THE GREAT BEAST: ENOCHIAN AND THELEMA

Note: The following assumes, gentle reader, that you have read the four prior "Little Lectures on Magick" series here on the blog.

So he carried me away in the spirit into the wilderness: and I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet coloured beast, full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns. And the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet colour, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication: And upon her forehead was a name written, MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH. And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus: and when I saw her, I wondered with great admiration.

— Revelations 17:3-6

The Coming of the Beast

FOLLOWING DEE AND KELLEY the Enochian materials lay quietly, largely forgotten.  And yet everything Dee had wanted, he got.  Britain not only survived, she thrived.  The Spanish Armada was decimated by what could only be termed an "act of God," clearing the way for England to become an imperial power.  By the end of the 19th century, the tiny island kingdom with its rebel queen was the greatest empire the world had ever seen, under a new queen whose very name summed it all up nicely; "Victoria."  It might have seemed to Dee, had he been resurrected to see it, that God and his Angels had delivered.  Still, the Apocalypse they warned off, the Apocalypse he had been given the Keys to unlock, was nowhere to be seen.

In 1886, a group of Masons with occult leanings came into possession of some improbable cipher manuscripts.  The provenance of these documents is not terribly relevant to our discussion; suffice it to say the papers granted these men to launch an English branch of a Continental secret society.  It came to be called the Ordo Hermeticus Aurorae Aureae, the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn.

The Golden Dawn was a Rosicrucian society, a curious cocktail of Christian Mysticism, Freemasonry, and Egyptology.  Its founders, William Robert Woodman, William Wynn Westcott, and Samuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers, did an extraordinary job of combining Kabbalah, Tarot, Alchemy, and the obscure Enochian system, into a new and cohesive whole.  The Enochian element was largely to work of Mathers, who combed over Dee's journals (then property of the British Museum).  To be certain, he took liberties, inventing something called Enochian Chess and turning the Great Table into a bizarre collection of truncated pyramids, but all the same he liberated the Enochian Keys from their dusty vaults and passed them down into the hands of someone who would finally use them for their intended purpose.

We are speaking, of course, of Aleister Crowley (1875-1947).  Crowley joined the Golden Dawn in 1898, shot up at ridiculous speed through its ranks, and within two years (according to some accounts) had destroyed it.  This was a pattern with Crowley.  Chaos came in his wake.

In his time with the Order, Crowley had become Mather's protege, and like his mentor took a keen interest in the Enochian Keys.  Perhaps the Apocalyptic imagery spoke to him; Crowley had been raised in the Plymouth Brethren, a severe sola scriptura Evangelical sect hot for the End of Days.  A rebellious polymath, Crowley put as much distance between him and his upbringing as possible, but he could still quote the King James Bible chapter and verse until the end of his life, and internalized the name his mother used to taunt him with...the Beast.

In 1900, Crowley took the Keys with him to Mexico, where he decided to use them to explore the 30 Aethyrs, the "heavens" that surround the material world (analogous to the Gnostic Aeons).  He was only able to unlock two, and would return finish the remaining 28 nine years later.  Crowley record of these visionary experiences, Liber 418: The Vision and the Voice, is (next to Dee's own diaries) the single most important document in the whole Enochian canon.  It has been compared, favorably, to Blake.  Crowley himself considered it his second greatest work.

But let's not get ahead of ourselves.

In 1900, scrying the first Aethyr, the young Crowley recorded;

I AM in a vast crystal cube in the form of the Great God Harpocrates. This cube is surrounded by a sphere. About me are four archangels in black robes, their wings and armour lined out in white.

In the North is a book on whose back and front are A.M.B.Z. in Enochian characters.

Within it is written:

...Lift up your heads, O Houses of Eternity: for my Father goeth forth to judge the World. One Light, let it become a thousand, and one sword ten thousand, that no man hide him from my Father's eye in the Day of Judgment of my God. Let the Gods hide themselves: let the Angels be troubled and flee away: for the Eye of My Father is open, and the Book of the Aeons is fallen...

...Tremble ye, O Pillars of the Universe, for Eternity is in travail of a Terrible Child; she shall bring forth an universe of Darkness, whence shall leap forth a spark that shall put his father to flight...

This is 1900, four years before the event Crowley is best known for, but there are clear hints of what-was-to-come right there in the first Enochian vision...Harpocrates, a Book proclaiming an Apocalypse, a "Terrible Child" about to be born and replace his father.  Four years before Thelema officially "went public," the Enochain angels seemed to be leaking the story.

Crowley made it only so far as the 29th Aethyr (having scried the 30th Aeythr, the one closest to Earth, first).  He would later claim he lacked sufficient initiation to go further.  But the two visions are Apocalyptic, referring both to a coming Book and a Child.  In the wake of these visions, for various reasons, Crowley abruptly abandoned magic and mysticism and converted to Buddhism.  He married, and took his bride, Rose, on a globe trotting honeymoon.  Perhaps he thought he was done with the Angels.  The Angels, however, were not done with him.

Here is the official story.  Do what you will with it.

The Book of the Law

While on honeymoon in Cairo, Crowley decided to entertain Rose with some of his old, rejected magic.  He figured conjuring the sylphs would be harmless enough.  But Rose fell into a sort of trance, and started telling her husband that the god Horus was trying to get in touch with him.  As Rose had no knowledge or interest in things esoteric, Crowley was understandably irritated by her ramblings.  He took her to a museum and challenged her to point out who was trying to reach him, sneering to himself as she blindly walked right past all the well known images of Horus.  But straight she went to a small, painted funeral stele, and pointed excitedly.  Sure enough, it displayed Horus (Ra Hoor Khuit), as well as two other deities, the Egyptian star goddess Nut (Nuit) and Behdet (Hadit) the winged solar disc.  She insisted this was the source of the voices calling to her, and Crowley, who had been called by his mother "the Beast" and "Antichrist" for his rebelliousness and rejection of her faith, couldn't help but notice that the museum exhibit number of this little wooden item was number 666.  It was enough to convince him to listen to her.

Following her instructions, Crowley locked himself in his bedroom between the hours of noon and one o'clock on three successive afternoons, April 8th, 9th, and 10th.  There he sat down at his desk, pen and paper ready.  And there, the story goes, a voice dictated to him Liber AL vel Legis, also known as The Book of the Law.  He always insisted it wasn't in his head.  He heard it from over his left shoulder, from the corner of the room.

So what exactly is in this book?  It's a tricky business, really, to talk about it.  Preaching a doctrine of extreme individualism, it is forbidden to interpret Liber AL bel Legis for anyone else.  Everyone must read and decipher it through the lens of their own experience.  So I tread lightly here.

For starters it is divided into three short chapters, each dictated over the space of one hour as Crowley furiously scribbled them out. Each chapter was dictated, through a messenger named "Aiwass," the "minister of Hoor-paar-kraat" (the god Hapocrates, mentioned above in Crowley's scrying of the 30th Aethyr).  The chapters, however, are messages from three different deities.  The first is Nuit, the Divine Feminine and goddess of infinite Space. The second is her counterpart Hadit, the Divine Masculine.  He is said to exist at the center of every individual. The third is Ra-Hoor-Khuit, the Crowned and Conquering Child.  This is the "Terrible Child" the Enochian Angels told Crowley would be born.  Ra Hoor is the fiery, active form of Horus (Hoor-paar-kraat or Harpocrates, is his hidden, passive form...more on this later).  Horus is also, it seems, the Lord of the New Aeon.

What is this New Aeon?  Simply put, The Book of the Law is announcing the Apocalypse. 

The book puts forward a theory of Aeons, ages of time not unlike the Ages of Man discussed by Hesiod and Ovid or the "Yugas" of India.  Each Aeon represents a stage of human development.  Human prehistory is largely dominated by the Aeon of Isis, the Mother.  Societies tended to be matrilineal hunter gatherers, and were dominated by the family or clan. The great mystery was Birth; "where does life come from?"  Women, it seemed, periodically brought life forth from their bodies, as did the Earth.  Reproduction was not clearly understood.  

With agriculture, the Aeon of Isis was replaced by that of Osiris, the Father.  It was very clear to the Osirians where life came from...the Seed.  Women, like the soil, were merely incubators.  Patriarchy took over, and worship moved from the Earth to the life-giving Sky Father, the Sun.  The notion of sacrifice became central, as crops and livestock died so that mankind could live.  And with the new focus on growing seasons, the formula of "death and resurrection" took hold.  The Sun, it seemed, was reborn ever day.  The patriarchal, hierarchal, and sacrificial were the dominant themes of this Aeon, and the central forces of society were the church and the state.

The Book of the Law is the trumpet blast heralding the death of the Osirian Age.  Horus, the son of both Isis and Osiris, is taking his place on the throne of his father.  This is the Age of the Child, in which we understand now that both men and women play roles in reproduction, so there shall be equality of the sexes. Indeed, the authority of the Mother (Family) and the Father (Church/State) are overturned; the seat of society is now the Individual.  The only law is do what thou wilt, discover your true nature and act in accordance with it (allowing others to do the same).  All the old formulae of self-sacrifice, abstinence, and restriction are swept aside.  Notions of birth and death are defunct--the molecules in our bodies were forged in stars and will endure until the end of time.  The Sun doesn't die and get reborn, we simply turn away from it awhile, but it is always there, affecting the world.  Likewise the existences we lead endure forever in the marks our actions made upon the world.  Our error is in seeing ourselves as isolated, rather than as part of the continuity of existence. We are each of us the Universe experiencing itself. 

But it is not all good news.  The transformation of one Age to the next is a bloody, chaotic, tumultuous affair.  The Dawn of the New Aeon will see Horus in his most bloodthirsty, martial aspect; he will stamp down the wretched and the weak.  The third chapter of The Book of the Law, his chapter, is the most difficult to read, filled with violent imagery;

...Thou shalt have danger & trouble. Ra-Hoor-Khu is with thee. Worship me with fire & blood; worship me with swords & with spears. Let the woman be girt with a sword before me: let blood flow to my name. Trample down the Heathen; be upon them, o warrior, I will give you of their flesh to eat!

Crowley, it seemed, was to be the Prophet of this New Aeon.  He and his wife Rose were meant to fill the offices of the Beast and Scarlet Woman of Revelations, dedicating their lives to spreading word of the new law.

Crowley, however, was having none of it.  There was a great deal in the book he didn't understand, large sections he considered gibberish, and much of what he did understand disturbed him.  So, despite warnings of dire consequences should he reject his role, Crowley did exactly that.  Tucking The Book of the Law away, he promptly spent the next five years forgetting about it.  

43. Let the Scarlet Woman beware! If pity and compassion and tenderness visit her heart; if she leave my work to toy with old sweetnesses; then shall my vengeance be known. I will slay me her child: I will alienate her heart: I will cast her out from men: as a shrinking and despised harlot shall she crawl through dusk wet streets, and die cold and an-hungered...

Rose and Crowley went about their way, and one by one the warnings of the book came true.  In 1906 the couple lost their daughter (born the year The Book of the Law was received).  Several years later Rose had to be put away in an institution for alcoholic dementia.  Crowley, meanwhile, suffered a string of failures and misfortunes.  In the end it was enough to convince him to give The Book of the Law another look.  

What is crucial, however, is that when he needed aid in deciphering this text, he went back to the Enochian Aethyrs.

The Vision and the Voice

The genuineness of these Keys, altogether apart from any critical observation, is guaranteed by the fact that anyone with the smallest capacity for Magick finds that they work...

The intelligent reader is faced with two possibilities here.  One, The Book of the Law is indeed a declaration from "on high."  The Angels who spoke to Dee in the 1580s handed him the Keys to the Apocalypse, but not for his use...for Crowley's, three centuries later.  When Crowley scried the first two Aethyrs in 1900, with their visions of a Terrible Child and a Book, he was doing what the Angels has always planned...unlocking that Apocalypse, the New Aeon of Horus.  Crowley was, as he later came to believe, the Beast spoken of in Revelations.

Or...

Aleister Crowley, fascinated by Revelations and the Beast, read the Enochian materials and internalized them.  Just as Dee was trying to create a new English religion, so too was Crowley.  Consciously or subconsciously Dee's spiritual revolution inspired Crowley to pen The Book of the Law.

Either way it is clear that Enochian and Thelema are connected, either by angelic or human intent.  They are the same spiritual revolution in two phases, separated by three centuries but bound by a common language and culture.  Born at the dawn of the British Era, Enochian was an English attempt to overthrow an older era.  Thelema, born at Britain's climax, was exactly the same.  In Crowley's mind, at least, he was finally bringing the revolution Dee started to the world.

In 1909, in the deserts of North Africa, Crowley returned to Dee's Angels and the Aethyrs.  Working with an assistant named Victor Neuburg, Crowley successfully scried the remaining 28.  

Now, while The Book of the Law is without question the foundational text of the New Aeon, it is actually from the Aethyric visions that Crowley received much of what we consider the core doctrines of Thelema.  The concept of the Holy Guardian Angel, of Crossing the Abyss, the Thelemic deities BABALON and CHAOS, all of these come from his communications with the Enochian Angels.  A review of his titles for the scrying of the Aethyrs illustrates this (see the image below).

Perhaps it is simplest to say that while The Book of the Law lays out the "what," the visions Crowley beheld in the Aethyrs detail the "how" of Thelema, as well as introducing three new key figures to Thelemic cosmology.

Let us examine briefly some of the major teachings Crowley obtained from these visions.

THE HOLY GUARDIAN ANGEL

And because I am with thee, and in thee, and of thee, thou shalt lack nothing. But who lack me, lack all. And I swear unto thee by Him that sitteth upon the Holy Throne, and liveth and reigneth for ever and ever, that I will be faithful unto this my promise, as thou art faithful unto this thine obligation...

The Holy Guardian Angel is representative of one’s truest divine nature. The term is equivalent with the Genius of the Golden Dawn, the Augoeides of Iamblichus, the Atman of Hinduism, and the Daemon of the gnostics.  It was in the 8th Aethyr that Crowley was taught the nature of this being, and his was identified as Aiwass, the entity who dictated Liber AL to him.  

The Knowledge and Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel is the first thing all new Thelemites must aspire to, for it is the revelation of the True Will.  Without this attainment, the aspirant acts blindly, in ignorance of his deepest nature.

BABALON

Though her name is an Enochian word derived from Dee and Kelley's sessions, BABALON only reveals herself as a Thelemic divinity while Crowley was scrying the Aethyrs (particularly the 12th);

This is the Mystery of Babylon, the Mother of Abominations, and this is the mystery of her adulteries, for she hath yielded up herself to everything that liveth, and hath become a partaker in its mystery. And because she hath made her self the servant of each, therefore is she become the mistress of all. Not as yet canst thou comprehend her glory.

Beautiful art thou, O Babylon, and desirable, for thou hast given thyself to everything that liveth, and thy weakness hath subdued their strength. For in that union thou didst understand. Therefore art thou called Understanding, O Babylon, Lady of the Night!

BABALON is a manifestation of Nuit, and more prefectly, of Binah (the Third Sephiroth that births the universe).  She is the Divine Feminine.  The Scarlet Woman spoken of in The Book of the Law is merely an office, a representative of BABALON on Earth.  

It is worth mentioning that BABALON is referenced in the workings of Dee and Kelley themselves;

"...I am the daughter of Fortitude, and ravished every hour from my youth. For behold I am Understanding and science dwelleth in me; and the heavens oppress me. They cover and desire me with infinite appetite; for none that are earthly have embraced me, for I am shadowed with the Circle of the Stars and covered with the morning clouds. My feet are swifter than the winds, and my hands are sweeter than the morning dew. My garments are from the beginning, and my dwelling place is in myself. The Lion knoweth not where I walk, neither do the beast of the fields understand me. I am deflowered, yet a virgin; I sanctify and am not sanctified. Happy is he that embraceth me: for in the night season I am sweet, and in the day full of pleasure. My company is a harmony of many symbols and my lips sweeter than health itself. I am a harlot for such as ravish me, and a virgin with such as know me not. For lo, I am loved of many, and I am a lover to many; and as many as come unto me as they should do, have entertainment.

Purge your streets, O ye sons of men, and wash your houses clean; make yourselves holy, and put on righteousness. Cast out your old strumpets, and burn their clothes; abstain from the company of other women that are defiled, that are sluttish, and not so handsome and beautiful as I, and then will I come and dwell amongst you: and behold, I will bring forth children unto you, and they shall be the Sons of Comfort. I will open my garments, and stand naked before you, that your love may be more enflamed toward me."

In the language of the Angels, babalon means "wicked" and babalond is "harlot."  Thus not only does this passage from Dee's journals sum up the Thelemic understanding of BABALON nicely, it also references her ("harlot," in bold above).

CHAOS

The male counterpart to BABALON, Chaos is the "Unnamed God" that inhabits Chokmah, the Dyad (the number two).  Together BABALON and CHAOS are the Female and Male principles of existence, and forms of both Nuit and Had.  The Beast is his earthly representative.

And thou shalt give the sign of the Mother, for BABALON is thy fortress against the iniquity of the Abyss, of the iniquity of that which bindeth her unto the Crown, and barreth her from the Crown; for not until thou art made one with CHAOS canst thou begin that last, that most terrible projection, the three-fold Regimen which alone constitutes the Great Work.

Associated with the Dyad, two, CHAOS is inherently also associated with that perfect, Qabalistic zero or "nothingness" as well (2=0, or +n + -n = 0).  From Crowley's comments on the 4th Aethyr;

This is the meaning of that passage; they are attempts to interpret Chaos, but Chaos is Peace... Blackness, blackness intolerable, before the beginning of the light. This is the first verse of Genesis. Holy art thou, Chaos, Chaos, Eternity, all contradictions in terms!... But when the balances are equal, scale matched with scale, then will Chaos return.

There is some suggestion here that the Devil (Dual, Dyad, Double) is Pan, the "All," with the "Night of Pan" being the state of transcendent Nothingness of Void.  This is an interesting spin on the title "the Prince of Darkness."

CHORONZON AND THE ABYSS

In the writings of John Dee, "Choronzon" was the angelic word for Satan, the Serpent in the Tree of Knowledge.  Crowley's Enochian visions link him with the Abyss.

Though the Abyss exists also in Qabalah, as the gulf between the 3rd and 4th Sephiroth (between the Heavens and the Earth), it exists also among the Aethyrs (the 10th).  Here it is the lair of Choronzon, synonymous in Dee's journals with Satan.  Crowley says of him;

The name of the Dweller in the Abyss is Choronzon, but he is not really an individual. The Abyss is empty of being; it is filled with all possible forms, each equally inane, each therefore evil in the only true sense of the word—that is, meaningless but malignant, in so far as it craves to become real. These forms swirl senselessly into haphazard heaps like dust devils, and each such chance aggregation asserts itself to be an individual and shrieks, "I am I!" though aware all the time that its elements have no true bond; so that the slightest disturbance dissipates the delusion just as a horseman, meeting a dust devil, brings it in showers of sand to the earth...

It is scrying the Aethyrs that Crowley crosses the Abyss, one of the major landmarks in Thelemic mysticism.  If the Knowledge and Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel is the discovery of the True Self, crossing the Abyss is the identification of the Self with the Absolute.  It is one of the highest attainments a Thelemite may reach.

THE CROWNED AND CONQUERING CHILD

In the 1st and final Aethyr, LIL, Crowley comes face to face with Horus himself, the Lord of the Aeon;

I am light, and I am night, and I am that which is beyond them. I am speech, and I am silence, and I am that which is beyond them. I am life, and I am death, and I am that which is beyond them. I am war, and I am peace, and I am that which is beyond them. I am weakness, and I am strength, and I am that which is beyond them. Yet by none of these can man reach up to me. Yet by each of them must man reach up to me...

This is an elaboration and confirmation of truths revealed in The Book of the Law, the general formula of the Aeon which is 2 = 0; the Great Work consists of uniting all things with their opposites to transcend them:

27.  ...O Nuit, continuous one of Heaven, let it be ever thus; that men speak not of Thee as One but as None; and let them speak not of thee at all, since thou art continuous!

28. None, breathed the light, faint & faery, of the stars, and two.

29. For I am divided for love's sake, for the chance of union.

This idea is encountered over and over again; n + -n = 0.  Nuit and Hadit, Ra Hoor Khuit (the outer Horus) and Hoor-paar-kraat (the hidden Horus), CHAOS and BABALON, Heaven and Earth.  In the New Aeon, "God," and by this we mean "highest reality," cannot be understood as One, but as Two that merge to become Zero.  It is implicit even in the notion of this as the Aeon of the Child, the product of the Union of Isis and Osiris that overthrows them both.

All in all, the visions Crowley received scrying the Aethyrs are inextricably linked with Thelema.  They elaborate and expand on The Book of the Law.  From a Thelemic perspective, the Enochian system given to John Dee is the Magick of the New Aeon; and this is why Dee was never given permission to practice it.  

It wasn't meant for him.  It was meant for us.

Appendix: A COMMENT UPON THE NATURES OF THE ÆTHYRS 

Aleister Crowley

30. Without the cube—the material world—is the sphere- system of the spiritual world enfolding it. the Cry seems to be a sort of Exordium, and external showing forth of the coming of the new Æon, the Æon of Horus the crowned child.

29. The disturbance of Equilibrium caused by the Coming of the Æon.

28. Now is a further and clearer shadowing-forth of the Great Mystery of the Æon whichis to be led up to by the Æthyrs. Note however that the King of the New Æon never appears until the very first Æthyr.

27. Hecate appears—her son, the son of a Virgin, a magus, is to bring the Æon to pass. And she, the herald, her function fulfilled, withdraws within her mystic veil.

26. The death of the past Æon, that of Jehovah and Jesus; ends with adumbration of the new, the vision of the Stele of Ankh-f-n-khonsu, whose discovery brought about in a human consciousness the knowledge of the Equinox of the Gods, 21. 3. 04.

25. Appearance of the Lion God of Horus, the child of Leo that incarnates him. The first Angel is Isis its mother.

24. Now appears his mate, the heavenly Venus, the Scarlet Woman, who by men is thought of as Babalon as he is thought of as Chaos.

23. Here appear the Cherubim, the other officers of the new Temple, the earth and water assistants of the fire and air Beast and Scarlet Woman.

22. Here is the First Key to the formula of Horus, a sevenfold arrangement. A shadow of Horus declares his nature.

21. This seems to be the Vision of God face to face that is the necessary ordeal for him who would pass the Abyss, as it were. A commission to be the prophet of the Æon arising is given to the Seer. The God is the Hierophant in the Ceremony of Magister Templi.

20. A guide is given to the Seer, his Holy Guardian Angel. And this is attained by a mastery of the Universe conceived as a wheel The Hiereus in the Ceremony of Magister Templi.

19. Now cometh forth the Angel who giveth instruction, in the lowest form. The Hegemone in the Ceremony of Magister Templi which the Seer is about to undergo.

18. The Vault of preparation for the Ceremony of M.T.

The Veil is the Crucifixion, symbol of the dead Æon. The first ordeal is undergone.

17. The symbol of the Balance is now given unto the Aspirant.

16. The sacrifice is made. The High Priestess (image of Babalon) cometh forth upon her Beast and maketh this.

15. The mystic dance by Salome. The new Temple, the signs of the grades are received and the A.E. rejected.

14. The Shrine of Darkness. Final initiation into grade of M. T.

13. The emergence of Nemo into the world; his work therein. This is the first mystery revealed to a M.T.

12. The Second Mystery: the cup-bearer of Babalon the beautiful. The Holy Grail manifested to the M.T., with the first knowledge of the Black Brothers.

11. Now cometh the Frontier of the Holy City; the M.T. is taken into the Abyss.

10. The Abyss.

9. The M.T. hath passed the Abyss, and is let to the Palace of the Virgin redeemed from Malkuth unto Binah.

8. The fuller manifestation of the Holy Guardian Angel.

7. The Virgin become the Bride, the great Reward of the Ceremony. also an adumbration of the Further Progress.

6. A shadowing-forth of the grade of Magus.

5. The reception of the M.T. among the Brethren of the A∴ A∴; the manifestation of the Arrow.

4. Further concerning the Magus. The marriage of Chaos with the purified Virgin.

3. The Magician. Exhibition of the Guards to the Higher Knowledge.

2. The understanding of the Curse, that is become a Blessing. The final reward of the M.T., his marriage even with Babalon Herself. The paean thereof.

1. The final manifestation. All leads up to the Crowned Child, Horus, the Lord of the New Æon.

LITTLE LECTURES ON MAGICK, PART 4: THE ENOCHIAN UNIVERSE

He symbolized the Fourth-Dimensional Universe in two dimensions as a square surrounded by 30 concentric circles (the 30 Æthyrs or Aires) whose radii increase in a geometrical proportion...The sides of the square are the four great watch-towers which are attributed to the elements. There is also a “black cross” (or “central tablet” according to the arrangement shewn)...

--Aleister Crowley, Liber Chanokh

LIKE THE TREE OF LIFE the Enochian Watchtowers are a conceptual model of existence.  This model consists of two main parts; one signifies the Earth and is a table made up of lettered squares, 25 columns by 27 rows.  The other signifies the Heavens, consisting of 30 concentric circles surrounding and enclosing this grid (see the diagram below). As we shall see, the Circles and the Squares are perfect reflections of one another.  Though at first glance this may not look anything like the Qabalistic Tree of Life, the two models in fact work very much the same way.

The Keys

The first things Dee and Kelley were given by the Angels were the Enochian Keys, dictated in both the Angelic language and English.  These consisted of 18 Keys meant to be used with the Watchtowers of Earth, and 30 Keys meant to be used with the Aethyrs of Heaven (though technically they were given only 48 Keys total, they were told there was a 49th being held back from them).

The Aethyrs

Next they were given were the 30 three-letter names of the Aethyrs.  These Aethyrs enclose each other like the layers of an onion, with the first Aethyr, LIL, being the outermost, and the thirtieth, TEX, being innermost and closest to the Material World.  Each Aethyr is ruled by 3 Governors, except TEX, which being closest to the Material World has 4.  The names of these Governors are all 7 letters long.  Along with each Governor's name, Dee and Kelley were given a Sigil for that name (see the accompanying picture for a sample).  The grand total of Governors was 91.

Dee was told little about these Aethyrs.  But as we shall see, much can be gleaned about them from the Watchtowers.

The Watchtowers

The lettered square at the heart of the circles is called "the Great Table." It represents the Material World, the Earth.  

The Great Table is composed of four smaller tables, and these correspond to the Four Elements (Air, Fire, Earth, and Water) as well as the Four Directions (East, South, North, and West).  Each of these is said to be a Watchtower, occupied by a Great King, his Seniors, and various angelic and demonic beings.  These Four Watchtowers stand guard over the material universe, and are responsible for maintaining and governing it.  The Watchtowers are connected by a central "Black Cross" of Spirit, the 5th Element or "quintessence."

Each Watchtower consists of 12 columns and 13 rows of letters, for a total of 156 letters per Watchtower.  Some of these letters are capital, some are lowercase, and two letters per Watchtower are backwards.  There are reasons for all of this.  Every Watchtower is further subdivided into four quadrants by another cross created by the 6th and 7th columns and the 7th row.  These quadrants are each made of 5 columns and 6 rows.  Again, there is nothing arbitrary in any of this.

Finally, each quadrant contains yet another cross, made by the 3rd column  and the 2nd row of that quadrant.  See the picture above for clarification.

The Black Cross holds only 4 names, but the left side and bottom of the cross mirror the names (see above).

The Angels instructed Dee and Kelley to letter the Great Table in English, rather than the "Angelic Script" of the Celestial tongue.  This is crucial, because the Angelic Script doesn't have capitals or lower case letters.  Kelley and Dee drew up the grid and lettered all several hundred squares from left to right, top to bottom, instructed to write capitals seemingly at random.  There seemed no rhyme or reason to the eight backwards letters either (shown above with an asterisk).  The Angels refused to explain, and it wasn't until years later--long after the sessions ended and Kelley was gone--that Dee finally cracked the code.  The mysterious capitals mark the initial letter of a Governor's name.  The names of the 91 Governors make up the letters on the Great Table, each one arranged in the shape of its Sigil, like interlocking puzzle pieces...  

The Watchtowers of Earth thus mirror the Heavens.  The same 91 Governors who define the Aethyrs define them.

The Governors in the Watchtowers

Each Watchtower, as it turns out, is made up of exactly 22 Governors.  As we shall see, this is vital.  The eight reversed letters, however, are a special case.  One of them, the "L," wraps "around" to the black cross to make a Governor name.  That leaves seven, PARAOAN, unaccounted for. When Dee questioned the Angels about PARAOAN, they were warned each letter of the name is a living fire and the final N is a vial of destruction.

Qabalistic  Correspondences 

When we examine the Enochian Model, it begins to resemble both the Tarot and the Tree of Life in fundamental ways.  Partly, this is because the same numbers are in play; 1-10, especially 3 and 7, along with 12 and 22 are all key.  The extremely significant Kabbalistic number 13 is also present (we touched on 13 in a broad sense--the 12 edges of the Cube plus the center--but it is very important in Hebrew gematria.  13 is the enumeration of Unity "AChD" and Love "AHVH." Together these make 26, "YHVH," suggesting the nature of God is Unity and Love).  

But the numbers are only part of the story.  Like the Tree of Life, the Enochian universe assumes both a spiritual and a physical dimension, the Heavens and the Earth.  Both Enochian and Qabalistic cosmologies postulate a spiritual hierarchy that governs the cosmos.  And both incorporate the idea of the Four Elements, the Seven Planets, the Twelve Signs of the Zodiac, and the notion of Heaven as a Sphere and the Earth as a Cube.  All of this makes it easy to draw parallels between the Tree of Life, Tarot, and Enochian.

Consider the 30 Aethyrs.  In most schools of Qabalah, there is not one Tree of Life, there are actually four (one Tree for each of the Qabalistic worlds, see below).   This fits nicely with the Four Suits of the Tarot.  The Six of Wands, for example, is Six in the highest world of Atziluth.  The Six of Cups is Six in Briah, the Six of Swords is Six in Yetzirah, and the Six of Discs is Six in Assiah, the Material World.  The 30 Aethyrs, likewise, correspond to the Trees in Atziluth, Briah, and Yetzirah.  The first Aethyr, LIL, corresponds to  Kether in Atziluth, while the Thirtieth, TEX, corresponds to Malkuth in Yetzirah.  The Fourth Tree is actually hidden in the Watchtowers, which correspond to Assiah, the Material World (as we shall see, there are ten "choirs" of Angels in each Watchtower).  

These four Trees of Life also have 22 paths each, so theoretically there are four sets of Tarot Trumps, one each for the Fiery world of Atziluth, the Watery world of Briah, the Airy world of Yetzirah, and the Earthy world of Assiah.  In the Enochian system, there are 22 Governors in each of the Watchtowers, a direct parallel of this. 

Looking at the Watchtowers, each corresponds to a classical Element, and thus to  a Tarot Suit.  The Watchtower of the East and Air corresponds to Swords, the Watchtower of the West and Water to Cups, the Watchtower of the South and Fire to Wands, and the Watchtower of the North and Earth to Discs.  Each of these, as we have seen, is subdivided into Quadrants, and these correspond to the Court Cards.  The Quadrants of the Southern Watchtower, for example, relate to the Knight, Queen, Prince, and Princess of Wands.  And again, each Watchtower is home to 10 Choirs of Angels, each corresponding to one of the small cards.  The 22 Trumps are present in each as the 22 Governors.

In addition to the Watchtower associations above, each tower is itself the Ace, with each of the quadrants relating to a court card.  This fact, coupled with each tower being lettered by the names of 22 Governor (each relating to a Tarot Trump) means that the Great Table itself contains the whole of the Tarot in it.

The following tables have been prepared to demonstrate some of these correspondences.

LITTLE LECTURES ON MAGICK, PART 3; ENOCHIAN, AN INTRODUCTION

I have often read in thy [God’s] books & records, how Enoch injoyed thy favour & conversation; with Moses thou was familiar; And also that to Abraham, Issack & Jocob, Joshua, Gideon, Esdras, Daniel, Tobias & sundry others thy good angels were sent by thy disposition, to Instruct them, informe them, helpe them, yea in worldly and domestick affaires, yea and sometymes to satisfie their desires, doubtes, and questions of thy Secrete...

Dr. John Dee (Sloane MS. 3188)

While the precise origins of Kabbalah and Tarot are obscured by history, we know exactly when, where, and how the system of Enochian Magic arrived in the world.  It is ironic, then, that it remains by far the most controversial system of the three.

The facts are as follows; between the years 1582 and 1589, two men conducted a long series of seances, crystal-gazing sessions in which one asked questions of discarnate spirit beings while the other gazed into a “shewstone” to answer for them.  Their goal was to rediscover the "true art" of Magic, withdrawn by Heaven due to man's ignorance and wickedness.  What they received was--according to the spirits--something that would bestow superhuman powers upon its practitioners, change the political face of the world, and herald the coming of the Apocalypse.   

One of the men involved was Dr. John Dee (1527-1608).  Dee was an Elizabethan polymath; astronomer, cartographer, cryptographer, Hermetic philosopher, alchemist, mathematician, diplomat, and loyal servant of Elizabeth I.  It is well known that Dee picked the date for her coronation (having cast a horoscope for her), and that he remained her tutor and advisor throughout his life.  Less certain--though the arguments for both are strong--are the assertions that Dee served as Elizabeth's spymaster, and that he was the primary inspiration behind the Rosicrucian Manifestos (1614-1615), documents that called for a scientific and spiritual revolution in Europe and the end of the Church (Dee's personal magical sigil, the Monas Hieroglyphica, appears on the cover of one of them).

The other member of this magical partnership was Edward Kelley (1555-1597).  A man of modest education, he was a self-proclaimed alchemist and spirit medium who may (or may not) have been convicted of forgery or counterfeiting as a young man, and had his ears cropped as punishment.  Aside from his visions, Kelley was given to all sorts of wild claims, such as possessing the Red Powder that transmuted base metals to gold.  Because of his ill reputation, Enochian detractors dismiss the entire system as an elaborate con game, with Kelley feeding Dee all sorts of nonsense over their seven years together while fleecing him.  The fact that there is little or no evidence of this, and a great deal of evidence to the contrary, does little to stop such opinions from circulating.

Owing to Dee's importance as a historical figure, and that he amassed one of the most impressive libraries in Elizabethan England, his books and papers survive largely intact in the British Museum (as part of the massive Sloane Collection).  These records include the complete  Enochian sessions, and they make for fascinating reading.  

A picture emerges from them of Dee as a sort of spiritual revolutionary.  Influenced, perhaps, by the likes of John Wycliffe, Dee rejected the necessity of the Church as a mediator between Man and God.  If the ancient prophets and kings could appeal directly to the Lord, why not modern Man?  He wrote;

God did not refuse to instruct the prophets and seers and to give answers to the common people...therefore I was sufficiently taught and confirmed that I would never attain wisdom by man's hand or by human power, but only from God, directly or indirectly...

Views like this put him at odds with the Catholic Bishop of London Edmund Bonner, and led to him being charged with treason against the Catholic queen, Mary, who had him dragged before the Star Chamber.  Dee managed to exonerate himself, but the arrest brought him to the attention of the Protestant Princess Elizabeth and her supporters.   They were natural allies.  He saw, in Elizabeth, a spiritual revolutionary like himself, fighting to throw of the yoke of the Catholic Church.  As a statesman and strategist, however, he knew the odds were not in their favor.  Both Catholic France and Spain--the greatest power in the world--were against them.  Catholic Europe was calling Elizabeth the Whore of Babylon, and England the seven headed dragon she rode on.  If Elizabeth was to hold her throne, if England was to survive as a nation, divine intervention was needed.  

Dee decided to revive what he considered the "lost teachings" of the prophets, practices forbidden by the Church as sorcery.  I considered the Shewstone which the high priests did use, he wrote, by God's own ordering, wherein they had lights and judgements in their great doubts...  Thus, adopting the methods the ancient priests used to call upon the Almighty, Dee set out to invoke God and His angels on behalf of his Queen.

It is important to note all of this is long before Kelley.  Dee, who found he was not much of a spirit medium himself, employed several others.  He wasn't satisfied with any of them.  Kelley was different; in their first session together, Kelley passed the tests Dee had laid out for him with "credible" visions.  Dee had found a satisfactory scryer at last.

While Dee was pleased with the arrangement, Kelley was another matter.  From the very start Dee accepted the spirits at their word that they were "good angels," Kelley by contrast feared them, often trying to convince Dee they were demonic beings and that the sessions needed to stop.  For their part, the spirits constantly mocked and berated Kelley, insulting his character and above all his intelligence.  In one instance, Kelley complained that the angels were speaking to him in gibberish...when in fact they were mocking him in Greek, a language he didn't understand but Dee did.

Nor were the tortures limited to insults. As the years wore on Kelley seemed pushed to the point of breakdown, plagued by nightmares and messages from the angels in his sleep.  He complained of the angels violating his body;

(He felt)...a great stir and moving in his brains, very sensible and distinct, as of a creature of human shape and lineaments going up and down, to and fro in his brains and in his skull...

At times he even snapped;

Suddenly E. K. fell into such a rage that...much ado I, Emericus, and his brother had to stop or hold him...the rage and fury was so great... (that we feared E.K.) ...destroying himself, or of me, or of his brother...

On several occasions, Kelley tried to leave, but Dee always pulled him back, reminding him of the wife and brother he was supporting on the £50 annual stipend Dee was paying him, and the importance of their work to the nation.  In the end, after finally parting ways, Kelley (who showed signs of genuine mental trauma), murdered a man in a rage and then threw himself to his death off a tower.

The idea of Edward Kelley as a seedy professional "psychic," an Elizabethan palm reader taking a gullible old man in for money, is absurd.  He was not getting rich of off the sessions; his annual salary was modest and there are no signs he asked for or was given additional sums.  Nor did he acquire power or prestige from the partnership.  Dee's reputation was hurt by his occult dabblings, and Kelley--who had no reputation to begin with--was dismissed as a charlatan.  Where the assertion really starts to fall apart though is in the quality of the information the seances produced.  Aside from the prediction of key events--the angels warned Kelley and Dee of the death of Mary Queen of Scots and the coming of the Spanish Armada--the system itself and the way it was received makes it almost  impossible to believe Kelley faked it.

Enochian and its Reception 

In the interest of full disclosure we will confine ourselves here to the system of magic Dee and Kelley received while working together in Kraków.  This magic--consisting of the Four Watchtowers, the Calls or Keys, and the Aires or Aethyrs--is technically the third magical system the duo received.  When occultists speak of the "Enochian System," this is the one they refer to.  But Dee and Kelley did in fact receive two prior systems; in 1582 they were given a system of planetary magic revolving around 49 "Good Angels" called the Heptarchia Mystica.  Beginning in March of 1583, a second "system" comprised of 49 tables, each composed of 49 by 49 rows of numbers and letters was transmitted, called Liber Loagaeth (see the picture).  Now, the Heptarchia is a very derivative system, with little to distinguish it from other Renaissance magic.  Loagaeth feels something more like a test than a magic system, to see if Dee and Kelley would really sit there and painstakingly copy each and every table down as instructed.  If there collaborations had resulted in only these two, it would be easy to denounce Kelley as a fraud.

But in Kraków, in 1854, something utterly remarkable began to happen.

Starting in April that year, after Dee's endless pestering and requests for clarification of the materials given, and the Angels long reticence to provide anything good, the spirits begin transmitting the Enochian Calls, or "Keys."  It is here that the entire character of the Dee and Kelley work changes.  Nothing remotely like them exists in the sessions before.  They are amazing pieces of poetic prose, Apocalyptic in imagery.  Unlike prior communications, the Angels give these in both the "Celestial" or "Heavenly" language they speak, and in English translation.

Linguistics will tell you this Angelic tongue is not a real language.  It has the surface characteristics of one, but no discernible grammar.  Further, there are words that sound uncomfortably like English and many others that defy pronunciation by the human mouth.  And yet it is not gibberish.  Words do have a clear meaning, and the Calls have a rhythm and cadence consistent from one to the next.  Hearing them read aloud sends shivers down to spine.  Whether we are dealing with an alien, inhuman language here--something not meant as human speech--or a very clever fakery is unclear.  What is clear is that for 1584, it would have to be a very clever fakery, well beyond Kelley's meager education.

And then there is the poetry of the English translations.  Compare this bit of Kelley's writing with one of the Enochian Calls;

The heavenly cope hath in him nature's flower,

Two hidden, but the rest to sight appear;

Wherein the sperms of all the body lower

Most secrett are, yett spring forth once a yeare

and;

Can the wings of the windes vnderstand yor voyces of wunder, O you the second of the first, whome the burning flames haue framed within the depth of my Iaws; whome I haue prepared as Cupps for a Wedding, or as the flowres in their beawty for the Chamber of righteousnes. Stronger are your fete then the barren stone, and mightier are your voices then the manifold windes. For you are become a buylding such as is not, but in the mynde of the All powrefull. Arrise, sayth the First: Move therfore vnto his Servants: Shew your selues in powre: And make me a strong Seething: for I am of him that liueth for euer.

Kelley receives these 19 Keys first, in Angelic and in English.  It should be noted that the first 18 seem to have a single use; the 19th Key is actually thirty Keys in one for reasons we will shortly discuss.  This is noteworthy because in both previous Dee/Kelley systems, the number 49 is significant.  As these Keys total 48, Dee pondered if one was being held back.  The Angel Nalvage explained;

This self-same art is it, which is delivered unto you as an infallible doctrine, containing in it the waters which run through many Gates: even above the Gate of Innocency, wherein you are taught to find out the dignity and corruption of nature: also made partakers in the Secret Judgements of the Almighty to be made manifest, and to be put into execution.

I am therefore to instruct and inform you, according to your doctrine delivered, which is contained in 49 Tables. In 49 voices, or callings: which are the Natural Keys to open those, not 49 but 48 (for One is not to be opened) Gates of Understanding; whereby you shall have knowledge to move every Gate, and to call out as many as you please, or shall be thought necessary, which can very well, righteously, and wisely open unto you the secrets of their Cities, and make  you understand perfectly [that] contained in the Tables.

Eighteen Keys and then Thirty...with one held back.  So, 18 and 31.  Keep those numbers in mind.

After the Keys, a second piece of the puzzle is given.  In May, 1854, the names of 91 Angelic Governors are given, along with Sigils for each one.  These are transmitted simply; the Angels spell out the names and instruct Kelley how to draw each symbol (see picture).  These Governors inhabit 30 Aethyrs or Aires" accessed by the 19th Key.  The uses of the other 18 Keys remains unrevealed.  We learn, however, that these Governors rule over regions of the Earth as well as the Heavens.

At this stage we have only the Keys and the Governors and their Sigils.  But in June, Kelley is given the rest of the puzzle.  He has a dream of Four Watchtowers that rule the world, and soon the Angel Ave elaborates on the vision;

Four sumptuous and belligerant Castles, out which sounded trumpets thrice. The Sign of Majesty, the Cloth of passage, was cast forth.

In the East, the cloth red; after new smitten blood.

In the South, the cloth white, Lilly coloured.

In the West a cloth, the skins of many Dragons, green: garlick-bladed.

In the North, the cloth, Hair-coloured, Bilbery juyce. The trumpets sound once. The gates open. The four Castles are moved. There issueth 4 Trumpeters, whose Trumpets a Pyramis, six cones wreathed. There followeth out of every Castle 3,  holding up their Banners displayed, with ensigne, the names of God. There follow Seniors six, alike from the 4 Gates: After them cometh from every part a King: whose Princes are five, gardant, and holding up his train. Next issueth the Crosse of 4 Angles, of the Majesty of Creation in God attended upon every one with 4: a white Cloud, 4 Crosses, bearing the witnesses of the Covenant of God, with the *Prince gone out before: which were confirmed, every one, with ten Angels, visible in countenance: After every Crosse, attendeth 16 Angels, dispositors of the will of those, that govern the Castles. They proceed. And, in, and about the middle of the Gate: The rest pause. The 24 Seniors meet: They seem to consult. ...

It vanisheth.

The Angels begin dictating another great table, 25 x 27 letters across (see the diagram).  They have Dee write the letters in each from left to right, row by row.  Seemingly at random, some letters are capitalized, most are lower case, and eight--out of them all--are backwards.  No explanations are given.  Dee is told, however, that this Great Table is actually the Four Watchtowers of Kelley's vision, held together by a Black Cross.  Dee eventually assigns color to it, and rewrites the English letters with characters from the Angelic Script.  This is a mistake, because the Angelic script does not distinguish between Upper and Lower Case, which is essential for understanding the tablets.

Dee asks for clarification on the Great Table over and over again.  The Angels lie about why some letters are capitalized and others are not.  Of the eight reversed letters, they explain that seven of the eight letters scattered across the tablets spell out PARAOAN, that each letter is "a living fire" and the N a "vial of destruction."  They do not explain the eight reversed letter, the L.  Nor do they deign to inform Dee who or what PARAOAN is.

They do, however, slowly begin to reveal the structure of the Enochian universe,  and how the Watchtowers relate to the 30 Aethyrs.  Crowley latter sums up the arrangement as;

(They) ...symbolized the Fourth-Dimensional Universe in two dimensions as a square surrounded by 30 concentric circles (the 30 Æthyrs or Aires) whose radii increase in a geometrical proportion. The sides of the square are the four great watch-towers which are attributed to the elements...

The Angels related how to divide each Watchtower into smaller and smaller sections, and how the letters could be read to discover the names of all sorts of Angels and demons inhabiting those towers (which we will detail in a later chapters).  They explained the uses of the Keys to conjure different sorts of spirits, and they explained which of the 91 Governors inhabited each of the 30 Aethyrs encircling the world.  But they never revealed the lettering of the Table itself, or why some were capitalized.  And crucially, they never gave Dee permission to use the system.  In fact, the Angel Gabriel, speaking for God, warned against it;

I have chosen you, to enter into my barns: And have commanded you to open the Corn, that the scattered may appear, and that which remaineth in the sheaf may stand. And have entered into the first, and so into the seventh. And have delivered unto you the Testimony of my spirit to come.

For, my Barn hath been long without Threshers. And I have kept my flayles for a long time hid in unknown places: Which flayle is the Doctrine that I deliver unto you: Which is the Instrument of thrashing, wherewith you shall beat the shears, that the Corn which is scattered, and the rest may be all one. 

If I be Master of the Barn, owner of the Corn, and deliverer of my flayle: If all be mine (And unto you, there is nothing: for you are hirelings, whose reward is in heaven.) 

Then see, that you neither thresh, nor unbinde, until I bid you, let it be sufficient unto you: that you know my house, that you know the labour I will put you to: That I favour you so much as to entertain you the labourers within my Barn: For within it thresheth none without my consent...

It would be much latter, after the sessions had stopped and Dee and Kelley split, that Dee finally figured out the mystery of the letters.  It started when he realized the 91 Governor names, assigned to the 30 Aethyrs, and all seven-lettered, totaled 637 letters.  Each of the Four Watchtowers had 156 letters, for a total of 624.  But the letters that make up the Black Cross uniting the Towers were twenty, bringing the total to 644.

Then it hit him.  The mysterious name PARAOAN is also seven-lettered, like the Governors.  With it added in, the total was also 644.  

Armed with this, he was able to look back over the Table, and discovered the capital letters were the initial letters of each Governor's name.  More shockingly, if you overlaid the strange Sigils with each name, they fell together like puzzle pieces (see diagram).

It was a masterpiece of Hermetic logic, the supreme maxim of which is "as above so below."  The Material Plane of Earth (signified by the Watchtowers) was constructed from the names of the 91 Governors, just as these same Governors inhabited and defined the 30 Aethyrs of the Heavens.  But the construction showed a further secret; each Watchtower is composed of exactly 22 Governors, with 3 Governors ruling the Black Cross.  Above these is PARAOAN, apparently a 92nd Governor without a Sigil, or a place in the Aethyrs.  The Great Table is then constructed on key esoteric numbers; 1-10, 12, 13, and 22.

Questions

The idea that Kelley manufactured all this to dupe John Dee beggars belief.  Aside from the poetic and linguistic skills required, the way in which the system was given would have required a prodigious memory.  Upon constructing the tablets and lettering them, he would have needed to memorize all 91 Governor names--strings of letters like "DOANZIN," "VSNARDA," and "OOANAMB"--along with their Sigils, delivering them a month ahead of time before instructing Dee how to letter hundreds of squares completely out of order.  And for what?

The easier explanation, of course, is that Dee made the whole thing up.  There never were any skrying sessions...Dee sat down day after day, year after year, scribbling down seances that just never happened.  The entire massive journal collection was a hoax.  But this strains credulity as well.  In several instances, Dee records information--charts, tables--that later need to be corrected because Kelley misheard or misunderstood.  The diaries resemble nothing so much as lengthy Senate hearings, with repeated questions, endless clarifications and corrections, tedious lines of inquiry.  And most damning, the sections of the system are recorded completely out of order, as if Dee and Kelley were given random puzzle pieces.  Neither were ever fully able to put these pieces together and see the whole.  Thus Dee never finished the work, never put it together into a system. He labored seven years for nothing.

What would have been the point of such a hoax?  If neither Dee nor Kelley gained anything from the sessions, who did?

The answer is simple; the only "people" who got what they wanted were the angels.

To be continued...