Theurgia-Goetia, on Gods and Demons

[Zhongyongdaoist]

The post which follows is a reply to a post that appeared in Apech's Ancient Egyptian symbols thread (http://thetaobums.com/topic/26848-ancient-egyptian-symbols/?p=405379). Apech suggested that it be moved and I am copying it here as a new topic, as I mentioned I might in my response to him.

 

It is an attempt to clear up misconception related to gods and demons and the process of demonization that occurred in the Hellenistic period. It deals tangentally with matters of Theurgy and Goetia. There are some interesting cross cultural references in it. If I have time I will endeavor to reply to questions on its content or the content of the posts which it references. Unfortunately because of time constraints, I cannot guarantee a response at all, much less a timely one.

[Zhongyongdaoist]

It is said you can summon some Egyptian deities to physical appearance, as they have been subjugated as some of the Goetia.(http://thetaobums.com/topic/26848-ancient-egyptian-symbols/?p=405379)

 

 

The Gods as the Gods cannot be summoned by Goetia, they can only be invoked by the art of Theurgy which through refining our awareness reveals our fundamental kinship with the Gods and allows us to enter into communion with them. What is evoked by Goetia is a dim and distant reflection, powerful perhaps to achieve certain effects, but dangerous as a ravenous tiger. It is only profound achievement in the art of Theurgy which can allow one to successfully and and safely perform Goetic rites, anything else is “playing with fire”, hellfire.

 

Shortly after I joined Tao Bums I started a series of posts on “Demons” which if reviewed should help to clarify this. I have been experimenting with a way to rescue posts like this so that the most useful material will be available. Here is my guide to these posts.

 

The first post introduces a distinction between Gods and daimones, the conceptual ancestor of demon.

 

http://thetaobums.com/topic/8438-demons/?p=98480

 

The core of the above discussion is this:

 

So what is the relationship between these daimones, good or evil and the Gods, conceived as wholly good? In Plato's Phaidrus Plato describes the Gods as being leaders of a great train of beings ranging down from them to human beings and perhaps lower. The daimones were seen as being follows in the chain of a particular God, just as people were. Philosophers were followers of Zeus, military men of Ares, etc., and so these daimones were also followers of the Gods and partook of their nature just as people did. Thus the ancient myths came to be seen largely as stories of the doings of the daimomes and their interactions with human beings, cacodaimones sending evil dreams and agagthodaimones being the sources of uplifting inspiration and saviors in cases distress.

 

The next section introduces a cross cultural discussion comparing shen and gui with agagthodaimones and cacodaimones.

 

http://thetaobums.com/topic/8438-demons/?p=98573

 

This post expands the distinction between good and evil and even provides a working definition for the notion of “black magic” and by implication of “white”.

 

The next section examines how this conceptual framework is developed during the Hellenistic period culminating in the full classification that Iamblichuse provides in his work on Theurgy, On the Mysteries, and also introduces the mythology of the “fallen” angels, more properly fallen daimones, because angels cannot fall.

 

http://thetaobums.com/topic/8438-demons/?p=98799

 

The most important part of the above post is here:

 

It may come as a surprise to some readers that in my previous post I was referring to Plato at all. At this time Plato is one of the most misunderstood thinkers of all time, and a lot of people who might benefit from studying him don't because they think he is some sort of 4th century BC Immanuel Kant. Well, he's not. John Rist (Eros and Psyche, Toronto University Press 1962) says Plato believed, '(people)...have the potentiality of divinity." and that Plato believed that '(people) can raise themselves to the level of divinity, or rather can "know themselves" to be in a sense already divine" and finally that "Plato's notion of theology is not so much anthropomorhic as his notion of mankind is theomorphic" If you went to a platonic philosopher during the Hellenistic period, it was not to learn to prattle on about this that and the other thing, it was to achieve liberation from the delusion that you were a mere mortal, a humanoid animal and to realize that you were a real partaker in divine nature and in some powerful and profound sense a god. This is what constitutes self-knowledge in real Platonism and was the explicitly stated goal of Platonic study from the First Century BCE to the end of the Hellenistic age, around 500 AD

 

 

The part that I have emphasized being the whole rationale of Theurgy.

 

The next post is something of an introduction to the post that follows it, the really important discussion being there, but it makes more sense if one reads this one first:

 

http://thetaobums.com/topic/8438-demons/?p=98949

 

The next section is extremely important for understanding the demonization of the the daimones. Among other things it points out the importance of the Gnostic sects in the process of demonization.

 

http://thetaobums.com/topic/8438-demons/?p=99106

 

The next section is very important. It is a cross cultural comparison of Plato's Hades as portrayed in the Gorgias, its descendant in the Roman Catholic conception of Purgatory and the Chinese concept of hell.

 

http://thetaobums.com/topic/8438-demons/?p=101119

 

Unfortunately at this time the posts move off in other directions, interesting in themselves perhaps, but not the type of exposition that characterizes the above. Also, I became too busy to finish the exposition as I intended to finish it, but the following does introduce a comparison between “Hell” and Tartarus which is useful, since according to the conjurations of Goetia, it is from Tartarus that the Goetic spirits are summoned.

 

http://thetaobums.com/topic/8438-demons/?p=112448

 

The discussion about light is interesting in itself and is part of the reason that “the light shineth in the darkness, and the darkness apprehended it not.” (John 1:5)

 

I hope that the above material is both interesting and helpful.

 

Finally, thank you Apech for introducing and maintaining such an interesting and stimulating topic. I respect your opinions and find your discussions very suggestive.

[JustARandomPanda]

This thread is so good I'm tempted to pin it even though I typically don't like pins.

[RongzomFan]

I was into western occultism as deeply as anyone reasonably could be. Zhongyongdaoist's viewpoints are not even remotely standard.

 

Read the best translation of the Goetia, and go from there:

 

http://www.amazon.com/Lesser-Key-Solomon-Joseph-Peterson/dp/157863220X

[RongzomFan]

It is only profound achievement in the art of Theurgy which can allow one to successfully and and safely perform Goetic rites, anything else is “playing with fire”, hellfire.

 

Actually its all about following the grimoire as close as possible, including especially the lion skin belt.

[RongzomFan]

some people say you can substitute hart skin for lion skin (based on a different grimoire).

 

but others who claim to have evoked demons to physical appearance say that there is a reason why the goetia only mentions lion skin.

Edited February 18, 2013 by alwayson

[Zhongyongdaoist]

I was into western occultism as deeply as anyone reasonably could be. Zhongyongdaoist's viewpoints are not even remotely standard.

 

Read the best translation of the Goetia, and go from there:

 

http://www.amazon.com/Lesser-Key-Solomon-Joseph-Peterson/dp/157863220X

 

I can only assume that by "standard" you mean the "standard" of Western Occultism. I had read pretty much all the "standard" works of Western Occultism by my early twenties and that was forty years ago. The "standard" to which I now hold myself and have held myself for over thirty years, is the standard of Western Occult Philosophy which is not by any means the same thing as Western Occultism. Western Occultism is a creation of the 19^th Century, further developed in the 20^th. Western Occult Philosophy has its roots in the whole spiritual tradition of the Mediterranean basin and integrated with the Greek Philosophical tradition. Everything that I wrote in my post and the posts that are referred to there is in line with the "standards" of that tradition, which include a respect for scholarship and history which is generally speaking, lacking in Western Occultism. Some "authority" in Western Occultism notices a similarity in a name and maybe even appearance of spirit that appears in a medieval grimoire and an ancient Egyptian God and jumps to the conclusion that they are the same entity. After that it is repeated and repeated until it becomes, well, "standard". That's how Western Occultism works.

 

I am afraid that like Hebrew National, I am answerable to a higher authority, though not the same one.

 

In the first post referred to, I cited Plotinus, Ennead III.4, 'Our Tutelary Spirit', I said see "Philip Merlan's discussion 'Theology and Demonology: Plato and Xenocrates' p.32-36, in The Cambridge History of Later Greek and Early Medieval Philosophy."

 

Perhaps you are one of the people to whom I was referring in my third post for whom it is "a surprise ...I was referring to Plato at all." I don't know why it should be a surprise, Agrippa does it all the time.

 

In the fifth post I refer the reader to "For Hermes Trismegisus and the ancient Theologians; see Frances Yates, Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition, especially the first part.

For the assimilation of the Pagan Gods; see Jean Seznec The Survival of the Pagan Gods and John Block Friedman, Orpheus in the Middle Ages." for more information/confirmation about what I am saying about the early Church and its attitudes about Paganism. I read these books in my mid to late twenties more than 30 years ago, when did you read them?

 

Everything that I wrote in the posts cited is within reasonable lines of interpretation of these and many other books. If you have a specific criticism based on a specific "standard" please post it.

 

Actually its all about following the grimoire as close as possible, including especially the lion skin belt.

 

Regarding your recommendation of Joseph Peterson's edition of the complete Lemegaton, I can only say that I think highly of Peterson and his work in general and for convenience sake often link citations in my post to his site rather than page references of obscure and/or expensive books.

 

Back in 1980 I wrote a detailed analysis of the formal structure of the Lemegaton and compared it to the structure of Enochian Magic. Among other things in it I cited the relationship to Trithemius Steganographia and the inclusion of seals that derive from Paracelsus Archidoxes of Magic and used that, combined with Agrippa's mention of the Pauline Art and the Almadel in his Vanity and Uncertainty of Arts and Sciences to argue for the late composition of the whole text and its possible origin in a group centered on or strongly influenced by Agrippa. What were you doing with magic in 1980?

 

As for the importance of Lion skin belts, I have argued at length for the "occult" virtues of natural things in another series of posts on The Tao Bums all based on Agrippan and Platonic principles. Just off the top of your head, can your explain occult virtues?

 

I don't think anyone should just take a Grimoire and follow it. These books were part of a secret tradition delivered master to disciple and were meant to be accompanied by oral instruction. They are notes and prompts and parts of the tradition and lacking that oral tradition the best that one can do is to study, study, study and then study some more and to practice, starting with the highest levels and only working with the lower ones as one can because it is the higher ones that control the lower ones. Jumping into the Goetia is like someone who finds part of a tattered manual of chemistry and fascinated by the section on explosives proceeds to try to make TNT, not realizing that the third nitration of the toulene occurs above it's boiling point, where the instability causes an instant and naturally devastating explosion. In such a case the best thing that can happen is nothing, but maybe I am just being overly cautious.

[JustARandomPanda]

Zhongyongdaoist...

 

I'm guessing you read Tyson's translation of Agrippa's 3 Books of Occult Philosophy?

 

I'd like to bring a brand new translation to your attention you might find interesting. Apologies if you already have it/read it, etc.

 

Three Books Of Occult Philosophy Book One: A Modern Translation

 

Here's Christopher Warnock's blog post describing this new translation.

[Zhongyongdaoist]

Zhongyongdaoist...

 

I'm guessing you read Tyson's translation of Agrippa's 3 Books of Occult Philosophy?

 

I'd like to bring a brand new translation to your attention you might find interesting. Apologies if you already have it/read it, etc.

 

Three Books Of Occult Philosophy Book One: A Modern Translation

 

Here's Christopher Warnock's blog post describing this new translation.

 

SereneBlue- just a quick note,

 

If by read, you mean cover to cover, no. I had already read others. By the time Tyson's version of J. F.'s translation appeared I had 20 or so years of study of Agrippa behind me and had no need to read it. Refer to it for convenience sake, yes. Despise it for its pretension, yes. Mourn it as a travesty, yes.

 

I have looked into the new translation which you mention here, because you have mentioned it elsewhere and it sounds promising, but I always have misgivings when occultists undertake such tasks. To borrow an issue in Enochian Magical scholarship, do they really understand the differences between "aethers" and "aires" which would have existed in the Renaissance? I am not holding up any hope that they do.

 

I have been familiar with Christopher Warnock's interesting site for many years. I have not paid enough attention to it to know if he has gotten outside the Neo-magical paradigm and into a real understanding of the Occult Philosophy. Still, he seems to be much better than Tyson.

[JustARandomPanda]

I do not know. I am certainly no expert in hermeticism nor occult philosophy. I do know Warnock is a strict adherent to pre-modern astrology. That is...sticking only to the planets visible to the naked eye. I've found his mailing list helpful in seeing deeper aspects of astrology or what not.

[Zhongyongdaoist]

In my post above (http://thetaobums.com/topic/27141-theurgia-goetia-on-gods-and-demons/?p=405624) I referenced Plato's dialogue The Phaedrus and its discussion of great trains of spirits, here is the quote in detail. The fundamental image will be familiar to anyone with a cursory knowledge of the Tarot.

 

Of the nature of the soul, though her true form be ever a theme of large and more than mortal discourse, let me speak briefly, and in a figure. And let the figure be composite-a pair of winged horses and a charioteer. Now the winged horses and the charioteers of the gods are all of them noble and of noble descent, but those of other races are mixed; the human charioteer drives his in a pair; and one of them is noble and of noble breed, and the other is ignoble and of ignoble breed; and the driving of them of necessity gives a great deal of trouble to him. I will endeavour to explain to you in what way the mortal differs from the immortal creature. The soul in her totality has the care of inanimate being everywhere, and traverses the whole heaven in divers forms appearing--when perfect and fully winged she soars upward, and orders the whole world; whereas the imperfect soul, losing her wings and drooping in her flight at last settles on the solid ground-there, finding a home, she receives an earthly frame which appears to be self-moved, but is really moved by her power; and this composition of soul and body is called a living and mortal creature. For immortal no such union can be reasonably believed to be; although fancy, not having seen nor surely known the nature of God, may imagine an immortal creature having both a body and also a soul which are united throughout all time. Let that, however, be as God wills, and be spoken of acceptably to him. And now let us ask the reason why the soul loses her wings!

The wing is the corporeal element which is most akin to the divine, and which by nature tends to soar aloft and carry that which gravitates downwards into the upper region, which is the habitation of the gods. The divine is beauty, wisdom, goodness, and the like; and by these the wing of the soul is nourished, and grows apace; but when fed upon evil and foulness and the opposite of good, wastes and falls away. Zeus, the mighty lord, holding the reins of a winged chariot, leads the way in heaven, ordering all and taking care of all; and there follows him the array of gods and demigods, marshalled in eleven bands; Hestia alone abides at home in the house of heaven; of the rest they who are reckoned among the princely twelve march in their appointed order. They see many blessed sights in the inner heaven, and there are many ways to and fro, along which the blessed gods are passing, every one doing his own work; he may follow who will and can, for jealousy has no place in the celestial choir. But when they go to banquet and festival, then they move up the steep to the top of the vault of heaven. The chariots of the gods in even poise, obeying the rein, glide rapidly; but the others labour, for the vicious steed goes heavily, weighing down the charioteer to the earth when his steed has not been thoroughly trained:-and this is the hour of agony and extremest conflict for the soul. For the immortals, when they are at the end of their course, go forth and stand upon the outside of heaven, and the revolution of the spheres carries them round, and they behold the things beyond. But of the heaven which is above the heavens, what earthly poet ever did or ever will sing worthily? It is such as I will describe; for I must dare to speak the truth, when truth is my theme. There abides the very being with which true knowledge is concerned; the colourless, formless, intangible essence, visible only to mind, the pilot of the soul. The divine intelligence, being nurtured upon mind and pure knowledge, and the intelligence of every soul which is capable of receiving the food proper to it, rejoices at beholding reality, and once more gazing upon truth, is replenished and made glad, until the revolution of the worlds brings her round again to the same place. In the revolution she beholds justice, and temperance, and knowledge absolute, not in the form of generation or of relation, which men call existence, but knowledge absolute in existence absolute; and beholding the other true existences in like manner, and feasting upon them, she passes down into the interior of the heavens and returns home; and there the charioteer putting up his horses at the stall, gives them ambrosia to eat and nectar to drink.

Such is the life of the gods; but of other souls, that which follows God best and is likest to him lifts the head of the charioteer into the outer world, and is carried round in the revolution, troubled indeed by the steeds, and with difficulty beholding true being; while another only rises and falls, and sees, and again fails to see by reason of the unruliness of the steeds. The rest of the souls are also longing after the upper world and they all follow, but not being strong enough they are carried round below the surface, plunging, treading on one another, each striving to be first; and there is confusion and perspiration and the extremity of effort; and many of them are lamed or have their wings broken through the ill-driving of the charioteers; and all of them after a fruitless toil, not having attained to the mysteries of true being, go away, and feed upon opinion. The reason why the souls exhibit this exceeding eagerness to behold the plain of truth is that pasturage is found there, which is suited to the highest part of the soul; and the wing on which the soul soars is nourished with this. And there is a law of Destiny, that the soul which attains any vision of truth in company with a god is preserved from harm until the next period, and if attaining always is always unharmed. But when she is unable to follow, and fails to behold the truth, and through some ill-hap sinks beneath the double load of forgetfulness and vice, and her wings fall from her and she drops to the ground, then the law ordains that this soul shall at her first birth pass, not into any other animal, but only into man; and the soul which has seen most of truth shall come to the birth as a philosopher, or artist, or some musical and loving nature; that which has seen truth in the second degree shall be some righteous king or warrior chief; the soul which is of the third class shall be a politician, or economist, or trader; the fourth shall be lover of gymnastic toils, or a physician; the fifth shall lead the life of a prophet or hierophant; to the sixth the character of poet or some other imitative artist will be assigned; to the seventh the life of an artisan or husbandman; to the eighth that of a sophist or demagogue; to the ninth that of a tyrant-all these are states of probation, in which he who does righteously improves, and he who does unrighteously, improves, and he who does unrighteously, deteriorates his lot (Emphasis mine, ZYD, http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/phaedrus.html)

 

When, back circa 1980, I first started talking to my "Western Occultist" friends about Plato, uniformly they all said, "but Plato was not a mystic" to which I always replied "have you ever actually read any Plato?". Those who were honest immediately replied, "well, no, but everybody knows Plato was no mystic." I challenged them to read certain of the dialogues and see what they thought after actually reading Plato. Everyone who accepted my challenge came back saying "Wow, Plato was a mystic".

 

The above is only a small part of what Plato writes about that influenced "Western Occultism", but is completely unacknowledged. Plato's writings are fundamental to Western Occult Philosophy and it is passages like this that is the reason why Agrippa is constantly referring to Plato, but like Rodney Dangerfield, a comedian popular circa 1980, among "Western Occultists" he still gets no respect.

 

There is another Tarot Trump at least implied in the above quote, perhaps some people might care to speculate about which one it is.

 

Edit: First paragraph was split, corrected that.

Edited February 21, 2013 by Zhongyongdaoist

[Apech]

There is another Tarot Trump at least implied in the above quote, perhaps some people might care to speculate about which one it is.

 

Only one?

[Soothsayer]

This:

 

"the human charioteer drives his in a pair; and one of them is noble and of noble breed, and the other is ignoble and of ignoble breed; and the driving of them of necessity gives a great deal of trouble to him"

 

suggests this:

 

 

 

This:

 

"The soul in her totality has the care of inanimate being everywhere, and traverses the whole heaven in divers forms appearing--when perfect and fully winged she soars upward, and orders the whole world; whereas the imperfect soul, losing her wings and drooping in her flight at last settles on the solid ground-there, finding a home, she receives an earthly frame which appears to be self-moved, but is really moved by her power; and this composition of soul and body is called a living and mortal creature"

 

suggests this:

 

 

 

 

This:

 

"The divine is beauty, wisdom, goodness, and the like; and by these the wing of the soul is nourished, and grows apace; but when fed upon evil and foulness and the opposite of good, wastes and falls away"

 

and this:

 

"The rest of the souls are also longing after the upper world and they all follow, but not being strong enough they are carried round below the surface, plunging, treading on one another, each striving to be first; and there is confusion and perspiration and the extremity of effort; and many of them are lamed or have their wings broken through the ill-driving of the charioteers; and all of them after a fruitless toil, not having attained to the mysteries of true being, go away, and feed upon opinion."

 

suggest this:

 

 

 

This:

 

"There abides the very being with which true knowledge is concerned; the colourless, formless, intangible essence, visible only to mind, the pilot of the soul."

 

possibly this:

 

 

or this:

 

 

 

And this:

 

"For the immortals, when they are at the end of their course, go forth and stand upon the outside of heaven, and the revolution of the spheres carries them round, and they behold the things beyond."

 

suggests this:

 

 

How did I do?

[Apech]

@Soothsayer : some merit in all those I think also saw temperance in there somewhere but can't remember why

[Zhongyongdaoist]

 

There is another Tarot Trump at least implied in the above quote, perhaps some people might care to speculate about which one it is.

 

Only one?

 

I was in a hurry, so I was only thinking of one at the time. As Soothsayer has shown there are a lot of interesting ideas suggested by the quote. If I have time I may come back to this.

 

How did I do?

 

Excellent, though you missed the one that I had in mind. As I was writing, I was struck by how the dynamics depicted in the passage suggested this:

 

 

Though more on the level of the soul than the card itself might indicate which is usually more on the level depicted here:

 

 

Which if you don't know Latin can create confusion like this:

 

 

To avoid which, you should pay particular attention to this:

 

 

For those interested in astrology, this is the origin of the much misunderstood "part of fortune", which was the part of the Moon and did not indicate money or wealth in itself, but rather good or bad fortune depending on whether it was in good aspect or afflicted in a chart.

 

Edit changed "time a may come back" to "time I may come back" in the first sentence. In a hurry again.

Edited February 23, 2013 by Zhongyongdaoist

[Soothsayer]

@Apech, @Zhongyongdaoist - thanks for the postive feedback and apologies for the late response, I've been indisposed of late. Your posts are always stimulating with further lines of enquiry to follow.

It is interesting to note similar themes across the literature. The Chemical Wedding of Christian Rosenkreutz echos the imagery of the parlous state of the wing clipped collective in the Phaedrus:

"For I was yet scarcely fallen asleep, when I thought that I, together with an innumerable multitude of men, lay fettered with great chains in a dark dungeon, in which, without the least glimpse of light, we swarmed like bees one over another, and thus rendered each other's afflicition more grevious."

There is also clear Tarot imagery in the discussion of the Virtues in Porphyry's Launching Points to the Realm of Mind.

: )

[BaguaKicksAss]

Zhongyongdaoist...

 

I'm guessing you read Tyson's translation of Agrippa's 3 Books of Occult Philosophy?

 

I'd like to bring a brand new translation to your attention you might find interesting. Apologies if you already have it/read it, etc.

 

Three Books Of Occult Philosophy Book One: A Modern Translation

 

Here's Christopher Warnock's blog post describing this new translation.

 

This one has been my fave for quite some time: http://archive.org/details/cu31924028928236 from Cornell. Now I'm curious about the Warnock one though.

[BaguaKicksAss]

some people say you can substitute hart skin for lion skin (based on a different grimoire).

 

but others who claim to have evoked demons to physical appearance say that there is a reason why the goetia only mentions lion skin.

 

Bearskin (for example) is good too, for the same reasons lionskin is. Not the only approach though. (source: me, been doing evocation for couple decades, know many others who do too).

[BaguaKicksAss]

..

Edited January 12, 2014 by BaguaKicksAss

[Zhongyongdaoist]

Compared with Enochian? Do you mean the Theurgia Goetia, or the Demonographia bits? I'm curious now!

OK, let me go back to what I wrote in the post to which you are referring, an admittedly terse and not well written passage, and then I will expand on the account, but please be forewarned that that I have posted more in the past few days then in months and am starting to run into the type of time conflicts which I have often mentioned.

Back in 1980 I wrote a detailed analysis of the formal structure of the Lemegaton and compared it to the structure of Enochian Magic. Among other things in it I cited the relationship to Trithemius Steganographia and the inclusion of seals that derive from Paracelsus Archidoxes of Magic and used that, combined with Agrippa's mention of the Pauline Art and the Almadel in his Vanity and Uncertainty of Arts and Sciences to argue for the late composition of the whole text and its possible origin in a group centered on or strongly influenced by Agrippa.

To begin, the piece itself was almost thirty pages long and all that can follow is the barest outline, also while I have copies of it, I am not going to search for them and review them, I will rely on my memory which is of course pretty reliable.

 

First some context, the piece was in reply to an article giving an account of what is usually the third book in the Lemegeton, the Pauline Art. The Pauline Art is a work in two parts dealing with astrological magic. The first part gave a method of calling up the planetary spirits ruling the days of the week and the planetary spirits ruling the hours, the second part was an account of 360 spirits for the 360 degrees of the Zodiac and how if you knew the time of your birth you could call up your guardian spirit, kind of an astrological Holy Guardian Angel. This was all well and good, but the woman author of the piece proceeded to espouse opinions about Medieval and Renaissance magic that just were not correct, characterizing the Middle ages as a period in which superstitious, greedy and lascivious practitioners sought to call up goetic spirits for carnal and material ends and the Renaissance as a period of light, where clear minded Renaissance Magoi sought wisdom from from the Planetary spirits and eschewed all things worldly. Nothing of course could be further from the truth and I proceeded to demonstrate that through suitable arguments and citations.

 

I may have to cut this up into multiple sections, but to begin one thing I cited was the Sworn Book of Honorius a work of the High Middle Ages and whose first operation is the Vision of God. Sounds carnal and greedy doesn't it? One of the things that I point out, and I believe that this was one of the first times that this appeared in print was the similarity to John Dee's Sigillum Dei Aemuth. Even more importantly I point out the passages in the beginning of, If I recall correctly, the Second Book of Mysteries (See Meric Casaubon's True and Faithful Relation of etc., London 1659, and several times reprinted, twice in the 70s alone) where Dee's spiritual informants give the the instructions for this seal and tell him that its geometrical form is to be found in a book in his library, this book may well have been the Sworn Book. This may be one of the earliest times that this connection appeared in print, because the editor of the Heptangle Press printing which I had made no mention of the resemblance and surely would have had he been aware of it.

 

I go on to contrast the Faust legend in the Renaissance and the many Faust books that appeared, forgeries created to meet a demand, basically the Necronomicons of their day. The chief operation of these books was to raise Spanish treasure ships or elevate buried treasure, which meant to locate buried treasure and then conjure the local spirits to bring it to the surface. The point that pious motives existed in the Middles Ages and worldly ones in the Renaissance, I proceeded to an interesting more detailed argument about the Lemegeton and its structure and how it could be be compared to Dee's Enochian Magic, and used as an aid to practicing Agrippan style magic using the principles of Agrippa's Three Books.

 

That however, will have to wait until my next post

[Zhongyongdaoist]

I have felt rushed on these replies because there is a lot to summarize and I know that my schedule can suddenly become so busy that I may not be able to reply for weeks to months. This has already lead me to one mistake. In the previous post I had referenced the True and Faithful Revelation for the information that Dee's spiritual informants referred him to a work in his own library which may have been the Sworn Book of Honorius. The real reference would be to the Sloane Manuscript that had Dee's first five books of Mysteries in them. In these days when everything is just a google query away, you can look it up yourself.

In the late 70s when I was trying to learn everything I could about this system, it was not easy. Then it required contact with the British Library and microfilms, which are a good deal more cumbersome that today's CD-rom compilations. I had gone as far as I could go at the time, having two copies of the True and Faithful Relation and even a very difficult to obtain copy of the Golden Dawn's Liber H, which was the basis of their Adeptus Minor instructions. Whatever the value of the obviously anachronistic aspects of the Golden Dawn's adaptation of original material, such as the use of Egyptian gods, I had already noticed some differences between what was recorded in the True and Faithful Relation and the Golden Dawn material and that these discrepancies originated in the Liber H. When a friend who could present the necessary academic credentials said that he was visiting London and would be happy to procure for me the necessary microfilms of the material I did not have, I jumped at the chance. Between Charlotte Fell Smith's 1906 biography of John Dee and Peter French's book, at that time at least, a more contemporary study, I had a fair idea of the shopping list to give him. He came back with a wonderful tale of how amazing it was to actually look at the original diaries of John Dee and the information that a microfilm would soon be arriving from the British Library with everything that I had wanted except for one work which was being rebound at the time. Few people reading this will ever have experienced the frustrations involved in dealing with microfilm, not the least of which is having to go to a library to use a microfilm reader. Some of these readers could print out hard copy of what you were looking at, but it was poor quality, not large enough and expensive by the standard of the time.

These difficulties and the fact that, while interesting in themselves, the references that I got from Charlotte Fell Smith's Dee biography that did not duplicate those from Peter French's book, were not useful, being a few pages from the Dee material here, something from the Goetia there, interspersed between material that was largely medical in nature, implying that the text was that of a doctor. All this taken together was frustrating because one still had to go through it, like an old fashioned tape player where you had to listen to a song you didn't want in order to get to one you did.

So I decided to bite the bullet and have the most useful material printed up, which cost about $200.00, at least a thousand in modern dollars, probably much more, but it was worthwhile, I could now flip through a stack of tabloid size sheets about 3 inches thick and have things more or less at my finger tips. I won't bore you with all the details, like learning the “Secretary hand”, an obsolete script in which Dee wrote and studying Josten's six volume biography of Elias Ashmole, etc., but I definitely delved deep into detail, form and structure, which is why in 1980, I was in an excellent position to compare the structure of the Lemegeton with the structure of Enochian magic in its true and complete form, but an account of that, will have to be next time.

[BaguaKicksAss]

I remember about only 10 years ago some of us ordered a set of the microfilm from the British library. Back then you couldn't find them online or in digital from the British library yet (as you likely know). It cost about $500 from what I recall. You wouldn't beleive our excitement when they finally came in the mail! As soon as they arrived we headed over to the local university library to view them on their microfilm readers there . It was pretty exciting to see Dee's actual handwriting!

 

Of course now they are all digital and fairly easy to come by, and as you mentioned the 5 books of mystery. Now my copy of True and Faithful I didn't get until about 1992. Boy did I have to save up for that one, and have it special ordered.

 

When I started Enochian I was using the Golden Dawn version as that is what was readily available. Then I fortunately ran into someone who had been practicing it for about 20 years at least already. I set about making the tools after that.

 

Considering how difficult it was for me to find information in 1990, I can only imagine how difficult it was to find anything back in the 70's!

 

Have you also looked into the various manuscripts of the Theurgia? Some very interesting stuff in there; not all published.

[Zhongyongdaoist]

Have you also looked into the various manuscripts of the Theurgia?

 

If you mean by “Theurgia” the Theurgia-Goetia in the Lemegetaon, no, but then the Dee material was my only attempt to procure manuscript material anyway. My purpose with the Dee material was to answer certain questions which could not be answered without it. I did however remain interested in Trithemius' Steganographia, in part because of the fact that of the arguments I proposed in this 1980 piece, the one relating Trithemius with with the Theurgia-Goetia was the weakest and also because there were aspects of the text and the technique which have relevance to to higher levels of what I call magical systemics then I am about to discuss here.

 

Some may wonder, "what is magical systemics?" Well, it is the study, analysis and comparison of magical systems with the view to understanding their form and structure. This is no idle curiosity, the aim is to learn how to create magical systems. Now creating magical systems is not to be confused with “making them up”, the creation of a magical system involves the creation of a well formed, that is coherent symbol system that so accurately reflects the structure of the cosmos that it effectively mediates the power of the cosmos. The keys to it are all in Agrippa, but I am not saying anything more on the subject.

 

Now to get back to my 1980 piece. In the post that began this exposition, I cited counter examples to the author's thesis about the Middle Ages and Renaissance. I wanted to strengthen my position with another argument. I realized that if it could be shown that a group of Renaissance magicians valued that "demonic travesty" the Goetia so much that they would use it as part of their own system, then my point would be even more strongly reinforced. The irony is that the Lemegeton from which the author to whom I was replying had taken the Pauline Art as an example of "enlightened" Renaissance Magic, appeared to be just such a text

 

Enochian Magic entered the picture because it can be argued that formally, that is in terms of its form and structure, it is a nearly perfect system, representing as it does every important aspect of the Cosmos as conceived of in the Renaissance. On the surface the Lemegeton seems to be a rather haphazard affair, but if I could show that there really was a reason why these texts were assembled, that each contributed to a larger whole then, I could argue that the person or persons who brought it together had a reason for including each book.

 

So, I had to examine and if possible prove several things, at least the follwoing and maybe more:

 

That the Lemegeton was assembled in the Renaissance

 

That it met the criteria of a magical system, though not a well formed one such as Enochian, because the individual texts are not as coherent as Enochian or as well interrelated.

 

Finally as I looked at what was available to me I realized that it was possible to fix a likely source for the Lemegeton, existing in its present form as centered around Cornelius Agrippa, either as a direct group of students around him or as a group inspired by his writings.

 

I will examine these in upcoming posts, but one of them the relative lateness of the Lemegeton, is generally agreed upon with few surviving manuscripts before the late 1500s. Arguing from earliest surviving manuscripts is not proof, but this was the case when I wrote and as far as I can tell, this remains the case.

 

More next time.

[BaguaKicksAss]

Busy busy work day, so I will reply more later, after I've had the time to properly re-read over your reply and put some thought into it .

 

I just wanted to say.... and to think, that several of the Enochian dairy notes were either lost during the fire, or used to wrap pies and fish with!

 

Those 49X49 tables still elude me, even with much discussion about them with the Enochian entities.

[Zhongyongdaoist]

I am sorry for the delay in getting this post up, this last weekend was much more hectic than I thought and gave me little time to work on or think about these posts. Being pressed for time I forgot to mention in my last post as a matter of comparison to what BaquoKicksAss mentioned about how much she and her friends had paid a decade or so ago, that circa 1977 or 78 my friend paid about $100.00 for the British Library microfilms that were to prove so interesting.

 

So let's look at the parts of Enochian Magic and see how they relate to the structure of the cosmos as conceived of in the Renaissance.

 

The highest level is represented by Dee's Sigillum Dei Aemuth, which as you may recall from a previous post probably corresponds to the Seal of God that is used to achieve the vision of the God in the Sworn Book of Honorius. It is largely formed from names of the Angels of the seven planets, which in turn yield other names, etc. This corresponds to the divine hierarchy and to the Super Celestial world.

 

Next is the Tabula Bonorum (Table of the Good) and its forty-nine spirits which are assigned the days of the week and represents the powers of the planets as they relate to and affect the earth. This would be where one would to practical Astrological Magic, it corresponds to the astrological magic of the Sworn Book, which is similar to the Magical Elements attributed to Peter D'Abano.

 

Next is the Four Watchtowers and the Fifth Table of Union. The Watchtowers are interpreted two ways, if they are read one way the yield the names of the ninety-one Governors of the Thirty Aires, which are each seven letters long and are arranged into a pattern which is the seal that calls them. They are attributed to the signs of the Zodiac and here we have a type of magic which deals with the distribution of the planetary energies throughout the world, through power of the Zodiac.

 

Interpret the tables another way as a series of crosses which define squares or lesser angles within the watchtowers and you have the names of a large number of spirits who rule the elements. The Heptangle Books edition of the Sworn Book did start to introduce an account of Elemental Spirits and the rites for summoning them, but the manuscripts from which it was compiled and translated did not have that section complete, so the editor added some invocations and Conjurations from other sources.

 

Finally are a number of evil spirits whose names can be derived from the lowest division of the Watchtowers themselves. Each of them are made up from two of the four letters that define the names of the good spirits of who are beneath the Cross in each lesser angle.

 

I am sorry that the above must seem confusing to someone not familiar with the material and without illustrations. Off hand I don't know of any web sites that have a more detailed account of this material and as I am pressed for time I am not going to go look for one. My only intent here is to outline the big picture as it were, and show how perfectly it corresponds to the Renaissance worldview. The above hardly does justice to the intricate way in which the various parts of the system interlock.

 

If you have been paying attention you will see that the Enochian System has some overlaps with aspects of the Sworn Book of Honorius. This in itself is interesting because the Sworn Book is definitely a Medieval system. So it was to this Enochian System onto which I chose to map the books of the Lemegeton to show how the four or in some manuscripts, five books of the Lemegeton could have been chosen by Renaissance magicians to meet their needs in practicing the various disciplines of magic as conceived of in the Renaissance.

 

That will have to wait until next time though, when I hope to draw this account of my article to a close.