Past Hierophant of Golden Dawn at last (Why I may never be allowed to return to the Hermetic branch)

Given how much of my former life was consumed by the Golden Dawn, especially the Hermetic and Rosicrucian Knighthood branches, my planned silence on this blog might need to be explained; just in case, I still have any friends in those exalted halls. Doubtful.

First, there is the little fun fact that I have been convicted of black magick three times.

Yeah, three times. By people who are not of my religion. By Christians, Freemasons, and members of Golden Dawn Orders other than the one I swore my Oath to. Yeah, three times, I have been convicted. For things that are ethical, legal, and standard practice in Wicca and witchcraft. Oh, these people claim to respect the beliefs of others. Sin, I did.

Second, I was tired of not being able to hit people with a frying pan for correcting me. 

Especially when those individuals had never even brought a Golden Dawn book in their entire life, truly read one, took a class, or successfully cast a Lesser Ritual yet. I had been born into magick and witchcraft, as well as a Theosophist vs Rosicrucian Knight soap opera drama, faked my first Wiccan lineage at age twenty, became a "paid ritual script writer" for a Thelemic AA lineage at age twenty-five, went straight at age thirty. 7=4. Plus. 

Third, I carried far too much weight in a resource/candidate poor environment, aka I was a fucking Hierophant for Bast Temple, Denver Colorado--at first, Capital Hill 80203, later Walnut Hill (North Denver) 80205 from Fall 1996 (my first Open Full Moon ritual under the supervision of Maggie Moonstone), to 13 October 2024. Now, I am no longer. Bitches!

Khari opened her mouth, "I can do it better. And I am in charge next time." Which combined with an earlier "I am ready to initiate students in Outer Order," made me . . . 

 . . . start figuring out the blast radius of a Hubris ZAM nuclear pile. At least, a ZAM. 

Do I need to explain the joke? Okay, non-science people, you admitted ignorance. Science.

If Cavemen, or Mad Football Players, place bricks of strange material on top of one another, without no math at all, they can make a nuclear bomb. All you need is a group of really healthy men with an obsession to make of a pyramid of strange bricks, lots of food to feed them, bricks and more bricks of special "Let's not talk about the radiation," and a field, or maybe a cave, that no one is going to miss. I know what team that my Mom would have suggested, but it feels kinda dirty to say that Mom is dead, and all that jazz. 

Anyway, I heard my dear wife say, "I am ready to be a Hierophant." And I was me.

Unfortunately, in my lineage, you had to be Zelator Adept Minor to be a Hierophant. 

So I heard hubris from someone had not done that level of work yet. And I do know. 

My lineages, Thelemic AA and Hermetic Golden Dawn, were healed through Master Cherubim, going by the way of both Aliester Crowley and Israel Regardie; provided that you believe Master Cherubim, it may have been just a cover to explain away his sources. Either way, I do know that his initiation of me had an effect that went up the entire tree.

Plus, I served time in many Inner Order courses--some even in person, oh my god. 

I have invested in a rather expensive Inner Order course, getting up into 6=5. Thin air. 

Hence, I know that ZAM is supposed to be a gateway; I have my doubts; Goddess weighs.

Nevertheless, the day after the memorial where Khari said that the next time that we do the Three Toasts Ritual, we are using a timer, I resigned from Outer Order of Hermetic. 

Because I had been gone since 2016. The Third Order Face-Shaming. By Tribal Boy. 

Oh where were you during this? I know where I was. 20--fucking--16! God, what a year.

I was trying to start a pagan magazine. Failing. Then my High Priestess, my "Secret Sith Master," Maggie Moonstone died. And the moves to remove me from the Capital Hill Open Full Moon community started immediately. That I unfairly stolen my promotion. 

Add to that it was a rough year for my wife at work, a hell, with a toxic boss with issues.

One of my friends, a "coven member," started to show her true colors, thanks to ambition.

All of this is building up to spring, my wife's off and . . . my mother-in-law commits suicide, due to her ongoing pain issues (after my own trauma two and a half year earlier).

Basically, my universe is a dumpster fire in 2016 when Tribal Boy calls me out on Facebook. "He's upset with you, dude." I can make no sense of it. No one can. Seriously.

Essentially, Tribal Boy has decided to announce to one and all that I owed him students as payment for the advanced training that he gave me years before. Part of a contract. 

A contract that I never signed. No oath. One that Tribal Boy has revised several times. 

What I did that suddenly owed him students, I could not have told you on that day. 

Because my fucking universe was on fire. My wife was trying to put her mother's affairs in order. My so-called best friend was nowhere to be seen. And this punk kid . . . 

I tried ignoring his mental illness. Others tried reasoning with him. Traditions cited.

"Why would you teach Morgan anything that he wasn't free to teach his own students?"

Tribal Boy did not answer that question. This had not been the first time that he had gone nuclear claiming that he had a "monopoly" over the information that he had taught me. 

My solution to his claim? I quit teaching his material. Immediately. The first explosion. 

I wanted to ask him if he was claiming that all his material was greater than all my teachers before and after him. If he knew how much I invested in a rather expensive Inner Order course. 6=5. If he understood what being paid to write 8=3 material meant.

Unlike him, I did not need to fake being in contact with Third Order. I could be Third Order any damn day of the week that me and Khari got done playing Hermetics. 

But I gladly bent my knee, kissed his ring, give him reward for whatever wrong I did. 

"Yes, you are right. I was wrong not to send you students. My bad. You are my better."

Then I walked out of Hermetic Golden Dawn. And never went back. Outside of Gherkin.

Tribal Boy was welcome to all the students of the system. After all, that mother fucker had stolen control of my lodge by helping a Freemason (only a Practicus) convict me of black magick for binding a serial rapist, "attempting to overthrow the American legal system," a claim that he gleefully published on his website to authorize a new lodge.

Oh, I owe him students?!? Thank goddess, mine and Khari favorite student's lodge turned out to be more successful. Yes, Royal Arc also invested in expensive Inner Order course. 

If I had to summarize Tribal Boy's issue, it's that he's proud of his native magick, yet it has no Brand Name power, so he's stuck selling the Conquerer's Magick, and gets to him. Tribal Boy also fancies himself to worthy of being published by Big Name Publisher. Ego. 

Then Tribal Boy learns that I briefly mention one of his concepts that I actually am using thanks to the lessons of a different teacher--hehe, guess what, we share a mentor in common (is he even aware this fact?), and loses his mind because my little blog post gets more views than the last book that he slaved over with the aid of Third Order. Sad, it is. 

That's the Alpha and Omega of our student teacher relationship--no clue of my later years. Or my earlier years. No, only his need to be the chosen one of Third Order. 

So I left Hermetic Golden Dawn in his capable hands . . . with no idea of my crime.

It's only recently that I think that I figured it out. And it's sad. Because it's ego. 

Going back to 2016, my dumpster fire year, sometime during it, a GD publisher friend comes to me, begging for the author-expert to pitch in on a project. Sigh. I on fire. Friends.

For some reason, I said yes. It was on the damn Flying Rolls. WTF are the Flying Rolls?!?

Context being everything: My lineage, my lodge, owed a copy of King's book. On a shelf.

Yep, that's the level of knowledge that anyone in my own personal orbit had. None at all. 

And I was being asked to join this project. My friend had to be desperate. Near list end.

"Oh dear god. I know nothing about them. Any of them. Why is he asking me? I have never mentioned them ever. Am I the last Golden Dawn person on his list? Oh no . . . "

The Flying Roll I end up with, initially seems to be the last piece of trash. Because I am still in the Jewish publisher's office when I should be doing ministry stuff. Dead people.

But I have the Luck of the Library Lottery on my side, and the Flying Roll I was assigned seemed custom made for my background, resources, and current set of questions. The article ended up containing shout-outs to the three most important of the Inner Order courses that I had taken. I am quite sure that the very expensive one was apparent. 

If I had to pick an article as a capstone for my Hermetic Golden Dawn career, so be it.

Because that is what it ended up being. Thanks to the ego of Tribal Boy. Facebook Shaming me for not sending him students. Because his teachings was more important. 

As of now, none of this is a damn issue. I dropped out to avoid sending a sub-par teacher students that I did not owe him in the first place. I never signed a NDA (non-disclosure agreement). Nor a Non-Compete. And they are the only things that matter in American courts, so Tribe up your money, mo fu. The only person I ever owed future students to was Khari, the Second Hierophant of Bast Temple. I didn't teach her a damn thing. 

Khari may have my energetic lineage; but she has absolutely none of the training, mo fu. 

The next version of Bast Temple is Egyptian Wiccan, not Hermetic; we are free priests.