Assume you had the resources to purchase any book and have the Mastering Divination and OAA video courses. What would you recommend for reading order to progress through E.A Keotting’s system? There is just so much information out there I am genuinely interested in doing it right and not start and stopping, or reading books out of order etc.
There isn’t much of a right way to do it. Just read whatever books interest you in whatever manner you want. If you want to learn about evoking, read evoking eternity. Same goes for any other of his books and their topics. Just go with whatever feels right to you.
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I think it was the publishers, EA and Timmy, that said there is no order but they do suggest reading through his books in chronological order (the order they are presented within the big book combining his cult classics I think it is). This is just to get a clearer understanding of where EA was at at the time and to see the progression of his thought process more clearly as he gained more magical experience and published more material.
So if you want to go by their suggestion, you can, but you are free to skip around as they are stand alone similarly.
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This is trained into us in public school, to be spoon fed info. It’s not like that. Your journey will be as unique as you are…
Get used to not being told what to do or what to think, stand up for what you want to do and make your own way.
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I respect your response though it misses the mark. I probably should have clarified more with my request. I was not looking for someone to “spoon feed” me. I come to this site and workings with around 15 years of experience in many orders and many types of magick. I am well on my path. I was more concerned about approaching E.A Keotting’s work in the order that he or others experienced with it would recommend for efficient results.
Path working is common with most forms of magick, and approaching it randomly can not only waist a lot of time, but it can also be disastrous. Also, a writer as prolific as Keotting usually get redundant, so someone may have advised that I read a certain book because it covers a lot of material that other books mention and that way I could move forward without wasting time or money on re-reading similar material.
I have received some good advice from others and appreciate their words. Only the foolish would not seek help from experienced people. Never be afraid to ask, it can get you very far.
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As has already been stated, there is no established order for study, but, personally, I started with Works of Darkness, which was the second of his books to be published, and that is what I usually recommend to others. It gives a good overall taste of black magick, while also teaching the student some basic skills in meditation, candle magick, demonic sigil magick, scrying, and basic evocation. It also covers a bit of working with the shades of the dead, baneful magick, and psychic vampirism.
What was cursory in WoD is then built on in his next book, Baneful Magick, which goes more in depth into different types of baneful work, from candle magick curses, to astral weapons, to demonic evocation.
Evoking Eternity introduces a system of evocation, one neutral enough to be used for any entity, while the method given in WoD is specifically aimed at demonic evocation. The book covers every permutation of evocation you can think of, from single operator to multiple operators, from a single entity to evoking legions, and provides some in depth pathworkings with specific groups of spirits. This book, I have found to be one of the most in depth explorations of the art of evocation I have ever read.
From Evoking Eternity, I then went to his first book, Kingdoms of Flame, which is another separate system. However, both Works of Darkness and Evoking Eternity included some of the entities from that book, so I wanted to see the rest of them.
Questing After Visions is not really a grimoire so much as it details EA’s exploration of various disciplines, like what he terms the Theta/Gamma sync, the chakras and astral travel. It provides a few exercises, but it is mainly a description of his experiences within the LDS church, an esoteric Christian order, and with the Abramelin Operation. It also provides a detailed explanation of inner and outer visions, and how to tell the difference between the two. QAF and Ipsissimus are probably his two least “dark” books, as they have nary a demon to be found.
Ipsissimus is EA’s exploration of Soul Travel, and his experiences with his RHP mentors, Master Sunham and “Raj.”
The Book of Azazel explores EA’s pact with the demon, and provides the seals and details of some of his legions, powerful demons he calls Nether Lords.
The Spider and Green Butterfly is EA’s exploration of the Vodoun current.
That is the order in which I personally worked his stuff, but the brief run down on them should help give you an idea on where you would like to start your own path through them.
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Dam DarkestKnight- that’s some serious insight. I’ve read books here and there by him, but I generally use other systems because they’re what I know. With this type of guide, I might give it a try.
Thank you!
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That was great, thank you! The first work I have read so far is the Real Magick and Real Results, which touches on some of those topics, but I could tell pretty fast that the book was more like a sales pitch for the other books as it lacks overall content, like deeper path working. All the same, it did provide some good insights and the Soul Travel technique was new to me.
I had started reading the OAA book/course, but from your suggestions maybe I should hold off on that until reading some of the more foundational work.
I really appreciate the depth of your response and I am sure others will as well.
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The other books provide more in depth. For example, the darkness mediation in the OAA is also in Works of Darkness, but it is taken further. In the OAA material it is simply used as a vehicle to obtain an altered state, whereas in WoD, the darkness is breathed into the self as a type of communion.
The OAA material used to be private and was released to the public for the first time when he originally released his Complete Works in which it was included as an addendum. It can be worked on its own, without having read any of the previous books.
I also have the Become A Living God ebook (I believe that is what you are referring to when you say “Real Magick, Real Results”) and pretty much all that is written in it is copied directly from his earlier work. I think it’s important to note that his earlier books predate BALG so there is bound to be some repetition, especially in the beginning, when the ebook was first released.
You’re very welcome 
Thanks again, that makes up my mind. I was torn between focusing on the OAA works (though those seem to no longer really be supported) or starting with WoD. I think I will follow your insights, they were well given and clearly you are a scholar of E.A Keotting’s works. I may at some point return to the OAA and work through the Flames (I am curious are these the same Flames as in Keotting’s first book Kingdom of Flames?) but it sounds like Keotting may have matured his understanding of the material and wrote out a more detailed curriculum separated into multiple books.
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No, they are not. The Kingdoms of Flame are distinct realms within the higher planes, whereas the 18 Flames of the OAA are more like the embodiments of higher forces.
I definitely recommend eventually working through the Flames. While some of the exercises, like the darkness meditation, are found in the other works, the 18 Flames are a distinct pathworking in their own right. The physical order may no longer exist, but it is still fully active in the upper planes.