guardian Angel. The essay portrays the relationship between the soul and the Angel as a passionate infatuation and subsequent marriage, coded in heterosexual terms and involving hierarchical power relations and elements of self-​ deprecation, pain, and humiliation. Lola emphasizes her ignorance, youth, and inexperience, describing the Fairy Prince as beautiful and awe-​inspiring. She proves her devotion to him in more or less painful ways on the astral plane. Lola describes her wedding to the Angel thus: First there is a tiny, tiny, tiny doorway, you must crawl through on your hands and knees; and even then I  scraped ever such a lot of skin off my back; then you have to be nailed on a red board with four arms, with a great gold circle in the middle, and that hurts you dreadfully. Then they make you swear the most solemn things you ever heard of, how you would be faithful to the Fairy Prince, and live for nothing but to know him better and better. So the nails stopped hurting, because, of course, I saw that I was really being married.92

50  The Eloquent Blood This excerpt emphasizes connections between love and pain and vulnerability and loss of control, even of the self. In order to marry her Fairy Prince, Lola must shed her own blood. She subsequently enters a bridal chamber, where she is chained and stabbed.93 Later in her journey, she scourges and cuts herself.94 On a textual level, “The Wake World” posits masculinity, as the Angel, as dominant and femininity, as Lola, as subservient. While the figure of Lola in Clouds without Water seems to denote a person outside of Crowley, the identification in “The Wake World” is less clear. Although Crowley’s biographer Richard Kaczynski suggests that the protagonist Lola is modeled on Crowley’s mistress Vera Snepp, the tale can be read as a general account of any seeker’s initiatory progress and relation with the Holy Guardian Angel.95 Crowley frequently described himself in feminized terms in relation to his own Angel.96 Thus, Lola in “The Wake World” may be read as Crowley’s alter ego, signifying how he utilized femininity to connote the vulnerability and receptivity he saw as desirable traits for a spiritual seeker and to indicate his desire for erotic destruction at the hands of his Holy Guardian Angel. This indicates how Crowley lauded aspects of hegemonic femininity. There are numerous parallels to historical aspects of Christian mystical and theological tradition in which the individual soul is construed as feminine, and thus passive or receptive, in relation to the divine.97 Significantly, many of the so-​called Holy Books of Thelema, a series of purportedly inspired texts written by Crowley around the same time, contain similar themes of eroticism, power, and gender inversion.98 Although the sincere, albeit naïve, Lola of “The Wake World” appears different from her femme fatale namesake in Clouds without Water, Crowley’s usage of the same name for the figures undermines this dichotomy. The notion of initiation through transgression is a recurring theme in Crowley’s writings, and the “Wake World” Lola commits transgressive acts as sacraments.99 In later works, Crowley continued to associate sexual and spiritual submission with initiatory attainment, often in conjunction with the notion of enlightenment through transgression.100 Similar ideas are present in some of Crowley’s magical texts written around the same time.101 However, “The Wake World” is less ambiguous in the outcome of Lola’s transgressive acts and eroticized submission, stating clearly that she becomes enthroned in the heavenly palaces. “The Wake World” presents the concept of crossing the Abyss. In Crowley’s A∴A∴ system, the ordeal is linked to attainment of the degree of Magister Templi. On the Tree of Life, the Abyss constitutes the space between the three upper sephiroth and the lower seven, correlated with the distance between the numinous and the manifest. In order to unite with the divine, Crowley writes, it is necessary to “abandon utterly and for ever all that one has and is.”102 The Abyss is a terrifying void of meaningless delusion, ruled by the demonic entity Choronzon. The

The Scarlet Goddess and the Wine of Her Fornications  51 year 1909 marked Crowley’s deliberate, ceremonial passing through the Abyss and acceptance of the grade of Magister Templi.103 This was one of the most important magical transformations of Crowley’s life, and his rendition of this process is the source of the later mystical doctrines concerning Babalon.

The Dancing God and the Pyramid Gateway: Babalon in The Vision and the Voice In the preceding discussion, I  have highlighted a number of key themes and motifs in Crowley’s writings on femininity that appeared until 1909. Although Crowley frequently drew on the stereotype of the femme fatale, he did so unconventionally by linking the spectral pariah femininity of the sexually promiscuous, assertive, and independent woman, who theatened autonomous masculine subjectivity, to notions of spiritual attainment through transgression of bourgeois sociosexual norms and the erotic destruction of the individual self in union with the other. Crowley vacillates between construing femininity as indexical of the pariahlike destroyer and as that which is destroyed, or both. Thus, although Crowley in some texts rejects hegemonic femininity, he lauds aspects thereof—​such as receptivity and vulnerability—​when attached to the ideal spiritual seeker. Although Crowley’s articulation of Babalon built on understandings of femininity developed in earlier writings, she first appeared as a goddess in Crowley’s record of his exploration of Enochian magic. A digression is warranted to trace the history of this system, developed by Queen Elizabeth’s astrologer John Dee (1527–​1608/​1609), collaborating with Edward Kelley (1555–​1597). Dee used Kelley as a medium, believing him to be adept at spirit travel. Dee began by performing some preliminary invocations, after which Kelley gazed into a “shew-​ stone” or crystal, describing his visions to Dee, who asked Kelley questions and recorded the results. The early sessions resulted mainly in the drawing of a number of squares of letters and numbers, the larger of which were subsequently used to receive a series of angelic invocations, or “calls.” The nineteenth call invokes the thirty “Aires,” or “Aethyrs,” an obscure concept that Egil Asprem interprets as referring to “certain spirits, spiritual realms, or principles located in various parts of the air surrounding the earth.”104 The word “Babalon” appears in the sixth Enochian call, where it is not the name of an entity but is translated as “wicked.” The nineteenth call includes the word “Babalond,” translated as “harlot.”105 The Enochian system was later integrated into the second tier of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn; however, adepts of the order were primarily interested in the Enochian table, mostly ignoring the cosmology of the Aethyrs.106

52  The Eloquent Blood In 1900, in Mexico, Crowley had begun exploring the Enochian Aethyrs but found himself unable to progress beyond the 29th.107 Nine years later, while traveling through the Algerian desert with his disciple and lover, the poet Victor B.  Neuburg, Crowley decided to resume the work.108 Their technique was simple: Crowley recited the nineteenth Enochian key, modified in accordance with the particular Aethyr he sought to access, and then gazed into a topaz stone, dictating the visions and messages he received to Neuburg, who acted as scribe. Over the course of four weeks, Neuburg and Crowley traversed the desert, scrying approximately one Aethyr per day. The recorded visions are vivid and complex, drawing on a vast set of symbolical correspondences derived from the kabbalah, Tarot, mythology, and biblical apocalyptic tradition.109 As the experiences gradually increased in solemnity and sublimity, Crowley describes feeling something akin to “the subtle trembling of a maiden before the bridegroom.”110 Epitomizing the gender reversal that is fairly typical in Crowley’s writings, where he conceptualizes himself as feminine in relation to divinity, this statement reflects broader themes in the literary history of Western mysticism, where the relationship between humanity and divinity is often portrayed in romantic or erotic terms, with the pious seeker construed as feminine.111

Dancers, Bulls, and Amphoras: Babalon below the Abyss Babalon is an important presence throughout large portions of The Vision and the Voice, Crowley’s record of his Enochian explorations. Although there are previous references to the woman of the Apocalypse, the goddess is first mentioned by name in the 12th Aethyr. However, Crowley’s later commentary identified some of the earlier visions with avatars of the goddess.112 The commentary will be discussed here in conjunction with the original text, although it is important to emphasize that Crowley wrote his comments several years later, after the operation had been completed and he had spent considerable time contemplating its meaning. Thus, the commentary links Babalon to a number of visionary episodes that were perhaps not interpreted as such in 1909. However, Crowley’s added comments may indicate that he, over time, came to view his visions of the goddess as increasingly central to Vision. In the 25th Aethyr, Crowley receives a vision of an angel bearing an amphora, who closes the mouth of a lion. The lion roars, asking, “[W]‌ho shall ride me but the Woman of Abominations?”113 The animal carries “a spear that is a cup of fornication.” These statements clearly reference John’s vision of Babylon and the Beast. In the commentary, Crowley later identifies the angel—​who in the original vision is male—​as an avatar of Babalon and the lion as a symbol of the Beast 666. He relates their interaction to the eleventh Tarot trump card, “Atu XI”.

The Scarlet Goddess and the Wine of Her Fornications  53 This appears to be a reference to the card that in historical Tarot decks is labeled Strength or Fortitude, and which conventionally shows the image of a female or androgynous figure with a lion. Crowley writes that she is “the Scarlet Woman who rides upon him in the new form.” Seemingly, this alludes to Crowley’s later redesigning of the card to show a woman riding a leonine beast.114 In the commentary, he interprets this vision as meaning that Babalon prepared Crowley, or the Beast, to utter the word of the aeon, “Thelema.”115 Thus, the theme of the Scarlet Woman as the female partner of the Beast seen in Liber AL is seemingly continued in Vision. In the 16th Aethyr, Crowley encounters the apparition of a “crowned virgin” astride a bull. In the commentary, Crowley links this vision to the Greek myth of the sun god Helios’s daughter Pasiphae, who mates with a bull after being cursed by Poseidon. She gives birth to the Minotaur, whom Crowley identifies with the bull in the vision, writing: “All mythologies contain this Mystery of the Woman and the Beast as the Heart of the Cult.”116 In the commentary to Vision, Crowley identifies the mystery of the woman and the bull with Atu (i.e. Tarot trump) XI, writing that it is “the subject of constant reference in the higher Aires.”117 The virgin reappears again later in the Aethyr, this time accompanied by a number of angels: [A]‌nd they are dancing round her with garlands and sheaves of flowers, loose robes and hair dancing in the wind. And she smiles upon me with infinite brilliance, so that the whole Aethyr flushes warm, and she says with a subtle sub-​ meaning, pointing downwards: By this, that.118

In the commentary, Crowley identifies this woman with Babalon, writing that she is “the true mistress of The Beast; of her all his mistresses on lower planes are but avatars.”119 This comment indicates the idea that the Scarlet Woman is an earthly emissary of Babalon, and the female partner to the Beast. Crowley writes in the commentary that the woman’s downward gesture constitutes Babalon’s “promise to give Herself to The Beast.”120 A dancing woman once again appears at the beginning of the 15th Aethyr, which in the commentary is identified as dealing with the preparation of the Adeptus Exemptus for initiation into the Magister Templi grade. On entering the Aethyr, Crowley encounters “a tremendous column of scarlet fire, whirling forth, rebounding, crying aloud.”121 Upon closer inspection, the fire proves to be “but the skirt of the dancer, and the dancer is a mighty god.” The vision continues: As the dancer whirls, she chants in a strange, slow voice, quickening as she goes: Lo! I gather up every spirit that is pure, and weave him into my vesture of flame. I lick up the lives of men, and their souls sparkle from mine eyes. I am

54  The Eloquent Blood the mighty sorceress, the lust of the spirit. And by my dancing I gather for my mother Nuit the heads of all them that are baptized in the waters of life. I am the lust of the spirit that eateth up the soul of man. I have prepared a feast for the adepts, and they that partake thereof shall see God.122

In the commentary, Crowley identifies the whirling dancer who gathers the heads of men as a form of Babalon, connecting her to Salome, evincing a direct link with the fin-​de-​siècle discourse of the femme fatale as the feminized threat to masculine rationality and bourgeois, autonomous subjectivity. However, Crowley’s reworking of this trope—​as shown, more subtly, in his earlier poetry—​ is indicated by the statement that the woman in the vision gathers the souls of men for Nuit, and that they will “see God.” Thus, the erotic destruction of self is indicated as a prerequisite for communion with divinity. Crowley is subsequently tried by a succession of adepts and given knowledge pertinent to the next steps in his initiatory journey. It is established that he is entitled to the grade of Magister Templi, but that he cannot yet aspire to the degree of Magus.123 On December 3, 1909, Crowley invoked the 14th Aethyr, encountering an impenetrable black veil and being halted by a darkly imposing angelic figure who commanded him to terminate the vision. While preparing to leave the mountain on which he had performed the invocation, however, Crowley writes that he had the sudden impulse to “sacrifice” himself. He and Neuburg proceeded to build a circle of rocks and erect a stone altar on which the ceremony was performed. Crowley describes the event thus: The fire of the all seeing sun smote down upon the altar, consuming utterly every particle of my personality. I  am obliged to write in hieroglyph of this matter, because it concerns things of which it is unlawful to speak openly under penalty of the most dreadful punishment; but I may say that the essence of the matter was that I had hitherto clung to certain conceptions of conduct which, while perfectly proper from the standpoint of my human nature, were impertinent to initiation. I could not cross the Abyss till I had torn them out of my heart.124

In more prosaic terms, Crowley and Neuburg had anal sex on the stone altar, with Crowley acting as the receptive party.125 Crowley conceptualized this sexual act as a sacrifice to the god Pan, which brought about the obliteration of his ego, a necessary preparation for crossing the Abyss. After the ritual, he describes wandering in the desert with a completely altered sense of self. He records subsequently being able to properly scry the Aethyr, entering the City of the Pyramids as “Nemo” (“No Man”).126 This occurrence illustrates the importance of embodied (sexual) experience to Crowley’s Enochian explorations.

The Scarlet Goddess and the Wine of Her Fornications  55 Whereas no seemingly feminine entities play a role in this part of Crowley’s Enochian explorations, including Babalon or the Scarlet Woman, I would like to draw the reader’s attention to how Crowley, once again, construes erotic destruction—​the shattering of rational, self-​contained subjectivity—​as a spiritual necessity, a process the adept must undergo on the pathway toward union with divinity. Significantly, this transformation is equated with a sexual act of penetration, wherein Crowley acted as the receptive party. Thus, I argue that the above excerpt presents an image of masculinity as erotically destroyed. Given the prevalent scholarly interpretation of the fin-​de-​siècle’s femme fatale trope as representing a perceived threat to masculine, rational subjectivity, this equation of ego dissolution with spiritual attainment sheds further light on Crowley’s fondness for this otherwise pariahlike femininity. His self-​designed sacrifice on the mountain can be read as a willing engagement with the anxiety and horror Margrit Shildrick connects to the dissolution of the stable boundaries of subjectivity in contact with the other. In order to cross the Abyss, Crowley deliberately sought to abandon “separation and autonomous being,” and it is significant that Shildrick connects especially penetrative sex to a breach in “the boundaries of embodied being.”127 Shildrick views the concern with maintaining bounded subjectivity as linked to the reproduction of European bourgeois masculinity. In Waldby’s terms, we may read the stereotypical construction of masculinity as erotic destroyer and femininity as destroyed as part of an investment in maintaining hegemonic masculine-​feminine relations. I  will explore the gendered connotations of Crowley’s Abyss ordeal further in a subsequent section.

Enter the Mother of Abominations: Babalon above the Abyss When entering the 12th Aethyr, Crowley beholds a chariot of white fire, which he identifies with the Chariot card of the Tarot. It is steered by a charioteer in golden armor, who holds a cup that emanates a reddish glow. In the commentary, Crowley writes that this cup represents “the true Sangraal, of which the Christian legend is a perversion.”128 The charioteer speaks: Let him look upon the cup whose blood is mingled therein, for the wine of the cup is the blood of the saints. Glory unto the Scarlet Woman, Babylon the Mother of Abominations, that rideth upon the Beast, for she hath spilt their blood in every corner of the earth, and lo! she hath mingled it in the cup of her whoredom.129

In this excerpt, wine and blood are again associated. Babalon’s cup, identified as the true subject of the Grail mythos, is connected to her whoredom. As

56  The Eloquent Blood mentioned previously, Crowley in the 12th Aethyr still uses the conventional spelling “Babylon.” The above passage draws strongly on Revelation 17:3–​6, in which John witnesses “Babylon The Great, The Mother Of Harlots And Abominations Of The Earth,” who “sit[s]‌upon a scarlet coloured beast” and is “drunken with the blood of the saints.”130 In Vision, the charioteer replaces the angel who indicates the Whore to John in Revelation. In the commentary, Crowley once again relates this part of the vision to Atu XI. There are parallels to Revelation 18, in which the angel states that “all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her.”131 In this part of Crowley’s record, the “Scarlet Woman” is an epithet of Babalon rather than the moniker of a separate being. The charioteer’s continuing monologue diverges from the biblical narrative, hinting at Babalon’s mystical function: With the breath of her kisses hath she fermented it [the blood], and it hath become the wine of the Sacrament, the wine of the Sabbath; and in the Holy Assembly hath she poured it out for her worshippers, and they have become drunken thereon, so that face to face have they beheld my Father. Thus are they made worthy to become partakers of the Mystery of this holy vessel, for the blood is the life. So sitteth she from age to age, and the righteous are never weary of her kisses, and by her murders and fornications she seduceth the world. Therein is manifested the glory of my father, who is truth.132

This excerpt implies that Babalon, by gathering the blood of the saints, enables the aspirants to come face to face with the divine. The text connects ecstasy and suffering (even death) in its description of how the saints’ drained blood is fermented into wine that intoxicates Babalon’s worshippers. Ostensibly, Crowley’s thoughts on the cup and its contents are then relayed within parentheses: (This wine is such that its virtue radiateth through the cup, and I reel under the intoxication of it. And every thought is destroyed by it. It abideth alone, and its name is Compassion. I understand by “Compassion,” the sacrament of suffering, partaken of by the true worshippers of the Highest. And it is an ecstasy in which there is no trace of pain. Its passivity (= passion) is like the giving-​up of the self to the beloved.)133

Bearing in mind the earlier conflation of Babalon’s cup with whoredom, it is significant that Crowley describes this vessel as radiant with virtue, destabilizing the dichotomy of (feminized) sexual immorality and moral righteousness. Once again, it is significant that ecstasy is conceptualized in terms of the erotic destruction of rational subjectivity. The reference to passivity, its equation with

The Scarlet Goddess and the Wine of Her Fornications  57 passion, and its importance for the magical formula of Babalon indicates how the goddess is ascribed aspects of hegemonic Victorian-​Edwardian femininity. However, passivity is here ascribed not only to Babalon but also to the highest initiates of the mysteries. When the charioteer resumes speaking, he continues to explicate the mystical significance of the goddess: This is the Mystery of Babylon, the Mother of abominations, and this is the mystery of her adulteries, for she hath yielded herself up to everything that liveth, and hath become a partaker in its mystery. And because she hath made herself the servant of each, therefore is she become the mistress of all. ... Beautiful art thou, O Babylon, and desirable, for thou hast given thyself to everything that liveth, and thy weakness hath subdued their strength. For in that union thou didst understand. Therefore art thou called Understanding, O Babylon, Lady of the Night!134

This excerpt elaborates on the ostensive dichotomy of servitude and mastery; as Babalon has “made herself the servant of each,” she has, in fact, “become the mistress of all.” This binary is reflected in that of weakness and strength, wherein the former overcomes the latter. By yielding adulterously, without discrimination, to all aspects of creation, Babalon is described as having become privy to its mystery. The fact that this yielding is construed in sexual terms is further evinced by the reference to Babalon as “Lady of the Night,” connoting prostitution.135 As the 12th Aethyr continues, a voice proclaims: O Babylon, Babylon, thou mighty Mother, that ridest upon the crownèd beast, let me be drunken upon the wine of thy fornications; let thy kisses wanton me unto death, that even I, thy cupbearer, may understand.136

The reference to Babalon’s wine recalls Revelation.137 Ecstasy, eroticism, and death are again associated with the notion of femininity as erotic destroyer through the entreaty to the goddess to slay the devotee with her kisses. Crowley subsequently sees Babalon astride the Beast far above him. As the cup continues to glow ever more strongly, he is overcome by the vision; his senses are “smitten with ecstasy.” It is stated that “Babylon the Beautiful, the Mother of abominations ... will not rest from her adulteries until the blood of everything that liveth is gathered therein.”138 The 12th Aethyr introduces Babalon and her cup, which is filled with the blood of the saints who have dared to surrender their individuality in order to unite with her. Through the symbolic conflation of bloody sacrifice, sexual union, and enlightenment, the text deals with the necessity of ego sacrifice, or annihilating the boundaries of self-​contained subjectivity and becoming passive

58  The Eloquent Blood toward the cosmos in order to attain communion with the divine, which is likened to sexual union. Thus, what Waldby refers to as erotic destruction has a central function, with Babalon seemingly playing a dual role as both destroyer and the destroyed who has given herself up to everything. In signifying a form of passivity or receptivity, Crowley’s Babalon encapsulates aspects of hegemonic femininity. However, this modality is construed as desirable for all who wish to traverse the Abyss. Babalon’s adulterous yielding to all of creation—​a formula that must be emulated by those who desire to cross the Abyss and unite with her—​is contrasted with what Crowley calls the “Dark Brotherhood,” who fear oblivion and death and therefore refuse to surrender their selves to Babalon. This brotherhood can be interpreted as those who balk at the prospect of erotic destruction; thus they are morbid caricatures of the ideology of autonomous selfhood and independence characterizing European bourgeois masculinity-​as-​ destroyer.139 Crowley elaborates on this concept in the commentary, identifying the “Dark Brotherhood” with the “Black Brothers of the Left Hand Path.” He writes that the Exempt Adept has the choice of crossing the Abyss and becoming a Magister Templi or building a “False Tower of Egoism” in the void. In the end, the Black Brothers will, however, perish, and Crowley writes in the commentary that the death of the saints is really “increased life,” and that Babylon’s formula entails “constant copulation or samādhi” on everything.140

The Daughter and the Blasphemy: Babalon beyond the City of the Pyramids As will be further explored in the subsequent chapter, the 12th Aethyr is the main source of Crowley’s later writings on Babalon’s mystical significance. However, she appears in several of the subsequent visions. Babalon is mentioned in the record of the 11th Aethyr, in which Crowley again prepares to cross the Abyss, this time consciously, and to fully confront the demon Choronzon. This ordeal is described in the record of the 10th Aethyr, detailed on December 6, 1909, when Crowley and Neuburg journeyed far into the desert, finding a secluded valley in which they traced a protective magical circle in the sand, inscribed with divine names. They subsequently drew a triangle nearby, lined with further holy names as well as that of Choronzon.141 Crowley proceeded to sacrifice three doves at the corners of the triangle, after which Neuburg positioned himself within the circle, armed with a dagger and under oath to attack anything attempting to cross its protective barriers. Crowley’s records of the operation then describe him retiring to “a secret place.”142 Crowley then recited the Call of the Aethyrs, after which Choronzon announced himself within the triangle, and Crowley fell silent. According to the record, Neuburg then beheld a series of manifestations in

The Scarlet Goddess and the Wine of Her Fornications  59 the triangle. Choronzon engaged Neuburg in conversation in order to distract him, while surreptitiously erasing the protective barrier of the circle, and then suddenly launching himself at Neuburg, who forced the demon back into the triangle using the names of God and striking at it with his dagger. Crowley writes that he identified himself astrally with Choronzon throughout the operation, experiencing “each anguish, each rage, each despair, each insane outburst.”143 After the manifestations faded, the record describes how Crowley used his ring to trace the name “Babalon” in the sand, marking the first recorded use of this subsequently canonical spelling. Here, the name appears to serve as a protective incantation against the dispersive force of Choronzon.144 Crowley used a version of gematria to render this spelling, giving the name a numerological correspondence of 156. He explains the numerological significance as pertaining to the number of squares on Dee and Kelley’s Enochian tablets. Crowley writes that these tablets are composed of pyramids, identifying them with the City of the Pyramids.145 Historian and gender studies scholar Alex Owen interprets Choronzon psychoanalytically as the “dark, repressed components of the psyche” or the unconscious. In Owen’s view, successfully undergoing the ordeal of the Abyss—​as explicated by Crowley—​is dependent on “the dominating power of the magical will,” and on the magician being able to “exercise an infinitely clear-​sighted and all-​powerful magical personality,” controlling the boundaries between the conscious and unconscious aspects of the self.146 While Owen’s argumentation is eloquent, I maintain that she misinterprets the implications of Crowley’s engagement with Choronzon by focusing on the importance of will at the expense of surrender. Significantly, the record of the 10th Aethyr describes the evil Choronzon proclaiming “I am I,” seemingly a reference to “I Am That I Am,” the words spoken by God to Moses in the Hebrew Bible.147 Owen notes this parallel, writing that Helena Blavatsky used this statement to reference the “true individuality” of a human being, and that Crowley would have been familiar with this work.148 Crowley would certainly have been familiar with the quote from Exodus, and perhaps with Blavatsky’s interpretation thereof. However, I am unconvinced that Crowley shared Blavatsky’s positive view of the statement, given Crowley’s ascription thereof to the ultimate symbol of evil in his initiatory system. After completing the ordeal, Crowley tellingly writes that “so long as ‘I am I,’ all else must seem hostile.”149 This statement indicates that Crowley viewed Choronzon’s declaration as indicating a wish to maintain individual, bounded subjectivity; an aim that is construed as the essence of the demon’s evil. Illustratively, the demon proclaims that he has shut himself up, recalling Crowley’s conceptualization of the Black Brothers. In contrast to Babalon’s ecstatic surrender of herself to the all, Choronzon describes himself as having “made every living thing my concubine.” As Choronzon “is himself,” perceiving himself as separate, the record states that

60  The Eloquent Blood all of creation is hostile to him: he is burned by the sun and cut by the wind, and his thirst is unquenchable.150 The magical name protecting against Choronzon is not Thelema (“will”), but the feminine Babalon, whom Crowley at this point would have associated with passionate yielding, receptivity, and the erotic destruction of self, rather than cool self-​control. In the narrative of Vision, Choronzon rules over the Abyss that is inhabited by the Black Brotherhood who fear loss of self. The erotic undoing of the adept, equated with both passion and passivity, is construed as the prerequisite for their ability to traverse the horrifying void. I propose that the encounter with Choronzon can thus be read as a disavowal of the bourgeois masculine ego as the foundation for selfhood and a rejection of the struggle, to speak with Judith Butler, to remain intact in the face of the other.151 The masculine Choronzon is constructed as the antithesis of the feminine Babalon, the fragile ego trying to avoid being passionately undone through union with the eroticized, feminine other. Thus, in contrast to Owen, I do not interpret the record of the 10th Aethyr as an exaltation of the stereotypically masculine modalities of willpower and utter control, but rather as an engagement with erotic destruction as soteriology. Babalon plays a central role in the 9th Aethyr. Crowley is greeted by the emissary of an army, who salutes him as “he whose blood hath been gathered into the cup of BABALON.” Crowley is led to a palace built out of jewels and beset with moons, which turns out to be the body of a young girl, unimaginably beautiful and delicate, her naked body covered in fine gold hairs, her long hair being “the very light of God himself.” “Of all the glories beheld by the seer in the Aethyrs,” Crowley says, “there is not one which is worthy to be compared with her littlest finger-​nail.” Crowley is told that this girl is:  “the daughter of BABALON the Beautiful, that she hath borne unto the Father of All ... the Daughter of the King. This is the Virgin of Eternity ... she that is set upon the Throne of Understanding.”152 In the commentary, Crowley relates the vision to “the Woman clothed with the Sun in Atu XIV.” This is a Tarot reference: the fourteenth card is conventionally called Art, or Temperance, and usually shows a young woman or angel pouring a liquid from one cup into another. However, the comment is seemingly also a reference to Revelation 12:1’s “woman clothed with the sun.”153 Babalon is mentioned in the 8th Aethyr,154 and her name appears in the commentary to the 7th Aethyr as the likely candidate for a secret word of seven letters.155 Moreover, in the 7th Aethyr, Crowley beholds a woman “like the woman in the Apocalypse” who possesses almost unbearable “beauty and radiance.”156 This could either be a reference to Babalon or to the woman clothed with the sun. However, it seems reasonable to infer that the woman is linked to Babalon, as it is said that she exists so “that first the Wisdom may be joined with the Understanding.” The record continues to say that she “transmitteth the Word to

The Scarlet Goddess and the Wine of Her Fornications  61 the Understanding, and therefore hath she many forms, and each goddess of love is but a letter of the alphabet of love.”157 Crowley describes encountering a brilliantly blue peacock, whose head is a woman’s. He sees “little lonely souls” running about at her feet, and in the footnotes he equates them with the Black Brothers. They are described as having “grasped love and clung thereto ... they that have shut themselves up in fortresses of Love.” Thus, the Black Brothers are again associated with the striving to “stay intact” and avoid undoing.158 The woman-​peacock is equated with Shakti.159 Near the end of the vision, she returns astride a dolphin, and Crowley once again sees the lonely souls who have not understood that “[t]‌he word of Sin is Restriction.” A voice sounds, declaring that these souls have shut themselves up, even though they have given their blood to Babalon, and that they are the Black Brothers.160 In the 6th Aethyr, Crowley hears a voice, which cries: Cursed be he that shall uncover the nakedness of the Most High, for he is drunken upon the wine that is the blood of the adepts. And BABALON hath lulled him to sleep upon her breast, and she hath fled away, and left him naked, and she hath called her children together, saying: “Come up with me, and let us make a mock of the nakedness of the Most High.”161

The story continues by saying that there are three adepts: one white, who covers the shame of the divine with a cloth before walking backward; one yellow, who covers the divine as well before walking sideways; and one black, who makes a mockery of the nakedness of God.162 Babalon is mentioned in the commentary to the 5th Aethyr, where Crowley writes that Baphomet is Babalon after “a certain Mystery.” This passage is ambiguous, suggesting a more flexible gender identity to Babalon than previously indicated by the text. She is mentioned again in the record of the 5th Aethyr proper, where a voice tells Crowley: “For as thy blood is mingled in the cup of BABALON, so is thine heart the universal heart.”163 Babalon is also referenced in the 3rd Aethyr, in which she is described as the concubine of Chaos, who has “made him drunk upon the blood of the saints that she hath gathered in her golden cup,” and onto whom Chaos “hath . . . begotten the virgin that now he doth deflower.”164 Her name appears again later in the vision, where it is stated: Moreover, there is Mary, a blasphemy against BABALON, for she hath shut herself up; and therefore is she the Queen of all those wicked devils that walk upon the earth.165

The preceding comment posits an antagonistic dichotomy between the Virgin Mary and Babalon, seemingly inverting the conventional virgin–​whore trope.

62  The Eloquent Blood Mary is seen as the negative antithesis to Babalon, as she has “shut herself up,” in contrast to Babalon’s adulterous yielding to the mysteries of the universe. It is illustrative that Mary, like Choronzon, is described as having deliberately cloistered herself, and that this is the reason for her evil. Thus, the binary of Mary–​ Babalon is an opposition not solely between hegemonic and pariah femininity but also between the striving to police the boundaries of self-​contained subjectivity and the willing engagement with its erotic destruction. In the commentary, Crowley writes that Mary “seeks to resist Change, which is Life,” and “refuses the Formula, ‘love under will.’ ”166 Similar to Choronzon, Mary is described as one who balks at the prospect of ego annihilation in passionate union with the other. These statements suggest that Mary, in Crowley’s view, represents a spiritual formula anathema to that of Babalon, shutting herself up rather than engaging, as the latter does, in constant “copulation . . . on everything.” This passage and Crowley’s comment thereon echoes AL III:55: “Let Mary inviolate be torn upon wheels: for her sake let all chaste women be utterly despised among you!” The record of the 5th Aethyr continues to state that Babalon is “under the power of the Magician, that she hath submitted herself unto the work; and she guardeth the Abyss.”167 While this statement suggests that her importance is ultimately subordinate to that of the magician, who will gain access to divinity through her before transcending her, it may indicate that Babalon—​connected to the degree of Magister Templi—​is situated below the grade of Magus in the initiatory hierarchy. In Babalon, it is said, “is a perfect purity of that which is above; yet she is sent as a Redeemer to them that are below. For there is no other way into the Supernal Mystery but through her, and the Beast.”168 In this description, Babalon appears as a soteriological figure—​the sole gateway to the divine. Interestingly, she is ascribed an active role as redeemer and rider of the Beast. Later in the 3rd Aethyr, Crowley receives a series of violent and terrifying visions, seemingly linked to the illusion of dualism. He beholds the demoness Lilith, appearing as “a black monkey crawling with filth,” covered in open wounds, rotten slime, and eaten by worms.169 In the commentary, however, Crowley writes that this manifestation of Lilith is actually a warped vision of Babalon. In the vision, Crowley is saved by a black triangle, apex pointing upward, which causes Lilith to vanish and be replaced by a golden-​haired, green-​ girdled maiden. Crowley writes in the commentary that the black triangle is the seal of Binah, which destroys the image of Lilith and reveals her in her true form as a corporeal avatar of Babalon, reminiscent of the woman of the 9th Aethyr.170 Babalon is described later in the Aethyr as a “fortress against the iniquity of the Abyss,” once again supporting the impression that the feminized modality of yielding or receptivity, rather than that of omnipotent willpower and self-​ control, is the soteriological goal.171

The Scarlet Goddess and the Wine of Her Fornications  63

Enthroned in Eternity: Babalon in the 2nd Aethyr The 2nd Aethyr centers on Babalon; however, as will be discussed in the subsequent chapter, it appears to have been less important than the 12th Aethyr as a source of inspiration for Crowley’s later writings on the subject. Upon entering, Crowley once again beholds a woman astride a bull, as seen in the 16th Aethyr. This time, he asserts that the woman reflects Babalon.172 In the record of the Aethyr, Crowley discusses Revelation, reasoning that it is likely made up out of numerous unrelated allegorical narratives, pieced together and fashioned into an account that supported the interests of early Christianity.173 Crowley witnesses a beautiful woman, and in the commentary he speculates that she may be one of his previous Scarlet Women.174 However, remaining in the Aethyr proves laborious; after confronting Choronzon and fully crossing the Abyss, Crowley reports the visions becoming increasingly mysterious, claiming that he is progressively more exerted by each Aire, describing “a sense of obstacle.”175 In the commentary, Crowley writes that this exhaustion was due to him not possessing the requisite initiatory level to fully comprehend the topmost Aethyrs at the time, writing: “Only a Magus can truly pierce the Veil of BABALON. ... [T]‌o lift it and look upon Her is one thing; to possess Her another!”176 Thus, Crowley suggests that he—​not yet having attained the necessary grade to be able to fully understand the Aethyr—​was unfit to be Babalon’s equal. Crowley subsequently takes a break, recuperating in some sulphurous hot springs.177 When returning to the vision, he sees a black pyramid. In the commentary, he associates black with Binah, and writes that the pyramid represents “the Phallus, for She is also androgyne.” He correlates the pyramid with the City of the Pyramids.178 Crowley is subsequently addressed by the storm-​god Typhon, who cries: Despair! Despair! For thou mayest deceive the Virgin, and thou mayest cajole the Mother; but what wilt thou say unto the ancient Whore that is throned in Eternity? For if she will not, there is neither force nor cunning, nor any wit, that may prevail upon her.179

The thundering voice continues that the seeker cannot hope to woo Babalon with love, gold, knowledge, or wit as she is already love, and the “kings and captains of the earth” have already showered her with gold: “[K]‌nowledge is the thing she hath spurned . . . and her Lord is Wit.”180 Neither can the seer ask her for pity, love, or understanding nor win her with the sword, as her eyes are fixed on the highest.181 In the commentary, Crowley once again asserts that although a Magister Templi can lift the veil of Babalon and see her, it is beyond his ability to “meet Her as an equal, and possess Her.”182 This notion that the mystery of

64  The Eloquent Blood Babalon is unveiled in several stages highlights the complex linearity of Crowley’s visions as detailed in Vision, which is connected to the hierarchical cosmology of the Enochian system. The excerpt also presents a triad of femininities, similar to the cluster of roles Irigaray writes that phallocentric culture offers women. In Irigaray’s rendering, all three roles are in different ways related to the exchange between men.183 In Crowley’s recorded vision, however, the figure of the “ancient Whore” appears rather to represent an image of (divine) femininity that is sufficient and sovereign in itself, which cannot be swayed or claimed by the seer Crowley, who can only hope to “meet Her as an equal, and possess Her” after attaining the requisite degree. Similarly, the whore is in some sense construed as transgressing hegemonic masculine-​feminine relationships by being impervious to the charms and riches of kings and captains, as she is seated above them all. Nearing the end of the 2nd Aethyr, Babalon speaks through one of her ministers, singing a siren song. The lyrics of this song bear strong traces of Romantic influence, beginning:  “Silence! the moon ceaseth (her motion).” The goddess continues to serenade the seer, the imagery of her words evoking themes of the natural, nocturnal world. She sings: “I dance in the night, naked upon the grass, in shadowy places, by running streams.”184 She describes how she has trod the earth as a nature nymph: Many are they who have loved the nymphs of the woods, and of the wells, and of the foundations, and of the hills. ... For it was not a nymph, but I myself that walked upon the earth taking my pleasure. So also there were many images of Pan, and men adored them, and as a beautiful god he made their olives bear double and their vines increase; but some were slain by the god, for it was I that had woven the garlands about him.185

This excerpt conflates Babalon and Pan, described as a gentle woodland god who represents the splendor of nature, in terms reminiscent of the Romantic poets.186 In the commentary, Crowley writes that Babalon appears to be the feminine or androgynous equivalent of Pan, “not merely [his] complement.”187 The significance of this statement is unclear, and it does not appear to have been a major theme in Crowley’s later interpretations of Babalon. The goddess proceeds to sing, a sweet song containing “all things that lure men to the unattainable,” embodying “the passionate ache of the moonlight, and the great hunger of the sea, and the terror of desolate places.”188 The verbal imagery becomes more violent: I am the harlot that shaketh Death. /​This shaking giveth the Peace of Satiate Lust. /​Immortality jetteth from my skull, /​And music from my vulva. /​ Immortality jetteth from my vulva also, /​For my Whoredom is a sweet scent

The Scarlet Goddess and the Wine of Her Fornications  65 like a seven-​stringed instrument, /​Played unto God the Invisible, the all-​ruler, /​ That goeth along giving the shrill scream of orgasm.189

Once again, this song recalls the theme of salvation through transgressive sexuality. This time, Babalon offers immortality—​ presumably in the form of nonindividuated union with divinity as the all—​through her whoredom, representing her mastery of the formula of passionate surrender and union with all of existence. Notably, this excerpt indicates a view of female reproductive anatomy not as lack but as the source of infinite life. The description of the 2nd Aethyr continues to draw on a great deal of nature romanticism, and Babalon describes how she appears, as follows: [I]‌n the coals of the fire, and upon the smooth white skin of woman, and in the constancy of the waterfall, and in the emptiness of deserts and marshes, and upon great cliffs that look seaward; and in many strange places, where men seek me not.190

Describing the angel of the 2nd Aethyr as representing “all seductive and deadly things,” Crowley writes in the commentary that Babalon signifies that which disturbs the divine equilibrium of “Existence in perfect Peace,” causing the necessary change without which nothing can exist.191 The notion of Babalon as related to the forces of change is, as seen in the preceding discussion, echoed in the “New Comment” to Liber AL. Although Crowley emphasizes that he struggles greatly with the 2nd Aethyr, he nonetheless appears to see it as highly important, describing it in the commentary as “quite apart from, and beyond, almost anything else in the experience of the Seer.” He continues: “The memory of it diminishes the value of the rest of His life, with few excepted incidents, almost to nothing.”192 The veil of the 1st Aethyr is an azure night sky, filled with stars. In its center burns a winged, solar globe. Beyond the veil is a small child covered in flowers and bearing the sign of the Beast. While the vision is fragmentary, its similarity to the conclusion of Revelation is striking.193

Erotic Destruction and Pariah Femininities: Blood, Receptivity, and Reframed Whoredom Gender difference as articulated in the Victorian-​Edwardian ideal of complementarity was framed within an ideology of reproductive, marital monogamy, with the heterosexual family unit construed as the foundation of bourgeois society and threatened by promiscuity, prostitution, and nonreproductive

66  The Eloquent Blood sexuality. Beyond the hegemonic, hierarchical complementarity of active and rational masculinity and nurturing, emotional, and domestic femininity lurked the specter of the sexually assertive and public woman, the femme fatale who threatened masculine rationality and wellbeing through her unbridled sensuality. The concept of pariah femininities is illustrative in highlighting the feelings of moral outrage seemingly provoked by the femme fatale, who embodied traits conventionally attributed to a hegemonic masculinity. Representing independence, dominance, and assertive sexual desire, the femme fatale represented the pollution of unruly femininity, which threatened the stability of the gender order. Optimistic cultural narratives of assertive feminine sexuality were, as previously discussed, mostly lacking in the nineteenth century, including within the women’s movement. Feminists who stressed female sexual pleasure mostly advocated for marital monogamy, which was a far cry from Crowley’s contempt for the nuclear family and glorification of promiscuity. One reason for Crowley’s engagement with the femme fatale trope may thus be that it, ironically, presented one of few pervasive images of the desiring feminine subject in fin-​de-​siècle culture, albeit usually viewed through a misogynist lens. However, Crowley’s Babalon was not simply a replication of dominant concepts of pariah femininity, although his early lyrical writings on the femme fatale retain the notion of the unruly, desiring feminine threat to masculine sanity. In Vision, this idea is completely framed in mystical terms as part of the doctrine of the crossing of the Abyss. Vision is the source of the mystical doctrines surrounding Babalon. The 12th Aethyr presents a complex reworking of the Whore of Babylon from Revelation: while drawing closely on the language and phrasings of the biblical narrative, Babalon’s significance in Vision is utterly different from that of her Apocalypse prototype. Whereas the Mother of Abominations meets a violent end in Revelation, Babalon in Vision is praised and eulogized. The text presents a vivid confluence of themes hinted at in Crowley’s earlier works: exalted pariah femininity, the interconnection of love and death, the association of blood and wine, and the link between undoing and sexuality through erotic destruction. The narrative of Vision brings some of these themes to a head, suggesting an initiatory journey in which the threat posited by the feminized other is passionately embraced, and the promise of ego dissolution through erotic desire discussed by Waldby, Shildrick, and Butler is not abjected but claimed. Vision articulates Babalon as a feminine entity linked to the spiritual modalities of passivity or receptivity, which are feminized and sexualized by being conceived as harlotry. To some extent, Babalon appears as the opposite and concubine of the active Beast.194 A possible reading of Babalon is as one half of a complementary gender polarity; the record of a male seeker’s union with a female goddess constructs heterosexual polarity as a meaningful concept.

The Scarlet Goddess and the Wine of Her Fornications  67 However, Babalon in the text does not simply relate to masculinity through lack or absence, nor is her femininity reducible to subordination. She is not consistently portrayed as passive, but repeatedly calls the seeker upward, manifesting on earth to take her pleasure with the natural world. Multiple femininities are articulated within the text, some of whose spiritual properties are symbolized in sexual terms. As a whore and adulteress, Babalon is upheld as an ideal in contrast to the roles of virgin and mother. Although distinction between femininities along sexual lines could be seen as stereotypical, the boundaries between these figures are blurred in that Babalon is also construed as a mother whose daughter is described as a virgin. While Crowley’s rereading of whoredom as indexical of virtue is, in my view, related to his social critique of Victorian-​Edwardian sexual norms, the text interprets whoredom as a multilayered concept, linked but not reducible to sexuality. In the text, the concepts of whoredom, fornication, and adulteries are interpreted as holding significance beyond sexual practice; in regard to Babalon, they indicate yielding and receptivity. Babalon’s adulteries and fornications do not signify moral deficiency. On the contrary, they are synonymous with her sacredness. This mode of being, necessary for surviving the Abyss, is contrasted with the Virgin’s restrictiveness, a modality ascribed to the Black Brothers who fear draining their blood into Babalon’s cup. The narrative around this process, couched in erotic terms, links ecstasy and annihilation. Babalon is construed as the antithesis of Choronzon, who, like the Virgin Mary, has shut himself up. I  have argued that Choronzon can be read as Crowley’s morbid caricature of the bourgeois masculine ego, revolting against the dissolving threat of the erotic other, symbolized by the pariah femininity of the divine whore. Crowley’s early poetry foreshadows this theme of individuality lost and numinous experience won through the erasure of boundaries between self and other. However, the femmes fatales of these early poems are more ambivalently portrayed than Babalon, indicating a stronger tie to the Decadents’ own mixed feelings toward these female characters and fin-​de-​siècle fears of the erotic destruction of the rational masculine ego at the behest of pariah femininity. In Vision, this process is wholly embraced. I suggest that Babalon plays a sort of dual role in Vision. As encapsulated in the entreaty to her in the 12th Aethyr to slay her devotee with her kisses, she is conceptualized as the feminized other, in union with whom individual selfhood is tenderly annihilated. Through Babalon, the text presents an image of femininity as erotic destroyer, corresponding with the image of a masculinity desirous of destruction. However, Babalon and femininity also signify that which is erotically destroyed. By subjecting herself to the universe without discrimination, Babalon is described as having become privy to the mysteries of the all. In this sense, Babalon is not only conceptualized in terms recalling fin-​de-​siècle pariah

68  The Eloquent Blood femininity but also contains characteristics linked to hegemonic femininity, such as submissiveness and receptivity. However, her feminine receptivity is not primarily conceived in opposition to active masculinity but rather as an ideal that must be emulated by the seeker. The pervasive association of femininity with vulnerability or receptivity, hinted at in Vision, has been critiqued from feminist perspectives. As noted in ­chapter 2, however, scholars within queer paradigms have challenged the association of receptivity and passivity with (feminized) humiliation, vulnerability to attack, and the shame of losing face. Ann Cvetkovich stresses passivity as distinct from receptivity, contending that the latter does not imply object status but rather responsivity, presence, and awareness in the world. Similarly, Babalon’s receptivity as emphasized in Vision does not simplistically relegate her to the position of object; in contrast, her openness and surrender is stressed as voluntarily chosen and aimed at partaking of the universal mysteries. Parallels can be drawn between Crowley’s characterization of Babalon and Cvetkovich’s description of the femme modality as one of “active receptivity,” desire for “power received and transformed,” and the “capacity to embrace the world.”195 Unlike Choronzon and Mary, Babalon embraces erotic undoing in union with the other, making her receptivity one of labor and power rather than nonagency. The willing yielding to existence ascribed to Babalon recalls Dahl’s assertion of vulnerability as “an openness in and to the world.”196 Similar to Dahl and Cvetkovich, Judith Butler’s work on vulnerability and undoing challenges the equation of receptivity or vulnerability with lack of agency, instead emphasizing these modalities as characterized by relationality, responsiveness, and openness to the world. Butler stresses vulnerability not as something that should be escaped but as an inevitable and fundamentally human aspect of existence: We’re undone by each other. And if we’re not, we’re missing something. . . . One does not always stay intact. It may be that one wants to, or does, but it may also be that despite one’s best efforts, one is undone, in the face of the other, by the touch, by the scent, by the feel, by the prospect of the touch, by the memory of the feel. And so when we speak about my sexuality or my gender, as we do (and as we must) we mean something complicated by it. Neither of these is precisely a possession, but both are to be understood as modes of being dispossessed, ways of being for another or, indeed, by virtue of another.197

Butler thus construes undoing as an inevitable property of social existence, drawing attention to how the relational nature of concepts such as gender and sexuality always entails the contingency of subjectivity. Tellingly, Butler links this argument to the concept of ecstasy as referring to the state of being “outside oneself,” whether with grief or desire.198 Significant parallels can be drawn

The Scarlet Goddess and the Wine of Her Fornications  69 to Crowley’s articulation of Babalon, who can be said to represent the culmination of his previous engagement with themes of erotic undoing. Babalon’s receptivity can thus be read as signifying the difficulty of openness and relationality in the face of the other. Crowley’s attribution of Babalon’s mystical formula as one that the seeker must emulate in order to cross the Abyss can consequently be interpreted as a disavowal, to speak with Catherine Waldby, of the tendency to project erotic destruction onto femininity, instead embracing the “tender violence” of dissolution.199 As noted previously, the construction of the individual soul as feminine in relation to the divine is not unique to Crowley’s writings but appears as a recurrent theme in a plethora of religious traditions. A prominent example is the reception of the “Song of Songs,” derived from the Hebrew Bible, which presents a passionate dialogue between two opposite-​sex lovers. Cistercian monk and mystic St. Bernard de Clairvaux (1090–​1153) interpreted the “Song” as a depiction of the relationship between God and the individual soul, with the latter conceptualized as feminine.200 Clearly, a construction of the soul as feminine in relation to divinity does not in itself support nonhegemonic constructions of femininity; on the contrary, it is significant that femininity is—​in these cases—​articulated as subservient and submissive to masculinity. However, I propose that Vision differs from this tradition by situating femininity not only as indexical of that which surrenders but also as the feminine other that the spiritual seeker must surrender to. The narrative’s feminized seeker does not strive to approach a masculinized divine but a goddess. Although the text focuses strongly on Babalon as indexical of a modality of receptivity, Vision also indicates what, to speak with Waldby, may be seen as a more “phallic” Babalon, a femininity-​as-​destroyer who moves actively through the world and has the ability to effect the erotic undoing of the seeker. As will be discussed in the subsequent chapter, Crowley further emphasized this aspect of Babalon especially in some of his private magical records. Furthermore, if Babalon represents the modality required of the individual seeker, it is relevant that soteriology is construed as identification with a pariahlike femininity. Crowley would later repeatedly construct his own identity in feminized terms of whoredom, and his act of receptive self-​sacrifice to Neuburg on the mountain in Algeria suggests the importance of queerly masculine desire for erotic destruction in Crowley’s sexual and magical explorations. Babalon’s idealized femininity—​representing femininity both as destroyer and destroyed, indicating the simultaneous threat and promise of undoing—​is construed as an ideal to which Crowley must aspire, thus positing femininity as a positionality not limited to women. In 1909 Crowley recorded his first visions of the goddess Babalon, who from this point on became an aspect of his magical worldview. The same year, Crowley appears to have more fully accepted the message of Liber AL, which introduced

70  The Eloquent Blood the figure of the Scarlet Woman as the consort and female counterpart of the Beast. Until now, I  have analyzed some of Crowley’s writings not directly related to Babalon or the Scarlet Woman, as these figures had not fully emerged in Crowley’s writing yet but are clearly foreshadowed by similar themes of transgressive femininities otherwise named. From 1909 onward, my analysis of Crowley’s writings will have a narrower focus, as Crowley then began trying to synthesize these themes, as expressed vividly in the cosmology of Vision, making sense of his experiences and fashioning them into a coherent system that could be relayed and taught to others.

Notes 1. See Aleister Crowley, “The Commentary Called D(jeridensis) Provisionally by 666,” Yorke OS16, Warburg. Quotations from the “Old Comment” are derived from Aleister Crowley, “Liber Legis. The Comment,” The Equinox I, no. 7 (1912):  387–​ 400. Quotations from the new and Djeridensis comments are drawn from Aleister Crowley, The Magical and Philosophical Commentaries on The Book of the Law, ed. John Symonds and Kenneth Grant (Montreal: 93 Publishing, 1974). Crowley was unhappy with both the old and new comments; see Crowley, Confessions, 675; Aleister Crowley, “The Cephaloedium Working,” 1920–​1921, Yorke OSA1, Warburg. In Tunis in 1925, Crowley wrote a short comment that appears at the end of most editions of Liber AL, which warns the reader against discussing the contents of the work. 2. Michel Foucault, The History of Sexuality, vol. 1 (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1990). 3. Urban, Magia; Pia Laskar, Ett bidrag till heterosexualitetens historia: kön, sexualitet och njutningsnormer i sexhandböcker 1800–​1920 (Stockholm: Modernista, 2005). 4. Laskar, Bidrag. 5. See, e.g., Lucy Bland, “Heterosexuality, Feminism and The Freewoman Journal in Early Twentieth-​Century England,” Women’s History Review 4, no. 1 (1995): 5–​23; Ellen Carol DuBois and Linda Gordon, “Seeking Ecstasy on the Battlefield: Danger and Pleasure in Nineteenth-​Century Feminist Sexual Thought,” in Pleasure and Danger: Exploring Female Sexuality, ed. Carole S. Vance (London: Pandora Press, 1992), 31–​49; Owen, Place, 93–​98. Many of these women were Spiritualists and/​ or occultists. Sex-​radical arguments and women’s rights advocacy also intersected in the fin-​de-​siècle libertarian socialist movement in the United States. See, e.g., Marsha Silberman, “The Perfect Storm:  Late Nineteenth-​Century Chicago Sex Radicals:  Moses Harman, Ida Craddock, Alice Stockham, and the Comstock Obscenity Laws,” Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society 102, no. 3/​ 4 (2009):  324–​367. A  shift occurred in the first decades of the twentieth century. Whereas social purity feminists had opposed contraceptives, fearing that they would give men greater excuse to demand sex from unwilling wives, a new generation of feminists argued that women should not have to abstain from sex to achieve reproductive control.

The Scarlet Goddess and the Wine of Her Fornications  71 6. Judith R. Walkowitz, “Male Vice and Feminist Virtue: Feminism and the Politics of Prostitution in Nineteenth-​Century Britain,” History Workshop 13 (1982):  79–​93; DuBois and Gordon, “Seeking Ecstasy.” 7. Karin Johannisson, Den mörka kontinenten. Kvinnan, medicinen och fin-​de-​siècle (Stockholm: Norstedts, 2005), 14–​15, 18. 8. Bram Dijkstra, Idols of Perversity: Fantasies of Feminine Evil in Fin-​de-​Siècle Culture (New York: Oxford University Press, 1986). A prominent example is Leonardo da Vinci’s La Gioconda (more commonly known as Mona Lisa), which several writers of the time read through the lens of the femme fatale. Notably, the protagonist of Expressionist writer Georg Heym’s (1887–​1912) short story “Der Dieb” (“The Thief,” 1911) sees the Mona Lisa as a paradigmatic icon of feminine evil, connecting her to the Whore of Babylon. Per Faxneld, “Mona Lisa’s Mysterious Smile: The Artist Initiate in Esoteric New Religions,” Nova Religio: The Journal of Alternative and Emergent Religions 19, no. 4 (2016): 14–​32. 9. The misogynist aspects of this connection were clearly perceived during this time, as evinced by Elizabeth Cady Stanton’s comments on Babylon in The Woman’s Bible (1895). Elizabeth Cady Stanton, The Woman’s Bible: The Original Feminist Attack on the Bible (Edinburgh: Polygon, 1985), 185. 10. Andrew P. Scheil, “Babylon and Anglo-​Saxon England,” Studies in the Literary Imagination 36 (2003):  37–​58. However, the construction of Babylon is complex, and ancient Chaldea has also been associated with learning. Cf. Ola Wikander, De kaldeiska oraklen (Malmö: Sitra Ahra, 2008). 11. Herodotus, The Histories, trans. George Rawlinson (Ware, Hertfordshire: Wordsworth Editions, 1996), 89–​90 [1.199]. 12. Zainab Bahrani, Women of Babylon:  Gender and Representation in Mesopotamia (London; New  York:  Routledge, 2001). The idea of ancient sacred prostitution is challenged in Stephanie Budin, The Myth of Sacred Prostitution in Antiquity (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2010). 13. James George Frazer, The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion, vol. 3, 2nd ed. (London: MacMillan, 1900), 162–​196. 14. Hanson, “Oscar Wilde”; “scarlet, n.  and adj.,” OED Online, June 2017, Oxford University Press, http://​www.oed.com/​view/​Entry/​172079?rskey=pRZ0Bg&result= 1&isAdvanced=false. 15. James Harding, Babylon and the Brethren:  The Use and Influence of the Whore of Babylon Motif in the Christian Brethren Movement, 1829–​1900 (Eugene:  Wipf & Stock, 2015). 16. Alexander Hislop, The Two Babylons of the Papal Worship Proved to Be the Worship of Nimrod and His Wife (London: n.p., 1916), 1–​3. The association of Catholicism with pagan corruption can be traced to the Reformation. Hanegraaff, Esotericism and the Academy, 77–​152. Some nineteenth-​century esotericists—​affirming pagan religiosity—​embraced this supposed connection. See, e.g., Georges Le Clément de Saint-​Marcq, L’Eucharistie:  Etude Historique (privately printed, 1906), English translation provided in Theodor Reuss and Aleister Crowley, O.T.O. Rituals and Sex Magick, ed. A.R. Naylor, 425–​439 (n.p.: I-​H-​O Books, 1999); Theodor Reuss, “Das

72  The Eloquent Blood Wahre Geheimis Der Freimaurerei Und Das Mysterium Der Hl. Messe,” in Der Grosse Theodor-​Reuss-​Reader, ed. Peter R. König (München: Arbeitsgemeinschaft für Religions-​und Weltanschauungsfragen, 1997), 240–​242. 17. Hislop, Babylons, 3. 18. Ibid., 3–​4, 110. 19. Bahrani, Women, 176. 20. Owen, Place; Dixon, Divine; Kraft, Sex. 21. E.g., George Robb, “Eugenics, Spirituality, and Sex Differentiation in Edwardian England:  The Case of Frances Swiney,” Journal of Women’s History 10, no. 3 (1998): 97–​117; Joy Dixon, “Sexology and the Occult: Sexuality and Subjectivity in Theosophy’s New Age,” Journal of the History of Sexuality 7, no. 3 (1997): 409–​433; Dixon, Divine; Owen, Place; Kraft, Sex. 22. Ida Craddock, Heavenly Bridegrooms, ed. Theodor Schroeder (New York: privately printed, 1918); Paschal Beverly Randolph, Eulis! The History of Love: Its Wondrous Magic, Chemistry, Rules, Laws, Modes, Moods and Rationale; Being the Third Revelation of Soul and Sex (Toledo, OH:  Randolph, 1874). See also Urban, Magia Sexualis. 23. Crowley, Confessions, 44. 24. Ibid., 67. 25. There are numerous other parallels. The term “Book of the Law” recurs in the KJV, principally in reference to Mosaic law. See, e.g., Deut. 29:21; 30:10; 31:26; Josh. 1:8; 8:31, 34; 23:6; 24:26; 2 Kings 14:6; 22:8, 11. Ra-​Hoor-​Khuit, the speaker of the third chapter of AL, is presented in terms reminiscent of Revelation’s descriptions of the second coming of Christ; see Rev. 19:11–​22 [KJV]. See also AL I:36, 54; II:54; and Rev. 22:18–​19; AL II:57; and Rev. 22:11; AL I:51 and Rev. 21:10–​21; AL I:55 and Gen. 15:4; and AL III:19 and Matt. 24:15. Thanks are extended to Fredrik Gregorius for sharing his notes on the parallels between AL and the KJV. 26. The book was popular among the Plymouth Brethren and read by Crowley. Aleister Crowley, Crowley on Christ (London: Daniel, 1974), 29. 27. Crowley may also have been inspired by Frazer’s Golden Bough in his treatment of Semiramis. See Frazer, Golden Bough, 1900, 161–​168, 195. 28. Crowley, Confessions, 142–​148. 29. Johan Nilsson, “Den scharlakansröda gudinnan: Aleister Crowley—​dekadensen och den hotfulla kvinnligheten,” Lyrikvännen 56, no. 4 (2009):  105–​112; Owen, Place, 190, 213. The erotic poetry collection White Stains (1898), which had to be published anonymously abroad due to its salacious content, incorporates prominent Decadent themes. Aleister Crowley, White Stains, ed. John Symonds (London:  Duckworth, 1973); Kaczynski, Perdurabo, 49. 30. Cf. Per Faxneld, Satanic Feminism: Lucifer as the Liberator of Woman in Nineteenth-​ Century Culture (Stockholm: Molin & Sorgenfrei, 2014). 31. Crowley, Confessions, 409. Jezebel also appears in the poem “Sonnet for Gerald Kelly’s drawing of Jezebel.” Crowley gave one of his daughters the middle-​name Jezebel. Crowley, Confessions, 409.

The Scarlet Goddess and the Wine of Her Fornications  73 32. 1 Kings 16:29–​34 [KJV]. For a discussion of Jezebel in fin-​de-​siècle art, see, e.g., Dijkstra, Idols. 33. Aleister Crowley, “Jezebel,” in Aleister Crowley, The Collected Works of Aleister Crowley, Vol. 1 (Des Plaines, IL: Yogi Publication Society, 1974), 130. 34. See Rev. 17:1–​5 [KJV]. 35. Crowley, “Jezebel,” 130. 36. Ibid., 131. 37. Ibid. An alternate interpretation is that the prophet only fantasizes about their union. 38. Crowley, “Jezebel,” 131. 39. Ibid., 132. 40. Ibid. 41. Artistic examples include Symbolist painter Gustave Moreau’s Salomé (1876) and L’Apparition (1874–​ 1876) and Henri Regnault’s Salome (1870). In Joris-​ Karl Huysmans’s Decadent classic À Rébours (1884), the protagonist admires Moreau’s rendition. Joris-​Karl Huysmans, Against the Grain, trans. John Howard (New York: Lieber & Lewis, 1922), 94–​95. 42. Flavius Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews (Book XVIII, c­ hapter 5.4), trans. William Whiston, http://​www.gutenberg.org/​ebooks/​2848 (accessed October 15, 2017). 43. Mark 6:21–​28; Matt. 14:6–​11 [KJV]. 44. Oscar Wilde, Salome: A Tragedy in One Act, Translated from the French by Lord Alfred Douglas and Illustrated by Aubrey Beardsley (London: Limited Editions Club, 1938). 45. Crowley, Confessions, 147. 46. See, e.g., Dijkstra, Idols; Nilsson, “Scharlakansröda.” 47. See, e.g., Aleister Crowley, “Tannhäuser. A Story of All Time,” in Aleister Crowley, The Collected Works of Aleister Crowley, Vol. 1 (Des Plaines, Ill.: Yogi Publication Society, 1974), 222–​264; Aleister Crowley, “A Saint’s Damnation,” in Aleister Crowley, The Collected Works of Aleister Crowley. Vol II (Des Plaines, Ill.: Yogi Publication Society, 1974), 132–​133; Aleister Crowley, “Ahab,” in Aleister Crowley, The Collected Works of Aleister Crowley. Vol II (Des Plaines, IL: Yogi Publication Society, 1974), 121–​127. 48. AL I:40, 57. 49. Crowley, Magical and Philosophical, 129. In the “New Comment,” Crowley writes of this maxim: “[I]‌t seems to imply a theory that if every man and every woman did his and her will—​the true Will—​there would be no clashing. ‘Every man and every woman is a star,’ and each star moves in an appointed path without interference. . . . From these considerations it should be clear that ‘Do what thou wilt’ does not mean ‘Do what you like.’ It is the apotheosis of Freedom; but it is also the strictest possible bond.” Crowley, Magical and Philosophical, 130. Crowley’s account of the events leading up to, and including, the reception of Liber Legis is published in Crowley, The Equinox of the Gods. 50. Crowley, Magical and Philosophical, 130–​131. 51. Ibid., 159. 52. The passive half of Heru-​Ra-​Ha is identified as Hoor-​paar-​kraat. In the first chapter of Liber AL, Aiwass presents himself as “the minister of Hoor-​paar-​kraat.” AL I:7.

74  The Eloquent Blood 53. AL I:15. 54. Crowley, Magical and Philosophical, 102–​103. 55. AL III:14. 56. AL III:43–​45. The supposed speaker of the third chapter is Ra-​Hoor-​Khuit, rather than Crowley himself. 57. AL III:55. 58. In this tradition, Satan’s rebellion against divine authority made him heroic. These writers embraced the Enlightenment rejection of dogmatic faith, as well as the Romantic zeal for myth and spirituality. Faxneld, Satanic; Peter Schock, Romantic Satanism: Myth and the Historical Moment in Blake, Shelley, and Byron (Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire; New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003). 59. William Blake appears to have associated the Whore with greed and violence. Christopher Rowland, “Imagining the Apocalypse,” New Testament Studies 51, no. 1 (2005): 303–​327. 60. Cf. Stephanie L. Johnson, “‘Home One and All’: Redeeming the Whore of Babylon in Christina Rossetti’s Religious Poetry,” Victorian Poetry 49, no. 1 (2011): 105–​125. 61. James Pryse, The Apocalypse Unsealed. Being an Esoteric Interpretation of the Initiation of Iôannês (New York: n.p., 1910), 187–​188. 62. Pryse, Apocalypse, 188. 63. Ibid., 197. 64. Nick Lamb, “THE APOCALYPSE UNSEALED. Being an Esoteric Interpretation of THE INITIATION OF IOANNES. By James M. Pryse. New York; John M. Pryse, 9–​15 Murray Street, 1910. London: J. M. Watkins. 8s. 6d. net,” The Equinox I, no. 6 (1911): 167–​168. 65. Johannisson, Mörka; Laskar, Bidrag. Crowley critiques notions of women as naturally chaste in the “New Comment” to Liber AL, writing that all “Great Women of History” have been sexually free. Crowley, Magical and Philosophical, 132–​134. Crowley’s views on female sexual freedom are discussed in c­ hapter 4. 66. Aleister Crowley, Magick without Tears, ed. Israel Regardie (Phoenix, AZ:  Falcon Press, 1982), 334. 67. In the “Old Comment,” Crowley writes that the Beast and Scarlet Woman are not persons, but “titles of office.” Crowley, “Liber Legis. The Comment,” 388. He connects the role of Scarlet Woman with his first wife Rose. Crowley, “Liber Legis. The Comment,” 400. 68. See AL I:22; Aleister Crowley, The Book of Lies, Which Is also Falsely Called Breaks (York Beach, ME:  S. Weiser, 1980), 109; Crowley, Magical and Philosophical, 109. However, as previously noted, Crowley first used the spelling “Babalon” in his record of the 10th Aethyr in Vision. Crowley, Vision, 170. 69. AL III:11. See Crowley, Magical and Philosophical, 261, 283. 70. For Crowley’s initial attitude to AL, see, e.g., Crowley, Confessions, 403–​404, 451–​452, 513, 517, 541, 595–​598. 71. For an overview of the development of the idea of sephiroth and the Tree of Life in Western esotericism, see Goodrick-​Clarke, Western,  41–​46. 72. Owen, Place,  57–​58.

The Scarlet Goddess and the Wine of Her Fornications  75 73. Crowley, Vision, 166, 234; Aleister Crowley, “Liber Os Abysmi vel Daath sub figura CDLXXIV,” The Equinox I, no. 7 (1912): 77–​81; Aleister Crowley, Liber Aleph vel CXI; The Book of Wisdom or Folly, in the Form of an Epistle of 666, the Great Wild Beast, to His Son 777, Being the Equinox Volume III No. VI (York Beach, ME: S. Weiser, 1991), 104. For an explication of Daath (or Da’at) in Jewish kabbalah, see Gershom Scholem, Jonathan Garb, and Moshe Idel, “Kabbalah,” in Encyclopædia Judaica, ed. Michael Berenbaum and Fred Skolnik, vol. 11 (Detroit:  Macmillan Reference, 2007), 586–​692. 74. For an overview of the degree structure of A∴A∴, see the essay “One Star in Sight,” included in Crowley, Magick: Liber ABA, 479–​489. 75. Crowley, Confessions, 556; Kaczynski, Perdurabo, 192. 76. The poems “The Black Mass,” “The Adept,” and “The Vampire” in Clouds without Water were inspired by Crowley’s relationship with Bruce. Crowley, Confessions, 556; Kaczynski, Perdurabo, 192. 77. Aleister Crowley, Clouds without Water (Des Plaines, IL: Yogi Publication Society, 1974), x. 78. Crowley, Clouds, 9. 79. Ibid., 12. 80. A prominent example is the art of Felicien Rops, which Crowley admired. Crowley, Confessions, 148. Cf. Faxneld, Satanic, 393–​407. 81. Crowley, Clouds, 13. The herbal references clearly allude to the folklore surrounding witches’ flying ointment. Serenity Young, Women Who Fly:  Goddesses, Witches, Mystics, and Other Airborne Females (New York: Oxford University Press, 2018), 158, 167–​169. 82. Crowley, Clouds,  14–​15. 83. Ibid., 68. 84. See discussion in the subsequent chapter. See also Aleister Crowley, The Magical Record of the Beast 666:  The Diaries of Aleister Crowley, 1914–​1920, ed. John Symonds and Kenneth Grant (London: Duckworth, 1983), esp. 229–​235. 85. Crowley, Clouds, 76. 86. Ibid., 101. 87. Ibid.,  79–​80. 88. Cf. Faxneld, Satanic, 206–​276. 89. Crowley began experimenting magically with similar ideas during this period. Aleister Crowley, “Liber LXVI, Liber Stellæ Rubeæ,” The Equinox I, no. 7 (1912): 29–​ 36. Arguably one of Crowley’s earliest documented experimentations with sexual magic, Crowley mistakenly lists it as having been written in 1911. Crowley, Confessions, 673. Kaczynski writes that it was, in fact, penned in 1907. Kaczynski, Perdurabo, 173. 90. Crowley, Confessions, 142. 91. As his occult career progressed, Crowley would experiment with bondage and mortification in both erotic and nonerotic ritual contexts. See, e.g., Aleister Crowley, “Liber DCLXXI vel Pyramidos: A Ritual of Self-​Initiation Based Upon the Formula of the Neophyte,” in Aleister Crowley, Commentaries on the Holy Books and Other

76  The Eloquent Blood Papers: The Equinox, Volume Four, Number One (York Beach, ME: Samuel Weiser, 1996), 59–​72. See also c­ hapter 4. 92. Aleister Crowley, “The Wake World,” in Aleister Crowley, Konx Om Pax: Essays in Light (Des Plaines, IL: Yogi Publication Society, 1974), 12. 93. Crowley, “Wake,” 13. 94. Ibid., 17. The sadistic and masochistic practices Lola undergoes are similar to those stipulated in “Liber DCLXXI vel Pyramidos,” enhancing the thematic overlap between pain, eroticism, submission, and spiritual ascent. Crowley, “Liber DCLXXI.” 95. Crowley, Confessions, 537; Kaczynski, Perdurabo, 159–​160, 176. 96. See, e.g., Crowley, “Liber DCLXXI”; Aleister Crowley, “John St John,” The Equinox I, no. 1 (1909): 14, 34–​35, 59, 96; Aleister Crowley, Commentaries on the Holy Books and Other Papers: The Equinox, Volume Four, Number One (York Beach, ME: Samuel Weiser, 1996), 149. 97. See discussion under the sub-​section “Erotic Destruction and Pariah Femininities,” which concludes the present chapter. 98. See Aleister Crowley, The Holy Books of Thelema (York Beach, ME: Weiser, 1988). 99. E.g., Crowley, “The Wake World,” 11. 100. As discussed in the next chapter, Crowley explored ritualized sadomasochism in magical workings with both male and female partners, repeatedly assuming a submissive role. E.g., Aleister Crowley, “The Paris Working,” in The Vision and the Voice with Commentary and Other Papers, ed. Hymenaeus Beta (York Beach, ME: Samuel Weiser, 1998), 343–​409; Crowley, Magical Record, 229–​235, Crowley, “Cephaloedium.” 101. E.g., Crowley, “Liber LXVI.” 102. Crowley, Confessions, 510. 103. Crowley believed he had partly and inadvertently undergone the Abyss ordeal in 1906, but stresses that he only accepted the associated grade of Magister Templi after “ceremonially” completing the ordeal in 1909. Crowley, Confessions, 510–​533. 104. Egil Asprem, Arguing with Angels:  Enochian Magic and Modern Occulture (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2012), 24. See also Håkan Håkansson, Seeing the Word: John Dee and Renaissance Occultism (Lund: Lund University, 2001). 105. John Dee, A True & Faithful Relation of What Passed for Many Years between Dr. John Dee ... and Some Spirits (London: Printed by D. Maxwell for T. Garthwait, 1659). 106. Asprem, Arguing. 107. Crowley, Vision,  8–​9. 108. Although Crowley claims this was a sudden impulse, the fact that he had visited Oxford’s Bodleian Library earlier that year to study Dee’s manuscripts, and brought tools and transcripts of the nineteen Enochian “keys” to Algeria, suggests some precalculation. Crowley, Confessions, 595, 611–​616. Cf. Asprem, Arguing, 93. 109. Crowley believed the visions united all available religious systems. Crowley, Confessions, 618. 110. Crowley, Confessions, 619. This statement reflects the recurrent concern with gender reversal in Crowley’s writings.

The Scarlet Goddess and the Wine of Her Fornications  77 111. Cf. Jeffrey J. Kripal and Wouter J. Hanegraaff, “Introduction: Things We Do Not Talk About,” in Hidden Intercourse:  Eros and Sexuality in the History of Western Esotericism, ed. Jeffrey J. Kripal and Wouter J. Hanegraaff (Leiden: Brill, 2008), ix–​ xxii. An example is the reception of the Song of Songs; see Bernard of Clairvaux, “Commentary On the Song of Songs,” Archive.org, https://​archive.org/​details/​StB ernardsCommentaryOnTheSongOfSongs (accessed October 15, 2017). See also Alana Harris, “‘For Those with Hardened Hearts’: Female Mysticism, Masculine Piety, and the Divine Mercy Devotion,” in Contemporary Encounters in Gender and Religion: European Perspectives, ed. Lena Gemzöe, Marja-​Liisa Keinänen, and Avril Maddrell (Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016), 259–​281; Lena Gemzöe, “Working the Way to Santiago de Compostela: Masculinities and Spiritualities of Capitalism,” in Contemporary Encounters in Gender and Religion:  European Perspectives, ed. Lena Gemzöe, Marja-​Liisa Keinänen, and Avril Maddrell (Cham:  Palgrave Macmillan, 2016), 77–​101; Elizabeth Reis, “The Devil, the Body, and the Feminine Soul in Puritan New England,” Journal of American History 82, no. 1 (1995): 15–​36. 112. She appears in the commentary to a number of other Aethyrs including the 27th, 26th, 25th, 24th, and 22nd. See, e.g., Crowley, Vision, 54, 61, 62–​64, 71, 78. 113. Crowley, Vision, 63. 114. Ibid., 62. In the Thoth Tarot, which Crowley cocreated with Frieda Lady Harris, the Strength card is exchanged for Lust, which shows a naked and ecstatic woman astride a leonine, many-​headed beast. The Lust card is associated with Babalon. See ­chapter 4; and Aleister Crowley, The Book of Thoth: A Short Essay on the Tarot of the Egyptians, Being the Equinox, Volume III, No. 5 (York Beach, ME: S. Weiser, 1974),  91–​95. 115. Crowley, Vision, 64. 116. Ibid., 125. This notion is seemingly derived from James Frazer, who believed the legend to reflect a rite of sacred marriage between the sun and the moon. James George Frazer, The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion, pt. III, 3rd ed. (London: Macmillan & Co, 1911), 71–​72. Crowley likely appreciated the idea of the woman and bull representing a union of solar and lunar forces. He repeatedly identifies the sun with masculine energy and the moon with feminine ditto. See, e.g., AL I:16; Crowley, Magical and Philosophical, 104. 117. Crowley, Vision, 125. This is illustrative of Crowley’s tendency toward systematization of his diverse and often contradictory writings. 118. Crowley, Vision, 129. 119. Ibid. 120. Ibid. 121. Ibid., 130. The description of the dancer resembles Ezek. 1:4 [KJV]. 122. Crowley, Vision, 131. 123. Ibid., 133–​135. 124. Crowley, Confessions, 621. 125. Kaczynski, Perdurabo, 196–​197; Owen, Place, 198. 126. Crowley, Confessions, 620–​622. 127. Shildrick, “Unreformed,” 329–​330.

78  The Eloquent Blood 128. Crowley, Vision, 148. Once again, there are parallels in imagery with Ezek. 1:4–​26  [KJV]. 129. Crowley, Vision, 149. 130. Rev. 17:3–​6 [KJV]. 131. Aside from the clear influence of Revelation, the description of Babylon in the 12th Aethyr has strong parallels to that of Jerusalem in Ezekiel 16. Ezek 16:15, 21, 22, 30, 32, 36 [KJV]. Crowley’s reference to the chariot in the 12th Aethyr indicates an influence from Ezekiel on Vision. 132. Crowley, Vision, 149. 133. Ibid. 134. Ibid., 150. Emphasis in original. 135. Ibid. In the commentary, Crowley relates the notion of subduing strength by weakness to the chapter “Peaches” in The Book of Lies (1912), related to the Scarlet Woman. Crowley, Lies, 108–​109. See ­chapter 4. 136. It is unclear whether the charioteer or Crowley is speaking. Crowley, Vision, 150. Emphasis in original. 137. Rev. 17:2 [KJV]. 138. Crowley, Vision, 151. 139. Cf. Margrit Shildrick, Embodying the Monster: Encounters with the Vulnerable Self (London; Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE, 2002); Shildrick, “Unreformed.” 140. Crowley, Vision, 151. 141. The use of a protective circle, and a triangle to contain demonic forces, is consistent with older forms of Goetic magic. Owen Davies, Grimoires:  A History of Magic Books (New  York:  Oxford University Press, 2012); Aleister Crowley, Goetia:  The Lesser Key of Solomon the King (Oxford: First Impressions, 1993). 142. Crowley, Vision, 160. In Confessions, Crowley writes that he “abode apart” whilst Choronzon was evoked. Crowley, Confessions, 623. However, Crowley may in fact have sat within the triangle, as suggested in Asprem, Arguing, 96; Owen, Place, 200. I find this interpretation credible, as Crowley and Neuburg followed a similar procedure during an evocation in 1910. Crowley, Confessions, 630. 143. Crowley, Confessions, 623. 144. The printed record of the Aethyr begins with the words: “In nomine BABALON Amen. Restriction unto Choronzon.” Crowley, Vision, 159. In several later texts, Crowley follows the demon’s name with variations on this formula. Aleister Crowley, Little Essays toward Truth (Scottsdale, AZ:  New Falcon Publications, 1996), 21, 48; Aleister Crowley, The Magical Diaries of Aleister Crowley:  Tunisia 1923, ed. Stephen Skinner (York Beach, ME: S. Weiser, 1996), 31–​32. 145. Crowley, Vision, 173. In Jewish tradition, gematria is a hermeneutical technique for Torah interpretation. David Derovan, Gershom Scholem, and Moshe Idel, “Gematria,” in Encyclopædia Judaica, 2nd ed., ed. Michael Berenbaum and Fred Skolnik (Detroit: Macmillan Reference, 2007), 424–​427. 146. Owen, Place, 199, 210. 147. Ex. 3:14 [KJV]. 148. Owen, Place, 299.

The Scarlet Goddess and the Wine of Her Fornications  79 149. Crowley, Confessions, 624. 150. Crowley, Vision, 163–​165. 151. Butler, Undoing, 29. 152. Crowley, Vision, 174. 153. Ibid., 174; Rev. 12:1 [KJV]. The notion of Babalon’s daughter may also be derived from the biblical “daughter of Babylon,” originally a negative motif. See, e.g., Ps. 137:8; Isa. 47; Jer. 50:42, 51:33 [KJV]. 154. Crowley, Vision, 183. 155. Ibid., 185. 156. Ibid., 186. 157. Ibid. This alludes to Babalon’s kabbalistic association with the sephirah Binah (understanding) and its relation to Chokmah (wisdom). See Aleister Crowley, 777 and Other Qabalistic Writings, ed. Israel Regardie (York Beach, ME: Samuel Weiser, 1993), 2. 158. Butler, Undoing, 19. 159. Crowley, Vision, 187. 160. Ibid., 189. 161. Ibid., 193. 162. In a comment, Crowley relates this to the story of Noah. The adepts are associated with three schools of magic, which Crowley—​in a comment presumably written after he attained the grade of Magus—​asserts are really one. Crowley, Vision, 193. 163. Ibid., 205. 164. Ibid., 210. 165. Ibid., 213. 166. Ibid. Crowley, however, comments that the name Mary also corresponds numerologically with 156. 167. Crowley, Vision, 213. 168. Ibid. 169. Ibid., 216. 170. Ibid., 217. 171. Ibid., 219. 172. Ibid., 220. 173. Ibid., 222. This interpretation of Revelation has parallels to that of D. H. Lawrence, as discussed in ­chapter 4. D. H. Lawrence, Apocalypse and the Writings on Revelation, ed. Mara Kalnins (London; New York: Penguin Books, 1995), 81. 174. Crowley, Vision, 223. 175. Ibid., 231. 176. Ibid. 177. Ibid., 232. 178. Ibid. 179. Ibid., 233. 180. Ibid., 233–​234. The reference to “wit” as Babalon’s lord indicates her kabbalistic relation to Binah, located “after” Chokmah (wisdom) on the Tree of Life. Knowledge denotes the “false sephirah” Daath (the Hebrew word for “knowledge”), located in the Abyss and thus beneath Babalon.

80  The Eloquent Blood 181. Crowley comments that this refers to the highest sephirah, Kether. Crowley, Vision, 234. 182. Ibid. 183. Irigaray, This, 184–​186. 184. Crowley, Vision, 241. 185. Ibid. 186. Cf Ronald Hutton, The Triumph of the Moon: A History of Modern Pagan Witchcraft (Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 1999). 187. Crowley, Vision, 241. 188. Ibid., 242. 189. Ibid. In the original text, this song is written in an invented language, which renders “the shrill scream of orgasm” as “HRILIU.” Crowley, Vision, 242. The word “HRILIU” marks the climactic moment of Crowley’s Gnostic Mass, as discussed in ­chapter 4, under “Cup, Grail, and Eucharist.” 190. Crowley, Vision, 242–​243. 191. Ibid., 244. 192. Ibid., 239. 193. Ibid., 248–​250; Rev. 22 [KJV]. 194. In the 7th Aethyr, she is presented as that which receives and transmits the male principle, and in the 2nd Aethyr it is said that wisdom (i.e., Chokmah, the male divine principle) is her lord. Crowley, Vision, 186, 234. 195. Cvetkovich, “Receptivity,” 128. 196. Dahl, “Femmebodiment.” 197. Butler, Undoing, 19. 198. Ibid., 20. 199. Waldby, “Destruction,” 266. 200. Clairvaux, “Commentary.” Kripal notes that Bernard eschews verbal imagery pertaining to “penetration and orgasmic fusion.” Jeffrey J. Kripal, Roads of Excess, Palaces of Wisdom: Eroticism and Reflexivity in the Study of Mysticism (Chicago; London: University of Chicago Press, 2001), 71.

4

Yielding Peaches and Women with Whips Babalon, Crowley, and Magical Systematization 1911–​1947

In the years after 1909, Aleister Crowley increasingly systematized the revealed cosmology and teachings of Liber AL as well as the other Holy Books of Thelema. For instance, in 1911, he penned his first significant attempt at a commentary to The Book of the Law.1 With regards to Babalon, this systematizing process seemingly meant teasing out what Crowley appears to have viewed as the central strands of Vision into the more concise teachings regarding Babalon’s specific function in the initiatory system of A∴A∴. However, some of Crowley’s personal records show a more anthropomorphic and ambivalent deity. This pertains especially to his many records of sexual magic conducted from 1914 onward, in which Babalon is variously described as a lofty fantasy and a highly corporeal priestess of sadomasochistic sexual rites. The purpose of this chapter is thus to continue to trace and discuss the roles and traits Crowley attributes to Babalon and the Scarlet Woman in relation to hegemonic notions of femininity and feminine sexuality, from 1909 and until his death in 1947. The first preserved reference to Babalon in Crowley’s writings after Vision seems to be an obscure three-​page manuscript titled “Notes on Tarot.”2 It appears to detail a condensed interpretation of the Book of Revelation read through Crowley’s personal cosmology, with various points in the narrative linked to the astrological significances of the Minor Arcana of the Tarot according to the Golden Dawn system. The text includes a number of references to Babalon, the City of the Pyramids, and the “Great Dragon.” Undated, it appears to have been written sometime between 1909 and 1919. However, I believe that the manuscript was penned closer to 1909 than 1919; its particular interpretation of Babalon’s relation to astrology and the Tarot does not appear to recur in any later document, and the emphasis on Revelation and the Golden Dawn system suggests Crowley authored the text early in his esoteric career. Moreover, this manuscript indicates a slightly different interpretation of Babalon than that which Crowley would later emphasize, as notably exemplified in the next text I will discuss. In 1911, Crowley penned “Liber Cheth vel Vallum Abiegni” (hereafter “Liber Cheth”). First published in The Equinox I, no. 6 (1911), it is one of his first post-​1909 writings dealing explicitly with Babalon. It describes the process The Eloquent Blood: The Goddess Babalon and the Construction of Femininities in Western Esotericism. Manon Hedenborg White, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780190065027.001.0001

82  The Eloquent Blood of crossing the Abyss in more concise terms than Vision, and instructs the aspirant in dissolving their personality in the “Universal Life,” providing the formula of “Attainment by devotion to our Lady Babalon.”3 The text emphasizes that the adept seeking to cross the Abyss must surrender their ego entirely, becoming utterly receptive toward the universe in order to be reborn in the City of the Pyramids. It explicates the formula of Babalon as a mystical gateway: 1. This is the secret of the Holy Graal, that is the sacred vessel of our Lady the Scarlet Woman, Babalon the Mother of Abominations, the bride of Chaos, that rideth upon our Lord the Beast. 2.  Thou shalt drain out thy blood that is thy life into the golden cup of her fornication. 3. Thou shalt mingle thy life with the universal life. Thou shalt keep not back one drop. 4. Then shall thy brain be dumb, and thy heart beat no more, and all thy life shall go from thee; and thou shalt be cast out upon the midden, and the birds of the air shall feast upon thy flesh, and thy bones shall whiten in the sun. 5. Then shall the winds gather themselves together, and bear thee up as it were a little heap of dust in a sheet that hath four corners, and they shall give it unto the guardians of the abyss. 6. And because there is no life therein, the guardians of the abyss shall bid the angels of the winds pass by. And the angels shall lay thy dust in the City of the Pyramids, and the name thereof shall be no more.4

Like Vision, “Liber Cheth” indirectly references Revelation through its allusions to abominations and Babalon’s cup of fornication. The text continues the association between virtue and transgression; Babalon’s cup of fornication is described as “sacred” and identified with the Holy Graal. The quoted passages clearly reference the crossing of the Abyss, conceptualizing the necessary annihilation of the ego in metaphorical terms of death through blood sacrifice; the adept is instructed to drain all of their blood into Babalon’s cup, relinquishing individual life to unite with the all. Thus, Babalon’s “secret” is construed as the dissolution of individual subjectivity. Where Vision emphasizes sexual metaphors connected to erotic destruction with regards to Babalon, however, the verbal imagery of “Liber Cheth” appears somewhat to deemphasize erotic symbolism. Nonetheless, the text relates self-​annihilation to desire. In order to drain their self in Babalon’s cup, the seeker is instructed to rid themselves of goods, wealth, and health and also to slay thyself in the fervour of thine abandonment unto Our Lady. Let thy flesh hang loose upon thy bones, and thine eyes glare with thy quenchless lust unto the Infinite, with thy passion for the unknown, for Her that is beyond Knowledge the accursèd one.5

Yielding Peaches and Women with Whips  83 The combined references to physical mortification and desire continue the thematic overlap between love and pain and also between dissolution and eroticism as connected to pariah femininity, which is foreshadowed in Crowley’s early poetry and powerfully exemplified in Vision. However, “Liber Cheth” presents a more concise theological framework for the adept’s sacrifice to Babalon than that occurring in some of Crowley’s Decadent poems, no longer hinting at, but clearly affirming, the necessity of utter self-​annihilation. “Liber Cheth” affirms the notion expressed in Vision that retaining even a portion of one’s individuality is not an option if one wishes to traverse the Abyss: 10. Thou hast love; tear thy mother from thine heart, and spit in the face of thy father. Let thy foot trample the belly of thy wife, and let the babe at her breast be the prey of dogs and vultures. 11. For if thou dost not this with thy will, then shall We do this despite thy will. So that thou attain to the Sacrament of the Graal in the Chapel of Abominations. 12. And behold! if by stealth thou keep unto thyself one thought of thine, then shalt thou be cast out into the abyss for ever.6

The quoted passage superficially reads as a disavowal of conventional family norms. However, the prime significance of the excerpt appears to be mystical, and I suggest that the figures of parents, progeny, and spouse here symbolize the seeker’s position in the social order, which they must cease to identify with in order to progress. Nonetheless, choices of metaphor are rarely arbitrary, and it is interesting to note at least on the textual level an association of the pariah femininity of Babalon with a challenge to the nuclear family structure. The ominous tone of this excerpt contrasts with many of the passages concerning Babalon in Vision, which are generally gentler, and describe the process of self-​annihilation as an “ecstasy in which there is no trace of pain . . . like the giving-​up of the self to the beloved.”7 As noted, however, “Liber Cheth” tends to present the union with the goddess in more violent verbal imagery. If one succeeds in annihilating one’s ego, it is stated that one shall be granted joy, health, wealth, and wisdom when one is no longer oneself: [T]‌hou shalt revel with the wanton in the market-​place, and the virgins shall fling roses upon thee, and the merchants bend their knees and bring thee gold and spices. Also young boys shall pour wonderful wines for thee, and the singers and the dancers shall sing and dance for thee. 15. Yet shalt thou not be therein, for thou shalt be forgotten, dust lost in dust.8

“Liber Cheth” is one of the first texts in which Crowley relates Babalon to a more generic process of initiation, to be undergone by all seeking attainment in the

84  The Eloquent Blood A∴A∴ system. Marking the beginning of a systematization of Babalon’s role, it emphasizes the pariah femininity of the divine whore as emblematic of erotic destruction, as is especially emphasized in the 12th Aethyr in Vision. However, several of the aspects articulated in the higher Aethyrs, including the connections to Lilith, Romanticism, and Babalon as the female or androgynous Pan, are absent, as would they be from most of Crowley’s subsequent writings on the goddess. Thus, “Liber Cheth” presents a clearer and less polyvalent vision of Babalon, consolidating what Crowley may, at the time, have perceived as her most central aspects: her mystical function as the representative of the attitude of surrender or passivity toward the universe that the adept must emulate in order to cross the Abyss. Following Vision, “Liber Cheth” is arguably the most influential of Crowley’s writings with regards to the mystical significance of Babalon. However, she is mentioned in a number of other important texts from this period. For instance, she is referenced in “Astarte vel Liber BERYLLI” (first published in The Equinox I, no. 7 in spring 1912), also written in the summer of 1911, which outlines how to unite with a chosen deity through devotion. The text includes Babalon among a succession of goddesses, as loftier than Venus, Aphrodite, and Isis, but more accessible than Nuit.9 The year 1912 witnessed the publication of Crowley’s The Book of Lies, a collection of 93 brief essays, each dedicated to the explication of a particular magical teaching.10 The subject of each chapter is related to the kabbalistic significance of its number.11 Babalon and the Scarlet Woman appear in a number of chapters, as well as in Crowley’s commentary (written circa 1921), including the commentary to ­chapter 4, titled “Peaches.” The chapter itself features the following lines: Soft and hollow, how thou dost overcome the hard and full! ... Be thou the Bride; thou shalt be the Mother hereafter. To all impressions thus. Let them not overcome thee; yet let them breed within thee. ... Receive a thousand lovers; thou shalt bear but One child. This child shall be the heir of Fate the Father.12

The quoted excerpt has parallels to the descriptions of Babalon in Vision, especially the record of the 12th Aethyr, which states that Babalon’s weakness has triumphed over strength, and that she has become the mistress of all through her adulterous yielding.13 Here, a dichotomy of hardness and solidity versus feminized softness and hollowness is presented, with the latter being construed as more durable. The text appears to emphasize the idea of vulnerability or erotic receptivity—​symbolized by feminized promiscuity—​as a form of heightened engagement with existence. In referencing the roles of bride, pregnant woman, and mother, “Peaches” links receptivity or passivity to femininity through metaphors of female sexuality and motherhood. In the commentary, Crowley elaborates

Yielding Peaches and Women with Whips  85 that “Peaches,” being c­ hapter 4, is linked to the letter Daleth, which is equated with “the Empress of the Tarot, the letter of Venus,” and the yoni.14 He writes: The chapter is a counsel to accept all impressions; it is the formula of the Scarlet Woman; but no impression must be allowed to dominate you, only to fructify you; just as the artist, seeing an object, does not worship it, but breeds a masterpiece from it.15

In Crowley’s commentary, the Scarlet Woman’s “thousand lovers” are equated with receiving and accepting “all impressions,” implicitly referencing the idea of feminized surrender as a source of creativity. To speak with Ann Cvetkovich, the Scarlet Woman’s strength is seemingly situated in her “capacity to embrace the world” and in taking in and transforming power.16 While neither the chapter nor the comment explicitly mention Babalon, Crowley later—​in the commentary to the 12th Aethyr of Vision—​related “Peaches” to Babalon, and specifically to the notion of her weakness conquering strength.17 Babalon figures in c­ hapter 11 of The Book of Lies, in which it is said that she exists in “seeming duality” with Chaos, the pair illusorily appearing as “Father and Mother,” “Brother and Sister,” “Husband and Wife.”18 In the commentary, Crowley writes: “Chaos and Babalon are Chokmah and Binah, but they are really one; the essential unity of the supernal Triad is here insisted upon.”19 Based on the idea that there is no duality beyond the Abyss, this statement presents a paradox between different models of gender. While the dynamic interaction of gendered principles is emphasized on the one hand, this polarity is presented as illusory, with Chaos and Babalon as aspects of the same divine reality.20 Chapter  49, titled “Waratah-​Blossoms,” deals with Babalon. Like the 15th Aethyr of Vision, this text draws on imagery related to the Salome story, beginning with the words: “Seven are the veils of the dancing-​girl in the harem of IT.”21 The reference to the seven veils alludes to the Salome narrative, although Crowley also ascribed mystical significance to the number seven (see subsequent excerpt). The chapter continues: Seven are the names, and seven are the lamps beside Her bed. /​Seven eunuchs guard Her with drawn swords; No Man may come nigh unto Her. /​In Her wine-​cup are seven streams of the blood of the Seven Spirits of God. /​Seven are the heads of THE BEAST whereon She rideth. /​ . . . /​Seven letters hath Her holiest name.22

This “holiest name” in the quoted excerpt is indicated as Babalon. In the final paragraphs of the chapter, it is written:

86  The Eloquent Blood Here is Wisdom. Let Him that hath Understanding count the Number of Our Lady; for it is the Number of a Woman; and Her Number is An Hundred and Fifty and Six.23

Aside from the term “Understanding,” referring to Binah and the corresponding initiatory grade of Magister Templi, this is obviously a play on Revelation 13:18, which reads: Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six.24

“Waratah-​Blossoms” features the image of a heptagram inscribed with the name Babalon, which Crowley identifies as the “official seal of A∴A∴.”25 This appears to be the first instance of this seal being used to represent the order that, in Crowley’s view, systematized his Magick. The importance of this symbol—​inscribed with the name of the goddess—​being used to represent the consolidation of Crowley’s initiatory system can hardly be overstated, indicating the spiritual centrality he ascribed to Babalon’s function. In the commentary, Crowley continues to say that the chapter concerns Babalon, and that the statement that no man may come near her is a play on words, referring to Nemo, the Magister Templi, as elucidated in Vision. This indicates that none may approach Babalon who has not traversed the Abyss, surrendering their individualities in union with the divine feminine other. Crowley writes that Babalon is the secret name of Nuit referred to in Liber AL.26 As mentioned previously, this idea is echoed in one of the comments to the latter.27 Seven is clearly an important number in this chapter, being both the square root of the chapter number 49 as well as the number of veils, names, lamps, eunuchs, bloodstreams, spirits of God, heads of the Beast, and letters of Babalon’s name. In the commentary, Crowley writes that the number seven is “the passive and feminine number.”28 Thus, Babalon, femininity, and passivity are again equated, though Babalon is crucially identified with a spiritual formula that all adepts must embrace, as is also suggested by the inclusion of her name in the A∴A∴ seal. Significantly, ­chapter 3 of The Book of Lies (titled “The Oyster”) states: “The Brothers of A∴A∴ are Women: the Aspirants to A∴A∴ are Men.”29 In the commentary, Crowley writes that the passage provides the “initiated feminine point of view,” and identifies the so-​called Brothers of A∴A∴ with the grade of Magister Templi.30 This further indicates how Crowley associated a feminized modality of receptivity with spiritual attainment, suggesting that the Masters of the Temple have, to some extent, spiritually changed genders. The link between Babalon and Nuit is hinted at in c­ hapter 56, “Trouble with Twins,” which begins:

Yielding Peaches and Women with Whips  87 Holy, holy, holy, unto Five Hundred and Fifty Five times holy be OUR LADY of the STARS [Nuit]! Holy, holy, holy, unto One Hundred and Fifty Six times be OUR LADY [Babalon] that rideth upon THE BEAST!31

Finally, Babalon features in c­hapter  90, titled “Starlight.” This chapter emphasizes the link between Nuit and Babalon, as well as between the pair and the woman Laylah, clearly a reference to Crowley’s lover and disciple Leila Waddell (1880–​1932), who served as Grand Secretary General of OTO for a time.32 It is written that “all is vanity on earth, except the love of a good woman, and that good woman LAYLAH,” and that “in heaven all is vanity ... except the love of OUR LADY BABALON.” Crowley then writes, “beyond heaven and earth is the love of OUR LADY NUIT.” The chapter ends with a proclamation that identifies the three with each other: “And at THE END is SHE that was LAYLAH, and BABALON, and NUIT.”33 As seen in some of the previous works, this chapter of The Book of Lies hints at an emanationist cosmology, in which divine reality manifests on a number of progressively grosser levels, with Crowley’s lover Leila appearing as a material manifestation of Babalon, who is in turn a reflection of the goddess Nuit. Thus, this chapter construes a relation wherein Crowley’s human lover is seen as a more concrete materialization of Babalon. Finally, The Book of Lies features the first version of the Star Ruby, an official ritual of A∴A∴, which invokes a quartet of divine names at the four cardinal points. In the first version of the ritual, these names are Chaos, Babalon, Psyche, and Eros.34 In the commentary to The Book of Lies, Crowley describes the Star Ruby as a “new and more elaborate version” of the Lesser Ritual of the Pentagram (LRP), a ritual taught in the Golden Dawn to banish the temple of unwanted influences, in which the body of the magician is identified with various points on the Tree of Life. The Star Ruby substitutes the LRP intonation of the Hebrew names of God for the heterosexual polarities of Chaos/​Babalon and Eros/​Psyche, and it can be seen as reflecting Crowley’s intention to create a more Thelemic banishing ritual.35 Babalon thus appears as part of the male-​female cosmic dynamic that sustains the universe.

Cup, Grail, and Eucharist: Babalon 1913–​1918 Crowley writes that the publication of The Book of Lies resulted in a visit to his London home by a disgruntled Theodor Reuss (1855–​1923), head of the Ordo Templi Orientis (OTO), an initiatory order founded in Germany around 1912. In 1910, Reuss had granted Crowley honorary membership in an irregular masonic organization known as the “Antient and Primitive Rite,” also known as the

88  The Eloquent Blood “Rite of Memphis-​Mizraim.”36 In 1912, Crowley writes, Reuss approached him anew, this time to accuse him of revealing the central secret of OTO: He said that since I was acquainted with the supreme secret of the Order, I must be allowed the IX° and obligated in regard to it. I protested that I knew no such secret. He said, “But you have printed it in the plainest language.” I said that I could not have done so because I did not know it. He went to the bookshelves and, taking out a copy of The Book of Lies, pointed to a passage in the despised chapter. It instantly flashed upon me. The entire symbolism, not only of freemasonry but of many other traditions, blazed upon my spiritual vision.37

Reuss conferred the IX° on Crowley, installing him as the National Grand Master General for the order in Great Britain and Ireland. Given the historically questionable nature of Crowley’s account, and OTO’s importance for Crowley’s magical career and the subsequent development of Thelema, a brief digression to recount what is known of the order’s genesis is motivated. While Reuss credited the Austrian paper chemist and Freemason Carl Kellner (1851–​1905) as the “spiritual father” and first head of OTO, this is dubious. The order’s first constitution is dated to 1906, but this appears far too early, and the document was likely produced closer to 1912. Similarly, although Reuss signed Crowley’s charter for the “Antient and Primitive Rite” (misleadingly dated 1906) as a representative of OTO, there is no evidence for the order existing as a functioning membership organization prior to Reuss’s and Crowley’s collaboration in 1912.38 In 1912, Reuss announced the order in his periodical Der Oriflamme, writing that it possessed the secret key to all masonic and Hermetic systems: sexual magic, which was taught in the order’s higher degrees. The VIII° is associated with autoerotic magic, whereas the IX°—​originally the highest initiatory degree—​is associated with sexual intercourse, generally of a heterosexual nature.39 In 1913, while in Moscow, Crowley wrote “Ecclesiæ Gnosticæ Catholicæ Canon Missæ,” also known as the Gnostic Catholic Mass or “Liber XV,” for OTO as the “central ritual of its public and private celebration.”40 The ceremony was later accepted by Theodor Reuss as an official ritual of Ecclesia Gnostica Catholica (EGC), a neo-​Gnostic church that was integrated into OTO under Reuss’s leadership.41 The Gnostic Mass is a complex Eucharistic ritual performed by a priest, a priestess, a deacon, two “children,” and a congregation. The priest and priestess, ritually identified with the divine masculine and feminine principles, enact a “Mystic Marriage” through an act of symbolic heterosexual intercourse, with the tip of a lance being lowered into a wine-​filled grail. They jointly bless a Eucharist consisting of a goblet of wine and a “Cake of Light,” which is subsequently consumed by the priest followed by the congregation. Although structurally similar to the Russian Orthodox Mass, the Gnostic Mass is based on

Yielding Peaches and Women with Whips  89 a Thelemic worldview, and it is indebted to the cosmology of Liber AL with the addition of the characters of Chaos and Babalon from Vision.42 In the Gnostic Creed, recited by the deacon and congregation at the beginning of the ceremony, Babalon is identified as “one earth, the mother of us all . . . one womb wherein all men are begotten, and wherein they shall rest, Mystery of Mystery.”43 This identification of Babalon with the earth differs to some extent from that of the previously discussed texts. It may be related to Crowley’s attempt to integrate the visionary cosmology of Vision into a collective ritual constructed for a fraternal order, in contrast to the more private and interior focus of the A∴A∴ system. However, the Gnostic Mass alludes more subtly to Babalon at the climactic moment of the “Mystic Marriage,” where the priest and priestess whisper the word “HRILIU” in unison. This word, rendered in Babalon’s song from the 2nd Aethyr of Vision, is translated in the latter text as “the shrill scream of orgasm.”44 Although subtle, this set of actions implicitly emphasizes the idea of erotic dissolution in a wine-​filled grail as a spiritual goal. After joining OTO, Crowley proceeded to develop the order’s organizational and ritual structure. After the so-​called Paris Working, a series of rituals conducted with Victor Neuburg in Paris in 1914, Crowley added an eleventh degree.45 He explored sexual magic in solitary forms as well as with male and female partners, meticulously recording his experiments in his diary.46 Very simply put, his technique entailed focusing the will on a particular outcome whilst performing a sexual act, being especially focused at the point of orgasm. Crowley would then harvest and sacramentally consume the resulting genital fluids or “elixir.” Sometimes, part of the elixir was used to anoint a material object such as a talisman.47 Based on these experiments, Crowley wrote a number of instructions in sexual magic for OTO’s higher degrees, with a particular emphasis on the IX°. Babalon is mentioned in “De Nuptiis Secretis Deorum Cum Hominibus” (1914), which pertains to the VIII° of OTO. The fifth subsection of the text, titled “De Sabbato Adeptorum” or “Of the Sabbath of the Adepts,” describes a dark age of Christian superstition, during which a select few perpetuated the true mysteries. These adepts would, supposedly, meet clandestinely in rural areas to invoke a deity who was seen as Satan by outsiders, but who was really Pan, Bacchus, Baphomet, or Babalon.48 Aside from this reference, Babalon is largely absent from Crowley’s formalized sex magical instructions, which focus more strongly on the idea and practice of sex magical gender polarity.49 Crowley equated the male and female ritual partners as well as their respective bodily fluids with different functions in the operations.50 Identifying the masculine fluids with the active, divine spark and intention that determines the course of the operation, Crowley viewed the feminine fluids as the passive, material basis, with the body of the female ritual practitioner acting as the shrine receiving and nourishing the creative masculine principle.51 Thus, Crowley stressed, it is

90  The Eloquent Blood generally advantageous if the female partner is not aware of the objective, as this can cause a conflict of wills, and a male magician can therefore make do with a completely untrained priestess. Although both men and women can aspire to the IX°, Crowley writes, “the Ninth degree is not so easy to be made effective by Woman initiates,”52 as it is the male priest’s intention that guides the operation. Crowley writes that men can more easily dispense with the help of a female partner than vice versa, as only the masculine sexual fluids contain the divine creative spark.53 However, in the essay “Energized Enthusiasm,” written in 1913 and pertaining to the IX°, Crowley connects divine consciousness to a particular sexual secretion that he sees as analogous but not identical to semen, which, he writes, not all men and a small number of androgynous women can produce.54 Thus, while Crowley clearly associates the divine spark with masculinity, the latter is not wholly identified with physical (or birth-​assigned) sex in this case. In the texts discussed in the preceding section, feminine anatomy is construed as a passive shrine that receives the male magician’s intention but that cannot produce new life in itself. In Luce Irigaray’s terminology, it may be suggested that Crowley’s IX° instructions are rooted in a concept of femininity as lack, specifically of the divine creative spark transmitted through semen. Femininity is thus defined in relation to masculinity as the other, construed as “the other of the same, rather than an/​other subject, irreducible to the masculine subject and sharing equivalent dignity.”55 While Crowley appears occasionally to have performed the role of priestess, indicating that he did not always view these roles as a matter of biological sex, he does not indicate that a woman could equally well fulfill the role of priest.56 The magical union of male and female sexual fluids is thus not conceptualized as the interaction between different yet equally important forces but rather as a dialectic of active and passive.57 As I will indicate in a subsequent section, however, this conceptualization of masculinity versus femininity was not consistently reflected in the ritual roles taken by Crowley and his female partners, many of which were highly active. Babalon’s relative absence from Crowley’s sex magical instructions from this period may indicate that he, at this time, connected the goddess more strongly to the initiatory trajectory of the A∴A∴ degree structure.58 However, Crowley’s personal worldview appears to have been less clear-​cut than his documents of instruction. Babalon actually appears repeatedly in diary entries from this period, which detail acts of magic connected to the OTO system. For instance, Crowley on several occasions ritually masturbated while envisioning her. The desired outcome of these procedures varied: some were aimed at material success, while others were focused on attracting a lover.59 Crowley performed these rituals as devotional acts to Babalon, as well as to find a new Scarlet Woman.60 In an entry from January 1915, Crowley complains about his continued failure to manifest a suitable Scarlet Woman, proclaiming his inclination to “throw the whole

Yielding Peaches and Women with Whips  91 thing down and stick to Babalon until I succeed in incarnating her.” Seemingly, this means that Crowley contemplated reverting to ritual masturbation until he succeeded in attracting a worthy partner.61 In May, however, Crowley considered himself successful, meeting and falling “violently in love” with a new woman, the Theosophist and modernist poet Jeanne Foster (1879–​1970). Later, while ritually masturbating in thanksgiving for meeting her, Crowley imagined Babalon as Foster. Foster subsequently became Crowley’s lover and Scarlet Woman, taking the magical name Hilarion.62 A few years later, Crowley sought a similar purpose, performing sex magic with a prostitute in order to bring Bertha Bruce, his mistress and current Scarlet Woman, to his side. In a poem, which bears strong similarities to Crowley’s earlier Decadent poetry and writings on transgressive femininity, he eulogized her mouth and breath as “[a]‌fierce red wine that sucks me down a drunkard into death.”63 Crowley’s references to sexual fantasies about the goddess suggest a disparity between his personal worldview and the more systematized structure he articulated for A∴A∴. Babalon plays a minor role in Crowley’s Liber Aleph, subtitled The Book of Wisdom or Folly. Written in 1918, the book comprises 208 epistles, presented as a series of instructions to Crowley’s “magical son,” Charles Stansfeld Jones (1886–​1950), alias Frater Achad. In this work, Babalon occupies several related positions:  she is construed as the antithesis of Choronzon; as Crowley’s “True Lady” and in connection to a discussion of the Scarlet Woman; and as the gateway to the City of the Pyramids in an epistle dealing with the Black Brothers, who have chosen to build fortresses around themselves in the Abyss rather than dissolving their lives in the universal life.64 Thus, Crowley continues the theme of dichotomizing Babalon and Choronzon, viewing the Scarlet Woman as a manifestation of Babalon and connecting her to the mystical process of eroticized self-​ surrender or destruction for the purpose of union with divinity.65 Babalon is the main subject of a rhapsody, appearing as a demanding force compelling Crowley to create: Blessed be She, ay, blessed unto the Ages be Our Lady BABALON, that plieth her scourge upon me . . . to compel me to Creation and to Destruction, which are One in Birth and in Death, being Love!66

The quote concisely connects Babalon to a form of erotic destruction, which Crowley appears to see as linking birth and death. Crowley continues ecstatically: Blessed be She, that offereth Beauty and Ecstasy in the Orgasm of every Change, and that exciteth thy Wonder and thy Worship by the Contemplation of Her Mind many-​wiled! Blessed be She, that hath filled Her Cup with every Drop of my Blood, so that my Life is lost wholly in the Wine of Her Rapture!67

92  The Eloquent Blood This quote suggests a view of Babalon, and consequently of femininity, as having the potential to effect divine drunkenness and ecstasy through her blood-​filled cup, the epitome of the erotic destruction of the seeker. The rhapsody concludes, euphorically: Behold, how She is drunken thereon, and staggereth about the Heavens, wallowing in Joy, crying aloud the Song of uttermost Love! Is not She thy true Mother among the Stars, o my Son, and hast not thou embraced Her in the Madness of Incest and of Adultery? Yea, blessed be She, blessed be Her Name, and the Name of Her Name, unto the Ages!68

The panegyric emphasizes the continual association between Babalon, intoxication, and sexuality, especially that which is ostensibly transgressive, underlining Babalon’s formula as connected to ego death or the ecstatic dissolution of self in union with the all. In presenting a scourge-​wielding and dominant Babalon driving him to create, Crowley hints at what in Waldby’s terminology may be referred to as a femininity that is not exclusively or primarily soft or receptive, but rather a “phallic” femininity-​as-​destroyer, which has the ability to “indicate a realization of the masculine erotic potential for pleasure in passivity, a desire to be fucked, to be taken.”69 Indeed, the preceding excerpts appear to give voice to a masculine desire for erotic destruction in union with a “loud and adulterous” divine feminine. Crowley’s allusions to Babalon as a “phallic” femininity interacting with a masculinity desiring destruction foreshadows themes in his diary records from 1920, as I will return to shortly. In a later epistle, Crowley muses on the symbol of the sphinx, writing that it represents the union of Crowley as the Beast with Babalon, and therefore the enlightened initiate, who has mastered the magical virtues of willing, daring, knowing, and keeping silent. Crowley writes that the sphinx, although it represents perfect balance, assumes “the Aspect of the Feminine Principle” so that it may be the partner of the phallus, the “pure Image of our Father the Sun.” The meaning of this symbolism, Crowley contends, is that the adept must “be whole, Himself, containing all Things in true Proportion,” before making himself the bride of the cosmos.70 This epistle of Liber Aleph exhibits a tension between different understandings of gender. While it builds on a notion of male-​female polarity, it seemingly implies that transcendence of such polarities is what makes the quintessential adept.71 Thus it hints at the type of gender inversion common in many of Crowley’s writings—​as discussed above—​in which the seeker—​regardless of sex—​is coded as feminine in regards to divinity.

Yielding Peaches and Women with Whips  93 The theme of spiritual hermaphroditism is continued in a later epistle, in which the bovine and human aspects of the sphinx are identified with the feminine aspects of the perfected self, being the gifts of Babalon to the seeker. However, Crowley warns the seeker not to develop these aspects in excess of the masculine virtues associated with the lion and the dragon, as “the Excess of the Feminine is Dead Weight.”72 A similarly negative view of femininity is espoused in other parts of the text, where Crowley compares telling the truth to a woman to casting pearls before swine.73 Furthermore, Crowley claims women are incapable of true magical advancement, being passive and static in nature and thus suited only to aiding the male magician’s transformation: It is indeed easy for a Woman to obtain the Experience of Magick, in a certain Sort, as Visions, Trances, and the like; yet they take not Hold upon Her, to transform Her, as with Men, but pass only as Images upon a Speculum. So then a Woman advanceth never in Magick, but remaineth the same, rightly or wrongly ordered according to the Force that moveth Her. Here therefore is the Limit of Her Aspiration in Magick, to abide joyous and obedient beneath the Man that her Instinct shall divine so that by Habit becoming a Temple well-​ ordered, comely and consecrated, she may in her next Incarnation attract by her Fitness a Man-​soul. For this Cause hath Man esteemed Constancy and Patience as Qualities preeminent in Good women, because by these she gaineth her Going toward Our Godliness.74

Whereas Crowley does not mention Babalon in connection to this statement, it is included as a point of comparison in order to highlight how he continued periodically to conceptualize femininity as lack defined by its relation to masculinity or, to speak with Irigaray, as “the other of the same” rather than as something in itself. Here, feminized receptivity is not construed as a spiritual modality necessary of all seekers wishing to cross the Abyss, but instead in terms of an inconstancy and susceptibility to external influence that ultimately renders women incapable of magical attainment. In the quoted passage, Crowley appears to idealize what Schippers would refer to as a hegemonic femininity, which legitimizes a hierarchical and complementary relationship between male and female.75 Although it is my argument that some of Crowley’s writings on Babalon hint at an alternative femininity that also supports other ways of doing masculinity, this indicates how Crowley’s views on gender shifted among his different texts, many of which support hegemonic gender relations. This illustrates how the feminization or masculinization of specific characteristics in themselves do not render a particular femininity or masculinity hegemonic, pariahlike, or alternative; instead, their position is determined by their relation to the gender system.

94  The Eloquent Blood

High Priestess of the Goddess: Crowley and Leah Hirsig at the Abbey of Thelema During his lifetime, Crowley ascribed the title of Scarlet Woman to a number of his female lovers whom he felt played important parts in his magical work and advancement. One of Crowley’s most important female ritual partners, who held the title of Scarlet Woman between 1920 and 1924, was Leah Hirsig. Born in Switzerland in 1883, Hirsig grew up in New York City from the age of two. Employed as a music teacher, Hirsig and her sister were both interested in the occult, leading them in the spring of 1918 to visit Crowley, who was currently staying in Greenwich Village. Crowley and Hirsig were instantly attracted to each other.76 In January 1919, Hirsig once again sought out Crowley. She would subsequently take the magical name Alostrael, meaning “womb” or “grail” of god.77 In 1920, Hirsig and Crowley founded the Abbey of Thelema in Cefalù, Sicily. Crowley turned the main room of the house into a temple, erecting a throne for himself as the Beast in the east and one for the Scarlet Woman in the west.78 He created a “Chamber of Nightmares” by painting the walls with grotesque and vivid sexual images, aimed at breaking down subconscious prejudices in order to unleash the mind. Drugs were made freely available to all residents, and the days were otherwise filled with ritual, studying, exercise, play, and writing.79 Crowley’s diaries from the Abbey of Thelema feature numerous descriptions of sexual fantasies and encounters phrased in a language of eroticized submission, wherein the boundaries between Babalon and various human women are permeable. It is worth noting that these diary records, similar to the abovementioned ones from 1914–​1918, thus differ from the more official A∴A∴ instructions, in that Babalon here occupies a more anthropomorphic and multifaceted role as Crowley’s personal mistress. In December 1919, he writes: “I am terrible in my love for Babalon. It obsesses me. And yet Alostrael loves me as of old.”80 Later, he waxes lyrical about the impending arrival of his disciple Jane Wolfe (1875–​1958), with whom he had corresponded since 1918 and whom he hoped to make his lover and priestess.81 He describes his intention to take a vow of holy obedience to her, losing himself in her as “the indivisible point Hadit, all-​soul of her omnipresent body.”82 He continues: And I am Hers; I lift my Lance only that Blood may fill Her Cup. I die that She may live; my roots grow darkly for no fulfilment but Her flowering. She is the green and glory of Night, and I Her slave, her fule, hidden below the Earth. . . . She is . . . the incarnation of Nuith, the Infinite Space that absorbs me, dissolves me, aspires as I  expire, inspires me as I  become her priest, Her prophet, Her saint, Her martyr, Oracle of Her shrine, and Image of Her form.83

Yielding Peaches and Women with Whips  95 This excerpt blends the symbolism of the two major Thelemic goddesses: while the woman described is labeled “the incarnation of Nuith, the Infinite Space,” the reference to Crowley’s death and his blood filling her cup appears to indicate Babalon. The excerpt continues the theme of masculine desire for erotic destruction in union with femininity. In that Crowley’s fantasies about Wolfe bear clear overtones of erotic investment in pain and humiliation at the feet of a deified female figure, there are parallels to the scourge-​bearing Babalon of Liber Aleph and to themes of erotic pain, dominance, and submission in Crowley’s early poetry. He continues to imagine: I drown in delight at the thought that I who have been Master of the Universe should lie beneath Her feet, Her slave, Her victim, eager to be abased, passionately athirst for suffering, swooning at Her cruelty, craving Her contempt . . . . to bleed under Her whip’s lash, to choke as Her heel treads my throat. . . . I want to prostitute my manhood, to abase my godhead before my lady. I want my crown crushed by Her feet; I want my face fouled by Her spittle. I want my heart torn by Her boot-​heel, my mind to Her skirt-​hem’s rustle, my soul to Her privy. . . . The greater I, the more hell-​deep my humiliation, the viler that in Her which pashes me, the higher and the holier She!84

This excerpt alludes to a sort of “phallic” femininity, which very clearly effects an erotic destruction passionately desired by Crowley himself. Paradoxically, however, Crowley’s arousal at this fantasy is seemingly enhanced by his view of himself as a supremely powerful person. When Wolfe finally arrived in Cefalù, Crowley was disappointed in her appearance, finding her older than he expected. Wolfe was similarly unimpressed by the Beast. However, she stayed at the Abbey as Crowley’s dedicated student, remaining an ardent Thelemite throughout her life, and would later play a crucial role in the establishment of the Thelemic movement in the United States.85 Nonetheless, Leah Hirsig appears to have been Crowley’s most important lover and magical partner, as his Scarlet Woman and high priestess, during Crowley’s time at Cefalù. At the Abbey, Hirsig and Crowley engaged in an increasingly intense series of sexual explorations, which continued and concretized themes present in Crowley’s earlier poetry and writings on Babalon, in the emphasis on eroticized pain, debasement, and destruction in union with a feminine other and the confluence of sex and death (of individualized subjectivity), love and blood, drunkenness and annihilation. As Crowley’s Scarlet Woman, the lines between Hirsig and Babalon blur in many of Crowley’s descriptions. Alostrael is presented repeatedly as a more-​or-​less divine figure, simultaneously an exalted goddess and a terrifying tyrant, to whom Crowley sacrifices himself and swears fealty. His diary records describe him taking a vow of holy obedience to her, declaring her

96  The Eloquent Blood High Priestess of Aiwass, his Holy Guardian Angel, stating that she is to “direct all action, taking the initiative throughout.”86 Indeed, Hirsig repeatedly took a dominant role in their frequently violent sexual encounters. There are themes of gender inversion and queerly feminine desire, as Crowley describes conducting a “Lesbian Orgie [sic]” with Leah, where he assumed a submissive role in his feminine persona Alys. Crowley describes the event ecstatically: [A]‌fter a frightful ordeal of cruelty and defilement put on me as Her first passion for Her slave, which tore from me the last rag of manhood, violated my last veil of modesty, degraded me below the dog and the hog, revolted even my body, and made me free forever of my preferences for matter, made me Pure Spirit. From it she rose Ishtar, Love’s Goddess, and drew me into Her womb; Her Babe am I. . . . It is for Her to nurse Her Babe, train it with Her sharp whips and sharper words, bring it to puberty, to virile might, and like Semiramis . . . murder him.87

In this quote, Crowley clearly associates erotic debasement with spiritual advancement, ascribing to Hirsig the ability to tear him from his sense of self and ties to social convention, thus rendering him “Pure Spirit.” The demolition of individual subjectivity, conveyed in deathly verbal imagery, is construed as a prerequisite for initiatory advancement, and Crowley’s loss of self in union with Hirsig as the goddess Ishtar is conceived as simultaneously degrading and enlightening. Hirsig in her dominant role as erotic destroyer appears as a semi-​deified figure whom Crowley links to Ishtar and the Babylonian queen Semiramis, an association that is potentially derived from Hislop’s Two Babylons, where both appear as highly dominant female figures linked to the Whore of Babylon (see ­chapter 3).88 Crowley’s record of his sexual explorations with Hirsig continue the theme of damnation and salvation as intertwined and intimately related to sexuality: he likens himself to Satan, being thrown into a “Bottomless Pit” through a “flame-​jaggéd gaping gateway,” which in this case is seemingly a reference to Hirsig’s vagina. Crowley draws on the symbolism of the Black Mass, continuing: She will rise up, command me, master me, lash me to manhood, torture and mock me, smear her snake-​slaver over me, and with foul word and act make me the tool of Her abominable craft. She will perform Her Black—​nay, Her unnameably-​hued Mass.89

Once again, Hirsig is construed as erotically dominant, Crowley submitting to her utterly. Satanic themes are strongly present in this part of Crowley’s magical record from the Abbey of Thelema, as evinced by the two preceding excerpts,

Yielding Peaches and Women with Whips  97 and Crowley repeatedly identifies Aiwass –​ the entity who had dictated Liber AL, whom Crowley by this time saw as his Holy Guardian Angel –​ with the Devil.90 The erotic destruction of an autonomous sense of self is emphasized in Crowley’s assertion that his soul is melded with Hirsig’s, writing that Aiwass has “fused His Beast’s soul with His Scarlet Whore’s, to be One Soul completed.”91 He appears to posit himself, Alostrael, and Aiwass as a trinity.92 In relation to Aiwass, Crowley adopted a spiritually submissive and seemingly feminized role. He implores Aiwass to “kindle my manhood to beget, and moisten my womanhood to conceive.” Pledging his devotion, he continues: I am to Thee the harlot crowned with poison and gold, my garment many-​ coloured soiled with shame and smeared with blood, who for no price but of my wantonness have prostituted myself to all that lusted after me. . . . I have made my flesh rotten, my blood venomous, my nerves hell-​tortured, my brain hag-​ridden, I have infected the round world with my corruption.93

This quote indicates that femininity, while not consistently reducible to a socially subordinate role in Crowley’s mind, could be associated with submission to a masculine other. It is worth noting that Crowley here constructs himself as a prostitute. Although this may simply be interpreted as an aspect of his attempts to debase himself through identification with pariah femininity, it may indicate that Crowley to some extent identified with Babalon. He continues: To Thee I am this woman-​thing, nameless because unique . . . I am to Thee virgin and bride, Thy ring upon my finger, my body gleaming through the gossamer of lawn that veils its glory and reveals it. I am all Thine, quick to conceive and bear Thine Image. . . . For she in me that played the harlot was but the phantom bred of a maid’s vapours. . . . I sought Thee only. . . . For I the harlot found Thee where I sought Thee, Thee who art everywhere; in mine atrocity’s excess I won Thee, I possessed Thee, I enjoyed Thee, ’Twas thus, nor more nor less, than when Thy love gave back to its spoiled treasured-​house the jewel of my virginity, sealed it and brake the seal.94

As noted in the previous chapter, the tendency to conceptualize the self as feminine in relation to (masculine) divinity is not unique to Crowley’s writings but can be placed in the context of a longer tradition in Western Christian mysticism and theology. Whereas femininity in this tradition can be read as indexical of inferior status, thus seemingly supporting a hegemonic view of gender, Crowley to some extent stands out in relation to this broader tendency by allying himself with pariah femininity, presenting the promiscuous harlot as the emblem of the ardent spiritual seeker. Crowley alternates between describing himself

98  The Eloquent Blood in self-​debasing tones, as a lowly whore, and as the pure and virginal bride of Aiwass.95 Crowley’s and Hirsig’s engagement with eroticized violence, dominance, and submission continued, and gradually became more intense. In his diary, Crowley connects Hirsig to the literary femme fatale motif by likening her to John Keats’s poem “La Belle Dame sans Merci” (1819). Thus, Crowley’s diaries from this period continue the reworking of the femme fatale trope both implicitly and explicitly, in that he casts the perceived threat to masculine bourgeois subjectivity in positive terms. Crowley expresses intense admiration for Hirsig, describing how during his first hour of obedience to Alostrael she proved herself to be the rightful Scarlet Woman, and how she “sprang instantly to Goddess-​stature.”96 Continuing the theme of spiritual advancement through sadomasochistic erotic destruction, Hirsig proceeds to test Crowley and break down his mental and physical barriers. She mocks him and burns him repeatedly with a cigarette to conquer his fear of pain. Crowley expresses regretful shame at having whimpered and recoiled from the pain on the first attempts, praying that next time he will bear the pain and prove that he is “worthy at last to love Her.” He writes, admiringly, that he has beaten and kicked Hirsig and that she withstood this pain far better, simply asking him for more.97 Crowley repeatedly portrays Hirsig as braver and more resilient than he in her lack of hesitance toward performing seemingly transgressive sexual acts. After Crowley boasts to Alostrael of his ability to transmute even the foulest substances into the body or blood of God using the force of love, she proceeds to test him by commanding him to consume her excrement. Very hesitantly, Crowley obeys: My mouth burned; my throat choked; my belly retched; my blood fled whither who knows, and my skin sweated. She stood above me, hideous in contempt. .  .  .  . Hierophantia stood She, Her eyes uttering Light, Her mouth radiant Silence. She ate the Body of God, and with her Soul’s compulsion, made me eat . . . . that which to Her teeth was moonlight, and to her tongue ambrosia; to her throat nectar, in Her Belly the One God. . . . So with my body shuddering, retching, fainting and convulsed; with my mind tempest, my heart crater, my will earthquake, I obeyed Her lash.98

In this quote, Alostrael appears as spiritually superior to Crowley, succeeding where he fails in transmuting her faeces into divine substance. Hirsig’s sexually transgressive behavior is construed as emblematic of her sacredness and divinity. For Hirsig, according to Crowley’s description, there is no distinction between any one thing and another, and the incident can be interpreted as Crowley’s recognition that Hirsig has seemingly mastered the formula of the Scarlet Woman, as articulated in The Book of Lies, by accepting all impressions and engaging

Yielding Peaches and Women with Whips  99 passionately with the all. Clearly, Crowley does not ascribe equal success to himself in this endeavor, and he expresses gratitude to Hirsig for exposing him to his own hypocrisy.99 Thus, Hirsig appears as a sometimes brutal initiatrix figure, disciplining Crowley in order to aid his advancement, literally entering—​or penetrating—​his body with hers. As mentioned in the preceding discussion, Crowley’s magical record presents Hirsig as a semidivine albeit demonic figure, and his writings concerning her often draw closely on imagery and phrasing related to Babalon. Recalling Crowley’s vision of the dancer recorded in the 15th Aethyr of Vision, in which Babalon identifies herself as “the lust of the spirit” who “lick[s]‌up the lives of men,” Crowley writes that Hirsig’s lust “licks, licks up, devours, transmuting to absorbing in itself this glad Burnt Offering all of me, my Soul.”100 This excerpt continues the strong emphasis on femininity-​as-​destroyer and masculine desire for this erotic destruction. Crowley describes his own calling as Beast and prophet of Thelema as being to bring all people “to Her by Her veil’s broidery, its perfume, its mystery,” and to be thus: The Beast to Her that rideth me, the Scarlet Woman, loud, adulterous, Whore, mad drunk on Her own Cup. Her Cup blood-​glutted, Her Cup drugged with the Herbs insane that she hath soaked in Sin; hath bruised in Cruelty, and hath stewed in Vice, distilled in Fancy, until Imagination’s cucurbit congealed, drop sweltering after drop, the Venom Her Soul’s Spilth, Quintessence and Elizir, Absolute, uttermost, perfect; its name Abomination!101

It is worth noting that Crowley here defines his own role in relation to that of the Scarlet Woman, contrasting with other passages in which her role instead appears as secondary to his.102 The above quote in its references to the Scarlet Woman’s drunkenness and adultery, her blood-​filled cup, and abomination has clear similarities to Revelation as well as Liber AL, in which the Scarlet Woman is prompted to be “loud and adulterous.”103 Through the persistent conflation of blood and wine, (erotic) ecstasy and death continue to be associated; Babalon is described as drunk on the blood drained into her cup, signifying the surrender of the adept’s individuality and ego. The description of sin-​spiked blood reifies the theme of transgression as the pathway to spiritual attainment and of engagement with that which one perceives as personally abhorrent as necessary to initiation. In this and the previous quote, the boundary between the Scarlet Woman and Babalon does not appear to be absolute. Instead, Hirsig has more than a little of the goddess herself about her, at least in Crowley’s view. He continues: All men confess Her power, live by Her breath, their thought, Our Lord the Devil’s [Aiwaz] their Word, the Word Thelema, spoken of me The Beast,

100  The Eloquent Blood and their one act Her act, Alostrael’s, Her act that hath writ Mystery on Her brow, hath dyed Her robe with blood, hath filled Her cup with poison and madness, ay, Her sole Act, continuous, Her true life that which hath set Her straddling me, enthroned Her on me through Earth proclaimed the Whore!104

The reference to “Mystery on Her brow” clearly indicates Revelation, in which the Whore of Babylon is described as bearing the word “mystery” on her forehead.105 Once again, Hirsig as the Scarlet Woman is described as taking on a number of aspects of Babalon herself, dressed in a robe that is red with blood and carrying a venom-​filled cup. This and several of the preceding excerpts attribute to Hirsig or Babalon a seemingly pariahlike femininity, encompassing outspokenness, sexual assertiveness, and violent dominance, traits that—​based on Schippers’s framework—​challenge hegemonic masculine-​feminine relations by comprising aspects of a hegemonic masculinity. It is thus my argument that Crowley’s descriptions of Hirsig-​Babalon challenge hegemonic femininity as nurturing, passive, and erotically “destroyed” by instead offering an image of femininity-​as-​destroyer, a positively lauded feminine threat to masculine autonomous subjectivity and rationality.

“Whore to Herself ”: The Cephaloedium Working Whereas Crowley’s diary entries from the summer and early autumn of 1920 center largely on his sexual explorations with Hirsig, tragic reality intervened. On October 14, 1920, Hirsig and Crowley’s daughter Anne Lea (b. 1920), alias Poupée, died, leaving her parents shattered.106 The grief-​stricken Hirsig, who was pregnant again, suffered a miscarriage a few days later, and underwent surgery as she hovered between life and death.107 Crowley describes his mind being deadened, “except in one part where slowly revolved a senseless wheel of pain,” recounting how Hirsig’s “courage, wisdom, understanding and divine enlightenment” pulled him through.108 On November 21, 1920, Crowley’s disciple Cecil Fredrick Russell (1897–​ 1987), alias Frater Genesthai, arrived at the Abbey. In late November, Crowley, Hirsig, and Genesthai performed the “Cephaloedium Working,” which involved sexual magic. Its purpose was to establish the Aeon of Horus and to inspire Crowley to complete a satisfactory commentary to Liber AL, an endeavor that he had worked at, futilely, for years. In the record of this working, Crowley refers to Hirsig, whom he describes as robed in scarlet, girt with a sword, and carrying a golden cup:

Yielding Peaches and Women with Whips  101 [T]‌he Scarlet Woman Léa my concubine, in whom is all power given, sworn unto Aiwaz, prostituted in every part of her body to Pan and to the Beast, mother of bastards, aborter, whore to herself, to man, woman, child and brute, partaker of the Eucharist of the Excrements in the Mass of the Devil.109

Here, Hirsig is once again attributed a pariahlike femininity, and her epithets of “mother of bastards, aborter, whore to herself ” appear as honorary titles. Hirsig—​ and thus Babalon—​is associated with extramarital procreation, nonheterosexual relations, and nonreproductivity. However, it is important to stress that these textual references should not necessarily be interpreted literally. Just as there is no indication that Hirsig engaged in commercial sex work at this time—​it is reasonable to infer that the term “whore” denotes a spiritual and sexual modality connected to nondiscriminate union—​several of these other attributes suggest a more figurative interpretation. The instructions for the ritual continue the thematic confluence of self-​ surrender and the erotic. It is said that Russell should “sacrifice” himself to Crowley (i.e., have sex with him), and subsequently Crowley should “sacrifice” himself to Hirsig. Continuing similar themes of gender inversion, Crowley, fantasizing, calls Russell: “Bull in my Pasiphae-​pasture!”110 Bearing in mind his previous association in Vision of the legend of Pasiphae and the bull with Babalon and the Beast (see ­chapter 3), this is significant as it posits Crowley in the feminine role. Crowley implores: Come, brother, come, my Bull! Desire me though, delight me! Defile me and destroy me. . . . I love thee not; I loathe thee and I fear thee; therefore, I say my body be thy brothel! . . . In thy distaste for me, in thy contempt for me, my shameless soul, my soddenness, my soiled stupration, in these devouring them with cold and carnal acts, find thou the splendours and serenities thou hast sought, the sanctities that none but Sin, the Sin against thyself, hath power to give.111

Recalling some of his writings on Babalon, Crowley pledges to “make no difference between any one thing and any other thing . . . begetting in my soul’s womb one.”112 At one point, he seems to identify himself as “Sow of Purple,” pleading: “[C]‌ome, my master, come to Alys thy slave . . . I prostitute myself to thee.”113 Despite Crowley’s best efforts to entice Russell, the latter was not impressed.114 As a result, Crowley proclaimed the “Cephaloedium Working” a fiasco in January 1921, blaming Russell’s failure to be aroused by his and Hirsig’s ministrations.115 However, the record of the working is nonetheless interesting in presenting

102  The Eloquent Blood a dual view of femininity both as the dominant and deified harlot Hirsig and the debased and submissive Crowley. Thus, the “Cephaloedium Working” articulates femininity within a hegemonic gender dynamic as both subordinate to masculinity and—​through Hirsig’s role—​as triumphant, “phallic,” and dominant. Furthermore, it is interesting to note how the idea of whoredom alternates in the text between exaltation and degradation. Although the latter could be interpreted as part of a hegemonic gender discourse wherein pariah femininity is construed as polluting, it is significant that Crowley repeatedly construes feminized transgression as an initiatory tool. In the “Cephaloedium Working,” Crowley appears to have identified himself with the receptivity and nondiscrimination he ascribed to Babalon, indicating the complex gendered dynamics of the ritual and how femininity, for Crowley, was not necessarily limited to particular physical bodies but rather was a positionality that he himself sometimes strove to inhabit. Crowley and Hirsig’s sex magical experiments continued, although they appeared to have lost some steam following the death of their daughter. On a particularly unsuccessful occasion, Crowley and Hirsig sought ritually to explore the mysteries of animal-​human union, attempting to coax a goat into mounting Leah. When the attempt failed, Crowley and Leah instead had intercourse, Crowley acting as stand-​in for the animal.116 In May 1921, Crowley and Hirsig conducted a sex magical ritual aimed at unleashing the force of Babalon within the latter. In her mind, this working marked her transformation from Scarlet Woman and emissary of the goddess to Babalon incarnate, and Crowley’s attainment of the degree of Ipsissimus, the highest degree in the A∴A∴ system.117 Following this transition, Hirsig would frequently sign her correspondence as “Babalon.”118

“I Expect a New Semiramis”: The “New Comment” During his time at the Abbey of Thelema, Crowley made substantial progress on a number of significant works, including a longer comment to Liber AL, which has subsequently been called the “New Comment.”119 The “New Comment” interprets the passionate union of the opposite-​sexed lovers of Nuit and Hadit—​ described in Liber AL—​in terms of gender polarity, with Nuit as passive and Hadit as active.120 Importantly, however, Crowley stresses that Hadit represents the inner core of each person, regardless of sex.121 The gender polar model is complicated by Crowley’s discussion of the Beast and the Scarlet Woman in the same text. In accordance with the Hermetic principle of “as above, so below,” Crowley writes, the Beast and the Scarlet Woman are “avatars of Tao and Teh, Shiva and Shakti.” He contends that while “the Beast appears to be a definite

Yielding Peaches and Women with Whips  103 individual . . . the man Aleister Crowley . . . the Scarlet Woman is an officer replaceable as need arises,” noting that there have been “several holders of the title.”122 He includes a list of former female lovers and magical partners whom he believed had played this cosmic role, including his first wife Rose, Mary d’Este (1871–​1931), Jeanne Foster, Roddie Minor (1884–​1979), and finally Leah Hirsig.123 Thus, the Scarlet Woman appears in Crowley’s view to be more replaceable than the Beast. Crowley links the Beast and the Scarlet Woman with the image on the Strength card in the Tarot, described by Crowley as “Babalon and the Beast conjoined.”124 In his commentary to AL III:11, “Let the woman be girt with a sword before me,” Crowley writes that the woman referred to may be the Scarlet Woman but might also refer to women in general. He writes: “Remember that in the Scarlet Woman ‘is all power given’; and I expect a new Semiramis.”125 Crowley discusses AL III:55, “Let Mary inviolate be torn upon wheels,” at some length, linking it to Vision, in which Mary is described as “blasphemy against BABALON,” as she has “shut herself up.”126 Crowley writes that this represents “the image of death,” “the opposite of Going, which is God.” He continues that the maternal divine principle is the gateway between “the Tao and the Manifested World,” and that the divine feminine principle of Babalon must be symbolized “as a Whore,” meaning that this door should be open rather than locked, as this prevents change.127 Once again, this suggests the association between Babalon and a modality of spiritual openness and receptivity expressed in terms of pariah femininity, entailing passionate union and transformation rather than the stasis Crowley ascribes to the Virgin Mary. However, the text presents a more literal interpretation of sexual practices, stressing an opposition between the hegemonic feminine ideal of female chastity and sexual liberation. Crowley writes that women in Christian culture are kept virginal so that men can maintain power over them. He describes women under patriarchal oppression as “hideously disgusting, a sickening slime of uncleanliness,” and as having the “moral characteristics . . . of the parrot and the monkey.”128 In these statements, Crowley thus expresses a pronounced disgust for what he appears to view as the hegemonic femininity that legitimizes a hierarchical and complementary relationship between the sexes, instead writing that man should make woman “his comrade, frank, trusty, and gay, the tenderer self of himself, his consubstantial complement even as Earth is to the Sun.”129 He continues: We of Thelema say that “Every man and every woman is a star.” We do not fool and flatter women; we do not despise and abuse them. To us a woman is Herself, absolute, original, independent, free, self-​justified, exactly as a man is. We dare not thwart Her Going, Goddess she! We arrogate no right upon Her will; we claim not to deflect Her development, to dispose of Her desires, or to determine

104  The Eloquent Blood Her destiny. She is Her own sole arbitar; we ask no more than to supply our strength to Her, whose natural weakness else were prey to the world’s pressure. Nay more, it were too zealous even to guard Her in Her Going; for She were best by Her own self-​reliance to win Her own way forth! We do not want Her as a slave; we want Her free and royal, whether Her love fight death in our arms by night, or Her loyalty ride by day beside us in the Charge of the Battle of Life.130

In this passage, Crowley appears to suggest a sort of alternative femininity, characterized by freedom, independence, and passion, in contrast to the weakened ideal of hegemonic femininity. He stresses that Thelemites welcome women as their allies in both battlefield and bed, in war and peace, life and death, stating that women are held to be “sinless and shameless even as we are.”131 Although this portion of the text does not explicitly mention Babalon, pariah femininity is exalted through Crowley’s assertion that Thelemites do not hesitate to use the term “whore” as a compliment: “[W]‌e cry Whore as Her armies approach us. We beat on our shields with our swords.”132 The idea of whoredom is thus conflated with martial imagery; Thelemic women are construed as warriors, enhancing the connection with pariah femininity. Echoing arguments made by first-​wave feminists, Crowley writes that patriarchal society has exerted a dual control over women by forcing the poor into prostitution and the rest into unhappy marriages.133 Women have been enslaved, starved, sexually shamed, deprived of their children, Crowley writes, and abandoned by their partners for younger women when they begin to age. He contends that male supremacy operates by turning women against each other, and that women have been enslaved by their socialized altruism to serve others above all else. Unlike the sacrifices of men, however, he writes that women’s sacrifices have been made silently.134 Thus, the text reads as a critique of hegemonic femininity in disavowing the notion that women should primarily nurture others. Crowley rejects the sexual double standard, writing that “[t]‌he best women have always been sexually-​free, like the best men.”135 While a number of early-​twentieth-​century women’s rights advocates critiqued the sexual double standard, the feminist movement of the time generally focused more on limiting women’s exposure to male sexual exploitation than on positive valuations of feminine sexuality (see ­chapter 3). Crowley’s affirmation of complete sexual freedom for both men and women was thus somewhat unconventional for its time, although similar ideas had flourished in utopian socialist and anarchist milieus since the nineteenth century.136 However, the largely negative view of sexuality held by many early-​twentieth-​century feminists was motivated by wishes to prevent the spread of genital disease, uncontrollable births, and maternal death, to which women were highly vulnerable. Given the lack of access to reliable contraceptives, and Crowley’s antipathy towards abortion

Yielding Peaches and Women with Whips  105 expressed in the text,137 his encouragement of sexual promiscuity for women appears more ambivalent. Crowley presents Thelema as essential to women’s emancipation: The Book of the Law is the Charter of Woman; the Word Thelema has opened the lock of Her “girdle of chastity.” Your Sphinx of stone has come to life; to know, to will, to dare and to keep silence. Yes, I, The Beast, my Scarlet Whore bestriding me, naked and crowned, drunk on Her golden Cup of Fornication, boasting Herself my bedfellow, have trodden Her in the Market place, and roared this Word that every woman is a star. And with that Word is uttered Woman’s Freedom; the fools and fribbles and flirts have heard my voice. The fox in woman hath heard the Lion in man; fear, fainting, flabbiness, frivolity, falsehood—​these are no more the mode.138

In the preceding passage, Crowley links the Scarlet Woman and, implicitly, Babalon to the ideal of female emancipation. However, it is interesting to note that his positive usage of the term “whore” does not appear to coincide with a positive valuation of commercial sex. On the contrary, Crowley writes that female liberation will result in the disappearance of prostitution.139 He emphasizes that women will liberate themselves, rather than be liberated by men.140 Finally, Crowley emphasizes the link between Babalon and emancipated womanhood as well as with erotic destruction: Beneath thee, rejoicing, he lies: he exults as he dies, burning up in the breath of thy kiss. Yea, star rushes flaming to star; the blaze burst, splashes the skies. There is a Cry in an unknown tongue, it resounds through the Temple of the Universe; in its own Word is Death and Ecstasy, and thy title of honour, o thou, to Thyself High Priestess, Prophetess, Empress, to thyself the Goddess whose Name means Mother and whore!141

As evinced by this quote, the “New Comment” continues to intertwine the concepts of death and ecstasy; sexuality; and annihilation of the individual self through union with the divine feminine as Babalon, who is identified with female liberation and the lauding of a pariah femininity that challenges the nurturing and sexually passive ideal of hegemonic femininity. In the “New Comment,” Crowley critiques male supremacy, positing Babalon and the Scarlet Woman as alternatives to hegemonic femininity, encompassing traits such as violence, assertive sexual desire, independence, and the ability to effect erotic destruction on men. As such, Babalon and the Scarlet Woman embody traits that may be connected to fin-​de-​siècle masculinity, and the text thus perpetuates Crowley’s tendency to valuate pariah femininity, as is indicated by

106  The Eloquent Blood the continued usage of “whore” as a title of honor. However, importantly, the “New Comment” does not present the emancipated womanhood supposedly represented by the Scarlet Woman as pariahlike within its particular worldview, but rather as a Thelemic feminine ideal that posits women as sexually desiring subjects and independent beings. Thus, it is possible to argue, in Schippers’s terminology, that the Scarlet Woman in the “New Comment” functions as something of an alternative femininity, representing modes of doing gender that—​while read as feminine—​do not directly legitimize a hierarchical and complementary relationship between the sexes. It is unclear what prompted the more overtly feminist aspects of the “New Comment,” and to what extent they were a result of the people around Crowley at the time of writing, such as Hirsig. Nonetheless, it is interesting that Crowley produced large portions of this text with the aid of, and while working magically with, one of his most important Scarlet Women. However, Crowley was highly dissatisfied with the “New Comment,” viewing it as a failure, and it was never published during his lifetime.142 Furthermore, it is debatable whether the alternative gender roles suggested in the text were fully realized at the Abbey of Thelema, or indeed whether Hirsig enjoyed the complete sexual freedom Crowley promised women.143 In 1924, Crowley appeared to have grown tired of his and Hirsig’s explorations, seeking a new Scarlet Woman in Dorothy Olsen (1892–​?), alias Soror Astrid. Reluctant to surrender her title, Hirsig declared herself Babalon incarnate, claiming Olsen to be her magical daughter. On September 22, she wrote to Crowley, renouncing her office and passing the torch to “ ‘The Scarlet Concubine of his desire,’ the daughter of Babalon.” She signed the letter as Babalon herself, and continued to identify with Babalon for some time. She also practiced sexual magic with Crowley’s disciple Norman Mudd, whom she regarded as her magical son.144 While Hirsig’s diaries from this period indicate that women have been a part of the Babalon discourse since its inception, proposing their own interpretations, it is questionable whether the radical potential of Crowley’s Babalon as a symbolic ideal, hinting at an alternative femininity, was realized in social practice. Hirsig’s diaries, although containing brief references to Babalon and her own identification with this role, are generally fragmentary and do not contain lengthy theological elaborations that shed light on how she perceived the dynamic between her and Crowley. I will return to the relationship between symbolic ideals and social practice, and disparities between the historical and contemporary Babalon discourse in terms of women’s participation, in ­chapter 12. In Crowley’s magical record from the Cefalù period, Babalon assumes an anthropomorphic form in Crowley’s fantasies of Wolfe, and subsequently through the body of Leah Hirsig. Contrary to A∴A∴ instructions such as “Liber Cheth,” Crowley’s magical record conveys a more intimate image of Babalon and the

Yielding Peaches and Women with Whips  107 Scarlet Woman as his personal partner. Importantly, these writings were not intended as magical or mystical guidelines for his disciples but detailed Crowley’s more personal and exploratory musings and records. Nonetheless, they are interesting as they indicate how some of the concepts that—​in Crowley’s more official writings—​were systematized and concretized into teachable doctrine from 1909 onward appear to have been enacted in “lived” religious practice in the early Thelemic milieu. Crowley’s magical experiments at the Abbey of Thelema concretize many of the themes present in his previous writings, with a clear emphasis on the soteriological and initiatory aspects of submission to a simultaneously goddess-​like and demonic female sexual partner. Femininity is constructed in complex and paradoxical ways in these records. While Crowley in several instances posits a dichotomous relationship between femininity and masculinity, construing his own submission in terms of self-​feminization, Hirsig as feminine initiator takes a highly dominant role with regards to Crowley. Although the latter appears to articulate receptivity and openness—​ symbolized through feminized sexual promiscuity and whoredom—​as part of his own subordination to the masculine Aiwass or Russell, it is important to stress that receptivity is emphatically not construed as negative within Crowley’s system of Magick. On the contrary, self-​surrender and loss of control through erotic engagement with the site that Shildrick identifies with the monstrous—​the realm of being associated with dissolution of the boundaries of self-​contained subjectivity—​are posited as initiatory goals in themselves. For instance, Hirsig is upheld as particularly virtuous and courageous in her ability to “accept all impressions,” and Crowley laments his own lack of her strength.

Babalon in Magick, The Book of Thoth, and Magick without Tears Babalon appears briefly in several chapters of Crowley’s Magick in Theory and Practice (1929), which covers a number of important aspects of his magical system, although she is not a major theme. The work does not contain any lengthier or more detailed expositions of her meaning or function akin to, for instance, “Liber Cheth,” Vision, or even Liber Aleph. Magick focuses in a relatively straightforward manner on Babalon as the gateway to the City of the Pyramids. Once again, this could be seen as indicative of Crowley’s ongoing quest to systematize Thelema in a format that would be teachable to others. Crowley writes that the teachings pertaining to Babalon are “too important and too sacred to be printed,” and they could only be communicated personally by Crowley to his chosen pupils.145

108  The Eloquent Blood The Book of Thoth (1944) expounds on the symbolism and philosophy of the Thoth Tarot, the deck of Tarot cards designed by Crowley, and painted (and codesigned) by the artist Frieda Lady Harris (1877–​1962), between 1938 and 1943.146 Much of the imagery of the Thoth deck is indebted to Vision. Crowley renamed several of the cards, the most important of which for the present study is the card previously called “Fortitude” or “Strength.” In most historical decks, this card pictures a woman with a lion. The Rider-​Waite Tarot deck (published in 1920, and one of the most popular Tarot decks today) has the woman in the Strength card clasping the lion’s jaws, while other decks have her straddling it.147 As indicated in the preceding discussion, Crowley had previously identified older versions of this card with Babalon. In the Thoth deck, the card has tellingly been renamed “Lust” (see Fig. 4.1) and features a vivid image painted in bright scarlet, orange, and reddish hues. Clearly based on Crowley’s vision of Babalon in the 12th Aethyr of Vision, the card shows a naked woman with long, flowing hair astride a seven-​headed beast, her head thrown back in ecstasy. In her right hand, she brandishes a large golden cup, filled with a glowing red liquid. In her left hand, she holds the reins bridling the beast, beneath whose feet a number of pallid figures are crouched. Crowley explains the name change of the card, writing that “Lust implies not only strength, but the joy of strength exercised. It is vigour, and the rapture of vigour.”148 In The Book of Thoth, the accompanying description and interpretation of the card features a number of quotes from Liber AL pertaining to ecstasy, drunkenness, and sensuality. The card is described as depicting “the original marriage as it occurs in nature,” “the most critical of all the operations of magick and of alchemy.” Crowley links the image to Revelation, writing that its author’s limited perspective led him to demonize the Beast and the Scarlet Woman.149 He continues: She rides astride the Beast; in her left hand she holds the reins, representing the passion which unites them. In her right she holds aloft the cup, the Holy Grail aflame with love and death. In this cup are mingled the elements of the sacrament of the Aeon. The Book of Lies devotes one chapter to this symbol.150

The chapter in question from The Book of Lies is “Waratah-​Blossoms,” which is reproduced in the same chapter of The Book of Thoth. Crowley goes on to explain that the Lust card is linked to “divine drunkenness or ecstasy,” the woman being “more than a little drunk” and the lion “aflame with lust.”151 The pallid figures at the lion’s feet are the saints, whose blood has been absorbed into Babalon’s cup, seen as the Holy Grail.152 Crowley subsequently quotes Liber AL on the Beast and the Scarlet Woman, contending that the card depicts a process of alchemical union between solar and lunar principles.153 Crowley links the image to Vision,

Yielding Peaches and Women with Whips  109

Figure 4.1  Frieda Lady Harris and Aleister Crowley, Atu XI, “Lust.” © Ordo Templi Orientis.

adding that further insight into the card can be gained by studying “Liber XV,” that is, the Gnostic Catholic Mass.154 Crowley’s substitution of the traditional Strength card with the Lust card exemplifies the emphasis on eroticized ecstasy in his system, and his explication of the card links Babalon to sexual magic through the reference to “Liber XV.” As stressed repeatedly in this chapter and the previous one, Babalon’s mystical formula in Crowley’s writings is strongly linked to erotic destruction, an experience that is connected to both pleasure and danger. While the relationship between Babalon and the Beast is expressed in terms of gendered polarity, crossing the

110  The Eloquent Blood Abyss in Crowley’s system implies adopting an attitude of nondiscrimination toward existence, effectively making the adept like Babalon. This helps explicate why Crowley in his attitude to Babalon, as potently illustrated by his relationship with Leah Hirsig at the Abbey of Thelema in 1920, as well as in regards to his Holy Guardian Angel, often adopted a submissive and receptive approach, willingly surrendering control in order to reach higher stages of spiritual attainment. As Crowley writes in The Book of Thoth, the Lust card shows “no attempt to direct the course of the operation.”155 In this sense, the Lust card and Crowley’s exposition on the same creates a tension between the idea that the universe is sustained through the interaction of opposite-​gendered forces, in this case represented by Babalon and the Beast, and a system in which neither masculine nor feminine roles in magic are reducible to activity or passivity.

Dissolution and Danger: Babalonian Femininity and Ambivalence in Crowley’s Work Babalon is not the only emblem of femininity in Thelema, and Crowley’s writings do not present a coherent and singular position on femininity. On the contrary, different understandings of femininities are articulated in his many writings. Several of Crowley’s most important texts put forth a gender polar cosmology and theory of magic, in which masculine and feminine constitute ontological, complementary opposites. Core Thelemic theology as expressed in Liber AL posits the gendered dialectic of Nuit and Hadit as the driving force of the cosmos, the Aeon of Horus as the synthesis of previous masculine and feminine aeons, and the Beast and the Scarlet Woman as embodying complementary solar and lunar forces. The notion of gender polarity as central to magical work is reflected in several of Crowley’s most important sex magical texts. Within this framework, femininity is equated with passivity or receptivity and linked to matter, nature, the moon, and so on.156 In this heteronormative cosmogony, receptive femininity unites with active, dynamic masculinity in order to create the universe.157 The feminist sentiments of the “New Comment” clash with Crowley’s ideas about femininity expressed in other works, as evinced by the preceding discussion of Liber Aleph. As noted, Crowley’s sex magical instructions, written principally for the IX° of OTO, espouse a notion of femininity as lack, defined by its relation to masculinity or, to speak with Irigaray, as “the other of the same” rather than as something in itself. In defining women’s value by their usefulness to the male magician, Crowley heralds a version of hegemonic femininity that legitimizes a hierarchical, complementary relationship between the sexes. Similarly, in his magical record, Crowley writes: “If God made man a little lower than the angels he made woman a lot lower than the animals.”158

Yielding Peaches and Women with Whips  111 In Confessions, large portions of which were written around the same time as the “New Comment” and dictated to Hirsig, Crowley asserts that women are merely a distraction to men, only tolerable if “trained to help a man in his work without the slightest reference to any other interests,” and that they must do so blindly as “a woman is fundamentally incapable of understanding the nature of work in itself.”159 He contends that women lack individuality and are constantly swayed by moods if not under the firm guidance of a strong man. As women’s most powerful impulse is always motherhood, in Crowley’s view, they can never be completely trusted.160 He states that his female sexual partners during his college years were a strong source of romantic and poetic inspiration but all the same “morally and mentally . . . beneath contempt,” intellectually nonexistent and completely bound up with their reproductive lives. However, Crowley condescendingly observes that it was beneficial for him to have sexual relations with “animal[s]‌with no consciousness beyond sex.”161 He writes that women, “like all moral inferiors,” should be treated kindly but firmly, and that the fall of Rome as well as the suffrage movement were due to the erosion of masculine virtue in men.162 Later, in Magick in Theory and Practice (1929), Crowley asserts with regards to Babalon’s cup: [I]‌t is a Woman whose Cup must be filled. It is rather the sacrifice of the Man, who transfers life to his descendants. For a woman does not carry in herself the principle of new life, except temporarily, when it is given her.163

This statement alludes to the notion of a male active principle and a female passive or receptive ditto, constructing femininity in terms of lack or absence, specifically of the masculine, life-​giving principle. It constructs a symbolic dichotomy between a male magician, who achieves union with the divine by launching his life force into a receptive feminine vessel, and the vessel, which passively accommodates him. Significantly, Crowley writes in Magick that [a]‌male star is built up from the centre outwards; a female from the circumference inwards. This is what is meant when we say that woman has no soul. It explains fully the difference between the sexes.164

As evinced by these quotations, which, with one exception, do not deal with Babalon, Crowley’s opinions on femininities and women’s roles vary considerably among different texts, including ones written around the same time. Indeed, historian of religions Hugh B.  Urban describes Crowley’s magical experimentations as “androcentric, arguably misogynistic, and exploitative of the female body.”165 Although I concur with Urban that some of Crowley’s writings are undoubtedly misogynist by contemporary standards, I  find the

112  The Eloquent Blood former’s assessment of Crowley’s composite oeuvre too categorical. Firstly, this interpretation disregards the strong emphasis on themes of gender inversion or blurring in Crowley’s writings, which parallel with the concerns of other fin-​de-​ siècle occultists.166 Secondly, in my view, Urban’s reading overlooks the historical agency of women in Thelema as well as the specific importance of Babalon as alternative femininity in Crowley’s system, symbolic of both a mystical receptivity linked to the initiatory ordeal of ego annihilation and the feminized other threatening or promising the erotic destruction of the self. These two aspects of Crowley’s system do not perhaps in themselves disprove Urban’s charge of misogyny, and it is important to stress that the Babalon discourse is only one part of Crowley’s oeuvre. Nonetheless, Crowley’s engagement with gender-​bending as well as his articulation of Babalon complicates the image, indicating how—​ despite his occasional chauvinism—​ he challenged early-​ twentieth-​ century bourgeois masculinity. Crowley’s articulation of Babalon and the Scarlet Woman fits somewhat uneasily with the conceptualization of women as tools for the male magician, or of femininity as lack or absence, as articulated in some of the writings discussed in this chapter. Although Crowley in some passages conceptualizes Babalon as the receptive half of a metaphysical, heterosexual polarity, she emerges repeatedly—​ especially in his private records—​as a dynamic figure who cannot simply be reduced to the lack or absence of masculinity. Moreover, as stressed repeatedly in my analysis here, Crowley’s emphasis and lauding of Babalon’s receptivity is complex and does not, in my view, merely constitute a glorification of hegemonic femininity. Crowley’s articulation of Babalon’s function in Vision and “Liber Cheth,” as well as his assertion in The Book of Lies that the “Brothers of A∴A∴ are Women,” in addition to the many admiring descriptions of Hirsig’s spiritual qualities construe femininity as a positionality that Crowley himself seeks to inhabit. Crowley sees receptivity as a feminized virtue required of all seekers. Of course, this in itself does not mean that femininity is construed in an alternative or nonhegemonic fashion; quite the opposite, as indicated by the long historical tradition in Western Christian mysticism and theology of conceptualizing the soul as feminine in relation to masculine divinity. However, Crowley distinguishes himself from this tradition by specifically allying himself with and exalting pariah femininity in construing the ideal spiritual aspirant as a whore.167 In lauding aspects of an early-​twentieth-​century pariah femininity, Crowley posits feminine sexual transgression, promiscuity, dominance, and violence as that which renders the individual magical practitioner akin to the divine rather than different from it. Thus, Hirsig’s “whoredom” and, crucially, her pariah femininity are indexical of her “Goddess-​stature.”168 Crowley’s celebration of the violent, sexually desiring, and ego-​rending femininity of Hirsig-​Babalon, whom he links to Semiramis, clashes starkly with Alexander Hislop’s interpretation of the

Yielding Peaches and Women with Whips  113 Babylonian queen as put forth in his Two Babylons. Whereas Hislop denigrates Semiramis for her violation of hegemonic femininity through sexual licentiousness and worldly power, Crowley interprets the queen as an admirable character and historical predecessor for the quintessentially Thelemic woman. Just as a number of different understandings of femininity are articulated in Crowley’s oeuvre, the femininities of Babalon and the Scarlet Woman are construed in different ways, not solely reducible to lack or absence, in his post-​1909 writings. Crowley’s conceptualization of the goddess and her human avatar exists in tension with some of his other writings—​not dealing specifically with Babalon or the Scarlet Woman—​where he clearly defines femininity in relation to masculinity. As indexes of femininity, it is my argument that Babalon and the Scarlet Woman in Crowley’s writings occupy a dual role symbolizing that which is erotically destroyed, indicating the receptive mode Crowley stresses as required of all seekers, as well as the “phallic” womanhood that has the potential to effect erotic destruction on others, including men. Femininity and feminine sexuality, as construed in Crowley’s writings on Babalon, are thus in Butler’s wording not exclusively “possessions” but “modes of being dispossessed,” functioning as the starting point for the ecstatic undoing of subjectivity. Etymologically, Butler observes, the term “ecstasy” denotes the experience of displacement—​of being transported outside of oneself. Ecstasy entails being “transported beyond oneself by a passion,” or being “beside oneself.” Sexual passion, Butler writes, thus destabilizes the boundaries of the self-​contained subject. Desire has the power to challenge “the very notion of ourselves as autonomous and in control,” and sexuality, Butler argues, can thus be seen as a “mode of being dispossessed” rather than the possession of an individual.169 Although Crowley perpetuates the stereotypical association of femininity with that which threatens rational masculine subjectivity, he lauds the annihilation of the self, and his diary records contain many instances of vocal masculine desire for ecstatic erotic destruction at the hands of a threatening and seductive feminine other. Crowley’s lauding of erotic destruction in connection to Babalon can thus be read as a rejection of bourgeois masculine subjectivity in favor of the erotic affirmation of vulnerability and openness as a prerequisite for mystical relationality. In containing images of phallic womanhood as well as masculine desire for penetration and erotic destruction, Crowley’s diaries may tentatively be read as having the potential to contribute to the refiguration of femininity as well as masculinity, presenting a “queer” image of male-​female sexual desire and relationality that does not conform to a binary dialectic of destroyer and destroyed. In Waldby’s argumentation, such a refiguration of sexual relations has feminist potential. However, it is important to stress that this potential in Crowley’s writings was not necessarily always translated into practice. Similarly, although Babalon as described by Crowley and experienced by Hirsig is not

114  The Eloquent Blood reducible to the lack or absence of masculinity, and contains some of the aspects Irigaray argues are necessary for the development of a robust concept of feminine subjectivity, it is questionable whether Crowley’s interpretations of Babalon had the potential to provide a “horizon” for the development of an independent concept of femininity for his female disciples. Indeed, Hirsig’s experiences following her split with Crowley indicate the potential difficulty for those around Crowley to separate the concepts of Babalon or the Scarlet Woman from Crowley himself or to materialize a concept of femininity not defined by masculinity. Although Hirsig, interestingly, sought to emphasize the mother-​daughter relationship—​ which Irigaray sees as essential to the development of an independent feminine subjectivity—​in order to make sense of her own role after being replaced as the Scarlet Woman, the latter role appears in her mind to have been strongly defined by its relation to Crowley as the Beast. Moreover, these issues highlight that everyone in the early Thelemic movement was not ascribed the same authority to challenge and revise established teachings. While I feel Urban’s assertion as to the fundamentally “chauvinistic and misogynistic” nature of Crowley’s magical practice is too simplistic, the nonhegemonic aspects of Babalon and the Scarlet Woman in Crowley’s writings nonetheless exist in profound tension with other articulations of femininity in his writings.170 Although the Whore of Babylon was primarily seen as a negative motif in the early twentieth century, Crowley was not the only writer to suggest a more generous interpretation of the figure. For instance, the painter Frederick Carter (1883–​1967), an acquaintance of Austin Osman Spare, interpreted Babylon along occult lines. In 1923, Carter contacted D. H. Lawrence (1885–​1930), asking the latter to take a look at his manuscript “The Dragon of the Alchemists.” This sparked an enthusiastic correspondence between the two, although their plans for collaboration came to nothing.171 Carter published portions of the original text in The Dragon of the Alchemists (1926), which combines illustrations with an essay on alchemical and astrological symbolism. In The Dragon of Revelation (1931), Carter undertakes a more detailed survey of the Apocalypse of John, which Carter claims perpetuates many mythological elements from Greek and Babylonian tradition.172 Carter’s view of the Whore of Babylon is ambivalent; he describes her golden cup as “manifestly evil . . . the cup of ill dreams and corporeal enchantments.”173 “The City Goddess of Babel,” he writes, “is a strange figure . . . meretrix, buyer and seller, the divinity of trader and chafferer, the evil of the city incarnate living upon the blood of the world—​a vampire.”174 However, he suggests that the woman clothed with the sun described in Revelation, the Scarlet Woman, and the heavenly bride may all be “transmutations of the same feminine principle . . . perhaps types of woman as Eve, as Rahab, and as Mary.”175 Although the widespread cultural fear of unruly female sexuality may have rendered clear-​cut affirmations of the Whore of Babylon less feasible in the

Yielding Peaches and Women with Whips  115 early twentieth century, D. H. Lawrence provides an explicitly anti-​Christian and less ambiguously positive treatment of Babylon.176 Lawrence interprets John’s vision of the woman clothed with the sun as an epiphany of an ancient pagan goddess, reading the vision of the Whore of Babylon as evidence of the degradation of this goddess. Lawrence writes that she is “Magna Mater in malefic aspect. . . . Splendid she sits, and splendid is her Babylon. . . . The harlot sits magnificent with her golden cup of the wine of sensual pleasure in her hand.”177 While Apocalypse was published years after Crowley penned his first descriptions of Babalon, it is relevant that Lawrence’s revaluation of the Whore coincided with a positive view of sexuality and the body and a firm rejection of Christian orthodoxy, both of which characterized Crowley’s worldview. Compared to the interpretations of writers such as Carter, Christina Rossetti, and James Pryse, however, Crowley was remarkably original in his interpretation of the Whore of Babylon motif.

Notes 1. At this point, he still appears to have identified the Scarlet Woman with the role first held by Rose Kelly. See comment to AL III:43–​45. This commentary developed the idea of aeons, periods of around 2,000 years, representing phases in human spiritual history. The succession of aeons is depicted in gendered terms of mother, father, and (male and/​or androgynous) offspring, represented by the Egyptian deities Isis, Osiris, and Horus. Crowley, “Liber Legis. The Comment,” 387–​400. Crowley’s notion of aeons is indebted to theories of religious evolution as espoused by Frazer, among others, and to dispensationalism. See, e.g., Crawford Gribben, Writing the Rapture: Prophecy Fiction in Evangelical America (Oxford; New  York:  Oxford University Press, 2009). Cf. Henrik Bogdan, “Envisioning the Birth of a New Aeon:  Dispensationalism and Millenarianism in the Thelemic Tradition,” in Aleister Crowley and Western Esotericism, ed. Henrik Bogdan and Martin P. Starr (New  York:  Oxford University Press, 2012), 89–​106. 2. Aleister Crowley, “Notes on Tarot,” n.d., Yorke OS27, Warburg. Although included in a notebook, most of whose remaining contents are dated to 1904, the references to Babalon and the City of the Pyramids render it unlikely that “Notes on Tarot” was penned before 1909. 3. Crowley, Confessions, 665–​673. 4. Crowley, “Cheth,” 25. 5. Ibid., 26. The reference to Babalon as being “beyond Knowledge” indicates her kabbalistic location above the “false” sephirah Daath (identified with knowledge) on the Tree of Life. 6. Crowley, “Cheth,” 26. 7. Crowley, Vision, 149. 8. Crowley, “Cheth,” 26.

116  The Eloquent Blood 9. Aleister Crowley, “ASTARTE vel Liber BERYLLI sub figura CLXXV,” Equinox 1, no. 7 (1911): 55. The notion of Babalon as a perennial love goddess with many guises is foreshadowed in Crowley, Vision, 185. For nineteenth-​and early-​twentieth-​century interpretations of Astarte, see, e.g., Frazer, Golden Bough, 1900,161; Hislop, Babylons; cf. Bahrani, Women. Crowley may have seen Babalon and Astarte as interlinked; see parallels between Crowley, “ASTARTE,” 58; Crowley, Vision, 217. 10. Although the book is listed as being published in 1913, this is incorrect. Cf. Kaczynski, Perdurabo, 251. 11. Crowley, Confessions, 709. 12. Crowley, Lies, 18. 13. Crowley, Vision, 148–​153. 14. Crowley, Lies, 19. 15. Ibid. 16. Cvetkovich, “Receptivity,” 128. 17. Crowley, Vision, 150. 18. Crowley, Lies, 32. 19. Ibid.,  32–​33. 20. Similarly, Crowley in the chapter “Venus of Milo” writes that “the soul is beyond male and female,” and that the male and female genitals are developments of the same organ. Crowley, The Book of Lies, 80. However, he conversely writes that “the female body becomes beautiful in so far as it approximates to the male.” Crowley, Lies, 81. 21. Crowley, Lies, 108. 22. Ibid. 23. Ibid. 24. Rev. 13:18 [KJV]. Emphasis in original. 25. Crowley, Lies, 109. 26. Ibid. 27. Crowley, Magical and Philosophical, 109. 28. Crowley, Lies, 109. 29. Ibid., 15. 30. Ibid., 16. 31. Ibid., 122. 32. See Aleister Crowley, Manifesto of the M∴M∴M∴ Issued by Order of L.  Bathurst, Grand Secretary General (London: privately printed, 1914). 33. Crowley, Lies, 190. 34. Ibid., 60. 35. Ibid., 61. A revised Star Ruby, substituting Eros and Psyche for the Thelemic Hadit and Nuit, later appeared in an appendix to Magick in Theory and Practice (1929). See Crowley, Magick: Liber ABA, 557. Crowley printed the LRP in Crowley, “Liber O.” 36. Theodor Reuss, “Charter to Aleister Crowley for the Antient and Primitive Rite” [d. 1906 but probably ca. 1910], OTO archives. 37. Crowley, Confessions, 709–​710. 38. Theodor Reuss, “Charter to Aleister Crowley for the Antient and Primitive Rite”; Theodor Reuss, I.N.R.I. Constitution of the Ancient Order of Oriental Templars. O.T.O.

Yielding Peaches and Women with Whips  117 [d. 1906 but probably ca. 1912], OTO archives; Theodor Reuss, “Charter to Aleister Crowley for OTO and M∴M∴M∴,” April 21, 1912, OTO archives. Reuss formally announced OTO in Die Oriflamme in 1912. Reuss, ed., I.N.R.I./​Jubilaeums-​Ausgabe Der Oriflamme. The emergence of OTO is explored in Richard Kaczynski, Forgotten Templars:  The Untold Origins of Ordo Templi Orientis (n.p.:  R. Kaczynski, 2012). My gratitude is extended to William Breeze for sharing his research on OTO’s early history. 39. Cf. Henrik Bogdan, “Challenging the Morals of Western Society:  The Use of Ritualized Sex in Contemporary Occultism,” The Pomegranate 8, no. 2 (2006): 211–​ 246. See also Theodor Reuss, ed., I.N.R.I./​Jubilaeums-​Ausgabe Der Oriflamme (Berlin; London, 1912). For an overview of the degree structure of the early OTO, see Crowley, Manifesto of the M∴M∴M∴. The IX° was originally the highest initiatory degree, with the X° denoting the head of the order. 40. Crowley, Confessions, 714. The Mass was first published in English in The International in 1918. Aleister Crowley, “Ecclesiæ Gnosticæ Catholicæ Canon Missæ,” The International 12, no. 3 (1918): 70–​74. Reuss translated and published an edited version of the Mass in German. Theodor Reuss, “Die Gnostische Messe. Aus Dem Original-​Text Des Baphomet Übertragen in Die Deutsche Sprache von Merlin Peregrinus,” Oriflamme (1918). It was published in 1919 as part of the Blue Equinox; see Aleister Crowley, “Liber XV:  Ecclesiæ Gnosticæ Catholicæ Canon Missæ,” in Aleister Crowley, The Blue Equinox: The Equinox Vol. III No. I (San Francisco: Red Wheel/​Weiser, 2007), 247–​270. Quotations from the Mass herein are derived from this version. 41. The historical roots of EGC can be traced to nineteenth-​century neo-​Gnosticism, specifically l’Église Catholique Gnostique (renamed l’Église Gnostique Universelle in 1908), of Jean Bricaud (1881–​1934), Gerard Encausse (1865–​1916), and Louis-​ Sophrone Fugairon (b. 1846). After crossing paths with Encausse in 1908, Reuss established a German branch of the church, Die Gnostische Katholische Kirche (G.K.K.). Ladislaus Toth, “Gnostic Church,” in Dictionary of Gnosis and Western Esotericism, ed. Wouter J. Hanegraaff (Leiden: Brill, 2005), 400–​403. Crowley’s 1912 M∴M∴M∴ manifesto mentions the “Gnostic Catholic Church” as a spiritual antecedent to OTO. Crowley, Manifesto of the M∴M∴M∴. 42. Crowley, “Liber XV.” 43. Ibid. 44. Crowley, Vision, 242. 45. Crowley, “Paris”; Crowley, Confessions, 704. Some of Crowley’s experiments with the XI° are detailed in Crowley, Magical Record, 53–​64. Crowley describes this degree as “inscrutable.” Aleister Crowley, The Blue Equinox: The Equinox, Vol. III, No. I (San Francisco: Red Wheel/​Weiser, 2007), 245. It is customarily interpreted as entailing anal intercourse. Cf. Bogdan, “Challenging,” 218; Henrik Bogdan, “Aleister Crowley. A  Prophet for the Modern Age,” in The Occult World, ed. Christopher Partridge (Abingdon, Oxon.; New York: Routledge, 2015), 293–​302. 46. Crowley’s records of these experiments are found throughout; e.g., Crowley, Magical Record; Crowley, “Paris”; Crowley, Magical Diaries.

118  The Eloquent Blood 47. Important influences for OTO’s sexual magic appear to have been the writings of P. B. Randolph and his Hermetic Brotherhood of Luxor, via the Hermetic Brotherhood of Light, as well as George Le Clément de Saint-​Marcq’s ideas about the mystical properties of semen. Bogdan, “Challenging”; Marco Pasi, “The Knight of Spermatophagy: Penetrating the Mysteries of Georges Le Clément de Saint-​Marcq,” in Hidden Intercourse: Eros and Sexuality in the History of Western Esotericism, ed. Jeffrey Kripal and Wouter J. Hanegraaff (Leiden: Brill, 2008), 369–​400. 48. Aleister Crowley, “De Nuptiis Secretis Deorum Cum Hominibus,” n.d. [ca. 1914], Yorke OS25, Warburg. 49. A veiled reference to Babalon appears in the significantly later “IX° Emblems and Modes of Use,” which identifies the feminine sex-​magical principle with 156. Aleister Crowley, “IX° Emblems and Modes of Use,” 1944, Yorke NS3, Warburg. Crowley appears sometimes to have read homosexual workings in terms of polarity, himself assuming the role of priestess, denoting his male partner priest. Crowley, Magical Record,  25–​26. 50. Thus, he echoed beliefs perpetuated in some early-​nineteenth-​century sex manuals that explicated heterosexual intercourse and conception in terms of electrical polarity or magnetism. See, e.g., Laskar, Bidrag, 61, 93, 175; Maja Bondestam, Den moraliska kroppen. Tolkningar av kön och individualitet i 1800-​talets populärmedicin (Hedemora:  Gidlund, 2002), 63; Per Gustaf Cederschiöld, Lärobok i vården om qvinnans slägtlif i synnerhet dess fortplantnings-​förrättning eller förlossningskonsten (Stockholm: n.p., 1836). 51. Aleister Crowley, “AGAPE vel Liber C vel AZOTH. Sal Philosophorum the Book of the Unveiling of the Sangraal Wherein It Is Spoken of the Wine of the Sabbath of the Adepts,” 1914, Yorke OS26, Warburg. 52. Aleister Crowley, “Liber CDXIV: De Arte Magica,” 1914, Yorke NS3, Warburg. 53. Crowley, “Liber CDXIV.” 54. Aleister Crowley, “Energized Enthusiasm,” The Equinox I, no. 9 (1913): 19–​46. 55. Luce Irigaray, “The Question of the Other,” Yale French Studies 8, no. 7 (1995): 8. 56. Crowley, Magical Record, 26. This suggestion that women’s magical capacity is more strongly dependent on their biology reflects nineteenth-​century medical discourses of gynaecologization. Johannisson, Mörka; Thomas W. Laqueur, Making Sex: Body and Gender from the Greeks to Freud (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1990). However, Crowley did not discount the idea that women could take a determining role in sexual magic. Aleister Crowley to Georgia B. Crombie, 1936–​1947, esp. July 6, 1943; February 10, 1944; and October 11, 1944, OTO archives. 57. However, Crowley ascribed some independent magical potential to female genital fluids. While discouraging sexual magic with a female partner on the first day of menstruation, he writes that the second day onward is advantageous. Crowley, “Liber CDXIV.” He records numerous acts of sexual magic with a menstruating priestess, euphemized as Elixir Rubeus. Crowley, Magical Record, 36, 54, 58, 71, 81, 96, 126. He appears to have found this practice especially beneficial for operations aimed at financial gain. Crowley, Magical Record, 43, 47, 61, 63, 72, 76–​77, 79; Aleister Crowley to Georgia B. Crombie, February 10, 1944, OTO archives.

Yielding Peaches and Women with Whips  119 58. For instance, in Magick: Liber ABA, Babalon is associated with the ritual cup, which is linked to her cup of “bitterness, and of blood, and of intoxication,” and the magical principle of understanding. Crowley, Magick: Liber ABA, 74. 59. Crowley, Magical Record, 5–​6, 9, 18. 60. Ibid., 8, 24. 61. Ibid., 14. 62. Ibid., 24–​27. Foster is mentioned as one of Crowley’s Scarlet Women in Crowley, Magical and Philosophical, 103. 63. Aleister Crowley, “Almira,” n.d. [ca. 1918], Yorke OSn3, Warburg. 64. Crowley, Aleph, 81, 101, 104, 109. 65. Crowley also identifies the name Olun, his lover Marie Lavrova Röhling’s magical name, with Babalon, suggesting that he connected her to the Scarlet Woman at the time. Kaczynski, Perdurabo, 327; Crowley, Aleph, 109–​110. Babalon is also mentioned in Crowley, Aleph, 161–​162. 66. Crowley, Aleph, 140. 67. Ibid. 68. Ibid. As Crowley is addressing Frater Achad, his “magical child” by Foster, the reference to Babalon as Achad’s “true Mother” may allude to Foster’s role as Scarlet Woman. In undergoing the ordeal of the Abyss and uniting with Babalon, Achad can be said to have engaged in magical incest. See Crowley, Confessions, 801–​802. 69. Waldby, “Destruction,” 274. 70. Crowley, Aleph, 152. 71. Similar notions are expressed in Aleister Crowley, Commentaries to the Holy Books and Other Papers (York Beach, ME: Samuel Weiser, 1996), 202–​203. 72. Crowley, Aleph, 161. 73. Ibid., 133. 74. Ibid., 171. 75. Crowley was highly pleased with the work. Crowley, Confessions, 831. This idealization of hegemonic femininity recurs in Magick without Tears, wherein Crowley writes that only the woman who devotes herself to a man and his career can be useful to the male magician. Crowley, Magick without, 254. 76. Crowley, Confessions, 792. 77. Hirsig is listed as one of Crowley’s Scarlet Women in Crowley, Magical and Philosophical, 103. 78. Kaczynski, Perdurabo, 359. 79. See, e.g., Crowley’s record of the activities at the Abbey in Crowley, Magical Record, 104–​300; Crowley, Confessions, 863–​877. 80. Crowley, Magical Record, 86. 81. Crowley, Confessions, 864. 82. Crowley, Magical Record, 176. 83. Ibid., 177. 84. Ibid., 177–​178. 85. See Martin P. Starr, The Unknown God: W.T. Smith and the Thelemites (Bolingbrook, IL: Teitan Press, 2003).

120  The Eloquent Blood 86. Crowley, Magical Record, 229–​230, 234. 87. Ibid., 230. 88. Frazer’s Golden Bough is also a plausible source of inspiration. See Frazer, Golden Bough, 1900, 161–​168. 89. Crowley, Magical Record, 230. 90. Ibid., 230, 237, 239, 241, 274, 296. For a reference to Aiwass (or Aiwaz) as Crowley’s Holy Guardian Angel, see ibid., 134. 91. Ibid., 230. See also ibid., 231, 236. 92. Ibid., 229. 93. Ibid., 218. 94. Ibid., 218–​219. 95. Ibid., 219. 96. Ibid., 233–​234. 97. Ibid., 234. 98. Ibid., 235. 99. Ibid., 236. 100. Ibid., 237. 101. Ibid., 237. 102. See, e.g., Crowley, Magical and Philosophical, 103; 307. 103. AL III:44. 104. Crowley, Magical Record, 242. 105. Rev 17:5 [KJV]. 106. Crowley, Magical Record, 238. 107. Crowley, Confessions, 867. 108. Ibid., 867. 109. Crowley, “Cephaloedium.” The published version of the Cephaloedium Working, see Aleister Crowley, “The Cephaloedium Working,” in Aleister Crowley, The Fish, ed. Anthony Naylor (Essex House, Thame: Mandrake Press, 1992), 108–​122, is not entirely reliable, wherefore I use the original manuscript for quotations. 110. Crowley, Magical Record, 296. 111. Ibid. 112. Ibid. 113. Ibid. 114. Cecil Frederick Russell, Znuz is Znees, Memoirs of a Magician, vol. 2 (privately printed: 1970), 174–​177. 115. Crowley, “Cephaloedium.” 116. Kaczynski, Perdurabo, 373. 117. Leah Hirsig, September 28, 1924. In Leah Hirsig, “Diary of Leah Hirsig. The Magical Diary of Babalon, September 25 to October 28, 1924,” 1924, Yorke OSDD2, Warburg. 118. See, e.g., Leah Hirsig, “Letters from Leah Hirsig to A.C., Norman Mudd, Jane Wolfe, Ninette Shumway, Dorothy Olsen,” Yorke OSD11, Warburg. 119. He also wrote “Liber Samekh,” an invocation of the Holy Guardian Angel, for his disciple Frank Bennett. Keith Richmond, Progradior & the Beast:  Frank Bennett

Yielding Peaches and Women with Whips  121 & Aleister Crowley (London: Neptune Press, 2004), 177. Babalon is mentioned in this ritual. Aleister Crowley, “Liber Samekh. Theurgia Goetia Summa (Congressus Cum Daemone) sub figura DCCC,” in Aleister Crowley, Magick: Liber ABA, ed. Hymenaeus Beta (York Beach, ME: S. Weiser, 1994), 506. 120. Crowley, Magical and Philosophical, 120. This model incorporates metaphors of electricity and magnetism, similar to those espoused by some nineteenth-​century Romantic philosophers; see, e.g., Gunnar Eriksson, Romantikens världsbild speglad i 1800-​ talets svenska vetenskap (Halmstad:  Wahlström & Widstrand, 1969). Crowley also connects Nuit with matter and Hadit with motion. Crowley, Magical and Philosophical, 183. In a later text, he associates Nuit and Hadit with centrifugal and centripetal forces. Crowley, Magick without, 251–​252. 121. Crowley, Magical and Philosophical, 183. 122. Ibid., 103. 123. Ibid. 124. Ibid., 104. See discussion of the Strength card in c­ hapter 3. 125. Ibid., 261. As mentioned above, Crowley likened Hirsig to Ishtar and Semiramis. Crowley, Magical Record, 230. This identification of the Scarlet Woman with Semiramis was likely inspired by Hislop’s Two Babylons. 126. Crowley, Magical and Philosophical, 282. 127. Ibid. 128. Ibid., 283. 129. Ibid. 130. Ibid., 283. 131. Ibid., 284. 132. Ibid. 133. Ibid. Cf. Walkowitz, “Male.” 134. Crowley, Magical and Philosophical, 284. 135. Ibid., 286. 136. Crowley’s writings on female sexuality in the “New Comment” bear similarities to ideas expressed in the controversial journal The Freewoman as well as the turn-​of-​ the-​century anarchist periodical Lucifer. See Bland, “Heterosexuality”; Silberman, “Perfect.” 137. Crowley, Magical and Philosophical, 286. 138. Ibid., 284. 139. Ibid., 286. See also Crowley, Confessions, 402. However, Crowley performed sexual magic with prostitutes throughout large portions of his life. Cf. Bogdan, “Challenging,” 220. 140. Crowley, Magical and Philosophical, 285–​286. 141. Ibid., 287. 142. Crowley, “Cephaloedium.” Decades later, he referred to it as “the most turgid and incomprehensible hogwash ever penned.” Crowley in a letter to Eliza M. Butler on April 1, 1946, quoted in Hymenaeus Beta, “Foreword,” in Aleister Crowley, The Law Is for All: The Authorized Popular Commentary on Liber AL vel Legis sub figura CCXX The Book of the Law, ed. Louis Wilkinson and Hymenaeus Beta (Tempe, AZ: New

122  The Eloquent Blood Falcon Publications, 1996), 7–​12. Nonetheless, its proto-​feminist arguments likely influenced Jack Parsons (see c­ hapter 5). 143. At the time, Crowley’s disciples Jane Wolfe and Norman Mudd both noted that Hirsig had told them Crowley behaved possessively toward her. Jane Wolfe, Cefalu Diaries: The Cefalu Diaries 1920–​1923. With Commentary by Aleister Crowley, ed. David Shoemaker (Sacramento, CA: College of Thelema of Northern California, 2008), 129. Mudd suggested that AL III:44’s declaration that the Scarlet Woman should be “adulterous” might have legal meaning, volunteering to marry Hirsig so that she could fulfill her potential by continuing an adulterous affair with Crowley. Crowley was unconvinced and dispatched Mudd on a magical retirement. Norman Mudd, “Norman Mudd’s Diary for 1923,” 1923, Yorke OSDD6, Warburg; Norman Mudd, “Diary of Norman Mudd 1 September—​8 October 1923,” 1923, Yorke OSDD6a, Warburg. 144. Leah Hirsig, “Diary of Leah Hirsig, including ‘Alostrael’s Visions,’ ‘Magical Diary of Alostrael 31–​666–​31,’ ‘New Magical Record,’ and ‘Preliminary Invocation,’ ” October 29, 1923–​December 27, 1924, Yorke OSDD1, Warburg; Leah Hirsig, “Diary of Leah Hirsig: Magical Diary of Babalon,” 1924, Yorke OSDD2, Warburg. 145. Crowley, Magick: Liber ABA, 202. 146. Crowley had been interested in creating his own Tarot from at least 1920, as evinced by the discovery of artwork Crowley created during his time at the Abbey of Thelema. Marco Pasi, “Aleister Crowley, Painting, and the Works from the Palermo Collection,” Abraxas: International Journal of Esoteric Studies 3 (2015): 65–​77. The artwork is reproduced in Marco Pasi, “An Inventory of the Palermo Collection,” Abraxas: International Journal of Esoteric Studies 3 (2015): 78–​81. 147. Cf. Helen Farley, Cultural History of Tarot:  From Entertainment to Esotericism (London: I. B. Tauris, 2009), esp. 137–​142. 148. Crowley, Thoth, 92. 149. Ibid.,  93–​94. 150. Ibid., 94. 151. Ibid., 95. 152. Ibid. 153. AL I:15–​16. 154. Crowley, Thoth, 95. 155. Ibid., 93. 156. See, e.g., Crowley, Magick without, 43; Crowley, “AGAPE.” 157. Similar ideas were also expressed by other occultists around this time. See, e.g., Dixon, Divine, 159. 158. Crowley, Magical Record, 112. 159. Crowley, Confessions, 96. 160. Ibid., 97. 161. Ibid., 142–​143. 162. Ibid., 370. 163. Crowley, Magick: Liber ABA, 149. 164. Ibid., 248.

Yielding Peaches and Women with Whips  123 165. Urban, Magia, 135. 166. E.g., Crowley, Confessions, 45; Crowley, Commentaries to the Holy Books, 202–​203. Cf. Owen, Place, 108–​112; 212–​215. 167. See the contrasting view discussed in Reis, “The Devil.” 168. Crowley, Magical Record, 234. 169. Butler, Undoing,  19–​20. 170. Urban, Magia, 260. 171. Mara Kalnins, “Introduction,” in D. H. Lawrence, Apocalypse and the Writings on Revelation, ed. Mara Kalnins (London: Penguin Books, 1995), 11–​32. 172. Frederick Carter, The Dragon of Revelation: Introduced by D. H. Lawrence (Essex House, Thame: I-​H-​O Books, 2002), 97. 173. Carter, Dragon, 140. 174. Ibid., 142. “Meretrix” (Latin) means prostitute. 175. Ibid., 114. In the Bible, Rahab is a Jerichoan prostitute who assisted the Israelites. Josh. 2 [KJV]. 176. Kalnins, “Introduction.” Lawrence had previously read a number of books on esotericism and the occult, although he was unimpressed by Blavatsky’s writings. Kalnins, “Introduction,” 13. 177. Lawrence, Apocalypse, 121.

5

Her Banner Is Unfolded Babalon and Scarlet Femininities in the Writings of Jack Parsons

After all, the other name of Armageddon will not be written until the morning of Ragnarok, when at last Her banner is unfolded before the armies. . . . I know that Babalon is incarnate upon earth at this moment, although I do not know where or as whom.1

John Whiteside “Jack” Parsons (1914–​1952) is one of the most legendary characters of modern occultism. Rocketeer, poet, and polyamorous protofeminist, his turbulent life and magical career have been the subject of at least two biographies and one television series.2 An early adopter of Thelema and an ardent, albeit heterodox, student of Crowley’s works, Parsons interpreted Babalon—​who occupied a central role in his worldview—​in his own way. Colored by his libertarian socialism, feminist leanings, and penchant for fantasy and mythology, Parsons construed Babalon as a blood-​thirsty revolutionary, a living messiah, the quintessential new aeon woman, and the goddess of witchcraft. The purpose of this chapter is to analyze how femininity is articulated and negotiated in Parsons’s interpretations of Babalon. Beginning with a biographical overview, I will proceed to trace Parsons’s interpretations of Babalon, commencing with his records of the so-​called Babalon Working conducted in 1945–​1946 and ending with Songs for the Witch Woman, a set of poems written for his wife and magical partner Marjorie Cameron between 1946 and 1952.

From Childhood Loner to Occult Enfant Terrible:  Jack Parsons 1914–​1945 John Whiteside Parsons was born on October 2, 1914. Parsons was raised by his mother Ruth Whiteside and his maternal grandparents, Walter and Carrie, in Southern California, specifically the affluent suburb of Pasadena. A wealthy man, Walter purchased a large mansion on Orange Grove Avenue, known as The Eloquent Blood: The Goddess Babalon and the Construction of Femininities in Western Esotericism. Manon Hedenborg White, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780190065027.001.0001

126  The Eloquent Blood “Millionaire’s Row.”3 An avid reader, the boy Parsons eagerly devoured all kinds of literature, particularly epic tales, mythology, and sci-​fi literature.4 As an adolescent, Parsons began experimenting with rockets with his school friend Ed Forman (1912–​1973), who shared his enthusiasm for sci-​fi. Despite their lack of qualifications, Forman and Parsons eventually began collaborating with Frank Malina (1912–​1981), a graduate student at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), conducting unofficial experiments with the aim of developing functional rockets.5 Parsons, Forman, and Malina gained the endorsement of legendary scientist Theodore von Karman (1881–​1963), who allowed the slowly growing group of rocket enthusiasts to conduct experiments on campus.6 The group of rocketeers eventually founded the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), which played a key role in the American space program. Parsons’s contributions were essential to the development of the technology that enabled the moon landing.7 In adulthood, Parsons became absorbed in the melting pot of alternative religiosity that was early-​twentieth-​century Southern California.8 Having previously read Aleister Crowley’s Konx om Pax (1907), Parsons appears to have been drawn to Thelema in the early 1930s.9 In January 1939, Parsons was invited to attend a performance of the Gnostic Mass at the Ordo Templi Orientis’s (OTO) Agape Camp in Los Angeles, led by Regina Kahl (1891–​1945) and Wilfred T. Smith (1885–​1957).10 With Crowley’s blessing, Smith had registered and incorporated the Church of Thelema, establishing the OTO body in 1934. Its first meeting was held on September 21, 1935.11 Crowley hoped that Smith would be able to capitalize on the alternative religious craze in Los Angeles and ingratiate himself with wealthy benefactors. To his dismay, however, Smith’s OTO body mainly attracted bohemians, actors, artists, writers, musicians, and scientists.12 Parsons’s interest in Thelema and Crowley grew over time, and Smith became a close friend and father figure to him.13 By the end of 1939, Parsons had assembled a sizable collection of Crowley’s books.14 On February 15, 1941, Jack and his wife Helen (1910–​2003) were formally initiated into OTO, with Jack joining A∴A∴ under Smith’s tutelage the same year.15 Parsons immersed himself in the order, contributing generously to Crowley. By April 1941, he was leading biweekly discussion groups on Thelema.16 Still, relations within the OTO body were not friction-​free. Following Crowley’s advocacy of free sexual relations, many of the lodge members practiced nonmonogamy. When Parsons initiated an affair with Helen’s younger sister Sarah Northrup (1924–​1997), alias Betty, Helen began an affair with Smith.17 In 1942, at Parsons’s suggestion, Agape relocated to Pasadena, settling in a stately mansion on 1003 Orange Grove Avenue.18 In June 1942, the California OTO body was termed “Agape Lodge.”19 Due in part to frictions caused by an FBI investigation, dwindling monthly contributions to Crowley, and antagonisms

Her Banner Is Unfolded  127 caused by drug use and partner swapping, however, Smith was ordered to resign as lodge master in the spring of 1943. Parsons succeeded him.20

“Flame Is Our Lady”: The Babalon Working The year 1945 witnessed the arrival of L. Ron Hubbard (1911–​1986), a prolific fantasy writer and the future founder of the Church of Scientology, who moved into the lodge house. Although Parsons instantly liked his new tenant, their camaraderie was complicated when Betty Northrup fell for Hubbard.21 Parsons’s career was similarly in a slump. Partly due to the pioneering discoveries of Parsons and his Caltech colleagues, rocketry had become a recognized science, and Parsons’s unorthodox methods and lack of formal credentials made him seem like a liability.22 So, Parsons launched himself into magic. Claiming to have been intrigued by witchcraft and darker magic since childhood, Parsons held that he had invoked Satan successfully at the age of 13.23 This time, he solicited the aid of his boyhood friend Forman, and the pair began conducting experimental rituals. Parsons’s unorthodox activities appear to have disturbed the other members of the lodge. On October 25, 1945, a concerned Jane Wolfe wrote: There is something strange going on . . . Jack is enamored of witchcraft, the houmfort, voodoo. From the start he always wanted to evoke something—​no matter what, I am inclined to think, so long as he got a result.24

Fellow lodge member Roy Leffingwell similarly suggested that Jack was engaged in strange magical proceedings, including invoking magical forces into statuettes with the intention of selling them.25 During this period, Parsons also began a series of conjurations to procure a female ritual partner or elemental mate.26 Convinced that Hubbard possessed particular magical sensitivity, Parsons soon invited the latter to partake. Parsons performed daily invocations between January 4 and 18, 1946, recording a number of minor accidents, fires, and seemingly auspicious meteorological phenomena. On January 18, the two men traveled into the Mojave Desert, adjourning at Parsons’s favorite spot at the intersection of two electrical power lines. At sunset, Parsons sensed that the work was completed. He returned home to discover a young woman at his doorstep, who had arrived there in response to an advertisement for a new tenant.27 The woman was 24-​year-​old Marjorie Cameron (1922–​1995) of Belle Plaine, Iowa, formerly a U.S. navy volunteer who worked as a cartographer during World War II.28 Tall and striking with fiery red hair, Parsons’s biographer George Pendle suggests the young woman reminded Parsons of April Bell, the sinister but

128  The Eloquent Blood irresistible female protagonist and femme fatale of pulp writer Jack Williamson’s fantasy novelette Darker Than You Think, which Parsons had read and loved.29 First published in 1940, the story’s protagonist Will Barbee learns of the existence of an ancient secret race of shape-​shifting witches, waiting for a coming messiah known as the Child of Night.30 The main motifs of a male seeker with a crucial role in the destiny of humanity and a red-​haired, female initiatrix at his side appears to have entranced Parsons. Parsons was instantly infatuated with Cameron, viewing her as his elemental and describing her as “an air of fire type with bronze red hair, fiery and subtle, determined and obstinate, sincere and perverse, with extraordinary personality, talent, and intelligence.”31 The attraction appears to have been mutual, and the pair spent the next few weeks in bed together. Describing their activities in more technical terms, Parsons writes: “During the period of January 19 to February 27, I invoked the Goddess BABALON with the aid of my magical partner, as was proper to one of my grade.”32 This appears to be a reference to the IX° of OTO, associated with heterosexual sex magic. Cameron, who had little interest in occultism at this time, was not particularly concerned with the meaning of the working.33 As previously discussed, Crowley in some writings conceptualized the Scarlet Woman as Babalon’s human avatar. However, Parsons appears to have gone a step further by seeking to magically accomplish the physical manifestation of Babalon on earth.34 This female Thelemic messiah would liberate the world and balance the energies of the Aeon of Horus, which Parsons saw as volatile and chaotic, relating to “power, violence, and energy.”35 In contrast, he equated the force of Babalon with “love, understanding, and dionysian freedom.”36 As will become apparent, however, Parsons did not interpret Babalon merely as a sweet-​ natured feminine complement to Ra-​Hoor-​Khuit but as a fierce and powerful figure in her own right.

The Speaking Goddess: The Daughter of Babalon and the Covens of Old in “Liber 49” On February 28, 1946, Parsons returned alone to the desert to invoke Babalon. Parsons records being overcome with “the presence of the goddess,” who commanded him to transcribe a text from dictation. The manuscript, which came to be called “Liber 49,” comprises 77 verses, of which numbers 5 through 8 are lost. It refers to itself as “the fourth chapter of the Book of the Law.”37 Like Liber AL, “Liber 49” is an apocalyptic text. It begins with the narrative “I” identifying herself as the goddess Babalon and declaring her imminent manifestation, stating she will “take flesh and come among men” as a “devious song, a trumpet

Her Banner Is Unfolded  129 in judgment halls, a banner before armies.”38 Paralleling especially the third chapter of Liber AL, this impending incarnation is identified with cataclysmic change. Babalon instructs Parsons of his own role in her coming, stating that his self-​sacrifice will provide for her manifestation: Thou shalt offer all thou art and all thou hast at my altar, witholding nothing [sic]. And thou shalt be smitten full sore and thereafter thou shalt be outcast and accursed, a lonely wanderer in abominable places.39

This ominous proclamation is reminiscent of Crowley’s conceptualization of the crossing of the Abyss, and “Liber 49” similar to Crowley’s writings continues to juxtapose the concepts of Babalon, blood, and death. However, “Liber 49” and the remainder of Parsons’s record describing his subsequent ritual attempts to manifest the goddess appear to hint at a more literal interpretation of these notions. Babalon orders Parsons to prepare the ritual altar and construct a devotional talisman. He is to obtain a disc of copper, painting on it the seven-​pointed star of Babalon in gold against a blue background.40 The narrative “I” then describes her future manifestation, stating that Parsons should wait for her to declare herself: Let her be dedicated, consecrated, blood to blood, heart to heart, mind to mind, single in will. . . . And she shall wander in the witchwood under the Night of Pan, and know the mysteries of the Goat and the Serpent, and of the children that are hidden away.41

It is once again stressed that Parsons will provide the “tears and blood” necessary for accomplishing this goal, which for Babalon is “ecstacy and agony untellable [sic].” Babalon states that her human vessel—​whom she refers to as her daughter—​will have “captains and adepts in her service”; that she will be “wise, and sure, and excellent”; and granted “all power, and all men and excellent things, and kings and captains and the secret ones at her command.”42 It is emphasized that the daughter will tread an unconventional path: 36. . . . [M]‌y way is not in the solemn ways, or in the reasoned ways, but in the wild free way of the eagle, and the devious way of the serpent, and the oblique way of the factor unknown and unnumbered. 37. For I am BABALON, and she my daughter, unique, and there shall be no other women like her. . . . 40. Call me, my daughter, and I shall come to thee. Thou shalt be full of my force and fire, my passion and power shall surround and inspire thee; my voice in thee shall judge nations. 41. None shall resist thee, whom I lovest. Though they call thee harlot and whore, shameless, false, evil, these words shall be

130  The Eloquent Blood blood in their mouths, and dust thereafter. But my children will know thee and love thee, and this will make them free. All is in thy hands, all power, all hope, all future.43

Recalling Irigaray’s emphasis on the mother-​daughter relationship, it is worth noting that “Liber 49” emphasizes Babalon as a maternal figure, less as “mother of us all” as described in Crowley’s “Liber XV” than in the specific sense of mother of a daughter.44 Babalon’s daughter takes a similar role to that of Crowley in Liber AL as a messianic figure chosen by the gods. It is stressed that Babalon’s daughter will provoke outrage and be called whore, harlot, and shameless, linking this human avatar to pariah femininity. It is repeatedly asserted that Babalon’s daughter will be immensely powerful, and that her enemies will not be able to deter her. The text shifts to addressing Parsons in alternatingly violent and amorous tones. It is said that Babalon’s adept (i.e., Parsons) will be “crucified in the Basilisk abode,” and he is told: “Thy tears, thy sweat, thy blood, thy semen, thy love, thy faith shall provide. Ah, I shall drain thee like the cup that is of me, BABALON.”45 Although this ominous statement seemingly alludes to the metaphorical notion of draining one’s “blood” into Babalon’s cup, “Liber 49” appears to imply that Parsons will do this for Babalon’s benefit rather than for his own initiation. This statement reinforces the suggestion that Parsons is expected to shed his actual blood. However, Babalon also appears as an actively receptive and desiring feminine subject, calling Parsons: For thy sake shall I stride through the flames of Hell, though my tongue be bitten through. Let me behold thee naked and lusting after me, calling upon my name. Let me receive all thy manhood within my Cup, climax upon climax, joy upon joy. Yea, we shall conquer death and Hell together.46

“Liber 49” builds on Romantic notions of witchcraft. In verses 64–​77, Babalon addresses her “children,” ostensibly those who will fulfil her vision on earth. She instructs them to “[g]‌ather together in the covens as of old,” and to “be naked and shameless and rejoice.” They are told: Work your spells by the mode of my book, practice secretly. . . . The work of the image, and the potion and the charm, the work of the spider and the snake, and the little ones that go in the dark, this is your work. . . . This is the way of it, star, star. Burning bright, moon, witch moon. You the secret, the outcast, the accursed and despised, even you that gather privily of old in my rites under the moon. You the free, the wild, the untamed, that walk now alone and forlorn.47

Her Banner Is Unfolded  131 These excerpts allude to the popular mythology of witches. Notions of clandestine and socially subversive witch covens practicing ancient rituals by moonlight were perpetuated by a number of amateur anthropologists and historians in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Prominent examples, which appear to have influenced Parsons, include Margaret Murray’s The Witch-​Cult in Western Europe (1921), Charles Leland’s Aradia (1899), and Jules Michelet’s La Sorcière (1862). After 1946, witchcraft became increasingly important in Parsons’s worldview, and I will return to this point in a subsequent section. The motif of Babalon as a feminine, Thelemic messiah, come to earth to bring divine judgment and retribution, is emphasized through veiled allusions to biblical language, with Babalon stating: There is threshing of wheat and a trampling of grapes that shall not cease until the truth be known unto the least of men. But you who do not accept, you who see beyond, reach out your hands my children and reap the world in the hour of your harvest.48

This passage is similar to several excerpts in the Bible where divine punishment is connected to threshing, harvesting, and reaping, and it recalls the third chapter of Liber AL, attributed to Ra-​Hoor-​Khuit.49 The triumphant and martial tone of the text appears implicitly to construe Babalon as a Thelemic equivalent of the second coming of Christ.50 “Liber 49” ends with a victorious call from Babalon to her children, where she proclaims her victory, stating: “[M]‌y laughter is the drunken laughter of a harlot in the house of ecstasy.” She calls: Set my star upon your banners and go forward in joy and victory. None shall deny you, and none shall stand before you. . . . Invoke me, call upon me, call me in your convocations and rituals, call upon me in your loves and battles in my name BABALON.51

A striking aspect of “Liber 49” is the idea of Babalon descending to earth to liberate humankind as a feminine messianic figure who appears destined to surpass Parsons himself. Babalon is ascribed traits and roles that challenge the hierarchical complementarity of masculinity and femininity. She is not chaste or nurturing but a violent and lustful army commander. “Liber 49” overlaps thematically with Vision in the emphasis on Babalon as a goddess of love and annihilation. However, Parsons’s text diverges from Crowley’s writings in that it is consistently narrated from Babalon’s perspective. The text deemphasizes the crossing of the Abyss, as well as the image of Babalonian femininity as indexical of that which is erotically destroyed; a modality of receptivity Crowley construed as required of all seekers. Instead, Parsons’s text focuses more

132  The Eloquent Blood clearly on Babalon as a divine feminine conqueror and erotic destroyer external to the male magician. Babalon’s relationship with her daughter is articulated in terms of love, affinity, and identification, whereas Parsons’s relationship to the goddess is construed in terms of carnal passion and devotion. “Liber 49” does not construe Babalon’s human representative as dependent on her relation to Crowley or indeed to any male magician. Although the text articulates an erotic dynamic between Babalon and Parsons, whose joint efforts will provide for the coming of the goddess’s daughter, Parsons’s value appears to be contingent on his usefulness to her, rather than the inverse.

Beautiful and Horrible: Finalizing the Babalon Working Following his reception of “Liber 49,” Parsons established an altar in accordance with the aforementioned instructions. Hubbard, who had been out of town, returned on March 2, and the two men proceeded. Robed in white and carrying a lamp, Hubbard continued to act as scribe, while Parsons, wearing a hooded black robe and carrying a cup and dagger, directed the operation. At approximately 8 o’clock p.m., Hubbard began to dictate, while Parsons transcribed, using a number of invocations both original and borrowed from Crowley’s work. Having obtained directives from the goddess, the aim of the two men was now to accomplish her material manifestation. With Hubbard as medium, Parsons recorded further communications from Babalon on this and the following night, which were both ominous and sensual in tone. The medium Hubbard informed Parsons: “Transgression is death,” describing Babalon thus: “She is flame of life, power of darkness, she destroys with a glance, she may take thy soul. She feeds upon the death of men. Beautiful—​ Horrible.” Visibly strained, Hubbard dictated further ritual instructions, telling Parsons to light a candle on Babalon’s altar, reciting: “Flame is Our Lady, flame is Her hair. I am flame.” Parsons is instructed to sacrifice some of his own blood at the altar, and to prepare three questions for the goddess.52 Hubbard repeatedly emphasizes that Parsons’s willing self-​sacrifice will provide for the physical incarnation of the goddess, and on March 2, Parsons records being instructed thus: Display thyself to Our Lady; dedicate thy organs to Her, dedicate thy heart to Her, dedicate thy mind to Her, dedicate thy soul to Her, for She shall absorb thee, and thou shalt become living flame before She incarnates. . . . It is lonely, it is awful.53

This excerpt draws strongly on the theme of erotic destruction in emphasizing that Parsons should allow Babalon to absorb him. The idea of Babalon as erotic

Her Banner Is Unfolded  133 destroyer and that Parsons should surrender himself for her benefit destabilizes conventional dichotomies of masculinity as conquering and femininity as erotically destroyed. However, as noted in the preceding discussion, concepts related to death and annihilation appear to be more literally interpreted in Parsons’s writings. After Hubbard ceased dictating, Parsons proceeded to perform rituals in congruence with the received instructions. The proceedings incorporated excerpts from the Gnostic Mass, including the priestess’s speech from behind the veil, which is described as recited by “Babalon.” It is unclear who fulfilled this role. Excerpts from the 12th Aethyr of Vision, Crowley’s play Tannhäuser (1902), and the seventh Enochian key (which Parsons labels the “Call of the Seventh Aire”) were also used as invocations.54 The ritual included an original invocation by Parsons as follows: O BABALON, BABALON beloved, come now, partake of the sacrament, possess this shrine. Take me now! Let me be drunken on the wine of your fornications; let your kisses wanton me to death. Accept thou this sacrifice willingly given!55

The invocation is clearly inspired by similar wording in the 12th Aethyr of Vision, further underlining the motif of masculine desire for erotic destruction in union with a “phallic” femininity.56 The continued communications documented in “The Book of Babalon,” Parsons’s record of the rituals, emphasize the thematic overlap between death, drunkenness, and the erotic, and as the rituals went on, Parsons recalls sensing “a presence inexpressibly poignant and desirable.” At midnight, he asks his preprepared questions, querying how he should invoke the goddess and, later, ascertain the identity of her human vessel. Parsons is told, “[I]‌nvoke me carnally with all your passion. Thus will you feel my desire,” and he is advised not to concern himself with the issue of Babalon’s female representative.57 Continuing on the following night, March 3, Parsons and Hubbard receive further instructions from the goddess, identified as “Lady of the Night most gracious  .  .  .  pure lewd and whoresome Lady BABALON.” Parsons—​ through Hubbard—​was asked if he would be willing to sacrifice his life for the cause:  “Mortality. We have not asked this of another, nor shall we ever. Even now we doubt thy faith. . . . Beware, should’st thou falter again, we will sure slay thee.”58 Again, this statement conveys the image of a more literal self-​surrender than the mystical dissolution of subjectivity narrated in Vision. The record also depicts Parsons and Babalon as (opposite-​sex) lovers. Similar to Crowley’s diarized sexual fantasies of Babalon, Parsons is instructed to visualize Babalon as a human lover:

134  The Eloquent Blood Envision thyself as a cloaked radiance desirable to the Goddess, beloved. Envision Her approaching thee. Embrace Her, cover Her with kisses. Think upon the lewd lascivious things thou couldst do.59

In this excerpt, the goddess figures as a sexually desiring subject, instructing Parsons to view himself as someone whom she would desire and love. Parsons is told: Thou as a man and as a god hast strewn about the earth and in the heavens many loves, these recall, concentrate, consecrate each woman thou hast raped. Remember her, think upon her, move her into BABALON, bring her into BABALON, each, one by one until the flame of lust is high . . . then meditate upon thy desire, think upon Her. . . . Recall each lascivious moment, each lustfull day [sic].60

Parts of the text construct the relationship between Babalon and Parsons metaphorically as heterosexual lovers yearning for each other. Parsons is prompted: “Thou art a god. Behave at this altar as one god before another,” and several quotes emphasize Babalon’s desire for him. While the quoted passages seem to represent Parsons and Babalon as equal lovers, however, several excerpts allude to a more hierarchical relationship, with the goddess as erotic destroyer. The record of the Babalon Working ends with the original poem “The Birth of Babalon,” an invocation of the goddess with revolutionary and martial themes. Written in rhyming verse, it describes how God’s face has “turned grey,” as a “terrible ruby star” announces the manifestation of Babalon. The pallid, patriarchal God is construed as the opposite of the red-​blooded, embodied goddess, whom it is said “has taken flesh, she is come to judge the thrones ye rule upon. Quail ye kings for an end is come in the birth of BABALON.”61 The verbal imagery of the poem is violent, and Parsons, the narrative “I” of the poem, describes how he has given “marrow and tears and sweat /​and blood to make her fair,” continuing: I have lain my love and smashed my heart /​and filled her cup with blood, /​That blood might flow from the loins of woe to the cup of brotherhood. /​The cities reel in the shout of steel /​where the sword of war is drawn /​Sing ye saints for the day is come /​in the birth of BABALON.62

Babalon’s coming is construed in terms of social upheaval and strife, with the goddess represented as a feminine revolutionary who will wreak havoc on kings, priests, and God himself:

Her Banner Is Unfolded  135 Now God has called for his judgement book /​and seen his name therein /​And the grace of God and the guilt of God /​have spelt it out as sin /​His bloody priests have clutched his robes /​and stained his linen gown /​And his victims swarm from his broken hell /​to drag his kingdom down.63

Given the articulation of Babalon as a threat to worldly and religious (masculine) authorities, it is unsurprising that the poem continues the exaltation of pariah femininity. It is stated that Babalon is “too beautiful /​for the sight of mortal eyes,” although she has “clothed her beauty in robes of sin /​and pledged her heart to swine.” However, a new era is dawning, and it is stated that Babalon has divested herself of her sinful garments, appearing “naked . . . as a terrible blade /​and a flame and a splendid song /​Naked in radiant mortal flesh.”64 The poem announces the perceived success of Parsons’s rituals. It is stated that Babalon has now been incarnated as a human woman, “forgetting her high estate.” Although “death and hell are at her back,” the poem continues, this woman’s “heart is high and her sword is strong /​to meet the deadly strife.” The beautiful and martial woman’s voice is described as “sure as the judgement trump /​to crack the house of wrong.” The poem continues to articulate the sexually desiring, assertive, and violent woman as a feminine ideal. The final stanzas of the poem stress Babalon, in the form of her human avatar, as a sexually desiring feminine subject and soteriological erotic destroyer, who has descended to earth to free humanity of social and religious taboos and restriction: Her mouth is red and her breasts are fair /​and her loins are full of fire, /​And her lust is strong as a man is strong /​in the heat of her desire, /​And her whoredom is holy as virtue is foul /​beneath the holy sky, /​And her kisses will wanton the world away /​in passion that shall not die. /​Ye shall laugh and love and follow her dance /​when the wrath of God is gone /​And dream no more of hell and hate /​in the Birth of BABALON.65

Although warned repeatedly not to concern himself with the time and place of Babalon’s manifestation, Parsons finally declared the operation a success, claiming that the goddess was now incarnate on earth in “some living woman.”66 On March 6, he wrote to Crowley excitedly but ambiguously, revealing only that he had communicated with “One who is most Holy and Beautiful.”67 Crowley expressed a hesitant interest, but he warned Parsons not to get carried away with the results of his work nor with his infatuation for his alleged elemental, Cameron.68 However, the Beast appears to have lost faith in Parsons, later dismissing his and Hubbard’s experiments as “idiocy.”69 Others within the Agape Lodge were also ambivalent: a couple of months later, Jane Wolfe wrote:

136  The Eloquent Blood I so wanted this materialization to take place, I acted as though it had, if not through Jack’s efforts, then surely through the work of some one else: accepting the statement that there was One seeking incarnation [sic].70

Years later, Karl J. Germer (1881–​1962)—​Crowley’s successor as head of OTO—​ wrote that he had always been interested in Parsons’s work with Hubbard, describing the Babalon Working records as “very possibly genuine.”71

The Speaking Babalon: Heterosexual Sacrifice and the Goddess in the World In the record of the Babalon Working, the male devotee’s relationship with the goddess is construed as a heterosexual love affair between Babalon as erotic destroyer and Parsons as a willing sacrifice, who offers himself up to provide for her future manifestation. In contrast, Babalon’s female daughter is addressed in “Liber 49” in affectionate—​but not erotic—​tones, and prophesized as a female messiah enflamed by the power of the goddess. There are no threats toward the life or wellbeing of Babalon’s daughter. An essay titled “The Star of Babalon,” included as a part of “The Book of Babalon” but most likely written a couple of years later, elaborates on Babalon’s function in Parsons’s worldview, placing a stronger emphasis on the crossing of the Abyss.72 Like Crowley, Parsons presents Babalon as beyond rational comprehension, stating: “[N]‌either wit nor wisdom, nor even will alone, but only understanding and passive love avail.”73 Parsons construes the encounter with Babalon as an initiatory journey, where the adepts will finally face “the dark mother of anarchy and abominations” and be stripped of all of their power, surrendering utterly. He instructs the adept to meditate on “the demon woman Lilith that devoureth her own children, Kali, avatar of destruction, Venus, the whore averse” and to realize that these are all one with Babalon. He notes that Babalon is “incarnate on the earth in the form of a mortal woman,” and that she will eventually “manifest, a banner before armies and a judgment of nations,” but that he is unsure of her identity. However, Parsons also stresses that Babalon’s spirit is awakening in all women, writing: The demand for increased freedom, the rejection both of the tyrannical husband and the child lover, the increase of feminine polygamy and lesbianism, all indicate the development of a new type of woman, who will have a whole man or none.74

Interestingly, Parsons posits Babalon as an independent entity as well as an animating principle behind the women’s movement, associated with an alleged

Her Banner Is Unfolded  137 increase in female nonmonogamy and same-​sex desires. The emphasis on lesbian desire as inherently linked to Babalon is an innovation that does not appear in Crowley’s writings. Parsons’s written work emphasizes the goddess as an independent and self-​ determined entity, exceeding the other Thelemic deities in importance. While Crowley appears not to have believed that the Scarlet Women remained divine avatars after splitting with him, the role of Babalon’s human incarnation in Parsons’s vision far exceeds his own initiation and even his mortal life. Thus, feminine value is to a larger degree construed as independent of masculinity. In portraying Babalon as divine lover, revolutionary, and erotic destroyer, “The Book of Babalon” articulates a femininity that is not reducible to the lack or inverse of masculinity. Although Parsons in his introduction describes Babalon as complementary to Horus, she appears, in actuality, to replace the hawk god’s function as harbinger of a new era, through her human “daughter” who appears as a martial version of the prophet-​role defined for Crowley in Liber AL. Parsons’s interpretation of Babalon deemphasizes femininity as indexical of receptivity compared to Crowley’s writings, with a stronger focus on what Waldby would refer to as the “phallic” femininity-​as-​destroyer. Babalon is portrayed in terms reminiscent of a conventional masculinity, with a “war-​body . . . equipped for victory.”75 Interestingly, Babalon’s nudity is likened to a blade, positing an idea of the female body as inherently penetrative as well as penetrable. In repeatedly emphasizing Parsons’s ardent desire for erotic destruction at her hands, the text hints at a nonhegemonic version of heterosexuality where femininity is not exclusively destroyed, but may effect “tender violence” on others. Appearing as both mother and lover, Babalon in the text appears to possess at least some of the aspects Irigaray sees as necessary for the divine feminine that may serve as a “horizon” for the development of feminine subjectivity. Once again, however, Parsons’s work shows this divine feminine principally being conceptualized through the worldview of a male magician, and I will return to this in my final discussion.

Into the Sunset with Her Sign: The Black Pilgrimage and the Rise of the Antichrist The Babalon Working marked a turning point in Parsons’s magical career. Years later, he wrote to Cameron: “I should have died that time, what lives has had one purpose, to teach and transmit.”76 After concluding the operation, he began withdrawing from OTO. In March 1946, he wrote a letter to the members of the Agape Lodge, alluding to the Babalon Working and announcing his plans to sell the house at 1003 Orange Grove Avenue. After Hubbard and Betty Northrup

138  The Eloquent Blood disappeared with a significant part of Parsons’s life savings, he submitted his resignation to Crowley, who accepted.77 Parsons married Cameron on October 19, 1946. Although his time in the Agape Lodge was behind him, he seemingly continued to identify as a Thelemite.78 He also began instructing Cameron in magic. There is reason to believe that Parsons wished to mend his relationship with Crowley, asking Cameron—​who was traveling in Europe during 1947—​to visit the Beast in his stead.79 However, Crowley’s health was dwindling, and he passed away on December 1 the same year before Parsons had the chance to reestablish contact. As the Cold War progressed, Parsons (like many of his old friends and colleagues) was investigated by the FBI due to his former connections to socialism. In September 1948, he was stripped of his security clearance.80 Cameron and Parsons’s relationship also suffered. The couple separated for a time, with Cameron departing for the artists’ commune of San Miguel de Allende, Mexico.81 At the beginning of October 1948, Parsons records resuming his ritual work with Babalon with a forty-​day working devoted to the goddess. In early November, he describes beginning to write a new text on Magick, intended for inclusion in “The Book of Babalon.” On November 9, he writes that he has finished 90 pages and repaired and reconsecrated the devotional seal of Babalon used in the Babalon Working. A week later, Parsons notes dreaming of Babalon’s voice, telling him to undertake the “black pilgrimage,” a concept that had been prefaced in “Liber 49.”82 Parsons accordingly conducted an astral ritual, passing through a succession of landscapes and visions and carrying the sign of Babalon.83 In a later record of this process, titled “The Book of the Antichrist,” Parsons describes traveling “into the night past accursed and desolate places and cyclopean ruins.”84 In the visions recorded, Parsons sees himself as a boy, invoking Satan and swearing off magic after succeeding. He receives fleeting glimpses of his former incarnations as various historical men, seemingly united by their having (in Parsons’s mind) failed at elevating their female partners to representatives of the divine feminine.85 He arrives at a great black castle but is prevented from entering. The following day, he undertakes the same procedure, arriving again at the castle and being greeted by a robed and hooded figure, who informs him that he has arrived at Chorazin in the dominion of the Antichrist. Parsons is informed that he is now partly in the Abyss and must take the Oath of the Abyss before Wilfred Smith. Parsons inquires about Babalon’s manifestation, but he is brushed off and informed that the work will take seven years. In “The Book of the Antichrist,” seemingly written after the completion of the ordeal, Parsons recalls being led into the castle and meeting a mysterious “Prince,” after which things were done to him that he is forbidden to disclose. Parsons’s diary records from the subsequent days are brief and indicate his troubled state of mind. On December 21, he proclaims the process completed and appears to be more contented.86

Her Banner Is Unfolded  139 In Parsons’s worldview, the completion of the black pilgrimage marked his transformation into the Antichrist himself, charged with fulfilling Crowley’s work on earth and paving the way for Babalon’s manifestation.87 As the Antichrist, Parsons swears to shatter Christian morals and bring about the widespread acceptance of Thelema.88 He proclaims that Babalon will manifest within seven years to finish this work.89 Although the goddess is not the main focus of Parsons’s records of the black pilgrimage, he undertakes the journey at her behest, and she is decidedly central to Parsons’s conceptualization of this process. In adding further anti-​Christian flair to Parsons’s vision, the record of his transformation into the Antichrist emphasizes Babalon’s apocalyptic connotations. Given Parsons’s declaration in Chorazin that he has given all of his blood to Babalon, combined with the fact that he proclaimed himself a Magister Templi shortly after returning, it appears he identified the black pilgrimage with crossing the Abyss. However, he brought his own eclectic touch; in an unpublished manuscript, he writes that he has attained the “grade of Accursed Adept.” This is curious given that no such grade exists in Crowley’s A∴A∴ system as well as the frequent association of the term “accursed” with the Abyss and the sephirah Daath.90 Chorazin, located near the Sea of Galilee in present-​day Israel and now in ruins, is mentioned in the Bible as one of three villages cursed by Jesus for failing to accept his teachings.91 Some medieval theologians believed the Antichrist might come to be born in Chorazin.92 This notion clearly influenced Parsons, who explicitly calls the location “the city of the Anti-​Christ” and believed that his astral journey there marked his transition into the figure. The black pilgrimage, however, is not a biblical concept, but appears to be derived from the writings of English author and medievalist scholar M. R. James, specifically the short story “Count Magnus,” published in Ghost Stories of an Antiquary (1904). James’s work has been highly influential to the horror genre, and given Parsons’s well-​documented love of fantasy and sci-​fi literature it is likely that he was aware of the tale. Central to the story is the legend of a seventeenth-​ century Swedish count who dabbled in black magic and made a black pilgrimage to Chorazin in order to attain a sinister servitor spirit.93 Given that James was also a scholar, it is possible that this fictional story has some foundation in popular tradition.94 In the instructions to the prospective pilgrim cited in the story, it is stated that the latter after arriving in Chorazin must salute “the Prince of the air.”95 This is in all likelihood a reference to Satan, described in the Bible as the “prince of the power of the air.”96 As noted above, Parsons details meeting a mysterious prince in Chorazin.97 Given his familiarity with biblical tradition, Parsons would likely have recognized James’s prince as a reference to Satan. James’s story ends with the novel’s protagonist, Mr. Wraxall, fleeing from Count Magnus and his supernatural helper. The pursuers eventually catch up,

140  The Eloquent Blood however, and Magnus’s monster kills and maims the unfortunate Wraxall to the point of unrecognizability. The description of the pilgrimage demonstrates how fact and fiction, politics and magic were intimately connected in Parsons’s mind. Through the framework of Crowley’s initiatory system and his own view of Babalon, Parsons interpreted James’s short story in his own way. Literature scholar Zoë Lehmann Imfeld argues that M. R. James’s protagonists—​such as Mr. Wraxall—​represent a modern notion of bounded, autonomous subjectivity, regarding the world with detachment. Thus, Imfeld appears to suggest, James’s monsters indicate a premodern notion of selfhood as porous, malleable, and contingent.98 This is a fitting interpretation of Count Magnus’s monster, which is described as pseudo-​anthropomorphic. To speak with Margrit Shildrick, the monstrous can be the object of longing, signaling the erotic potential of the undoing of autonomous selfhood.99 This longing is seemingly embraced by Parsons, who does not flee but willingly enters the black castle of Chorazin, embracing self-​annihilation and draining his blood into Babalon’s cup. Although perpetuating the notion of unruly femininity (as Babalon) as that which threatens the boundaries of bounded, masculine subjectivity and rationality, Parsons thus continued in Crowley’s footsteps by lauding this eroticized and violent undoing as an initiatory imperative. Parsons’s discussion of the black pilgrimage and the events around it seemingly indicate that he saw his relationship with Babalon as highly personal. Although superhuman entities addressing human initiates to provide ritual instructions and guidance were hardly unprecedented in Thelemic tradition, Babalon does not appear to have filled this role in Crowley’s life.100 Thus, Parsons’s writings around the black pilgrimage further emphasize an active and vocal Babalon as a subject in her own right. Parsons’s Babalon intervenes directly in his life on several occasions and tells him what to do. This almost mentoring role, combined with the violent and erotic, sometimes sadomasochistic, imagery in which the relationship between Babalon and Parsons is couched, is reminiscent of Crowley’s concept of the Holy Guardian Angel.101

Babalon as a Feminist Revolutionary Thus far, I have pinpointed witchcraft; the interpretation of Babalon’s daughter as a female Thelemic messiah; and the emphasis on actual—​ rather than metaphorical—​blood sacrifice as some of Parsons’s innovations to the Babalon discourse. However, the notion of Babalon as a revolutionary with her own utopian vision is perhaps Parsons’s most important, original contribution to the discourse around the goddess, especially emphasized in the essay “Freedom Is a Two-​Edged Sword,” which Parsons wrote between 1946 and 1950. One of

Her Banner Is Unfolded  141 Parsons’s most well-​known works, this sexpartite essay expresses Parsons’s disillusionment with contemporary American society. He protests against his own treatment at the hands of the increasingly paranoid and anticommunist government and critiques religious and sexual repression. Ultimately, he posits Babalon as the savior of humankind.102 Part of “Freedom Is a Two-​Edged Sword” paraphrases Crowley’s Liber Oz, which the latter wrote as a response to totalitarianism and a declaration of basic human rights.103 In this tract, Crowley declares each individual’s right to “live by his own law” and to work, play, rest, die, drink, dwell, move, speak, write, create art, build, dress, and enter into relationships in accordance with their will, as well as to “kill those who would thwart these rights.”104 Although he shares Crowley’s emphasis on individualism, critique of organized religion, and exaltation of free love, Parsons also attacks sexism, racism, and oppression of workers and argues that people should be granted decent living conditions and basic resources.105 Parsons’s involvement in different forms of libertarian socialism probably influenced his writings.106 A significant part of “Freedom” is devoted to critiquing misogyny and the oppression of women. He writes that women will finally strike back and relieve all of humanity. In the final section of the essay, “The Woman Girt with a Sword,” Parsons links Babalon to this envisioned feminist liberation.107 He appears to draw on theories of pre-​Christian matriarchy, while rejecting the term “matriarchy” itself: It is not a matriarchy as we imagine it, a rule of clubwomen, or frustrated chickens. It is an equality. The woman is the priestess, in her reposes the mystery. She is the mother, brooding yet tender, the lover, at once passionate and aloof, the wife, revered and cherished. She is the witch woman. It is coequal. Undifferentiated, the man, chieftain, hunter, husband, lover, doer, thinker.108

Parsons equates the denigration of women with the advent of Judeo-​Christian monotheism.109 The essay features themes of a surviving lineage of pre-​Christian pagan witchcraft as a paragon of equality and liberation, epitomized in the address:  “Witch woman, out of the ashes of the stake, rise again!”110 Parsons describes woman as “priestess of the irrational world! Irrational, but enormously important, and how deadly because it is unadmitted and denied.”111 Feminine agency is central to Parsons’s utopian vision, which involves a radical and possibly violent reshaping of society. Parsons clearly equates this revolutionary feminine force with Babalon. He stresses repeatedly that the new woman, epitomized by Babalon, will require men to rise to her standards, or she will refuse them.112 The essay concludes with a rallying cry, possibly aimed at Babalon’s human daughter or women in general. As it clearly illustrates Parsons’s

142  The Eloquent Blood conceptualization of Babalon as a goddess of war and feminist rebellion, it is worth quoting at length: Somewhere in the world today there is a woman for whom the sword is forged. Somewhere there is one who has heard the trumpets of the new age, and who will respond. She will respond, this new woman, to the high clamor of those star trumpets; she will come as a perilous flame and a devious song, a voice in the judgment halls, a banner before armies. She will come girt with the sword of freedom, and before her kings and priests will tremble and cities and empires will fall, and she will be called BABALON, the scarlet woman. For she will be lustful and proud; she will be subtle and deadly, she will be forthright and invincible as a naked blade. And women will respond to her war cry, and throw off their shackles and chains, and men will respond to her challenge, forsaking the foolish ways and the little ways, and she who will shine as the ruddy evening star in the bloody sunset of Gotterdamerung, will shine again as a morning star when the night has passed, and a new dawn breaks over the garden of Pan. To you, oh unknown woman, the sword pledged. Keep the faith!113

Parsons links Babalon to female emancipation. As previously discussed, Crowley voiced similar ideas in the “New Comment,” and the strong similarities in verbal imagery makes the latter text a likely source of inspiration for Parsons.114 However, Parsons’s essay differs from Crowley’s commentary to Liber AL in its nature romanticism and references to witchcraft as the continuation of pre-​ Christian religion. The essay reproduces a connection between femininity, nature, and intuition. In 1950, Parsons penned an alternate foreword to “The Book of Babalon,” in which he directly addresses Babalon’s human avatar or daughter, whom he remains certain is incarnate. The essay implicitly references Parsons’s crossing of the Abyss and entry into Chorazin, and he notes that the misfortunes that have befallen him since the Babalon Working made him able to prepare the book for the instruction of Babalon’s daughter. The text betrays a strong sense of urgency on Parsons’s part, although he stresses that he knows Babalon’s avatar will one day manifest in order to bring all of humanity into the City of the Pyramids.115 The philosophy expressed in “Freedom Is a Two-​Edged Sword” is likely indebted to Parsons’s background in leftist circles, and Parsons’s feminist ideas are reminiscent of views expressed by some early-​twentieth-​century socialists and sex radical women’s rights advocates who espoused free love ideals and a positive view of the sexual instinct. These thinkers affirmed women’s right both to spurn unwanted advances and to take lovers at will.116 Although positive conceptualizations of active female sexuality were still marginalized during Parsons’s lifetime, something of a breakthrough, as previously noted, occurred

Her Banner Is Unfolded  143 in the first decade of the twentieth century, when feminist thinkers and activists began increasingly to argue for women’s equal rights to sexual freedom.117 In linking feminist sentiments and the call for female sexual freedom explicitly to the revaluation of divine femininity and theories about the restoration of pre-​Christian matriarchy, Parsons preceded central ideological trends in the emergence of modern witchcraft a few years later, as well as in 1970s and 1980s goddess feminism.118

“An Ancient Garden and a Secret Call”: Babalon and the Witch In the 1950s, when Parsons’s life had once again stabilized, he busied himself formulating a new religion that he dubbed “the Witchcraft,” desiring an “austere simplicity of approach” that would speak to the passions and embodied experience of men and women.119 As illustrated in the preceding discussion, his interest in witchcraft and the witch figure had begun earlier; Williamson’s Darker Than You Think appears to have influenced Parsons’s ideas, and he clearly drew on Margaret Murray’s writings on witchcraft.120 Parsons compiled a collection of poems titled Songs for the Witch Woman, written mostly between 1946 and his death in 1952. The poems draw strongly on Romantic and Gothic themes, featuring figures such as the Lamia, vampires, and werewolves, alongside motifs like the witches’ Sabbath, Stonehenge, Merlin, and Pan. Cameron appears increasingly to have become associated with witchy motifs in Parsons’s mind, and several of the poems allude to her.121 Parsons’s view of Babalon in the final years of his life seems to have been colored by these themes. Indeed, the collection is dedicated to “Candida [Cameron’s magical name], in whom She is incarnate,” which is seemingly a reference to Babalon.122 Parsons presents the Witchcraft as a duotheistic religion focused on the veneration of a divine couple represented by Babalon and Lucifer.123 His conceptualization of the Witchcraft has many similarities with the Wiccan traditions that appeared in England over the next few years. Parsons describes witchcraft as a world-​affirming pagan religion centered on a heterosexual, divine dyad and focused on the worship of sex, nature, and freedom, as old as humanity and surviving in secret despite centuries of Christian persecution.124 Although these themes are alluded to in “Liber 49,” “The Book of the Antichrist,” and “Freedom Is a Two-​Edged Sword,” it does not appear that Parsons had previously attempted to flesh them out into an independent religion.125 Many late-​nineteenth-​century thinkers and authors associated the witch with social resistance and women’s liberation. Although the motif was often used by conservative authors to illustrate the supposed dangers of feminism, the narrative

144  The Eloquent Blood of the witch-​hunts was sometimes used as a pretext for demonizing the Church.126 A prominent example is Jules Michelet’s (1798–​1874) La Sorcière, a nominally historical work on witchcraft based on questionable research and inferences. One of the first sympathetic accounts of witchcraft, the author viewed witches as champions of equality, reason, and freedom. Michelet’s witch is a Satanist, but Satan is described as a symbol of goodness connected to nature and knowledge.127 A similarly influential book for the conception of witchcraft as a positive and emancipatory force is Charles Godfrey Leland’s (1824–​1903) Aradia: or the Gospel of the Witches, which (in contrast to works such as Michelet’s) posits witchcraft as a living religion. The book details Leland’s alleged findings studying folk traditions in Italy, and tells of an ancient fertility cult passed down through generations since pre-​Christian times. Although not explicit Satanists, Leland’s witches appear to revere Lucifer alongside the goddess Diana.128 There are strong similarities between the religion portrayed in Aradia and Parsons’s witchcraft, and the likelihood of his familiarity with the work is strengthened by the fact that one of the “Witch” poems is titled “Aradia.”129 Parsons’s melding of Babalon with the idea of an egalitarian, subversive, and ancient paganism associated with women’s emancipation and resistance to Christianity is a logical continuation of his previous work, which he may have developed further had he lived long enough. By drawing on this discourse, Parsons gave Babalon a past of sorts, as a goddess of witches, kept alive in secret through the centuries and finally arisen. “The Witchcraft” is included in a longer collection of texts titled “The Cup, the Sword and the Crux Ansata.” The first section, “The Cup,” deals specifically with Babalon. Parsons queries: [I]‌s not BABALON Woman, the beloved Whore, who gives all that she is, and uses all of a man? Verily, she is that accursed angel in whom is all damnation and all redemption, for in her is all power given.130

In this excerpt, Babalon is explicated as part of a reciprocal erotic destruction. Parsons connects her to an idealized version of pre-​Christian paganism, identified with a matriarchal age in which women were respected as spiritual and worldly authorities. Notably, he references the idea of sacred prostitution in antiquity, writing that this Babalonian woman “sat at the temple gate by the waters of Babylon and gave herself to a stranger.”131 He construes Babalon as the opposite of the chaste and submissive Virgin Mary: Look upon her now in her nakedness, this glorious whore called woman. Behold her chanting a war cry, riding a steed of the Sagas—​Semiramis, Vicingerotix—​Brunhild. Is she not admirable? Behold her in the chambers of night, her cheeks flushed, her eyes large, her mouth moist with honey and sweet

Her Banner Is Unfolded  145 with fire, giving the ecstasy and anguish of her body utterly in love. Is she not magnificent! Follow her into the temple of the forest, and see by what wondrous rites she invokes the godhead upon the tribe. Where is pale, sad, chaste Mary in comparison with this vision? Why, if they came to crucify her son, she would seize a sword and slay until men ran screaming before that fury. That, or if need be nail him up with her own hands.132

The excerpt posits Babalon as the opposite of the “pale, sad, chaste” Virgin Mary—​she is a deadly and unwavering female warrior. Parsons continues to elaborate on the theme of dissolution of self and (masculine) subjectivity, stating: For there is a woman that will suck a man’s soul down to hell, and utterly destroy him. . . . Is she not a demon? Verily she is a demon from the deepest pit. . . . It is a subtlety of the Cup that it conquers by yielding, and yields to conquer.133

Parsons’s “The Cup” posits Babalon as a prototypical liberated femininity, “flashing with battle, tender with love and withdrawn in mystery.”134 He asserts that she is the “essence of woman.”135 The Babalonian woman of the essay is clearly ascribed traits congruent with what Schippers conceptualizes as hegemonic masculinity, namely, violence and erotic assertiveness; however, she also comprises traits that can be related to a hegemonic femininity, such as the propensity for erotic yielding. Parsons draws explicitly on the stereotypical image of unruly pariah femininity as threatening male wellbeing and morals, although he conceptualizes this feminine propensity as laudable. Importantly, Babalon is construed as both erotic destroyer and destroyed. Similar to Parsons’s previous writings, the text construes a feminized subjectivity that does not, in any simplistic fashion, legitimize a hierarchical and complementary relationship between masculinity and femininity, nor is it reducible to lack or absence. Thus, Babalon in the text can be read as a discursive site through which Parsons appears to sketch an alternative femininity, which he situates in both futurity and a constructed historical past.

Divine Women, Witches, and Feminine Agency After testifying before a closed court, Parsons regained his security clearance, and began working for the Howard Hughes Corporation. During this time, he was offered employment within the Israeli rocket program. Parsons decided to move to Israel, but he was fired from the company and accused of espionage. Although Parsons was found innocent, his security clearance was nonetheless permanently revoked in January 1952.136 By this time, Parsons and Cameron had

146  The Eloquent Blood reunited. They moved to a small house on Orange Grove Avenue in Pasadena—​ the same street where the Agape Lodge had once resided—​and Parsons launched his own chemical business, producing special effects for Hollywood. The couple planned to visit Mexico for some time, possibly in order to facilitate a future move to Israel.137 One day before their scheduled departure, while attending to some last-​minute work in his home laboratory, Parsons dropped a vial of highly explosive fulminate of mercury. The resulting explosion ripped through the ceiling, destroying the lower floor of the building and injuring him mortally. Jack died in hospital on June 17, 1952, less than an hour after the accident.138 Cameron maintained a continued interest in the results of the Babalon Working—​as well as in occultism—​after Parsons’s death.139 In 1953, she appears to have shared Parsons’s record of the operations with Jane Wolfe, who claimed bewilderment in a letter to Germer. Wolfe writes that Cameron had assembled a circle of friends working magic based on Liber AL and the Tarot as well as what she had learned from Jack.140 The two women corresponded for a time, and Wolfe instructed Cameron in magical matters.141 In 1954, Cameron starred as the Scarlet Woman in avant-​garde filmmaker Kenneth Anger’s Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome (1954). Cameron clearly claimed the role of Babalon herself for a time after Parsons’s death. On February 20, 1955, Wolfe described her thus: Cameron. Aggressive and masterful—​Yes! Because of these qualities, she accepted from Jack the role of Babalon, with all the hordes of followers with waving banners. This for about a year. It took another year to slowly drop the mantle.142

Cameron’s preoccupation with Babalon seemingly influenced her circle of friends for a time. For instance, her friend Renata Loome—​an artist who costarred with Cameron as Lilith in Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome—​created a painting, Babalon and the Beast (1958), which shows a dark-​haired woman reclining leisurely with a large feline.143 In contrast to Crowley, Parsons made only brief attempts to create his own magical system. “The Book of Babalon” and the various texts pertaining to his black pilgrimage and crossing of the Abyss were private magical records, which similar to Crowley’s own contain a great deal of genre-​specific ambiguity. A great deal of Parsons’s writings are lost, possibly forever; some because Cameron in the years after her husband’s death developed the habit of ritually burning his old possessions. However, ideas clearly prefaced in Parsons’s personal writings were later developed in more systematized form in, for instance, “Freedom Is a Two-​ Edged Sword”; “The Witchcraft”; and the additional essays included in “The Cup, the Sword and the Crux Ansata,” which were clearly intended for broader circulation.

Her Banner Is Unfolded  147 Parsons’s writings continue themes established in Crowley’s writings, including the connection between Babalon and erotic destruction and the exaltation of pariah femininity. Indeed, Parsons’s conceptualization of Babalon challenges early-​ twentieth-​ century notions of hegemonic femininity by appearing as unabashedly sexual and powerful. Perhaps due to Parsons’s own background in leftist circles and a possible ideological indebtedness to early-​ twentieth-​century amalgamations of socialism, feminism, and calls for female sexual liberation, the notion of Babalon as a feminist revolutionary has a particularly pronounced position in Parsons’s writings. Although he engages with the motif of Babalon as an emblem of receptivity, conceptualized in terms of feminized promiscuity, this theme appears to be less central to Parsons’s writings than Crowley’s. In contrast, Parsons appears to place a stronger emphasis on Babalon as a conqueror. This appears, perhaps somewhat paradoxically, to coincide with a less flexible view of femininity in relation to anatomical morphology. Although Parsons affirms in one passage that the force of Babalon may be inherent to all human beings, he appears—​to a larger extent than Crowley—​to construe femininity as a positionality that is principally relevant to women, and which from his own perspective of male magician is approached as a threatening and seductive other. Nonetheless, femininity in Parsons’s writings is not reducible to what Irigaray refers to as “the other of the same,” the lack or absence of masculinity, or traits and practices that materialize a feminine, subordinate position.144 The femininity of Parsons’s goddess is decidedly different from its hegemonic variety, which—​in Schippers’s terminology—​legitimizes a hierarchical, masculine-​feminine complementarity.145 Parsons engages with notions of pariah femininity by idealizing the sexually voracious, nonmonogamous, nonexclusively heterosexual, and violent feminine that threatens autonomous subjectivity. Thus, Babalon in his texts functions as a discursive site for the envisioning of what in Schippers’s terminology may be referred to as an alternative femininity. In Parsons’s writings, Babalon is characterized as a desiring feminine subject who is both ecstatically undone and effects the “tender violence” of erotic destruction onto others. Significantly, Parsons emphasizes woman-​to-​woman relationships in suggesting lesbian relationality as congruent with Babalon’s nature, centering the affinity between Babalon and her daughter. There are parallels between Parsons’s conceptualization of Babalon and Irigaray’s description of the role of the divine feminine in her own vision, representing a concept of independent feminine subjectivity.146 Like Irigaray’s divine feminine, Parsons’s Babalon appears to transcend the sensible–​ transcendent binary, being described as existing within as well as beyond physical women (and men). Irigaray stresses that this feminine divinity must supersede the binarization of sexual and maternal femininity, and that it is

148  The Eloquent Blood necessary to represent feminine creativity in ways that exceed physical reproduction. The goddess in Parsons’s writings indeed appears to encompass a view of femininity and women not only as mothers but also as social revolutionaries, warriors, lovers, and magical initiators. It is relevant that Babalon is construed as the mother of a daughter. Irigaray critiques Christian theology for only offering women the possibility of identifying with divinity through the image of an altruistic mother nurturing her son. In contrast, Babalon as articulated in Parsons’s writings seemingly offers a female reader the possibility of identifying with divinity through a mother-​daughter relationship. Parsons’s interpretation of Babalon as goddess of witchcraft is a departure from Crowley’s theology. Parsons looked to imagined history for images of a gender-​equal society in which femininity was revered. In doing so, however, he drew on stereotypical gendered tropes, such as the idea of femininity, nature, and intuition as connected. While ascribing a central role to Cameron in the Babalon Working, it is significant that Parsons did not appear initially to have felt it necessary for his “elemental” to be an active magician in her own right.147 Although his views appear to have shifted over time, and he emphasized the necessity of magical training for Babalon’s daughter, his claims to having conjured Cameron, as well as the mythology he created for her, may have weighed heavily on her (as some readers have suggested).148 This indicates the difficulties in reading a male magician’s articulation of femininity as an example of Irigaray’s utopian (divine) feminine, which Irigaray ultimately suggests women must develop for themselves. Thus, although Parsons’s Babalon challenged hegemonic femininity and the hierarchical complementarity of masculinity and femininity, the goddess in his writings is still femininity as envisioned from the perspective of masculine subjectivity.

Notes 1. John W. Parsons to Marjorie Cameron, October 5, 1949, Yorke, Warburg. 2. George Pendle, Strange Angel: The Otherworldly Life of Rocket Scientist John Whiteside Parsons (Orlando: Harcourt, 2005); John Carter, Sex and Rockets: The Occult World of Jack Parsons (Venice, CA: Feral House, 1999). See also Strange Angel, CBS All Access (2018). 3. Pendle, Strange, 26–​28; Starr, Unknown, 252–​253. 4. Pendle, Strange,  33–​40. 5. Ibid., 45–​46; 74–​80; Starr, Unknown, 253–​254. 6. Pendle, Strange,  80–​83. 7. Ibid., 175–​201. 8. Ibid., 143–​146.

Her Banner Is Unfolded  149 9. Jane Wolfe to Karl Germer, April 20, 1941, in Karl Germer, Karl Germer: Selected Letters 1928–​1962, ed. David Shoemaker, Andrew Ferrell, and Stefan Voss (Sacramento: International College of Thelema, 2016); Pendle, Strange, 134. 10. Martin P. Starr notes that the Agape guest log lists January 1938 as Parsons’s first visit, but that this is likely erroneous. Starr, Unknown, 257. See also Pendle, Strange, 132–​153. 11. Jane Wolfe, “Agape Lodge Minutes,” September 21, 1935, OTO archives. 12. Starr, Unknown, 257; Pendle, Strange, 135. 13. Pendle, Strange, 136. 14. Ibid., 152; Starr, Unknown, 257–​258. 15. Starr, Unknown, 263; Pendle, Strange, 172. 16. Jane Wolfe to Karl Germer, April 20, 1941, in Germer, Selected. 17. Pendle, Strange, 204–​205; Starr, Unknown, 270–​271. After Jack and Helen Parsons divorced, Helen married Smith. Helen Parsons Smith was instrumental to the reestablishment of OTO in the late 1960s and 1970s. Cf. Starr, Unknown; James Wasserman, In the Center of the Fire:  A Memoir of the Occult, 1966–​1989 (Lake Worth, FL; Newburyport, MA: Ibis Press, 2012). 18. Starr, Unknown, 271–​274; Pendle, Strange, 207–​213. 19. Starr, Unknown, 275. In the OTO structure, the term “lodge” marks the largest form of local body (see overview of OTO’s structure in c­ hapter 7). 20. See, e.g., letter from Karl Germer to Jane Wolfe, April 24, 1943, in Germer, Selected. See also Pendle, Strange, 220–​223; Starr, Unknown, 289. 21. See John W.  Parsons to Aleister Crowley, January 26, 1946, Yorke, Warburg; Jane Wolfe to Karl Germer, January 23, 1946, in Germer, Selected; Grady McMurtry, “Agape Inspection Report,” January 25, 1946, OTO archives. 22. Pendle, Strange, 239–​241, 252–​257. 23. John W. Parsons, “The Book of the Antichrist,” n.d. [ca. 1948], Yorke, Warburg. 24. Jane Wolfe to Karl Germer, October 25, 1945, in Germer, Selected. Eight years later, Wolfe again mentioned “Jack’s interest in Witchcraft and Voo Doo [sic].” Jane Wolfe to Karl Germer, January 20, 1953, in Germer, Selected. There is no evidence that Parsons dabbled in Vodou, nor of Wolfe herself having much knowledge of the tradition. However, it is noteworthy that Wolfe mentions the “houmfort,” a traditional term denoting a Vodou temple. 25. McMurtry, “Agape.” 26. An “elemental” is a person thought to embody a natural, elemental force. Parsons seemingly derived this idea from the OTO’s grade papers for VIII°. An unpublished section of “The Book of Babalon” titled “Of Familiars” quotes extensively from Crowley’s “De Nuptiis Secretis Deorum cum Hominibus.” See John W. Parsons, “Of Familiars,” n.d., Yorke, Warburg; Crowley, “De Nuptiis.” It is unclear exactly when Parsons began performing rituals with this aim. As early as October 25, Wolfe suggests to Germer that Parsons may have procured an elemental. Jane Wolfe to Karl Germer, October 25, 1945, in Germer, Selected. However, Parsons himself notes beginning sometime around or near early January 1946. John W. Parsons, “The Book of Babalon,” 1946, Yorke, Warburg.

150  The Eloquent Blood 27. Starr, Unknown, 313; Parsons, “Babalon”; Pendle, Strange, 261–​263. 28. In Cameron’s more prosaic version of events, she crossed paths with Parson about a year earlier, and she returned to 1003 at his behest. Bogdan, “Babalon,” 22. Pendle, Strange, 263–​264; Spencer Kansa, Wormwood Star:  The Magickal Life of Marjorie Cameron, 2nd ed. (Oxford: Mandrake, 2014), 28–​29. This suggests that Parsons’s narrative was (at least partly) a romantic fictionalization. 29. Pendle, Strange, 295. 30. Jack Williamson, Darker Than You Think (n.p.: Fantasy Press, 1948). 31. Parsons, “Babalon.” 32. Ibid. Cameron later confirmed being this partner, but writes that she was unaware of the objective of the working. Marjorie Cameron to Gerald J. Yorke, July 28, 1962, OTO archives. 33. Parsons may have heeded Crowley’s advice in his instructions for the IX° of OTO that the female ritual partner should be kept unaware of the objective of a working. Crowley, “Liber CDXIV.” 34. Crowley’s novel Moonchild has been suggested as a potential inspiration for Parsons’s Babalon Working. Henrik Bogdan, “The Babalon Working 1946: L. Ron Hubbard, John Whiteside Parsons, and the Practice of Enochian Magic,” Numen: International Review for the History of Religions 63, no. 1 (2016): 12–​32; Urban, Magia, 137. It is unclear if any particular occurrence prompted Parsons to seek to incarnate Babalon. Although Wolfe suggested that the Babalon Working may have been conducted at Crowley’s behest, Crowley’s apparent skepticism renders this unlikely. However, Parsons appears to have been interested in Babalon at least since 1942. See Jane Wolfe to Karl Germer, January 20, 1953; Karl Germer to Jane Wolfe, January 22 and February 9, 1953, all in Germer, Selected. 35. Parsons, “Babalon.” 36. Ibid. 37. Ibid. 38. Ibid. 39. Ibid. 40. In response, Parsons painted a seven-​pointed star—​a simplified version of the A∴A∴ emblem first used in The Book of Lies—​on the disc. 41. Parsons, “Babalon.” 42. As seen in ­chapter  3, a daughter of Babalon figures in Vision, although the latter presents a more mystical interpretation of the concept. Crowley, Vision, 174–​175. AL III:45, referencing the Scarlet Woman’s child, does not specify the sex of the latter, and Parsons may have been inspired by this verse. 43. Parsons, “Babalon.” 44. Crowley, “Liber XV.” 45. The term “basilisk abode” appears to be derived from Crowley’s poem “The Wizard Way.” See Aleister Crowley, “The Wizard Way,” The Equinox I, no. 1 (1909): 37–​46. 46. Parsons, “Babalon.” 47. Ibid. 48. Ibid.

Her Banner Is Unfolded  151 49. See, e.g., Jer. 51:33; Rev. 14:14–​15; and Joel 3:13 [KJV]; see also AL III. 50. See Rev. 19:11–​22 [KJV]. 51. Parsons, “Babalon.” 52. Blood sacrifice holds a marginal position in Crowley’s system. Crowley describes it as inferior to “the true sacrifices” of the devotee’s intent and suggests offering one’s own blood if a physical sacrifice is required. Crowley, “ASTARTE,” 57. However, there are a few examples of Crowley using ritual self-​cutting as well as animal sacrifice. E.g., Crowley, “Liber DCLXXI”; Crowley, Lies, 98–​99; Crowley, Vision, 160; Kaczynski, Perdurabo, 607, 645–​646. 53. Parsons, “Babalon.” 54. This Enochian key may have been utilized in response to Babalon’s previous proclamation to “seek [her] in the Seventh Aire.” Parsons, “Babalon.” Parsons appears to have confused Enochian procedure, as the Aethyrs are traditionally invoked by the nineteenth key. Cf. Bogdan, “Babalon.” 55. Parsons, “Babalon.” 56. Crowley, Vision, 150. 57. Parsons, “Babalon.” 58. Ibid. 59. Ibid. 60. Ibid. 61. Ibid. 62. Ibid. 63. Ibid. 64. Ibid. 65. Ibid. 66. Ibid. 67. John W. Parsons to Aleister Crowley, March 6, 1946, Yorke, Warburg. This communication was discussed by the other Thelemites. See Karl Germer to Jane Wolfe, April 13, 1946; February 9, 1953, in Germer, Selected. 68. Aleister Crowley to John W. Parsons, March 27, 1946, Yorke, Warburg. 69. Aleister Crowley to John W. Parsons, April 19, 1946, Yorke, Warburg. 70. Jane Wolfe to Karl Germer, May 16, 1946, in Germer, Selected. 71. Karl Germer to Jane Wolfe, February 9, 1953; Karl Germer to Jane Wolfe on February 22, 1953, in Germer, Selected. 72. The holograph manuscript is included in the Warburg Institute’s collection with an unpublished foreword to “The Book of Babalon,” which Parsons appears to have written in 1950. See John W. Parsons, “Unpublished Foreword to the Book of Babalon” n.d. [ca. 1950], Yorke, Warburg. 73. John W. Parsons, “The Star of Babalon,” in John W. Parsons, Freedom is a Two-​Edged Sword and Other Essays, ed. Hymenaeus Beta and Cameron (Tempe, AZ: New Falcon Publications, 2001), 90. As noted in ­chapter 3, Crowley describes Babalon similarly in the 2nd Aethyr. Crowley, Vision, 233–​234. 74. Parsons, “Star,” 91. 75. Waldby, “Destruction,” 268.

152  The Eloquent Blood 76. John W. Parsons to Marjorie Cameron, January 27, 1950 [possibly 1949]. In John W.  Parsons, “Letters from Jack Parsons to Marjorie Cameron, 1949–​1950,” n.d. [1949–​1950], Yorke, Warburg. 77. Nonetheless, Wolfe retained hopes for Parsons’s magical future. Jane Wolfe to Karl Germer, May 16, 1946, in Germer, Selected. 78. Pendle, Strange, 266–​270, 277; Starr, Unknown, 313–​314. Parsons appears to have put many of his books up for sale, including unpublished Crowley manuscripts. “Agape Lodge Minutes,” August 14, 1946, OTO archives. However, Parsons’s continued interest in Thelema is evinced by the numerous Thelemic references in his later work. Parsons, “Book of the Antichrist”; John W. Parsons, “Basic Magick: Fundamental Theory and Practice,” in John W. Parsons, Freedom Is a Two-​Edged Sword and Other Essays, ed. Hymenaeus Beta and Cameron (Tempe, AZ: New Falcon Publications, 1989), 50–​66. He continued to correspond with Germer on Crowley’s legacy and reaffirmed his commitment to promoting Thelema. John W. Parsons, letters to Karl Germer, 1949–​1952, Yorke, Warburg. 79. Pendle, Strange, 278. Parsons urged Cameron to approach Germer around this time. Marjorie Cameron to Jane Wolfe, March 5, 1953, CPF archives. 80. John W. Parsons to Karl Germer, June 19, 1949, Warburg; Pendle, Strange, 280–​283. 81. Pendle, Strange, 283–​284; Starr, Unknown, 320. 82. See “Liber 49,” especially verses 33, 58, and 61. Parsons, “Babalon.” 83. The procedure is recorded in the unpublished document “The Black Pilgrimage.” John W.  Parsons, “The Black Pilgrimage,” n.d. [ca.  1948], OTO archives; and in Parsons, “Book of the Antichrist.” The latter document appears to have been penned after the working, and presents the process more cursorily. 84. Parsons, “Book of the Antichrist.” 85. Ibid.; Parsons, “Black Pilgrimage.” “The Book of the Antichrist” mentions “Francis Hepburne, Earl Bothwell, manipulating Gellis Duncan, that was an unworthy instrument.” Both are historical figures, arrested on charges of witchcraft. Although there is no evidence the two were connected, Margaret Murray held that they were involved in the same witch cult. Margaret Murray, The Witch-​Cult in Western Europe: A Study in Anthropology (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1962). 86. Parsons, “Black Pilgrimage.” 87. Parsons, “Book of the Antichrist.” 88. John W.  Parsons, “Manifesto of the Antichrist,” n.d. [ca.  1948], Yorke, Warburg; Parsons, “Black Pilgrimage.” 89. Parsons, “Manifesto of the Antichrist.” 90. It is unclear when this document was written. Parsons designed it as a chapter in “The Book of Babalon,” but his reference to having become an “Accursed Adept” appears to indicate the document was written after the Babalon Working. Parsons, “Of Familiars.” 91. Luke 10:13 [KJV]. 92. The earliest documented reference to the Antichrist being born in Chorazin appears to be the seventh-​century Apocalypse of Pseudo-​Methodius. The idea recurred in several later sources. Cf. Paul Julius Alexander, The Byzantine Apocalyptic Tradition

Her Banner Is Unfolded  153 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985); Nicolae Roddy, “The Antichrist at Bethsaida,” in Bethsaida: A City by the North Shore of the Sea of Galilee, ed. Rami Arav and Richard Freund (Kirksville, MO: Truman State University Press, 2004), 283–​294. 93. M. R. James, “Count Magnus,” in Ghost Stories of an Antiquary (London.: Edward Arnold, 1904). 94. Cf. Rosemary Pardoe and Jane Nicholls, “The Black Pilgrimage,” Ghosts and Scholars 26 (1998). Accessed on April 30, 2019 from http://​www.users.globalnet. co.uk/​~pardos/​ArticleTwo.html. Pardoe and Nicholls contend that James’s story likely inspired Parsons. 95. James, “Count Magnus.” 96. Eph. 2:2 [KJV]. 97. Parsons, “Book of the Antichrist.” 98. Zoë Lehmann Imfeld, The Victorian Ghost Story and Theology: From Le Fanu to James (Cham: Springer, 2016), 34, 100. 99. Shildrick, “Unreformed.” 100. For an example of such magician-​deity interaction in Crowley’s writings, see, e.g., Crowley, “Paris.” 101. Parsons appears to have undertaken the operation of the Holy Guardian Angel around this time. John W. Parsons to Karl Germer, n.d. [ca. 1952], Yorke, Warburg. This evinces his unorthodox approach to Magick; Knowledge and Conversation of the HGA is traditionally associated with the grade of Adeptus Minor (5°=6), while crossing the Abyss is connected to Magister Templi (8°=3). See “One Star in Sight,” in Crowley, Magick: Liber ABA, 479–​489. 102. John W. Parsons, “Freedom Is a Two-​Edged Sword,” in Freedom Is a Two-​Edged Sword and Other Essays, ed. Hymenaeus Beta and Cameron (Tempe, AZ:  New Falcon Publications, 1989), 9–​43. 103. Cf. Hymenaeus Beta, “Foreword,” in John W. Parsons, Three Essays on Freedom, ed. Hymenaeus Beta (York Beach, ME: Teitan Press, 2008), xiii. 104. Crowley penned “Liber Oz” in 1941 as a response to totalitarianism and the ongoing world war. Kaczynski, Perdurabo, 517–​519. 105. Parsons, “Freedom,” 15–​16; 20. 106. Cf. Beta, “Foreword,” ix. 107. Parsons, “Freedom,” 39–​44. 108. Ibid., 41 109. Ibid.,  41–​42. 110. Ibid., 42. 111. Ibid., 43. 112. Ibid.,  39–​44. 113. Ibid.,  43–​44. 114. Parsons commissioned an editorial treatment of the commentaries to Liber AL, and possessed one of few extant typescripts of the abbreviated edition of the comment. Beta, “Foreword,” 8–​10. See also Karl Germer to Jane Wolfe, October 20, 1946, in Germer, Selected.

154  The Eloquent Blood 115. Parsons, “Unpublished Foreword.” 116. For instance, sex-​radical ideas were expressed in the anarchist periodical Lucifer, the Light Bearer (1883–​1906), later named The American Journal of Eugenics. Its editor, Moses Harman, was a women’s rights advocate who opposed marriage. Harman was in contact with Ida Craddock, a female sexual mystic whom Crowley admired (see previous chapters). Silberman, “Perfect.” 117. Cf. Bland, “Heterosexuality.” 118. Cf. Fredrik Gregorius, “Luciferian Witchcraft: At the Crossroads between Paganism and Satanism,” in The Devil’s Party: Satanism in Modernity, ed. Per Faxneld and Jesper Aa. Petersen (New York: Oxford University Press, 2013), 235. These themes in modern Wicca are discussed in Hutton, Triumph. 119. John W. Parsons to Marjorie Cameron, January 27, 1950. Yorke, Warburg. 120. As previously discussed, “The Book of the Antichrist” references elements from Murray’s work. Murray, Witch-​Cult. 121. See, e.g., the titular “Witch-​Woman,” which refers to a female figure with slanting eyes and red hair. John W. Parsons and Marjorie Cameron, Songs for the Witch Woman, With Commentaries from William Breeze, George Pendle & Margaret Haines (London:  Fulgur Esoterica, 2014), 27. In a letter to Crowley, Parsons describes Cameron as having “red hair and slant green eyes.” John W. Parsons to Aleister Crowley, February 22, 1946, Yorke, Warburg. 122. While this may suggest that Parsons gradually came to believe Cameron to be Babalon’s avatar, it may also reference his belief that the goddess is incarnate in all, and especially liberated women. Parsons, “Babalon”; Parsons, “Star.” 123. John W. Parsons, “Manifesto of the Witchcraft,” in John W. Parsons, Freedom Is a Two-​Edged Sword and Other Essays, ed. Hymenaeus Beta and Cameron (Tempe, AZ: New Falcon Publications, 2001), 69–​70; John W. Parsons, “The Witchcraft,” in John W. Parsons, Freedom Is a Two-​Edged Sword and Other Essays, ed. Hymenaeus Beta and Cameron (Tempe, AZ: New Falcon Publications, 2001), 71–​74. 124. Despite the similarities between Parsons’s ideas about witchcraft and those of Gerald Gardner, the founder of Wicca, there is no evidence of contact between the two. More likely, both were inspired by a similar corpus of works on comparative mythology and anthropology, as well as Crowley’s ideas. Gardner—​like Parsons–​ was initiated in OTO. See Hutton, Triumph; Gregorius, “Luciferian.” 125. Gregorius, “Luciferian.” 126. Faxneld, Satanic. 127. Jules Michelet, Satanism and Witchcraft: A Study in Medieval Superstition, trans. A. R. Allinson (New York: Citadel Press, 1963). 128. Charles Godfrey Leland, Aradia:  Or the Gospel of the Witches (London:  David Nutt, 1899). 129. Parsons and Cameron, Songs, 53. 130. John W. Parsons, “The Cup, the Sword and the Crux Ansata,” in John W. Parsons, Freedom Is a Two-​Edged Sword and Other Essays, ed. Hymenaeus Beta and Cameron (Tempe, AZ: New Falcon Publications, 2001), 80. 131. Parsons, “The Cup,” 80.

Her Banner Is Unfolded  155 132. Ibid., 81. 133. Ibid. 134. Ibid., 80. 135. Ibid., 81. 136. Pendle, Strange, 288–​296. 137. Ibid., 293–​299. 138. Ibid., 1–​8; Starr, Unknown, 326–​327. Although Parsons’s death has provoked numerous conspiracy theories, the most plausible, and perhaps the saddest, explanation is that his death was simply a macabre accident. Cf. Pendle, Strange, 300–​301. 139. Although Cameron survived Jack by decades, the memory of her first husband appears to have lingered. See, e.g., Marjorie Cameron, “Notebook of Cameron,” 2012.M.42, Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles. In 1962, Cameron requested copies of Yorke’s material on Parsons, writing that she was using her late husband’s old wand and talisman. Marjorie Cameron to Gerald J. Yorke, March 2, 1962, OTO archives. Although Yorke expressed interest in Cameron’s role in the Babalon Working, he was dismissive of the operation. Gerald J. Yorke to Marjorie Cameron on May 28, 1962, OTO archives. In 1963, Cameron wrote to Karl Germer’s widow, Sascha, indicating a wish to put Parsons’s ashes to rest with those of Crowley, Germer, and Wolfe. Marjorie Cameron to Sascha Germer, May 23, 1963, OTO archives. 140. Jane Wolfe to Karl Germer, February 20, 1955, in Germer, Selected. See also Kansa, Wormwood Star,  85–​98. 141. Marjorie Cameron and Jane Wolfe, “Letters,” 1952–​1954, CPF archives. 142. Jane Wolfe to Karl Germer, January 20, 1955, in Germer, Selected. 143. Renata Loome, Babalon and the Beast [photograph of painting], 1958, Yorke NS74, 202, Warburg. 144. Irigaray, “Question.” 145. Schippers, “Recovering.” 146. Irigaray, “Divine.” 147. John W. Parsons to Aleister Crowley, January 26, 1946, Yorke, Warburg. 148. See, e.g., William Breeze, “Foreword,” in John W. Parsons and Marjorie Cameron, Songs for the Witch Woman, With Commentaries from William Breeze, George Pendle & Margaret Haines (London: Fulgur Esoterica, 2014), 9–​16.

6

Kundalini, Kalas, and Qadeshim Babalon and Femininity as Other in the Writings of Kenneth Grant

A system of spiritual culture which includes the sexual use of the female and which establishes an exalted ideal of reverence for the female principle as the Shakti, or power-​aspect of the cosmos, is not the product of psychopaths, unless we posit the existence of an unbroken line of delinquents extending over untold centuries.1

In many of his writings, the British occultist Kenneth Grant (1924–​2011) outlines a religious tradition in which women embody the goddess in sex magical ritual. Grant has been called a “pioneer of . . . ‘Western Tantra,’ ”2 and his works have exerted a significant influence on the development of occultism from the 1970s onward. He played an important role in the preservation and spread of Aleister Crowley’s writings, collaborating with Crowley’s friend Gerald J.  Yorke. Grant edited and introduced (often with Crowley’s literary executor John Symonds) several of Crowley’s important works and has been instrumental in reviving interest in the work of the British occultist and artist Austin Osman Spare (1886–​1956). However, the present chapter will focus on Grant’s work in his interpretations of Babalon and the Scarlet Woman, which in his writings indicate a specific understanding of sex magical priestesshood and feminine divinity.3 Grant’s view of Babalon is difficult to comprehend without some grasp of his perennialist articulation of what he called the “Typhonian tradition,” as well as his interpretations of Tantra and the kabbalistic Tree of Life. Therefore, this chapter will begin with an exposition of some core themes in his writings. The aim of this chapter is not to comprehensively explicate Grant’s personal, magical universe but rather to chart and analyze how femininity is articulated in Grant’s interpretation of Babalon and the Scarlet Woman. Grant’s legacy is vital to the broader Babalon discourse; he has crucially influenced a number of later occultists working with the symbol of Babalon, as will become more apparent in subsequent chapters.

The Eloquent Blood: The Goddess Babalon and the Construction of Femininities in Western Esotericism. Manon Hedenborg White, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780190065027.001.0001

158  The Eloquent Blood

Biographical Overview At the age of 15, Grant first encountered Crowley’s Magick in Theory and Practice (1929), a discovery he later claimed changed his life. Three years later, he volunteered for the army, hoping to be sent to India, where he planned to search for a guru. After being discharged due to ill health, Grant initiated a correspondence with Crowley, and he briefly served as the latter’s secretary.4 This sparked a lifelong interest in Thelema. In 1946, Crowley introduced Grant to David Curwen (1893–​1984), a student of Crowley’s work who had previously been initiated into the IX° of OTO.5 Curwen was a disciple of Swami Pareswara Bikshu, who was his superior in the Holy Order of Krishna, an Indian order mixing aspects of Hinduism with Western occultism, including aspects of Thelema.6 Grant’s acquaintance with Curwen changed the trajectory of his magical career, and perhaps especially his interpretation of sexual magic; through Curwen, Grant writes, he received “full initiation into a highly recondite formula of the tantric vama marg.”7 According to Grant, Curwen’s ideas about sexual magic were derived from a document given to him by Bikshu: a commentary on the Ananda Lahari, an eighth-​century Tantric manuscript attributed to Adi Shankara, a central proponent of the nondualist philosophy Advaita Vedanta.8 Under Curwen’s influence, Tantra became a central interest of Grant’s, and he subsequently attempted to revise OTO’s system of sexual magic accordingly.9 Advaita Vedanta, an Indian philosophical tradition that holds the material world to be a mirage and emphasizes the complete identity of the individual soul or self (atman) with divine reality (Brahman), strongly influenced Grant.10 From the 1950s onward, Grant published a number of essays on aspects of Advaita, drawing connections between Indian philosophy and Western occultism, including Thelema.11 Grant’s wife Steffi (b. 1923)  shared an interest in Advaita Vedanta.12 Central to Grant’s interpretation of Advaita is the illusory nature of the phenomenal universe, the primacy of nonbeing to being, and the identity of the Self with the formless void that underlies manifestation.13 In an essay from 1953, Grant writes that “we should strive always to realise the Void nature of things and to merge into that state of formless awareness.”14 He describes ultimate reality as a “Pure and perfect void,”15 and as a prerequisite for enlightenment he stresses the complete union of opposites through insistence on “the sameness of all things and not on their differences—​which are purely illusory because mind-​made.”16 Although Grant’s early essays on Advaita differ in style and tone from his later Typhonian works (see subsequent discussion), their underlying theme of nonduality is arguably central to the latter. Grant refers repeatedly to Advaita throughout his Typhonian books. Henrik Bogdan has argued that the Advaita teaching of nonduality is “the cornerstone upon which Grant bases his

Kundalini, Kalas, and Qadeshim  159 particular current of contemporary occultism.”17 Significantly, Grant describes Advaita and Tantra as being “in complete accord with the doctrine of Thelema.”18 In 1948, after Crowley’s death, Grant was accepted as a IX° member of OTO, and in 1951 he received a charter from the order’s head Karl Germer to establish an OTO body in London. Around the same time, in 1949, Steffi Grant introduced her husband to Austin Osman Spare, marking the beginning of a fruitful collaboration. In 1955, Grant established the New Isis Lodge as a body of OTO, proclaiming its establishment in the Manifesto of New Isis Lodge O.T.O. The manifesto claimed the earth was under the energetic influence of “the transplutonic planet Isis,” whose energies it was the purpose of the New Isis Lodge to channel.19 Although Germer was unimpressed by Grant’s interpretation of Crowley’s work and expelled him from OTO, Grant continued—​undeterred—​to operate the New Isis Lodge until 1962.20

An “Onslaught of Compulsive Weirdness”: Deciphering Grant’s Magic Grant was mostly a reclusive figure, and unlike many other occultists of his time he did not lecture publicly.21 Instead, he focused on explicating his occult system through a number of published writings. Between 1959 and 1963, Grant issued the Carfax Monographs, a series of short essays on various aspects of magic, many of which featured artwork by Steffi Grant.22 The year 1972 witnessed the publication of a monograph titled The Magical Revival, the first of nine works that later came to be known as the Typhonian Trilogies.23 The Magical Revival put forth Grant’s perennialist interpretation of the history of religion. The author argued that Tantra as well as Western occultism are rooted in a much older “Typhonian” tradition, which crystallized in ancient Egypt but whose earliest roots can be traced to Central Africa. The book was followed in 1973 by Aleister Crowley and the Hidden God, in which Grant develops his own interpretation of Crowley’s work in greater detail, linking it with Tantra. The third installment in the series, Cults of the Shadow (1975), continues to build on Tantra and the works of Crowley and Spare, drawing on Grant’s particular interpretation of Vodou. In 1977, Grant published the first volume of the “second” trilogy, Nightside of Eden, which develops his personal interpretation of the Tree of Life. Given this work’s influence on later forms of magic, it is worth making a brief digression in order to discuss its contents further. Grant objects to what he sees as the tendency of most previous occult writings on the kabbalah to focus on the “positive side” of the Tree of Life, that is, the ten sephiroth connected via twenty-​two paths, whilst conspicuously neglecting “the other side, the negative or adverse side.”24 Thus, he draws inspiration from Crowley’s “Liber Arcanorum” (1907), which

160  The Eloquent Blood lists a series of sigils corresponding to the “genii” of the twenty-​two paths of the reverse side of the Tree of Life, the domain of the qliphoth.25 Grant articulates a system for how to explore what he refers to as the “nightside” of the Tree of Life, epitomized by the qliphoth and interconnected by the sprawling “Tunnels of Set.” Just as “there is no day without night,” Grant argues, “Being” is contingent on “Non-​Being,” and he thus stresses the initiatory necessity of engaging with the qliphoth.26 The gateway between the dayside and nightside of the Tree of Life is, in Grant’s view, located in the “eleventh” sephirah, Daath, which he situates in the Abyss.27 Grant thus construes the demon Choronzon (discussed in the context of Crowley’s work in ­chapter 3), whom he relates to Daath, both as ruler and gateway to the nightside of the Tree.28 As will become apparent in subsequent sections, Grant links this gateway between the manifested dayside of the Tree and its dark, ineffable nightside to Babalon. Grant appears to view the adverse side of the Tree as ontologically primary, relating to the state of numinous nonbeing underlying phenomenal manifestation. A comparison can thus be drawn between Grant’s interpretation of the Tree of Life and his view of Advaitan nonduality, and his idea of nonbeing or void as the ultimate reality underlying the illusion of manifestation.29 Grant stresses darkness as the prerequisite for light, and nonbeing as the “source of Being,” the two “terminals” being connected through Daath.30 He contends: The Left Hand Path is prior to that of the right in the sense, and in this sense only, that the Left is the first (the Ain) which is symbolic of true being (i.e. non-​being) as distinct from apparent or phenomenal existence, which, as the word implies “exists outside.” That which is noumenal (i.e. within) is prior to that which is without (i.e. phenomenal). There is no objective reality, but there is the manifestation of non-​manifestation; the shadow of being that is cast by non-​being.31

In describing “being” as the “shadow” of “non-​being,” Grant implies the ontological primacy of the latter. This dichotomy is gendered in a later passage, in which Grant equates the nonmanifested with the feminine Nuit and writes that the “Word or Logos of the male is secondary,” being a “reflection or glamour, a positive and therefore phenomenal manifestation.”32 Ultimate reality, Grant argues, lies beyond the mirage of the manifest universe, in the realm of the qliphoth, which represent “the shadow, the dark, the non-​manifest, absence, the total dis-​ appearance of the phenomenal world.”33 The fact that Grant appears to feminize the ultimate reality of the nonmanifested is highly significant, indicating the importance and role of the divine feminine as the ultimate other in his thought. In 1980, Nightside of Eden was followed by Outside the Circles of Time, in which Grant expounds on his ideas about extraterrestrial influence. The second trilogy

Kundalini, Kalas, and Qadeshim  161 was concluded with Hecate’s Fountain (1992), in which Grant continues to draw on the writings of H. P. Lovecraft (1890–​1937) and Michael Bertiaux (b. 1935), retelling anecdotes from the days of the New Isis Lodge. In this work, Grant puts forth the obscure concept of the “Mauve Zone.”34 The third trilogy commenced in 1994 with the publication of Outer Gateways. It was followed in 1999 with Beyond the Mauve Zone, in which Grant further developed his ideas about this concept. The series concludes with The Ninth Arch, published in 2002. Grant’s Typhonian works are often described as opaque, peppered with a broad array of occult, fictional, and artistic references; lengthy exercises in gematria; and obscure arguments based on Grant’s highly particular approach to etymology. As not all readers are likely to have prior acquaintance with Grant’s writings, it is worth quoting graphic novelist and occultist Alan Moore’s (b. 1953) succinct and fairly representative description of reading the Typhonian Trilogies following the “relatively lucid” Magical Revival: [A]‌n information soup, an overwhelming and hallucinatory bouillon of arcane fact, mystic speculation, and apparent outright fantasy, as appetising (and as structured) as a dish of Gumbo. The delicious esoteric fragments tumble past in an incessant boil of prose, each morsel having the authentic taste of magic, each entirely disconnected from the morsel which preceded it. Spicing this delirious broth . . . [are] jaw-​dropping accounts of magic workings that defy all credibility. . . . The onslaught of compulsive weirdness in Grant’s work is unrelenting. . . . A shotgun full of snails and amethysts discharged point blank into the reader’s face.35

As Moore highlights, a central aspect of Grant’s Typhonian works is the absence of clear distinctions between fact and fiction. In developing his magical system, Grant drew freely on an innovative bricolage of seemingly disparate concepts and ideas drawn from Indian philosophy; Tantric traditions; Western occultists; the comparative mythology of amateur Egyptologist Gerald Massey (1828–​ 1907) and the horror fiction of H. P. Lovecraft, who in Grant’s view was an unwitting initiate who accidentally tapped into the same magical current as Crowley.36 Bogdan suggests that Grant integrated fictional concepts in his work due to his grounding in Advaita philosophy, with the aim of challenging the reader’s perception of reality and dismantling mundane consciousness to allow for a comprehension of the void nature of all phenomena.37 In Outside the Circles of Time, Grant contends that he does not strive to construct a logically coherent worldview but instead aims to use mechanisms of “suggestion” and “evocation” in order to render the reader receptive to “the influx of certain concepts that can . . . fertilize the unknown dimensions of his consciousness.”38 In Grant’s view, the irrational nature of the creative process requires new modes of communication

162  The Eloquent Blood and indeed the rebirth of language.39 He likens his own style of writing to the efforts of a magician who produces a suitable ritual atmosphere through subtle symbols and sensory tools, asserting that he himself endeavors to create the right atmosphere through “nuances and not necessarily . . . the rational meanings of the words and numbers.”40 These aspects of Grant’s thought are important to bear in mind when attempting to decipher his writings, not least with regards to Babalon and the Scarlet Woman, whom Grant interprets in numerous (and conflicting) ways. Although I will “hazard” (and I use this term deliberately) to indicate some coherence in his articulation of these notions, Grant’s different assertions regarding these figures do not always fit neatly together, nor is this necessarily the point. In fact, the stabilization of meaning in clear definitions allowing one concept neatly and decisively to be separated from another may, in Grant’s case, be the exact opposite of the point.

From Typhon to Thelema: The Primordial Sex Cult Born in 1828, Gerald Massey was a poet, journalist, and amateur Egyptologist. From his first main work on the subject, A Book of Beginnings (1881), Massey argued that human civilization originated in central Africa, which was the birthplace of a primordial religious cult. This cult centered on the veneration of a great mother goddess, known as Ta-​Urt or Typhon, who was linked to the stellar constellation of the Plough, and her “bastard” son—​as the role of the male in procreation was yet unknown—​Sut, or Set, connected to Sirius, the Dog Star. The “Typhonian” cult worshipped the female sexual organs. When the role of semen in procreation was discovered, the Typhonian stellar-​lunar cult was driven underground by worshippers of the solar god Osiris. The Osirians demonized the Typhonians, who scattered across the earth, settling, among other places, in Mesopotamia.41 Although Massey’s work was disdained in academic circles, he found an enthusiastic admirer in Grant.42 Massey’s influence is particularly central to Grant’s idea of the Typhonian (or “Draconian”) tradition, a concept that is present from The Magical Revival onward.43 Following Massey, Grant in his Typhonian Trilogies articulates the idea of a primordial serpent cult that he believed to have emerged in central Africa, “which included sex as a means to spiritual attainment.”44 The “Draconian or Typhonian Cult” of ancient Egypt was “the first systematized form” of these vastly anterior mysteries.45 The Draconians, in Grant’s narrative, venerated a primordial goddess identified with a circle of seven stars, manifested in the eighth as her son Set, whom Grant viewed as “the first male deity ever to be worshipped.”46 After the clash with the Osirians, Grant contends,

Kundalini, Kalas, and Qadeshim  163 the Typhonians spread across the globe, their religious mysteries later flourishing in “the tantras of India, Mongolia, China, and Tibet.”47 Grant thus views Tantra as a continuation of the Typhonian cult. Although he drew strongly on Massey’s ideas, Grant introduced a key innovation by associating the Typhonian tradition with modern occultism.48 Grant was hardly the only modern occultist to espouse perennialist or universalist notions, which were central to currents such as Theosophy and Traditionalism.49 Grant compared Thelema to Tantric beliefs and practices, identifying Liber AL as a Tantra for a new age of Western culture, writing:50 Crowley incorporated vital aspects of the Vama Marg into the Western magical tradition; this was one of his major contributions to occult science. This path is equivalent to, and perhaps the sole surviving example of, the vastly anterior Draconian Cult.51

In this excerpt, Grant clearly identifies Tantra with Thelema and Crowley’s Magick, indicating the latter as a continuation of the ancient Typhonian tradition. Grant correlates Crowley’s ritual usage of intoxicants, sex, and “Words of Power” for purposes of magical energization with the Tantric awakening of “the Serpent Power (Kundalini),” referring to Liber AL’s proclamation:  “I am the Secret Serpent coiled about to spring: in my coiling, there is joy.”52 Grant indicates OTO’s “spiritual father” Carl Kellner as a conceivable source of the Tantric components of the order, writing that Kellner was likely an initiate of the Tantric Vama Marg.53 What, in Grant’s mind, is the common denominator linking OTO with the Orient, and which links the Typhonian tradition with Tantra and Thelema? The short answer is sex, or more specifically the magical or spiritual use of sexual techniques. Grant emphasizes that the Typhonians worshipped their stellar goddess through sexual rites, writing: The use of sex as a means of gaining access to invisible worlds or other planes of consciousness did not, of course, begin with Crowley. Such practices go back to pre-​dynastic times in Egypt, where the Great Mother Goddess . . . was worshipped with sexual rites.54

Grant stresses that the primordial Typhonian cult was oriented toward a great goddess. This focus on the divine feminine is related to another central term within Grant’s works, namely, Vama Marg or the “Left-​Hand Path,” the Tantric tradition Grant claimed Curwen had initiated him into.55 While other occultists such as Blavatsky and Crowley used the latter term derogatorily,56 Grant attaches no moral value to the distinction between right and left, instead emphasizing

164  The Eloquent Blood the feminine and bodily orientation of the latter as its core characteristics. He describes the Left-​Hand Path as follows: [T]‌he Path involving the use of woman, the female being considered as the left or lunar aspect of creation in contradistinction to the Dakshina Marg [i.e., Right-​Hand Path], which involves the solar current, the male, or right-​hand aspect.57

In this quote, Grant stresses the use of female ritual partners as central to what he views as the Left-​Hand Path of Tantra. Grant’s distinction between Left-​Hand Path and Right-​Hand Path Tantra thus mirrors his dichotomization (following Massey) of the Typhonian, lunar, and goddess-​oriented cult and the Osirian, solar, and male-​oriented cult in ancient Egypt. Grant attributes the persecution of the Left-​Hand Path to misogyny, writing that this current has been demonized and seen as “universally suspect” due to its “connection with the feminine aspect of the Creative Principle” as well as its “sex-​magical use of Woman.”58 However, Grant writes that the Dakshina Marg may employ women in sex magical rituals, although in a different way than the Left-​Hand Path does.59 An important concept in Grant’s writings is kundalini, a Sanskrit term appearing in Hindu Tantric and yogic literature from approximately the eighth century onward to denote a primal feminine energy (Shakti) that lies dormant and coiled at the base of the human spine in the muladhara chakra. Through particular techniques, the kundalini force can be awakened and raised in the subtle body through the chakras located along the spine.60 Grant outlines diverging methods for awakening the kundalini in male and female bodies. He writes that the process is simpler for woman, who can imagine the “Serpent Power . . . in phallic form,” visualizing this force in her muladhara chakra and exciting herself to orgasm, bringing the image to her ajna chakra, the location of the will, before climax. Grant elaborates: If she is highly skilled she will have transferred the primal power to this centre at an earlier stage of the rite; if not, she must make the transfer immediately before orgasm occurs and maintain in mind the magical child or “bud-​will” until consummation occurs.61

In this excerpt Grant highlights the benefit of a trained female ritual practitioner. This is a central aspect of Grant’s work, distinguishing it from Crowley’s writings on sexual magic (see c­ hapter 4), and I will return to this point later in the present chapter. Similarly, Grant’s assertion that a female magician can provide the animating “bud-​will” departs from Crowley’s view that the latter must be formulated by a man.62 As will become evident in a subsequent section, the

Kundalini, Kalas, and Qadeshim  165 notion of kundalini as cosmic feminine energy is central to Grant’s articulation of the Scarlet Woman or Babalon, whom he conceives as the incarnation of this primordial force.

Subtle Emissions and Crowleyan Omissions: The Magical Function of the Kalas A central theme in the Typhonian series, and especially the first three volumes, is the magical and mystical use of the female genital secretions, which Grant identifies as the “vital elixirs sought after by the Alchemists and Adepts of old.”63 Drawing directly on Bikshu’s model, Grant describes sixteen so-​called kalas, female sexual secretions “charged with magical energy” and representing “the total potential of Woman as an agent or vehicle of the goddess.”64 The kalas are generated through particular Tantric rites, in which the kundalini force is awakened and energized. Once roused, the kundalini vitalizes “subtle centres” of energy within the body of the priestess, which are connected to the endocrine glands. The vibrations produced by the kundalini force impact the chemical makeup of the resulting genital secretions. After the requisite preparation, the kalas are collected and imbibed by the male priest, who transmutes their psychosexual energy for spiritual ends.65 Whereas the emphasis on genital fluids has clear parallels to Crowley’s sex magical system, Grant differs from Crowley in his emphasis on the primacy of the female secretions.66 Grant proposes that Crowley failed to expound upon women’s role in a sex magical operation, adding that his own exploration of the IX° of OTO convinced him that Crowley did not fully comprehend the function of the kalas.67 Contending that Crowley’s equation of the bindu with semen was a misconception, Grant writes that the masculine genital fluids act merely as the “catalyst” causing the priestess to emanate the feminine sexual secretions.68 Grant asserts that Crowley attributed the “menstruum of the elixir” to the male and female genital fluids combined, whereas practitioners of the Vama Marg see the magically charged female sexual fluids as primary, placing no value on “the sexual prowess of the phallus . . . since it is considered solely as a stimulant to the female in the ordinary processes of insemination and reproduction.”69 Unlike Crowley, Grant appears not to have seen the physical presence of semen as necessary for sexual magic. Although Grant contends that “the method of physical contact” between the priest and priestess may be effective in producing trance states, it does not necessarily “produce the Supreme Elixir, the exclusive emanation of the Scarlet Woman.”70 In “ancient traditions,” Grant writes, the female sexual secretions—​“the kalas of the Goddess”—​were used as the sole material basis of magic, and he stresses the “informing current” or Will can be

166  The Eloquent Blood effectively administered without any physical participation by the priest.71 Grant suggests the practice of mingling male and female genital fluids as characteristic of the Right-​Hand Path or Dakshina Marg, writing that Left-​Hand Path Tantra values the “elixirs of the suvasini,” whilst the Right-​Hand Path “exalts these elixirs . . . after an infusion of the solar [i.e., male] current has rendered them active.”72 He appears to see physical intercourse between priest and priestess as an important difference between Tantra and Thelemic sexual magic, writing that the latter “involves the earthing of the magical Current” (i.e., through physical sexual intercourse), whereas in Tantra the priestess is “the sole source of the supreme Elixir, the virgin whore of heaven who sheds her star-​light without direct sexual contact with the priest.”73 Grant’s development of the doctrine of the kalas coincides with a different attitude to the role of the female sex magical partner. Acknowledging that Crowley did not see a highly initiated female partner as a necessity, Grant contrastingly stresses that the potency of the kalas is ensured by the priestess being “of an equal, if not a higher, degree of initiation than the priest.”74 Grant cites a letter from Crowley to Jack Parsons in which the former stresses that it is inadvisable for a woman to initiate a man. In contrast, Grant asserts that this is “not a generally acceptable view,” reasoning: There seems no reason therefore from a magical point of view why such a procedure should not be adopted, and the fact that the Tantras exalt the goddess over the god is perhaps the strongest point in its favour.75

Thus, Grant’s writings present what may be the first—​or at least a very early—​ attempt at a systematic critique of androcentrism within Crowley’s writings. Grant links veneration of the divine feminine to the exaltation of physical priestesses. While he contends that Liber AL ostensibly resolves the conflict between god and goddess-​oriented Tantra by elevating the child resulting from the union of male and female, he notes that Crowley nonetheless leaned “heavily towards the Shaivite or patriarchal side.”76 In addition to his critique of the Crowley-​OTO sex magical system due to its lack of explication of the kalas, Grant presents his own reading of OTO’s XI°. Whilst this degree has traditionally been interpreted as pertaining to anal sex, Grant instead argues that the XI° actually entailed heterosexual intercourse with a menstruating woman.77 He writes that “[t]‌he genuine Left-​Hand or Backward Path does not involve unnatural practices such as those,” and that the Draconian Cult held the “sodomitical formula” to be “a perversion of magical practice.”78 Although he contends that anal sex can be used for magical purposes, Grant writes that the ancient Egyptian and later Tantric cults almost exclusively used it for harmful magic.79 Whereas Grant’s interpretation of the XI° has been

Kundalini, Kalas, and Qadeshim  167 construed as homophobic by some later occult writers,80 it is important to distinguish between anal sex and homosexuality; as referenced previously, Crowley utilized both male and female partners for XI° operations.81 Grant’s disavowal of Crowley’s interpretation of the XI° may be linked to his emphasis on the primacy of the vaginal secretions.

Ophidian Others: Gender and Femininity in Grant’s Writings Similar to Crowley, Grant draws on concepts of gender polarity. He describes the formula of the Aeon of Horus as one of “passionate union of opposites,”82 and he explains the magic of OTO’s IX° degree in terms of a gender polar dynamic wherein “[m]‌an is the mind; woman is the body. . . . Man is the Word; Woman is the act.”83 In Cults of the Shadow, Grant articulates an ontological model of gender polarity: [N]‌aught symbolizes the negative, unmanifest potential of creation, and the two polarities involved in its realization. The Goddess represents the negative phase. . . . The lightning-​swift alternations of these terminals, active-​passive, are positive emanations of the Void, i.e. the manifestation of the Unmanifest.84

In this quote, Grant identifies the divine feminine with the “negative, unmanifest,” and the “Void.” This is important given his general view that nonbeing precedes being, thus hinting at the primacy of femininity in relation to masculinity, existing as the ultimate other that eschews rational comprehension by existing in nondifferentiated unity. Based on his emphasis on the priestess and the feminine divine, Grant generally posits distinct roles for men and women in sex magic. The Tantric priestess, or Scarlet Woman, is frequently conceptualized as a repository or receptacle of the magically charged fluids to be collected and transmuted by the male.85 In Cults of the Shadow, Grant writes that the Scarlet Woman is the “gateway par excellence,” and that the sexual magic of OTO is a means for establishing a gateway through which “extra-​terrestrial or cosmic energies” can be channeled, harnessed, and manifested on earth.86 In one passage Grant conceptualizes femininity literally as the other or mirror of masculinity, describing woman “actual or imagined, as the prime instigator of orgasm  .  .  .  the supreme shadow, the doubling agent through which the mind reproduces and materializes its agency.”87 This idea of femininity as the other appears to conform with what Irigaray indicates as the phallocentric logic that understands femininity as “the other of the same,” solely defined by the lack

168  The Eloquent Blood or absence of masculinity.88 However, it is worth bearing in mind that Grant ascribes ontological primacy to femininity, which is repeatedly construed less as the other of masculinity than as the site of ultimate alterity where all dichotomies break down, reminiscent of what Shildrick refers to as the monstrous. I will return to this point in my final discussion.89 Although Grant posits different magical roles for men and women, the interaction between priestess and priest as defined in his writings is not simply a dynamic of passivity and activity. On the contrary, Grant describes activity and passivity as twin poles inherent to the psyche of the magical adept as well as the “fully realized artist.”90 He posits the priestess as the human embodiment or incarnation of the kundalini force, although he stresses that this “Ophidian Current” can only be carried by women “possessing a particular constitution.”91 Grant describes the role of woman in Kaula Tantra as follows: [T]‌he woman chosen to represent the Fire Snake is identified with it to such an extent that she is in herself a powerful personality, with great strength of will and individuality. She is not worshipped as a merely passive instrument or embodiment of the Fire Snake, she is the Fire Snake and she directs the worship and corrects errors of procedure during the ritual.92

In this passage, Grant identifies the Tantric priestess with “strength of will,” “individuality,” and (ritual) leadership, which are requisite characteristics if she is to be able to incarnate kundalini. In Schippers’s terminology, this association of a feminine role with characteristics conventionally associated with a hegemonic masculinity suggests that Grant’s view of the priestess can be seen as an alternative femininity that does not directly legitimize a hierarchical and complementary relationship between the sexes. However, it is important to stress that a prominent ritual role need not coincide with social leadership in other contexts.93 Grant compares this active role taken by the Tantric priestess to Spare’s descriptions of astral witches’ Sabbaths, during which the men supposedly took a “peculiarly passive rôle.”94 In many of the ritual descriptions in Hecate’s Fountain, the leading priestess is highly active.95 Nonetheless, Grant posits a more passive or receptive female role in other works, with the priestess functioning more akin to a magical battery through a state of trancelike sleep.96 Grant’s differentiation of roles appears rooted in biological dimorphism, with the female reproductive organs and their associated secretions identified as sources of distinctly feminine magical and mystical powers. In Cults of the Shadow, Grant contends that the Thelemic current will be perpetuated through “power-​ zones” governed by pairings of “priest and ... priestess, or Scarlet Woman,”97 whose interaction is described thus:

Kundalini, Kalas, and Qadeshim  169 The centre of Will (Thelema)—​source of solar-​phallic energy—​is centred in the priest, while the Fire Snake or elemental cosmic Power has its seat in the vaginal vibrations of the priestess. The interplay and polarizing of these two centres constitutes the magick of the O.T.O.98

The Scarlet Woman is described as the embodiment of kundalini. Grant repeatedly describes women as holding oracular and visionary powers due to their possession of the kalas, and he ascribes mystical properties to the menstrual flow.99 In Outside the Circles of Time, Grant contends that menstruation opens a doorway, allowing women to access alternate realms.100 The menstrual cycle is thus construed as a sort of gateway to alterity, emphasizing the notion of femininity as otherness. In The Magical Revival, Grant writes that Babalon and Therion are “the biological avatars (kteis and phallus) of Nuit and Hadit,” and he correlates this binary opposition with a succession of polarities including sun–​ moon, earth–​air, and fire–​water. As such, they are expressions of a seemingly universal gendered polarity. Indeed, Grant asserts, “[s]‌ex functions through polarity.”101 In the preceding sections, I have sought to highlight how Grant conceptualizes gendered interaction and femininity more generally. A fundamental observation that can be made here is that Grant identifies specific biochemical aspects of women’s physique as the positive source of certain capabilities. Whereas this notion is not entirely absent in Crowley’s writings, it is considerably less pronounced, and the latter’s emphasis on semen as the magical substance par excellence leads him in his sex magical documents mostly to conceptualize femininity in terms of lack (of semen).102 In contrast, Grant construes femininity as differentiated presence, and I will return to this theme repeatedly throughout this chapter.

Blood-​Drenched Harlot of Choronzon: Babalon and the Scarlet Woman Chalice of the Kalas: Babalon as Tantric Priestess As mentioned in the preceding discussion, Grant sometimes deliberately employs cryptic or circuitous modes of argumentation, and a rudimentary grasp of his broader worldview is thus a prerequisite for picking up on subtle references. Moreover, the highly intertextual nature of many of Grant’s writings means that an explication of one concept often has bearing on an ostensibly disparate one, and the author seemingly assumes that his reader will make the necessary connections. Centrally, Grant tends to view different goddesses as

170  The Eloquent Blood names or guises for the same primordial feminine energy. His discussions of figures such as Kali, Nuit, or Typhon have relevance for his understanding of Babalon, as he frequently equates them with each other. In Aleister Crowley and the Hidden God, Grant writes that the Scarlet Woman is the Thelemic equivalent of Kali, “the dark goddess of blood and dissolution.”103 In Cults of the Shadow, Grant instead likens Babalon to Odudua, a supposedly African goddess of sacred prostitution.104 In Nightside of Eden, Grant associates Babalon with the ancient Egyptians’ conception of Typhon, the “primordial goddess of the Seven Stars,” whose magical instrument was the uterus.105 He equates Kali with Babalon and the Scarlet Woman.106 I propose that Grant’s synonymization of different goddesses should be understood as part of his universalist or perennialist articulation of the Typhonian tradition. As noted, Grant views Thelema as a Westernized form of Tantra, which in turn is a continuation of the vastly anterior Typhonian mysteries. In Grant’s view, exoteric distinctions between different goddesses may thus be considered masks obscuring the ontological unity of the divine feminine. Grant’s conceptualization of figures such as Typhon and Kali—​and their repeated association with themes of sexuality, blood, death, and regeneration—​is thus related to his interpretation of Babalon and the Scarlet Woman and, by extension, femininity. As discussed in ­chapters 3 and 4, Crowley vacillated between using the term “Scarlet Woman” as an epithet for Babalon and using it as a title or office held by human women. Grant, however, uses the terms “Babalon” and “Scarlet Woman” more or less interchangeably.107 In the first three works of the Typhonian Trilogies, both terms appear most frequently in reference to the Tantric priestess or female sex-​magical initiate who embodies the goddess and generates the mystical kalas, as well as for the divine feminine force she embodies.108 Babalon is thus equated with the Tantric suvasini, “literally ‘the sweet smelling lady’ of the Mystic Circle.”109 The following excerpt from The Magical Revival encapsulates the view of Babalon presented in the first three installments in the Typhonian series: Babalon, the Scarlet Woman, is the earthly avatar or priestess of the “stars”; of those kalas which inform the sexual emanations of the magically trained woman. . . . Any properly trained woman may become oracular in the sense which applies to the Scarlet Woman.110

Significantly, Grant stresses the necessity of initiatory training for the female sex-​ magical practitioner. In Nightside of Eden, Grant writes that the term “Scarlet Woman” denotes an “initiate of the highest sexual mysteries.”111 The association of Babalon and the Scarlet Woman with the idea of a technically trained priestess as beneficial is important, contrasting with Crowley’s assertion that a skilled

Kundalini, Kalas, and Qadeshim  171 female partner is unnecessary.112 As will be indicated in a later section of this chapter, Grant associates feminine sex-​magical knowledge with the advancement of the aeon and, consequently, with the spiritual destiny of humankind.113 Grant tends toward articulating differing and complementary gender roles in sexual magic. Congruently, he draws a clear distinction between the operative (presumably male) magician and the Scarlet Woman. In Aleister Crowley and the Hidden God he describes the Scarlet Woman as a “repository” of the mystical kalas required by the adept to establish contact with metaphysical entities.114 She is defined as the “Seer” and “Gate of Vision” through whom the magician gains access to visionary states.115 In Cults of the Shadow, Grant identifies Babalon as “a representative of the Feminine Principle or Scarlet Woman chosen for her magical ability to transmit the solar current and manifest it in oracular and/​ or tangible form.”116 In Nightside of Eden, Grant describes her as “the woman or priestess specially consecrated to the work of the Draconian Current,” who “incarnates the cosmic energies of the Fire Snake.”117 In Hecate’s Fountain, Grant summarizes the magical gender role division thus: “The Beast communicates the secret seed, and the Scarlet Woman communicates the kalas.”118 In summary, Grant presents a number of disparate roles for the female sex magical partner, who is variously conceptualized as a repository or gate—​words seemingly implying a more or less passive function—​and as a seer who incarnates kundalini and produces the kalas, appearing to indicate a more active role. Grant repeatedly uses the term “Babalon” to designate the woman who embodies a particular magical or divine energy. As illustrated in the previous passage, Grant frequently emphasizes the Scarlet Woman as the one who embodies the “Fire Snake” (i.e., the kundalini force). She exudes the mystical kalas, which flow from her genital organs. Thus, the role of Babalon or Scarlet Woman in Grant’s work is inherently linked to bodies that are conventionally coded as feminine. Whereas Crowley himself occasionally served as “priestess” in sexual magic, Grant appears to posit stronger links among the feminized sex-​ magical role, Babalon, and the morphology and hormonal composition of female reproductive anatomy.119 Although Crowley did not suggest the role of Scarlet Woman could be embodied by a man, his articulation of this role nonetheless has a lesser focus on the biological properties of the vagina. Similarly, Grant appears more than Crowley to interpret Babalon’s cup or grail as concretely linked to the genitals of the magically trained priestess. Whereas Crowley emphasized the phallus—​both as a designator for the penis and as a more mystical term denoting human regenerative potential—​he devoted little attention to the vulva as magically powerful in itself. While Grant’s departure from Crowley in this regard to some extent biologizes Babalon, it also suggests a concept of sexual difference or the specificity of feminine embodied experience within a heterosexual binary understanding of humanity.

172  The Eloquent Blood As shown in ­chapter  4, Crowley’s sex magical writings repeatedly construe femininity as lack or absence of the divine creative spark represented by semen.120 Grant, crucially, articulates femininity in terms of a different and distinctly gendered presence or potential. In Grant’s worldview, the priestess’s role is not contingent on her lack of something but rather on her link to cosmic power, which, crucially, is her ability to incarnate and manifest the kundalini and her ability to produce the alchemical kalas. This emphasis on the biochemical properties of female bodies and their reproductive organs seemingly limits the role of Scarlet Woman to magicians possessing a vagina, and parallels can be drawn to Irigaray’s emphasis on developing a concept of sexual difference and a notion of femininity as something in itself. Irigaray uses the female reproductive organs—​specifically, the labia—​as a departing point for a conceptualization of the feminine as “the sex which is not one,” defined in relation to itself rather than to masculinity.121 Although Irigaray has been criticized for focusing on cisgendered female bodies in her attempts to conceptualize sexual difference, and similar criticism could be directed at Grant’s work, it is worth noting that Grant’s writings have inspired female occultists to develop his notion of feminine difference further.122

“The Blood Is the Life”: Menstruation as a Magical Gateway As illustrated in the preceding discussion, Grant repeatedly uses the terms “Babalon” and “Scarlet Woman” to signify the role of the Tantric priestess or female initiate, who ritually embodies the goddess and exudes the kalas.123 The menstrual cycle is ascribed particular importance in relation to the Scarlet Woman, whom Grant writes becomes “oracular at the moment of lunar eclipse.”124 In fact, Grant attributes the redness of the Scarlet Woman to the color of menstrual blood, writing that “scarlet equates with the red substance of the female source, the prime menstruum of magical energy.”125 As mentioned previously, Grant equates the magical formula of OTO’s XI° with heterosexual intercourse with a menstruating priestess, and he notes that Crowley repeatedly performed sex magic with menstruating women.126 In ancient times, Grant writes, woman was seen as the sole progenetrix, and menstruation was revered. The number five was seen as magical, denoting the days during which women were “engulfed in darkness and eclipsed,” issuing the “deluge that primitive man rightly identified as the substance which would later congeal and flesh forth progeny.”127 The following excerpt, in which Grant traces his understanding of human concepts of procreation, is worth quoting at length as it illustrates his association of redness and menstrual blood with feminine creative force:

Kundalini, Kalas, and Qadeshim  173 Blood was recognized as liquid flesh and the female expressed (through the number five) her nobility, which was the archetypal nobility because the only known lineage was of the blood of the mother alone. The male’s rôle in the procreative process was at that time unknown. The five day eclipse was the seal of woman’s nobility, the nobility that wears the scarlet mantle of nature herself, the one unimpeachable rubric of her sovereignty. And because she was seen to renew life upon earth woman was likened to the goddess in the sky.128

Thus, female nobility is associated with menstruation; menstrual blood in turn is understood as “liquid flesh,” highlighting feminine reproductive power. Grant sees the solar cult’s power grab as the reason for the fracturing of this ancient understanding of women and menstrual blood. In Nightside of Eden, he critiques beliefs that menstruation is unclean, attributing such notions to “Old Aeon” misogyny. Menstruation, in Grant’s view, was conceived as a “nucleus of impurity” as it coincided with female sexual unavailability to men.129 In his view, the demonization of the number 13 is related to menstruation, as there are 13 (28-​day) menstrual cycles to a year. This is the reason why a witches’ coven traditionally consists of 13 members, as the Sabbatic rites, according to Grant, pertained to the lunar—​or menstrual—​mysteries.130 Blood is repeatedly linked to femininity and the goddess in Grant’s writings. He links Mars with menstrual blood, writing in Cults of the Shadow that the 15th kala, “the kala of Mars,” carries the “violence,” “heat,” and “energy” linked to “the feminine power at its peak.”131 The 15th kala is associated with rituals of “blood and sexual license,” which Grant sees as characteristic of the cults of Sekhmet in Egypt and Kali in India.132 The identification of menstrual blood with Mars is interesting, given the latter’s association with war. In a later passage, Grant writes that Mars “symbolizes predominantly sexual energy,” and that the association of Mars with “bloodshed in the sense of war” is a later interpretation, as the first bloodshed “was sexual . . . the female who bled on being ‘opened’ at the time of puberty.”133 Thus, the bloodshed of menstruation is conceptualized as semiotically prior to warfare. In Nightside of Eden, Grant describes Kali—​whom, as mentioned above, he links to Babalon and the Scarlet Woman—​as “goddess of Time and of Blood.”134 Grant connects menstruation to the manifestation of unearthly forces, a notion that appears connected to his understanding of femininity as otherness. Grant writes that Kali is associated with “the eclipse of periodic chaos,” “i.e. menstrual flow”; this is the breach that allows chaotic Typhonian entities to enter the realm of creation.135 This could be read as suggesting that Kali signifies fluidity and monstrous incursion, representing the breakdown of all stable dichotomies, including that of being and nonbeing. Grant thus contends that taboos on menstruation resulted from ancient peoples suspecting “that woman and her peculiar

174  The Eloquent Blood mechanism constituted . . . a door, a gateway on to the void, through which awful forces could be invoked by those who chanced upon the keys.” Grant links these keys to the doctrine of the kalas.136 In Outside the Circles of Time, Grant continues to argue that menstruation bestows supernatural powers, allowing women to traverse the boundaries between worlds.137 In Shildrick’s terminology, Grant thus literally construes femininity as monstrous—​as the site where established categories disintegrate. Grant writes that a menstruating woman can be connected to Daath as the breach that allows “demon hordes of chaos and disruption” to enter the world.138 He continues that this is “the formula of the Scarlet Woman, which is wholly negative” with regards to “phenomenal creation,” in that it is connected to “the root of the Tree leading into noumenal silence.”139 Crucially, Grant does not view this formula as negative in a moral sense; the negative charge of the Scarlet Woman’s formula appears to pertain instead to the idea of femininity as connected to ontologically primary nonbeing. In a later passage, he equates menstruation with the gate to the Abyss.140 As Grant interpreted the Abyss in a very different manner than Crowley (see the discussion later in the chapter), it is important to stress that he does not view this as a bad thing. Instead, menstruation is conceptualized as a potential source of creativity, signaling the breakdown of the barriers of reality. Grant posits menstruation—​identified as the matter from which all creation takes form—​as a particular feminine talent, endowing women with spiritual abilities that men have to work to possess.141 In this emphasis on menstruation, Grant diverges from Crowley, who—​despite ascribing some magical properties to menstrual blood142—​upheld semen as the genital secretion par excellence. There is possibly a reciprocal influence between Grant’s articulation of the magical significance of menstruation and that of the British poets Peter Redgrove and Penelope Shuttle, whose nonfiction book The Wise Wound (1978)—​inspired by Jungianism and cultural feminist ideas—​outlines a similar interpretation of menstruation as a source of creativity and power linked to ancient goddess worship and witchcraft.143 Redgrove inquired about Grant’s work while writing The Wise Wound, and he corresponded with Crowley’s friend Gerald Yorke on the subject of menstruation, Grant, and the kalas.144 Whereas Redgrove and Shuttle presented women as nurturing and respectful of life, however, Grant links menstruation to the feminine talent for materializing unearthly forces. While the emphasis on menstruation as naturally granting certain mystical capabilities to women is undeniably biologistic, it again illustrates how Grant does not conceptualize femininity—​or the feminine role in sexual magic—​as lack, but rather in terms of magical propensities he sees as specific to women.

Kundalini, Kalas, and Qadeshim  175

The Scarlet Harlot: Grant’s Interpretation of Whoredom As in Crowley’s and Parsons’s writings, notions of whoredom figure in Grant’s concept of Babalon. However, Grant places a stronger emphasis than the aforementioned writers on the imagined practice of sacred whoredom. Grant links Babalon and the Scarlet Woman to the mythological conception of ancient sacred prostitution, writing that the “biblical concept of the Scarlet Woman is already a corruption of that ancient magical tradition of which . . . temple prostitution is the only remembered form.”145 He writes that this tradition has been kept alive in Tantric rituals centering around the use of “the kalas  .  .  .  which imbue the exudations of specially trained priestesses.”146 Grant introduces the term Qadeshim as a designator of the (imagined) cult of sacred prostitution in antiquity, linked to the magical formula of sex with a menstruating woman.147 In Cults of the Shadow, Grant similarly conceptualizes the sacred prostitute as an embodiment of the primordial “Ophidian Current,” also represented by “pythonesses, high priestesses, and suvasinis of the Tantric cult of the Vama Marg.”148 Grant writes that this “formula of the ‘holy whore’ ” is perpetuated through the role of the Scarlet Woman of Thelema.149 Grant identifies Babalon and the Scarlet Woman with the figure Odudua, whom he describes as a goddess of sacred prostitution.150 Although Grant appears to connect the concept of whoredom to a form of sexual practice, he also articulates the term “whore” as a signifier for the autonomous progenetrix or maternal “breeder who brings forth independently of the individualized father.”151 As such, whoredom is associated with feminine creative power, a notion that may be related to the idea of the Scarlet Woman’s ability to materialize influences from the nonmanifested realm. Grant does not construe maternity solely in terms of biological reproduction, writing that the priestess is “childless” in a physical sense, although she is “anything but . . . on the subtle planes.”152 The cult of the whore thus entails an understanding that the magical child is of the mother’s essence alone, as the individual father remains unknown.153 The term “whore” in Grant’s writing partly denotes female-​originated creation without paternal interference, equivalent to the pre-​Osirian or Typhonian model of procreation. This may perhaps be analogized with Grant’s emphasis on the supreme importance of the kalas and his assertion that these can be collected and utilized without any physical participation on the part of the phallus.154 Grant correlates a Thelemic understanding of femininity with that of the ancient tradition, writing that both exalt “the rôle of the unwed mother, the whore . . . above all other expressions of the feminine principle.” Distinguishing the role of whore from commercial prostitution, Grant writes that the original etymological

176  The Eloquent Blood significance of the term “whore” is “ ‘dear one,’ cara, the beloved,” claiming that Crowley used the term in its original sense.155 Similar to Crowley, Grant construes whoredom in terms of feminized receptivity. In The Magical Revival, Grant writes that Crowley lauded “the whore as the type of Thelemic womanhood,” connecting both the virgin and the “wedded mother” to “the formula of the Black Brothers:  isolation and rejection of the universal life-​current.”156 Similarly, Grant writes that some Tantric rituals value childless women more highly than mothers, as “the magical energy of the latter has been to a certain extent dissipated.”157 In these excerpts, Grant thus seems instead to associate whoredom with transmission of the magical current. Similarly, in Nightside of Eden, Grant links whoredom to gateways. Grant writes that the Venusian kala permeating one of the tunnels of Set is “represented by the Whore,” whose kabbalistic significance is that of “ ‘a door’; the door that permits of access to her house or womb, and egress from it.”158 This assertion could be interpreted as meaning that whoredom equates to the role of gateway to the other side.159 As discussed in previous chapters, Crowley emphasizes the idea of Babalon and the Scarlet Woman’s whoredom as a metaphor for receptivity or openness toward the universe, implying the full participation in experience through which one becomes privy to its mysteries. Crowley also interprets whoredom in terms of sexual promiscuity, as part of a social critique of bourgeois notions of hegemonic femininity.160 The latter interpretation is less emphasized in Grant’s work, where the triad of whore, virgin, and wedded mother appears principally to describe different positionalities in regards to the magical current. In this sense, Grant appears to construe whorish receptivity as especially linked to a specifically female role in magic rather than a feminized but universally required spiritual virtue. Concepts of whoredom are more directly linked to the idea of influx from the “other side,” the ontologically primary realm of nonbeing, through Grant’s conceptualization of the qliphoth. Significantly, in the glossary in Outer Gateways, the entry for “Babalon” simply refers to that of the qliphoth.161 Contending that the term qlipha means “harlot,” Grant writes that Babalon is the archetype of the qliphoth, “the whore being symbolic of ‘Outside.’ ”162 Similarly, in Beyond the Mauve Zone, the harlot Babalon represents “the strange or alien woman, the outsider . . . she embodies the Qliphoth in a very special sense.”163 These statements indicate Grant’s understanding of Babalon not simply as the other woman threatening the stability of reproductive heteronormativity, nor “the other of the same,”164 but as the monstrous site of ultimate otherness that eschews rational comprehension by hinting at the disrupting of all stable meaning. Like Crowley, Grant emphasizes Babalon’s whoredom as denoting a specific function, ability, or mode of feminine sexual behavior and mystical ability. However, as noted above, Grant’s conception of sacred prostitution as

Kundalini, Kalas, and Qadeshim  177 a predecessor of the cult of Babalon represents an innovation, foreshadowing themes that have gained further traction in the Babalon discourse in recent decades. Moreover, Grant’s association of whoredom with nonindividuated fatherhood does not reflect any motifs I  have uncovered in Crowley’s works. Interestingly, the term “whore” is frequently used in his writings to refer to a feminine symbol that does not primarily relate to masculinity, whose creative force is highlighted as something in itself. Similarly, the identification of the scarlet whore with the qliphoth, representing the strange, alien, or other, suggests this version of femininity as something of a “trickster” force, straddling the boundaries between worlds. This is emphasized by Grant’s identification of the menstruating woman with the voltigeurs, a term he uses to denote those who are able to traverse the “nightside” of the Tree of Life.165

Babalon, Choronzon, and Qliphoth: Uneasy (Non-​)Duality In Crowley’s writings, Babalon is conceptualized as the antithesis of Choronzon, representing the formula of erotic destruction and nondiscrimination that counterbalances the demon’s clinging to individualized subjectivity.166 In Nightside of Eden, however, Grant makes a radical departure from his predecessor in constructing an affinity between Babalon and Choronzon, based on his particular conceptualization of the Tree of Life. Grant posits Choronzon simultaneously as the ruler of “Universe B” and the gateway to the “nightside” of the Tree. Thus, while he—​like Crowley—​relates Choronzon to the Abyss, Grant’s understanding of the figure differs. His repeated conceptualization of the Scarlet Woman as a gateway, as well as his grounding in Advaitan nonduality, perhaps renders his partial conflation of the figures less surprising. Grant equates Choronzon with Typhon, writing that this being is the “prototype of Babalon, the Scarlet Woman,” and is equivalent to the female half of “[t]‌he Dragon whose eighth head reigns in Daäth.”167 Later, Grant suggests: “Choronzon manifests as the Scarlet Woman, a form of Babalon, as the first opening or gateway, the beginning represented by blood, the scarlet fluid of incarnation.”168 This statement once again identifies Babalon with blood, presumably menstrual blood, continuing the association of femininity with the incursion of monstrous alterity. Here, Babalon is seemingly designated as a manifested form of Choronzon, and Grant identifies Babalon kabbalistically with Daath.169 Similarly, Babalon is later linked to Daath, as the “Gate of the Abyss.”170 However, somewhat contradictorily to this identification of Choronzon with Babalon, Grant states that Babalon constitutes one half of Choronzon.171 In another excerpt, Grant instead contends that Babalon is the “Bride of Choronzon.”172 Furthermore, he identifies Choronzon with Chaos, writing that the “explosive union” of this force with

178  The Eloquent Blood Babalon “opens the Gates of the Abyss.”173 However, Grant subsequently identifies Chaos with Babalon.174 He suggests that Babalon is “one half of the Beast,” and that Choronzon is “the feminine half of the Beast,” thus once again inferring an identity between the figures.175 Exemplifying Grant’s penchant for circular reasoning and eschewal of stable signification, Babalon throughout Nightside of Eden is variously conceptualized as a manifestation of Choronzon; the bride of Choronzon; one half of Choronzon; one half of the Beast; and the equivalent of Chaos (who is Choronzon, who unites explosively with Babalon, and so on). These seemingly contradictory meanings present challenges to anyone seeking to extract a coherent doctrine regarding the relationship between Babalon and Choronzon in Grant’s oeuvre. Luckily, this is not the aim of the present study. Whether or not Grant’s descriptions of Babalon’s relation to Choronzon are logically coherent is hardly the point; as noted above, Grant himself emphasized that he in the Typhonian Trilogies was not trying to fashion a concise magical system, but rather—​in conformity with Arthur Rimbaud’s (1854–​1891) formula of “derangement of the senses”—​to shatter his readers’ perception of reality. Nonetheless, the common denominator—​and the way in which Grant’s various conceptualizations of the relationship between Choronzon and Babalon departs starkly from Crowley—​is that Grant suggests varying degrees of affinity rather than antagonism between the figures. Although it is hazardous to assume that this seeming inconsistency reflects an inner and logically consistent philosophical framework, I suggest that Grant’s deemphasizing of the antagonism between Babalon and Choronzon can be linked to his basic understanding, rooted in Advaita, of the infinite variety of phenomenal and comprehensible manifestation as a mirage belying the fundamental, nondual reality of the void. Based on this understanding, all dichotomies are ultimately illusory, and Grant’s soteriology entails realizing that ultimate reality exists without distinction. Thus, Grant’s association of Choronzon with Babalon may be read as an attempt to resolve the duality caused by Crowley’s dichotomization of the figures. The equation of Babalon with Choronzon appears to further enhance the monstrous qualities of the former, while simultaneously construing femininity as an endlessly fluctuating and ultimately definitionally uncontainable site of alterity.

Annihilation and Manifestation: Transforming Femininities Grant recurrently emphasizes feminine creative power in his written works. As mentioned in the preceding discussion, Grant partly identifies Babalon or the Scarlet Woman as the manifestation of Choronzon, defining her as the “prototype of manifestation,” whose union with Chaos (or Choronzon) “in the sense

Kundalini, Kalas, and Qadeshim  179 of No-​Word” unlocks the gateway to the Abyss.176 Significantly, Grant in Beyond the Mauve Zone equates manifestation with abomination, a term with obvious intertextual connections to Babalon.177 Conversely, femininity is also linked to annihilation in Grant’s works. In The Magical Revival, Grant likens the female genital organs to the “Cremation Ground,” being the location where desire is quenched and finally annihilated, “i.e. satisfied.”178 This, he writes, can “be compared to the Cup of Babalon, the Red or Scarlet Woman into which the adept expresses the last drop of his blood. The desires of the tantric are consumed on the funeral pyre of the Beloved.”179 In this and similar passages, Grant appears to reference an understanding of (mystical) death as “sexual orgasm . . . mystical annihilation of the personality which occurs when the individual unites ecstatically with any one of his ‘ideas’ or possibilities.”180 Grant thus positions femininity as destroyer, with the erotic destruction of masculinity as a mystical imperative. These assertions can be read as part of his continual deconstruction of rational subjectivity, and his embracing of the erotic as paradigmatically linked to the dissolution of boundaries between self and other. However, Grant does not conceptualize the Scarlet Woman’s body as “phallic” or warlike so much as in terms of an unquenchable receptivity in which individual consciousness is extinguished. Similarly, Grant writes that the emanations of the kalas are connected to the “ultimate dissolution typified in the Tantras by the . . . cremation-​ground, the supreme altar of Kali whereupon the multitudinous desires of the devotee are burned to blackness (kali) on the funerary pyre.”181 As I have attempted to illustrate in this chapter, much of Grant’s discussion of Babalon and the Scarlet Woman hinges on the idea that women—​whether through the biochemical composition of their secretions or some other innate characteristic—​have a particular role to fill in magic, initiation, and the spiritual trajectory of humankind. Within the context of sexual magic, Grant’s articulation of Babalon’s role is frequently framed within concepts of gender complementarity, wherein the male and female ritual practitioners embody different and mutually complementary functions. However, Grant seemingly identifies the new aeon with an expansion of feminine roles beyond what they have previously entailed. In Aleister Crowley and the Hidden God, Grant writes that woman is to some extent contained by the lunar forces if she does not “respond to the vibrations of the New Aeon.”182 Thus, this new age is linked to a broadening of female roles beyond a narrow equivocation with lunar energies. He writes that women are now “for the first time acquiring the Nu-​Isiac attitude . . . relinquishing the baleful lunar influence.”183 His interpretation of the changing roles of women in the new age is worth quoting at length: She no longer concentrates merely a lunar and venusian type of energy; she is instinct with a fierce lust which is driving her beyond the bearing of merely

180  The Eloquent Blood physical children. She is beginning to glimpse freedom and to make certain her release from the ancient and restrictive formulae of the Typhonian forces of the piscean current. The ancient rites of Isis veiled certain secret signs or chakras which are only now beginning to revolve in the psycho-​astral vehicles of the new priestesses. Within the next few centuries many such priestesses will enter the stream of the human life-​wave which animates this planet.184

Grant indicates that the progression of the new aeon will coincide with a liberation for women. Quoting Liber AL’s “Let the woman be girt with a sword before me,”185 Grant contends that women will be the visible leaders of “the initiatory system of the New Aeon,” while their “priests will be veiled and out of sight.”186 This statement has parallels to the excerpts cited in the preceding sections that pertain to whoredom as denoting feminine creativity with nondifferentiated fatherhood, thus highlighting how women will be rendered independently visible with men remaining in the shadows. He writes that in the new aeon, “woman will achieve a ‘soul,’ a centre of her own, independent of the male intervention at present necessary for her full initiation. She will be able to initiate not only herself but others also.”187 While this could be read as a suggestion that women have previously been devoid of souls, Grant’s statement is characteristically open to interpretation, and it evokes parallels to Irigaray’s discussion of how phallocentric culture has not permitted the full manifestation of a feminine subjectivity and that its blossoming as of yet lies in the future.188 It may suggest that women in the new aeon, having previously needed men for their initiation, will be able to work magic autonomously. Grant seems to indicate that new aeon magic will no longer require a material link, and that this will entail a transition away from the lunar current, where “Babalon . . . must be free to extricate her essentials from their veiling particles.”189 This may suggest Grant believes that in the future, the material basis of, for instance, menstrual blood will not be necessary. However, he writes that the “lunar force” will be “liberated from its association with the solar current of Horus once and for all,” and can thus be used freely and magically.190 This indicates that Grant supposes women in the future will be able to work sexual magic without the involvement of a male partner. In Outside the Circles of Time, Grant similarly suggests that the forthcoming Aeon of Maat—​which he sees as partly coexistent with that of Horus—​is inherently linked to women’s roles in magic.191 He describes what he perceives as the ongoing magical empowerment of women—​ and its consequences—​as follows: [T]‌he emergence of woman as a being in her own right, free and potent to control her own destiny, with the discomforting hint that she may surpass the male in knowledge and power, is paving the way for the advent of that aeon

Kundalini, Kalas, and Qadeshim  181 wherein she will function as a gateway through which cosmic influences will be invoked.192

This passage seems to describe a process of female liberation, related to women’s realization of their own power to introduce “cosmic influences” to the material realm. Similar to many of the excerpts cited in this chapter, Grant in this text links women’s abilities to straddle the boundaries between worlds to the oracular powers supposedly linked to menstruation.193 He relates this to the concept of the voltigeurs.194 Thus, femininity is once again linked to otherness, construed as a metaphysical trickster force or liminal modality inhabited by women who, through their embodied connection to the nondual void underlying manifested reality, signify the breakdown of boundaries between worlds as well as of other stable definitions. Grant’s tentative suggestions that the spiritual evolution of humankind may coincide with more autonomy and a greater diversity of magical roles for women is interesting, mirroring themes that are foreshadowed in Crowley’s “New Comment” as well as in Jack Parsons’s writings.195 However, it is important to stress that sociopolitical issues play a very minor role in Grant’s written work.196 Nonetheless, there are indications of reciprocal influence between aspects of cultural feminism—​through the writings of Peter Redgrove and Penelope Shuttle—​ and Grant’s thoughts on female anatomy, and the passages cited in the preceding sections indicate an indebtedness to feminist discourse. Redgrove and Shuttle’s work has, in turn, influenced interpretations of menstruation in contemporary feminist spirituality, as noted by anthropologist Anna Fedele.197 Grant’s engagement with what can be seen as feminist notions, and the possible, indirect influence of his ideas on broader feminist discourses, is an aspect of his work I hope to explore further in future publications.

Scarlet Difference and Trickster Femininity The fact that Grant’s writings do not lend themselves easily to systematization does not diminish their importance for the subsequent development of occultism, including the Babalon discourse. Grant’s amalgamation of Thelemic ideas with Tantra has influenced a number of later occultists and Babalon devotees whose works will be analyzed in subsequent chapters.198 In highlighting Crowley’s work with Babalon as well as that of Parsons and Cameron, Grant initiates a meta-​discussion of the Babalon discourse. His perennialist interpretation of the Scarlet Woman, linking Crowley’s symbol system to pre-​Christian pantheons and temple prostitution, foreshadows themes that are strongly present in later interpretations of Babalon.199 Moreover, Grant’s articulation of feminine

182  The Eloquent Blood difference as ultimate otherness shows both dependence on and departure from Crowley’s ideas, foreshadowing themes in later occult writings on Babalon. As Henrik Bogdan has noted, Grant carried a Tantric lineage that can be traced back to India, and he was well versed in Tantra for a Westerner of his time.200 Parallels can be drawn between some of the gendered intricacies of Indian Tantra and Grant’s articulation of Babalon, the Scarlet Woman, or the suvasini as the embodiment of cosmic goddess energy. Hugh B. Urban notes that many Indian Tantric texts, or tantras, laud women as representatives of the goddess, and numerous tantras emphasize that women of all castes and backgrounds embody the divine feminine by virtue of their genitals, that is, their yonis. However, Urban stresses that ritualistic reverence for women’s reproductive organs does not necessarily coincide with any “actual empowerment of women in the larger social sphere.”201 On the contrary, Urban contends that the fact that women’s roles are so heavily construed in biologically essentialist terms means that the tantras tend to laud woman “not primarily because of her intellectual abilities or personal virtues, but because of her possession of and identity with her sexual organ.”202 Thus, he contends, Tantric yoni worship tends more often to be oriented toward empowering the male practitioner.203 Can Urban’s critique be applied to Grant’s conceptualization of femininity? While Grant emphasizes the supreme magical importance of the kalas, he repeatedly stresses the powers a male magician may acquire through working with the Scarlet Woman. Grant’s conception of female reproductive anatomy as the essence of femininity may be seen as reproducing a stereotypical equivocation of female value with sexuality and reproduction. However, Grant’s seeming disinterest in the rational intellect is, admittedly, gender-​inclusive. As noted in the preceding discussion, a central objective of his Typhonian Trilogies was the transcendence of the rational mind. In contrast to Indian Tantric literature, much of which Urban notes is characterized by a lack of instructions for use by a female practitioner, Grant pays far more attention to the feminine genital secretions and the idea of trained sexual priestesses who can move between worlds.204 Crucially, Grant stresses how the Scarlet Woman may gain supernatural powers through working with the kalas. Despite his reservations, Urban observes that many Tantric texts conceive of the divine feminine in ways that radically challenge constructions of femininity as passively nurturing by linking transgression, femininity, and power, positing taxonomic associations among “femininity, intoxication, impurity, power, death, redness, sexuality, and blood.”205 Commenting on the common denominators within this chain of association, Urban suggests these concepts all hinge on “a triad of powerful but dangerous forces, namely, sexuality, violence, and femininity, all of which are symbolized by redness and blood.”206 There are obvious parallels to Grant’s conceptualization of Babalon and the Scarlet Woman,

Kundalini, Kalas, and Qadeshim  183 which are associated with redness, blood, power, intoxication, and death. The connection of the kalas and the funeral pyre where the adept’s individuality is extinguished construes an image of femininity as erotic destroyer. Grant’s articulation of the divine feminine as creator and annihilator similarly challenges hegemonic constructions of femininity as passive and nurturing. His repeated emphasis on physical childlessness as beneficial to the priestess, and lauding of the whore as a spiritual ideal, also challenge the idealization of monogamous and reproductive feminine sexuality.207 Parallels can thus be drawn between Grant’s conception of Babalon and Irigaray’s notion of the feminine divine as able to represent feminine creativity beyond reproduction, while transcending dichotomies such as mother and lover. Femininity, in Grant’s writings, is associated with particular characteristics and potentials rooted in biological propensities. The heterosexual and biologistic orientation of Grant’s system of magic, and his equivocation of femininity with the possession of a (menstruating) vagina, less easily incorporates genderqueer and trans experience and potentially the experiences of aging women. However, Grant’s emphasis on the metaphysical properties of the kalas distinguishes his approach from the way in which Crowley in his sex magical instructions tends to construe femininity as lack, specifically of semen.208 In contrast, Grant defines femininity not as the absence of masculinity but in terms of presence or potential: the power of kundalini, the ability to produce the kalas, and the propensity of menstruating bodies to straddle the boundaries between worlds and occupy a sort of trickster position, epitomized by the “harlot” as the other, strange, or alien woman. As noted, Grant articulated an early critique of androcentrism within Crowley’s sexual magic. Drawing on Irigaray, Grant’s development of the kala system can be read as an attempt toward rectifying the lack of a concept of sexual difference in earlier forms of occultism by constructing femininity as “an/​other subject, irreducible to the masculine subject and sharing equivalent dignity.”209 Grant’s writings challenge hegemonic notions of femininity as chaste, nurturing, and reproductively oriented, contributing to the articulation of an authoritative and skilled female sex-​magical role as an alternative femininity. Nonetheless, Grant in a sense views femininity from the outside, through his own worldview. His writings suggest ways of conceptualizing femininity and female bodies in magic beyond lack or deficiency but limit possibilities for thinking about feminine positionality beyond cisgendered female morphology. Importantly, Irigaray appears to view the divine feminine—​as well as an independently defined concept of femininity—​as something women must develop from their own experiences, rather than something men can offer to them. Thus, as in the case of Crowley and Parsons, it may be unfair to expect Grant’s writings to provide such a notion fully fledged. Nonetheless, his emphasis on the Tantric Vama Marg as a

184  The Eloquent Blood metaphysical pathway that exalts the divine feminine has clearly influenced later occultists who have brought this analysis further.210 Although Grant refers to femininity as the other, this otherness is not so much conceptualized as the “other of the same,” but rather in terms of a passionate engagement with what Shildrick refers to as the monstrous. In ­chapter 3, I argued that Choronzon can be seen as a morbid caricature of the bourgeois masculine subject scrambling to “stay intact,”211 with Babalon representing the soteriological promise of feminized vulnerability and nondual openness. Grant’s rupturing of the Babalon–​Choronzon binary signals his thorough engagement with the fluidity of meaning, further “othering” Babalonian femininity by construing it as that which utterly defies stable dichotomizations. In order to explicate what this means, it is worth quoting one of Grant’s principal sources of literary inspiration, namely, H. P. Lovecraft: We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was not meant that we should voyage far. . . . [S]‌ome day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality, and of our frightful position therein, that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the deadly light into the peace and safety of a new dark age.212

Similar to Lovecraft’s cosmic horror, concepts of ultimate alterity or otherness are central to Grant’s written work, although he feminizes these realms. In partial congruence with the previously quoted excerpt, Grant’s Typhonian Trilogies are seemingly written with the aim of shattering the “placid island of ignorance” made up by the illusory stability of meanings and subjectivity, plunging the reader into those “black seas of infinity” that, in Grant’s view, underlie manifest reality. Grant reframes this plunge into madness as a soteriological endeavor, casting Babalon as a metaphysical trickster who rends the fabric of reality and straddles the boundaries between worlds. Her genital secretions appear as the biochemical equivalent of Grant’s own written work as he intended it, opening the gateway to unspeakable realms where the illusion of individuated subjectivity is annihilated. The signifier of Babalon encapsulates the conflation of the monstrous and the erotic in Grant’s writings, indicating not only the permeability of bodies but also the ways in which erotic touch breaches corporeal boundaries as well as those delimiting subjectivity.213 Femininity, in Grant’s reading, is thus strongly associated with the other, but less as “the other of the same” than as the nondual void preceding manifestation. This ultimate otherness has clear parallels to what Julia Kristeva refers to as the abject, which exists outside of the symbolic order and resists representation.214 Although this perpetuates an association between femininity and that which threatens autonomous, rational subjectivity, Grant’s lauding of the

Kundalini, Kalas, and Qadeshim  185 dark and ontologically primary divine feminine and the trickster-​esque Scarlet Woman can be read as a challenge to notions of stable selfhood, embracing what Shildrick, Butler, and Waldby all in different ways construe as the inherent potential of the erotic to dissolve the boundaries between self and other.

Notes 1. Kenneth Grant, Aleister Crowley & the Hidden God (London: Skoob Books, 1992), 64. 2. Henrik Bogdan, “Evocation of the Fire Snake: Kenneth Grant and Tantra,” in Servants of the Star & the Snake: Essays in Honour of Kenneth and Steffi Grant, ed. Henrik Bogdan (London: Starfire, 2018), 253–​268. 3. Grant does not clearly distinguish between these two figures. Throughout this chapter, the terms will be used interchangeably. 4. Kenneth Grant, Remembering Aleister Crowley (London: Skoob Books, 1991), v. 5. Grant, Remembering,  49–​50. 6. Henrik Bogdan, “Reception of Occultism in India: The Case of the Holy Order of Krishna,” in Occultism in a Global Perspective, ed. Henrik Bogdan and Gordan Djurdjevic (Durham:  Acumen, 2013), 177–​201; Henrik Bogdan, “Introduction,” in Aleister Crowley and David Curwen, Brother Curwen, Brother Crowley:  A Correspondence, ed. Henrik Bogdan (York Beach, ME: Teitan Press, 2010), xviii–​xlviii. 7. Grant, Remembering, 49. 8. Kenneth Grant, Beyond the Mauve Zone (London: Starfire, 1999), xi. 9. Importantly, Grant’s interest in Tantra exceeded its sexual components. Bogdan, “Evocation of the Fire Snake.” 10. Jeffrey J. Kripal summarizes Advaita Vedanta as “a particular interpretation of the Hindu scriptures that emphasizes the ‘non-​dual’ (a-​dvaita) identity of the deepest core of the human Self (atman) and the cosmic essence of all there is (brahman).” Jeffrey J. Kripal, Comparing Religions: Coming to Terms (Malden: Wiley Blackwell, 2014), cii. Advaita Vedanta has been one of the most influential aspects of Eastern religiosity in the West from the late nineteenth century on. Richard King, Orientalism and Religion: Postcolonial Theory, India and “the Mystic East” (London; New  York:  Routledge, 1999), 118–​142; Henrik Bogdan, “Advaita Vedanta in the Works of Kenneth Grant,” in Servants of the Star & the Snake: Essays in Honour of Kenneth and Steffi Grant, ed. Henrik Bogdan (London: Starfire, 2018), 39–​56. 11. Kenneth Grant, At the Feet of the Guru: Twenty-​Five Essays (London: Starfire, 2006), 44–​48, 68. Grant appears to have faltered in his enthusiasm for Thelema in the spring of 1953, distancing himself from Crowley’s works and focusing on “Oriental Mysticism” or Advaita. Bogdan, “Advaita Vedanta.” 12. Steffi Grant, “A Dream,” in Kenneth Grant, At the Feet of the Guru: Twenty-​Five Essays (London: Starfire , 2006), 35–​37. 13. Grant, At the Feet, 24. 14. Ibid., 16.

186  The Eloquent Blood 15. Ibid., 21. 16. Ibid., 52. 17. Bogdan, “Advaita Vedanta.” 18. Grant, Aleister, 73. Bogdan notes that Grant’s willingness to combine Advaita with Tantra was unusual for the time. Bogdan, “Advaita Vedanta.” 19. Kenneth Grant, Manifesto of New Isis Lodge O.T.O. (London: privately printed, 1951). 20. Henrik Bogdan, “Kenneth Grant and the Typhonian Tradition,” in The Occult World, ed. Christopher Partridge (Abingdon, Oxon.: Routledge, 2014), 323–​330. 21. Bogdan, “Kenneth Grant and the Typhonian Tradition,” 323. 22. The texts have been published by Skoob Esoterica as Hidden Lore. Kenneth Grant and Steffi Grant, Hidden Lore: The Carfax Monographs (London: Skoob Esoterica, 1996). 23. Grant’s “Typhonian” OTO (renamed the Typhonian Order in 2011) emerged around this time. Bogdan, “Kenneth Grant and the Typhonian Tradition,” 325. 24. Kenneth Grant, Nightside of Eden (London: Muller, 1977), 1. 25. Aleister Crowley, “Liber Arcanorum Τών ATU Τού TAHUTI QUAS VIDIT ASAR IN AMENNTI Sub Figurâ CCXXXI Liber Carcerorum Τών QLIPHOTH Cum Suis Geniis. Adduntur Sigilla et Nomina Eorum,” The Equinox I, no. 7 (1912): 69–​ 74. Beyond this text, Crowley did not take a particular interest in the qliphoth. Grant also cites an influence from Crowley’s magical son Frater Achad. Grant, Nightside, 2. 26. Grant, Nightside, 1. Grant’s statement regarding the relationship between being and nonbeing can be linked to his interpretation of Advaita Vedanta. 27. Grant, Nightside, 1–​3. Grant’s association of Daath with the Abyss is congruent with Crowley’s interpretation. See Crowley, Vision, 166, 234; Crowley, “Liber Os Abysmi”; Crowley, Aleph, 104. 28. See, e.g., Grant, Nightside, 3, 8–​9, 48, 52, 60, 100, 261. 29. As expressed by Grant in many of his essays on Advaita; see Grant, At the Feet. Cf. Bogdan, “Advaita Vedanta.” 30. Grant, Nightside, 25. 31. Ibid.,  52–​53. 32. Ibid., 102. 33. Ibid., 104. 34. Grant defines the Mauve Zone as “existing outside or between the two states of dreaming and waking”; see Kenneth Grant, Hecate’s Fountain (London: Skoob Books, 1992), foreword. He identifies this concept with Daath and the Abyss. Grant, Hecate’s, 256. He also describes it as “the region between dreaming and dreamless sleep. . . . It is the state which dawns beyond the abyss that separates phenomenal existence from noumenal being.” Grant, Mauve Zone, 326. 35. Alan Moore, “Beyond Our Ken,” Kaos 14 (April 2002): 155–​156. 36. Kenneth Grant, The Magical Revival (London:  Skoob, 1991), 99, 114–​117; Grant, Aleister, 35–​ 38; Kenneth Grant, Outside the Circles of Time (London:  Muller, 1980), 168–​170; Kenneth Grant, Outer Gateways (London: Skoob Books, 1994), 5. Lovecraft’s influence on Grant is discussed in Dave Evans, The History of British Magic after Crowley: Kenneth Grant, Amado Crowley, Chaos Magic, Satanism, Lovecraft, the

Kundalini, Kalas, and Qadeshim  187 Left Hand Path, Blasphemy and Magical Morality (Harpenden: Hidden Publishing, 2007), 330–​344. 37. Bogdan, “Advaita Vedanta.” 38. Ibid., 12. 39. Ibid., 13. 40. Ibid. 41. Gerald Massey, A Book of the Beginnings. Containing an Attempt to Recover and Reconstitute the Lost Origines of the Myths and Mysteries, Types and Symbols, Religion and Language, with Egypt for the Mouthpiece and Africa as the Birthplace (London: Williams & Norgate, 1881). Christian Giudice notes that Massey’s “afro-​ centric” ideas strongly influenced Grant. Christian Giudice, “From Central Africa to the Mauve Zone: Gerald Massey’s Influence on Kenneth Grant’s Idea of the Typhonian Tradition,” in Servants of the Star & the Snake: Essays in Honour of Kenneth and Steffi Grant, ed. Henrik Bogdan (London: Starfire, 2018), 63–​74. The term “Afrocentrism” (or “Afrocentricity”) is commonly used to denote an intellectual movement that rejects Eurocentric notions of Africa as a “dark continent,” instead highlighting African cultural heritage. Fredrik Gregorius, “Inventing Africa: Esotericism and the Creation of an Afrocentric Tradition in America,” in Contemporary Esotericism, ed. Egil Asprem and Kennet Granholm (Abingdon, Oxon.: Routledge, 2014), 49–​71. 42. Cf. Giudice, “From Central Africa.” 43. Massey’s works were part of the curriculum of the New Isis Lodge; see Grant, Hecate’s, 37; Kenneth Grant, Key to the Pyramid (London: privately printed, 1952). 44. Grant, Magical Revival, 36. 45. Ibid. 46. Grant, Aleister, 207. 47. Grant, Magical Revival, 36. 48. Cf. Giudice, “From Central Africa.” 49. Narratives of a timeless, hidden wisdom at the core of all—​ or some—​ “exoteric” religions—​abound in historical Western esotericism. See, e.g., Hanegraaff, Esotericism, esp.  5–​ 76, 277–​ 314; Mark J. Sedgwick, Against the Modern World:  Traditionalism and the Secret Intellectual History of the Twentieth Century (Oxford; New  York:  Oxford University Press, 2004). Grant differed from many Traditionalists in his positive evaluation of Western occultism. Gordan Djurdjevic, India and the Occult: The Influence of South Asian Spirituality on Modern Western Occultism (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014), 93. 50. Grant, Magical Revival, 7; Grant, Aleister, 74. 51. Grant, Aleister, 33. 52. AL II:26; Grant, Magical Revival, 18. 53. Grant, Aleister, 63–​64, 72. As previously mentioned, however, Kellner’s role in the teachings and formation of OTO is questionable, and neither Kellner nor Reuss appear to have had significant knowledge of Tantra (a fact that even Grant admits; see Grant, Aleister, 102). 54. Grant, Magical Revival. 55. Ibid., 2.

188  The Eloquent Blood 56. Crowley uses the term to denote those who have not mingled their “blood” in Babalon’s cup. See Crowley, Vision, 151; Crowley, Magick: Liber ABA, 483–​484. 57. Grant, Aleister, 21. 58. Kenneth Grant, Cults of the Shadow (London: Skoob, 1994), 2. 59. Grant, Aleister, 231–​232. 60. See, e.g., Hugh B. Urban, The Power of Tantra: Religion, Sexuality, and the Politics of South Asian Studies (London; New York: I. B. Tauris, 2010), 113–​114; Gavin D. Flood, The Tantric Body: The Secret Tradition of Hindu Religion (London; New York: I. B. Tauris, 2006), 157–​162. 61. Grant, Aleister, 30. 62. Crowley, “AGAPE.” 63. Grant, Aleister, 29. 64. Grant, Aleister, 81. In Cults of the Shadow, Grant instead proposes 22 or 32 kalas. In this context, the term kalas seems to denote not only female sexual secretions but also energetic paths within the occult anatomy of the human body. Grant, Cults,  13–​20. 65. Grant, Magical Revival, 35–​36, 125–​126; Grant, Aleister, 25. 66. Cf. Djurdjevic, India, 107; Bogdan, “Evocation of the Fire Snake.” 67. Grant, Magical Revival, 34. See also Grant, Remembering, 49. 68. Grant, Aleister, 34. 69. Ibid., 40. 70. Ibid., 42. 71. Ibid., 43. 72. Ibid., 232. 73. Ibid., 45. 74. Ibid., 42. 75. Ibid., 43. 76. Ibid. Parallels can be drawn to Irigaray’s arguments that notions of gender-​neutral subjectivity—​in a culture that lacks a concept of sexual difference—​universalize an implicitly masculine positionality. Cf. Irigaray, Speculum; Irigaray, This. 77. Grant, Aleister, 106–​109; Grant, Cults, 12. Cf. Bogdan, “Challenging.” 78. Grant, Aleister, 108–​109. Emphasis in original. 79. Ibid., 110. 80. See, e.g., Phil Hine and Paul McAndrew, “Occult Homophobia—​Some Choice Quotes,” Phil Hine, http://​www.philhine.org.uk/​writings/​flsh_​phobia.html (accessed March 29, 2017). 81. Cf. Bogdan, “Challenging.” Crowley’s experimentation with the XI° are recorded in, e.g., Crowley, “Paris”; Crowley, Magical Record,  53–​64. 82. Grant, Aleister, 70, 78. Similarly, Grant in Cults of the Shadow associates Horus with the “realization of the identity of Matter and Spirit, Body and Mind, Female and Male ... through the ‘passionate union of opposites.’ ” Grant, Cults, 124. 83. Grant, Aleister, 70. 84. Grant, Cults, 200. 85. Grant, Aleister, 28. 86. Grant, Cults, 136.

Kundalini, Kalas, and Qadeshim  189 87. Ibid., 2. Emphasis in original. 88. Irigaray, “Question.” 89. Shildrick, “Unreformed”; Shildrick, Embodying. 90. Grant, Outside, 36. 91. Grant, Cults, 2. 92. Ibid., 72. Emphasis in original. 93. Cf. Urban, Power, 137. 94. Grant, Cults, 72. 95. See, e.g., Grant, Hecate’s, 201–​204. 96. See, e.g., Grant, Outside, 39. 97. Grant, Cults, 132. 98. Ibid., 132. 99. See, e.g., Grant, Aleister, 121–​122, 222; Grant, Cults, 39; Grant, Nightside, 77–​79, 170; Grant, Hecate’s, 30; Grant, The Ninth Arch (London: Starfire, 2002), 202–​203, 205. 100. Grant, Outside, 9. 101. Grant, Magical Revival, 24. 102. As discussed in ­chapter 4, however, Crowley recommended sexual magic during menstruation for gaining material wealth. 103. Grant, Aleister, 1. In a different passage, she is indicated as the “priestess of Kali,” illustrating Grant’s confluence of goddess and human avatar. Grant, Aleister, 225. Grant describes Babalon as the “terrestrial representative of Kali.” Grant, Outer, 44. 104. Grant, Cults, 27, 31. In Yoruba mythology, Oduduwa is a legendary male ruler who is commonly held as the ancestor of the Yoruban royal dynasties. R. C. C. Law, “The Heritage of Oduduwa:  Traditional History and Political Propaganda among the Yoruba,” Journal of African History 14, no. 2 (1973): 207–​222. 105. Grant, Nightside, 71. Grant writes that Nu comprises both Babalon and Nuit and is therefore equivalent to Typhon. He argues that the term “Baba,” which he sees as the root of the word “Babalon,” is a title of Typhon. Grant, Nightside, 104. 106. Grant, Nightside, 113. 107. See, e.g., the entries for “Babalon” and “Scarlet Woman” in the glossaries included in the Typhonian Trilogies. Grant, Magical Revival, 216; Grant, Aleister, 205, 225; Grant, Cults, 211–​212; Grant, Nightside, 259, 277; Grant, Outside, 275; Grant, Mauve Zone, 315–​316. 108. Grant writes that Liber AL anthropomorphizes the moon as “Babalon, the Scarlet Woman.” Grant, Magical Revival, 23. He later writes that “[t]‌he name Babalon . . . is used to designate the office of Scarlet Woman.” Grant, Aleister, 20. 109. Grant, Magical Revival, 35. He writes that “[t]‌he formula of the Scarlet Woman is the formula of the Suvasini.” Grant, Aleister, 20. 110. Grant, Magical Revival, 129. 111. Grant, Nightside, 177. Grant asserts that the roles of Scarlet Woman and Beast can be assumed by anyone with the requisite magical training. Grant, Magical Revival, 129. He thus challenges Crowley’s identification of the Beast with “the man Aleister Crowley,” and the Scarlet Woman with “any woman that receives and transmits my solar Word and Being.” Crowley, Magical and Philosophical,

190  The Eloquent Blood 103. Later, Grant critiques the “tendency to historify archetypal images.” Grant, Hecate’s, 43–​44. The notion that the Scarlet Woman and Beast can be embodied by any magician is common among Thelemites today, as will be seen in subsequent chapters. 112. Crowley, “Liber CDXIV.” 113. See, e.g., Grant, Aleister, 161–​162; Grant, Outside, 9. This theme is recurrent in several later interpretations of Babalon as well, as discussed in subsequent chapters. 114. Grant, Aleister, 28. 115. Ibid., 83. 116. Grant, Cults, 211–​212. 117. Grant, Nightside, 233, 252. 118. Grant, Hecate’s,  50–​51. 119. Crowley, Magical Record, 26. 120. Crowley, “AGAPE”; Crowley, “Liber CDXIV.” 121. See, e.g., Irigaray, This. 122. See c­ hapters 9 and 10. 123. The quote in the heading is derived from Grant, Ninth, 236. 124. Grant, Magical Revival, 131. In this context, the term “lunar eclipse” refers to “the physiological moon, the menstrual flux.” Grant, Magical Revival, 132. 125. Grant, Aleister, 20. See also ibid., 106. See also Grant, Magical Revival, 23, 142; Grant, Nightside, 277. However, he also writes that the “vermillion” shade of Babalon’s robes is derived from a Martian “inner core of mystic fire,” rather than “the red of the moon,” as her “sovereignty does not lie in her physical generative potential but in her ability to conceive Ideas of extra-​terrestrial realms begotten on her by the Beast.” Grant, Aleister, 157. 126. Grant, Magical Revival, 132. 127. Grant, Aleister, 122. 128. Ibid. Emphasis in original. 129. Grant, Nightside, 218. 130. Grant, Aleister, 121. See also Grant, Nightside, 73. 131. Grant, Cults, 31. 132. Ibid., 32. 133. Ibid., 56. 134. Grant, Nightside, 55. 135. Ibid., 77. 136. Ibid.,  78–​79. 137. Grant, Outside, 9. 138. Grant, Nightside, 84. 139. Ibid. 140. Grant, Nightside, 170–​172. 141. Grant, Outside, 9. 142. See ­chapter 4. 143. Peter Redgrove and Penelope Shuttle, The Wise Wound:  Menstruation and Everywoman (London: Gollancz, 1978).

Kundalini, Kalas, and Qadeshim  191 144. “Redgrove Papers; Letters,” MS171, University of Sheffield Library. The dustjacket for Grant’s Outside the Circles of Time (1980) quotes an endorsement from The Wise Wound, and Redgrove’s The Black Goddess and the Sixth Sense (1987) is reviewed in a 1989 issue of the journal Starfire, issued by Grant’s “Typhonian” OTO (later the Typhonian Order). Michael Staley, “The Black Goddess and the Sixth Sense, Bloomsbury, 1987,” Starfire 1, no. 3 (1989): 98–​99. 145. Grant, Aleister, 20. 146. Ibid. 147. Grant, Aleister, 107–​108. 148. Grant, Cults, 2. 149. Ibid.,  2–​3. 150. Ibid., 27, 31; Grant, Nightside, 179. 151. Grant, Aleister, 123. 152. Ibid., 34. 153. Ibid., 123. 154. Ibid.,  43–​45. 155. Grant, Magical Revival, 129. 156. Ibid. In this explication of different femininities, Grant draws on Crowley’s “New Comment” and Magical Record, both produced during his time at Cefalù. Grant, Hidden God, 130–​131. See also Grant, Nightside, 170. 157. Grant, Magical Revival, 131. 158. Grant, Nightside, 176. 159. Ibid., 178. 160. See discussion in c­ hapters 3 and 4. 161. Grant, Outer, 233. 162. Ibid., 240. 163. Grant, Mauve Zone, 197, 315–​316, 330–​331. See also Grant, Ninth, 546. 164. Irigaray, “Question.” 165. Grant, Nightside, 90, 173, 283; Grant, Outside, 9, 174–​176; 295. 166. See ­chapter 3. 167. Grant, Nightside, 43. 168. Ibid., 53. Emphasis in original. 169. Ibid. 170. Ibid., 111. 171. Ibid., 102. 172. Ibid., 230. 173. Ibid., 145. 174. Ibid., 145, 260. 175. Ibid., 260–​261. In Hecate’s Fountain, Grant describes Choronzon as the female form of the Beast. Grant, Hecate’s, 128. 176. Grant, Nightside, 145. 177. Grant, Mauve Zone, 173. 178. Grant, Magical Revival, 143. 179. Ibid.

192  The Eloquent Blood 180. Grant, Magical Revival, 144. 181. Grant, Aleister, 105. 182. Ibid., 149. 183. Ibid., 168. 184. Ibid., 161. 185. AL III:11. 186. Grant, Aleister, 161. 187. Ibid., 161–​162. 188. Cf. Irigaray, This; Irigaray, Speculum. 189. Grant, Aleister, 162. 190. Ibid. 191. Grant, Outside, 10. 192. Ibid., 9. 193. He quotes the writings of Carlos Castaneda, suggesting that menstruation opens a gate to an alternate realm. Grant, Outside, 9. 194. See, e.g., Grant, Nightside, 90, 173, 283; Grant, Outside, 174–​176, 295. 195. See c­ hapters 4 and 5. 196. In an early essay on Indian philosophy, Grant writes that “Economics, Progress, Civilisation, are pet foibles and base illusions . . . for they pertain to a totally unreal state of things.” Grant, At the Feet, 17. Nonetheless, Grant implies that realization of the Great Work will result in the “dissolution of all barriers which hinder the free interchange of nations, races and sexes.” Grant, Aleister, 185. 197. Anna Fedele, “Reversing Eve’s Curse:  Mary Magdalene, Mother Earth and the Creative Ritualization of Menstruation,” Journal of Ritual Studies 28, no. 2 (2014): 23–​35. 198. E.g., Nikolas Schreck and Zeena Schreck, Demons of the Flesh: The Complete Guide to Left Hand Path Sex Magic (London: Creation, 2002); Mishlen Linden, “Playing with Fire: The Training of Babalon,” in Faces of Babalon: Being a Compilation of Women’s Voices, ed. Mishlen Linden (Logan:  Black Moon Publishing, 2008), 16–​21; Linda Falorio, “Kiss the Sky! On Channeling Babalon,” in The Faces of Babalon: Being a Compilation of Women’s Voices, ed. Mishlen Linden (Logan: Black Moon Publishing, 2008), 6–​12. 199. See especially c­ hapter 10. 200. Bogdan, “Evocation of the Fire Snake.” 201. Urban, Power, 137. 202. Ibid., 133. 203. Ibid., 133–​134. 204. Ibid. 205. Ibid., 130. 206. Ibid., 131. 207. Grant, Magical Revival, 129–​131; Grant, Aleister, 34; Grant, Nightside, 170. 208. See discussion in c­ hapter 4. 209. Irigaray, “Question of the Other,” 8.

Kundalini, Kalas, and Qadeshim  193 210. See, e.g., Schreck and Schreck, Demons; Amodali, “Introductory Theoria on Progressive Formulas of the Babalon Priestesshood,” in A Rose Veiled in Black: Art and Arcana of Our Lady Babalon, ed. Daniel A. Schulke and Robert Fitzgerald (Hercules, CA:  Three Hands Press, 2016), 45–​60; Amodali, “Feminism, ‘Weird’ Essentialism and 156,” Amodali.com, March 20, 2016, http://​www.amodali.com/​ feminism-​weird-​essentialism-​and-​156/​. See subsequent chapters. 211. Butler, Undoing. 212. From “The Call of Cthulhu,” first published in 1928, and included in Howard Phillips Lovecraft, Necronomicon: The Best Weird Tales of H. P. Lovecraft: Commemorative Edition (London: Gollancz, 2008), 201. 213. Cf. Shildrick, “Unreformed.” 214. Julia Kristeva, Powers of Horror:  An Essay on Abjection (New  York:  Columbia University Press, 1982).

7   

Intermezzo Contemporary Occultism and Thelema

The Babalon discourse is not merely a historical or literary phenomenon. On the contrary, the ideas of the historical occultists discussed in previous chapters inform the magical practice of thousands today. The role of this chapter is therefore to link the historical Babalon discourse to its contemporary manifestations by outlining the landscape of contemporary Thelema as well as its relation to present-​ day esotericism more broadly. As mentioned in c­ hapter  1, my fieldwork and interviews have primarily been carried out in the United States among groups and individuals that can broadly be defined as Thelemic. The lack of quantitative studies precludes reliable estimates of the total number of Thelemites today, and self-​proclaimed Thelemites are too few to be visible on national censuses. If formal affiliation with an organization that defines itself as Thelemic is used as an estimate, matters become only marginally easier. Ordo Templi Orientis (OTO) counts approximately four thousand members worldwide and is thus easily the largest Thelemic organization today.1 However, there are numerous smaller groups whose membership numbers are less accessible. Moreover, counting the total number of Thelemites by organizational membership disregards unaffiliated or solitary practitioners. Thus, although I suggest that the total number of Thelemites globally is likely between five and ten thousand, the accuracy of this number is highly uncertain. However, the influence of Crowley and Thelema in the esoteric milieu exceeds self-​identified Thelemites. Karl Germer died without appointing a successor as head of OTO. Upon learning of Germer’s death, Grady McMurtry (1918–​1985)—​a member of the old Agape Lodge—​began attempting to salvage Crowley’s legacy. Assuming headship of the order, he engaged in a series of legal battles, culminating in his OTO being legally established as the continuation of Crowley’s order, with exclusive copyrights to Crowley’s work and the OTO name and lamen. McMurtry died in 1985, and he was succeeded by Frater Hymenaeus Beta (William Breeze).2 Ordo Templi Orientis subsequently established an International Headquarters (IHQ), which organized national grand lodges in five countries. The largest and most active of these is the United States Grand Lodge (USGL), which counted over 60 local bodies and over 1,600 members as of February 2017.3 In total, the order has been established in over 30 countries worldwide. The Eloquent Blood: The Goddess Babalon and the Construction of Femininities in Western Esotericism. Manon Hedenborg White, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780190065027.001.0001

196  The Eloquent Blood Similar to Freemasonry, OTO is based on a structured series of degrees, or initiations, through which the initiate is gradually made privy to esoteric teachings. Today, the OTO system has thirteen numbered degrees, ranging from O° to XII°. The majority of USGL’s membership are concentrated in the first four degrees.4 Local bodies of OTO exist as camps, oases, and lodges, whose organizational levels and responsibilities increase progressively.5 Larger OTO bodies offer initiations and host the Gnostic Mass, which is organized by OTO’s ecclesiastical arm, Ecclesia Gnostica Catholica (EGC).6 The latter organization also offers baptisms, confirmations, weddings, funeral rites, and clerical ordinations. Aside from OTO, the most influential Thelemic organization historically is A∴A∴. Unlike OTO, A∴A∴ work is traditionally solitary. Therefore, it is common for Thelemites to combine A∴A∴ affiliation with membership in a fraternal order such as OTO. Today, several distinct groups claim descent from Crowley’s A∴A∴. The leadership of OTO formally endorses the A∴A∴ currently under the headship of J.  Daniel Gunther, formerly a student of the Brazilian Thelemite Marcelo Motta (1931–​1987), an A∴A∴ student of Karl Germer.7 The largest alternative claimant group is traced to Phyllis Seckler (1917–​2004), a member of the old Agape Lodge, who was initiated into OTO in 1939, later receiving the IX°.8

Demographics, Values, and Practices Thelema is part of a landscape of contemporary ritual magic that, following Egil Asprem, may also be said to include groups affiliated with the Golden Dawn system, Wicca, Neopaganism, Satanism and the Left-​Hand Path, and Chaos Magick.9 In practice, these movements may overlap, as is evinced by the present study. Although most I have spoken to during my research are current or former affiliates of a Thelemic organization, not all identify as Thelemites, nor do self-​identified Thelemites only draw inspiration from Thelema. All of my interviewees engage in a variety of magical practices. These include, but are not limited to, meditation and yoga as stipulated in Crowley’s A∴A∴ curriculum; divination; sexual magic; astral projection; ritual magical practices such as banishings (namely, the Lesser Ritual of the Pentagram and/​or the Star Ruby); invocations and evocations; and other forms of devotional work. The Babalon discourse is thus formed in interaction with a broader Thelemic and esoteric milieu, and many of my interviewees have developed a personal ritual practice around Babalon by drawing inspiration from different traditions. Research on Neopaganism may provide some indications as to the demographic composition of contemporary Thelema. Neopaganism and occultism

Intermezzo  197 have similar cultural roots in Romanticism and earlier forms of esotericism and ritual magic.10 Several of my interviewees use terms such as “witch” self-​ referentially or have a background in Neopagan witchcraft. Thelema and many forms of Neopaganism overlap in an emphasis on ritual magic; an affirmation of the natural world, the body, and sexuality; and a rejection of patriarchal monotheism and related tendency to view the divine as both feminine and masculine.11 As I will highlight, some of the influx of feminist thought into contemporary Thelema may be indebted to its interface with Neopaganism. According to previous research, Neopagans—​like other practitioners of alternative spirituality—​are mostly white, middle-​class, and more highly educated than the general population.12 Similarly, previous research among contemporary OTO members suggests that a majority are white and university-​educated.13 The racial and socioeconomic composition of Thelema and other branches of contemporary esotericism can be traced to nineteenth-​century occultism, which was strongly connected to the emerging bourgeoisie.14 The underrepresentation of poor people and people of color in esotericism today may also be the result of concerns with respectability and social inclusion, which may historically have made esotericism less attractive for poor and/​or racialized religious seekers.15 As will be noted in subsequent chapters, the ways in which respectability is racialized and classed affects how different social groups can engage with counternormative aspects of esoteric symbolism. Given this demographic composition, it is unsurprising that the contemporary Thelemic milieu emphasizes middle-​class values of literacy and education. Nearly all larger Thelemic community spaces I  have encountered maintain libraries, which may vary greatly in size. Aside from the ubiquitous works by Aleister Crowley and writings by other Thelemic and esoteric authors, a notable feature is academic works on the history of religion, mythology, or psychology (especially of the Jungian variety).16 Many of those occultists whose words are analyzed in subsequent chapters quote feminist theory, academic research, philosophy, and the “canon” of Western literature. As noted in c­ hapter 1, a majority of my interviewees are university-​educated, with several holding postgraduate degrees. Although my broader fieldwork observations also suggest that the average Thelemite is generally more highly educated than average, further studies are needed to determine whether this is generally applicable. There is a dearth of research on Thelemic values and political views. Available studies as well as likely similarities with the Neopagan milieu suggest a preference for liberal politics, stronger-​than-​average support for religious and sexual freedom, and a tendency to support nonheterosexual, nonmonogamous relationship forms.17 Similarly, American sexologist Vere Chappell, who has analyzed sexual behavior among U.S. OTO members based on a survey distributed

198  The Eloquent Blood to attendees of the biennial OTO national conference in 2005, suggests OTO members generally consider themselves more liberal in matters of sexuality than the general population. Chappell’s respondents appeared more likely to support and engage in practices such as sadomasochism, anal sex, and group sex and to have a larger number of sexual partners than average. The respondents also appeared to be supportive of same-​sex sexual contact, with a slight majority of female respondents identifying as bisexual.18 The indication that U.S. Thelemites largely condone nonheteronormative expressions of gender and sexuality is supported by USGL policy decisions. Sabazius X°, National Grand Master of OTO in the United States, vocally supported same-​sex marriage in a blog post from 2008, affirming EGC’s commitment to officiate and recognize same-​sex marriages, regardless of state policy.19 The USGL’s nondiscrimination policy was amended in 2015 to include prohibition of discrimination on the basis of sexual identity in addition to previously stipulated categories of race, ethnicity, sex, and sexual orientation.20 A policy memorandum issued by Sabazius X° on June 19, 2017, outlining styles of address for officers of EGC, explicitly stipulates that individuals identifying as nonbinary may use the nongendered title “Sibling,” instead of the conventional “Brother” or “Sister” (or the Latinized Frater/​ Soror).21 While official policy may not always reflect lived practice, this stipulation indicates active and ongoing discussions regarding gender and sexual identity in the contemporary OTO, and my own observations support the impression that Thelemites are generally welcoming of a wide variety of sexual and gendered identities and practices. Unlike many forms of alternative spirituality, the contemporary OTO (at least in the United States) does not appear to be numerically female-​dominated. Chappell notes a gender distribution of 58 percent male and 42 percent female respondents to his survey, observing that this reflected the gender distribution of the 194 attendees at the conference during which his questionnaire was distributed.22 I made similar observations during my fieldwork.23 Although the localized nature of these observations renders their broader applicability dubious, they may give some indication of the gender distribution of OTO in the United States. All of my interviewees view divinity as multifaceted. Many Thelemites, like esotericists in general, maintain altars in their homes that may be devoted to specific deities or traditions. While some of those I have spoken to self-​identify as atheists, viewing deities as metaphors for psychological or natural concepts, others are hardline theists who ascribe ontological independence to deities. Many appear to fall somewhere in between, engaging with deities as other-​than-​ human persons, while reserving judgment regarding their literal existence as ontologically independent entities.24

Intermezzo  199

Gender in Contemporary Occultism and Thelema A significant theme in the contemporary Babalon discourse is critique of androcentrism and misogyny in esotericism historically, and a recognition of the scarcity of female authors in the literary “canon” of modern occultism. While foreshadowed in earlier writings, this mirrors broader changes in the esoteric and Neopagan milieus over the last few decades, which have witnessed increasing discussion of gender and sexuality. The interrelation of Neopaganism with second-​wave feminism is well attested in scholarship.25 From the 1990s onward, Neopagans have increasingly also critiqued the magical concept of gender polarity, producing interpretations of theology and practice that are inclusive of LGBTQ experience.26 Similarly, several other prominent occult authors have challenged concepts of gender polarity, highlighted sexism in older forms of occultism, and discussed LGBTQ issues in magic.27 Feminist and queer thought appears to have influenced the Thelemic milieu sensu stricto, in which critical gender debate has been ongoing since at least the 1990s. The year 1996 witnessed the first Thelemic Women’s Conference, with additional conferences devoted to women and the divine feminine in Thelema held in 2006 in Las Vegas; in 2008 in Sacramento (“Mystics, Mothers, and Magicians: Women and Goddesses of OTO”); and in 2016 in Minneapolis (“OTO Women’s Symposium:  Ladies of Force and Fire”), where topics discussed included sexism and sexual harassment, women’s history, gender, and feminism. Moreover, there have been a number of emic publications highlighting issues of gender in Thelema.28 I have encountered several other initiatives aimed at promoting Thelemic women’s voices, including discussion groups for female-​identified Thelemites and the Stooping Starlight podcast, which was curated, written, and spoken exclusively by women.29 Recent years have witnessed some debate regarding binary gender constructs and LGBTQ issues in Thelema.30 The increasing attention to issues of gender and sexuality, and the experiences of women and LGBTQ persons, can also be seen within the Babalon discourse, as will be seen in subsequent chapters.

Notes 1. Communication with OTO’s International Headquarters, 5 April, 2017. 2. For an emic review of OTO’s history from the aftermaths of Germer’s death until the election of Breeze as OHO, see Wasserman, Center. 3. “Annual Report of the United States Grand Lodge of Ordo Templi Orientis. Fiscal Year 2016 E.v.,” OTO USA, July 28, 2017, http://​oto-​usa.org/​static/​usgl_​annual_​report_​Vii. pdf?x87021.

200  The Eloquent Blood 4. “Annual Report . . . Fiscal Year 2016 E.v..” For an overview of the early OTO’s degree system, see Crowley, Manifesto of the M∴M∴M∴. 5. Crowley, “Liber XV.” 6. The historical roots of EGC and the Mass are reviewed in c­ hapter 4 of this volume under “Cup, Grail, and Eucharist.” Ecclesia Gnostica Catholica existed between 1979 and 1985 as an autonomous religious nonprofit, but was reintegrated into OTO by Hymenaeus Beta. Sabazius X°, Mystery of Mystery: A Primer of Thelemic Ecclesiastical Gnosticism, 2nd ed. (Berkeley, CA: Conjoined Creation, 2014), 12–​13. 7. There is no academic, “outsider” account of A∴A∴’s development from 1907 until the present. The curious reader is referred to the various “insider” histories in existence. See, e.g., Wasserman, Center. 8. Starr, Unknown, 247, 366. 9. Asprem, “Contemporary.” 10. See, e.g., Bogdan, Western; Hutton, Triumph. For discussions of the reciprocal influence between historical and contemporary esotericism and Neopaganism, see, e.g., Tanya M. Luhrmann, Persuasions of the Witch’s Craft:  Ritual Magic and Witchcraft in Present-​Day England (Oxford:  Basil Blackwell, 1988); Hanegraaff, New, 85–​87; Granholm, Dark, 149–​156; Graham Harvey, “Contemporary Paganism and the Occult,” in The Occult World, ed. Christopher Partridge (Abingdon, Oxon.; New York: Routledge, 2015), 361–​371. 11. Overviews of Neopagan values can be found in, e.g., Helen A. Berger, Evan A. Leach, and Leigh S. Shaffer, eds., Voices from the Pagan Census: A National Survey of Witches and Neo-​Pagans in the US (Columbia: University of South Carolina, 2003); Sarah M. Pike, Earthly Bodies, Magical Selves: Contemporary Pagans and the Search for Community (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2001); Jone Salomonsen, Enchanted Feminism: Ritual, Gender and Divinity among the Reclaiming Witches of San Francisco (London; New York: Routledge, 2002); Hutton, Triumph. 12. See, e.g., Shoshanah Feher, “Who Looks to the Stars? Astrology and Its Constituency,” Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 31, no. 1 (1992): 89; Danny L. Jorgensen and Scott E. Russell, “American Neopaganism: The Participants’ Social Identities,” Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 38, no. 3 (1999): 325–​338; David Green, “What Men Want? Initial Thoughts on the Male Goddess Movement,” Religion and Gender 2, no. 2 (2012): 305–​327; Berger et al., Voices from the Pagan Census, 30; Jeffrey Kaplan, “The Reconstruction of the Ásatrú and Odinist Traditions,” in Magical Religion and Modern Witchcraft, ed. James R. Lewis (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1996), 193–​236. 13. Chappell, “Sexual Attitudes”; Claudia Kowalchyk, “A Study of Two ‘Deviant’ Religious Groups: The Assemblies of God and the Ordo Templi Orientis,” (PhD diss., New York University, 1994). 14. See, e.g., Owen, Place. 15. Cf. Finley et  al., “Introduction”; Beverley Skeggs, Formations of Class and Gender: Becoming Respectable (London: Sage, 1997). 16. Similar findings have been made among other Neopagan and esoteric groups; see, e.g., Kennet Granholm, Dark Enlightenment:  The Historical, Sociological,

Intermezzo  201 and Discursive Contexts of Contemporary Esoteric Magic (Leiden; Boston:  Brill, 2014), 107–​ 108; 197–​ 198; Egil Asprem and Kennet Granholm, “Constructing Esotericisms:  Sociological, Historical and Critical Approaches to the Invention of Tradition,” in Contemporary Esotericism, ed. Egil Asprem and Kennet Granholm (Abingdon, Oxon.: Routledge, 2014), 25–​48; Hutton, Witches, 280–​281; Pike, Earthly, 132–​134; Hutton, Triumph, 402. 17. Berger et al., Voices, 28, 53–​81, 142–​143; Hutton, Triumph, 404–​405; Pike, Earthly, 237. This is congruent with findings regarding contemporary Satanists. Asbjørn Dyrendal, Jesper Aa. Petersen, and James R. Lewis, The Invention of Satanism (New York: Oxford University Press, 2015), 160–​161. 18. Vere Chappell, “Sexual Attitudes and Behavior among Members of Ordo Templi Orientis,” unpublished thesis submitted to the Institute for Advanced Study of Human Sexuality, 2006. 19. Sabazius’s statement was a response to Proposition 8, an amendment to the California constitution passed in November 2008, stipulating that only heterosexual marriages should be recognized. Sabazius referred to the policy as “an act of bigotry and oppression.” Sabazius X°, “Same-​Sex Marriage,” Sabazius-​X, November 9, 2008, http://​ sabazius-​ x.livejournal.com/​ 12249.html (accessed September 10, 2017 through https://​web-​beta.archive.org). 20. “Change to Non-​Discrimination Policy,” OTO USGL, January 12, 2015, http://​oto-​ usa.org/​2015/​01/​change-​to-​non-​discrimination-​policy/​. 21. “Honorific Styles of Address for E.G.C. Clergy,” OTO USGL, http://​admin.oto-​usa. org/​styles-​of-​address-​egc (accessed September 10,  2017). 22. Chappell, “Sexual Attitudes.” 23. Between 2014 and 2015, I counted the gender distribution at 31 Thelemic events, most organized by OTO, where an average of 36 percent of attendees were women. 24. A similar position is expressed in Crowley, “Liber O.” 25. E.g., Salomonsen, Enchanted; Hutton, Triumph; Pike, Earthly. 26. E.g., Starhawk, The Spiral Dance:  A Rebirth of the Ancient Religion of the Great Goddess (20th Anniversary Edition) (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 1999), 20; Lynna Landstreet, “Alternate Currents: Revisioning Polarity. Or, What’s a Nice Dyke like You Doing in a Polarity-​Based Tradition like This?” Wild Ideas, 1999 [1993], http://​ www.wildideas.net/​temple/​library/​altcurrents.html (accessed September 11, 2017); Storm Faerywolf, “The Queer Craft: Rethinking Magickal Polarity,” Faerywolf.com, 2000, http://​www.faerywolf.com/​queer-​craft/​(accessed September 11, 2017); Sara Thompson, Gina Pond, Philip Tanner, Calyxa Omphalos, and Jacobo Polanshek, eds., Gender and Transgender in Modern Paganism (Cupertino, CA: Circle of Cerridwen Press, 2012). 27. E.g., Phil Hine, “Some Musings on Polarity,” PhilHine.org, 1989, http://​www.philhine. org.uk/​ writings/​ flsh_​ polarity.html (accessed September 11, 2017); Katon Shual, Sexual Magick (Oxford: Mandrake of Oxford, 1995), 40–​44, 76–​97; Julie Hayes Leeds, “Woman to Woman,” in Katon Shual, Sexual Magick (Oxford: Mandrake of Oxford, 1995), 110–​111. See also Donald Michael Kraig, Modern Sex Magick: Secrets of Erotic Spirituality (St. Paul, MN: Llewellyn, 1998), 200.

202  The Eloquent Blood 28. Brandy Williams, “Feminist Thelema,” in Beauty and Strength:  Proceedings of the Sixth Biennial National Ordo Templi Orientis Conference (Riverside, CA:  Ordo Templi Orientis, 2009), 161–​ 185; Brandy Williams, ed., Women’s Voices in Magic (Stafford:  Megalithica Books, 2009); Brandy Williams, The Woman Magician:  Revisioning Western Metaphysics from a Woman’s Perspective and Experience (Woodbury, MN:  Llewellyn, 2011); Mishlen Linden, ed., The Faces of Babalon:  Being a Compilation of Women’s Voices (Logan:  Black Moon Publishing, 2008); Mishlen Linden and Linda Falorio, eds., Women of Babalon:  A Howling of Women’s Voices (Logan: Black Moon Publishing, 2015). 29. Stooping Starlight was launched in 2015, but it appears to have been discontinued. 30. This includes discussion surrounding OTO’s Gnostic Mass policy, which calls for a female-​identified priestess and a male-​identified priest in so-​called public masses, i.e., those that are open to noninitiates. E.g., Michael Effertz, Priest/​ess: In Advocacy of Queer Gnostic Mass (West Hollywood, CA: Luxor Media Group LLC, 2013). I have analyzed this debate in Manon Hedenborg White, “To Him the Winged Secret Flame, to Her the Stooping Starlight,” Pomegranate:  The International Journal of Pagan Studies 15, no. 1–​2 (2013): 102–​121.

8

“It All Goes in the Cup” Receptivity and Unstable Polarities in the Contemporary Babalon Discourse

Babalon’s receptivity is a prevalent theme in Aleister Crowley’s writings, and a recurrent yet contested idea in my contemporary source material.1 Thus, the principal purpose of this chapter is to analyze how contemporary occultists engage with the concept of receptivity in relation to Babalon and the Scarlet Woman and how this relates to hegemonic notions of femininity. A central question for this chapter is if and how contemporary esotericists gender Babalon’s receptivity and whether or not it is articulated as part of a dynamic of gender polarity. In analyzing the articulation of this theme, I have paid attention not only to parts of the material in which the exact term “receptivity” is used but also to how related notions of vulnerability, openness, and pregnability are negotiated. Babalon is articulated as the passive or receptive half of a gender polarity with active masculinity in the writings and thought of Thelemic author J.  Edward Cornelius (b. 1951). Cornelius developed an interest in Crowley in the late 1960s. Together with Marlene E. Cornelius, he has produced a number of Thelemic writings, including the periodical publication Red Flame: A Thelemic Research Journal, first issued in 1994. Volume 7 of Red Flame includes a number of essays, or epistles, in which Cornelius outlines his conceptualization of Babalon. In Cornelius’s writings, the term “Babalon” is frequently used to refer to the feminine principle in magic, and its corresponding female sex magical role, which is characterized as receptive. He articulates opposite and complementary roles for men and women in sexual magic, rooted in biology, and relates this to his interpretation of the magical formula ON.2 In Cornelius’s interpretation, the letters O and N signify the union of male and female energies, or “Babalon and the Beast conjoined,” with O representing the male formula of Abrahadabra and N representing the female formula of Babalon.3 Cornelius’s interpretation of ON has practical consequences in that he links it to the initiatory pathways and modes of sex magical interaction he posits for male and female magicians. When invoking the Holy Guardian Angel, Cornelius writes, male and female magicians both employ the masculine and feminine formulae of Abrahadabra and Babalon simultaneously, but during a sex magical operation men and women manifest The Eloquent Blood: The Goddess Babalon and the Construction of Femininities in Western Esotericism. Manon Hedenborg White, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780190065027.001.0001

204  The Eloquent Blood the formulas separately, the man representing O through Abrahadabra and the woman embodying N as Babalon. In concrete terms, this means that the man supplies the “Bud-​Will” or active magical intent of the operation, while the woman embodies the receptive “nourishing capacity” that enables the magical intention to flourish.4 In other words, Cornelius asserts that men and women work sexual magic in opposite ways.5 According to Cornelius, this is the reason for Crowley’s insistence that the female ritual partner should be unaware of the aim of a sex magical working, as knowledge on her part of the goal of the operation would interfere with the ascending magical currents.6 While Cornelius views it as possible for men to work the female formula both internally and on the material plane, he writes that women can only work the male formula inwardly. In more prosaic terms, this suggests that men can willingly choose to assume a receptive or “feminine” role in sexual magic, while women cannot conversely choose to embody an active or “masculine” role. This, Cornelius explains, is because the male formula is equivalent to speech, word, or manifestation, which on the material plane corresponds with semen.7 Thus, in his view, the feminine role in magic—​identified with Babalon—​is partly conceptualized in terms of absence. Women are unable to work magic in certain ways due to their lack of semen.8 Cornelius also applies a gendered model of magic to the A∴A∴ system, arguing that its conventional structure is not neutral but designed for male initiates. Cornelius asserts that the great disparities between men and women in regards to their “body, mind and psyche” means that women should explore initiation differently.9 While Crowley did not appear to feel the need to defend his assertions of essential gender difference, it is interesting to note an apparent discursive shift within the Thelemic milieu. Tellingly, in Red Flame 7 (1999), Cornelius prefaces his exposition on Babalon’s situation on the Tree of Life by humorously entreating female readers to hear him out before burning his writings, suggesting he has previously received critique for his ideas or that he is aware of a dissonance between his own views and attitudes held by many female magicians.10 It is also significant that Cornelius uses his gender polarity framework to argue for the necessity of more writing on female initiates’ experiences with magic and the Babalon formula. He stresses the necessity of magical training for women, arguing that women should stop following in men’s footsteps and instead thoroughly explore sexual magic and initiation from their own viewpoints, carving their own paths for other women to follow.11 Erica M Cornelius similarly relates Babalon to an inherently feminine role in magic, defining the role of a Scarlet Woman as “a Thelemic priestess whose function is to generate Power within a magickal coupling.”12 She challenges Crowley’s understanding of women’s roles in sexual magic, stressing that men and women are equally important as magicians, and that each serves only their personal

“It All Goes in the Cup”  205 will.13 When I interviewed Erica in 2014, she underlined the need for further exploration of sexual magic from a female perspective, contending: Where women do the processes and we try to flesh out how a woman does it, because it really isn’t written anywhere. I mean, you would be hard pressed to find anything written about female mysteries . . . Crowley, he just didn’t think women really needed to know . . . [laughs].14

The necessity of more women recording their experiences with sexual magic is, in Erica’s wording, associated with her articulation of feminine difference. As women and men experience and do magic differently, men’s narratives cannot be taken as universally applicable. Femininity is thus construed as different from, albeit equal in value to, masculinity. Like J. Edward Cornelius, Erica M Cornelius emphasizes female and male magicians as distinct in their roles, in congruence with the male–​active, female–​receptive dichotomy. In an essay, she writes that the principal nature of woman is “to limit or enclose,” regardless of “gender identity or sexual orientation.”15 During our conversation in 2014, she similarly stressed that men and women are equal in importance but distinct in roles, and that this is a matter of biology rather than orientation or sexual identity: [I]‌f a male has an orgasm, then his libido drops. Because, basically, the energy has just gone directly down the left side of the Tree [of Life] and earthed into Malkuth, so it’s gone. But for a female it’s the opposite, it only energizes her more. . . . I think that’s true irrespective of one’s gender identity or gender—​ what people perceive or how they perceive you, or how you can perceive yourself. It doesn’t really matter for those purposes. It matters a great deal for other purposes. I would never say, like: “Oops, sorry, you’re just a woman,” or something to somebody who’s maybe female-​formed but doesn’t identify that way. I don’t see that as a woman. But for these [sex magical] purposes they’re female. That’s something they don’t like to hear, in my experience [laughs]. But that’s my view.16

Erica construes female sexuality as essentially different from male ditto. She distinguishes between the practice of sexual magic and other forms of social interaction. Whereas she acknowledges the validity of transgender experience and sees a person’s identified gender as paramount in other social situations, she construes sex magical role division as a matter of birth-​assigned sex, suggesting that the congenital morphology and hormonal constitution of the physical body is essential to the sex magical role one is able to assume. Interestingly, Erica concurs that people “don’t like to hear” that men and women, for biological reasons, function differently in operations of sexual magic, and she makes

206  The Eloquent Blood similar inferences in her written work. Discussing the different roles of men and women in an essay, she reasons: We women act as the receptive partner due to the nature of our vehicle. There is no moral value attached. Thus if we find ourselves taking it personally, that only indicates that we have important and promising work to do regarding our karmic baggage. (Remember, you can always pick a male vessel next time if that is important to you.)17

Similar to J.  Edward Cornelius’s request to female readers not to dismiss his ideas, Erica suggests some may take offense at the notion of women as inherently receptive. These statements appear to indicate a perception of resistance toward the conceptualization of receptive or passive femininity in contrast to active masculinity within the Thelemic milieu, suggesting a potential shift in the Babalon discourse. While Erica argues in favor of a gendered model of sexual magic where male and female roles are determined by biology, she too employs this model to argue for women’s significance as magical practitioners, contending that women—​by virtue of their difference from men—​will make unique contributions to the development of magical knowledge. During our conversation, she stressed biological feminine difference as the reason why there needs to be more writing and discussion on women’s roles and experiences as sexual magicians: I see this a lot too, that some women want to deny that we’re different from men, so that anything where we’re saying we’re different is actually downplayed and kind of bashed. . . . Just like in the feminist movement, there’s been both threads, there’s been people saying we need to value women’s stuff: care, nurture, things like that. . . . But there’s also been lots of people saying basically that men and women are the same; that it’s a load of crap, that there’s no difference. And for certain purposes that may make no difference at all, but for sex magic that would be devastating. It would basically stop all lines of research, as far as I’m concerned, so I hope it doesn’t go that way.18

Above, Erica highlights disparities between different branches of feminist thought with regards to the perception of femininity, seemingly taking a critical stance toward notions of masculinity and femininity as completely socially constructed. Instead, she aligns herself more closely with feminist thinkers who have insisted on essential notions of feminine difference. Due to Erica’s belief that men and women work magic in profoundly different ways, she contends that women will contribute fundamentally to the spiritual knowledge of the new aeon by working the magical formula of Babalon externally.19 The preceding

“It All Goes in the Cup”  207 quote indicates Erica’s awareness of a broader debate within the Thelemic milieu in which different understandings of femininity and gender are negotiated and contested. J. Edward and Erica M Cornelius’s understanding of sexual magic is predicated on notions of biological gender complementarity, wherein masculinity and femininity are construed as ontological polar opposites. Rooted in a characteristically esoteric attitude of “as above, so below,” this metaphysical gender complementarity is mapped onto the macrocosmic level of divinity as well as the microcosm of the individual human psyche, understood as a reflection of the Tree of Life. Furthermore, on an interpersonal level, the interaction of these opposite-​gendered principles are enacted between a male and female magician in sexual magic. In the reasoning of the Corneliuses, the concepts of Babalon and the Scarlet Woman are thus related to a model of initiation and sexual magic that is rooted in irreducible, biological sexual difference, where masculine and feminine are constructed as essentially different, and the masculine is seen as gendered rather than universal. The model of sexual difference offered in J. Edward Cornelius’s early writings suggests that the feminine role in sexual magic is predicated on women’s lack of semen. However, both Corneliuses encourage sex magical training for women, albeit of a different kind than that recommended for men, and stress that men and women as magicians serve their own will rather than that of another. In critiquing the idea of a male magical path as universal, the Corneliuses articulate femininity as not exclusively defined by masculinity. Thus, Babalonian receptivity is not construed simply as passivity in the sense of nonagency but as something requiring “power and labor.”20

Open Circulation: Babalon beyond Passivity and Birth-​Assigned Sex Another occult author who has sought to explore and describe initiation, sexual magic, and Babalon from the perspective of a Scarlet Woman is esoteric author and practitioner Soror Syrinx. Together with Paul Rovelli, Syrinx is the cofounder of the Gnostic Church of LVX, which combines Thelema with other esoteric currents. Syrinx has authored a number of self-​published books on magic, many of which focus on initiation from a female point of view. Her written works are often practical in orientation, providing instructions and exercises for magical ritual. The concepts of Babalon and the Scarlet Woman are explored in several of Syrinx’s books. Soror Syrinx tends to emphasize the Scarlet Woman as a concrete role taken by human magicians, rather than Babalon as a more abstract goddess. In Syrinx’s writings, Babalon is defined as one who strives “to birth the new aeon and establish Thelema on earth.”21 She thus connects the role both to a

208  The Eloquent Blood broader spiritual vision and to a concrete function in magic and sexual magic. An important aspect of her conceptualization of Babalon and the Scarlet Woman is syzygy, a heterosexual magical pairing in which the male and female parties complement each other’s strengths and functions. According to Syrinx, the role of Scarlet Woman can be assumed by any woman working within a magical couple in which she strives to “manifest the Will of her partner.”22 This statement assumes a gender polar structure wherein femininity, epitomized by the Scarlet Woman, is associated with receiving and manifesting the will of the (presumably male) partner. Indeed, Syrinx writes that the Scarlet Woman “heals the soul of Man and brings form to his Will,” reintegrating the spirit of the Goddess into the magical community and society.23 Referring to Crowley’s succession of Scarlet Women, she indicates a number of roles and ways in which the Scarlet Woman can “serve” her Beast as oracle, seer, medium, and muse, thus complementing his abilities. She connects femininity to intuition, writing: “[w]‌here he was the rational, she was the subconscious . . . yet they were also opposite poles when performing sex magick.”24 However, Syrinx’s conceptualization of polarity is ambivalent. She also writes that it is up to the Scarlet Woman whether she prefers to tread her own path or to “take turns” with her partner in bringing about each other’s wills through sexual magic.25 Thus, these differences in roles appear not so much to be rooted in irreducible biological difference as in an understanding of polarity or complementarity as essential to sexual magic. Significantly, Syrinx writes that a Scarlet Woman can be male or female, straight or gay.26 Syrinx asserts that sexual polarity is the prerequisite for all of existence.27 She draws on notions of the male–​female and active–​receptive dichotomies in explicating the role of Babalon and the Scarlet Woman and references J. Edward Cornelius’s concept of Babalon as the receptive, feminine half of the ON formula.28 In one of Syrinx’s works, she includes the script for Aleister Crowley’s Star Ruby ritual, with explanatory parentheses translating or commenting on its more obscure components. In the invocation of the deities Therion, Nuit, Babalon, and Hadit at the four cardinal points, Syrinx writes that Therion and Hadit represent “active” energy, whereas Nuit and Babalon represent “passive” energy.29 These statements infer an understanding of femininity as inherently passive or receptive that appears to mirror that of the Corneliuses. The male–​female and active–​passive dichotomies are, however, ambiguously constructed in Syrinx’s writings. She contends that the male genitals are positively charged whereas the female genitals are negatively charged, but that women’s minds are positive and men’s negative. Thus, the Scarlet Woman is not conceptualized simply as a shrine for the male magician’s intent in Syrinx’s work, but she is viewed as an active participant who cooperates with her male counterpart in directing energy. In her instructions for a sex magical operation, Syrinx describes how the male and female ritual practitioners circulate energy

“It All Goes in the Cup”  209 like an electrical current from the male genitalia to the female, up the woman’s spine to her third eye, back into the male and down his body into his phallus.30 Thus, both parties are construed as equally involved in directing the flow of the magical current, indicating that she does not understand feminine receptivity as passivity in the sense of inaction. Syrinx destabilizes the association between physical sex and polarity-​based roles by writing that the sex magical exercises she recommends can equally well be used by same-​sex couples.31 While Syrinx asserts that the polarity rituals she describes can be utilized by same-​sex couples, her ritual scripts are written from the viewpoint of a heterosexual pairing. Among other things, Syrinx outlines what she presents as an adaptation of OTO’s VII°. She describes this degree as being originally written for men and centering on “solar-​phallic worship” but suggests it can be adapted and embraced by female practitioners, who can picture their wombs as “a shrine to the sun,” the latter being identified with the phallus.32 In Syrinx’s ritual, the Scarlet Woman as the moon proclaims her love and devotion to the sun, offering her womb to the phallus as a temple. This seemingly implies a view of the feminine role as receptive. However, as noted in the preceding discussion, receptivity in Syrinx’s writings does not denote nonagency, as she instructs the female practitioner to bring the energy from her womb to her “mind’s eye,” projecting it to the male, who subsequently brings it down his spine in a constant cycle. The couple then both focus on a chosen symbol at the point of of orgasm.33 The ritual described by Syrinx, as paraphrased here, engages ambivalently with the male–​active, female–​receptive conceptualization of polarity. Clearly, Syrinx does not concur with the view that the Scarlet Woman should be kept ignorant of the objective of a sex magical working, and sees her role as comprising both reception and active manipulation of the energetic current. There are parallels between Syrinx’s and the Corneliuses’ reasoning in that receptivity is not construed as complete passivity but as an agential modality requiring “power and labor.”34 While it could be argued that Syrinx’s ritual hinges on an identification of femininity as absence of masculinity (specifically of the phallus), her written works, which focus on elaborating magical practice from a feminine viewpoint and are rooted in her personal experiences of magic, negotiate feminine difference as something not reducible to lack. In one of Syrinx’s books, she outlines instructions for a ritual in which a solitary woman magician invokes Babalon and identifies herself with the goddess. The ritual, analyzed in the penultimate chapter of this study, destabilizes the notion that the Scarlet Woman’s receptivity signifies lack of agency. As seen above, both Syrinx and the Corneliuses in different ways address the perceived dearth of magical instruction for female initiates in the history of esotericism, linking Babalon to the production of writing on magic from a feminine perspective. Receptivity and the importance of magical training for female sex

210  The Eloquent Blood magicians were articulated as centrally related to Babalon by Sandra, a female occultist whom I interviewed in 2014. During our talk, Sandra stressed that a key ability for a priestess of Babalon is her propensity for self-​sacrifice: [A]‌good priestess, number one, has to know how to give herself. That’s the sacrifice, and that can be a pretty heavy duty sacrifice. The men are not giving you anything like that. They’re taking you, you’re not taking them. The real gift, the giving of the body, and the giving of the energy, the sharing of the spirit . . . .35

Sandra identifies the ability to surrender as inherently feminine and a key skill for a Scarlet Woman. She appears to some extent to build on a conventional connection of femininity to that which is, so to speak, erotically destroyed, conceptualizing masculinity as the taking and conquering party. Similar to Syrinx, however, Sandra does not see the role of the Scarlet Woman or Babalon as limited to cisgendered women, observing that anyone female-​identified can claim the title: Any woman or transgendered female, who is able to open up, not just between their legs, but her heart and her spirit, who can encompass the person she is with and share that with them. That is the single most important thing that we have to be able to do, in order to be a Babalon. . . . People think Babalon is Babylon—​you know, sodomy and all of that. Western civilization has taken these juxtapositions and created Babalon, and they made her beautiful and gorgeous and sexy. . . . [But] one of the most Babalon-​type women I know is not at all sexy, in any way. But she knows how to work it. And she provides these experiences that change men’s lives forever. And . . . part of what we have to do is to help the change in men. Not just ourselves. With Babalon, that’s the purpose: to change. Through the body. To me, that’s what a Babalon is.

Manon: And changing and teaching men? Sandra: Or other women. . . . It’s not gender-​based, it’s role-​based.36 In the quote, Sandra emphasizes openness and receptivity as central to the role of Babalon. Although construed in erotic terms, Sandra stresses the necessity of spiritually and emotionally embracing and encompassing one’s sexual and magical partner, embodying a position of relationality and sharing. Thus, like Syrinx and the Corneliuses, Sandra does not simply equate receptivity with passivity in the sense of nonagency or passively enshrining the male magician’s intent. Instead, she construes receptivity as something that would appear to require ability, courage, and expertise—​skills that are essential to one’s ability to embody

“It All Goes in the Cup”  211 the magical role of Babalon. During our conversation, Sandra stressed that one cannot hope to undertake effective and complex sexual magic without the help of a trained partner: [Crowley] says things like “you don’t need to have a trained priestess, you can just have a prostitute.” Because all he had were prostitutes. But the truth is, the more trained the woman, the farther the man can go. And so it’s in the best interest of both the man and the woman to be as trained as possible, and to do the work together as long as possible, and get into it as deeply as possible. And then continue. . . . You have to have a priest who is as good as you are, and you have to be good enough to be able to do it, too. You cannot get a date or a prostitute or someone off the street who knows nothing, forget it. Forget it. Maybe for fun, for creating sigils, but with any higher magic you have to have someone who’s as skilled as you are.37

This assertion can be read as a critique of the ways in which some male magicians, historically, have performed sexual magic with unwitting female partners, or of the notion that it is beneficial for the female sex-​magical participant to be unaware of the objective of a working. Congruently, Sandra emphasizes the necessity of magical training for female magicians. Significantly, both Sandra and Syrinx part ways with the Corneliuses in stressing the role of the Scarlet Woman—​or Babalon—​as one that is not limited to cisgendered women. During our conversation, Sandra repeatedly returned to transgender issues, and—​although Syrinx’s writings analyzed herein are written from the perspective of a woman working with a male partner—​her assertion that the Scarlet Woman’s role can be enacted within any magical pairing evinces an awareness of, and attempt at accommodating, queer and transgendered experience.

Receptivity as Openness? Changing Perceptions of Femininity in the Babalon Discourse Several of the interpretations of Babalon, sexual magic, and femininity discussed so far affirm the connection between receptivity and femininity. In the words of these occult authors and practitioners, however, receptivity is not reducible to a lack of action but denotes specific forms of agency that challenge a stereotypical dichotomy of activity and passivity. Other contemporary practitioners and writers have formulated more direct critiques of the equation of femininity with receptivity. Sophie, a longtime EGC priestess, OTO member, and former body master whom I interviewed in 2014, construes Babalon as inherently connected

212  The Eloquent Blood to femininity. Stressing that this is a matter of “fundamental nature” rather than birth-​assigned sex, Sophie articulates Babalon’s femininity in a way that is inclusive of transgender experience. However, she contended that the categorization of male energy as active and female energy as receptive is “a misnomer, because the female energy is actively receptive, which makes it not receptive at all.”38 This statement highlights Sophie’s distinction between receptivity and passivity as well as the seeming implication that receptivity precludes activity. However, a central theme in Sophie’s conceptualization of the goddess is instead nonjudgment, in the sense that Babalon’s cup absorbs everything without discrimination. Sophie emphasizes this function as something that is related to creation: What does it mean when the blood of all the saints goes into that cup. . . . It’s a form of creation. . . . I guess you start talking about reincarnation from that standpoint. Because everything that goes in there can be reborn. But at the moment it’s a big primordial soup in there, there’s no more value to one thing than to another.39

In this statement, Sophie emphasizes the image of Babalon’s cup that swallows everything without distinction. Sophie construes its absorbing power as inherently intertwined with creation. She continues to articulate the idea of nondiscrimination in relation to the goddess, focusing on sexuality and magical roles: I have encountered many initiates—​female initiates—​especially early on, who say: “I want to be the Scarlet Woman.” . . . And I say: “No, you want to be the temple whore. You don’t want to be the Scarlet Woman.” Take the most disgusting, horrible thing you could possibly think of—​are you okay with that? It makes no difference with Babalon. Whether we’re talking about energy or we’re talking about the sex act, it makes absolutely no difference. How far are you willing to go? Because it has to mean nothing to you, one way or another.40

Sophie attests to what she feels is a common misperception among newer female initiates, who may be attracted to the overtly sexual aspects of Babalon without understanding her mystical connotations of nondiscrimination. In her emphasis on nonjudgment, Sophie engages with a notion of nondiscriminating engagement with all of existence, which implies immersion in that which one may find objectionable and repellent. Thus, although Sophie does not explicitly state that this is a question of receptivity, her emphasis on the nondiscriminating openness of Babalon has parallels to the ways in which theorists such as Margrit Shildrick have intertwined openness or vulnerability with the realm of the abject, arguing that an affirmation of the former entails engagement with the latter.41 Sophie relates the idea of vulnerability to the role of the priestess in the Gnostic

“It All Goes in the Cup”  213 Mass, stating: “You’re vulnerable every way you can be. You’re energetically wide open.”42 In explicating the meaning of the Babalon current, occult author Linda Falorio emphasizes nonjudgment, in the sense of openness and sensual surrender to experience. She links Babalon to a particular attitude toward existence rather than physical sex or gender, writing that walking the path of Babalon means experiencing “existence as pure sensation,” without judgment, surrendering completely to “sensations of pleasure and desire” toward all experiences, unafraid of losing one’s self in the process. She underlines the need for the representative of Babalon to be able to channel “unconditional love” for all of creation and be “yielding to desire,” while remaining independent, empowered, and sovereign. Falorio thus continues some of the core themes in the historical source material by construing Babalon as indexical of that which is erotically destroyed but simultaneously autonomous. Falorio lauds ego abandonment through the ecstatic dissolution of the boundaries between self and other, emphasizing this as a modality that one can embody regardless of sex. There are strong parallels between Falorio’s articulation of the (non-​gender specific) role of Babalon and Cvetkovich’s notions of the femme’s receptive power as inherent to her “capacity to embrace the world, to be open to the touch of things material and immaterial” and “live inside the body,” as well as to Ulrika Dahl’s explication of femme vulnerability as indicating “the difficulty and persistence of . . . openness.”43 In stressing Babalon as a feminized positionality open to all, Falorio’s essay construes both femininity and agency beyond rigid dichotomies of activity and passivity. Gender polarity is explicitly critiqued by Peter Grey, author of the book The Red Goddess (2007), which centers on Babalon. The book’s release marked the foundation of the occult publishing house Scarlet Imprint by Grey and his partner, Alkistis Dimech.44 When I interviewed Grey in 2016, he underlined: [T]‌he core problem for me is the mistake at the heart of the sex magical teachings, which is the idea that the sperm is the creative principle and nothing else is. And that’s gone into the DNA of the whole system, and that’s wrong. It’s just fundamentally wrong. Aleister had it wrong. . . . His conception is entirely based on the primacy of the will of the male magician, or the male magician’s thinking. But when you look at the church fathers, and you look at Genesis and the watchers. It’s all about the woman’s thinking. It has nothing to do with the man. 45

Grey critiques Crowley’s emphasis on the male will in sexual magic and the understanding of women as lacking a creative magical potential equated with semen. Instead, he underlines the centrality of feminine will in sexual magic. In The Red Goddess, Grey similarly rejects the idea that women are passive

214  The Eloquent Blood in magical work, separating polarity from biological sex and writing:  “Fuck gender. We are all lunar or solar, depending on our intent.”46 Thus, Grey contests the idea that women or men can simplistically be relegated to certain magical roles due to their biological composition. Astutely, he observes that historical polytheism offers just as many moon gods and sun goddesses as the opposite. Grey conceptualizes Aleister Crowley’s sexual encounter with Victor Neuburg on the mountain in Algeria—​when Crowley acted as the receptive party in an act of anal intercourse—​as a sacrifice to Babalon, writing: “The goddess does not care for gender.”47 However, as I will explore more thoroughly in ­chapters 10–​11, both Grey and Dimech place a strong emphasis on receptivity in the sense of passionate, ecstatic, and embodied engagement with experience, although they do not posit this as a modality specific only to feminine Babalon devotees. Critique of the idea of receptive or passive femininity in contrast to active masculinity is voiced by Amodali, a British occult artist, musician, and author. Between 1990 and 2000, Amodali was engaged with the “Mother Destruction” project, which comprised musical recordings and performance art, wherein Amodali explored the Babalon current, sexual trance states, and female subtle anatomy. The project was part of Amodali’s ongoing endeavor to elaborate what she refers to as the “Body of Babalon,” which she identifies with the esoteric body and sexual energy flow of the Babalon priestess. Amodali has developed and reinterpreted Kenneth Grant’s conceptualization of the kalas.48 Significantly, Amodali credits Grant with realizing that the intention of the priestess can fruitfully affect a magical operation.49 I interviewed Amodali in 2016, and during our conversation she explicitly challenged gender polarity, critiquing the notion that women do not play an active role in sexual magic. During our talk, Amodali repudiated the idea that Babalon can only be accessed through traditional conceptions of polarity: I’m really interested in breaking those polarities, ideas about polarity and limited ideas about gender and sexuality. . . . Because it’s such a powerful, complex current, and she’s being pushed into really narrow parameters, really. I want to break her out. . . . My sense, in terms of magical work, is that one starts with a completely open, pansexual awareness. And the Babalon current should be able to express all of that. It encompasses it all so it should be able to express it. But because of the structural imbalances in the magical traditions, it just hasn’t been possible to formulate ideas like that until recently. . . . There’s a wider practice in which you engage all different aspects of your sexuality and your energy and connect to the whole gender spectrum. Because for me, that’s the foundation, that’s absolutely foundational that it has to cover the whole spectrum. . . . And that’s got really lost with all this kind of obsession with the polarities.50

“It All Goes in the Cup”  215 Amodali expresses frustration at how much previous discussion of Babalon has hinged on notions of sexual polarity. In a 2016 essay, she argues that Crowley’s “Liber Cheth” (1911) provides an incomplete account of the formula of union with Babalon, at least from a feminine perspective.51 In Amodali’s view, the text presents this initiatory process as one of pouring blood into a feminine vehicle that passively receives the sacrifice, whereas in actuality the Babalon priestess plays an active and technical role in transmuting the “wine” in Babalon’s grail. Thus, the priestess’s role requires a significant amount of magical training.52 In this essay, Amodali engages with the notion of Babalon’s whoredom as denoting something beyond sexual practice or passive reception: The harlotry of Babalon is a highly complex metaphysical concept that signifies an active process of magical, copulatory engagement with the ALL, rather than one of a simple, passive receptivity. The magical role of cup-​bearer requires a lengthy training process and techniques that deliver active transubstantiation of the “wine.”53

Amodali reads Babalon’s “harlotry” in terms of a sophisticated and active modality of engagement with all of existence. She stresses that this does not entail passive absorption, but also technical aspects that require training, in that the female adept or alchemist must work consciously to transmute the elixirs produced through sexual magic.54 In order to illustrate her position, Amodali compares the Lust card of Crowley’s Thoth Tarot to the Rider-​Waite version of the Strength card. She observes that the latter, in which the woman is depicted closing the mouth of the lion, shows her exercising a “mercurial, magical element of will” and represents “an authoritative role for a female magician.”55 Amodali subsequently cites Crowley’s own commentary to the Thoth Tarot deck, where the Lust card is described as showing “no attempt to direct the course of the operation.”56 For Amodali, this provides a limited understanding of the Babalon formula, and consequently of women’s roles in magic, as it suggests that women do not or should not exercise a deliberate influence. Although she maintains that ego abandonment and erotic openness are integral to the formula of the card, she writes that the magic of Babalon also hinges on a more directed “initiatory intelligence of the female magical will.”57 A blending of the two cards, in which the priestess embodies both erotic frenzy and will, provides a more composite understanding of her role.58 Amodali challenges the gendered dichotomy of active and passive by critiquing previous writing on women’s roles in sexual magic and emphasizing will and intelligence as key aspects of the Babalon priestess. While she critiques the notion of Babalon or the sex magical priestess as merely receptive, her simultaneous underlining of ecstatic openness and ego abandonment subverts

216  The Eloquent Blood perceptions of receptivity as opposed to will, agency, or the ability to exert a directing influence. Thus, in my view, Amodali does not so much disavow Babalon’s receptivity as critique the ways in which sex magical priestesshood has been seen as passive, and she emphasizes “Babalonian,” feminine modalities as equally technically demanding as those posited for the male party in historical writings on sexual magic.

Degendering Polarity? Dialectical Magic beyond Masculine and Feminine Aside from those writers and thinkers who explicitly critique gender polarity or notions of feminine receptivity, several contemporary occultists attribute receptivity to Babalon but deemphasize gender. For instance, Sam, an OTO initiate whom I interviewed in 2014, rejects the notion that metaphysical concepts are essentially masculine or feminine, stating: “I don’t think the biological constituents of an individual affect their capacity to work any particular kind of magic.”59 Instead, he conceptualizes the relationship between Therion and Babalon in terms of “primordial movement and will, and this primordial receptivity to the way things are.”60 He does not view these aspects as essentially gendered but connects them to processes inherent in each being. Sam discusses the relationship between the priest and priestess in the Gnostic Mass, arguing that the priest represents “action and movement” whereas the priestess role entails “understanding, and communicating that action into a coherent role.”61 In Sam’s view, these two positions are not gendered roles but inherent to each individual. Thus, although he emphasizes a form of polarity, he does not construe it in terms of gender. Sam identifies as an atheist and reads Thelemic symbolism through a philosophical framework. He compares the interaction of the priest and priestess in the Gnostic Mass to the philosophy of Immanuel Kant and the latter’s “distinction between spontaneity and receptivity.”62 He says: “[T]‌he idea of receptivity to experience, of sensory consciousness in the world, and also my own will to create, are the two relations between Chaos and Babalon.”63 It is interesting to note how Sam’s association of Babalon with receptivity stresses the latter as a form of engagement with existence and “sensory consciousness in the world” that is not exclusive to either sex. The interpretation of Babalon or the Scarlet Woman as representing a particular way of approaching existence that is not necessarily gender-​specific was also voiced by Frater IAO131, an OTO member whom I interviewed in 2014. IAO131 emphasizes that the Scarlet Woman symbolizes the acceptance of all impressions without denying or distorting any one of them. IAO131 explains: I think the most important aspect of what the Scarlet Woman is, is a symbol of a way of approaching life. Much like Babalon takes everything symbolically into

“It All Goes in the Cup”  217 her cup, the formula of the Scarlet Woman is to accept all impressions, meaning all perceptions, and not denying or trying to distort or avoid any of them. So it’s kind of a formula of acceptance of all things as they are. Which is for both men and women.64

IAO131 expresses a view of Babalon as related to a way of “approaching life” that entails engaging fully with all of existence without attempting to deny or shy away from any experiences. He stresses that this modality is not gender-​specific but can be employed by people regardless of sex. Thus, the symbolic image of Babalon bringing everything into her cup is construed as representative of openness in one’s attitude to life. IAO131 states that Babalon could be seen as symbolic of ecstatic joy or engagement with existence: I think Babalon also can be a symbol of what we sometimes call intoxication, or life intoxication. Which I think specifically refers to the spiritual intoxication that occurs upon some form of gnosis or unfolding of understanding reality, where she’s almost always depicted as some kind of unbridled, uncontrolled force that basically represents the mystic’s energized enthusiasm and engagement with an immersion in life. And the joy that can come from that.65

IAO131 suggests that “Babalonian” modes of being are not limited to a particular physical sex or gender in that the deity is associated with spiritual ecstasy and intoxication. Significantly, IAO131 stresses that these modalities are associated with a form of receptivity, and he contends that the Scarlet Woman formula “refers to a kind of receptive standpoint.” While this is conventionally coded as feminine within Thelema, IAO131 reasons that this is mostly a matter of convenience and pedagogy, as “typically the feminine is understood as receptive.”66 Many of the Thelemites and occultists who deemphasize conventional understandings of biological feminine difference in their interpretations of Babalon appear to conceptualize receptivity more in terms of openness toward existence, nonjudgment, and surrender to ecstasy, rather than passivity as opposed to activity. Thus, receptivity is constructed as synonymous with a way of relating to experience, rather than (passively) receiving the active will of a male magician. A  similar viewpoint is expressed by Henry, a longtime OTO and A∴A∴ member whom I interviewed in 2014. Henry defines Babalon as “the concept of complete and utter receptivity to all experience.”67 Like IAO131, he does not see this mode of being as restricted to a particular sex or gender, stating that it is [a]‌ vailable to every person, in every moment, if they can be with that. . . . Crowley began mythologizing it as the idea of the Whore of Babylon

218  The Eloquent Blood as an archetype of receptivity, including sexual receptivity, but that’s just a tiny piece of the mental attitude that we’re getting at here. The idea of being able to really embrace fully, joyously, rapturously everything that we experience in life. The complement to that, Chaos, or the Beast, is the energetic pursuit of the experience. The desire, the force, the ultimate expressive and projective and active complement to that. The True Will that’s the motive force . . . is in each of us that primal drive, and in each of us the ability to be receptive towards it. That’s . . . Chaos and Babalon.68

In Henry’s view, Babalon and the Beast symbolize aspects of experience, which are inherent in each person. In this quote, Babalon is articulated as synonymous with an ability and willingness to, in Cvetkovich’s words, “embrace the world” and fully embrace all aspects of experience with joy and rapture. Henry highlights that the ascribed sexual receptivity of Babalon is only one part of the puzzle, serving as a metaphor for a broader spiritual way of existing. While Henry does not explicitly critique the notion of sexual polarity or essential gender difference, he articulates Babalon into a model in which the latter concepts are not particularly emphasized, nor are the modalities symbolized by Babalon limited to one sex or gender. Like several of the occultists discussed here, Henry stresses receptivity as something that requires training, and he asserts that the A∴A∴ system is designed to hone the “state of consciousness” that Babalon represents. In a broader sense, Henry claims that receptivity entails disidentifying with the ego and gradually beginning to identify with all of existence, not automatically embracing one’s likes or rejecting one’s dislikes. He says:  “What we’re really talking about is a Tantra of letting the universe experience the ecstasy of existence through us.”69 Thus, receptivity is not conceptualized as a modality that is especially advisable for women, but rather it indicates a model of ecstatic engagement with experience that all adepts should strive to cultivate. Henry’s interpretation of Babalon appears, through the lauding of an ecstatic relationality with existence, as a sacralization of nonbounded subjectivity, challenging the notion of erotic receptivity as inherently feminized or connected to a (negative) vulnerability to attack. Charlotte, a self-​identified Thelemic Buddhist whom I interviewed in 2015, associates Babalon with the idea of ego dissolution and the notion of approaching this process through sexual desire: One of the most efficient ways to approach ego dissolution . . . is to ingrain in ourselves, that sort of dissolution being something sexy, or something that is an outgrowth of a desire. . . . [T]‌hat lust or desire being redirected towards a desire for the absolute, the enlightenment and all these kind of things.70

“It All Goes in the Cup”  219 Charlotte stressed that conceptualizing ego dissolution in erotic terms is highly effective and that “experientially that act of giving one’s ego to the higher” is inherently “an act of love,” and she relates this to the idea of the Scarlet Woman. Although Charlotte is uncertain exactly how to understand the concept of crossing the Abyss—​and whether it is a demarcated process, something one undergoes in every moment, or something that only happens after death—​she nonetheless views Babalon as an effective symbol for relinquishing the ego. Charlotte describes developing a meditative practice of ego-​surrender, which she connects to the symbolism of Babalon’s cup: [O]‌ne of the ways I apply all these teachings to my daily life, is when I find that my ego is giving me a problem. If I get upset over something that’s pointless, that’s just my ego being in the way or something. . . . And so I sort of meditate on the desire to give myself to this goddess, and just let go of my blood, I guess, into her cup and let her drink my blood [laugh] and just not be too worried about that. And it works. It’s a good image for that. I guess there’s a number of ways or deities one could think of to sacrifice one’s ego to at any given moment. Again, it’s not a crossing the Abyss thing, it’s like, “At this moment I’m sacrificing my ego because it’s causing a problem.” And then that allows in the moment after that for my self to be, in a manner of speaking, reborn without that problem. Without that inner obstacle, if that makes sense. . . . It’s like a little tiny death. Maybe it could be called a tiny Abyss-​crossing on some level.71

Although Charlotte relates to the erotic aspects of Babalon, she stressed throughout our conversation that she finds some interpretations of the goddess to be overly focused on sexuality in a literal sense. For instance, she articulates the idea of Babalon’s whoredom as a form of compassion that places her close to the nature of the Buddha: I think oftentimes people view that in almost a mundane sense, like a symbolism of female sexuality in a very mundane sense. Which in our society is probably needed. . . . [But] I like to abstractify this stuff, so the way that sacred whoredom relates to the qualities of Buddha, is that in the nature of a sacred whore there is this all-​accepting compassion. It’s a very accepting form of compassion. So I think that that’s kind of a Buddha nature, in that sense. . . . I guess there’s a sexual aspect there, but there’s also a maternal aspect and I don’t know where the line is exactly, but there’s that acceptance. . . . And in my case I think I  like to perceive that as more maternal because I’m a heterosexual female [laughs] so the sort of female sexual deity thing just doesn’t do it for me in that way. [laughs] If that makes sense. I think it may be helpful for men, or for non-​ exclusively heterosexual women, but it doesn’t touch me in that way [laugh].72

220  The Eloquent Blood It is interesting to note how Charlotte stresses that she, as a heterosexual woman, is less inclined to focus on Babalon’s accepting nature in terms of sexuality. However, Charlotte observes that she, in relationships with men, has sometimes sought to emulate a Babalonian acceptance and openness with regards to her partner: I don’t have a specific practice . . . but I definitely like to take that mind-​set into an interaction with a man I’m close with. Again, that’s sort of like infusing that interaction or sexual interaction with that all-​encompassing love and compassion and acceptance.73

However, Charlotte stresses that Babalon does not exclusively represent gentle nurturance. Charlotte relates Babalon to the concept of dakini in Vajrayana Buddhism, which she describes as “the female principle” within the tradition. Dakinis, in Charlotte’s view, “tend to be on the wrathful side,” and she sees this as congruent with Babalon. She connects the imagery of Babalon’s blood-​filled cup to Buddhist images of female deities who decapitate, and stresses that the wrathful aspect of Babalon is especially pronounced when there needs to be “dropping of the ego”: The more a person resists, the more that hurts. . . . And I think that could be true of a sexual experience as well, an orgasm is an ego dissolution. But even just day-​to-​day, if your ego is wrapped around something, and you need to drop your ego, the more you fight, the more horrible it is. And that’s where wrathful comes in. So if one is fighting that ego dropping, that is when an only mildly wrathful Babalon might become a very scary Babalon.74

Thus, Charlotte connects both all-​accepting compassion and ferocity through Babalon’s association with ego dissolution. Although Charlotte does not principally apply the terminology of receptivity, she nonetheless articulates notions of openness, encompassing, and embracing as essential to the modality of the goddess.

(Re)Active Vulnerability: Receptivity and Agency In this chapter, I have sought to analyze the negotiation of receptivity in the contemporary Babalon discourse. Feminine receptivity occupies an ambivalent position in Crowley’s writings. In some of his sex magical instructions, the role of the priestess is seemingly based on an idea of femininity as lack, and thus her function is to receive the active male intent. Receptivity is thereby articulated as

“It All Goes in the Cup”  221 part of a hegemonic femininity, supporting a hierarchical and complementary relationship between masculinity and femininity. In the context of the A∴A∴ system, however, Babalon’s receptivity is not principally construed as the lack of activity, but rather as a spiritual modality required of all seekers. Thus, femininity is constructed as a positionality that can theoretically be inhabited by male subjects.75 The contemporary Babalon discourse does not merely replicate its historical antecedents. Engaging with earlier interpretations of Babalon, gender, and magic in creative and complex ways, contemporary occultists navigate a tension between occult “tradition” and contemporary concepts of gender. There seems to be an awareness of feminist critiques of essential gender constructs, and a willingness on the part of some of those I have spoken with to integrate their idea of Babalon with social constructivist perspectives on gender. In the contemporary source material, receptivity thus occupies a complex position characterized by tension, where it is variously conceptualized as part of a gender polarity framework and outside of it—​as gendered and nongendered. A prominent theme in the writings and words of the contemporary esotericists who associate Babalon with receptivity is that the latter is distinct from passivity in the sense of nonagency or object status. Instead, receptivity—​whether or not it is construed as feminine—​is repeatedly constructed as requiring skill, and it is associated with openness and the ability to engage with experience. In several instances, this coincides with an explicit critique of the idea of women as magically passive and the affirmation of an authoritative role for female magicians. Feminist theorists have challenged the association of receptivity with femininity, arguing that this restricts women to a socially subordinate and vulnerable role.76 The idealization of receptivity in women has been understood as harmful in that it construes deliberate agency as a masculine trait, and indeed receptivity and associated modalities of openness and vulnerability form part of a hegemonic femininity when articulated in contrast to an idealized, agential masculinity. Directly or indirectly, feminist critique of the association of femininity and receptivity appears to have made an impact in contemporary occult discourse, with Thelemites as well as other Neopagan writers questioning earlier articulations of gender polarity and problematizing the notion of women as naturally receptive.77 It is interesting to note that even some thinkers who view femininity as inherently receptive in relation to active masculinity appear to feel the need to defend and qualify their views, as evinced by the writings and statements of J. Edward and Erica M Cornelius. Whether or not their perceptions are reflective of broader trends in contemporary Thelema, it is noteworthy that the Corneliuses seemingly feel their views are marginalized. This indicates that gender polarity has increasingly become a point of contention in the contemporary esoteric milieu. It also may be related to the influx of feminist and queer

222  The Eloquent Blood thought in contemporary Thelema and esotericism more broadly, perhaps partly through the influence of Neopaganism. This development has produced novel strategies of gender negotiation. Interestingly, a number of practitioners indicate Babalon’s seemingly active propensities as a counterargument to notions of her receptivity. With regards to the material discussed in the preceding sections, it may be warranted to ask a provocative question: What—​in the construction of Babalon as emblematic of a specifically feminine modality of receptivity—​distinguishes these ideas from hegemonic notions of femininity? Parts of the source material indeed reify hegemonic femininity as Babalonian, as evinced by references to femininity as connected to intuition (in contrast to masculine rationality) and the experience of being taken rather than erotically taking. Thus, the Babalon discourse reproduces hegemonic notions of gender by tying receptivity to femininity, whether within or outside of a gender polarity framework. However, it is worth recalling Judith Butler’s and Ulrika Dahl’s related arguments that articulations of feminist and queer emancipation as a departure from receptivity may risk reproducing problematic binaries of agency as antithetical to vulnerability or relationality.78 Inspired by these authors, I wish to call attention to if and how the articulation of feminine receptivity in the Babalon discourse enables new ways of thinking about agency. Significantly, although a number of occult authors and practitioners appear to understand Babalon as receptive, they distinguish receptivity from passivity. Instead, their understanding of receptivity appears to have parallels to Ann Cvetkovich’s understanding of the concept as entailing simultaneous vulnerability and responsiveness, a form of agency that entails both acting and being acted upon. In Cvetkovich’s reading, receptivity denotes a way of being present in the world and body, an interpretation that appears to be shared by several of the people whose words are analyzed in this chapter.79 As Butler similarly argues, the concept of vulnerability entails the acknowledgment that one is “neither fully passive nor fully active,”80 but that all subjectivity is intertwined with relationality, involving a way of being related to what is not me and not fully masterable, vulnerability is a kind of relationship that belongs to that ambiguous region in which receptivity and responsiveness are not clearly separable from one another, and not distinguished as separate moments in a sequence.81

Butler herein stresses that vulnerability is an inevitable consequence of the relational nature of subjectivity. Social existence means that part of one’s sense of identity and being is always located outside of one’s control, and desire thereby contains the inherent potential for undoing. However, the ideology of the modern liberal (and usually masculine) subject seeks to obscure the ways in

“It All Goes in the Cup”  223 which relationality renders all subjectivity vulnerable by construing receptivity or vulnerability as linked to (feminine) humiliation or susceptibility to attack.82 In Waldby’s terminology, penetrability is feminized, whereas the ability to penetrate (without oneself being penetrated) is construed as masculine.83 The emphasis on Babalonian receptivity as a spiritually advanced way of being can thus be read as a disavowal of masculinist idealization of nonreceptive agency and bounded subjectivity, instead valuing ecstasy in the sense of being transported outside of oneself. To speak with Butler, the term “ecstasy” connotes the sense of being beside or outside of oneself, which she connects to intense emotional experiences. Ecstasy, in Butler’s view, challenges the perceived boundaries of limited and individual subjectivity, offering the possibility for relationality with something beyond the self. Similar to Butler, Shildrick has analyzed vulnerability and openness, linking the rejection of these concepts in European bourgeois masculine discourse to the rejection and othering of women and non-​Europeans. Shildrick specifically links the concept of the monster, and specifically the fear of the monstrous, to the strivings of Western discourse to abject the fragility and vulnerability of subjectivity, constructing idealized, self-​contained, and stable bodies and identities by projecting that which traverses their tenuous boundaries onto the monstrous other.84 This argument can illustrate the connection of openness or vulnerability to that which is seemingly repellent or frightening, as attested to in the previous discussion by my interviewee Sophie. In this way, the emphasis on openness and receptivity as essentially connected to Babalon forms part of a broader problematization of modern concepts of bounded subjectivity. Here, parallels can be drawn to religious studies scholar Terhi Utriainen’s analysis of contemporary angel spirituality. Utriainen suggests that angel enchantments make “liveable” an “enchanted” relationality, through which the mostly female practitioners feel empowered in the face of crisis, and angel spirituality thus has the potential to highlight “the open, volatile, and enchantable body as potentiality for life maintenance and transformation.”85 Similarly, emphases on receptivity in the contemporary Babalon discourse seemingly affirm an enchanted and relational subjectivity and body. However, as I will return to discuss in the penultimate chapter, the beings “not quite of this world,” which Utriainen’s informants refer to as gentle and nurturing, are conceptualized very differently than Babalon, who is often seen as dominant and brutal. This highlights how receptivity, while in some respects a hegemonic feminine characteristic, can be articulated within a framework that challenges hegemonic femininity as caring and soft. I propose that the Babalon discourse “makes liveable” and enchants a form of nonbounded subjectivity that acknowledges ecstasy, that is, transcendence of the bounded self as a fundamental magical experience. Needless to say, such notions are present in a plethora of religious traditions and do not necessarily in

224  The Eloquent Blood themselves challenge hegemonic notions of gender. However, it is my argument that parts of the source material construct agency in ways that allow for alternative configurations of both masculinity and femininity by dislocating gendered positionalities from specific bodies and disavowing masculinist rejection of vulnerability as connoting humiliation. In the words of many of the occultists discussed in this chapter, feminine receptivity emerges not as signifier of lack or absence but as emblematic of a distinct subjectivity that is neither inferior to masculinity nor reducible to it. Thus, blanket dismissal of receptivity, vulnerability, and openness, and assumptions of feminine departure from these modalities as inherently empowering, are perhaps too simplistic, hinging on a disdain for anything coded as feminine that risks solidifying the very precepts it sets out to destabilize. Emphases on the feminine receptivity of Babalon and the Scarlet Woman as well as more generally within Thelema have, in some cases, gone hand in hand with the idea of masculine activity and feminine yielding to a hierarchical social order, thus being congruent with what Schippers delineates as a hegemonic femininity. However, receptivity, which is a component of a historical hegemonic (white, middle-​class) femininity when contrasted with masculine activity, is also frequently metaphorically explicated in terms of promiscuity, which has resolutely been located outside of hegemonic femininity in Western modernity, and is frequently associated with nonwhite and working-​class women. The connection between Babalon and receptivity is as complex in the contemporary discourse around the goddess as it is historically. To speak with Schippers, receptivity is frequently articulated as part of alternative modes of doing gender.86 I argue that the Babalon discourse, while drawing on a stereotypical conception of receptive womanhood, constructs gendered existence beyond antinomies of receptivity and agency. In so doing, it not only highlights the tenuousness of the self-​contained, independent, and in-​control (liberal, masculine) subject, but also sacralizes the “difficulty and persistence of vulnerability as an openness in and to the world.”87

Notes 1. The quotation in the chapter title is derived from Sophie, interview, 2014. 2. According to Cornelius, this secret was divulged to him by Grady McMurtry, whom Cornelius writes had learned it from Crowley. Cornelius, “Introduction,” xxvii–​xxix; Cornelius, “In the Name of the Beast,” 55–​56. ON is an obscure formula, which appears in Crowley’s “Liber Samekh.” Crowley, “Liber Samekh,” 509. 3. J. Edward Cornelius, “The Magickal Essence of Crowley. Understanding the New Aeon through the Teachings of the Great Beast: Epistle No. 3: An Open Letter on

“It All Goes in the Cup”  225 the Formula of Abrahadabra and & ON,” Red Flame: A Thelemic Research Journal 7 (1999): 40; J. Edward Cornelius, “The Magickal Essence of Crowley. Understanding the New Aeon through the Teachings of the Great Beast: Epistle No. 5. An Open Letter on the Greater Mysteries of the Formula ON & 418,” Red Flame: A Thelemic Research Journal 7 (1999):  41; J. Edward Cornelius, “The Magickal Essence of Crowley. Understanding the New Aeon through the Teachings of the Great Beast: Epistle No. 6. An Open Letter on BABALON 156 & the Formula of Nun,” Red Flame: A Thelemic Research Journal 7 (1999): 51. 4. Cornelius, “BABALON 156,” 57–​58. The term “Bud-​Will” is derived from Crowley’s Liber Aleph. Crowley instructs the magician to “formulate this Bud-​Will as a Person,” bringing it magically into existence. Crowley, Aleph, 86. 5. J. Edward Cornelius, “On the Phases of the Moon,” in Essays: Volume Two, ed. J. Edward Cornelius and Erica M Cornelius (Berkeley, CA: privately published, 2015), 87–​90. 6. Cornelius, “ON & 418,” 43–​44. As previously discussed, Crowley articulates this view in his essay “Liber CDXIV,” which expounds on the magical formula of OTO’s ninth degree. Crowley, “Liber CDXIV.” However, Cornelius contends that the naturally “upward” flow of feminine energy can be advantageous for the female aspirant, who need only to “be quiet, stop all mundane interferences and go within.” Cornelius, “ON & 418,” 43. In contrast, men in Cornelius’s view must struggle to control the downward flow of masculine energy. Cornelius, “ON & 418,” 44. 7. Cornelius writes that the female formula, in contrast, represents silence, which is why women should be kept in the dark about the object of sex magical workings. Cornelius, “BABALON 156,” 53–​54. 8. As noted in ­chapter 4, this interpretation is largely congruent with Crowley’s views as expressed in his sex magical instruction manuals. 9. J. Edward Cornelius, “On Women in A∴A∴, Should They Follow the Same Paths up the Tree of Life as Men?,” in Essays: Volume Two, ed. J. Edward Cornelius and Erica M Cornelius (Berkeley, CA: privately published, 2015), 93. 10. Cornelius, “BABALON 156,” 53. 11. Cornelius, “On Women in A∴A∴,” 96. 12. She relates this position to the statement in Liber AL I:15 that “in . . . the Scarlet Woman is all power given.” Erica M Cornelius, “On Tykhe,” in Essays: Volume Two, ed. J. Edward Cornelius and Erica M Cornelius (Berkeley, CA: privately published, 2015), 122. As per the request of Erica M Cornelius, the “M” in her name is intentionally rendered without a period following it. 13. Erica M Cornelius, “On Redemption as a Woman: Or on Authoritatively Embracing One’s Receptivity,” in Essays:  Volume Two, ed. J. Edward Cornelius and Erica M Cornelius (Berkeley, CA: privately published, 2015), 97–​101. 14. Erica M Cornelius, interview, 2014. 15. Erica M Cornelius, “On Women’s Sexual Freedom,” in Essays:  Volume Two, ed. J. Edward Cornelius and Erica M Cornelius (Berkeley, CA:  privately published, 2015), 82. 16. Erica M Cornelius, interview, 2014. 17. Cornelius, “Redemption,” 98.

226  The Eloquent Blood 18. Erica M Cornelius, interview, 2014. 19. Cornelius, “Redemption,” 100–​101. 20. Cvetkovich, “Receptivity.” 21. Soror Syrinx, Traversing the Scarlet Path (n.p.: America Star Books 2014), 7. 22. Soror Syrinx, The Scarlet Grimoire (n.p.: Publishamerica, 2013), 6. 23. Syrinx, Scarlet Grimoire, 5. 24. Ibid.,  7–​8. 25. Ibid., 46. 26. Syrinx, Traversing, 72; Soror Syrinx, She of the Silver Star (n.p.:  Createspace Independent Platform, 2015), 60; Syrinx, Traversing, 8. Syrinx consistently uses female pronouns for Babalon and the Scarlet Woman, explaining that this is because she writes from her own point of view. 27. Syrinx, Traversing, 76. 28. Ibid., 90. 29. Syrinx, Scarlet Grimoire, 17. 30. See, e.g., Syrinx, Traversing,  94–​95. 31. Ibid., 80. 32. Ibid., 94. 33. Ibid.,  94–​95. 34. Cvetkovich, “Receptivity.” 35. Sandra, interview, 2014. 36. Sandra, interview, 2014. 37. Sandra, interview, 2014. 38. Sophie, interview, 2014. 39. Sophie, interview, 2014. 40. Sophie, interview, 2014. 41. Shildrick, “Unreformed.” 42. Sophie, interview, 2014. 43. Cvetkovich, “Receptivity”; Dahl, “Femmebodiment.” 44. “History,” Scarlet Imprint, https://​scarletimprint.com/​history/​ (accessed September 8, 2017). 45. Peter Grey, interview, 2016. 46. Peter Grey, The Red Goddess (London: Scarlet Imprint, 2007), 153. 47. Ibid., 121. 48. Amodali, “Introductory Theoria,” 53. In Grant’s writings, as discussed in ­chapter 6, the term kalas denotes the magically charged genital secretions of the Scarlet Woman. 49. Amodali, “Introductory Theoria,” 53. 50. Amodali, interview, 2016. 51. Amodali, “Introductory Theoria,” 49. 52. Ibid., 49, 52. 53. Ibid., 49. 54. Ibid. 55. Ibid., 51. 56. Crowley, Thoth, 93. See c­ hapter 4 for a discussion of the Lust card of the Thoth Tarot.

“It All Goes in the Cup”  227 57. Amodali, “Introductory Theoria,” 51. 58. Ibid.,  51–​52. 59. Sam, interview, 2014. 60. Sam, interview, 2014. 61. Sam, interview, 2014. 62. Kant’s view of these concepts is discussed in Andrea Kern, “Spontaneity and Receptivity in Kant’s Theory of Knowledge,” Philosophical Topics 34, no. 1–​ 2 (2006): 145–​162. 63. Sam, interview, 2014. 64. IAO131, interview, 2014. 65. IAO131, interview, 2014. 66. IAO131, interview, 2014. 67. Henry, interview, 2014. 68. Henry, interview, 2014. 69. Henry, interview, 2014. 70. Charlotte, interview, 2015. 71. Charlotte, interview, 2015. 72. Charlotte, interview, 2015. 73. Charlotte, interview, 2015. 74. Charlotte, interview, 2015. 75. Crowley, Lies, 16. 76. See ­chapter 2. 77. See, e.g., Starhawk, Spiral Dance, 20; Phil Hine, “Some Musings on Polarity,” Phil Hine, 1989, http://​www.philhine.org.uk/​writings/​flsh_​polarity.html (accessed September 11, 2017); Landstreet, “Alternate Currents”; Faerywolf, “Queer Craft.” 78. Judith Butler, “Rethinking Vulnerability and Resistance,” 2014, Instituto Franklin, http://​ w ww.institutofranklin.net/​ s ites/​ d efault/​ f iles/​ f iles/​ R ethinking%20 Vulnerability%20and%20Resistance%20Judith%20Butler.pdf (accessed September 11, 2017). 79. Cvetkovich, “Receptivity.” 80. Butler, “Rethinking.” 81. Ibid. 82. Dahl, “Femmebodiment.” 83. Waldby, “Destruction.” 84. Shildrick, “Unreformed”; Shildrick, Embodying. 85. Terhi Utriainen, “Desire for Enchanted Bodies:  The Case of Women Engaging in Angel Spirituality,” in Contemporary Encounters in Gender and Religion: European Perspectives, ed. Lena Gemzöe, Marja-​ Liisa Keinänen, and Avril Maddrell (Cham:  Palgrave Macmillan, 2016), 186–​ 188. Emphasis in original. However, Utriainen observes that angel enchantments seldom “highlight . . . the female body and its difference,” presenting a marked difference from the Babalon discourse. Utriainen, “Desire,” 185. 86. Schippers, “Recovering.” 87. Dahl, “Femmebodiment,” 49.

9

Feminist Difference Babalon and the Hope of an Alternative Femininity

What is femininity? What does it mean to be feminine or to be female in a society where women are subordinated? Finally, what is the role of a female magical practitioner, and how can femininity be conceptualized in ways that challenge narrow views of feminine agency? As stressed in the previous chapter, the trajectory of the feminist movement in the second half of the twentieth century appears to have impacted the Thelemic and occult milieus. In Thelema, there has been critical debate on gender and sexuality since at least the 1990s, which has addressed previously taken-​for-​granted concepts (such as feminine receptivity); sexist comments in Crowley’s works; and perceptions of homosexuality and its relation to gender polarity, transgender, and gender queerness.1 Throughout my fieldwork, I spoke to numerous people, both men and women, who posited Babalon and the Scarlet Woman as responses to these questions. Many of those I have conversed with identify what they perceive as hegemonic femininity as problematic, indicating the need for different ways of envisioning femininity. The purpose of this chapter is to analyze how contemporary occultists articulate Babalon and the Scarlet Woman as symbols that give meaning to the experience of femininity, and that have the potential to indicate alternative ways of understanding the latter. Although all of the contemporary source material discussed in this study can be read as an ongoing negotiation of the meaning of femininity, this chapter highlights utterances that I view as characterized by a gender-​critical, or even “feminist,” analysis of social relations.2 Throughout this chapter, I will ask questions regarding how contemporary esotericists within the Babalon discourse understand femininity, how they view dominant (or hegemonic) norms of femininity, and how they articulate the goddess and the Scarlet Woman in relation to these conventions.

Reclaiming the Complete Divine Feminine: Babalon Straddling Dichotomies A recurring theme in my source material is that images of divinity have an important role in challenging unequal gender relations, and also that Western The Eloquent Blood: The Goddess Babalon and the Construction of Femininities in Western Esotericism. Manon Hedenborg White, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780190065027.001.0001

230  The Eloquent Blood Abrahamic culture has suppressed or marginalized symbols of female power or sacredness. This reasoning is not unique to the Babalon discourse but overlaps with endeavors within the field of feminist theology. Importantly, parallels can be drawn to the branches of feminist Neopaganism that have emerged from the late 1970s onward as a result of the merging of Wicca with radical feminism and the women’s spirituality movement.3 Similarly, Luce Irigaray has argued that the construction of a divine feminine is integral for the possibility of imagining a complete and independent feminine subjectivity, which is not defined as the inferior, other, or lack of masculinity.4 As will become apparent throughout this chapter, several of the occult practitioners whose words are analyzed herein stress similar views. Alan, a male Thelemite in his 30s, critiques what he perceives as stereotypical gender constructs, such as the idea that men should be breadwinners and women mothers. In Alan’s view, the individualistic Thelemic injunction of “Do what thou wilt” offers a progressive alternative to limiting gender roles. Alan underlines that “having a very strong female archetype is so essential in moving forward in the new Aeon,” and he stresses that Babalon can be seen as such a feminine archetype. To Alan, Babalon represents a very strong and occasionally “harsh” energy that needs to be treated with care, reverence, and respect. He contends that it is “really important to realize the power that is inherent in the feminine force,” and that this force is “not passive.”5 Thus, Alan appears to view Babalon as having the potential to signify a form of femininity that is different from limiting gender stereotypes. Charles, also a male Thelemite in his 30s whom I spoke to in 2014, draws on psychoanalytic concepts to argue that Babalon represents “the rectification of the feminine in the ego of humanity.” He continues that Babalon embodies a celebration of feminine “assertiveness,” “sexuality,” and “force,” all of which have been stigmatized: [W]‌e have all these wonderful terms, sexist terms around those things, and Babalon is: “Let’s put that back where it belongs in a place of adoration and respect.” Breaking the chains that have been holding down half of our psyche for the last two to three thousand years.6

Charles identifies Babalon with boldness, eroticism, and strength, thus—​in his view—​revaluating traits that conventional gender norms proscribe as inappropriate for women. In Schippers’s terminology, this may be interpreted to mean that Babalon encapsulates hegemonic masculine traits, which have historically been deemed pariahlike when embodied by women, and challenges the hegemonic gender order by combining these traits into a sacralized femininity that is adored and revered.7 It is illustrative that Charles posits a link between Abrahamic religion, female subordination, and sex-​negativity; this is a frequently

Feminist Difference  231 recurring theme in the source material. Charles appears to see “the rectification of the feminine” as a matter of societal gender equality, and he emphasizes the need to revaluate the feminine as an inherent component in each being’s psyche. This view is shared by Alan, who contends: “I think we are all fully capable of accessing those energies. And that they’re just inherent.”8 During a lengthy interview I conducted in 2014, Amy, a longtime OTO member, EGC priestess, and former body master, discussed the history of patriarchy in Western culture. Amy connects Babalon to the notion of healing and restoring what she sees as the damaging effects of dualistic worldviews and the process of revaluating femininity and womanhood. Although she stressed that she is not opposed to Christianity, Amy contends that the Abrahamic religions are dualistic, dividing existence into dichotomies—​such as light–​dark, heaven–​earth, mind–​body, spirit–​matter, and man–​woman—​and denigrating the latter half of the binaries. For Amy, a central aspect of Thelema is its ability to act as “an antidote to the errors of Christianity,” healing the imbalances caused by Western dualism by working within a framework of Abrahamic symbolism but also integrating that which it has suppressed. Amy sees the Gnostic Mass as particularly effective in this regard. As the ritual employs sensual stimuli and symbolic language, Amy observes, it can address subconscious biases by showing rather than telling. She emphasizes that this applies to the naked priestess on the high altar, querying: How do we convince people that the female body isn’t really dirty and gross? Well, we can talk about it all day, or a couple times a month we can put a naked female body on the altar and have everybody kneel [laughs].9

Amy suggests that the Gnostic Mass can challenge misogynistic perceptions of women’s bodies in elevating a naked female form. For Amy, Babalon represents a revaluation of those aspects of femininity that Christianity has rejected in the form of “the physical female, the sexual female, the active female.” Thus, Babalon represents the “dark side” of the Virgin Mary, embodying all of the characteristics that the latter lacks:10 And so by embracing Babalon, essentially, we’re reclaiming the lost side of the feminine. The Virgin Mary is peaceful and passive and receptive and loving—​ all of which are good things, but what about the other side of it? . . . [S]‌o when you read the Book of Revelation and you see Babalon robed in red and purple and covered with jewels, being prideful, and being sexual, and being politically powerful, all these things are the flipside of the Virgin Mary.11

Similar to Charles, Amy posits Babalon as a sort of feminine, symbolic antithesis to dominant notions of femininity. She identifies characteristics such as

232  The Eloquent Blood passivity, receptivity, and lovingness—​which can be connected to a hegemonic femininity—​as laudable traits, while observing that they can create an imbalance when the “other side” of femininity is disavowed. Amy does not appear to suggest rejecting the seemingly hegemonic femininity of the Virgin Mary in favor of the pariahlike Babalon, stressing instead that the dichotomization of femininity is rooted in a dualistic worldview. By embracing Babalon, Amy suggests that it is possible to restore the imbalances of Western culture by celebrating sexuality, activity, and sovereignty alongside receptivity, nurturance, and love, thus accomplishing a more integrated view of femininity. Significantly, Amy does not see all aspects of hegemonic femininity as inherently bad but rather as limiting when women are stigmatized for diverging from this norm. In Schippers’s terminology, Amy’s words could be interpreted as signifying that Babalon represents a historical pariah femininity, whose integration with the laudable aspects of hegemonic femininity results in an alternative femininity that allows for a broader range of feminine experience.12 In early 2015, I met with Mary, an OTO member and EGC priestess of more than 30 years. Mary states that many OTO members during her early days in Thelema identified the priestess in the Gnostic Mass with Babalon, who was seen primarily as a sexual symbol. However, Mary notes that the idea that Babalon is “just a whore” is the most common misconception about the goddess. Instead, she asserts that Babalon represents a more complex and comprehensive vision of femininity by encapsulating and holding everything within herself. Thus, Mary identifies Babalon as “a true united goddess.”13 Drawing a historical connection to ancient Mesopotamia, Mary compares Babalon to the Sumerian goddess Inanna and the Akkadian Ishtar: The only thing Babalon has that Inanna didn’t is motherhood. Because Inanna was perhaps the wife, and definitely the seductress. You know, she was the goddess of taverns, right? But not the mother. That wasn’t added until Babylonian times, when Inanna turned into Ishtar. But then Ishtar wasn’t allowed to be a sexy kitten anymore, because she was now a mama. So that was the dividing factor. Ever since then the goddess has not been truly united. Babalon is everything. She’s mother, she’s daughter, she’s sister, she’s whore. She’s independent. She is herself. Sovereign. . . . [T]‌here’s nothing that says Babalon is always the ravishing whore, she could be the terrible mother killing her child.14

Mary critiques the dichotomization of motherhood and assertive feminine sexuality as reductive and limiting. In Mary’s view, this distinction has fractured the idea of femininity in that the role of mother has been construed as antithetical to that of the “sexy kitten” or “ravishing whore.” In contrast to this version of the virgin–​whore complex, Mary interprets Babalon as all-​encompassing,

Feminist Difference  233 autonomous, and sovereign, identified with limitless possibilities of feminine expression. Mary challenges narrow conceptualizations of femininity as passive, nurturing, and maternal by commenting that Babalon could equally be the terrible, murderous mother. As I interpret Mary’s words, she construes Babalon as a symbol that contests stereotypical dichotomizations of hegemonic and pariah femininity by thwarting attempts to define femininities according to rigid divisions of nurturing motherhood and sexual assertiveness. Mary’s articulation of Babalon can tentatively be compared to Irigaray’s conception of the feminist potential of female divinity, as well as the ways in which some Chicana feminists have utilized indigenous goddesses in order to conceptualize femininities beyond the virgin–​whore dichotomy.15 Furthermore, there are significant parallels to notions of the divine feminine in feminist witchcraft, Neopaganism, and goddess feminism, and I will return to this in the final section of this chapter. Helen, a long-​term OTO member, EGC priestess, and former body master, links Babalon to a composite vision of femininity that encompasses roles and traits she feels are conventionally regarded as contradictory. Like Mary, Helen contends that motherhood and assertive feminine sexuality are often seen as antithetical, and that Babalon’s maternal aspects are often disregarded, as most people, in Helen’s words, “don’t tend to see mothers as whores.” Similar to Mary, Helen thus critiques perceptions of femininity in society at large as well as within Thelema, underlining that interpretations of Babalon can be encumbered by a stereotypical division between woman-​as-​mother and woman-​as-​lover. For Helen, Babalon’s connection to all kinds of love naturally implies that she can represent motherhood. During our conversation, Helen stated: “I think she can be considered a mother goddess. And love in general. And love has a broad spectrum. So, why not?” Thus, Helen articulates Babalon as a symbol that can challenge stereotypical dichotomizations of femininity.16 Another theme touched on by several of my interviewees who emphasize Babalon as a symbol of female power, strength, and agency is the divine feminine as creatrix, which they view as challenging patriarchal, monotheist notions of divinity. Alan, mentioned above, identifies Babalon with “the emission of the creative energies of our reality,” and he emphasizes that creative energy is not simply paternal. Similarly, Helen refers to the idea of Babalon’s all-​absorbing grail, underlining that the cup that receives all is simultaneously the source of all, thus implying a creative aspect to the goddess. Likewise, Mike, a longtime Thelemite and former OTO member, describes Babalon as one manifestation or name for the divine feminine, an “incredible, intelligent, loving, cosmic mother force.” Mike describes experiencing a fundamental shift in his understanding of reality and the divine creative impulse during a psychedelic vision, realizing that “the nature of this creative impulse is not a patriarchal, angry father, but an

234  The Eloquent Blood incredibly powerful, loving, brilliant, divine feminine energy.” However, Mike contends that the divine feminine is not just warm, maternal, and nurturing, nor exclusively sexual, but a creator and initiatrix who compels the adept to strive for self-​development and spiritual advancement.17 He describes Babalon thus: She’s in charge of the growth. . . . Babalon is singing behind the Abyss, and is kind of calling creation up. . . . [T]‌his is not just a hot, BDSM, naughty goddess. . . . She’s kind of singing: “Know and do your True Will.” . . . Babalon is not singing a beautiful mommy love. She’s singing: “Hold your shit together.”18

Mike critiques perceptions of divine femininity as either the “hot, BDSM, naughty” goddess or the embodiment of “beautiful mommy love,” instead emphasizing Babalon as a source of creativity and inspiration that compels the adept toward self-​transformation. Mike compares Babalon to the Platonic concept of the “beautiful itself,” being the ultimate representation of beauty, which all manifested images of beauty mirror. He quotes Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s suggestion that “the Eternal Feminine draweth us ever on” to illustrate this point. Thus, Babalon in Mike’s view represents the principle that calls the aspirant to evolve so that they can approximate the beauty represented by the Platonic form of this concept. Mike contends: [T]‌here’s all the sexy parts, and the divine whore, but when you really look at it within the context of a system of attainment . . . . [I]f you do your True Will really well, there comes a stage in which you have to surrender yourself into this vessel, and then you become a vehicle fully representing the divine plan to serve as a Master of the Temple, to serve humanity.19

Mike elaborates on the understanding of Babalon as the figure through whom an adept can become a Magister Templi. He highlights the initiatory imperative of utter surrender into Babalon’s cup, leading the adept to be reborn as a divine vehicle in service to humanity. Given Babalon’s ascribed function within the A∴A∴ system, it is interesting to note that the concept of crossing the Abyss is otherwise a comparatively minor theme within my interviews. This may be due to the fact that the Abyss ordeal, in Crowley’s system, is connected to a very high level of initiation that may appear distant or abstract to many contemporary Thelemites. By emphasizing Babalon as the principle calling humanity upward to spiritual attainment, Mike conceptualizes the goddess as a dynamic principle that human men and women can and should seek to emulate. Mike expresses an appreciation for Jack Parsons’s writings, stating that he feels the latter was able to envision a “divine feminine warrior archetype.” On the significance of Parsons’s work, Mike explains:

Feminist Difference  235 [Parsons] seemed to be speaking from the point of view of women warriorhood. And that there’s a power in the feminine, it’s not this meek thing, but there is this strength, there is this power. And that men need to step up [laughs], to meet that, because it’s not . . . . It doesn’t coddle fools.20

Mike indicates Parsons’s view that women’s strength and liberation would be key to the spiritual betterment of humanity by compelling men to rise to worthiness of the “new woman,” and he ascribes to Parsons’s concept of Babalon a recognition of feminine strength and power.21 Thus, Mike references an idea of the goddess as representing a seeming alternative femininity. In the preceding discussion, I have attempted to focus on one aspect of how contemporary occultists draw on Babalon to respond to the question of the meaning of femininity, and how the goddess is construed as an alternative to what they see as pervasive feminine stereotypes. The occultists discussed here emphasize the contrast between Babalon and what—​in Schippers’s terminology—​may be referred to as a hegemonic femininity. Two interlinked approaches can be distinguished in their responses. Firstly, Mary, Helen, and Mike emphasize Babalon as a symbol with the potential to straddle dichotomies, such as mother–​lover, virgin–​whore, and nurturance–​authority, combining them in one and thus challenging notions of femininity as either/​or. Read through Schippers’s framework, these occult practitioners interpret Babalon as encompassing aspects of both hegemonic and pariah femininities. Secondly, Charles and Amy conceptualize Babalon as a symbol who does not necessarily contain hegemonic feminine traits such as nurturance or motherhood, but who instead sacralizes aspects of pariah femininities, such as sexual assertiveness and authority, thus signifying a refusal to embody the hegemonic relationship of masculinity and femininity. The source material mentioned shows both male and female occultists drawing on Babalon as they seek to make sense of femininity and how they feel that male supremacy and patriarchal monotheism have shaped perceptions of the latter. All of the esoteric practitioners discussed in this chapter conceptualize Babalon as a symbol that challenges stereotypical concepts of femininity, which has magical as well as potential sociocultural significance. I have not personally spoken to any contemporary occultist who feels that Babalon may conversely reify stereotypical notions of femininity. However, such an argument is made by Nema (1939–​2018), a prominent female esoteric author who both influenced—​and was influenced by—​Kenneth Grant. Nema founded the Horus-​Maat Lodge and the system of Maat Magick. In an essay, Nema attests to appreciating Babalon’s historical function in sacralizing female sexual expression, but she writes that the inherent connection of the symbol to anti-​Christian defiance and male sexual fantasy renders it limited. Today, Nema writes, Western society no longer officially condones the oppression of women’s freedom and sexual expression,

236  The Eloquent Blood and contemporary women can control their reproductive lives with contraception.22 Thus, the image of the sexually liberated woman is less transgressive today than during Crowley’s day, and Nema asserts that Babalon is a limited symbol, which like the biblical Whore of Babylon is the “product of a male imagination.” Indicating the sexualized connotations of Babalon as inherently limiting and determined by the heterosexual male gaze, she writes that invoking the goddess is akin to “invoking a Playboy centrefold.”23 Nema stresses that women need not be limited to images created by men but should choose for themselves which gods they wish to work with. Thus, she concludes that Babalon, although she has played an important historical role, is now obsolete and not suited to the needs of contemporary magicians.24 Unsurprisingly, given that the people I have interviewed are principally those who find Babalon a relevant symbol, Nema’s perspective represents a minority position within my source material. Nonetheless, it has been included as a point of comparison to illustrate how the contemporary Babalon discourse—​as opposed to its historical antecedents during Crowley’s day—​comprises an ongoing dialogue among female magicians regarding issues of power, sexual freedom, sexualization, and women’s roles in magic. Importantly, the responses of the occult practitioners discussed here indicate how perceptions of appropriate femininity have shifted over the course of the twentieth century. Whereas positive (as opposed to misogynist) images of the feminine, sexually desiring subject were marginalized around the fin-​de-​siècle, sexualized images of femininity are now prevalent in popular culture and advertising. Contemporary women negotiate the dual stigmas of being too sexual and not sexual(ized) enough, navigating the oppositional pariah femininities of slut and the sexually unavailable woman (the latter is perceived as frigid or prudish).25 Whereas a recurrent theme in the Babalon discourse from its inception until today is an affirmation of assertive feminine sexuality, a theme I have uncovered in the contemporary source material—​and which I  will return to in the subsequent chapter—​is the right to sexual self-​determination and denial of unwanted advances. This indicates how the Babalon discourse, in emphasizing the goddess as having the potential to challenge stereotypical and damaging concepts of femininity, has shifted to accommodate changing notions of femininity over the course of the twentieth century.

Sword-​Wielding Warrior: Babalon as Empowered Woman The “New Comment” to Liber AL is arguably Crowley’s most explicitly feminist text, and it is frequently quoted in online discussions about women’s roles in Thelema.26 Crowley expresses a number of contradictory positions on

Feminist Difference  237 women’s roles and value in his vast oeuvre, and the widespread preference for the “New Comment” in contemporary, emic discussions on Thelema and gender illustrates how the transmission of religious “tradition” always entails historically and culturally situated interpretation. As Anglo-​American Thelemites appear generally to be supportive of gender equity, a reasonable interpretation is that the feminist passages from the “New Comment” are often perceived as more representative of a Thelemic viewpoint on women’s rights (though not necessarily of Crowley’s beliefs). In contrast, many of the Thelemites I have spoken to indicate the passages from Liber Aleph (discussed in ­chapter 4), wherein Crowley conceptualizes femininity in terms of lack, as troublesome. Tellingly, Soror Syrinx uses the “New Comment” to exemplify Crowley’s views on women. Although Syrinx’s sex magical framework—​as described in the previous chapter—​is based on a gender polarity dynamic in which the female magician is partly identified with receiving, nourishing, manifesting, and serving the male magician’s will, she emphasizes female empowerment, writing that Scarlet Women “wield their power unashamed,” freely and independently treading their own paths through life.27 She suggests that her readers consider mythological parallels to their own lives and interpret their own development in terms of the hero’s journey, a concept introduced by the American mythologist Joseph Campbell in his popular comparative study The Hero with a Thousand Faces (1949).28 Discussing the Scarlet Woman, Syrinx stresses: May she rise to do her Will, throw off the shackles of society, and enthrone the Goddess to her rightful place. . . . Take up your sword; let no one step on your power. Rise up in your Will. That is your right, Woman. You are a star, not a slave.29

Syrinx critiques patriarchal society and posits the divine feminine as being in need of revaluation. Thus, she refers implicitly to the idea of Abrahamic, patriarchal monotheism as having marginalized the divine feminine. In her assertion that women are stars, Syrinx implicitly references the statement in Liber AL that “[e]‌very man and every woman is a star,” thus emphasizing women as independent, sovereign beings who have their own pathways to fulfill in life.30 My interviewee Helen strongly identifies Babalon with the idea of female liberation. In her view, the terms “Scarlet Woman” or “sacred whore” do not denote a title or office to be fulfilled by a particular woman but symbolize a femininity characterized by autonomy, freedom, and sexual sovereignty, which may, as of yet, lie in the future: It means that the woman is in charge of her body and her sexuality and can be as [laughs] promiscuous as she wants to be, or not, or she can choose to be a

238  The Eloquent Blood mother, and you don’t need to be married, you don’t need any of those society things. And I think that in a sense it’s very spiritual, too. The sacred whore is not just somebody who just wants to fuck. I don’t think that we’re anywhere near people being that aware, even women.31

Helen’s articulation of the Scarlet Woman emphasizes liberal values of personal choice and self-​determination, underlining the right to govern one’s own sexual and reproductive life. Similar to Mary, however, Helen challenges what she appears to perceive as a simplistic association between the Scarlet Woman and female sexual availability, stressing that this misconception is rooted in a current cultural inability to imagine a truly emancipated concept of femininity. In contrast to Crowley’s identification of the Scarlet Woman’s role with his own female partners, Helen does not feel that the Scarlet Woman is defined by fulfilling a particular function in a (male) magician’s life, although she acknowledges that some male magicians may believe this: I think that a lot of magicians see it as the role of a woman who comes to work with them. . . . And that’s okay. I’m not saying they’re wrong. I just think that in The Book of the Law there’s a bigger picture. And maybe we just can’t look at that bigger picture right now because it’s too far ahead of us.32

Helen’s words indicate an important shift in the Babalon discourse, where the Scarlet Woman’s role is increasingly not defined as a particular positionality within a heterosexual magical coupling but rather as an independent magical role that a female magician can take on. Helen indicates that the femininity represented by the Scarlet Woman may, as of yet, not be fully conceivable, due to the fact that it lies “too far ahead” of contemporary gender norms. There are parallels between her reasoning and Irigaray’s argument that the phallocentric concept of femininity has hitherto rendered it impossible to envision true sexual difference, with femininity defined as something in itself. Helen’s notion of the Scarlet Woman may tentatively be compared to Irigaray’s conceptualization of a fully articulated feminine subjectivity. Helen states that the symbol of the Scarlet Woman may be more necessary and relevant to women due to the cultural history of male supremacy, reasoning:  “Because women have been repressed so much, that is kind of needed more.” In fact, she contends, men may not need a symbol such as the Scarlet Woman as much, as they perhaps “already experience that freedom.”33 In the preceding section, I  have attempted to trace how contemporary occultists articulate Babalon and/​or the Scarlet Woman as femininities that do not adhere to the hegemonic, hierarchical, and complementary relationship of masculinity and femininity. These occult authors and practitioners emphasize

Feminist Difference  239 Babalon or the Scarlet Woman as representative of female power, autonomy, sexual self-​determination, and independence. In articulating an image of feminine divinity as part of an endeavor to redefine women’s social roles, there are parallels between the reasoning of my interviewees and the esoteric authors mentioned here and broader discourses on divine femininity and male supremacy in Neopaganism and goddess feminism. However, a marked difference is that participants in the contemporary Babalon discourse relate to a greater extent to occult history and perceived sexism within what they construe as their own traditions. This indicates how feminist ideas have influenced contemporary occultism. As noted, the contemporary Babalon discourse differs from its historical antecedents in how hegemonic femininity is construed and approached. Whereas Crowley strongly emphasized women’s right to sexual freedom, many of the contemporary occultists cited in this study stress women’s right to deny unwanted sexual advances and not exclusively be defined by their sexuality. This will be further exemplified in the subsequent chapter. In my interpretation, this indicates how the Babalon discourse has shifted to accommodate changing conceptions of hegemonic femininity in society, acknowledging how the pariah femininity of slut or whore is today contrasted with that of the “prude” who is perceived as insufficiently sexually available. More simply put, the present-​day Babalon discourse places a stronger emphasis than its historical antecedents on what may be called “negative sexual freedom” (i.e., the right to decline unwanted sexual advances) in addition to “positive sexual freedom” (i.e., the right to act on one’s own desires without risking social stigma). The authors and practitioners discussed here ascribe to Babalon and the Scarlet Woman the potential to challenge hegemonic notions of femininity by embodying traits and characteristics usually not associated with it, such as political power, strength, and a sexual positionality that encompasses both assertive desire and self-​determination. Thus, Babalon and the Scarlet Woman operate in a liminal space between pariah and alternative femininities, stigmatized under the current gender system but representing the hope of a new femininity. In Helen’s ascription of the Scarlet Woman to futurity, parallels can be drawn to Irigaray’s reasoning on the current impossibility of truly imagining sexual difference or femininity as something in itself. Thus, the Scarlet Woman is imagined in terms of potentiality, linked to a form of femininity that has yet to be fully articulated.

Redefining Babalon: Conceptualizing the Authoritative Female Magician The occultists discussed in this chapter critique patriarchal and androcentric structures in society, which they view as having limited perceptions of the divine

240  The Eloquent Blood feminine and women’s roles. Similarly, several of the contemporary esotericists whose ideas are analyzed herein contend that women’s voices and experiences have been underrepresented in occult literature. A number of these persons also indicate that conventional interpretations of Babalon and the Scarlet Woman have been skewed and limited by sexist and/​or androcentric bias within the occult milieu. A  recurring trope in the source material is thus of Babalon or the Scarlet Woman as representing an authoritative, female magical role, and arguments to this end will be analyzed in the present section. As discussed in the previous section, J. Edward and Erica M Cornelius both argue that Thelemic sexual magic thus far has primarily been oriented toward a male magician. J. Edward Cornelius contends that his teacher Grady McMurtry was “in many ways . . . a chauvinistic pig,” and that the latter did not see fit to share the secrets of sexual magic with female IX° initiates.34 J.  Edward views many of Crowley’s writings on the OTO degrees as directed toward a male readership, and he seeks to elaborate how these doctrines can be approached by female magicians.35 As mentioned in the previous chapter, J. Edward Cornelius addresses what he perceives as a dearth of exposition on women’s initiation in A∴A∴ by positing a different model of spiritual ascent for female aspirants. Similarly, Erica M Cornelius stresses the shortage of writing on what she refers to as the Babalon formula or the “female formula.” In the introduction to a 2015 collection of essays produced by J. Edward’s A∴A∴ group, Erica M Cornelius writes that she hopes the treatises on “female magick” included will inspire other women magicians to conduct further research.36 The Corneliuses emphasize the benefits of sex magical training for female magicians. Esoteric author Mishlen Linden writes that “Babalon is, and always has been, a Woman of Power,” who, despite the fact that she has often been perceived in a limited fashion by her male consorts, is alive in “the self-​realized freedom of the powerful.”37 Here, Linden indicates that Babalon has often been viewed through a “misguided” male gaze, preventing a full acknowledgment of her agency. She writes that a Scarlet Woman does not need a physical partner in order to access her magical powers and that she can channel the goddess alone.38 Thus, Babalon and the Scarlet Woman emerge as symbols of a form of magical femininity that exists as a thing in itself, which is not dependent on its relation to masculinity. Babalon is articulated in Linden’s interpretation as an alternative femininity identified with freedom and power. A 2015 essay by Linden comprises a lengthy excerpt from her magical diary, which details her sex magical experimentation with her male partner and draws strongly on the writings of Kenneth Grant, not least in the emphasis on the kalas.39 Parallels can be drawn to Crowley’s own sex magical diaries, principally “Rex de Arte Regia,” which spans the period 1914–​1918. However, whereas Crowley’s own diary records of his sex magical operations are usually sparse and

Feminist Difference  241 technical (his diary from Cefalù being a notable exception), Linden provides extensive and vivid descriptions of visionary experiences and sensations. Linden’s record is highly personal, detailing her grief for a deceased former lover and magical partner, as well as her sex magical explorations with a new one. In the text, Linden stresses women’s ability to self-​initiate without male help and provides instructions for an invocation where the priestess identifies herself with Babalon, proclaiming: I command the Earth, sacred vessel of my Bodies Light. /​I  command the Waters, on ancient seas flowing, kalas /​of life from within my Womb. /​I command the Air, which fills my body with Life. /​I command the Fires, which blaze within my Heart. /​For I am She: Babalon, Shakti, initiator! /​Doorway to the Path of Self-​Knowledge /​And Priestess of Transformation!40

In this passage, the female body is identified with the four Hermetic elements, and the invocation emphasizes feminine will as having the power to command them. Thus, female embodiment is construed not in terms of lack or absence but as a positive site of power and vehicle of ecstatic religious experience. Linden provides an invocation for attracting a suitable priest, or magical partner, wherein the female magician proclaims her identification with Babalon thus: “As Babalon /​I am the eternal warrior /​And the eternal whore /​And the witch that rides the Beast /​Dark, Primordial and Raw.”41 Thus, her invocation alludes to the femininities of warrior, whore, and witch as inherently Babalonian. There is a significant age difference between Linden and her partner—​at the time of the record, Linden is 58 and her lover, 28—​and the author discusses female aging and menopause in relation to sexual magic. Although she notes that the fact that she no longer menstruates affects the magical practices she undertakes, Linden argues that menopause brings a heightened magical power: When one no longer bleeds, there is no starting anew. We simply build the power up inside ourselves . . . it just grows with age. A younger man, at his peak of sexuality, and an older woman, who has crone wisdom, is arguably the best combination for this work. Of course, it’s not likely you will hear this from a man!42

Here, Linden articulates an interpretation of feminine sex magical power as being of a more cyclical nature in fertile women, with menstruation signaling a monthly discharge and rebuild, whereas postmenopausal women’s power simply accumulates and grows continually stronger. In articulating the older woman as an especially authoritative female magician, Linden’s essay thus challenges notions of feminine value as contingent on youth or fertility. Linden’s humorous

242  The Eloquent Blood observation that few men would likely suggest the coupling of an older woman and a younger man to be magically ideal suggests her awareness of the fact that the norm is usually the inverse. In Linden’s magical record, Babalon is implicitly intertwined with the idea of what may be referred to as a magical écriture féminine, a feminine genre of occult writing where female magicians verbalize for other women their experiences as occult practitioners and women.43 Significantly, Linden’s record ends with the declaration: “The time of the rising of the female power is at hand.”44 My interviewee Sophie, mentioned in the previous chapter, posits Babalon as a paradoxical symbol in that she is construed as feminine but challenges hegemonic notions of femininity, and that she is thereby very different from the softer and more maternal goddess Nuit. Regarding her experiences of the energy Babalon represents, she stresses: It’s not nurturing in that sense. It’s a wonderful place to be, in its way. But it’s not nurturing, it’s not: “There, there, honey.” It just is. It sounds silly when I say this, but if you can handle that, that it’s not nurturing, but it is, in all of its glory, so to speak, there it is in all of its strength, if you’re willing to go there, it’s a tremendously wonderful place to work. It’s also very solitary.45

Sophie stresses that Babalon does not represent gentle nurturance or comfort but glory, strength, and solitariness. In so doing, she implicitly highlights Babalon as a counterimage to hegemonic perceptions of femininity as oriented toward care for others. Sophie explicitly stresses that femininity is often understood as “nurturing and . . . loving,” which she contends does not match her experience of Babalon. She explains: [T]‌he Babalon archetype is interesting because in my opinion, there’s no value, there’s no difference between one thing and the other. . . . [T]here’s not a moral judgment. Everything is the same. It all sort of goes in the cup. Which makes it an interesting archetype to work with also, because although she is portrayed as female, and it is a feminine energy because of the creative content of it, in everyday life walking around, one thinks of women as nurturing and as loving and as more Nuit-​like. That’s not Babalon. At least not in my experience. . . . [She] tends to be more: “And those I call must follow.” There’s not an option there. . . . [S]he’s not benevolent. It’s not there. So what do you do with that? A female archetype who doesn’t have the classic characteristics of what we would consider feminine.46

Sophie asserts that Babalon’s demanding nature—​encapsulated in the telling phrase, “And those I  call must follow”—​and her propensity for absorbing

Feminist Difference  243 everything without judgment contrasts with hegemonic notions of femininity as nurturing and maternal. These aspects of the goddess shape Sophie’s embodied experiences of working magically with her. When embodying Babalon in ritual, Sophie says that she is unconcerned with the thoughts and feelings of others: I could give two hoots what anyone else thought. What anyone else feels, it makes no difference. . . . And that I think is what that archetype actually is. There’s no judgment. But there is no concern either. There’s not compassion, it’s not compassionate, it just is.47

This quote emphasizes Babalon as a feminine symbol that differs from dominant perceptions of femininity by not caring or being compassionate. In Sophie’s wording, embodying Babalon in ritual allows her to occupy a feminine positionality that nonetheless transgresses hegemonic expectations of femininity, where the concerns and opinions of others are utterly irrelevant. In Sophie’s case, Babalon appears to offer the possibility of inhabiting femininity in a way that does not necessarily legitimize a hierarchical and complementary relationship between the sexes. Thus, Sophie implicitly connects Babalon to what in Schippers’s terminology may be called an alternative femininity, comprising a gendered modality that does not simplistically support a hegemonic relationship between masculinity and femininity. Occult writer Soror Chen critiques previous interpretations of Babalon in an essay published in the Faces of Babalon anthology.48 Similar to Linden, the Corneliuses, and Helen, Chen reasons that past conceptions of Babalon and women’s roles in magic have been limited by androcentrism and male bias. She rejects the idea of Babalon as the passive half of a heterosexual magical pairing, arguing that patriarchal society mistrusts “[s]‌trong women who are equal and armed with truth and integrity.”49 Although she acknowledges that Crowley attempted to craft a new understanding of femininity, Chen feels the latter was impaired by a fundamental misogyny in this endeavor as well as in his conceptualization of Babalon. In Chen’s view, Crowley’s Scarlet Women were not seen as magicians in their own right but represented the goddess “by virtue of being fucked by ‘The Beast.’ ”50 She writes of Leah Hirsig’s despair after her abandonment by Crowley, and Hirsig’s longing for a ritual through which the office of Scarlet Woman could be transferred to Crowley’s new lover, Dorothy Olsen. Chen regretfully observes that Hirsig appears never to have recognized that she could represent Babalon in her own right, with or without the Beast.51 Chen’s critique of how she feels Crowley’s Scarlet Women were limited by their role being defined by its relation to masculinity can be read in conjunction with radical feminist critiques, which have affirmed the experience of “being fucked” as the essence of femininity.52 However, Chen clearly does not see this

244  The Eloquent Blood tendency to define femininity by its relation to masculinity as inevitable, instead stressing the potential for reworking femininity. She argues that women need to begin “invoking Babalon upon themselves” and to “trust the image of the strong, powerful, glorious woman” rather than wait for men to call the goddess into them. She encourages artistic expression as a means of invocation, and longingly anticipates “a world which reflects the gifts of women’s genius.”53 Chen stresses the importance of female agency and autonomy, and she urges women to begin defining Babalon for themselves. Similar to Helen, she emphasizes that the role of the Scarlet Woman does not simply amount to playing a particular role in a male magician’s life. Chen appears to express a hope for ways of doing femininity that are not defined by the relationship to masculinity. In a 2015 essay, occult author Maegdlyn Morris similarly associates Babalon with liberal values such as independence and self-​actualization, writing that Babalon’s power derives from serving her own True Will rather than that of another. Similar to Helen, Morris appears to see the role of Babalon as not exclusively magical or ritual but as pertaining to women’s roles in society at large. Babalon, in Morris’s view, challenges patriarchal disdain and fear of powerful women who honor their own desires above social conventions. Thus, parallels can be drawn between her idea of Babalon and an alternative or pariahlike femininity, which refuses to embody the hegemonic, hierarchical masculine-​ feminine relationship. Like Mary and Helen, Morris broadens the scope of the symbol to encompass a variety of manifestations of empowered womanhood.54 She stresses that Babalon is not merely the young and fertile woman, but equally the female politician battling patriarchal and religious oppression, the single mother stripping to make a living wage, the avant-​garde musician, the young girl who makes her own weapons, the elderly female metal head and psychedelics user, the Chechnyan woman terrorist, and the root woman aiding her tribe. Babalon, for Morris, represents freedom and all aspects of sexuality, as well as the fact that sexuality is not just for procreation.55 Significantly, Morris links Babalon to female emancipation by associating the goddess with different versions of femininity that challenge hegemonic notions of gender. In the thinking of some of the occultists discussed in this chapter, the association between Babalon and a more autonomous form of femininity or an empowered woman magician coincides with a critique of gender polarity as well as the notion that women are passive or receptive in magic. One example of this is Amodali, who is mentioned in the previous chapter. In an online essay, Amodali defines Babalon as “an entity that represents and embodies a wholly inclusive magical sexuality, completely open to all individuals on the gender spectrum and inclusive of every sexual orientation.”56 Thus, Babalon in Amodali’s view does not simply represent an alternative form of femininity but challenges the established categories of the gender system altogether. When I interviewed Amodali,

Feminist Difference  245 she described having been aware of sexual energies from childhood, and discovering at an early age that she could produce magical effects by touching her body. As an adult, she engaged in spiritual exploration, ranging from meditation to ceremonial magic, and experienced a resurgence of her trance experiences. Amodali began working with the Thoth Tarot, using sexual energies to project herself into different spaces. Over the following years, her spiritual experiences intensified. Eventually, she began experiencing what she describes as “physical scrying,” where she felt as though she was being taught techniques and movements and guided in the flow of energy. During our conversation, Amodali emphasized the lack of magical research and documentation of female sex-​magical embodiment, echoing feminist calls for a feminine mode of writing or écriture féminine in stressing the necessity for women to create spaces for exploration. When her own explorations began, she states, the lack of writing on sexual magic from a female perspective meant that there was very little context for her experiences, and she has therefore needed to develop her own techniques from scratch over the course of many years: It is really explosive. It’s an explosive energy for lots of reasons. Because as a body of magical knowledge it’s been suppressed, the female, physical, not just the textual layer of it, but the actual physical embodiment part of it. So when that starts to come through, there’s so little context. So many layers, not just in the way you can connect it with other people or what’s actually extant on a practical level. But almost on an etheric level, it feels like it hasn’t been able to manifest properly before. And now it feels like it is. I can see that the current is happening in a lot of ways. And you need a technique to be able to handle it. Because there aren’t techniques. So you can get hurt, or you can . . . lose it, quite badly.57

For Amodali, learning to handle the energies of the Babalon current included developing the ability to manage volatile energetic currents and move in and out of trance states at will, such as during performances, when she needed regularly to check the audience’s responses. Amodali underlines that a key aspect she feels has been missing from mainstream occultism is the sense of the Babalon current as a serious, spiritual path, requiring technical skill and active participation: [T]‌hat was something I felt wasn’t there at all. This sense that this is a calling, this is a spiritual, magical path that actually has a learning curve, that has progression. And that it’s something you can actually learn and change yourself and transform, rather than just being the muse having a lot of energies projected upon you, but actually working with them, and developing.58

246  The Eloquent Blood Amodali thus stresses the necessity of magical training for the female sex magician, emphasizing the potentially damaging effects of having “energies projected” onto oneself without the requisite preparation. She notes that this appears to have been the case with several of Crowley’s Scarlet Women: I’ve obviously got a lot of admiration, and empathy, and sadness, really, that a lot of them came to rather sticky ends, or it didn’t end very well. Having that archetype of Babalon projected onto oneself and not being able to properly prepare and not totally understanding how to work with it. I can’t blame Crowley, but I think he didn’t understand what he was unleashing, what he was doing to those women. I think it was all incredibly unfortunate in a lot of ways, and a lot of amazing work has happened, but the women tend to be the casualties more often than not. Because there wasn’t that sense that they were active participants.59

Similar to Soror Chen, Amodali connects the lack of understanding of women’s roles in sexual magic to the dissolution of some of Crowley’s relationships with his Scarlet Women, stating that “there wasn’t that sense that they were active participants,” and that having the archetype of Babalon projected onto oneself without being magically trained in working with it can be harmful.60 Here, Amodali voices a critique at what she sees as issues within the occult milieu, indicating what she perceives as an incomplete understanding of the role of the sex magical priestess. Amodali feels that Crowley did not fully comprehend how women can function as sex magicians in their own right. She feels the sexual revolution did not quite fulfill its potential in terms of the liberation of women’s sexuality, but notes that a shift seems to have occurred in the last 10 to 15 years. She envisions a priestesshood of women working with and developing the Babalon current, sharing their discoveries with the world.61 Associating the magical and sexual liberation of women with the transformation of humanity as a whole, she contends: I think it will be hugely challenging. In an incredibly positive way, but it’s still going to be hugely challenging for women to be able to create that space. This idea of the priestesshood, again, that probably just seems really utopian. . . . But I think if humanity wants her, then they’ll make a space for her and they’ll understand her role and what her role is for humanity. . . . But that’s a big question, whether that space will appear and whether women will be able to actually . . . . Women are trying to create that now, absolutely. It’s how far we can go, how far we can take it. That’s the really exciting thing, how we can run with it and really make something incredibly beautiful and powerful of it. . . . I really do

Feminist Difference  247 genuinely believe that that’s possible. I wouldn’t be pushing myself if I didn’t believe in theory it was possible, that on a magical level it was possible. It’s just a case of whether you can make the space.62

In Amodali’s work, there is a strong thematic overlap between the concept of Babalon and the revaluation of women as magicians, priestesses, initiators, and the hope for a new understanding of female sexuality, agency, and esoteric skill. She explicitly draws on poststructural feminist theory in her written work. During our conversation, she stressed:  “[T]‌he only places I’ve come close to finding any real, powerful concepts of female agency have been in feminist texts. I haven’t found them anywhere else.”63 Thus, she sees feminist theory as useful or even integral to the reconceptualization of the female sex magician, stating in the online essay “Feminism, ‘Weird’ Essentialism and 156” that “[a]ny enquiry into contemporary, magical sexuality is incomplete without consideration of feminist theory . . . feminism is the ‘greatest revolution in thought of the (20th) century.’ ”64 Similar to several of the contemporary occultists discussed here, Linda Falorio, mentioned in the previous chapter, stresses will and sovereignty as central to the idea of Babalon. In her contribution to the Faces of Babalon anthology, she writes that the individual representing Babalon is a social warrior who works to transform society in a positive manner: Babalon is that individual of power who is open and aware and in touch with hir magickal sexuality, yet is defined by no other individual, only by hir own Will to experience existence. S/​He is that individual able to stand-​in for the goddess in channeling the total unconditional love of the universe for all things in creation . . . to be totally yielding to desire—​the desires of others as well as hir own, yet retaining hir personal integrity, independence, and power. . . . As Warrior, one who walks the path of Babalon actively works for the positive transformation of culture and society, in a role of leadership, and through the application of courage, will, creativity, love, and above all, the Feminine Voice.65

Falorio’s reference to a concept of “the Feminine Voice” suggests a notion of feminine difference on an ontological level. However, Falorio construes Babalon as a feminine positionality that is not limited to magicians of a particular sex or gender, which represents sovereignty, leadership, and self-​determination in combination with ecstatic yielding, openness, and receptivity. Babalon, in Falorio’s reading, is an active transformer of society who is simultaneously able to surrender to desire and unite passionately with all. In Falorio’s text, femininity is defined not in relation to masculinity but rather as a floating positionality available to all subjects, which suggests an irreducible

248  The Eloquent Blood and utopian modality of openness and autonomy. There are significant parallels between Falorio’s articulation of Babalon and Ann Cvetkovich’s reflections on femme receptivity as involving “power and labor,”66 the ability to be present in the world as well as honoring one’s own and others’ experiences. Thus, Babalon in Falorio’s essay appears to function as a symbol of femininity beyond hetero-​ binary complementarity, hegemonic gender constructions, and simplistic antinomies of agency and receptivity. In this way, parallels can be drawn to Irigaray’s notion of how a feminine divine could be articulated that represents the full expression of feminine subjectivity, allowing for a fuller concept of sexual difference and the theorization of femininity as something in itself, rather than the absence or lack of masculinity.67 In indicating potential trajectories for research on gender and religion, Ursula King highlights as an important point for scholarly consideration whether women in particular religious traditions are able to wield religious authority. King indicates that scholars should pay attention to whether women are able to construct rituals of their own without going through intermediary male power and if they are seen as authorities in their own right who can interpret foundational sources of tradition. King notes that many religious traditions have historically valued women’s domestic work above their mystical proclivities, and she highlights as an important area for research whether particular systems value female engagement in demanding spiritual work.68 Although women have been central to modern occultism since the fin-​de-​siècle as both social and ritual leaders, preceding sections show how contemporary practitioners—​and especially women—​relate to a historical tradition of sexual magic that they nonetheless perceive as having undervalued women’s knowledge and experience. Significantly, these occult authors and practitioners articulate Babalon and/​or the Scarlet Woman as part of attempts to define an independent, feminine, magical subjectivity against the backdrop of what they construe as an androcentric historical tradition, highlighting the need for women taking an active role in invoking and defining the goddess for themselves. As shown in this and the previous chapter, and as I will return to repeatedly throughout the remainder of this study, the contemporary source material shows numerous examples of female-​ identified magicians creating their own rituals and epistemological frameworks for understanding their own relation to divinity. Tellingly, many of those I have spoken to, as well as the esoteric authors analyzed herein, emphasize the necessity of rigorous magical training for women as well as the serious and demanding nature of magical work. In this way, Babalon and the Scarlet Woman emerge as discursive sites for thinking about magical femininity beyond male-​defined concepts, with obvious parallels to Irigaray’s discussion of feminine divinity, as well as Schippers’s reasoning regarding the potential of alternative femininities to challenge the existing gender system by not adhering to hegemonic

Feminist Difference  249 masculine-​feminine relations. These negotiations are, however, fraught with tension, as attempts to challenge the existing gender system must always rely on established linguistic categories and structures. In the contemporary Babalon discourse, opinions diverge as to whether gender difference is relevant to magic, and feminine difference is variously situated as a matter of biology, hormones, energies, and social identity. In seeking to redefine femininity beyond lack or absence, some contemporary esotericists employ language that may be seen as reifying heteronormative linkages between birth-​assigned sex and gender. In the final chapter of this study I will return to the prospect of Babalon for functioning as a feminine figuration enabling new ways of envisioning and doing gender and sexuality.

Goddess of Gender Trouble? Babalon Challenging Heteronormativity As I  have repeatedly sought to highlight above, the increasing integration of feminist critiques into contemporary esotericism appears to have resulted in a shift in the contemporary Babalon discourse, where the need to redefine femininity and women’s roles, in society and/​or the occult, is frequently emphasized. Falorio and Syrinx dislocate the roles of Babalon and Scarlet Woman from a particular sex and gender, tendencies that were also seen in my interviews with Alan, Henry, and Sam (see previous chapter). Significantly, Amodali identifies the ability to engage with a limitless span of gendered experiences as an inherent aspect of what she calls the “156 current.” Several of the esoteric practitioners I have interviewed allude to issues of transgenderism in magic. These themes were especially emphasized during my interview in 2015 with Steve and Ash, who are romantic as well as magical partners. When I met them, Ash and Steve had been in a nonmonogamous relationship as well as practicing magic together for over a decade. Both have trained in the Golden Dawn system, and their joint work together draws inspiration from witchcraft as well as a number of other occult currents. Babalon is a central aspect of their work together, which strongly emphasizes concepts of sacred sexuality, including sacred prostitution and what they refer to as “sacred kink.”69 During our conversation, Steve, a male magician and former OTO member in his 40s, recounted an order event early in his magical “career,” at which a priestess recited an excerpt from Parsons’s “Freedom Is a Two-​Edged Sword,” specifically the final section titled “The Woman Girt with a Sword.”70 This was the first time Steve heard the text, which remains one of his favorite pieces of writing. Becoming disenchanted over time with OTO and what he sees as “conventional” Thelema, Steve investigated Parsons’s and Cameron’s work, wanting to find out more about Cameron’s life history and observing that

250  The Eloquent Blood her role in occult history life is frequently understated. Ash agrees with Steve that female occultists are often devalued: Steve: I think Cameron has often been, on the one hand exalted, but on the other hand almost like more of an accessory. . . . Ash: I think that’s a really common experience. As I’m sure you’ve [laughs] experienced in your research, that the female partner often—​in a dyad, in that experience—​is often, like “Oh well, clearly she’s just kind of there. Whatever. She’s just there to embody a goddess, whatever that’s about. Clearly not even a big deal. But the guy, the man, clearly he’s doing all the work.” [laughs] Steve: Even with Crowley, it’s like: “He’s the Beast! But the Scarlet Women that ride the Beast . . . . ” Ash: “It could be anyone really. They’re not doing anything special or anything.” [laughs] Steve: [laughs] Oh, god. Ash: I mean, a lot of it makes sense in the historical context, and considering misogyny and sexism, et cetera. But at the same time it’s just, like . . . . And especially, I feel like people who are actually working with Babalon, and have that sort of attitude, I’m just kind of, like: “Do you actually realize? No? Okay, I’ll be over here.” [laughs] But this culture changes, as we have more of an understanding and idea of what female power looks like. Feminine power.71 Steve and Ash feel some people working with Babalon underestimate female or feminine power, a fact they seem to find both amusing and strange. They recount an experience a few years previously, during a ritual in which Steve and the other cisgendered male participants invoked Babalon into Ash, who identifies as genderqueer, and two cisgendered women: Ash: We did a Babalon ritual together that was quite lovely, and kind of hilarious in many ways, but definitely potent. Steve: It was really funny, because . . . . One of the things that became apparent was that all the men, myself included, needed a kind of readjustment there. It became very clear. Ash: [laughs] Steve: The Babalon energy was just like: “Okay, you need to just shut up now.” Ash: It was really an excellent ritual—​there were three of us who were channeling Babalon, and then also three cis men who were there. And somehow, it seemed like a good idea for the men to actually invoke Babalon into us rather than us actually invoking Babalon into us. And we all . . . I think a lot of it was, we were very exhausted, and there were many things that happened. . . . But there was this moment where we were, kind of like: “Are you sure that’s what

Feminist Difference  251 you wanna do? Okay, that’s what you wanna do.” To the people who were designing the ritual, we were kind of like: “Okay, sure, we’ll do that. Let’s do that.” And basically [we] had this time period in it that was sort of “Babalon oracle time” where the two women and I were like, “You’re asking us these questions, and mostly we just want to rip you apart. We just don’t even . . . . What do you think that you’re doing right now?” [laughs] It was really kind of ridiculous. But also lovely. Steve: That was very much a wake-​up call for me. I could sit there and see one individual in particular very much trying to emulate Crowley and trying to boss Babalon around. Which I think is the problem. Crowley is famous for bringing about Babalon but I  don’t think he ever actually understood Babalon. Parsons got closer, but I don’t think he totally got there either. It’s very easy for these brilliant, powerful, charismatic male figures to kind of take on that role, but it became very clear to me that that’s really not what we need to do.72 Ash and Steve discuss their experiences of a collective Babalon ritual, noting how its gendered role-​division proved less than ideal. It is implied that male magicians who seek to command and dominate the goddess are somewhat misguided in their approach, and that the ritual served as something of a wake-​up call for Steve in this regard. Ash and Steve both welcome more writing on women’s experiences in magic, and they are pleased that recent years have witnessed a greater proliferation of writings by Babalon devotees and magicians. Steve voices his appreciation for what he sees as a greater proliferation of older and highly experienced female magicians disseminating their work. Similar to Amodali, Steve is critical of binary and gender-​essentialist ideas in what he views as “conventional” forms of Thelema, as well as in some branches of Wicca. Likewise, Ash stresses the necessity of examining one’s own internalized sexism, cis-​sexism, and homophobia so as to avoid perpetuating unconscious biases, and that this awareness is often lacking in the occult milieu. Steve continues that many people appear to seek magical justifications for their own sexism by adopting binarized roles, such as (male) magician and Scarlet Woman. However, the couple attest to a change in recent years, due in large part to the greater proliferation of works by female, transgendered, and queer magicians. Steve describes Babalon as a goddess who “deliberately seeks out those things that are shocking and taboo and blasphemous,” and Ash stresses: Definitely she’s connected with women . . . but . . . she is really open to all forms of breaking out of the norm and the normative stereotypes that people are often stuck into. And . . . transness is another way that she also really supports and really works with in that aspect.73

252  The Eloquent Blood In underlining the challenging of gender-​related and sexual norms, Ash and Steve both strongly connect Babalon to themes of queerness, transgender, and gender subversion. Ash, who describes themselves as genderqueer but “solidly rooted in femme,” has undergone a long process of working out for themselves what it means for them to be dedicated to Babalon, a feminine deity who simultaneously has aspects of queerness and gender fluidity in her close association with that which is perceived as deviant and transgressive, something Ash feels certainly applies to transgenderism today. Ash reflects: I haven’t quite figured it all out, of course. I don’t know if I ever will. . . . And what does it even mean that I am taking testosterone, and what does that even mean in terms of my relationship with Babalon? And it pretty much, at least from what I’ve discovered so far, is that it’s the same. [laughs] It hasn’t actually changed or shifted anything, but I’ve had to go through a process of kind of moving away from being a woman or being female, necessarily. . . . And what does that even mean for my connection to this deity that is also really powerful in her embracing of femininity and woman-​ness? And also really important, I think, in the experience of women really embracing their own sexual power and their own experience of gender and carving out that experience of, like: “No, women are powerful, women are these things.” And for me it’s been a process of trying to do that. I’ve tried to do that, I’ve tried to be: “Oh, I can do that, I can be a cis woman, I can do that, I can live life like that,” and it just never quite worked or felt right. But because I was really trying to do that for a long time, and because I really have a lot of love for women and a lot of belief that women are powerful—​of course—​moving away from that was really hard for me, too. And because of my connection, I would say, too, with Babalon and other really strong female deities. To be like, those things are all true and I want to take testosterone and I want to be in this weird, amorphous space—​liminal space—​that’s also very much not a rejection of my own self. Or that is a rejection in my own self of woman and female but also still embracing femininity.74

Ash describes navigating their own process of transition, and negotiating their own gender identity with what they view as Babalon’s connection to femininity and female power. Ash describes undergoing a process of rejecting the categorizations of “woman” and “female” while simultaneously embracing femininity, and that they have struggled to reconcile their belief in women’s power with themselves not identifying as female. However, Ash stresses that their relationship with Babalon has remained the same throughout this process, and that overthinking these issues disconnects them from their own embodied experience. Ash’s eloquent reasoning explores a central theme in the source material analyzed in this and the previous chapter, namely, the meaning of femininity and

Feminist Difference  253 what it means to be feminine. Ash clearly construes femininity as a positionality that is not limited to women (whether cis or transgendered) but that can be embodied and lived in diverse ways. Steve notes that Babalon can in certain ways be seen as very conventionally female or feminine, but that the goddess is also linked to a transgression or subversion of the meaning of those concepts. He refers to the symbolism surrounding Babalon as the one who rides the Beast in order to highlight how Babalon, in his view, takes a dominant position and refuses to conform to conventional gender norms surrounding femininity: Steve: I think so much of Babalon really is . . . . Yes, in some ways very conventionally female or feminine, but also so much transgressing what that means. Ash: I agree. Steve: Even in her aspect of riding the Beast, taking that dominant position, refusing to be submissive, refusing to conform to the societal idea of how a woman should be. And she’s a war goddess—​she’s a general of an army, she comes girt with a sword, and she definitely takes that male role and just embraces it. Ash: Girt with a sword, which is also just quintessentially a symbolic icon of a phallus. She has a sword and a cup, right? That merging of masculinity and femininity that is so revered in both alchemy as well as a lot of Eastern traditions. . . . She really has all of those aspects within her. Steve: Yeah. It’s hard to be gender essentialist about a goddess that is really all about fucking gender expectations. [laughs] Ash: While that’s true, and also, surprisingly, not always true. [laughs]75 Above, Steve appears to indicate Babalon as symbolic of an alternative femininity, encompassing characteristics that, to speak with Schippers, are part of a hegemonic masculinity.76 Thus, Steve explicates Babalon in terms of a pariahlike femininity, though he views these aspects of the goddess in a very positive light. Ash, in turn, underlines how Babalon can be seen as a symbol that traverses binary gender concepts by merging masculinity and femininity within her. However, Ash notes, some people within the occult milieu still hold what Ash views as essentialist ideas about the goddess. Significantly, both Steve and Ash underline the idea of Babalon as a sword-​bearing deity as connected to her assertive and active role. Similarly, Syrinx and Mike stress the “sword-​bearing” aspect of Babalon, which is emphasized in a number of other sources.77 Steve and Ash’s conceptualization of Babalon as being “girt with a sword” recalls what Waldby refers to as the idea of the “phallic” woman, representing femininity in the position of erotic conqueror that is not only destroyed through the “tender violence” of erotic experience but that has the potential to effect such destruction on others.

254  The Eloquent Blood

Babalon and Feminist Femininities: Difference, Divinity, and Subversive Spaces In this chapter, I have discussed how contemporary occultists articulate Babalon and/​or the Scarlet Woman in opposition to what they perceive as hegemonic notions of femininity or gender relations by pointing toward alternative femininities that do not simplistically legitimize a hierarchical, male-​female relationship. While several of the people discussed herein voice what may be referred to as feminist critiques of Crowley, Thelema, and sexual magic and occultism in general, feminism holds an ambiguous position within the Babalon discourse. Amodali, while appreciative of feminist philosophy, writes that she feels the latter has tended to obscure female embodied experience.78 Similarly, my interviewee Alkistis Dimech engages ambivalently with feminism, and I will return to this in the subsequent chapter. In the source material, Babalon is frequently linked to critiques of sexism and androcentrism and to a perceived need to redefine femininity and women’s roles in society and magic. Moreover, she is repeatedly construed as a challenge to restrictive conceptualizations of femininity and female agency. This entails a gender-​critical approach to the historical Babalon discourse as well as female roles in magic, and several esoteric authors and practitioners indicate how stereotypical perceptions of femininity have limited female magicians as well as perceptions of Babalon. Although not all of the contemporary esotericists cited in this study identify as feminist (in fact, some may resist identification with the label), it is nonetheless my view that these tendencies evince how contemporary occultism and Thelema have been influenced by the trajectory of feminism and the LGBTQ movement. The contemporary Babalon discourse echoes liberal feminist arguments for representation, radical feminist emphases on separatism and critiques of the liberating effects of the sexual revolution, and feminist and queer perspectives and terminology relating to transgenderism and gender variance. As I  will discuss in the subsequent chapter, the Babalon discourse overlaps strongly with sex radical feminist analyses of sexuality, kink, and sex work. Thus, the contemporary Babalon discourse is not only a product of specific developments within Thelema or occultism but is intertwined with broader discussions regarding femininity, sexuality, and gender in society. Crucially, the mere presence of a concept of divine femininity within a religion does not in itself guarantee the articulation of a spiritual feminism, nor does the historical Babalon discourse provide a ready-​made forum for subjects seeking to challenge sexism, androcentrism, and misogyny within occultism. On the contrary, the articulation of gender-​critical tropes in the Babalon discourse is part of the negotiation of gendered concepts within occultism, taking part within contested terrain and reflecting the concerns of the people engaging with the

Feminist Difference  255 goddess.79 I propose that this development can be linked to the increasing proliferation of writings by female occultists working with Babalon, though my source material may provide a biased view given that a slight majority of those I have interviewed are women. Although female participation in a discourse does not automatically result in a more gender-​critical orientation of that discourse, it is nonetheless possible, drawing on Irigaray, to argue that increasing woman-​to-​ woman dialogue on female experience and issues pertaining to a goddess may, in fact, contribute to the articulation of concepts of femininity that are not exclusively defined by phallocentric standards. As previously discussed, femininity has often been a sore point within feminist theory, frequently defined in terms of lack; as an effect of masculinity that mainly exists by means of distinction from or subordination to it; as an inauthentic and debilitating mask that women must discard; or as simply fake, trivial, or superficial.80 This is problematic, as femininity is not monolithic, nor does it only relate to masculinity through lack or differentiation.81 In contrast to the notion of femininity simply as the embodiment of a socially subordinate position, whose associated traits and attributes must be discarded if women are to be liberated, feminist scholars and activists working within poststructuralist and queer paradigms have instead suggested that femininity can be transformed in ways that challenge the existing gender system.82 Attempts to rework femininity in such ways are a strong theme within the contemporary Babalon discourse, which utilizes the goddess and her human avatar as points of departure for revaluating femininity, sexuality, and agency. All of the esotericists analyzed in this chapter indicate unequal gender relations and argue that hegemonic notions of femininity have been shaped by patriarchal or phallocentric logics (although they do not always use these terms). Whereas in the previous chapter I highlighted a number of contemporary practitioners who degender Babalon, the writers and practitioners discussed in this chapter stress feminine difference as magically meaningful, suggesting how the latter can be embodied in ways that challenge the hegemonic gender order. In the contemporary source material, Babalon is repeatedly ascribed characteristics that, in Schippers’s terminology, can be associated with a hegemonic masculinity, including assertive sexual desire, worldly power, creativity, and martiality. As such, Babalon is conceptualized in terms of pariah femininity. In this way, the Babalon discourse suggests femininities beyond hegemonic notions, encompassing traits that, ordinarily, are not highly valued in femininity. By signifying a feminized positionality that does not legitimize a hierarchical and complementary relationship between the sexes in a clear-​cut manner, Babalon in the contemporary source material thus has aspects of what Schippers defines as an alternative femininity. However, the Babalon discourse cannot be reduced to one position on what constitutes femininity. As seen in the previous chapter, Babalon

256  The Eloquent Blood is ascribed aspects that, taken by themselves, are connected to a hegemonic femininity. Whereas some esotericists interpret the goddess or the Scarlet Woman in terms of “loud and adulterous” pariah femininity as opposed to nurturing and passive hegemonic femininity, others stress similar interpretations of Babalon as too simplistic, instead indicating the potential of the symbol to encompass a potentially limitless range of femininities.83 Thus, it is my argument that the Babalon discourse does not so much present a single and demarcated feminine ideal but rather offers a flexible space wherein different understandings of femininity are articulated and negotiated. Some of the arguments made by the contemporary esotericists whose words and work are analyzed herein could potentially be characterized as essentialist, in the sense of articulating some version of essential gender difference. Not least within the academic tradition of gender studies in the Nordic countries, “essentialism” has frequently been used as a pejorative term to denote what one perceives as naïve and universalist readings of gender. This is understandable given that arguments for an innate female nature have historically been used to limit women’s roles and counteract feminism.84 Furthermore, the implicit question of what it means to be a woman, or what it means to be feminine, frequently departs from an assumption that it is possible to define these concepts decisively across time, space, and other intersections of power, overlooking how feminine experience is shaped by factors such as class and race. Understandings of how female agency is circumscribed, as expressed in the contemporary Babalon discourse, are structured by the classed and racialized perspectives of its proponents, and in the subsequent chapter I will return to how this shapes the construction of feminine sexual liberation in the source material. However, labeling parts of the source material as essentialist is, in my view, less than ideal for understanding how contemporary esotericists within the Babalon discourse engage in a discussion about the meaning of femininity that is far from uncritical toward assumptions of an essential or universal womanhood. Although their opinions diverge as to the meaning of feminine difference, all of the occult practitioners and authors cited in this chapter voice a wish that they could, to quote Ulrika Dahl, “write the feminine differently.”85 Irigaray’s analysis of sexual difference and feminine subjectivity is helpful for understanding desires to rework gendered concepts rather than abandoning them altogether. In Irigaray’s view, discarding concepts of femininity will not change the underlying phallocentrism of the dominant culture, which has denied women subjectivity by representing masculinity as universal and femininity as its lack, other, or mirror.86 Sexual equality, according to Irigaray’s reasoning, requires a concept of sexual difference allowing femininity to be defined in relation to itself. For Irigaray, a feminine divine that encompasses and transcends dichotomies such as mother–​lover is integral for articulating an independent feminine subjectivity.

Feminist Difference  257 “In order to become,” Irigaray writes, “it is essential to have a gender or an essence . . . as horizon.”87 For the female occultists discussed in this chapter, identification with Babalon is construed as a departing point for the realization of feminine divinity and the articulation of an authoritative feminine magical role. As such, there are parallels between their conceptualization of Babalon and how Rosi Braidotti understands Irigaray’s archetypal feminine as representing the borders of the sacred and profane and the human and divine, which is the object of both masculine fear and envy as well as the potential source for a redefinition of feminine power.88 Thus, I argue that the Babalon discourse encompasses a number of different strategies for articulating what Schippers denotes as an alternative femininity or, to speak with Irigaray, a concept of femininity not as “the other of the same,” but as “an/​other subject, irreducible to the masculine subject and sharing equivalent dignity.”89 The usage of divine or sacralized feminine symbolism as the departing point for redefining femininity is not unique to the Babalon discourse, and similar arguments to those made by the occult authors and practitioners discussed here can be found in feminist branches of Neopaganism as well as within movements that can broadly be categorized as belonging to goddess feminism. These comprise attempts to overcome perceived dichotomies of woman-​as-​lover and woman-​as-​mother and to valuate sexually active femininity outside of the context of reproductive matrimony. An interesting parallel is contemporary Mary Magdalene spirituality, analyzed by Anna Fedele and Kim Knibbe, who write that Mary Magdalene pilgrims construct rituals based on the idea of Mary Magdalene as the patron saint of menstruation and of sacred feminine sexuality.90 As I will return to in the subsequent chapter, however, a significant contrast between the contemporary Babalon discourse and Fedele and Knibbe’s source material is that the former, to a far stronger extent, emphasizes imagery related to a “phallic” femininity and draws on symbolism and terminology related to a pariahlike femininity in order to emphasize Babalonian and feminine agency. The ways in which divine femininity and its connection to female liberation are articulated in the contemporary Babalon discourse are strongly shaped by its historical trajectory, and thus it is unsurprising that these esotericists relate to a significantly greater extent to the historical trajectory of occultism. The contemporary Babalon discourse can be read as an implicit discussion about the meaning and location of feminine and sexual difference, which has become increasingly complex as the Thelemic and esoteric milieus have incorporated an awareness of issues related to transgenderism and queerness. Some of my interviewees and the occult authors analyzed herein stress the specificity of gendered experience and the primacy of sex and gender to the magical roles one is able to perform, but opinions diverge regarding the location of gender difference, which is variously construed in terms of anatomical morphology,

258  The Eloquent Blood hormonal composition, sociocultural experience, or identity. Some of the occultists discussed in this chapter and the previous one articulate notions of essential femininity existing on the level of “energy” or ontology, but they construct it as not necessarily limited to female sex (whether birth-​assigned or transgendered), thereby to some extent conceptualizing femininity as a floating positionality that shapes and is shaped by embodied experience. My interviewee Ash’s discussion of how to reconcile their own genderqueer identity with a valorization of femininity and femme encapsulates this ongoing conversation and its inherent complexities.

Notes 1. See discussion in ­chapter 7. See also, e.g., Kowalchyk, “A Study,” 161–​162; Hymenaeus Beta, “Women’s Conference Address,” The Magical Link 1997, no. 1 (1997):  8–​10; Williams, “Feminist Thelema”; Effertz, Priest/​ess. 2. In building on the notion that women are socially subordinated, and that this inequality should be rectified. See, e.g., Karen Offen, “Defining Feminism: A Comparative Historical Approach,” Signs 14, no. 1 (1988): 151. I apply the term “feminism” etically to arguments phrased by people who would not necessarily identify as feminist. 3. See ­chapter 7. 4. Irigaray, “Divine.” 5. Alan, interview, 2014. 6. Charles, conversation, 2014. 7. Schippers, “Recovering.” 8. Alan, interview, 2014. 9. Amy, interview, 2014. 10. Amy, interview, 2014. 11. Amy, interview, 2014. 12. Schippers, “Recovering.” 13. Mary, interview, 2015. 14. Mary, interview, 2015. 15. Anzaldúa, Borderlands; Lara, “Goddess.” 16. Helen, interview, 2014. 17. Mike, interview, 2014. 18. Mike, interview, 2014. 19. Mike, interview, 2014. 20. Mike, interview, 2014. 21. See Parsons, “Freedom.” 22. Nema, “A Double Vision of Babalon,” in Faces of Babalon: Being a Compilation of Women’s Voices, ed. Mishlen Linden (Logan: Black Moon Publishing, 2008), 22–​23. 23. Nema, “Double,” 23. 24. Ibid., 24.

Feminist Difference  259 25. Cf. Schippers, “Recovering”; Willey, “Constituting.” 26. This assertion is based on my fieldwork as well as on unsystematized background research in Thelemic Facebook groups and online forums conducted since 2012. 27. Soror Syrinx, Traversing, 7. 28. Ibid., 39–​40. This approach marks a departure from Campbell, whose seventeen-​ tier model of the hero’s journey defines two roles for women: “the Meeting with the Goddess” and “Woman as the Temptress.” See Joseph Campbell, The Hero with a Thousand Faces (Novato, CA: New World Library, 2008). 29. Soror Syrinx, Scarlet Grimoire, 11. 30. AL I:3. 31. Helen, interview, 2014. 32. Helen, interview, 2014. 33. Helen, interview, 2014. 34. J. Edward Cornelius, “Introduction,” Red Flame:  A Thelemic Research Journal 7 (1999), xxix. 35. J. Edward Cornelius, “On Arousal ... and the Sabbath of the Witches,” in Essays:  Volume Two, ed. J. Edward Cornelius and Erica M Cornelius (Berkeley, CA: privately published, 2015), 71–​82. 36. Erica M Cornelius, “Introduction,” in Essays: Volume Two, ed. J. Edward Cornelius and Erica M Cornelius (Berkeley, CA: privately published, 2015), 8. 37. Mishlen Linden, “The Faces of Babalon:  Preface,” in Faces of Babalon:  Being a Compilation of Women’s Voices, ed. Mishlen Linden (Logan: Black Moon Publishing, 2008), iv. 38. Mishlen Linden, “Playing with Fire:  The Training of Babalon,” in Faces of Babalon: Being a Compilation of Women’s Voices, ed. Mishlen Linden (Logan: Black Moon Publishing, 2008), 18. 39. Mishlen Linden, “In the Garden of Earthly Delights: From the Magickal Record of Mishlen Linden,” in Women of Babalon: A Howling of Women’s Voices, ed. Mishlen Linden and Linda Falorio (Logan: Black Moon Publishing, 2015), 79–​119. 40. Linden, “Garden,” 81. Linden cowrote the calling of the priest with Diane Narraway. 41. Ibid.,  82–​83. 42. Ibid., 99. 43. The term écriture féminine is associated with French poststructuralist feminists such as Hélène Cixous, Luce Irigaray, and Julia Kristeva. The term was coined by Cixous; see Hélène Cixous, “The Laugh of the Medusa,” Signs 1, no. 4 (1976): 875–​893. 44. Linden, “Garden,” 119. 45. Sophie, interview, 2014. 46. Sophie, interview, 2014. 47. Sophie, interview, 2014. 48. Soror Chen, “Failed Babalons,” in The Faces of Babalon:  Being a Compilation of Women’s Voices, ed. Mishlen Linden (Logan: Black Moon Publishing, 2008), 13–​15. 49. Chen, “Failed,” 13. 50. Ibid. 51. Ibid., 14.

260  The Eloquent Blood 52. See ­chapter 2. 53. Chen, “Failed,” 15. 54. Maegdlyn Morris, “The Warrior Babalon,” in Women of Babalon:  A Howling of Women’s Voices, ed. Mishlen Linden and Linda Falorio (Logan:  Black Moon Publishing, 2015), 159–​166. 55. Morris, “Warrior.” 56. Amodali, “Feminism.” 57. Amodali, interview, 2016. 58. Amodali, interview, 2016. 59. Amodali, interview, 2016. 60. Amodali, interview, 2016. 61. Amodali, interview, 2016. 62. Amodali, interview, 2016. 63. Amodali, interview, 2016. 64. Amodali, “Feminism.” 65. Falorio, “Kiss,” 7. 66. Cvetkovich, “Receptivity.” 67. Irigaray, “Divine.” 68. King, “Gender and Religion.” 69. A commonly recurring term in the esoteric and Neopagan milieus, Michelle Mueller writes that ”sacred kink” can be defined as the intentional use of kink, i.e., “consensual power play” for “spiritual ends.” Michelle Mueller, “If All Acts of Love and Pleasure Are Her Rituals, What About BDSM? Feminist Culture Wars in Contemporary Paganism,” Theology and Sexuality 24, no. 3 (2017): 1–​14. 70. Parsons, “Freedom.” 71. Steve and Ash, interview, 2015. 72. Steve and Ash, interview, 2015. 73. Ash, interview, 2015. 74. Ash, interview, 2015. 75. Steve and Ash, interview, 2015. 76. Schippers, “Recovering.” 77. See, e.g., Lou Hotchkiss-​ Knives, “Watch Her Wrap Her Legs Around This World: Babalon, Sex, Death, Conception, Punk Rock, and the Mysteries,” in Women of Babalon:  A Howling of Women’s Voices, ed. Mishlen Linden and Linda Falorio (Logan:  Black Moon Publishing, 2015), 121–​153; Raven Greywalker, “Notes of a Professional Babalon,” in Faces of Babalon: Being a Compilation of Women’s Voices, ed. Mishlen Linden (Logan: Black Moon Publishing, 2008), 25–​27. 78. Amodali, “Feminism.” 79. Likewise, Alex Owen and Joy Dixon have both shown that feminism was contested in fin-​de-​siècle occultism, which comprised a number of contradictory views on gender. Owen, Place; Dixon, Divine. 80. See ­chapter 2. 81. Dahl, “Turning.” 82. See ­chapter 2.

Feminist Difference  261 83. Similar to, e.g., Anzaldúa, Borderlands; Lara, “Goddess.” Cf. AL III:44. 84. Cf., e.g., Sherry B. Ortner, “Is Female to Male as Nature Is to Culture?” Feminist Studies 1, no. 2 (1972): 5–​31; de Beauvoir, The Second Sex. 85. Ulrika Dahl, “Re-​Figuring Femme Fashion,” Lambda Nordica 2–​3 (2009): 73. 86. Irigaray, Speculum. 87. Irigaray, “Divine,” 61. 88. Braidotti, “Sign.” 89. Irigaray, “Question,” 8. 90. Anna Fedele and Kim Knibbe, “From Angel in the Home to Sacred Prostitute:  Unconditional Love and Gendered Hierarchies in Contemporary Spirituality,” in Contemporary Encounters in Gender and Religion:  European Perspectives, ed. Lena Gemzöe, Marja-​ Liisa Keinänen, and Avril Maddrell (Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016), 195–​216.

10

Inhabiting the Uninhibited Babalon, Sexual Politics, and the Liberation of the Desiring Feminine Subject

In the stereotypical virgin–​whore dichotomy, the virgin is commonly seen as the feminine ideal. The Babalon discourse inverts this trope, connecting the goddess to female sexual emancipation. So, what does this imagined emancipation entail, and which strategies of sexual liberation are utilized within the present-​day Babalon discourse? This chapter aims to analyze how sexual restriction and liberation are understood in the material, and how Babalon is articulated as an alternative to hegemonic notions of feminine sexuality. The first section of the chapter will discuss how Babalon is constructed as a challenge to notions of feminine sexuality as moderate, nurturing, and passive by representing an assertive feminine sexuality.1 The second section will analyze a recurrent trope in the Babalon discourse, namely, sacred whoredom. In conclusion, I will explore how the Babalon discourse reifies and challenges hegemonic notions of feminine sexuality.

Babalon as the Liberator of Feminine Sexuality Unsurprisingly, given Babalon’s Crowleyan origins, a strong thematic element in the contemporary source material is the sacredness of sexuality. A common notion in the source material is that sexuality, and especially female sexuality, has historically been, and continues to be, restricted by cultural and social mores. A prominent narrative is that the advent of the Abrahamic religious paradigm in the West coincided with a denigration of sex and the body, particularly female sexuality.2 In the contemporary writings and interviews, sexually assertive femininity is frequently conceptualized as having the ability to destabilize hegemonic masculine-​feminine relationships. In her essay “Feminist Thelema” (2007), Thelemic author Brandy Williams writes that “[m]‌onotheistic religion sanctifies the image of woman as sexually chaste and submissive.” Williams contends that Thelemic theology challenges this notion, elevating “the free expression of sexuality, represented by Babalon.”3 Williams posits Babalon and Mary as opposing images of femininity. In contrast to the “virgin mother,” she writes, Crowley’s Babalon represents a sacralization of “the sexually active mother.”4 The Thelemic The Eloquent Blood: The Goddess Babalon and the Construction of Femininities in Western Esotericism. Manon Hedenborg White, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780190065027.001.0001

264  The Eloquent Blood images of Nuit and Babalon function, in her view, as “model[s] for women’s sexual behavior,” meaning that women “are free to act just as men do as sexual creatures.”5 For Williams, Babalon thus symbolically sanctifies feminine sexual agency. Williams connects ancient paganism to a positive attitude to female sexuality. She especially views the cults of pre-​Christian goddesses as affirming of women’s sexuality.6 Williams identifies Babalon as the modern manifestation of a form of divine femininity represented by an array of female deities including the Sumerian Inanna, the Akkadian Ishtar, the Greek Aphrodite, the Egyptian Hathor, and the Semitic Qadesh and Asherah, all of whom share “a sense of sacredness and joy in women’s sexuality and the connection of sexuality with power.”7 Williams continues: This was the specific line of female sacredness that the author of the Book of Revelation demonized and that was repressed in Europe in the post-​Pagan era. In the modern period, Babalon roared back, and Crowley as her priest promoted her power and the power of women’s sexuality. This was not only shocking and radical in his time, during the late Victorian-​Edwardian era, but remains shocking and radical today, where women’s sexuality continues to be repressed rather than celebrated.8

The identification of Babalon with Inanna and Ishtar is a recurring trope in the contemporary Babalon discourse.9 Williams links sexual repression with female subjugation, ascribing both to the spread of Christianity. Babalon is construed as an oppositional symbol with the ability to destabilize social conventions both historically and today. Describing herself as a “childless, mature woman,” Williams writes that she feels a strong sense of affinity with Babalon as the epitome of “the unbridled lover.”10 She indicates Babalon as a feminine symbol that challenges the equation of femininity with motherhood, sanctifying uninhibited, nonreproductive sexuality as valid and sacred. Nonetheless, Williams comments that Thelema lacks images of feminine divinity that are not framed in maternal or sexual terms.11 Thus, she implies that Babalon is constructed in relation to masculinity. Syrinx addresses the connection between Babalon and sexuality in her work. While she does not view Babalon or the Scarlet Woman—​titles she mostly uses interchangeably—​as solely defined by sexuality, Syrinx nonetheless emphasizes the erotic components of the role. Similar to Williams, Syrinx contends that contemporary culture stigmatizes feminine sexuality, and she underlines that women must be allowed to be sexual without being seen as “sinner[s]‌or ruined.”12 Syrinx connects the Christian cult of the Virgin Mary to an antisexual hatred of women’s creativity and power.13 In her view, each Scarlet Woman is free

Inhabiting the Uninhibited  265 to choose how best to express her sexuality, and neither her sexual orientation nor preferences should be anyone else’s concern.14 Thus, she associates Babalon less with any particular sexual practices than with feminine sexual agency. This point recurs frequently in the contemporary source material, and I will return to it in my final discussion. During my interview with Steve and Ash, both connected Babalon to Inanna. Ash reasoned thus regarding Babalon’s connection to the history of sexuality: She comes from the lineage of Inanna, Ishtar, Astarte, and also you could put Aphrodite, maybe Hathor, maybe Isis. . . . [A]‌ny kind of Venusian love-​and-​lust deities are in the same vein, but definitely distinct from her. . . . [T]his connection to erotic life force, to the erotic as a fundamental aspect of life and life force, that has been cast aside and denigrated in this culture. And I also really believe that a lot of people are moving back towards that and realizing the amount of what we’ve lost through the many years of casting aside sexuality, also casting aside women, and casting aside all of these really powerful forces that she represents, or is connected to. . . . Do we value love in this culture, do we actually value eroticism? Certainly not. But at the same time we are overly eroticized.15

Ash connects female subjugation with sexual repression and constructs Babalon as linked to recognition of sex as a vital aspect of life. Ash indicates that love and eroticism are simultaneously undervalued and fetishized in contemporary culture. During the same conversation, Steve linked Babalon to the Sumerian myth of Inanna’s descent into the underworld; which is a popular mythological trope in the Neopagan and occult milieus:16 A lot of people have a tendency to almost identify Babalon with Inanna, and . . . probably that’s the closest fit. But one of the things that we have adopted as a working model is that there’s the myth of Inanna descending into the underworld and having to shed her seven garments, and literally die and be hung upon hooks. And that almost becomes a perfect metaphor for that goddess force being driven underground into the underworld through the last few thousand years of patriarchal, very anti-​sex, very anti-​female culture. And Babalon is what comes back up, from that. Transformed, different. Still rooted in that same thing, but something new.17

In Steve’s view, Inanna’s descent can be interpreted as a metaphor for the marginalization of the divine feminine by a sexually repressive, patriarchal culture and the subsequent reemergence of the goddess in modernity. However, Steve

266  The Eloquent Blood contends, the goddess’s stint in the underworld appears to have endowed Babalon with a transgressive quality, and he links this to the idea of sacred prostitution: Steve: Babalon isn’t about sacred prostitution in the sense that the ancient world might have seen it, where there was a cultural thing around it. But instead, Babalon deliberately seeks out those things that are shocking and taboo and blasphemous. Even the name, taking on the name Babalon which clearly relates to the Book of Revelation. . . . It’s taking back that power and reveling in it. And really, not only trying to say: “No, no, no, it’s okay, you say this is bad but it’s not really.” It’s like: “In your face. This is my power. You’re scared of this? Let me terrify you.” Ash: “Oh you think this is bad? You haven’t seen anything. I’ll be the baddest that you’ve ever seen.” Steve: Yeah. And so, a good portion of our work in day-​to-​day life is fostering a sex positive culture, a queer positive culture, kink positive, poly positive. . . . All these things that are transgressive in their own right, in the sense that our culture has all these strict taboos around it. Being supportive of sex workers, being supportive of all these other things. . . . That’s kind of our passion, to help spread awareness, spread education, spread a way for people to be okay with their sexuality, okay with their bodies, being okay with being something other than what society tells them they should be.18 Steve and Ash emphasize that Babalon not only represents a sacralization of sexuality and disavowal of stigma around specific sexual acts but also epitomizes deliberate engagement with what they see as nonhegemonic modalities, including queerness, kink, polyamory, and sex work. As seen in the previous chapter, both strongly connect Babalon to transgender experience. Steve and Ash imagine Babalon not primarily as nurturing or gentle, but as a provocative and fearsome image of feminine sexuality. In my view, this highlights a difference between the contemporary Babalon discourse and Neopagan and alternative spiritual discourses on sacred sexuality. It appears that the Babalon discourse places a stronger emphasis on nonhegemonic gendered and sexual modalities, and I will return to this in a subsequent section.19 Similar to Williams, Ash, and Steve, Peter Grey in his book The Red Goddess describes some pre-​Christian pagan cultures—​especially ancient Mesopotamia, and its cult of Inanna—​as affirming of the power and sacredness of sexuality, not least that of women. Grey associates Babalon with unrepressed feminine sexuality, which he notes is perceived as a threat to social convention. He views John’s vision in Revelation as genuine, but skewed by a Christian loathing of female, spiritual-​sexual power.20 In Grey’s view, the Christian church has used the image of the Virgin Mary to co-​opt the cult of the divine feminine and demonize

Inhabiting the Uninhibited  267 female sexuality in the process. He thus conceptualizes Babalon as the antithesis of Mary, of whom he writes: “As a Goddess she is a cliterodectomy.”21 Instead, he reads the biblical character of Mary Magdalene and her later reception as an echo of the cult of the goddess. Magdalene, in Grey’s view, was not a repentant “fallen woman,” but perhaps instead a temple prostitute or priestess of Inanna.22 However, he stresses that the Magdalene is not equivalent to Babalon, but rather a “cautionary tale or crutch for recovering Christians looking for Our Lady but unable to accept the Antichrist as their personal saviour.”23 Grey links Babalon to a critique of historical esotericism, and especially modern sexual magic, which Grey repeatedly stresses has degraded feminine sexuality.24 Furthermore, Grey argues that the androcentric focus of modern sexual magic has neglected some magically powerful practices. For instance, Grey asserts that the magical potential of kissing has been disregarded, as male sex magicians often focus on ejaculation.25 Thus, Grey associates Babalon not only with a liberation of sexuality from social constraint but also with a reorientation of sex magical practice so as not to objectify feminine bodies. Furthermore, although Grey points to what he sees as a loosening of sexual restrictions in modernity, he notes that commercialization and commodification of women oppress and hinder the expression of feminine sexuality.26 Occult author and practitioner Maegdlyn Morris, writing in an essay published in Women of Babalon (2015), sees Babalon as symbolic of female sexual independence and authority. Morris writes that Babalon “counsels rulers and watches over the sex workers.” I will return to the theme of Babalon and sex work in a subsequent section. Babalon, in Morris’s view, is a liberator of sexual taboos, who serves only herself: She removes boundaries and guilt, and destroys the sexual doubt and shadows that society uses to control. All of this she does without concern for socially imposed taboos. As a result she is reviled, called a bitch, a slut, a whore, and all of these she welcomes and channels into power. She may offer her body at the slightest invitation to those who have desire, without any expectation of love or respect, because it suits her needs and her will. Her power comes from serving her True Will, and NO ONE ELSE!27

Morris stresses that Babalon’s challenge to sexual and social taboos renders her threatening. Her understanding of Babalon recalls Schippers’s notion of pariah femininity as hinging on qualities connected to hegemonic masculinity.28 Morris makes this connection implicitly herself by stressing that Babalon (or, presumably, whoever embodies her) is labeled “bitch,” “slut,” and “whore,” all of which are epithets of pariah femininity. However, Morris notes that Babalon derives power from these slurs. Paradoxically, Morris’s conceptualization of Babalon emphasizes

268  The Eloquent Blood both the seemingly hegemonic feminine aspect of Babalon’s instantaneous sexual availability and the pariahlike feminine trait of wielding sexuality independently. Morris contends that feminine assertiveness and power evokes hostility, as a woman who “questions authority and places her own desire above that of current legal or moral standards and norms is a serious threat indeed.”29 She construes Babalon as a challenge to sexual norms, including the idealization of reproduction, writing: “Babalon represents all aspects of the sexual current. . . . Babalon is also free of the notion that sex is for procreation.”30 As mentioned in the preceding discussion, the author envisions the goddess as a protector of sex workers. She discusses her own experiences of BDSM sex work, writing that she views this as a “volatile form of consciousness altering . . . dangerous and highly effective.”31 Morris has explored both the “bottom” and “top” roles, writing that the power of the “Babalon that wields a whip” lies in her ability to break with convention and compel her partner, or Beast, to be vulnerable: She reaches down inside the willing Beast and rips out his vulnerability, expands it to the size of his entire universe, sets it on fire and then dances around it watching as it burns. She holds the Beast in her arms as he weeps and reveals his inner-​most shadows, and they celebrate the sense of release as his sparks light up the sky, or in some cases burn the house to the ground.32

Morris’s dominatrix Babalon is reminiscent of Waldby’s “phallic” femininity as erotic destroyer, and the excerpt indicates the possibility of masculine desire for erotic destruction. Similar to Crowley’s diaries from Cefalù, Morris connects this phallic Babalon to the ordeal of initiatory ego annihilation, writing that Babalon uses BDSM “edge play” in order to “introduce her magician to life without ego . . . with the ultimate goal of being able to plunge into the Abyss.”33 As the counselor of rulers, Morris writes, a sadistic Babalon enables her lover to experience powerlessness, while a submissive ditto teaches her partner the importance of not hesitating to deliver pain “for a greater good.”34 Thus, Morris’s Babalon may willingly choose a subservient position for pedagogical purposes. Nonetheless, Morris stresses that Babalon is never owned by her partners.35 She ascribes to Babalon the anti-​authoritarian power to inspire people with “sex, art, creativity, and freedom,” and writes that this poses a social threat as it may cause people to rebel against repressive social systems.36 Thus, Morris embraces the notion of the sexual feminine threat to social stability as an ideal femininity. Lou Hotchkiss-​Knives, occult writer and musician, views Babalon as a goddess of sex and death, connecting her to the symbolism of witchcraft and punk in an essay. The author asserts that “[w]‌oman’s unbridled sexuality is still considered a threat to the foundations of society.”37 She draws on her own experience as a punk musician and singer, reading punk history as the manifestation

Inhabiting the Uninhibited  269 of Babalon in the music industry and writing that punk music provides a forum in which women can transgress gendered norms.38 Hotchkiss-​Knives describes Babalon as a bisexual punk goddess, an aggressive and desiring feminine threat to hegemonic gender relations. She observes that religious institutions seek to limit access to contraceptives and reproductive health care so as to steer youth toward “the acceptable framework of monogamy, marriage and maternity.”39 She writes that Babalon may challenge her devotee by sending sexual experiences that trouble respectability and personal relationships, and that one’s destined sex-​magical partner may be “your best male friend, your neighbour’s husband or wife, or your boss.”40 The idea that deities may further one’s initiation by subjecting one to intense or painful experiences has been voiced by both male and female occultists I have spoken to during my research. One who is not prepared to transcend one’s comfort zone, “or to suffer for Love,” Hotchkiss-​Knives stresses, will only achieve a limited understanding of its power. The author thereby disassociates the love Babalon represents from social respectability. Babalon’s body and sexuality are not, in Hotchkiss-​Knives’s reading, reducible to lack, and she connects female reproductive anatomy, feminine desire, and martial force: Babalon is predatory, sexually and spiritually assertive. . . . As a Lover, she in an initiatrix who challenges man to meet her in bed as an equal [sic]. . . . The sword, which is sacred to her, is the weapon of the conquering sex warrior, of the woman who, fully embracing her power, stays true to her own desires and freely picks her mate amongst equals. Its corresponding organ is the clitoris, the most phallic-​like of our female organs, the little war-​like Boudicca which presides over the logistics of sexual pleasure.41

Disrupting the hierarchical complementarity of male and female, Babalon here symbolizes the sexually desiring feminine subject. Her sexual agency is analogized with the morphology of her genitals, specifically articulated in terms of presence (of the clitoris). This description of Babalon is reminiscent of Waldby’s “phallic” femininity, with the goddess possessing a “war-​body” armed and ready for victory. Nonetheless, the author posits a complementarity of activity and receptivity within Babalon herself, stating that the goddess is “all-​accepting, unrapable in her all-​encompassing desire.”42 Like Grey, Hotchkiss-​Knives critiques commodification of female bodies.43 She indicates what she perceives as a tendency to fit women into narrow stereotypes: Porn stars and pin-​ups are celebrated, but heavens forbid they should be educated as well as sexy. . . . They should inspire sexual desire, but not Love, and certainly not both, for then their power would be absolute.44

270  The Eloquent Blood Thus, she suggests that Babalon disrupts dichotomization of female intellectualism and sexual desirability. Hotchkiss-​Knives points to the threat of sexual violence as an area in which identification with Babalon can be used to empower female sexuality. She writes that victim-​blaming and rape culture teach girls and women to fear their bodies and sexuality from a young age.45 Hotchkiss-​Knives notes that many women sometimes experience rape fantasies, which, she writes, is a sensitive subject as this fact may be used to justify sexual assault on the premise that women secretly enjoy rape. However, Hotchkiss-​Knives stresses, the term “rape fantasy” is misleading; as the person fantasizing is really in charge, a rape fantasy is fundamentally different from actual rape. Thus, rape fantasies may allow women to overcome feelings of powerlessness by becoming “the unrapable . . . the all-​receiving chalice.”46 Identification with Babalon’s receptivity is suggested as a strategy for negotiating the fear of sexual assault and asserting sexual sovereignty. Hotchkiss-​Knives also indicates how sexual bondage can heighten awareness and allow women to work through taboos and fantasies with an intimate partner. Hotchkiss-​Knives’s essay ends with a guided meditation. The author addresses the reader directly, interpellating her as a feminine devotee of the goddess. Hotchkiss-​Knives sets the scene by describing her reader as wearing “the mask, the garter, the sword and nothing else,” and then how Babalon descends, “like a pornographic re-​enactment of the Visitation of the Virgin Mary.”47 The author asserts that the devotee may not herself have initiated the encounter, but that Babalon “tends to pop your spiritual cherry only when the time is right.”48 The goddess is situated in the position of feminine erotic destroyer, as the devotee, overwhelmed with desire, begs: “Open me up, fuck me, set me free.” 49 She lies down, and devotee and deity unite ecstatically, their energies meeting and circulating “from cunt to mouth and mouth to cunt.”50 Gradually, the boundaries between their bodies dissolve: You’ve hit the place where hearts meet in the knowledge that they are one, made of the same pure divine Love, when lovers gaze into each other’s eyes and know they are looking at themselves. And still the flow carries on, relentless, mouth to cunt, cunt to mouth. Whose mouth, whose cunt? The boundaries are so blurred that you are not sure when she begins and you end anymore, or who rides who. When you ride, you’re ridden.51

The relation between Babalon and her devotee is constructed in terms of queer feminine desire, with femininity as indexical of both destroyer and ecstatically destroyed. In Schippers’s terms, this represents an alternative femininity, which does not unequivocally support a complementary and subordinate relationship

Inhabiting the Uninhibited  271 to masculinity. While the unarticulated imploration from the devotee to the goddess to “fuck” her implies a receptive attitude, the polarities of activity and passivity are destabilized through the metaphor of a flowing current. As such, Hotchkiss-​Knives’s guided meditation recalls Ann Cvetkovich’s analysis of penetration, or being “fucked,” as entailing receptivity rather than passivity, characterized by deliberate engagement and presence.52 The idea of Babalon as symbolic of female sexual liberation, expressed by many of those cited in the preceding discussion, is critiqued by Alkistis Dimech, who is a dancer, choreographer, occult author, and cofounder of the publishing house Scarlet Imprint. Alkistis first experienced Babalon in a vision, which she described thus during our conversation in 2016: She kept changing her appearance. Her face kept changing. Her dress stayed the same . . . but I wasn’t really noting that, I was fixating on her face, which she kept transforming. There was nothing fixed about it. . . . And it was very different from Tantric visions I’ve had, where I would start to construct a vision of the dakini and then the dakini would start to modify her vision. She would take me on her journey. This one was just sort of there. She was there. I didn’t construct her, I opened a door in my meditations. . . . And I was looking at her face and it kept changing. So every woman. She looked like every woman. . . . But I guess also the fact that she is every woman in that sense, every woman especially carries this energy.53

Although Alkistis links Babalon to femininity, she is hesitant toward viewing the goddess as an emblem of female sexual freedom: There is a feminist aspect of Babalon. But I feel occasionally when she is represented purely in terms of a goddess of female sexuality or female liberation. . . . No, it’s liberation in the full sense, you get to the point that your body, or your flesh, is hanging off bones and erupting. An extreme liberation, which has nothing to do with what sex or gender you are. . . . She presents as female, as meaning she’s somehow a goddess for women and women’s liberation. But I mean, Aphrodite was the patron goddess of Julius Caesar. [laughs] The way the gods appear does not say, female gods are for women and male gods are for men. She’s the goddess of sexuality. And sexuality is something that I find really ambiguous. Because it is the energy all life comes from, but it is also the end of life. So this is something I think gets overlooked in a lot of contemporary interpretations of Babalon.54

Although Alkistis ascribes feminist aspects to Babalon, she views the goddess as connected to sexuality in ways that transcend sociocultural liberation, implying

272  The Eloquent Blood complete loss of self. However, she also connects the goddess to the idea of women developing their own language: [T]‌here are problems because of capitalism, especially in cities, everything is full of advertising. There is no personal space. It’s just crowding your interior world. . . . But there’s so much work to be done from a woman’s perspective in terms of developing this space, because so much in the history of Western culture, or global culture, what you see is man’s space. . . . I’m very interested in the Islamic understanding of the veil as meaning that this is woman’s private quarters. Not in the sense of oppression, but in the sense of privacy, and separation. It’s got a strong energy, and for Babalon very useful. The bride that is separate and her ability to transform those around her with her own transformation, her own revelation. This period of seclusion and this privacy. But I see that very much as an interior sense that women have to develop. And it’s really difficult, because you are challenged at every level, first by this dominant culture outside, where everything, images, these are made by men. . . . To find what is woman’s vision, to find what is woman’s interior. Which is something every woman has to do almost from scratch, almost from the very foundations. And I find working with Babalon is perhaps the only way I can do that. She’s the only way to go to the source, to go to that point where my sex erupts into the world.55

Through the metaphor of veiling, Alkistis connects Babalon to the idea of women establishing a personal space in order to develop a sense of self. Alkistis stresses that it is difficult for women to articulate their own visions, as dominant culture is governed by the male gaze. In Alkistis’s view, the development of a personal, feminine language is linked to sexuality, and she associates this with her ambivalence toward viewing Babalon as a feminist symbol: Many of my fantasies are not in line with a modern understanding of what the feminist, liberated woman should be like. . . . So I find feminism too ideological. . . . I want no ideology, I want to just go straight to the sex, and to see what happens. What I respond to. I want to explore things that are difficult for me. If something is difficult, if I’m blocked somewhere, that’s where I go. If my creative path was determined by an ideology, I wouldn’t be able to do that and I wouldn’t know what’s beyond that point. Babalon enables the force I need to get through these blocks. . . . I’m interested in experience. For me, Babalon is very much about absolute sensual experience, absolute descent into the flesh. Because that’s where I find my images, that’s where I find my language. Then the words start to come from that. . . . But it’s also a way of getting beyond this patriarchal language, into a language that comes more from my experience of

Inhabiting the Uninhibited  273 this body, and this world, and the situations that I find myself and I put myself. . . . That also to me relates very strongly to Babalon and to get back to this idea, for me, that our bodies, our corporeal reality, what they do, their moving, is our primary language. And that all the other languages come out of that. So I want to get to that, and then to rediscover language from that point. So it takes time [laughs]. But it’s not a feminist pursuit in the way that it’s understood in first-​, second-​, or third-​wave feminism.56

Alkistis underlines that what she sees as the ideological underpinning of feminism can obstruct her own explorations of sexuality, and she implies that considering sexuality exclusively in feminist terms is too limiting. Similar criticisms have been a part of feminist debates since the 1980s, and Alkistis’s critique has parallels to sex-​radical feminist arguments against labeling certain preferences or practices as inherently liberating or oppressive.57 Interestingly, Alkistis links Babalon to the idea of honing her creative vision. She associates the goddess with transcendence of patriarchal language and the development of a mode of expression based in her own embodied experience. Despite Alkistis’s hesitance toward labeling her magical practice “feminist,” parallels can be drawn to Irigaray’s call for a feminine language, or écriture féminine, and for a divine feminine to support this process. In the preceding section, I have explored how contemporary occultists construe Babalon as emblematic of feminine sexual liberation. A recurring trope in these interpretations is opposition to a perceived cultural stigma against assertive feminine sexuality or the desiring feminine subject. In the source material, feminine sexuality is associated with worldly and magical power, and the advent of Christianity is associated with sexual repression, especially toward women. There are significant parallels between this trope and discourses on gender and sexuality in Neopaganism and the goddess movement, possibly indicating an influence from the latter. However, as previously noted, I contend that the contemporary Babalon discourse to a greater extent emphasizes a pariahlike femininity as sacred by underlining Babalon’s “phallic” aspects of activity and acting as an erotic destroyer as well as lauding her epithet of “whore.” Several of the occultists cited in this chapter construe Babalon as an aggressive force that smashes social convention in elevating various modalities such as queerness, transgenderism, BDSM, and sex work.58 The Babalon discourse also deemphasizes motherhood.59 Illustratively, a female occultist whom I spoke to during my fieldwork observed that “the Babalon women tend not to have children,” indicating a perception that female devotees of the goddess are less likely to desire a nuclear family life. The factual veracity of this statement is less relevant than how it suggests an understanding of Babalon as symbolic of feminine sexuality beyond reproduction. Although the qualitative nature of my study renders broader generalizations

274  The Eloquent Blood tenuous, it is nonetheless interesting that none of the esotericists quoted in this study cite motherhood as Babalon’s most important characteristic.

Availability and Independence: Babalon’s Sexual Limits Several of the occultists cited herein do not posit negative repression as the sole hindrance to feminine sexual agency. Both male and female occultists, Thelemites and otherwise, whom I have spoken to have observed that perceptions of Thelema as a “sex cult” may create expectations of female sexual availability. It has been observed that notions of the Scarlet Woman or Babalon as the all-​ accepting whore may lead male magicians to expect female Babalon devotees to be sexually accessible. As one female Thelemite expressed it, a misperception surrounding Babalon is that “she’s there to fulfill the priest’s fantasy.” Thus, some of those I have spoken to caution against taking the idea of whoredom too “literally.” My study does not allow for broader conclusions regarding the frequency of sexual harassment or abuse. The (mostly American) Thelemites I have spoken to have especially ascribed problems in this regard to 1970s and 1980s Thelema. It has frequently been stated that sexual harassment was a recurrent problem during this period, and that women who rejected male advances were sometimes accused of having archaic sexual morals. However, many of those I have spoken to suggest that this problem has vastly improved over time, as Thelemic leaders have worked to counter sexual violence and harassment. There is some validity for skepticism toward constructions of history in terms of linear progression. Ascription of sexual harassment issues to the past may be a strategy for managing current problems, and it is worth noting that those I have spoken to are mostly people who have felt at home within Thelema or related currents over a prolonged period. While I  have conversed with practitioners who chose for some time to distance themselves from Thelema altogether, or from a specific Thelemic group, after experiencing sexual harassment or abuse, interviewing persons who have chosen to leave the milieu entirely for such reasons would likely have rendered different responses. If a progressive development has indeed taken place, however, it may be connected to the increasing gender-​critical debate in Thelema. None of the many occult practitioners I have spoken to claim that sexual availability is a necessity for embodying Babalon. On the contrary, a prominent theme in my source material is feminine sexual self-​determination and adherence to one’s own sexual “nature” or will as the epitome of sexual liberation, whether one chooses to be promiscuous or celibate. Occult author Donald Michael Kraig describes a neo-​Tantric practitioner, Lola Babalon, as a “true Scarlet Woman,” in the sense of being sexually autonomous and self-​determined.60 Syrinx stresses

Inhabiting the Uninhibited  275 that personal sexual practices and preferences are no one else’s concern, and Soror Chen similarly emphasizes that questions of whether Babalon should be monogamous or promiscuous are beside the point.61 Erica M Cornelius relates Babalon to the Law of Thelema, stating that the principle of “There is no law beyond Do what thou wilt” means that “nothing except your own law” should be allowed to govern one’s sexual behavior.62 Although she feels that Crowley interpreted Babalon’s whoredom as meaning that women should have many lovers, Erica interprets it as entailing “complete liberation to [one’s] own natural sexuality.”63 As all people are different, liberation may appear differently in each individual case. Fundamentally, Erica feels this is an issue of freeing oneself from cultural limitations and engaging with one’s sexuality in accordance with one’s will. She elaborates: Most women, most of us, especially at this point in the aeon, have a lot of hang-​ ups. We still have a lot of guilt and shame around sexuality, we still have a [emphasizes] lot of issues with our bodies. Because if you’re not comfortable in your own skin you really can’t be sexual. Truly, fully. It sounds so trivial but it’s actually so much work. To do that work of liberation on Self. But I think that’s what the potential is of saying that somebody is a representative of Babalon. And again it’s not just fun and games, it’s your bread and butter if you’re a true spiritual practitioner.64

In Erica’s view, the idea of whoredom implies feminine sexual autonomy. She construes this as a fundamentally spiritual issue, stressing that she exclusively uses her sexual energy in service of spiritual attainment. In her reading, Babalon emerges as a symbol with the potential to transform female sexual experience, as the representative of Babalon strives to liberate herself from physical and sexual guilt and shame.65 In an essay on Babalon, Chaos Magician Kirsten Brown writes that she initially saw the goddess as a symbol Thelemic men could use to justify why women should have sex with them. However, Brown attests to her perception of Babalon shifting after reading more about the goddess.66 Similar to Hotchkiss-​Knives, Brown observes that Babalon can be useful in working through and resolving sexual trauma, and she recalls utilizing the symbol to this effect herself.67 Brown writes that she associates Babalon with the idea that her limits are her own, and that she need never engage in any sexual acts against her will.68 This signals that Babalon can be interpreted as signifying both a lack of freedom to refuse unwanted advances and the absolute right to define one’s own boundaries. Although some of the occult authors and practitioners discussed here construe a particular affinity between Babalon and specific sexual practices, very few people I have spoken to emphasize any particular sexual practice or orientation

276  The Eloquent Blood as more valid than others in relation to Babalon. However, several indicate that the idealization of Babalon as symbolic of the sexual woman may, in some cases, produce a localized, problematic femininity, namely that of the insufficiently sexually available woman. This indicates how, as Hugh B. Urban has argued in relation to modern sexual magic, the rhetoric of “sexual freedom” can “at best [become] a hollow promise” if the underlying gender system is not challenged.69 It furthermore supports Schippers’s conclusion that the position of masculinities and femininities in a social system is not determined by their associated characteristics alone but must be considered in relation to the social structuration that privileges a hierarchical and complementary relationship between men and women.70

The Call Girl and the Whore’s Heart: Reworking Whoredom in the Babalon Discourse In contemporary interpretations of Babalon—​ as in their historical antecedents—​the idea of whoredom is rarely simplistically equated with commercial sex. However, ancient sacred prostitution, a concept that appears in Kenneth Grant’s writings, is a recurring trope in contemporary interpretations. Left-​Hand Path authors Zeena and Nicholas Schreck construe the modern Babalon as a reflection of the pre-​Christian cult of the goddess Ishtar or Astarte, whom they link to sacred prostitution.71 In an online essay, the author Magdalene Meretrix, a self-​identified Thelemite and sacred whore, describes her own practice thus: I am a whore. I  accept money in exchange for sexual intimacy. And I  feel honoured to be able to offer such a valuable service. . . . I am a Thelemite and my whoring is as much an expression of my spiritual reality as it is a way to earn a living.72

Meretrix writes that her engagement with sacred prostitution has brought her to a “deeper understanding of the Thelemic definition of ‘love,’ ” not as “that wonderful warm gushy feeling you get in the pit of your stomach” but rather as pertaining to union with Nuit. Although she articulates all-​acceptance as related to sacred whoredom, she stresses that this does not mean that she must accept abusive treatment, and she attests to regularly turning clients away. However, she notes, all clients regardless of appearance or social status receive the same level of love, acceptance, and care, and clients who are dismissed are sent off with “compassion and understanding.” “Without acceptance,” Meretrix contends, “there will always be separation. It is only when the Sacred Whore learns to accept that

Inhabiting the Uninhibited  277 which is Other that the union of opposites and the joy of dissolution can commence.”73 She describes an intense encounter with a client as follows: It represents the pinnacle of what I strive for with each encounter . . . I had been working so hard on my focus and magick for so many years and getting a trickle of energy back. This client came walking through my door and added that mysterious missing ingredient and the trickle turned to a torrent that nearly drowned me.74

Meretrix conceives of sacred sex work as a spiritual practice, which is both a service to others and a part of her own initiatory journey. She articulates sacred whoredom in terms of a reciprocal erotic destruction, implicated in the ecstatic dissolution of the boundaries between self and other. In an essay, Raven Greywalker relates Babalon to sacred prostitution. Unlike Meretrix, who refers to actual and hypothetical clients using male pronouns, Greywalker uses gender-​neutral pronouns to indicate that the role of Babalon is not limited to a particular sex. Greywalker identifies Babalon with the sacred prostitute, whom she defines as “Choronzon’s mate . . . the creative and destructive urge of Chaos.”75 This is a clear departure from Crowley’s understanding of Babalon as the antithesis of Choronzon and likely indicates an influence from Kenneth Grant.76 Greywalker describes Babalon as a “WoMan girt with a sword,” who smashes social conventions in order to allow humans to be reborn as “individuals and gods,” unfettered by the demands of work, consumerism, and traditional family norms.77 Greywalker relates the goddess to the interconnection between body and soul and a recognition of the sacredness of sexuality, writing that “no part of you is but of hir. . . . The body is the soul. Sex is god.” The author lists and refutes a number of aversions to commercial sex, which Greywalker argues are rooted in a fear of the irrational and sensuous. Greywalker states that it is misguided to deny women the right to choose their professional lives on the basis that prostitution is degrading.78 For Greywalker, sacred prostitutes heal humanity through the use of their bodies, teaching openness and union.79 In Meretrix’s and Greywalker’s essays, sacred prostitution signifies commercial sex work, which entails a consciously spiritual component. Both authors view the sacred prostitute as one who offers a numinous, healing, and mutually beneficial spiritual and sensuous experience. However, Greywalker’s essay places a stronger emphasis on the disruption of social convention and societal betterment in addition to individual transformation, and the author explicitly engages with a nonheterosexual understanding of the practice. Like Greywalker, Lou Hotchkiss-​Knives is critical of antiprostitution legislation, which she writes cuts off a predominantly female workforce from social security and prevents improvement of working conditions. Hotchkiss-​Knives reasons:

278  The Eloquent Blood Prostitutes offer an intimate service which has the potential of bringing genuine enrichment to both parties on a human level. Sex as an experience can be healing, relaxing, comforting, exhilarating, releasing. Should sex work be more highly regarded, it could exert a truly positive role across society as a whole. In the past, Sacred Prostitution offered the promise of religious experience through the sexual encounter of the pilgrim and the priestess.80

Meretrix, Greywalker, and Hotchkiss-​Knives all relate sacred whoredom to commercial sex but emphasize the centrality of spirituality to the exchange. They suggest that commercial sex work is not inherently oppressive to women so long as sex workers themselves have protection and autonomy. In The Red Goddess, Peter Grey discusses the idea of sacred prostitution in antiquity, drawing on Herodotus’s account of women selling their bodies in the temples of Inanna and Ishtar; Grey views these goddesses as antecedents of Babalon. In Grey’s reading, sacred prostitution epitomizes sexuality as a vital repository of spiritual power, with priestesses offering a numinous experience through sexual ecstasy.81 However, Grey is critical of the contemporary sex industry, which he writes is mostly based around slavery and sexualized violence. Although he writes that Babalon is incarnate in the modern streetwalker and call girl, he underlines that there is a difference between sacred sexuality and coerced prostitution and that human trafficking is equivalent to rape.82 During our interview in 2016, I asked Grey and Alkistis about their interpretation of Babalon’s whoredom. Alkistis commented that she does not object morally to prostitution and feels that women should be able to choose how to earn their living. However, Grey stressed that the notion of Babalon’s whoredom is sometimes misinterpreted: There’s this magical formula of openness that is an important part of it. . . . The exploration of sexual identity, which involves engaging in these practices of openness, of multiple partners, of random encounters. . . . All these elements of exploring the full extent of one’s sexuality. And what’s often missed in the discussion of whoredom is that whores also discriminate. If you want to live, and not be murdered as a whore . . . you need to say no to some clients. And that often gets overlooked, and it gets written in this kind of male dialogue, where it’s: “Oh you’re working with Babalon, therefore you have to have sex with me.” And that kind of bullshit I still see being played out by male magicians from the scene.83

Grey critiques what he appears to perceive as a narrow and androcentric approach to whoredom in relation to Babalon. He indicates that the idea of the prostitute who receives everyone is an idealized concept, which is contradicted

Inhabiting the Uninhibited  279 by real-​life sex work. Alkistis links the idea of whoredom to feminine (sexual) difference, as well as nonreproductive sex, stressing the connection of sexuality to women discovering their own language: The mystery is within the sex. And the female sex is particularly mysterious because she transforms the male sex. . . . When the female veil is opened, then the male sex transforms. What is interesting to me about the male sex, and the male sexual formula, is that he transforms from loose flesh to erect flesh. So he has this amazing quality of being able to be different things, to transform, but he transforms under her power. And so the relationship is really her power for his transformation. And the secrets of whoredom, if you want to call it that, whoredom or just sex, and the woman who understands the full potential of sex beyond simply the procreative, “you are going to bear children,” and so on. You are exploring the nonprocreative aspects of sex, and also this. . . . Woman’s fantasy world is really important, and I think it’s really underexplored. We see everything else except our own inner world, and it’s really incumbent upon us now to explore these inner, fantastical worlds. Because this is the world that we then externalize through our culture, through our way of dressing or presenting ourselves or what we do or what we create. Which causes the transformation, whether it’s of the male sex, the penis, the phallus, or culture at large. It’s very much about drawing from this well which for me descends to the sex.84

Alkistis emphasizes the connection between nonreproductive feminine sexuality and a woman’s striving to explore her own inner world. In her view, sexuality allows women to access creativity, enabling the transformation of sexual relationships and culture in general. My conversation with Steve and Ash dwelt at considerable length on the subject of sacred prostitution and sex work, which both see as connected to Babalon. Steve and Ash were partly drawn together through a shared interest in sacred sexuality and sacred prostitution. Around the time that Ash and Steve began a dialogue, Ash had been reading about the myth of Mary Magdalene as a sacred whore. When Steve and Ash began discussing the subject, Steve mentioned his devotion to Babalon, which inspired Ash to explore the symbol further. Today, Ash connects their professional work as a sexological bodyworker to the idea of sacred prostitution: Some of the things that I do . . . could legit be considered prostitution just by the written definition of the law, and mostly that is because I touch and penetrate genitals, and because of that therefore I am doing prostitution regardless of the purpose or what it looks like or anything like that. . . . [B]‌ut at the same time I don’t think that to engage with the concepts of sacred whoredom and

280  The Eloquent Blood sacred prostitution, I don’t think that actually engaging with the legal definition of prostitution is necessary.85

According to Ash, sacred prostitution does not necessarily involve either physical sexual acts or monetary compensation. Instead, it implies an attitude of openness, acceptance, receptivity, and love that fosters healing and growth in the self and others: [A]‌concept that I  really love is the concept of the whore’s heart—​basically having this way of approaching the world or approaching anyone and everyone that you meet in a way that is from a place of openness and love. But not just in the cheesy greeting card definition of love, but in that way of: “I can really see you and accept you for who you are and I can really be present with you and really try to foster growth in you,” even if maybe for a moment, or try to have actually unique and intimate connections with people. And that is [emphasizes] incredibly transgressive [laughs] and radical in this culture, and is also difficult to do, and certainly I don’t do it all the time by any means, but it is a thing that at least I think is really fundamental to an approach to sacred prostitution, sacred whoredom, sacred harlotry, whatever the fuck you want to call it, right? This openness and maybe also availability. But that also acknowledges one’s own sovereignty and one’s own ability to set boundaries. A lot of the time . . . there’s this idealized concept of: “Let’s be open to have sex with anyone or to love anyone that comes across who expresses desire,” and I think that’s lovely. A really lovely, idealized concept, but not necessarily a realistic one [laughs].86

Similar to Grey, Ash stresses that the idea of the sacred prostitute as “having sex with anyone and loving anyone” is not necessarily feasible, and they relate the concept of the whore’s heart to an empowered and engaged embodiment of love, sexuality, and eroticism. Ash notes that both they and Steve seek to emulate this concept, and continuously work to offer healing and sexual awakening in the world. During our discussion, we approached the subject of sacred prostitution in antiquity: Steve: The idea of sacred prostitution—​there’s certainly debate as to the historical accuracy of how this worked, but the idea . . . . Ash: But there’s at the very least a mythological accuracy. Mythologically it has been around for a long time, whether or not there was actually historical precedent for it or not. Steve: But it’s basically somebody offering not just a sexual experience, but a spiritual and sexual experience, in exchange for some kind of compensation. And I think definitely that’s an important part—​offering that spiritual and sexual experience and initiation, almost, is really, really potent and can be

Inhabiting the Uninhibited  281 tremendously healing. And also the idea of compensation is a way to say that this is something of value, this is something that’s revered, this is something that actually . . . is meaningful. Ash: And necessary. Steve: And that gives it power. And I think that’s one of the big reasons why prostitution has been so degraded, it has become this degraded thing, to try to take away the value of that experience. And I think the work with Babalon is really . . . . The sacred prostitution aspect is to help people reawaken their sacred sexual sovereignty and their own experience.87 While both Steve and Ash observe that sacred prostitution may not have existed in antiquity, they correctly attest to its longevity as a cultural construct. Similar to Meretrix, Greywalker, Grey, and Hotchkiss-​Knives, Steve stresses that the sacred prostitute offers a sexual experience with potential initiatory and healing power. Regardless of the metaphorical aspects of the concept, Ash observes that Babalon is connected to sex workers everywhere: [T]‌here’s the aspect of Babalon that I think is connected to all whores everywhere, including even the people who are coerced into prostitution, or sex trafficking, and things like that, all the way up on that kind of consent continuum to people who are actively engaging with prostitution from a place of sovereignty, really. And that she’s also connected to everyone who’s doing that work. Because certainly sex work is also along these same lines that we’ve been talking about, it’s deviant and transgressive. And especially people doing sex work because they are actively wanting to, not coerced into it, from a place of sovereignty, and often from a place of “fuck you” to the government and things like that [laughs], that’s very powerful.88

Ash stresses Babalon as inherently connected to all forms of sex work through what they see as its essentially transgressive character. Steve and Ash’s conceptualization of Babalon is thus clearly distinct from the interpretations of some other contemporary occultists—​as shown especially in the previous chapter—​ who seek to harmonize the virgin and the whore tropes through Babalon and the Virgin Mary. For Steve and Ash, Babalon is not only associated with pariahlike femininities; they posit an inherent connection between the goddess and counterhegemonic gendered and sexual modalities, including transgenderism, BDSM, and sex work. In Mishlen Linden’s magical record, the author elaborates on the symbolism of Babalon’s whoredom. Linden writes that Babalon does not become “addicted to any one person,” nor does she confuse a mortal lover with the source of magical power, but instead “loves all” and does not adhere to the delusion of the “one

282  The Eloquent Blood source.” Acting as the sacred whore means keeping one’s sex magical relationship dedicated to “that which lies beyond,” allowing “the forces . . . to enter, change, metamorphose into a greater being.” In order to do this, Linden writes, Babalon must “sacrifice a precious belonging: that of personal love.”89 Linden admits that this sacrifice is dearly bought, speaking of the risks of working intimately with a partner as one may come to fall in “mundane” love, coming to see the partner “as the god outside ritual.” So as to avoid this danger, Linden stresses, one should quickly “pick another (referred to as bouncing)” in order to prove that the object of one’s love is not one’s mortal partner. She concludes: “Those around you will call you a whore, and that is exactly right! But you are a Sacred Whore.”90 Linden thus construes Babalon’s sacred whoredom as oppositional to monogamy.

Sex Worker Rights and Spiritualized Whoredom Many of the occultists quoted in this chapter engage with the notion of whoredom or prostitution with regards to Babalon. During my research, I have encountered a number of people who identify as current or former sex workers with experience as prostitutes, dominatrices, or adult film actors and who view this practice as part of their devotion to Babalon. Thus, interpretations of the goddess provide a symbolic structure for meaning-​making in the lives of some contemporary sex workers. Although my informants’ interpretations of the concept differ in the level of literal emphasis on commercial sex work, none appears to view sacred prostitution simply as accepting money for sex. This hinges on the idea of sexuality and spirituality as intertwined. Several critique antiprostitution legislation and negative perceptions of sex workers. These narratives indicate changing understandings of whoredom historically. Long seen as a (sometimes temporary) occupation, the late nineteenth century witnessed an increasing focus on the prostitute as a particular type of woman.91 In late-​modern occultism, the prostitute is transformed further yet into a magical pathway. Although the “spiritualized” reading of whoredom is evident in the historical Babalon discourse from Crowley onward, interpretations of sacred whoredom in the contemporary source material draw more strongly on both older myths of sacred prostitution in antiquity and more recent interpretations thereof. These notions are not unique to the Babalon discourse; on the contrary, my source material appears to be influenced by broader discourses on sacred prostitution in alternative spirituality, Neopaganism, and women’s spirituality.92 Cultural studies scholar Lee Gilmore situates the movement around sacred whoredom at the intersection between the sex workers’ rights movement, sex-​radical feminist readings of sex work, and goddess spirituality.93 Experiences of sex work are not universal but mediated through intersections of race, class, and gender, among others.94 The late-​modern, self-​identified

Inhabiting the Uninhibited  283 sacred whore appears, based on previous research, generally to be white, middle-​ class, and well-​read, drawing on comparative history and mythology to construct meaning around sacred prostitution.95 This is largely representative of the people I have spoken to about these subjects, and it is also reflective of the Neopagan and occult milieus. Although I do not seek to discount experiences of sacred sex work as healing and transformative, the emphasis in my source material on the socially and spiritually beneficial aspects of sex work reflect the generally highly educated and at least culturally (if not always economically) middle-​class orientation of the contemporary occult milieu. For more socially disadvantaged groups of sex workers, this aspect may be less central than concrete economic need. Nonetheless, finding both spiritual meaning and much-​needed income in sex work are, of course, not mutually exclusive. Discussing these questions with a larger and more socioeconomically diverse group of people may have generated other perspectives on the interconnections of sexuality, economy, and spirituality. This may also have shed further light on meaning-​making among transgendered sex workers, whose vulnerability to work discrimination and sexual violence may render a symbol such as Babalon particularly compelling. Drawing on sex-​radical feminist arguments, some sex worker activists have argued that sex work challenges concepts of feminine sexuality as monogamous and reproductive.96 However, gendered disparities should, perhaps, be taken into account when considering the emancipatory potential of the sacred whore trope. Significantly, Chappell’s quantitative survey of the contemporary OTO suggests that paying for sex is far more common among Thelemic men than women, whereas women are considerably more likely to report having been paid for sex.97 This is consistent with my own observations in the Thelemic milieu; I have not spoken to any cisgendered males identifying as current or former sex workers. The discourse of sacred prostitution also draws on aspects of hegemonic femininity as nurturing, service-​oriented, and offering sexual availability. Although the idea of sacred prostitution may offer a model for a receptive sexual sovereignty combined with spiritual authority that is not limited to women, idealization of the sacred whore as an abstract concept may obscure the gendered inequalities shaping the landscape of contemporary sex work.

Babalon and Feminine Sexuality: Some Reflections Feminine sexuality has occupied a problematic position in Western modernity, constituting a battleground for feminist politics. Irigaray argues that phallocentric culture denies women access to desire and sexual pleasure, which are construed as masculine properties; women are expected to serve as the passive, beautiful, and alluring objects of male desire. Irigaray indicates the roles of

284  The Eloquent Blood mother, virgin, and prostitute as feminine positions that all idealize the values phallocentric culture lauds in female sexuality:  compliance and acquiescence to male desire without demanding pleasure for oneself.98 Irigaray notes that this conception of appropriate feminine sexuality reduces women to objects in the exchange between men, rather than desiring subjects in themselves.99 Schippers similarly observes that, sexually, (hegemonic) “masculinity is defined as desire for the feminine object, and femininity as the object of masculine desire.”100 Femininities exhibiting active sexual desire and assertiveness—​not least if this desire is oriented toward other femininities—​risk being marginalized as pariahlike, as they threaten the hegemonic, hierarchical complementarity of masculine and feminine by inhabiting characteristics ascribed to masculinity. Pariah femininities, perhaps especially those of “slut” or “whore,” are central to the contemporary Babalon discourse, wherein these terms are articulated as designations for the position of the desiring feminine subject. Strategically and reflexively, the esotericists discussed in this chapter relate to the notion of the desiring feminine subject threatening established gender norms. Babalon is linked to assertive feminine desire and the search for sexual pleasure outside of reproductive romantic monogamy, and the discourse around the goddess indicates ways of envisioning and inhabiting a desiring feminine subjectivity that do not simplistically support a hierarchical and complementary relationship between masculinity and femininity. As in the historical Babalon discourse, the goddess’s whoredom is understood in positive terms. Contrary to how Irigaray interprets the feminine subject position of “prostitute” in society at large, whoredom in the contemporary Babalon discourse is (re)interpreted as signifying feminine sexual sovereignty or the refusal to serve as a commodity. While some of those I have spoken to note this idea may itself become implicated in expectations of female sexual availability, these comments in themselves attest to shifts in the Babalon discourse, where objectification of female bodies is now acknowledged as problematic alongside issues of sexual repression. A prominent theme in my source material is the idea of post-​pagan repression of sexuality in general and feminine sexuality in particular. It is frequently stated that feminine sexuality has been demonized by patriarchal religious forces in an attempt to mitigate its power, and female sexual liberation is thus ascribed socially and spiritually emancipatory potential. Whether or not it is due to a direct influence, there are clear parallels with sex-​positive or sex-​radical feminist thought.101 The discursive connection between goddesses and female sexual liberation is a strong theme in many prominent Neopagan writings, although the contemporary Babalon discourse appears to distinguish itself from these by focusing on the lewd, brutal, and “phallic” femininity of the whore Babalon. Like the Thelemic milieu at large, the Babalon discourse also appears to have a more

Inhabiting the Uninhibited  285 positive attitude toward BDSM, suggesting a stronger influence from sex-​radical feminism.102 Narratives of the universal repression of female sexuality in the Babalon discourse to some extent marginalize racialized and classed inequalities between women. The sense of liberation experienced by some feminine subjects strategically identifying with a “bad girl” stereotype is, perhaps, contingent on originally having been ascribed respectability and modesty. One’s ability to act as the unabashed, sexually desiring subject is thus mediated by race and class as well as gender.103 Intersectional feminist theorist bell hooks emphasizes that “the socially constructed image of innocent white womanhood relies on the continued production of the racist/​sexist sexual myth that black women are not innocent and never can be.” hooks argues that racist hypersexualization means that women of color cannot as easily “publicly ‘work’ the image of . . . innocent female daring to be bad.”104 hooks’s concerns overlap with more recent feminist debates regarding respectability and female sexuality and how racial and class privilege affect women’s ability to engage strategically with the pariah femininity of slut.105 Importantly, however, other feminists of color have critiqued concerns with respectability, arguing that the heightened vulnerability of women of color to sexual harassment and violence provides an added impetus to deconstruct sexual chastity as a feminine ideal, suggesting that eroticism may function as a source of empowerment in the face of racism and sexism.106 Moreover, feeling that one’s religious virtue is at odds with one’s sexual desires may be a very real and painful experience.107 Dismissing concerns with feminine sexual agency as trivial runs the risk of reproducing the prevalent trope that femininity is, in itself, trivial or that sexual desire and fulfillment is less essential for women. Moreover, it naturalizes an androcentric position that takes for granted the freedom to exhibit assertive sexual desire.108 Female, queer, and trans occultists are not free from the threat and reality of sexual violence, and their identification with sexualized pariah femininities may function as forms of noncompliance with notions of feminine value as contingent on chastity. While experiences of sexual restriction and liberation are determined by intersections of class and race besides gender, articulating new ways of doing sexuality should not be seen as a narcissistic pursuit compared with graver issues. The contemporary Babalon discourse destabilizes the hierarchical privileging of monogamous, noncommercial bodies as the most natural and legitimate form of sexual expression by revaluating nonmonogamy, commercial sex, and BDSM as legitimate and spiritually valid. However, revaluation of nonhegemonic sexual practices does not automatically destabilize hegemonic notions of feminine sexuality; the hierarchical stratification of sexual acts is analytically distinct from the gender order, and challenging the former does not necessarily distort the latter.109 Many of the occultists quoted in this study

286  The Eloquent Blood emphasize a heterosexual dynamic in interpretations of Babalon within the context of sexual magic. A large proportion of the women esotericists whose words are analyzed herein, and whom I have spoken to during my research, construe their relation to Babalon in terms of identification, whereas male-​ identified practitioners in the context of sexual magic appear more inclined to construe their relationship to the goddess in terms of difference and desire for the other. However, this is not universally the case, as evinced by Lou Hotchkiss-​Knives’s queerly feminine guided meditation. Increased gender-​ critical debates in Thelema, and the growing visibility of female esotericists as ideology producers within the Babalon discourse, have coincided with a stronger emphasis on sexual sovereignty and the development of a genre of occult writing and debate centering on female sexuality and magic that departs from the embodied experience of femininity. The subsequent chapter will explore the embodiment of femininity in the Babalon discourse more fully by shifting the focus from words to ritual.

Notes 1. Cf. Irigaray, This; Willey, “Constituting.” 2. Notions of sexual liberation as intertwined with female emancipation are prominent in different forms of feminist Neopaganism, as well as in parts of the women’s spirituality movement. Salomonsen, Enchanted; Kathryn Rountree, Embracing the Witch and the Goddess:  Feminist Ritual-​ Makers in New Zealand (London; New York: Routledge, 2004); Raivio, Gudinnefeminister. It echoes the sacred sexuality movement. The discourse on sacred prostitution (see discussion later in this chapter) is an example of this. See, e.g., Fedele and Knibbe, “From Angel.” 3. Williams, “Feminist,” 169. 4. Ibid. 5. Ibid., 170. 6. Parallels can be drawn to the broader Neopagan and women’s spirituality movements. See, e.g., Christ and Plaskow, Womanspirit; Daly, Gyn/​Ecology; Starhawk, Spiral. 7. Williams, Woman, 25. 8. Ibid. 9. See discussion of the interviews with Mary, Steve, and Ash. See also Schreck and Schreck, Demons, 28; Grey, Red; Peter Grey, Apocalyptic Witchcraft (London: Scarlet Imprint, 2013). 10. Williams, Woman, 41. 11. Williams, “Feminist.” 12. Soror Syrinx, Scarlet Grimoire, 47. 13. Soror Syrinx, Silver Star, 61. 14. Soror Syrinx, Scarlet Grimoire, 46. 15. Ash, interview, 2015.

Inhabiting the Uninhibited  287 16. See Thorkild Jacobsen, The Treasures of Darkness: A History of Mesopotamian Religion (New Haven; London: Yale University Press, 1976), 55–​63; Campbell, Hero, 87–​90; Janet and Stewart Farrar, The Witches’ Goddess (Blaine, WA:  Phoenix Publishing, 1987), 104–​111; Luhrmann, Persuasions, 102–​103. 17. Steve, interview, 2015. 18. Steve and Ash, interview, 2015. 19. Cf. Rubin, “Thinking.” 20. Grey, Red,  10–​29. 21. Ibid., 86. 22. Ibid.,  77–​84. 23. Ibid., 83. 24. See, e.g., ibid., 114, 116–​117, 153. 25. Ibid., 216. 26. Ibid., 203–​208. 27. Morris, “Warrior,” 159. 28. Schippers, “Recovering.” 29. Morris, “Warrior,” 159. 30. Ibid., 161. 31. Ibid., 162. 32. Ibid., 163. 33. Ibid. 34. Ibid., 166. 35. Ibid., 163. 36. Ibid., 161. 37. Hotchkiss-​Knives, “Watch,” 144. 38. Ibid., 137. 39. Ibid., 144. 40. Ibid., 150. 41. Ibid., 143. 42. Ibid., 144. 43. Ibid., 145. 44. Ibid. 45. Ibid., 146–​147. 46. Ibid., 148. 47. Ibid., 150. 48. Ibid., 151. 49. Ibid. Emphasis in original. 50. Ibid. 51. Ibid. 52. Cvetkovich, “Receptivity.” 53. Alkistis Dimech, interview, 2016. 54. Alkistis Dimech, interview, 2016. 55. Alkistis Dimech, interview, 2016. 56. Alkistis Dimech, interview, 2016.

288  The Eloquent Blood 57. See ­chapter 2. 58. This can be contrasted with Fedele and Knibbe’s description of contemporary Magdalene pilgrims, who construe feminine sexuality as healing, loving, and compassionate. Fedele and Knibbe, “From Angel.” 59. This can be contrasted with Neopagan, goddess-​oriented discourses. Åsa Trulsson, Cultivating the Sacred: Ritual Creativity and Practice among Women in Contemporary Europe (Lund: Lund University, 2010). 60. Kraig, Modern Sex Magick, 346. 61. Chen, “Failed,” 15. 62. Erica M Cornelius, interview, 2014. 63. Erica M Cornelius, interview, 2014. 64. Erica M Cornelius, interview, 2014. 65. Similar ideas are expressed in Cornelius, “Women’s.” 66. Kirsten Brown, “Every Time You Play the Red,” in Women’s Voices in Magic, ed. Brandy Williams, 114–​118 (Stafford: Megalithica Books, 2009). 67. Cf. Fedele and Knibbe, “From Angel.” 68. Brown, “Every Time.” 69. Urban, Magia, 265. 70. Cf. Schippers, “Recovering.” 71. Schreck and Schreck, Demons. 72. Magdalene Meretrix, “In Nomine Babalon:  Sacred Whoredom in a Thelemic Context,” Heathen’s Lair, 1999, http://​heathenslair.tripod.com/​id52.html (accessed October 16, 2017). 73. Meretrix, “In Nomine.” 74. Ibid. 75. Greywalker, “Notes.” 76. See ­chapter 6. Raven Greywalker, “Sado-​Masochistic Ritual in a Thelemic Context,” Necronomi.com, http://​www.necronomi.com/​magic/​hermeticism/​sandm.txt (accessed March 4, 2017). 77. Greywalker, “Notes,” 25. 78. Ibid., 26. 79. Ibid., 27. 80. Hotchkiss-​Knives, “Watch,” 145. 81. Grey, Red. 82. Ibid., 204–​205. 83. Peter Grey, interview, 2016. 84. Alkistis Dimech, interview, 2016. 85. Ash, interview, 2015. 86. Ash, interview, 2015. 87. Steve and Ash, interview, 2015. 88. Ash, interview, 2015. 89. Linden, “Garden,” 84. 90. Ibid., 97. 91. Cf. Walkowitz, “Male.”

Inhabiting the Uninhibited  289 92. See Barbara G. Walker, The Woman’s Encyclopaedia of Myths and Secrets (San Francisco:  Harper & Row, 1983); Nancy Qualls-​ Corbett, The Sacred Prostitute:  Eternal Aspect of the Feminine (Toronto:  Inner City Books, 1988); Diane Darling, “Agents of Aphrodite: In Her Majesty’s Sacred Service,” in Green Egg Omelette, ed. Oberon Zell (Franklin Lakes, NJ: New Page Books, 2009), 236–​ 240; Cosi Fabian, “The Holy Whore: A Woman’s Gateway to Power,” in Whores and Other Feminists, ed. Jill Nagle (New  York:  Routledge, 1997), 44–​54; Ellen Evert Hopman and Lawrence Bond, People of the Earth: The New Pagans Speak out (Rochester, VT:  Destiny Books, 1996), 140–​151; Laurelei Dabrielle, In Her Service: Reflections from a Priestess of Aphrodite (n.p.: Magic Woods Publishing, 2007); Raven Kaldera, Hermaphrodeities: The Transgender Spirituality Workbook (Hubbardston, MA: Asphodel Press, 2008), 72–​74. The relationship between sacred prostitution and Neopaganism is discussed in Marguerite Johnson, “Drawing down the Goddess:  The Ancient (Female) Deities of Modern Paganism,” in Handbook of Contemporary Paganism, ed. Murphy Pizza and James R. Lewis (Leiden: Brill, 2009), 329–​330; Chas S. Clifton, “Sex Magic or Sacred Marriage? Sexuality in Contemporary Wicca,” in Sexuality in New Religious Movements, ed. Henrik Bogdan and James R. Lewis (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014), 160. 93. Lee Gilmore, “The Whore and the Holy One: Contemporary Sacred Prostitution and Transformative Consciousness,” Anthropology of Consciousness 9, no. 4 (1998): 1–​14. Cf. Nagle, Whores; Rubin, “Thinking.” 94. See Cymene Howe, Suzanna Zaraysky, and Lois Ann Lorentzen, “Devotional Crossings:  Transgender Sex Workers, Santisima Muerte, and Spiritual Solidarity in Guadalajara and San Francisco,” in Religion at the Corner of Bliss and Nirvana. Politics, Identity, and Faith in New Migrant Communities, ed. Lois Ann Lorentzen, Joaquin Jay Gonzalez III, Kevin M. Chun, and Hien Doc Du (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2009), 3–​38; Jill Nagle, “Showing Up Fully: Women of Color Discuss Sex Work. Blake Aarens, Hima B. Gina Gold, Jade Irie, Madeleine Lawson, and Gloria Lockett. Moderated by Jill Nagle,” in Whores and Other Feminists, ed. Jill Nagle (New York: Routledge, 1997), 195–​209; Siobhan Brooks, “Dancing towards Freedom,” in Whores and Other Feminists, ed. Jill Nagle (New York: Routledge, 1997), 252–​255. 95. Cf. Fedele and Knibbe, “From Angel”; Gilmore, “Whore.” 96. Cf. Nagle, Whores. 97. Chappell, “Sexual Attitudes.” 98. Irigaray, This, 186–​187. 99. Ibid., 187. 100. Schippers, Beyond, 38. 101. E.g., Lorde, “Uses of the Erotic.” 102. Cf. Mueller, “If All Acts”; Jo Pearson, “Embracing the Lash:  Pain and Ritual as Spiritual Tools,” Scripta Instituti Donneriani Aboensis 23 (2011): 351–​363. 103. Cf. Skeggs, Formations; Juana Maria Rodriguez, “Queer Politics, Bisexual Erasure: Sexuality at the Nexus of Race, Gender, and Statistics,” Lambda Nordica 21, no. 1–​2 (2016): 172–​173; Finley et al., “Introduction”; Schippers, Rockin’, 125–​127.

290  The Eloquent Blood 104. hooks, “Madonna,” 159–​160. 105. E.g., Bonnie J. Dow and Julia T. Wood, “Repeating History and Learning from It:  What Can SlutWalks Teach Us about Feminism?,” Women’s Studies in Communication 37, no. 1 (2014), 22–​43. Cf. Stinson, “Afro-​American.” 106. See, e.g., Lorde, “Uses of the Erotic”; Anzaldùa, Borderlands. 107. Cf. Sonya Sharma, “When Young Women Say ‘Yes’: Exploring the Sexual Selves of Young Canadian Women in Protestant Churches,” in Women and Religion in the West:  Challenging Secularization, ed. Kristin Aune, Sonya Sharma, and Giselle Vincett (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2008), 71–​82. 108. Cf. Linda Woodhead, “‘Because I’m Worth It’:  Religion and Women’s Changing Lives in the West,” in Women and Religion in the West: Challenging Secularization, ed. Kristin Aune, Arvind Sharma, and Giselle Vincett (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2008), 149–​150. 109. Rubin, “Thinking.”

11

Possession and Dispossession Embodiment, Ecstasy, and Erotic Destruction

Whether straight, hetero, bi, it’s this: how do you incite the goddess’s interest? How do you make her fantasy enflamed? . . . How do I attract her interest? What is it I do that makes her want to come into me, to show me how she feels? You know, I have a kind of intoxication in my flesh where . . . it feels qualitatively different when she’s within me. And it’s just an utter intoxication. The dimensions open up and the depth of physical experience sort of transcends time and space. It doesn’t even transcend my physical body, but the true nature of it becomes present to me.

The words in the opening epigraph were spoken to me by the dancer, choreographer, and writer Alkistis Dimech. They pertain to her embodied experience of contact or communion with divinity, and more specifically, what she can do to make Babalon want to enter her, thus allowing Alkistis to experience, in her own body, how the goddess feels.1 Alkistis describes Babalon as a desiring feminine viewer, whose presence in Alkistis’s body is conceptualized as “an utter intoxication,” which feels “qualitatively different” from her mundane consciousness. Her words highlight a recurrent theme in both the written and oral source material for this study, namely, of the body—​and especially the feminine body—​as, to speak with Hugh B. Urban, a “supreme vehicle to religious ecstasy or spiritual liberation.”2 This chapter will thus analyze how the “Babalonian” body is produced and gendered in esoteric ritual. This entails scrutinizing what contemporary esotericists to do attract and embody Babalon in ritual and how this relates to notions of femininity. I will emphasize the body as a socially produced entity that is materialized through gendering technologies. This chapter will depart from the approach of the preceding ones in analyzing four rituals centered around Babalon. However, I did not have the opportunity to participate in any explicitly Babalon-​oriented rituals during my fieldwork, and my discussion will thus primarily be based on written and verbal accounts of four rituals, which vary in their degree of privacy and engagement with the body and The Eloquent Blood: The Goddess Babalon and the Construction of Femininities in Western Esotericism. Manon Hedenborg White, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780190065027.001.0001

292  The Eloquent Blood sensual experience. Analyzing rituals in textual form has obvious disadvantages and presents interpretive challenges. There are numerous dimensions of ritual that are lost when one relies on verbal descriptions, including but not limited to tone of voice, smells, movements, and tastes, unawareness of which may lead to the omission of key dimensions of the ritual from the analysis. As participation would, however, not have been an option in any of the rituals discussed herein, and given the importance of practical magic to the contemporary Babalon discourse, I  nonetheless consider the unavoidably limited vantage point of analyzing rituals as text preferable to omitting rituals entirely from my discussion.

Ritual 1. “Procession of Babalon” by Aisha Qadisha As previously discussed, several interviewees and esoteric authors posit Babalon and the Scarlet Woman as symbols representing a more liberated view of femininity than that offered by the Abrahamic religions, with the potential to transcend dichotomies such as virgin–​whore. This view is seemingly reflected in “Procession of Babalon:  The Evolution of the Goddess through the Aeons,” a ritual written by OTO member Aisha Qadisha and presented at the 1996 Thelemic Women’s Conference for a group of female participants.3 In this ritual, Babalon is presented as the culmination of a succession of three divine feminine figures: the Semitic goddess Astarte, the Virgin Mary, and, finally, Babalon herself, all embodied by human ritual participants who address the other partakers in turn. The ritual presents a view of history in which pre-​Christian antiquity represents a more liberating understanding of human, and especially feminine, sexuality. The ritual culminates in a sensual guided meditation, wherein the participants identify themselves with the divine feminine as Babalon and envision themselves as giving birth to their more empowered, Babalon-​like selves. Astarte addresses the participants first. She is dressed in a “loose, flowing robe or gown in ancient style,” and carries “[a]‌snake in one hand and a lotus in the other.” Astarte proclaims: At the dawn of civilization when the world was still young and mostly wild, men knew my true name and power. They called me the Queen of Heaven, Astarte, Anat, and Ishtar. And the women also knew my holy names and they drew my power through their bodies and gave it to the men in sacred rites and thus was the community made strong and healthy. I am a goddess of rapture and I delight in the dance of life and death that finds its best expression in the sacrament of sexual love. Therefore were my priestesses the keepers of my wisdom which is the wisdom of the joy of the body. Men came to my temples and worshiped at the altars of my priestesses that they might know me and my dance of life and

Possession and Dispossession  293 death. All acts of love and pleasure are my rituals and in my day there was no shame in their expression.4

In this part of the ritual, Astarte appears as an ancient goddess of “rapture” and sexuality, represented on earth by a class of priestesses who commanded the magical power of their bodies and presided over the mysteries of the “dance of life and death,” which she identifies with “the sacrament of sexual love.” Astarte’s speech thus perpetuates the theme of intertwining sexual ecstasy with death, as seen in the historical source material discussed in this study. Astarte contends that her priestesses were the keepers of her mysteries, “the wisdom of the joy of the body,” and that in her day there was “no shame” in love and pleasure.5 Her declaration constructs ancient Near Eastern culture as sexually liberated and characterized by an understanding of sexuality and the body—​and not least the female body—​as sacred sources of wisdom, and Astarte is construed as “Queen of Heaven,” a goddess of sexual ecstasy. Her statement that “[a]‌ll acts of love and pleasure are my rituals” is derived from the Wiccan “Charge of the Goddess”; however, the line has been augmented with the final proclamation that in Astarte’s day there was “no shame” in the expression of sexuality. Nonetheless, this inclusion exemplifies how the distinction between occultism, or Thelema, and Wicca or Neopaganism is not watertight. Astarte is succeeded by the Virgin Mary, who wears a “blue and white gown . . . with halo.” The ritual script states that Mary begins with her head bowed in “sorrow and shame,” and she laments: Lo! these two thousand years I have been cast out and despised by men. I am no longer a goddess and I have been stripped of my rituals of love and pleasure. They have forsaken the joy of my body and in doing so they have forsaken their own bodies, their own temples. They see me as a source of evil and shame in the world. For they have associated the joy of my body with sin and damnation. Therefore do they now wander the earth in separation from me, the great Mother, who is Life, but for them is a dead Death. And there is a greater travesty; even my daughters fear me and in so doing they fear the source of their power and they hate their sex. I would rather be a harlot than the weak, sexless virgin that Christian men have made me.6

Mary’s sorrowful speech differs starkly from Astarte’s proud declaration.7 In this excerpt, the rise of Christianity is identified with a rejection of the body and of the sacred power of sexuality as well as the oppression of women. The devaluation of women and sexuality are construed as intertwined, and the divine feminine is described as having been degraded and forsaken. Through the denial of the goddess, Mary contends, the power of the body—​and thus the source of all life—​has

294  The Eloquent Blood been subjugated. Due to the denigration of the divine feminine, women have become estranged from “the source of their power”—​presumably their bodies—​ and have begun to “hate their sex.” Mary ends by declaring that she would rather be seen as a harlot than as a “weak, sexless virgin.” The Virgin Mary is thus conceptualized as a goddess castigated and demeaned by the misogyny and negativity toward sexuality and the body that is ascribed to Christianity. Rather than being envisioned as an entirely different figure than Astarte, she is constructed as the divine feminine as viewed and treated under patriarchal, monotheistic rule. Mary is finally succeeded by Babalon. The deliberate contrast between Babalon and the previous two female figures is exemplified by her clothing; rather than a flowing robe in “ancient style” or a veil and halo, Babalon sports a red wig and the seven-​pointed star and wears a red bra and garter paired with high heels and stockings. In contrast to Astarte’s regal robes and Mary’s modest gown and veil, Babalon’s provocative get-​up appears simultaneously to showcase modernity and immoderate femininity and how the divine feminine has now emerged from centuries of denigration in an unapologetically sexual and transgressive form. Her speech presents a martial, triumphant, and revolutionary vision of the goddess, who begins: I am the Grail and the Glory. I am the Mother of Abominations. I am the one whom you call the Law and they have called lawlessness. In my name is all power given for I am BABALON. I have given myself to everything that lives and my weakness has subdued their strength. I have attained to the union of the One with the Many. And in that union did I understand, therefore am I called Understanding. I am the flames and fuel that shall ignite an obsolete Age.8

This excerpt is triumphant in tone and has strong parallels to the language of the 12th Aethyr of The Vision and the Voice.9 Babalon depicts herself as a rebellious goddess; she identifies herself with “the Law”—​presumably, the Law of Thelema—​meaning that she identifies herself with the maxim of “Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.” However, she contends that this law has been deemed “lawlessness” by outsiders. The goddess continues with an encouragement to the participants: Hear me my daughters, for our time is at hand. A new star blazeth across the sky. It is my star. . . . I charge you to set it upon your blood-​red banners go forth in joy and victory [sic]. You, my children, the free, the wild and the untamed. You who walk upon the earth at the dawn of a New Aeon. . . . We shall laugh and dance as the dying god crumbles and falls in an ashen heap and our laughter shall be the cackle of harlots in a house of fornication. Be drunk on the wine of my fornications, my daughters, be drunk thereon. Let my kisses wanton you

Possession and Dispossession  295 to death. You shall thrive in my power and in my Name: BABALON. You have but to call me and I shall come to thee and fill thee with my Force and Fire, my Passion and Power shall surround and inspire thee, my voice shall judge Nations and I shall lie with all the Kings of the earth for there is no other woman like unto BABALON.10

The excerpt borrows several lines, more or less verbatim, from Parsons’s “Liber 49,” as well as from the 12th Aethyr of Vision. The parallels to Parsons’s writings are especially strong in the references to blood-​red banners, a star blazing across the sky, and the laughter of Babalon and her daughters being as the laughter of “harlots in a house of fornication.” Similar to Parsons’s “Liber 49,” Aisha Qadisha’s Babalon addresses her “daughters.” However, it is worth calling attention to the fact that the former text addresses the daughter of the goddess in singular, whereas in Aisha Qadisha’s ritual Babalon appears to address all of the (presumably female) ritual participants as her progeny. The reference to being kissed by the goddess contains a possible subtext of queerly feminine desire, which becomes more pronounced as the ritual progresses (see further discussion later in the chapter). There are significant thematic parallels especially to Parsons’s writings in the way that the ritual associates the divine feminine as Babalon with cataclysmic social transformation and the liberation of women through the shattering of the patriarchal order. Aisha Qadisha’s ritual continues the connection between Babalon and pariah femininity by reappropriating the word “harlot” or its synonym, “whore,” in a positive manner. The unapologetically sexual aspect of Babalon is intertwined with her opposition toward patriarchal power structures, as showcased by her assertion that she and her daughters will behold the death of “the dying god” while laughing “the cackle of harlots.” The positive engagement and deliberate identification with pariah femininity—​specifically that of “slut” or “whore”—​ is compounded by Babalon’s provocative outfit. In this ritual, the red bra and garter, high heels, and flamboyant wig are embraced as the garb of a deity, clearly contrasted with the modest feminine dress of the Virgin Mary who is “no longer a goddess.” In this way, the two participants embodying these figures enact a sort of inversion of the virgin–​whore split. Aisha Qadisha’s ritual shows Babalon inhabiting a form of pariah femininity as a manifestation of the divine, calling to her human “daughters” to be as drunken, ecstatic, and prideful as she. Pariah femininity, and the scantily dressed body of the harlot goddess, is construed as a source of strength and inspiration for women at a turning point in history, a time when her daughters are to set her symbol upon their “blood-​red banners” and go forth into the world. This aspect of the ritual appears to engage in intertextual dialogue with the soteriological narrative of Christianity, as the “Procession of Babalon” ritual centers on the daughters of a goddess rather than the son of God.

296  The Eloquent Blood Through the assertion that the laughter of Babalon and her daughters will be “the cackle of harlots,” there is an identification of the other ritual participants with the goddess through the signifier of pariah femininity. However, the ritual destabilizes the stereotypical binary of woman-​as-​lover and woman-​as-​mother by showcasing the harlot goddess as a maternal figure. The ritual script plays with several such dichotomies and binaries, constructing Babalon as one who unites them within herself. Seemingly drawing inspiration from “The Thunder, Perfect Mind”11—​a poem found among the manuscripts discovered at Nag Hammadi in 1945—​Babalon subsequently identifies herself with a series of antinomies, declaring: Mystery of Mystery, I am compassionate and cruel. I am control and the uncontrollable. I am the Word and the Silence. I am the mother of my father, and the sister of my husband. I am strength and fear. I am joy and sorrow. I am union and dissolution. I am the root of iniquity and yet holy, holy, holy is my name. I am above you, yet ever do I seek to incarnate through you. I am with you when you call my name in ecstasy. My wisdom is the joy and exuberance of the body. If you would invoke me, invoke me through your holy kteis. For all acts of love and lust are my rituals. I, I am external to you, so shall you seek me within your own bodies.12

In this statement, Babalon’s (alternative) femininity is not simply equivalent to the pariah femininity of whore. Instead, the goddess appears as a symbol that encompasses a broad range of femininities, thus indicating a vision of femininity beyond simplistic binaries. This manner of identifying with antinomies could be interpreted as a way of conceptualizing boundless possibility, thus subverting associations between femininity and particular, limiting social roles for women. It could be seen as a way of attempting to describe the (currently) indescribable; drawing on Irigaray, it could be argued that this, at present, ineffable concept is one of femininity not defined by phallocentric standards but existing as a thing in itself. In her speech, Babalon identifies herself as both beyond and within her human “daughters,” and she situates her power specifically within the female body and reproductive anatomy. Thus, the goddess instructs the ritual participants to seek her through their bodies, which are thus construed as prime sites of mystical, ecstatic experience. The ritual proceeds with a guided meditation, in which the participants are instructed to seek the source of their power within their yonis as the sources of all life and death, connecting with their sexuality and touching their bodies with love and reverence. Babalon declares:  “[S]‌acred art thou maiden, thou mother, thou crone, thou whore, thou virgin, thou queen, thou Scarlet Woman.” The participants are instructed:

Possession and Dispossession  297 Use your imagination to scry into the nature of the sexual power and creative power that abides in your yoni. Feel your femaleness and its beauty, feel it open like a flower to the sun, whether you are voluptuous or thin, tall or short, dark or light. . . . Do not be afraid of your power.13

The participants are encouraged to caress their bodies and know themselves as “beautiful and powerful and desirable,” while directing their breath toward their yonis. Babalon instructs the participants: Imagine that each caress casts off a veil that has been keeping you from the consciousness of your power. Yearn for the manifestation of your Scarlet Self as you would yearn for a lover. Caress your Scarlet Self as you would caress a lover.14

In this quote, the realization of the individual participant’s own affinity with Babalon is identified with becoming attuned to her sexual power and self-​ awareness, and the guided meditation is seemingly aimed at producing a sense of simultaneously erotic and creative energy being generated and directed. Rhythmic breathing, autoerotic touching, and clenching of the anal and vaginal muscles are here used as bodily techniques in order to attune the participants’ sense of connection with their sexual force. The term “Scarlet Self,” which I have not encountered elsewhere in the source material, is seemingly used within this context to signify a more liberated, sexually empowered, or “Babalonian” version of selfhood. The suggestion to yearn for and caress one’s Scarlet Self as one would a lover construes the relationship between the current and future Scarlet or Babalonian self in terms of a queerly feminine circuit of desire and identification, where the future self is conceptualized as something both within and outside oneself. However, Babalon continues to instruct the participants in visualizing themselves as children within their own wombs: You are at one with the source of your power. This power you have inherited from your mother who inherited it from her mother who inherited it from her mother who inherited it from her mother before her and so down through the ages of women like a torch that is passed from hand to hand within a cave; we and our mothers have nurtured civilization and human evolution since prehistoric times. The child who you are now within your own womb is the crowned and conquering child of your unobstructed female power. . . . Our power as women is to give form to force; what better thing to form than your own Higher Self, your own star within your own womb.15

In this excerpt, the womb is constructed as a source of feminine creative power, which is identified not only with biological motherhood but also with the ability

298  The Eloquent Blood to give birth to a new and more empowered self. This conceptualization of the womb diverges distinctly from understandings of the female body or reproductive anatomy as lack. Instead, the feminine reproductive anatomy is ascribed a presence and creative power that is not contingent on male participation but instead is rooted in the relationship of daughter and mother, grandmother, great-​grandmother, and so on, which constitutes a prime site of affinity and communion with Babalon. The ritual concludes with the participants envisioning themselves giving birth to—​and identifying with—​their “future self ” before looking around at the other participants, seeing them as “the beautiful and desirable goddesses that have just awakened to their power.” The ritual script ends with the participants creating a vesica piscis together, which is described as inspired by feminist artist Judy Chicago’s epic artwork The Dinner Party.16 Chicago’s The Dinner Party, created with the aid of a large number of volunteers, appears as an important intertext for Qadisha’s ritual. The Dinner Party was designed as a triangular table, around which 39 female figures from mythology and history were seated. These women represented a sort of tripartite vision of history, with each line of the triangle corresponding to a separate historical period. The lineup at the table included historical goddesses, such as Ishtar and Kali, and historical figures, such as Elizabeth I, Mary Wollstonecraft, and Sojourner Truth. The installation drew heavily on vulvic symbolism.17 The view of history enacted in Qadisha’s ritual is similar to that discussed in previous chapters, in which pre-​Christian antiquity is identified with a recognition of female sexuality as a principal source of religious power and creativity. Christianity is construed as a destructive force, which has simultaneously marginalized women and resulted in the demonization of sexuality. The constructed disparity between Christianity and paganism is illustrated by the dichotomy of the Virgin Mary as a “weak, sexless virgin” on the one hand and Babalon as an ancient-​yet-​modern pagan goddess on the other.18 In Qadisha’s ritual, Babalon is construed as a powerful composite figure, who integrates joy and exuberance in women’s bodies and sexuality, and the harbinger of a “blood-​red” revolution in which the “daughters” of the goddess will reclaim their power and connect to their bodies and genitals as sacred sources of empowerment. The female body as Babalon, dressed so as to evoke notions of pariah femininity, is construed as the physical embodiment of divinity and the site of religious experience. The guided meditation, accompanied by autoerotic touching, rhythmic breathing, and clenching of the vaginal and anal muscles, gives way to what, to speak with Butler, could be understood as an ecstatic—​in the sense of being transported outside of the bounded, individual self—​dispossession, that is, the experience “of being  .  .  .  by virtue of another,”19 where feminine sexual power is identified not only as an individual propensity but also as a site of relationality with other women. Although Qadisha’s ritual appears to stress

Possession and Dispossession  299 a biological interpretation of feminine difference as a source of power and creativity for women, the Babalonian body—​as inhabited in the ritual—​is materialized through “technologies of femininity,”20 which transmit a narrative of feminine sexual oppression and liberation. Although donning special clothing and other forms of attire—​often in kabbalistically or otherwise doctrinally significant colors—​is not unusual in Western ritual magic,21 it is notable that the ritual gear stipulated for Babalon in Qadisha’s ritual consists of revealing red underwear, high heels, and a red wig. The visually striking dichotomy of this garb with Mary’s modest dress recalls the contrast between “good girl” and “bad girl” stereotypes, wherein the latter—​as is indicated by Mary herself—​is identified as a more liberating role. While this ritual use of technologies of femininity could be read as internalization of a stereotypically male-​centered fantasy of sexualized heterofemininity, I will argue in a subsequent section that this reading is too simplistic, disregarding the importance of technology to all materializations of gender as well as to ritual in general and marginalizing the role of queer feminine desire as well as how femininities are negotiated, affirmed, and rejected in localized social contexts.22 In Qadisha’s ritual, performed by an all-​female group of participants, Babalon’s highly sexualized femininity is not enacted for a male gaze but is performatively inhabited in a visual and somatic dialogue between the participants. The trappings of pariah femininity are used to materialize a female body as a vehicle of a feminine—​or, indeed, feminist—​divine, and can be interpreted as signifying the divine potentiality of female bodies. However, the situation of this sanctified feminine difference can be interpreted as inherent to the “potentiality of a womb.”23 In the discussion concluding this chapter, I will return to the issue of biology and technology in the conceptualization of femininity.

Ritual 2. Freyja The second ritual differs from the first in both scale and components. Rather than being performed at a group event for a larger number of people, it included only two participants—​Freyja and James, a cisgendered woman and man in a romantic and sexual relationship—​and was performed privately in the couple’s home.24 Whereas Aisha Qadisha’s ritual appears aimed at materializing a sense of affinity between all of the female participants and the feminine divine as Babalon, the purpose of Freyja’s and James’s ritual was to invoke the goddess specifically into Freyja, with James acting as priest or officiant. In preparation for the ritual, the couple established a makeshift temple in a spare bedroom by covering the windows and draping a table in red cloth to produce an altar. The altar was then decorated with numerous objects of sympathetic significance: vases of red

300  The Eloquent Blood roses, red candles, an image of the seven-​pointed star of Babalon, the Lust card from the Thoth Tarot, and a glass of red wine.25 Finally, a whip was placed on the altar. Rose incense was burned on a coal brazier, filling the room with a heavy, aromatic scent. The participants dressed for the occasion: Freyja donned a low-​ cut red dress and tied a sword around her waist. She applied elaborate makeup and red lipstick, which—​as she informed me during our conversation—​was deliberately heavier than she would ordinarily use. She donned eye-​catching gold jewelry. Freyja describes opting against high heels, feeling that they would be too uncomfortable and restricting during the ritual. James, who was to act as the facilitating priest, was dressed inconspicuously in black. Although stressing that she chose to dress and adorn herself as a form of ritual preparation for experiencing herself as Babalon, Freyja concurred that the presence of her romantic partner James was not irrelevant to her choice of attire. Feeling that her own sense of being able to embody the goddess would be enhanced by her ritual partner seeing her as such, and given that the ritual focused on Babalon as a goddess of sexual ecstasy, Freyja felt that being sexually attractive to her priest would be beneficial. In Freyja’s view, evoking feelings of sexual desire would be helpful both for purposes of building energy to fuel the ritual and in allowing her to distance herself from her non-​ritual subjectivity to allow for a sense of embodied identification with Babalon. Notably, however, Freyja attested to having used feminine technologies of dress and makeup during solo Babalon rituals both before and after the one discussed here, feeling that this may be pleasing to the goddess. The ritual began with the couple meditating quietly in the temple for a few minutes as preparation. Freyja then proceeded to perform Crowley’s “Star Ruby” ritual, after which James performed “Liber Reguli,” an A∴A∴ ritual that Crowley described as “an incantation proper to invoke the Energies of the Aeon of Horus.”26 After Freyja declared the intention of the ritual to invoke Babalon, James proceeded to ritually purify and consecrate her in a similar manner to that of the priest and priestess in the Gnostic Mass, after which he performed a version of the Wiccan fivefold kiss on Freyja.27 Once again, this indicates how contemporary Thelemites may be inspired by modern witchcraft or Neopaganism in designing their magical practice. In order to invoke the goddess, James read from the King James Bible, specifically Revelation 17, and also Crowley’s “Waratah Blossoms” from The Book of Lies.28 Freyja then responded by reciting the passage wherein Babalon first appears in the 15th Aethyr of The Vision and the Voice.29 These textual excerpts were selected more generally for their association with the goddess, and particularly as both indicate Babalon as “dancing-​ girl” or “dancer.” The significance of this choice of liturgy is apparent as James subsequently seated himself on a cushion on the floor and then proceeded to repeatedly recite the invocation of Babalon from Crowley’s “Liber Samekh,” while

Possession and Dispossession  301 Freyja danced barefoot to prerecorded ritual drum music.30 Freyja, who does not have any particular training in dance, describes this sequence as improvisational, ecstatic, and aimed at lowering her sense of inhibition and effecting an altered state of consciousness wherein she would experience herself as enflamed by Babalon. She recalls feeling initially self-​conscious and somewhat restricted in her movements, giving way to a gradual sense of surrender to bodily sensation; a growing feeling of disconnection from her mundane self; and an increasing perception of herself as a deity before her officiant, whose judgment of her was irrelevant. Although she had little notion of the passing of time during the ritual, she later approximated her dancing to have lasted between 30 and 45 minutes. When the music ceased, James recited from the 12th Aethyr of Crowley’s The Vision and the Voice, with Freyja responding—​paralleling Aisha Qadisha’s ritual, discussed in the preceding section—​with a recitation from the Gnostic “Thunder, Perfect Mind.” Subsequently, James removed Freyja’s clothing and bound her hands behind her back. She knelt in front of the altar, after which James, using the aforementioned whip, delivered 156 blows to her back. Freyja stated during our conversation that she and James used this ritual incursion of moderate pain as a form of ecstatic technique, and that the aim of this practice was to generate further sexual energy for both participants and enhance Freyja’s sense of identification with Babalon. While being scourged, Freyja used the star of Babalon as a visual focus. Afterward, the couple sacramentally shared the red wine in the cup on the altar, had sex, and then meditated silently together. During this meditation, Freyja describes feeling an overwhelming sense of love, gratitude, and emotional release as well as awe and humility at Babalon’s greatness. Although Freyja felt that the goddess was infinitely greater than herself, she describes having the sense that she could experience part of the deity through her own physical body, and especially through ecstatic experiences of euphoria, love, sexual desire, and suffering. Finally, Freyja performed the Star Ruby again in order to close the ritual. Although Freyja’s ritual differs from Aisha Qadisha’s in several ways, not least in being performed in a more private context, there are similarities. Both rituals place a woman in the role of Babalon and draw inspiration from Crowley’s writings as well as the Gnostic “Thunder, Perfect Mind.” Similar to Qadisha’s ritual, Babalon appears as a goddess of sexuality and sensual ecstasy, and the feminine body is construed as a site of interface and relationality with the divine. As in Qadisha’s ritual, Freyja deliberately utilized feminine technologies such as a revealing dress, elaborate adornment, and heavy makeup. However, whereas the Thelemic Women’s Symposium ritual was designed to enable a large number of people to participate and share a meaningful experience, Freyja’s ritual was instead oriented around producing an experience of erotic ecstasy for the couple, facilitated through the use of prolonged, free-​form dancing and ritual

302  The Eloquent Blood flagellation. Furthermore, Freyja’s ritual took place in a heterosexual context, conducted by a woman and her male romantic and sexual partner, and involving an act of ritualistic heterosexual intercourse. The implications of Freyja’s use of technologies of femininity, and their utilization in a heterosexual context for the conceptualization of Babalonian femininity, will be analyzed in the discussion concluding this chapter.

Ritual 3. Soror Syrinx In the rituals discussed in the preceding sections, the feminine body is materialized as a vital magical tool as well as a site of ecstatic relationality between female magician and goddess. These themes recur in the writings of Soror Syrinx. In her book Traversing the Scarlet Path, Syrinx recommends familiarizing oneself with Babalon personally before engaging in sexual magic with a partner, and outlines a ritual of adoration through which the female magician can begin physically to embody Babalon. Similar to Freyja’s ritual above, Syrinx recommends her reader to utilize technologies of femininity as preparation for the rite: Adorn yourself in fine apparel, red or purple, and be creative with your makeup. May your lips be ruby, your eyes a heavenly azure. Then let your hair flow free from constraint while you add finishing touches such as covering yourself with glittering jewels. I prefer silver to honor the moon, but choose whatever works for you. Lastly, girt yourself with a sword.31

Syrinx’s instructions have parallels to Freyja’s preparations for her ritual with James in the use of red clothing and “creative” makeup, especially red lipstick and opulent jewelry. Syrinx subsequently instructs her reader to place a selection of sweets on her altar, “the more lush and juicer [sic] the better,” in front of a seal of Babalon. She should then light candles and incense, and display the Lust card of the Thoth Tarot so that it is fully visible on her altar.32 Syrinx’s instructions continue: Sit and breathe deeply. See your chakras opening, the mother flame licking your spine. Every inch awakens and bursts forth with energy. See yourself as the divine feminine. Stand tall, raise your arms.33

The reader is instructed to recite from an excerpt from the 12th Aethyr of The Vision and the Voice. Syrinx then prompts her to imbibe the wine and sweets on the altar, reveling in the sensual experience of the act. Syrinx writes: “Notice the texture, color, scent, taste, the sound of sipping or chewing, make it a sensual act.

Possession and Dispossession  303 Arouse your senses with pleasure.”34 The reader is subsequently encouraged to dance ecstatically, basking in “[d]‌ivine ecstasy, divine madness,” and letting “the warmth and inhibition of the wine erase all mental chains.”35 Similar to Aisha Qadisha’s ritual, Syrinx’s description proceeds to a sort of guided meditation, where she describes the experience of possession by Babalon and the dissolution of boundaries between devotee and deity: Impenetrable darkness envelopes you, the bitter sea of Binah pulls you under, where you merge with the universal waters, losing yourself to the all, to stillness. You dissolve. Blackness in all directions, physical matter dissolving into eternal.36

In the above excerpt, we see the thematic interrelation between Babalon and the idea of dissolution of the self into the all, with the kabbalistic association between Babalon and Binah used as the basis for a metaphor wherein the devotee experiences herself as dissolving into an eternal, dark sea. This meditation on mystical or metaphorical death is followed by a vision of rebirth from Babalon’s womb, which Syrinx describes as follows: Slowly, the water turns to a river of blood dividing into tributaries. Slowly, you realise you are forming, growing, but you are encased in a sac, unable to escape. Warm liquid cloaks your being, and blood is seeping in through a cord attached to your belly, feeding your veins, reviving your heart, and beating as if an ancient drum reminding you of song. Pounding, pounding, it calls for you to awaken. You stir, swaying in revelry, but you want more. Desire is budding, urging you onward. Yearning to sing, to express, life courses life through your veins, and you vibrate in sync with all existence. Only then do you emerge from her womb, aflame with love.37

This excerpt shows how Syrinx, through her guided meditation, leads the reader through an experience of dissolution into Babalon, and subsequent rebirth, couched in the metaphorical language of lying within a great womb connected to an umbilical cord. Similar to Aisha Qadisha’s “Procession of Babalon,” Syrinx’s ritual thus posits a connection between Babalon and female reproductive anatomy. Syrinx emphasizes her reader’s desire for awakening, emergence, and creativity as a driving force “urging” her “onward” until she is finally reborn, “aflame with love,” and proclaiming her identification with the goddess by stating: “Beautiful art thou, I, Babalon!”38 This declaration seemingly encapsulates a completion of the endeavor, consummating a shifted subjectivity wherein Babalon is acknowledged as both transcendent and immanent; an independently existing force that is simultaneously one with the female magician.

304  The Eloquent Blood Similar to the “Procession of Babalon,” Syrinx’s ritual ends in artistic practice: the author encourages her reader to engage in some form of creative activity such as writing “lyrics or poetry,” painting, automatic writing, playing an instrument, or dancing “around and around, becoming one with the music.”39 The sensual and embodied identification with Babalon is thus conceptualized as a potential source of creativity. The ritual discussed here differs from the two previously discussed in that it is designed as a solo operation. As text, it is relevant that Syrinx’s ritual is in a published format, included in one of her books as an instruction for a magician beginning to work with Babalon. Unlike the ritual performed by Freyja and James, Syrinx’s ritual script does not contain any explicitly sexual practices. However, similar to the former, it has a strong focus on interiorized mystical experience and sensual ecstasy, and it employs technologies of femininity in order to materialize the female body as a site of communion between divinity and female magician. In centering gustatory indulgence as a ritual technique, and encouraging the reader to revel sensuously in the delicious tastes, scents, and sounds of her indulgence, Syrinx construes an apparent connection between Babalon and feminized excess and consumption, rather than moderation or abstinence. This dimension of the ritual has classed implications; the Scarlet Woman’s opulent dress, comfortable position, and feasting on delectable sweets and wine seemingly recall the image of a historical woman of the wealthier classes at a banquet, contrasting with modern, bourgeois notions of femininity as congruent with modesty and delicacy. I will return to this in my final discussion, as well as the ways in which both eating and technologies of femininity are utilized in Syrinx’s ritual in order to materialize an open and ecstatic feminine body as the site of interface between magician and divinity.

Ritual 4. Peter Grey and Alkistis Dimech The three previously discussed rituals have in common that they are all written, or cowritten, by female magicians and focus on an individual woman, or group of women, embodying Babalon. The fourth ritual description I will discuss differs from the others by centering a male magician, Peter Grey, and his devotional act to the goddess. The ritual description, published in 2009, focuses primarily on Grey’s offering, hinting sparsely at the magical preparations by mentioning “the elaboration of salt and circles and coloured candles,” the “scattering of roses and tying of brass and glass bells to the ankles of the dancing girl,” and “calls and symbols drawn in the air.”40 Aside from Grey himself, it is possible to discern that three other participants are present during the ritual: the “dancing girl,” whose

Possession and Dispossession  305 bare feet weave across “wooden floor and torn petals,” someone drumming, and someone holding a scalpel. Grey describes lying naked on his back, hands and feet open, and feeling the scalpel cut into his chest to trace the shape of a “crescent cup.” This is the devotional act, which Grey writes that the goddess has demanded of him: A smile, a red line. Seven layers of skin. This is what I have been asked to do by Her. Make sacrifice. Offer up my heart’s blood. Surrender to ordeal.41

Grey vividly describes the sensations of pain, how the endorphin rush quickly fades, writing: “This is not meant to be easy. Love hurts. This is no oceanic release, this is severe.”42 Babalon, Grey writes, “demands absolute physical commitment, abandon, freefall.”43 While the knife continues to cut and the drum quickens, Grey hears sounds issuing from his body: “I sound like an animal, like all animals, a lion, a serpent, a dragon. I am getting wracked with spasms.”44 His sense of time wanes, and “[t]‌ime stretches away, bottomless, abyssal,” while “outside the circle a dancing girl is doing her own striptease.”45 He continues to repeat the mantra that this is done for Babalon: “For Her. This is done for Her.”46 When the cutting is finally done, Grey stands: The blood has run down over my chest and fingered across my abdomen, already nigredo black. I stand naked, my heart revealed. Rose heads have been crushed under bare feet. The candles have burned down. There is a blood crescent cup cut into my chest. This is dedication. This is ritual. This is self knowledge. It means I offer every drop of mine own heart’s blood.47

Grey’s essay provides a brief but visceral depiction of ecstatic ritual, exemplified by his sense of abandon and surrender and the altering of his perception of time. The text—​in which Grey’s experience is centered and the other participants appear as shadowy presences—​emphasizes the floral scent of roses combined with the metallic tanginess of blood, the tingling of the bells, the vibrations, the visual impressions, and, above all, the overwhelming reality of pain as his skin is peeled back, blotting out all else. After the ritual, Grey describes spending seven days scrubbing the open wound, as Babalon dwells “in . . . raw exposure.” He continues to anoint the scar with rose oil, treating it as “a living testament to the changing nature of [his] devotion.”48 Grey contends that the scar represents both augmentation and a “cutting away,” and that both of these pursuits reveal the true self, analogous to the way that Babalon may manifest “as a slave girl dancer twisting and circling down to the dance of atoms, or creating Herself in the ornaments of gold and pearls and precious stones.”49 Through the scar, Grey writes that the goddess has marked him:

306  The Eloquent Blood This is Babalon, forever marking my heart with a kiss, become a cup, to fill with my blood and offer up to her lips. She scents and tastes me. . . . She asked for this, and I did it for her. My deliberate ritualised choice. This is neither narcissism, nor self-​hatred, nor masochism. Instead, honesty, clarity of intent and surrender. I perfect myself for Her.50

Grey writes that sacrifice, adversity, and ordeal are integral to developing self-​ knowledge and knowledge of Babalon. He stresses that blood, violence, and physical pain are integral methods toward magical empowerment. However, as exemplified in the previous excerpt, Grey is careful to stress that this is not a masochistic pursuit, but an ordeal he undergoes to be more present in his body, as a form of surrender, and for the purpose of perfecting himself for his goddess. Notably, he relates this imperative for self-​augmentation to technologies of femininity, contending that “devotees of Babalon . . . must transform [their] bodies to reveal their true natures,” but that “rolfing, pilates, or high heeled shoes and depilation” are equally valid as “needle, knife, and branding iron.” Fundamentally, Grey stresses, Babalon’s history is “one of torture,” and one must “be prepared to suffer for Love” and rediscover one’s “grace and beauty” through bodily truths. This places feminine technologies such as high heels or hair removal within the context of other deliberate uses of pain utilized not to harm or deny the body but for self-​transformation, religious devotion, and heightening one’s sense of embodiment. Grey stresses that devotion to Babalon means embracing the body as “the primary magical tool,” and realizing that the “root to the stars is embedded in the flesh.”51 The physical body is thus construed as the principal site of religious ecstasy and self-​transformation. Emphasizing the importance of bodily devotion, Grey levels a critique at modern occultism for what he perceives as its excessive emphasis on control and intellectual abstraction. Writing that his cutting ordeal can be seen as “an act of Love under Will,” Grey continues that “in the Will-​centric madness of the western path, the call to devotion often goes unanswered.” Devotion, Grey stresses, requires one to go further, and he recommends turning to “the poets, the Lovers, the warriors, the scarred” in order to learn more about the nature of love.52 He emphasizes the fundamental importance of embodied and ecstatic surrender, and writes that “Babalon is here, beyond edge and reason, where the Will cannot extend. Love is in brave abandon, whatever artifice has brought you to that point.”53 In the final portion of the essay, Grey ruminates on his own sexual history, writing that he has had a multitude of lovers and “drowned in a valley of cunt.” However, in “[d]‌ressing Babalon as the most immediate body to honour, in the meditation of never saying no,” Grey writes that he overlooked something about both himself and the goddess. The author stresses the importance of “sacrificing

Possession and Dispossession  307 all, over and again,” and allowing oneself to be undone by the experience of love rather than being “seduced by the surfaces”: The beloved is not an abstract. We cannot project her as a patina on the world, for in penetrating we are penetrated. The rose heart shot through with barbed arrows. I am all undone with Love. The much vaunted state of detachment kills the subtle alchemy of true union. This is for beginners, trying to control their sexual response, and a relic of cultures and times when woman was seen as less than human. . . . How can the lover of Babalon treat the beloved as a whore for hire, thrown back out onto the street after the dispassionate act? She asks the hardest thing, Love. The destroyer of all.54

Grey’s emphasis on surrender, sacrifice, and loss of control echoes themes present throughout his book The Red Goddess, in which he frequently emphasizes the limits of intellectual analysis when it comes to understanding Babalon. The goddess is associated with a violent and ecstatic, embodied awareness of dissolution unavailable to those refusing to relinquish control. This is phrased within a critique of what Grey appears to view as the chauvinist notion that simply having sex with many women will produce an understanding of the nature of Babalon. Instead, he suggests that penetrating the mysteries of the goddess requires the self to be penetrated and cut through with “barbed arrows.”55 Maintaining a state of detachment, Grey writes, is counterproductive, and truly facing Babalon entails allowing oneself to be destroyed and undone by love. To speak with Catherine Waldby, Grey’s essay can be read partly as an expression of male desire for erotic destruction and also as a critique of the stereotypical gender division of men as destroyers and women as destroyed.56 Grey’s essay presents something of an analytical challenge in that the author has himself already, to some extent, interpreted the ritual for the reader through his discussion of the magical ideas underpinning the practice. Nonetheless, it is interesting to note the similarities and differences with the previously discussed rituals. Like those by Freyja and Soror Syrinx, Grey’s ritual was conducted in a private context and is strongly focused on the personal religious experience of the individual devotee. While not in focus, it is evident from the text—​as well as from my interview with Peter Grey and Alkistis Dimech—​that aspects of traditional ceremonial magic were incorporated as structuring elements into the rite. There is an implicit reference to Crowley’s Babalon through the mentioning of the “dancing girl” and “[s]‌even layers of skin.”57 During my interview with Grey and Dimech, both underlined that—​ although they use aspects of ceremonial magic for structure—​scripted ritual is not necessarily the most efficient way to interact with Babalon, whom they observe often comes through in unexpected ways. Both stressed that one’s

308  The Eloquent Blood ability to surrender to ecstatic sensation is more important than adhering to traditional magical procedure. In an essay from 2009, and published in the same volume (edited by Dimech) as the one previously discussed, Dimech describes her work with Babalon in terms of surrender and passion. She contends that training in dance loosens inhibitions and conditioning and allows the dancer to become a conduit of pure, crashing energy.58 During our conversation in 2016, Peter and Alkistis both emphasized the importance of materiality, ecstasy, and embodiment to their relationship with Babalon. Peter critiqued what he sees as a tendency in esoteric interpretations of Babalon to read the goddess through intricate kabbalistic frameworks, instead underlining the centrality of ecstasy. Peter articulates this aspect of Babalon as connected to a sort of anti-​authoritarian potential that especially challenges male-​dominated order structures, observing: One of the things I’ve found with magical groups and also particularly with male patterns of authority is that they’re challenged by when things actually become oracular, when you actually get spirit contact and spirit presence, because it doesn’t follow the script. Someone who’s trying to follow just a mathematical understanding of things, they lose authority immediately when that happens. Because the voice and the experience doesn’t necessarily come through the person who’s read the most books or has been playing masonic games the longest. It can come through someone who is relatively new. . . . [W]‌hen you’re working with Babalon . . . my experience has been that it’s about letting go. It’s about reaching that place where you have to let go of all of that, and many just don’t want to do that. . . . You can walk yourself up to the experience using a constructed intellectual framework. And that’s important for some people to do. . . . But then you have to reach a point where, to enable the experience you have to let go. And some people just keep building more and more complexity, whether that’s retreating into Enochian speculation, or whatever. But no, it’s in the ecstasy. [emphasizes] It’s in the ecstasy.59

Peter and Alkistis both emphasize that the experience of Babalon happens in the world and is not safely positioned, so to speak, beyond the Abyss. They stress that traditional ritual frameworks are not always the most effective for working with the goddess: Peter: The crazy thing, when you see people saying: “We’re doing Babalon work and then we draw this thing on the floor.” It’s like, you fucking idiots! Where is the altar of Venus? It’s pretty fucking obvious. But no, they’re still trapped in this ridiculous circle thinking. So no, that’s not the temple you need to be in for that kind of work.

Possession and Dispossession  309 Alkistis: Every time. . . . Whatever ritual we do in a circle, with Babalon, she appears outside the circle. When the circle comes down, then, boom. And it can be quite violent. . . . When she comes through, it’s usually when you get beyond that state. When there isn’t a circle . . . . Some kind of force is built up, something is registered and then the lightning hits. That’s how I’ve found it. That’s why it’s really hard to talk about it in terms of ritual, because I don’t know how much conventional ritual work works with Babalon, it’s never been my experience. . . . She’s very unpredictable like that. Does that make sense? [laughs] . . . You approach her first of all with what you know, and then you get to the edge. And then if you’re lucky you get yourself to the edge, to the point where the lightning hits you. It’s just that unpredictable and that simple. Peter: And there’s also the risk element, that the lightning doesn’t always strike. . . . If you work within a strict ritual setting . . . . Alkistis: It’s about having a space for things to happen. Peter: Yeah. Say, for example, you never have a free space in ritual wherein spirit contact occurs. You do your pentagram, hexagram, invoke, pentagram, hexagram, close. And there’s no actual space for the risk and danger of the encounter. And it’s the encounter that is the important thing, not the other stuff. The other stuff is just to get you there. So we’re interested in that free space. Being able to reach a point where you get to that free space. And there are a whole range of ways in which you can do that, there’s a whole range of modalities that you can employ. . . . It’s also something that’s very much in the world. . . . The whole ritual setting, and the grade structures, are designed to get you to the edge of the Abyss. And then it’s like, off you go. And don’t drag all your Crowley books into the Abyss, and see the bottom and come out and then go: “I’m an Ipssissimus.” And that’s largely what I see happening. Despite the fact that the system is meant to produce geniuses, I don’t see it working in the sense of doing that. People carry too much baggage. They travel too heavy. You need to travel light. And the lightest thing to travel with is the body.60 Similarly, although several chapters in The Red Goddess are devoted to Grey’s interpretation of Babalon’s historical trajectory, he emphasizes that learning to surrender is paramount when it comes to understanding the goddess, and highlights infatuation, sexual experience, and mind-​altering substances as supremely efficient pathways in this regard.61 Grey’s ritual account, described in the preceding section, presents an ordeal wherein the magical practitioner deliberately surrenders to pain for purposes of initiation and devotional offering. Although Freyja’s and James’s ritual included deliberate pain infliction, Grey’s and Dimech’s ritual goes further by

310  The Eloquent Blood accomplishing a permanent change to the visual appearance of the skin. Unlike the three previously analyzed ones, this ritual is not primarily focused on a woman embodying Babalon, nor on the technologies of femininity as ritual preparation. However, Grey draws parallels between his own ordeal and feminine technologies as equally valid ways of perfecting the body to reveal its inner truth, and I will return to this in the subsequent section.62 Significantly, Grey’s discussion—​like the previously discussed rituals—​highlights, albeit more reflexively, the theme of surrender, and he construes both feminine technologies and succumbing to ritual cutting as methods for simultaneously manifesting a core self and penetrating the boundaries of the autonomous body. This once again prompts us to pay attention to the usage and conceptualization of feminine technologies as religious techniques, and the subsequent section will discuss the implications of these rituals for the construction of femininity in the contemporary Babalon discourse.

Feminine Matter(s): The Body in the Contemporary Babalon Discourse At the beginning of this chapter, I questioned the implications of the construction of the body—​and techniques of the body—​in the contemporary Babalon discourse for the conceptualization of femininity. In the preceding sections, I have described and discussed how the body, and techniques of the body, are utilized and given meaning within the contemporary Babalon discourse, using an analysis of four rituals as a starting point. In different ways, all of these rituals employ bodily techniques such as rhythmic breathing, deliberate infliction of pain, scarification, sexual intercourse, autoerotic touching, consumption of mind-​altering substances, and eating for purposes of shifting the participants’ mundane self-​perception in order to effect an ecstatic experience of communion with divinity. Crucially, these rituals—​in different ways—​construe the body, and especially the feminine body, both as the ultimate site of individual religious experience and self-​transformation and the starting point for the erotic destruction of bounded subjectivity. The embodied performance of femininity occupies a shifting position in the four rituals described in the preceding sections. In the three rituals wherein a human esoteric practitioner explicitly assumed the role of Babalon, this role was performed by someone presenting as female. (In the fourth ritual, the role of “dancing girl”—​which may be interpreted as an implicit reference to Babalon—​was also performed by a woman.) In the case where a male magician occupied the central role in the ritual, he did not strive physically to embody the goddess. While further research is needed, it appears more common for

Possession and Dispossession  311 female-​identified magicians to assume the role of Babalon in ritual.63 The ritual embodiment of Babalon is thus couched within a heteronormative framework where women are more likely to relate to the goddess through identification, and men are more likely to do so through desire for a perceived feminine other. Nonetheless, the ritual practices discussed in this chapter construe femininity as not exclusively defined by its relation to masculinity through emphasizing the relationships between femininities. Thus, some of the rituals can be read as indicating a queerly feminine identification and desire between female esotericists and Babalon. In several of the rituals, the female body is construed as a prime site of ecstatic religious experience.64 Both Qadisha’s and Syrinx’s rituals, in their emphasis on womb imagery, seemingly draw on an understanding of femininity as equivalent to a particular reproductive morphology. Although these aspects of the two rituals can be considered, in Irigaray’s terms, as attempts to craft a vision of feminine anatomy as something in itself rather than as defined by the absence of a phallus, usage of this imagery reproduces normative understandings of femininity as biological essence, connected to pregnancy and childbirth. However, especially Qadisha’s ritual can be interpreted as engaging with a sex-​positive feminist understanding of women’s sexual freedom as inherently intertwined with female empowerment and how feminine sexual liberation is a prime concern for feminist policies. In this way, parallels can be drawn to, for instance, Audre Lorde’s conception of “the erotic” as a potential source of feminine creativity and power.65 The way Qadisha’s ritual construes the interaction between participants and Babalon in terms of a mother-​daughter relationship, and indicates feminine sexual power as deriving from this relationship, recalls Irigaray’s emphasis on revaluating the culturally marginalized mother-​daughter relationship as emblematic of a femininity defined in relation to itself, rather than by its relation to masculinity.66 Three of the rituals discussed here utilize technologies of femininity in order to materialize an embodied connection with Babalon. This tendency to envision Babalon through attributes connected to high femininity is recurrent in the material.67 Drawing on those feminist theorists who understand feminization as primarily a restrictive process through which women come to understand themselves as objects, this usage of lipstick, high heels, and revealing clothing could be interpreted as the internalization of a heteronormative order of desire, wherein female subordination is eroticized. For instance, Susan Brownmiller writes that “to care about feminine fashion, and do it well, is to be obsessively involved in inconsequential details on a serious basis.”68 In Brownmiller’s words, feminine styles of dress are inherently nonfunctional and uncomfortable, as “practicality is a masculine virtue,” and being “truly feminine is to accept the handicap of restraint and restriction, and to come to adore it.”69

312  The Eloquent Blood Based on this understanding, female occultists’ investment in makeup and dress could be seen as a reproduction of femininity as artifice, impelling women magicians to busy themselves with surface while their male peers are allowed to focus on what “really” matters. Indeed, neither Qadisha’s red wig and heels nor Freyja’s low-​cut dress and elaborate makeup appear primarily to have been worn with functionality in mind. However, it is important to stress that practicality or functionality are rarely prime concerns guiding styles of dress for either men or women in occult ritual. Furthermore, the understanding of feminine dress, makeup, and adornment as mere restrictive artifice disregards the inherence of technology to all materializations of gender and, not least, to ritual.70 In the rituals analyzed in this chapter, matter matters. Material implements are used not only to communicate specific roles—​roles that are not limited to a monolithical femininity defined in relation to masculinity—​but also to materialize an enchanted and open body. As I have sought to illustrate, these ritual usages of techniques of femininity call into question the notion that feminine styles of adornment are always a matter of surface or artifice. Instead, I believe it is more fruitful to consider dress, including the ritual wearing of red underwear and high heels, “as an embodied technology of both gender and desire.”71 Engaging with the divine as something simultaneously within and outside of the self, Syrinx’s, Qadisha’s, and Freyja’s rituals posit the Babalonian feminine body as indexical of the potential for queerly feminine identification and desire for femininity. Significantly, two of the rituals do not feature any male participation, and both Freyja and Alkistis Dimech also emphasize Babalon as a potentially desiring feminine viewer in herself. This interpretation is also espoused by Grey, whose crescent wound is not crafted for reasons of functionality but instead as a way of perfecting himself for the goddess. The use of feminine technologies for magical purposes can also be seen in other contexts. Church of Satan founder Anton LaVey in his widely read The Compleat Witch (published in 1971, and then reissued in 1989 as The Satanic Witch) presents a concise manual for how female Satanists should acquire power. The author discourages collective struggles for increased rights, instead suggesting female Satanists use manipulation and glamour—​including feminine attire and makeup—​in order to beguile men into doing their bidding.72 This distinguishes LaVey’s suggested approach from Qadisha’s, Freyja’s, and Syrinx’s rituals, wherein feminine technologies are not simply tools for increasing desirability to the male gaze but ritual techniques aimed at materializing an ecstatic relationality with the divine, which is accomplished through a “material citational practice”73 that renders the female devotee alike to Babalon. Furthermore, whereas LaVey’s basic ritual framework, as discussed by Per Faxneld and Jesper Aagaard Petersen, generally casts women in passive roles with men serving as

Possession and Dispossession  313 active, the women in all of the rituals discussed in this chapter assume highly active roles.74 Significantly, Freyja’s, Qadisha’s, and Syrinx’s rituals materialize an exaggerated hyperfemininity with connotations of vanity and sexual excess. In Qadisha’s ritual, Babalon’s outfit appears to connote feminine sexual empowerment and disregard for repressive social mores, and by extension the female body as a site of divine potential, in that Babalon and her daughters are both identified as harlots. In this way, her high heels, revealing clothing, and elaborate adornment can be read as, quoting Ulrika Dahl, “ways out of the confines of a heterosexualized order of respectability.”75 To inhabit an ultrafeminine positionality is, in this context, not exclusively about either restraint or restriction but signifies the female magician as a vehicle of the goddess and the liberation of feminine sexuality as a discursive ideal. Similarly, the gustatory indulgence of Syrinx’s ritual implies feminized excess in ways that challenge notions of feminine respectability as modesty. The ritual indulgence in sweets and fruits, literally brought beneath the surface of the body and contributing to its materialization, signal the irreducibility of femininity to exterior decoration. The Babalonian feminine body, as inhabited in Aisha Qadisha’s ritual and materialized through technologies of femininity, is not construed in terms of deficiency or lack but rather as the principal site for individual mystical experience, as well as queerly feminine identification and desire, rendering it not only an individual possession but, perhaps more accurately, a site of dispossession,76 wherein the boundaries of self-​contained subjectivity are destabilized, at least temporarily. The blurring of these boundaries occurs through an erotic identification with a goddess who proclaims herself to exist both within and beyond her human “daughters,” as well as with a “Scarlet Self ” who is simultaneously distinct from the feminine ritual practitioner as (an)other object of desire, and identical with the highest manifestation of the ritual practitioner’s self. I will return to this point in my final discussion. Similarly, both Dimech and Freyja conceptualize the embodied relationship with Babalon partly in terms of a queerly feminine circuit of desire, wherein the embodied experience of the other (i.e., the goddess) is predicated on one’s own ability to attract her interest. In this rendering, Babalon—​and the index of the cup—​appear as symbolic of the potential dissolution of the boundaries surrounding rational, self-​contained subjectivity through erotic experience or, to speak with Waldby, erotic destruction—​the tender violence inflicted on one’s sense of embodied selfhood through erotic interactions with other subjects. Based on her own ritual description, it is possible to interpret Freyja’s utilization of technologies of femininity as part of an endeavor to materialize her feminine body as the fleshly site of interface with divinity, as well as—​from Freyja’s own perspective—​part of a queerly feminine dialogue of desire in which she

314  The Eloquent Blood seeks to incite Babalon’s interest through her own inhabiting of ultrafemininity. However, as noted above, Freyja concurred that her own utilization of dress and adornment was partly aimed at inciting the desire of her male partner James, as the couple wished to create a sexually charged atmosphere. In order to aid her in achieving what she saw as an altered state of consciousness Freyja felt would be conducive to the manifestation of an embodied communion with a deity, she thus deliberately sought to be interpellated as heterofeminine by her heteromasculine ritual partner. However, Freyja’s utilization of dress and makeup in this ritual cannot solely be understood as self-​objectification, but also entail the production of herself as a perceived vehicle of ecstatic, religious experience, for herself as well as for her partner. This highlights the complexity of the materialization of femininity within the Babalon discourse, and how the pariahlike ultrafemininity of these Babalonian ritual performances is neither entirely freed from the male gaze nor exclusively defined by it. Ritual usage of symbolism for purposes of communication requires that the symbols are to some extent meaningful to those present. In the rituals discussed in this chapter (as in other social contexts), femininity does not simply emanate from some inner core or essence of the self, but is also constructed relationally through material and verbal citation and dialogue with both human and non-​ human others. In order for the ritual subject to experience herself credibly as Babalon, she may choose to assume certain characteristics, mannerisms, or styles of dress that increase the likelihood of successful interpellation. Femininity as materialized through redness, revealing clothing or flowing dresses, makeup, high heels, and adornment is only intelligible in relation to other femininities and masculinities and—​in this case—​the Babalon discourse in which pariah femininity is ascribed soteriological significance. The rituals discussed above draw on an understanding of femininity as having (wrongfully) been subordinated, turning away from notions of feminine modesty and sexual shame and instead turning towards and embracing behavior and attire coded as “shameless.” The success of this gendered “message”—​communicated through the centring of an ultra-​feminine, sexualized, and assertive Babalon—​relies on a sort of “material citational practice”77 with other gendered modalities, some of which appear in embodied form in Aisha Qadisha’s ritual, but which are to some extent absently present in the other examples as well. Thus, as argued in the preceding sections, the Babalonian femininities embodied in the ritual practices discussed in this chapter draw upon existing gendered notions, while simultaneously not being exclusively defined by them. In my reading of technologies of femininity, I have sought to go against the grain of those theorists who have understood feminization primarily as restrictive, instead highlighting how feminine styles of dress and adornment are put to religious use in the endeavor to materialize an embodied relationality with

Possession and Dispossession  315 the divine. While not seeking to discount the ways in which femininities are implicated in the hegemonic gender order, I have sought to highlight how they can be deliberately utilized and reworked in ways that affirm agency. Especially Grey’s and Qadisha’s rituals emphasize an image of a conquering and demanding Babalon, thus presenting a possible image of femininity as erotic destroyer. Significantly, Grey succumbs to cutting, his skin penetrated at Babalon’s behest and branded with the symbol of the cup in what can be considered a materialization of erotic relationality with—​or erotic destruction at the hands of—​a divine, feminine other. His and Dimech’s ritual thus enacts male desire for—​and experience of—​erotic destruction in the confrontation with femininity, offering an image of “phallic” femininity in the form of Babalon. In all of the rituals discussed in this chapter, however, Babalonian femininity is strongly connected to modalities of openness and surrender. As is partially illustrated by Grey’s analogy of blood-​sacrifice, Freyja’s and Syrinx’s utilization of technologies of femininity as well as eating and drinking, binding and scourging, were not used to materialize a bounded, instrumental, and empowered body, but one that is permeable, receptive, and ecstatic. Tellingly, Freyja’s ritual features the Babalonian feminine body being literally physically restrained, in a sequence mediated by a male gaze without being entirely determined by it. Similarly, Qadisha’s ritual emphasizes an open and relational body—​epitomized by womb imagery symbolizing the interconnection between the female ritual participants, their female ancestors, and Babalon—​as the site of religious experience. In different ways, these rituals reproduce the connection between femininity and penetrability, while simultaneously displacing stereotypical binaries of activity and passivity by positing openness and receptivity as integral to a relation with the goddess for both male and female devotees. Femininity thus appears simultaneously as indexical of that which is ecstatically undone, as in especially Syrinx’s and Freyja’s rituals, and as the threatening yet seductive other carrying the promise of one’s own undoing. In the ways in which the body and bodily techniques are used and understood for purposes of materializing a sense of communion with Babalon, femininity and feminine embodiment are neither exclusively deliberate, brazen, and subversive nor solely defined by lack or absence, but instead signal agency and desire as well as receptivity in ways that both implicate and transcend the hegemonic gender order. In reading feminine embodiment beyond artifice and complete oppression, I wish to avoid reproducing a stereotypical binary of active–​passive wherein Babalonian ultrafemininity is construed as qualitatively different from or opposed to “normative” femininity in that it is deliberate, intentional, or subversive.78 Instead, to speak with Ulrika Dahl, I have sought to highlight “the part of desire that is also concerned with annihilation,”79 and to consider Babalonian engagements with embodied femininity “in more complex and

316  The Eloquent Blood varied ways than as either acting with agency or as hopelessly passive, as neither free nor forever oppressed.”80 As stressed in the preceding discussion, vulnerability, subordination, and openness are construed as essential to the ritual participants’ embodied relationship with the goddess. Following Dahl and Sarah Ahmed in considering vulnerability as “a particular kind of bodily relation to the world”81 that “is tied to a notion of openness,”82 it is my argument that the rituals described here—​while all to some extent emphasize liberal notions of agency and self-​transformation—​materialize the Babalonian body not primarily as autonomous, smooth, or instrumental but rather as a soft, porous, and malleable site of ecstatic relationality. Skin, as utilized in these rituals, is not only a “canvas” for temporary gendered expressions that may be discarded at the end of the ritual, but a soft interface “that in its nakedness . . . both undoes and empowers.”83 In these Babalon rituals, the body is neither wholly active nor entirely passive but exists in what Butler would refer to as that “ambiguous region in which receptivity and responsiveness are not clearly separable from each other.”84 The ecstatic religious experience mediated by this body is conceptualized in terms reminiscent of Waldby’s notion of erotic destruction or the dissolution of boundaries between self and (divine) other.85 In this sense, conceptions of the body in the contemporary Babalon discourse draw on hegemonic gender logics by reifying the connection between femininity and penetrability, simultaneously destabilizing them by construing vulnerable femininity as a site of religious authority and meaning. In the rituals discussed here, the use of technologies of femininity and Babalonian techniques of the body are actions simultaneously performed by creative religious subjects and implicated in the materialization of a “daring openness” to the potential trauma of touch by both human and nonhuman feminine agents.86 As I have attempted to indicate in previous chapters, there is a tension in the contemporary Babalon discourse between empowering a conquering and erotically destroying, active femininity within a liberal framework of agency and in producing bodies that connote receptive openness. The magical practices discussed here read paradoxically as concerned with both a liberal discourse of individual autonomy and a simultaneous transgression of the autonomous and bounded modern body and self. To speak with Margrit Shildrick, erotic touch breaches the boundaries of individuality, thus signaling the instability of subjectivity. For this reason, Shildrick writes, “sexuality is paradigmatically a site that invokes feelings of vulnerability, feelings that may be either positive or negative.”87 Although the source material discussed here presents a number of differing interpretations of the body, a thematic convergence is the emphasis on the body not as a stable entity, delimited by a smooth and impermeable surface, but rather as a site of dispossession. While this is perhaps not unique to

Possession and Dispossession  317 the Babalon discourse, the dispossessive aspect of the material is enhanced by the fact that Babalon—​in Thelemic tradition—​is construed as representative of the dissolution of self, which is often phrased in terms of erotic destruction. The close connection between vulnerability and eroticism in the contemporary Babalon discourse indicates the importance of considering femininities—​as well as all investments in gender—​not simply as individual possessions but, to speak with Butler, as ways of being possessed or dispossessed. In this context, feminine technologies—​while used agentially and, in some cases, reflexively—​are not simply brazen and subversive but a way of entering into an embodied, gendered dialogue that is neither entirely free from heterosexist logics nor completely determined by them.

Notes 1. The opening epigraph is from Alkistis Dimech, interview, 2016. 2. Hugh B. Urban, Songs of Ecstasy: Tantric and Devotional Songs from Colonial Bengal (Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 2001), 80. 3. Aisha Qadisha, “Procession of Babalon: The Evolution of the Goddess Through the Aeons,” Sex Magick, http://​www.sexmagick.com/​aisha/​mywork/​procession.htm (accessed January 15, 2017). 4. Qadisha, “Procession.” 5. Ibid. 6. Ibid. 7. Her statement that she has been “cast out and despised by men” echoes the declaration in AL III:43. 8. Qadisha, “Procession.” 9. Crowley, Vision, 148–​153. The statement “In my name is all power given” also recalls AL I:15. 10. Qadisha, “Procession.” 11. Robinson, Nag Hammadi, 295–​303. 12. Qadisha, “Procession.” 13. Ibid. 14. Ibid. 15. Ibid. 16. Ibid. 17. Jane F. Gerhard, The Dinner Party: Judy Chicago and the Power of Popular Feminism, 1970–​2007 (Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 2013). 18. This view of Mary follows Crowley’s understanding as expressed in Liber AL and Vision. See AL III:55; Crowley, Vision, 213. 19. Butler, Undoing, 19. 20. Dahl, “Femmebodiment.”

318  The Eloquent Blood 21. See Crowley, “The Temple of Solomon the King (Book II),” 244–​294; Aleister Crowley, “Liber Vesta vel Paroketh sub figura DCC,” in Commentaries on the Holy Books and Other Papers. The Equinox, Volume Four, Number One (York Beach, ME: S. Weiser, 1996); Crowley, “Liber XV.” 22. Cf. Dahl, “Ytspänningar.” 23. Dahl, “(Re)figuring Femme Fashion.” 24. The ritual description analyzed in this subsection is based on Freyja, interview, 2016. 25. This is not unusual for esoteric or Thelemic ritual. See Crowley, “Liber O,” 16; Crowley, “Liber XV.” 26. See explanation of the “Star Ruby” in ­chapter  4. “Liber V vel Reguli” was first published as an appendix to Magick in Theory and Practice (1929). See Crowley, “Liber V vel Reguli.” 27. Crowley, “Liber XV,” 253–​255; Gerald Gardner, Witchcraft and the Book of Shadows (Thame: I-​H-​O Books, 2004),  63–​64. 28. Crowley, Lies, 108. 29. Crowley, Vision, 131. 30. Crowley, “Liber Samekh,” 506. 31. Soror Syrinx, Traversing, 72. 32. Ibid. 33. Ibid. 34. Ibid.,  72–​73. 35. Ibid., 73. 36. Ibid. 37. Ibid. 38. Ibid.,  72–​74. 39. Ibid., 74. 40. Peter Grey, “The Amfortas Wound,” in Devoted, ed. Alkistis Dimech (London: Scarlet Imprint, 2008), 129. 41. Grey, “Amfortas,” 129. 42. Ibid. 43. Ibid., 130. 44. Ibid. 45. Ibid., 129–​130. 46. Ibid., 130. 47. Ibid., 131. 48. Ibid. 49. Ibid. 50. Ibid., 132. 51. Ibid. 52. Ibid., 133. 53. Ibid. 54. Ibid., 134. 55. Ibid.

Possession and Dispossession  319 56. Waldby, “Destruction.” 57. This recalls the introductory line from Crowley’s “Waratah Blossoms,” in Crowley, Lies, 108. 58. Alkistis Dimech, “Outside the Temple,” in Devoted, ed. Alkistis Dimech (London: Scarlet Imprint, 2008), 148–​151. 59. Peter Grey, interview, 2016. 60. Peter Grey and Alkistis Dimech, interview, 2016. 61. See, e.g., Grey, Red, 61–​65,  70–​73. 62. This can be contrasted with Faxneld’s findings regarding self-​cutting Black Metal musicians, who ascribe macho connotations to their practice. Per Faxneld, “Bleed for the Devil: Self-​Injury as Transgressive Practice in Contemporary Satanism, and the Re-​Enchantment of Late Modernity,” Alternative Spirituality and Religion Review 6, no. 2 (2015): 165–​196. Grey contrastingly associates his own behavior with feminine technologies. 63. Similarly, it appears more common for female-​identified magicians to act as priests in the Gnostic Mass than the opposite. Hedenborg White, “To Him the Winged Secret Flame.” 64. Parallels can be drawn to other religious traditions in which female practitioners and mystics have asserted the female body as a sacred site of interplay with the divine. See, e.g., Harris, “ ‘For Those with Hardened Hearts.’ ” 65. Lorde, “Uses of the Erotic.” 66. Irigaray, “Bodily.” 67. Chaos Magician Kirsten Brown attests more ambivalently to this association, describing herself as a tomboy and recalling how she was initially repelled by Babalon’s pronounced femininity. See Brown, “Every Time.” 68. Brownmiller, Femininity, 81. 69. Ibid., 86. 70. Cf. Dahl, “Ytspänningar,” 62–​63. 71. Dahl, “(Re)figuring Femme Fashion,” 48. 72. Anton LaVey, The Satanic Witch (New  York:  Feral House, 1971). See also Anton LaVey, The Satanic Bible (New York: Avon Books, 1969), 135. 73. Dahl, “(Re)figuring Femme Fashion,” 56. 74. Per Faxneld and Jesper Aagard Petersen, “Cult of Carnality: Sexuality, Eroticism, and Gender in Contemporary Satanism,” in Sexuality and New Religious Movements, ed. Henrik Bogdan and James R. Lewis (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014), 165–​181. 75. Dahl, “(Re)figuring Femme Fashion,” 49. 76. Cf. Butler, Undoing. 77. Dahl, “(Re)figuring Femme Fashion,” 56. 78. Dahl, “Femme-​inist Agency,” 181. 79. Dahl, “Femmebodiment,” 48. 80. Dahl, “Femme-​inist Agency,” 186. 81. Sara Ahmed, The Cultural Politics of Emotion (Edinburgh:  Edinburgh University Press, 2014), 69.

320  The Eloquent Blood 82. Dahl, “Femmebodiment,” 37. 83. Ibid. 84. Butler, “Rethinking Vulnerability.” 85. Waldby, “Destruction.” 86. Dahl, “Femmebodiment,” 45. 87. Shildrick, “Unreformed,” 330.

12

“Like Fire and Powder” Erotic Destruction and the Eloquent Blood

In Shakespeare’s tragedy Romeo and Juliet, centering on the doomed romance of two young lovers, the second act finds the infatuated male lead waxing lyrical to his friend, Friar Laurence, about his beloved Juliet. Romeo wants the friar to marry the young couple, but Laurence is concerned and tries to warn Romeo of the potentially dire consequences of immoderate passion. When Romeo maintains that he accepts whatever misfortunes that may later transpire, Laurence counters: These violent delights have violent ends /​And in their triumph die, like fire and powder, /​Which, as they kiss, consume. The sweetest honey /​Is loathsome in his own deliciousness /​And in the taste confounds the appetite. /​Therefore love moderately. Long love doth so.1

The friar’s utterance hints at the intersection of desire with catastrophic potentiality. Romeo’s passion is too violent and intense, muddying his mind and compromising his rationality. Thus, the friar cautions, Romeo should seek to love in moderation so as to evade disaster. Violent, loathsome, and confounding—​these words could equally serve as descriptions of desire for the femme fatale of fin-​de-​siècle literature. Although Shakespeare’s tragedy predates Aleister Crowley’s birth by centuries, Friar Laurence’s injunction can be read anachronistically against the backdrop of Victorian-​Edwardian relational and sexual morals and the elevation of the stable, marital union of two clearly differentiated sexes as a social ideal. Nineteenth-​ century discourse on the bourgeois family attributed social volatility to unbridled carnality, construing sexuality as foundational to social stability if correctly channeled through the boundaries of reproductive, monogamous heterosexuality. Conversely, sexuality was seen as antisocial, even dangerous, when associated with promiscuity, homosexuality, or masturbation. Laurence’s statement, interpreted anachronistically, suggests the gendered imperative to avoid the danger of erotic destruction, that is, the partial annihilation of the self in ecstatic, sexual experience, which phallocentric discourse seeks to project onto femininities by construing men as destroyers and women as the destroyed. The Eloquent Blood: The Goddess Babalon and the Construction of Femininities in Western Esotericism. Manon Hedenborg White, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780190065027.001.0001

322  The Eloquent Blood In Crowley’s reading, the spectral threat of the “violent end” for bourgeois normativity and erotic destruction of the bounded self is feminized as Babalon, the “loud and adulterous” Scarlet Woman who shamelessly flaunts herself to all.2 Babalon first appeared to Crowley engulfed in scarlet fire, and his subsequent writings and ritual work with the goddess engaged thoroughly with themes of erotic destruction and dissolution of the self in union with the other. Crowley’s own desire for the “tender violence” of erotic destruction is partly couched as a queer turn away from rational, masculine subjectivity and toward a male femininity that is upheld as an A∴A∴ ideal. The Babalon discourse offers particularly fertile soil for understanding how femininities are conceptualized and inhabited, as well as how they intersect with sexuality in modern Western esotericism. Originally figured by a queer, male fin-​ de-​siècle occultist with conflicting attitudes to gender, Babalon has subsequently been transformed throughout the twentieth and early-​twenty-​first centuries by a growing number of differently gendered occult authors and practitioners—​ including women and LGBTQ individuals—​who have drawn on a variety of discourses related to feminism and, increasingly, queer and transgender issues. This final chapter will summarize the findings of this study, suggesting responses to its overarching questions and teasing out the broader implications of the Babalon discourse.

Danger, Delight, and Feminine Positionalities: Babalon in Crowley’s Writings In Crowley’s writings, Babalon is construed as a goddess linked to initiatory ego annihilation, a form of mystical erotic destruction through passionate union with the infinite. Babalon retains the biblical epithets of “whore” and “Mother of Abominations,” and she is portrayed as equally promiscuous, intoxicated, and bloodthirsty as Babylon the Great. Babalon’s infinite harlotries are emblematic of her sacredness; drunk on the blood of those who have offered up their egos in pursuit of ecstatic, mystical death, she has herself experienced erotic destruction by giving herself to all. Babalon is simultaneously the feminine goal of the crossing of the Abyss; the recipient of ego sacrifice, in which the adept dissolves their individuality in order to achive unification with her; and the emblem of the attitude required to successfully attain the grade of Magister Templi. In that Babalon is indicated as symbolic of a spiritual modality desirable for all seekers, there is the possibility of reading femininity in Crowley’s system as a positionality not exclusively linked to female bodies. Crowley’s articulation of Babalon as a feminine ideal counters Victorian-​ Edwardian notions of hegemonic femininity as compliant and nurturing and

“Like Fire and Powder”  323 of feminine sexuality as passive, monogamous, and reproductively oriented. His conceptualization of the goddess both reifies and transforms aspects of turn-​ of-​ the-​ century pariah femininity. Frequently interpreted as a stereotypical rendition of fears of the dissolution of the autonomous, masculine, European subject, Crowley appropriated the femme fatale motif, reworking it within the soteriological narrative of ego death, which in Crowley’s work is strongly connected to sexuality. To speak with Shildrick and Waldby, Crowley’s Babalon signifies the potential of the erotic to destabilize the boundaries of self-​contained subjectivity.3 While Crowley’s system of Magick emphasizes will and self-​determination, many of his mystical texts affirm vulnerability, signaling a longing to be erotically destroyed in union with the other. I therefore challenge historian and gender studies scholar Alex Owen’s otherwise persuasive analysis of Crowley’s crossing of the Abyss as detailed in The Vision and the Voice, and suggest that the text posits the feminized modality of surrender as superior to the masculinized will in terms of conquering the demon Choronzon.4 In contrast to the feminine messianic figure of Babalon, I read Choronzon as a morbid caricature of Edwardian bourgeois, rational masculinity and its associated values of power through domination, emotional temperance, and sexual moderation.5 Although Crowley sought increasingly to synthesize his system of Magick into coherent doctrine, his diaries evince a continuously multivalent vision of Babalon even after the transitional period of 1909–​1915. In the diaries from the Abbey of Thelema, Babalon-​as-​Leah Hirsig appears as the epitome of the phallic dominatrix and initiatrix, erotically destroying Crowley to further his spiritual attainment.6 This highlights how the tension between religious doctrine and lived practice is not only an issue of historical tradition versus later interpretation but also may characterize the life of a religious founder. In Crowley’s writings, the Scarlet Woman is both an epithet of Babalon and a replaceable office he ascribed to some of his most important female lovers and magical partners, construed as the human representatives of the goddess. In the “New Comment” to AL, the Scarlet Woman appears as the quintessential emancipated woman and symbol of liberated female sexuality. As the woman currently transmitting Crowley’s “solar Word and being,” Crowley nonetheless suggested his “scarlet concubine” was defined by her relation to him, rather than the inverse.7 When Crowley proclaimed Dorothy Olsen his new Scarlet Woman, Hirsig was consequently expected to abdicate her title. Hirsig’s response of claiming identity with Babalon and declaring Olsen her magical daughter illustrates how female Thelemites have always developed their own interpretations of tradition, albeit, in Hirsig’s case, in an unequal relationship with Crowley as the founder and prophet of the religion through which she sought to articulate her authority. Thus, it is debatable to what extent Crowley’s vision of

324  The Eloquent Blood the Scarlet Woman’s counterhegemonic femininity provided space for Hirsig’s own agency.8 There is no indication that Crowley designated Victor Neuburg or any other of his male lovers “scarlet men”. Crowley thus appears to have seen the ability to act as Babalon’s earthly avatar as female-​specific. This dynamic is complicated by the narrative around the crossing of the Abyss, wherein initiates regardless of sex approach Babalon as both a feminine other external to the self and a symbol of that which they must emulate. The construction of the Abyss ordeal thus indicates the possibility of femininity as a floating positionality that can be inhabited, at least in theory, by any subject.9 Crowley associated his own crossing of the Abyss with anal receptivity to his lover Neuburg, identifying his ability to progress to the higher Aethyrs with divesting himself of sexual prejudice. Crowley’s own sexual receptivity is thus construed as analogous to the spiritual receptivity required of him to proceed, symbolized as Babalon. Drawing on Waldby, Crowley’s reasoning signifies a queer turn away from the role of erotic destroyer toward an embracing of erotic destruction. The Babalonian receptivity Crowley seeks to emulate is, here, not equivalent to nonagency but can be read as a feminized modality of ecstatic engagement with experience. Although Crowley’s sex magical instructions posit a gender polar dichotomy of active masculinity and passive femininity, Babalon troubles this framework. In his written work, Babalon does not simply relate to masculinity through lack but exists in relation to other femininities, represented by Nuit, Salome, Lilith, the Virgin Mary, and her own daughter. Babalon and the Scarlet Woman embody several characteristics connected to hegemonic masculinity, such as sexual assertiveness, aggression, and authority, and the receptivity Crowley ascribes to Babalon is intertwined with openness and agency. By indicating both the possibility of a phallic femininity and femininity as a positionality not limited to women, in ways that do not univocally support a hierarchical and complementary relationship between masculinity and femininity, Babalon in Crowley’s writings thus indicates alternative configurations of femininity. Notwithstanding the sexism characterizing some of Crowley’s important texts, I therefore find assertions as to the fundamental misogyny of Crowley’s magical system too simplistic, disregarding the feminist sentiments of the “New Comment,” as well as Crowley’s broader challenge to bourgeois masculinity through his engagement with erotic destruction and phallic femininity. Nevertheless, the potential of Crowley’s Babalon to function as an alternative femininity on the level of concrete social practice does not appear to have been realized to the extent that can be seen in the present-​day occult milieu.

“Like Fire and Powder”  325

Fire, Blood, and the Avenging Harlot: Babalon in Parsons’s Writings Although Jack Parsons’s writings are sparser and generally simpler than Crowley’s, he made several innovations to the Babalon discourse that influenced its trajectory after his death. While drawing on the idea of Babalon as the gateway to the City of the Pyramids, Parsons placed a stronger emphasis on the goddess as a messianic warrior descending below the Abyss to dictate a sacred text and herald her impending earthly incarnation. Departing from Crowley’s idea of the Scarlet Woman as a title for those of his mistresses so designated by him, Parsons stresses Babalon’s human avatar as defined by a filial relationship to the goddess. Conversely, Parsons’s value is contingent on his own utility to the divine mother-​ daughter pairing of Babalon and her human representative. In connecting Babalon’s increasing force in the world to lesbianism and female polyamory, Parsons suggests a link between the goddess and queerly feminine desire. He hypothesizes that the force of the goddess may, more generally, be present in all people regardless of sex. In underlining an anthropomorphized version of Babalon, Parsons’s writings deemphasize the idea of the goddess as emblematic of a receptive modality required of all seekers. Thus, femininity is conceived less as a floating positionality and more as an embodied role, principally linked to women. Parsons’s construction of the goddess is mediated through a mostly heterosexual dynamic, in which his own relationship with her is construed in terms of violent desire and delightful annihilation, whereas the relationship between Babalon and her daughter (and, by extension, all women) hinges on affinity and maternal devotion. Parsons’s writings retain many themes from Crowley’s conceptualization of Babalon. His articulation of the goddess challenges early-​twentieth-​century hegemonic femininity in emphasizing assertive sexual desire, strength, and political authority. Thus the link to a sort of pariah femininity, reworked as an ideal, is continued. Similarly, Parsons follows Crowley in feminizing the perceived threat to autonomous subjectivity. In so doing, Parsons—​like Crowley—​both perpetuated and reworked a prevalent feminine stereotype, and his association of femininity with nature and intuition indicates how strategic reversal of negative tropes often reproduces aspects of hegemonic discourse. Nonetheless, Parsons’s emphases on witchcraft and Babalon as protector of a pre-​Christian fertility cult illustrate how his writings did not merely replicate Crowley’s ideas but foreshadowed themes that have been articulated by later occultists working with the goddess. In his interpretation of Babalon as linked to feminist revolution, Parsons appears to have drawn on a conflation of early-​twentieth-​century anarchist, feminist, and sex radical thought.

326  The Eloquent Blood By associating the divine feminine with assertive sexual desire, martial strength, and the propensity for effecting social change, Parsons’s writings support an alternative configuration of femininity that does not, simplistically, relate to masculinity through hierarchical complementarity. The focus on the dynamic of Babalon and her avatar centers the relationship between femininities, rather than that of femininity and masculinity. Thus, female embodiment is construed not as the lack or opposite of male ditto but as the ultimate site of relationality between woman and goddess. Despite the radical nature of Parsons’s vision, however, it is once again debatable to what extent it was realized on the level of social practice in his own life. While Cameron, whom Parsons at least partly linked to Babalon, lived an unconventional life as a pioneering artist and cultural personality, the greater scarcity of her preserved writings renders it more difficult to determine how she perceived identification with the role of Babalon.

The Other Woman: Babalon in Grant’s Writings While Grant placed little emphasis on worldly politics, he was one of the earliest writers to articulate a systematic critique of androcentrism within Crowley’s sex magical system. Like Parsons, he did not read the human avatar of Babalon as an office only available to Crowley’s magical and sexual partners, instead interpreting it as a potential role in a heterosexual magical pairing. The concepts of Babalon and the Scarlet Woman, used more or less synonymously in Grant’s writings, signify the trained sex magical priestess as well as the feminine divine force she incarnates. Grant opposed the idea of the priestess as a passive shrine or temple for the male divine force, instead emphasizing her supreme importance in incarnating the kundalini force and generating the kalas. Femininity, in Grant’s writings, is thus not constructed in terms of lack or absence (of phallus), but instead through presence and creative potential, and Grant emphasizes the mysteries of the female reproductive organs as the secret heart of the primordial Typhonian cult. Blood, and specifically menstrual blood, has particular significance for Grant’s Scarlet Woman, whose redness he attributes to the color of the lunar flow, which Grant posits as the base substance from which life is created. He links the redness of Mars to menstrual bloodshed, which he sees as the ancient prototype for the later development of masculine warfare. Grant’s conceptualization of Babalon and the Scarlet Woman challenges hegemonic notions of femininity by prioritizing violence, bloodshed, and sexuality. His writings challenge notions of female anatomy as lack by construing the Scarlet Woman’s body as the supreme site of interface between the material and the numinous. Although the first of the Typhonian Trilogies were produced during the zenith of second-​wave feminism, Grant’s writings—​unlike

“Like Fire and Powder”  327 those of Parsons—​draw far less explicitly on contemporary political currents.10 Nonetheless, there are thematic overlaps with the women’s spirituality movement and cultural feminism, as evinced by Grant’s possible indebtedness to the work of Peter Redgrove and Penelope Shuttle, as well as the latter authors drawing inspiration from Grant (as discussed in c­ hapter 6). Furthermore, contemporary feminist movements may have exerted an indirect influence on Grant’s reading of Crowley, shaping his critique of the latter’s androcentrism in his system of sexual magic. In problematizing Crowley’s understanding of the magical properties of genital fluids and articulating an authoritative role for the sex magical priestess, Grant has exerted a significant influence on the later Babalon discourse. Male and female subjects occupy decidedly different positions with regards to Babalon in Grant’s writings: the sex magical priestess is Babalon, while the male magician relates to her as other. Emphasizing an understanding of biological and binary gender difference, Grant’s system centers heterosexual acts as the prototype for sexual magic. However, as noted previously, this difference becomes a starting point for conceptualizing a femininity not defined by its relationship to masculinity but rather through its affinity with the divine feminine. Although Grant’s writings may reproduce the connection of femininity to the body and sexuality, his conceptualizations of Babalon and the Scarlet Woman also support alternative configurations of feminine embodiment and sexuality as repositories of magical power. Grant suggests that the new aeon will coincide with women gaining a soul (or—​possibly—​an autonomous subjectivity?) and being able to work magic without the interference of men. In this regard, parallels can be drawn to Irigaray’s reasoning. Grant’s development of the idea of the kalas partly foreshadows the emergence of a sort of Babalonian écriture féminine among female esotericists in the twenty-​first century. Grant’s writings emphasize Babalon as representative of the annihilation of individuality, continuing the theme of the goddess as the feminized and sexualized threat to rational subjectivity. In the Typhonian Trilogies, Babalon not only encroaches on the limits of the self but also marks and traverses the boundaries between worlds, representing the dissolution of all distinctions where dimensions bleed into each other. In this way, Grant’s Babalon can be interpreted in terms of Shildrick’s monstrous. Grant tellingly equates the goddess with the qliphoth, a term he connects to the harlot, “alien,” or other woman. Grant thus explicitly correlates femininity with otherness, although less as the “other of the same,”11 which Irigaray attributes to phallocentric notions of femininity, than as the site of ultimate alterity. This, in Grant’s view, is a soteriological goal, and the dissolution of meaning epitomized by his polyvalent and (quite likely intentionally) paradoxical articulation of Babalon appears central to the stipulated aim of the Typhonian Trilogies to rupture the reader’s perception of reality, allowing for the influx of previously unthinkable forms of creativity. The female body is thus

328  The Eloquent Blood construed as the prime vehicle for the incursion of divine energies as well as for individual mystical experience.

The Goddess Who Is Not One: Babalon in Contemporary Esotericism Contemporary esotericists do not merely replicate historical interpretations in their views of Babalon. Crucially, the contemporary Babalon discourse differs from its historical antecedents in the greater visibility of women as authors and publishers as well as critics of perceived androcentrism and sexism in historical Western esotericism. Whereas the previous chapters have indicated that women have always participated in the Babalon discourse and formulated their own interpretations, it is highly significant that the 1990s onward has coincided with the increasing proliferation of writings and original rituals centering on Babalon, written by and addressed to women occultists. The importance of this shift can hardly be overstated. While Crowley, Parsons, and Grant through the symbol of Babalon constructed femininity in ways that, in Schippers’s terminology, can be seen as alternative, as well as radical for their time, we may question how far these ideals were realized in social practice among the women around them. The proportionally greater availability of written theological reflections by these historical male occultists regrettably renders it more difficult to establish how their female partners, disciples, and lovers felt and engaged with these concepts. Today, the substantially increased spread of writings by women occultists enables an analysis of Babalon not only as a symbolic ideal but also as a lived, counterhegemonic positionality. Importantly, several contemporary interpretations of Babalon question binary and biologistic conceptions of gender, constructing femininity in ways that are explicitly inclusive of transgender and genderqueer experience. While still a minor theme, there are also attempts to envision the relationship between female-​identified devotees and the goddess in terms of queerly feminine desire, resulting in a decentering of masculinity. I propose that these transformations are connected to the trajectory of the women’s and LGBTQ movements, which, from the 1990s onward, appear to have gained increasing influence within several branches of the occult milieu. These broader cultural movements seem to have provided ideological resources for female and queer occultists to question historical perceptions of femininity in society as well as within their respective occult movements, thus reworking Babalon. However, it is also important to stress that the articulation of gender-​critical approaches to occultism and Thelema has resulted from the active innovation of female and queer voices—​such as those cited in this study—​deliberately working to reshape their respective traditions.

“Like Fire and Powder”  329 Previous research suggests that Thelemites, at least in the United States, hold more liberal attitudes to sexuality than the general population. Perhaps unsurprisingly given its historical indebtedness to Crowley’s work, a central theme in the contemporary Babalon discourse is of sexuality as a powerful and largely beneficial force that is linked to both individual and social liberation. While Gayle Rubin observes that similar notions of a “transcendental libido” may themselves contribute to the stratification of sexual practices and preferences, the Babalon discourse questions the idealization of compulsory monogamy and reproductive heterosexuality.12 In articulating sex work or sacred whoredom and BDSM as transgressive in themselves, and having the potential to challenge hegemonic notions of feminine sexuality as passive and reproductively oriented, the Babalon discourse appears to be indebted to sex-​radical feminism. This is evinced by the strong emphasis on female subjugation and sexual repression as inherently connected, reflecting broader discourses in the related cultural domain of Neopaganism. Likely, the articulation of the sacred whore as sexually independent, self-​determined, and sacred is at least partly the result of an influence from Neopaganism and the women’s spirituality movement. However, feminine sexuality remains a point of tension within the contemporary Babalon discourse. Unlike writers such as Crowley, Parsons, and Grant, many of the contemporary occultists I have spoken to, and whose writings are analyzed herein, critique perceived oversexualization, objectification, and fetishization of women’s bodies. I have frequently encountered the view that both historical and contemporary interpretations of Babalon may have been limited by androcentric or sexist bias. An important disparity with regards to the historical source material is critique of how the idea of Babalon’s whoredom may create expectations of sexual availability, recalling second-​wave feminist criticisms of the so-​called sexual revolution and its unequal gender dimensions. Feminist strategies connected to the second wave such as consciousness-​raising and separatism—​as are sometimes used in the present-​day occult milieu—​have been utilized in the U.S. Thelemic milieu. This indicates how the contemporary Babalon discourse is not merely a continuation of its historical antecedents. On the contrary, its proponents reflect critically on—​and respond to—​issues connected with perceptions of femininity as they have transformed over the course of the twentieth century. Whereas writers such as Crowley and Parsons appear principally to have related to a dearth of positive images of assertive feminine sexuality, contemporary female occultists also navigate and criticize hypersexualization of female bodies and expectations of female (hetero)sexual availability. Thus, a significant theme in interpretations of sexuality in the contemporary source material is the emphasis on sexual self-​determination, and the right to say yes as well as no to sex, as Babalonian. Once again, I argue that this reflects the increasing impact of feminist ideology within occultism and the

330  The Eloquent Blood Thelemic milieu, as well as—​most likely—​the growing influence and visibility of women as producers of ideology within the contemporary Babalon discourse. In the Babalon discourse today, there is no general consensus regarding how gender or sexual identity shapes a person’s relationship to the goddess. Tensions exist between interpretations that focus on biological propensities as inherently linked to specific magical currents and those that tend toward articulating Babalon as a more universalized spiritual ideal. Somewhere in the middle of this spectrum, a number of contemporary occultists emphasize different conceptions of feminine difference, which is situated variously at the level of hormones, social identity, experience, or something more intangible altogether. It appears more common among those I have spoken to for female-​identified persons to assume the role of Babalon in ritual settings. However, a crucial difference between the contemporary and historical material is that some present-​day esotericists problematize gender essentialism in historical esotericism using contemporary terminology connected to genderqueer and transgendered experience. Among other issues, this has given rise to a variety of interpretations of concepts such as feminine receptivity, which appear to have been perceived as mostly unproblematic by writers such as Crowley, Parsons, and Grant but are increasingly discussed and questioned today. Emphases on femininity as social construction, floating positionality, identity rather than birth-​assigned sex, or attempts towards deemphasizing the gendered connotations of Babalon altogether (as illustrated especially in ­chapter 8) can, in my view, be interpreted as strategies for navigating tension between historical interpretations of Babalon, as well as occultism and sexual magic more generally, and feminist and LGBTQ critiques of binary and essentialist conceptions of gender, which have increasingly come to influence the Anglo-​American occult milieu. This indicates how gender-​related concerns are not peripheral to the historical trajectory of occult or esoteric tradition, but may in some instances even be crucial factors in ideological development. The contemporary Babalon discourse cannot be equated to a single, stable, or coherent construction of the goddess, which relates in a singular way to hegemonic notions of femininity or feminine sexuality. This discourse exalts the positionality of the feminine desiring subject. Irigaray stresses that phallocentric culture denies women this positionality, and she critiques notions of appropriate feminine sexuality as compliant, reproductively oriented, or monogamous. The source material repeatedly challenges the dominant dichotomization of masculinity-​as-​erotic-​destroyer, and femininity-​as-​erotically-​destroyed, and I will return to this issue shortly. In the interpretations of the contemporary occult authors and practitioners whose words are analyzed herein, Babalon appears as a flexible discursive space in which a plethora of femininities are articulated and negotiated, in ways that challenge the hegemonic gender order. However,

“Like Fire and Powder”  331 as I have repeatedly emphasized, parts of the source material affirm aspects of hegemonic femininity such as its link to receptivity and permeability, and I will address this tension in my subsequent discussion.

Lived Religion and Bodies of Power: Babalon and the Study of Esotericism Does the historical development of the Babalon discourse—​and my scrutiny thereof from the perspective of gender and femininities—​reveal anything about Western esotericism more broadly, or its transformation during the studied period? While the qualitative nature of my study renders broader generalizations difficult, I nonetheless propose an affirmative response. Firstly, it illustrates that esotericism is not static but a dynamic and “lived” phenomenon that intersects with broader trends in society at large.13 The contemporary Thelemic milieu drinks from a conceptual pool of historical “esotericisms,” including the Hermetic kabbalah, Enochian magic and ceremonial magic in the style of the Golden Dawn, the Tarot, and astrology. However, arguably equally important influences are the less-​than-​esoteric cultural currents that have impacted Thelema at different points in time, including Decadence and Symbolism; cultural anxieties regarding feminine sexuality; nineteenth-​century medical discourses; libertarian socialism; cultural feminist interpretations of menstruation; liberal, radical, and queer feminist arguments; and sex-​positive interpretations of BDSM and sex work. The Babalon discourse, like esotericism at large, is shaped by—​and responds to—​historically and culturally situated queries and points of tension, such as the position of feminine sexuality and understandings of gender difference, which are articulated in varying ways over time. My study has traced some of the intertextual and interdiscursive connections of the Babalon discourse, and my hope is that this arguably narrow material has nonetheless served to highlight the importance of exploring esotericisms as ever-​changing and lived religious phenomena, whose practitioners are active producers of history. While acknowledging contemporary occultism and Neopaganism as distinct fields, I have sought to highlight how boundaries between the two are sometimes malleable or even nonexistent at the level of individual practice. The influence of second-​wave feminism on the trajectory of Neopaganism has been well attested in previous research, as have the interfaces between the first wave of the women’s movement and organizations such as the Theosophical Society in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. However, less has been said about the impact of feminism on contemporary occult groups more strictly defined. In the present study, I have attempted to shed some light on this development, but more research in this direction is warranted.

332  The Eloquent Blood Secondly, the Babalon discourse indicates the significance of the body to Western esotericism, which comprises abstract cosmological or theological speculations as well as the embodied practice of gendered, racialized, and classed entities. Esoteric and occult understandings of the body—​as the principal site of mystical experience, as a potential hindrance to the evolutionary ascent of the spirit, or as the repository of magical fluids—​are historically and culturally contingent. Ritual experiences and social interactions are mediated through bodies whose meanings are socially constructed, contested, and negotiated in occult belief and practice. The Babalon discourse, historically, has comprised a number of conflicting understandings of the female body, which has variously been understood in terms of lack, a nurturing womb, a reflection of the creative and destructive power of the divine, a mystical vehicle or producer of magical substances, and the source of a potential feminine language or écriture féminine. This discourse has not only been a site in which dominant understandings of femininity or female embodiment as the other of masculinity have been inscribed, but also one through which female occultists have resisted such interpretations. Through the creation of novel rituals, contemporary occultists—​including female and queer practitioners—​experience relationality with divinity, and these practices generate new and sometimes critical understandings of historical occult “tradition.” Analyzing the embodied positions of the various proponents of this debate sheds light on different understandings of the body as gendered, and it is my hope that future research will continue to explore the importance of the body in Western esotericism historically and today. Thirdly, the historical development of the Babalon discourse sheds further light on the complexity of understanding Western esotericism, in congruence with Wouter J. Hanegraaff, as the “wastebasket of modernity,” consisting of those epistemologies, worldviews, and beliefs that modernity has rejected in the project of defining sound science, appropriate religion, and modern subjectivity. As Justine Bakker has highlighted, the Enlightenment dichotomization of rationality and irrationality was a narrative about particular beliefs and practices as well as of bodies and phenotypical difference. This narrative has been directly implicated in the colonial and imperialist project of othering and defining racialized bodies as irrational and thereby in need of European domination.14 I  concur with Bakker’s argument, with the addition that the narrative of Western rationality is also gendered; in other words, the construction of Enlightenment subjectivity has hinged on the denial of women as rational subjects.15 As highlighted by Randall Styers, the anthropological category of magic has been inherently tied to racialization, feminization, and sexual deviance, and the European history of the category of irrationality can hardly be understood outside of its gendered dynamics.16 Significantly, these processes are visible as internal boundary work within Western esotericism, shown in how esotericists have resisted the

“Like Fire and Powder”  333 construction of themselves as irrational—​and thereby feminized—​by projecting irrationality and femininity onto the other. Examples of this include fin-​de-​ siècle ritual magicians’ dismissal of Spiritualism as effeminate and passive, and Crowley’s description of women in Liber Aleph.17 In the Babalon discourse, the discursive association between femininity and emotion, irrationality, or intuition is sometimes perpetuated.18 While I concur with Hanegraaff ’s analysis of the genesis of Western esotericism as a cultural complex, it is thus important to stress that esoteric movements have been implicated in—​and contributed to the localized reification of—​some of the very ideologies that are central to European modernity, such as the denial of full human status to women and people of color. However, occultists have implicitly and explicitly challenged these logics, and I will return in the final portion of this chapter to how the Babalon discourse distorts the narrative of the supremacy of the masculine, rational subject.

Feminine Resistance and Hopeful Figurations: Babalon, Gender, and Femininity Studies Following Mimi Schippers, I identify hegemonic femininity as the quality content of femininity that legitimizes a hierarchical and complementary relationship between masculinity and femininity, which is ascendant in relation to other femininities.19 As outlined in ­chapter 2, this reasoning is based on the understanding that femininity is neither one nor exclusively the site of oppression, but comprises numerous positionalities that can provide the starting point for agency. Such notions have been central to femme theorization, with femme scholars and activists stressing that femme-​ininity is different from normative femininity in that it is deliberate, subversive, and agential. Eschewing the approach of feminist thinkers who have suggested departure from femininity as a prerequisite for female emancipation, we may thus ask how alternative ways of doing femininity and feminine sexuality can be generated, and what the potential limits of such hopeful visions are. Braidotti argues that feminism is currently in greater need of hopeful images indicating different ways of doing gender and sexuality than further theoretical systems, and she conceptualizes the feminist figuration as a “politically informed account of an alternative subjectivity.”20 Combining Schippers with Braidotti and Irigaray, we may speak of a feminist figuration as a “political fiction” that supports the articulation of alternative femininities (and/​or masculinities), or which allows for the conceptualization of sexual difference and a fully articulated feminine subjectivity beyond the phallocentric order. As stipulated in the introduction, a fundamental concern for this study is whether the Babalon discourse challenges hegemonic gender constructions and conceptualizations of

334  The Eloquent Blood femininity. In the following pages, I will make the argument that Babalon does indeed function as a feminist figuration, which destabilizes hegemonic gender logics by providing a “horizon” for the development of feminine subjectivity; lauding the desiring feminine subject; indicating the possibility of phallic femininity and masculine desire for erotic destruction; and providing a starting point for an esoteric écriture féminine, wherein feminine embodiment is understood not as deficiency or lack but as the site of relationality between divine and human subjects. In congruence with scholars such as Donna J. Haraway, Judith Butler, and Saba Mahmood, however, I wish to emphasize the contingency and situated nature of all forms of agency. As any challenge to the gender order must always draw on existing discursive conventions, it almost inevitably reproduces some of the categories it seeks to destabilize. I concur with Mahmood that reading all forms of (feminine) agency as clear-​cut “resistance” toward existing convention obscures the complex ways in which norms are lived and inhabited.21 Thus, although I maintain that Babalon functions as a feminist figuration by supporting alternative configurations of femininity and feminine sexuality, the contemporary Babalon discourse relates in multifaceted ways to the existing gender order, which are neither reducible to complete acquiescence or opposition. Irigaray writes that a concept of feminine divinity can support the articulation of feminine subjectivity by providing a symbolic with which women can identify.22 My study suggests that the Babalon discourse indeed offers such an intellectual, emotional, and embodied concept of divine femininity. Although originally figured by a male occultist who built on the reworking of biblical and fin-​de-​siècle misogynist stereotypes, and whose concept of the goddess and her human avatar was characterized by profound tensions with regards to its relation to masculinity, later interpretations especially by female occultists have transformed the image of the goddess toward a concept of femininity that is not solely conceived as a commodity in male exchange. In “writing” Babalon, female occultists today do not posit the goddess as something entirely external but as a malleable entity, which is simultaneously immanent and transcendent and establishes connections with other women. Irigaray suggests that the divine feminine symbolic should indicate feminine potentiality beyond motherhood and encompass the illusory dichotomy of woman-​as-​mother and woman-​as-​lover. Motherhood constitutes something of a point of tension in the contemporary Babalon discourse. While several of the occult authors and practitioners whose words and works are analyzed herein emphasize Babalon as mother, and construe the mother-​daughter relationship as prototypical of the connection between divinity and humanity, other voices conversely stress Babalon as emblematic of the idea that women are not only, or necessarily, mothers. Nonetheless, neither the contemporary Babalon discourse nor its historical antecedents posit ideal femininity solely in maternal terms.

“Like Fire and Powder”  335 While it is not necessary to agree with Irigaray’s normative presupposition that the articulation of a feminine subjectivity and language requires a concept of divine femininity, it is nonetheless my argument that the Babalon discourse—​in the context of modern occultism—​has to some extent provided a site of agency, perhaps even resistance, toward dominant logics of gender. Significantly, several of the contemporary occultists whose words are analyzed herein articulate Babalon as the starting point for a critique of male supremacy and phallocentrism within occultism and society, conceptualizing the goddess and her human avatar as challenges to narrow perceptions of femininity. Thus, in the writings of contemporary female and queer occultists, Babalon appears to function as a feminist figuration, not only in the sense of an abstract thought figure but also, as Braidotti emphasizes, as something that is inhabitable through body and emotion. In subverting the stigma against the pariah femininity of slut, the Babalon discourse resists the denigration of assertive feminine desire and search for pleasure. In numerous instances in the contemporary source material, female-​ identified and queer occultists embrace Babalon as emblematic of the sacredness of active, nonreproductive, nonmonogamous feminine sexuality. Importantly, this reworking of the stereotypical pariah femininity of slut is not solely—​or perhaps even primarily—​effected through attempts to “soften” the stigma and argue for the harmlessness of feminine sexual assertiveness. Instead, many of the occultists whose words are analyzed herein emphasize and embrace the potentially threatening aspects of this configuration of femininity. However, others seek to mitigate the split between “virgin” and “whore,” emphasizing Babalon as a multifaceted symbol that challenges rigid binaries of feminine identity. Both of these discursive strategies are united by a validation of the positionality of the feminine, sexually desiring subject, and the source material indicates how the ideas of Babalon and the Scarlet Woman are invoked to counter stigma toward feminine nonmonogamy and active desire. In decentering monogamy with regards to feminine sexuality, the Babalon discourse destabilizes notions of feminine respectability as moderacy. Instead of navigating the pariah femininities of the “frigid” woman, “dyke,” or “slut” by entering into monogamous relationality with one man,23 Babalon is seen as symbolic of feminine engagement with sexuality as a source of pleasure, joy, and creativity. In positing something other than heterosexual, monogamous relations solely involving bodies as the only valid expression of sexuality, the Babalon discourse calls into question some of the broader stratifying logics underpinning the production of sexuality in contemporary Western society. However, as noted especially in c­ hapter 10, this oppositional potentiality is perhaps not equally feasible to all, and the counternormative value of inhabiting the femininity of slut may be contingent on other intersections of power, such as class and race.

336  The Eloquent Blood In my view, the Babalon discourse challenges heterosexist and misogynist narratives of sexuality by providing imagery related to phallic femininity as well as penetrable masculinity. In reworking the femme fatale—​the specter signaling the potential annihilation of bourgeois masculine rationality—​as a messianic figure, Crowley both corporeally and verbally invoked images of masculinity being erotically destroyed. His construction of penetrability as linked to soteriology is clearly evident in The Vision and the Voice, wherein Crowley’s anal receptivity to Neuburg-​as-​Pan precipitates his initiation into the degree of Magister Templi. Crowley lauded the potential of femininity to effect this destruction. In his magical diaries, phallic femininity is envisioned through descriptions of the scourge-​wielding Hirsig-​as-​Babalon. Whether or not Crowley himself fully embraced the potential for erotic destruction, his articulation of Babalon can be read as indicating nonhegemonic ways of doing femininity, as well as masculinity, by lauding the enactment of hegemonic feminine propensities by a male body. Similarly, Parsons in his writings repeatedly entreats a phallic, sword-​ wielding Babalon to take, possess, and destroy him. He lauded the experience of dispossession and being undone by the confrontation with the feminine other. In Parsons’s writings, gender and sexuality are thus to some extent, to speak with Butler, sites of dispossession, of existing—​quite literally—​for another, as a willing male sacrifice, destined to be consumed by flames in order to accomplish the manifestation of Babalon. Further, Grant celebrated the potential for masculine erotic destruction, triumphantly identifying the goddess with the “funeral pyre” where the fiction of the autonomous subject is burnt to ashes. The contemporary Babalon discourse provides several images of phallic femininity, repeatedly encapsulated by the idea of Babalon as dominatrix or brutal initiatrix, scourging, binding, and piercing male skin. By emphasizing Babalon not simply as passively receptive, but actively engulfing of the individual seeker’s individuality, the source material challenges pervasive assumptions of the experience of penetration as characterized by passivity. Thus, it is my argument that the Babalon discourse, by indicating and lauding the possibility for reciprocal erotic destruction, challenges binary dichotomies of activity and passivity, allowing for alternative configurations of the erotic—​perhaps even, in Lynne Huffer’s terminology, a queering of heterosexuality.24 All of this notwithstanding, reading the Babalon discourse simplistically in terms of opposition to hegemonic gender constructions obscures the ways in which notions of openness and surrender are fundamental to many devotees’ relationship with the goddess. In emphasizing Babalon as emblematic of a feminized modality of receptivity, the discourse around the goddess affirms aspects of hegemonic femininity. This also applies to the utilization of technologies of femininity within ritual contexts, which are neither completely determined by hegemonic gender logics nor entirely free from them. I part ways with feminist

“Like Fire and Powder”  337 theorists who have understood technologies of femininity exclusively as restrictive and objectifying, and argue that some Babalon devotees use high heels, lipstick, revealing clothing, or lingerie to materialize a feminine body that is not characterized by lack or absence but enables a fleshly gnosis of the goddess. These technologies of femininity are implicated in the production of a simultaneously powerful and vulnerable body. Like sadomasochistic bondage, specific technologies of femininity may indeed constrict a subject’s range of movement, manifesting openness in ways that both include and transcend susceptibility to attack, and implicate permeability and access as starting points for religious relationality with divinity. Babalon devotees’ utilizations of embodied technologies of femininity are not exclusively oriented toward the male gaze but are—​ in some cases—​implicated in a queer turn toward a desiring feminine viewer. Nonetheless, the embodied articulation of an exaggerated femininity in Babalon ritual relies on established cultural symbols and tropes, indicating how the inhabiting of femininity is neither defined by hegemonic gender logics nor entirely free from them. Viewing the Babalon discourse simply in terms of brazen and deliberate subversion of the gender system thus risks obscuring how gender and sexuality, to speak with Butler, are not simply possessions, but “modes of being dispossessed, ways of being for another or, indeed, by virtue of another.”25 In the contemporary Babalon discourse, this other may signify both an individual lover, a collective of people (such as a lineage of women), and the goddess herself. The Babalon discourse exhibits a tension between liberal notions of self-​empowerment and an emphasis on pleasurable and dangerous ecstatic dispossession. Acknowledging the ways in which the Babalon discourse indicates alternative ways of inhabiting femininity, it is nonetheless important to stress that the goddess is variously constructed as both destroyer and destroyed, indexical of both penetrability and the conquering other. This ambiguity in the Babalon discourse mirrors a broader tension in Thelema, illustrated by the dual maxims of “Do what thou wilt” and “Love is the Law”; and between individual empowerment and an affirmation of erotic undoing, which is never entirely resolved. In the final section, I will return to the implications of feminized surrender and receptivity in the Babalon discourse, indicating how this construction—​while partly reproducing hegemonic gender logics—​challenges rigid binaries of activity and passivity, opening up new ways of envisioning gender and sexuality on a broader scale. As indicated in the preceding discussion, the contemporary Babalon discourse comprises and intersects with bourgeoning movements toward creating an occult écriture féminine, wherein female-​identified subjects enter into dialogue, constructing their own narrative and ritual frameworks for understanding embodied feminine experience. In highlighting Babalon as a mother of daughters rather than sons, attention is brought, as Irigaray encourages, to

338  The Eloquent Blood the mother-​daughter bond as well as to relationships between women. Thus, claiming an identity as the embodiment or daughter of Babalon can be read as an affirmation of relationality with other women or femininities. The contemporary source material shows an increasing proliferation of female-​originated narratives and terminology for conceptualizing magical and sex magical femininity, not as lack or absence (of phallus), but in terms of presence and capabilities exercised through ritual practices not requiring male participation. These strategies implicate reconceptualizations of the female body, which in Irigaray’s terms can be read as attempts to conceive embodied femininity as something defined in relation to itself. However, in emphasizing anatomical affinities between (cisgendered) women as the starting point for articulating feminine specificity and challenging the universalization of masculinity, there are tendencies in the Babalon discourse to close off avenues for solidarity with a broader variety of feminized subjects. The articulation of qualitative sexual difference—​when construed in terms of biological destiny—​may reify notions of maleness and femaleness as an incommensurable binary. The tendency in the Babalon discourse to construct female morphology not as deficiency, pollution, or cause of feminine irrationality may thus marginalize transgendered and genderqueer experience, obscuring power differentials between cisgendered, transgendered, and genderqueer feminine subjects. However, several of the contemporary occultists cited in this study challenge binary and heteronormative understandings of gender, articulating Babalon as inclusive of—​or even especially connected to—​trans and queerness. In congruence with Mahmood’s assertion that there can be no universal categories of gender resistance, attention must be paid to how strategies for destabilizing the hegemonic gender system are always localized, contingent, and situated. The various forms of dissent and resistance articulated and embodied within the Babalon discourse respond to particular problems and historical experiences: the role of female (and, to a lesser extent, transgendered and queer subjects) in Western esotericism; understandings of feminine sexuality as passive, compliant, monogamous, or reproductively oriented; and a perceived lack of (assertive) images of feminine divinity in the modern West. Narratives and experiences of these problems, as well as their solutions, are classed and racialized, historically as well as today, and the universalization of particular experiences risks masking power relations among different groups of women and femininities. Without discounting the ways in which the Babalon discourse challenges hegemonic sexual logics, its associated opportunities for oppositionality towards hegemonic images of femininity and feminine sexuality are, perhaps, not equally feasible to all. In other words, the challenge toward feminine sexuality as chaste and diminutive acquires different connotations when considered in conjunction with racialized and classed inequality, as poor women and women of color have,

“Like Fire and Powder”  339 to a far greater extent, been historically hypersexualized. Demographic changes in the occult milieu may gradually lead to a stronger intersectional awareness of the heightened vulnerability of poor women, women of color, transgendered, and genderqueer subjects to sexual violence, and of how labels such as “whore” or “wrongly feminine” are more frequently attached to these groups than to white, middle-​class, cisgendered women. However, this is hypothetical, and a task for future research on esotericism is further exploration of the importance of race and class as well as gender. Focusing exclusively on feminine agency as resistance risks generating a reductive reading of the Babalon discourse, overlooking the complex ways in which the latter has related to hegemonic notions of femininity and feminine sexuality over time. From Crowley until today, interpretations of Babalon have both drawn on and challenged pervasive logics in the construction of femininity and feminine sexuality. Although the Babalon discourse has frequently constructed itself in opposition to dominant views on femininity, its historical and contemporary proponents’ responses to the gender system represent neither complete assent nor univocal resistance. These caveats notwithstanding, I nonetheless wish to restate my position that Babalon appears in some respects to function as a feminist figuration, supporting alternative configurations of femininity and feminine sexuality, although this potential is necessarily—​as is the case with all figurations—​contingent and situated. I contend that the Babalon discourse has historically opened up alternative ways of envisioning femininity by offering imagery related to phallic femininity and receptive masculinity and sacralizing the pariah femininity of slut. Contemporary interpretations of the goddess seemingly inspire discussions around the meaning of feminine difference beyond hegemonic gender logics, resulting in a growing genre of writings that I view as a sort of occult écriture féminine. This is accomplished through a localized idealization of the pariah femininity of slut or harlot, as well as in the way the esotericists whose words are analyzed in this study ascribe to Babalon the potential to transcend dichotomies between femininities. Although I am inclined to concur with Irigaray that a fully fledged concept of femininity qua femininity may lie in futurity, we can nonetheless see how the contemporary Babalon discourse—​optimistically figured—​continues the conversation regarding the meaning of feminine difference. This conversation, although it sometimes draws on notions of femininity or feminine sexuality as a lost continent in need of rediscovery, also indicates new ways of thinking and doing femininity that are not reducible to a romanticization of past concepts of gender and, to speak with Braidotti, “take the fact of being a woman,” or perhaps more appropriately, being feminine, “as a positive, self-​affirming force.”26 Concurring with scholars such as Waldby, Irigaray, and Braidotti, I agree that feminist theory is in need of alternative visions of how gender and sex can be

340  The Eloquent Blood done.27 Babalon as the epitome of the sexually desiring subject and multifaceted symbol straddling categorizations of femininity is not necessarily the only answer, nor the answer for all. I am acutely aware of the situated locality and contingency of the Babalon discourse and the ways in which the potential resistance it engenders are mediated through intersections such as race and class. Nonetheless, I end this portion of my discussion on an optimistic note, recognizing interpretations of the goddess Babalon as one instance of subordinated groups manipulating and resisting hegemonic notions of gender in society at large as well as within their religious communities. I argue that Babalon, as a feminist figuration, functions not only as an intellectual thought figure but also as a positionality that esotericists inhabit through body and emotion, which points to a positive conceptualization of femininity (whether figured as a corporeal propensity or a floating positionality) as something in itself. While neither completely determined by nor entirely free from dominant power relations, the Babalon discourse nonetheless indicates alternative femininities that do not simplistically reproduce hegemonic gender relations.

Engendering Dispossession: The Violent Delights of Babalonian Femininities As argued in the preceding section, the Babalon discourse exhibits a tension between emphasizing the empowerment of the individual (feminine) subject and centering the undoing or dispossession of individuality as an initiatory imperative. I would thus like to devote my final discussion to teasing out the broader implications of the whore goddess and her infinite fornications being construed as signifiers of soteriology and religious ecstasy. As argued by Hanegraaff and Styers respectively, much can be learned about the self-​image of Western rationality and subjectivity by studying that which it has rejected.28 The narrative of the modern subject has hinged not only on rejection of certain beliefs or practices but also on the abjection of particular configurations of gender and sexuality. The ascendancy of the pariah femininity of harlot in the Babalon discourse reifies the feminization and sexualization of this threat, prominently exemplified in fin-​de-​ siècle culture as the femme fatale. However, the Babalon discourse departs from this hegemonic narrative by celebrating the undoing of the self in the face of the feminine other as a soteriological goal. Several scholars have indicated how sexuality is essentially linked to the experience of undoing. Butler contends that desire has the power to challenge “the very notion of ourselves as autonomous and in control,” arguing convincingly for gender and sexuality containing the inherent potential for undoing in that they derive from sources that are always beyond the individual subject.29 Existing

“Like Fire and Powder”  341 as a gendered and sexed subject means existing in relationality to others; thus, gender and sexuality are, essentially, ways of being dispossessed. Butler links this propensity of sexuality to the fact that we are never fully knowable to ourselves, observing that this unknowability is connected to drive.30 As Shildrick similarly contends, erotic touch is “paradigmatically” the site of both pleasure and danger in that it has the potential to highlight the relationality and contingency of embodied experience. As the ever-​present reality of vulnerability and the dependency of selfhood threaten the construction of the rational, bounded subject, these propensities are instead projected onto feminine or racialized others, and the monstrous realm.31 However, the instability of subjectivity can never fully be exteriorized, and thus this project of abjection is doomed to failure. Ecstasy and dispossession in the Babalon discourse are strongly related to the concept of receptivity, in ways that both reaffirm and transcend hegemonic notions of femininity. Focusing only on brazen gender subversion among devotees of the red goddess obscures the ways in which the Babalon discourse centers on ecstatic disempowerment. Analyzing femininities in the Babalon discourse, I have sought not to simplistically interpret all instances of agency as deliberately oppositional or the discourse around the goddess as simplistically empowering. Instead, it has been my aim to emphasize how relationships to others are both empowering and, in a sense, disempowering. Whether one projects the experiences of vulnerability, relationality, and erotic destruction onto a feminized other, or instead embraces them as initiatory modalities, the potential for undoing is, fundamentally, an inescapable aspect of all social life. The forms of receptivity, vulnerability, and openness inhabited by subjects working with Babalon are not merely “voluntary” receptivity, in the sense of something that can be discarded as simply as a pair of high-​heeled shoes.32 Instead, these modalities are linked to an affirmation of—​and perhaps capitulation to—​an aspect of social and sexual interaction that may always be inherent. A central theme in the Babalon discourse is the simultaneous threat and promise of ecstatic undoing—​of being transported outside of the self. Highlighting violent relationality, it idealizes receptivity as a mode of yielding engagement with existence, a corporeal presence that cannot be equated to an abdication of agency but in which activity and the potential for being acted upon are intertwined. In the contemporary Babalon discourse, femininities are not solely sites of oppression but relational positionalities that offer the potential for agency. This agency is couched variously in terms of outward-​directed resistance, indicated by the phallic Babalon as army general or dominatrix, and the strength and courage to yield, which is upheld as an initiatory ideal for both men and women. Receptivity is thus conceptualized as requiring labor and power, the constant strain of being present in the world and of honoring one’s ties to others, whilst simultaneously recognizing how they predicate one’s undoing in ways that

342  The Eloquent Blood render Babalon highly similar to, among others, Cvetkovich’s conceptualization of the femme.33 The feminization of this desire for and reality of vulnerable engagement in the Babalon discourse reproduces the pervasive stereotype of the feminine monstrous, which threatens the autonomy of the masculine subject while simultaneously indicating Babalon as a utopian figuration signifying new ways of doing femininity (and perhaps masculinity as well). With the above reflections in mind, we may read Friar Laurence’s injunction to “love moderately” as an anachronistic imperative to fortify Western bourgeois masculine rationality. In Crowley’s terms, this can be expressed as constructing a tower for oneself in the Abyss, thus resisting erotic destruction and refiguration in union with the other. The Babalon discourse does not break with the cultural tradition of linking the potential destruction of subjectivity to femininity, but celebrates it. Rather than seeking to expel the monster from the cultural center, projecting it onto others, the Babalon discourse takes the monster to bed. As a symbolic image of that which is infinitely receptive, Babalon perpetuates the connection between femininity and pregnability, while rendering visible (male desire for) erotic receptivity, both building on and destabilizing dominant discourses on femininity, feminine sexuality, and subjectivity. The Babalon discourse is an erotic discourse; a (queerly) feminine discourse; a hopeful, monstrous discourse messy with the blood of tender violence. Read as figuration, Babalon indicates configurations of sexuality and femininities that have the potential to transcend chauvinistic antinomies of receptivity and agency, desiring and desired, penetrating and penetrated. The Babalon discourse hints at the potential for what I consider a queer heterosexuality hinging on the reciprocal embrace of erotic destruction. If a liberal humanist ideology of subjectivity emphasizes the individual self as autonomous and self-​contained, the Babalon discourse weaves a tantalizing dance of the seven veils between the center and margins of Western modernity, privileging desire and rejecting the assumption that it is, to quote Roland Barthes, “better to last than to burn.”34 In the actions of occultists engaging with Babalon who alter their bodies, suffer for love, and strive to challenge personal and socio-​sexual boundaries, there is a disavowal of the injunction to love moderately and according to a clearly defined hierarchical gender complementarity. The striving of Babalon devotees not to fortify their autonomous selves, but instead to confront undoing in the face of the other, to welcome the experience of being ecstatically taken and affirming the intimate relationships through which self-​perception is constituted, construes the goddess as a simultaneous site of pleasure and danger, of delight and violence. This ineffable state of being, the ways in which we are bound and empowered by gender—​how we come to create and destroy each other in ways that run too deep to articulate—​spread like an intricate network of blood vessels through interpretations of the goddess Babalon. The labor of receptivity, the contingency of

“Like Fire and Powder”  343 subjectivity, the vulnerability of existence. The softness of all bodies; the yielding of our undone hearts; the unruliness of desire—​these are the violent and delightful stories told by the eloquent blood.

Notes 1. William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet, 2.6.9–​15. 2. AL III:44. 3. Shildrick, “Unreformed.” 4. Owen, Place, 199. 5. Joanna de Groot, “‘Sex’ and ‘Race’:  The Construction of Language and Image in the Nineteenth Century,” in Sexuality and Subordination:  Interdisciplinary Studies of Gender in the Nineteenth Century, ed. Susan Mendus and Jane Rendall (London: Routledge, 1989), 89–​130. 6. Cf. Waldby, “Destruction.” 7. Crowley, Magical and Philosophical, 103, 307. 8. Hirsig’s role and influence—​as well as that of other women—​in the early Thelemic movement is explored in my research project, “Power through Closeness? Female Authority and Agency in a Male-​Led New Religion,” funded by the Swedish Research Council and running from 2018 to 2021. 9. Cf. Schippers, “Recovering.” 10. Contrasting with the developments of Neopagan witchcraft in the United States, which during this period became strongly intertwined with feminism. See ­chapter 7. 11. Irigaray, “Question.” 12. Rubin, “Thinking Sex.” 13. Cf. Meredith B. McGuire, Lived Religion: Faith and Practice in Everyday Life (Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 2008). 14. Justine Bakker, “Race in/​and the Construct and Study of Western Esotericism,” paper presented at “ESSWE6: Western Esotericism and Deviance,” Erfurt, Germany, June 1–​3,  2017. 15. See, e.g., Genevieve Lloyd, The Man of Reason:  “Male” and “Female” in Western Philosophy (London: Methuen, 1984). 16. Styers, Magic. 17. Crowley, Aleph, 171. Cf. Owen, Place,  87–​88. 18. Parsons, “Freedom,” 43; Soror Syrinx, Scarlet Grimoire,  7–​8. 19. Schippers, “Recovering.” 20. Braidotti, Nomadic, 1. 21. Saba Mahmood, Politics of Piety:  The Islamic Revival and the Feminist Subject (Princeton, NJ:  Princeton University Press, 2005); Donna Haraway, “Situated Knowledges:  The Science Question in Feminism and the Privilege of Partial Perspective,” Feminist Studies 14, no. 3 (1988):  575–​ 599; Haraway, “Cyborg Manifesto”; Butler, Gender Trouble.

344  The Eloquent Blood 22. Irigaray, “Divine.” 23. Cf. Willey, “Constituting.” 24. Huffer, “Lips.” 25. Butler, Undoing, 19. Emphasis in original. 26. Braidotti, Nomadic, 130. 27. Irigaray, “Divine”; Braidotti, Nomadic; Waldby, “Destruction.” 28. Hanegraaff, Esotericism; Styers, Making. 29. Butler, Undoing, 19. 30. Ibid.,  15–​16. 31. Shildrick, “Unreformed.” Parallels can be drawn to the Kristevan abject, the site of horror where all stable boundaries dissolve. Kristeva, Powers. 32. Cf. Dahl, “Femmebodiment,” 49. 33. Cvetkovich, “Receptivity.” 34. Roland Barthes, A Lover’s Discourse:  Fragments, trans. Richard Howard (New York: Hill and Wang, 1978), 23.

Bibliography Interviews with Author Alan. October 23, 2014. Tape recording. Amodali. December 1, 2016. Tape recording. Amy. October 27, 2014. Tape recording. Ash and Steve. February 13, 2015. Tape recording. Charlotte. January 26, 2015. Tape recording. Cornelius, Erica M. October 6, 2014. Tape recording. Dimech, Alkistis, and Peter Grey. November 26, 2016. Tape recording. Freyja. December 2, 2016. Tape recording. Helen. October 24, 2014. Tape recording. Henry. October 18, 2014. Tape recording. IAO131. October 17, 2014. Tape recording. Mary. January 18, 2015. Tape recording. Mike. September 24, 2014. Tape recording. Sam. October 4, 2014. Tape recording. Sandra. November 12, 2014. Tape recording. Sophie. December 9, 2014. Tape recording.

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346 Bibliography Butler, Judith. “Rethinking Vulnerability and Resistance.” Instituto Franklin, 2014. Accessed September 11, 2017. http://​www.institutofranklin.net/​sites/​default/​files/​ files/​Rethinking%20Vulnerability%20and%20Resistance%20Judith%20Butler.pdf. Faerywolf, Storm. “The Queer Craft: Rethinking Magickal Polarity.” Faerywolf.com, 2000. Accessed September 11, 2017. http://​www.faerywolf.com/​queer-​craft/​. Greywalker, Raven. “Sado-​Masochistic Ritual in a Thelemic Context.” Necronomi.com. Accessed March 4, 2017. http://​www.necronomi.com/​magic/​hermeticism/​sandm.txt. Hine, Phil. “Some Musings on Polarity.” PhilHine.org, 1989. Accessed September 11, 2017. http://​www.philhine.org.uk/​writings/​flsh_​polarity.html. Hine, Phil, and Paul McAndrew. “Occult Homophobia—​Some Choice Quotes.” Philhine. org.uk. Accessed March 29, 2017. http://​www.philhine.org.uk/​writings/​flsh_​phobia. html. Josephus, Flavius. Antiquities of the Jews (Book XVIII, ­chapter 5.4), translated by William Whiston. Accessed October 15, 2017. http://​www.gutenberg.org/​ebooks/​2848. Landstreet, Lynna. “Alternate Currents: Revisioning Polarity. Or, What’s a Nice Dyke Like You Doing in a Polarity-​Based Tradition Like This?” Wild Ideas, 1999 [1993]. Accessed September 11, 2017. http://​www.wildideas.net/​temple/​library/​altcurrents.html. Meretrix, Magdalene. “In Nomine Babalon: Sacred Whoredom in a Thelemic Context.” Heathen’s Lair, 1999. Accessed September 11, 2017. http://​heathenslair.tripod.com/​ id52.html. Pardoe, Rosemary, and Jane Nicholls. “The Black Pilgrimage.” Ghosts and Scholars 26, 1998. Accessed 30 April, 2019. http://​www.users.globalnet.co.uk/​~pardos/​ArticleTwo. html. Qadisha, Aisha. “Procession of Babalon:  The Evolution of the Goddess through the Aeons.” Sex Magick. Accessed January 15, 2017. http://​www.sexmagick.com/​aisha/​ mywork/​procession.htm [accessed through https://​web-​beta.archive.org]. Sabazius X°. “Same-​ Sex Marriage.” Sabazius-​X.livejournal.com, November 9, 2008. Accessed October 7, 2017. http://​sabazius-​x.livejournal.com/​12249.html.

Unpublished Works Cameron Parsons Foundation Archives Cameron, Marjorie, and Jane Wolfe. Letters. Holograph MSS and facsimiles. 1952–​1954.

Getty Research Institute Library Cameron, Marjorie. “Notebook of Cameron.” Holograph MS in notebook containing sketches, poems, and drafts of letters. N.d. [ca. 1957]. Special collections, 2012.M.42.

Aleister Crowley Collection, Harry Ransom Center, University of Texas at Austin Crowley, Aleister, and Victor B. Neuburg. “The Vision and the Voice, Being the Cries of the Thirty Aethyrs.” Holograph MSS in Neuburg’s hand with annotations by AC, in 6 notebooks, 1909. Series 1, box 5, folders 1–​3.

Ordo Templi Orientis Archives “Agape Lodge Minutes.” August 14, 1946. Typescript.

Bibliography  347 Cameron, Marjorie. Letter to Gerald J. Yorke, March 2, 1962. Facsimile of holograph. Cameron, Marjorie. Letter to Gerald J. Yorke, July 28, 1962. Facsimile of holograph. Cameron, Marjorie. Letter to Sascha Germer, May 23, 1963. Holograph MS. Crowley, Aleister. Letters to Georgia B. Crombie, July 21, 1936 to May 25, 1947. Facsimile of typescript copied in 1955 from originals in the possession of Karl J. Germer. McMurtry, Grady. “Agape Inspection Report.” January 25, 1946. Typescript. Parsons, John W. “The Black Pilgrimage.” N.d. [ca. 1948]. Facsimile of holograph MS. Reuss, Theodor. “Charter to Aleister Crowley for the Antient and Primitive Rite.” [d. 1906 but probably ca. 1910]. Facsimile. Reuss, Theodor. “Charter to Aleister Crowley for OTO and M∴M∴M∴.” April 21, 1912. Facsimile. Reuss, Theodor. I.N.R.I. Constitution of the Ancient Order of Oriental Templars. O.T.O. d. 1906 [most likely ca. 1912]. Facsimile. Wolfe, Jane. “Agape Lodge Minutes.” September 21, 1935. Typescript. Yorke, Gerald J. Letter to Marjorie Cameron, May 28, 1962. Typescript.

Gerald J. Yorke Collection, Warburg Institute Crowley, Aleister. “AGAPE vel Liber C vel AZOTH. Sal Philosophorum the Book of the Unveiling of the Sangraal Wherein It Is Spoken of the Wine of the Sabbath of the Adepts.” Holograph MS in hardback notebook, 1914. OS26. Crowley, Aleister. “Almira.” Included in “The Book of Oaths.” Typescript, corrections in Crowley’s hand. N.d. [ca. 1918]. OS N3. Crowley, Aleister. “The Cephaloedium Working.” Holograph MS in hardback notebook, 1920–​1921.  OSA1. Crowley, Aleister. “The Commentary Called D(jeridensis) Provisionally by 666.” Holograph MS in the hand of Aleister Crowley and Leah Hirsig, in hardback notebook, 1923. OS16. Crowley, Aleister. “De Nuptiis Secretis Deorum Cum Hominibus.” Holograph MS in hardback notebook. N.d. OS25. Crowley, Aleister. “IX° Emblems and Modes of Use.” Typescript in springback folder, 1944. NS3. Crowley, Aleister. “Liber CDXIV: De Arte Magica.” Typescript, 1914. NS3. Crowley, Aleister. Letters to John W. Parsons, March 27 and April 19, 1946. Typescripts. Crowley, Aleister. “Notes on Tarot.” Holograph MS, in hardback notebook with list of contents by Gerald J. Yorke. d. 1904 [most likely 1909–​1919]. OS27. Hirsig, Leah. “Diary of Leah Hirsig, including ‘Alostrael’s Visions,’ ‘Magical Diary of Alostrael 31–​666–​31,’ ‘New Magical Record,’ and ‘Preliminary Invocation.’ ” Holograph MS in hardback notebook, October 29, 1923 to December 27, 1924. OSDD1. Hirsig, Leah. “Diary of Leah Hirsig. The Magical Diary of Babalon, September 25 to October 28, 1924.” Holograph MS in hardback notebook with a passage in Norman Mudd’s hand, 1924. OSDD2. Hirsig, Leah. “Diary of Leah Hirsig. Diary of? Known on Earth as Leah Hirsig, Dec 29/​24 e.v.” Holograph MS in hardback notebook, 1924. OSDD3. Hirsig, Leah. “Diary of Leah Hirsig, 8 May 1925 to 16 June 1925. Diary of Alostrael 31–​ 666–​31 started May 8 1925 e.v. at Belvedere Hotel, Tunis, Leah Hirsig.” Holograph MS in hardback notebook. OSDD4. Hirsig, Leah. “Letters from Leah Hirsig to A.C., Norman Mudd, Jane Wolfe, Ninette Shumway, Dorothy Olsen.” N.d. OSD11.

348 Bibliography Loome, Renata. “Babalon and the Beast.” Photograph of painting, in hardback scrapbook. 1958. NS74. Mudd, Norman. “Diary of Norman Mudd, 1 September–​8 October 1923. The Record of the Magickal Retirement of ‘Omnia Pro Veritate’ An XIX, Sept 28 to Oct 8, in the Neighbourhood of Tunis.” Holograph MS, with comments in Crowley’s hand, in hardback notebook. 1923. OSDD6a. Mudd, Norman. “Norman Mudd’s Diary for 1923.” Holograph MS. 1923. OSDD6. Parsons, John W. “The Book of the Antichrist.” Typescript, in springback folder. N.d. [ca. 1948]. NS 110. Parsons, John W. “The Book of Babalon.” Typescript, 1946. Parsons, John W. “Letters from Jack Parsons to Marjorie Cameron, 1949–​ 1950.” Typescript. N.d. [1949–​1950]. Parsons, John W. “Letters from Jack Parsons to Karl Germer.” Typescript. Parsons, John W. “Of Familiars.” Typescript. N.d. Parsons, John W. “Unpublished Foreword to the Book of Babalon.” Typescript. N.d. [ca. 1950].

University of Sheffield Library Redgrove, Peter, et al. “Redgrove Papers; Letters,” MS171.

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Bibliography  349 Bakker, Justine. “Race in/​and the Construct and Study of Western Esotericism.” Paper presented at “ESSWE6:  Western Esotericism and Deviance.” Erfurt, Germany, June 1–​3,  2017. Barthes, Roland. A Lover’s Discourse:  Fragments. Translated by Richard Howard. New York: Hill and Wang, 1978. Bartky, Sandra. “Foucault, Femininity and the Modernization of Patriarchal Power.” In Feminism and Foucault: Reflections on Resistance, edited by Irene Diamond and Lee Quinby, 61–​86. Boston: Northeastern University Press, 1988. Bauckham, Richard. “Revelation.” In The Oxford Bible Commentary, 1287–​1305. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007. Beauvoir, Simone de. The Second Sex. Translated by Helen Parshley. Harmondsworth, UK: Penguin Books, 1984. Berger, Helen A., Evan A. Leach, and Leigh S. Shaffer. Voices from the Pagan Census: A National Survey of Witches and Neo-​Pagans in the United States. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2003. Beta, Hymenaeus. “Foreword.” In Aleister Crowley, The Law Is for All: The Authorized Popular Commentary on Liber AL vel Legis sub figura CCXX The Book of the Law, edited by Louis Wilkinson and Hymenaeus Beta, 7–​12. Tempe, AZ:  New Falcon Publications, 1996. Beta, Hymenaeus. “Foreword.” In John W. Parsons, Three Essays on Freedom, edited by Hymenaeus Beta, vii–​xiii. York Beach, ME: Teitan Press, 2008. Beta, Hymenaeus. “Introduction.” In John W. Parsons, Freedom Is a Two-​Edged Sword and Other Essays, edited by Cameron and Hymenaeus Beta, 7–​8. Tempe, AZ: New Falcon Publications, 2001. Beta, Hymenaeus. “Women’s Conference Address.” The Magical Link 1997, no. 1 (1997): 8–​10. Bland, Lucy. “Heterosexuality, Feminism and The Freewoman Journal in Early Twentieth-​ Century England.” Women’s History Review 4, no. 1 (1995): 5–​23. Bogdan, Henrik. “Advaita Vedanta in the Works of Kenneth Grant.” In Servants of the Star & the Snake: Essays in Honour of Kenneth and Steffi Grant, edited by Henrik Bogdan, 39–​56. London: Starfire, 2018. Bogdan, Henrik. “Aleister Crowley:  A Prophet for the Modern Age.” In The Occult World, edited by Christopher Partridge, 293–​ 302. Abingdon, Oxon.; New  York: Routledge, 2015. Bogdan, Henrik. “The Babalon Working 1946: L. Ron Hubbard, John Whiteside Parsons, and the Practice of Enochian Magic.” Numen: International Review for the History of Religions 63, no. 1 (2016): 12–​32. Bogdan, Henrik. “Challenging the Morals of Western Society: The Use of Ritualized Sex in Contemporary Occultism.” The Pomegranate 8, no. 2 (2006): 211–​246. Bogdan, Henrik. “Envisioning the Birth of a New Aeon:  Dispensationalism and Millenarianism in the Thelemic Tradition.” In Aleister Crowley and Western Esotericism, edited by Henrik Bogdan and Martin P. Starr, 89–​106. New York: Oxford University Press, 2012. Bogdan, Henrik. “Evocation of the Fire Snake: Kenneth Grant and Tantra.” In Servants of the Star & the Snake. Essays in Honour of Kenneth and Steffi Grant, edited by Henrik Bogdan, 253–​268. London: Starfire, 2018. Bogdan, Henrik. “Introduction.” In Aleister Crowley and David Curwen, Brother Curwen, Brother Crowley: A Correspondence, edited by Henrik Bogdan, xviii–​xlviii. York Beach, ME: Teitan Press, 2010.

350 Bibliography Bogdan, Henrik. “Introduction: Modern Western Magic.” Aries: Journal for the Study of Western Esotericism 12 (2012): 1–​16. Bogdan, Henrik. “Kenneth Grant and the Typhonian Tradition.” In The Occult World, edited by Christopher Partridge, 323–​330. Abingdon, Oxon.: Routledge, 2014. Bogdan, Henrik. “Reception of Occultism in India:  The Case of the Holy Order of Krishna.” In Occultism in a Global Perspective, edited by Henrik Bogdan and Gordan Djurdjevic, 177–​201. Durham: Acumen, 2013. Bogdan, Henrik. Western Esotericism and Rituals of Initiation. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2007. Bondestam, Maja. Den moraliska kroppen. Tolkningar av kön och individualitet i 1800-​ talets populärmedicin. Hedemora: Gidlund, 2002. Braidotti, Rosi. “In the Sign of the Feminine: Reading Diana.” Theory & Event 1, no. 4 (1997). Braidotti, Rosi. Nomadic Subjects: Embodiment and Sexual Difference in Contemporary Feminist Theory. New York: Columbia University Press, 1994. Brooks, Siobhan. “Dancing Towards Freedom.” In Whores and Other Feminists, edited by Jill Nagle, 252–​255. New York: Routledge, 1997. Brown, Kirsten. “Every Time You Play the Red.” In Women’s Voices in Magic, edited by Brandy Williams, 114–​118. Stafford: Megalithica Books, 2009. Brownmiller, Susan. Femininity. New York: Ballantine Books, 1985. Bryman, Alan. Social Research Methods. Oxford; New  York:  Oxford University Press, 2016. Budin, Stephanie. The Myth of Sacred Prostitution in Antiquity. New  York:  Cambridge University Press, 2010. Butler, Judith. Gender Trouble:  Feminism and the Subversion of Identity. New York: Routledge, 1999. Butler, Judith. Undoing Gender. New York; London: Routledge, 2004. Campbell, Joseph. The Hero with a Thousand Faces. Novato, CA: New World Library, 2008. Carr, Joetta L. “The SlutWalk Movement: A Study in Transnational Feminist Activism.” Journal of Feminist Scholarship 4 (Spring 2013), 24–​38. Carter, Frederick. The Dragon of Revelation. Introduced by D. H. Lawrence. Essex House, Thame: I-​H-​O Books,  2002. Carter, John. Sex and Rockets:  The Occult World of Jack Parsons. Venice, CA:  Feral House, 1999. Cederschiöld, Per Gustaf. Lärobok i vården om qvinnans slägtlif i synnerhet dess fortplantnings-​förrättning eller förlossningskonsten. Stockholm: n.p., 1836. Chappell, Vere. “Sexual Attitudes and Behavior among Members of Ordo Templi Orientis.” Unpublished thesis submitted to the Institute for Advanced Study of Human Sexuality, 2006. Chen, Soror. “Failed Babalons.” In The Faces of Babalon: Being a Compilation of Women’s Voices, edited by Mishlen Linden. 13–​15. Logan: Black Moon Publishing, 2008. Christ, Carol P., and Judith Plaskow, eds. Womanspirit Rising:  A Feminist Reader in Religion. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1992. Cixous, Hélène. “The Laugh of the Medusa.” Signs 1, no. 4 (1976): 875–​893. Clifton, Chas S. “Sex Magic or Sacred Marriage? Sexuality in Contemporary Wicca.” In Sexuality in New Religious Movements, edited by Henrik Bogdan and James R. Lewis, 149–​163. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014. Connell, R. W. Masculinities. 2nd ed. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2005.

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Index Note: For the benefit of digital users, indexed terms that span two pages (e.g., 52–​53) may, on occasion, appear on only one of those pages.  Note: Figures are indicated by f following the page number    A∴A∴  8, 46, 50–​51, 81, 83–​84, 86, 87, 90–​91, Babalon Working, see Parsons, John Whiteside: 94, 106–​7, 112–​13, 126, 139, 150n.40, Babalon Working 153n.101, 196, 204, 218, 220–​21, 234, Babylon  240, 322 ancient culture  37, 38, 71n.10, 144, 232 Ipsissimus  46, 102 in anti-​Catholic rhetoric  12–​13n.2, Magister Templi, see Abyss, crossing the 37–​38,  39 seal  86, 150n.40 daughter of  79n.153 Abbey of Thelema  94–​102, 106–​7, 109–​10, Whore of (biblical)  1, 37–​38, 39, 40–​41, 122n.146, 323 43–​45, 52–​53, 55–​56, 57, 66, 71n.8, 71n.9, Abyss, crossing the  46, 50–​51, 53, 54–​60, 78n.131, 96, 100, 108, 113–​15, 175, 210, 62–​64, 66, 67, 68, 76n.103, 81–​84, 86, 217–​18, 235–​36,  322 91, 93, 109–​10, 119n.68, 129, 136, 138, banishing  87, 196 139, 142, 146, 153n.101, 159–​60, 174, BDSM, see sadomasochism 177–​79, 218–​19, 234, 268, 308–​9, 322–​23, Beardsley, Aubrey  39–​40 324, 342 Beast, the  Advaita Vedanta  2–​3, 158–​59, 160, 161–​62, as a name for Crowley  1–​2, 3, 43–​44, 74n.67, 177–​78, 185n.10, 186n.18, 186n.26 92, 94, 96–​97, 99–​100, 101, 102–​3, 105, Aeons (Thelemic concept)  113–​14, 243, 250 Horus, Aeon of  2, 43–​44, 52–​53, 100, 108, as a replaceable office  136, 189–​90n.111, 110, 115n.1, 125, 128, 167, 170–​71, 179–​ 190n.125, 203–​4, 207–​8, 241, 253, 268 81, 206–​8, 230, 275, 294–​95, 300–​1, 327 as an aspect of the individual  217–​18 Isis, Aeon of  115n.1 in “Liber Cheth”  82 Osiris, Aeon of  173 in Revelation  1, 39, 43–​44, 47, 52–​53, 64–​65 Aethyrs, see Crowley, Aleister: The Vision and in The Book of Lies  85,  86–​87 the Voice in The Book of Thoth  108–​10 Afrocentricity (Afrocentrism)  187n.41 in The Vision and the Voice  52–​53, 55, 57, 62, Agape Lodge  126–​27, 135–​36, 137–​38, 145–​46, 65, 66–​67, 101 195, 196 bell hooks,  285 Aiwass (Aiwaz)  43, 50, 73n.42, 95–​98, 99–​100, Bennett, Frank  120–​21n.119 101, 107, 109–​10, 120n.90 Besant, Annie  38–​39 alchemy  6, 108, 253, 307 Black Brothers  57–​58, 59–​60, 61, 67, 91, 176 Alostrael, see Hirsig, Leah black pilgrimage, see Parsons, John Whiteside: Amodali  8–​9, 214–​16, 244–​47, 249–​50,  254 black pilgrimage Anger, Kenneth  2–​3, 146 Blake, William  74n.59 anti-​Catholicism  12–​13n.2, 37–​38, 71–​72n.16 Blavatsky, Helena Petrovna  59–​60, Antichrist  138–​40, 152–​53n.92 123n.176,  163–​64 Aphrodite  37, 84, 264, 265, 271 bondage, see sadomasochism Astarte  37, 38, 116n.9, 265, 276, 292–​94 Braidotti, Rosi  4–​5, 22–​23, 256–​57, 333–​34,   335, 339 Babalon discourse, definition  3–​4, 13n.6 Bruce, Kathleen  46–​47, 75n.76 Babalon, spelling  2, 11, 58–​59, 74n.68 Bud-​Will  164, 203–​4,  225n.4

370 Index butch/​femme relationships  23–​24 Butler, Judith  19–​20, 25–​26, 60, 68–​69, 113, 222–​23, 298–​300, 315–​17, 336, 337,  340–​41 Breeze, William, see Hymenaeus Beta   California Institute of Technology (Caltech)  125–​26,  127 Cameron, Marjorie  2–​3, 125, 127–​28, 135, 137–​38, 143, 145–​46, 148, 150n.28, 150n.32, 155n.139, 181–​82, 249–​50, 326 Campbell, Joseph  237 Castaneda, Carlos  192n.193 Cefalù, see Abbey of Thelema Cephaloedium Working  100–​2 chakras  164, 179–​80, 302 Chaos (entity)  61, 82, 85, 87, 88–​89, 177–​79, 216, 217–​18, 277 Chaos Magick  196, 275 Chorazin,  138–​40, 142, 152–​53n.92. See also Parsons, John Whiteside: black pilgrimage Choronzon  50–​51, 58–​60, 61–​62, 63, 67, 68, 78n.142, 78n.144, 91, 159–​60, 177–​78, 191n.175 Church of Satan, see LaVey, Anton cisgender (meaning)  10 City of the Pyramids  54, 58–​59, 63, 81–​82, 91, 107, 115n.2, 142, 325 Clairvaux, Bernard de  69, 77n.111, 80n.200 Connell, R.W.  26–​27 Constant, Alphonse-​Louis, see Lévi, Eliphas Cornelius, Erica M  8–​9, 204–​7, 222, 240 Cornelius, J. Edward  203–​4, 206, 207, 208, 222, 225n.6, 225n.7, 240 “Count Magnus”  139–​40 counterreading  44–​45 Craddock, Ida  38–​39 Crombie, Georgia B.  118n.57 Crowley, Aleister  The Book of Lies  78n.135, 84–​88, 98–​99, 108–​ 9, 112–​13, 150n.40 The Book of Thoth (see Tarot; Lust card; Thoth Tarot, general) Clouds without Water  46–​48,  50 critique of views on women  5, 111–​12, 165, 166–​67, 183–​84, 205, 213–​14, 235–​36, 240, 243–​44, 246, 248–​49, 250–​51, 254, 324,  326–​27 “Jezebel”  40–​42, 46–​47, 48, 49 Liber ABA  15n.44, 119n.58 Liber Aleph  91–​93, 95, 107, 110–​11, 225n.4, 236–​37,  332–​33 Liber AL vel Legis  2, 10–​11, 15n.44, 35, 39, 43–​46, 47, 52–​53, 61–​62, 65, 69–​70, 70n.1,

72n.25, 74n.70, 77n.116, 81, 88–​89, 96–​97, 99, 100, 102–​3, 108–​9, 110, 128–​29, 130, 131, 137, 142, 146, 150n.42, 163, 166, 180, 189n.108, 225n.12, 237, 317n.9, 343n.18 “Liber Cheth”  81–​84, 106–​7, 112–​13, 215 “Liber LXVI, Liber Stellæ Rubeæ,”  75n.89 “New Comment” (to Liber AL vel Legis) 35, 65, 73n.49, 74n.65, 100, 102–​6, 110–​11, 121n.136, 142, 153n.114, 181, 191n.156, 236–​37,  323–​24 “Old Comment” (to Liber AL)  35, 70n.1, 74n.67, 81, 115n.1 sexual magic  75n.89, 81, 87–​48, 94–​102, 109–​11, 117n.45 The Vision and the Voice  1–​2, 11, 35, 51–​70, 81, 83–​85, 88–​89, 99, 101, 103, 108, 116n.9, 131–​32, 133, 150n.42, 294–​95, 300–​1, 302–​ 3, 317n.18, 324, 327, 336 (see also Abyss, crossing the) “The Wake World”  49–​51 cultic prostitution, see prostitution: sacred; cultic   Daath, see kabbalah: Daath Dakini  220, 271 Dakshina Marg (Right-​Hand Path)  164,  165–​66 Dark Brotherhood, see Black Brothers Darker Than You Think, see Williamson, Jack Decadence (literary movement); Decadent poetry  39–​40, 48–​49, 67, 72n.29, 331. See also Crowley, Aleister: “Jezebel” Dee, John  1–​2, 51, 58–​59, 76n.108 Devil, the (also Lucifer; Satan)  39, 44–​45, 46–​ 47, 48, 74n.58, 89–​90, 96–​97, 99–​100, 101, 127, 138, 139–​40, 143–​44, 312–​13. See also Satanism Dimech, Alkistis  8–​9, 213–​14, 254, 271–​73, 278–​79, 291, 304–​10, 312, 313, 314–​15 discourse, see Babalon discourse divination  7, 196 Donne, John  13n.4 Draconian tradition, see Grant, Kenneth: Typhonian tradition Dworkin, Andrea  18–​19   Ecclesia Gnostica Catholica (EGC)  9, 88–​89, 117n.41, 196, 198, 200n.6 écriture féminine  20, 241–​42, 245, 259n.43, 273, 327, 332, 333–​34, 337–​38, 339 elemental (entity)  127, 128, 135, 148, 149n.26 Enochian magic  1–​2 , 11, 51–​5 2, 133, 151n.54, 331. See also Crowley, Aleister: The Vision and the Voice; Dee, John; Kelley, Edward

Index  371 Falorio, Linda  213, 247–​48 Farr, Florence  38–​39 feminism  critique of  110–​11, 206–​7, 254, 272–​73 cultural  17–​18, 174, 181, 326–​27, 331 eco-​  17–​18,  29n.5 first-​wave  18–​19, 36–​37, 38–​39, 111,  331 goddess (thealogy)  29n.5, 142–​43, 233, 238–​39,  257 radical  17, 18–​19, 229–​30, 243–​44, 254 second-​wave  199, 229–​30, 326–​27, 329–​30,  332 sex radical; sex positive  18–​19, 142–​43, 154n.116, 265–​66, 273, 282, 283, 284–​85,  329 sex wars  18–​19, 23 femme (lesbian)  18, 22–​24, 68, 213, 247–​48, 252–​53, 257–​58, 333,  341–​42 femme fatale  35–​38, 39–​42, 44, 45, 46–​49, 50, 53–​54, 55, 65–​66, 67, 98, 127–​28, 321, 322–​23, 336, 340 Foster, Jeanne  90–​91, 102–​3, 119n.68 Foucault, Michel  36 Frater Achad, see Jones, Charles Stansfeld Frazer, James  7–​8, 37, 38, 72n.27, 77n.116, 115n.1 Freemasonry  6, 87–​88, 196   gematria, see kabbalah: gematria gender polarity  38–​39, 85, 87, 89–​90, 92, 102–​3, 109–​10, 112–​13, 118n.49, 118n.50, 121n.120, 122n.157, 167–​69, 188n.82,  203–​9 critique of  199, 211–​12, 213–​16, 221–​22, 229, 236–​37, 244–​45, 324 genderqueer, see queer Genesthai, see Russell, Cecil Frederick Germer, Karl  136, 146, 159, 195, 196 Germer, Sascha  155n.139 Gnostic Creed  89 Gnostic Mass; also Gnostic Catholic Mass  80n.189, 88–​89, 117n.40, 126, 133, 196, 202n.30, 212–​13, 216, 231, 232, 300–​1 goddess feminism, see feminism: goddess Goetia 78n.141 Golden Bough, The, see Frazer, James Golden Dawn, see Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn Grant, Kenneth  critique of Crowley  165, 166–​67, 183–​84 qadeshim 175 sexual magic  157, 162, 163–​72, 179–​81, 182–​ 85, 326–​27 (see also kalas; sexual magic: women’s roles)

Tantra  157–​59, 161, 162–​69, 170–​72, 173–​ 76, 178–​79, 181–​84, 187n.53 Typhonian order (formerly Typhonian OTO) 186n.23 Typhonian tradition  157, 158–​59, 162–​65, 170, 175–​76, 326 Typhonian Trilogies (overview)  159–​62 Grant, Steffi  158–​59 Grey, Peter  8–​9, 213–​14, 266–​67, 278–​79, 304–​ 10, 312, 314–​15 Gunther, J. Daniel  196   Hadit  43, 44, 94, 102–​3, 110, 116n.35, 121n.120, 169, 208 Hathor  264, 265 Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn  38–​39, 40, 46, 51, 81, 87, 196, 249–​50, 331 Hermeticism (Renaissance)  6 Herodotus  37, 278 Heym, Georg  71n.8 Hirsig, Leah  2, 94, 95–​103, 106–​7, 109–​11, 112–​14, 323–​24,  336 Hislop, Alexander  38, 39, 72n.26, 96, 112–​13, 121n.125 Holy Books of Thelema  81, 92 Holy Graal  55, 82, 83 Holy Guardian Angel  46, 49, 50, 95–​97, 109–​10, 120n.90, 120–​21n.119, 140, 153n.101,  203–​4 Holy Order of Krishna  158 Horus-​Maat Lodge  235–​36 HRILIU 89 Hubbard, L. Ron  2–​3, 94, 127, 132–​33, 137–​38 Huysmans, Joris-​Karl  39–​40,  73n.41 Hymenaeus Beta  11, 195, 200n.6   IAO131  8–​9, 216, 217 Inanna  232, 264, 265–​67, 278 Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome, see Anger, Kenneth Irigaray, Luce, key concepts  critique of  21–​22 feminine divine  21 reworkings of  22–​23 sexual difference  19–​21 Ishtar  37, 38, 96, 121n.125, 232, 264, 265, 276, 278, 292–​93, 298 Isis  84, 159, 179–​80, 265   James, M.R., see “Count Magnus” Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL)  125–​26 Jezebel  biblical character  36–​37, 40, 72n.31, 73n.32 poem by Crowley (see Crowley, Aleister: “Jezebel”)

372 Index Jones, Charles Stansfeld  10–​11, 91, 119n.68 Jones, George Cecil  46   kabbalah  46, 49–​51, 52, 74n.71, 75n.73, 79n.180, 80n.194, 80n.181, 87, 115n.5, 139, 157, 159–​60, 174, 176–​78, 186n.34, 204, 205, 207, 331 Binah  62, 63, 79n.157, 85, 86, 303 Daath  46, 75n.73, 79n.180, 115n.5, 139, 159–​ 60, 174, 177–​78, 186n.34 gematria  58–​59,  161 Qliphoth  159–​60, 176–​77, 186n.25,  327–​28 kalas  165–​67, 169, 170, 171–​72, 173–​76, 178–​79, 182–​83, 184, 214, 240–​41, 326, 327 Kali  2–​3, 136, 169–​70, 173, 178–​79, 189n.102, 298 Kelley, Edward  1–​2, 51, 58–​59 Kellner, Carl  88, 163, 187n.53 Kelly, Rose  43, 74n.67, 115n.1 King James Bible (King James Version)  12n.1, 39, 72n.25, 300–​1 kink, see sadomasochism Knowledge and Conversation, see Holy Guardian Angel kundalini  163, 164–​65, 168, 169, 171, 172, 183, 326   La Gioconda, see Mona Lisa LaVey, Anton Szandor  312–​13 Lawrence, D. H.  79n.173, 113–​15, 123n.176 Left-​Hand Path  57–​58, 158, 160, 163–​64, 165–​ 66, 175, 183, 196, 276 Leland, Charles Godfrey  131, 143–​44 lesbianism, see queer: feminine/​female desire Lesser Ritual of the Pentagram (LRP)  87, 196 Lévi, Eliphas  6–​7 LGBTQ movement  40, 254, 322, 329, 330. See also butch/​femme; femme; queer Linden, Mishlen  240–​42,  281–​82 Loome, Renata  146 Lovecraft, H.P.  160–​61, 184 Lust card, see Tarot: Lust card   Maat Magick, see Nema MacKinnon, Katharine  17, 18–​19 magic, definition  7–​8 Magick, spelling  7–​8 Mary, see Virgin Mary Mary Magdalene  257, 266–​67, 279, 288n.58 Massey, Gerald  161, 162–​63, 164, 187n.43 McMurtry, Grady L.  195, 224n.2, 240

menstruation  118n.57, 166–​67, 169, 172–​74, 175, 176–​78, 180, 181, 183, 190n.124, 190n.125, 192n.193, 241–​42, 257, 326, 331 Michelet, Jules  131, 143–​44 Milton, John  44–​45 Mona Lisa,  71n.8 Moore, Alan  161 Moreau, Gustave  73n.41 Mudd, Norman  106, 122n.143 Murray, Margaret  131, 143, 152n.85   Naturphilosophie 6 Nema  235–​36 Neopaganism  6, 196–​98, 199, 221–​22, 229–​30, 233, 238–​39, 257, 265, 266, 273–​74, 282–​ 83, 284–​85, 293, 300–​1, 329, 331 Neoplatonism 6 Neuburg, Victor  1–​2, 52, 54, 58–​59, 69, 89–​90, 213–​14, 324, 336 New Isis Lodge  159, 160–​61, 187n.43 Nightside, see kabbalah: Qliphoth; Grant, Kenneth No Popery movement, see anti-​Catholicism nondualism, see Advaita Vedanta nonmonogamy/​monogamy  9, 36–​37, 45, 65–​ 66, 126–​27, 136–​37, 147, 197–​98, 249–​50, 265–​66, 268–​69, 274–​75, 278, 281–​82, 283, 284, 285–​86, 321, 322–​23, 329, 330–​31,  335 Nuit; also Nut (Nu in quotations)  43, 45–​46, 53–​54, 84, 86–​87, 94–​95, 102–​3, 110, 116n.35, 121n.120, 160, 169–​70, 189n.105, 208, 242, 264, 277, 324   occultism, see Western esotericism Ordo Templi Orientis (OTO)  8–​10, 87–​91, 110–​11, 116–​17n.38, 117n.39, 126–​27, 128, 136, 137–​38, 149n.19, 149n.26, 154n.124, 158, 159, 163, 165, 166–​68, 172, 187n.53, 195–​96, 197–​98, 199, 200n.6, 202n.30, 209, 225n.6, 240, 283 Owen, Alex  59–​60   Paganism, contemporary, see Neopaganism Pan  54, 64, 83–​84, 89–​90, 101, 129, 142, 143, 336 Paris Working  89–​90 Parsons, John Whiteside  325–​23 as Antichrist  138–​40, 152–​53n.92 Babalon Working  127–​38, 142, 146, 148, 155n.139 black pilgrimage  138–​40, 146 feminism  125, 136–​37, 140–​45,  147–​48

Index  373 Freedom is a Two-​Edged Sword  140–​43,  146 “Liber 49”  128–​32, 136, 138, 143, 295 posthumous influence  166, 181–​82, 234–​35, 249–​51,  295 sexual magic  128 socialism  125, 138, 141, 142–​43, 147 witchcraft  127–​28, 129, 130–​31, 141, 142–​ 45, 152n.85, 154n.124 Parsons Smith, Helen  126, 149n.17 Plymouth Brethren  37–​38, 39, 48–​49, 72n.26 Pollitt, Herbert Jerome  39–​40 polyamory, see nonmonogamy prostitution  attitudes towards actual (historical)  36, 65–​ 66, 104, 105 contemporary (see sex work) sacred; cultic  37, 38, 71n.12, 144, 169–​70, 175, 265–​67, 276–​82, 286n.2 Pryse, James  44–​45,  114–​15 pulp fiction  127–​28   qadeshim, see Grant, Kenneth: qadeshim queer. See also butch/​femme; femme; LGBTQ movement definition 10 feminine/​female desire  18, 19, 23–​24, 95–​96, 136–​37, 147, 197–​98, 270–​71, 285–​86, 296–​97, 298–​99, 310–​11, 312, 313–​14, 325, 328,  336–​37 genderqueer identity  8–​9, 10, 28, 183, 252–​ 53, 325, 328, 330, 337–​39 heterosexuality, possibility of  21–​22, 25, 113–​14,  342–​43   race; racialization  7, 18, 23, 29, 36, 197, 223, 224, 256, 282–​83, 285, 332–​33, 335,  337–​41 Ra-​Hoor-​Khuit  43, 72n.25, 74n.56, 128, 131 Randolph, Paschal Beverly  38–​39, 118n.47 Redgrove, Peter  174, 181, 191n.144, 326–​27 Reuss, Theodor  87–​89, 116–​17n.38, 117n.40, 117n.41, 187n.53 Revelation, Book of  1, 12–​13n.2, 39–​4, 40–​41, 43–​45, 47, 52–​53, 55–​56, 57, 60–​61, 63, 65, 66, 78n.131, 81, 82, 86, 99, 108, 113–​14, 231, 264, 266–​67, 300–​1 Röhling, Marie Lavrova  119n.65 Romanticism  37–​65, 74n.58, 83–​84, 121n.120, 130–​31, 143,  196–​97 Rops, Felicien  39–​40, 75n.80 Rosicrucianism 6 Rossetti, Christina  44–​45,  114–​15 Russell, Cecil Frederick  100, 101–​2, 107

sadomasochism  18–​19, 49–​50, 75–​76n.91, 76n.100, 81, 98, 140, 197–​98, 234, 249–​50, 254, 260n.69, 266, 268, 270, 273–​74, 281, 285–​86, 329, 331, 336–​37 Salome  36–​37, 41–​42, 54, 73n.41, 85, 324 Sangraal, see Holy Graal Satanism. See also Devil, the contemporary  6, 196, 312–​13, 319n.62 Romantic; literary  44–​45, 74n.58, 143–​44 Schippers, Mimi, key concepts  27–​29 Seckler, Phyllis  196 Secret Chiefs  46 semen  89–​90, 118n.47, 130, 162, 165, 169, 172, 174, 183, 204, 207 Semiramis  37, 38, 39, 72n.27, 96, 103, 113, 121n.125,  144–​45 sephirah; sephiroth, see kabbalah sexual magic  38–​39,  109–​10 OTO  87–​91, 150n.32 with prostitutes/​sex workers  90–​91, 121n.139,  210–​11 women’s roles in  89–​91, 110–​11, 118n.49, 118n.56, 118n.57, 148, 150n.33, 163–​ 67, 169–​72, 174–​77, 179–​81, 182–​85, 203–​11, 213–​16, 225n.6, 225n.7, 236–​37, 240–​42, 245–​47, 267, 281–​82, 324, 326–​27,  337–​38 sex work  9, 19, 254, 265–​66, 267, 268, 276–​78–​, 279–​81, 282–​83, 285–​86,  329 Shelley, Percy Bysshe  3 Shildrick, Margrit  Shuttle, Penelope  174, 181, 326–​27 Smith, Wilfred T.  126–​27, 138 Smithers, Leonard  39–​40 Snepp, Vera  46–​47, 50 social class  7, 18, 19, 23, 29, 36–​37, 104, 197, 224, 256, 282–​83, 285, 304, 332, 335, 338–​40 Song of Songs, see Clairvaux, Bernard de Soror Syrinx  207–​10, 211, 236–​37, 249–​50, 264–​65, 274–​75, 302–​4, 307, 311, 312–​13,  314–​15 Spare, Austin Osman  113–​14, 157, 159, 168 Spiritualism  6, 38–​39,  332–​33 Star Ruby  87, 116n.35, 196, 208,  300–​1 Strength card, see Tarot: Strength card Suffrage movement  110–​11. See also feminism: first-​wave Swami Pareswara Bikshu  158, 165 Swinburne, Algernon Charles  48–​49   Tantra  2–​3, 157–​59, 161, 162–​69, 170–​72, 173–​ 76, 178–​79, 181–​84, 187n.53, 218, 240–​41, 271, 326, 327

374 Index Tarot  general  49, 52–​53, 55, 60, 81, 102–​3, 115n.2, 122n.146, 146, 215 Lust card  77n.114, 108–​10, 109f, 215, 299–​300,  302 Rider-​Waite Tarot deck; Rider-​Waite version  108, 215 Strength card  52–​53,  55–​56 Thoth Tarot, general  77n.114, 108–​10, 215, 244–​45, 299–​300,  302 The Two Babylons, see Hislop, Alexander The Vision and the Voice, see Crowley, Aleister Thelema, meaning  43 Theosophy  6, 35, 38–​39, 59–​60, 123n.176, 163–​64, 331. See also Blavatsky, Helena Petrovna Therion  169, 208, 216 Traditionalism 163 transgender  10, 18, 21–​22, 28, 183, 205–​6, 210, 211, 229, 249–​50, 251–​53, 254, 257–​58, 266, 273–​74, 281, 282–​83, 285, 322, 328, 330,  337–​39 Tree of Life, see kabbalah true Will  43, 73n.49, 217–​18, 234, 244, 267 Typhon (deity)  63, 162, 169–​70, 177–​78 Typhonian Order, see Grant, Kenneth Typhonian Tradition, see Grant, Kenneth Typhonian Trilogies, see Grant, Kenneth   vaginal fluids  89–​90. See also kalas; menstruation Vama Marg, see Left-​Hand Path Venus  38, 84–​85, 136, 176, 179–​80, 265, 308

Virgin Mary; Mary  36–​37, 38, 44, 45, 61–​62, 67, 68, 79n.166, 103, 113–​14, 144–​45, 231–​ 32, 263–​65, 266–​67, 270, 281, 292, 293–​94, 295, 298–​99, 324 virgin-​whore dichotomy  4, 20–​21, 44, 45, 61–​ 62, 63, 67, 103, 144–​45, 176, 231–​33, 235, 263–​64, 281, 283–​84, 292, 293–​94, 295, 298, 335 Vodou  127, 149n.24, 159–​60   Western esotericism  contemporary demographics  196–​98 and gender  4, 5 history, general  38–​39, 70n.5, 199, 254–​55, 260n.79, 328, 332–​33 and occultism  6–​7 overview  6–​7 as the “wastebasket of modernity”  6–​7,  332–​33 as Western  7 Wicca  143, 154n.124, 196, 229–​30, 251, 293,  300–​1 Wilde, Oscar  39–​40,  41–​42 Williams, Brandy  263–​64 Williamson, Jack  127–​28, 143 witches, witchcraft  2–​3, 47–​48, 75n.81, 127–​28, 129, 130–​31, 141, 142–​45, 148, 152n.85, 168, 173, 174, 196–​97, 233, 241, 249–​50, 268–​69, 300–​1,  325 Wolfe, Jane  94–​96, 106–​7, 122n.143, 127, 135–​ 36, 146, 149n.24, 150n.34   Yorke, Gerald J.  155n.139