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back in the olde days, there was little difference between xtianity and other forms of magick. augustine argues in city of god that rome should convert because jesus-mojo was bigger than other forms of mojo, and this would be demonstrated in various miracle contests.
made for a pretty exciting period, all these magician duels, i would expect.
then later, after aquinas and other such, xtianity entered a more paranoid, less magical phase. some of the stuff that aquinas hallucinated about the outer edges of xtiandom found their way into canon law, and with that the great adventure of witch hunting was born. it was never clear if there actually was a witchcraft that was being hunted or if it was a construct--and in those cases where there was clearly something else going on, how and in what ways what the inquisition thought was happening intersected with what was happening. much of this confusion probably comes from the inquisition's use of torture as an interrogation technique---oddly, things were even more out of hand in protestant areas which took over the idea without the legal procedures. those wacky guys.
basically, it is not obvious either that there was or was not a continuous tradition of witchcraft, or if it is a way of referring to all kinds of magic practices that don't necessarily have much to do with each other, or if it was a function of christian paranoia about anything and everything that is not itself.
so what crowley and others outlined is no more or less legit than anything else, and is certainly no more or less legit as a religion (even if it is one for people who like to think themselves Naughty in a way) than any other, including christianity. they're all charades that people believe in so aren't charades unless you don't believe in them.
there was a point to this, but i've forgotten it.
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a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear
it make you sick.
-kamau brathwaite
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