What’s a good way to make sense of A.O. Spare?

I’d start with a close reading rather than a guide that promises one complete system. Keep three columns, so to speak: what Spare states plainly, what seems metaphorical, and what you’re inferring to connect the passages. That makes it easier to see where the text is clear and where it leaves room for competing readings.

For a question this specific, a commentary is most useful when it shows its reasoning and points back to the text, rather than just translating every difficult term into a familiar mystical concept.

Kenneth Grant may be worth reading as an interpretation, but I wouldn’t treat him as a neutral guide to Spare. Read his claims alongside Spare’s own writing and notice where Grant is explaining the text versus building on it.

I’d be cautious about carrying terms such as Kia or gnosis from later magical writing back into Spare as if they must mean the same thing. Similar vocabulary does not guarantee the same underlying idea.

Practice might give some of the material more context, but it won’t automatically settle the metaphysics. The practical instructions are sparse, so I’d use practice as one source of questions, not as a substitute for careful reading.

And I wouldn’t assume that calling Kia non-dual makes it equivalent to Brahman or the Tao. Those comparisons need an argument, not just a familiar label.