Someone asked me why I use Aleister Crowley’s birth details as my blog’s sample chart. The reason is, one he is dead, I don’t like using living peoples charts as study material on a public forum. Then his birth data is reasonably accurate and his life-events match the chart. His chart has so very many significant positions which can be used in discussions. He had a very happening life, the events are documented. How he was first involved with the material and then evolved into the spiritual is also clear. And I love using his Thoth tarot deck. You know a man by his work and this deck is his crowning achievement. It is a work of art, philosophy, magic, the cards are brimming with so much energy. I have used this deck for my personal development, as a quick fix, for setting energies right, as a tool in magics, divination, to make events move faster etc in so many ways.

But what really made me appreciate him the most, is his this quote, “The mind of man is obsessed and blinded by geometry which blocks his spiritual vision”. The most significant sentence ever which cemented my opinion that Crowley was very highly aware of the material and the highest spiritual. He must have studied Vedanta in depth and experienced the deepest stuff to have made such a profound statement. This philosophy is very clear in the Star Trump card of his Thoth deck.

This is a very beautiful card made using Egyptian philosophy. But here is the Vedic part of this card. The Prakruti creates the manifested universe. If you observe the cups in her hands. The upper cup represents the divine spiritual, the energy has wavy and straight lines, no crystalline geometry. The cup is golden in color, it represents the inner Sun, the Eternal Divine. She is pouring this energy on her own body. The lower cup has crystals coming out of it which are settling around her feet, ie geometry has taken form. The lower cup is silver colored, it represents the Moon, the illusion, a mere reflection of the divine Eternal. The crystals indicate the creation of the manifested world. Divine energy flows over her and as it flows down and out, it crystallises and becomes a fixed geometry of the universe. (This same thing is clearly mentioned in Sankhya philosophy.) At the right lower corner of the card are butterflies, which represent realised Souls who have come out of the geometry bound worlds.

This fixed geometry is our Shri-chakra. The Shri-chakra pervades the manifested universe in its several dimensions. (I have experienced this hyper-dimensional form of Shri Chakra in Dhyan, so will you if you focus on your own self) The Shri-chakra is the rule by which the worlds are created, exist, evolve and finally end. The body/ mind of your current incarnation is a part of the geometry of the universes. But your soul is the Divine, it is beyond geometry. That is why this quote “The mind of man is obsessed and blinded by geometry which blocks his spiritual vision” is so beautiful. As long as you are obsessed by your mind/ body and the things of the material worlds you will always remain blind to the splendour of the pure Soul. If you believe that you are the mind/ body you will never realise that you are the Soul. The Soul is not a part of this world’s geometry, it is pure Advaita. The body/ mind has been created for one single purpose, that is to go through karma. The body /mind is this crystalline geometry! The Soul is not linked to any karma or anything of the manifested universe in any way. The Soul is beyond geometry. The Soul is beyond Prakruti. It is the Advaita, the Nirvishesh Brahma itself.

Now we are astrologers, we read charts. The chart is also this same fundamental geometry. If you have read my earlier posts, the planets and the signs are all inside your Sushumna nadi. Each chakra is linked to one planet and the signs ruled by it. And obviously each chakra in your body is a part of the Shri-chakra itself. So these planets and signs are also a part of the geometry of the universe and under the rule of Prakruti. When you read the horoscope you are reading geometry ie only the mind/ body. You cannot read the Soul from the chart. But you can gauge how deeply is the Soul’s light is veiled by the geometry of the mind/ body. ie is the chart’s energy directed towards enjoyment of the material or is the chart’s energy more directed towards tearing the veil of illusion around the Soul. A chart can do only one of these two things at a time. It cannot be spiritual as well as materialistic at the same time!

When the mind get obsessed with desires linked to the chakras, ie geometry, the energy flow in this part of the Sushumna is distorted. This distortion can be ‘seen’ as actual snakes hissing at you from within your chakras while you do Dhyan. Or microscopic bits of floating black energy in your Sushumna. Unless this distortion is cleared out the Kundalini cannot rise up in the Sushumna. This is what Crowley indicates by ‘spiritual vision’. You ‘see’ all this when you focus on your third eye chakra.

If you study charts where the spiritual potential is very high, you will see that the karma of the body/ mind do not affect this person. He goes through all the karmic events (prarabdha karma) but he is completely disconnected from all this happening. He has understood that he is not the body/ mind, he understands that he is the Soul and is actively working towards his actual Realisation. Such a person will never ask you any materialistic question like, ‘when will I get married’ or worry about things of the material worlds. Every act he does will be for spiritual progress. If he does a puja it will be for gaining Himself not for making his marriage work! He knows that all this is an illusion and his objective is to go beyond it. He will know very clearly what his goal is and he will not waver in the least from it. He will not create new bindings of marriage or business which have the potential to create trouble in his chosen path. Materialistic stuff is meaningless for him. A serious aspirant knows that given the least bit of scope, material life can easily overpower spiritual energy. (Read the Vivekchudamani by Adi-Shankaracharya). Prakruti does not let the aspirant pass upwards through her until she has tested him to the limit. For such high level aspirants, the horoscope is generally meaningless as the joy/ sadness represented by it does not affect him deeply. The physical events will occur as per the horoscope but they will not affect him in the least. But he will remain alert about creating new karmic tangles, will avoid such situations assiduously

So as per Crowley, you are blind to the Divine as long as the mind is enchanted by the illusory geometry. The crystalline geometry hides and distorts the light of the Self. The mind itself is a product of the geometry! So no wonder it is enmeshed in the crystalline Prakruti. To dissolve the Mind is the goal of all spiritual practice. Only when the mind dissolves does the veil of the crystalline geometry dissolve. This is called the Unmani-avastha. After this, your progress towards Yourself is faster.

But for your general clients, who are quite fascinated by the geometry of the universes, the horoscope’s events will affect them on all levels. They will be happy/ sad and create more karma etc as per the chart. The divine spark exists but it is hidden behind the geometry. So for your routine clients all this spiritual stuff is meaningless. And the material stuff is paramount. So if they ask you, ‘when will I get married?’, do tell them the correct time, match their charts and also tell them to do pujas and remedies for having a happy married life. This is their life goal, counsel them and help them complete it.

Once while in Dhyan I had an extraordinary vision, as if my Sat-guru had offered my Shri-yantra to the flames of ’Soham’. That was the day I experienced the power of the Advaita in freeing the soul from the blinding veils of geometry. A genuine Sat-guru is very rare. There are several Guru-s, yogi-s, high level aspirants, in this world who can be generally respected, but give your faith and your trust only to a Sat-guru else you may get into trouble in your practice.

For clients who have very material desires, I do recommend the Shri-chakra/ Shri-sukta as a first step. They are obsessed with experiencing the material, so what better than to make them focus on its fundamental geometry itself. It works for general auspiciousness and beneficial things and will give you every material thing you desire, but also slowly make you desire the spiritual too, maybe now or a few lives later. When you are sated with your experience, obviously you transcend. The Shri-Chakra geometry can be a part of your spiritual school syllabus in the initial stages but it is not the ultimate goal. Once you feel the burning desire to know yourself, ‘Soham’ is the only mantra which will take you onwards. The ultimate goal is your Soul, the Advaita.

My Sat-guru did puja of the Shiv-lingam in his initial practice, did complicated Hatha Yog and seriously very high level stuff. But after he realised Himself, he stopped doing all sorts of worship. (Maximum I have seen my Sat-guru do Soham-jaap using a jap-mala, very rarely, only when he had no other engagements. Then he would give this mala to some disciple. He was always on the move, giving discourses, meeting and blessing his lakhs of disciples, from the age of 29yrs – 96yrs). He always ‘gave’ the easiest Soham mantra for all his disciples. This, after he himself had performed the most complicated stuff for his own realisation! He would say that Soham is the easiest and the best way for attaining that Ultimate state. Soham mantra is essentially Sushumna Yog. Only a Sat-guru can ‘give’ it in the real sense. Performing it is also very simple. It will spontaneously take you to Kevala Kumbhak, Samadhi and Advaita in this life-time itself.

A Sat-Guru who has Seen the ultimate Self cannot worship the Shri-chakra or the Shiv-lingam or any moorthi! How can the Advaita, the Eternal Divine worship a mere geometry for hours and in seclusion as a practice! A Sat-guru is a Jivan-mukt, he is Eternally Aware. A genuine Sat-guru will not put his disciples into very complicated rituals. These are all a part of the geometry of this manifested worlds, these have no place where the Self exists. (Krishna has said the same thing in his Bhagvat Gita 18-66, ‘dissociate from the geometry of this manifested worlds and realise that you are the Advaita yourself’)

If your Guru whom you follow, still worships a yantra, linga, moorthi etc for hours, secludes himself for his ‘practice’, follows strict rules on things, prescribes complicated rituals, still goes on pilgrimages, feels emotional about events around him, eg death of someone or a handicapped child being born to someone, if he is still affected by the things of this geometric universe, then judge for yourself if he has Realised Himself or not. Best would be to ask him directly and see what kind of reply he gives. Does he say ‘yes’ with the power of the Advaita in his words or baffle you with empty words? (Someone I know was searching for a Sat-guru, about 50yrs ago. He met several Gurus and actually asked them if they had realised the Eternal. They were genuine at heart so clearly said that they were also aspirants, albeit very high level ones. So he searched some more and finally met my Sat-guru, all his questions were answered here.)

Back to Aleister Crowley, if he could comprehend this existential complexity and yet it’s essential simplicity he must have been much more spiritually than what his contemporaries report about him. So this is the real reason I use the Thoth tarot as my go-to deck and use his birth chart as a sample chart in my blog!