The best introduction to the Way of Thelema was written by its creator, Aleister Crowley. Unfortunately this introduction does not appear in one place but instead exists in fragments strewn throughout his commentaries and essays. The newcomer to Thelema can therefore hardly be blamed for turning to contemporary authors of secondary literature to supply orientation in the face of Crowley's vast literary corpus. Many of these authors write admirable, even erudite books, but their respective understandings of Thelema are refracted and filtered through their own experiences and presuppositions. While there is a place for the new and creative applications of Thelema represented in the best of these books, what the new student of Thelema needs to experience, most of all, is the direct, unmediated application of the essence of Thelema to their own life.
Such a confrontation between the essence of Thelema itself and the Khabs of the seeker is more likely to occur by reading the words of he whose life was given over completely to expressing the Word of the New Aeon. Once the Life of the Silent Self has been ignited by this Logos, the student is in a better position to adjudicate the claims put forth by contemporary authors of Thelemic literature. It is therefore my hope that this modest project will go some way to filling at least part of the lacuna of primary, introductory Thelemic literature and get the student reading Crowley himself as quickly as possible.