The Alpha et Omega was an occult order, initially named the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, co-founded in London, England by Samuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers in 1888. The Alpha et Omega was one of four daughter organisations into which the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn fragmented, the others being the Stella Matutina; the Isis-Urania Temple led by A. E. Waite and others; and Aleister Crowley's A∴A∴. Following a rebellion of adepts in London and an ensuing public scandal which brought the name of the Golden Dawn into disrepute, Mathers renamed the branch of the Golden Dawn remaining loyal to his leadership to "Alpha et Omega" sometime between 1903 and 1913. "The title was usually abbreviated as A.O." and according to some sources its full name was "Rosicrucian Order of Alpha et Omega". All of the temples of the order appear to have gone out of existence by the Second World War.
Origin
In 1900, the hegemony of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn was disturbed by a letter sent from Samuel Mathers, who was living in Paris, to his representative in London, Florence Farr. In the letter he claimed that his co-founder Wynn Westcott forged communications between himself and the Secret Chiefs, who had given him the authority for the Order to exist. This revelation culminated in a rebellion of the adepts of the Isis-Urania Temple No. 3 wherein Mathers was expelled from his position as Chief.
This was quickly followed, in 1901, by the Horos scandal (see Ann O'Delia Diss Debar), in which two con artists used Golden Dawn materials obtained from Mathers to cover a sex scam. The name and reputation of the Golden Dawn were defamed in the courts and in the press. S.L. MacGregor Mathers subsequently dissolved the Order of the Golden Dawn in 1906 and founded the Alpha et Omega in Paris. However, the name A.O. also first appeared in a copy of a 0°=0□ Hall of the Neophytes ritual owned by Henry Kelf and is dated 1905. It appears to have been used soon after the schism.
Two temples in Great Britain remained loyal to Mathers and joined the Alpha et Omega, one in London and the other in Edinburgh. Two or three former Golden Dawn temples in the United States, including Thoth-Hermes in Chicago, remained loyal to Mathers during the schism and became part of the Alpha et Omega as well.
Expansion
Elsa Barker, a poet and author who traveled frequently between Europe and the USA, became Mathers’ emissary to the American temples of the A.O. For example, the minutes book of the Ahathoor temple mentions that, on July 3, 1911, just prior to Elsa Barker’s return to the USA, Mathers had received applications from 9 members to form a new temple, Neith Temple No. 10.
By 1913, Mathers was presiding over at least five Temples of the Alpha et Omega; the original Isis-Urania Temple No. 3 (with 23 Inner Order members by 1913), presided over by Dr. Edmund William Berridge, the Ahathoor Temple No. 7 in Paris led by Mathers himself, the Amen-Ra Temple No. 6 in Edinburgh, presided over by John William Brodie-Innes, the Thme Temple No 8 in Chicago, The Thoth Hermes Temple No 9 in New York, presided over by Michael Whitty, and the Neith Temple No. 10 in New York.
Three other American temples of the Alpha et Omega were founded after the First World War: Ptah No. 10 in Philadelphia in 1919, Atoum No. 20 in Los Angeles in 1920, and Themis No. 30 in San Francisco in 1921.
When Mathers died in 1918, he was succeeded by Moina Mathers, his widow, and J. W. Brodie-Innes. After Moina's death in St Mary Abbots Hospital on 25 July 1928 Isabel Morgan Boyd, her daughter Isme, and Edward John Langford-Garstin took over the London temple.
Decline
According to Langford-Garstin's cousin Ithell Colquhoun, the AO "survived until the outbreak of [World War II] in 1939" when it was "officially closed" and its temple-furniture destroyed "at the instance of the Secret Chiefs." Colquhoun later asserts that the furniture, along with its Vault of the Adepti, were "consumed in a bonfire" at Sacombe Park, Hertfordshire.
Rituals
While the rituals of the original Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn and its Stella Matutina offshoot were published in the early 1900s (1909-1910 and 1937 respectively), the rituals of the A+O remained secret until they were published in 2011.