Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law – AL I:57
In some modern circles Thelema has become very appealing; especially if you’re a closet Christian. After years of being told that you can’t do this or that, Thelema offers the dirty little school children justification to act out their neurosis under the pretenses of ‘do what thou wilt.’ Sadly, if such people has not been taught correctly as to what Thelema really means, they’ll walk around this feeble little world calling themselves a Thelemite when in fact, they are not.
The concept of being a Thelemite is based on the Greek word θέλημα or Thelema. This implies a person who is pursuing their True Will. In other words, this person admits that their Soul had picked its incarnations in order to gain a certain ‘experience’ at which time after puberty it was believed, to use more modern jargon, that the Soul would be given the free choice to “Do what thou wilt.” Still, the Greeks understood that there was no guarantee that our Soul would fulfill its desired incarnation because “Do what thou wilt” is a double-edged sword. On the one hand it implies that we’re given the license to pursue our Earthly experience as we choose. However, the danger in this assumption as finality is that our mercurial Soul, having passed the River of Forgetfulness in order to incarnate, could now easily focus all its attention toward Earthly “do what thou wants” which could unconsciously steer it away from the real reason as to why it incarnated.
“One of the most important questions puzzling earlier Greek philosophers was whether or not there was a preordained order of events in each new incarnation or are we endowed with free choice. Most believed that both answers are webbed around what is called Fate, which implies an obligatory decree given by the Gods that predetermines the course of our life. But the ideas behind Fate should not be seen as an explanation as to why certain things happen, or if something happened, “it had to be.” Instead this decree of Fate, which in the modern sense is called our True Will, is merely the underlying reason behind the desired experience of an incarnation. However, fulfilling this mandatory ronouncement, like the ideas behind Fate itself, was not something carved into stone. The ancients recognized this problem and attempted to influence guardian spirits through a series of rites and sacrifices in their sacred Temples in order for these spirits to help them fulfill their destiny. They also believed that we had free choice to pick and chose whether or not to perform the rites, or even to do them well or badly. This was the paradox of Fate or destiny. On the one hand life was said to be predetermined. On the other hand, by our own feeble actions, we could clearly influence our incarnation to either occur as planned or curse ourselves for all eternity for the blunders we invoked through free choice.”
–from CORNELIA No.1 IN QUEST OF THE HOLY GUARDIAN ANGEL, Chapter One: “The Daimon, Between Good and Evil”
Those who pursue daily ‘Wants’ through free choice above the quest to discover their ‘True Will’ are properly called Thelomites which is based on the Greek word Θέλω for ‘Want.’
Yes, I find the hypocrisy of modern Thelema very amusing and late Phyllis Seckler and I often discussed this problem; we saw many who claim to be true Thelemites over the years acting not in accordance with The Book of The Law, or in a Thelemic manner but who love to scream, “Do as I say, not as I do or act.” … So here is the new definition:
Thelomite (Θέλω) : a person who disregards the Will of others and acts out of personal beliefs or wants on the ‘horizontal plane’ in contrast to the
Thelemite who acts ‘vertically’ and respects the Thelemic Rights of others.
The bottom line: Simply calling yourself a Thelemite, doesn’t make you a Thelemite … and if you’re confused … that is the difference betwen bugs and Gods.
Love is the law, love under will. – AL I:57