Greetings Golden Dawners!
Apparently, a little bit of controversy has been stirred up by the new Commentaries on the Golden Dawn Flying Rolls – specifically over the “author” of the book: the “Golden Dawn Community.”
Commentaries on the Golden Dawn Flying Rolls – Front Cover
Our choice to use this particular phrase has given rise to some questions, such as what exactly makes up such a community. That is, how are we defining this “community” as opposed to any other community, and what makes one either a member of it or an outsider to it? Nick Farrell recently addressed this issue rather well on his blog. So, if you’ve been asking yourself these same questions, I recommend you head over there and see what he has to say on the issue. 🙂
Meanwhile, a somewhat different question has come to my attention via a private email. It would appear that a few people out there feel the Commentaries book is a political move to define its contributors – and only its contributors – as members of the Golden Dawn Community. In other words, if you are a member of an Order or private Temple that is not represented in the book then – according to this view – you are being subtly informed that you are not invited to our little party. (Sadly, the author of that email expressed that he would not be interested in similar projects in the future due to what he felt was the “political” nature of this one.)
Nick also covers this to some extent in his blog post – where he outlines the criteria he used when inviting authors to contribute. To summarize that portion of his post: you were not invited to participate in this book if you were A) hostile toward the Golden Dawn or other members of the community or B) if your Temple or group is so secretive that we simply don’t know you exist. Plus, of course, there were only so many Flying Rolls to cover, and only so many Golden Dawners who are also authors – so even if you don’t fall into points A or B we still might not have found room for you in this particular project.
Still, I find it concerning that anyone would view our use of the term “Golden Dawn Community” as intended to limit or define that community to strictly the good folks who contributed to the project. When we all decided to use that term as the “author” of the book, I was among those who gave it a “yay” vote, so I feel I can rightfully speak for what we truly intended by it.
While the project was in its infancy, we cast our net as far and wide as we were able to. We wanted to include representatives from as many Golden Dawn Orders and independent Temples as we could manage – within the above-mentioned criteria. And it was in this same light that we decided the author should be listed as “the Golden Dawn Community.” The message we hoped to convey was that this book was not written by a single individual or even a single Order. It was a pan-GD effort intended to highlight both the diversity of the various Orders and the fraternity that exists between them. It was intended to be inclusive rather than restrictive.
Any concept of defining the community as “only” those who contributed was the furthest thought from our minds! In fact, it was our hope that those who couldn’t (or wished not to) contribute to the Commentaries… book would be inspired to contribute to later projects – thereby expanding the very notion of the “Golden Dawn Community” further and further which each subsequent event.
To put all of this very simply, consider that the Commentaries on the Golden Dawn Flying Rolls is a book both by and for the Golden Dawn Community. If you’re a Golden Dawner, then this means you. 😉
UPDATE: Check out this great blog post from Eric v. Sisco. 🙂 I also posted a comment there that you might enjoy reading. (At the moment it is waiting for approval, but it should appear shortly.)
Ananael (The Secrets of Wisdom) 
Other people are welcome to organize their own “Golden Dawn Community” projects. Heavens knows that I am kicking around trying to organize one.
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Please let me know what you come up with, Morgan! I sincerely hope others pick up the same idea. 🙂
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Wise comments. But this was expected (at least by me) because still there are some who argue about being part of but at same time, their discourse appears to be like they want to be the “owners” of GD.
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It’s a sad commentary on our times that some people can’t conceive of such a project NOT being “political”. Or that such a project can’t possibly “work” and begin to heal the reputation of the GD in the greater occult community.
Here’s an analogy: To these people, the normal condition is a sick, disgusting mass of muck and mud, with everybody trying to get their heads above it by pushing others down and climbing over them. Now imagine a group of these muck-divers decide to try to build a platform above it all, and invite some others to climb up onto it with them. But there are others, still down in the muck, who stick their heads out and say, “well that’s a great idea but it’s not PRACTICAL, and I wasn’t in the first group that got pulled up onto it. So forget it, I’ll just stay down here in the muck!” And they sink back down again and continue as before.
And then there’s the persons who have consistently been the ones doing the most pushing of other people’s heads down in the muck so they can climb over them, and the platform builders see no reason to extend a hand to them, for fear they will just pull people off the platform back into the muck. You only want the people who have demonstrated the ability and inclination to play well with others to be on the platform with you. And this is a perfectly reasonable attitude if you want the platform to endure.
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Long story short: A lot of very accomplished Occult scholars contribute to the progress of Golden Dawn study and practice, and some of their work surfaces in print from time to time. Anybody who just wasn’t in the right place at the right time doing the right stuff to make a relevant contribution to one particular project, and thinks this amounts to “persecution”, has problems better addressed on an analyst’s couch than a Temple floor.
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I have to agree with Joe on this. It is indeed a sad commentary that some people think that projects such as this book represent are “politically motivated”.
What is often missed is that this Golden Dawn Community has been around and active for many years. In fact it was around when I first came to the Golden Dawn about 20 years ago. It has always been something that has been going on behind the public scenes of the Golden Dawn.
Many will ask what the Golden Dawn Community has been up to behind the scenes; what is it hiding. Simple really, it has been a long series of communications between various senior (and not so senior) members of the various Golden Dawn Orders, independent Temples, and groups. These communications have served as a basis to get to know each other, share ideas and information. Elicit feedback for those ideas and information. And generally to discuss something that has been near and dear to everyone’s heart, the Golden Dawn System of Magic and the Tradition. There has been a great deal of Fraternal discussions in these behind the scenes communications within the Community. Not all these discussions have been easy, nor have they been without disagreement. The one thing that separates these disagreements though from others is that the people always maintained respect for each other even though they disagreed on various points of the Tradition.
I was a bit skeptical when I was approached with the idea behind the Flying Rolls Commentary book. What got me onboard with this project were the goals. What are those goals you ask? Well those goals have always been education, sharing of information and ideas, especially new insights into the Corpus of Golden Dawn material. They also include research, expanding the Corpus of the GD, growing the body of the overall Golden Dawn Community into something stronger and healthier. All this was through something simple. Participation in the very Tradition and Community that we all dearly love.
It is through participation that we are good and fruitful members of our society. This is true in all democracies and republics. It is equally true with esoteric societies and communities. Whether a person votes, does jury duty, community service, partakes in town hall meetings, etc. is a mark of how they care about their community. Same thing can be seen here in the Golden Dawn Community. The people that participated in this book project care about the welfare of the Golden Dawn Community and want to give something back to that Community.
Not everyone could participate in the Flying Rolls Commentary project. I understand. I understand that many more were asked than those that contributed. Many of these people had scheduling issues. They were working on their own projects for their Orders, Temples, and Groups. Some had personal issues at the time and were unable to contribute. Some were simply overlooked because the editors and project managers of the Flying Rolls Commentary project are human and prone to human failings like forgetting someone. Also as both Aaron and Nick have pointed out, if your group is so secret that someone does not know about it, well then you cannot be asked to participate whether you wanted to or not. Some people do not like writing for publication because it is scary (and yes it is scary) and they often feel that they either have nothing to say or are not skilled enough to by authors.
Many of those that were asked to contribute is because they are often seen as authors, writers, and in some cases scholars in and of the Golden Dawn. They just happened to be in the right place at the right time to be asked because their names and images are associated with the Golden Dawn Community as a whole.
My hope is that there will be more projects like this for the Golden Dawn Community, by the Golden Dawn Community. That more people will step forward and will contribute and participate in the Golden Dawn Community that they are a part of. The best way to do something like that is to participate. Contact people that were part of this Flying Rolls Commentary book project. Throw them ideas (be careful though, you might be expected and asked to participate), let them know that you would like to participate in your Community that you care so much about. I am sure that they, and you, can find something to talk about and discuss.
In LVX,
Samuel Scarborough
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Reblogged this on Abhainn – the blog and commented:
From the blog of Aaron Leitch on the processes behind the “Golden Dawn Community” as authors to the new Commentaries books brought forward by Kerubim Press.
As for my own 2cents worth, well those that were – either through process of elimination or through simply not being in reach – excluded, they seem to miss a vital element to both writing books and to being part of a community. A Community doesn’t operate simply with having the same everywhere and if all GDers were writers and scholars the community aspect would be in serious doubt. As it stands the GD Community seems to be heavily populated with writers and scholars and academics (ironic given my chosen career trajectory right now!) but I’m certain that this work will inspire more creative projects for members and practitioners of the Golden Dawn to come and some of those may be in direct response to the Commentaries book.
During Dublin Pride over the last weekend I was astonished to see kids jumping in to the march and singing and dancing and generally showing very little regard to the so-called order of proceedings and whats more this wasn’t just some passive following of young people in the parade they were all wearing TENI – Trans* Equality Network of Ireland t-shirts. It was then my line of view began to notice how the audience started to react to the spectacle as more and more people began to wave back and cheer and generally break down the constraints of self-comportment for a short wee while at least. The Golden Dawn Community as well as the Occult/Esoteric Community as a whole could learn a thing or two from this in seeking not to stifle creative developments in art for the community but to allow inspiration to begat inspiration.
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