Dragobete – The Day When The Birds Are Betrothed

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Next on our journey in Romanian lore is a wonderful celebration of love that I am happy to be able to share with you. It’s a very endearing celebration that has always fascinated me and that I have always enjoyed myself. And no, it’s not Valentine’s Day. Spring is all about love, mating, breeding, fertility, abundance, reawakening, renewal – you get the picture. In Romanian folklore, the beginning of the love season starts with the celebration of Dragobete.

Dragobete is an old Dacian deity that in some depictions has the appearance of a satyr. He was worshiped in February, the month of Fertility. Some linguists suggest that Dragobete means “drunk with love”, which makes sense when you think about it. In Romanian, “drago” comes from the word “dragoste” which means love and “bete” comes from the word “beat” which means “drunk”.

Dragobete has ancient roots that have yet to be explored in more depth, but he is still celebrated as a young god, patron of love and joy, who is associated with Cupid and Eros. In the minds of many, he is the Romanian version of Valentine’s day. Both Dragobete and Valentine’s Day originate from Lupercalia, a pre-Roman festival of fertility celebrated in mid-February.

While Valentine’s is a Christian product, Dragobete is inherited from the Dacians and the Romans. As opposed to its more famous counterpart which celebrates a sanitized form of love, Dragobete celebrates love in the purest form by preserving man’s primeval bond with Nature.

Dragobete is also known as the Dashing or the Betrothed of Birds. He is young, handsome, strong, and he brings love and joy to both men and animals. He is the son of Baba Dochia (Old Dokia) and the brother in law of the hero Lăzărel. His mother is the symbol of the end of a harsh winter, while he is the symbol of spring and renewal.

Flames of a Bonfire- macro
Originating in the Daco-Thracian ritual of the Sacred Fire, the ceremonial bonfires lit throughout the year have various meanings for Romanians. On the day of Dragobete, the Fire becomes a symbolic incineration of the Winter Spirit and a rekindling of Nature and fertility.

He is celebrated around the Spring Equinox and Baba Dochia’s days, on February 24th, also known as the day when the birds are betrothed, which is believed to be the most fertile day among birds. This celebration of fertility is a symbol of the marriage between man and nature and their resurrection to life. The tradition is for both boys and girls to put on their best clothes and meet at a sacred place in the village. Then they go in pairs in forests and gather spring flowers, such as snowdrops and violets.

During the day, they gather on the hills in the village and they light bonfires. The sit around the fire telling jokes and stories. They return to the village running, as the boys chase the girls they like, and the girls play hard to catch. This tradition is known as “Flying” and the young man has to be quick enough to catch the girl dear to him in order to kiss her. This tradition gave birth to the common expression: “Dragobetele kisses the girls”.

The kiss which is witnessed by the other villagers marks the engagement of the young pair for the year to come. That’s why many young couples used this opportunity to reveal their relationship to the rest of the village and have it acknowledged. So yes, on Dragobete’s day love is in the air, but lovebirds are not the only ones enjoying the magical powers of the day.

Friends use this opportunity to become blood brothers or blood sisters. They lightly carve the shape of a cross on their arms and overlap their cuts to bind themselves with blood. While the blood ritual was very common in the past, nowadays this is practiced through hugs, fraternal kisses, and vows of loyalty. Unlike many other celebrations of the old age, sacrifice was and still is forbidden on this day.

Snow water - collected in Transylvania during the Dragobete holiday
Snow water derived from snow collected the night before Dragobete is also called sometimes “the snow of the faeries” and has special magickal powers. 

Animal sacrifice is a great insult to the young god. It would greatly upset him, as the purpose of his celebration is to nurture the animal kingdom and bring forth fertility and abundance in the natural world. The young ladies who are not yet married, use the magical powers of this day to gather snow left from the night before, also called “the snow of the faeries”, and they use the melted snow throughout the rest of the year in beauty rituals and love spells.

Dragobete is also very protective of women, so it is common sense that on this day women are to be respected and appreciated. If anyone upsets a woman on this sacred day, they will be cursed with bad luck for the rest of the year by Dragobete himself. That’s why young people celebrate the day by telling jokes, laughing, and enjoying each other’s company. And because of that, the love god will keep them in love for the rest of the year.

The god also appreciates those who offer bouquets of snowdrops and violets to their dear ones. Those who pick their own bouquets or receive them from their loved ones, keep them for the rest of the year next to their icons or on their altars. They use them throughout the year for love charms, beauty rituals, and love spells.

One of the most popular traditions for Dragobete is a divination spell that is still practiced today and is very similar to that of the Epiphany Night. Young women who are eager to find out the identity of their betrothed put holy basil under their pillows and ask Dragobete to help them find their true love. The god will reveal their true love’s identity within a dream they will have that night.

To this day, being kissed on Dragobete’s day is considered to be lucky and powerful. It is believed that if no one kisses you on Dragobete’s day, you will be single for the rest of the year. That is why many girls hope and even wish to receive a kiss.

On this day, when Dragobete releases the tongues of birds so that they can sing again and mate, nature is rekindled and mankind rejoices. Because of that, it is one of my favorite ancient celebrations of fertility that has survived to this day.

Antoine-Joseph Pernety, The Illuminates of Avignon and the Quest for the Philosopher’s Stone

The Great Work - Illustration for Dom Pernety's book "Dictionnaire Mytho Hermétique"
The Great Work – Illustration in Dom Pernety’s “Dictionnaire Mytho Hermétique”, a seldom remembered book with enormous impact on alchemy and hermetic philosophy

“Adepts do not run after gold and silver” wrote French polymath Dom Pernety more than 300 years ago, referring to a legend popular in alchemy set in the 7th century. King Calid, the Latin name for Umayyad prince Khalid ibn Yazid, “found many books which treated of Hermetic Science, and being able to comprehend nothing of them, offered a great reward to him who would explain them… The charms of this reward brought to him many souffleurs.”

“Then Morien, the Hermit, [also Morienus, the Greek, sometimes Marianos Romanos. A Christian mystic and according to Michael Maier one of the great alchemists; comment by Nettle] departed from his desert attracted not by the promised recompense, but by the desire of manifesting the power of God, and of showing how wonderful He is in all His works. He found Calid, and demanded as the others a suitable place to work, in order to prove, by his works, the truth of his words. Morien, having finished his operations, left the Perfect Stone in a vase around which he wrote: Those who have all that is necessary for them, have need neither of recompense nor of the aid of others. He then departed without saying a word, and returned to his solitude. Calid having found this vase, and having read the writing, understood well what it signified, and after having tested the Powder, he banished, or put to death, all those who had wished to deceive him.”

Dom Pernety reassures us that “this Stone is the center and source of virtues, since those who possess it scorn all the vanities of the world, vain glory, ambition; since they esteem gold no more than sand or dust”. Moreover, “Hermetic Philosophy is therefore, the school of piety and religion.”

It comes as no surprise that the story was re-told at a time when Alchemy in Europe was already under attack by sceptics – it seems that the golden days of old used to be better than the present and that the Europe of the 18th century was no exceptions for this rule, at least for alchemists. It also comes at no surprise that the feather who wrote these pious words was guided by the hands of a monk. A Benedictine monk, who was born today, 302 years ago at the dawn of the early 18th century on the 23rd of February, 1716 under the sign of Pisces, in Roanne, France, baptized Antoine-Joseph Pernety. During his lifetime he became known as Dom Pernety and would become one of the most influential occultists of the western hemisphere in the last centuries – if we judge by the impact his work had.

Likewise, the story reads as an allegory on Dom Antoine-Joseph Pernety himself, his life and his work: leaving the silence of his Monastery not earlier than at the age of 50 after decades of deep study and contemplation, Dom added value, wherever he went and initiated deep change and transformation wherever he decided to activate – both to last for the centuries to come.  But he did it so gentle, so quiet that he always managed to leave the scene as quickly and unobserved as he had entered it in the first place – no matter how much he had stood in the spotlight in between.

Masonry owes him new rites – some of them, such as one of the highest degrees of the Scottish rite, have repercussions until today – and especially the deep carving of hermetic thought and alchemical symbolism into the stone of masonry. And while he prepared the ground for his teachings on masonry, he also seemed involved in the building of inner schools – or as it may be described: hermetic orders with Masonic rituals.

For alchemical students (two of) his works are an essential read until today.

Abbey of Saint Germain des Prés in Paris
Abbey of Saint Germain des Prés in Paris, the main chapter of the Saint-Maur Congregation, in which’s library Pernety studied many of the old hermetic texts. Image: 2014 by David McSpadden

However, at the beginning of all work stood a long phase of learning and contemplation. At the age of about 17 he joined the Benedictines in the congregation of Saint-Maur. The Benedictines an order known for their „Ora et labora et lege“; Latin for “pray, work and read” and the congregation of Saint-Maur was renown in particular for their high level of scholarship. Thus, it was seemingly the right climate for polymath Pernety and his various interests, among them what we call today science and study of nature. The first book he published, was a translation of a German mathematical textbook at the age of 27. He published several other books, for example a manual for Benedictine monks in 1755, he wrote on art, the Americas, the human physiognomy and as a naturalist on the journey to the Falkland Islands. But his main concern was the great work, i.e. Alchemy.

At the age of 42, in 1758 he defined alchemy as “science and art of making a fermentative powder, which transmutes the imperfect metals into gold, and which is a useful universal remedy for all the natural illnesses of man, of animals and of plants” (Dictionnaire Mytho-Hermetique, reprint from 1980).

Dictionnaire mytho-hermétique Dom Pernety from 1758
The Dictionnaire Mytho-Hermétique by Dom Pernety from 1758

A careful study and patient comparison built the outstanding foundation for Pernety’s teachings. Being widely-read in hermetic literature, Pernety does not only excel by collecting, systematizing and developing former materials further (especially D’Espagnet and Maier he held in the highest esteem) and contributing with a large body of his own commentary on the great work. But also by serving as an invaluable prime source for recommendations on what to read (or not). D’Espagnet, Hermes, Morienus, Lull and Michael Maier are recommended, however: “Most of the works of Raimundus Lullius, not here mentioned, are worse than useless” instructs Pernety.

However, overall the Dom is an integrative thinker, who prefers to stress similarities and makes this even a method: “All real Adepts speak with one voice … Egyptians, Arabs, Chinese, Greeks, Jews, Italians, Germans, Americans, French, English, etc. have agreed, without knowing each other… Does not this conformity of ideas and principles form, at least a presumption in favor of the truth and reality of what they teach?”

List of Works Called Upon by Perenety

  • Hermes, Egyptian;
  • Abraham, Isaac de Moiros, Jews, quoted by Avicenna;
  • Democritus, Orpheus, Aristotle, (De Secretis Secretorum), Olympiodoros, HeIiodorus (De rebus chemicis ad Theodosium Imperatorem), Etienne, (De magna et sacra scientia, ad Heraclium Coesarem) and other Greeks;
  • Synesius, Theophilus, Abugazal, etc., Africans;
  • Avicenna, (De re recta. Tractatulus Chemicus. Tractatus ad Assem Philosophum. De anima artis) Rhasis, Geber, Artephius, Alphidius, Hamuel, surnamed the Elder, Rosinus, Arabs;
  • Albertus Magnus, (De Alchymia, Concordantia Philosophorum; De Compositione Compositi, etc.), Bernard Trévisan, Basil Valentin, Germans;
  • Alain (Liber Chemicoe), Isaac, father and son, Pontanus, Flemish or Dutch;
  • Arnaud de Villeneuve, Nicolas Flamel, Denis Zachaire, Christophe Parisien, Gui de Montanor, d’Espagnet, French;
  • Morien, Pierre Bon de Ferrare, the anonymous author of the “Marriage of the Sun and the Moon, Italians;
  • Raymond Lully, Spanish; Roger Bacon, (Speculum Alchemioe), Hortulain, Jean Dastin, Richard, George Ripley, Thomas Norton, Philalethes and the Cosmopolite, English or Scotch.
  • Finally, many anonymous authors, (Turba Philosophorum, Seu Codex veritatis, Clangor Buccinoe, Scala Philosophorum, Aurora consurgens, Ludus puerorum, Thesaurus Philosophioe, etc.)

This list is far from being complete, even though it seems to be a list of essentials or favorites Pernety calls witness in his Treatise to prove the similarities in thought between apparently unrelated authors

Overall, to Pernety it seems, that all these authors and many more agree in principle. This, however, doesn’t make him shy of conflict where it seems necessary to him. We are nowadays used to a constellation in which science attacks alchemy and the relatively large amount of space Pernety devotes to gathering witnesses and to prove the validity of his subject suggests, that this was also a common case back then. But on the contrary, rather than defending alchemy he prefers to attack modern “chemistry”, which in his eyes, is unable and unworthy to perceive the secrets of nature, and which only with violence and force is able to achieve − questionable − results.

He regards timeless wisdom as it is to be found in Hermetics, unchanged over millennia, higher than the quest for progress of the “common Philosophers or Physicists … The latter have no certain system. They invent new ones daily, and the last seems to be conceived only to contradict and destroy those that have preceded it. Briefly, if one is erected and established, it is upon the ruins of its predecessor, and it will exist only until a new one overthrows it and takes its place”.

The undeniable results of this new, positive scientific approach are viewed with caution:

“working blindly, without knowing what the result would be, they have seen monsters arise; and… the same work repeated, (they) have given exactly the same result; but they have not observed that this result was monstrous… analogous only to the abnormal productions of Nature”.

The alchemical/hermetical worker, on the other hand, can serve here as a positive example: “without employing so many vases, without consuming so much charcoal, without ruining one’s purse and one’s health, one may, I repeat, work in concert with Nature, who, being aided, will lend herself to the desires of the Artist and will freely open to him her treasures”.

Pollution caused by inorganic compounds. Plastic waste at the sea.
Pernety: ” [the] result was monstrous… analogous only to the abnormal productions of Nature”. Image: Pollution caused by inorganic compounds. License Creative commons. In this light, Pernety’s critic of chemistry does not seem to be founded in him being unaware of it’s benefits, but rather of being aware of it’s unintended consequences.
It should be underlined here, that these are not the words of a reactionist, unable to cope with progress and filled with bitterness about being marginalized, but rather the prophetic vision of someone, who was not only at the current state of the science and – when he wanted in the very center of society, arts, science and religion –, but one of those few driving and expanding the current state of the science in a manner, only a handful in each generation can hope to achieve. If one really thinks through Pernety’s words one cannot but acknowledge, that the enormous, unpreceded and irreversible damages to nature of the last centuries proved Pernety quite right, following a remark my friend Azatoth made just 4 days ago.

Monte Video - a map and account by Antoine-Joseph Pernety
Monte Video – a map and account by Antoine-Joseph Pernety

Anyways, in 1763, Dom Pernety joined the expedition under Louis Antoine de Bougainville that established the Port Saint Louis settlement in the Falkland Islands, which lead him to write and publish his two-volume report of his exploration in the Falklands and Santa Catarina, accompanied by the first description of the Falklands stone runs phenomenon (French: Journal historique d’un voyage fait aux îles Malouines en 1763 et 1764 pour les reconnoître et y former un établissement et de deux voyages au détroit de Magellan avec une relation sur les Patagons).

Drawings by Dom Pernety of the fauna encountered on the journey to the Falkland Island
Drawings by Dom Pernety of the fauna encountered on the journey to the Falkland Islands and to Santa Catarina

Maybe it was this travel, which made him realize the boundaries of his monastery, maybe he had found in the meantime what he had searched for and was now ready to share it with others, maybe he just felt that he needed more companions and a different environment for the second part of his quest for the red lion. Certain is, that in 1965 he left the monastery for good, but kept “Dom Pernety” as reference and never gave up on his deep Christian belief, which, obviously, never prevented him to search for the truth in the ancient classics (such as the pagan Egypt, Greece and Rome) and other, not only European sources. He would find masonry as a fruitful soil for his thoughts to plant, and a large part of his followers he recruited exactly here: among the freemasons.

Freemason symbolism: Sun, Moon and the Eye of Providence
Typical Freemason symbolism: Sun and Moon and the Eye of Providence. Sometimes, a flaming star is used instead of the eye: all three are attributed to the three pillars. In Pernety’s version, the word Force appeared on the flaming star and represented “black matter” – the first alchemical process called “putrefaction. “Wisdom”, was the inscription in the moon and the symbol for the “white matter” or the process of “purification”. Finally, “Beauty”, would be inscribed in the sun, representing the final stage, the “red matter”.

He settled at Avignon. Where he soon became involved in masonry and he founded his first “Rite Hermetique”, or sometimes “Rite de Pernety” in six steps of initiation, in which the Masonic symbolism was resolved in alchemical explanations.

  • Vrai maçon,
  • Vrai maçon dans la voie droite,
  • 3 Chevalier de la Clef-d’Or,
  • Chevalier de l’Iris,
  • Chevalier des Argonautes,
  • Chev. de la Toison-d’Or

Later, he would add a seventh grade – the Chevalier du Soleil or “Knight of the Sun” – as a complete hermetic initiation. As vibrant as Avignon was for Pernety, the papal bull against masonry was enforceable and consequently, Pernety was forced to move on.

Tadeusz Grabianka - The Polish Count - Portrait
Tadeusz Grabianka – “The Polish Count” – Mystic and alchemist, co-founder of the Illuminates of Avignon

In Berlin the Dom was appointed as curator of the Royal Library to the Francophile King Frederick (II) the Great of Prussia, who also made Pernety a member of the Royal Academy of Berlin. Soon Pernety was again in the middle of the occult circles of the city with a small, but select audience, and furthermore, he started to translate the works of the Swedish scientist and philosopher, Emanuel Swedenborg, into French. Pernety founded the Illuminates of Berlin and was guided by an angel named Assadai on his quest for the philosopher’s stone. Around this time, he also met Thaddeus Leszczy Grabianka, often just named “the Polish Count” who shared Pernety’s interest in Swedenborgianism.

Château du Mont-Thabor in Bédarrides, near Avignon
Château du Mont-Thabor in Bédarrides, near Avignon

In 1784, Pernety returned upon Assadai’s advice to Avignon. Another take on Pernety’s leave was, that Frederick II started to disapprove the Illuminates’ missionary activities. Back in France the Dom founded the Les Illuminés d’Avignon – the Illuminates of Avignon – or sometimes Illuminés du Mont-Thabor, named after the premise where he was the permanent guest of a friend, the French Nobleman Marquis Vaucroze. As Mont-Thabor did not fell into the jurisdiction of the pope, the papal bull was not enforceable and soon hundreds of masons would gather around Pernety and his lectures. Grabianka followed soon after, but not before paying a visit to the Swedenborgians in London. Still deeply influenced by Christianity, their doctrines were a mixture of Swedenborgianism, Roman Catholicism, and occultism.

Hotel de la Bastide in Avignon - here found Pernety a new place in the aftermath of the french revolution and allegedly died on the 16th of October 1796
Hotel de la Bastide in Avignon – here found Pernety a new place in the aftermath of the French revolution and allegedly died on the 16th of October 1796. Image: Creative Commons.

The Illuminates were dispersed in the aftermath of the French Revolution due to the Republican Terror. Pernety himself was shortly arrested, but soon set free again upon the intervention of French politician François Poultier. Dom remained the guest of lawyer Vincent-Xavier Gasqui, finding a new stay in the formers “Hôtel de Gasqui”, where is said to have died on the 16th of October of 1796.

Things had changed without Pernety. In 1799 Grabianka closed the temple in Avignon with its remaining 15 members and moved to St. Petersburg in Russia, where the society revived as the “Grabianka Society” for a short time (about 1805-1808) and with a somewhat different program, until it was forced to close by the authorities.

The Scottish rite remained relevant until the early 20th century and many elements have been preserved with the Martinists. According to A.E. Waite Antoine Joseph Pernety “died in the Dauphiny about 1800 or 1801” (A.E Waite – The Secret Tradition In Freemasonry Vol 2) and sometimes even different dates have been named. But you may also find someone to testify, that the last time he met the Dom, the latter has been quite alive and well. Not to bad a legend for an alchemist.

The Asgtronomical Clock in Venice - St. Marks
Pernety related each alchemical process to a sign of the Zodiac: 1. process of Calcination – Aries, 2. Congelation – Taurus, 3. Fixation – Gemini, 4. Solution – Cancer, 5. Digestion – Leo, 6. Distillation – Virgo, 7. Sublimation – Libra, 8. Separation – Scorpio, 9. Ceration – Sagittarius, 10. Fermentation – Capricornis, 11. Multiplication – Aquarius, 12. Projection Pisces. Image: Astronomical Clock in V3nice, St. Marks. Creative Commons.
Nettlesgarden - The Old Craft
www.Nettlesgarden.com – The Old Craft

Frater Ipafs on the Golden Dawn and Occult Discipline

Frater Ifpas - on Instagram "this_occult_life" in black altar robe with hexagram
Frater Ifpas – on Instagram “this_occult_life” in altar robe

I first noticed Frater Ipafs one year ago on Instagram and started following his quite unique feed, which gives rare and open insights into his strict discipline, rigorous studies and practice of ceremonial magick, deeply rooted in the Golden Dawn tradition. We occasionally had a small chat on Instagram and at the beginning of the year, I invited him to an interview on the new to be made Nettle blog. Fortunately, he agreed, as he recently slowed down his activity there, in favor of a new blog project (work in progress – fireandlux.com) … 

Alexander: Frater Ipafs, great to have you here! I am glad you took the time to speak with me today about Instagram, ceremonial magick, and especially: You. But I also want to give our conversation today a theme or frame: how to integrate occult practice into everyday life and routines – That would be a very interesting thing.

Let me explain the background and meaning of this question: I was just having a conversation with a friend yesterday, how the Occult scene and people in it have changed over the course of the years, compared to the, let’s say the 70s or 80s. My conclusion was that one the one hand, we have more access to occult information and communities than ever, on the other hand, the time we actually have to practice the craft shrank, due to modern working conditions and frequent interruptions through technology. Then, today, I was reading on WildHunt.org that a large spiritual center was selling its premises and lands – The Light Haven. The reasons stated: changes in economics and lifestyle – people (have) work more and are less available to learn every weekend focused within a community. Maybe they do it more on their own.

“Very few people develop the capacity for actually producing results in ritual – without that discipline, they usually remain ‘armchair occultists’…”

Frater Ipafs: I always enjoy a good theme! I’d be interested in hearing your experiences throughout the 80s and 90s within the world of occultism – I’m disappointed that I wasn’t yet alive to have experienced them to any real measure. I have heard of other centers/chapters/lodges closing due to a lack of resources. There isn’t often a demand for such places these days, and because very few people are sincere in their practice, they aren’t able to develop the capacity for actually producing results in ritual – without that discipline, they usually remain “armchair occultists.” Therefore, they often end their journey before it ever begins.

Many people, particularly of my generation and younger (and specifically in the USA), are barely taught any skills within the realm of citizenship. Civil services aren’t very well-understood, and proposing ideas to a city (such as in a town meeting,etc.) are skills that escape the majority of my peers. Civil disobedience is not taught, therefore all of our protests are almost instantly violent. And it seems to be engineered on a greater scale.

However, back to my point, most young magicians/witches/etc would not know where to begin in locating, contacting, and much less participating with any sort of metaphysical group or community, because they often lack such basic social skills within the context of their society. The popularity of such groups as the OTO abounds online, but they have only a handful of members that actually attend any of their services. You’ll meet many “Thelemites,” but they are almost always never formally initiated.

Alexander: Spot on, regarding the discipline. This is exactly an observation I made quite often. As in any craft, a certain degree of skill requires practice, no matter how much talent birth has endowed you with. That is as true for magick as it is for ballet, martial arts or the road to enlightenment, just to bring our Eastern counterparts into the equation.

Regarding the 80s and before – I was a kid back then, being born in ’78, but I remember the generations before quite well – starting to work in an occult bookstore since the early 90s I was exactly between these generations of occultists which have grown up before and after the digital revolution. Anyways, my main point is that back then many people could live well enough from one job: that for most of them this job ended in the afternoon (and not in the evening) and that with the lack of modern technology people were more likely to have the time and silence it takes to deeply study a book without interruption and to exercise at least an hour or two a day, without being disturbed… 

“I’d estimate I spend (consciously) 5 hours of each day devoting myself to the Great Work”

But let’s talk about ourselves, and mainly you. You have a quite rigid discipline and routine and even start at five o’clock in the morning. How much time per day do you devote to the great work?

Frater Ipafs: I’m very glad you mentioned Eastern counterparts — Butoh is one of my largest sources of inspiration in all my personal expressions of creativity. In regard to your question, though, I’d estimate I spend (consciously) 5 hours of each day devoting myself to the Great Work. This includes reading, my creative endeavors, my physical and spiritual conditioning, etc.

Alexander: Five hours is quite a lot for most people. How does a typical day of yours look like and what is your practice?

Magical journal of Frater Ipafs. Here: notes the hexagram ritual
Besides reading, meditation, ritual and yoga journaling is an important part of Frater Ipafs daily routine

Frater Ipafs: Indeed, I suppose it is. I almost never leave my home to socialize; my coworkers from my day job can corroborate that.

Every morning, I am certain to cast the Lesser Banishing Ritual of The Pentagram. This is immediately followed by the Lesser Invoking Ritual of the Hexagram. I perform them in this order for their unique operative purposes (casting them, juxtaposed, in various combinations creates different effects on the “field”). This is followed by Tai Chi and then the Middle Pillar Exercise.

I am sure to offer items to my altars that are of a favorable similitude to whatever Celestial bodies, Sephirothic bodies, angelic, etc that I am currently synchronizing with per the requirements of my present work.

Meditation, by the use of a daily tarot card drawing, is performed to explore the various paths and gateways of the Tree of Life itself. Of course, certain gateways remain closed–it takes exorbitant amounts of time and effort to endure and ultimately transcend any one path. I also complete (at a minimum) 30 minutes of Hatha Yoga; this is followed by pranayama.

I hold myself to reading a minimum of 15 pages per day, but my journal of discipline suggests I average close to 50 lately.

Before bed, I cast The Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram and the Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Hexagram.

This, currently, seems to be my personal standard of performance. If I am engaged in any specific workings, then those too will be incorporated. Logging my activities in my journal consumes a bit of time too.

Alexander: Yes! The journal ? With this amount of practice I suppose the journaling of relevant experiences, progress, and insights will take another hour…

“Believe me, my arm aches often from the strain on the wrist”

Frater Ipafs: Haha, quite right! Believe me, my arm aches often from the strain on the wrist. I’m also inclined to illustrate my notes upon occasion– this really helps me to catalog the information concretely.

Alexander: How did you find this passion for the occult – or how did the occult find you?

Frater Ipafs: This question is difficult. How does one become a doctor? A teacher? A factory worker? I suppose, initially, we all are seeking some framework to help ourselves. Usually to mollify some stress, need for resources, or what have you. It was no different for me.

As a child, I was often able to see those that had died in a very clear sense. At that age (I think 6 years old), I had no understanding of it. Parents, when faced with this, have a tendency to steamroll over it until the ability is suppressed– usually an indirect result of practiced alienation. In my late teens, I experienced a massive car accident (I can’t remember it to this day) in which I completely lost consciousness for a considerable amount of time. Since “returning” from that experience, my once-suppressed sensitivities returned, and I was a scattered mess. I couldn’t manage them.

At first, I turned to the path of the Healer. I apprenticed and became a Reiki Master; I’m also a certified crystologist teacher under the school of Melody (a renowned crystal healer). I attended unusual seminars to help cultivate my psychic abilities. But what I found mostly were money hungry charlatans and people that made a living on “being a guru.” This was largely disturbing to me.

One of my best friends from childhood (who had run off with a traveling “hippie” community) had returned to my life around the age of 21 or so. I had already been deeply exploring the works of famous chaos magicians, wiccans, various traditions of hoodoo, voudon gnosis, etc. But my friend, as it turns out, had been doing the very same thing. He also happened to have a copy of A Garden of Pomegranates by Israel Regardie. My introduction to that book completely changed the course of my work. Essentially, it was the advent of my real work. As I’ve matured and gained a deeper understanding of the great work, my sense of purpose has matured as well. It is not longer a struggle to rectify some unusual component of myself. Israel Regardie states something in The Tree of Life that is similar to By lifting ourselves through the great work, we also lift our fellow man.

I have found a sense of purpose within the work itself

Alexander: This brings me to the benefits of occult work — which are the three main benefits you obtain from your practice?

Frater Ipafs: Three? I’ll do my best to keep it to three haha. One of them, without question, is that I have found a sense of purpose within the work itself. I am passionate about what I’m doing, regardless of whether or not anyone watching understands it entirely. The work isn’t meant to be a prescription for “obtaining purpose,” but it has certainly worked out that way for me. Another benefit is that, through mutual aims/interests, it has connected me with several individuals that appear to appreciate what I’m doing/creating as a result of my efforts. A third benefit is that I have come to trust every step I take toward manifesting my will– I no longer question and second guess myself when it comes to my personal goals and agendas.

“All things lead back to their origins. And so it is that we seek ascension through the Tree of Life, allowing humanity access to higher and higher branches until we are finally able to return to Kether, the source.”

Alexander: How would you define “the great work”? What is it?

Frater Ipafs: I’m thrilled that you’ve asked this. It’s a question that is almost never asked. Many renowned magicians that have written several books on devotional ritual, systems of magick, etc, have no answer for this. With all this work, what are we working towards?

Dion Fortune stated in (I believe) The Mystical Qabalah that The Great Work is the massive undertaking of encouraging mankind to evolve spiritually. Like all things in existence, our evolution is cyclical. Streams eventually curl in on themselves to ultimately return to their origin (which happens to be a circle). The watch/clock is also designed this way, because there really aren’t any true linear paths. All things lead back to their origins. And so it is that we seek ascension through the Tree of Life, allowing humanity access to higher and higher branches until we are finally able to return to Kether, the source.

Fortune also states that The Great Work is responsible for removing accumulated Karmic discrepancies (psychic infection, she calls it at one point) for this very purpose. And I would like to think this is quite true. I suppose no one can validate it, for no being may experience Kether fully and live.

Alexander: Then, it has to remain a secret ?
By the way, Dion Fortune had the magical Motto “Deo, Non Fortuna”. You are in the same tradition of hermetic magicians who call themselves Frater (Brother) or Soror (Sister), followed by a personal Motto or an acronym thereof, usually in Latin. Your magical name is Frater Iipafs or i-pah-fus (very similar to the pronunciation of Icarus). This name, or motto also refers to the great work, I suppose?

Frater Ipafs: Indeed. It translates from the Latin, “In Principio Ad Finem Sum,” to, “In the beginning, I am the end.” This is a direct statement about the return to Kether, the origin. It is a reference to the relationship of the court cards of the tarot as they descend through the four worlds of the Sephiroth as well.

Frater Ipafs ritual room with view on the altar and cerimonial magical accessories
Frater Ipafs’ ritual room with view on the altar – a four-staged shelf representing the four worlds (or levels) of the tree of life

Alexander: I noticed your Altar is also structured in four (five) stages. One for each of the worlds Aatziluth, Briah, Yetzirah, Aassiah and also analog to the four elements… but we are already deep into the cabala here…

Frater Ipafs:  That’s a keen observation. It isn’t uncommon for my altars to deviate a bit depending on the specific workings I’m doing, but yes–that is their typical structure. This is due to so much of my work involving the direct invocation of the Spheres of the Sephiroth for spiritual growth. Sometimes, If I’m transparent enough to post them, it can be seen that I’ve switched the order around–this usually suggests I’ve been directly invoking god forms.

Alexander: Regarding your Instagram – Your Instagram account is maybe the most original and illustrative one when it comes to ceremonial magick. How come you started it?

Frater Ipafs: I deeply appreciate that statement. I had avoided most social media for a very long time. For a moment, I’d returned to Facebook, and I’d experienced a few of the “witchy” communities therein. Though I did find one knowledgeable group, almost all of them were shallow, insubstantial, and full of Hollywood references. It certainly wasn’t a place for learning.

I quickly left Facebook; having nothing left to lose, I tried Instagram. I eased in by posting a few images of Low Magick rituals I’d been performing; they were received well enough. I gradually faded in the true meat of my work as time went on. As my connections grew, so did my confidence. I receive many messages regarding ritual practice, techniques, etc, and I’m very happy to have those opportunities to teach and also learn.

Magicians of the past were enflaming a spiritual/magickal revolution … many practitioners of today seem to be more inclined to … self-image, and … popularity

Alexander: Which brings us again to our starting topic: How did occultists change over time in regards to the depth of their practice and studies…

Frater Ipafs: Well, I suppose any answer to that question will depend upon the period of time in which we address it. With The Golden Dawn, we had the revival of many lost practices — with that came secrecy and a corrupt system of aristocracy too. Then, Crowley emerges and releases much of the information that was hidden, establishes an entirely new paradigm, etc. However, this example alone shows the difference in magnitude between the magicians of the past and the magicians/witches/etc of today. Whereas these magicians of the past were enflaming a spiritual/magickal revolution and essentially encouraging mankind to evolve, many practitioners of today seem to be more inclined to practice for the sake of convenience, self-image, and a strange sort of popularity. I really can’t say enough about this; even our more popular occult authors don’t seem to be exploring new arenas of the work — they mostly dissect the practices of old, repeating them endlessly, and then publishing further diluted works about their results. Dissection is absolutely necessary in the formula of Solve et Coagula, but analysis must, at some point, take place so that something new is conceived.

Alexander: One thing is new, though. It is the Pottermania: the new generation of witches has read Harry Potter inside out and refers to it all the time. I am in some witch chat on a messenger app, and Potter comparisons are one of the most frequent encounters each day. It is not bad though – it gives the community common reference points… 

Frater Ipafs: As far as Harry Potter goes, this doesn’t bother me either. I feel that series does have integrity, and it often makes interesting, legitimate references to occult figures. Besides, who can resist a story built around the Dying God formula? Personally, I’m a fan.

Alexander: Rowling definitely has a more than solid occult education. I like the universe she created and their stories became a reference point for many conversations on many levels. If she intended that – I have no idea.

Frater Ipafs: I’d say Rowling probably has more up her sleeve than we’ll ever know.

Enochian wand and sigillum dei aemeth in bee wax
Enochian wand and Sigillum Dei Aemeth carved in beeswax – the sigillum is handcrafted by Frater Ipafs, the wand handcrafted by Tabitha and Chic Cicero – two of Israel Regardie’s direct students 

Alexander: Anyways, Harry Potter reminds me of your interest in magic wands and the high level of skill you seem to have in crafting a lot of your own accessories and ritual supplies – such as the Sigillum Dei Aemeth you made.

Frater Ipafs: Ah, thank you again. Honestly, that Sigillum took 30+ hours to create. Besides the baking of it, carving each tiny character into with a sewing needle nearly drove me mad. My home smelled of beeswax for at least a week.

Alexander: How do you decide whether you make a tool yourself or purchase it?

Frater Ipafs: Usually, it becomes a matter of finances. If I can afford the tools that I need to make the magickal tool, I’ll almost always make it myself. For instance, a metal engraver isn’t terribly pricey, nor is beeswax, paint, glass engraver, or whatever else is small and practical. However, when it comes to making tools that require very competent wood-working, I usually have to surrender my creative freedom. For my traditional Golden Dawn implements (such as the Keryx wand, the Water Cup, and the Fire Wand), I contact Tabitha and Chic Cicero, the last two practitioners to be trained personally by Israel Regardie. They have an online store in which they offer customized tools. They do beautiful work– they even send a certificate of authenticity.

Alexander: And how do you handle your new purchases before letting them into your altar room?

Frater Ipafs: The consecration ritual must be performed before they are to enter– the Keryx wand is designed specifically for this purpose.

Alexander: Here I want to ask a laymen question, maybe also for all those, who do not practice ceremonial magic, but still want to do some cleansing. As an expert in crystals – would you recommend for example Amethyst to clean such a new purchase or item of any kind from foreign / unwanted energies and influences?

Frater Ipafs: If one is familiar enough to utilize crystals in such a way, of course! Interesting you should bring up Amethyst — I was reading a bit of Agrippa’s works earlier, and he was talking about their use as far as removing drunkenness goes. He also stated that drunkenness can be remedied by washing one’s genitals with vinegar. Not entirely relevant, but I thought it worth sharing.

Crystal Tonics - Manual with crystal laying on paper for a course taught by Frater Ipafs
Crystal Tonics – Manual for a course taught by Frater Ipafs

Alexander: It is a good advice for the next time someone very drunk wants to get sober very fast ?
As for the crystals: there is another reason I asked – you offered a course on crystal tonics. Do you still offer it? Can it be attended?

Frater Ipafs: Ah, yes! That feels like ages ago that I was “advertising” for that. Unfortunately, the metaphysical center from which I used to teach has closed. I still have the curriculum I created. It was compiled from my own results gained from utilizing the techniques therein. I’d really like to teach it again someday. It made use of the planetary squares from Francis Barrett’s The Magus to create specific sigils which were then used to charge the tonics (already infused with relevant crystals). Perhaps it could be one day adapted to an online format? For now, I’m working on a few other projects.

Alexander: That would be definitely be something where NettlesGarden.com would like to get in. Even in publishing it — printed. Let’s look into that. But, what is the basic idea of a crystal tonic anyways?

Frater Ipafs: I like the idea of that. The idea is derived from the thought that the crystals might more potently affect our physical/energetic bodies if they are directly ingested. This does entail some danger–not all crystals are safe. Several are radioactive/toxic, etc. But the material covers the techniques involved in charging safe crystals for specific augmentations or effects that decrease unwanted attributes. These encompass the use of solar patterns as well as lunar cycles for nuanced applications.

The material also teaches the basic skill of diagnosing someone’s needs based on their health or circumstances. The advanced work then involves gaining an understanding of the planetary squares (from which sigils are created). The planets each have unique properties, and through the use of the sigils, we can augment the tonic’s potency with their specific property. We then learn the planetary days/hours for maximum potency of the tonic.

Alexander: Could you give us a simple example of such a tonic? How to and why make it?

Frater Ipafs: Of course. Let us assume that I am suffering from a fear of confrontation. I am constantly pressured into making disadvantageous decisions at work that will benefit only other people. Therefore, I’m likely having imbalances in my throat chakra (primarily–I could be suffering in other centers as well, but we’ll keep it simple). This being the case, I would choose a blue stone (particularly one that assists with communication such as Blue Kyanite).

Crystals, jars and accessories for the preparation of crystal tonics
Crystal tonics: crystals, supplies and accessories needed for preparation

This would be safely placed in a glass vessel of water (I’ll omit the methods for preparing delicate stones such as Kyanite). Because it is a matter of needing some form of augmentation, we’d likely choose to charge the vessel during a Full Moon. We’d try to obtain as much exposure as possible, simply letting the vessel sit in the yard and charge during the night.

Going further, we could create a statement of intent.  “I am confident and express my feelings honestly and fearlessly.” From this, we’d could find the numerological value of the statement and use those values as coordinates upon a planetary square. We’d then create a sigil from those points.

This would create a talisman (of whatever relevant planet we chose) that we could further augment our tonic. After all is said and done, we could then massage a few drops of the tonic onto the targeted chakra or ingest it directly. It is, at its most elementary, sympathetic magick.

Alexander: That is a beautiful system. It should work similar with other materials, specifically herbs?

Frater Ipafs: Absolutely. So long as those herbs are agreeable with the chosen celestial bodies.

Alexander: There is another thing I wanted to ask you, but for this, I need to switch topics. You also created one guided meditation – it is your voice, a very pleasant one! Did you also do the editing?

Frater Ipafs: I’d nearly forgotten until I stumbled upon it myself the other day. Yes, that is my voice– thank you! I used to volunteer for a voice acting community that would record free audio books for the blind. I did the editing as well. Unfortunately, I didn’t take the time needed to produce a result I was pleased with haha.

Alexander: I was quite impressed with it, but let me make an observation before asking further about the guided meditation: You seem to be a lot into charitable work. Volunteering, an important part of the great work for you is defined by helping mankind evolve — it is something you mentioned before any personal or individual benefit. Is the concept of serving important for you?

Frater Ipafs: When I really analyze the thought of serving in this context, serving seems to be the incorrect term. I suppose that my aims are slightly self-indulgent in the sense that I hope to shape a paradigm that allows for more acceptance, more harmony, but also more exploration, because that is a world I would personally desire. I would like to see the evolution of mankind personally, but I do not believe I’ll truly see the results in my life, for they are probably too expansive and subtle to perceive effectively. I’m sure Crowley never understood the depth of his impact, whether we consider it positive or negative, on the perception of sexual liberation and spirituality. Though, I’m not so bold as to compare myself to the likes of Crowley or any of the greats for that matter.

Fun fact – What is your stance on Aleister Crowley?

This is not a question I often receive. Most seem to assume I’m a Thelemite and probably also assume I have the greatest endearment for him. Truthfully, I absolutely respect his contributions. Do I respect his methods for reaching such achievements? Not all of them, no. It is difficult to approach the question in a satisfactory way, because I obviously never had the chance to know the man. He seems, from his writings, sincere, clever, funny, and erudite.

There is an introduction in the 5th edition of Regardie’s The Golden Dawn in which Regardie is discussing the criticism he received via mail for his having revealed secret information kept exclusively within the order. One such letter came from Crowley himself (Regardie, in his younger years, was an assistant of some nature to Crowley). Crowley berated him, as did the others, for his offenses against the order, but Regardie was entertained by the raw irony of this, for Crowley, in his Equinox series, had done the very same thing years before. Regardie states that he feels Crowley might have been sour over the fact that his The Golden Dawn was far better edited than the Equinox series. I feel Crowley probably wrote such a preposterous letter for the irony itself.

Besides his obvious contributions, I feel something went terribly wrong for Crowley along the way; no matter what I read and learn about him, I can’t shake the feeling that there was some discrepancy in his approach to the Adeptus Minor grade, the sphere of Tiphareth. Again, I can only assume. It is interesting to note that Crowley had embellished the Lesser Bannishing Pentagram Ritural with his Aiwass addition, but, towards the end of his life, was reported to have abandoned the embellishment and was once again using the format from The Golden Dawn.

Alexander: I see. I just made that insertion, because one of the slogans important to the SOL (a magic school founded by W.E. Butler, who in turn was trained in the order of Dion Fortune) was something like “I wish to know to be able to serve” – I am not quite sure about the wording, as I read the relevant books in German, more than 25 years ago. But it reminded me of that.

Frater Ipafs: In that sense, I understand. Yes, I would say surrender is intrinsically connected to The Great Work. The Christ Formula champions it, the relationships of Mambos and the Lowa as well– even the return to Kether is ultimately the greatest surrender. I definitely see your point.

Alexander: Maybe it’s a constant in occultism and Witchcraft anyways. Most occultists and witches were healers and served the community at some point. Agrippa even refused to leave the city during an epidemic as he considered his healing service more important. 

Frater Ipafs:  An excellent point! The metaphysical paths, when sincerely practiced, are most often a humanitarian endeavor at their root.

Alexander: Which brings me back to your guided meditation – which seems also quite helpful. The meditation aims to free from negative influences – the listener separates and bundles negative or disturbing influences within an object which is to be buried until her mirror image clears. – What is the idea behind it?

Frater Ipafs: The Guided meditation, I think, was made for the purpose of removing those landmarks of self-loathing from ourselves, to be free to turn a new page in our lives. At the time I created it, I was suffering from seizure activity induced by panic attacks. They began happening abruptly one day– they’ve since gone. But, usually, when we feel crippled, it is because we are crippling ourselves.

Alexander: So it is about letting go and rest in peace. Mainly when we are not feeling well in our skin?

Frater Ipafs: Absolutely. It could generalize to just about anything: letting go of people, jobs, memories, deceased ones, etc.

What good is talent if it is easily perverted by gluttony or sloth? It must be focused to be of any use

Alexander: For today we have about five minutes left – Unfortunately, but it already well over 2 am here in Moscow. But I’d be delighted to continue another day ?

Anyways, after all that insights I realize again, that introducing you seems to me like being in danger of omitting something important. I mean, you are into ceremonial magic, the cabala, Enochian magic, but still well acquainted with Wicca and Voodoo. You practice tarot, prepare and teach crystal tonics, you draw and paint in oil, and show quite some talent in crafting your own tools and accessories for your altar room. Let’s get bluntly back to our first topic: Talent or discipline? Which one wins?

Frater Ipafs: You’re too generous to me, really. Thank you for all of your kind words! Of those two variables, the answer seems obvious to me: Discipline. What good is talent if it is easily perverted by gluttony or sloth? It must be focused to be of any use.

Frater Ipafs in his ritual room, reading a book
Would you believe … I stood in tree pose with a glass of water on my head while holding a book before me?

Alexander: My last question for today: Who took the photos of you, especially in the ritual poses?

Frater Ipafs: I’m smiling as I type this. I can’t help but laugh– I have taken every photo I’ve posted.

Would you believe that I set up the camera, initiated the timer function, ran across the room, stood in tree pose with a glass of water on my head while holding a book before me? It’s true.

Though, unfortunately, the glass was cut out of the picture. But even that, I feel, is a testament to willpower and discipline, albeit a frivolous one.

Alexander: That is awesome, I guess that would have been worth filming )))

Frater Ipafs: I’m so glad it wasn’t. No one deserves to see me shambling about in a robe haha.

Frater Ipafs performing the lesser bannishing pentagram ritual of the Golden Dawn
Frater Ipafs performing the Lesser Banishing Pentagram Ritual of the Golden Dawn: Beginning pose – Vibration of “AThH”

Alexander: The results are impressive – such as the portrait with a ritual dagger while performing the lesser banishing pentagram ritual. It would be nice to continue our conversation soon about further topics 🙂

Frater Ipafs: Thank you again. It’s been an absolute pleasure. And I would be delighted. 🙂

Alexander: Bonus question – Are there any books or other works you want to share with us and why?

Frater Ipafs:I’d highly recommend a book called the Geosophia. It is an incredible piece on the chthonic roots of ceremonial magick, tracing its origins to the Greeks and then following its evolution to the grimoiric format of the medieval age. For those magicians studying the art of evocation, I’d highly encourage this book. Another would be Through Gateways of Stone and Cirlce by Ashen Chassad– its an excellent elaboration on the works of Trithemius (apocryphally published later by Francis Barrett in The Magus).

Nettlesgarden - The Old Craft
www.Nettlesgarden.com – The Old Craft

Cornelius Agrippa – The Witch’s Advocate and Historical Faust

Agrippa von Nettesheim - Portrait
Agrippa von Nettesheim, born in Nettesheim near Cologne. Renaissance man, magician and often considered to be the historical Dr. Faust after his death in 18 February 1535

The Witch’s Advocate, Cornelius Agrippa was on a mission to bind man back to the First Principle, God. While not a witch himself, he was well-known for his involvement in occult matters and for defending those pursued by the Inquisition and accused of witchcraft or heresy.

In 1519 he was in Metz, Germany serving as an orator and advocatus of the town when an old woman was accused of witchcraft. Even though to him most women accused of witchcraft were “deluded old women”, he intervened and save the woman’s life. The old woman was from the village of Woippy where her mother was a witch.

Therefore, the other villagers accused the woman of being a witch by association. The woman was captured and brought before Dominican and Grand Inquisitor, Nicholas Savini, who sought to burn her at the stake. As her public defender, Agrippa eluded the possibility of witchcraft, thus shifting the focus from the accusation to the accuser.

He attacked Savini’s procedures asserting that they were irregular and even illegal for kidnapping the woman. But more importantly, he argued that the accusation based on the hereditary smear campaign was invalid, mostly because the woman’s mother who was also accused of being a witch was burnt at the stake before her and that the heresy of this accusation denies the power of her baptism.

To save the power of baptism and that of purging through fire, the Inquisition had no choice but to release the woman. Agrippa was successful in defending the witch, but his success resulted in his exile from the city of Metz. Regardless, he gracefully proved how you can beat them with their own weapons.

Just like many magicians of his time, Agrippa was a wanderer: he married three times, he never benefited of a long-term patronage, he never stayed in the same place for a long time and pursued many professions such as theologian, legal expert, soldier, and physician.

He was a German polymath that became one of the most renowned occult writers of all time. He studied the occult sciences, he was politically involved and dedicated himself to the problematic theological and legal questions that attracted accusations of heresy. While he was never gravely persecuted for his interest in the occult arts, he did raise controversy and was negatively cited by many.

Köln - Cologne 1531, according to a woodcut by Anton by Worms
Köln – Cologne 1531, according to a woodcut by Anton Woensam / Anton of Worms

Years of Wandering

City hall tower of Cologne - Statue of Agrippa of Nettesheim (left)
Statue of Agrippa of Nettesheim (left) among other personalities of the city’s history. Sculptor was Wolfgang Reuter, who added von Nettesheim in 1992. Image © Raimond Spekking / CC BY-SA 4.0 (via Wikimedia Commons)

Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa von Nettesheim was born on September 14th, 1486 in Nettesheim near Cologne, Germany. As a child, Agrippa wished to follow in his father’s footsteps who respected the family’s tradition of serving the royal House of Habsburg. But Cornelius Agrippa went on to be a scholar.

He graduated from the University of Cologne in 1502 with a self-proclaimed degree in medicine and a doubtful doctorate in Canon and Civil Law. He pursued his interest in natural philosophy at the school of Albertus Magnus in Cologne. During his youth, he established many relationships with humanists who shared his interest in the wisdom of Antiquity.

He traveled to France where he formed a secret initiatory circle otherwise known as a sodalitium which consisted of other personalities at the time, and at some point, after that, he even went on a mysterious military mission to Spain. In 1509 he was appointed to lecture on Christian Kabbalah at the University of Dole in Burgundy which he began with a prolusion in honor of the Margaret of Austria, the daughter of Emperor Maximilian, Princess of Austria and Burgundy.

This prolusion developed into a treatise in praise of womankind that he dedicated to Margaret and it was the precursor of his De nobilitate et praecellentia foeminei sexus declamatio (Declamation on the Nobility and Pre-Eminence of the Female Sex), which was published only in 1529. His lectures attracted substantial interest from members of the University and the Parlement, so he joined the college of theologians.

Benedictine Abbot Johannes Trithemius (Born Johann Heidenberg)
Benedictine abbot Johannes Trithemius (Born 1462, Johann Heidenberg, died 1516). Mentor to – inter alia – Agrippa and Paracelsus.

However, the Franciscan Jean Catilinet who was the provincial superior of Burgundy denounced Agrippa as a “Judaizing heretic”, which ended Agrippa’s teaching career. In the winter of 1509-1510, Agrippa returned to Germany and went to the monastery of Saint Jacob in Wurzburg, where he met the Abbot of Sponheim, Johannes Trithemius. Trithemius became Agrippa’s mentor and shared his interest in natural magic.

Their discussions helped Agrippa complete his compendium on magic that he had been working on for some time. This compendium, known as the first draft of De Occulta Philosophia was dedicated to his mentor, Trithemius, who received a manuscript sometime around 8 April 1510. Upon examining Agrippa’s work, Trithemius expressed the following:

“Your work, most renowned Agrippa, entitled Of Occult Philosophy, which you have sent by this bearer to me, has been examined. With how much pleasure I received it no mortal tongue can express nor the pen of any writer. I wondered at your more than vulgar learning—that you, being so young, should penetrate into such secrets as have been hid from most learned men; and not only clearly and truly but also properly and elegantly set them forth.”

The compendium circulated in manuscript form for quite some time, but Agrippa continued to develop it and 20 years later he finally completed the final version of De Occulta Philosophia as we know it today.

In 1510, Agrippa went on another mysterious military mission, this time to London, on the orders of Maximilian I. There he was introduced to the study of Saint Paul’s epistles, which lead him to write Commentariola (Little Commentaries) which seems to have been lost in time. While there, Agrippa also wrote Expostulatio super Expositione sua in librum De verbo mirifico cum Joanne Catilineti (Expostulation with Jean Catilinet over His Exposition of the Book On the Wonder-Working Word) in response to Catilineti’s accusations, which was the first work in a series of epic battles with his contemporary theologians.

Agrippa von Nettesheim, Portrait by Boissard
Portrait of Agrippa by Boissard. 1645
Copyrighted work available under Creative Commons Attribution only license CC BY 4.0

 

In between 1511 and 1518, Agrippa continued to serve Maximilian I in Italy, where he also lectured Plato’s Symposium and on the Hermetic Pimander at the University of Pavia. He was forced to quit his lectures and leave Pavai when the Swiss and Imperial troops were defeated at Marignano. He attempted to obtain patronage at the court of Marquis de Monferrato, to whom he dedicated 2 of his works: De homine (On Humankind) and De triplici ratione cognoscendi Deum (On the Threefold Way of Knowing God).

While there, he frequented circles that enabled him to explore more Neoplatonic and Hermetic literature. In the following years (1518-1524) Agrippa became a city orator and advocatus in Metz, started practicing medicine in Geneva and became a city physician in Freiburg. During this time, he gained a reputation as an “occult philosopher”.

He wrote De originali peccato declamatio (Declamation on Original Sin) in 1518 (which was printed in 1529) that puzzled his circle at the time with his interpretation of Adam’s original sin. He also participated in the debate of St. Anne’s triple marriage and supported Jacques Lefèvre d’Étaples’ criticism of the tall tale that she had three husbands and three daughters. In his De Beatissimae Annae monogamia ac unico puerperio (On St. Anne’s Monogamy and Sole Childbirth, printed 1534), he responded to the accusations of heresy against him and Lefèvre.

During this time, he had also successfully defended the woman of Woippy who was accused of witchcraft, saving her life. These events especially earned him the respect of many scholars, but it also caught the attention of religious authorities at the time.

Agrippa moved to Lyon in the spring of 1524 as the physician of Louise of Savoy, the mother of Francis I. He wrote De sacramento matrimonii (On the Sacrament of Marriage, 1526) which he dedicated to Marguerite d’Alençon, the king’s sister. He benevolently referred to her as an “Erasmian spirit”, which she was offended by, thus failing to win her favor.

This also made his reputation worse in front of the religious authorities that identified Erasmian influence in his works and positive attitude towards marriage. His Dehortatio gentilis theologiae (Dissuasion from Pagan Theology) raised suspicions about his religious orthodoxy, his correspondence with the Duke of Bourbon (who betrayed the French Crown) questioned his political loyalties, his refusal to provide an astrological prognosis for François I, and his remarks about Louise’s superstition – all of this attracted hostility towards him.

He was denied pension and forbidden to leave France. Meanwhile, he wrote his De incertitudine et vanitate scientiarum which launched an attack on the moral and social assumptions of his time. When he was finally able to leave France, Agrippa accepted the position as an archivist and imperial historiographer at the court of Margaret of Austria in Antwerp. It is then that he was finally able to start printing and publishing his written work.

His published works have once again caught the attention of the religious authorities and the Louvain theologians who questioned Margaret of Austria herself for her association with Agrippa and they deemed his De vanitate as heretical. Agrippa was requested to reply to these accusations and so he responded by writing Apologia (Defense) and Querela (Complaint) in which he refuted criticism and accused his accusers of ignorance and bad faith.

Agrippa von Nettesheim - often also referred to as the historical Dr. Faust
Agrippa von Nettesheim in his later years. His ability to win a case against the inquisition and his involvement into the “dark arts” earned him a questionable reputation and often he would be referred to as the historical Dr. Faust

This ended his career at the court. But Hermann von Wied, Archbishop of Cologne, who had an interest in the occult sciences, offered him protection and welcomed him into his home. He was finally able to complete his De Occulta Philosophia and with the intervention of Hermann he was able to print it, despite the Inquisition’s efforts to suspend it.

Very little is known about the last years of Agrippa’s life. According to his student, Johann Weyer (Wierus), Agrippa was in Bonn until 1535 when he returned to France and was promptly arrested on the orders of François I. Johann writes in his De praestigiis daemonum that Agrippa died in Grenoble in 1535. Augustin Calmet wrote that as Agrippa’s time of death neared, his dog jumped into the Rhone river, which lead many to believe it was a familiar or a demon.

According to some sources: “As early as 1525 and again as late as 1533 (two years before his death) Agrippa clearly and unequivocally rejected magic in its totality, from its sources in imagined antiquity to contemporary practice.” Many believe his repudiation of magic was sincere, but others suggest that it might’ve been misunderstood. He may have merely retracted his first draft of De Occulta Philosophia, but not his final draft.

Aggripa’s Heritage

Pentagram - the seven planets and Man - Gravur after Agrippa von Nettesheim
The Pentagram set into relation to man’s anatomy and the seven planets – Gravur after Agrippa von Nettesheim as discussed in Book two of De Occulta Philosophia

Cornelius Agrippa was undoubtedly the most influential writer of the Renaissance Esoterica. His magnum opus, De Occulta Philosophia – Three Books of Occult Philosophy, remains one of the leading texts of Western esoteric thought even 500 years later.

The famous fourth Book of Occult Philosophy – a grimoire on evocation – appeared only in 1559 – 24 years after Agrippa’s death and is of unclear origin. The “Magickal Elements” is typically attributed to Peter de Abano.

While many believe he recanted it, in fact, he had only admitted that his earlier work on magic was juvenile. But his mission to renew magic was at the center of his intellectual journey at all times. He believed that the reform of magic (magia reformata) would not only invest the magus with mastery over nature and the ability to attain astral and angelic virtues, but it would also enable his ascension to the First Principle, God.

“Seeing there is a Three-fold World—Elementary, Celestial and Intellectual—and every inferior is governed by its superior, and receiveth the influence of the virtues 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 virtues of His Omnipotency upon us, for whose service He made and created all these things: Wise men conceive it no way irrational that it should be possible for us to ascend by the same degrees through each World, to the same very original World itself, the Maker of all things and First cause, from whence all things are and proceed; and also to enjoy not only these virtues, which are already in the more excellent kind of things but also besides these, to draw new virtues from above.”

The proportions of the body of man and numerological relations after Agrippa von Nettesheim
The proportions of the body of man and numerological relations after Agrippa von Nettesheim – Book Two of De Occulta Philosophia

De Occulta Philosophia attempts to recover “true magic” in the context of Hermetic theology and Neoplatonic metaphysics in order to offer mankind a full restoration of cognitive and practical abilities and the knowledge to work wonders.

His systematic exposition of the occult has an encyclopedic quality that showcases Renaissance magic and passes down knowledge of the occult virtues, the Divine Trinity, The Kabbalistic names of God and evil spirits, the order of the evil spirits, types of divination, numerology, planetary rulerships, the various states of natural things, astrological talismans, and even enchantments and sorceries.

Furthermore, each of the three books corresponds to the three realms: elementary, celestial, and intellectual. For Agrippa, all things have descended from God and through the same realms He’s descended in, it is possible to ascend back to God.

Through his De occulta Philosophia and De incertitudine, we see an emerging paradox of a comprehensive treatise on magic and a rebuttal of all products of human reason that coexist in his work. He had never retracted one or the other, so through this Agrippa shows us that the paradox is inherently natural.

This paradox challenges the readers and practitioners to be in two different realms of speculative concerns at the same time. This is why Agrippa’s heritage is both a cultural and a religious project. Furthermore, Agrippa had a very well thought writing strategy that used erratic juxtapositions and borrowed material to hide the true purpose of his work.

This dispersia intentio must be put together by the student (reader/practitioner) to find the message he intentionally concealed in a scattered exposition. This is typical of sapiential tradition and it was used by Renaissance scholars who were  “forced to create spaces for themselves by merging learning with prophecy” (Celenza 2001: 128).

The concepts and quotations that Agrippa’s texts consisted of, where from both ancient and contemporary sources and he systematically removed them from their original context to give them a new revelatory structure. Perhaps this can also be seen as a model on how to de-construct and re-construct a magical system.

This systematic re-construction enabled Agrippa to find implications that the sources themselves often left unspoken. He was able this way to connect the implications in a single design. In the words of Couliano:  It is a “systematic exposition of … Ficinian spiritual magic and Trithemian demonic magic (and) … treatise in practical magic”. Furthermore, Agrippa was able to introduce a political meaning in these texts that emphasize the civic function of philosophy.

Even though De Occulta Philosophia provides methods of using the four elements, astrology, Kabbalah, etc in medicine, alchemy, divination, and ritual magic, this work distinguishes itself from others at the time. What separates it from other grimoires at the time is that the three books are more scholarly than they are foreboding – and so they continue to provide a coherent system to those in the study of the occult arts and sciences.

The moondragon - one of the images of the moon sphere in Book Two of De Occulta Philosophia
The moondragon – one of the images of the moon sphere in Book Two of De Occulta Philosophia

De Occulta Philosophia and Modern Occultism (Thoughts by Nettle)

De occulta philosohpia has been named by translator Donald Tyson the “foundation Book of Western Occultism” (1992). For practitioners who consider  themselves as  part of a stream, which through history and time runs unbroken – sometimes visible at the surface , sometimes concealed in the depths  –  it may be debatable how unique or “new” Agrippa really is. What remains undebatable though, is that his opera is the first to systematically and comprehensively describe the pillars of western esoteric thought and that his undertaking of giving a complete overview at hand was unmatched for centuries until Crowley and Regardie broke the seals of silence by publishing the magickal system of the Golden Dawn, thus providing a large audience for the very first time with a workable and coherent system of  applied western esoteric thought, while still being deeply rooted in the hermetic worldview described in De occulta philosophia. Likewise, Franz Bardon, the second occultist in the 20th century to provide a complete and coherent system of Western Occultism, does by no means replace Agrippa’s work, but develops it further and translates it into our contemporary understanding of the world.

 

Indeed, Agrippa’s writings are deeply influenced by the understanding of the world of his time and its specific body of knowledge. It is exactly this part, which makes De occulta philosophia sometimes hard to approach. Not necessarily because  Agrippa never left the Christian paradigm and monasteries where important places of his life and work. No, Christianity during the Renaissance was surprisingly open – at times – as humanists such as Reuchlin or the omnipresent Neoplatonists in Italy began to revive classical philosophical texts, translated the corpus hermeticum or integrated the Kabbalah  into Christian thought, making it such a part of Western esoterics, without which a large part of today’s western occultism would be plainly inconceivable. This era witnessed a new generation of scholars, ready to view nature as a book to be opened and discovered, while with one leg already storming the heavens with science, with the other leg still stuck in medieval superstitions and in their hands holding the torches of timeless wisdom. Agrippa is  no exception, but a primary example. And it is this feature, when reading hermetic classics, which makes reception difficult: it may be a matter of taste, when Agrippa lengthily cites the classics – for example Virgil or Ovid, to prove his point, however, it soon will become obvious that he takes stories about mythological beasts such as the Phoenix at face value and accordingly uses it to illustrate timeless laws and principles of nature.

 

The reader furthermore learns, for example, that the suckling fish “doth so curb the violence of the winds, and appease the rage of the sea, that, let the tempests be never so imperious and raging, the sails also bearing a full gale, it doth notwithstanding by its mere touch stay the ships and makes them stand still, that by no means they can be moved”. This dubious fish is called witness several times during the first book, and has to testify for the elements, the laws of polarity and basic principles of sympathetic magick. In the German version by the way, it is by no means clear which fish he does mean by this illustrative name, while English readers are spared such dilemmas by translating it plainly with echeneis, which indeed is a choice more plausible than the catfish, even though the modern reader will know, that no known fish possesses such abilities.

 

And while aspects like this bring a lot of joy to curious readers, they do not necessarily build up trust, which naturally should pose some problems at some point. So, for example the fish or serpent “Myrus” – it is unclear if Agrippa is aware that he is talking about the Moray eel, which he featured already in other parts of the book – could be used to heal the inflammation of the eyes, if its eyes are bound to the forehead of the patient, and if they were taken in such a way that the “serpent is let go alive”. As the patient heals, so the fish Myrus will build new eyes itself. Another magickal recipe against ghosts, advices for Mule hair in the middle of a certain crystal bound to the left arm as the talisman of choice. And while we are amused today (I know I am) about these applications of symapethetic magick, we still hold the healing signatures attributed by Agrippa to many crystals or herbs in high regard: caring little for the fact that to most contemporary scholars and other muggles all of the aforementioned notions seem  nonsensical.

 

Today we still use the laws and tables of of elementary and planetary analogies as systematically laid out in the second edition of De occulta philosophia. The seals and hours of the planets, the 28 moon stations, the genies and intelligences of the spheres, the four, respective five elements, even though Agrippa still used the Western term “spirit” or “Aether”, for what nowadays often is referred to as Akasha , and the 3 realms or plains, which after all are nothing but different degrees of density of the Akasha principle: mental, astral, physical. It is all there, not by coincidence only corresponding to the 3 parts of his opera.

 

Indeed, differences exist: Agrippa obviously understands the elements as real, physical building blocks of matter and our real world. Nowadays we take comfort as viewing them as principles, while leaving the elements of matter to Mendeleev and his colleagues. Nevertheless, maybe by slightly anticipating the latter, Agrippa for the first time introduced three orders of the four elements, increasing in complexity and decreasing in pureness to explain the large variety of substances in the real world, which obviously more often do not feature pure fire, water, air or earth (the typical bird or tree contains none of these in the pure form…). By doing so, he makes the first and very timid steps into the direction of modern science, even though to many of his contemporaries he may have seemed already storming fast into the heavens of a new paradigm.

 

From a hermetic point of view, it is interesting that Agrippa views the earth element as the most basic one, as it is the earth element which beholds all others. This approach is very inductive and makes sense from an alchemical point of view. However, it also makes sense from  a practical point of view: after all, the typical cabalist will ascend the Tree of Life starting at Malkuth, and not at Kether, which in and by itself may exist only in a deductive world. Let’s remember here that every Sephirot contains all other Sephirah at any point on the Tree of Life. It is worthwhile to think about this for some time. Maybe this was also Bruno’s ontological remark on the matter.

 

This however, maybe an uneasy thought to spiritual currents, which seek enlightenment and salvation beyond the world, rather than in it.

 

Agrippa here, proves himself to be a progressive thinker – despite his nowadays  seemingly obscure knowledge of nature – starting with the obvious. And as such, he actually was one of the first to find knowledge in the real world, rather than in the library and the sole repetition of the past.

 

Agrippa viewed science or in his own words “philosophy” as threefold: physics, mathematics and theology. Physics in his understanding was a comprehensive study of nature and may comprise such doctrines as the one of the four elements and modern fields such as biology. Mathematics is not the abstract theoretical science of today, but has as an important function the very practical task to observe, measure and describe the movement of celestial bodies. Theology finally teaches the mysteries, and the intelligences for the theurgist to meet. Again, these three disciplines correspond with the three realms: physical, astral and mental, to use modern hermetic language. Magick, however, is the forth, the ultimate science (philosophy) which has the former three at its base but brings them to their ultimate perfection.

 

Thus, the magician is the one, who by knowing the laws of cause and effects in the entire universe, is able to work his will be setting new creative causes in a top-down approach, starting on the mental level, and materializing it step by step, by using the right astral analogies to imprint the mental idea through the astral level into the appropriate physical correspondences. This deep understanding of the laws of cause and effect and the ability to create, not just to re-arrange already existing effects – is something we find in Bardon’s distinction between the magician and the “wizard” (German: “Zauberer”), who is limited to sympathetic magick and piggybacking on others’ efforts.

 

This complex system of correspondences at its very core is used in Western occultism until today, and few attempts except Crowley’s Liber 777 have been made to expand or even alter it. And while some parts may seem obsolete today, it should be clear that this seems so, because of a chain of progress which was spearheaded by Agrippa – not mimicked. It is the responsibility of each generation to – at least – translate the body of occult knowledge into the current worldview, or even to develop it further and to become a net contributor to progress.  Currently, about 100 years after the revolution of the Golden Dawn, it still seems that most magickal texts still stand in Agrippa’s shadow. Sometimes, because this knowledge is so timeless, sometimes because men – and women – of Agrippa’s stature  are born so rarely – even across centuries.

Nettlesgarden - The Old Craft
www.NettlesGarden.com – The Old Craft

Giordano Bruno – Rebel Monk and Wandering Magician

Giordano Bruno - Modern copy of the portrait from "Livre du recteur"
Giordano Bruno, the Benedictine monk found himself in conflict for his heretic views early on: at the age of 19 he removed the icons from his cell and opposed the adoration of Virgin Mary. The waters calmed down due to the leadership of the fraternity invoking Bruno’s young age. This argument, however, would not protect him for all his life…

In the first light of Ash Wednesday, on the first day of Lent, Giordano Bruno rode into Rome’s Campo de’ Fiori on a mule. He mounted the funeral pyre stripped naked and gagged with a leather bridle that kept him from spewing out his heresies to those who’ve come to witness his execution. While tied to the stake, Bruno could turn only his head away from the crucifix held up to his face. The pyre was then lit and the flames consumed him. Alas, one of the most original and interesting minds of the 16th century was burnt to ashes.

Giordano Bruno was in the abysm between the old world he had inherited from his pagan ancestors and the new world of scientific revolution. From the abysm he was in, he tried to revive the ancestral world of magic within the context of the new world of scientific revolution. Bruno is one of the figures in the history of ideas that I sympathize with, not so much for his ideas necessarily, but for his passion and mission. Bruno was a free thinker who cared little for the reactions of those who took offense at his ideas.

While some claim that he got in trouble for his scientific ideas, others have speculated that it was his carelessness, demeanor, tone, and language, not his controversial views. Let’s just say that people enjoy finding excuses for his horrific execution instead of acknowledging the fact that he was executed purely for his religious ideas and not for any of his speculations on multiple worlds and an infinite cosmos.

What saddens me the most is that people know Giordano Bruno mostly for how he died, executed by the Inquisition, rather than how his ideas serve as some of the precursors to modern scientific thought (the theory of relativity), and magic, specifically Thelema.

Giordano Bruno was not a “hero of science”, but a hero of free speech. He was not a poster-child for the religious persecution of science, but a poster-child for the Inquisition. Many associate Bruno with the “discovery” of Heliocentrism and that is such a gross misconception. To clarify: Philolaus, the 5th century BC Greek philosopher hypothesized that the Earth was a sphere that revolved daily around a mystical “central fire” that ruled our universe.

A couple of centuries later, Aristarchus of Samos identified that mystical central fire as the Sun. But because this heliocentric system was only in its embryonic states, no one could answer the mystifying question: “if the Earth does indeed move around the Sun, then why do the stars remain in the same position every night?”

And in the 2nd century AD, Ptolemy’s geocentrism came as a solution to this problem, by proposing that the Earth is in the center of the “universe” and everything else revolves around it. This was accepted as a scientific fact for about 1400 years. Until 1444, when Nicholas of Cusa questioned this fact. However, it took another 99 years to elaborate on this matter and with the publication of Nicolaus Copernicus’s De revolutionibus orbium coelestium libri VI (“Six Books Concerning the Revolutions of the Heavenly Orbs”) in 1543, the heliocentric system had finally come to a coherent reestablishment.

The most notable figure to endorse this system was Galileo Galilei not only because his discoveries with the telescope supported the Copernican heliocentric system, but also because it leads to his famous trial before the Inquisition in 1633.

But before Galileo, it was Bruno. Giordano Bruno merely advocated for the Copernican heliocentric system in a way that served his own theology which offended the church because it called into question the truth-value of Christ. So, who was, in fact, Giordano Bruno and what is this theology am I referring to?

Renaissance Man and Rebel Monk

Painting by Oswald Achenbach: Vivid Life on Square San Domenico Maggiore - orognal, German: "Piazza San Domenico Maggiore in Neapel mit regem Treiben"
Pulsating life before on the Benedictine church San Domenico Maggiore in Naples, on the same named square, as depicted by German 19th-century artist Oswald Achenbach.

Filippo Bruno was born in 1548 in Nola (near Naples, Italy). In his youth, Bruno was privately tutored at the Augustinian Monastery in nearby Naples and he attended public lectures at Studium Generale. When he turned 17, he joined the Dominican Order at the monastery of San Domenico Maggiore in Naples. It is then that he took the name of Giordano after his metaphysics tutor, Giordano Crispo.

Three Memory seals or "mnemonic devices" by Giordano Bruno
Three memory seals or “mnemonic devices” by Giordano Bruno. The basic techniques can be traced to classical antiquity and were a prominent feature in Western Hermetics and Alchemy. The similarity to bindrunes and sigills magick should be  striking to most modern practitioners of the craft

At the age of 24, Giordano Bruno became an ordained priest known for his skill with the ancient art of memory. He has even traveled to Rome once, where he demonstrated his mnemonic system before Pope Pius V and Cardinal Rebiba. Bruno soon became known to the Church not only for his mnemonic system but for his free thinking as well. Bruno was passionate about works that were considered heretic and he wasn’t discreet about it.

This (and other things like defending the Arian heresy) caused the Church to prepare an indictment against him. Upon learning about this, Bruno fled Naples in an attempt to escape charges. He shed his religious habit and he was no longer recognized or acknowledged as a priest.

He spends the next 15 years wandering Europe and in 1579 he arrives at Geneva where he publishes an attack on distinguished professor Antoine de la Faye that leads to his arrest, alongside the printer. Instead of recanting, he continued to defend his publication.

Eventually, he left Geneva and went to France where he took his doctorate in theology and was elected to lecture in philosophy. He also became known for his prodigious memory that some of his contemporaries believed to be supernatural. His reputation reached the ears of King Henry III who summoned Bruno to the court. Bruno reported the following:

“I got me such a name that King Henry III summoned me one day to discover from me if the memory which I possessed was natural or acquired by magic art. I satisfied him that it did not come from sorcery but from organized knowledge; and, following this, I got a book on memory printed, entitled The Shadows of Ideas, which I dedicated to His Majesty. Forthwith he gave me an Extraordinary Lectureship with a salary.”

Bruno thrived under the protection of his powerful French patrons and went on to publish several works that were based on his own mnemonic models of organised knowledge and experience, such as: De umbris idearum (On the Shadows of Ideas, 1582), Ars Memoriae (The Art of Memory, 1582), and Cantus Circaeus (Circe’s Song, 1582).

Having received letters of recommendation from Henry III, Giordano Bruno went to England in April 1583 as a guest of the French ambassador at the time, Michel de Castelnau. There he frequented the Hermetic circle around John Dee and even lectured at Oxford. However, his attempt to gain a teaching position there was unsuccessful, largely due to his controversial views with the bishop of Oxford and George Abbot who later became Archbishop of Canterbury.

Abbot even mocked Bruno for supporting “the opinion of Copernicus that the Earth did go round, and the heavens did stand still; whereas in truth it was his own head which rather did run round, and his brains did not stand still”. Nevertheless, Bruno went on to publish his six “Italian Dialogues” and cosmological tracts such as La Cena de le Ceneri (The Ash Wednesday Supper, 1584), which seemed to have offended some people. If his controversial views weren’t upsetting enough, Bruno was also tactless, which resulted in a loss of support from his influential friends.

He spent his last years of wandering (1585-1592) in Germany, where he produced an abundance of magical works, such as De Magia (On Magic), Theses De Magia (Theses On Magic) and De Vinculis In Genere (A General Account of Bonding).

In 1591 his feats in the art of memory caught up with him once again, and he received an invitation to Venice from Giovanni Mocenigo, a patrician who wished to be instructed on mnemonics and suggested that he could apply for the vacant chair of mathematics at the University of Padua. The Inquisition at the time seemed to be more relaxed and because Venice was the most liberal Italian state, Bruno made the fatal decision of returning to Italy.

Bruno first went to Padua, where he failed to obtain the chair for mathematics – fun fact, this position was instead given to Galileo Galilei one year later. In March 1592, Bruno moved in with Mocenigo in Venice. Mocenigo became disenchanted with Bruno and denounced him to the Venetian Inquisition. Giordano Bruno was arrested on May 22nd, 1592. He was accused of blasphemy, heresy, and based on Mocenigo’s denunciation, he was also accused of personal misconduct and belief in the plurality of worlds.

Relief on the "campo dei fiori" in Rome in remembrance of Giordano Bruno's trial by the inquisition
Bronze relief from Campo de’ Fiori, Rome by Ettore Ferrari in remembrance of Giordano Bruno’s trial by the Roman Inquisition.

The Burning of Giordano Bruno

Bruno’s trial in Rome lasted for 7 years in which he was held in confinement. The numerous charges against him included heresy, blasphemy, immoral conduct, which were made worse not by the basic doctrines of his cosmology and philosophy, but by his, again, lack of tact, such as calling Christ a “wretch” and declaring himself as an “enemy of the Mass”, according to Mocenigo’s account.

According to Luigi Firpo, the Roman Inquisition also charged Bruno with:

  • holding opinions contrary to the Catholic faith and speaking against it and its ministers;
  • holding opinions contrary to the Catholic faith about the Trinity, divinity of Christ, and Incarnation;
  • holding opinions contrary to the Catholic faith pertaining to Jesus as Christ;
  • holding opinions contrary to the Catholic faith regarding the virginity of Mary, mother of Jesus;
  • holding opinions contrary to the Catholic faith about both Transubstantiation and Mass;
  • claiming the existence of a plurality of worlds and their eternity;
  • believing in metempsychosis and in the transmigration of the human soul into brutes;
  • dealing in magics and divination.

Bruno was demanded a full recantation, but he refused. Because of this, Pope Clement VIII declared him a heretic and on January 20th, 1600 the Inquisition sentenced him to death. To this, Giordano Bruno replied with the following words:

“Perhaps you pronounce this sentence against me with greater fear than I receive it”.

On Ash Wednesday morning, February 17th, 1600, Bruno was burnt at the stake and his ashes were thrown in Tiber river. The Church records for that morning reported the following:

(Bruno) “was led by officers of the law to Campo de’ Fiori, and there, stripped naked and tied to the stake, he was burned alive, always accompanied by our company singing the litanies, and the comforters, up to the last, urging him to abandon his obstinacy, with which he ended his miserable and unhappy life.”

Giordano Bruno's statue on the “campo dei fiori” in Rome
Giordano Bruno’s statue in Campo de’ Fiori, Rome, errected in 1889. Crafted by sculptor, Ettore Ferrari – Grand Master of the Italian Freemason Order “Grande Oriente d’Italia”. The unveiling of the sculpture on the site of Bruno’s execution was a response of the freemasons to Pope Leo XIII’s 1894 condemnation of masonry. Every year, on the anniversary of his execution, Rome’s mayor, masons, atheists, pagans among several other groups remember Bruno. The engravement says: “To Bruno – From the Age he Predicted – Here Where the Fire Burned”.

Bruno’s entire works were placed on the Index Librorum Prohibitorum in 1603. The burning of Giordano Bruno would haunt Cardinal Robert Bellarmine, the man most responsible for Bruno’s execution. His execution could’ve had political repercussions since the man shared his ideas with kings, dukes, and ambassadors in Protestant countries. In truth, his execution influenced how Cardinal Bellarmine handled the trial of Galileo Galilei three decades later. A document containing a summary of the legal proceedings against Bruno in Rome states:

“In the same rooms where Giordano Bruno was questioned, for the same important reasons of the relationship between science and faith, at the dawning of the new astronomy and at the decline of Aristotle’s philosophy, sixteen years later, Cardinal Bellarmino, who then contested Bruno’s heretical theses, summoned Galileo Galilei, who also faced a famous inquisitorial trial, which, luckily for him, ended with a simple abjuration.”

The Nolan Philosophy

Giordano Bruno did not die for his support of the Copernican heliocentric system – the Catholic Church did not even have an official position on the matter, therefore it couldn’t have been considered heresy. Instead, he died for his “theological errors” such as: “Christ was not God but merely an unusually skillful magician” or “the Holy Ghost is the soul of the world”, in other words: calling into question the truth-value of Christ and denying all forms of Christology.

Bruno was deeply influenced by Renaissance Hermeticism and Neoplatonism. His philosophy (Nolan philosophy, named after his hometown, Nola) was his own version of cosmology. Bruno’s “infinite worlds” heresy was inspired by the Copernican heliocentric system. As a natural philosopher, he interpreted the work of Copernicus and drew the conclusion that there is no upper limit to the universe, the universe was infinite with infinite solar systems similar to our own and perhaps even inhabited by beings like us.

Camille Flammarion's engraving from 1888
Engraving by an unknown artist, first printed in 1888 in Camille Flammarion’s book “L’atmosphère: Météorologie populaire, often invoked to illustrate the medieval worldview: A flat world surrounded by several heavenly spheres. The original caption reads “A missionary of the Middle Ages tells that he had found the point where the sky and the Earth touch…”
The four elements as depicted in one of Giordano Bruno's mnemonic devices.
The four elements as depicted in one of Giordano Bruno’s mnemonic devices.

Bruno’s cosmos is infinite, homogeneous, and isotropic and it has planetary systems evenly distributed throughout. The entire cosmos consists of the same four elements: air, fire, earth, and water. He did not see the stars as made up from a separate quintessence. He also asserted that space and time are infinite, which further canceled Christian notions such as divine Creation.

The Sun was just another star, just like all the other stars were suns. He believed that the fundamental unit of the universe was a solar system and that there is an infinite number of solar systems in the universe, separated by Aether – pure air or “spiritus”. Through his words, we can understand his active principle, understanding of the elements and the infinitude of the universe as he perceived it:

“Whatever is an element of the infinite must be infinite also; hence both Earths and Suns are infinite in number. But the infinity of the former, is not greater than of the latter; nor where all are inhabited, are the inhabitants in greater proportion to the infinite than the stars themselves.”

From these scientific speculations, he drew his religious conclusion, that God is present in all of us and in all heavenly bodies. This causes him to call into question the truth-value of Christ: because if God is in all of us, why would there be a need for a mediator like Christ?

Scala Naturae as depicted by Raimundus Lullus (Ramon Lull)
The Scala Naturae as depicted by Raimundus Lullus (Ramon Lull) showing the hierarchy of being. As opposed to orthodox clerical versions, hermeticians viewed the realms of being as grades of perfection and man free to move the stairs in both directions – maybe best expressed in Pico’s Oration on the Dignity of Man (Oratio de hominis dignitate).

Bruno’s universe had no top, bottom, center, beginning, or end, therefore, there could be no God at the “top” overseeing the Creation. But to Bruno this didn’t invalidate “God”; in fact, it made “God” accessible to anyone and anything at any point in time and space. This absolutely demolishes the clerical version of Scala Naturae (Great chain of being) where God was the permanent being at the top of Creation. In his De Magia, he identifies two scales on his chain of being: descending and ascending.

  • Descending scale: “in all the panorama before our eyes, God acts on the gods; the gods act on the celestial or astral bodies, which are divine bodies; these act on the spirits who reside in and control the stars, one of which is the earth; the spirits act on the elements, the elements on the compounds, the compounds on the senses; the senses on the soul, and the soul on the whole animal.“
  • Ascending scale: “is from the animal through the soul to the senses, through the senses to compounds, through compounds to the elements, through these to spirits, through the spirits in the elements to those in the stars, through these to the incorporeal gods who have an ethereal substance or body, through them to the soul of the world or the spirit of the universe; and through that to the contemplation of the one, most simple, best, greatest, incorporeal, absolute and self-sufficient being.”
The great chain of being as printed 1579 in Rhetorica christiana by Franciscan missionary Didacus Valades (Diego de Valadés). As opposed to Ramon Llully's version the scale appears as a chain of a god-given order. 
The Great Chain of Being as printed in 1579 in Rhetorica Christiana by Franciscan missionary Didacus Valades (Diego de Valadés). As opposed to Ramon Llully’s version the scale appears as a chain of a God-given order.

Bruno uses the Greek myth of Actaeon as an allegory to find not a moral meaning, but a divine one that further closes the gap. In this version of the myth, Actaeon goes hunting for a stag with his hounds in a forest, where he comes across the goddess Diana bathing in a river. He is mesmerized and gazes at the divine beauty, but the goddess punishes him by turning him into a stag.

Thus, the hunter becomes the hunted. His hounds devour him and Actaeon dies. Bruno interprets this myth as a metaphor for his pantheism. The prey that Actaeon seeks is the divine truth. He catches a glimpse of it when he comes across Diana and this encounter transforms him into that which he sought: the divine. He is then devoured by his hounds that represent the will and discursive intellect. This way, Actaeon becomes the heroic man. Bruno states the following:

“He saw himself transformed into that which he sought and realized that he himself had become a much-desired prey for his hounds, his thoughts. Because he had actually drawn the Godhead into himself, it was no longer necessary to seek them outside himself. Here, his life in the mad, sensuous, blind and fantastic world comes to an end, and from now on he leads a spiritual life. He lives the life of the gods.”

In other words, the active pursuit of the desired object transforms one into the object itself. This employs the concept of Eros as mystical love, in which the exchange of the phantasmatic images impresses the spirits of the subjects and the objects. Basically, through mystical love, A becomes B and B becomes A. This further develops Bruno’s Naturalistic Pantheism to reestablish the hierarchy of being.

God, which is pure actuality, from the top of the hierarchy, descends at the same time that Nature which is pure potentiality, at the bottom of the hierarchy ascends. When they meet, a phenomenon occurs, something called coincidentia oppositorum or unity of opposites, a concept that Bruno borrowed from Nicholas of Cusa (but my educational background in philosophy and love for my favorite Ancient Greek philosopher compel me to state that it was Heraclitus who first suggested this concept).

Since Bruno believed in an infinite universe in which he locates the divine in the natural and the natural in the divine, he is able to deduce that this unity of opposites happens at every single point in the universe.

Furthermore, he employs another concept from Nicholas of Cusa (which can also be tied back to Empedocles): “God is an infinite circle whose center is everywhere and whose circumference is nowhere.” Thus emerges the idea that this constant unity of opposites in an infinite universe is the state of being.  Similar to this is one of the principles of Liber AL: “In the sphere I am everywhere the center, as she, the circumference, is nowhere found” (AL, II:3).

Because the divine is located in the natural and the natural is located in the divine and because there is no permanent being at the top of the hierarchy, there is no need for a creator – the anima mundi is creating itself general material forms that are intrinsic to it. Creation creates and is in itself created in the act of creating.

For Bruno, this means that understanding the divine means understanding nature. And you can understand nature by understanding the laws of the universe by employing an intellect and the concept of mystical love. So, the more the laws of the universe, the natural world, are assimilated through the heroic employment of mystical love, the more the intellect identifies with God and Nature.

Thus, the heroic enthusiast emerges, Actaeon, the man (intellect) who assimilates the laws of the universe through mystical love and becomes one with nature and the divine. The concept of the heroic enthusiast dissolves the need for a mediator, such as Christ, between nature and the divine.

It looks like Bruno was able to close the abysm in which he found himself, but he soon found that closing one abysm opens up another. Where the problem of finite beings in an infinite universe opens up a gap, for Bruno is a space for magic. Bruno asserts that for all actions to occur in the world, three conditions need to be met:

  • an active power in an agent
  • a passive power or disposition in a subject or patient “which is an aptitude in it not to resist or to render the action impossible”, which is the potency of matter.
  • “an appropriate application, which is subject to the circumstances of time, place and other conditions.”

With this, he is able to form his concept of binding, as he wrote in his De Vinculis In Genere:

“Humans are bound in many ways. Of all the things which bind, certainly more of them bind humans than brute animals, and more of them bind those who have an active character than those who are dull witted; those who are well endowed in their faculties and powers are aware of more details, circumstances and purposes, and thus, they are moved by more desires.”

The way to bind is through Eros, mystical love. It’s all about dissolving the abysms in between, binding, and ultimately identifying with the object. In this way, the binder becomes bound, the manipulator becomes manipulated, and the reciprocal process of exchange occurs. Therefore, just like science, magic is another form of assimilating the laws of the universe and it leads to man’s transcendence through the identification with Nature and God.

“A bonding agent does not unite a soul to himself unless he has captured it; it is not captured unless it has been bound; he does not bind it unless he has joined himself to it; he is not joined to it unless he has approached it; he has not approached it unless he has moved; he does not move unless he is attracted; he is not attracted until after he has been inclined towards or turned away; he is not inclined towards unless he desires or wants; he does not desire unless he knows; he does not know unless the object contained in a species or an image is presented to the eyes or to the ears or to the gaze of an internal sense.”

Again, through Eros, we are able to do our will, our bidding: we manipulate or are manipulated, we are subjects or objects that exchange images. A bonding agent or a magician is able to manipulate these exchanges, or in other words: to establish links or bonds in order to bind.

Just like any bonding agent, a magician must know the laws of nature (which includes science), and in Bruno’s concept, the laws include his vision of the elements: gods are made of the pure substance of fire, airy and aqueous spirits are denser in body, so they are made of air and fire, and terrestrial spirits, which are the densest of bodies are made of water, air, and fire. In order to bind efficiently, one must know what appeals to these spirits and the elements they consists of.

“Therefore, he who knows how to bind needs to have an understanding of all things, or at least of the nature, inclination, habits, uses and purposes of the particular things that he is to bind.”

While a bonding agent is not always a magician, a magician is always a bonding agent. In his De Magia, Bruno identifies 10 meanings for the terms ‘magic’ and ‘magician’:

  1. Wise man: “for example, the Trismegistes among the Egyptians, the druids among the Gauls, the gymnosophists among the Indians, the cabalists among the Hebrews, the magi among the Persians (who were followers of Zoroaster), the sophists among the Greeks and the wise men among the Latins.”
  2. Magician: “someone who does wondrous things merely by manipulating active and passive powers, as occurs in chemistry, medicine and such fields; this is commonly called ‘natural magic’.”
  3. Prestidigitation: “(the type of) magic involves circumstances such that the actions of nature or of a higher intelligence occur in such a way as to excite wonderment by their appearances”.
  4. Natural magic: “magic (that) refers to what happens as a result of the powers of attraction and repulsion between things, for example, the pushes, motions and attractions due to magnets and such things, when all these actions are due not to active and passive qualities but rather to the spirit or soul existing in things.”
  5. Mathematical magic or occult philosophy: “the use of words, chants, calculations of numbers and times, images, figures, symbols, characters, or letters. This is a form of magic which is intermediate between the natural and the preternatural or the supernatural.”
  6. Theurgy: “prayers, dedications, incensings, sacrifices, resolutions and ceremonies directed to the gods, demons and heroes. Sometimes, this is done for the purpose of contacting a spirit itself to become its vessel and instrument in order to appear wise, although this wisdom can be easily removed, together with the spirit, by means of a drug. This is the magic of the hopeless, who become the vessels of evil demons, which they seek through their notorious art. On the other hand, this is sometimes done to command and control lower demons with the authority of higher demonic spirits, by honouring and entreating the latter while restricting the former with oaths and petitions.”
  7. Necromancy or Pythian magic: “the petition or invocation, not of the demons and heroes themselves, but through them, to call upon the souls of dead humans, in order to predict and know absent and future events, by taking their cadavers or parts thereof to some oracle. This type of magic, both in its subject matter and in its purpose, is called ‘necromancy’. If the body is not present, but the oracle is beseeched by invoking the spirit residing in its viscera with very active incantations, then this type of magic is properly called ‘Pythian’.”
  8. Wicked or poisonous magic: “incantations are associated with a person’s physical parts in any sense; garments, excrement, remnants, footprints and anything which is believed to have made some contact with the person. In that case, and if they are used to untie, fasten, or weaken, then this constitutes the type of magic called ‘wicked’, if it leads to evil. If it leads to good, it is to be counted among the medicines belonging to a certain method and type of medical practice. If it leads to final destruction and death, then it is called ‘poisonous magic’.”
  9. Diviners: “those who are able, for any reason, to predict distant and future events are said to be magicians. These are generally called ‘diviners’ because of their purpose. The primary groups of such magicians use either the four material principles, fire, air, water and earth, and they are thus called ‘pyromancers’, ‘hydromancers’, and ‘geomancers’, or they use the three objects of knowledge, the natural, mathematical and divine. There are also various other types of prophecy. For augerers, soothsayers and other such people make predictions from an inspection of natural or physical things. Geomancers make predictions in their own way by inspecting mathematical objects like numbers, letters and certain lines and figures, and also from the appearance, light and location of the planets and similar objects. Still others make predictions by using divine things, like sacred names, coincidental locations, brief calculations and persevering circumstances. In our day, these latter people are not called magicians, since, for us, the word ‘magic’ sounds bad and has an unworthy connotation. So this is not called magic but ‘prophecy’.”
  10. Any foolish evil-doer: “‘magic’ and ‘magician’ have a pejorative connotation which has not been included or examined in the above meanings. In this sense, a magician is any foolish evil-doer who is endowed with the power of helping or harming someone by means of a communication with, or even a pact with, a foul devil.

His Mission, Or: Giordano Bruno, Aleister Crowley and Thelema

Giordano Bruno Giordano Bruno. Engraving by Johann Georg Mentzel
Giordano Bruno – Portrait. Engraving by Johann Georg Mentzel (1677-1743)

Giordano Bruno, the precursor of modern culture, was someone who constantly tried to reconcile opposites by filling in the gaps, more notably, by filling in the gap between the old pagan world and the new world of the scientific revolution. He did this by developing a cosmology and theology that filled in not only his personal voids, but that helped pave the way for both magicians and scientists today.

Bruno can be and is considered by some as a proto-Thelemic philosopher, largely for his use of mystical love in the practice of magic and binding. Perhaps for this reason he was included as a Gnostic Saint in Aleister Crowley’s Liber XV, the Gnostic Mass.

This is why I find it ironic that atheists push his image forward as their poster-child. Bruno was initially a priest and ultimately a magus that not only supported, but incorporated science into his system. But the problem for many was not that he fancied science, but the fact that he raised man from the bottom of the hierarchy of being and knocked off the permanent being at the top.

To this day, he is still as controversial as always to both scientists and magicians. His spirit is of that element that stirs up ontological conflicts, but which inspires many to think and speak freely, and to be as tolerant as he was to those who had no tolerance for him.

Bruno’s influence on magic is still subject to criticism today. Those who question it might’ve never asked themselves: if the divine is present in all of us and in all heavenly bodies as Bruno proposed, isn’t then every man and every woman a star? And if through intellect, will employs Eros, love, to bind, isn’t then love under will?

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Eliphas Lévi and the Sphinx of the Occult Sciences

Eliphas Levi - Alphonse Louis Constant - Portrait
Ceremonial magician and one of the fathers of modern occultism: Éliphas Lévi Zahed, born Alphonse Louis Constant

One of the stories I like to tell when showcasing how I feel about the way occult practice is perceived even today is that of Éliphas Lévi’s visit to London in 1854. He went there to teach, but Lévi couldn’t really speak English so his ability to teach anything was limited. Much to his dismay, he was also expected to perform hocus-bogus magic to entertain his audience. When he was asked to conjure the spirit of the ancient magician Apollonius of Tyana, Lévi honestly admitted that he had never before attempted such a thing, nor was he truly into that sort of thing.

But after much persuasion, he accepted to at least try it. To prepare, he went on a vegan diet for 2 weeks, followed by another week of fasting. During this time, he used his imagination to project the experience of talking to the dead magician of ancient times. He performed the ritual itself in a so-called temple and after 12 hours of incantations, he got cold and uneasy. Of course, this may also have been caused by his fasting, but that’s not the point.

A spirit did manifest and touched the ritual sword he was holding. He felt a pain in his arm after which it went numb. He then felt extremely cold, frightened, and he fainted. He claimed that his arm was numb for days after that. However, he treated his experience in a subjective manner, but he was able to evaluate the power of magical ceremonies through it.

And he accurately deduced the importance of a strong and experienced psyche when it comes to ceremonial magic. Lévi was honest and did not hide behind the glamour of Spiritualism which was trending at the time. Nor did he dismiss the power of ceremonial magic, instead he used his experience to appreciate it. So, who exactly was Eliphas Lévi?

Birth house of Eliphas Lévi - No. 5 Rue des Fossés-Saint-Germain-des-Prés, nowadays Rue de l'Ancienne-Comédie.
Birth house of Eliphas Lévi – No. 5 Rue des Fossés-Saint-Germain-des-Prés, nowadays Rue de l’Ancienne-Comédie.

Alphonse Louis Constant was born on February 8, 1810, in Paris, France as the son of a shoemaker. He began his studies to enter the Roman Catholic priesthood in 1830, but he gave up the collar in 1836. Some say it was because he wanted to become an occultist, while others say it was because he fell in love and simply abandoned the idea of the priesthood.

He later became known as Éliphas Lévi Zahed, the French ceremonial magician, and author of occult books. Alphonse claimed that Éliphas Lévi is a transliteration of his given name in Hebrew and whether or not that is accurate, the name evokes the powerful image of Baphomet as we know it today.

Although he is now mostly known for the books he has written since 1854, Lévi has published several others before that, such as La Bible de la Liberte (The Bible of Liberty) in 1841, La livres des larmes (The Book of Tears) in 1845, La testament de la Liberte (The Testament of Liberty) in 1848, and a few others. His work before Dogme et Rituel de la Haute Magie (Transcendental Magic, its Doctrine, and Ritual) in 1854-1856 served his radical socialism and his ideology that he described as communisme neo-catholique.

When he published The Bible of Liberty in 1841 he was even given a prison sentence of 8 months for his radical writing. It is suggested that Lévi became disillusioned with his ideology of the perfect universal, socialist order and that is why he turned to occultism after 1848. However, he might have just as well developed his occult system alongside his socialist and neo-catholic ideas.

After Dogme et Rituel, Eliphas Lévi went on to publish other occult books such as Histoire de la Magie (The History of Magic), La clef des Grands mystères (The Key to the Great Mysteries), and several others, out of which Le grand arcane, ou l’occultisme Dévoilé (The Great Secret, or Occultism Unveiled) was published after his death.

His magical system was marked by a confluence of socialist and magnetistic ideas, and his work especially reflects on three fundamental principles that have been influenced by Hermeticism, Kabbalah, and alchemy. The three fundamental principles of magic as identified by Lévi are:

  1. The material universe is an infinitesimal part of total reality. Total reality is a multiverse of planes, modes of consciousness, and it can only be comprehended and experienced through “astral light”. Astral light is a cosmic fluid which can be transmuted into physical forms by will.
  2. Will or willpower is a limitless force and it can transcend all boundaries.
  3. A human being is a microcosm, a scaled-down version of the macro cosmos. Both are linked and have the power to equally influence one another.

However, it is not his philosophy that he is best known for, but the image of the demon Baphomet as it is today. Baphomet, the deity that the Knights Templar were accused of worshiping, is a representation and symbolic form of the Absolute. It is dualistic in nature and embodies both male and female aspects of creation.

Baphomet - The famous black white drawing by Eliphas Levi
Baphomet as drawn by Eliphas Levi – Probably one of the most renown illustrations of modern occultism and model for major arcana XV in A.E. Waite’s Tarot (Rider-Waite)

Lévi depicted Baphomet as a winged goat-headed being with both male and female traits. The main ideas represented in his depiction of Baphomet are polarity (as expressed through the Hermetic concept: “As above, so below”), the unity of the four Platonic elements, and fertility. He has also invested the inverted pentagram with Baphomet’s qualities after being the first to separate the symbol of the pentagram into two different applications.

The inverted pentagram became the symbol of the macrocosm, Baphomet “the sphinx of the occult sciences”, while the upright pentagram, the Tetragrammaton, became the symbol of the microcosm, the symbol of men.  This representation of Baphomet later became the Devil card in A.E. Waite’s popular Tarot deck.

Eliphas Levi's upright pentagram with Tetragrammaton
Eliphas Levi’s upright pentagram – the symbol of the microcosmos

Lévi’s first published treatise on ritual magic, Dogme et Rituel de la Haute Magie (1854-1856) established his position as one of the key founders of the 20th-century revival of magic. While throughout his life he was ostracized by the church for his heretical views, it is believed that he made peace with the church and passed having received his last rites.

Until his death on May 31st, 1875, Lévi made a living from his magical work, through the books he wrote and lessons that he taught. Not only was he popular in the 1850s Spiritualism movement, but his popularity continued to spread after his death as well.

Lévi’s work was and still is so appealing because of its naivety. He did not glamorize his work at all, instead, he approached the matters in a truly scholastic manner. He is also one of the more popular magicians at the time to incorporate Tarot cards into his system, which had a major impact on Western occult practice ever since.

He also had an impact on the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn that was founded in 1888 in London, which adopted much of his teachings. A former member of the order, Aleister Crowley, is known to have claimed at times to be the reincarnation of Lévi because he was born the same year that Lévi died.

Eliphas Levi - Portrait 1874 - color
Eliphas Levi 1874 , one year before his death. He left no less than 148 books behind, but his influence is going much further. The vast majority of modern occult literature rests on ideas spread by Eliphas Levi and his followers, such as Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn – which was heavily influenced by Levi’s writings.
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