Over the years, I have seen on social media, blogs and YouTube several discussions relating to the history of the IOT. These vary in quality, some being very good and others less so.
One thing they appear to have in common is that they are produced by people who have either no or tenuous links to the IOT, and the research is conducted mainly through other articles accessed via the internet. It’s my opinion that any discussion that over relies on information gleaned from the internet which does not include book research and fieldwork to be essentially flawed. As we all know, because it’s on the internet that does not mean it’s accurate, and there may be some essential information that will not be included.
In relation to the IOT while there are some books that will give information there are not many and therefore, I would consider fieldwork to be an essential component of any research conducted into this magical order. Putting it plainly: if you want to know what happened in the IOT, ask the membership.
I would point to this video made by someone who was there when the IOT was born to be the most accurate account as well as Dave’s series on the history of the IOT on this blog.
Most internet discussions focus on an event which I like to call the ‘Ice Magick Argument,’ often referred to as a ‘war.’ I personally cannot comment on the ins and out of what happened with this as it happened so long ago before I had joined the IOT.
Most histories of the IOT given by people who have never been members tend to finish with The Ice Magick Argument and little attention is paid to any history that occurred after that event or how the IOT is today. The IOT is a group that is constantly evolving and changing and due to this development, the IOT that exists today will have some differences to the IOT of five years ago. Occasionally I see discussions on social media involving people who say they were members 10 years ago or so whose opinions may have historical value, but due to the continual evolving nature of the IOT bear little resemblance to how the order is today.
The PACT will also mean different things to different people. One person’s experience of it may be very different to another’s, as individual development and expression is encouraged within the order.
On the BIS YouTube account, youtube.com/c/IOTBIS we have started a series of personal accounts of how individuals joined the IOT which gives a more up to date flavour of the IOT by showcasing these individual journeys within the PACT. As the IOT encourages its membership towards personal autonomy and finding their own magical style it is hoped that these videos will give a hint of the diverse experience of PACT members and a more accurate snapshot in time of how the British Isles Section operates during the time the video was made.
(This is the opinion of Soror Brigantia and does not necessarily reflect the opinion of everyone in the IOT)
Chaos magicians in general don’t like their magical life to be controlled by anyone. Yet the little pond of occultism is crammed with wannabe Big Fish; Mages, Grand Masters and Ipsissimi just gagging to tame us to bridle and bit for their own purposes which could make them anything from benign tyrant to barking mad cult leader.
The IOT was never going to be just another magical order: we are the cats you cannot herd. So how do we keep things organised while safeguarding our personal autonomy within our Pact? Or, as it’s mostly asked, how does a Chaos Order work?
One of the answers is the Insubordinate. This role is a mainstay of the Pact’s anti-authoritarian way of doing things but is by definition pretty alien to the majority of occulture. If you haven’t read the definitive account in the Book of the Pact, here’s a link: https://iotbritishisles.com/the-book-of-the-pact/. Let’s see what it says:
A repeated phrase in The Book is “Criticism in the Pact flows from the bottom to the top.” Just as there’s nobody to tell you what to think or believe, there’s nobody wagging their finger at you telling you you’re doing it wrong. This is the complete opposite of authority-led groups. Nevertheless, we have ‘leaders,’people ‘at the top.’ And so the role of Insubordinate was devised to keep them in check.
“Every Magister Templi, Adept, Magus, and Section Head, is assigned an Insubordinate … electedby Initiates and Neophytes.” They don’t get to choose somebody compliant: they get an Insubordinate foisted on them who is nobody’s pet.
“It is the task of the Insubordinate to ensure that the Magister Templi, Section Head, Adept or Magus does not neglect their personal magical progress and that they carry out their tasks well. There are different ways to fulfill the duties of the Insubordinate.
They may convey criticism with the loutishness of the Jester, making everything appear ridiculous,
or inquire with the Fool’s naivety about issues that are unclear.
Taking the role of Chaplain, the Insubordinate may point out personal weaknesses and blind spots of the recipient of the insubordination,
acting as Confessor they may receive reports on personal developments, as Inquisitor they may raise an objection to decisions.”
Accountability is the name of the game here. The Insubordinate is not just some personal assistant or PR rep. They proactively take the poor hierarchical figure to task where necessary, and may be as searching and uncompromising as they like. The German term for the Insubordinate is ‘Querulant.’ Says it all.
“These five roles of the Insubordinate consist of the following tasks.
Ensure that all explanations, speeches and teachings are clear to everyone and criticize those, which are not, and demand their clarification. Thus, the Fool’s task is to simulate ignorance where others pretend understanding.
Convey criticism with a certain easiness and impertinence. Thus the duty of the Jester is to take something appear ridiculous which others would like to diplomatically overlook.
Point out personal weaknesses and blind spots. Thus it is the responsibility of the Chaplain to handle personal issues in an impartial manner.
Receive reports on personal magical development without commenting on them. Thus it is the task of the Confessor to offer protection from laziness and self-satisfaction.
Hold the right to veto any instruction and to inform a Magus, the Section Head or the Council of the Magi about its exercise. Thus it is the Inquisitor’s duty to prevent the abuse of position.
Predominantly the Insubordinate will conduct their official business with the Recipient of their insubordination in private. It may be advisable for the Recipient to inform their Insubordinate about any controversial events beforehand in order to prevent the exercise of a veto inpublic.”
That veto. The unstoppable power to say ‘No!’ to what a higher grade proposes, with no comeback. This is a powerful tool for undercutting authoritarianism.
Furthermore, the Insubordinate may use their role on behalf of any other member who feels a need to criticise, especially those who might not feel comfortable presenting their criticism themselves. The Insubordinate’s intervention gives them anonymity and shields them from any possible reprisals.
How’s a megalomaniac supposed to operate under these conditions? Thanks to the Insubordinates, not at all.
Developing a magical will has never been an issue for me. Stubborn and determined to the core; formulating a goal, planning the process of achieving said goal, executing the plan and achieving the goal at the end has been a natural process for me.
This has been surprising for some folks that I have met throughout my life, who thought that being introverted meant being weak and took it upon themselves to foolishly attempt to bully me into a course of action that I did not want to take. However nothing will persuade me into doing something I do not want, immovable as a mountain and as stubborn as Balaam’s ass … I would not be moved!
If my heart is set on something I will achieve it by hook or by crook. If I find that a door is closed unto me then I will either get a battering ram and smash the door to smithereens or will take the side route and find a way around the door, perhaps through a side gate that’s been left unlocked. I have always found a way. If a person gets in my way, well, that only encourages me to work harder for the goal and makes the victory all the more sweet.
This has served me well in the sense that I have met all the goals that I had as a child and have had awesome experiences – seen things and done things that go beyond what would have been expected for me as a child. I have also gone beyond my own expectations of myself as a direct result of my experiences within the Illuminates of Thanateros and have done things I would not have done otherwise and have been all the better for it. I have used a combination of magical and non-magical means to build for myself the life that I wanted.
However this determined carpe diem nature has also led to a feeling of tension or stress within my self; the type of tension that any completer/ achiever has I guess. Sometimes I enjoy the fight and sometimes I don’t but it does feel like a fight on occasions.
Due to the pandemic however I have experimented with a different way of doing things. Maybe this is because the keyworking I was doing made my working life busier than it usually is. Sometimes the pandemic stress impacts on my cognitive functioning and just getting through the pandemic successfully is all one can manage. Maybe it’s because I am getting into a time of life where I want to chill more and no longer feel the need to be so goal driven.
Lately I have been experimenting with working more with the energy that is there and making that work for me. Instead of battering down the closed door I am now finding a different door one that is open and working with that as opposed to aggressively focusing on the locked one. Working with the Tao and finding the path that is obstacle free and making that work for me is a gentler way of working with my magical will.
I don’t always achieve exactly what I want with this method, I achieve something else which is of equal value with the knowledge that aggressively achieving is not always necessary. There are other ways to live.
This has led to my now having more than one way of working with my magical will. I can choose to work gently with the energy that presents to me but I can still take a battering ram when I want to. Flexibility is the key.
Soror Brigantia is a Magus of the Pact and a former British Isles Section Head
Some time in 1982 Pete Carroll went to live in Bristol and founded an IOT Temple there, known as Cabal Heraclitus. In 1983 he asked our little Leeds group (PD, Robin, Rodney and myself) to try out a new series of sorcery pathworkings, the Cthonos Rite (a CD of this is still available from New Falcon, http://www.originalfalcon.com/chaos-magick-audios-1-cthonos-rite.php ). This is a set of five elemental pathworkings, suitable for enchantment, divination, illumination, evocation and invocation.
Here is an excerpt from the first one:
THURS 10TH NOV 1983: TEMPLE OF EARTH (Evocation)
The room is square, faintly illuminated by a glowing yellow double-cube altar on which is a pen, ink, a small wand and a square of yellow paper.
Around me is visialised a bright circle on the floor, and to the North, a bright triangle of evocation.
Sigil drawn on paper, black on yellow, of ERAMI (a Franz Bardon spirit), and traced over with the wand drawing it in light, and making the intention to summon him.
We asked him to produce £22 within a week. On THURS 17th November I noted: ‘Failure’.
Overall, we had three failures; the above one, our skrying for a hit single (Water/Divination Temple), and a weather spell (Air/Invocation Temple). The Spirit / Illumination working was a telepathy experiment which produced a partial success. The big hit was the Fire (Enchantment) Temple (I also wrote about this in Bright From the Well):
MON 21ST NOV: TEMPLE OF FIRE: Intention: To cause mistakes in the reading of the BBC 9 o’clock news between 9.10 and 9.15 this evening, fault on sound severe enough to warrant an apology.
At Rodney’s, 8.35-58 pm, Astral Travel incense and oil.
Standing in a line facing the aperture in Temple of Fire, visualizing BBC News Studio, with chaosphere above newsreader influencing her to be confused in speech, clock on wall repeatedly running between 9.10 & 9.15.
Chaos reigned throughout the working: candles wouldn’t light, then were knocked over, tape had irritating feedback noise through it, alarm bell in the bakery a few doors along went off near the beginning of rite and only stopped at 9 o’clock. There was a problem with finding TVs that were working and not being watched on other channels; eventually we ended up at a friend’s, at 9.06!
Total success: Just after 9.10 Sue Lawley made a slight speech fault and corrected it. During film there were overlapping voice-tracks for which she apologized at 9.14. This is thoroughly chaotic, for BBC news!
The only meeting of Cabal Heraclitus I ever went to was a public event, on Yule 1983, with the band Mark Stewart and the Mafia. The rock star was to be a sacrificed god. I was to be his attendant, and my friend Jessica was to be High Priestess. The other four ritual participants were Cabal Heraclitus members. One of them was quite well know for losing it and causing crazy scenes. Someone had passed round some speed in the afternoon, and that was probably a mistake, given the presence of that person.
Present: Pete Carroll, Faedra, Claire, Richard at quarters. Jessica and myself.
The scripted and rehearsed order of ritual was abandoned, due to some problem Mark Stewart had. He read some Burroughsian texts but, as for the magical working, only its barest framework was used. The Mass of Chaos B was read from the stage and various proclamations were made, before chaos – in the vulgar sense – broke loose and Faedra jumped down off the stage and started fighting with a member of the audience (Simon).
At this point, Pete seized the microphone and wound it up, announcing ‘The manifestation of chaos is at an end.’ This was optimistic – the two chaps in front of the stage kept slugging it out for a while longer, but at least it enabled the magicians on stage to relinquish any further magical responsibility.
Dave Lee is the author of several books, including Chaotopia, Bright From the Well and Life Force: Sensed Energy in Breathwork, Psychedelia and Chaos Magick. Visit his website and sign up for his newsletter.
We’ve been in lockdown for weeks now, hiding from each other so as not to spread the lethal disease. At least we’re still breathing. Already there may have been people we know who haven’t been so lucky. Our own responses are ranging from happy productivity for the natural hermits to cabin fever for many of the rest, with the added nagging worry of where the money’s going to come from for this. And as the social distancing precautions begin to slip, cracks are appearing in the solidarity of lockdown, as more people get fed up with it and decide that breathing’s not that important anyway.
We magicians might be among those asking themselves ‘Am I doing enough during this enforced leisure time?’ assuming, of course, that we’re not among the quietly heroic essential workers risking their lives so that we can have anything from medical care to sliced bread.
So what are we doing with this unwanted gift of time? Me, I’m writing a book. Woo, go me. Some of us are cracking on with some intensive/extensive practice, the Great Magical Retreat. And some of us are fraying at the edges. Or maybe all of the above.
In general, I try to keep a balance between structure and license. I get up, I do the daily stuff, from hygiene and housework to meditation and magic. Structure, see. However, I also feel free to miss something out, to not get much done today, to feel like shit if I feel like shit, dialling down the expectations in order to remove that Work Ethic pressure to produce. License.
Structure and license, then, moderating each other (more or less) so that neither runs off with your marbles. The ancients called it Temperance.
I maintain a fairly positive attitude of gratitude. This isn’t a matter of airbrushing the unpleasant bits out of my experience, although it has meant that I use the antisocial media less than I did before lockdown in order to screw down the toxic demands to be outraged and afraid. As magicians we should be filtering the bullshit as standard practice, but it’s more important than usual right now.
Instead, I voice aloud my thankfulness for particular things in my day: this meal, that weather, this moment of quiet joy. The voicing aloud seems to make the difference: try it. I’m not saying pray to anything, just acknowledge that you’re glad that whatever-it-is is here right now.
My meditations include the all-inclusive contemplation of my immediate surroundings, my own experience and present state of mind, accepting all, letting all blow past, fixating on nothing.
I’m lucky enough to have a household of people, but I miss the Bunburys, the periodic disappearances from the respectable world to do disrespectable things among disrespectable people. Y’know, occultists. But we have internet chat. It’s a poor substitute, but better Prosecco than no wine at all. So I make a little time to chat with my family and friends, and most of all, my tribe.
I feel very lucky to have the Pact. Right now our Section has weekly online ritual meetings and catchup, which fulfils my definition of the Pact as “a group of free individuals who agree to act together in each others’ interests” with group magic as the mode. Group magic is only the tip of the iceberg of our magical practice, but the fellowship of the members is truly extraordinary. Dave Lee has described it as a sangha, the Buddhist term for the community of fellow-travellers on the Great Way, which I’ve not noticed anyone else but myself using until Dave. I’ve argued for years that a magical community is the second most important aid to remaining sane in the wacky world of wizardry, as you can read from that first link above. (the first most important thing? Your own bullshit detector, natch). It’s a privilege to be part of such a tribe. If you have one, you can’t do better than to connect up to them as close as you can under the circumstances, even if you’re not suffering from the isolation as much as many. It’s a collective sanity thing, and it’s not just about yours.
I hope you find these suggestions encouraging and useful. Stay well. Choyofaque!
I’m
finding it an odd experience being an essential worker during the
Covid-19 crisis. In many ways the world is a much quieter place, it
takes less than half the time for me to drive to work than usual and
the streets are deserted. In my life however there is a higher degree
of activity than usual as my place of work responds to the crisis, I
am busier than ever. I exist in this strange place amid this duality
of activity and inactivity- in Isa my life is the swirling
undercurrent of activity while all on the surface is still. The birds
sound much louder than they used to.
I
find myself on occasion feeling somewhat envious of my magical
friends who are utilising the freed up time for a magical retreat.
Then at other times I remember the people who have lost loved ones,
the people who have lost their jobs and income as a result of the
crisis, people who are vulnerable — and then I am grateful for my
own situation. The truth is while part of me would like to retreat
and isolate I would not do that. If I was not working I’d be
volunteering.
I
find myself in a position of solidarity with other essential workers;
the people who clean the hospitals and shops, shop workers, factory
workers, care workers, steel workers, police and the postal services
and the many many others who do jobs that run so smoothly we are not
aware of their essential work. The unknown heroes of the crisis. It
seems that some of our most essential people are the lowest paid,
putting themselves at risk every working day for a pittance. I find
myself grateful for the locksmiths – it’s a bit challenging
having a lock down when one is locked out, as I found out! I am
grateful to the magicians who are on retreat doing their magick to
eliminate the virus. Julian
Vayne’s work on ‘Hearty’ is something that I found very
inspirational.
sigil of Hearty
I
worry about my friends doing the front line work in the hospitals but
I get the vocational drive behind why they have to do what they do. I
worry about the people who are street homeless and hope that they
have found shelter and that the people helping them are OK.
A
great deal of my magical work over the last year has been about space
clearing and protection and I wonder if a part of me knew that there
was something coming that I would need protection from. Reflecting on
2019 I did feel a sense that change was on its way leading to my huge
space clearing and decluttering project where even my paperclips were
cleaned with Florida water and prayed over. I developed a fondness
for Psalm 121 which in the context of Covid-19 feels very relevant
and I find myself saying the psalm before I enter the workplace:
Back
in 1993, my IOT group made a healing servitor. I imagine most readers
of this blog will be familiar with the idea of a servitor, but just
in case, it’s a helper spirit, generally one you put together
earlier, that does something specific for you. This entity was more
than the usual small servitor right from its inception. We gave it
more pure chaos, so that it has more degrees of freedom, is capable
of making more elaborate decisions. Thus it belongs to that curious
class of entities that is more than a servitor but not as complex and
autonomous as a god/dess. I’ll just refer to it as a spirit.
Such
spirits are formed from group magic – in other words, they are
egregore spirits. We have a few examples of such spirits in the IOT,
most of which have been, or will be, loosed on the wider world at
some stage. One such is IZAWA – a spirit whose remit is to support
the psychedelic gnosis. This has been brought gradually into the
wider world via the Breaking Convention conference and other non-IOT
events.
The
healing spirit has been through a number of changes. When we first
made it, it didn’t even have a name and sigil, but it always had
the added chaos. It was made to be capable of healing at any level,
because it’s equipped with heuristic ‘expert software’
concerning human existence, so it evaluates what you need and then
turns itself into whatever will provide that.
It
was made collectively in 1993, and had already created another
dimension to itself by 1994, as I learned when I scried it that year.
It had acquired a home, a pyramid of green laser light at the bottom
of an ocean trench. It had generated for itself a massive and ancient
prehistory, upping its dramatic glamour considerably, and this is
always a good thing with spirits. I was not the only member who
detected its new form – I had a report from someone a long way away
who saw much the same as I did.
In
1995, it was named, by another group. Around a large octagonal altar,
we called it and scried for its name and sigil. It is called KAWA
POHR.
It
was definitely evolving now. On more than one occasion, non-members
have detected its presence, quite often behind some degree of
disguise, which the spirit judged would appeal to the recipient and
make the healing work better.
In 1997 it was released to the wider magical world, in the course of a series of intense workings against the HIV virus. A group called Temple T, led by Peter Mastin, installed a huge industrial sized version of KAWA POHR under the dance floor at a London venue called Turnmills. This was the home of Warriors, a gay dance club. The idea was to use the intense collective energy of the music, dancing, chemognoses and sexual energy that pervaded the dancefloor. Temple T had a trigger track of the KAWA POHR mantra embedded in the playlist at some point in the evening and sigils in some lights. Before the club opened, we would perform a ritual on the dancefloor, then reappear at the end of the night in robes to complete the working. So involvement with the club was quite extensive and depended on the cooperation of the club promoters. A significant number of deep remissions were reported, including massive increases in T-lymphocyte levels, and a remission of Kaposi’s Sarcoma (For some more on Temple T see this interview with Peter Mastin in Fortean Times).
Sigil of KAWA POHR
The
pathworking instructions for the original servitor are in my book
Chaotopia!, but here is the full ‘suite’ of pathworkings.
Part
2: The Pathworkings
Version
1: For work on yourself and your group
Close
your eyes. Consider what you need from this session.
It
is twilight. You are on a beach, whipped by a wind of spray, with the
sea crashing nearby. The light is fading rapidly.
You become aware of a slow throb, a heartbeat pulse of infrasound. The heartbeat still sounds in your mind … Gradually, you begin to make out syllables, dim echoes of a word … Begin to vibrate this heartbeat sound out loud “… munumm munumm …” the sound builds to a mantra “… munumm munumm munumm munumm munumm …”
As
you look out to sea, you detect a faint shimmering light under the
surface of the water.
The light brightens, flashing with faint colours. A circle of flickering lights plays over the sea, like a slice of an aurora. Call the servitor’s name: “KAWA POHR, KAWA POHR …”
Suddenly
a massive wobbly sphere bursts out of the sea and hovers in the air.
It is milky-white, with flashes of octarine, yellow, green and pink.
It heads straight for you, and envelops you. You sink into it, until
you are completely enclosed in it. Around you writhe sentient swathes
of coloured lights, harmonizing and strengthening.
This
may be as far as you need to go…
Version
2: A deeper healing experience
You
find yourself borne aloft in the sphere, over the ocean. The servitor
sinks into the water, taking you with it. Down, down you dive, the
waters darker and darker, into the dark heart of the ocean, into the
depths. There is no light down here, only the light from the servitor
itself.
Let your vision penetrate the sea … down, down into oceanic silence … down, down into a dark stillness where distant light flickers and throbs. As you continue to sink, you see a faint light … there is something down here, and you are heading straight for it. A greenish glow fills your vision, and suddenly the object becomes clear: a trapezoid, a truncated pyramid, made of solid ocean-green light edged with metallic purple. This is another phase of KAWA POHR, this is its home, this is the place you come to for deep healing. The sphere enters the trapezoid, and you see the interior, a maze of shifting green light, shimmering underwater radiance, that penetrates you cells and revitalises you, teaches you how to heal yourself.
Version
3: Sending KAWA POHR to someone far away
Work
Version 1 up to where the sphere appears above the sea.
Tell
KAWA POHR whom you are sending it to, and what needs doing.
Now prepare to launch the servitor into the aethers. If you are in a group, join hands in a circle. We will launch the servitor up and out of our auric space at the end of the countdown, with a great outbreath, a surge of voice. Resume the mantra, feeding power to the servitor “… munumm munumm munumm …”
Dave Lee is the author of several books, including Chaotopia, Bright From the Well and Life Force: Sensed Energy in Breathwork, Psychedelia and Chaos Magick. Visit his website and sign up for his newsletter.
Evocation of Kawa Pohr from the Illuminates of Thanateros
After
Hexagram 8, Pi / Union, the work fell apart. Basically, each of us
needed to do a lot of work on our own emotional stuff. This will
probably be familiar to anyone who has worked with an initiatic (as
distinct from a purely pragmatic-sorcerous) approach to magic: you
take yourself up into higher consciousness a lot, you will likely
find there is a lot more grunt-work than you thought when you come
down. So we decided to do the work individually at our own pace. My
sequence got as far as 12, P’i, Standstill. Which was pretty apt; I
never resumed the work, nor did my co-workers.
Through
rapidly to meet a guide tall and kingly, in purple and wearing a
sword. He has long red hair and beard and dark grey eyes. I am
reminded of my Grey King experience of about a year ago, so I vibrate
the Godname of Kether. White radiance washes through him; his eyes
have turned green, and he smiles faintly.
“It
is good that you are cautious. You have come to a place where night
and day cleave together, and many strange currents cross.”
The
garden is diamond-shaped, the long axis east-west, in small stone
pieces in a tight mosaic of shades of green, spiralling about a
rectangular pool with steps leading into dark water. In the east is a
throne of purple-grey rock with armrests carved as lion’s heads
inlaid with silver. Two standing stones delimit the short axis of the
garden, which stands on a high rocky hilltop. It is just into dusk.
“P’i
is the axis about which revolve the cycles of night and day, yin and
yang. You have come to the yin garden of this axis.”
I
notice that the guide wears about his neck a Maltese cross of
double-headed axe blades on a cord of plaited straw.
“Standstill
is alertness through the dangerous time of change. You may prepare by
bathing in the pool.”
I
do so; the water is hot, from a deep mineral spring, sulphurous, and
draws out impurities through my skin. When I emerge the air smells of
cinnamon. It is getting dark.
I
look at the strange arrangement of standing stones; the guide says,
“Under different conditions their position is changed, to the long
axis or elsewhere. Much about the harmonization of earth-currents may
be learned from this hexagram.”
It
is dark now, in the dark too of the moon, and billions of stars seem
to race overhead as we whirl through space. They seem to point to a
distant mountain-top, where stands the garden of Chien, the Creative.
We
constructed rituals using the eight trigrams, which had
dragon-spirits that Mike had contacted. As with the ritual described
in Temple in the Squat, our Summer Rite in 1981 also involved
Qabalistic Archangels and Enochian names – the God-names and Kings
of the quarter positions and other Enochian spirit names.
The
work was very poorly grounded. The following year, 1982, I took the I
Ching work with me on my European travels. This was not a good time.
The following item is where I tried to use an astral gate for some
useful advice, but instead had an extraordinary vision amidst
personal disaster.
MARDI
17TH AOUT: Opened I Ching gate in the Cathedral here, in the Goddess
chapel.
——
——
—
— — —
——
——
——
— —
——
— —
—
— ——
A
landscape, hills, green, shading to distant ochre-red round-toped
hills by a lake. My guide is purple, cerise, an intellectual, a
diplomat in demeanour conceals a warrior in spirit, tight-belted over
his lush shirt, hands me a sword which I raise aloft, it becomes a
curve of brilliant white light reaching over the lake: lake, sword
are one in a circle of brilliance, a furnace of truth through which I
step into the ‘interior of colour’, the heart of every jewel, I
am tasting the beauty of atomic matrices, so peaceful yet so alive it
is here, magenta green yellow, then the core itself, a black
double-pyramidal diamond absorbing all light. I hold it, identify
with it, become an infinite web of black and white cuboidal atomic
webs through which speaks pure intelligence:
“You
have outgrown many levels of symbolism and reached the heart, the
shores of the life/death duality. I need tell you no more in this
accustomed way. You will return to your world through the heart of
this net; take this” – a nine-pointed snowflake star mandala with
3D sigils in its core. It reaches my throat chakra, and it burns and
is heavy. No, I will not carry it, it is too heavy. “You have gone
thro this illusion of power too, sacrificed the lesser for the
greater.”
I
returned, flashing almost instantaneously through the symbols.
I
left my silver neck-chain here in sacrificial gnosis.
Dave Lee is the author of several books, including Chaotopia, Bright From the Well and Life Force: Sensed Energy in Breathwork, Psychedelia and Chaos Magick. Visit his website and sign up for his newsletter.
’’If
there is no God or Devil, no Heaven or Hell, and if the place we go
to when we forsake our physical bodies is merely a ‘sea of memory’
in constant flux, then would it not be better to ‘make a deal’
and know exactly what you’ll become and where you will go when you
die, or persist with the constant fear and anxiety of an uncertain
fate..(?)” Denerah Erzebet (The Rites of Astaroth)
Over the last year I made several attempts at spirit evocation using a Goetia type formula with mixed success. I tend to take the position that the demons listed in the grimoires are neither ‘evil’ nor ‘good.’ The rituals were performed by myself as well as in group settings. Some of the summonings seemed to set off a series of events whilst others seemed to not culminate when they were supposed to with the most intense visual experiences occurring at unscheduled times. The format I used was to summon the demon into a cauldron that would be placed at the centre of a circle of magicians with a triangle of art around it and a protective circle around that: cleansings would precede and follow each ritual. Incense was burnt inside the vessel in an incense burner placed over the sigil.
The
first temple summoning of a Goetia entity was Ashtaroth. I like to
use very unorthodox methods in my magic with a particular leaning
towards the trappings of traditional witchcraft. So in this ritual I
used a small dutch-pot with Ashtaroth’s sigil in chalk at the base.
The dutch pot is a particularly useful tool in witchcraft, lending
itself to all sorts of sorcery; it appears very much like a
traditional cauldron but with a flat floor it lends itself well to
having sigils drawn inside it.
We
had another magician present who did a brilliant Lesser Banishing
RItual of the Pentagram and after a relatively short summoning we did
some connected breath-work: breathing deeply we chanted ‘Ashtaroth’
on our outbreath. We kept this up for 20 minutes. This ritual was
reasonably intense but without any major effects during the
summoning.
I
myself have experience of Ashtaroth through my work with Exu Rei das
sete Encruzilhadas, a powerful spirit who will intervene on the
physical plane especially if etiquette is not properly observed, with
a penchant for cigars and rum. A series of synchronicities did unfold
in parallel with a Soror who was making offerings at the Crossroads
for Lucifer in identical fashion to how I did for Exu: both entities
being associated with Venus as the Morning Star. A Tarot ritual
preceding this did point out to me that paths would cross with this
person in no uncertain terms- it did in the familiar challenging ways
that I have come to expect when working with Exu.
The
second conjuration was out in the country with a group of magicians
and it was Asmodeus this time. I brought my dutch pot and the ritual
was preceded by a thorough cleansing ritual performed by a very
competent magician and he did it in the manner as set out in the
grimoires. I used the Asmodeus prayer from Spare’s Grimoire of
Zos, bowdlerising it somewhat as I could not imagine this temple
indulging in an evening of fornication. This time we used the
connected breath-work again chanting ‘Asmoday’ on the outbreath.
This was followed by the ‘spontaneous path-working’ method that
we devised where a vision would be passed around the circle with a
squeeze of the hand, each participant adding to it. The ritual
completed at exactly the stroke of midnight and we had some
insightful visions.
For
my third demonic conjuration I would break-away from traditional
goetia-type work altogether and loosely follow the ritual as outlined
in a book called The Rites of Astaroth. This would be
considered a dangerous rite which culminates in trading one’s soul
to gain favour with this demon. In principle I would have no
objections to trading my soul to Astaroth: is it not the case that
practically every religion requires its adherents to dedicate their
soul to the object of their adoration anyway but dressed up in
different words?
I
made a few adjustments but the rite is performed from the full moon
to the new moon in a very left-hand path fashion. I made offerings of
my own blood on each day of the rite and made a point of learning the
conjuration from Grimorium Verum off by heart: mastering it by
the day of the actual rite. The blood offerings were astoundingly
powerful! I had ordered a sigil that was laser-branded onto wood and
that I was wearing around my neck. I pricked my finger each day that
I conjured Astaroth using sterile diabetic lances and anointed this
talisman. There is something very primal and potent about letting
your own blood, even if it is only such a tiny amount. The
discomfort, the psychic link and the vital energy all help strengthen
the magic. This was a revelation to me!
I
did want to get in touch with the author to have some insight on the
magician’s state of sanity after having completed the rite and by a
strange coincidence I made her acquaintance on Facebook! I timed it
so that I could have the weekend off on a river-boat. The climax of
the ritual would be to summon Astaroth as a demoness or entity of the
opposite gender and to consummate the ceremony sexually. Astaroth is
historically associated with Astarte and Ishtar and mentioned in the
Bible as such, so it makes perfect sense in this context. My feeling
throughout was that Astaroth is female or at least gender-fluid.
I
do much of my magic whilst working at my job as a gardener. Michael
Bertiaux discussed the fact that many of the African slaves would do
their sorcery whilst labouring in the fields in his Voudon Gnostic
Workbook and I took my inspiration from this. I use the time that
I do monotonous work to also do magic or to learn lines off by heart.
During the time that led up to the ritual when I was learning the
conjuration, Ashtaroth seemed to manifest very intensely. This would
in retrospect have been the correct time to have consummated the
ritual as outlined in the book but I wanted to keep to the schedule.
I had intense visions and instructions on how to draw up a pact and
what should be included.
The
encounter had a very erotic flavour of the type associated with
incubus/succubus phenomena documented in the witchcraft trials. I
also had an intense dream that I had impregnated a black woman who
would have our baby and it was going to be called Cressida. I had no
idea what the significance of the name was until I researched it.
Cressida was the daughter of the seer Calchas in Greek mythology. The
book has a ritual for creating a magical child and it seemed that I
was on my way of having done so already. The name has become a word
of power for me with some weird effects when I intone it. When I say
the name I feel like a female spirit superimposes its body astrally
over mine.
When the actual day of the ritual arrived I headed out of London with my shamanic drum and a sacrament expecting a night of drumming and conjuring. I did actually draw up a pact with clauses to ensure that I get to know Astaroth a lot better before commending my soul to her. The ritual itself ended up being unspectacular. I was not ready for an all night session of drumming so I decided to keep the sacrament for another day in the future – maybe after my nine-month pact comes round. I intoned the conjuration that I had learnt 108 times and did a good amount of drumming. Astaroth did hear me and I have come away from this rite with a new method of magic that I will be experimenting with based on my experience with The Rites of Astaroth.
The book The Rites of Astaroth is available from Draco Press
