Concerning The Somnium Scipionis

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An Esoteric Note On The Somnium Scipionis Of Cicero
(pdf)

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The above text is a companion to the author’s recent essay Some Notes On The Picatrix.

Some Notes On The Picatrix

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The Latin text known in the West as the Picatrix – a medieval translation, via Spanish, of the Arabic text Ghayat al-Ḥakim, which Arabic text has been dated as from around the year 1000 CE {1} – has received some attention in the last few decades by those interested in or claiming to be practitioners of Western Occultism, with a few English translations of the Latin text by such people available and with some of these versions stating that they are based on the scholarly version of the Latin text, edited by David Pingree, published in 1986 by the Warburg Institute. The problem with these modern translations based on the text of the Picatrix is of course that they are translations of a Latin medieval translation of a Spanish translation and thus are quite far removed from the original Arabic text.

The Picatrix itself is widely believed – by scholars – to have influenced and informed the European Renaissance, and a recent book titled Arabic Influences on Early Modern Occult Philosophy {2} places the Picatrix in the necessary historical context, referencing as it does works by and studies of figures such as Marsilio Ficino, Aristotle, Macrobius (who wrote Commentarii in Somnium Scipionis), and Al-Farabi.

In terms of modern Western Occultism, the Ghayat al-Ḥakim – the original Arabic text – and some other Arabic texts would seem to be the origin of the ‘grimoire’ and talismanic tradition predating as they do the much later Hebrewesque and Kabbalah influenced grimoires – with their Hebrewesque ‘demons’ – beloved by The Hermetic Order of The Golden Dawn, Aleister Crowley, Howard Stanton Levey, and by perhaps the majority of individuals claiming to be practitioners of Western Occultism.

            In contrast to this later Hebrewesque and Kabbalah influenced grimoire tradition, the Order of Nine Angles (ONA, O9A) have always claimed not only that their Occult tradition pre-dates such Hebrewesque and Kabbalah influenced Occult traditions but is also the original, the traditional, Western Occult tradition, melding as that original tradition did Greco-Roman pagan sources – for example, the Somnium Scipionis of Cicero, and the Corpus Hermeticum with its septenary anados {3} – with Arabic sources such as Al-Kitab Al-Alfak (The Book Of The Spheres) and which Arabic text was most probably influenced by, or derived from, the Ghayat al-Ḥakim.

The O9A have also claimed that the later Hebrewesque and Kabbalah influenced Occult tradition – with its ten-fold Otz Chim – is a distorted version of the earlier, Greco-Roman and pagan, septenary tradition. {4} {5}

That the O9A claims have scholarly, historical and Western pagan foundations should by now be obvious to those who have studied primary sources such as the Arabic text of the Ghayat al-Ḥakim, other Arabic works such as De Radiis Stellarum by Al-Kindi, {6} and Kitab Al Madkhal Al Kabir Fi’ilm Ahkam Al Noudjoum, {7} and who have also taken the trouble to read Myatt’s commentaries on the Corpus Hermeticum as well as O9A essays such as (i) Lapis Philosophicus, Isaac Newton, And The Septenary System and (ii) Azoth: Western Alchemy And The Seven Fold Way Of The Order Of Nine Angles. {8}

R. Parker
July 2018 ev
v.1.03

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{1} As of July 2018 ev, a digital edition of the Arabic text of Ghayat al-Ḥakim – published in 1933 in Germany – is available at http://catalogue.ulrls.lon.ac.uk/record=b2205045~S12

{2} Liana Saif, Arabic Influences on Early Modern Occult Philosophy, Palgrave Historical Studies in Witchcraft and Magic, 2015, ISBN 978-1137399465.

{3} qv. David Myatt’s translation of and commentary on the Pymander text of the Corpus Hermeticum, available in his book Corpus Hermeticum: Eight Tractates. 2017. ISBN 978-1976452369

See also the O9A text Alchemical And Hermetic Antecedents Of The Seven Fold Way, available from https://omega9alpha.wordpress.com/ἀρρενόθηλυς/

{4} qv. O9A texts such as https://omega9alpha.wordpress.com/2013/12/25/originality-tradition-and-the-order-of-nine-angles/

{5} qv. the O9A compilation The Esoteric Hermeticism Of The O9A, available from https://omega9alpha.wordpress.com/2016/03/30/the-esoteric-hermeticism-of-the-order-of-nine-angles/

{6} According to some scholars this treatise by the Arab philosopher Al-Kindi influenced John Dee.

{7} A copy of the Arabic text is, as of July 2018 ev, available at https://archive.org/details/1H5Uuo

{8} The essays are included in The Esoteric Hermeticism Of The O9A.

The Exoteric And Esoteric Reality Of The O9A

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The Exoteric And Esoteric Reality Of The Order Of Nine Angles
(pdf)

The O9A Deofel Quartet

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The Deofel Quartet present much of the diverse aural traditions of the Order of Nine Angles as Anton Long received them: as stories about people, their interactions; their ‘satanic’ or esoteric views and beliefs; and about certain events that involved those people. In The Deofel Quartet he simply reworked the factual material – as writers of fiction are wont to do – in order to make an interesting story, in the process obscuring the identities of those involved and sometimes their place of residence or work; added some entertaining details (as in the ‘astral battles’ of a kind now familiar – decades later – from the Harry Potter stories) and concatenated certain events in order to provide ‘action’ in a limited time-frame.

Thus, the fictional stories not only compliment other O9A material but provide a ‘different way into’ the complex O9A mythos; a way that many will find more interesting (and certainly more entertaining) than thousands of pages of sometimes polemical and sometimes ponderous O9A factual texts, and a way that especially places the O9A’s satanism into perspective, Aeonically and otherwise.

The Quartet was written by Anton Long with the stories originally read out from handwritten manuscripts at Temple/nexion meetings of the Order of Nine Angles (O9A) in the decades of the 1970s and 1980s. These meetings were never large – sometimes only a few people, occasionally a dozen or less – and were always held in intimate and candle-lit surroundings.

Following the expansion of the O9A in the late 1980s resulting from O9A articles being published in occult zines such as Nox, the original handwritten manuscripts (most with handwritten corrections or alterations) were, in the early 1990s typed out on manual typewriters by various people.

° Falcifer
° The Temple of Satan
° The Giving
° The Greyling Owl

Further reading:

O9A Occult Fiction
(pdf)
Note: Contains Plot Spoilers

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Other fictional works by the O9A include:

° Eulalia – Dark Daughter of Baphomet. c.2009.
° Tales of the Dark Gods, c.2008, comprising the four short stories (i) In The Sky of Dreaming, (ii) Jenyah, (iii) Sabirah, and (iv) A Dark Trilogy.
° The two individual short stories Hangster’s Gate and Copula cum Daemone. c. 1976.
° The short story Gruyllan’s Tale, which forms part of the Balocraft of Baphomet series. c.2010.
° The short story Sunedrion: A Wyrdful Tale. 2015.

Herewith, A Return To The Dark?

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Herewith, A Return To The Dark?

As Anton Long wrote in 2011 ev in the ONA text The Discovery and Knowing of Satan,

                   “The Order of Nine Angles is an esoteric association of individuals, and the emphasis of this association is on: (1) practical experience and challenges (Occult, exoteric, and amoral) and (2) on the authority of individual judgement. Thus, for the ONA, what matters is the individual developing, from their own years-long (mostly decades-long) practical experience, a personal weltanschauung: that is, discovering their own individual answers to certain questions concerning themselves, life, existence, the Occult, and the nature of Reality.”

Also, two decades earlier he had written,

                   “There is no acceptance of someone else’s authority […] I claim no authority, and my creations, profuse as they are, will in the end be accepted or rejected on the basis of whether they work. Satan forbid they should ever become dogma or a matter of faith. I also expect to see them become transformed, by their own metamorphosis and that due to other individuals: changed, extended and probably ultimately transcended, may be even forgotten. They – like the individual I am at the moment – are only a stage, toward something else.” {1}

As Professor Monette explained, the O9A

                   “is not a structured lodge or temple, but rather a movement, a subculture or perhaps metaculture that its adherents choose to embody or identify with.” {2}

Now, in 2018 ev, with the early stages of Phase III of O9A sinister strategy {3} well-presenced, {4} and with an abundance of new and old O9A texts freely (and, for now, still) available from the omega9alpha weblog, it is obvious that the public future and the public persona/personae of the O9A – and the present and future interpretations, manifestations, and the natural evolution of the O9A – belong to (i) independent O9A nexions – be they traditional, Satanist, pagan, Left Hand Path, NS-orientated, Darkly Sinister, Vampyric, or otherwise – and (ii) to those artists, musicians (of whatever genre or none) and activists who presence by their endeavours the sinister-numinous aesthetic, and/or who presence or embody the esoteric philosophy and praxises, of the Order of Nine Angles.

Sufficient has been written, over the past four decades, by both “Anton Long” and The Inner ONA for those interested in the O9A to, should they so desire, follow the O9A Seven Fold Way, establish an independent O9A nexion or presence the ethos of the O9A through music and art or by other means.

Sufficient has also been written to counter the anti-O9A propaganda and silly allegations that modern self-described – mostly Levey inspired – ‘satanists’ and mundane others have spewed forth for decades and no doubt will continue to spew forth by means of various mediums.

All that those interested in the O9A, or interested in understanding the O9A, need for them to begin to appreciate the O9A in esoteric context – that is, sans polemics and propaganda, both O9A and anti-O9A – are the following five, brief, introductory guides all of which are available as gratis open access (pdf) documents:

Practical Guide To The Seven Fold Way
(pdf)

The Exoteric And Esoteric Reality Of The O9A
(pdf)

Classifying O9A Texts
(pdf)

Quintessence Of The Order Of Nine Angles
(pdf)

O9A Occult Fiction
(pdf)

T.W.S. Nexion
May 2018 ev
v.1.07

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{1} Letter to Michael Aquino, dated 20th October 1990 ev. The Satanic Letters of Stephen Brown. Volume 1. Thormynd Press, 1992.

{2} Monette, Connell. Mysticism in the 21st Century. 2013. Sirius Academic Press. p.89

{3} Phase III of the sinister strategy of the O9A is evident
(i) in “a burgeoning esoteric [O9A inspired] culture of which clandestine O9A nexions are a part,”
(ii) in those clandestine O9A nexions returning to the tradition of personal covert recruitment and the practical testing of new Initiates which testing includes culling,
(iii) in each O9A person, nexion, group, or cell, freely developing their own interpretation of everything O9A, because they are “free to develop and change everything O9A, [since] there is no authority above the individual, or beyond each group or collective of groups. No leader, no outer (or inner) representative, no council, no old guard, who can make pronouncements about or declare what is or is not correct. No official or genuine O9A; no heresy; no proscription of individuals or groups. Furthermore, no consensus is necessary or required among those who are or who associate with the O9A, although naturally a particular O9A nexion may have or arrive at a particular internal consensus and thus presence a particular interpretation of matters O9A,”
(iv) in “each O9A person, nexion, group, or cell, [using] their own judgement in respect of what they do; in how they, individually and/or as part of an O9A nexion, presence the dark and manifest the sinister in practical ways,”
(v) in the retirement of “Anton Long”.

{4} Examples of such recent Presencing “Of The Sinister” (valid as of May 2018 ev) include but are not limited to the following:

§ the availability of gratis open access digital texts such as (a) the 1460 page seventh edition of Guide To The Order of Nine Angles: Theory and Praxises (external link), and (b) its companion work the 159 page The Esoteric Hermeticism Of The O9A (pdf),
§ the availability of printed versions of classic ONA texts included in books such as (a) The Sinister Tradition, ISBN 978-1479324613, (b) Hostia: Secret Teachings of the ONA, ISBN 978-1493633906, and (c) Sinister Tales, ISBN 978-1479305636,
§ the active and traditional Italian Secuntra nexion, who have published two books – (a) Corpus Secuntra, Telos, ISBN 978-1981879342, and ISBN 978-1545074497, and (b) Satanica Eresia – Una Guida al Satanismo, ISBN 978-1986070034 – and also recorded some O9A chants,
§ the Deathwave Nexion who have produced recordings by O9A-inspired musicians such as Hvile I Kaos which band had a successful public concert in 2018 at a venue in Long Beach California,
§ the release of ‘sinisterly-numinous’ recordings by the Deverills Nexion,
§ the Finnish Black Metal record label The Sinister Flame, and groups such as Altar of Perversion,
§ the MMP Temple record label,
§ the Tempel ov Blood,
§ the Non Est Secundus Quia Unus Est book of Tarot images by Richard Moult,
§ the O9A inspiring some members of some politically active National Socialist groups.
§ And so on and so on…

Another Journalist Misunderstands The O9A

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One of the investigative journalists who earlier this year wrote about the neo-nazi group AtomWaffen Division {1} has revealed – through messages posted on “Twitter” – what appears to be a basic lack of understanding of the O9A despite having claimed that he has studied the O9A for quite some time. His earlier “tweets” about a possible connection between AtomWaffen Division (AWD) and the O9A may well have led to journalist Kelly Weill publishing an article in The Daily Beast about links between AWD and the O9A.

The journalist in question is Jake Hanrahan who, in his latest tweets about the O9A, referenced an article on a website and which website states that it represents an O9A nexion.

In those “tweets” Hanrahan appears to assume that what is written on the website in regard to Mr Myatt is some sort of “official statement” by the O9A whereas – as Anton Long and many others have stated time and time again – no one person, no one O9A nexion, no collocations of O9A nexions, can ever speak or write “on behalf of the O9A” since the fundamental O9A principle of the authority of individual judgment means that the O9A does not have, never has had, and never will have an “official policy” about anything, and never has, and never will make “official statements” about anything. {2}

All any person or group associating themselves with the sub-culture that is the O9A {3} can do is present their personal opinion and/or their personal interpretation of matters O9A and otherwise.

Hanrahan thus seems to repeat the error made by the likes of Massimo Introvigne which is the fallacy of Illicit Transference {4}.

That journalists, academics, and others – in respect of the O9A – continue to commit the fallacy of Illicit Transference by ignoring one of the fundamental principles of the esoteric philosophy of the O9A is proof of just how limited their research into the O9A is, has been, and continues to be.

In regard to how people associating themselves with the O9A regard Mr David Myatt, journalists, academics, and others should read the book A Modern Mysterium {5} and the article Decoding The Life Of Myatt {6}. They will find a diversity of opinion, which diversity is in accord with the O9A principle of the authority of individual judgment.

TWS Nexion
June 2018 ev

{1} For an overview see https://wyrdsister.wordpress.com/2018/03/24/the-o9a-and-atomwaffen-a-summary/

{2} The matter is outlined, with references to the relevant O9A texts, in the article referenced at {1} and also in the article at https://wyrdsister.wordpress.com/2018/06/02/about-this-blog/

{3} As Professor Monette explained, the O9A is “not a structured lodge or temple, but rather a movement, a subculture or perhaps metaculture that its adherents choose to embody or identify with.” Monette, Connell. Mysticism in the 21st Century. Sirius Academic Press. 2013, p.89.

{4} Scott, Kerri. The Authority Of Individual Judgment And The Fallacy Of Illicit Transference, in The Peculiar Matter Of Myatt And Long, 2018, e-text. The essay is included in the compilation A Modern Mysterium: The Enigma of Myatt And The O9A, see {5} below.

{5} Available as a gratis open access (pdf) file at
https://www.o9a.org/wp-content/uploads/myattian-mysterium-v7.pdf [accessed June 2018]

{6} https://wyrdsister.wordpress.com/2018/06/01/myatt-and-the-o9a/

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Article source: https://wyrdsister.wordpress.com/2018/06/15/another-journalist-misunderstands-the-o9a/

The O9A Star Game

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The O9A Star Game
(pdf)

I. Overview of The Star Game
II. Introducing The Star Game

The two articles – one written in 2013, the other in 2018 – outline the Esoteric Art of the O9A Star Game, a modern and innovative method of both personal and Aeonic sorcery.

Another Academic Misrepresentation

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A 2017 essay by Della E. Campion of the University of Washington Рwho has written various essays about modern esotericism and modern Satanism Рdeals with the Order of Nine Angles document titled The Culling Texts, containing as that document does the five (mostly vintage) texts (i) Concerning Culling as Art, (ii) A Gift for the Prince РA Guide to Human Sacrifice, (ii) Victims РA Sinister Expos̩, (iii) Culling РA Guide to Sacrifice II, (iv) Guidelines for the Testing of Opfers, (v) Satanism, Sacrifice, and Crime РThe Satanic Truth.

There are serious flaws with the essay and which flaws undermine the argument and conclusions of Campion.

The article by Ms Scott enumerates these five serious flaws and, by referencing O9A primary sources, deals with each in detail.

Another Academic Misrepresentation Of The Order Of Nine Angles
(pdf)

Classifying Order Of Nine Angles Texts

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Classifying O9A Texts
(pdf)

Since the early 1980s, beginning with the Black Book of Satan, the Order of Nine Angles (O9A, ONA) has published and circulated thousands of texts; so many in fact that one academic wrote:

               “the ONA has produced more material on both the practical and theoretical aspects of magic, as well as more ideological texts on Satanism and the Left-Hand Path in general, than larger groups such as the Church of Satan and the Temple of Set has produced in combination [which] makes the ONA an important player in the theoretical discussion of what the Left-Hand Path and Satanism is and should be according to the practitioners.” {1}

Given (i) the sheer volume of O9A texts, (ii) the growing interest in the O9A both academically and otherwise, and (iii) the profusion of recent (post-2011) texts dealing with aspects of O9A esotericism such as links to Hellenic hermeticism and why the O9A represents a ‘sinister-numinous’ and modern pagan tradition, it seems apposite to place now familiar O9A texts into their historical and esoteric context.

T.W.S. Nexion
129 yf

{1} Senholt, Jacob. The Sinister Tradition. A paper presented at the international conference, Satanism in the Modern World, held at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology in Trondheim on the 19-20th of November, 2009. p.26

Western Paganism

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Regarding Western Paganism And Hermeticism
(pdf)

A selection of recent articles about Western paganism and hermeticism.

Contents:

° Preface
° Re-discovering Western Paganism
° An Insight Into Pagan Mysticism
° Regarding The Hermetica
° The Divine Pymander
° Monas – A New Translation of Corpus Hermeticum IV
° On Native Egyptian Influence In The Corpus Hermeticum
° Suffering, Honour, And The Culture Of The West
° A New Pagan Metaphysics

Appendix I – Concerning ἀγαθός and νοῦς in the Corpus Hermeticum
Appendix II – A Review Of ‘Classical Paganism And The Christian Ethos’