PHUL

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Planet: Moon.

Uses: Phul rules all things corresponding to the

Moon, as well as providing familiar Spirits of the
water-who, it is said, can serve in visible and
bodily form-as well as converting any metal
into silver. (In the Arbatel, it says Phul can con-
vert any metal into silver in both word and deed
or action. This, 1think, demonstrates that these
uses are symbolic, as it is nonsense to say that
a word or action can be solidified into the raw
metal known as "silver". Nonsense in a grimoire
is a hint that something deeper is being referred
to. Turning things into silver refers to bringing
them into Lunar energy. The Moon, along with
Mercury, is the most magickal of the luminaries
in Western astrology, and much of what applies
to Ophiel applies to Phul.)

Time: Monday.

Colors:White background with a black or purple

sigi l.

Candles:White and purple.

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Lamp:Purple or white .

Fragrance: Orchid.

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 Essay on the Nature of Reality and Evocation

Now that you know how to evoke the Olympicks

through this simple method, I'd like to discuss
sorne interesting questions about the nature of
evocation and chaos magick.

Basically, when you perform a chaos magick rit-

ual, you can attempt to summon any Spirit at all.
It could even theoretically be the Spirit of Santa
Claus (sorne people have done this. 1 haven't).
But, if it is something that obviously doesn't
exist and never existed (like the traditional idea
of Santa Claus), the question arises what exactly
is happening when the evocation is successf ul. As
in, if you feel a presence, see imagery on your
scrying mirror or are able to manifest results in
the form of a spell, and it is all based upan some-
thing fictitious like Santa Claus, what does this
mean?

The obvious answer is that you are simply ex-

ternalizing a group of attitudes and perceptions
you have and making them magickally potent.
Because you are objectif ying them in a ritual
context, your mind is working with them in a
new and more powerful way.Santa Claus doesn't
exist, but there is obviously power in the con-
cept, and if you've been raised in a Western
Christian background, Santa Claus has sorne as-
sociations with your childhood. You believed in
him at one time, and if that belief re-occurs later
in life, maybe something interesting can happen.

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1use Santa Claus as an obviously absurd example.
However, what if there is more to it than that?
All around the world, hundreds of millions of
children believe in Santa Claus. His image is ev-
erywhere during certain times of the year, and as
a figure he has massive cultural influence. Could
the idea of Santa Claus theref ore be magickally
potent because it is given so much energy and
belief by so many people? Could the collective en-
ergy behind the idea of Santa Claus take on its
own existence and achieve a kind of sentiency?

This is actually the idea in chaos magick of

a "Godform", although an unintentional one.
Without going into too much detail, the typi-
cal chaos magick explanation is that desire can
be objectified through the form of a sigil (which
is basically like the seal s in a grimoire), but as
it gains energy it can increase into three other,
higher levels. The first is a Servitor, which is
where the desire takes on a kind of sentience
of its own and be directed like a living being.
You might say it is somewhat intelligent at this
point, whereas befare the sigil operated as brute
force. If more energy is added to it, it turns
into its second form, called an Egregore, which
is a type of collective thought form, even more
sentient than a servitor. Usually more than one
person is needed for this transformation. How-
ever, when a large group of people transfer their
energy to an Egregore, it then becomes even
greater, transforming into a Godform.As a God-
form, it takes on a total life of its own and is

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able to usurp its own energy independent of the
minds which gave rise to it. It is a created god, if
you will.

Theoretically, if there was such a magickally po-

tent aspect to Santa Claus, it would be because of
a model similar to this. Chaos magick describes
this type of phenomena in this way. However,
sorne have concluded that Spirits in general fol-
low this basic model and have no true indepen-
dent existence. They, too, are Godforms or Egre-
gores of bygone ages. Magick is then looked upon
as a form of psychological self-manipulation . It
does have paranormal and occult results, but
this has less to do with contacting objective enti-
ties and more to do with learning how to harness
and express one's own psychic energy through
such tools as belief, concentration, ecstasy, etc.
As such, the beings described in the various old
grimoires of Europe, the Middle East, India and
China, etc. are taken as aspects of oneself rather
than objectively existent entities.

But how would you know? In theory, there's

nothing a Godform would do or look like that
wouldn't also apply to an objectively existing
Spirit. It's a non-falsifiable position, for if a God-
form can act independently of its creators, it
resembles an objectively existent being in all ob-
servable ways.At this point, it really all depends
on what theory you want to subscribe to.

The paradigm of old European ceremonial mag-

ick, however, always assumes that these Spirits
have an objective existence independent of the
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sorcerer. They may be infernal Spirits, like the
demons of the Goetia, or planetary Spirits like
the Arbatel describes, but there is no concept
that they are somehow a part of our own psy-
che. It is accepted that they are literal angels
and demons and the sorcerer treats them as
such. The entire apparatus of the rituals asso-
ciated with them, in fact, is based upon this
understanding. Thus angels are supplicated in
a reverential manner, whereas rituals involving
demons are performed with many precautions
in place and once the demon actually appears,
it is kept on a tight leash. In our modern age,
we might think that this viewpoint is outdated
and that we know better now, but is that really
the case? What actually happens when we evoke
these Spirits, and how does it compare to evoca-
tions of obviously fictional beings?

The Olympicks provide an interesting clue, 1

think. As 1 said, there is really no way to de-
termine if they are Godforms or not, as a God-
form supposedly has all the aspects of an objec-
tive being, but, personally, my experience of the
Olympicks is very different than evocations of
outright fictions. Evoking them is also different
than evoking an insentient sigil as part of a spell.
And, yes, it is very easy for a critic to sit back
and say that this is simply due to suggestion or
an over-active imagination, but 1am not so sure.
1was first introduced to magick through chaos
magick and it was only after meeting ceremo-
nial magicians who operated with old grimoires
that 1 began to work them myself-albeit in a

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chaos magick style. But 1 was very comfortable
with the idea that these Spirits were elements of
my own psyche. Repeated experiences, however,
have forced me to question this model.

Having said that, the method 1describe of evok-

ing them is not the method described in the
Arbatel. It is a simplified technique that uses
the sigil of the Spirit in question and sorne
basic planetary correspondences to heighten the
effect. That is all. Nevertheless , it is very power-
ful. 1have experimented with more traditional
forms of evocation-yes, even reciting prayers in
Latin to the Christian Gods-and 1 can say that
1 far prefer my own meditative and simplified
method.But, actually, 1have found that even the
simple visualization of its sigil can call up an ex-
perience of the Olympick . It is not quite as in-
tense as the ritual, but the presence is certainly
there.

What are the implications of this? 1 think it's

clear that the Spirits spoken of in old grimoires
can be summoned through many different
methods. The use of Latin prayers, for example,
is something that is obviously contrived and
makes little sense when many of these Spir-
its have Hebrew, Persian or Egyptian names. Of
course, Latin prayers can be very useful to some-
one who was raised going to Latin masses all
their life and for whom Latin feels like a "holy
language",just as 1611King James English often
seems like a "holy language" to English speakers.
The point is not the details of the method, but

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how the method impacts the magician. Colored
lamps, for example, always seem to make my
evocations much more vivid and intense. In the
past 1made more use of incenses and fragrances,
and these, too, had a great effect-although, per-
sonally, 1think lighting is more important. So it
is not the case that grimoires are infallible books
which must be followed to the letter. They de-
scribe the Spirits and a method to contact them,
but the most important factor is the magician-
not the method.

As to the question of whether these Spirits are

objective or subjective, however, the Olympicks
serve as a very illuminating case in point: as 1
stated earlier, all names of the Olympicks have
meanings, sorne of which are easier to find out
than others. However, if you evoke them having
no idea what their names mean, and find out
that you receive impressions from them which
reveal the name's meaning or aspects of its
meaning, then it is quite clear that there is an
objective component to their existence. A person
could say that all knowledge is subjective, ulti-
mately, and this may be true-we may be able
to tap into any form of knowledge in the cos-
mos because we are microcosms ourselves, and
contain the entire universe within us-but if you
get information from a Spirit which you weren't
aware of previously, there's nothing about this
experience that says it is wholly subjective. And
even if it is tapping into a universal memory la-
tent within ourselves, still, that universal mem-
ory must have an objective aspect which is above

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and beyond our own existence. At a certain
point, we're not just imagining things anymore:
reality begins to intrude, and we come to realize
evocation, and magick in general,is very real.

This is just one example. There are many ex-

periments you can conduct. In fact, I think the
future of magick is going to be a greater and
more complex incorporation of ancient Spirits.
Bast, for instance, is a remarkable Spirit from
the old Egyptian pantheon and is very much
alive. Theoretically, by using sorne of the open
methods of chaos magick, one has access to
the entire plethora of ancient Spirits, no matter
what culture or time period . True, you may find
that sorne of them had a strictly ideological ex-
istence, and were only there to serve the inter-
ests of priests and kings, but this isn't the case
with all of them. And you do not need to take
my word for it, for the methods described here
with the Olympicks can be applied to any Spirit.
In my book on Evocation Through Sigil M agick , I
describe in detail how any Spirit may be sum-
moned. Once this is known, the rest is simple
experimentation.

Yet this is not to say that everything which is

communicated in an evocation is actually real,
in an objective sense. To think otherwise is dan-
gerous. A thousand thoughts will flood your
mind in evocation, and it takes much skill and
self-honesty to determine what corresponds to
the actual evocation and what is simply your
imagination . You can enjoy the experience of a

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Spirit, but a good rule is to not believe anything
the Spirit tells you-or appears to tell you-un-
less you can verify it, objectively. If it is truly
a disembodied intelligence present in the room
with you, and is aware of you in a conscious
and personal way, then you can expect that it is
not going to speak in vague generalities. Though
1 am mostly a solitary practitioner of magick
now, in the past 1 associated with a few other
magicians. What always struck me about them,
though, was that they were not interested in
concrete, tangible and factual results. It seemed
like magick was more of a faith for them than an
experiential path. They were content to have the
Spirits convey these vague, fortune-cookie like
pieces of self-help advice, and would far rather
smoke pot while looking at old Hermetic designs
instead of using magick to, say, help acquire a
decent job . 1 think it was because they needed
magick to feel special about themselves, as they
were economically disadvantaged and powerless
in their society, and magick gave them a sense of
power and uniqueness. So it worked like a faith.
And "God works in mysterious ways", as people
say-which means he does not work at all. This is
why testing magick out and seeing if there is an
objective basis is so important: you may find evo-
cation fun and exciting, but is it real?

That being said, tangible results may not appear

quickly.With spells, you can usually tell within a
few weeks whether it worked or not, depending
on what the spell is, but evocations are a differ-
ent situation. It appears to me that Spirits have a

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