Note to update: the addresses and phone numbers in these issues of the Thelema Lodge Calendars are obsolete since the closing of the Lodge. They are here for historic purposes only and should not be visited or called.
Thelema Lodge
Ordo Templi Orientis
P.O.Box 2303
Berkeley, CA 94702 USA
May 1992 e.v. at Thelema Lodge
Announcements from
Lodge Members and Officers
Brother Karl Germer, Frater , Grand Master of O.T.O. from December 1947 e.v. to October
1962 e.v., made notes of his experiences over the years. Here's an account he wrote less
than a year after Crowley's Greater Feast. This selection focuses on his flight from the
Nazis and visa troubles. An outline for a book about his experiences in a Nazi concentration
camp is also extant. Although he made efforts to conceal the fact from A.C., Karl Germer had
been arrested by the Nazi's for his efforts on behalf of Crowley. Crowley was the "high-
grade British Freemason" noted below. The difficulties Germer had with getting a British
visa continued after the war. He was denied permission to travel to England when Crowley was
on his death-bed. The history of O.T.O. might have been very different if Karl Germer had
been able to received final instructions from Crowley. Germer probably wrote this account in
yet another doomed attempt at getting a visa to go to England, this time to clear up
Crowley's estate. Such bits of history as this shed light on the development of the Order.
I have lived in London, England, from 190{0} to 1904; I was the representative for Alfred
Herbert Ltd., Coventry, Berlin Branch, from 1912 to 1914, representing them in Eastern
Germany and West Russia; during that period I visited England again.
I came to London again in 1929 on my way from New York and travelled to London repeatedly
between 1929 and 1932. When the Nazis took over in Germany I went to London and lived there
from 1933 to 1934, all the time preparing my departure for the U.S.A. to rejoin my American
wife, but I failed to get my U.S. immigration visa in time.
The Home Office refused to extend my temporary visa and I returned to Germany at the end
of 1934. (From February 5, 1935 to August 1935 I was in a Nazi Concentration Camp.) I
escaped from Germany in October 1935, and entered England on a Belgian refugee passport at
Harwich (if I remember correctly) at the end of November 1935. I obtained a temporary visa
which was extended from 3 to 3 months; until at the end of November 1936 I was asked to leave
England. I had not been able to earn any money because regulations did not allow me to do
so. I was in a desperate plight. Friends who knew that I spoke English fluently persuaded
me not to return to Belgium which was too close to the German frontier and people had been
known to have been kidnapped by Nazi agents, and the Nazis had been searching for me because
I had written a book against them. They suggested that I go to Ireland which they said was a
"Free State" where I could easily begin activities in the machinery line.
I decided to do this and I think I arrived in Dublin on Dec. 1, 1936. I quickly made
contact with a leading machinery firm who were eager to put my expert knowledge into their
services; I was very successful there, in fact after 4 weeks they financed the purchase of a
car which I paid off within a few months.
Around Easter 1936 there was a need for me to make a business trip in the interest of the
machines which I handled to Belgium. I decided to use the opportunity to regularise my stay
in Ireland and obtain a permanent visa. I went to the French Consul in Dublin and asked for
a visa. When he saw my Belgian refugee passport (the only document I had) he said it was
impossible to give me a visa; He would have to apply for this in writing to Paris, and this
would take three to four weeks. My business did not permit such a delay. When he saw my
predicament, he came outside his office and said: I have spoken to you in my official
capacity, now let me talk to you as a person. There is a way for you to cross the channel
over the Easter holidays by going to London and buy a week-end ticket; this allows you to set
foot at Boulogne (or was it Calais?) without any visa.
This sounded simple, and I followed his advice. When I got to London I bought a return
ticket to Paris without any formalities. (The point has been raised at the British Passport
Office in New York that I had claimed to be a British subject. This is not true. I have
never done this, and would not do this. The official in New York then tried to explain the
details of how one buys such a ticket in London; that there are several booking offices, one
for British subjects, another for aliens. I do not think that I paid any attention to any of
this. I remember talking to the man at the window asking him some questions about the validity etc., etc., I cannot remember details; enough, at that time I was proud to be able
to speak the language with great fluency. It seems to me that the train on which I arrived
came very early in the morning and I was eager to catch the next train; there was not much
time to lose.)
On the boat I was asked by the French official (the English official, if there was one,
never bothered me) to show some paper to identify me. It was then that I showed a calling
card of a man who had just died and whose widow had asked me take over the machinery business
of her husband as without such help there was no one to continue it. (Her husband whom I
knew well enough, had felt his end coming and implored me to assist his family if something
should happen to him.) I had a supply of those calling cards with me for the exact purpose
of identifying me as being the one who continued in that machinery business. I certainly did
not pose as having the name shown on the calling card; I did not say one word; there was much
rush and pushing on board because it was Easter.
I attended to my business affairs in Belgium and France and obtained a new Belgian refugee
visa. I presented this to the British Passport Office in Brussels which issued a proper visa
for Ireland. I went via Harwich where I was stopped and ultimately sent back to Antwerp.
As I had many business obligations in Ireland my return to Dublin was imperative. I asked
for a new Belgian passport; I went again to the British Passport Office in Brussels who again
issued a visa for a trip to Ireland direct; on arrival in Dublin I presented this passport,
and after several weeks was ordered to return to Brussels. The Minister of justice informed
me that if I could obtain from the German Ambassador a letter that he withdrew his objection
against my stay in Ireland, he could arrange for a visa. I know this part sounds incredible:
it is a fact; I could, if necessary, amplify it with many details which can now be told but
which I had to withhold for many years in order not to compromise certain persons. Mr.
Smylie, editor in chief of the Irish Times, was fully informed by me at the time; he was
amazed and wanted to take steps in the Dail to stop the fifth column influence.
In subsequent years I was able to build up a fairly large machinery export business in
Brussels, exporting Belgian machines mostly to England. This should have necessitated visits
to England, but with a Belgian refugee passport a special British visa was required.
Whenever I applied for one it was refused.
Had I been a good and fanatical Nazi I would never have met with any visa trouble in
England. As it turned out it was my being an enemy of the Nazis that led to my victimisation
by the British. (The crime, which the Gestapo accused me of, was being in touch with high-grade British Freemasons.)
Other documents of this sort will appear from time to time in these pages. There are
quite a few unusual ones, shedding light on byways of Thelemic and O.T.O. history. Examples
include a 3/13/52 letter from J.F.C.Fuller to Grady McMurtry, giving Fuller's latter day
opinion of Crowley and one from Frieda Harris to Karl Germer in January 1948 e.v., stating a
belief that Gerald Gardner was the head of OTO in Europe at the time of Crowley's death.
Out of the star enshrouded night it fell, | |
A battered derelict that space had maimed, | |
Its hull a twisted wreck, its power tamed, | |
And of its crew no living soul to tell. | |
Space dry and thin the rigid mummy sits | |
And marks a vigil only death may keep; | |
What endless night, what weary age of sleep | |
Has he kept sentinel? No lip admits. | |
That was a golden age, that world carefree | |
When men stood foursquare on the crust of Urth | |
And threw their challenge to the stars; with mirth | |
They swore to conquer all infinity. | |
So armed with courage knowledge would deny | |
Their fragile bulbs of steel wire launched to float | |
Across the shallow solar gulfs, where bloat | |
Strange moons and planets in a crowded sky. | |
And then with knowledge astronautic gained, | |
With fire atomic as a willing slave, | |
Upon the silent God of Night they gave | |
An offering of ships, and men ordained. | |
Of men imbued with zeal the mystics know | |
Who manned those mighty ether ships that fell | |
Like pebbles dropping down an endless well | |
Until they came to alien suns where glow | |
The incandescent vapors multihued, | |
Where toxic gasses burn with tourquoise light | |
Or smash the space-time contin'um with white | |
Heat from a hellish dwarf, where planets brood | |
Like peering eyes that stare upon the doomed; | |
And from those new worlds of the starlit seas, | |
From island nebulae, from galaxies, | |
From burned-out suns whose glory once illumed | |
Weird destinies. Here cosmic engineers | |
Set colonies along their orbit runs | |
Till navies filled with commerce of the suns | |
Bore fruit of conquest, for those pioneers | |
On the high sea of interstellar space | |
By trellised lace of orbit lines, and force | |
That binds each star and planet to its course | |
Had welded fast their empire. But the race | |
Of humankind had changed as aeons passed. | |
No longer was the man of Urth supreme, | |
But cosmopolitan, had lost his dream, | |
And though he stood where wealth of knowledge massed | |
Had thrown his outposts to the chasmed lip | |
That marks the lightless, ultimate abyss | |
Beyond which shore no beacon sun may hiss | |
Or sibilate in silence, yet the whip | |
Of manly strength that was his heritage | |
Sank deep and fallow, while his gnarled machines | |
Were given to the task, and thoughtless means | |
Of mindless android monsters who for gage | |
To measure used no human eye that scans | |
But walked in darkness shadowed by the length | |
Of instruments prehensile to strength | |
Of electronic solenoids, where spans | |
The rippled muscles of a force that spoke | |
The unleashed power of atomic might | |
Stripped from the glowing nucleus, where bright | |
And hot the whiplashed positrons are broke | |
Against bedrock neutronium, but soft, | |
Effeminate and poised the progeny | |
Of space tanned mariners where dark debris | |
Who bloated on the ebb tide, for aloft | |
The tentacles that spread to integrate | |
With calculus logistical the plan | |
That was to be the Monument to Man; | |
A universe of virile peace, a state | |
Omnipotent of matter, held decay | |
And back the tide rolled, back across the years | |
Of light and peace, back down the trail of tears, | |
For empire is not won within a day | |
But must be purchased by the blood of those | |
Who dream the Greater Dream, and who would die | |
While searching in the archives of the sky | |
For knowledge that was placed beneath the Rose | |
So long ago, back to its place of birth | |
It slowly ebbed, and then along the sands | |
Of outpost planets it has washed, rough hands | |
Colonial were set against the Urth | |
And Chaos ruled. So came the Tongueless One | |
To walk the empty spaceways, and to grin | |
With his huge imbecility, at men | |
Beat down into dust and, beaten, shun | |
Their heritage. And now from Urth is seen, | |
When with a slow, majestic sweep begun | |
Each eventide at setting of the sun, | |
The Wheel of Stars parading down the screen | |
Zodiacal, the constellations lost, | |
The solar systems, fertile worlds, and rocks, | |
The frigid planets, and the flame swept locks | |
Of guardian keeps on Mercury. The cost | |
Was paid in treasuries of energy | |
Extraneous, and toil and sweat and thought | |
Of terrene life to barren planets brought, | |
Ten billion New Worlds in immensity. | |
And now the old Urth, like a jeweled hag, | |
Her gemmed cities bright against the breast | |
Of umbrial shadows draped across the West | |
From shoulders of the senile hills that sag | |
With weariness that ages slow erode, | |
Has gathered her ephemerae to dwell | |
In cities sealed and domed with crystal shell, | |
Here sits the Elder Brethern, here they bode | |
In vaulted halls to weigh the Cosmic Plan | |
By symboled logos, and as worlds set free | |
Launch each a space-borne fleet to destiny, | |
They comprehend the All; this was our Pan! | |
[Previously unpublished.]
by Aleister Crowley
Some years ago I thought to try
Prayer--test its efficacity.
I fished by a Norwegian lake.
"O God," I prayed, "for Jesus' sake
Grant thy poor servant all his wish!
For every prayer produce a fish!"
Nine times the prayer went up the spout,
And eight times--what a thumping trout!
(This is the only true fish-story
I ever heard--give God the glory!)
This fish-story is literally true. The condition was that the Almighty should have the
odds of an unusually long line--the place was really a swift stream, just debouching into a
lake--and of unusual slowness of drawing in the cast.
But what does any miracle prove? If the Affaire Cana were proved to me, I should merely
record the facts: Water may under certain unknown conditions become wine. It is a pity that
the owner of the secret remains silent, and entirely lamentable that he should attempt to
deduce from his scientific knowledge cosmic theories which have nothing whatever to do with
it.
Suppose Edison, having perfected the phonograph, had said, "I alone can make dumb things
speak; argal, I am God." What would the world have said if telegraphy had been exploited for
miracle-mongering purposes? Are these miracles less or greater than those of the Gospels?
Before we accept Mrs. Piper (a twentieth century medium), we want to know most exactly
the conditions of the experiment, and to have some guarantee of the reliability of the
witnesses.
At Cana of Galilee the conditions of the transformation are not stated--save that they
give loopholes innumerable for chicanery--and the witnesses are all drunk! (thou hast kept
the good wine till now: i.e. till men have well drunk--Greek, , are well drunk).
And I am to believe this, and a glaring non sequitur as to Christ's deity, on the
evidence, not even of the inebriated eye-witnesses, but of MSS. of doubtful authorship and
date, bearing all the ear-marks of dishonesty. For we must not forget that the absurdities
of today were most cunning proofs for the poor folk of seventeen centuries ago.
Talking of fish-stories, read John xxi:1-6, or Luke v:1-7 (comparisons are odious). But
once I met a man by a lake and told him that I had toiled all the morning and had caught
nothing, and he advised me to try the other side of the lake; and I caught many fish. But I
knew not that it was the Lord.
In Australia they were praying for rain in the churches. The Sydney Bulletin very
sensibly pointed out how much more reverent and practical it would be, if, instead of
constantly worrying the Almighty about trifles, they would pray once and for all for a big
range of mountains in Central Australia, which would of course supply rain automatically. No
new act of creation would be necessary; faith, we are expressly told, can remove mountains,
and there is ice and snow and especially moraine on and about the Baltoro Glacier to build a
very fine range; we could well have spared it this last summer.
Conclusion
[OURANOS nods, erases board, begins new drawings - from
underground there are five knocks
and some low, angry
groans - OURANOS roars and stamps once in reply
- GAIA begins
weeping]
MERCURY. What's wrong? [AQU. moves to GAIA]
GAIA. They're our children too, down there, though HE won't admit it.
[OURANOS makes 'no way' signs and twists his face up in a
caricature of ugliness]
GAIA. So what if they're not perfect? They're beautiful in their own way! You're not
giving them a chance!
[OURANOS makes 'no way' sign again]
MERCURY [to PROMETHEUS]. Are some of Gaia's children under that rock?
PROMETHEUS. Yes, it's a sad case. Strange, monstrous creatures -
GAIA. Monstrous! What do YOU know! [to OURANOS] Why can't things just have existence?
Why do they have to follow some - some scheme or vision you've dreamed up?
[OURANOS groans and stamps, signs 'no way' - mimes that
he is a hunchback dwarf creeping
across stage - grabs
GAIA and AQUARIUS and points at audience - all onstage
stare at
audience with some bewilderment - OURANOS
points at them and signs that they are
boxed in and morose]
MERCURY. I think I see his point. Pitiful existence they have.
GAIA. It's not 'pitiful'! They're fine too! Maybe they don't 'leap to the stars' -
maybe they're mean to each other sometimes - [OURANOS cackles loudly and bitterly] - but they
have lives! They have joys sometimes! And at least they have some form, some weight! I'm
not even sure if you're really there!
[OURANOS pauses, smiles, shrugs and exits]
GAIA. This can't go on. Everything is so erratic; there's no ... calm or peace ...
there's no room for anything to grow ... [she becomes resolved] Yes, it is time. Kronos
knows. He can do it. Time must begin, and the world must begin.
[GAIA begins song:]
Kronos, Kronos,
Your time has come, your time has come
Kronos, Kronos,
My youngest one, your time has come
Let the children of Earth be freed
Time dancing in reality
Let their bodies walk on my fertile ground
Harbinger of the seasons,
Steadfast regularity
Weighted down in reason,
Steadfast regularity
Ye child of the New Year
This sickle I give you dear
To sever all that lives in its time
Oh horned one of night,
Hoofed and bare, your delight,
Children of Earth may you sire
And remember in your balls
is my heart's fire
Son of Earth and Chaos,
Footsteps of lead, footsteps of lead
To your father's flights of fancy,
You must lend your heavy hand
Let your brothers out of Tartaros land
Oh child do you understand
I place the future in your hand
ITEM: c. 11:30 AM, Good Friday. Procession behind man crowned with thorns and carrying cross
on Miracle Mile going in to San Rafael.
ITEM: c. 12:30 PM, Good Friday. At Fairfax Post Office, a man looking at newspaper in
dispenser sees headline and says: No Clemency! Good, Harris ought to die!
Did anyone really think a jury in Simi Valley, probably the most conservative town in the
United States, would convict "white" police officers for using unnecessary force on a "black"
motorist? Is anyone really surprised at a reincarnation of the Watts riots after the last
twelve years? The United States has been in denial on a level unknown since 1944 e.v.
Germany. No matter what the facts, its all rosy. Too many homeless and unemployed? No
problem, change the way the statistics are reported, move them out of town. A President who
vetos everything that might cost his friends money. A Congress that votes for funds that its
own Ways and Means Committee is preprogrammed to suspend. A nation that ignores the news and
journalists more interested in bed-room bingo than brains. As long as people in this country
think "black" and "white" are races, this country will be racist. There is no black race and
no white race. Those words are prime segregationist terms, racist, not racial. Yet school
children of more than one ethnic origin are required to "CHECK ONE: White, Black, Hispanic,
Oriental".
What's wrong with this picture? You, if you don't vote. One vote won't make any
difference, but taking "My vote won't make any difference" for a mantram is one and the same
with spreading a plague. The odds against any particular event happening exactly as it did
happen are near infinite. Yet every event happens, odds be damned. It's the same with
futility. If you think you can do nothing, you will be right. If you try to do something to
make things better, other people will see you and they might try it. The odds against that
perfect world you dreamed of as a kid are astronomical. So what! Do what you think is right
at the time. There is no other way to do your Will. If you base inaction on the failings of
others, you are a slave.
5/3/92 | Lodge Council & LOP 3:33 PM | Thelema Ldg. | ||
5/3/92 | Gnostic Mass 8 PM | Thelema Ldg. | ||
5/4/92 | Thelema Lodge meeting 8 PM | Thelema Ldg. | ||
5/5/92 | Beltane | Thelema Ldg. | ||
5/9/92 | Jerry's Logoraea 6:30 PM Call to attend | Thelema Ldg. | ||
5/10/92 | Gnostic Mass 8 PM | Thelema Ldg. | ||
5/12/92 | Planetary Magick a la Agrippa with Mark S. Class 7:30 PM Invocation 9 PM | Thelema Ldg. | ||
5/14/92 | Magick in Theory and Practice Study Circle with Marlene 7PM | Thelema Ldg. | ||
5/16/92 | Thelema Lodge initiations Call to attend | Thelema Ldg. | ||
5/17/92 | Mass Workshop 4:18 PM | Thelema Ldg. | ||
5/17/92 | Gnostic Mass 8 PM | Thelema Ldg. | ||
5/19/92 | Introduction to Chakras Study Circle With Andrew, 8:00 PM | Thelema Ldg. | ||
5/20/92 | Class on Banishing Rituals 8 PM with Bill Heidrick | Thelema Ldg. | ||
5/23/92 | Thelema Lodge initiations Call to attend | Thelema Ldg. | ||
5/24/92 | Gnostic Mass 8 PM | Thelema Ldg. | ||
5/27/92 | Basic Astrology with Grace 8 PM | Thelema Ldg. | ||
5/28/92 | Magick in Theory and Practice Study Circle with Marlene 7PM | Thelema Ldg. | ||
5/30/92 | Jerry's Logorrhea 6:30 PM Call to attend | Thelema Ldg. | ||
5/31/92 | Lodge Clean-up begins 1:11 PM | Thelema Ldg. | ||
5/31/92 | Gemini Birthday party 4:18 PM | Thelema Ldg. | ||
5/31/92 | Gnostic Mass 8 PM | Thelema Ldg. |
The viewpoints and opinions expressed herein are the responsibility of the
contributing authors and do not necessarily reflect the position of OTO or its
officers.
Note to update: the addresses and phone numbers in these issues of the Thelema Lodge Calendars are obsolete since the closing of the Lodge. They are here for historic purposes only and should not be visited or called.