The Franklin Files

Omega · Guru

RE: The Thule Society II

Omega · Guru

In 1945, Hubbard became involved with Crowley's acolyte, Jack Parsons. Parsons wrote to Crowley that Hubbard had "described his angel as a beautiful winged woman with red hair, whom he calls the Empress, and who has guided him through his life and saved him many times." In the Crowleyite system, adherents seek contact with their "Holy Guardian Angel".

John Whiteside Parsons, usually known as Jack, first met Hubbard at a party in August 1945. When his terminal leave from the US Navy began, on December 6th, 1945, Hubbard went straight to Parsons' house in Pasadena, and took up residence in a trailer in the yard. Parsons was a young chemist who had helped to set up Jet Propulsion Laboratories and was one of the innovators of solid fuel for rockets. Parsons was besotted with Crowley's Sex Magick, and had recently become head of the Agape Lodge of the Church of Thelema in Los Angeles. The Agape Lodge was an aspect of the Ordo Templi Orientis, the small international group headed by Aleister Crowley.

Parsons' girlfriend soon transferred her affections to Hubbard. With her, Hubbard and Parsons formed a business partnership, as a consequence of which Parsons lost most of his money to Hubbard. However, before Hubbard ran away with the loot, he and Parsons participated in magical rituals which have received great attention among contemporary practitioners.

Parsons and Hubbard together performed their own version of the secret eighth degree ritual (017) of the Ordo Templi Orientis in January 1946. The ritual is called "concerning the secret marriages of gods with men" or "the magical masturbation" and is usually a homosexual ritual. The purpose of this ritual was to attract a woman willing to participate in the next stage of Hubbard and Parsons' Sex Magick.

Omega · Guru

Hubbard and Parsons were attempting the most daring magical feat imaginable. They were trying to incarnate the Scarlet Woman described in the Book of Revelation as "Babylon the Great, the Mother of Harlots and Abominations of the Earth ... drunken with the blood of saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus." (018) During the rituals, Parsons described Babalon as "mother of anarchy and abominations". The woman who they believed had answered their call, Marjorie Cameron, joined in with their sexual rituals in March 1946.

Parsons used a recording machine to keep a record of his ceremonies. He also kept Crowley informed by letter.The correspondence still exists. Crowley wrote to his deputy in New York "I get fairly frantic when I contemplate the idiocy of these louts".

Crowley was being disingenuous. His own novel The Moonchild describes a ritual with a similar purpose. Further, the secret IXth degree ritual of the Ordo Templi Orientis (019) contains "Of the Homunculus" in which the adept seeks to create a human embodiment of one of the energies of nature - a god or goddess. The ritual says "to it thou art Sole God and Lord, and it must serve thee."

In fact, Hubbard and Parsons were committing sacrilege in Crowley's terms. Crowley respelled "Babylon" as he respelled "magic". His magick was entirely dedicated to Babalon, the Scarlet Woman. Crowley believed himself the servant and slave of Babalon, the antichrist, styling himself "the Beast, 666". For anyone to try to incarnate and control the goddess must have been an impossible blasphemy to him. Crowley, after all, called Babalon "Our Lady" (020).

Omega · Guru

Hubbard and Parsons attempts did not end with the conception of a human child. However, just as Crowley said that "Gods are but names for the forces of Nature themselves" (021), so it might be speculated that Hubbard embodied Babalon not in human form, but through his organization.

Parsons sued Hubbard in Florida in July 1946, managing to regain a little of his money. The record of their rituals was later transcribed and has since been published as The Babalon Working (022). Parsons made a return to Magick, writing The Book of the Antichrist in 1949 (023). Parsons pronounced himself the Antichrist. In a Scientology text, Hubbard spoke favourably of Parsons, making no mention of their magical liaison (024). A Piece of Blue Sky covers Hubbard's involvement with Parsons in much greater detail than I have given here.

Hubbard's interest in the occult was kindled long before he met Parsons. It dates back at least to his membership of the Ancient and Mystical Order Rosae Crucis or AMORC, in 1940. Hubbard had completed the first two neophyte degrees before his membership lapsed, and later there were private complaints that he had incorporated some of the teachings he had promised to keep secret into Scientology (025).

Having stolen Parsons' girl and his money, Hubbard carried on with magical practices of his own devising. Scientology attempted to reclaim documents which recorded these practices in its case against former Hubbard archivist Gerald Armstrong. Some $280,000 was paid to publishers Ralston Pilot to prevent publication of Omar Garrison's authorised biography of Hubbard. However, Garrison retained copies of thousands of Hubbard documents and showed me one which had been referred to in the Armstrong trial. The Blood Ritual is an invokation of the Egyptian goddess Hathor, performed by Hubbard during the late 1940s. As the name suggests, the ritual involved the use of blood. Hubbard mingled his own blood with that of his then wife (the girlfriend he had stolen from Parsons and with whom Hubbard contracted a bigamous marriage).

Omega · Guru

In a 1952 Scientology lecture, Hubbard referred to "Aleister Crowley, my very good friend" (026). In fact, the two black magicians never met, and Crowley expressed a very low opinion of the man who he saw had tricked his disciple Jack Parsons. Even so, Hubbard had a very positive regard for Crowley, calling his work "fascinating" (027) and recommending one of his books to Scientologists. Having referred to Crowley as "The Beast 666", Hubbard said that he had "picked a level of religious worship which is very interesting" (028). He also made it clear that he had read the fundamental text of the Crowley teaching, The Book of the Law (029).

In his 1952 lectures, Hubbard also referred to the Tarot cards, saying that they were not simply a system of divination but a "philosophical machine". He gave particular mention to the Fool card, saying "The Fool of course is the wisest of all. The Fool who goes down the road with the alligators barking at his heels, and the dogs yapping at him, blindfolded on his way, he knows all there is to know and does nothing about it ... nothing could touch him" (030).

The only Tarot pack which has an alligator on the Fool card is Crowley's (031). When I interviewed Gerald Armstrong, Hubbard's archivist, in 1984, he told me of a Hubbard "scale" dating from the 1940s. At the base of the scale was the word "animals". It then ascended through "labourers, farmers, financiers, fanatics" and "the Fool" to "God". Hubbard seems to have seen himself as the Fool and was perhaps trying to create a trampoline of fanatics through whom he could achieve divinity. Indeed, if Scientology could live up to its claims, then Hubbard would be a "godmaker".

Of course, the Tarot pack also contains the Empress card and knowing this it is finally possible to understand what Hubbard believed his Guardian Angel to be.