1.1 Purpose of This Guide

The Mere Thelema Manual of Style Student Supplement is a practical companion to the full MTMOS. It is intended for students, beginning researchers, and writers who need clear, consistent rules for writing about Thelema and related religious, philosophical, magical, and literary traditions. It may be used for term papers, essays, research projects, online publications, and journal-style writing, including venues such as Mere Thelema.

This guide is necessary because student papers and public-facing essays often require a simpler set of rules than a full professional style guide. Writers may need to cite hierological texts, works by Aleister Crowley, commentaries, historical documents, magical and initiatory writings, digital archives, and modern scholarship, but they may not need every technical rule used in formal editorial work. This guide provides the basic models most writers will need for ordinary academic and public-facing writing.

Writers should use this guide while researching, not only while formatting a finished paper. When taking notes, record complete bibliographic information for every source consulted. For books and printed works, this usually includes the author, title, editor or translator, edition, volume number, series title, place of publication, publisher, and date. For online sources, record the author or editor, page or document title, website or archive name, publication or revision date, stable URL, and date accessed when needed.

The examples and instructions in this guide are designed to help writers avoid common problems in citation, formatting, transliteration, and presentation. They do not replace the full MTMOS in cases requiring more detailed judgment, nor do they override the requirements of an instructor, editor, or publication. When a question is not answered here, consult the full guide or follow the directions given for the assignment or venue.