Disclaimer: I am 100,000,000% aware that you can not gain a proficiency in magic by reading a book. One needs to apply what is taught and learning from the spirits themselves trumps a book.
Ok, now that THAT is out of the way…
I have noticed a lot of talk going on (on this forum and others) about the Ars Goetia and the spirits found in the pages. There are many who swear that Rudd’s Goetia is the bees knees, while others swear by S. Connolly, and some will punch you right in the giblets if you even mention the Mathers Edition. I know that Poete says that the entire system is flawed and he has undertaken a project to sort it all out.
So all you who are experienced with Goetic Evocation, I ask. What book did you start with? What book would you recommend? And what are your experiences with everybodies favorite 72?
One thing I would ask is please no personal attacks on forum memebers, if you dissagree please do it respectfully.
You can start by the increasing amount of investigation into the Goeita by many other experienced researchers.
I found this review informative enough I bought the book.
Ishtar Publishing is a publishing house specializing in the translation of ancient Arabic magical texts into the English language. In this respect they are one of a kind and in my opinion provides a great service to the occult community of which they should be commended. I have reviewed one of their titles before on my blog, Nineveh Shadrah's Magic Squares and Tree of Life: Western Mandalas of Power. I have just finished reading their recent publication, the highly anticipated Grand Key of Solomon the King: Ancient Handbook of Angel Magic and Djinn Summoning.
As the title suggest this text belongs to the so-called Solomonian magical tradition and occult lore which has been preserved through different so called “grimoires”, or working manuals in the art of spirit summoning, through the late middle ages or early renaissance until today. In most cases these texts are straightforward and void of any theosophical or esoteric speculation as to the how or why of the existence and nature of supramundane beings and corresponding planes. These books thus presuppose that the reader is well versed with or initiated into a magical worldview that is based upon a Hermetic and Qabalistic tradition. This is also the case with the Grand Key of Solomon the King.
Now there are lots of books and texts circulating today with the title of “Key of Solomon”, orClavicula Salomonis as it is called in Latin, attached to them, most notable the translations made by S.L. MacGregor Mathers, the co-founder of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, of which the first was titled simply asThe Key of Solomon the Kingand published in 1889. This translation is often referred to as the “Greater Key of Solomon” to distinguish it from MacGregor Mathers’ later translation from 1904, edited and expanded upon by Aleister Crowley, called The Lesser Key of Solomon or The Goetia, also known as the Lemegeton.
Though both texts by MacGregor Mathers deals with the evocation or the summoning of lesser spirits or demons attributed to the astrological forces, using magical circles painted upon the floor and a wide array of magical weapons such as wands, swords, and daggers, etc., the later work is however not at all related to the “Greater Key” in content and nature as the earlier work mainly deals with the seven Planetary forces while the “Lesser Key” deals with the 72 spirits or demons of the Zodiacal Decans.
Your copy-paste effort is of no relevance to the line I highlighted and which is, in fact, absolute bollocks.
The attributions to the decans are not a part of the Ars Goetia itself, and the broader tradition from which the list of spirits in the Ars Goetia derives does not consist of 72 spirits, showing that these astrological attributions, which by the way merely follow the almost completely arbitrary number sequencing of the Ars Goetia rather than consisting in any attributes of the spirits themselves, is sheer bollocks pulled out of someones arse. Bael is, incidentally, not even the first spirit in the list which Weyer butchered (oh dear, Paimon is here, but what happened to the other three of the 4 kings?), Scot copied (oops, where did poor Pruflas disappear to?), and the author of the Lemegeton copied again (Pruflas is still not here … but Vassago, Seere, Dantalio and Andromalius have miraculously appeared to give us the magic number 72). He would be at least the eighth. The first would actually be Lucifer, so you would have to start there with the first decan of Aries (as if that made sense), but good luck from there because you don’t actually have 72 spirits to fit neatly into your completely arbitrary attributions.
Jus out of curiosity Orismen what’s got you interested in the Goetia or Solomonic evocation? Just looking for something new or do you feel modern methods are somehow lacking?
Poete correct me if I’m wrong but wasn’t the application of the 72 of the Goetia to the Zodiac done to mirror the correspondence to the Shem Ham Maphoresh?
There are many who swear that Rudd's Goetia is the bees knees,
Rudd’s idea isn’t far from the mark as a useful system to incorporate into this practice, except that the attributions to the Shem angels are arbitrary and thus far less useful than they could be. It makes far more sense to find the angel that embodies a virtue which implies power over the force wielded by the particular djinn. And there is not going to be any one-to-one correspondence.
And then to use the angel on whom, that is the question. On the demon out there? How can one, say, pretend to call on a spirit to command the powers of lust within others when these same powers are commanding oneself? How can one have power over a demon who in actual fact has power over oneself? Remember how the texts constantly allude to the fact that demons can appear hideous at first but may be commanded to take on a fair form? Do not write off this story of the demons attempting to regain their position in heaven through completing works for the magician as some Christian propaganda. There is a mystery touched on here that lies at the heart of this entire enterprise which I won’t go into in detail, save to say that what you need to conquer and bind in order to have power is the demon within yourself.
Authority and detachment, my friends.
while others swear by S. Connolly
As I’ve said before:
offerings: good
veneration: depends
worship: lunacy
God is boss, you possess authority as His child, and to dismiss either when involving yourself with spirits is just sheer stupidity. You want to give offerings to spirits, well, you should. They need to be fed to have a substantial presence in the material world just like as a spirit do. You want to venerate the holy ones to keep yourself in their favour or praise the ones that are good to you, that’s not a bad idea. You want to worship them and grovel for things and let them be when they are being antagonistic in fulfilling their duties, and you have a problem. You’re being controlled. Yes, of course the demon worshiper is going to claim that you shouldn’t be commanding them by the power of God if they aren’t being nice to you. What else would you expect him to say?
And I’ll tell you why NOT COMMANDING a disobedient spirit is a BAD, BAD idea. Been there, done that. It’s disobedient because you have a problem with the particular thing this demons controls. Because you are in reality enslaved to its powers. It’s laughing in your face. This is the symbolism of the Devil card. If you don’t come into an harmonious relationship with it, that means that this things is left with power over your life. And sometimes to do that you are going to have to seriously bust some balls inside and out. Think about that carefully.
and some will punch you right in the giblets if you even mention the Mathers Edition.
[quote="-TWF-, post:7, topic:2283"]Jus out of curiosity Orismen what’s got you interested in the Goetia or Solomonic evocation? Just looking for something new or do you feel modern methods are somehow lacking?
Poete correct me if I’m wrong but wasn’t the application of the 72 of the Goetia to the Zodiac done to mirror the correspondence to the Shem Ham Maphoresh?[/quote]
Comes with the territory I suppose. The Golden Dawn et al. had an unhealthy obsession with trying to fit everything together. Look what they did to the Tarot. Fit them to the elements, to the sephirah, to the planets and zodiac, to the Tree of Life, to the Ars Goetia … it gives me a headache just thinking about it. Tarot is Tarot, Tree of Life is Tree of Life, astrology is astrology, and while there are parallels, they do not all fit neatly together into one grand system. As for the Ars Goetia and the Tarot as presented by the GD …facepalm … yeah, you can use it and can make it work sort of, if you like, but that’s just a chaos magic effect.
If yu call this spirit Paimon alone yu must make him some offering to him & there will attend him 2 kings called Bebal & Abalam, & other spirits of ye order of Potestates [Potentates] in his host are 25 Legions because all those spirits wch are subject to him, are not allwayes wth him unlesse ye Magician compelleth them, etc.
Bebal. Abalam.
A most obvious gloss that is simply repeated from Weyer to the modern editions of the Goetia. Old manuscripts written in archaic lettering are not easy to read.
“Bebal” is none other than Belial. It’s readily conceivable how an ‘l’ and ‘i’ become a ‘b’. Abalam is, perhaps much more obviously, Balam. Do I have any evidence besides mere conjecture? Here is the the proof:
Of Paimon’s 12 chief spirits, the first two, being kings themselves, are called here Beliall and Bafon. Their descriptions match exactly those of Belial and Balam in the Ars Goetia. Bingo. We have recovered a piece of tradition and made sense of s strange passage in the Goetia.
But wait a minute. You mean to tell me the 9 kings of the Goetia are not really some special set of nine kings over the others? There’s a king ruling two other kings? But the Goetia doesn’t even list Paimon as one of the 4 kings of the directions! Yeah, well, the Goetia is WRONG and INCOMPLETE in some regards, which is why it is not internally consistent.
[quote=“Poete Maudit, post:9, topic:2283”][quote="-TWF-, post:7, topic:2283"]Jus out of curiosity Orismen what’s got you interested in the Goetia or Solomonic evocation? Just looking for something new or do you feel modern methods are somehow lacking?
Poete correct me if I’m wrong but wasn’t the application of the 72 of the Goetia to the Zodiac done to mirror the correspondence to the Shem Ham Maphoresh?[/quote]
Comes with the territory I suppose. The Golden Dawn et al. had an unhealthy obsession with trying to fit everything together. Look what they did to the Tarot. Fit them to the elements, to the sephirah, to the planets and zodiac, to the Tree of Life, to the Ars Goetia … it gives me a headache just thinking about it. Tarot is Tarot, Tree of Life is Tree of Life, astrology is astrology, and while there are parallels, they do not all fit neatly together into one grand system. As for the Ars Goetia and the Tarot as presented by the GD …facepalm … yeah, you can use it and can make it work sort of, if you like, but that’s just a chaos magic effect.[/quote]
I thought Rudd had done it before GD, but I believe they changed it a bit from Rudds version, I’m not a huge Golden Dawn fan so I don’t keep up with their system too closely. I agree with you about them trying to fit Qaballah and Tarot into everything,just because there are correspondences doesn’t mean they’re linked any more closely. I think they took the Hermetic views and tried to put them all in one big pot instead of getting a real understanding of each, when you put them all together you get a general understanding but miss out on the deeper levels.
Ha, sorry. Didn’t mean to place more responsibility on ya.
I have always been attracted to the Solomonic Legend. I know that some say there is a lot of fiction to it, but the idea of a Holy Sorcerer always intrigued me, mostly while I was board out of my mind in the spiritually dead religion my parents forced a young me to attend.
I remember reading through the Goetia and feeling inspired by it. My first attempt at evocation was a mixed success. I evoked the spirit I found in the Mather’s edition (I agree that he DOES need a good giblet punchin’) I tried as hard as I could to see the spirit and feel its presence. After what felt like forever I finally got sick of it and issued a task. I didn’t get what I asked for, I got something else and in the end after doing more research than I knew was humanly possible it became clear to me that I asked the wrong spirit. It was trying to accomplish the task, but it was not in its wheel house.
Yet I heard LMD and others mention he Goetia and the success they had with it. I still want to get into the Solomonic Magic, but being honest with myself as a college student who works full time I can make the time to do serious study. A grimorie I can read, but having to piece together a system, while I have classwork and work is just too much for me right now.
I have never been a strict traditionalist, but I have learned that things in magic are the way they are for a reason. One can play around with things to a degree, but there are certain things that must remain the same. For example the LBRP, there is a reason one calls on those particular archangels and not four demons they happen to like, or four other archangels. I believe that once one internalizes the lesson, and truly understands why Michael, Gabriel, Uriel, and Raphael are in the LBRP then they can find four other spirits with those attributes and see if they work in place of the archangels.
I feel that some modernism misses the mark and some traditional traditions need to be updated. But that is just my 2 cents.
I have had success with EA’s methods and in my workings with Hecate, but the Goetia is very different. It feels like something is just not adding up.
Sorry, just to clarify: are you saying EA’s methods don’t work with Goetic spirits for you?
As far as my experience, I started out in demonolatry, but eventually came to the conclusion that despite all their power and wisdom, I should not be the groveling supplicant in the relationship. I moved on to the method outlined in Rufus Opus’s “Modern Goetic Grimoire”, whose beliefs are very hermetic, and he uses kind of a bastardized version of Mathers. It was an interesting period, but results were lacking.
Frankly, and I can say without any trace of pandering, EA’s evocation rituals have far and away been the most successful for me. I learned a lot from Connolly (I think the enns in particular are very powerful), but when it comes down to results, I’ve only really seen the spirits act after utilizing EA’s methods.
Of course, it’s had it’s bumps along the way. Sometimes there would be nothing to show for it, and sometimes they lost steam somewhere along the way, like my last post about the curse. I’ve also had Sallos bring the man of my dreams back into my life, ask for my number, and then see things fizzle out as fast as it started.
To be honest, I always thought it was my desire that was hampering my progress, but the idea that there is something more to tradition is interesting. What exactly is it about the older methods you find so appealing? Is it the drama? There is definitely a sense of regalness to it, I’ll give you that.
It’s not that EA’s methods don’t work, it is just that the Goetia is screwy. I do some divination and everything looks ready to go, but they go about things in the screwiest way.
Have you ever read the comic “Family Circus?” Issuing a task to a Goetic is like asking Billy to take something to the neighbors. At least that has been my experience.
Belial worked fine, Hecate is great (and demanding), Angels and I get along fine. But Goetics outside of Belial…shrug.
With the Solomonic system I wanted to go to the root and see for myself. I want a good base of tradition and modern to blend into my own. To be fair my current practice is heavily influenced by EA and Andrieh Vitimus.
But lest anyone who is mildly curious, may dare to rashly imitate this proof of folly; I have omitted passages from this study, in order to render the whole work unusable.
Just using the basic needs for communication/manifestation with entities.
Having a name or a sigil, ignoring all the “skills” listed in the grimoire, one can still comunicate with whatever is behind that sigil or name.
So, instead of using the goetia as a system, can it still be used as a list?
My thoughts on the skills listed under those names is that are just the limited task they did for a certain number of magicians, not necesarily their real/full capabilities)
so basically is an unexplored world and only the entities itself can help clearing it out
[quote=“Orismen, post:1, topic:2283”]Disclaimer: I am 100,000,000% aware that you can not gain a proficiency in magic by reading a book. One needs to apply what is taught and learning from the spirits themselves trumps a book.
Ok, now that THAT is out of the way…
I have noticed a lot of talk going on (on this forum and others) about the Ars Goetia and the spirits found in the pages. There are many who swear that Rudd’s Goetia is the bees knees, while others swear by S. Connolly, and some will punch you right in the giblets if you even mention the Mathers Edition. I know that Poete says that the entire system is flawed and he has undertaken a project to sort it all out.
So all you who are experienced with Goetic Evocation, I ask. What book did you start with? What book would you recommend? And what are your experiences with everybodies favorite 72?
One thing I would ask is please no personal attacks on forum memebers, if you dissagree please do it respectfully.[/quote]
In my case was a complex task. Probably for not proficency on the Goetic approach. After a training contacting Kingdoms of Flame spirits and demons, and rebel anges, face a Goetic spirit was completly different. In my case I contact Marbas to heal a person near me. The results were moderate ( according to that actual approach on my expirience ) but was fine, despite of the objects falling all around the house, ( and later check that everything was there in the right place )
I own only the Mathers version, but barely even bother reading even the description of the spirits themselves. I do my own independent research regarding the current, become more familiar with that spirit’s current by meditating on the sigil, then do a full blown evocation.
I realized a long, long time ago that the Mathers version was deeply flawed when I evoked Astaroth for the first time, as my first Goetic evocation, and She appeared to me as a thirty year old Middle Eastern woman of nobility with deep violet robes draped seductively around Her body, and a chalice in Her hand. A far cry from the goofy looking spirit with bad breath Mathers talks about. I immediately made connections between Her form and Astarte, Ishtar, Innana, even Isis. It is interesting to note that Lady Ishtar was renowned for subjugating men by knowing them, a reference to sexual intercourse, and Isis subjugates Ra by also knowing him; specifically his True Name. As both these Goddesses are linked to Astaroth, I have found Her to be a phenomenal teacher regarding mastery of other people, through deep and intimate knowledge of the other person. This, I believe, is the key behind Mathers’ description of Astaroth as one who is skilled in divination, and also linked to causing love between men and women.
There is no question about it - the Ars Goetia is intentionally incomplete - Wyer says so himself (as was posted above).
You can work with Lucifer through the Grimorium Verum.
Make the tools as best you can at the prescribed times.
The Spirits will respond according to your earnestness.
If they add uncomfortable circumstances mixed in with the results, my recommendation is to work through the circumstance and learn the lesson they have included in the package, rather than dumping the gift they have given you.
