Thelema is Like a Box of Chocolates Revealed Framework of Thelema

Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.

My momma always said,
“Life was like a box of chocolates.
You never know what you’re gonna get.”¹Forrest Gump. Directed by Robert Zemeckis. 1994. Los Angeles, CA: Paramount Pictures, Film.

If you’re as old as I am, and you remember the Whitman’s Sampler boxes of chocolates, you also remember that they had the map or guide printed inside the top of the box to help figure out what each of the chocolates were so you could avoid the nasty, nasty coconut ones—or whichever ones you didn’t like. (My dad didn’t like the cherry cordials.)

You know what’s coming next, right?

Thelema is like a box of chocolates. Hah!

Except that we don’t have to play with the “you never know what you’re gonna get” part of that quote.

Or at least I don’t think we do. Not entirely.

I should probably have titled this Thelema is Like a Box of Chocolates, Part I. I was originally going to riff on the different types of Thelema: Amway Thelema, Armchair Thelema, Country Club Thelema, Cosmic Fruitcake and Nuts Thelema, Eyeliner Academia Thelema, Lone Dead Wolf Thelema, Hashtag Thelema, Hot Tub Thelema, Jackboot Thelema, Lego Thelema, Magisterium Thelema, Nominal Thelema, and so on. But I got sidetracked and ended up elsewhere in my thoughts. Maybe I’ll come back in the future and do a Thelema is Like a Box of Chocolates, Part II for all these.

Where I ended up, however, was the claim from Crowley that Thelema revolutionized “philosophy, religion, ethics and the whole nature of Man”²Aleister Crowley, Magick: Liber ABA (Weiser Books, 1997), 429.—and I believe that. I abuse that quote all the time for my justification for all kinds of directions in my writing. The question I have is this: can we support his claim from the Book of the Law, the physical source for our ground and surety of Thelemic faith (fidēs)?³I take up what fidēs means, contextually, elsewhere; but, in brief, whenever we speak of a Thelemic fidēs—referenced herein as a Thelemic faith in the sense of trust, conviction, or strong confidence, but ultimately as the ground of spiritual origin—we must always presuppose and remember the complex structure of relationships that organize and define that faith: (1) a matrix of historical origin; (2) the lack of and disinclination toward the need for an ecclesial tradition; (3) contemporary and emergent communication; and (4) an uncoerced certainty of truthfulness that continues to examine and learn through intimate engagement with the truth

And I believe we can. So did Crowley, who wrote, “[The Book of the Law] may therefore be regarded as indicating a complete revolution in human affairs, for it advances mankind in the most radical manner.”⁴Aleister Crowley, “The Commentary {to The Book of the Law, unabridged}.” In OS K2, Yorke Collection Papers — Yorke Film 6 (Warburg, 1923), 168–169. I agree with him that Thelema is “a complete revolution in human affairs.” That then asks the question: what are all these “human affairs” in which there is “a complete revolution”?

First, we must disabuse the notion that Thelema is a thing of itself, a commodity to be marketed as something alone. What I mean here is that Thelema is the Whitman’s Sampler box.

So then the question is why do people keep trying to define the box as something more rather than opening the box and looking inside? Or, alternatively, why do people keep opening the box, taking out a piece of chocolate, and then insisting that all the chocolate in the box is the same when it’s obviously a Whitman’s Sampler box?⁵We are so stuck, as Thelemites, into a modus operandi of bullshit that we haven’t made a dent in society at all. I mentioned this in an earlier piece about shaping society in less than a generation. We don’t have the cultural testicular fortitude to do it. Some religion of force and fire we’ve turned out to be.

Second, what all is inside the box? I mean, I can define Thelema on the whole.⁶And I will be in “Mere Thelema: Street Theology—A Plain and Simple Thelema” in 2025. But it’s not necessary at the moment. But if the Whitman’s Sampler has all different kinds of chocolate inside the box, what does Thelema hold inside it?

For my purposes here, I just want to see if we can pick out the seven major areas of “human affairs” (as identified by the 7M movement⁷I have snatched these from Christian nationalist theology, I admit. I shamelessly have stolen their gameplan and I’m coming back to it in 2025 with “Storming the Seven Mountains: Our Sole Business in a World of Chaos.” I keep saying: why reinvent the wheel when there are already skiis left out for stealing in the wintertime? Or something like that. Technically, I have my own (better?) version; but for this essay, I’m going to use the actual “7M” version of the list.) from the Book of the Law.

Seven Major Areas of Human Affairs

Let’s see if we can do it. I’m not going to pontificate on each one because I will return to this subject in more depth in 2025 with “Storming the Seven Mountains: Our Sole Business in a World of Chaos.” I just want to crack open the box, so to speak, and see if we can find the barest evidence of this framework revealed in the Book of the Law. Will there be something, anything at all, that indicates an idea that could be used to justify us pursuing a “revolution” in each area?

Family

Given Crowley’s personal antagonism toward family itself, this is difficult, but these are “headings” for the 7M mandate and are not always literal. In this case, it is.

I would submit that this is one area that we can’t specifically justify as written by the 7M, but we could justify it under the heading of “Community.” The Book of the Law is very explicit about the connections (relationships) of individuals within communities, and I would say it revolutionizes those quite a bit. But I wouldn’t object if anyone tossed this out under “it doesn’t fit.”

Economy

“Establish at thy Kaaba a clerk-house: all must be done well and with business way” [AL 3.41]. We at least have a reference to good business sense. The Book of the Law does indicate our need to ensure economic means of survival and not haphazardly but properly, and in a business-like manner.

Government

There are multiple verses in the Book of the Law that I could use for this one. The various allusions to Kings at rule and with armies [AL 2.24], initiatory programs [AL 1.50], and even the command of “Obey my prophet” [AL 1.32] all allude to governing systems.

Education

“He must teach …” [AL 1.38a] There it is. Woop. Woop. There it i… Okay. I’ll stop with that. (If you haven’t seen Abominable … seriously. IYKYK! First time I literally snorted and laughed out loud in a movie theater in over a decade. Should have seen it coming. Just didn’t. Good thing we were almost alone in the theater.)

Media

For the 7M mandate, this is about mass communication. I had to think about this for a moment, but then it really hit me. The media is about communication, yes. It is about providing something to others. This comes back to “to each man and woman that thou meetest, were it but to dine or to drink at them” [AL 3.39d–e]. I think other verses could be used, but this is the most obvious. I realize this could be taken in opposition to my thoughts on promulgation versus proselytization, but it’s really not. It’s just about communication—which is what media is.

Celebration

This is where arts and entertainment come into play for the 7M movement. Honestly, I think this may be the easiest to justify. “Come forth, O children, under the stars, and take your fill of love!” [AL 1.12]. Now, I know most people interpret this sexually. But what if we interpret it as merely people enjoying themselves, together, without expectation beyond togetherness? Love, as an act of union, as an act of togetherness, as an act of community? Love under will? Love as a community; Will as the individual? It could work.

Spirituality

And of course, par for the course, 7M leaves spirituality (or religion) for last. I don’t think there is any debate Thelema supports a revolution in this area. The Book of the Law is jam-packed with enough evidence for this from multiple directions.

Results?

I’d say we explicitly got six out of seven (and I could stretch and say all seven, but I won’t quibble with anyone here over it). Given some of the really stupid ideas I’ve seen from Crowley’s writings on social “progress,” I think we could do better. But that takes getting out and doing it. We’ll be talking more about these things in 2025. I promise.

The Framework of Thelema

Thelema isn’t magick or New Age self-help or psychology or religion or philosophy or an ethical code or a new morality.

And yet it is all of these. It touches all of these. It revolutionizes all of these. We need to be talking about all of these (well, maybe except “New Age self-help”—that’s a scam!). But you get my point, I hope.

Thelema is the box. Sure, we can define the box in broad terms and it’s still useable as such. I mean, I still have one as a junk box for all kinds of things that aren’t chocolate.

But the point here is the box holds a lot of different pieces of chocolate. It’s okay to pick a piece and not like it. I’m not particularly fond of politics, but I’ll still grab it now and again because it’s there—and, overall, I like all aspects of Thelema.

But picking up a single piece of chocolate and trying to suggest all the other pieces of chocolate are exactly like yours? Stupid. We all have taste buds, champ. We can tell the difference between that cherry cordial and the maple fudge. You ain’t fooling anyone.

Love is the law, love under will.