Dr. Ian Edwards is a clinical psychologist, professor, philosopher, and author. He is well known in occult circles for his 4 volume series, Being and Non-Being in Occult Experience published by Atramentous Press, which applies a philosophical lens to the works of renowned occultists Aleister Crowley, Austin Osman Spare, Kenneth Grant, and Andrew D. Chumbley. He is also the author of "A Druid in Psychologist's Clothing: E. Graham Howe's Secret Druidic Doctrine", published by Anathema Publishing.
Dr. Edwards is extremely well-read and draws upon an aquifer of knowledge to reconcile 20th-century psychology and phenomenological philosophy with mystical traditions like Thelema, Druidism, Zen Buddhism, and others. He was kind enough to grace us with an interview.
Do you have any mentors, gurus, or teachers?
I think it would be safer to say mentors and “influences” rather than gurus and teachers. My own personality and independent spirit don’t permit me to submit myself to any gurus or teachers, even though I find great value in the teachings and work of many of them.
In terms of mentorship, historically, I would acknowledge the guidance of Drs. Daniel Burston and Stanton Marlan, whose direct influence and work have been continual sources of inspiration, in particular, in my role as an academic and psychologist. I would also like to acknowledge the mentorship and influence of Peter Hamilton-Giles, with whom I have had the pleasure to correspond over the past several years. The nice thing about this correspondence is that it is one of mutual influence. His written works and private reflections that I have been privy to have shaped my own thinking, especially when it comes to reading occult texts through the lens of 20th century continental philosophy.
In addition to being influenced by numerous 20th-century continental philosophers and depth psychologists, I have to acknowledge the debt that I owe to the works of Andrew D. Chumbley and the Cultus Sabbati. I think we are only beginning to scratch the surface in developing a full philosophical appreciation of his ideas, in particular his understanding of “Magical Quintessence,” “Qutub,” and the “Geminus.” In reference to the Geminus, when taken up ontologically, it allows us to develop a metaphysics of absence, without abandoning metaphysics entirely, and thus, resolves many of the problems that Heidegger encountered when he sought to think the meaning of being, in his deconstruction of presence.
Do you consider yourself to be operating within a particular tradition or school of psychology?
I would say I operate primarily with the depth psychological tradition or school, as well as the existential-phenomenological school. I also lean toward transpersonal psychology, but in a way that doesn’t encourage spiritual bypassing. For me, shadow and ego work are necessary preconditions to spiritual, contemplative, and magickal praxis. Ultimately, though, like E. Graham Howe, I prefer to eschew labels and instead use the language school to point to the art of healing in them all. This includes many of the contemplative traditions, both east and west, as well, where I look at them through the lens of a healer. I very much identify with the Greek word, iatromantis, or “physician-seer,” beginning with the tradition initiated by Parmenides. Moreover, I see myself as a “wounded healer” who values the presence of light in the darkness itself.
What is “dialectical non-dualism”?
Dialectical non-dualism proposes an oscillation between thesis and antithesis, and all seeming pairs of opposites, that doesn’t necessarily and typically result in what would be considered a synthesis. The back-and-forth movement reveals or unconceals what is always-already present, as opposed to revealing something new. For instance, when thinking of presence and absence, presence is in absence and absence is in presence. The revelation of one is the hiddenness of the other. There is a type of gnosis that occurs at the most fundamental level of identity, where all obscurations are stripped away, revealing the omnipresence of the “I”, which holds opposition itself, permitting the aspirant to transgress and transcend the law of non-contradiction.
Who are some of your favorite fiction authors or favorite fiction books? What importance do you think reading fiction has for a person’s education?
I particularly enjoy reading Dostoevsky, Kafka, Camus, and Hesse. Works such as Notes from Underground, The Trial, The Stranger, and Siddhartha, for instance, can be counted as books that have exerted a profound impact upon my thinking.
Reading fiction allows the reader to project themselves onto the book’s characters, resulting in an identification that allows the reader to examine and work through universal conflicts and feel themselves into an array of emotions and affects.
A lot of people in the occult world have strong opinions on Kenneth Grant. Given that one of your books draws on Kenneth Grant, why do you think his body of work is a meaningful addition to modern occultism and Thelema?
For me, one way to approach Grant’s work is to see him as a pioneer in the exploration of consciousness. In many ways, he does a masterful job of synthesizing the work of Crowley, Lovecraft, Bertiaux, and Advaita Vedanta, in particular, the teachings of Ramana Maharshi. His delineation of a terrestrial and non-terrestrial (extra-terrestrial) consciousness, Universe A and Universe B, the Mauve Zones, and the Zone(s) of Zos Kia, moves us beyond the metapsychologies of Freud and Jung, and depth psychology in general. He laid the groundwork for an Ophidian metaphysics and associated psychology.
Heidegger, especially in “Being and Time,” is often seen as impenetrable, even by seasoned students of philosophy. Do you have any shortcuts or advice for seekers looking to interact with the philosophy of Heidegger? How was he affected your own worldview and philosophy?
I think, one of the ways of reading Heidegger, is to think the meaning of being along with him, which is his fundamental project, not only in “Being and Time,” but in his later works as well, which can be described as more “poetic” and contemplative, in contrast with the calculative thinking associated with the spirit of technology. Thus, one can’t read Heidegger from the perspective of trying to “understand” him in the conventional way, as in to “comprehend” as a means to appropriate information. One has to be moved or be gripped by him in a way that is evocative. Reading Heidegger is to journey with him, to stand with him on what he described in his later work as the “abyssal ground of the in-between.” To think the meaning of being is to think this abyssal ground. It is only through letting go of understanding that the abyssal ground can be thought.
What is grammatology, and how do you use that in your reading?
Grammatology is a way of reading or studying systems of writing – the relationship between the written and spoken work, the relationship between signifiers and their signifieds, etc. In my own work, I have explored the way occult texts have been written, focusing primarily on deconstruction, but a form of deconstruction that allows for mutual influence, so that my readings elude reductionism. In essence, it’s a dialogue, or better yet, an encounter between occult writing and deconstruction. Here, what has emerged for me is a way of reading occult texts. Beginning with the signifier, “occult,” which means “secret” or “hidden,” my objective is not to write about the occult but to write the occult, to write the secret, to write hiddenness, showing the othernesses that are present and absent in the written word, and in occult experience.
The Gallowglass team often refers to the work of Freud, Jung, and their spawn as a “software update” for human consciousness. And we often encounter people operating on out-of-date software, so to speak. As a psychologist, what were some of the most important works (books, essays, lectures, etc.) you came across from Freudians or Jungians? And how do those ideas shape your work as a psychologist day to day?
In many ways, such “software updates” from depth psychologists such as Freud, Jung, and their lineage bearers constitute return paths to more ancient, and at times, esoteric or occult psychologies, which have been articulated by many of the wisdom and perennial traditions. They repackaged them, using different nomenclatures that spoke to each thinker’s proposed school or system. Thus, in a way, their words could be said to be grammatologies predicated upon dialogue and encounter, which were at times reductive, specifically, in the Orthodox Freudian school that reduced libidinal energy to sexual energy. This was the basis for Jung’s break with Freud, with Jung’s position being articulated in his book Psychology of the Unconscious, published in 1912. For Jung, libidinal energy was psychic energy as a whole, which included sexual energy. In 1910, just before the publication of Jung’s Psychology of the Unconscious, Freud informed Jung that he must make a “dogma” of the sexual theory, to protect it from the “black tide of mud, occultism.” In 1914, Jung began working on what would ultimately be called The Red Book: Liber Novus, which he continued writing as a notebook that recorded his self-experiments, his “confrontation with the unconscious,” until around 1930.
With all of that said, I would say that some of the depth psychological works that have most influenced me are, in no particular order of rank:
The Red Book: Liber Novus by C.G. Jung
Psychology and the Unconscious by C.G. Jung
Memories, Dreams, Reflections by C.G. Jung
Two Essays on Analytical Psychology by C.G. Jung
Psychology and Alchemy by C.G. Jung
The Practice of Psychotherapy by C.G. Jung
Psychology and Religion by C.G. Jung
The Interpretation of Dreams by Sigmund Freud
Introductory and New Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis by Sigmund Freud.
Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality by Sigmund Freud
All of Freud’s case histories
Ecrits by Jacques Lacan
Seminar XX: On Feminine Sexuality by Jacques Lacan
Revisioning Psychology by James Hillman
The Dream and the Underworld by James Hillman
The Black Sun by Stanton Marlan
In my work as a psychotherapist, trained in the depth psychological tradition, I listen for the presence and even absence of the unconscious as it reveals itself in language, parapraxes, visions, and dreams. I work, not so much to “cure” a person of their suffering, but to facilitate healing, which is individuation, wholeness. Following James Hillman, I believe one of the primary goals of psychotherapy is to have a patient “sing” their symptoms, re-narrativizing them, poeticizing them, transforming them by way of metaphor. The psychotherapeutic space itself, for me, is a temenos, a type of ritual space where there is an encounter between the patient’s ego and the various othernesses that function to challenge the ego’s dominion. As a result of this encounter, the patient has the potential to not only give birth to new images of self, but to a new god image.
In our own bookstore, we tend to run into an issue with books on Druids and the Celts, because those traditions did not leave much in the form of written material. How did your own studies of the Druids play out, given the lack of authentic original material?
In many ways, the traditions of the Druids and the Celts are anti-systematic, comparable to the spirit of Zen in Zen Buddhism, the Tao in Taoism, and Kia in Austin Osman Spare’s Zos Kia Cultus. In Druidry, there is an equivalent, which they call Awen, which can be likened to the Source of inspiration, poesis, or creativity. In my reflections, I have thought of Awen, adapting the thought of John Michael Greer, as neither nothingness nor somethingness, but the between of nothingness and somethingness. It is a type of bridge that translates nothing into something, the creative impulse itself. Comparable to the way E. Graham Howe took up Druidry, and even the controversial 18th-19th century poet, Iolo Morganwg, to a certain extent, I rely upon Awen itself to guide my hand and eye. This is not to say that I haven’t read many of the Druidic texts. I have read Iolo’s Barddas and John Michael Greer’s books, in addition to Howe’s The Mind of the Druid. In reference to the latter, I see this “mind” as being the “mind” that the perennial philosophy is articulating, whether that be Atman, Anatman, Buddha Nature, Christ Consciousness, Crowley’s True Will, or Chumbley’s Magical Quintessence.
Who is E. Graham Howe, and how did you come across his works? What could people gain by interacting with his material?
E. Graham Howe was a 20th-century British psychiatrist who influenced the likes of Alan Watts, Henry Miller, and R.D. Laing. He was also a friend of Krishnamurti. Howe was one of the first psychologists to weave insights from existential-phenomenological philosophy, the wisdom, and occult traditions, in particular, Druidry, into his psychology and practice of psychotherapy. I wrote extensively on E. Graham Howe’s psychology and psychotherapy in my book, A Druid in Psychologist’s Clothing: E. Graham Howe’s Secret Druidic Doctrine, published by Anathema Publishing.
I was introduced to Howe’s works by my dissertation chair, Dr. Daniel Burston, who suggested I write my dissertation on E. Graham Howe. Before that, I had no idea that Howe existed, even though he had published thirteen books and countless articles, and was one of the leading figures who formed the Tavistock Clinic in London. While I was writing my dissertation, I had the privilege of corresponding with Dr. John Heaton, who was then Howe’s oldest living student. Dr. Heaton shared many of his personal experiences with Howe and his own reflections on Howe’s ideas, which could not be garnered from any books or articles.
One of the beautiful byproducts of reading Howe, especially his 1965 book, Cure or Heal?, and my book, A Druid in Psychologist’s Clothing, is that they are intended to facilitate psyche’s own healing process in the reader. They rely less on jargon, even though they are not void of academic material, they focus on using concepts and notions that the reader can use to begin drawing from psyche’s own Source of healing. My book, in particular, without being a manual, is a book to be used. Many readers have commented that the book has changed their lives, helping them through bouts of grief and depression. One reader wrote that it helped him through one of the “darkest times” in his life.
What does your own spiritual practice or routine look like? Is there a daily routine or certain practices you follow?
I routinely practice sitting meditation in the tradition of Soto Zen Buddhism as well as mantra meditation, which are my most regular or routine practices. The mantras “Om Namah Shivaya” and “Diabolus est Deus Inversus” are mantras that I often work with. I also work with practices as found in the works of Andrew D. Chumbley, in particular, The Azoetia and The Dragon Book of Essex, and Peter Hamilton-Giles’ Book of the Black Dragon. I recently created my own book of “inverted psalms,” which will be published in my forthcoming, Crooked Confessions: An Ophidian Philosophy of the Sanctified Devil, illustrated by Luciana Lupe Vasconcelos, and published by Atramentous Press.
Working with images that come from visions and dreams, in the tradition of Jung’s active imagination technique, is also a regular practice that I engage in. For instance, each of my volumes in Being and Non-Being in Occult Experience, published by Atramentous Press, was preceded by a vision or dream.
Hecate or Hekate seems to be getting a lot of attention in modern occult and archetypal studies. We have a lot of customers coming in looking for related books. What is going on there, or why are we seeing particular attention paid to her?
While there are many ways to respond to this question, I can only comment regarding her appeal to me, and then perhaps speculate on why others might be drawn to her. Hekate is one of the goddesses who is featured in my Being and Non-Being in Occult Experience tetralogy. Here, I take her up less from a mythological or ontic perspective, but from an ontological perspective. The attempt was to do an ontology of Hekate in her aspect as crossroads goddess, or goddess of the crossroads. I developed a notion of what I described as the “Hekatean Self.” The crossroads can be depicted as an “X,” which I have labeled a chiasm. At the center of the chiasm is what I have described as the nullpunkt, or zero-point. It is at the nullpunkt where non-being and being intersect. The nullpunkt is potentially infinite, existing always-already. What Heidegger described as Dasein or “Thereness” is present at and as this zero-point, with each being standing at the center of the crossroads, the place where non-being and being intersect.
This is the site where magick, where sorcery occurs, not necessarily as performance, but as a way of being-in-the-world. Magick, sorcery is always-already, thus, through certain practices, it is unconcealed, at the very place one stands.
This is not to discount her mythological or ontic meanings, but to emphasize a metaphysical, ontological way of taking her up. She is the essence of magick itself, inviting opportunities for primordial gnosis, and here, primordial gnosis is the revelation of where the aspirant stands, at the center of the crossroads. Standing at the center, the aspirant is infinitely irreducible, simultaneously disclosing the sorcerous nature of the world itself. From a Hekatean perspective, magick, sorcery, can be appreciated as ways of standing, magickal, sorcerous becoming, from the center whose circumference is nowhere.
Hekate’s appeal may be in the way in which one is called to her, but each call, in my opinion, is an invitation to return to the Self, which reflects the betweenness of reality when factoring in Hekate’s aspect as crossroads goddess. To see through her eyes is to see sorcerously, which is to experience self, other, and world from the abyssal ground, the Real clothed with the arcanum of Magical Quintessence.
Why should people study Austin Osman Spare?
Like Nietzsche, who Heidegger thought was the “last philosopher,” Spare could be considered the last occultist or the first to think another (or second) beginning for occult philosophy, in that he rethinks the very meaning of the occult through his Neither-Neither and Zos-Kia, for instance. After Spare, we can’t take up the occult in the same way without some sort of regression toward more archaic models of thinking. His philosophy and sorcery posit betweenness when it comes to identity, metaphysics, and the intersection between worlds. Spare’s work indirectly puts the signifier “occult” under erasure, which suggests that the word fails to describe what it intends to signify, which is an oscillation between presence and absence, appearing and concealing. His art and written works often capture the intertwining itself, the moments of betweenness, showing the hybrid forms that come with sorcerous perception, which are seen when the veil that separates the worlds is lifted.