Tag Archives: Z’ev Ben Shimon Halevi

December 23, 2010 · 2:50 pm

Holy Guardian Angel

News today that over a third of Britons apparently believe they have a Guardian Angel, with “17% unsure.” This plus recent discussions I have been having over the interwebby-type thing have got me thinking about the subject. The “Holy Guardian Angel” is a term that crops up a lot in the occult, mainly thanks to a certain Mr A Crowley. I wrote an article about this a little while ago, but I thought I would expand upon the subject with an attempt to debunk some myths which crop up about it.

Fiction: Attaining Knowledge and Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel is the be-all and end-all of Magick

Fact

If one reads the Book of the Sacred Magick of Abramelin the Mage, one finds that the “Abramelin Operation” is a preparatory step before embarking on a career as a ceremonial magician which will involve evoking all the demons of hell, charging magic squares, etc.  Moreover, if one consults other grimoires such as the Pauline Art, Trithemius’ Art of Drawing Spirits into Crystals, etc, one finds that the invocation of a Guardian Angel is an important first step before communicating with other intelligences. Finally, one should note that according to “777” the so-called “Vision of the Holy Guardian Angel” is the spiritual experience not of Kether, nor even of Tiphereth, but of Malkuth.

The reality of the situation is that from being the ultimate end, KCHGA is the exact opposite – it is only the beginning of the path. The end is “Divine Union.” KCHGA on the other hand should be seen as the simple basic qualification that one is now an actual magician, as opposed to a mere theorist.

Related to this realisation that KCHGA is the beginning, not the end, is the unfortunate phenomenon one sees of people who let their egos inflate egregiously when they say they have achieved KCHGA, as if this is supposed to mean something. The true experience of KCHGA is not exalting, it is humbling – rather like one feels humbled when coming into the presence of something of great beauty like a great work of art.

The only gratifying thing that can truly be said about KCHGA is that it may be the bottom rung of the ladder, but at least it is the right ladder.

Fiction: The Holy Guardian Angel is identical to the Higher Self.

Fact:

I have dealt with this in a previous blog post. This is an assertion put about by Crowley, but the evidence breaks down when one starts to examine and compare the grimoires from the past which actually mention Holy Guardian Angels. The HGA is the Guardian Angel of the Clairvoyant process – be that a crystal ball, magic mirror, or one’s own ability to skry generally. The HGA ensures that only the spirit with which you desire to communicate speaks to you, and that it speaks the truth when it does so. In mediumistic terms the HGA is a “Spirit Guide.” Franz Bardon in his book “Initiation into Hermetics,”
and in the present day the Kabbalist Z’ev Ben Shimon Havlevi, state that the souls of departed human beings can fill this role as well.

The Higher Self is better thought of as the Yechidah, the Divine Spark within one’s own soul, which corresponds to Kether. The point being that whilst Knowledge of the Higher Self is a valid aim of magick, it is theoretically possible to achieve this without having anything resembling conversation with anything resembling an angelic being.

Fiction: The “Holy Guardian Angel” is a term used by Crowley which was not part of the GD teachings.

Fact:

This is something I have seen crop up from time to time. Yes it is true that Crowley used “KCHGA” to describe the work of the 5=6 of the A.’.A.’. . Yes it is also true that this term is not used in the 5=6 teachings of the Golden Dawn – phrases like “higher self” being used instead. On this basis I have heard it confidently asserted that the term “Holy Guardian Angel” belongs to Crowley only and does not form any part of the GD’s teachings.

WRONG. In the Stella Matutina the Holy Guardian Angel crops up in the 6=5 Adeptus Major ceremony. In a paper in W B Yeats’ collection – which is published in George Mills Harper’s Yeats’ Golden Dawn – whilst the aspirant gazes into a bowl of water during the passage of the path of Mem, his “Holy Guardian Angel” wraps him with its wings, whilst he gazes upon the image of his “resurrection body.” This is all part of the astral working that formed the structure upon which the Stella Matutina Adeptus Major ritual was based.

Hence we have primary evidence (or at least – the National Library of Ireland does) – that at least one faction of the GD incorporated the concept of “Holy Guardian Angel” at least in some respect into its Higher Grade teachings.

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September 6, 2010 · 2:07 pm

Z’ev Ben Shimon Halevi

The “Great Tree.”

To London on Saturday to attend a talk on the Qabalah by Z’ev Ben Shimon Halevi (which is the Hebrew name of an English gentleman named Warren Kenton). Interestingly enough it was being held at Dion Fortune’s place in Chalk Farm, London. We were even privileged to use Dion Fortune’s own temple room, though I understand this was only because it was a special occasion – the Society of the Inner Light’s Director of Studies told me they don’t usually let hoi polloi in there as it is “consecrated ground.”Anyway: Z’ev, who has mixed Sephardic and Ashkenazic ancestry, teaches what he calls the “Toledano tradition” of the Kabbalah, which is a particular form of the Sephardic school which derives from mediaeval Toledo in Spain. Z’ev said that he was first moved to study the Kabbalah after having lived in Toledo in a past-life. From what I can make out, the Toledano tradition is fairly similar to the conventional Kabbalah though with a few peculiarities such as their focus on the “Great Tree,” which appears to be a concatenation of the regular Tree of Life in the four worlds of Atziluth, Briah, Yetzirah and Assiah (see picture).

I picked up the following tid-bits from Z’ev’s presentation:

  • Despite the Kabbalah being the mystical tradition of the Hebrews, its inner meaning is a Perennial tradition which has been known to different cultures at different times, even those unconnected with one another: e.g. China, Tibet, Babylon, etc. This is even shown in iconography from these regions which all purport to show variants of the Tree of Life.
  • The story of Noah’s Ark is metaphorical: the real Ark was in fact knowledge of the Kabbalah itself, whilst the various animals that were saved were particular aspects of that knowledge, which Noah managed to preserve for posterity. In that respect the Great Tree (left) was the blue-print for the Ark described in Genesis. (Alex thinks: Hmm, I wonder if the Royal Ark Mariners have ever considered this?)
  • Z’ev takes a curiously wary view of Angels. He used the metaphor of a corporation: God is the boss of the company; Man is the boss’ son; whilst the Angels are the boss’ employees. Thus whilst it is entirely possible that if one were to approach God directly, He would instruct one of His Angels to help: but an Angel would not necessarily be helpful if it were approached directly. In fact, according to Z’ev, an Angel might be downright troublesome. Z’ev took the view that if one asked an Angel to help, one might end up “paying with one’s soul.” At first this makes it seem that Angels are hardly any different from Goetic spirits: although by viewing angels this way it might explain why e.g. Enochian angels are often reported to be troublesome when invoked.
  • Z’ev believes in the existence of spirit guides – Maggidim – but avers that they are they are human spirits, rather than “Holy Guardian Angels” (this is probably connected with the dim view that he takes on Angels generally – see above). Z’ev himself claims that he is guided by the spirit of a Kabbalist who lived in the 11th century. He also believes that everyone has within their psyche an “Inner-Teacher” which is equivalent to Daath. From the way he described it, the Inner Teacher seemed to be equivalent to Freud’s notion of the Super-Ego.
  • Apparently, in every age at any one time there is an “Alpha-Qabalist” (Aleph-Qabalist?) living, who is like a Secret Chief, world teacher or Qabalistic version of the Messiah. The identity of this Alpha-Qabalist is always secret: he or she always keeps him-or-her-self to him-or-her-self. Z’ev was far too modest to hint in anything other than the mildest terms that it was himself! 😉

After lunch, Z’ev led those assembled on a Qabalistic pathworking exercise. From the ease with which he interpreted peoples vision-experiences I very much suspected that he had done this kind of thing many times in the past, and consequently knew every type of symbolism that commonly cropped up!

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