Who owns the Silver Star

Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.

I despise the politics that have grown around Thelema, and particularly, around the A.'.A.'.; it was this politicking that caused me to withdraw from social Thelemic groups and pursue a completely solitary path away from the constant gossip of those who should know better. I do however feel the need to respond to something that has come up on my radar a number of times over the last year or so. Having given it some thought and boiled it down to its essentials I have a few comments to make on the matter. This is not to cast blame, but in the interests of clarity. There are those who seek to capitalise on the reputation of the A.'.A.'., and do so with impunity due to our unwillingness to discuss the matter lest we draw accusations ourselves. Complicit silence allows untruths to become truths. Yet, one of our mottoes is : Mystery is the enemy of Truth!

It is no news to anyone involved in Thelema over the last 30+ years that some representing the A.'.A.'. have devoted considerable effort to claiming sole proprietorship, spreading propaganda and retelling history to fit a version of events, relying on the naivety of new aspirants to form a narrative supporting the fantasy that the Holy Order is the preserve of a handful of individuals and those who align with them. While I had though this had died down, recently the question has come up as to whether it is possible to trademark the initials A.'.A.'. or the sigil of the Holy Order?

There are those who wish to pursue this course of action and who question why it hasn't been done? To do so would mean that the rest of us would be infringing trademarks should we presume use the Sigillum Sanctum of the Holy Order that we serve. So far this has only been implied in passive aggressive threats and attempts to dissuade others from using the sigil on websites or other publications, claiming it is too holy to be used. I find this quite odd for Thelemites, who generally make a hobby out of sacrilege, making me wonder about the cult mentality being fostered. The tactics here are obvious and unsubtle, but the concern lingers that eventually such a mundane route to control of the Order may be followed. Such superficial minded individuals probably wouldn't care if they had to proclaim the A.'.A.'. a mundane order, so long as they control it.

In a transactionary world of legalisms the idea of control of the sigil and initials being seized in a battle in the courtroom appears to be a valid fear. It would mean that the rest of us would have to drop the name and sigil of the Order or bow down to the 'World Teacher of Thelema (TM)'. Knowing Thelemites this is quite frankly never going to happen. Getting initiates to agree on anything that might be seen to infringe on their autonomy is pretty much impossible, and those who would willingly bow down to such gangland tactics for the sake of a label are not worthy of being called initiates.

Luckily it isn't that simple. In order to make such a claim in the courts of law, it would be necessary to demonstrate its actuality beyond doubt. In a race to the bottom several others have stronger Malkuthian credentials and demonstrable lines of succession in the form of paperwork and copious written records. In any case, (if we are to resort to Malkuthian standards) we need only refer to the editorial of Motta's Equinox V:v (Sex and religion), to blow the pretense out of the water, since A.'.A.'. membership relies on a successional link from teacher to student, and this depends on the acknowledgement of that link from the teacher to the student, which in the case of the current pretense is proven in print not to be the case (parties requiring online or PDF copies of Motta's equinox please contact me). 

It should be stressed here that these flaws are pointed out not so much as to criticise a claim to aspire to the Holy Order, which is between the aspirant and the Order itself and such is neither my intention nor my right. My sole measure of an aspirant in this regard is the same as Crowley's, if a person makes such a claim, the let him abide by it. I draw a line when individuals make a point of repeatedly referring to others as 'pretenders', in an effort to validate themselves and shore up their insecurities by casting accusations, thereby bringing the Holy Order down to the level of petty intrigue. They might want to recall the proverb about people in glass houses not throwing stones. 

The nature of the Order itself also makes the idea of such action laughable. In the introductory papers, and throughout the literature associated with the A.'.A.'., Crowley is clear that this is not a mundane order, which implies that it has no legal entity. The A.'.A.'. is a sempiternal Order, an Order of the Spirit, any attempt to politicise, or to bring it down to the mundane level automatically cuts one off from it. The surest way to lose the Silver Star is to try to grasp it. To paraphrase the Tao te Ching: that A.'.A.'. which can be owned, is not the real A.'.A.'.. 

"But all exterior societies subsist only by virtue of this interior one. As soon as external societies wish to transform a temple of wisdom into a political edifice, the interior society retires and leaves only the letter without the spirit". (Liber XXXIII, An Account of A.'.A.'.)

It is clear from this that while we might work within a group of people under the banner of the A.'.A.'., this is no more than a name for our group if we do not abide by the spirit of that sempiternal Order to which we claim to aspire. With that basic principle violated all words are revealed as hollow, wisdom turns to dust, and aspiration to the highest becomes slavish adherence to a dead structure and a me, my, mine type of mentality at odds with the spirit of fraternity so essential to membership to that august body. On the whole I am convinced, perhaps it is an underlying faith in human nature, that most aspirants understand this. Those that I have come across tend to exhibit a tacit understanding completely at odds with this behaviour, best described again, in the words of Liber XXXIII: 

"This community has no outside barriers. He who may be chosen is as the first; he presents himself among the others without presumption, and he is received by the others without jealousy."

Humility and mutual recognition are the hallmarks of those chosen, who are linked not simply by lineage, but by direct connection to the current of the A.'.A.'.. Certainly not tribalistic games or grasping at paperwork or other credentials in an effort to own what cannot be owned, which was given freely at the beginning, and which Frater O.M. was at pains to make freely available to all, eschewing elitism and exclusivity. I suspect that a lot of the online chatter regarding this is lower level initiates still immersed in anal-territorial behavior and unaware of the reality of the Order as it is in itself, since I find it hard to believe that an adept would misunderstand the nature of things so severely. 

In conclusion: It is clear that the first person to make a grasp at the Silver Star, tries to make it a legal entity subject to the laws of men, in that very stroke cuts themselves off from the interior society, and just as surely if a man were to saw through the branch that he was sitting on, all credibility would be gone at a stroke regardless of the technical outcome. 

Love is the law, love under will.