Ars Congressus Cum Daemone: Aleister Crowley and the Knowledge and Conversation with the Holy Guardian Angel

Abstract

This article analyses experiential knowledge in the writings of the British occultist Aleister Crowley’s (1875-1947) writings, and more specifically the so-called Knowledge and Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel. I will first discuss Crowley’s own account of his attainment of communion with his Guardian Angel, which he set out to accomplish in 1900 and finally realised in 1906. Second, I will discuss a few key texts written by Crowley in which the method for attaining the Knowledge and Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel is described, with a special focus on Liber Samekh (1920). The first part of this article can thus be seen as the practiced aspect of the Holy Guardian Angel experience, while the second part is the *prescribed* aspect. By way of concluding, I will address the entangled nature of the instructional texts of the Knowledge and Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel.