Shalom Archangel,
welcome to our open forum!
I am glad to learn that you like our website and are interested in joining the correspondence course.
Your first question is actually addressed in our Qabbalah online course in the resource "Overview of our Training". I noticed you enroled and maybe you already read the text?
In order to answer your other questions, let me first explain the structure of our training:
Training for BOEL members consists of the correspondence course and of optional workshops.
The correspondence course consists of the Qabbalah online course and the associated practical work, mostly meditations, but also other practical occult work.
The Qabbalah online course provides the theoretical part of our training. It is open to non-members as well.
So, how to become a member?
We have modified our membership regulations recently, but our website has not yet been updated. The new terms are that membership requires an invitation first.
There are two possibilities on how you can get an invitation for membership. The one is to participate in at least one workshop series, which consists of six workshops that take place within about fourteen months. Since our current workshops take place in Germany, the travelling is unfortunately not possible for everyone. We offer translation to English for some workshops to enable international students to attend, of course.
The other possibility is to study our online course for at least one year, and to contribute to the course in a constructive manner during this time. Primarily this means course work, i.e. writing articles in the course units and giving feedback to the articles of your fellow students, and other forms of learning.
So these are two ways of becoming affiliated with us.
Both ways give the then-affiliated student the opportunity to decide whether or not they want to become more involved with us in the future.
An invitation for membership will normally not happen before one year has passed. It is not unusual that it might take longer, for an invitation will only be made if we can see a permanent interest in our spiritual work and a deep desire to dedicate oneself to this spiritual path. Until then there will be enough time to get to know each other better.
"2. What kind of books, ritual equipment, incenses, etc are required during the first year? "
In the first year you can do the online course which requires a computer and internet connection, and if you would like to do the daily candle exercise, you'll need a white candle and a candle holder. Additionally, you can buy the course book that is currently available.See the online course for details. So if you are travelling, this will not be a problem.
3. Does every student get a personal mentor and highest level of support and guidance to pass along the course efficiently?
Only BOEL members receive this kind of mentorship.
And if not a secret how many active members does the school currently have?
We have quite a number of active members - most of them in the German Qabbalah online course, since we are based in Germany - and of course in the workshops in Germany. However there are not thousands of students as of yet ;-)
I hope this answers most of your questions!
In Light
Andrea