This article is taken from the October 2023 issue of Fraternal Review titled, “Fringe Masonry 2”.
The Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn is a coed magical society whose aim is to bring its practitioners into contact with their Higher Selves through the application of practical magic. This is accomplished by first learning a vast and highly syncretic system of correspondences. The system weaves together all the disparate threads of the Western Magical Tradition extant at the time of the society’s formation during the Victorian era. These various tributaries include Hermeticism, Qabalah, astrology, tarot, alchemy, the Enochian language, Agrippa’s occult philosophy (largely, via Barrett’s The Magus), Rosicrucianism and Freemasonry. Aesthetically, the society was heavily influenced by the Egyptomania prominent at the time, and its Temple officers are named after those of the Eleusinian Mysteries (Heirophant, Hiereus, Hegemon, Mystagogue, Kerux, etc.). The Order’s qabalistic hierarchical structure—progressing “up” the Tree of Life, through each sephiroth—was patterned on the grades of the Orden des Gold und Rosenkreutz, a Masonic Rosicrucian fraternity formed in 18th century Germany.
There is an initiatory component to the Golden Dawn system. As in Freemasonry, the candidate progresses through a sequence of grades comparable to the Craft’s degrees. In fact, the structure of a typical Outer Order grade is very similar to that of the Blue Lodge degrees, and was clearly patterned on them. The candidate is hoodwinked and conducted about the Hall (Lodge), usually undergoing certain trials or consecrations and purifications. An obligation is recited at the altar; usually followed by an investiture of some kind; and each grade culminates in a lecture. Any Freemason would be familiar with this order of events.
The history and formation of the Order is somewhat blurry. In one of the more tenable accounts, William Wynn Westcott —a Freemason and prominent member of the Societias Rosicruciana in Anglia (S.R.I.A.)—traveled from London to England’s south coast on hearing of the death of Kenneth MacKenzie, the author of a Masonic encyclopedia. A friend and mentee of immanent British occultist and Freemason Frederick Hockley, MacKenzie was in possession of a cache of documents relative to various esoteric societies in England. Among these documents, Westcott discovered what has come to be known as the Cipher Manuscripts—a set of 60 folios written in a cipher composed by Cornelius Agrippa’s mentor Trithemius, outlining the rituals, structure and syllabus for an unnamed magical society. These were to become the foundational documents of what became the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn.
These Cipher Manuscripts were purchased, among other documents, from MacKenzie’s widow and promptly brought back to London where they were translated by Westcott who, along with figures such as John Yarker and Theodor Reuss, was an avid collector and transmitter of rites. Realizing the importance of the work and recognizing a significant opportunity, Westcott was inspired to actualize this material, which had no parallel in London’s Masonic and occult community. Enlisting the assistance of fellow Freemason Samuel Liddell.
MacGregor Mathers, the duo took steps to work the system outlined in the Manuscripts into a Lodge setting. This material formed the foundation of the first, or Outer Order of the society, while the rituals and curriculum of a second, or Inner Order, called the Rosae Rubae et Aureae Crucis (R.R. et A.C.), was designed by Mathers. The Inner Order was peopled by those who had completed the course of study in the Outer Order, and consisted of work relative to practical theurgy and the Mystery of Christian Rosenkreutz—which constituted the Adepti grades.
Throughout the 1890s, the Order flourished, having over one-hundred members from every strata of Victorian society. Members included celebrities such as Arthur Machen, William Butler Yeats and Florence Farr. At the close of the century, however, the Order became splintered due to infighting, personality clashes and scandal. This is generally referred to as the Golden Dawn Schism, after which several derivative groups were formed—these included Alpha et Omega, Stella Matutina and the Argenteum Astrum. While there is no unbroken, lineal transmission from the original Order, the Golden Dawn system still survives and is currently being worked today.
– Jaime Paul Lamb
BIO:
Jaime Paul Lamb is a Past Master of Ascension Lodge No. 89 in Phoenix, Arizona; a Frater of the Societas Rosicruciana in Civitatibus Foederatis (Arizona College); and the Hermetic Society of the Golden Dawn (M∴ Temple, Phoenix). He is also the author of three books on Freemasonry and Western Esotericism: Myth, Magick & Masonry (2018), Approaching the Middle Chamber (2020) and The Archetypal Temple (2021).