Larxene

Real life is such a bother. Let's just live inside the Internet.

Thanks for the feedback, Michael and Frater UFA. I will return to Agrippa in a month or so. Got school stuff to do at the moment. Larxene

I still have assignments and exam prep to do, plus my main occult study, so I'll come back to this in maybe a month. Larxene

Some short comments: Michael, Glad to be here . I always enjoy an active and lively community. BKA, Yes, but only if we can find the time to do the linking. Regarding the nine spheres, I have only started reading Agrippa, so I can't answer your question on whether he actually mentioned it. What I know is that his work was probably influenced by the Neo-platonists' works, whose works were in turn founded on some of Plato's ideas. But observe this: the three-fold World is the elemental/natural, celestial and the intellectual. The natural fold corresponds to the Earth, which is made of the four elements fire, air, water and earth. (Potentially Off-Topic Sidenotes: in Geomancy, fire and air are considered active, while water and earth are passive. In traditional astrology, the fire and air signs, or triplicities as they are called, are of the diurnal sect, while the water and earth triplicities are nocturnal. There's more to this but I'll stop here.) The celestial fold consists of the seven planets in traditional astrology, each of which has its own "crystalline" spheres, as Plato would have it. Finally, we come to the intellectual part of the cosmos. The fixed stars are in the final sphere and is closer to the Form of the Good (which is either a representation of God or God himself). Why are the fixed stars closer to God? Ancient philosophers noted that the things in this world seem rather transient and undergo changes as time passes. A question arose: how can something appears to change and yet be "real"? (Calculus freaks, start ranting now.) Plato explained his solution using the Allegory of the Cave. Briefly, the things we see in this world are just reflections of the things which are more fundamental of the world, and more real. These things which are more "real" and fundamental, are called the Forms or Ideas. They are unchanging, and therefore part of the world which Plato calls "the world of being" (if I remember correctly.) In contrast, the world we see, which is the Earth, is part of the "world of becoming". It still doesn't answer the question, why are fixed stars considered closer to the Good? Well, its name should give it away. The "fixed" part of the stars refers to the fact that their position on the ecliptic (from a geocentric perspective) do not appear to change as time passes. On the other hand, the lights and the planets have erratic movement; their "celestial longitudes", as some call them, change throughout the year. Therefore, Plato concluded that the FIXED stars are closer to the Forms because of their seemingly static position in the sky. On other hand, the wandering stars ("planet" was derived from Greek planetes, meaning wanderer), especially the Moon are closer to the Earth's condition due to their erratic movements. They are closer to the world of becoming. So ascending towards the fixed stars meant getting closer to God and understanding the nature of reality. Okay, that was kind of long, sorry. But why is it called the "intellectual" world? Plato claimed that these Forms cannot be perceived by the senses, and can only be apprehended by reason, in other words, the intellect. So here we have a strong correlation between the three-fold World and the nine spheres. I might be projecting my own thoughts though. This is why I said that the "ascend by the same degrees through each World" may have alluded to the nine spheres. The nine spheres idea may also explain the superior governing the inferior. In this case, the intellectual fold and its influences are the most superior, followed by the celestial influences, then lastly the elemental/natural. Regarding your comment on the body, spirit and mind, Plato and Aristotle had their respective versions. For Plato, it was the Tripartite Theory of the Soul. I don't remember what was Aristotle's version, but he kind of modified his teacher's theory. Anyway, there was this picture that reminds me of the tripartite theory: I think it's similar to the Chariot picture in Tarot. Okay, I'm out. Larxene

Hey guys, I wasn't really concerned about "desecration" or criticisms. I was thinking more in the lines of this: imagine you stopped at page 15. You came back one week or one month later, and you forgot which page you stopped at. Are you going to re-read the 15 pages again? My eyes go X_X when I do that. A temporary solution is to bookmark the page, but there are problems with that as well... Right now it's not a problem because this thread is only 6 pages long. I was thinking about the future, when we have gone through one whole book, and the thread reaches like page 20+. So yeah, like I said, I am just a bit of a neat freak. Ignore my suggestion for now until we've reached at least 20 pages. Larxene

Passages from the book will be in black. My comments are in blue. "CHAPTER 1: How Magicians Collect vertues from the three-fold World, is declared in these three Books." I am not sure if I am just imagining things, but whoever translated this might have used the caps to emphasise certain things in the chapter titles. In modern texts, every word will have capital letters except for things like "a", "an", "the" and so on. One thing to note is the capitalised "World", and the fact that it is singular. Agrippa seems to view the world as one unified thing that is folded into three (different?) layers. "Seeing there is a three-fold World, Elementary, Celestiall, and Intellectual, and every inferior is governed by its superior, and receiveth the influence of the vertues thereof, so that the very original, and chief Worker of all doth by Angels, the Heavens, Stars, Elements, Animals, Plants, Metals, and Stones convey from himself the vertues of his Omnipotency upon us, for whose service he made, and created all these things..." No wonder our grandpas complained about our short attention span; they were reading books like these! Anyway, this quote seems to be saying that there exists a Creator who created the angels, the heavens, the stars, etc. Everything that is "inferior" is "governed by" its superior. But I am not sure what "inferior" and "superior" means, and I don't understand what meaning should we place to the "governed by". It could mean that superior things "manage" inferior ones, like how a supervisor manages his workers...but I have a feeling there is another meaning here. Since every superior governs the inferior, the "vertues" of the former is present in the latter. I take this to mean that the nature or essence of superior things are infused in inferior things. Then, since the Creator created everything, his own essence or nature is contained in every single thing in the World. This makes sense. For example, a meticulous person would create reports that are devoid of spelling errors and are organised neatly. His writing tends to be neat. The way he speaks is careful and somewhat pedantic. Every single thing he does or creates contains his quality in varying degrees. The tricky term here is "vertue". What does this refer to? My interpretation is "essence" or "nature" or "quality", but it is not a dictionary definition. "...Wise men conceive it no way irrationall that it should be possible for us to ascend by the same degrees through each World, to the same very originall World it self, the Maker of all things, and first Cause, from whence all things are, and proceed; and also to enjoy not only these vertues, which are already in the more excellent kind of things, but also besides these, to draw new vertues from above." This might be alluding to the nine spheres (introduced by Plato?). We are in the first sphere, that of the Earth. The next sphere closest to us is that of the Moon. Next is Mercury, Venus, Sun...until Saturn, which is the eighth sphere. The final sphere is the sphere of the fixed stars. The further we move away from Earth, and the closer we are to the fixed star, the more "perfect" we become and the closer we are to God (which may be represented by the Form of the Good). So anyway, Agrippa asserts that it is possible for us to ascend through these spheres and become closer to the Creator, who created all things (here perhaps we see the Christian influence, although Christianity was arguably influenced by earlier Greek philosophies as well). The part in bold reminds me of a certain Christian prayer. The next part I am not so sure. Apparently we can enjoy the "vertues", whatever they are, and we can obtain new "vertues" from above. Perhaps this is talking about magical rituals. The idea that there are some things which are infused with these vertues to a great degree, again, this reminds me of a kind of a Platonic idea. The material world is imperfect and changing, while the Form is more perfect and unchanging. An example would be a chair. A chair can perform its functions (for sitting or standing on, or putting books) for a period of time, after which it may lose its essence. For example, a chair might eventually break. Then it would not be able to perform its functions anymore. This demonstrates the imperfection of matter. Okay, I'll stop here. I still have school work to do . Comments will be appreciated. Larxene

Hi Zhong, I was thinking along the lines of creating a "table of contents" kind of thing at the first page of this thread. It would contain links to the posts regarding specific chapters, and links to specific questions and concepts that are pivotal in learning Agrippa. If you have gone through 30+ pages threads, you will be able to see why this is a good system to have. When we click the title of a thread, it always sends us to the first page, so we can access the table of contents right away. We may also not know which page has the information we need without a table of contents. There are two problems with this. First is that BKA doesn't have the time to do it. The second is that the "table of contents" can get incredibly long, which can be tedious to go through as well, but not as tedious as going through pages of threads. I guess I am just a little OCD about organisation. BKA, This is how I will participate. I will break every chapter down into smaller quotes, and write my interpretations on it. For the sake of keeping things organised, I will post my interpretation on a separate post. Then you guys can comment about whether I am right or wrong, stuff like that. Regards, Larxene

Looks like this will get messy. Michael, I am kinda purist, but it's more like, I want to examine one perspective in great depth before moving to the next perspective. It is like trying to understand a person. From the outside in, we can "understand" what a person is going through, but we may not sympathise with him. To symphathise with him, we need move into his shoes, to "be" like him, to take on his mindset and values. This approach, both outside in and inside out, is richer and more comprehensive. But yeah, I think we'll get along. Hey BKA, I wish I can participate, but right now I'm tied to some $%^&ing assignments. It's partly my fault for leaving them until the last minute... Regards, Larxene

Hello again, BKA. Okay, that sounds about right to me. Don't worry, it happens. I am planning to create a blog specifically for interpreting Agrippa, but I am also being bogged down by school. The link turned up a blank page for me as well. Michael, We'll see what happens. Regards, Larxene

Hey Michael, Sure, but I think I'll use a projector instead. Or a tablet. Regards, Larxene

Hello BKA, I was directed to this thread by Michael Sternbach because I am interested in reading and interpreting Aggripa's Of Occult Philosophy. I have some questions. How is this online book club thing gonna work? Also, where is the link to your blog where you implied you are posting information about Aggripa? Thanks. Regards, Larxene

Thank you, soaring and Chang. Larxene

Hello everyone, My name is Larxene. My main interest is in the occult. I have been directed to this forum by a friend to participate in a particular discussion. Nice to meet you all. Larxene