If one is skeptical of the existence of Thelema or of the validity of these spiritual experiences, then this sounds a lot like religious leaders who say “Sure, believe in Heaven. But don’t commit suicide to get there faster. Or commit homicide to get other people there faster. Or do anything else that contradicts ordinary decency.”
Part of the fun of being right is that when your system contradicts ordinary decency, you get to at least consider siding with your system.
(although hopefully if your system is right you will choose not to, for the right reasons.)
My Crowley background is pretty spotty, but I read that as him generalizing over ethical intersections with religious experience and then specializing to his own faith. It’s not entirely unlike some posts I’ve read here, in fact; the implication seems to be that if some consequence of your religious (i.e. axiomatic; we could substitute decision-theoretic or similarly fundamental) ethics seems to suggest gross violations of common ethics, then it’s more likely that you’ve got the wrong axioms or forgot to carry the one somewhere than that you need to run out and (e.g.) destroy all humans. Which is very much what I’d expect from a rationalist analysis of the topic.
If one is skeptical of the existence of Thelema or of the validity of these spiritual experiences, then this sounds a lot like religious leaders who say “Sure, believe in Heaven. But don’t commit suicide to get there faster. Or commit homicide to get other people there faster. Or do anything else that contradicts ordinary decency.”
Part of the fun of being right is that when your system contradicts ordinary decency, you get to at least consider siding with your system.
(although hopefully if your system is right you will choose not to, for the right reasons.)
My Crowley background is pretty spotty, but I read that as him generalizing over ethical intersections with religious experience and then specializing to his own faith. It’s not entirely unlike some posts I’ve read here, in fact; the implication seems to be that if some consequence of your religious (i.e. axiomatic; we could substitute decision-theoretic or similarly fundamental) ethics seems to suggest gross violations of common ethics, then it’s more likely that you’ve got the wrong axioms or forgot to carry the one somewhere than that you need to run out and (e.g.) destroy all humans. Which is very much what I’d expect from a rationalist analysis of the topic.