As a philosophically aligned Initiatory School the Temple of Set tends to be somewhat differently oriented than other organizations positioning themselves as “occult organizations” and the like. Rather than offering a reactionary approach or ideology to limit anxieties and provide easy answers, the Setian approach suggests exploring reality as it is and in all of its facets.
In terms of the Setian Hierarchy of Knowledge, the project begins with two complementary areas of practice unified by a third. Awareness training, meaning developing your capacities at attention, orientation, intention, and mediation forms the first of these areas. Mathematics, beginning with formal logic, forms the second of these areas. The third area which brings the two together are what I term “representational skills” and includes things like drawing, sculpting, moving, and explaining such that you can capture your insights and communicate them with others.
When these skills are in place explorations of material and social sciences, the arts and the humanities, become the next major areas. Each has their own means of fact determination or “truth testing” which will help you to understand yourself, others, and the world around you. It will enrich your appreciation for reality and for the subjective experiences of other humans.
When these areas are understood, the next layer of the Hierarchy is that of Lesser Black Magic. One of the most misunderstood disciplines, Lesser Black Magic comes from the conscious use of meta-communicative or material factors either unknown or overlooked by most in order to impel towards intentional outcomes in a non-coercive manner. As you can see I made a distinction between intra-subjective acts of Lesser Black Magic, or the use of meta-communication and material factors to adjust your own behaviors, and intersubjective acts of Lesser Black Magic aimed at impelling the behaviors of others.
The top of this Hierarchy is the practice of Greater Black Magic. This is the intentional transformation of the subjective, perceptual universe in a manner which can impact circumstances in the objective universe based on the passion and precision of the magician. This is done through the unification of the individual psyche to encode and communicate its intentions, desires, and will.
Most people will look at something like this, and decide “Screw it, only Greater Black Magic matters” since it is placed at the top. But this sort of approach typically leads to delusion as you lack the necessary skills and grounding to evaluate your experiences. As Dr. Aquino notes in his Reading List entry for 16L. _World Civilizations_ by Edward McNall Burns et al. (reprinted in his Temple of Set):
“I am often concerned to see how little knowledge many aspiring Initiates have of exoteric human history. Unless you have a reasonably solid grounding in this subject, anything you derive from this reading list [and most other sensory-inputs] is going to be distorted in your mind.”
What he says of “exoteric” history applies to all layers of the Hierarchy of Knowledge as well.
Setemheb 