Writing Abramelin Lunar Ordeal

 

Recently, like over the Thanksgiving holidays, while I have been struggling to recover from a low grade diagnosis of pneumonia, I started writing and assembling the book “Abramelin Lunar Ordeal,” which is the eleventh book that I written since 2006. Like Liber Nephilim, there was a lot of material that had already been written, and I had sorted that material out so I could pull it into my manuscript. Therefore, it only took me around two weeks to complete the manuscript, but now I will need to fully edit it, insert footnotes and citations, insert the proposed artwork and diagrams, produce the bibliography and the index list. I have also signed a contract with Crossed Crow Books to publish this book, and I will need to submit the manuscript before March 1, 2024. Of course, I will be able to complete all of this work well before the due date. While I was able to use a lot of material that I already had, I also added a lot of new text and completely revised the rituals. This will be another book available in soft and hard covers, as well as a deluxe hand bound collector’s edition.

What I needed to write up that was missing in my blog posts or documentation was the background and motivation for developing an alternative method for manifesting ones Holy Guardian Angel, also known as the person’s Atman, or Godhead. I refer to this entity also as the Higher Self, agreeing with the Theosophists, who also saw this as the inner deity, but contradicting Crowley and other magicians who saw the HGA as separate and independent of the person. I don’t agree with that perspective, and because as a Witch I am intimately familiar with my own internal godhead and its ultimate nondual link to the Unity of All Being, known to the Neoplatonists as the One, I believe that everyone has within them a deity. Most of us are unconscious of this being, and some of us make contact with such a being nearly impossible (those who might be considered as soulless). There are many names for this entity, but it is the God of our head, as the African Traditional Religions call it.

The traditional Abramelin ordeal, as encapsulated in Mather’s French translation, outlined a preparatory phase required to obtain the ultimate objective of knowledge and conversation with one’s Holy Guardian Angel. That period of preparation was focused on the extreme piety of prayer, meditation, fasting, purification, total abasement, and atonement covering a period not less than six months, where the final month was spent in complete sequestration. In other words, the preparation was wholly religious and mystical and lacked any kind of magical operations. The environment and one’s person were to be kept clean and ordered, the prayer room or tabernacle needed to have eastern and western windows and a floor covered by sand, with a small altar. This period of absolute concentration on the objective could not be interrupted and then restarted. It had to be a continuous period of religious and liturgical obligations that intensified as the final period of sequestration occurred. Many have attempted this working, and some have succeeded and others have failed, and some who have succeeded have made it a point of pride and accomplishment.

However, this is not the only ordeal that can assist the operator in achieving the K and C of the HGA, and in fact, there are many other operations available to magicians to use, either from the older grimoires or from new approaches (such as the Beatification rite found in Sworn Book). Additionally, this six month working was not the final word, since an older and more complete version was recently translated and published from an original German manuscript. This version proposed a working lasting 18 months, and consisting of a solar cycle with the Passover and Feast of the Tabernacles as the pivot points. The older manuscript appeared to be more Jewish in its cultural perspective, and I believe that it represents the more accurate rendition of this important preparatory working. This new version doesn’t contradict anyone having used the older and shorter version, but I would imagine that the longer version of the working would be even more effective in helping the operator achieve their objective. It also demonstrated that the cycles imbedded into the working consisting of three six months periods of the solar calendric cycle of Jewish holy days. When I read that and understood what it implied, I believed that it was quite a revealing discovery, making the overall working more meaningful.

While I had admired the Abramelin working, I knew early on that I would never have the resources or opportunity to perform it. Once out of college, I became a working stiff, and I never had the luxury of being able to take an entire month off from work, not to mention equip, pay bills and feed myself. This working was always beyond my means, so I could read and study it, but I couldn’t actually try to perform it. I knew that starting something like this would require me to complete it, so I declined to figure that out and instead sought out other methodologies for obtaining a kind of magical enlightenment. When the new version came out and showed that the working should actually last 18 months with three months of sequestration, I felt that it was even more completely out of my reach. However, the pattern of three six month periods using a solar calendar cycle gave me some ideas for developing an alternative approach.

As anyone who knows me or has read my writings will tell you, I am not someone who believes in following the stricture of any tradition. Years ago I had developed my own tradition and it had served me so well that I was able to pass it on to others. That was the magical lore of the Order of the Gnostic Star that I had helped to found back in the 1980's. This has allowed me the freedom to develop my own mysteries, ordeals and magical workings, building a path that one could follow and undergo conscious and spiritual evolution through the methods of ritual magic. I am not the only one who has developed their own magical system, since in order to perform ritual magic in the modern age I believe it requires one to build a system that is personally meaningful and that has a practical and relevant basis in the current times. Therefore, I have always felt it to be my prerogative to adopt and adapt magical lore from the past into my personal magical system when such lore is needed, but mostly avoid engaging with it.

So, when I discovered that the Abramelin working consisted of three six month periods, spanning a year and six months based on the solar calendar, I wondered if this same ordeal could be adapted to work within a lunar period of one and a half cycles, or around 40 days. Since the moon was much more important to me than the sun, due to my Witchy bias, I saw this as a possible replacement. The shorter duration would need to be filled with a more intensive regimen of ritual work, because the period of sequestration would only be three days. What I had to do was to fill that period with the most powerful workings I could develop that would lead operator to undergo a full conscious transformation and personal transfiguration.

What I needed was an environment that contained a holy tabernacle (similar to the sandy floored temple in the traditional working), and I came up with the idea of invoking all of the angels of the Seraphim and Cherubim in a four week period, which I had previously determined to be four angels for each group, and fuse them into an octagon vortex to br joined with the elected Element Godhead, which would generate a highly charged and sacralized environment. I added to that a three-part gateway that included the western and eastern gateways (double gateway of initiation) and a crossing gateway using the northern and southern nodes and the ultra-point for the gateway of ascension, opening up the operator to the absolute spiritual plane.

Upon that foundation, I decided to use my revised version of the Bornless or Headless One invocation rite that had an ascent up the pyramidal steps of the four Qabalistic Worlds to a fifth temple at the top of the pyramid structure where the Bornless One invocation was to be performed. Since I had determined that the Bornless One invocation was a surrogate rite to acquire the K and C of the HGA (according to Crowley and others), I felt that the combination of ritual layers would lead the operator to experience a powerful transformation. I also incorporated other rites, both from the PGM and the Chemical Wedding of Christian Rosenkruetz, to assist in the merging the expanded conscious state of the HGA into the mind of the operator. I had developed all of this lore and decided to test it out during the holiday season of 2009.

What I discovered when I performed this ordeal, from November 2009 through January 2010, was that it not only produced the expected results, it had a profound and permanent effect on my life. From that moment forward I was no longer the same person. The ordeal worked as I had envisioned it, and I also posted edited versions of my diary entries to this blog. There were complexities to my experience with this ordeal, and in fact there was an important ritual that was missing, which I was able to add and perform in 2011 to complete it. I now had a variation of the Abramelin working that was lunar based and that would produce, if faithfully deployed, a similar kind of transfiguration including the revelation of the HGA. I made these rituals and writings available to my brothers and sisters in the Order of the Gnostic Star, but none in the Order attempted to perform this ordeal.

Many years have passed since that tremendous occurrence, and the effects of that ordeal still are having an impact on me. After I completed that working, I came up with new and creative ideas, and my writing efforts were and are stimulated and guided by my Higher Self, or HGA. I may not have conscious contact with this Godhead at all times, but it is there when I focus on it or when I need help. I owe it most of the creative work that I have achieved in the years since, and this contact has allowed me to more accurately look into my spiritual foundation and my past steps and to judge what I have done and where I must go, so that I might know my future path as it leads me to the end of life and beyond.

So, we come to my recent work, and I can say that the ordeal that I have prized above all of my previous workings will now appear in a comprehensive book. The documentation that I wrote years ago for members of my Order has been revised along with the rituals that I performed. The blog posting of my diaries will be gone over and synchronized where appropriate with my actual diary entries, and the book will aid anyone who wants to test my hypothesis that there is a viable and practical alternative to the traditional Abramelin working.

My book will have the title: “Abramelin Lunar Ordeal: An Alternative Magical Journey” and it will likely be released sometime in March 2025. It will represent my last book for the time being, but I will have eleven books in print by then, and it will be sufficient until such a time as I am able to rewrite and package the other books that I have planed in the future.
 
Here is the book synopsis that will be used to market the book.

Over a hundred years ago MacGregor Mathers published a book that introduced to the magicians of the 20th century the magical ordeal penned by an obscure German Jewish occultist. That book was called “Book of Abramelin the Sage” and contained an arduous preparation practice that lasted six months manifesting the Holy Guardian Angel that would instruct and guide the adherent. The book contained many magical squares of notorious potency. To use them, the magician had to undergo many months of prayer, meditation, fasting, purification, abasement, and a period of complete sequestration. Another version of this working, recently published, had the working last for eighteen months with three months of sequestration.

Many magicians attempted this arduous task, some succeeded and some failed. This working was typically beyond the means and resources of your average magician. This was the challenge to achieve the knowledge and conversation with their Holy Guardian Angel. However, Frater Barrabbas took this challenge and used it to forge a whole new magical ordeal. He decided to base it on a lunar cycle instead of a solar cycle, crafting an ordeal that could be accomplished in seven weeks with three days of sequestration, thus making its performance more practical.

Frater Barrabbas sought to create a powerful series of magical workings that would produce the promised state of transfiguration and manifest one’s Holy Guardian Angel. He used invocations of the four Seraphim and Cherubim in a four-week period, along with the Element Godhead, to produce a holy tabernacle of godhead and angelic intelligence. He chose a revised version of the Bornless or Headless One invocation rite of GD fame as the apex. He plumbed the PGM to extract three more rituals to add to Bornless rite. These rituals and more he has written into a book, including the diaries entries where he performed this working back in 2009 to validate it. All of this lore and instruction are encapsulated in the book “Abramelin Lunar Ordeal,” a unique and profound contribution to the art of ritual magic. Now, the Sacred Magic of Abramelin is available using a new, condensed paradigm.

If you want a taste of what this book might contain, you can examine these past blog postings that I put into a single web page. These are my thoughts, comments and my highly edited diaries associated with the working when I performed it back in 2009. There are no rituals nor any background documentation, so that will be reserved for the book itself. Also, the book will contain the mostly unedited diaries from my Liber Spiritus.

Here is the blog link to all of the earlier postings. You can find it here.

Frater Barrabbas

As the Light Dimmed in Egypt - Linking the PGM, Nag Hammadi and Stele of Jeu

The Roman province of Egypt was remarkable in the great confluence of cultures and ideas that managed to mix and merge together to formulate whole new perspectives. Yet it was also a place where native Egyptians found themselves demoted to third class citizens who were egregiously exploited, subjugated and crushed into unforgiving poverty and despair. While Rome extracted a massive grain harvest every year to feed itself (and its privileged allies in Alexandria) bread, the Egyptians who toiled on the land were oppressed by ever increasing taxes and punitive laws meant to enslave them. It was not a good time to be an Egyptian without also being a privileged Roman citizen. Few managed to achieve that distinguished privilege and the rest faced a hopeless and dwindling future.

There were occasional revolts against this excessive exploitation and subjugation, but these were cruelly put down, and each one only made the plight the native fellaheen more pitiful. It was during this time that the belief and worship of the old Egyptian gods lost their appeal with the common folk and a new religion began to quickly take their place, and that religion was Christianity. Like many other parts of the old world, Egypt fostered many varieties of Christianity and Greco-Roman syncretism.

“Egypt had an ancient tradition of religious speculation, enabling a variety of controversial religious views to thrive there. Not only did Arianism flourish, but other doctrines, such as Gnosticism and Manichaeism, either native or imported, found many followers. Another religious development in Egypt was the monasticism of the Desert Fathers, who renounced the material world in order to live a life of poverty in devotion to the Church.

Egyptian Christians took up monasticism with such enthusiasm that the Emperor Valens had to restrict the number of men who could become monks. Egypt exported monasticism to the rest of the Christian world.”

Magic flourished in these lands at that time, and many Christians of different stripes practiced magic along with their liturgical rites. Perhaps the most interesting of all of the Egyptian stripes of Christianity were the Sethians, whose massive volume of books and mysterious initiatory teachings have come down to us in the present era as various selections of their peculiar writings and puzzling theological statements. We know something about them from their extent writings but not enough to fully understand their teachings and beliefs. Time has nearly ablated their memory, like the shifting sands of the Egyptian desert that have scoured the painted surfaces of statues and shrines leaving only traces of their past glories.

We know so little about the Egyptians living in the area around Thebes in the Greco-Roman period because the focus of the world at that time was on the city of Alexandria. However, from the period of around the 1st through the 4th century various scrolls and codices were buried in that location which were only discovered in the last two centuries. The largest collection of codices was discovered at Nag Hammadi in 1945, a veritable library of forbidden books hidden in a sealed pot and buried next to a stone in an ancient monastic graveyard. However, other codices and scrolls were discovered in the same area around Thebes, such as the Bruce codex (containing the Books of Jeu) and the Greek Magical Papyri. All of these notable relics that have been intriguing scholars for decades as well as ordinary members of the reading public, and I might add, occultists and practitioners of magic, have been reconstructed, translated and published. All of these truly remarkable writings from antiquity were likely produced in this single location around Thebes during a period of three hundred years, and that is also quite remarkable.

Whether or not these writings represent the thoughts and beliefs of a single group of people, or the combined ideas and practices of an era participated by many individuals is unknown. We can speculate based on how they were written, in what language and the media (scroll or codex) of their presentation, and we can examine the content of the writings and notice the differences and similarities. Still, this is all speculation, but it is intriguing none-the-less.

We should also briefly examine the writing techniques of ancient Egypt and its history, since this will also assist us in assessing the historical context of these writings.

“As writing developed and became more widespread among the Egyptian people, simplified glyph forms developed, resulting in the hieratic (priestly) and demotic (popular) scripts. These variants were also more suited than hieroglyphs for use on papyrus. Hieroglyphic writing was not, however, eclipsed, but existed alongside the other forms, especially in monumental and other formal writing. The Rosetta Stone contains three parallel scripts – hieroglyphic, demotic, and Greek.

Hieroglyphs continued to be used under Persian rule (intermittent in the 6th and 5th centuries BCE), and after Alexander the Great's conquest of Egypt, during the ensuing Macedonian and Roman periods. It appears that the misleading quality of comments from Greek and Roman writers about hieroglyphs came about, at least in part, as a response to the changed political situation. Some believe that hieroglyphs may have functioned as a way to distinguish 'true Egyptians' from some of the foreign conquerors. Another reason may be the refusal to tackle a foreign culture on its own terms which characterized Greco-Roman approaches to Egyptian culture generally. Having learned that hieroglyphs were sacred writing, Greco-Roman authors imagined the complex but rational system as an allegorical, even magical, system transmitting secret, mystical knowledge.

By the 4th century, few Egyptians were capable of reading hieroglyphs, and the myth of allegorical hieroglyphs was ascendant. Monumental use of hieroglyphs ceased after the closing of all non-Christian temples in 391 CE by the Roman Emperor Theodosius I; the last known inscription is from Philae, known as The Graffito of Esmet-Akhom, from 394 CE.”

If we consider the Nag Hammadi library, the Bruce codex and the Greek Magical Papyri as having a common geographic location, we can also order these collections according to their content and writing styles, based on an understanding of the history of writing in that area.

The Greek Magical Papyri was likely written earlier than the other books because it was a large scroll written in Greek and Demotic. Since there are some parts of this book that were written in Demotic we can assume that the ancient Egyptian language was still being spoken and written at that time. So, perhaps the time period when it was written might have been in the 3rd century when the old pagan religions and the new were coexistent. The magical spells show a decided heterodoxy of religious beliefs with an emphasis on Pagan Greek and Egyptian gods, but with other religious elements, such as Judaism, included. There is only a hint of Christian theology to be found in these spells, so it represents the collective work of someone whose sympathies were not particularly Christian.

We know nothing about the owner of this scroll, other than he seemed to be collecting every notable magical spell that could be found or discovered in that time period. Because of the cosmopolitan nature of his collection, it is likely that he was privileged and well traveled, perhaps even having a residence in Alexandria. Magic is the focus of this work, so we can’t really deduce the owner’s religious beliefs other than to state that he was obviously open to all religions and didn’t discriminate between them. This large scroll was probably buried with the mummified body of the owner along with other artifacts at an unknown site somewhere outside of Thebes. If there were any other burial possessions in that tomb, none has ever been either recognized or recovered. 

Then, probably a century or so later, the various codices of the Nag Hammadi and the Bruce codex were written and kept by individuals in the same general area. These books were written in Coptic, representing a change in linguistic status. While it is likely that these books were originally written in Greek, they were translated into Coptic which was becoming the liturgical language of Egyptian Christianity. Hieroglyphic writing, including hieratic and demotic, had been abandoned as too complex, but Greek was replaced with an alphabetized writing modified to fit the phonetics of the Egyptian language.

The primary religious focus of these books was Christian, but a form of Christianity that is both strange and unusual by today’s standards. Within many of these works are to be found the specific theological speculations of the Gnostic group known as the Sethians. While it is likely that these books were part of a monastic library, probably the Pachomian monastery at Chenobokion (modern al Qasr), it represents that the Christian monks were likely tainted by the beliefs and perhaps even the practices of Sethian Gnosticism. The fact that these books were buried represents a kind of intellectual purge, due to the edict of the archbishop of Alexandria, Athanasius, who in 367 CE decreed that all Christians reject illegitimate and secret books. He produced a list of 27 books that were to be considered the accepted books of Christianity, and these books are what later became part of the New Testament. However, the monks from this monastery (so far from Alexandria) revered these books and rather than burn them, they decided to bury them instead. So they carefully sealed these codices into a storage pot and buried them in a nearby cemetery with a proper marker, as if they had hoped to someday return and recover them.

It would seem that the location around Thebes was a veritable hotbed of Sethian Gnosticism and also the practice of magic. Because the Sethians taught that one needed to undergo a five-fold initiation ordeal in order to be considered a proper Christian, or “one who knows,” they had quite a body of magical lore to aid them in this task. They also practiced forms of practical magic and likely infected the early Coptic Christian church with the practice of using magical spells that archeologists have recently discovered written or inscribed on various artifacts. The Sethians probably were in the area for at least three centuries before disappearing, and they may have melded their beliefs with those of the local pagan magical practitioners, since they believed that magic was the key to escape the material world ruled by the cruel and ruthless archons.

In many ways the Sethian’s theological ideas would have been very popular in the oppressed area of upper Egypt because it seemed to explain their world in a mythopoetic manner. No longer was life on the Nile one that was good and abundant, so there wasn’t much desire to perpetuate this material circumstance in the afterlife. In fact life was cruel, brutal, poor and apparently lacked the blessings of the gods for the average Egyptian. It was no wonder that a theology of escape, release from bondage and deliverance from one’s evil oppressors was quite intoxicating and attractive. I believe that this is the reason why Egypt embraced Christianity so ardently, and why a tradition of Sethian Gnosticism was popular amongst the literate elite.

Now this brings me to the main point of my article, which is to see these supposedly unrelated events and artifacts as representing a common thread that should be quite profound when we consider it as such. What I am proposing is that the magic in the Greek Magical Papyri and the magic practiced by the Christian Sethians and Coptic Christians was analogous. They are not the same, of course, because they are separated by time, but not by locality. The writer of the Greek Magical Papyri was aware of Sethian practices and beliefs even though he might not have shared them. The Sethians were likely aware of some of the magical spells written in the Greek Magical Papyri as well.

Previously, I have never really paid much attention to the rubric or title for the ritual of the Invocation of the Bornless One because it seemed to be not particularly important. The title of this spell is the “Stele of Jeu, the hieroglyphicist.” The name Jeu seemed to be familiar to me, but I had thought that it might be a reference to a real individual who still had the skill of being able to read Egyptian hieroglyphic writing. It was pointed out to me that the name Jeu was actually a Gnostic pseudepigraphic author name that was used to lend legitimacy to a writing or a spell. However, since there is indeed a series of Books of Jeu that were particularly sacred to the Sethians (Bruce Codex), attributing the Bornless One Invocation to Jeu was analogous to attributing it to the Sethians. Also, assigning a writing to a stele was a way of making it a highly important work, because an actual stele was writing and illustrations painted or carved on a stone tablet making it something of a permanent edifice. Three of the more important works in the Nag Hammadi library are the three Stele of Seth, so one could assume that the Stele of Jeu would also be a monumental work.

What does all of this speculation and background information really mean? It means that the ubiquitous Invocation of the Bornless or Headless One was possibly an important rite in the Sethian creed. The headless one then becomes analogous to the theological construct of the Gnostic concept of Autogenes, the self-begotten one. Autogenes was the principle intermediary between the One as the Father-Spirit, and the Father-Mother as Ennoia-Barbelo, and the rest of humanity. Autogenes was part of a trinity that was loosely based on the Neoplatonic Noetic triad of Being, Life and Mind that act as an intermediary between the One and the psychic domain. Summoning this entity to perform an exorcism would make sense, and it would be part of the Sethian initiation process to purge the self of all spiritual influences and pollution associated with the archons.

So, this might be the context for the Bornless Invocation rite, that it functioned as an important tool in the Sethian repertoire to purify the soul and make it ready for transport beyond spheres of the archon ruled material world, where it might unite once again with the One Source of All Spirit. That we use this rite today in a similar manner is quite interesting and also ironic. All of this is pure speculation on my part, of course, and it could easily be refuted as spurious and erroneous. However, my approach does seem to pull together a lot of interesting pieces of the puzzle, and the final resultant context is rather elegant - at least I think so.

Over seventeen hundred years separate our world from that of the Egyptian Sethians and magicians of the early centuries of the common era. But we seem to be connected by the thread of a common interest and a common need for a fusion of magic and religion as well as authentic visionary experiences. That common thread might be the vaunted Perennial Philosophy, or perhaps it is the just the convoluted evolution of society and the never ending spiritual search for authentic spiritual experiences.   

Frater Barrabbas

More Thoughts About the Bornless One and Other Stuff

It’s been nearly three months since I posted any kind of article to my blog, and some of you have probably been wondering what has happened to me. Well, I have been very busy doing other things and I haven’t had much opportunity to write. While I have successfully transitioned to my new role in my mundane job, it has also been very challenging and time consuming. I seem to have adopted the life-style of a shut-in person. I spend most of my day at the terminal, usually 8 to 10 hours straight with only a few breaks, spending all that time cooped up in my home office.

While I am working I occasionally notice the passing of the day outside my office window, but I have little time to go outside except to walk our dog. When I am done for the day my brain feels like Jell-O and my eyes are dry and I have problems focusing. About the only thing I am good for is to eat my dinner, mindlessly watch a bit of the Tube and then go to bed, exhausted. Weekends are typically for cleaning the house, shopping and spending some time with my wife. I don’t have a lot of time to visit with people and I usually forget to call or stay in touch with my friends. (I hope I still have some friends left when this cycle reaches its end.)

Right now there seems to be little time for writing or working magick, but I do try to read a bit before going to sleep. I have managed to read through a number of books, so at least I am continuing my research - that is unless I am indulging in some gratuitous fiction reading.  

This pattern of work and not much else has been going on for the last several months, but at least I can see that the pace will be slowing down in the near future - thankfully. My hope is that with the turning of the new year I will have more time for writing and working magick. At least I can boast that my wife and I have managed to put together a really great wedding ceremony and feast. We had some really important help from our friends, but it was our sole responsibility and it was quite a magical ordeal in its own right. I may have been unable to work any of my usual magical ordeals in the last couple of years, but the handfasting and feast were quite a magnificent magical working. We really needed to do nothing else than that to focus the transformative spiritual powers and bring them to bear on our lives. We feel quite bonded now and many of the issues that we had pondered about previously have now been swept aside. That alone should demonstrate to my readers that is was indeed a very magical and successful ordeal. It will be tough to top that for this year, but I’ll see what I can do.

My occult research and studies have been focusing on the writings of a very knowledgeable and brilliant German Professor of Egyptology by the name of Jan Assmann. His translated books on Egyptology and also, oddly, modern monotheism (and its price to the post-modern world) are all quite inspiring to me, although probably not in the way that Professor Assmann had in mind when he originally wrote these books. He is a contemporary scholar so I am not trying to read the writings of someone from the 19th or early 20th century whose scholarship is missing a century or more of archeological discoveries. Dr. Assmann’s writings are current and include a lot of the most up-to-date discoveries in the field of Egyptology. I will be discussing some of the things he has written in future articles since what he is saying about modern religious theology is also quite interesting and insightful.

While Dr. Assmann is a staunch Christian and has stated that the cost of monotheism was worth the benefits, his writings are helping me to determine what modern paganism should be like. Are we truly engaged in a primary earth-based religion or is our paganism a protest against Christianity and monotheism in general? Can we go back to the simpler times and mind-set of ancient paganism or do we have to come up with a completely different paradigm that takes 1,500 years of monotheistic religion into consideration? These are critical questions, and I am on the threshold of finally being able to answer some of them in a thorough and insightful manner.

Anyway, one of the points that caught my attention when I was reading the book “Of God and Gods: Egypt, Israel and the Rise of Monotheism” written by Jan Assmann (University of Wisconsin Press, 2008) was quite startling. Dr. Assmann compared the Egyptian mythological concept of “sep tepy” or “first time” to the first book in the Hebrew Bible, “berasheth” or Genesis. Seeing this comparison inspired me into thinking about the Bornless One all over again. Why would such a comparison bring that topic to mind? Because I had once written that I thought the famous ritual attributed to the Golden Dawn whose origin is a spell found in the Greek Magical Papyri in Translation (PGM V, lines 96 through 172 - Stele of Ieu the hieroglyphist) was correctly and aptly named. The Godhead that is invoked in that spell is called “Akephalos,” or the “Headless One” and somehow it got renamed to Bornless One.

The reason this happened was the simple fact that the word “headless” could also be considered a euphemism for a deity that had no origin, in other words, one that was bornless. Of course that could only be the case if the ancient Egyptian language used the same idiom as Hebrew, where the term “without a head” could be considered the same as “without a beginning.” The Hebrew word for head is “rosh,” and the first book in the Hebrew Bible about the creation of the world is called by the first word in that book, berasheth, or “in the beginning,” literally, “in the head.” Coincidently my thoughts about this term were similar to what Mathers in the Golden Dawn thought about the godhead named in this ritual, and that is how it got to be called the “Invocation of the Bornless One.” Others have pointed out the speciousness of this translation and its usage for this rite since there are indeed images of this god without a head on a number of Gnostic magical coins from verifiably ancient sources.

However, the comparison that Dr. Assmann made between “sep tepy” and “berasheth” intrigued me quite a bit. I managed to look up the Egyptian words for “sep tepy” and found that “tepy” does indeed mean “head.” It also means “chief” or “first,” but the hieroglyph is a man’s head. To the ancient Egyptians the term Sep Tepy represents the creation of the world from the watery abyss as performed by the creator god, who typically takes the form of Ra, Ptah or Atum. The God that creates the world would have to exist before the world was created in order to perform that feat. The First Time is a very hallowed event, and the age that immediately followed it was one where the gods, mankind and all of the flora and fauna lived together in peace. It was the golden age before the time of troubles when mankind rebelled against the gods and caused the world to be permanently separated into the sphere of humanity and the domain of the gods. The pharaonic king was the intermediary for the gods, and his court was the mechanism through which the gods ruled the earth and maintained contact (through their cultic centers) with humanity. One could say obliquely that the creator god was in fact without a beginning, bornless, or headless.

The invisible and unknowable headless deity called Akephalos that is summoned in the PGM exorcism rite has certain qualities that make this being an unmistakable amalgamation, similar to the contemporary Gnostic god Abraxas (the solar godhead whose name adds up to 365). He is said to be called “Osoronnophris” (Ausar un-nepher - Osiris the Blessed), but also compares him to “Iabes” and “Iapos” (probably corruptions of Bes and Apep). Only an amalgamation godhead would be able to reconcile opposed Egyptian deities such as Bes (the guardian) and the giant serpent Apep (personification of chaos and evil), not to mention also being associated with Osiris (fertility and resurrection) and the creative trinity of Ra, Ptah and Atum. The analogy to Apep might be an allusion to the Greek daimon Agathodaimon who was depicted as a giant serpent.

Akephalos is also associated with the primal creator godhead, and as such, represents the absolute spiritual master of everything in the material and spiritual worlds. This godhead would be the celebrated God who inaugurated the Sep Tepy or First Time according to the Egyptians, and he would also be the ultimate source of all being, perfectly representing the One of the Platonists without name or features. It would make sense that the erstwhile sorcerer of antiquity would call on this being to assist him in performing a grand exorcism. If you wish to eject an evil spirit from some person then it would make sense to summon the most powerful godhead available.

The odd epithet of this godhead which states that he has eyes in his feet seems to be a puzzle, but when you consider that the Headless God can be depicted as a serpent biting its tail then the mystery is revealed as a symbolic analogue. A serpent biting its tail would metaphorically have its eyes in its feet (tail). This symbol, called Ouroboros Ophis in Greek, represents the eternal cycle of self-creation and also primordial union, which would be a perfect emblem of the Headless or Bornless Godhead. This is also true of the phrase “my name is a heart encircled by a serpent,” which could symbolize the Sun in its eternal cycle, or that the core of one’s being is forever regenerated.

While the original spell in the PGM was a basic operation of summoning the absolute deity to perform an extremely powerful exorcism, the layered symbology of this being has taken on other qualities since that time. At around the same time that Europe and the Middle East was in the midst of a profound collapse and the beginning of the dark ages (7th Century CE), India was fashioning a new philosophy, beginning with the Mahayana Buddhists (the two truths doctrine) and continuing with the Hindu Vendantaists. Both groups postulated that the ultimate reality was non-dual, and in order to rectify the obvious duality of God (absolute) and immortal human spirit (relative) without completely negating one or the other, they simply stated that there was no duality. The ultimate Cosmic One was synonymous with the inherent union within all human beings. In Vendanta this concept was stated succinctly as there is no difference between Brahman and Atman, in other words, there is no difference between the absolute Godhead and the individual Godhead - they were one and the same. This new philosophical perspective took the Neoplatonist creed to its highest and ultimate level and resolved the inherent dualism found within it. If we consider then that the highest aspect of deity is the same as the deity within each and everyone of us then the Headless or Bornless deity becomes an analogue for our own internal godhead. We therefore invoke the Bornless One (or Headless One) that is within us in order to realize the highest expression of our beings - the non-dual godhead within us.

Magicians throughout the ages have always taken the liturgies and magical rites of the past and crafted new rites and magical lore from them. It seems to be almost the rule rather than the exception. We are shameless plagiarists and appropriators, and what we use as modern lore is often a mishmash of ancient and modern practices and beliefs. This also seems to be the case for the spells of the PGM that incorporated religious sources from a wide variety of religious cultures that were alive and accessible in late antiquity. We are no different today in regards to using all kinds of diverse sources for our magical rites and lore than the magicians and sorcerers in antiquity, and perhaps this is what unites us with them. Thus the ancient exorcism rite of the Stele of Ieu the hieroglyphist has become the epitome of one of the most powerful rituals in the arsenal of Western Magick used to realize and manifest the Bornless One or Higher Self within oneself.

Frater Barrabbas

BTW - I would like to thank Jake Stratton-Kent for writing his book “The Headless One” which I found very informative and helpful, and also my friend Jack Flash Von Faustus for his blog writings and the document that he pointed me towards, written from a lecture given by Morton Smith on PGM: Demons of Magick. You can find that lecture write-up here. I might add that Morton’s take on the Headless Godhead was quite interesting, stating that it was a possible personification of the flat “headless” land of Egypt itself and this would also lend it to being compared to the Egyptian fertility god Osiris. Although I must also state that the land mass of Egypt has been carved by the Nile for untold ages, making it anything but flat or for that matter, headless. You can also look over my previous article about the Bornless One that I wrote back in 2009.

Macranthropy and Theurgic Ascension

I have already discussed in detail the nature of substrate monism in a previous two-part article, but I wanted to show how monism can be used to fortify the magical process of theurgy. Since I defined macranthropy as an important step in the formulation of a monistic perspective, I have also found it very important in explaining how a modern pagan engaging with a plurality of gods and goddesses can evolve their beliefs into a form of pagan monism. So, it would seem that macranthropy is the missing key to the process of theurgic ascension and the adoption of an occult philosophy.

Let me take the definition that I proposed for macranthropy found in the my previous articles and copy it here so that we have a working definition from which to proceed.

“That process of coalescing a pantheon of deities into a single met-deity is called “macranthropy,” from macranthropus or “cosmic person.”

Macranthropy, or the creation of a meta-deity from a pantheon of many deities, allows for the paradox of both focusing on a single unified deity as well as focusing on the individual deities within the pantheon. ”

So it would seem that macranthropy is a mechanism where a henotheistic practice would be expanded to the point where that deity would assume a kind of super-deity or cosmic being perspective. How that would work in a theurgy of ascension through magical progression is actually quite simple and natural. In fact, macranthropy helps fill in an important gap in the overall process. Let’s go over what this structure would look like with macranthropy acting as an important bridge.

In the form of theurgy that I work, there are actually two targets. The first target is the personification of my own self as a deity, or what I call the God/dess Within. It is analogous to the Higher Self or Atman, and the objective is to gain as much of a conscious connection with that entity as possible. To facilitate that end I have chosen a specific godhead to act as an attribute of that being-ness, and I believe that it is a very important task to engage with that deity within a form of intensive spiritual alignment. In this fashion I have determined the microcosmic focus for the work as a powerful extension that reaches into the core of my higher self.

The second target is the corresponding macrocosmic godhead, and for this I would choose a deity that would be compatible with the specific godhead associated with my higher self. By compatible, I mean that it should be from the same cultural pantheon and represent an analogous quality. Since I happen to be a heterosexual male, then the godhead of my higher self is masculine and the corresponding macrocosmic godhead is female. (For those who have a different sexual orientation, these choices would be different, of course.) In my mind there is a powerful polarity between these two beings that will facilitate their joining into a unified expression of the One. Therefore, carefully choosing these two deities is a very important part of the work. The deity representing one’s higher self would be an analogue of one’s self, and the deity representing the macrocosmic godhead should be compatible with that deity of one’s higher self.

Once these two deities are chosen, then it is up to the theurgist to build up a powerful representation of them in his or her mind. It isn’t enough to just select these deities, one must also become powerfully intimate and completely knowledgeable of them as well. The mechanism for establishing an intimate contact with these two deities is through the process of spiritual alignment, but there are some differences in the methodology and degree in how one proceeds with each of them. The godhead representing one’s higher self is the first target to whom the magician must develop a powerful relationship, so all of the steps of alignment are fully incorporated, and this is performed for as long a period as necessary so that the higher self becomes fully realized in the guise of the chosen godhead.

For instance, if the godhead representing the higher self was Osiris of the Egyptian pantheon of deities, then the corresponding godhead representing the macrocosmic godhead would have to be Isis. To pick any other deity as the overall target would be silly, for instance, Sekhmet, Hecate or Ishtar. It is important that the deities chosen for this work makes overall objective sense, and that there is enough historical material to fill out the practices of spiritual alignment for both deities. 

Alignment is defined as devotion, invocation, assumption, sacrifice and communion. Devotion consists of regular and periodic services to the godhead, such as offerings, paeans, hymns, praise and cultic services. I define cultic services as any task associated with keeping up the personal shrine of the deity including the overall temple environment. Invocation is the regular and periodic summoning of the deity, sacrifice is the giving of permanent and special offerings, communion is the sharing and ingesting of sacraments, and godhead assumption is where the seeker as cult priest assumes the mantle of the qualities and persona of the deity. I have covered these items in previous posts, and you can find them here, here and here. A complete examination of these required practices and their development is an important step in this process of theurgic ascension, and this is done for both deities.

Once a full and complete alignment is established with the godhead representing the higher self, then this connection can be augmented through the use of the ritual of the invocation of the Bornless (Headless) One. Other ordeals can also be performed, such as the Lunar Abramelin Ordeal or the Talismanic Portae Lucis Ordeal, or a combination of them. It is important to note that the foundation for theurgic ascension is to acquire a near-conscious connection with the higher self. Once this connection has been powerfully established, then the magician may perform the following process of theurgic ascension.

I have defined theurgic ascension to consist of the following five steps, and these five steps are focused on the target deity representing the macrocosmic expression of the godhead. The magician must, in addition, ensure that he or she also has that potent connection to the higher self, and the tasks of alignment are required for that deity as well as the target deity - both must be served ardently and passionately. It might even be necessary for all other activities to cease at that time so that the focus on the godhead of the higher self and the godhead of the macrocosm might be completely undisturbed and as perfect as possible. The lunar cycle is the gauge and measurement for the cycles of devotion, invocation, assumption, sacrifice and communion, but each person will have their own preferences as to when the greater ordeal is to be performed. The following five steps are sharply focused on the target macrocosmic deity.

1. Focus on the specific deity - adopt a form of henotheism and establish a full spiritual alignment for it. This would include devotion, invocation, sacrifice, communion and offerings, but not yet assumption (for obvious reasons). Each service is performed while under the guise of the godhead of the higher self, thus giving it far more potency.

2. Explore the polarity and potential union with the target deity - the macrocosmic deity becomes the personal lover of the self in the guise of the godhead of the higher self. This polarity must be experienced as the passion for union, and it must be inflated incrementally until it is almost unendurable.

3. Use macranthropy to expand the nature of the macrocosmic deity until is becomes the ultimate, absolute and only deity. All other deities in the chosen pantheon are just part of the overall body of the macrocosmic deity. This is performed through the devices of exhortations, meditations and visualizations. One could even conceivably perform Qabalistic pathworkings and attribute everything experienced as attributes and elements of the body of that cosmic godhead. While this is occurring, the very foundation of the godhead higher self will undergo a process of expansion as well, since it has established a powerful and passionate link to that macrocosmic godhead, thus becoming the perfect representation of the microcosm.

4. Facilitate ecstatic union (magical hieros gamos) - once the stage is set where the targeted godhead and the godhead of the higher self have achieved the highest degree of polarity and total realization of the microcosm and macrocosm, then (and only then) the magician performs the assumption of the targeted macrocosmic godhead. This is done periodically and repeatedly until the union of the microcosmic godhead and the macrocosmic godhead are fully objectified and all differences are slowly dissolved until they begin to disappear altogether. Other mechanisms that would establish a corresponding physical ecstasy could also be employed in this step, thereby making the power and efficacy of this process even more potent. (It is assumed, however, that just performing the macrocosmic godhead assumption after such an arduous process would be all that is needed for a corresponding spiritual and physical ecstasy, but other mechanisms, such as the careful and minute use of sacramental drugs, sex magic, breathing exercises and visualizations could also be employed.)

5. Full Assumption of the Cosmic Godhead - once step four is fully realized, then the magician can perform the invocation of the Bornless (Headless) One as the godhead of the higher self invoking the Cosmic Deity in a full and objective magical realization of this tangible expression of the One within and throughout the consciousness of the magician. In order to maintain this high state of being, the magician should continue to perform the full spiritual alignment rites of both the godhead of the higher self as well as the macrocosmic godhead.

Once such a powerful state of being, awake within the being of the One, has been achieved, there is the corresponding consideration of what the magician will do after acquiring enlightenment. Is it the end of the whole process? According to what I know about the magical initiation cycle, achieving enlightenment is only half of the process. The magician who is dissolved and one with the Absolute Spirit or Unity of Being has many possible paths and directions to proceed. Certainly, once this massive elevation has been fully realized, there is the corresponding requirement to do the will of One within the domain of the Many, and this would entail being a physical mediator for the descent of Spirit into the physical world and its ultimate ascent and recovery.

The enlightened magician would play a very important part in the process of world enlightenment, or the enlightenment of all of the human race. That would require him or her to be a bridge between the One and the Many, and function as one of the archetypes of the Few, to redeem and anneal the duality caused by the effects of the individual mind and the petty ego, one person at a time. This is an eminent task, but one that cannot be limited to just one enlightened individual. It will take a veritable army of enlightened individuals over a period of many millennia to accomplish this task. Even so, the task is accomplished individually, both in terms of achieving enlightenment as well as spreading it to others. Perhaps I have assisted in this task simply by writing up this article, and who knows what it will do to those who read it and undertake the great work that it reveals.  

So, that’s my take on a full and complete method of theurgic ascension. This process could be performed by a single individual, or by a couple, who would perform it separately as well as jointly. It also helps to have someone to objectify the experience, so doing it with a working partner is probably the best approach. This ordeal is certainly not for the half-hearted and requires a considerable amount of time, resources and an exclusive focus. Most magicians would find these requirements prohibitive since they would have to earn a living and do other things besides consistently and continuously working all of these various rites.

In order for these workings to be the most effective, a magician would also have to do a lot of research so that the lunar and solar calendar of events would be thoroughly known, and then incorporated into the daily, weekly, monthly and seasonal practices. I have no illusions as to the difficulty of this ordeal, but I am quite certain that it would work. When a magician would fully complete such an ordeal, then he or she would have achieved a full and complete conscious union with the One, and that will, I believe, fully establish a state of near perfect enlightenment.

Achieving such a lofty state of consciousness has its own rewards, of course, but it is, I believe, one of the ways in which the Great Work could be accomplished through the methodology of ritual magick. Hopefully, I will be able to some day have the opportunity to perform this ordeal and discover all of the intricacies involved in its resolution and realization. I look forward to that time, since it will likely be when I have retired from my daily regimen of work and material responsibilities so that I could have the time and resources to perform it. Until that time, at least I now have a mechanism to consider and to build up within my magical lore.

Macranthropy was the missing key to this overall process, and reading Thomas McEviley’s book helped me to realize all the parts that I needed in order to contemplate a magical solution to the problem of enlightenment and theurgic ascension.

Frater Barrabbas   

Phase Two of Final Abramelin Lunar Ordeal Working

The strenuous labor and long period of discovery for this ordeal is now over, and I can begin to relate my final experiences of the last two evenings and Sunday morning. On Friday, May 13, I performed the Bornless One Envisioning Rite in its entirety, even though the directions specified a three day period of meditating before completion. I felt that having undergone this process for over eighteen months, I didn’t need to wait any further to complete this ordeal. Within myself, I felt as if everything was completely in order and in readiness. So, I followed my intuition as is my rule in the art of magick, and was not disappointed with the results. It was wholly and completely mind blowing, and I am still reeling from its effects.

My dreams leading up to this event have been quite vivid and instructive, and they gave me a strong sense of completion and fullness. I was more than ready to begin this working, and therefore more than prepared to undergo whatever impact it was to have on me. I am delighted to state that I found the Bornless One Envisioning ritual itself to be highly effective and more intense and powerful than anything that I have previously experienced. I had no difficulties in performing it, and was able to get everything worked out, particularly the substitutions that needed to be incorporated.

The Abramelin Lunar Ordeal, now a completed suite of rituals and workings, is not only highly effective, but is even more resplendent in its overall effects for the adherent than what I had originally thought. I can’t but recommend this new method to others who are interested in experiencing a pathway to personal illumination through the art of ritual magick. With respect to those who have faithfully followed the traditional Abramelin ordeal, I believe that I have developed a suitable alternative that others, who do not have the privilege of devoting from six to eighteen months exclusively to this working, may follow and achieve a similar end. That is, of course, my opinion, and those who might be critical of my efforts will have to at least judge it by performing the rituals and experiencing them for themselves. Needless to say, I should report what I experienced as part of my final engagement with this ordeal, since nothing more afterwards will need to be said.

I have completed this long struggle and I am so very glad that it is finally done - but what an amazing journey it has been! The total irony of this working is that it took me exactly, to the day, eighteen months to complete, which is the same amount of time specified for the German version of the traditional Abramelin ordeal. It has been something of wild ride at times, where I seemed to be floating a foot or two off the ground, so intense was the overall impact and its affect on me. Presently, I feel quite grounded and completely sober, which is so unlike what I felt over a year ago. Then, I needed to process everything that hadn’t been processed in my past, and I needed to figure out the final and most important ritual in the working, which was the Alchemical Hierogamy Rite of Union, based on the Chemical Wedding of Christian Rosencruetz.

Determining and developing that last rite took me over a year, but once I was able to deploy it, the other pieces all fell into place. I would assume that anyone else who would perform this ordeal,  now that the complete suite of rituals has been written up, would take them around seven weekends to complete. Then, of course, the envisioning rite would be performed at the next available full moon. Still, that final working shouldn’t be performed until the magician’s internal state is fully resolved and all issues, past and present, have been adequately processed.

For those who might not fully understand the functionality of this rite, the Bornless One Envisioning is used to both realize and project into the future the full nature of one’s True Will, incorporating a charged and consecrated black mirror for this purpose. This ritual was distilled and developed from a group of rituals in the PGM (Greek Magical Papyrus in Translation) used for performing divination by skrying into a pool of ink. I had adapted these rituals into one monumental working that would divine through the HGA the nature of the magician’s past, present identity and future destiny. The divination rite is therefore split into three parts, representing the necessity for the magician to know his past, know who he is, and know what his future will be. Some of these questions can be answered by the magician, others require the intermediation of the HGA. This rite incorporates a two way methodology in regards to divination - passive perception and active projection. The objective of this rite is to project the magician’s desired and realized destiny into the future, thereby making it fully capable of being realized in the present.

Let me now relate all that happened to me on that last set of days when I performed the final ritual working in the Abramelin Lunar Ordeal.

Envisioning Rite - First Evening - Friday, May 13, 2011 (from 9:45 pm to around 12:45 am)

As I have stated previously, I decided to do the entire ritual the first night of the working. I would follow it up with smaller workings on Saturday evening and Sunday morning. On Saturday, I would just say the Mass of the Goddess and intone the Hidden Stele and the Death Delivering Stele. On Sunday, I would just intone the two Stele to complete the working. I would perform an impromptu skrying session on Saturday evening after the Mass, but only briefly connect with the black mirror on Sunday morning. Two other substitutions were also decided on for the working. I would forgo wearing a crown of ivy (because the season is still so early) and I would bless my cincture instead of using a strip of linen with words written on it, functioning as a kind of phylactery.

These are the order of ritual actions to be performed the first evening before performing the Envisioning rite:

1. Perform ablutions and then set a consecrated magick circle.
2. Bless the cincture before saying Mass, intoning the invocation instead of wearing it around my waist as a phylactery. This was well received, so I then completed the vesting for the Mass.
3. Perform the Mass of the Great Goddess up to the point of performing communion, then perform the following operations while there is still sacrament available.

• Intone the invocations of the Hidden Stele and Death Delivering Stele
• Bless the magick ring for a second time (the ring is the link to the HGA). I put on the ring, said the activating word and then summoned the HGA. The result of these operations produced a highly enhanced sensation of the HGA, and the ring was tingling with magick power.
• Consecrate the magick squares from the Book of Abramelin (selected squares printed on parchment) with sacral wine and charge with the directed power of the HGA.

I then completed the magickal Mass and proceeded with the Envisioning rite.

The intoned invocations from the Hidden Stele and the Death Delivering Stele (both of which are from the PGM) produced an incredible intensity of magickal power. I felt myself briefly enter into a trance state where I saw points of light form various kinds of star formulations and even heard some kind of celestial tinkling, like some vast, distant glass wind chime. I felt intoxicated, and a rush of euphoria filled my heart. I had to rest momentarily while I processed these experiences. I thought to myself that this is certainly quite an auspicious occurrence for the beginning of this working.

Bornless One Envisioning Rite: I wrote this ritual more than eighteen months ago, but it has never been performed by me until now. I was amazed at how well it flowed and appeared to build up the power. The invocations taken from the PGM were astonishingly powerful. I could not believe how potent these incantations were, and their overall magickal effect was completely amazing. I doubt that some of these incantations have been used in magick for nearly a couple of millennia, but they had lost nothing in the passage of time. I performed the macro-rite to summon the HGA, but of course, it was already very much present. Still, I sensed it joyously respond to the remedial summoning, making me feel as though I were enclosed in golden column of light. I then set the inverted Rose Ankh device to each of the four Angles and the center of the circle, and the accompanied incantations taken from the PGM made the performance vastly more intense and powerful. At this point in the ritual, the combined devices generated a kind of network of manifesting and empowering forces that seemed to transform the temple into some kind of royal emplacement. I almost expected to see a throne room and the royal chambers of some magnificent palace. The vortex had generated through its fused energies a kind of royal domain with the black mirror set at its core.

These final actions brought me to the place where the black mirror was ensconced, and as I sat before it I made invoking spirals over it with my transmutar wand. As I did this, while intoning additional PGM incantations, the black mirror began to glow and pulsate, going from an obsidian black to a silver white orb at intervals. I felt myself pulled into this pulsating orb, and it opened up, becoming like a vast tunnel or worm-hole between worlds, revealing itself as a kind of silver lattice structure surrounded by inky blackness. I found myself drawn deep into it, and it was as if I was within a tunnel, but it also seemed like it was within me, simultaneously. When I got to the point in the incantation where I was supposed to utter a series of magickal words like an Egyptian Baboon, the illusion ceased for a moment (due to my mirth), but then quickly reasserted itself. I then proceeded to contemplate upon the vastness of the black mirror, performing first an inquiry and projection for my past, present self-definition, and then my life’s destiny. These were the three Eyes (or I’s) in the Triangle - and I made this sign into the black mirror before starting each period of contemplation.

Contemplation on where I have been: I saw so many images of my past consisting of all of the most important and strategic moments, all of which led me to become who I am today. I saw these as a very rapid progression from the earliest memories to the present moment, yet each scene evolved slowly and fully, while my mind’s eye had already gone on to the next event. After a short while it seemed that all of these memories were unfolding simultaneously, creating a vast illusion of time and events occurring all at once. It was an amazing thing to behold, and I imagined that one perceives this when death is fully realized. At that moment, I felt a powerful thought overwhelm me that “I must fully accept everything that has happened to me as a product of my True Will and the power of fate and necessity.” I bowed to this wisdom, and felt all of these memories coalesce into a single point of light, and then enter deep into my soul. The black mirror became dark again, but only for a moment.

Contemplation on who I am - my true identity: The mirror blazed forth again, but this time I saw and felt the full force of my HGA, it entered into my being and filled me with joy, happiness, wholeness and an intoxicating euphoria. Because I had wed my HGA with the Element Godhead, it appeared to have a greater power and affinity for me, unlike at any previous time when I had performed the Bornless One invocation. Through the HGA I received a powerful and total sense of who I am, where I have been and what I must do to complete my life. I was told by it that the key to my future spiritual enfoldment was to cultivate spiritual love, bliss and ecstasy, and to realize this when summoning my higher self. Through this agency, I will experience the continual spiritual evolution that leads to mastery. Then the mirror went dark for the second time.

Contemplation on my ultimate destiny: I have accepted that I am now gone deep into middle age, and that I am passing into my final years of life. I have accomplished much, but so much yet remains to be done. My inner fear is that I will not have time to complete everything that I want to complete, in order to leave behind an effective legacy - a true measure of immortality. Yet what I have seen is that the most interesting and amazing events of my life have not yet occurred, and that I must learn to live at a far greater level than what I have been doing lately. I asked for the time and longevity to complete my work, and saw that indeed I could very well be long lived, if I work at ensuring that my gift of life is not squandered. I must work at being more healthy, and I can’t take anything for granted. The future is indeterminate, so what I have left of my years of productive life may be a decade, two or even three, but I can, by my actions, extend my life.

Yet death comes to all living beings, and I am no exception. Nothing is granted or pre-ordained to me or anyone, everything must be earned by steadfast commitments and hard, tireless work. I sensed that a number of procrastinating issues and tasks for me had been overturned, and I was now free to complete a number of outstanding tasks. I felt blessed, protected, loved and wisely guided by the HGA that was now fully activated and enshrouding me like a luminous golden cloud. Yet this great spirit was also inside of me, looking at the world through my eyes, and feeling the joy of life through my heart.

Once these events had transpired, the black mirror seemed to turn silvery white, and felt my will come from within me and project into the future that has not yet been determined. I sought to know in the remaining years of my life a profound stable simplicity, to be divested of all of the clutter and chaos of competing desires and ambitions, and to be refined and honed to one single aspiration. This aspiration was to be one with my HGA, and to waken from death seeing through its eyes and thinking and feeling with its mind. More of this incredible phenomena I can’t relate, but it went on for seemingly forever, extending from my mere physical form into the infinity of the Godhead itself, where the boundaries of time and space melted away to nothing, revealing a single blazing supernova that filled my eyes and mind with dazzling and brilliant light. I sensed during this extended moment that the HGA was with me and in me, my eternal companion in all things.

I pulled myself away from looking into the black mirror and laid down to rest, to close my eyes so that they wouldn’t see anything more. But still I saw the brilliant light and felt the bliss and ecstatic happiness until I passed into unconsciousness for a time. Finally, I woke up, and the temple atmosphere was alive with tiny sparks of light barely perceived. I marveled at these for a moment, but then sealed the circle, covered up the black mirror and magickal tools, extinguished the lamps and candles and retired for the night. Yet I was given so little peace that evening afterwards, for the visions continued on in my head deep into the night.


Continuing the Working - Saturday, May 14, 2011 (from 9:55 pm to around 11:28 pm)

The second evening came, but I was exhausted and tired from the previous evening’s working. I stumbled through the days activities, but after a couple of naps and a good meal, I felt more refreshed and ready to start the next part of the working. But in truth, the greater part of the working was already completed, and it seemed that the next two incidents were just merely the final parts of an already magnicent conclusion.

I said the Mass, and then intoned the two Stele incantations, which were just as powerful as they were previously, and after the rites were completed, I unsealed the vortices and sat before the black mirror. I uncovered it, and expected that it would be dark and lusterless, but I was surprised that it was still luminescent, but not as startling as it was previously. However, what was imparted to me indicated that the greater manifestation had already occurred, but what remained was just as important.

I was told in some manner (perhaps in my head) that the past is now completed - there is no more to be extracted from it other than memories of what had once been. The future potential is there for me to harvest, since so much has already been established by years of practice, work and research. I have not been lax all of these years of my life. Yet the key to it all is the present moment - what I do here and now will give a final shape to my remaining years. There is so much to do before I finally experience an end to this life, and previously I had so much doubt and despair as to whether all of it could even be completed. Yet now I am not alone or without an important powerful spiritual ally. The HGA has now engaged itself to me in my quest for completion, and the addition of that magick should make the future to be quite interesting. Whatever my work brings to fruition, the greatest work is the simple process of bringing my higher self incrementally closer to me, until there is no difference. I have already begun this process, but its maintenance and continuation is both simple and succinct. It is wholly up to me to ensure that it is brought to complete manifestation and total realization. So what I felt from this revelation was the impending urge and need to get to work - there is so much to do, but the joy is in the doing!

That is all I received this night, and the next day, I just performed the intonation of the Hidden Stele and the Death Delivering Stele in the morning, and lit a stick of incense. I felt completely resolved. The working was completed, and so was the ordeal. I collected up all of the sigils that had been placed in the temple so many months ago, and now I could move on to other and newer challenges. I am grateful for what I have experienced, and I feel optimistic and blessed for what the rest of my life has in store for me.

Frater Barrabbas

Phase One of Final Abramelin Lunar Ordeal Working

Not everything turns out as you would like it to, but most often, it turns out as it needs to be. This is certainly true about the first phase of the two phase final part to the Abramelin Lunar Ordeal. As you may remember, I had scheduled to work magick for the weekend of April 16 and 17 during the full moon. I was going to re-establish contact with the previous structures of the Ordeal, which would include the Ogdoadic Godhead Vortex ritual, the Triple Tetrahedral Gate ritual, to be followed the next day with the Bornless One invocation (Stellar Gnosis version). Typically, if I schedule myself to work magick on a particular day, I will move heaven and earth to make certain that it gets done on that date. This is part of my magickal and spiritual discipline, and I am proud to say that most of the time, I adhere to this rule without prevarication. However, I found myself unprepared mentally and physically to do these rites for the scheduled weekend. Something seemed wrong about doing it then, and I also felt very much compelled to spend the time instead with my girlfriend, since she was leaving for nine days in the middle of the coming week. So I decided to perform the two day working on the following weekend, since I would be alone and able to better focus on my intention to do the work. It was also quite interesting that my plans intersected with the Christian observance of Easter and the Jewish observance of Passover.

Changing the date to the following weekend (April 22 & 23) seemed like a good idea to me. But then I started to think about what I was going to do and the sequence how I was going to do it. I had planned on doing the Alchemical Hierogamy Rite of Union during the next month as part of the second phase, but for some reason I felt driven to add it to the Friday working, so its effect would be in place before I performed the Bornless One invocation the next day. I could make this change because I had previously performed these rites back in December of 2009. I wanted to experience the joining of the Element Godhead with the HGA before I re-performed the Bornless One invocation. I felt obligated to do this, and so I listened to my intuition and decided to act on it. I am very glad that I listened, since the end results were quite splendid.

I now realize how important that ritual was, and how fortunate that I was able to figure it out and write it up. Had I managed to develop this ritual back in the autumn of 2009, I believe that the period of the overall ordeal would have been significantly shortened. At any rate, often the pioneer and trail blazer has to do things the hard way and experience the creative process of developing an ordeal with all of the half hazard, chaotic and serendipitous occurrences that happen along the way. Had I not delayed the working, then I might have done it the way that I originally planned. By letting the date slip a weekend, I came up with a different, and I think, better plan. We shall see over time how it works out, but so far I am very pleased with the results.

Additionally, I also decided to dispense with using the planetary hours for the two workings. Since most of the rites have been performed before as part of the original ordeal, I felt that it wasn’t necessary to enclose the working with planetary hours. I will, however, use planetary hours for the last working in May, because it has not yet been attempted. I also felt that the Benediction rite was unnecessary, since the temple was quite properly aligned and fully charged. Since I completed the first part of the ordeal back in December 2009, the sigils and other regalia for this working has been kept in the exact place where I left them. The forces and intelligences that were contacted back then are still quite active. I also felt that the auspiciousness of the dates precluded the need to somehow make the whole operation more sanctified and spiritually blessed than what it already was.  The important part of this working was to perform the Rite of Union, and to do it before the Bornless One invocation.

Needless to say, those (in the Order) who choose to undergo this ordeal as it has been established will perform it with the Rite of Union being done after the Bornless One invocation. I also will recommend that it be executed very quickly afterwards, perhaps the next day after the invocation. It was important for me to perform the Ogdoadic Godhead Vortex ritual and the Triple Tetrahedral Gate ritual in order to re-awaken and re-connect with the ordeal where I left it. Since the Rite of Union was supposed to be worked while the HGA and the Element Godhead were active, I felt that I needed to re-immerse myself in this work. So I assumed that the second time through these rituals wouldn’t really been very illuminating. The key, of course, was with the Rite of Union and the effect that it would have on the overall working. I was looking forward to that event with a great deal of anticipation.

Astrological considerations for the dates April 22 and April 23 were not particularly auspicious. The moon was in the sign Capricorn and it was five days from the full moon, or two days before the last quarter. Moon in Capricorn is not an emotionally effusive aspect - it is, in fact, cold and inhibited. However, the lunation cycle for the moon was at type 6, which was the disseminating type, useful for communication and guidance. I could expect a stable and placid, if not subdued, lunar impact, particularly with the sun recently entered into Taurus. Still, this was the date for Good Friday and Earth Day, with next day of Saturday (Holy Saturday) representing the transition from death to rebirth, at least in Christian practice.

In the tradition of the Roman Catholics, the church altar was stripped on Holy Thursday after the mass rite, and no mass was actually said after that event until Easter Sunday. Good Friday was a time of prayer, adoration of the cross, a procession of the Holy Eucharist and a mass of the pre-sanctified, using sacraments produced on Thursday. Holy Saturday continued the abstinence of saying mass, but consisted of the blessing of the fire, reading of the prophecies, blessing of the baptismal font (in preparation for a special baptism in the old rite), and at vespers, the first celebration of Christ’s resurrection. All of these rites commemorated the execution, death and rebirth of the founder and savior, Jesus Christ. So I was undergoing my personal rites of the Abramelin Lunar Ordeal when the rest of the Christian world, orthodox as well as the other denominations, was celebrating their holiest weekend of the year, next to Christmas. Therefore, the timing was particularly auspicious, if one considers the impact of performing personal magick during a religious holiday.

On Friday and Saturday (starting during the evening on Friday) the Passover Shabbat is celebrated, representing the most auspicious moment in the eight day celebration after the two Seder meals and before its final end, which is Tuesday. These are the fourth and fifth days of Passover, known as the Choi Hamoed, or intermediate days. The intermediate days represent the Hebrew’s deliverance from bondage in Egypt and their travels to the Red Sea. They are still in danger of being captured or killed by pharaoh’s soldiers, and it is the seventh day when the miracle of the Red Sea splitting is performed by Yahweh, allowing the Hebrews to cross over and safely begin their sojourn to the promised land.

Let me now relate what happened to me during these two events, since we have established the reasons and the context for their operation. I will write up edited notations from my journal, excluding only those entries that I consider too personal to relate here.

Friday, April 22: Began the working at approximately 8:30 pm. I completed setting the magick circle just after the clock signaled the half hour, so I was able to determine the start time. I performed the Mass of the Goddess to charge the temple, and the rite proceeded without any incident. I felt in high spirits for this work, and body was without fatigue or any pain - not at all like the last time I did this working. I performed the Ogdoadic Godhead Vortex ritual and found that the individual Seraphim and Cherubim had become completely fused into union. I received no sense of any individual messages or insights, instead they manifested as a powerful combination of force and intelligence, which was quite remarkable! I was nearly taken aback by the powers and the sense of the coalesced entities that I had awakened.

Once I had completed the invocation of the Element Godhead of Water, I did reconnect and re-encounter the Goddess aspect that I had encountered nearly sixteen months ago. I found myself returned to the peaceful misty beach, where I had met a youthful barefoot woman with a white lace shift, tanned body and face, blond hair in french braids, green eyes and a friendly smile. I could once again smell the sea salt and hear the gentle sound of the waves lapping against the shore. I also heard sea gulls in the background, but noticed that the sun was completely occluded by the enveloping mist. I communed with her a little while, and felt comforted and refreshed by her presence. I had a strong sense of well being and happiness, as if anticipating a time of joy. I now wonder if the Goddess was anticipating her wedding to the HGA, feeling the joy that one would expect to feel for such a glorious union.

The next ritual in the series for that evening was the Triple Tetrahedral Gate ritual. I found this rite to be easy to perform and did so without incident. There were no striking visitations or other magickal phenomena. I could feel the power of the ritual reach a kind of crescendo with the opening of the Great Gate, and I also sensed or even saw the Goddess and the HGA meeting each other on either side of the gateway. This rite set the stage for the next and final rite, having awakened and pulled together all of the elements from the last working. I was ready to proceed to the next level of the working.

Performing the rite of the Alchemical Hierogamy Rite of Union was effortless, flowing and nearly flawless. I marveled at how well the ritual worked, even though this was the first time that I had performed it. The first stage of the rite held an element of sadness, since that is where the young King and Queen are executed and drained of blood, preparing them for the alchemical resurrection. However, instead of sensing the Goddess and the HGA going through this process, I felt myself going through it instead. I could visualize myself progressing through the three steps of alchemical dissolution, where my sense of ego based selfhood was completely destroyed and made ready for distillation and regeneration. However, when I got to the central part of the rite, and began to perform the rites of Conjuction, where the Goddess and HGA were to be wed, I found that they had returned to my vision’s sight, and I drew them together through the wedding rite.

I then envisioned a scene right out of the Lovers Card in the Tarot, with me acting as the prelate who officially joins the two young lovers together. Once this act had reached it climax, I felt my heart filled with an indescribable joy and a blissful happiness. It was a powerful sense of ecstatic union, and I even saw in my mind’s eye where the two youthful lovers embraced and became as one great being of light and love. I had to stop the working at this point for a while as I fully processed these new sensations. I fully sensed and felt the mysterious “Lover Within” as I had never sensed it before.

The rest of ritual proceeded without any further interruption, but as in the first part, I saw myself being reconstructed and made alchemically whole, fulfilled, regenerated and renewed. The end of the rite had me feeling as if I were reborn and made completely new.

Once the final rite was finished, I had to sit and meditate for awhile. I felt that the Rite of Union was very likely the most magnificent ritual that I have ever experienced. I was so powerfully affected that I couldn’t go to asleep right way. The rite had been completed at around 11:30 pm, which was a three hour period of intense ritualizing, but I was not at all tired. Later that evening, my dreams were very vivid and active, and I felt a blissful kind of joy and happiness that I haven’t felt in some time, as if the weight of all my cares and troubles had been completely removed from my shoulders.

Saturday, April 23: This time there was a bit of a delay before I was able to begin the working. I had some tasks to complete for the day, and then afterwards, I wanted to take short nap to catch up on my sleep. Unfortunately, I slept for around two hours, which meant that the time at my waking was around 7 pm. It was still light out (because of daylight savings time and because the days get so much longer in Minnesota the closer one is to the solstice), so I was at first confused by the time. I hadn’t done the preparations for the Bornless One rite, so I had to focus on getting them completed before starting the work. I decided not to perform the Mass of the Goddess for this evening’s work, and instead, I would focus on just doing the Bornless One rite. I finally got everything ready, took a shower and properly anointed myself. The magick circle was fully erected at around 10:00 pm.

I then went through the five stages of the Bornless One invocation rite, where I set up the four Qabbalistic Worlds as the platform steps to a raised energy temple, with the fifth stage functioning as a trapezoidal prismatic temple at the very top. I was able to pace myself and make it through these five arduous stages without difficulty or fatigue slowing me down. I felt ebullient, inspired and fully empowered, so I managed to work through all of the operations until I got to the Bornless One invocation. I then went through this invocation and the final experience was far more powerful and remarkable than I have ever experienced it before. The ecstatic feeling from the previous evening was greatly amplified, and by the time I had completed the invocation, I felt a truly great joy and happiness overpower all of my senses. I felt that the HGA and it’s apparent manifestation was supremely energized by the Rite of Union of the previous evening. It was so apparent to my senses that I felt as if I were two individuals and not one. I could sense its thoughts and feelings as if they were my own. The union between us was neither complete or perfect, but it gave me a strange kind of doppelganger effect, where I moved and sensed myself in space and time in two places at once, even though both bodies were very close. It’s the oddest sensation that I have ever experienced, but it does represent to me that I am getting very close to my objective of being fully unified with the Higher Self.

Once the rite had achieved it’s climax, I found myself blissfully enclosed in a state that was absolutely wonderful. I saw the world through the HGA’s thoughts, and could even engage in an internal dialogue with my higher self, even anticipating the answers! I wanted to know my destiny, at least for the rest of my life, and I saw that there was still so much more to experience and learn, even though I have lived more than half of life so far. Could that mean that I have a long life ahead of me? I could interpret it that way, or it could just mean that my last days will be very busy, allowing me to complete my travels and studies in good order. I now realize that I have built a good solid foundation, and the HGA showed me this, and so much more.

After I sat in meditation for a while, the superimposition of the HGA and myself merged until I felt it in my body, or perhaps I was in its body - I couldn’t tell. He was talking to me inside my head as if it were just another facet of myself (or like to friends in a casual conversation), and I felt just blissful, whole and completely happy. Then when there was nothing more to say, we both became quiet but fully aware of and delighting in our merged beings. This state of mind continued as I completed the ritual and finally retired for bed. I felt like I was a container for this being, sharing the space of my thoughts, feelings and sensations with it. The whole thing was indescribable - and it is still very much active, even now, many hours after it was completed.

One thing that I did ask my HGA was to help me to determine a theme for the Theurgia-Goetia spirits. Looking at this problem through the eyes of my Higher Self, I found it to be all quite simple. The spirits of the Theurgia-Goetia are based on the sixteen directions of the winds, since they are winged air spirits who fly. Half of them are good, and the other half are demonic, so they would represent the spirits that ward the gateway of the Abyss - half of them are on this side, and the other half are in the night side of the abyss. They form a circle whose center is the abysmal gateway. I am sure that this will help me develop a magickal system to invoke and evoke those spirits, and I believe that more information will be forthcoming, but it was fascinating to ask this question and have it so easily answered.

The working was completed at around 1:15 am Sunday morning, and after shutting everything down, I tried to sleep. I have to admit that it was difficult to sleep, even though I was tired, because another part of me (the HGA?) was still awake and processing everything at light speed. I even had the odd thought of: “so this is what its like being in a body and seeking the succor of sleep - how interesting!”

On Sunday, which was Easter, I decided to rest somewhat, but I did feel moved to perform a Thanksgiving mass, which I did after completing my journal entries. I had woken late in the morning and still felt tired. I also felt like something was still moving around inside my head, inspiring me with all sorts of visions and insights. I said the Mass of the Goddess with all of the solemness and joy of the moment, but I also was very tired. I cooked for myself a wonderful feast and thoroughly enjoyed eating it, since my senses had been so much enhanced from my experience. I felt that I had successfully completed the first phase, and felt a great deal of wonder and amazement at the magickal process that produces these experiences. There was much to grateful about, and felt gratitude at the deepest levels.

I am looking forward to the next and final phase of this ordeal, which (unless something peculiar happens) will be Saturday, May 14. At that time, I will attempt to perform the Bornless One Envisioning rite. I will produced an edited version of my experience and also probably put together an epilogue for the whole ordeal. Stay tuned, because it only gets more interesting!

Frater Barrabbas