Dear Noah Gardiner et al
Good question
As they say on facebook "its complicated" : )
And indeed you will find more than one view on this in the Thelemic
community.
Thelema, imo, is both a critique of existing mores/society and a utopian
programme -
thus the concept of the "Abbey of Thelema" (in Rabbalais), has a set of
exclusions - ie behaviour types that are excluded from the ideal society -
in their absence freedom without rules is thought to be possible - its
an ideal.
This is a ethical model I think might have something in common with
Utilitarianism,
and indeed modern versions such as Rawls,
"A Theory of Justice" ?
Crowley updated this -
perhaps with the idea that only "perfected" individuals could live in
the idea society -
this the religion has a programme of disconditioning of society from its
pathological traits.
Crowley himself published commentaries on the seemingly atinomial "Liber
Al" - eg: I think Liber II (?)
that talked about how "do what you wilt" does not mean "do what you want" -
this is in an effort to explain how an absence of rules can lead to a
reasonable society ?
So I would say Thelema does has an ethics, perhaps more implied than
explicit
"Love and do what you will"
Mogg Morgan
wrote:
> I've been watching this discussion with great interest, as it first
> seemed that many on this list were primarily concerned with 'bad
> publicity' regarding Liber AL that might arise from this incident. I
> found that reaction somewhat odd, given that Crowley never seemed too
> concerned with making peace with the dominant public morality, to put
> it lightly. I'm guess I'm curious as to what extent academics and
> other writers on occultism, NRM etc. feel the need to act as defenders
> of the 'normalcy' or 'good morality' of the people involved in these
> movements, and to go about distinguishing the 'real' practitioners
> from the 'nutters'.
>
> This strikes close to home for me as I work and teach in Islamic
> studies, where we're often accused of being apologists for Islam at
> points where it comes into conflict with Western liberalism, or in
> debates surrounding the presence of some kind of intrinsic
> relationship between Islam and terrorism. From my own point of view,
> such accusations typically come from people who either have little
> in-depth knowledge of the subject and/or are pushing other political
> agendas that rely on fear of Muslims, but there certainly are people
> in my field who prefer to entirely gloss over these issues ( I
> certainly don't claim to be perfect in regard to any of this).
>
> So my question is, how do academics and writers on occultism etc.
> balance defending their subjects from outright slander and tabloid
> sensationalism while still accounting for beliefs and practices that
> may run drastically counter to prevailing norms?
>
> - Noah
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