I edited this transcript for clarity – non-essential comments and repetitions of the same material were omitted. I’ve also divided the lecture into parts and inserted a few comments and pictures.
You can find the original video of the lecture here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H6qOGLGAGwU
Intro
Hi guys, it is good to be back with y’all again tonight. The reason why I called this one “Alchemy” is because I wanted to pick up where we left off last night. I was talking about the path of High Magic: what it is and the steps of it. There is a lot out there that falls under the category of magic, like any kind of energy manipulation, but what I was focusing on specifically was high magic: what it is, why we’re doing it and how we’re doing it, and I talked about what we’re doing is retracing our way back up the chain of creation.
You know every time you hear about the Tree of Life, for example, they say that it begins in Kether and all the other spheres are just energy emanating from Kether, down to Malkuth, and that eventually, all this energy returns to Kether. It’s like this continual process, but it originates in Kether. But Kether is not the final stage that we’re trying to reach, there are three levels above Kether: the Ain, the Ain Soph, and the Ain Soph Aur.
Model vs Reality
First, I want to reiterate what I said last night: all of these things are just models, they are all metaphors, they are parables, this is why Jesus always spoke in parables, it’s because this is not the reality. The reality is there is no such thing as Kether, there is no such thing as Malkuth, these are just metaphors that we use to explain and understand a process. When you truly understand one of these metaphors, you understand all of them. If you truly understand the Tree of Life metaphor you will understand Aristotle’s model of the universe.
Aristotelian universe
You will understand how each of these models describes a process, but the process is not confined to words, the process is more than just the words.
Editor’s Comment: The Dao that can be spoken is not the enduring and unchanging Dao. The name that can be named is not the enduring and unchanging name.
The Goals of High Magic
Last night we were talking about using the model of ancient traditional High Magic which originates in the ancient middle east, in Sumer, what is modern-day Iraq, before it spread to the West. Keep in mind we’re not talking about the Golden Dawn here. The Gold Dawn is a system that gives people a little taste of a bunch of different aspects of magic. But it’s not the path in its entirety, it’s letting you sample a bunch of little things.
And it’s set in stages: in the first state of the Golden Dawn system, you’re working with the Hebrew language, second level you’re using a combination of Enochian and Hebrew, the third level you’re using all Enochian, the final level of the Golden Dawn system is alchemy. And there are all these different aspects to alchemy: there’s external alchemy, there’s internal alchemy which you find in different eastern traditions and in some of the western more tantra-flavored traditions. But even if you’re doing something externally, like creating spagyrics, you’re still taking part in an internal process.
So last night we were talking about how this is just another model like the Tree of Life. In the Tree of Life model, everything starts at Kether and then descends through the levels of reality to manifest in Malkuth. In the ancient middle-eastern model of high Magic everything begins and the Source and as the current descends from the Source the very first level of the physical reality that forms is that of the Fixed stars, and then as the energy comes down, it forms the constellations, and as it comes down even lower it forms the planets, and as it comes down even lower it forms the elements, which is the physical world.
The Main point of High Magic is to transcend what the Buddhist call the Wheel of Samsara, or like the Gnostics said "this world is a prison", that the Demiurge caused us to incarnate into this world over and over again. You’re trying to transcend that, to rise to the level where you won’t unconsciously and uncontrollably incarnate again into this realm. You do that by tracing yourself back up this chain of descent – from the Source to the fixed stars, to the constellations, to the planets, to the elements – you have to trace your way back up through that in order to transcend Samsara.
This process begins with the Lesser Pentagram ritual: the lesser Invoking and the lesser Banishing ritual. You’re going to do this (and the middle pillar) for at least nine months before you move to the next level. I’m not going to cover the Middle Pillar ritual because it was not a traditional part of High Magic, that came much later with the Golden Dawn. What I’m trying to stick to right now is just the ancient true preserved art of High Magic, not all the other stuff – not tantra, not the middle pillar, not Enochian, none of that. Just the path of High Magic that allows you to transcend the cycle of uncontrollable incarnation into this world. If you do this you will not be born here again.
Step One
You start by doing the Lesser Banishing and Invoking Ritual of the Pentagram, this is the elemental level, the very bottom level, and when you’re doing this, you are going to invoke the four archangels of the elements: Michael, Gabriel, Raphael, Uriel. And it’s not a thing that you’re going to do one time, you’re going to do this a lot, for months.
Step Two
The second step of the process is when you begin the planetary work. Remember we go Source -> Fixed Stars -> Constellations -> Planets -> Elements. In reverse we do the Elements first, then we ascend to the Planetary level. This is where you’ll be doing the Lesser and Greater Hexagram Rituals. The way you ascend to the level of Planetary incarnation is with the Solar Greater Hexagram Ritual. You are drawing all the planetary hexagrams overlapping and charging them. You usually start with other planetary hexagrams, because the Solar Hexagram Ritual is the hardest to do, the hardest to figure out for people who are just beginning the process. But what you’re working your way up to is the Solar Hexagram Ritual – it corresponds to Tiphareth on the Tree of Life.
With each step of this process, there are certain things that you have to learn: certain rituals you have to master, certain correspondences you have to remember, certain books you need to read, and certain meditations that you have to do. For the Planetary level, you are working towards the mastery of the Solar Hexagram ritual, when you do it you invoke all the planetary energies simultaneously. This is why you charge the hexagrams with ARARITA; it is not actually a word it’s an acronym of a Hebrew sentence that says that everything in existence is part of God, just like all other planets are different expressions of the solar energy.
Editor’s Comment: ARARITA is a notarikon for the Hebrew phrase "Achad Rosh Achdotho Rosh Ichudo Temurato Achad", which means "One is His Beginning; One is His Individuality; His Permutation is One."
This is also the stage of the work where you are expected to attain the knowledge and conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel (HGA).
Editor’s Comment: How? This part could use elaboration.
By doing the Solar Hexagram Ritual not only are you invoking all the planets, but you’re also going to start invoking the ten archangels of the Tree of Life. The spheres of the Tree of Life have the same energy as the Planets but in a more refined form.
When you learn the Lesser Pentagram Ritual, you’re learning a formula, you’re going to use this formula – just like you’re invoking the four archangels of the elements in the pentagram ritual, you’re going to invoke the ten archangels of the Tree of Life around you when you do the Solar Hexagram Ritual.
Editor’s Comment: Usually you invoke Archangels in the Pentagram rituals, not in the Hexagram rituals. Should it be done before or after doing the Analysis of the Keyword? This isn’t Golden Dawn format. I have a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore.
Step Three
In the next step of the process, you’re going one link up the chain to the Source, to the Zodiac level, the level of Constellations.
You know how the Buddhists say that we’re trapped in the wheel of Samsara and the Gnostics say that the world is a prison in which we incarnate over and over. If that were true, there would be some external manifestation that reflected that. As above, so below, as within, so without.
What mirrors that is the sun’s ecliptic: you have the sun in the middle of our solar system and all the planets revolving around it, and unless some outside force interacts with those planets in some way, they will continue to go through those cycles forever, rotating around the sun.
When you’re doing the Solar Hexagram ritual and you’ve attained the knowledge and conversation of the holy guardian angel – you’re still within the sun’s ecliptic, meaning you’re still stuck in the cycle of Samsara. In order to transcend the cycle of incarnation, you have to rise above the sun’s ecliptic, above the planetary aspects of magic.
You transcend the Sun’s ecliptic by rising to the Zodiacal level. Picture the solar system in the middle of a circle, this circle is the twelve constellations of the Zodiac. When you raise your consciousness to the Zodiacal level, you’re raising yourself out of the sun’s ecliptic.
Editor’s Comment: The Zodiac corresponds to Chokmah on the Tree of Life. One step above Binah which corresponds to Saturn.
The planets and the Zodiac
The way you’re going to do that is with the Supreme Pentagram Ritual, this is the one that’s using both Hebrew and Enochian. Again, it follows a formula, the same formula that you learned when you started doing the Lesser Pentagram Ritual. Just like you invoke the four archangels of the elements around you in the Lesser Pentagram Ritual, and like in the Solar Hexagram Ritual, when you invoke the ten archangels of the Tree of Life around you, when you do the Supreme Pentagram Ritual you will be invoking the twelve archangels of the constellations around you. That’s the first part of this step of the process.
In the second part, you’re going to add to that the invocation of the thirty-six angels of the deacons of the Zodiac. One constellation of the Zodiac represents 30 degrees of the Sun’s journey through the year. Thirty can be divided by three, you get three equal segments of ten degrees, there’s an angel that presides over each of the ten degrees sections – that’s what the thirty-six angels of the deacons are.
In the third part, you’re going to continue doing the Supreme Pentagram Ritual, and I don’t mean just this ritual. You’re going to do the Lesser Invoking Pentagram Ritual and invoke the four archangels of the elements, The Greater Solar Hexagram Ritual and invoke the ten archangels of the Tree of Life. On top of that, you’re going to be doing the Supreme Pentagram Ritual invoking the twelve archangels of the constellations, the thirty-six angels of the deacons, and the seventy-two angels of the Shem operation.
Editor’s Comment: How did the seventy-two get in there, I hear you cry?
When you divide the constellations into three equal parts of ten degrees, you can also divide those ten-degree sections in half. You get a total of seventy-two five-degree sections. That’s what the seventy-two angels of the Shem operations are, they are Zodiacal in nature.
The sequence of rituals gets longer with every step of the process. By the time you’re invoking the angels of the Shem operation, you’re talking about good three hours of time.
Step Four
The last step of the process before you start invoking the Empyrean (the Source, Kether) is to add the invocation of the Four Royal Stars. There are a few different ways of doing this, but I do it by a combination of the Lesser Pentagram and the Supreme Pentagram rituals. I didn’t use any Enochian anymore.
After all the previous steps (LRP, GRH, SRP) you are going to add a simplified Supreme Pentagram Ritual: First, you are going to do a white invoking pentagram and charge it with ARARITA. Then you’re going to do a blue pentagram over it in the same place and charge it with the name of one of the Four Royal Stars. If you want the names, just look up “Four Royal Stars” and read the article on Wikipedia.
Editor’s Comment: The stars are Aldebaran, Fomalhaut, Antares, and Regulus. Read this article, also read this.
There are also fifteen angels that go with this part of the invoking process. So, you invoke the four archangels of the elements, the ten of the Tree of Life, the twelve of the Zodiac, the thirty-six of the deacons, the seventy-two of the Shem operation, and lastly, you’re going to add fifteen more, the archangels of the fixed stars. You’re not going to find them in any book. They are not in Cornelius Agrippa’s books; they are not in Christopher Warnack’s books. They have to be given to you, if you make it this far in the process somehow these names will make their way to you. It’s like Jesus said: “Knock and it will be opened unto you”. If you do this work to the best of your ability, the next step will always come to you. "Ask and you shall receive."
Editor’s Comment: I found Hermes on the Fifteen Fixed Stars (would you believe that John Michael Greer is involved?) I’m sure these are the right stars. The only thing that’s left is to find the names of the archangels associated with these stars, which I couldn’t do because I’m not far enough in the process. Just in case, there’s another list of fixed stars.
Step Five
The final step of the process is invoking the Source. There are several names you can use, but the one I was given was the Empyrean. That’s what Dante called it. You’re going to invoke the Empyrean before you, behind you, to your right hand, to your left hand, above you, and below you.
The Divine Comedy's Empyrean
What you are invoking is the source that gave birth to the Fixed Stars – Kether. But this is not the end. When you invoke the Source you “go into the light” that’s the Ouroboros, the great snake that’s biting its tail. Once again, it’s just a metaphor, there is no giant snake in the stars.
Ouroboros biting its own tail
This is why you have to do this work while you’re alive, you can’t do it when you’re dead – if you go into that light after you’re dead you get spit out of the other end of this reality tunnel and back into the physical world, but you don’t have a physical body, you are pure spirit when this happens.
When you get cast back down into the physical world, you will begin to reformulate another physical body and you will be born again. However, if you do it while you’re still alive (which is what happens through this ritual work) you get returned to your body again. You don’t have to reincarnate because you’re already here, so you break this cycle. But if you were to die at that point, you would still incarnate again.
Editor’s Comment: Don’t try this at home! That is, dying right after doing a ritual.
Step Six
In order to completely transcend this cycle, you have to rise above the Tree, you have to go above that Source. Above the Tree, there are three veils: Ain, Ain Soph, and Ain Soph Aur. Those are the next things you’re going to be invoking, but it will not be the same invoking process.
Ain, Ain Soph, and Ain Soph Aur
Whenever you invoke something normally, planetary energy for example, like Venus/Netzach for love, or Mercury/Hod to be a better communicator, you’re reaching out into the universe with your will and pulling a specific kind of energy to you.
When you reach above the Tree and grab a hold of that energy with your will, that energy is immovable, it is fixed, it’s not coming to you. Instead, you’re what gives, you get pulled towards it, like doing a pull-up. You have to get to Kether before you can do this.
With each veil that you invoke, you pull yourself one step higher above the Tree until you reach the last veil. Then you have absolutely removed yourself from the cycle of incarnation, from the Ouroboros, you have risen above it.
Alchemy
How does it tie into alchemy? Let me show you this alchemical distillation kit. You would put the herb in this part of the distillation kit, and then you add water to it, and then you light this part, filled with oil, basically a lamp, on fire – it’s your heat source. You light this, and you let the water boil and evaporate. When it evaporates it comes to this part of the kit, and it goes down to this distillation coil. You’ll have a water source connected to here, you have to have the water source to cool the vapor back down.
A Distillation Set
The water boils and evaporates. The vapor then enters this coil here where you’re trying to cool it down, so when it comes down and comes out of here it’s going to condense back into a liquid and fill this beaker. Eventually, the original flask will be empty, it will have remnants of the herbs that you used in it, but there won’t be any more liquid. You’ll have less liquid than you started out with because you have removed the impurities from it. You have less liquid, but it’s more potent: a few drops of this liquid will be more potent than a whole cup of tea.
This symbolizes the process that you put your consciousness through when you do the rituals. When you trace yourself back up the chain – that’s evaporation. Then you come down (condensation) you just live your life; you do whatever you’re here to do. Just like they say in Zen: "before enlightenment – chop wood, carry water; after enlightenment – chop wood, carry water."
But it’s not the end of the alchemical process, that’s the beginning. After the process is done, you’re going to pour all your liquid back into the original flask with the remnants of the herbs, and you’re going to boil it again. It’s going to go through the same process again. By the time it’s gone through the process once, the volume has been reduced in half, the second time it goes through the process, maybe a quarter remains, but it’s even more potent. And then you put it through the process again. Traditionally to get the most powerful spagyric/tincture you’re going to put it through the process seven times. It sounds easy, it’s not. It takes a lot of time, it’s exhausting, and it’s very tiring just to do it one time. But when you’re done, you’re going to put through the process six more times.
Similarly, when you go through the process by ritual magic, you do the same thing, you rise through each level back to the source of creation, transcending the wheel of Samsara – that doesn’t mean you’re going to be perfect. You need to go through this process again, and again. Traditionally you would go through this process seven times in order to achieve a state of consciousness beyond even what Adam and Eve experienced before the Fall of humanity. And technically, you can do it more than seven times. The more you do it, the more purified you’re going to be. That’s the end of the process.
The first time you do it, it’s exciting, it’s amazing, you’re accomplishing all of these things, and having all these amazing adventures. This is what people call the search for the Holy Grail. After that, it's work. The first time you go through the process it’s kind of jerky and rough, but once you’ve gone through it one time you understand it. The second time you go through it – you know what you’re doing. So, you go back to doing the three long rituals again and you’re just refining your understanding of the process.
Q&A section
Q: If someone plateaus on the path, do they lose progress?
A: It depends. If you die before you complete the process at least one time, you will reincarnate again, you going to be changed, but you will have to go back to the physical world again. You don’t want to linger; you want to finish it. If you just quit, you will start to fall again. If somebody is doing the work all aspects of their lives are improving noticeably.
But if you drop the practice every aspect of your life will get worse again. You will become interested in pointless things and fall again into a state of illusion. I say that from first-hand experience.
When I was in prison, I reached a point when I felt I wasn’t in prison anymore, I was in a control tower. I could reach anything in the world and do anything and nobody could stop me. I felt more emotionally and mentally stable in prison. The day I got out of prison I had a nervous breakdown.
I went from not caring about anything in this life and my whole life revolving around magic, to a complete nervous breakdown when I couldn’t even do magic anymore. I went from doing magic eight hours a day to not being able to do it for eight minutes a day. And my life started to fall again because I haven’t completed the process. I found myself completely miserable and drunk every day, my physical health and my relationships disintegrated. And it didn’t stop until I hit rock bottom and went back to magic, that’s when everything started to get better again.
So yes, you can lose the ground you gained, in that manner of speaking. But once you go through the whole process once you will never fall back into that state of unconsciousness that most people live in.
Q: Do you fall faster the higher up you get?
A: That may very well be true. I hope that you never find out.
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