Fraternitas Saturni
Ordo Templi Orientis
Knights of the Neurosy-Cross
Nosferatu's Baby
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Please note that this article has no footnotes or source-references; the interested reader should
refer to the author's books, for example the English online version of The O.T.O. Phenomenon. The topic of hostility towards women in religion and occultism has scarcely been touched on in studies of these subjects. However, it is a symptom of such attitudes that even the hedonistic prophet of the "New Æon" Aleister Crowley, and his quasi-counterpart the ascetic Arnoldo Krumm-Heller, adhered to certain forms of misogyny in both theory and practice; attitudes which are still present in those who proclaim their ideas of a new humanity. The reader should ideally be familiar with The O.T.O. Phenomenon, or the authors' articles, before reading the following excursus on the practices and psychology of the various O.T.O. groups. In the disguised O.T.O. lodge that calls itself Fraternitas Saturni (FS), there is a misogynistic agenda, to which the FS's founder Eugen Grosche gave blatant voice. Only a few of many examples need be quoted here: "The Female Being is the enemy and the opposer of Man from the very Beginning." "Certainly not every cow is a beast of prey, and not every Female Animal a demonic being." The purpose of marriage is "to domesticate man." What can Man do against it? "In marriage the will of Man must be dominant." "The influence on Man of the pure sexual urge for females will be defeated in time through the self-conscious spiritualization of Woman." Under his pseudonym of Gregor A. Gregorius, Grosche defined his view of women's rôle clearly: "To be a lover who only satisfies all sexual and erotic desires of man." Nonetheless, the FS was - and still is - described as a "unique and recognised magical Lodge" which "nevertheless admits women," though the female members are only qualified "as help-meets for experimental magic, and in the cult of the sexual Mysteries." Hence the men in the FS used "consciously created sexual dependance" to achieve their aims. Grosche's successors have continued this doctrine: Karl Wedler (or 'Giovanni') and his protegé Guido Wolther ('Daniel') have on the one hand declared that "homosexuals and pederasts must be rejected as sex-magical monstrosities" - yet on the other hand proclaimed that the ruling spirit of the present æon is the "Dæmon of torture and adultery" worshipped with "grains of incense steeped in semen and human blood; he follows the Dæmon of Lies, of Sodomy and Homosexuality, the Dæmon of Lewdness and Orgies." This is indicated by certain magical symbols, which are said to confer "immediate power with respect to sex on both men and women." Wedler gave his "brother and friend" Wolther a manuscript entitled 'The Devil's Elixirs', which contained recipes for poisoning enemies, inflicting deadly ailments, driving people insane, and so on ad nauseam. Having come upon the dogma propounded by his FS predecessors, Dieter Heikaus ('Set Horus') elected to cathartically reveal their ideas to the outside world - a risky process that he hoped would set these "great magicians" up as magical idols once more. He decided that his Ordo Saturni, and more particularly its internal 'Pentalpha' group, could perform "the sex-magical operations of the old FS". Nosferatu's BabyBecause of his chauvinistic attitudes towards women, Eugen Grosche was never able to find his soul-mate in the physical world, but using his occult arts and knowledge, assumed the form of 'GOTOS' an égregore or group-spirit. GOTOS was also called 'UTUIT', which was supposed to mean 'OTO-it' (a sort of activated form); it was also the highest rank in the FS (from 'Gradus Ordo Templi Orientis Saturni'), and the égregore was created as an astral body by the joint efforts of all FS members, using a specially created head-and-shoulders statue or bust to help their efforts. By this means, Grosche hoped that after his death, in the form of GOTOS's astral body, he could at last be united with his soul-mate - and thereby reach an androgynous state on a higher plane. This group-spirit was supposed to have some femimine characteristics, but the only feminine aspect of GOTOS was the mediumship used to obtain the design of its statue. Representing an égregore as a bust or head recalls the literary traditions of statues coming to life (see next section); or else the tale of Salomé, who desired John the Baptist's head on a platter - perhaps to gain his powers of prophecy. So the central concept in FS lodges is that of the lodge égregore, and its powers of re-animation. The classic prototype for such an idea is that of Baphomet, the supposed idol of the Knights Templar, who was (as the Roman Emperor) likewise worshipped in the form of a head. It has been claimed that Baphomet was invoked with the first sura of the Qur'an, and dismissed with the twenty-fourth chapter of the apocryphal Book of Sirach. O.T.O. groups have all made use of the idea of Baphomet - but in the Saturn lodges it has been given a different emphasis, and far greater value than in the other versions of the O.T.O. People out of stoneIn India, it is a tradition amongst certain Tantric sects to anoint their phallic lingam images with oil, milk, and sometimes semen. A similar tradition involving living statues and plaster busts exists in Western culture - at least on a literary level. E.T.A. Hoffman, Edgar Allen Poe, Ambrose Bierce, and Jules Verne amongst others, have reinterpreted the original myth of Pygmalion from Ovid; it can even be seen in the musical 'My Fair Lady'. This tradition fulfills an ancient human dream, that of bringing the dead back to life, either artificially or with the help of the gods of magic. Even today there are hints of it in cybernetics and genetic engineering. Inspired by the attempts of Charles Darwin's grandfather Erasmus Darwin to re-animate dead worms, the nineteen-year-old Mary Shelley wrote the novel 'Frankenstein: or the new Prometheus' which was published in 1818. More on the theme has been written more recently by authors such as Philip K. Dick (as in 'Blade Runner'), Alfred Bester, Stanislaw Lem and Pierre Klossowsky. In Switzerland in 1972, a drama based on the classical myth of Galatea appeared, expressing the eternal dream of a man for a woman who is wholly dedicated to him. In the play, which was a reworking of an 'Alpensaga' (Swiss mountain fairy tale), some farmers create a 'Sennentuntschi', an artificial woman grown in a bottle from a mixture of dung and cheese. Needless to say, Sennentuntschi soon frees herself from their attentions. In Jewish mysticism, there is the legend of the Golem, which is ultimately based on Psalm 139 verse 16; the story is best known from the mediæval golem created by Rabbi Löw of Prague, as described in Gustav Meyrink's impressive novel The Golem (1915). Golems are reproductions of Adam, formed from the dust of the earth, and they go even further back in Jewish culture, as may be discovered in a commentary on the ancient Cabalistic text the Sefer Yetzirah, as expounded by the eminent scholar Gershom Scholem. The German author of occult and erotic potboilers H.H. Ewers added a sexual twist to the legend with his novel Alraune in 1911. Also in Germany, Paul Wegener directed a film of The Golem in 1915, the first in a series of German films such as Nosferatu, Das Kabinett des Doktor Caligari and Dr. Mabuse which evoked a fascination for evil. Neo-Gnostics and secret societies in Germany and elsewhere got a lot of inspiration from fictional sources such as these - enough for them to devise their own 'Order Secrets'. The concept of the Homunculus, an alchemical mannikin produced in a bottle, was not foreign to Theodor Reuss, the O.T.O.'s founder. The prescribed reading-list for O.T.O. members included G. Herman's work called Genesis - das Gesetz der Zeugung (Genesis - the Law of Procreation) which describes the production of a being "who is realized through the odic power of materialization, and which as odic mist streams from the vulvae, and under the traditional uterine influence easily forms child-souls." The alchemist Paracelsus described his formula for creating a Homunculus using blood and semen, and this has been compared to the consecrated hosts of the Spermo-Gnostics. In 1914 Aleister Crowley wrote his Xth degree instruction De Homunculo Epistola in which he described the homunculus, even though he was less than enthusiastic about it. It is quite possible that he had been inspired by Somerset Maugham, who had published a novel called The Magician in 1907, whose villain Oliver Haddo is based on Crowley; in the novel Haddo manufactures a mad homunculus by devilish arts. Similarly, Crowley himself wrote a novel in 1917 (not published until 1929) called Moonchild, in which sex-magicians create a speaking homunculus with astrological enchantments. "You are my Creator, but I am your Master — Obey!" [Mary Shelley, Frankenstein]In the Saturn Lodges a definite connection was made between the subject of 'artificial astral beings' and Vampire mythology. The égregore and its incarnate 'tenant', the possessor of the highest degree in the FS, were fuelled by the vital sexual powers of all the lodge members. Both the FS and its successor the Ordo Saturni deliberately tried to create a form of astral vampire, which they hoped eventually to incarnate as a being of flesh and blood. It was a reversal of the Christian Eucharist, where the congregation consumes the supposed flesh and blood of God, in the form of bread and wine. If one believes that Gods are the creation of Man, then it follows that an order-egregore is also a God. To successfully create a Golem might therefore mean that with the Golem even a God could be vicariously destroyed; a dream of omnipotence realised. In the FS the office of Gotos permits a personality to be united with GOTOS UTUIT itself; the Outer Head of the Order (OHO) becomes the Inner Head of the Order (IHO). Deus est Homo - Homo est Deus, as was stated similarly (but unconnectedly) in Reuss and Crowley's Liber Agapé. In the FS's magical system, the libido during sexual intercourse was transferred from the sexual partner to the astral égregore. In concrete terms, this meant all that heterosexual and homosexual activity was conducted with the use of wordshells/euphemisms (Holy, Logos, Saturn, etc.) to feed the égregore's vitality. These efforts to identify the Saturn Order with an (at least) astral Golem, a Homunculus, an image or statue brought to life, or else some other form of android to build up power, is quite different from the practises of other O.T.O. groups, who are effectively engaged in a quest for the 'Elixir of Life' in the form of psychosexual secretions to gain self-empowerment, or to contact spirits. Nonetheless, this has not prevented some membrs of the so-called 'Caliphate' O.T.O. from joining the Ordo Saturni; in the Saturn lodges this 'elixir' was mostly used for anointing the statue of the GOTOS. Baphomet and the O.T.O.The égregore has never been an important issue to other O.T.O. groups. As Marcelo Ramos Motta wrote: "the Egregora does exist in the so-called 'astral plane' and it is a demon, that is to say, an illusory entity. It is not a true Microcosm, but a gestalt of vitalized shells, a focus for everything that is negative, defeatist, maudlin, bigoted, introverted in human nature - a morass completely hostile to progress and to the spiritual evolution of mankind." The publication of an earlier version of the foregoing sections in this essay caused some interest among members of the 'Typhonian' O.T.O. following the FS example, they duly devised what they called an 'Égregore Map' from various more or less Thelemic entities: Lam, Olun, Aiwass, Maat, Babalon, and the Beast. "It can be defined as the group spirit (super-consciousness) of all the members of a particular Order... It is analogous to the running of magical computer programs across a network of adepts or members, in order to access necessary gnosis and guidance from the Secret Chiefs. This can be done using these égregore maps because they express the laws of Creation and the Fall through their symbolism. They allow people to free themselves from the lust of result by the externalisation of the Holy Guardian Angel into the égregore." The égregore is by definition a created soul (psychogon); according to Aleister Crowley it serves mostly to realise of wishes, and is consequently a 'helpmeet-spirit' who obeys the Holy Guardian Angel as in the Abramelin system. The 'Book of the Sacred Magic of Abramelin the Mage' (see illustrations 1 & 2 ) describes one method of attaining communication with one's guardian angel; every human being has an individual spiritual power, a divine mirror image called the Holy Guardian Angel, who restores a link to the divine for human beings engulfed in matter. Once contact with the Guardian Angel has been established - after six lunar months of asceticism and constant devotional prayer - the magician may then (if he dares) invoke armies of demons and servile spirits to do his will. From the other side, it could reasonably be claimed that the guardian angel gets something in return. In the ecstasy of a human orgasm, the Angel attains a vision of the Universe as a continuous, unblemished phenomenon, where it is separated from the pure union of human with the divine; and thus the Angel finds wholeness in the human to whom it ministers. Many FS techniques, like absorbing the libido from sexual partners may also be found in O.T.O. lodges. But in the OTO, the method is to transfer the libido's energy to one's own ego and its adjuncts. The Order becomes a substitute for the archetypal Mother, while its charismatic leader is transformed into a substitute for the corresponding Father-figure. This practice started with Carl Kellner, whose female followers wore a locket containing a photograph of him, and the lamen, or magical shield of the Memphis-Misraim Rite: a sphinx within a pyramid under a blazing sun. Kellner viewed his self-created office as Baphomet as descending from the Babylonian priesthood. However, in Richard Payne Knight's interpretation, Baphomet was an androgynous figure who united active and passive polarities. Kellner apparently did not accept Éliphas Lévi's diabolic interpretation of Baphomet, which Crowley was later to use in the 'Devil' card of his Thoth Tarot designs. Indeed, Crowley always described himself as Baphomet in connection with the O.T.O., and considered this to unite the offices of both Inner and Outer Head of the Order in himself - they were linked in the concept of the homosexual eleventh degree of the O.T.O. [This might explain the 'Caliph' William Breeze's assumption of the XIth degree]. It is not known whether he ever tried to bring an image to life (except the skeleton he fed with blood at his Chancery Lane 'Black Temple'), or to use Baphomet as an égregore in the FS sense. Certainly, when his follower Jack Parsons tried to create a homunculus with the aid of sex-magic (and the founder of Scientology, Lafayette Ronald Hubbard), Crowley reacted angrily, calling the affair "nonsense". Crowley, alias Baphomet XI°, assumed the rôle of an idealised father-figure in his rescension of the O.T.O. By idolising Crowley/Baphomet in this way, his followers nurtured precociously regressive sadistic and anal attitudes, which tended to be acted out in the form of oral aggression, as a consequence of a significant upset of the balance between fantasy and reality. As the central idol of the Crowleyan O.T.O. there stood a golden phallus, with which the sex-magician was meant to identify himself in the form of an ejaculating penis. In O.T.O. groups of this school there is little possibility of using such phallocentric and narcissistic behaviour as a way of obtaining solitary communion with an égregore. Energies liberated in this way would generate 'disorder' in 'practicing' individuals (at least in the higher degrees). The imitation of Crowley's biography stimulates dramatic relationships and drug-addiction. There is no Gnosis here. No, not even here, where a Gnostic sense of an intolerable existence is reflected in several different O.T.O. Orders all at war with each other; these merely show that there is a yawning void between the 'rotten places' and the Pleroma. With these O.T.O.'s, the light at the end of the tunnel for seekers is the corpse-light glimmer from carefully contrived schemes and inducements towards sensuality and self-indulgence; it shines on a mouthful of semen, and illuminates no more than ready-made images, images which are endlessly imitated, regurgitated and thoroughly manufactured. Knights of the Neurosy-CrossThe Saturn lodges have never succeded in achieving the union of the human holder of the Gotos office, with the GOTOS égregore. This is apparently why the O.T.O. fell into schism during Crowley's time; the Saturn lodges have not been able ("so far" that is) to invoke the spirits of Pluto necessary to the union, and this has meant the Gotos-Golem (the O.T.O. Saturni Golem) has fragmented into narcissistic offshoots of Grosche and his allies. If this human Gotos is not a Charismatic individual, then the efforts of his followers can only be devoted to the service of the égregore-GOTOS, charging it up like a battery; but if the human Gotos does not remain in the background, then the magical energies can flow back, and not drain away. But this latter possibility only works if the human Gotos avoids the trap of narcissistic folly through excessive dependance on the GOTOS (human or égregore), as also so long as the human Gotos separates himself from the lodge members having an influence on psychological transmission. This practice has only been tried in the 'Caliphate' O.T.O. (in contrast to H.J. Metzger's group) where the chief of the Order, the 'Caliph' remains effectively incomminicado, except for 'ex-cathedra' pronouncements; paradoxically, the 'Caliph' is seen as magically powerless. A repressed identification with a homosexual All-Father figure in the form of Crowley has proved to be a deficiency in the personal development of many 'Caliphate' followers. The result has been a fanatical, supposedly socially involved 'coming out' of the 'Caliphate' as a publicly recognised religious community, and led to their concealment of all their magical and sexual doctrines. Recently this group has told its membership to separate the "problematic" figure of Aleister Crowley from the doctrine of Thelema, even though Thelema is still to be considered as he Highest Truth of this Æon. This has effectively replaced critical thought, and replaced it with all the trappings of 'belief' in a cult, with an emphasis on the importance of ritual for its own sake, and new myths. Information which might promote dissent is suppressed, and measures to censure those who step out of line is now included in the group's statutes. Unsubstantiated legal threats frighten bogeymen. So the 'Caliphate' (which now represents itself as the one and only O.T.O.) proclaims that it is incapable of error, and uses the courts to fight every criticism from the moral 'majority', the press or the police. A strategy of positive news-management has been introduced, and where necessary truth is the first casualty. Fraternitas Rosicruciana AntiquaAlthough Baphomet also occurs in the initiation rituals of the F.R.A., it seems that Arnoldo Krumm-Heller was never involved in the aforementioned shenanigans. He saw himself in a messianic role, adhering strongly to the idea of Christian Gnostic objects of veneration, and Jesus as saviour. Salvation was obtained from Him alone, and it meant that people would only ever meet good deeds along the way. True, salvation could be achieved through spermo-gnosis as well, but only by avoiding ejaculation. These homoeopathic Gnostics served a higher divine order, but their concomitant will to bring order to humanity was very far from self-deification. In spite of his apparent adherence to Thelema, and the use of LAM as a mantra, Krumm-Heller was more involved with social concerns and joining organisations, rather than any magical or mystical self-development. Homoeopathy requires a lot of human sensitivity from both doctor and patient. There is no evidence that Krumm-Heller believed in any particular Intelligence, like those found in Crowley's spiritual cosmogeny. Krumm-Heller focussed more on human reality and not on gaining contact with transcendental realms, even when those were formulated as Beings. To this day, "the teachings of the Ancient Rose-Cross Brotherhood" have had no real rôle for their astral (actually Theosophical) Master Racoczy, nor of the égregore, nor of an Inner Head of the Order. Contact with the "angel on the other side" takes place only in "helping and healing". Apart from thinking that avoiding ejaculation helped healing and human evolution, Krumm-Heller thought it a "good deed for redemption". Maybe redemption was necessary in revolutionary Mexico, when the material world must really have looked like a Gnostic "Rotten Place". It is not known, however, whether he used semen either homoeopathically or isopathically as a universal medicine. After Krumm-Hellers death, there was conflict within his Rosicrucian organization, rather like those in the O.T.O. groups. But today his F.R.A. is relatively small, its membership regarding themselves as isolated groups, and not ruled by an overall leader. Krumm-Heller offered little room for his followers psychological projections, and his F.R.A. was, and still is, too exclusive to attract really deep devotion. Had it not been for H.J. Metzger's claims to be the leader of the F.R.A., nobody would have heard anything about Krumm-Heller or the F.R.A. in the German or English-speaking worlds after World War Two. It has only been by plagiarising the present author's books that the 'Caliphate' have been able to mix Krumm-Heller into their historical fantasies. Gnosis in Appenzell- A catalogueAt Stein in Appenzell, where Metzger's Swiss O.T.O. has its headquarters it was claimed that "Beauty and Ecstasy take the place of the previous taboos of society" and "through a period of monogamy in marriage (devotion to only one other person), which is a deviation from natural law, there may be rediscovered that substance which will regain the Divinty's blessing," which was apparently so because "Europeans lack the blessed institution of polygamy". "Every wedding dissolves matter, and creates less matter". The duty of women: "Eroticism and sin - these are the Gates to the Upper World. The Feminine has the key... women will become the Guardians of Good, Loyalty, and Morality." This group also taught techniques for tightening the vaginal muscles, and enjoined washing one's genitals in cold water to prevent sexually-transmitted diseases. "Homosexuality is spreading worryingly through the masses", while "Masturbation is a scourge" - and the only remedy was "to cut it off". The group was against Yoga; instead autogenic training was "the sweetest fruit of the struggle for self-knowledge". "Humanity finds a place on the astral plane after death. An interaction occurs with the chain-reactions from atom-bomb tests, whereby the fusion of nuclear hydrogen in the Sun facilitates the manifestation of divine power". "From the clouds, radioactivity gives life to stones." They apparently promote a sort of homeopathic "electronic healing", which "will solve the riddle of illness, especially of epidemics", because "it is not impossible that metals and precious stones can have a localised effect on the orbit of electrons". Accidents like broken legs are a result of wrong thinking according to Metzger's O.T.O., which also claimed that vaccination and vegetarianism are bad for health. Love is the Law - Love under WillIn the end all sex-magical systems fail, when psychological order (not to mention the body's metabolism) is upset by its techniques; any gaps (such as the Void in the image of the Self) are filled with synthetic replacements (the Phallus, the égregore, Crowley, etc.). Despite a rigid regulation of daily life, interpersonal relationships outside the artificial reality of the O.T.O. or FS shrink to the level of projecting one's own failures onto others. This produces dependency, fears of persecution, and a reliance on curses, rituals for destruction, and invoking the help of demons. For instance, at Easter 1992 the mother of what was claimed to be the future reincarnation of Eugen Grosche (and Gotos) Gertrude Zellhuber (aka 'Lara') felt magically threatened by the former Grand Master of the FS, Walter Jantschik. Although GOTOS and the necessary spirits of Pluto were evoked, Jantschik noticed nothing, which seems to have left these hostile intentions free to wreak havoc among other supposed enemies of Lara & co., such as the Temple of Set. A slowing-down in self-development can be a direct inducement to magical thinking, while overemphasis on instinctive and impulsive energy may cause weakening of control over sexual and aggressive behaviour. This particular polarised state is characterised by an exaggerated emphasis on autoerotic and autonomous activities - in other words, Do what thou Wilt. It can alter a person's self-esteem, their identity, and their sexual and societal rôles. Deliberately distorting the libido can become a serious sport in sex-magic. Crowley clearly identified himself with Thelema "I am the Beast... I am Thelema" (Diary, 22 October 1920); has Thelema turned out to be a a defect in the oedipal phase of the New Aeon, fostering tendencies towards neurosis and psychosis? © Peter-R. Koenig 1994/October 1996/August 1998, translation adapted by Mark Parry-Maddocks in October 2000 Versiune romana: Bebelusul Nosferatului In Nomine Demiurgi Saturni 1925-1969 First installment of 400 pages of saturnian documents In Nomine Demiurgi Nosferati 1969-1998 Another 400 pages dealing with the History of the F.S. In Nomine Demiurgi Homunculi Further 420 pages about the F.S. Context: Peter-R. Koenig: Der O.T.O. Phänomen RELOAD Johannes Goeggelmann / Frater Saturnius: Beispiel einer Skandalisierung durch den Boulevard. Adolf Hemberger, Horst Knaut, Friedrich–Wilhelm Haack. Completely updated. |
