Eugene Halliday

Eugene Halliday described himself as an Artist, which he meant in its Renaissance sense. He was an accomplished painter in both oil and water colour; he modelled the most beautiful miniature figures; he was a fine musician. He taught and practised philosophy and psychology, and believed with Shakespeare, Boehme and Blake that the proper study of man, is man.

Halliday was not a dogmatic or a schools man. He was deeply versed in religion, philosophy, mythology, metaphysics, hermeneutics and Qabalah, and maintained an active interest in the latest scientific discoveries. He wore his wisdom lightly, and was a charismatic teacher.

After wide travel in his youth, Halliday spent most of his life in the North West of England around Manchester. In 1963 he founded the Institute for the Study of Hierological Values (ISHVAL) at Parklands, Bowdon, in Cheshire, a fine Victorian mansion, generously provided by Fred and Yvonne Freeman. Here, Halliday worked and taught for twenty three years. Through lectures, groups and classes, as well as in one-to-one sessions, he instilled into his listeners the importance of the individual human being as a potentially reflexive vessel of the divine intelligence.

Eugene Halliday had a profound effect on everyone with whom he came in contact. He was held in affectionate reverence and, over twenty years after his death, his words and his presence are not only still fresh in the minds of those who heard him, but resound in his books and recorded lectures for every person who comes to them anew.

A Blakeian figure? Well, certainly he was very fond of Blake, and had a deep understanding of his work and his symbology. And, like Blake, Halliday talked with angels. Again like Blake, Halliday refused to be bound by merely moral or particularised systems. He paid tribute only to the Logos structure in all things.

In his lifetime, Halliday published privately three short books, plus innumerable essays. These, Reflexive Self-Consciousness, The Defence of the Devil, and The Tacit Conspiracy, contain the core of his teaching. Notable amongst the books published since his death are the four volumes of Contributions From a Potential Corpse, a fascinating day-book of Halliday's thought.

Nobody who met Eugene Halliday could ever forget him, and those who were taught by him regard him as a great sage, a true, reflexively self-conscious being, and a man of great humour and compassion.

In Halliday's lifetime, ISHVAL had some two hundred and fifty members. Halliday never advertised his work, but his influence spread widely, though quietly, by word of mouth. After Halliday's death, the work at Parklands continued until 1994, when David and Zero Mahlowe left the house. They founded the Melchisedec Press to publish the Collected Works of Eugene Halliday; and David continued to lecture at Tabley Hall, near Knutsford. Since David's death in 1998, the Institute's work still continues with classes, lectures, the preservation of Halliday's recorded lectures by transfer from analogue to digital format, the development of the ISHVAL website, funded by Fred and Yvonne Freeman, and the recording of Halliday's work as audio books by Zero Mahlowe. All of Halliday's published work and most of his recorded lectures, are now available freely, on the internet, and new members are most welcome to attend the lectures and reading group.

By David Mahlowe, 1995
Edited and updated by Hephzibah Yohannan, September 2008

David Mahlowe

David Mahlowe. Actor, artist, craftsman, writer, poet; good friend, loving husband, a real human being. David's many years' close study of both Shakespeare and Boehme in his lecture from 1973. As a companion piece, we include Eugene Halliday's short essay on Shakespeare's Wooden O and the art of playwriting, which links into David's lecture and reflects the involvement of both of them in the theatre.

Attending the theatre in Manchester in the 1950s was an exciting and enlightening experience. The Library Theatre Company had as its director, from 1954, David Scase, who had worked with Joan Littlewood.
The company included many fine actors, including David Mahlowe and Zero Mahlowe (under her stage name of Marah Stohl), Oliver Neville (later head of Rada) and John Franklyn Robbins (still appearing in film and on TV). Not only was this a young and vibrant company, but the cast here mentioned spent a large part of their off-stage time studying the work of Shakespeare and the meaning of acting with Eugene Halliday. Late into the night, they explored the art of acting, learning to feel the inner motivation and drive of their characters, experiencing the interactions within the plays as the interactions of real beings, dynamic and alive. Ably directed in the theatre by David Scase, they yet lived dangerously on the stage, following anew the responses of their living characters to each situation - which may not be quite the same from one performance to another. This could be disconcerting to other members of the cast, but made for dynamic and memorable performances.

David's poetry and his craftsmanship, with photographs of chessmen which he carved, and his calligraphy. He was a skilled jeweller, carpenter, and gardener, meticulous organiser, and publisher of Eugene Halliday's work, and a perfectionist in everything he did. Ten years on, the world is still not the same without him.

Fred Freeman

Fred Freeman was born in Liverpool on the 14th of March 1921. The son of a third generation draper, Fred had a deep emotional attachment to Liverpool and the welfare of those who lived and worked there.

Fred was educated at Repton School and left in the spring of 1939; aged 18, to become a trainee at Lewis's, another famous Liverpool department store. Fred was soon commissioned into the Kings Regiment (Liverpool) and eventually joined the Chindits led by General Orde Wingate. This special breed of men flew by glider and operated behind the Japanese lines in Burma performing incredible feats of bravery. His war service taught him much about the need and value of leadership and the responsibility of the individual. He looked back on his war years as a great education and led him to meditate on the forces within society that give rise to such events. Much of his future life's work was focussed on providing solutions to the problems that he had started to identify during his fight for survival in the isolated Burmese forests. Major Fred Freeman after distinguished war service then went on to train with the Harrods group in London for two years before returning to the family department store in Wavertree road, Liverpool.

Fred became deeply and actively involved in many aspects of the work of the Liverpool voluntary sector. He felt that it was his duty to help his fellow man in any way that he could. Fred was deeply sensitive to the suffering of others and with his highly perceptive mind was quick to identify the causes and to propose practical solutions. This attitude was embodied in the quotation of the United Trusts gift acknowledgement cards:
"I expect to pass through this world but once: any good therefore that I can do, or any kindness that I can show to any fellow creature, let me do it now, let me not defer it or neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again."

This resolute and determined will to affirm and support the essential qualities inherent in the voluntary sector brought Fred into contact with many powerful and intelligent people. None more so perhaps than Eugene Halliday, Eugene became a lifelong friend and was a major catalyst for Fred to formulate, develop and finally publish his ideas in a number of books and pamphlets. In Eugene he found a mind that linked the spiritual to the practical, through deep meditative intuition and logical analysis Eugene laid bare the spiritual structure of energetic forces that create and operate within the world of time. Fred remained deeply indebted to Eugene for his input and much of his written work reflects their weekly conversations. Fred was a founder member of the charity Ishval with Eugene Halliday. After Eugene's death in 1986 Fred worked with the charity Ishval and provided funds for the development of the website. His personal wish was to make the works of Eugene Halliday known worldwide. Fred considered Eugene to be one of the foremost spirits of the age and his work a source of inspiration for those seeking a true relationship with the source of all being. Fred was a deeply Christian man in thought, word and deed. He found in the works of Eugene Halliday inspiration and understanding that deepened his faith, enlarged his compassion, and he focussed his will on influencing others to share his vision of a society in which all individual members contribute positively to the good of the whole.

Fred Freeman died 6th August 2007.