Talk:Dion Fortune/Archive 1

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[edit] Question of "subversive bias"

These comments are not in chronological order due to unauthorised editing by user SBWNA

I have reverted to last edit by SBWNA. The suggestion that calling someone's most well known work a magnum opus is subervise is just a bit odd. Magnum Opus means, the greatest single work of an artist, writer, or composer. The Mystical Qabbalah is most certainly Fortune's best, and, best known work and it is widely acknowledged to be an important book in the field. IMHO this qualifies it as a magnum opus.

  • Semantics: It would help no end if you would avoid the use of terms like 'crackpot' or 'subversive' as this betrays your total lack of NPOV. You make it sound as if the fact that you avoided calling this book trash is a big favour to all wikipedia on your part. Remain calm. Fortune is far from an 'historically insignificant crackpot'. According to The Oxford English Dictionary, Magnum Opus is defined as "A large and important work of art, music or literature, especially one regarded as the most important work of an artist or writer".
  • Use of Magnum opus: By definition The Mystical Qabbalah certainly qualifies as her 'magnum opus.' It was ahead of its time and Fortune's work seriously influenced not only hermetic magic but also influenced Doreen Valiente and Gerald Gardener in their foundation of Wicca. See http://www.sacred-texts.com/bos/bos474.htm. It is also most probably not 'her most popular book' as her novel "The Sea Princess" has probably sold more copies. I'm not sure of this though and unless you have this info you shouldn't make this assumption.
  • On the Magical Battle of Britain: This paragraph does not make any claims as to the efficacy, or otherwise, of the event which is known as "The Magical Battle of Britain". It simply says that Fortune was famed for her action in instigating this event. There is at least one entire book regarding this event, and as such there is historical basis for citing this event. There are references for this and I suggest you read them before you deny their existence.
  • Chronology of Points: I would also like to request that when posting to talk pages you do not start your replies in the middle of someone else's post, which action has caused parts of earlier posts to be deleted. You have done this twice now. Also you would have a lot more credibility if you would register an account with wikipedia, or at least sign your posts with something.

The above remarks are an edited summary of my previous remarks over a number of days. These remarks were edited by user SBWNA who also removed my signings. Morgan Leigh 01:10, 27 June 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Counter Arguments

Edits to Morgan Leigh's Comments: It should be noted that the reason why I had to reorganize the Discussion on this page is that Mr. Leigh had repeatedly chopped up my responses in order to insert his rebuttals, as a result, deleting comments I had made.Template:SBWNA

I have already replied to this accusation. I did not edit your posts. I quoted the relevant peices of your posts to which I was replying, which I did underneath your posts. The only reason I am saying this again is that you have deleted my previous reply. Please do not remove this reply.
Morgan Leigh 01:51, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

Historical Significance of Dion Fortune: The bottom line is that you have clearly illustrated that there is reasonable doubt as to the significance of Dion Fortune in history or literature; thus, you should not use subjective terms like 'magnum opus' that semantically eleveate the quality of her writings. Also, you should not publish information about the "Magical Battle of Britain" into the main page, as there are no reputable sources on the topic, thus, it is a dis-service to users of Wikipedia to publish that as a fact, even if her followers believe that she was involved in a "Magical Battle of Britain." It should be posted to the Discussion page, not the main article.

Use of 'magnum opus': "Magnum opus" is a subjective term that generally refers to artists or writers whom are generally considered the greatest in their field (i.e. Shakespeare, DaVinci), not to historically insignifcant crackpots. Trying to impose the idea that Dion Fortune is a historically relevant author is a debatable question, which is why calling the Mystical Qaballah a work of great significance vis a vi calling it her 'magnum opus,' is subversive bias. In other words, if there is no general consensus on Dion Fortune's significance as an artist or writer, then you cannot honestly go around calling her writings great works of significance.

  • What I meant by saying "I didn't call it a work of trash" is that I was merely using a neutral-term. 'Magnum opus' generally connotes that it is a great work of art, music, or literature -- not for works of political, religious or spiritual beliefs. Nevertheless, because there is no general consensus on the relevance of Dion Fortune in the history of literature or history in general, then it is merely just your opinion that The Mystical Qaballah is a great work of literature. The reality is, The Mystical Qaballah is a well-regarded book amongst occultists, not with followers of literature.
  • It is my opinion that the Mystical Qaballah is just nonsense, but I did not insert my opinion into the article; and I say that, not because I think I'm doing anyone any favors but to illustrate the fact that the relevance of The Mystical Qaballah is highly subjective. Therefore, it is only fair to use a neutral term like "book" or phrase like "most popular book."
  • My use of the term "crackpot" is an opinion, obviously. However, I didn't start calling The Mystical Qaballah a work of trash, I simply replaced it with "book."
  • You just defeated your argument that The Mystical Qaballah is her magnum opus, by saying that you are unsure as to whether "The Sea Princess" has sold more copies than "The Mystical Qaballah." If the "The Sea Princess" sold more copies, than you can make a logical argument that the "The Sea Princess" was more influential amongst followers of Dion Fortune than "The Mystical Qaballah" was. Clealy, there is reasonable doubt as to the relevance of "The Mystical Qaballah" amongst followers of Dion Fortune; as well as the fact that Fortune has had no impact or relevance outside of occultism.

Magical Battle of Britain: Do not use the main article to post total nonsense about "The Magical Battle of Britain." There is no historical basis for the effect if any of the "Magical Battle of Britain," or even if the so-called Battle actually occured. You can discuss that topic on the Discussion page.

  • As for the "Magical Battle of Britain" it is, if nothing else, trvial. You cite that there are books on the subject, yet, I could not find anything reputable about it; except that Fortune purports to have been involved, which means nothing in terms of fact. Thus, citing it is just nonsense that doesn't belong on the Main Article. As far as I know, the "Magical Battle of Britain" was just propaganda by occultists like Crowley and Fortune to bolster the image of occultists in the public eye. I did point out however that it was an appropriate topic for the Discussion page but not for the Main Article.
  • By the way, just because something is in a book, doesn't necessarily make it true or even noteworthy.
  • As well, not even Wikipedia has a page dedicated to the "Magical Battle of Britain"

Privacy: I choose not to use a user account because there are too many people on Wikipedia that harass others with nonense that I prefer to reveal very little information.

The above was posted by user SBWNA who never signs their posts.


Please sign your posts on talk pages. It is very difficult for other users to contribute to this discussion if you don't sign. Furthermore, why my edit here has been reverted? I can't see why you regarded it as vandalism. Finally, why you Brits and Americans do not stop using Latin terms, mottos and sentences? Do you know that even in Italy it is not appreciated? The proper word is masterpiece in this case, I guess.--Clearcontent 17:17, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

It was not your work that was considered vandaliam Clearcontent. As you may have noticed we have been having a real problem here with user 67.185.57.48 deleting things from the talk pages and vandalising this article. I had to revert to a version before user 67.185.57.48's vandalism and I must have overlooked your contribution when I did the revert. Please feel free to replace your contribution. I apologise for the inconvience. Thank you for your opinion regarding Magnum Opus. I must say though that I am neither a Brit nor an American. I am an historian and latin phrases are used a lot in history, for obvious reasons. Because of this Magnum opus is just a regular part of my vocabulary, which is why I chose it. However I think your suggestion is a good one and seems like a good compromise so I am going to use it. Also I did sign all my posts but user 67.185.57.48 edited my posts, rearranging my comments into a different format. Because of the many, many edits this user did and the way he added information to his posts in a non linear manner it was impossible to revert these talk pages to their original state without many hours work. Consequentally I chose to leave this page as is. I have ammended a note to the above to indicate what has happened.
Morgan Leigh 01:10, 27 June 2006 (UTC)
Ok, many thanks, I'm happy that my humble suggestion has been appreciated.--Clearcontent 02:14, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

May I suggest that the Magical Battle of Britain be reserached and a page be created with the information. It is obvious that this event existed in some form or another. The eventual entry, and its inclusion here, can reflect its true nature--i.e. occultists' PR, psychic defense force, or somewhere in between. There are many articles on Wiki that attempt to trepresent neutral view points on topics that are either historically unclear or controversial; Considering the amount of extant information regarding the Nazi's esotericism, I can't think of any reason that the Magical Battle of Britain should be relegated to talk pages if it can be sufficiently fleshed out and NPOV. A quick tour of JSTOR revealed many peer-reviewed articles dealing with associated topics, though none concerning the MBoB directly. A different database or a more thourough look at other sources will probably reveal plenty more. I will be able to look into this a little later, but others should feel free since I tend to get easilt distra--Smallwhitelight 15:04, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Recent anon edit

The recent edit by 213.239.226.194 concerns me for several reasons:

  • It is a substantial re-write without source citation
  • The balance of the article seems to have shifted to POV claims
  • This extensive edit is the only contribution of that anon
  • Information here was maintained (presumably supported) by Wikipedia-downstream sites that are more specifically focused on magic

All together, this smells very much like either hoax data or a copyright violation (or both). Anyone know of a good, authoritative source they could check? -Harmil 11:00, 4 August 2005 (UTC)


I am the person who made the recent edit. I am sorry to have caused you to think that this edit is a hoax or otherwise questionable. The cause may well be that this is my first wikipedia edit and I may not be aware of all the things I am supposed to do. I will be glad to add sources to the pages... if only I can't work out how to do so. :) There are a couple of questions I would like to ask. What does one do in the case of contradictory published information? i.e. Ithell Colquhoun clearly says in her book 'The Sword of Wisdom' that Dion Fortune was an orphan. This is not so and is backed up by published data in both Gareth Knight's book, 'Dion Fortune and the Inner Light' as well as in Alan Richardson's 'The Magical LIfe of Dion Fortune'. Colquhoun also gets Fortune's birth year wrong as well, and this is what has lead me to consider her an unreliable source, for infomation on Fortune anyway.

12:59 AM Friday, August 05, 2005 (UTC)

Excellent points, and yes, I was hoping (though you sometimes get cynical around here) that this was a valid edit made by someone new. First off, consider creating an account. It will make communication and a number of other things easier for you.
As for conflicting facts, it's a fine thing to point them out. Just remember that Wikipedia attempts to stick to the neutral point of view, so claiming "this is not so" implies that it is widely accepted, non-controvercial fact that it is not so. If it is controvercial but generally not accepted, then say so.
As far as how to cite sources, it depends on what you're citing. For example, you might just say, "According to John Doe's 1883 book, See Dick Run, the state of New York borders the Pacific Ocean." If larger sections of the edit are dependent on a few sources, list them in a "References" section (see WP:STYLE for more information) toward the end (before "See also" and "External links" if those sections exist).
I hope this helps. -Harmil 01:55, 5 August 2005 (UTC)


I have added the citations. Please let me know if you think there is still anything that should be changed/added/removed. I will make a user account. Thanks for your comments.
3:43 AM Friday, August 05, 2005 (UTC)
Morgan Leigh 11:56, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Tidied, things to be done

Hi. I did a bit of copyediting on the article's text. There were some spots where the tone was veering a little away from our loose encyclopedic standard.

To do list should include

  1. Find references for the items marked "citation needed" -- these things may all be true, but we can't just assert them as Wikipedia's opinion.
  2. Write her Bibliography, formatted as a list with year: Title
  3. Move the quotes to Wikiquote
  4. Find a free, reusable image, with proper sourcing and a verifiable license. This may be quite a challenge.
  5. Expand the article. There are at least three biographies mentioned on this Talk page, so there is no shortage of reliable sources here.
  6. Write a proper WP:LEAD

I hope that is helpful. Nice to see some activity at this article. Jkelly 17:53, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

Hi. I really welcome your contribution to this article. I have added a bunch of references where you indicated they were needed. I'll get onto the other stuff you mention real soon now :)
Morgan Leigh 04:14, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Fraternity of the Inner Light

Any editors wishing to come on over to the Fraternity of the Inner Light article and help in expansion will be much appreciated. Zos 03:39, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Citation challenge

Theres a statement within this article which barely makes sense. I'll reproduce it here.

  • In 1919 she was initiated into the London Temple of the "Alpha and Omega" [7], a lodge of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, before transferring to the "Stella Matutina" Lodge of The Golden Dawn[8], then run by Moina Mathers, widow of Samuel Liddell MacGregor-Mathers.
For one, she wasnt initiated in the Lodon temple, she was initiated into the English temple under Brodie-Innes, then transferred to the London temple. Also, Fortune was never in the Stella Matutina, she was only in the Alpha et Omega. So either the authors from which those statements come from are wrong, or the editor didnt know what was going on. I'll expect a reply, or else I'll just suspect its wrong and will being to fix it. Zos 00:20, 8 July 2006 (UTC)


Hi Zos, Thanks for contributing to this article. Can you please provide references for your position? The reference for this information is Alan Richardson, who has a good reputation as Fortune's biographer. Richardson does point out that the London temple was under the leadership of Brodie-Innes at the time of Fortune's initiation. I know however that people do make mistakes, e.g. i.e. Ithell Colquhoun clearly says in her book 'The Sword of Wisdom' that Dion Fortune was an orphan, which is quite obviously not so. The thing is that if we find conflicting information in sources we can't decide that one is right and one is wrong, as that would be original research. All we can do is to note what various authors say, which is what I would encourage you to do in this instance. I recommend that you add something to the article citing your source and their position.
Morgan Leigh 02:48, 8 July 2006 (UTC)
My references/sources are Francis X. King. His book covers the Golden Dawn and related offshoots. My only issue here, which you now have cleared up, is that Fortune was initiated into the English temple, in 1919, and then in 1920 she was referred to the London temple. So this is basically saying that she wasnt in a London temple, until later. Also, she was never in the Stella Matutina. It gets confusing as to which temples are which, so I can understand that biographers can get thigns wrong from time to time, and this time I believe your source is. To add my thoughts on the matter would in fact be original research, yet I wasnt going to add my thoughts, just my sources POV. So if this matter isnt cleared up, I'll have to buy the books being cited and properly fact check it.
Also, you might want to fix the reference section. The citations should be in "note" or "footnotes" and the full title should go under "references". Zos 20:49, 8 July 2006 (UTC)
I think we are actually referring to the same thing here... Where the article says 'In 1919 she was initiated into the London Temple of the "Alpha and Omega"'. This is referring to the A&O temple in London, which was an offshoot of the A&O in Edinborough which was run by Brodie Innes and not the A&O in London run by Mathers i.e. the group descended from the Isis-Urania.
There is some disagreement as to when the Community of the Inner Light was started, though after having done a bit more research on this today, I think I shall put the date as 1922, as everyone except Gareth Knight gives this date. I think Knight's dating is due to a quite muddled way of laying things out in his book.
There is general agreement in the sources that Fortune was a member of the Hermes temple of the Stella Matutina. I refer you to the chart on p180 of Colquhoun's book (Sword of Wisdom), p114 of Richardson's book (the Magical Life of DF), p43 of Fielding and Collin's book (The Story of DF) and pages 49, 56, 189, 204, and 254 of Knight's book (DF and the IL). The chart on p133 of Colquhoun's book (Sword of Wisdom) is a very clear rendering of the descent of the orders. I can scan this chart and add it if you don't have access to it. Though I must say that I know Colquhoun to have made errors, e.g. she says Fortune was an orphan, so I cannot vouch for the veracity of her work.
I'd like to propose that we put the following paragraph in (to replace the existing one) in both this article and the Fraternity of the Inner Light article.
"In 1922, after a falling out with Moina MacGregor Mathers[1] and with Moina's consent, Dion Fortune left the Alpha and Omega and formed the Fraternity of the Inner Light as an offshoot of the Alpha et Omega [2][3]. This brought new members to the Alpha et Omega.[4] Fortune's group was later renamed "The Fraternity of the Inner Light", and was, later still, renamed "The Society of the Inner Light".
I am not sure exactly what is meant by the "This brought new members to the A&O" bit. Perhaps you can give me a bit of context as to what King is saying here as I don't have this book. Also I have added the King reference to the first line of the paragraph as I presume it is referring to this split with Moina. Can you please ocnfirm this?
I would also like to suggest that we merge the Fraternity of the Inner Light and the The_Society_of_Inner_Light articles as they both refer to the same thing.
Morgan Leigh 03:41, 9 July 2006 (UTC) (also posted to Talk:Fraternity of the Inner Light and Talk:The_Society_of_Inner_Light.
Ok, merge. --''clearcontent'' a.k.a. '''Doktor Who''' 05:53, 9 July 2006 (UTC)
I responded to the majority of this on the other talk page, so I'll only be commenting on this here:
    • I think we are actually referring to the same thing here... Where the article says 'In 1919 she was initiated into the London Temple of the "Alpha and Omega"'. This is referring to the A&O temple in London, which was an offshoot of the A&O in Edinborough which was run by Brodie Innes and not the A&O in London run by Mathers i.e. the group descended from the Isis-Urania.
You just about made my head spin with this comment. Well, heres the thing. The Isis-Urania Temple was in London. After the revolt, they were no longer affiliated witht the original GD, and it ended with Waites pompous ass. Mathers set up a West London temple, which was run by Edward Berridge and Mathers. So it cant be a London temple per say, but Brodie-Innies did run an Enlish temple, but thats not saying it was in London either. He joined up with Mathers in 1908, and one year before Fortune was initiated, he was in coperation with Moina (that is 1918 seeing as how Fortune was initiated 1919). Now heres where I am having a problem, as there is no article for Brodie-Innies. This guy was in charge of more than one temple, and was at one point in time, affiliated with the Stella Matutina.
As for the temple in Edinborough being A+O, I'm not sure who said this, and why. The Edinborough - Amen Ra temple was in fact ran under Brodie-Innes. Its origins were from the original GD, and during the revolt, this temple also broke off, only to return to be a section of the A+O. Also, Brodie-Innes helped in forming the Stella Matutina, but like its said, he felt it was unjustified to revolt, and went back to Mathers and the A+O.
So to sum it up, I'm not sure that there was a London temple after the revolt (only west london, which I cant find its name), and this cant be an offshoot of the Amen Ra temple in Edinborough because the Amen Ra temple was an original GD temple, possibly ran by the same guy (Brodie-Innies) for its entire existence, and now apart of the A+O. I cant say much for the current A+O though (see here: Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn (Rosicrucian Order of A+O)), because I'm not sure of the existence of a book discussing this matter.
So we have to be careful about wording this all out, as you can see. Zos 06:23, 9 July 2006 (UTC)
Strike that. There is a London temple, its Isis-Urania. I only meant a Lodon temple for the A+O. Zos
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