On the nature of Gods, Spirits and Demons

 What follows is cryptic writing but inside it are Ideas which should give the reader concepts which I am playing with now.  

These are the realms and natures of spirits.

The One Thing is like light, in which darkness and shadow are one. To understand itself it created a mirror and divided itself into seven aspects and these formed the jewels of a crown for creation.  

From these jewels were born the seven proto-gods, the Elohim, who contained in themselves the seeds for the reflection of the One Thing. These proto-gods created matter so that it could reflect the Face of the One Thing.

They divided the reflection into two; the light and its shadow became separated. Thus, the colours of the Elohim where reflected through-out creation, from the lightest to the shadow.

Then these proto-gods made the astral form of themselves and called it Adam Kadmon and they sat on his head as a nameless crown of reflected light. 

This child of the Elohim partook of two different natures, and contained within itself the rainbow of creation from light to shadow. Adam Kadmon existed in a twilight world of light and shadow for in matter were the full range of the colours of the Elohim expressed.

Adam Kadmon saw the Elohim in all aspects of himself and he named them. The highest Crown it called them the Seven Celestial Gods and declared all the colours pure inside them. Then it proceeded to name all the gods between the light and the shadow. At the top Adam Kadmon declared, was a trinity of male, female and union.

Adam Kadmon noted that there were those Gods which were closer to his nature than others were. Colours, and beings which were similar to him. These he related to strongly, but they changed with his mood and development. Sometimes they were overthrown by a vision of the Celestial, sometimes they were dragged down deeper into his own shadow.  

Some gods were bound to this shadow by their rivals and their true meaning became lost to all but those who sought them in the Shadowlands. They were called demons, but they were no more evil than that aspect of Adam Kadmon. They were ruled by King, a Queen and a Prince.

Then there were gods who Adam Kadmon feared so completely. They were part of himself and part of his not-self. For he knew that there was an infinity of being above the crown of light and below the shadow crown which were above his understanding -- beings which could only be defined by what they were not. They were nameless shadows beyond Erebus whose darkness ebbed and flowed like a black ocean between the subjective and the objective. When the waters rose, the shadows darkened and when they retreated, the shadows lightened. Likewise, when the nameless crown did brighten, so the light became dazzling.

There were also those spirits who were born of the Kingdoms of matter in which Adam Kadmon lived and these he called elementals and he was their manipulator using them to change his universe until it suited him.  Sometimes he would call upon the powers of his Gods to help him and other times he would bind them with his own power.

There were the fragments that Adam Kadmon had cast off; aspects of itself had fulfilled their destiny. Some, which partook of its highest aspects, merged their fates with the God which corresponded to it, others became Gods, and fewer managed to raise themselves beyond the trinity of light and darkness. Others became one with their family line and existed at their own level within the mind of Adam Kadmon.

And it shall be so until Adam Kadmon has truly reflected the Elohim and shall merge with them and he shall then merge with the One Thing, which will have understood itself.

Hitting the spirits instead of psychology

A True and faithful relation of what passed between me and a bottle of spirits

Anyone who has read my books will know that I am a big fan of psychology.  Since the 1930s psychology has stopped a large number of magicians going nuts by making them realise that what they might be experiencing is not the anti-christ but by some repressed complex that they have not dealt with.

In my new  book Magical Imagination I look at psychological techniques which are now called “active imagination” but are better known in occult circles as pathworking or visualisation.  I do this so that people can master those aspects of themselves so that they can be more balanced when they come to do more serious magical work on both the physical and astral planes.

But like many things, the psychological approach in magic has gone too far.  Like many things lately I have to chant the mantra “I blame Regardie” but to that mix I have to also blame Francis King, who coloured his history of the Golden Dawn with Regardie’s bias.  Dion Fortune also inspired much of this approach, being one of the pioneers of lay psychology in her time.

Both men believed that inner states were psychological states and that the beings we encounter there were all aspects of our unconscious.   Thus when Dr Felkin, or Samuel Mathers channelled their secret chiefs they were just opening up a path to their repressed unconscious aspects.  To Regardie, the Book of the Law came straight from Crowley’s unconscious, rather than any spirit.

In many ways I agree with Regardie and King, you always have to interpret visions, or dreams psychologically first.  This is because any energy you encounter on the astral plane is going to be communicating through your unconscious.  If you encounter a Goddess then it is going to appear through the symbols you associate with your “significant mother archetype.”

Israel Regardie channelling Harry Potter

But where I differ with Regardie is that spirits, angels, and gods do have an objective reality which is separate from your own psyche.  When you work a ritual to a particular god or goddess, and you are lucky, you are going to pick up the real deal.

These spirits will appear to have a personality, a life and memories which are just as real as any being you meet on the material world.  They are going to have plans and needs which will go well beyond what you think that being would have or need.

In the cases of the bigger ones, such as gods and archangels, there will be a celestial version of it which acts very differently from the sub-lunar lower astral version.  The celestial version will be the highest and most abstract version of the god or archangel.  It will also be the most aloof from the needs of humanity and be more concerned with cosmic events, rather than helping you get a girlfriend.

The sub-lunar aspects of these beings are closer to earth and therefore understand humans more -- they have also been more anthropomorphized by humans.  It is more often these beings that we end up talking to the most.  But the downside of dealing with these sorts of beings is that they have a few of humanity’s negative traits and need to be handled with care.

Some entities, such as ancestral spirits, elementals, and the darker daemons (I am not convinced that demons exist but are just Christian corruptions of sub-lunar entities) remain sub-lunar.  This sub-lunar realm also encompasses the underworld and anything you find there.  These sub-lunar entities which lack a celestial component are the most risky to deal with.  However they are also the most rewarding, because contacts with these spirits teaches us more about ourselves.  They are also more likely to help us with some of the magical heavy lifting.

The point of this particular blog is to say:

“Spirits exist.  They are not aspects of your unconscious, but real living beings.”

When that particular card is pulled out of the house of psychological magic, then a whole lot of things comes tumbling down with it.  Psychology becomes a method of communication and self understanding rather than a complete philosophy which can be applied to magic.