The study analyzes constructions of femininity and feminine sexuality in interpretations of the goddess Babalon, a central deity in the British occultist Aleister Crowley’s (1875–1947) religion Thelema. Babalon is based on Crowley’s positive reinterpretation of the biblical Whore of Babylon and symbolizes liberated female sexuality and the spiritual modality of passionate union with existence. Analyzing historical and contemporary written sources, qualitative interviews, and ethnographic fieldwork in the Anglo-American esoteric milieu, the study traces interpretations of Babalon from the works of Crowley and some of his key disciples—including the rocket scientist John Whiteside “Jack” Parsons and the enigmatic British occultist Kenneth Grant—from the fin-de-siècle to the present. From the 1990s onward, female and LGBTQ esotericists have challenged historical interpretations of Babalon, drawing on feminist and queer thought and conceptualizing femininity in new ways. Femininity has held a problematic position in feminist theory, often being associated with lack, artifice, and restriction. However, the present study—which assumes that femininities are neither exclusively heterosexual nor limited to women—indicates how interpretations of Babalon have both built on and challenged dominant gender logics. As the first academic monograph to analyze Crowley’s and his followers’ ideas from the perspective of gender, this book contributes to the underexplored study of gender in Western esotericism. By analyzing the development of a misogynistic biblical symbol into an image of feminine sexual freedom, the study also sheds light on interactions between Western esotericism and broader cultural and sociopolitical trends.
Based on fieldwork in the United States, the article analyses the social construction of gender in contemporary OTO. The article addresses an important and often neglected area of study in research on Western esotericism, and discusses how the notion of binary gender is both created and challenged in interactions between OTO members. Thelemic divinity as presented in Liber AL is envisioned as consisting of a divine father, Hadit, mother Nuit, and Ra-Hoor-Khuit, their divine offspring. Despite the gender polarity constructed thus, contemporary OTO members stretch the boundaries of binary gender through a plethora of deities, personal gender performances and acceptance of different sexual orientations and lifestyles. The creativity and innovation of contemporary OTO members' gender constructions demonstrates the necessity of greater methodological diversity in research on Western esotericism, in order to allow an understanding of esoteric traditions as lived religions.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.