Introduction

1.1 What Ashlar covers

Ashlar: A Manual of Perfected Style for Thelemic and Esoteric Publishing serves authors, editors, and publishers of books, journals, and websites that treat Thelema and the Western esoteric traditions, whether the writing comes from scholarship or from practice. It also serves students learning to write in the field.

The guide covers what this writing needs beyond what a general manual supplies: the citation of received texts such as Liber AL vel Legis; magical mottoes; grades and degrees; divine names; the Thelemic calendar; the transliteration of Hebrew, Greek, Egyptian, and Enochian; the presentation of Qabalistic argument; and the handling of restricted and oath-bound material.

1.2 The Chicago Manual of Style

Ashlar is grounded in The Chicago Manual of Style, eighteenth edition (2024), cited here as CMS. It sets out the rules that writing in the field depends on, and refers more detailed or specialized matters to CMS. Ashlar governs the matters it treats. For a matter it refers to CMS or does not treat at all, follow CMS.

A reference such as CMS 13.17 is to a numbered paragraph of the eighteenth edition, and one such as CMS chapter 14 is to a whole chapter.

1.3 How the guide is organized

• Chapter 2 sets out the responsibilities of authors and editors, including those that come with writing about a living tradition.
• Chapter 3 covers general style: spelling, italics, punctuation, names and titles, numbers and dates, quotations, and the language a writer uses of people and traditions.
• Chapter 4 covers transliteration, non-Latin scripts, magical alphabets, the transcription of manuscripts, and special characters.
• Chapter 5 covers notes and bibliographies.
• Chapter 6 covers the primary texts of Thelema and the adjacent esoteric corpora: how they are attributed, referenced, quoted, and argued from. It also covers the citation of restricted and oath-bound material.
• Chapter 7 covers indexes, and chapter 8 abbreviations and sigla.
• The Word List at the end gives the house form of terms the field uses constantly.

1.4 Numbering and cross-references

Each section is numbered by chapter and position: 6.12 is the twelfth section of chapter 6. A section may run to more than one paragraph, and its number covers all of them. Cross-references give the number alone.

In a note, cite the guide as 5.7 and 5.41 direct, with the section number as the locator. In running text and on a style sheet, give its title and the section number.

1.5 House style and the style sheet

A publisher, journal, or series may set house rules of its own, and those rules prevail in its publications. In a paper written for a course, the requirements of the course or its instructor prevail in the same way, and Ashlar governs what they leave open (see 2.51). Where a house adopts Ashlar with exceptions, it should publish the exceptions with its submission guidelines.

Every book or article has one style sheet, begun by the author and extended by the editor. It records the choices made for the work: the forms of recurring names and terms, any latitude Ashlar allows and how it was used, and any house exception that applies (see 2.2, 2.23).

1.6 What the guide does not decide

Ashlar governs how a claim is written, attributed, and cited. It takes no position on whether a claim is true, which reading of a text is correct, or which lineage or organization is legitimate. A believer and a skeptic citing the same text should produce the same citation.

1.7 This edition

Ashlar replaces the Mere Thelema Manual of Style in full, including its Student Supplement and Quick Reference.

1.8 Corrections and suggestions

Send corrections and suggestions to ashlar@thelemafdn.com, giving the section number. (For the online edition of Ashlar, select Report an error next to the section number to auto-create an email.)