List of Thelemites explained

Thelema is a philosophical and mystical system founded by Aleister Crowley early in the 20th century. This is a list of Thelemites, self-professed adherents of Thelema (including those who identified as Thelemites during part of their lives but subsequently left the faith) who have Wikipedia articles. These individuals come from diverse backgrounds, including artists, writers, occultists, scientists, musicians, and more, hailing from countries such as the United States, England, Canada, Germany, Australia, and Brazil.

A

• Kenneth Anger (1927-2023), American underground experimental filmmaker, actor, and writer.^{[1] [2]}

B

• Frank Bennett (1868–1930), Australian chemist.^[3]
• William Breeze (b. 1955), American writer and musician.^[4]
• Mary Butts (1890–1937), English modernist writer.^[5]

C

• Marjorie Cameron (1922–1995), American artist, poet, actress and occultist.^[6]
• Barbara Canright (1919–1997), American human computer at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, member of Agape Lodge.^[7]
• Aleister Crowley (1875–1947), English occultist, ceremonial magician, writer, and founder of Thelema.

D

• Lon Milo DuQuette (b. 1948), American writer, lecturer, musician, and occultist.^[8] He is also a National and International governing officer of the Thelemic organization Ordo Templi Orientis.

E

• Sally Eaton (b. 1947), American Wiccan high priestess, liturgist, singer and actress.^[9]

F

• Jeanne Robert Foster (1879–1970), one of Crowley's "Scarlet Women" who took the magical name Sister Hilarion.^[10]
• J. F. C. Fuller (1878–1966), Major-General in the British Army, military historian, and strategist.

G

• Peaches Geldof (1989–2014), English columnist, television personality, and model.^[11]
• Karl Germer (1885-1962), German and American businessman and occultist, O.H.O. of O.T.O. (1947–1962).
• Kenneth Grant (1924–2011), English ceremonial magician and advocate of Thelema.

H

• Lady Frieda Harris (1877–1962), English artist known for her design of Crowley's Thoth Tarot.^[12]
• Leah Hirsig (1883–1975), American schoolteacher and occultist, most famous of Crowley's Scarlet Women.^[13]
• L. Ron Hubbard (1911–1986) American author and founder of the religion Scientology. Was briefly involved with Thelema and collaborated with Jack Parsons on a Thelemic ritual before founding his own religion.^[14]
• Christopher Hyatt (1943–2008), American psychologist, occultist, and writer.^{[15] [16]}

J

• Charles Stansfeld Jones (1886–1950), Canadian occultist and ceremonial magician.
• George Cecil Jones (1873–1960), English chemist, occultist, Golden Dawn member and co-founder of the A∴A∴.^[17]

K

• Richard Kaczynski (b. 1963), American occult writer and psychologist.^[18]

L

• James Lees (1939–2015), English magician known for English Qaballa.^[19]

M

• Grady Louis McMurtry (1918–1985), American ceremonial magician and "Caliph" of O.T.O.^[20]
• Marcelo Ramos Motta (1931–1987), Brazilian occult writer and member of A∴A∴

N

• Nema Andahadna (1939–2018), American occultist, ceremonial magician, and writer about the Ma'atian current.
• Victor Neuburg (1883–1940), English poet and writer.
• Noname Jane, American pornographic actress.^[21]
• Eric Nord (born Harry Helmuth Pastor; 1919–1989), American Beat Generation coffeehouse and nightclub owner, poet, actor, and hipster, the "King of the Beatniks".
• Sara Northrup Hollister (1924–1997), American occultist and second wife of Scientologist founder L. Ron Hubbard.^[22]

P

• Jack Parsons (1914–1952), American rocket engineer, chemist, and occultist.^{[23] [24]}
• Helen Parsons Smith (1910-2003), American occultist and book editor, wife of John "Jack" Whiteside Parsons who married Wilfred Talbot Smith after Parson's death.

R

• C. F. Russell (1897–1987), American occultist and founder of the magical order G.B.G.

S

• Phyllis Seckler (1917–2004), American occultist and writer, and a lineage holder in the A∴A∴ tradition.
• Harry Everett Smith (1923–1991), American polymath, artist, experimental filmmaker, bohemian, mystic, record collector, hoarder, student of anthropology and Neo-Gnostic bishop.^[25]
• Wilfred Talbot Smith (1885–1957), English occultist and ceremonial magician.

W

• Leila Waddell (1880–1932), Australian violinist who became a Scarlet Woman of Aleister Crowley.^[26]
• James Wasserman (1948–2020), American writer and occultist.^{[27] [28]}
• Sam Webster, American writer, publisher, co-founder of the Chthonic Auranian Templars of Thelema and OSOGD.^[29]
• Jane Wolfe (1875–1958), American silent film character actress.^[30]

Former Thelemites

• Augustus Sol Invictus (b. 1983), American far-right political activist, attorney, blogger, and white nationalist.^[31] He has subsequently claimed to have reverted to Catholicism in 2022.^[32]

See also

• Magical organization
• Members of Ordo Templi Orientis

References

Works cited

• Book: Grant, Kenneth . Kenneth Grant . Outside the Circles of Time . Muller . 1980 . 978-0584104684. Contains a lengthy account of the writing of Nema's Liber Pennae Praenumbra.
• Book: Kaczynski, Richard . Richard Kaczynski . 2024 . Friendship in Doubt: Aleister Crowley, J. F. C. Fuller, Victor B. Neuburg, and British Agnosticism . Oxford University Press . 978-0-19-769400-8.
• Book: Readdy, K. . 2018 . One Truth and One Spirit: Aleister Crowley's Spiritual Legacy . Ibis Press . 978-0892541843.
• Book: Starr, Martin P. . The Unknown God: W. T. Smith and the Thelemites . 2003 . Teitan Press . Bollingbrook, Illinois . 978-0-933429-07-9.

Notes and References

1. Web site: Anger . Kenneth . Keneth Anger: how I made Lucifer Rising . www.theguardian.com . July 22, 2013 . February 13, 2021.
2. Web site: Represa . Marta . Kenneth Anger on the Occult . www.anothermag.com . April 22, 2014 . March 13, 2021.
3. Book: Richmond, Keith . 2004 . Progradior and the Beast . Neptune Press . 978-0954706340 . 99–100, 145.
4. News: 0261-3077 . Flood . Alison . Unseen Aleister Crowley writings reveal 'short-story writer of the highest order' . The Guardian . 2017-11-09 . 2015-10-15 .
5. Book: Booth, Martin . Martin Booth . A Magick Life: A Biography of Aleister Crowley . 2001 . Hodder and Stoughton . London . 0-340-71806-4 . 375–76.
6. Book: Kansa, Spencer . Wormwood Star: The Magickal Life of Marjorie Cameron . 2011 . Mandrake . Oxford . 978-1-906958-08-4 . 75–77, 247.
7. The Women Behind the Jet Propulsion Laboratory . Nathalia . Holt . . June 2016.
8. Book: DuQuette, Lon Milo . My Life With The Spirits: The Adventures of a Modern Magician . Red Wheel/Weiser . 1999 . 1-57863-120-3.
9. Book: Rabinovitch . Shelley . James . Lewis . The Encyclopedia of Modern Witchcraft and Neo-paganism . 27.
10. Book: Churton, Tobias . Tobias Churton . 2017 . Aleister Crowley in America: Art, Espionage, and Sex Magick in the New World . Inner Traditions/Bear . 978-1-62055-631-3 . 240.
11. News: Peaches Geldof has signed up to Aleister Crowley's sex cult OTO . April 15, 2013 . 2024-03-13.
12. Book: Symonds, John . Mayflower . The Great Beast: The Life and Magick of Aleister Crowley . St Albans, Herts. . 1973 . 978-0583121958.
13. Book: Sutin, Lawrence . Lawrence Sutin . Do What Thou Wilt: A Life of Aleister Crowley . St. Martin's Griffin . New York . 2000 . 330.
14. Book: Urban . Hugh . Magia sexualis: Sex, magic, and liberation in modern Western esotericism . 2006 . 137 . University of California Press . 9780520932883.
15. Book: Christopher . Hyatt . Zehm . Aloim . The Magic of Israel Regardie . New Falcon Publishing . 1-56184-230-3.
16. Book: Greer, John Michael . The New Encyclopedia of the Occult . 205 . Llewellyn Worldwide . 2003 . 978-1-56718-336-8.
17. Book: Eshelman, James A. . 2000 . The Mystical & Magical System of the A A: The Spiritual System of Aleister Crowley & George Cecil Jones Step-by-step . . 978-0970449603.
18. Book: Shoemaker, David . 2022 . Living Thelema: A Practical Guide to Attainment in Aleister Crowley's System of Magick . Red Wheel/Weiser . 978-1578637799 . 271.
19. Book: Thompson, Cath . All This and a Book . 2018 . Hadean Press Limited . 978-1-907881-78-7.
20. Book: Hanegraaff . Wouter J. . Dictionary of Gnosis and Western Esotericism . Faivre . Antoine . Broek . Roelof van den . Brach . Jean-Pierre . 2005 . Brill . 9789004141872 . Online . Leiden . 11 August 2018.
21. Web site: Official bio . 2012-06-12 . Noname Jane's Official Site . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20120328171324/http://www.nonamejane.com/?page_id=98 . March 28, 2012.
22. Book: Pendle, George. George Pendle. Strange Angel: The Otherworldly Life of Rocket Scientist John Whiteside Parsons. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. 2006. 978-0-15-603179-0. Orlando, FL. 203–4.
23. Book: Beta, Hymenaeus . "Foreword" to Three Essays on Freedom (J.W. Parsons) . 2008 . Teitan Press . York Beach, Maine . 978-0-933429-11-6 . x–xi.
24. Book: Parsons, John Whiteside . Three Essays on Freedom . 2008 . Teitan Press . York Beach, Maine . 978-0-933429-11-6 . 67.
25. [Ed Sanders]
26. Book: Cantú, K. E. . 2023 . Like a Tree Universally Spread: Sri Sabhapati Swami and Śivarājayoga . Oxford University Press . 978-0197665473 . 383, n. 74.
27. Web site: Tahuti Lodge O.T.O., serving the New York City Metropolitan Area . 2009 . Tahutilodge.org . . November 22, 2011 . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20111123143703/http://tahutilodge.org/history.php . November 23, 2011 .
28. Book: Wasserman, James . In the Center of the Fire: A Memoir of the Occult 1966-1989 . 187 . Ibis Press . Lake Worth, FL . 2012 . 978-0-89254-201-7.
29. Book: Wicker, Christine . Not In Kansas Anymore: A Curious Tale of How Magic Is Transforming America . 207–236 . HarperSanFrancisco . 2005 . 0-06-072678-4.
30. Book: Wolfe, Jane . 2008 . Jane Wolfe: The Cefalu Diaries 1920 - 1923 . Temple of the Silver Star . 978-0997668636.
31. Web site: Libertarian Party drama: Goat sacrifice, eugenics and a chair's resignation . Caputo . Marc . October 1, 2015 . . May 27, 2017 . https://web.archive.org/web/20170708025722/http://www.politico.com/states/florida/story/2015/10/libertarian-party-drama-goat-sacrifice-eugenics-and-a-chairs-resignation-026236 . July 8, 2017 . live.
32. Web site: Progress . HAWES SPENCER The Daily . 2024-02-21 . Florida man charged in 2017 torch cases speaks: He's stopped drinking goat blood . 2024-02-23 . The Daily Progress . en.