Spirit Actions

LON MILO DUQUETTE SYDNEY LECTURE - Thursday 29th October 2009

Enochian magic has been a fascination since about 2005 when I read the dubious text "Enochian Magic for Beginners" by that pillar of scholarship Donald Tyson. I was at the time in the midst of my Reiki study and was most intrigued at the mention of these Angels Skilled in the Arts of Healing" in the eastern sub-angles of the Great Table of the Watchtowers. I designed a ritual whereby the system of healing I was familiar in - Reiki - could speak tot he system I was not familiar with - Enochian. It was intended as a first rite in which I very ambitiously wanted to contact all four kings of the Watchtowers. It was basically a Golden Dawn style usage of the material - I printed out the flashing colour tablets and used them and I relied on the pronunciation of the keys in "The Ritual Magic Manual" by David A. Griffin - probably the only time I've really used that thing, which I've since learnt is considered somewhat of an abomination, especially by orthodox Golden Dawn-ites. Despite it's hodge-podge nature, and the in some ways diametrically opposed systems, and despite my not insignificant terror at what could possibly happen, it was an incredibly successful ritual - incredibly! I found myself in a prolonged visionary experience full of imagery and landscapes I have since seen innumerable descriptions of, I received several symbols and gestures direct from the Kings, and a universe in itself was opened to me. I have since not returned to the Enochian universe, but have spoken to many a person about it, read a lot more (good and bad) and late last year/earlier this year plans were in the works to begin an Enochian working group with my Order Sorors and Fraters, which never properly eventuated, or rather, hasn't YET eventuated.

Enough personal history though - the lecture. Before it even started Soror L quietly took me aside and asked what I was doing on Monday. I said I wasn't sure and asked why. She said she was taking Lon sightseeing in the Blue Mountains and there was a spare seat in her car. She needed say no more - I said I would clear my diary and be there. More about that later. This night was my first meeting with Baba Lon and I was naturally nervous and awestruck at this towering and hilarious intellect. Very unassuming at first, his dry humour makes him somewhat of an esoteric stand up comedian. He takes the work absolutely seriously, but does not take himself seriously quite in the same way.

He started by introducing the origins of the John Dee and the contemporary thinking with regards to evoking spirits. It only then occurred to me that the proscribe act of ritually bathing and putting on fresh clothing prior to invokation would actually have been a pretty huge thing in that day and age, considering the cost of fabrics and seamstresses, and the fact that unless it was April, you wouldn't even think about putting deodorant on let along have a bath. That act had a simple yet profound significance it no longer has in this day and age of ubiquitous plumbing and irrigation. If taklen ritual showers or baths before, but rarely put into them the attention I think this fact necessitates. I may shower everyday, but a ritual shower is a ritual act.

Having read Woolley's "The Queen's Conjurer" I had a pretty good idea about how fabulous Dee was, but the point that Lon makes in "Enochian Vision Magic" is that the Enochian system as we know it would have been vastly different (and probably much more easy to understand and enter into) if ANYONE but a genius mathematician, philosophy, code-obsessed nerd like Dee had been the receiver. These angels spoke to him in such a way that his psyche would understand and respond. If they had spoken to a poet we would have had divine eloquence, if he had spoken to a musician we would be able to hear the mind of God in transcendent melody and harmony, but no, we had Dee - numbers, grids, geometry, vast complexity.

Duquette tradition informs us (this is Lon's key phrase for "this is not necessarily historically accurate") that Dee wanted to know if his friend Laski would be King of Poland. The angels said Sure! We'll tell you that. But first you need to understand what WE think of when we say "Laski" or "King" or "Poland"... or "Europe"... or "Earth"... or "Heaven"... or "planet"... or "galaxy"... or "Universe"... or "God." Lon argues that the angels set about circumscribing the entire universe for Dee and Kelley in order that they could contextualise themselves within in. This came in stages, building in complexity. He used the analogy of a beginner magician learning the Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram as a first order of duty. This gets the magician the illusion that he knows WHERE he is - it orients him on the Earth, or at least the Earth he thinks he is in. THEN he moves on to learn the Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Hexagram, which orients him in the Solar System, then he moves on to progressively more and more complex ritual actions which parallel the expanding complexity of his Universe.

We went on to briefly examine the Sigillum Dei Aemeth and the elegant structure of it and the dynamic nature of its construction - I loved his description of it as like a "basket" focussing energy woven together. We have the Lamen worn on the magician's breast, constructed from two misaligned tables, which reflects our imperfection as manifest human beings. We have the Holy Table itself, constucted from the same table which was flawed to make the Lamen, but has been corrected in it's alignment - making the Table of Practice a representation of the perfect Universe. So by wearing the Lamen the magician places himself as an imperfect part in the perfect universe and is drawn to perfection by virtue of what he wears.

We then as a group performed Lon's simple Enochian invokation and we all skryed the 30th Aethyr TEX. This involved a preliminary statement of sanctification, declaration of authority with the Ring and the Lamen - we put these on ourselves in our own minds because we didn't have a pretty gold one like Lon. We then began chanting the names of the letters around the outer edge of the Holy Table of Practice starting at the top right and working counter-clockwise. We chanted these seven times - 7 times circumscribing the edges of the universe. All the while Lon was chanting the letters in the centre of the Table 7 times.The visionary aspect began here. I felt hot all over and my legs just kept restlessly jumping, like I wanted to just leap up in the air. It was like air was rushing around up and there was a cacophany of activity. I could see the rows of chairs with the group of us sitting and chanting while the room around us was swept away. I'd like to say it was like we were rushing down a tunnel, but it wasn't quite.

We then said another mini-prayer before reciting in groups the words of the Tablet of Nalvage while Lon recited the Call of the 30 Aethyrs for TEX. We then finished this chant and Lon recited the Call again. This was when the visionary shit got really intense. The activity aroud us increased. Flashes of light, a dust storm of purple and orange and light and dark. Then there was something like an altar or plinth ahead - basically a truncated pyramid of yellow stone, like sandstone - spinning or approaching, then spinning again - a bit like the way the TARDIS in the more recent Doctor Who incarnation spins through space. The group, and the lines of chairs is gone and I am by myself in a sort of temple with a marble floor and square trapezoidal arches. The roof may be open, or it may not be. The altar is before me and seems to have some kind of pool of wtaer aroudn it - blacky-purpley water. There are people rushing everywhere around me - ghost like people that come and go, streaking past - a bit like an interdimensional Times Square. I hear words spoken all around me. Then there is no one there but me. Then the activity is back, then gone, then back. I kneel down, almost as if I am compelled, before this plinth. There is a male figure before me. (EXPLICIT INTERDIMENSIONAL BIZARRENESS WARNING:) I see an erect phallus. It's blue - sky blue. I take it in my mouth, then I don't, then I'm receiving fluid from it. Then the figure is gone. I see another hooded figure behind the plinth to the left of it watching me from under a hood. It steps behind a wall out of sight. Lon is meanwhile reading the names of the four Governors of TEX: DOXMAEL, TAAOGBA, GEMNIMB, and ADVORPT. Then I am alone there but for four figures staning around me.

I think it's a fair assumption these are the four Governors. So, being proactive, I draw one of the symbols I received from the Elemental Kings. The four Governors immediately burst into joyous applause. I then hear a voice saying DOXMAEL and one of the figures steps forward and draws a simple sigil in the air - it is like a boiling down of the original symbol. I repeat his gesture and they all applaud again. This gesture is repeated for all four symbols, each time a different Governor steps forward and traces a simplified symbol - which is at the same time a gesture. I'm planning another trip back to visit to try the original gestures I received, and also see their reaction to the strange Enochian phrase I received a long time ago, which first set me on the road to Enochiana. I tried this during this little group ritual, but we were pulled out of it and while the "state" of TEX held firm, the vision of it began to rock and disintegrate like a shakey hologram.

It ended with a few of us describing what we were seeing or had seen. A nuimber of us had experienced the sensation or image of spinning. Columns featured in others - and mine had slanted columns in that trapezoidal canopy.

We wrapped up the talk, and I was still floaty and awestruck. It was the most hilarious mind fuck I'd ever experienced. And I mean mind fuck in the best possible way - as my account of the Qabalah lecture will show.

I had a lift home from Frater D, and discussed the possibility of my attending his next Masonic Lodge meeting (another story I guess - I mention it only for the potential of personal posterity). I barely slept that night, but I didn't have a heap of wild dreams like I expected to. The following day many others had the same reaction - except Soror L who said she slept like a log. Darn her.