I received a copy of Israel Regardie's magnum opus last week. I have the revised copy from Falcon Press.

So far I am into Part 2 Divination so I have not read the entire brick of a book as of yet. I have to admit that just the feel of the book in my lap is a pleasure in itself as it is a fairly large volume. Opened up its about 2 feet by a foot and a half so it has the feel of reading one of those huge musty old tomes from days of yore. You can feel yourself bonding with some sage in an alchemy lab. The book itself is bound in what seems to be red leather or pleather which is still nice. In other words this isn't your paperback necronomicon from your high school days. Ok.. enough about that.

I'm finding Regardies conversational tone very easy to follow. He doesn't just jump right in to complicated subjects but starts from a basic newbie standpoint. He even answers questions like "why is the hebrew alphabet so special in magick?" and even backs it up or I should say follows it up with funny stories about the alphabet from his own Jewish heriatage.

I also like how he is not discounting any other magickal system. He hasn't said "this is how the golden down did it and thats all there is so nanny nanny boo boo." He pulls information from many different sources and condenses them down into a very easy to read format. He even includes some papers that Golden Dawn members wrote that were not included in the original knowledge lectures. In some cases he even states that the original knowledge lectures were innadequate. This surprised me as I guess I was expecting him to be lockstep with Mathers and the rest. He does not leave one hanging either. When he states that the information is innadequate for the student to learn the subject discussed he gives the titles of several books where the student can learn enough to be an expert. For example when discussing tarot he states that Crowleys Thoth deck is a good deck to use and cites "The Book of Thoth" as a great reference book as well as many others. He lists several volumes concerning astrology and geomancy whereby the student could become expert in both of those subjects. I was happy about this because although I found geomancy interesting, I was also finding it the most confusing.

All this and I'm only into section 2 of the book with over 95% of the book to go. So far I think that he has recommended 10-15 other authors with even more books and papers which gives me alot of future work to do. I might add to this review as I get further into it so stay tuned.

Oh... I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in learning the Golden Dawn system of magic.

Arc

This post has been edited by Arcangle90: Apr 16 2006, 07:24 AM

Greetings.

I am still waiting for my copy to arrive via "media mail"...tooo slow for my taste. Its good to hear that someone gives it kudos though. TY.

Joe

Ok.. I'm in section 4 now and its starting to get good. Remember earlier I stated that Regardie gave reference material for further study on every thing that he talks about? Well here is a list that I've compiled based on his recomendations. I tried to put this in outliine form but it didn't work very well.

1. Volume 1: The Magical Alphabet
a. Introduction
i. Aleister Crowley: Liber LXI vel Causae
ii. Ithel Colquhoun: the Sword of Wisdom
iii. Christopher McIntosh: the Rosy Cross unveiled
iv. Ellic Howe: The Magicians of the Golden Dawn
v. James: Varieties of Religious Experience
vi. Crowley: Liber HHH
vii. Gopi Krishna: Kundalini
viii. Crowley:
1. Book 4
2. Liber LXV The Book of the Heart Girt with a Serpent
3. Liber VII Liber Lapidus Lazuli
4. Liber DCCCXIII Ararita
b. The Proper Attitude toward mind and body
i. Jung: Two Essays on Analytical Psychology
ii. Hyatt: Undoing Yourself with Energized Meditation
c. The Magical Alphabet
i. Mathers: Kabballah Unveiled
ii. Samual Weiser: The Alchemists handbook
iii. Dion Fortune: The mystical Qabalah
iv. William Gray: The Ladder of Lights
2. Volume 2: The importance of Divination
a. Tarot
i. AE Waite: Pictoral Key to the Tarot
ii. Crowley: The Book of Thoth
iii. Paul Case: The Tarot, the Key to the Mysteries of the Ages
iv. Stuart Kaplan: Encyclopedia of the Tarot
b. Geomancy
c. Astrology
i. Grant Lewi: Astrology for the Millions
ii. Grant Lewi: Heaven Knows What
iii. Llewellyn george: The A-Z Horoscope Maker and Delineator
iv. Liz Greene: Saturn
v. Noel Tyl: Slim astrology series
vi. Convolutions of the Serpent Formulae around the North Pole
d. Tatwas
i. Rama Prasad: Nature’s Finer Forces
ii. Ella Adelia Fletcher: The Law of the Rhythmic Breath
e. Alchemy
i. The Ayton Papers the letters of the Rev. WA Ayton to Frederick Leigh Gardner who was Frater De Profundis ad Lucem.
ii. Basil Valentine: Triumphal Chariot of Antimony
iii. Archibald Cockren: Alchemy Re-discovered and Restored
iv. Phillip Hurley: herbal Alchemy
v. Dom Pernety: The Great Art
vi. Doverman: the Goldmakers
vii. Eirenaeus Philalethes: The Metamorphosis of Metals
viii. Louise-Marie von Franz: Alchemist Active Imagination
ix.
3. Volume 3: The Core of the Tradition
a. The Garden of Eden Before the fall
b. The Garden of Eden After the fall
i. Israel Regardie: What you should know about the Golden Dawn
ii. Blavatsky: Secret Doctrine
iii. Jung: Secret of the Golden Flower
iv. Marc Edmund Jones: Sabian Symbols
c. On the Work to be Undertaken Between Portal and Adeptus Minor
i. Geraldine Coster: Psychoanalysis for Normal People
ii. Janette Rainwater: You are in charge
iii. Wilhelm Reich: The Function of the Orgasm
iv. C.G. Jung: Two Essays on Analytical Psychology
v. Georg Groddeck: Exploring the Unconscious
vi. Paul Schilder: The Image and Appearance of the Human Body
vii. William James: Varieties of Religious Experience
viii. Christopher Hyatt: Undoing Yourself with Energized Meditation
ix. Israel Regardie: Foundations of Practical Magic
1. article: The Art of True Healing
x. The Circle Book of Charts
d. The Tree of Life in the Aura
i. Israel Regardie: the Lazy man’s Guide to Relaxation

I'll be back with more updates as I read further

This post has been edited by Arcangle90: May 27 2006, 08:30 AM

I posted to ask for locatios on where to order it, but i found it so nevermind (amazon.co.uk yay!)

This post has been edited by animus: May 29 2006, 01:04 AM

Ok.. I'm up to section 4 and now its starting to slow down. It was like going into a lake and havng the bottom drop out from under you. The explanations just got very technical. I've been told by someone that would know that Regardie himself was disapointed in the book. Oh well. the first 3 sections makes it worth it. Maybe it will be a good companion or reference book for when I enter the Golden Dawn.