Magick

The occult world lost an important writer, teacher and ritualist on Friday. Ina Cüsters-van Bergen has died suddenly of acute leukaemia. She was 69.

Born on 5 April 1957 in Limburg, southern Netherlands, she came from a family of artists, and her creative gifts later shaped her work in the Western Mysteries. She spent much of her life in Rotterdam, but travelled extensively, drawn especially to places rich in spiritual heritage.

Ina trained as a psychiatric nurse and an alternative psychotherapist. She was also a uniquely gifted artist. She developed an early interest in spirituality and explored several spiritual paths before finding her spiritual home in the Western Mysteries.

She began training at the Servants of the Light school under Dolores Ashcroft-Nowicki and received her Third Degree initiation in 2003. Her lineage came through Dion Fortune, W. E. Butler and Ashcroft-Nowicki. Fortune’s understanding of the subconscious mind had particularly attracted Ina, whose therapeutic background informed her approach to magical training.

However, that order was rife with political games; Ashcroft-Nowicki pitted talented leaders like Ina against one another, dangling promises that one would succeed her. For a while, Ina was Ashcroft-Nowicki’s intended successor until it became clear she was too talented to wait for the role to open, so she started writing her books. This infuriated Ashcroft-Nowicki, who felt it took all the attention away from her, and the pair fell out.

Ina and her team founded the Temple of Starlight in November 2003. The separation from SOL began in 2005, and the school became fully independent in 2007. She developed an independent curriculum that grew into what is now the Academy for Hermetic Arts and Sciences. Its training encompasses the many facets of the Western Mysteries and every stage of a student’s development.

Her teaching brought together ritual, pathworking, Hermetic Kabbalah, and her experience in therapeutic work. Students worked through supervised exercises, building an inner temple and learning to use magical imagery through sustained practice. Her curriculum ranged from individual training to group ritual and preparing future teachers.

Saying this angered Servants of the Light and Dolores would be an understatement. Dolores ordered her minions to attack Ina’s work and school whenever they could. The attacks were mean, petty and untrue. Dolores could have stopped them but did not until people from the wider occult community approached her and suggested that she was poisoning her own legacy by allowing this to happen. She then ordered a very half-hearted ceasefire.

Around this time, I met Ina, and we swapped SOL stories in Paola’s shop near the Vatican. Ina was shocked and hurt by the SOL experience, but her approach was a lot more evolved than mine. She recognised she was upset and got back to her work.

She was a prolific writer and studied the various branches of Hermeticism in depth, with a particular dedication to the Egyptian Mysteries. Whenever a subject captured her imagination, she would immerse herself in it completely. The immense curriculum she created speaks for itself.

Her books included The Temple of High Magic: Hermetic Initiations in the Western Mystery Tradition, published in English in 2010 after its Dutch publication in 2007 as De weg naar de oude mysteriën. It combined practical exercises with her understanding of temple work, meditation and the Tree of Life. Her novel Mystery of the Sea used fiction to explore magical training and initiation.

She designed and painted the artwork for her own Tarot set, which, sadly, remains unfinished.

Ina had the rare gift of bringing the beauty of the Mysteries, as she perceived them, into the tangible world, allowing others to share in her visions.

She was also a great ritualist with a unique talent for transforming colourless seminar rooms into ancient temples that seemed to breathe beauty, wonder, and mystery.

Her student and friend of 24 years, Dr Julia Richter-Smit, remembered how Ina’s impressive presence could give way to sudden bursts of self-deprecating humour and prolonged laughter.

Richter-Smit, who will succeed her as head of the school, said:

“Ina taught me the Hermetic Tradition, but she taught me so much more than that. She taught me what consciousness is, what it means to be human, and how to hold on to the Light in increasingly dark times. She was there for me through all the major passages of my life, sharing in my deepest sorrows as well as my greatest joys.”

There are occultists who are the real deal and those who have talent but are mostly talk. Ina was the real deal. The planet and occult community were lucky to have her on their side. It is a shame that the illness which took Dion Fortune, whose lineage she carried, ended her life with so much work, including her Tarot, still unfinished.

 

The post Ina Cüsters-van Bergen has died appeared first on Nick Farrell | Golden Dawn, Ritual Magic and Western Esotericism.

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