Sandra Tabatha Cicero

I really enjoyed Cicero's way of writing. I found much of his analyses absolutely brilliant. He was a student of the late Israel Regardie. It's a very no-nonsense approach and devoid of all the usual esoteric jargon so common in magickal books. In fact, this book might have one of the clearest explanations of ritual magick I've ever encountered. That's quite a feat, as it's a pretty complicated subject. I also appreciate the fact that Cicero's not out to convince anyone, or that this system is better than others; he just offers the material and allows the reader to decide. The book explains the degree system within the order (think Freemasonry with magick), the order's philosophy, various rites and practices, and what they all mean. I also appreciate that the order is non-dogmatic and non-religious, unlike nearly all other magickal orders and secret societies.… (mer)

What a very fine idea! The amorphous dispersion and multiplication of the Golden Dawn as an institution, and the recognized insinuation of its technologies into virtually every corner of the contemporary practice of ceremonial magic, have set the stage for a momentous publishing project.

The Golden Dawn Journal is presented as an ongoing series of book-length anthologies on diverse topics of interest to the praciticing ceremonial magician. The first volume concentrates on divination, and projected themes appear to include everything from Alchemy to the Z documents.

As a material artifact, it is a little disappointing. The softbound book uses flimsy paper and coverstock. The cover bears an attractive design with a very conservative graphic, designed (I suppose) to attract stodgy ceremonialist types.

The editors preface the text with a fine essay on the general nature of divination and its role in ceremonial practice. I found myself getting annoyed that so many of the individual contributors then began their pieces with a reworking of the same generalities.

There is a wide mix of articles, though there is a predictable bias towards the Tarot among the available techniques. Any practicing magician is likely to find at least a couple of the 15 essays valuable.

The volume concludes with a "Forum" section, which appears to have been an interesting backfire. The concept was to get a variety of positions from the contributors in response to a single question on the topic. Instead, the query "Can a divination always be trusted?" elicited a high degree of consensus, broken mostly by semantic variations. That's not too surprising, since it's one of the few questions that I have not heard ever-contentious magicians disputing.

All told, this first volume of The Golden Dawn Journal is an ambitious project with mixed results and great promise.… (mer)