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Interlude: On Stolen Letters and Lettered Secrets
- The University of Alabama Press
- Chapter
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“The fool readeth this Book—and he understandeth it not.” This has a secret reverse-sense, meaning: The fool (Parzival = Fra.O.I.V.V.I.O.) understandeth it (being a Magister Templi, the Grade attributed to Understanding) not (i.e. to be ‘not’). Here the reader must realize that “Fra.” is an abbreviation for Frater, or brother; this is a grade in Crowley’s secret order, the “Silver Star.” Also, in medieval European mythology, Parzifal is a wise fool. When “Parzifal” is phonetically translated into Hebrew (O.I.V.V.I.O.) and is numerically added up, one gets 418—which for Crowley is rife with signi¤cance. Crowley continues: This Parzival, adding to 418, is (in the legend of the Graal) the son of Kamuret, adding to 666, being the son of me The Beast [Crowley calls himself “The Beast,” and his number is 666, which he took from the Book of Revelation] by the Scarlet Woman Hilarion [Crowley’s wife, Rose Edith Crowley, or “Ouarda”]. This was a Name chosen by her when half drunk, as a theft from Theosophical legend, but containing many of our letter-number Keys to the Mysteries; the number of the petals in the most sacred lotus. It adds to 1001, which also is Seven times Eleven times Thirteen, a series of factors which may be read as The Scarlet Woman’s Love by Magick producing Unity, in Hebrew Achad. For 7 is the number of Venus, and the sweet sevenlettered Name of my concubine B A B A L O N is written with Seven Sevens, thus: 77 + 7 + 7 + 77 = 156, the number of BABALON. 7 418 is the number of the Word of the Magical Formula of this Aeon [elsewhere and in many places, including in Liber AL, we are told that this formula is ABRAHADABRA].47 The only link between “fool” and Parzival is their Hebrew Qabalistic number, 418, yet Crowley ¤nds “fool” here rife with signi¤cance. Intertextual meanings are afforded the concept, which, unfortunately, is easily missed by the neophyte occultist unfamiliar with the myth of Parzival.48 Importantly, readers with some background in Crowley’s other writings would know that Crowley has also associated himself with “The Fool” in the tarot, a series of cards used for divination. In his own The Book of Thoth (Egyptian tarot), written toward the end of crowley and authority / 131 his magical career, Crowley explains the card of “The Fool” in more depth: “This card is attributed to the letter Aleph [a], which means an Ox, but by its shape the Hebrew letter (so it is said) represents a ploughshare; thus the signi¤cance is primarily Phallic. It is the ¤rst of the three Mother letters, Aleph, Mem, and Shin, which correspond in various interwoven fashions with all the triads that occur in those cards, notably, Fire, Water, Air; Father . . . [and on and on].”49 The Ox reference explains its mention in verse 48 of the ¤rst chapter of The Book of the Law, although in both old and new commentaries Crowley neglects to explain this Hebrew reference. Nevertheless, Crowley’s many, many ruminations on the “fool” in his commentary on The Book of the Law and elsewhere are indicative of an inability to stop with the chaining of symbolic reference, which can, of course, continue endlessly. Of course, Crowley suggests that when The Book of the Law reads like bad poetry, there must be a secret meaning that is only apprehended with numerical techniques. In prescribing the Qabalah, however , Crowley opens interpretation to a multitude of possible meanings. Such an opening leads to two interpretive possibilities for Crowley and his readers. First, in liberating words from a mundane ¤xed signi¤cation, Crowley is able re-signify them as he wishes, laying claim to critical power and thus giving him a way to assert his authority (if not to rescue his ugly text from the waste bin of “bad art”). This ¤rst possibility, incidentally, is yet another version of occult poetics , ironically, through the use of mundane terms. The second possibility , however, urges others to read The Book of the Law Qabalistically as well, which potentially empowers them to re-signify words in ways that Crowley cannot control. As a hermeneutic, the Qabalah is both a way to secure authority and a way to undermine it; it harbors a dialectic of control. For example, whereas Blavatsky used weird terms and hence had the sole power to signify, Crowley’s...