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Correspondence from Karl Germer to Kenneth Grant
Hampton N.J. P.O. Box 581
May 20, 1955.
Care Frater Aossic:
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.
I confirm receipt of your letter of May 11 with the pamphlet about a New Order. I welcomed news from you, in fact, I had been expecting something for some time. A man of your potential should not waste but grow.
Your letter and pamphlet pose an unusually great number of questions so you will have to consider what I intend going to set down as only a preliminary, sort of clearing up some immediate matters; in this I follow the last three lines of your letter.
O.T.O. : I can't quite see: how can you write so authoritatively? Have you a charter from anyone lawfully entitled? The Order which you propose has a number of O.H.O.'s [Outer Head of Order] of the O.T.O. apart from the I.H.O. [Inner Head of Order] of the O.T.O. The original Order of the O.T.O. had one O.H.O. on a planetary basis. Your system appears to set up an O.H.O. for the British group alone. Both the O.H.O. and the I.H.O. appear centred in London?
ISIAC — ISIS, on whom your Order is founded: first, what is the distance of the (?) planet Isis from the Sun, what its orbit? In any case it seems to be a planet. The O.T.O. is entirely solar, based on the centre of our mite in our galactic system. Why base an Order, or even a lodge, on the splinter of a Whole?
In the pamphlet it is referred to as a "sister-lodge in Germany, controlled by the Master G∴" (Grosche—Gregorius [Eugen Grosche], without doubt.) representing the Saturnian element—again planetary, instead of Sol. Apart from this: Grosche has often attempted to be affiliated with the O.T.O.; without success. Besides, I have known him for 30 years, it is rather funny to me to elevate him to a spiritual position as implied in the pamphlet. And as to Thelema? He knows as good as nothing of its purity, morals, diamond demands, its thought, etc.
In general, as far as lodges and orders go: it seems to me you attach too much importance to the O.T.O. as the exclusive possessor of the secret we know of. In fact, it is known the world over. I can only speak with some weight for Germany and there were back in 1925 quite a number of independent groups who taught it. The German masonic bodies in the 33°, where genuinely acquired, possessed and applied it; etc. etc. Of course, Himmler destroyed the groups, when he could not find the secret in their archives, but he looked for it as he did from me.
This much about the O.T.O. Now to some fundamental questions. I dwell at length on this Isis because it is the fundament of your planned Lodge. If it proves to be a sponge instead of a rock, there cannot be value of permanence.
I could say a lot on the paragraphs on page 6 of your pamphlet where Isis is equalled with Nuit—it is too hollow. Also: how can you "base your lodge particularly on the first chapter of the Book of the Law—and then follow it by the next paragraph!? It is sheer nonsense! No one can blame you for not having mastered the three different chapters of Liber Legis. That takes several lifetimes, even that of ten geniuses. But why then mention it at all? All three, Nuit, Hadit, Ra Hoor Khuit have no business in your Isaic Lodge. Your members should study the Book—EACH FOR HIMSELF!—, the whole book, not base his or her research on one chapter alone.
Next Par.: "New Isis Lodge possesses . . ." What are these special unpublished and secret documents"? what is that "certain Magical Formulae" . . . and at last! your "Sister-lodge in Germany" in the same connection and paragraph dealing with the highest secrets, when that very sister-lodge has no inkling of the Book of the Law at all! How silly can we get? (Grosche has received the translation of AL for the first time a few months ago; all he knew were the Greeting sentences, which he knew from me and from one of the old pamphlets of Reus [Theodor Reuss]; and he adopted a silly explanation I, when a babe, gave him of 'love under will', and printed it and uses it!
But you are NOT in accord with "a Past Master called Therion", "and with the present Master S∴"! And the next paragraph is simply not true!
From a general lodge manifesto point of view I also disagree profoundly with par. 3, 4, and 5 on page 3 of your pamphlet [Manifesto of the New Isis Lodge]. It smacks like Grosche's publication, where he also uses those dark and sinister threats; also like Romish method of cowing free men and free women. I took Grosche severely to task when I read it. I must do likewise with you, and warn you. It is certainly not Thelemic. We do not threaten with hell and purgatory and eternal damnation. Punishment (I don't like the word, but can't find the needed one at the moment) should be an automatic reaction, dealt out by ONE who is above the personal, i.e. in the way as described in the First Aethyr. All else is black magic.
There is much more that I have to criticize in the aura of your Manifesto, but I won't go into all these details, I have a feeling that you have yourself realized in sober moments how cockeyed it is. I must come to the O.T.O. angle.
Has none of your collaborators pointed out to you how incorrect your procedure is to acknowledge a "present World-Head of the O.T.O." and not ask his permission first before putting this Manifesto into print? (I take it you have not distributed it to anyone up to now).
[the remainder of the letter is missing]
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