Book Review Golden Dawn Rituals and Commentaries by Pat Zalewski

One of the difficulties working the Golden Dawn system of magic and spiritual development is that the system was never finished by the original creators of the system (William Wynn Westcott, Samuel Liddell Macgregor Mathers, and the unknown architect of the Cipher Manuscript). Over the years, there have been several attempts to flesh out the missing material and rituals of the Order. One of the tasks necessary to complete this quest is to figure out where the base of the system lays.

Where is the base of the Golden Dawn system?

There are two ways to answer this question. One is to assume that the base of the system is contained in the higher Grades of the system. Unfortunately, this answer leads to the uncomfortable possibility that the base of the system, the root from which the entire system is drawn from, rests in the missing Grades, rituals and materials. Throughout Golden Dawn history, this answer along with the mythical foundation story of the Order has led initiates and Chiefs to look outside of the system for clues to the missing parts, searching for the legendary (perhaps non-existent) Third Order. This answer is the "trickle down" model of Golden Dawn, where the information for the completion of the system must come from above.

The other way to answer this question is to assume that base of the Golden Dawn system was actually contained in the Cipher Manuscript, and the system was being built from the ground up. This answer requires that in order to create the missing rituals and material, one must understand the existing Grades and rituals of the system. This is the "incomplete pyramid" model of Golden Dawn, which assumes that contact with a superior Order is unnecessary and further development must come from within the existing system.

Golden Dawn Rituals and Commentaries: The Secret Teachings of the Golden Dawn (Ritual Documents Z4 and Z5) by Pat Zalewski assumes that the base of the system is contained in the materials and rituals that we already have. Taking a clue from Mathers, one of the three founding members of Golden Dawn, Zalewski has fleshed out the Grade system of Golden Dawn, including the creation of a full set of Adept Minor subgrades. While the majority of the resulting curriculum is restricted to the members of Zalewski's Inner Order Correspondence Course, this book combined with a lot of work and study could led those outside of the course to the same place that graduates of his course end up at.

Each subgrade of Adept Minor starts the study of one of the Outer Order rituals of the Golden Dawn. The Zelator Adept Minor starts studying the Neophyte ritual; Theoricus Adept Minor starts studying the Zelator ritual; Practicus Adept Minor starts studying the Theoricus ritual; Philosophus Adept Minor starts studying the Practicus ritual; Adept Adeptus Minor starts studying the Philosophus ritual. The remaining Grades of the system continue the same pattern; for instance, the Adept Major Grade starts the study of the Portal ritual, and the Adept Exemptus starts to study the Adept Minor ritual. One should note that moving onto the next stage of the system does not mean that one is done studying a Grade; moving on merely means that one has more layers to try to understand and work with.

The two most important pieces of information contained in this book are the godforms used in the initiation rituals and the pattern of how the admission badges interact with the ritual space of a Golden Dawn lodge. These two pieces are the cornerstone to understanding the initiation rituals of the Outer Order. Together the godforms and the admission badges create an energy field that the officers of the lodge tap to initiate the process of spiritual development in the candidate, and the magician uses to empower their own practical workings.

The only problems I have with this book are aesthetic. The book shows evidence of its long journey to this final version. The diagrams are from several different hands, including diagrams from the botched Llewellyn versions of the Neophyte and Zelator sections. I would also like to see a better set of godform illustrations. Nevertheless, those issues are inconsequential. Therefore, I am giving this book nine and a half out of ten stars.

Pat Zalewski. Golden Dawn Rituals and Commentaries: The Secret Teachings of the Golden Dawn (Ritual Documents Z4 and Z5): Second Revised Edition (2010). Edited by Darcy Kuntz. Preface by Tony DeLuce. Foreword by Martin Thibealt. Illustrations by Richard "Skip" Dudschus, Jonathan Pierce, and David Stoelk.