On Wednesday, we’ll read three short stories from Jorge Luis Borges: “Three Versions of Judas” (pp. 163-167), “The Lottery in Babylon” (pp. 101-106), and “The Library of Babel” (pp. 112-118). Marvelous!

On Wednesday, we’ll reflect on our eggsperience by reading Fr. Acher’s discussion of PGM VII. 505 in Holy Daimon (p. 162-174) and part of Elena Pachoumi’s essay “The Religous-Philosophical Concept of Personal Daimon and the Magico-Theurgic Ritual of Systasis” (just pp. 47-52, where that particular spell is discussed). Eggseunt!

This week we’ll consider some classical discussions of the daimon and the soul: First, The Myth of Er that concludes Plato’s Republic. We’ll go from pp. 279 about halfway down, where Socrates says “Yes, for the struggle to be good rather than bad is important, Glaucon…”, through to the end on pp. 292. Then we’ll look at Plotinus’ “On Our Allotted Guardian Spirit” from the 3rd book of Enneads (pp. 143-161). Note that the Plotinus features Greek on the verso and English on the recto, so the page count there is actually half of what it appears. Should be fun!

In preparation for our simultaneous workings of a paredros ritual from the Magical Papyri (starting on the 24th), we will take a look at some interesting sections from Stephen Flowers’ contextualizing contribution to the Hermetic traditions of the Papyri: Hermetic Magic. We’ll read “Origins” (pp. 3-17), “Principles of the Hermetic Synthesis” (pp. 37-43), “Daimonology” (pp. 99-100), and “Magical Theories” (pp. 135-141). See you then.

This week, at the suggestion of Sorcerix Helios, we will discuss The Alchemist’s Handbook by Frater Albertus.  Their selection: pages 24-42.

This week, we discuss two more selections by the masterful Sfinga:

Meeting With Your Own Daimon and St. Expedite’s “Cras” Powder

Bonus reading: anything else that strikes your fancy from the With Cunning and Command blog.

Short notice this week, so I’m suggesting a shorter reading. This is a contemporary account – by a practitioner I don’t know personally, but would like to meet – about summoning Kronos by faithfully implementing instructions from the Greek Magical Papyri. This one is eloquent both as a description of methods and as a magical tale worth reading.

Bonus reading: Feel free to browse elsewhere in the With Cunning and Command blog and pick out a second article; fertile ground on all sides, in my humble opinion.

Grace and Blessings to all You Bastards,

Fra. Gnostrigrangel

Next week, we’ll discuss Aleister Crowley’s diary of his magical retirement, John St. John, as published in the first issue of the Equinox. It begins at page 271 of the PDF and continues through to the end. Looking forward to seeing you!

Poorly formatted web version still here.

In honor of the Bastards’ one-year anniversary, we revive The Headless One!

This week, we’ll discuss the origins of the Headless Rite and the forms it has taken across traditions and practices. First, take a look at Jake Stratton-Kent’s pamphlet on the ritual, The Headless One. Then look at the translations from the Greek and Demotic magical papyri: from the PGM, “The Stele of Jeu the Hieroglyphist” (pp. 103, PGM V. 96-172) and from the PDM (pp. 232, PDM xiv. 675-694).

The Golden Dawn adapted their own version of the rite, translated as “The Bornless Ritual”, found in The Golden Dawn, pp. 442.

Next we progress to Crowley, who first adapted the ritual as the “Preliminary Invocation of the Goetia”, and later expanded it as Liber Samekh. And finally, a new version many of us have celebrated to great effect, Frater Antichristos’ Satanized and fleshed out Liber Thagirion.

OPTIONAL READING IF YOU ARE A GLUTTON:

Wikipedia article on the PGM.

Israel Regardie’s comparative analysis of the versions of the ritual.

From Hans Dieter’s translations, the introductions to the Greek and Demotic papyri found at the beginning of the volume (pp. xlii and lv).

AVDIERVNT’s preferred version of the ritual: The Stele of Jeu (Rite of the Headless One) as it appears in Stephen Flowers’ Hermetic Magic (pp. 182-184).

And our Skeue Euphemeo developed their own new variant from Liber Thagirion for personal use: Skeue Euphemeo’s Headless Rite (with commentary).

Many thanks to Princess Dysnomia for text-wrangling!

Dear Bastards,

Slightly exasperated with Mathers, this week we will experiment with a new (2006) translation of The Book of Abramelin, compiled and edited by Georg Dehn, translated by Steven Guth, and with a foreword by Lon Milo DuQuette. We’re cutting to the chase and reading Book 3, pages 75-141.

Grace and Blessings,

Lord Grang