ASP, the 21st Enochian Aethyr: Wind, Silence, and the Empty Throne

ASP strips away visual and sensory anchors before an unseen enthroned speaker appears; Crowley leaves the twenty-first Aire’s voice deliberately uncertain.

Aethyr number: 21 of 30
Earthly-part positions: 61–63
Crowley’s 1911 chapter: Printed pp. 37–41

Two historical layers

Dee’s Liber Scientiae is the earlier manuscript setting. The Equinox I:8 (1912) supplies the spelling and number used here. Crowley’s Vision and the Voice (1911) supplies the much later vision described below.

ASP in the numbered list

The Equinox I:8 prints ASP at number twenty-one. Whitby’s description of Dee’s Liber Scientiae groups the first twenty-nine Aethyrs in threes, so the ordinal earthly-part positions under this name are 61–63. The numbers are a calculation from that grouping. They are not a claim that present-day territories or Crowley’s throne scene appear under those exact labels in the manuscript.

The British Library catalogues Liber Scientiae in Sloane MS 3191, folios 14r–31r and 52r–80v. That manuscript setting belongs to Dee and Kelley’s sixteenth-century Angelical material. The 1912 table is a later printed witness to names and order, and the 1911 Vision and the Voice is Crowley’s still later interpretation.

Sources: The Equinox I:8 (1912), p. 125 ↗ · Whitby, John Dee’s Actions with Spirits, vol. 1, pp. 141–142 ↗ · British Library, Sloane MS 3191 catalogue ↗

ASP governor names: ordinals 61–63

The Equinox I:7 (1912) groups three names under ASP on printed page 241. These are the spellings in that later table; the comparison labels below identify only forms that differ in a modern Great Table reconstruction.

61 CHIRZPA2010 comparison form: CHIRSPA
62 TOANTOMSame spelling in the 2010 comparison appendix
63 VIXPALGSame spelling in the 2010 comparison appendix

Open ASP in the complete 91-name concordance →

Wind, black marble, and a throne

On printed page 37, the 1911 chapter begins with a wind described as empty of colour, form, substance, and even an ordinary sense of temperature. Briefly an avenue of pillars and a throne supported by sphinxes appears. After passing through the wind, the seer stands before that throne but says its occupant cannot be seen.

The account then presents a rapid series of tastes as a failed means of communication. The seer says he cannot understand this “taste-language”; a hum and distant bell-like notes follow. These shifts matter for interpretation: ASP is not simply a named angel, a fixed colour, or an easy message. The printed scene repeatedly says perception and comprehension are incomplete.

Sources: The Equinox I:5 supplement (1911), printed pp. 37–41 ↗

Who speaks in the later account?

A muttering voice eventually seems to explain the desolation of the throne, but the seer reports hearing only fragments of one long speech. When he asks why a being named Silence speaks so much, the narrative makes a crucial correction: the enthroned being has not uttered a word. The voice identifies itself as an ape speaking for that silent figure.

The seer later tries to approach, is pushed back, and is borne through the wind by an angel. The episode ends with a Bou Saâda desert date line of November 29, 1909. These are claims and literary devices in Crowley’s printed record. None establishes that Dee assigned ASP a “silent god,” a practice involving a throne, or a single universal psychological effect.

Sources: The Equinox I:5 supplement (1911), printed pp. 37–41 ↗ · The Equinox I:8 (1912), p. 125 ↗

Source editions and page locators

The 1911 link opens a scan of the original supplement at PDF page 39, corresponding to printed page 37. The 1912 issue link is a modern reconstruction. This page paraphrases the original printing and does not treat the visionary report as independently verified.

See all thirty Aethyr names and the ninety-one-part table →

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