Thelema

Thelema, religion established by the British occultist Aleister Crowley in the 1900s. It is commonly regarded as a form of both esotericism and occultism and sometimes also a type of modern Paganism. The tradition centers on a text, The Book of the Law, that Crowley claimed to have received from a supernatural source in 1904. Practitioners of Thelema, called Thelemites, are rarely exclusivist, and thus many Thelemites also practice other religious traditions.

Origins and history

Crowley was born in 1875 to a wealthy middle-class family who adhered to the Plymouth Brethren denomination of Protestant Christianity. He rebelled against this background and while studying at the University of Cambridge began to explore European traditions commonly labeled under the category of esotericism. Crowley developed a particular interest in ceremonial magic, which he pursued through the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, an organization he joined in 1898. He further took an interest in Asian religions such as Hinduism and Buddhism.

Through his practice of ceremonial magic, Crowley performed various rituals intended to contact spirits, including while honeymooning with his wife, Rose Kelly, in Cairo in 1904. It was at this point that he came to believe that he was being contacted by a supernatural entity called Aiwass, whom he identified as the messenger of the ancient Egyptian god Horus. Over the course of April 8–10, Crowley transcribed a text that he claimed was audibly delivered to him by Aiwass: Liber AL vel Legis, or The Book of the Law. Announcing the birth of a new aeon in history, this text also set forth the basis for a new religion, to be called Thelema, thelēma being the ancient Greek word for “will.”

Discover how ordinary objects work, and expand your understanding of the familiar.

SIGN UP

" height="20" alt="HEW Logo">

Thank you for signing up!"

Back to homepage

By clicking "Sign Up", you consent to the Britannica Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.

Crowley was initially unsure as to the significance of this revelation, but by 1909 he had come to regard it as being of considerable importance and published it in several editions over subsequent years. After the initial revelation in Cairo, he also produced additional texts that he claimed to have channeled from a supernatural source and that have since been collected together as The Holy Books of Thelema. None, however, are deemed as important to Thelemites as The Book of the Law.

Crowley formed his own esoteric organization, the Argenteum Astrum (“Silver Star”), or A∴A∴, with the English chemist George Cecil Jones in 1907. The German esotericist Theodor Reuss also inducted Crowley into his own initiatory group, the Ordo Templi Orientis (OTO), and in 1912 Crowley was appointed head of its new British branch. In the coming years Crowley reorganized OTO practices around his own Thelemic beliefs and built up a series of communal OTO rituals. The OTO played an important role in promoting Thelema, both in Europe and subsequently in North America.

In addition to the OTO’s system of lodges, Crowley promoted communal living according to Thelemic principles. In 1920 he established his Abbey of Thelema at Cefalù in Sicily, Italy, where he lived with several followers until being expelled by the Italian government in 1923. That decade saw widespread denunciation of Crowley in the British press, in part due to reports about his drug use, the death of an Abbey member, and his own tendency to court controversy. One newspaper, John Bull, famously labeled him “the wickedest man in the world.”

At the time of Crowley’s death in 1947, Thelema as an organized movement had seen substantial decline. The last operational OTO lodge, the Agape Lodge in California, closed in 1948. In accordance with Crowley’s wishes, leadership of the OTO passed to Karl Germer, a German esotericist then based in the United States. After Germer’s death in 1962, the organization became largely moribund, with various contenders claiming ownership. After legal challenges, the American Thelemite Grady Louis McMurtry secured control of the OTO trademarks and oversaw efforts to rebuild the organization.

Explore Britannica Premium!

The trusted destination for professionals, college students, and lifelong learners.

SUBSCRIBE

Other Thelemites also established their own organizations or otherwise formed new interpretations of the religion. The American rocket scientist Jack Parsons, for instance, believed he had channeled an additional chapter of The Book of the Law, titled “Liber 49,” in 1946. Another development appeared in the work of Crowley’s English secretary, Kenneth Grant, who in the 1950s initiated what later became the Typhonian Order. Grant’s approach, sometimes called Typhonian Thelema, integrated Crowley’s teachings with Indian philosophical notions from Tantra and Advaita Vedanta along with elements from fictional sources such as H.P. Lovecraft’s Cthulhu Mythos. Other Thelemites forged their own variants in ensuing decades, resulting in approaches such as Tantric Thelema and Thelemic witchcraft. The spread of the Internet during the 1990s further facilitated the emergence of new approaches as well as the broader dissemination of Thelema.

The OTO continues to operate through lodges in various countries and in 2017 reported about 4,000 members. There are also many Thelemites who remain independent of the organization. The historian of religions Manon Hedenborg White estimated that in 2020 the total number of Thelemites was between 5,000 and 10,000.

Although the number of Thelemites has always remained comparatively small among the Western esoteric milieu, the religion’s influence has been broad. Crowley’s writings were an important influence on Gerald Gardner, the key figure behind Wicca, and L. Ron Hubbard was involved in a Californian Thelemic group prior to developing Scientology. Several Thelemites have also made contributions to the art world, perhaps most notably the American independent filmmaker Kenneth Anger, who drew on Thelema in experimental productions such as Lucifer Rising (1972).

Beliefs and practices

Thelema centers on The Book of the Law. This text refers to three divinities: the goddess Nuit, the god Hadit, and their child Ra-Hoor-Khuit. Each of these entities is associated with a successive aeon in history: Nuit with the matriarchal Aeon of Isis, Hadit with the patriarchal Aeon of Osiris, and Ra-Hoor-Khuit with the Aeon of Horus, which Crowley believed began in 1904. In Crowley’s view, the Aeon of Horus was to be a time of growing individualism, and its emergence is of profound significance in Thelema.

Attitudes to this theology nevertheless vary among Thelemites. Some are theists and believe that Thelema’s deities literally exist, whereas others are atheists and regard such entities as symbolic figures. Moreover, Crowley talked of spiritual entities other than Nuit, Hadit, and Ra-Hoor-Khuit. One of the most significant was Babalon, a goddess whose name derives from the Book of Revelation’s whore of Babylon. In Thelema, Babalon is associated with the destruction of a practitioner’s ego and one’s union with all existence, an important task for a Thelemite’s spiritual development. Elsewhere, Crowley also invoked deities from pre-Christian Europe, notably the ancient Greek god Pan.

The Book of the Law offers a clear ethical tenet for Thelemites: “Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.” This concept is accompanied by a related statement, “Love is the law, love under will.” The phrase “Do what thou wilt” can be traced to the work of 16th-century French writer François Rabelais, who is sometimes considered the “first Thelemite” within the community. In the Thelemic context, “Do what thou wilt” is not simply an amoral injunction for people to satisfy whatever whim they may have. Instead, it reflects Crowley’s teaching that everyone has their own “True Will,” the central purpose of their existence. Each Thelemite is encouraged to discover and pursue their True Will, a task referred to as the “Great Work,” with Thelema teaching that doing so will place them in harmony with the cosmos. This emphasis on individualism has contributed to a highly liberal attitude to issues such as sexuality among Thelemites, although there are nevertheless ideological divisions between more right-libertarian and left-progressive perspectives in the Thelemic community.

Another key concept in Thelema is “magick,” spelled by Crowley with a k to distinguish it from illusionism or stage “magic.” Crowley defined magick as “the Science and Art of causing Change to occur in conformity with Will,” something that could encompass many aspects of a Thelemite’s life and not just the rituals typically associated with ceremonial magic. The latter practices nevertheless play an important role in Thelemic ceremony. Much of Crowley’s approach to the topic was informed by his training in the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, including its use of a series of initiatory degrees through which a practitioner can spiritually progress. Unlike the Golden Dawn, Crowley also placed much importance on sex magic, as part of which sexual acts (whether solitary or with a partner) are used to concentrate the Thelemite’s will to achieve specific aims. Moreover, Crowley was highly interested in Yoga and was an early advocate for this South Asian religious practice in the West, with many subsequent Thelemites integrating Yoga into their lives.

In addition to rites that can be performed solo, Crowley devised communal rituals for Thelemites to perform, especially within the OTO. The most notable was the gnostic mass, a rite that Crowley developed in 1913 on a trip to Moscow. Although imbued with Thelemic symbolism, the gnostic mass was partly inspired by Crowley’s observation of the Eastern Orthodox liturgy at St. Basil’s Cathedral—though in some ways it is closer in form to Roman Catholicism’s Tridentine mass. There are also several celebrations to mark important dates for Thelemites. Some of these, such as a feast to commemorate Aiwass’s delivery of The Book of the Law, are stipulated in the text itself, whereas others, such as Crowley’s birthday or “Crowleymas,” instead celebrate days of significance in the life of Thelema’s prophet.