Eroto-comatose Lucidity - History of The Rite

History of The Rite

Aleister Crowley documented the ritual. However, Crowley may not have been the originator of the rite, and may have learned about it from a female student first.

Other authors, however, have concluded that the rite can be traced back much earlier. Occult historian Allen H. Greenfield has observed that there was a deep interest in sexual magic and sex as a spiritual tool which began in the early-to-mid-19th century and built throughout the century. A number of spiritual sexual rites and practices were either allegedly rediscovered or created during this period.

Crowley wrote in his work De Arte Magica that eroto-comatose lucidity is also called the "sleep of Siloam" and both Allen Greenfield and Newcomb note that this rite preceded Crowley. They point out that Paschal Beverly Randolph ("arguably the single most important figure in the rise of modern sexual magic") called this ritualistic state the "sleep of Sialam." Randolph first discussed the "sleep of Sialam" in his 1873 work Ravalette, but described it at the time as a once-in-a-century prophetic trance. In later writings, Randolph used the term as a more general form of clairvoyant sleep used to understand spiritual things.

Helena Blavatsky may also have taught the technique, calling it the "Sleep of Siloam." In her 1877 work Isis Unveiled, Blavatsky wrote that the trance must be induced through drugs rather than sexual exhaustion. Later, Blavatsky altered her understanding of the rite to mean that drug-induced trance-like state in which a new initiate first comprehends spiritual things. This was described in Blavatsky's 1888 work Secret Doctrine, and she taught that the ritualistic state allowed the individual to either commune with the gods, descend into hell, or perform spiritual acts. Blavatsky taught this was a deep sleep, but Newcomb notes that modern ritualists do not enter sleep but rather a state between sleep and wakefullness.

On the other hand, sexual practices used for spiritual purposes are not new. Eastern traditions within taoism and tantrism also incorporated sexual rituals.