Has anyone done what is described in the Goetia?

Here’s my take. Don’t look at things literally all the time. Use your spiritual discerning eyes and read between the lines. For spirits transmuting metals into gold think perhaps spiritual alchemy.

But some of this is for real literal too.

Use your judgement.

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Because you won’t see anyone shapeshift into a bird or mermaid because they asked a demon to do it. Most lore about the goetia is heavily exaggerated, quite frankly not just the goetia. If anything it’s astral change or etheric.

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One, because literacy (reading and writing) was not taught to common folk until relatively recently in history like it is today, where illiteracy is quite uncommon (in developed countries, anyway). To illiterate people centuries ago, the very act of someone being able to look at symbols drawn on paper, or inscribed in metal or clay, and to discern their meaning, might have seemed like magic in and of itself.

Two, because traditional/ceremonial magickal systems have more or less always been hidden behind a veil of secrecy, and required initiation into its praxis by a mage more experienced in the current. Rituals weren’t just published in a straightforward manner like a cookbook in the same way you’ll find in modern and postmodern grimoires.

Three, because reading between the lines and thinking outside the box is a huge boon to any mage. Sure, you could ask Agares for help becoming fluent in learning another language. You could ask Foras to make you invisible. You can ask Haagenti to show you how to turn water into wine. But reading between the lines and interpreting those powers in a postmodern world, you will likely find them much different. Agares can destroy Dignities both Spiritual and Temporal break down others’ magickal defences. Marbas can change men into other shapes give you an attractive or repulsive glamour which changes the way other people respond and react to you. Bathin can transport men suddenly from one country to another aid you in easy, breezy, barrier-free travel. Foras can maketh men invisible make it so that others take no notice of your presence so you can go about your activities unhindered. And so on.

Pick up a copy of Demons of Magick, it deals with Goetic spirits but reinterprets their powers in modern ways. You can also use your discernment and imagination to figure out how the powers in the Lemegeton might apply to a situation.

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Okay kind of off-topic but you talk about DOM alot so i believe you are the best person to ask this to and i don’t want to bother you in dms so i’ll ask this here fast :

  1. Does doubt hinder ones ability to work with demons ? when working with angels i’m usually fine but with demons i have this sense of doubt that crawls inside me and i just can’t shake it. i’m afraid it will hinder my abilities to work with them.

  2. Any advice for someone who wants to go through a full evocation of a spirit with the DOM method ? i don’t have any dark rooms in my house

  3. do spirits get bothered when you ask them for to many stuff ? like, if i ask Gremory for a specific girl, and when i get her another one, than another one, than another one, will she eventually get sick of helping me or is it like a fast food where you come and go as you please ?

  4. how do you work with non-goetic spirits like Lucifer ?

thank you in advance

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By the way, you are not asking the Goets, do they know how to do these things?

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Contradictory point of view. Either matter is the highest form of spirit, and spirits can change it as they wish and push the planets out of orbits, or they are just some jugglers and psychotherapists for those who have no money.

Yes I do talk about it a lot haha, I think it was one of the first actual “work with entities” grimoires I bought and I’d already been awake for 24 hours at the time but I stayed up to read it cover-to-cover. That said, I may not be the best person to answer but I will do my best to answer your questions.

Doubt hinders your ability in everything. Where is your doubt coming from? Do you doubt that you’re going to get the results you want? Or do you doubt that you’re actually making contact with demons? If it’s the latter, the best thing you can do IMO is to tell yourself you are just pretending or playing make-believe, the way children do, when they can use their imagination to turn a cardboard box into a racing car or a castle. Act as though you have called the demon, they hear you, and they accept your petition.

If you doubt your results, I would suggest doing a petition ritual to Dantalion, Orias, or Paimon and ask them to remove doubts from your mind, or ask them to never let your mind linger on doubts. I spoke a bit about this here.

You can try using an astral temple (search the BALG forum for “astral temple”), or you could try another method, such as a pathworking. I believe there is a grimoire out there which contains pathworkings to the Goetic demons (hopefully someone will jump in and mention it because I don’t own it and am unsure what it is called or who wrote it). Alternatively you can use the evocation keys in DoM as pathworking steps. Pathworking, in short, involves going into a trance/altered state and then “walking” through a series of images or other sensory impressions to encounter the demon in question.

Hard to say, since I don’t use DoM exclusively, and I tend to layer rituals for the the results I want. And those other rituals might include working with angels, genius spirits, gods, other assorted entities, the Law of Consciousness, or my own experimental rituals.

In general it is best to ask for one thing at a time, wait until you get the result (or until sufficient time has passed that you are sure it will not happen - like 6-8 months might be a good benchmark for waiting).

Also, it never hurts to build up relationships with a spirit. Start with small requests which have a lot of avenues of opportunity to manifest and just need a nudge in the right direction. Give thanks and give the offering you promised. Build a good working relationship with a spirit if you intend to go back to them time and time again.

I can’t personally say whether one spirit or another is going to get annoyed if you overwhelm them with requests one-after-the-other, but if you don’t even give the original ritual room to manifest, it seems like a bit of a waste of time. E.g. Don’t call Sallos and ask him to make X your girlfriend, then call him up three days later and ask the exact same thing again.

Really this comes down to the individual and the kind of relationship you build with each entity. Like imagine if you have a new coworker, or a new classmate at school, and you talk to them once and they seem OK, and then immediately they assume they’re your best friend and suddenly they’re following you around everywhere you go, trying to talk to you all the time, trying to make friends with all your friends, inviting themselves along to your planned activities, etc., and you’ve only known them for one week. Would you get annoyed? Maybe you would, or maybe you’d be flattered, depending on the person. Does that make sense?

Me personally, I have a specific pathworking to Lucifer (one that I unfortunately cannot share) and some other pathworkings to a handful of gods and entities that were either channelled and shared with me by other practitioners, or discovered myself through experimentation.

In general, if I wanted to speak with a demon or entity and I couldn’t find a system for contacting them (on BALG or via online search), I would read about them and try and find a sigil or seal for them, or an image or symbol that represents them, and anything else related to them. For example, I made contact with a god of the Māori pantheon this way and was given a pathworking to him. For non-goetic “demon”-type entities, there are also grimoires like Lucifer and the Hidden Demons and Kingdoms of Flame, etc., neither of which I have read, so I can’t personally comment on, but I am certain you will find a lot of content if you search the forum for those titles.

Edit: There is also EA Koetting’s mantra/chant to call forth any spirit, #4 on this blog post.

Humans are of spirit too, but I think it would take a great deal of power to push planets out of orbit. And referring back to the above, who is to say that planets are not conscious in their own right?

I guess I partially agree in that consciousness is fundamental and results in matter, and not vice-versa. But with respect, I am not certain I understand your point, although I’m happy to discuss if, if it doesn’t result in derailing OP’s thread.

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Thank you for the detailed answer it was very useful. The pathworking book you are referencing is "Pathworking Goetia " by Corwin Hargroove

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Bathin can transport men suddenly from one country to another aid you in easy, breezy, barrier-free travel.

Okay. So, if I had a family member died in Cuba and I do not have a passport currently. The passport would take two months to file for but the funeral is in a week. Could Bathin aid me in that circumstance? If not give me an example of what you mean by “aid you in easy, brezzy, barrier - free travel.”

I don’t think that’s how it works. Personally what from I understand for example if you already had a valid passport and could afford to travel, then the spirit would aid you along the trip to reduce the chances of you missing your connecting flight or being mugged on your travel and other misfortunes that could delay your travel. Those things really do happen every day to people travelling… so if it’s something you worry could happen, then call upon Bathin to reduce the chances of it happening to you. Alternatively, it might mean he could aid you with learning how to astral travel.

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Foras can maketh men invisible make it so that others take no notice of your presence so you can go about your activities unhindered. And so on.

So, if I want steal a T.V from a store. Could Foras make it so no one notice me? Could I just walk in and out from any store taking what I please at any given’ time? If not then why not? Give me an example when " Foras can make it so that others take no notice of your presence ".

the spirit would aid you along the trip to reduce the chances of you missing your connecting flight or being mugged on your travel and other misfortunes that could delay your travel

There other things that a person could do to reduce those chances of missing connecting flight, being mugged and other misfortunes. For instance, plan a head, leave early and dress appropriately etc.

So, what would be the point asking a spirit when I could do this on my own? I want to believe that these spirits are more powerful than that.

If the ability to make invisible is not literally, then no one will notice you, but on cameras you will be visible.

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I feel like you can get away with this example within reason. You have to use common sense and be practical if you want to achieve results in magick or anything else. So ideally to get away with this example (in theory) you might go into the store after it is closed and you’re sure everyone’s went home. You probably should have the knowledge on how to dismantle the store’s security and enter the building discreetly after hours. Your job is to be prepared, knowledgeable and calculated. The demons job would be to keep you under the radar. Meaning, once YOU successfully get the TV, Foras could theoretically keep law enforcement away until you’re home or guide you not to trigger additional alarms.

It’s not as easy as snapping your fingers and waiting for a miracle, and Foras won’t give you a cloak of invisibility, so you need to be prepared to do your part and ask for something you can realistically accomplish. You can’t just walk into the store in broad day light and rip the tv off the mount in a store packed with people and think just because you summoned a demon earlier that day no one would notice you.

Side note, if you actually want to do that… I’ve done a spell (but not worked with Foras) to get less attention drawn to me. Sure, it could help you get away unnoticed but you must be calculated. The downside is you will likely become unnoticed by your crush and people who’s attention you seek. It could hurt lol so be careful what you wish for.

And there are some things that are out of your control no matter how prepared you think you might be, that’s why a demon / magick could be useful.

I completely share this guy’s bewilderment. Yes, probably, from the point of view of energy costs, it is easier for demons to somehow influence causal relationships, the consciousness of people (for example, law enforcement agencies or guards) than to make an invisibility cloak from Harry Potter or make you invisible in the literal sense. But damn it, if the first is possible, then the second should be possible. If the spirits of the healers can accelerate the healing of wounds, then not much more energy (on the scale of space, on the scale of the Earth) should be needed to, for example, turn you from a human into some kind of beast and vice versa in the literal sense.

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Yes when I evoke a spirit I first verify that I indeed have the right spirit I intended to call. I them ask the spirit about it’s traditional powers and offices and abilities. Even if I don’t have a task to assign the spirit I always make some banter and get clarification on the abilities and a commitment that I can call on them in the future.

That’s why I say when we read the lesser key of Solomon we need to use our spiritual eyes to discern what is the truth.

In the OP s example he listed President Haagenti because of the spirits legendary ability to transmute metals. I straight up asked about this and he said spirit alchemy. Which is what I suspected anyway.

Obviously Duchess Vepar isn’t going to turn you into a mermaid but the part about afflicting people with worms that can kill after three days…that’s no joke. Just gotta open your eyes and use your mind.

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@Arabian gave you a good answer to that. If you want a passport quickly you’d be better off with other spirits, like St. Expedite. If you need money for travel, Bune. Et cetera.

If you really wanted to commit burglary, which I don’t recommend, then you’d be better off layering spells with various demons. Not just asking Foras or Bael to “make you invisible” and then go and commit a crime thinking that others literally cannot see you or that you won’t show up on CCTV security footage.

Also, if your goal/desire is “I want a new TV” (for example), there are other ways of going about it. Like rituals for money to buy the TV, or rituals to be given gifts out of the blue. Again, think outside the box.

I have never worked with Foras so I can’t directly answer your question. I have however worked with Bael, most of whose listed powers are to do with making oneself invisible/unnoticed, or to make others uninterested in your affairs. I have used rituals with Bael multiple times to make people forget things I’ve told them (or at least never to bring the subject up again), to make my supervisor at work go from micro-managing me to leaving me completely alone, and to cover up a minor theft (Not proud of this, but it is what it is – and no, it wasn’t walking out of an electronics store with a stolen TV under my arm, it was eating my roommate’s leftover food (lol) which I’ve done a handful of times, am the only possible culprit, and never been confronted about it).

Just an observation if you’ll forgive me saying so, but you seem oddly hostile about the fact that you can’t simply snap your fingers and have a passport appear in your hand or rob a store in broad daylight. I don’t know how long you’ve been practicing, but magick is not like Hollywood magic where you wave a wand and say an incantation and something happens instantly. This hopefully answers your question of “if not then why not?”

You need to build up your own level of power/influence, develop good working relationships with spirits, learn and practice getting into trance and altered states, pouring your entire will into a working, and not doubt or lust for result. And also, reiterating, think outside the box as to how you’re going to achieve your goal.

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Just an observation if you’ll forgive me saying so, but you seem oddly hostile about the fact that you can’t simply snap your fingers and have a passport appear in your hand or rob a store in broad daylight. I don’t know how long you’ve been practicing, but magick is not like Hollywood magic where you wave a wand and say an incantation and something happens instantly.

I don’t think I was hostile at all. I was just asking general questions and I wanted to know if anyone had preform these specific acts and got the results that was mentioned in the Goetia.

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Gotcha. Well, for me the answer is yes, I have gotten results from Goetic spirits. But nothing as flashy as turning into the invisible (wo)man or anything that would get me burnt at the stake back in the days of witch-hunting :stuck_out_tongue:

On articles and videos I’ve read and heard some interpretations… They range from EA’s explanation of treasure = “simple” money, or treasures meant as knowledge, even to the point of an occultist writing that the idea of (for example) Goetic spirits is born out of distorted concepts. If this was true, we would’ve the eggregores case, or at least it’s possible that every thing has different levels/layers of reality.

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