So I was doing some random surfing online about occultism, Crowley, and the OTO. when I came across a few articles linking these things to the Freemasons. I'm not totally sure if we talked about it during class, but apparently the Ordo Templi Orientis group that Crowley was a memeber of was actually a part of the high ranking Freemasons BEFORE he took over. I had no idea that the OTO. was originally supposed to be a part of the Freemasons, but apparently Crowley had other ideas. This article talks about him reorganizing the OTO and has some more biographical information about him. His reorganization of the OTO made me wonder if he was opposed to Freemasonry, and if the Freemasons really do have any link to the occult because we all know Crowley was totally into that stuff.
This got me thinking about how the Freemasons have been tied to the occult in history. I'm sure most of you know about the history of the Freemasons, which dates back to the 1600s but this got me interested in how the occult could be tied to this mysterious fraternal organization. Of course, I'm not completely sure of the authenticity of these two articles, but they are actually pretty interesting. Freemasonry is a Religion says that "Freemasonry currently serves as the conduit between the political organizations of the global elite...and the occult groups of the Theosophical network." Maybe a bit of an extreme decleration, but it can't be argued that for centuries people have blamed the Freemasons for magical practices and some have seen it as an evil power.
This article offers the answering that Freemasonry is part of an occult partially because occult means hidden, and what could be more hidden than what happens in the Grand Lodge? It goes on to talk about how the first users of the Grand Lodge, the Illuminati, were developing evil plans of some sort and using magick, and that in the past century many groups who have played a part in the occult revival can all be linked to Freemasons.
It's obvious that we'll never know exactly what part the Freemasons have played in occult revival, or if behind those closed doors they're lighting candles and chanting spells. I think that the mystery surrounding the Freemasons is the only thing that keeps it interesting, and keeps people conjuring up those rediculous conspiracy theories.
1 comment:
Very interesting stuff, Eleanor. It is surprising sometimes to me how closely connected many of these groups seem to be.
I recall an interesting thing I heard a few years back. I borrowed a book from a local pagan group's library: The Secret Rituals of the OTO. It is not as exciting as you might think, BTW. Anyway, when someone (I can't recall who) saw this on my shelf they asked where I got it, and said that it was extremely hard to get, and that current members of the OTO were trying to buy up every extant copy, because it had been written by a former disgruntled member who never should have revealed their "secrets"!
I have a friend who has been in witchcraft covens for years but more recently joined a group of Masons in his town and has risen in their ranks rather quickly. A fair bit of the ritual text and practice used in modern Wicca derives from Freemasonry, actually. But even though what they do is connected to occult practices, and their proceedings are highly ritualized, and they are more or less a "secret society", they do not, unlike modern witches, actually practice magic (or magick, as Uncle Al would call it).
A frined of mine who lives in England once told me that nearly every person connected to government in the UK is a Freemason, and that it's impossible to get ahead in the fields of politics, law or business without being a member. As we have noted with occult involvement in the UK as portrayed in films, Freemasonry is also connected to an elitist notion of the occult arts (and therefore occult society) only being accessible to the upper classes. Though the class system in England really only remains in a vestigial way, the Freemason presence still causes a lot of class-conscious resentment, apparently.
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