‘The Sword of Song’ by Aleister Crowley
Aleister Crowley, The Sword of Song Called by Christians The Book of the Beast. Edited by Richard Kaczynski. London: Kamuret Press, 2021. [Reprint forthcoming from Inner Traditions: Spring 2025]
Re-Collecting an Edge
In
The Sword of Song
Since its inaugural appearance in 1904, The Sword of Song has been reprinted only a few times with little attention given to its original format.[1] As an early example of the on-going genesis of Aleister Crowley’s thelemic mindset it is surprising how long it has taken for a scholarly edition of this primary text to appear. Richard Kaczynski’s (RK) fastidious editing and insightful annotations clearly serve to accentuate this book’s reinstatement. This new edition by Kamuret Press, and subsequent forthcoming edition from Inner Traditions, marks a substantial contribution to the study and further understanding of this complex and challenging artifact.[2]
What is most interesting and at the same time intriguing about SoS is that it is not a single work but a compendium of poetry, prose, and polemic all wrapped up into one. However, using the term compendium may be potentially problematic because it suggests a systematized grouping. As to whether or not this collection is methodical in its arrangement must be left up to the reader to ascertain. In this respect RK does this expose’ justice because even though he may point out various particulars the one thing RK does not do is dictate SoS’s terms or potential conceptualizations by any means.
One of the most valuable aspects of RK’s contribution to SoS is the extensive background scholarship he contributes surrounding the context of the opening poems Ascension Day and Pentecost as well as Ambrosii Magi Hortus Rosarum. His introductions to The Three Characteristics, Berashith, as well as Science and Buddhism are equally noteworthy. The fact that he does not include any initial commentary or background for The Excluded Middle, Time and the Epilogue is easily pardoned given the extensive annotations provided for these and all of the other sections of the SoSincluding the appendices. At fifty four pages the Editor’s Introduction is more than thorough without overstaying its welcome prior to delivering the main body of the text that runs roughly two hundred and twelve pages. For those hungry, as I am, for the inter-textual and historical aspects of SoS, the reader encounters a proportionate balance maintained between the primary text and supplemental source work.
RK’s copious endnotes total 125 pages which signals one problematic aspect of annotating a work of such a discursive and open nature as SoS. We are informed at the opening of the Endnotes that “Footnotes from SoS first edition are given unbracketed. Footnotes added by AC in his Works or in unpublished proofs are given in brackets, < and >; Explanatory notes are given in square brackets, [ and ].” (p. 275) Then, bear in mind there are marginalia and footnotes in the actual text in red typeface. The challenge for the reader then becomes avoiding interruptions in the book’s contiguity and overall flow.[3] This is not to cast any aspersions on RK’s editorial decisions or Kamuret press’s as well as Inner Tradition’s layout but simply to address a matter that warrants due consideration. The impact of layout and organization pose a task for any editorial team and one that may not have a perfect outcome by any means. All-in-all RK’s arrangement is optimal given the parameters of maintaining such a complex array of supplemental components in one concise volume.
Stupefication Value
In RK’s biography of AC, Perdurabo, he asserts that Konx Om Pax “was one of AC’s more enigmatic offerings ranking up there with The Sword of Song for its stupefication value.”(Perdurabo, p. 176) For years I was somewhat taken aback by this assertion all the while attempting to attribute certain post-structural and seemingly cryptographic maneuvers to these two works. However, upon closely reading SoS in preparation for this review I came across a certain line that addressed this issue directly which I’d not fully considered before. Consequently, my entire reading of the book from that point on was altered to some benefit. Specifically, in the poem Pentecost AC describes how Egyptian Gods
Evoked ecstatic periods
In verse of mine, you thought I praised
Or worshipped them—I stand amazed.
I merely wished to chant in verse
Some aspects of the Universe,
Summed up these subtle forces finely,
And sang of them (think divinely)
In name and form: a fault perhaps—
Reviewers are such funny chaps!
I think that ordinary folk,
Though, understood the things I spoke.
For Gods, and devils too, I find
Are merely modes of my own mind!
The poet needs enthusiams!
Verse making is a sort of spasm
Degeneration of the mind,
And things of that unpleasant kind.
(SoS, p. 60)
Straightaway I was reminded of Rimbaud’s formula of the systematic derangement of the senses, via drugs, sex etc., for the sole purpose of expanding perception and producing an enlightened poiesis. In the case of SoS, AC’s engagement with altered perception was probably not so much facilitated by drug use or sex magic as it was probably from oxygen deprivation brought about by his protracted stay on the Baltoro glacier during his bid for K2.
AC and his team spent 68 days at 20,000 feet above sea level that still stands as a world record. “Crowley, meanwhile, was down with malaria. Locked in his tent on the mountain, with a fever of 102.9 degrees, the magician worked on SoS.” (Perdurabo , p. 105, 107f.) Then the infamous incident ensued with AC pulling his Colt revolver on Guy Knowles who promptly punched him in the stomach disarming the delirious beast. We do know with some degree of certainty that AC was continuing to jot down notes and work out sections of Ascension Day and Pentecost that were initially composed in Rangoon. However, even minor editing and light composition while oxygen deprived was no small feat undoubtedly impairing his abilities to perform at any appreciable level. At that stage, staying focused enough to compose anything cogent requires an immense effort by any standard.[4] Within this context, even though RK does not mention it, I would hazard to guess that the spiritual ascent described in Ascension Day is analogous to the mountaineer’s ascent.
As systematic as one should be in planning out a major expedition climbers must always be prepared to alter their course of action. Avalanche threat due to unstable névé or layers of granular snow are one of many factors that an alpinist’s sharp eye needs to be peeled for.[5] Even though one may select a given route from the bottom up, once in motion, adjustments invariably have to be made in adapting to the weather’s fluxuations. The climber in essence must understand how to read the mountain. Depending on the conditions, one’s method of interpretation is constantly subject to revision from within as well as without. Such itineraries at best rarely follow a straightforward linear progression from point A to B. Often way-points have to be asserted into the game plan and variations adopted with some backtracking in the offing. Unexpected detours arise out of necessity often due to “things of that unpleasant kind,” that AC so succinctly described in Pentecost.
In many ways one could suggest that the structure or lack thereof witnessed in SoS may be viewed as comparable to the post-structural itinerary of a mountaineering ascent. AC, after all, was quite young at the time, and through Oscar Eckenstein’s tutelage learned the finer points of negotiating a mountain’s summit. Mountaineering requires a certain grasp of dharana and is perhaps one of its sternest taskmasters. AC, by his own admission, was at a deficit with such mental disciplines prior to meeting Eckenstein. In a multitude of instances SoS mirrors the regimen of dharana or maintaining a focus on one thing overall—the summit or apex of aspiration’s intent. However, in striving toward the primary object of desire a variety of related particulars must be accounted for and in many ways this process is exactly what we see transpiring throughout the course of SoS.
According to the poet Robert Creeley “form is never more than an extension of content” and in the case of SoSthere is a reciprocal dance that occurs between content and form throughout the assembled poems and essays. For instance, one of AC’s seminal essays Berashith, literally the beginning, deals with origins as stated in its subtitle: An Essay on Ontology, does not appear until midway through SoS. Through the course of this essay in the quest to investigate zero “as the uncaused”, AC begins to pick apart the quandary of rationality as a sole tool of understanding. In pursuing some insight into nullity or naught AC states that “not only must we get rid of all subjects, but of all predicates.”(SoS, p. 116) He then works through a series of mathematical formulas that would, I believe, eventually contribute to his famous formulation of 0=2 as a symbolic representation of unity covalent with the dissolution of the opposites. Much of what AC works through here is a discourse on the futility of tracking down causality’s foundations through mathesis or logic. However, it is through that key phrase concerning the abolition of all subjects and predicates in approaching some conception of naught or the void of reasoning itself that AC exposes an important aspect of SoS’s objective.
This desire to attain some form of evolved or fluid and dynamic language in order to reckon the world via an illuminated perspective is something AC pondered throughout his life. Later on, in The Psychology of Hashish, AC insisted that “in the world of common sense, reason works; in the world of philosophy, it doesn’t. The metaphysical deadlock is a real and not a verbal one. The inner nature of things is not rational.” He then makes the crucial assertion: “At this point one almost desires to exclaim with Fichte that if it were only possible to start all over again, one would begin by inventing a totally new scheme of symbolism.” (Equinox vol.1, No. 2, Hashish, p. 51, 74) And in fact, this desire to reformulate a unique means of signification extends throughout what we witness in SoS not just semantically but structurally. For AC, the beginning is somewhere in the middle of the mix that he finds himself working in and out of.[6]In attempting to address the intricacies of his observations on the crossover between philosophy, logic, and metaphysics AC winds up employing verse, allegory, and the dialectic as exhibited in The Excluded Middle. Through this admixture AC fashions an innovative composition commensurate with the synthesis of his burgeoning insights. And in a way, it may be a mistake on my part to differentiate between these literary forms because on a certain level they all share a common ground be it a conceptual, artistic, metaphysical influence or all of the above. As AC himself astutely observed, “A thing is not necessarily A or not-A. It may be outside the universe of discourse wherein A and not-A exist” – thereby subverting bivalency and Aristotle’s excluded middle to some extent (Konx, p. viii). Perhaps a new approach to composition and arrangement was being called for, one that had not yet been assigned a title. It’s evident AC attempted to articulate an alternate universe of discourse corresponding to the mystic or the seer’s perception thereof.
Choosing to read SoS as a unified whole is extremely challenging as it represents AC’s early attempt to render an interpretation of his own recently initiated progression in thought. This unfolding thought was a work in progress and far from conclusive. At this stage AC discusses certain phases of awareness hypothetically or through 2nd hand accounts; since by his own admission, he was yet to achieve Dhyana or Samadhi. (SoS, p. 149) AC also openly works toward a critically informed vantage point informed through thinking out loud in SoS. This enlightened agnostic perspective was one that hounded AC throughout his works. In After Agnosticism AC indicates, “this is my position; while the postulates of Agnosticism are in one sense eternal, I believe that the conclusions of Agnosticism are daily to be put back.”(SoS, p. 265) Elsewhere in SoS AC repeatedly returns to Herbert Spencer whose positivistic approach to agnosticism irritated him to no end but it was one in which he detected a viable shred of truth. Spencer, after all, made allowances for the fact that even though we cannot comprehend the divine there is often a deistic influence harbored in western consciousness no matter how faint and is part of our evolution. Even after having received and published The Book of the Law, AC had to concede in The Soldier and the Hunchback that “We are Spencerian Agnostics, poor silly, damned Spencerian Agnostics!” (Equinox, Vol 1, Bk 1, p. 120) AC was intelligent enough to realize that the baby of agnostic postulates, careful empirics and informed skepticism, shouldn’t be thrown out with the potentially tainted bathwater of its conclusions. He fully acknowledges that the roadblocks to illumination erected by an agnostic fatalism would always be a specter in need of serious reckoning and banishing because it obviates the possibility of higher illumination. This very Dvaitist quandary and AC’s commitment to reaching some resolution within it is evidence of the early stages of his commitment to erecting a scientific approach to religious enlightenment. AC knew who the covert sympathizers of his program were and he was keen to engage their oppositional currents within his own far-reaching approach. In other words, AC kept his frenemies closest.
In Berashith, AC appears to pit Advaitism against Dvaitism suggesting that the unitive and dualist strains of the Vedanta are both valid as well as false approaches in relation to their disconnection from one another. Granted, AC appears to be emphatic when he claims in Berashith there is a “falsity alike” of Dvaitism and Advaitism. (SoS p. 11) But then in his essay “Time”, he calls for metaphysics to be thrown “to the dogs” in observing in mystics and skeptics alike that:
All they can mean is a state of consciousness which is never changed—that is, one unit of time, since time is no more than a succession of states of consciousness, and we have no means of measuring the length of one against another.
(SoS, p. 199)
AC no sooner lays one carpet down than he pulls it right out from under the game. What appears to be a potentially contradictory assessment of singularity vs. a plurality of states of consciousness can itself be seen as a fusion of the seemingly disparate Advaitist and Dvaitist camps. AC’s own attempt to equalize the field is his articulation of one state of consciousness but one that is developed successively. By means of this aporetic progression AC’s text strains to do the very thing he eventually sought via his reading of Fichte, to invent “a totally new scheme of symbolism.” However, it’s evident that even before composing The Psychology of Hashish, AC was not merely concerned with an innovating symbolism but an entirely new re- or de-structuration for the sake of clarity in magical discourse. The fusion of seemingly antagonistic concepts into an overriding awareness is a reoccurring theme that consistently arises throughout SoS.
The synthesis AC engaged with was certainly not new in the west. Nicholas of Cusa is most famous for his notion that God is the coincidence of opposites elaborated on in his Of Learned Ignorance. Such a negative theology as touted by Cusa and his predecessor John Scotus Eriugena arose from an agnostic rationale paired with a fundamental Neoplatonism that discloses God the One as inexplicable and unparticipated. And even though the One may be unknowable, we may receive hints about its apophatic nature through the parathetic combination of assertion and negation.[7] This is not to suggest an outcome of a self-canceling proposition but one in which presence and absence of a certain principle may be seen as a harmonious pairing indicative of an otherwise indescribable divine essence. What sets SoS apart in the tradition of negative theology is that AC’s is more of a negative theosophy as it is non-doctrinal in its aims. Furthermore, by following the germinating logic of SoS along with its anti-rationale we are witness to a step-by-step progression that tackles philosophy, metaphysics, and mysticism etc. as interrelated, all the while pitting them against one another in establishing a scientifically reckoned theurgy.
RK is convincing in his assertions throughout the Editor’s Introduction that SoS lays the foundation for Liber AL, The Book of the Law. For instance, in the chart on page lii he offers a very concise list indicating the parallels between both texts. But given the multi-valent nature of SoS and its history with AC returning to edit, revise and append to this work one gets the sense that he did intend for it to be a stand-alone work, its merit undiminished by time or the appearance of Liber AL. And coupled with the appearance of Konx Om Pax in 1907, which is similar in content and its free-form to SoS, AC clearly had not abandoned this method of composition or format. RK has even gone so far as to suggest that Ambrosii Magi Hortus Rosarum was a rough draft for what would later become The Wake World in Konx.[8]In this case, the project commenced in SoS sees its further extension in Konx (Konx om Pax being a variant title for the Egyptian Khabs Am Pekht that literally translates as light in extension).
With Liber AL clearly promulgated as a manifest of sorts, carefully structured in content and progression, perhaps AC felt the need to continue with a countering voice in Konx and SoS. The circular solvent quality of these two collections stands in direct contradistinction to the edict, almost mandate-like nature of AL. And in certain ways Konx and SoS serve to balance out the more definitive nature of Liber AL vel Legis’ proclamation. As AC put it in chapter 24 of the Book of Lies, “The wealth of a language consists in its Abstracts; the poorest tongues have a wealth of Concretes.” Nevertheless, as RK himself stated, one does not want to take all the fun out of reading SoS for others. I believe he is right since there is no reason why a serious magical text should not be entertaining on top of being informative. Furthermore, play in thought, language and reasoning is an essential part of the discovery process. This immediately brings to mind The Synagogue of Satan from Konx where the sage Kwaw after relaxing with some “sake’-and-soda” dictates:
The men who are willing by this means to become the saviours of their country shall be called the Synagogue of Satan, so as to keep themselves from the friendship of the fools who mistake names for things…
(Konx, p. 64)
and then eventually we are afforded a description of Kwaw’s miraculous structure such that:
One cannot describe the inside of the building, because to do so would spoil all the fun for other people. It must be seen to be understood, in any case; and there it stands to this day, open to anybody who is strong enough to force in the door.
(Konx, p. 66)
Perhaps in this light it is not the job for any reviewer, myself included, to assign any one genre or conceptualization to SoS, let alone Konx. Be that as it may, with no AC available anymore to talk to, all we have left of his house are his books even though the nature of these building blocks are hardly static. SoS is a groundbreaking venture that still defies most categorizations. The temptation to parallel such an experiment with AC’s life is in some ways far too great to pass up on. But the attempt to work through such an analogy may encourage correlating names with things in a tenuously subjective manner. And according to AC, that’s when mistakes occur. So whatever else one may wish to assert about SoS, at the very least it is safe to say it’s a hybrid example of writing that entails much more than mere textuality may suggest. Hopefully RK’s comprehensive edition will inspire revived and expansive interpretations of its contents for some time to come.
Note: Based on my recent perusal of the manuscript, the forthcoming edition by Inner Traditions appears to have closely followed the format and presentation of the previous edition by Karumet Press. This forthcoming version, in fact, will have a slip cover and is being afforded the lavish production it deserves at a reasonable price.
Footnotes
[1] RK is swift to point out this fact in the Editor’s Introduction to this edition (see page x). However, one is still left to wonder about certain particulars concerning the dimensions of the book since, as Timothy d’Arch Smith has observed that Crowley intended many of his books to be magical objects and that “even the size of Crowley’s books can have magical significance.” RK himself stated in a recent interview thatSoS was a “talismanic book” exhibited by the front and back cover’s adornment with 666. d’Arch Smith states that “the very first issue [of SoS] is in crimson paper with no statement of “edition” of the title page and consisted of only ten copies on paper and three on vellum. The other issues are all bound in blue wrappers.” See: Timothy d’Arch Smith, The Books of the Beast, (Oxford, UK: Mandrake Books, 1991, pp. 10-12 and fn 22 on p. 120; and RK’s Interview with Harper Feist, Thelema Now, Mar. 27, 2022, https://thelemanow.com/thelema-now-guest-richard-kaczynski-2022.
[2] In his catalog J. Edward Cornelius lists a total of 5 editions released of the SoS since the first edition. Every version he noted that I have had the opportunity to peruse is in no way comparable to Kamuret’s release in terms of notation, introductory material or references in general. See: J. Edward Cornelius, The Aleister Crowley Desk Reference. York Beach, Maine: The Teitan Press, 2013, p. 311.
[3] When I first tackled RK’s seminal study Forgotten Templars: The Untold Origins of Ordo Templi Orientis I was mesmerized by the scope and breadth of the detailed annotations. However, unlike SoS, Templars contained only footnotes thus eliminating any breaks in the reading’s flow. After initially flipping back and forth between end-notes and text in the opening sections of SoS I made the deliberate choice to avoid referring to these endnotes until I had finished a specific poem or essay. Rather than permit my penchant for more and more information to override my digestion of the primary text, I found that this was the only logical solution especially in the case of the poems. Such compositions’ lines must by necessity be consumed in an uninterrupted fashion and focused upon contiguously for the sake of immersion.
[4] I myself have personally experienced altitude sickness while mountaineering and I must say that the very last thing I’d consider, even though I’ve always carried pen and paper with me, was writing down anything of worth let alone working on a substantial project. The only concern that has ever occupied my mind in that situation has been holding down lunch and making it off the mountain in one piece. As a result I’ve been forced to concede that Crowley’s writing endeavors, no matter the scope, at that altitude represent an unparalleled feat of herculean stamina and willpower along with putting dharana to the ultimate test.
[5] Crowley still receives kudos by many contemporary mountaineers for being the very first, with the most primitive equipment, to reconnoiter and plot out the Abruzzi ridge section of K2.
[6] As many practitioners of magic have observed, the great work itself often transpires for them in medias res. Such illuminations may occur mid-thought, mid-life, or in the middle of the day, for example.
[7] It would be easy to lapse into the thesis, antithesis, synthesis triad most commonly attributed to Kant (in fact Fichte was actually responsible for this formula) as somehow applicable here. Nonetheless, synthesis as the objective of combined thesis and antithesis is not always the object of the apophatic method. The conclusion could just as well be that it is inconclusive which would itself be indicative of certain aspects of the divine rendered ultimately as anti-formulaic. Therefore I use the term parathesis that was developed by Alexander of Aphrodisias in discussing one aspect of synthesis where in the constituent parts retain their integrity in an essentially heterogeneous mixture.
[8] From RK’s Interview with Harper Feist, Thelema Now, Mar. 27, 2022, https://thelemanow.com/thelema-now-guest-richard-kaczynski-2022. Hopefully at some later point RK will elaborate on this intriguing proposition in greater detail as this assertion further suggests direct interplay between SoS and Konx.