The Great Work of the Flesh

An inside look at sex magic in Eastern and Western Mystery traditions.

The Great Work of the Flesh details the sex magic practices of P. B. Randolph, Aleister Crowley, Austin Osman Spare, Julius Evola, and Maria de Naglowska. It includes a complete overview of love magic in the Middle Ages, with accounts of the use of potions, powders, spells, and enchantments, and explores sex magic techniques of the East, including Taoist sexual alchemy.

Magic, almost in its entirety, is connected to sexuality. It is through the natural magic of love that sex magic operates, harnessing the forces that join lovers together. In this extensive study of sex magic in the Eastern and Western Mystery traditions, Sarane Alexandrian explains how there is a sex magic connected with every religion, spiritual belief system, and initiatory society.

Exploring sexual practices in folk magic, high magic, alchemy, and religion, the author begins with a complete overview of love magic in the Middle Ages, including accounts of the use of potions, powders, spells, and enchantments, and reveals how these techniques related to the religious practices of the time. He introduces the Taoist sexual alchemy practices of Mantak Chia, the secret tantric practices of the Tibetan bons, sexual shiatsu, and a Vietnamese practice called “mouth moxa.”

Examining the sacred sexuality that arose in Western initiatory orders in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Alexandrian details the development of P. B. Randolph’s white sexual magic and the black sexual magic of Aleister Crowley. He also explains the practices of Austin Osman Spare, Julius Evola and the Ur Group, and Maria de Naglowska. Alexandrian reveals the scientific principles underlying sex magic and how successful results are guaranteed by the influences of the heavenly bodies and the radiant powers of colour, number, scents, and physical movements, which intensify the activity of the human bioelectric field. Further, Alexandrian details the tantra practices of Margot Anand, the sexual rituals of Wicca, and magical “sex aids,” including talismans and jewels.

Providing complete practical information, the author explains how, through sex magic, a couple can extract from each other what they are missing by way of virility and femininity, multiplying their energies tenfold and merging the carnal and spiritual worlds to experience transcendent adventures in the deepest depths of reality.