Magickal Mastery – A Novice’s Guide

The essence of achieving success in both ceremonial and hermetic rituals is to restrict the aim of the ritual to one, very specific, aim and to find before the ritual a) a simple visualization of this aim; b) a phrase (which may be chanted/vibrated) which captures the aim in a few words. This phrase can itself be written down (e.g. on parchment and in a secret code of your own devising or in one of the well-known ‘Occult’ scripts) and ceremonially burned during the ritual.

This aim must then become your desire – and a ritual is a means whereby this desire may be achieved. It is essential, of course, for this desire to be strong, and the techniques of magick are simply a means whereby this desire can be strenghtened and directed.

The easiest technique to use and master is frenzy. This is when you gradually work yourself up to a height of emotion and excitement – and the ritual form is a means to aid this, providing a setting in both time and space. In a ceremonial ritual, for example, you should use the set texts (such as the Satanic ‘Our Father’ or the Invokation to Baphomet) as a means of generating from within yourself the necessary emotion, saying the words forcefully and with drama. If you are conducting a ritual with others present, get them into the right frame of mind beforehand as this helps to generate from them a certain amount of magickal energy – you might, for instance, keep them in a dark room for about half an hour before the start of the ritual. It is essential for you to stage-manage the ritual, making it a memorable event. The whole ritual from beginning to end should be emotive.

To achieve and sustain such emotion and drama takes practice. A good magickian will ‘play to’ his congregation like a good actor in a theatre does – ceremonial magick has always been a dramatic Art. The adept sorcerer (or sorceress) will also sometimes invoke extempore in ceremonial rituals, and for this some chants should be memorized beforehand: to be used as and when the occasion demands.

Rituals – both ceremonial and hermetic – demand energy, and you are the spark which ignites the Promethean fire. To generate this spark requires effort, both physical and mental, and you should at the end of any ritual feel elated but tired: be, in fact, almost on the edge of exhaustion. If you are not, the ritual is unlikely to be successful. This is one of the most important things to remember. It is no good just saying the words, doing a bit of chanting or waving implements about: you must be emotional. You must literally drive yourself almost to the point of possession, of divine/diabolic madness but always with your desire (i.e. the aim of the ritual) firmly before you, stopping just short of total abandonment. You must be prepared to dance, leap, laugh, cry and shout – but must be capable of changing abruptly: cultivating the dramatic silence and stare.

In most ceremonial rituals it is one of the tasks of the congregation to abandon themselves – to the dance their lusts and so on but you, as ceremonial master/mistress, cannot since you must direct the energies unleashed. There is a balance in any ritual which only experience teaches, and mastery involves undertaking rituals often in order to develop the skills required.

Rituals work through energy: this energy is directed via visualization and chant/vibration through your own desire. That is, the living ritual is the channel or ‘Gate’ which allows a flow of acausal energy into the causal (’everyday’) universe. This energy re-orders the causal – that is, produces changes.

One of the first priorities of any aspiring sorcerer should be to acquire and furnish an area as a Temple – and/or find a suitable isolated location outdoors. Temple furnishings should be simple, and space must be left for movement. Be creative and individual about creating the right atmosphere in the Temple – for example, a ‘plasma ball’ in a candle-lit Temple is more impressive than a boring collection of old bones or a skull. Do not use symbols or designs which you yourself do not understand/know the meaning of and keep to one tradition. For example, a genuine, traditional Satanist would never use any qabalistic symbolism or statues/implements/sigils from the dead Aeons (e.g. Egyptian, Sumerian). Instead, there would be Septenary and Dark Gods symbolism (for which see ‘Codex Saerus’ and ‘Naos – A Guide to Sinister Hermetic Magick’)

This may seem pedantic, but it is essential for you to feel part of a living, exclusive tradition – someone party to secret knowledge which outsiders do not possess nor understand if shown. For successful magick, being exclusive means added power and charisma.

Develop your chanting and vibrating ability by regular pratice, and do not be afraid of using Latin chants. They are not used simply because few understand the language – but because of all languages, Latin lends itself best to being chanted according to the principles of esoteric chant (qv. ‘Naos’). It was also the language used in the traditional Black Mass, and a few untranslated chants have survived the centuries. These chants should be among those memorized to be used extempore.

 

Chant Examples:

*Veni, omnipotens aeterne diabolus!

* Ad Satanas qui laetificat juventutem meam.

Pone, Diabolus, custodiam!

* Aperiatur terra, et germinet Abatu.

* Caligo terrae scinitur

Percussa solis spiculo

Dum Lucifer ex stella nascitur

In fedei diluculo

Rebusque jam color

Redit Partu nitentis sideris.

 

The Song of a Satanist

In an important sense, most of my life represents genuine Satanism in action – a going to extremes, a learning from the experiences of those extremes, and a doing of dark, dangerous and sometimes “illegal” deeds.

This life stands in stark contrast to those of the pseudo-Satanists, some of whom have acquired a notoriety and a ‘fame’. I have – as a Satanist should – been intoxicated by the essence of life itself – by that which inspires, which causes creativity, self-absorption and genius of all great artists be they musicians, writers, warriors, explorers or whatever. I have dared to dream and to defy – and have dared to try and make my dreams and inspiration a reality. I have used my life for some purpose – striven toward goals with a passion that overcomes all obstacles. I have known great love – physical, intellectual, and of the soul, the essence of existence. I have also known the opposite – the sadness that awaits all who venture into the dark starkness of the Abyss within and without. And thus the synthesis of these and other things which is the prehension of wisdom.

This living has been an ecstatic affirmation of existence – a self-surmounting. The goals striven for were for the most part irrelevant: what was important was the striving for something with a passion. For in such striving, in the action in the world so entailed in the striving, there was an intensity which captures the immortal and which re-presents the spirit of Satanism: that heroic defiance which is the essence of all conscious evolution and thus civilization itself.

Such exultation is dangerous. By its nature it is individual. It is anathema to those forms and structures which suck vitality and which by their very existence, level individuals down and break or try to break their spirit. It is Heresy. It is testing – some become possessed; some perish; some are broken in spirit and descend to the mediocrity of the majority; some are caught in the snares left by those who adhere to those things which suck vitality (such as religion and ‘law’ and ethics). But some few survive and prosper and thus inspire others to venture out where no one has dared to go before. And of those few who survive, there are some who can express in words or other mediums (like music) what they have felt, and experienced and learnt – in a way which is easily understood. These few are the really dangerous ones…

It amuses me – and has amused me – when I come in contact with modern, self-professed ‘Satanists’, be such people a part of some ‘Temple’ or ‘Church’ or ‘cult’, or be they working on their own. With a few notable exceptions, these people are ridiculous – for them, Satanism is an intellectual philosophy, a collection of rituals, and/or an anarchic attitude. For them, it is an object of study, and involves meetings, discussions. For them, it is communal, and involves ‘ethics’ and/or a religious approach and attitude. For them, it is a glorification of their ego and a wallowing in the pleasures and wealth this existence can offer: an excuse for self-indulgence and lack of self-discipline.

In reality, Satanism is an attitude to living – and an attitude foreign to these mostly urbanized people who profess to be Satanists. Satanism means living one’s life in a cetain way – achieving things, in the real world by one’s own efforts and because one is exulting in existence itself consciously. That is, one’s life is intentional – a striving toward a higher existence by practical deeds, by overcoming challenges which take evolution to new realms. A Satanist strives to change themselves – and then the world itself. They desire glory, fame – to be significant. They are not content, and even when a goal is achieved, there is a need to find and strive toward another goal, another way of living. There are always new experiences awaiting – new levels of achievement. A genuine Satanist needs action – they need challenges, because they possess within themselves the ‘fire of Satan’, that vitality which is the quintessence of living. This vitality shows in their eyes, their character – it is evident in their deeds.

Fundamentally, one becomes a Satanist by acting like one – by doing Satanic deeds. A Satanist of some experience would say one or more of these things: “I have experienced combat; I have killed; watched comrades die. I have loved – and hated. I have discovered something for the first time. I have been alone for months, bereft of most things, and thus come to know myself. I have faced my own imminent death, not once, but many times. I have achieved things with my body I thought not possible. I have exulted in overcoming physical, intellectual and psychic challenges. I know the passion that motivated Beethoven, Van Gogh, Nietzsche, and I know the feelings and greatness of Caeser, Adolf Hitler and Alexander the Great… I have heard the music of the galaxy and the stars and planets within it. I have been in a Prison cell and known the meaning of freedom. I have culled human dross. I have done criminal deeds – to learn and defy.”

Of course, these things are only examples – there are many more. What is important is that they express real experiences of a dangerous or learning kind: they breed character; they test. They are selective. They are the type of deeds done by individuals with with spirit – the type of understanding such an individual possesses, if only intuitively at first.

A Satanist will live life on the edge – will take up a profession which allows him or her to excel in deeds of action or creativity or exploration, or all of these. They will become experts in their chosen fields – and these fields by their nature will require persons of character and inner strength who prefer to work alone. Fields like assassination; Special Forces; Political manipulation… And then, having achieved, they will move on – to new ways and deeds. Or perchance they will die, defiant to the end.

Whatever, their quality of living will far surpass that of the weak majority. Their experience of both the dark and the light will be deeper, more extensive, and thus will they possess greater insight, a greater understanding, a real depth of character. In contrast, the self-professed ‘Satanists’ will be shallow – all talk, with little or no real experience of living on the edge. They shy away from real self-effort, from real self-overcoming, and build fantasy worlds in which they find comfort. They need the company of others, as they need their ego to be massaged by what they regard as their ‘Satanic peers’. They talk an awful lot with others about Satanism, and probably, having learnt a lot of ‘theory’ from books and various organizations, write their own ‘Satanic’ rituals which they perform with the glee of the necrophilac.

Some of these denizens of pseudo-Satanic organizations and cults will indulge in anarchic behaviour to impress themselves and others. But by so doing they reveal a lack of character – for a genuine Satanist possesses nobility and a self-discipline that others seldom understand. Imitation Satanists make excuses – and devise theories to explain their lack of Satanic deeds in the real world. They have seldom if ever changed themselves to something greater than what they were at Initiation, and they most certainly have not changed the world in any way, significant or insignificant. They have achieved no glory – discovered nothing new; not extended the frontiers of understanding by even one micron. Instead, they wallow in obscure doctrines and consume the drug of self-delusion. To be brief, they have not composed a Satanic song which illustrates their life. They labour, but in vain – Poeta nascitur, non fit.

Most Satanists cannot publish an autobiography, or even have a biography which relates their life in detail while they still live, for the simple reason that it would probably render them liable to prosecution by those asinine guardians of even more stupid system of ‘Law’(plus the fact that most wish to continue their sinister esoteric work in secret, to aid the sinister dialectic). If this threat does not exist, then their life has not been Satanic enough. And, moreover, that life is never completed until causal death – something written at a certain age, should be out of date within few years. If it was not, then again the full Satanic promise of one’s existence has not been fulfilled. The time for the publication of such writings is after the causal death of its subject – although an expurgated version may serve a purpose, for some replete with experiences who wish to express the essence and inspire others to follow and then surpass them.

In my own case, I have written a brief a brief recollection of some of the experiences of my Satanic life, for posthumous publication. But even in that MS, there were many things not recalled, perchance the MS falls into the wrong hands before the right time. Such a recalling – of dark and occasionally ecstatic deeds, most of them “illegal” and all of them “heretical” in this purblind society – will have to await my twilight years and a recounting of them to a trusted Satanic comrade. And even though the MS was written only two years ago, it is already out of date…

And of that living, it is the essence which is important, not especially the details. From that living, I have distilled the quintessence into words which cannot be mis-understood – devising a method by which others may obtain that elixir. I have constructed a guide to the goal, drawn a map and explained the goal in detail, because I have been there. I explored, and discovered. Now others can benefit from the lessons learnt from such a life. Non generant aquilae columbas.

Meanwhile, I anticipate the lies, rumours and distortions will continue, based on jealousy. The small and weak of character have always sought to drag those who are outstanding down to their own level of mediocrity – at least in the eyes of others.

Stephen Brown, ONA, 103 yf