Glossary - exWitch Australia (formerly 'Born Again Pagan')

ORDO TEMPLI ORIENTIS (OTO)

A German society in the Templar tradition founded in some obscurity in about 1904 by the occultist and high grade Freemason, Karl Kellner, who claimed that his doctrinal sources were largely oriental although the product was also seen to have elements of European Tantrism, an advanced shamanic technique deriving from Tibetan Buddhism. The Buddhist Tantra school aims at Ecstatic union of the individual soul with the world soul through the use of mystic formulas. In the west, Tantra alternates faith and scepticism until it reaches beyond the ordinary limits of both and arrives, it is argued, at the basis of all magical working.

Never widely recognized among magical and esoteric societies, OTO is alleged to have originated in various organizations the oldest of which, the Order of Knights Templar, dates from the 12th Century. More probably it represents a splinter group of Hermeticists (see HERMETIC TRADITION) and magicians in the 18th and 19th Centuries.

According to a magazine article published in 1912, it possessed the Key to all Masonic and Hermetic secrets, including strong emphasis on Sex Magick, the lore of nature, Freemasonry and all systems of religion.

It was structured with nine active grades on which was superimposed a tenth, purely administrative grade. Grades one to six were awarded by ritual Initiation, while the remainder were achieved wholly by instruction and were largely concerned with Sex Magick. It is organized not into Lodges but Oases.

Aleister Crowley was a member of the OTO, having been initiated into the 9th degree in 1912, becoming first the British president of a subsidiary order, the Mysteria Mystica Maxima. In 1922 he took over the international leadership having succeeded Kellner's successor, Theodor Ruess and compiled a set of rituals said, questionably, to have been heavily influenced by those of George Pickingill, including ceremonial garters and a dagger immersed in a Chalice representing a symbolic rite of sexual intercourse (see GREAT RITE).

Crowley was responsible for a revised formulation of the 9th degree which focused on heterosexual magic.

In 1916, the Metropolitan Police raided the London headquarters of the OTO and removed much of its content, allegedly in reprisal for Crowley's pro-German stance while living in the USA. In Germany, the activities of OTO came to a halt in 1937 when all occult organizations were effectively proscribed by the Nazis.

Crowley was succeeded as head of OTO by Karl Germer who subsequently emigrated to the United States. A modified British version of OTO, known as the New Isis Lodge OTO, was initiated by a former Crowley disciple, Kenneth Grant who, in 1955, was expelled from the official OTO by Karl Germer on the grounds that the New Isis Lodge had effectively distanced itself.

Germer was succeeded as head of the official OTO, on his death in the 1960s, by a Swiss named Metzger. The present head of OTO lives in America but approximately three Oases are known to exist in the U.K.

PLEASE NOTE:
One of the major problems with 'defining' Paganism and/or its beliefs and practices is that it is an 'organic' movement, in that it is undergoing constant change and re-evaluation from within, and as such any 'one-size-fits-all' approach to understanding Paganism will be found wanting.

Due to the very 'organic' nature of Paganism, and the many differing Paths and Traditions within it, in many cases no one definition may be universally accepted by all Pagans. Therefore, where such cases of possible conflicting and/or contradictory meanings of certain terms occur I have endevoured to give not only the generally accepted meaning, but also any major 'variations' in belief and/or practice.

Christians who believe this difference in meaning of certain key terms, beliefs and practices to be unique to Paganism need to remember that such conflicts also arise within the Body of Christ - the Church. Take for instance the differing practices amongst Christians concerning Baptism and the different attitudes towards women in the clergy.

- Jean-Luc