Original subtitles

I do hear what you do with this

information

for two hours for five

it is important

to our planet

it is important

so we write rain without the name but a

brave swallow up my train Aleister

Crowley the man who called himself the

Beast 666 black magician drug fiend sex

addict and traitor to the British people

I want none of your faint approval or

faint dispraise to hell with

Christianity rationalism Buddhism

I want blasphemy murder rape revolution

anything bad or good but strong nineteen

twenty Aleister Crowley founded a

commune in Sicily to practice the

beliefs that he said would one day sweep

away Christianity and free men from all

restriction and repression three years

later

Mussolini deported Crowley and his

followers from Sicily after reports of

human and animal sacrifice and

unimaginable sexual depravity caused an

international scandal the British press

called Crowley the wickedest man in the

world I have exposed myself to every

form of disease accident and violence I

have driven myself to delight in dirty

and disgusting deep porches and to

devour human experiments and human flesh

I have mastered every mode of my mind

and made myself a morality more severe

than any other in the world

a thousand years from now the world will

be sitting in the sun set of cruelly

anity

Oh

the thing about Crowley was doing

everything to absolutely excess pushing

yourself to the absolute limit so you

know at least where your limits are so

if you're going to do something that's

depraved you do something this is

extremely to break that even you feel

disgusted it and then try to learn to

enjoy Aleister Crowley declared the

death of Christianity he was to be the

new Messiah that would replace the

pallid dead Christ I believe he was the

real thing he had given himself and that

demonic control he was evil very clever

the genius for God's sake raving genius

you know

in a world of little tiny people it's

crowded saying my God why are you so

unhappy you want to make love what make

love for Christ that you want to take

drugs you want to expand your

consciousness please do it

since his death in 1947 Crowley has

become an icon of rebellion

The Rolling Stones David Bowie Led

Zeppelin's Jimmy Page have all been

influenced by his message of freedom he

continues to be a key figure in the

occult and as a focus for those engaged

in the battle between good and evil this

was a battle that was to play a crucial

part in Crowley's childhood Aleister

Crowley was born in 1875 into a wealthy

brewing family it was the height of the

Victorian era and his devoutly religious

parents constantly warned him about the

dangers of temptation and the terrible

consequences of sin his family were

members of the Plymouth Brethren sect

now the Plymouth Brethren were Radical

Protestants you might even say

pathologically anti pleasure they

believed in the literal truth of the

Bible this included in particular the

Book of Revelations which is a constant

echo throughout Crowley's imagination is

theology if you want to call it that

he seems to have been devoted to his

father they used to travel the country

together while his father preached a

fairly unorthodox fashion Aleister was

inspired by his father's evangelizing

and his earliest ambition was to follow

him and become a crusader for Christ

then something happened that completely

shattered his world

Crowley's father died suddenly leaving

Aleister who was still only a boy of

eleven bereft his sorrow turned to anger

he grew to hate his mother the church

and the pious tutors she employed to

school him

Crowley became increasingly rebellious

he set about attacking the thing which

had made his childhood such a misery I

had arrived at the conclusion that the

Plymouth Brethren were an exceptionally

detestable cruel I wanted sin a supreme

spiritual sin but hadn't the slightest

idea how to go about it he really could

not bear his mother and the first

opportunity when he was a teenager he

had the made on his mother's bed and

obviously felt that this was a kind of

revenge he developed a tremendous state

of resentment about his family and all

the family background and so from the

beginning you see Crowley's sort of had

a pretty good kind of background in

revolt

Crowley failed to distinguish himself

during his school days apart from

getting expelled from Tunbridge after

catching gonorrhea from a prostitute but

Cambridge Crowley finally broke free

from the shackles of his upbringing he

published his own poetry revealing a

rapidly developing obsession with sex

when Celia comes dessert quakes our the

bed vibrates like kettle drums it is a

grand display of power when Celia comes

when Celia farts my hasty nose sniffs up

the fragrance of her parts shamed other

violets and the rose when Celia farts

Crowley's poetry was so pornographic

that he would have been prosecuted for

obscenity and he not taken the

precaution of publishing it abroad under

a false name Crowley had the natural

appetite for sex you might expect from

someone in their adolescence there was

something different about Crowley though

I think there was almost he was

developing a compulsion part of that

compulsion seemed to be a compulsion

towards sin a form of blasphemy a form

of spitting in the eye of the Christian

Church Shay's at Cambridge that Crowley

first became fascinated with magic and

the occult he heard that there were

secret societies whose members practiced

dark and forbidden rituals Crowley was

intrigued and was desperate to access

this hidden world at the age of 21 a

large trust fund freed him from any

financial worries he decided to leave

Cambridge to pursue his quest to become

a black magician after two years of

searching he finally found what he was

looking for the golden dawn was a secret

society dedicated to the study and

practice of the occultists its exclusive

upper-class membership included many

famous artists and intellectuals of the

days he discovers the Golden Dawn it's

from here on really that he feels he's

really on to something this is this is

something brand-new it's fresh Bram

Stoker's involved I'm Yeats is involved

that sort of literary sort of society

lot and he wants to be part of that as

well and he rapidly Rises through the

magical grades like nobody else has gone

through them before he seems to take to

this literally like a fish to water

it seems to be his vocation for Crowley

who was now referring to himself as the

Beast 666 the Golden Dawn turned out to

be a bitter disappointment

he thought that they were playing at

magic and tried to take the society over

he clashed with the poet WB Yeats who

was a prominent member calling him a

lank disheveled demonologist this was

the really real major step for curly

when he thought that he was leaving

behind the Golden Dawn and all it sort

of milk and water magic and moving into

the world of sort of real magic and he

was perfectly willing to take on black

magic he was willing to use any forces

that he possibly could that he could

control Crowley decided to perform the

Abra Mellon a black magic ritual that no

magician had dared undertake for

centuries

Crowley's so dedicated to perform in the

Abra Menem ritual that he actually goes

to the lengths of seeking out and

finding the perfect place and buying a

house to do the actual ritual in nothing

else just actually to do this ritual and

it's in Loch Ness burlesque in house

this is such an extreme thing to do this

is not a game he I think he's trying to

break down he's trying to push further

than anywhere else has been before and

the moment his yardstick is the golden

dawn so he's already shattering that

completely the Abramelin dates back to

the 14th century the aim of the

six-month ritual is to master demons but

it was considered extremely dangerous if

the ritual went wrong it was believed

that evil spirits could be set loose and

take possession of the magician

the Avram Ellen ceremony has an

introduction which states that nobody

should perform this ceremony red rag to

a bull with Aleister Crowley a time when

he did it had a lot of determination to

delve as deep as he could into the

occult he certainly did

do partially the Abra Mellon ceremony in

the house which is to do with conjuring

up one's guardian angel and in order to

do that you've got to release a lot of

other spirits of one sort or another

even in broad daylight the room he was

working in became almost pitch dark and

he had to light candles and this sort of

thing to continue what he was what he

was about these mouths from the role of

deep-seeded the choirs of the eo6 they

are the lost of the demon the kingdom is

iingering Harry

the man actually I don't think mixed a

great deal with the locals but they knew

what he was about curry never made these

secrets about sort of individually he

was and the north of Scotland being the

way it is there's a still some sort of

healthy superstitions floating about and

yeah I mean there were some people who

wouldn't even walk past this place I

have a healthy respect for what the

occult can do and and how it can really

muck up your life

Crowley Anil absolutely typical way he

broke off the ritual he just couldn't be

bothered to go on because it really is

pretty exhausting you know living on

bread and water and and getting up at 3

o'clock in the morning within vacations

and all kinds of thing it's nothing so

much as like being a monk only harder

and so Crowley gave it up if you do that

kind of thing you get possessed in a

certain sense things get inside you and

use you for their purposes

it was at this point that Crowley metros

Kelly a young society lady courting

scandal he married her the day after

they met and took her off to Egypt for

their honeymoon

leaving the Abra Mellon ritual

unfinished

the honeymoon was a period of

uninterrupted debauchery once in the

first three weeks or so Rose took some

trifling Liberty I recognized the

symptoms and turned her up and spanked

her she henceforth added the qualities

of a perfect wife to those of a perfect

mistress

when I was in my late teens Craig's like

an inspiration he was somebody who was

living a life that you wanted to live

like you wanted to be able to do what

you wanted you know break down the

taboos break down the barriers and there

was somebody that already done it so

they sort of become your own sort of

personal guru or the Great Pyramid now

this is where Crowley and his wife came

on their honeymoon and one night they

decided to spend a night inside the

Queen's Chamber

this is just for Crowley really - off

and show what a great magician he is to

his wife they must have done this on

their own human Rose that's been quite

an eerie thing to do this is it

this is the King's Chamber I wanted my

wife to see what a great magician I was

we went accordingly after dinner with

candles I had with me a small notebook

in which was written the preliminary

invocation of the NGO Asia the NGO Asia

is a grimoire it's probably the closest

thing to a black magic book it's the

Lesser Key of Solomon it's got nothing

to do with invoking angels it's got

nothing to do with anything particularly

spiritual it's purely to raise demons

and nothing else I invoke thee the born

last one

neither has create the earth and the

heavens neither has to create light and

the day

haha baby gets it right your this must

have been one hell of a honeymoon

back in Cairo they were continuing their

orgy of hedonistic excess when the black

magic ritual in the Great Pyramid had an

unexpected result that was to be the

turning point in Crowley's life Rose got

into a strange state of mind I had never

seen anything like it before

she kept on repeating dreamily yet

intensely they are waiting for you they

are waiting for you

yeah

when Crowley asked Rose who was waiting

she kept repeating that it was Horus an

Egyptian god

Crowley was puzzled and irritated by his

wife's bizarre behavior she knew nothing

of magic and even less of Egyptology

surely she of all people was not

receiving a message from the gods

Crowley decided to take Rose down to the

Egyptian Museum to test what she was

saying Rose had never visited the museum

before to Crowley's amazement she rushed

through rooms full of ancient artifacts

until suddenly she stopped dead there

there he is it was an image of the same

God she claimed to have seen in her

vision Crowley was stunned what could

this mean Rose told him that they had to

go back to the hotel room and wait to

find out this seems to be that instance

back in the Museum in Cairo when he went

to look at this exhibit which was

exhibit 666 and after that getting in

touch with somebody that said they were

the god Horus I think at that point

something happened with in his life

he opened himself up to a power that

never ever left him which he developed

and I believe he was the real thing I

believe that people that came into

contact with him

came into contact with that which was

supernaturally evil he had given himself

and that demonic control and that

demonic control could now affect him and

could work through him I tell you I tell

you I am coming back Crowley was about

to receive a revelation that would make

him the prophet of a new religion giving

him a charter to pursue a life dedicated

to sex and magic no matter what the

consequences Aleister Crowley had delve

deep into black magic but in all the

rituals he had performed he had failed

to communicate with a demonic entity he

believed that this was necessary to

become a supreme master of the occult

who could harness the powers of darkness

a room in Cairo what he had been waiting

for all his life was about to happen

of Jesus's hands on the cross Crowley

heard an unearthly voice from over his

left shoulder for one hour at precisely

the same time over the next three days

Crowley said that the voice dictated to

him

the book of the law the work that would

become the Bible of his new religion

the book of the law it just really is

ripping up everything it's ripping up

the Bible with ripping up the Koran you

know it's ripping up all the holy books

and saying we're starting fresh now this

is the word this is the word of the new

Aeon we're going to back out the eyes of

Christ on the cross it's very very

blasphemous it's all about liberation

it's all about having no restrictions at

all you follow your path you follow your

goal in life and you do that above all

else the book of the law is the Bible of

the religion Crowley was endeavoring to

found a book of inspired writings

whereby Crowley portrays himself as a

medium for some higher force inevitably

with an egomaniac like Crowley he finds

himself cast in the central role the

book of the laws states do what thou

wilt shall be the whole of the law in

other words people have the right to

determine exactly how to live their

lives regardless of moral and religious

boundaries

Crowley saw himself as the prophet of

this new creed and a year later showed

just how far he was prepared to take it

when he set off to conquer one of the

world's highest mountains Crowley had

started climbing as a teenager scaling

the perilous chalk cliffs of beachy head

in 1905 a year after the great

revelation in Cairo Crowley led the

first attempt on the world's third

highest mountain kanchenjungha but the

belief in the absolute supremacy of his

will was to have terrible consequences

Crowley was in point of fact a very good

climber he could have become known as

one of the great climbers but in his

major expedition the kanchenjungha

expedition he deserted the rest of the

party because they'd had some kind of a

quarrel and the quarrel was largely due

to the fact that they didn't like the

way that he tried to boss everybody

around

and of course Crowley simply went off

saying orach bastards if you don't want

me then you know that's too bad the rest

of the party was descending the mountain

face

when an avalanche struck Crowley was

alleged to have ignored the cries of the

stricken men preferring to stay in his

tent drinking tea four people were

killed in the tragedy

Crowley more or less saw what had

happened and just let them die now

that's the sort of really unpleasant

because he knew perfectly well you know

that as a climber um it was his job to

help them and of course that finished

him as far as the climbing mode was

concerned from then on he was

untouchable unmoved by the tragedy

Crowley set off on a trek across China

with his wife Rose and their baby girl

reaching vietnam he abandoned his wife

and took up with the mistress back in

Shanghai Rose was unable to cope on her

own and the child died of typhoid

Crowley then deserted rose for good

blaming her for the death in despair she

went mad back in England

Crowley found his first disciple Victor

Neuberg a young Cambridge purge in the

case of Nyberg there was definitely a

peculiar kind of homosexual relation and

I'm not just now talking about the

ordinary thing Noah Berg was in love

with him that's what that's what I mean

he got mixed up with Crowley Crowley saw

there a far weaker character and plunged

on nyberg and of course got dragged him

into this whole business of black magic

ah

Nyberg was subjected to a series of

sadistic acts designed to test the

poet's dedication to the beasts the two

set off to Algeria to perform Enochian

magic the dark and dangerous set of

occult rituals they walked

deep into the Sahara for two days until

they reached the point of exhaustion I

think the reason for the desert is it's

so desolate so isolated and there are no

there's nothing for your consciousness

to latch onto there no markings there's

no change in the desert and I think this

beats your consciousness into a kind of

a state of sensory deprivation I think

this is perfect for the sort of magic

that Crowley was doing this is what he

wanted to do and they really were

stepping off into the unknown

disorientated by the effects of the

desert and copious quantities of hashish

and mescaline Crowley and Nyberg

embarked on the climax of the ritual

summoning Carranza the dweller of the

abyss seen within the occult world as

the devil himself this particular ritual

was extremely dangerous it was mainly a

mistake they were opening the gates of

Hell the the opening lines are zazas

zazas now certain are deserts and these

words are literally to open the gates of

Hell he knew and this sounds a weird

thing to say he knew that magic works we

don't believe in it nowadays but in

point of fact all that you're ready

doing is trying to persuade forces that

do exist outside this world to come into

this world and to do so you have to

serve as that passage yourself to a

large extent and that's the reason the

magician gets inside a circle and stays

inside the circle now Curley liked

playing with fire he drew the circle

around Nyberg and he himself was outside

the circle

well magicians don't do that it it

really is dangerous

you know people can go mad um that they

suddenly hear voices inside the heads

they can't get rid of

now I'll Crowley fortunately was such a

bastard

he was more less a mutant

Reigate seized with a passion to perform

a sexual act and Crowley is the passive

partner in the in the sex act and at the

point of orgasm Crowley has like a

mystic revelation that sees a blinding

white light who seems to commune with

the secret Chiefs and who suddenly

realizes that sex can be a sacrament can

be in praise of the gods it's like a

shortcut it's a short circuit to go

straight in to achieve whatever you want

to achieve magically the effect of the

rituals left no burger shattered man he

never fully recovered from the

experience but for Crowley this was the

final piece in the jigsaw he had now

United his belief in the power of sex

and magic into one occult Vision Crowley

headed off to New York and threw himself

into what he now called sex magic he

kept a detailed record of his exploits

I had a Dutch prostitute a muscular wolf

type with a fine fat juicy yoni she

inspired me a magnificent effort after

the first world war broke out

Crowley offered himself to the British

war effort as a spy rejected by the

intelligence services

he decided that instead he would support

the Germans

Crowley began issuing propaganda on

behalf of the Germans for German owned

American newspapers

Crowley's defense being that he was

deliberately writing such absurd

nonsense that it made the German cause

look a ridiculous to the American people

the best example of this is probably an

open letter that scroll published

addressed to Zeppelin a giant Zeppelin

leaves its base for a night rain seeing

how defense versus city will lie beneath

the gaze of a bomb the Germans have

decided to make the damage as widespread

as possible a great deal of damage was

done in Croydon where my aunt lives

unfortunately her house was not hit

count Zeppelin is respectfully requested

to try again in the exact addresses

Eaton Lodge out ramp Road denounced by

the British press as a traitor

Crowley decided that it was time to

fulfill his role as a prophet of the

religion that he now called

thelema Crowley needed a place to

practice the Lima and set off across

Europe to find somewhere away from the

prying eyes of Edwardian England he

eventually stumbled across a ramshackle

farmhouse in Chef aloo northern Sicily

unprepossessing as it was

this was to be Crowley's temple what the

book of the law proposed the hammy of

Thelema practiced Crowley must have had

in his mind the hope that this was the

beginning of his new religion

crowler set up the abbey in 1920 with

his latest mistress Leia hetsig the

newborn baby and a motley band of

followers from around the world

Crowley met Leia in New York when she

was only 19

she was totally dedicated to him and was

prepared to do anything he asked of her

I dedicate myself wholly to the great

work I will work for wickedness

I will kill my heart I will be shameless

before all men I will freely prostitute

my body to all creatures it's amazing to

think that you know in the 1920s eighty

years ago Crowley came here with its

side ports to sort of found his

spiritual College and really just to

live a completely different way of life

his own unique way of life they were

going to break through all the

constraints they were sort of tying them

up England amazing the thing and this

was hearing he had his children here and

several disciples and several of his

mistresses and they all lived under the

one roof the whole point of living here

was to completely clear yourself and

discover your true will and Crowley was

the man who could help you do that

the disciples performed sex magic

rituals under the influence of hashish

opium and cocaine they even had a dog

called Satan as far as Crowley was

concerned it was an experiment in a

different kind of living it were

positive drugs on the table and the

children ran around naked and we're

allowed to sort of come into the room

while adults were having sex

Crowley believed that if you gave man

absolute freedom to do exactly what he

wanted this could do nothing but good it

was evidently not the most pleasant

place to stay

the members were prone to disease

discomforts of various kinds most of

which could only be alleviated by faith

in Crowley himself and the ready supply

of drugs which Crowley made sure were

readily available amongst all of this

you have to imagine that there was also

a family atmosphere albeit a very

dysfunctional one think Charles Manson

rather than the Waltons I think when

Crowley first arrived in with his

followers and sour-faced

absolutely worked the Chili's cars whole

village because they've never seen

someone but hanging it's way before word

they've never even seen it was climbing

up a free man locally now this actual

house of Aleister Crowley is supposed to

be cursed and I was advised when I first

came here not to go to the house to have

been a very very bad thing to do some

people call January 2 a form of the

actual building Aaron paramore first

came to Sicily on a kind of a cult

pilgrimage and was amazed at what he

found inside the now derelict Abbey

it's gonna take a wall through

okay now

stabby over to morning

small to my brain so comedian and

my cocaine

this somebody very long tongue he seems

to sunny [ __ ] Lea this is the place that

Crowley called the nightmare line

disciples were given drugs and made to

sit and look at Crowley's pornographic

paintings on the walls the idea was that

by doing this they would lose all their

fear and repression their green demon

sir

rather well-endowed demon as people at

the abbey continued to lose their

inhibitions the sex magic rituals

Crowley asked them to perform became

more and more extreme probably the most

controversial and lurid episode in the

whole Chef Alou period is the scented

copulation between one of his scarlet

women Lea her sick and a goat now

supposedly at the time of orgasm the

goat was to mount Lea herceg and a ton

of orgasms to have its throat cut we can

wonder whether what he was trying to do

was a to test the dedication of his

disciples to see how far he could push

them perhaps he also thought it would be

a good show I mean Crowley was dedicated

to novelty I daresay that will be a

novelty to most people the goat the

symbol of course of Satan normal man and

woman is is repulsed by this sort of

thing and we wonder what actually can

bring human beings to this I think what

had happened was that in the Abbey they

had sated or satisfied so many of their

appetites

all the time they were going just that

bit further until eventually they were

copulating with animals and I suppose

when you get to that stage

it is symbolic of the depth of evil

things started to go wrong at the Abbey

Crowley struggled with his growing drug

addiction layer had a nervous breakdown

well what Crowley called the great work

had to go on people who use the word eye

are encouraged to cut themselves in

order to remind themselves that they

don't have an identity Crowley was there

destroying people's egos that was part

of the experiment

he was liberating them from their

conventional upbringing 'he's

role of day was an Oxford graduate who

broke away from his middle-class

background and came to Sicily with his

wife he wrote to his parents that he was

happier at the Abbey than he had ever

been but love day fell ill and died

after allegedly drinking the blood of a

cat sacrificed in a ritual his wife left

Sicily and went straight to the British

press Crowley's little scarlet piece of

heaven collapsed due to one of the

earliest tabloid attacks which rather

than attacking Crowley's Abbey as being

the kind of mind control camp it was

which probably wouldn't have made sense

to people at this time it portrayed this

kind of dark devil worshipping orgy

ridden den of human sacrifice which

which it wasn't eventually of course it

was Mussolini who kicked his little crew

out for many of the people at the Abbey

what they did there blighted the rest of

their lives deserted by Crowley lair

hurt cigs sank into prostitution other

disciples went mad one committed suicide

the dream was over Crowley was now

public enemy number one the wickedest

man in the world

Crowley's attempt to start a new

religion in the abbey of Thelema had

gone disastrously wrong his reputation

as the wickedest man in the world was

sealed the last year's of the great

beasts life was spent living from hand

to mouth his fortune was long gone and

his disciples had deserted him he moved

from one set of temporary lodgings to

another and finally ended up in a

boarding house in Hastings his life of

excess had left him with nothing but

chronic heroin addiction and infamy

Geoffrey has come and gone it is almost

like an irony to it that he's come here

really where old people died the great

beast 666 the wickedest man in the world

is now residing in a boarding house you

know with a lot of other old people he's

been through absolute hell and back you

know he's done for the devil and he's

come back again and is he a wise old man

or easier a sad lonely heroin addict in

a room

in 1934 Crowley began a libel case

against a writer who described him as a

black magician he was desperate for

money than believed he might be awarded

damages examples of Crowley's

pornographic poetry were read out in

court and then the wife of Raoul of day

the young man who died in the abbey of

Thelema gave evidence of Crowley's

depravity the judge was appalled saying

that in 40 years of Justice he had never

heard of such wickedness Crowley lost

the case and ended up bankrupt but even

after such a humiliating defeat his

extraordinary magnetism was undiminished

after a court case that Crowley loses

the young woman called didi McCallum

comes up to him and says I want to have

your child basically and Crowley agrees

and they go off together and they

perform a ritual to have a magical son a

sort of a magical heir for Crowley and

they perform various rituals and they do

have this son and his name is Alastair

attitude we're lucky he took me in his

arms and doorstep that Easter Laden

which at least led into the window I do

he he said I want you and I want your

child well I wanted a child and ice I

just started from them then he came

round and saw me often he had to give up

drugs pretty well give up drugs for six

months six week and three months because

he couldn't he couldn't conceive very

easily I suppose I can see he did the

other thing though that was the only

child who in the everyday concept I

think he really loved whom he wanted to

see have a future it wasn't till the end

of his life that I really think he came

into contact with the kind of love most

men would have wanted perhaps for the

first time Crowley was beginning to

question what his life had really

amounted to

have I ever done anything of value

what am i a mere trifling existing by a

series of ships of one kind or another a

wastrel a coward a man of straw I can

find no answer whatsoever the obvious

verdict being guilty every time from an

early age Crowley had been obsessed with

sex he came to believe that it was the

key to magical fulfillment so when he

wrote in his diary weak direction he

knew that the end was near there was no

tears falling down his face whatsoever

we talked the whole day before and the

whole of the next day but he died until

he went into a coma net which he did

very quietly and then the day after when

you did die it was this strange thing to

happen again by the curtains very still

day the curtains blew out across the

room and was a great peal of thunder

which was I think the gods reading

rotten as I am in a thousand ways I have

been chosen by the gods to bring to

earth the basic word in which mankind

will work for the next 2,000 years or so

I assure you the world is ready for this

move the great beast died in 1947 and

for a decade it seemed all his ideas had

died with him but then his do what thou

wilt philosophy found a new home with a

generation that was experimenting with

free love drugs and alternative beliefs

Crowley had pushed the same boundaries

forty years earlier he was now a 60s

icon John Lennon acknowledged him as a

personal hero by putting him on the

front cover of The Beatles Sergeant

Pepper album drugs guru Timothy Leary

went tripping in Crowley's footsteps

great trip and the Rolling Stones were

drawn to him by the underground

filmmaker Kenneth Anger the stones found

Kenneth Anger who in turn introduced

them to the world of Aleister Crowley

which at least for a time seemed a

heaven since probably the wrong word but

certainly seemed to suit the direction

they were heading which was

unquestionably infernal the stones

flirtation with the dark side was grief

but since the sixties the occult has

seen an explosion and popularity there

are now thousands of occult websites on

the internet with many dedicated to the

Great Beast

for devotees of Crowley it's possible to

certainly see a lot of the things he

predicted prophesied as having come to

pass

certainly Christianity's rip over what

we can and can't say what we can and

can't think what we can and can't do is

diminishing today Crowley's followers

believe that he was a true prophet

because he foresaw a society that has

now embraced ideas of sexual and

spiritual freedom others are not so sure

I think today modern occultism sees a

very watered-down version of Crowley

they gloss over some of the atrocious

things that he did and they just want to

see him as a benign a humanist somebody

who said let's be free let's go with the

flow and it is to deny an awful lot of

evilness that hand in his practices we

should be open and honest about Aleister

Crowley

Crowley may have done some extreme

things in his life but was he truly evil

does he really deserve his reputation as

the wickedest man in the world

Crowley never caught himself the

wickedest man in the world from a fairly

early age Crowley wanted to see himself

as the great beast 666

I'm simply because he wanted to see

himself as somebody who broken free

absolutely completely from Plymouth

Brethren from his mother

Crowley was a victim of his own idea of

Christianity probably if Crowley had

been born into a modern environment

where he didn't have to be a Christian

or anything of the sort I think that

half of the half of his force would have

disappeared because he wouldn't have had

anything to brace himself against to

fight against to hate

aleister crowley's life was spent

affirming his freedom

it began in defiance of his family

Victoria morality and the Christian

Church but the desire to exert his own

free will became an obsession and a

license to live his life to outrageous

extremes

Crowley's beliefs ultimately proved to

be as damaging to himself as they were

to others

he didn't seem to understand that a

philosophy of do exactly what you want

doesn't really work for 99% of people if

you took away all laws or restraints and

all the rest of it his society would

suddenly turn into a pretty horrible

mess

Crowley's attempts to establish a new

religion left him bankrupt friendless

and physically wrecked

but he has left an extraordinary legacy

of a life pushed to the absolute limit

Crowley ultimately is as magnetic and

exciting as he is repellent there are

aspects of his character which are very

difficult to admire or even tolerate he

was childish

he was unpleasant to many of the people

who most admired him but above and

beyond that Crowley was and is mythic

and there are aspects of this myth which

are very very positive I find it

difficult not to stand in all of his

appetite for life his vigor his

determination to challenge himself from

the world around him

Crowley wasn't afraid of anything or

anyone bury me in the nameless grave I

came from God the world per se I brought

them

the worship of liberty and love space

movie so be my grave without an egg

butter may swallow up my shame

you

masters of darkness next Tuesday is on

later at five past eleven as a taste of

that coming up in a moment