Getting Started with Demons

 

If you don’t do demonic magic but have seen or answered questions about it in forums, you should read the intro. If you have not, and you are just looking to learn demonic magic, you CAN read the intro of you can skip ahead to the break and read from there.

 

          I periodically see people asking how to summon a demon in various types of forums. Sometimes the question is more exciting, how do you sell your soul to a demon? Better worded ones might ask how to make a pact with a demon. It’s a popular enough question. If we’re going to be honest, it’s also probably a question driven by people’s impression of magic from movies, comics, stories, and warnings against magic. Still, amongst those asking, there may be people who are exploring magic who haven’t come across that information yet and wonder why they haven’t, where that information is, and ultimately, how do you do it?

          I was that kid once. I had read a handful of magical books. I had studied round the clock, quite literally, resources I found online. I was exploring and practicing the magic I had encountered. I was serious and was doing the work both practically and in terms of educating myself. Still, there was a glaring hole. Nothing had information on conjuring spirits of any kind. Most magic didn’t even talk about spirits or their existence. So, I understand going to a forum and asking. As far as the people who are asking because they got the idea from bad sources and haven’t explored magic yet…so what? Maybe in that forum asking that question is where they’re supposed to be. Maybe it’s how their exploration of magic begins. If they get good answers, it could lead them to good information.

          The problem is, people don’t give good answers. Most competent magicians don’t spend a ton of time in beginner forums. There are a few of us who hang out to answer questions. A lot will pop in periodically. The vast majority of questions get answered by people who, even if they’ve got some time under their belts, haven’t really progressed their knowledge or experience past the beginner phase. So you get a lot of people who think they’re being clever, or maybe insightful, or people who are just smug and think they know the inside truth about magic giving useless, meaningless and misguided answers.  A post I saw today had 144 comments and probably less than 10 were useful, and that’s a generous estimate.

          People see the word demon and they fall right into a Sunday school inspired mindset. People think real magicians don’t work with demons, or that demons aren’t real, or that you can’t summon a demon, or that that’s just how magic works in the movies but not in real life. Or they think the idea is so bad or dangerous no one should ever even give it a thought, rather than it’s dangerous so learn more about it to safely work with it or safely avoid it. Knives are dangerous, but we use them daily, fire is dangerous but we’d have a hard time surviving without it. 1.19 million people die in car accidents annually, I’m sure demonic conjurations aren’t killing over a million people a year, but we don’t tell teenagers not to ask about learning to drive.

          Magic involving demons has existed in Christianity and Islam as long as those religions have existed, and in Judaism for at least the last two millennia. For people who think it isn’t Pagan, we have plenty of surviving records of Pagan magic involving demons. Some of it involved conjuring demons to get them to leave people alone, some involved conjuring demons to accomplish things, some involved tormenting demons to get them to do something for you, some involved allying with demons to threaten other spiritual powers to do things for you, there were myriad ways in which Pagan magicians worked with demons. If you’re a NeoPagan and you think your religion has nothing to do with demons, the earliest forms of NeoPaganism drew significant portions of their ritual system from grimoires that included working with demons.

          You can do magic without working with demons. In most formal ritual magic I do, I would work with angels, gods or the dead more commonly than with demons, but would also work with demons where appropriate, and certainly do in less formal magic. So if you’re acting shocked someone would work with demons, advising that everyone should always stay away from such things, or implying it’s not a real, or not a valid, or not an acceptable form of magic, all you’re doing is showing that you have a very limited magical education. To be fair, not every one who does some magic needs to be extensively educated in all areas of magic. But, avoiding bigotry about magic that isn’t your approach, or realizing that you know what goes on in your corner of the pond but not in the whole pond would be appropriate.

 

 

 

Now…for the thing itself! If you want to get started working with demons, here are some resources!

 

 

Good books for this subject are limited. A lot of us got started by studying the traditional medieval and early modern books on the subject. There are some good modern books though…as well as a lot that aren’t advisable.

 

Jason Miller’s Consorting withSpirits

           This is a good practical beginner book for working with spirits in general, but its approaches apply particularly well for  demons, angels, and other spirits you might conjure. The book says it’s not a beginner book because it doesn’t include protection spells or rituals and it assumes you have studied some magic. Still, it’s written in a way that someone who has never explored magic could pick it up, read it, understand it and probably get started. Here is my review

 

Rufus Opus’s Modern Goetic Grimoire

           I’m not sure if this is still in print. It is a simplified approach to grimoire style conjuration of demons based on the Arte of Drawing Spirits into Crystals, which is one of the simplest grimoire approaches around.

 

BJ Swain’s Living Spirits

         All of my books could be used to learn more about work with demons, but none are really focused on demons. Living Spirits is a general guidebook to spirits and spirit work and includes portions on working with demons and looks at how that fits an overall magical practice. If your main goal is demons then you might focus on the other two, if you want a thorough exploration of work with spirits, including demons, and practical sorcery, this is a good option. It grew out of a project on conjuration for beginners, but many people have pointed to the density of information and the focus on the topic might make it more appropriate to intermediate occultist. Here is a review by former ADF ArchDruid Ian Corrigan

 

Beyond modern books, there are great resources in older books. Some of these you can find in print now. You can get many of them for free online. I highly recommend Esoteric Archives. This website has many free versions of grimoires available along with annotations and comments by the esteemed Joseph H. Peterson. I would recommend exploring the various things that are available there, but for getting started here are ones to focus on. (Unfortunately, I can not link to esoteric archives, but it is found at www . esotericarchives . com the links for these texts are to the physical editions which I would recommend for these texts.)

 

The Ars Goetia of Solomon (part of the Lemegeton)

This has been the standard grimoire for demonology for the last hundred years. It is not a particularly influential grimoire, as it was relatively late and only existed in the English language, but because it was available in English it has been readily available to English speakers throughout the 20^th century.

 

The Heptameron of Pietro D’Abano

 This is not concerned with infernal demons so much as the aerial spirits and the angels who rule over them. The conjurations could be used for demons and the text likely influenced the Ars Goetia. This text can be found within the Fourth Book of Occult Philosophy and developed from a text called the Lucidarium. Information on the Lucidarium texts is available on Esoteric Archives and Peterson released an edition of the older text, the full Heptameron is available there as well.

 

The Testament of Solomon

This is an early list of demons and their powers contextualized in the story of Solomon building the temple. The text does not give real ritual instructions but it provides a different list of demons than the popular one in the Ars Goetia.

 

The Key of Solomon

Again, not specifically a text for conjuring demons, but an influential grimoire. The version on Esoteric Archives is the version compiled by Mathers of the Golden Dawn in the late 19^th/early 20^th century. The pentacles in the text can be useful when working with spirits. The text also gives thorough descriptions of how to create various tools of ritual magic. The conjurations in the text are intended for the aerial spirits like those in the Heptameron.

 

The Grimorium Verum

 Esoteric Archives provides information on this text but I do not believe it provides a free version of it. Joseph Peterson has published an edition of the text as well as of its predecessor The Ars Rabidmadar which is available as The Secrets of Solomon. The Verum has become one of the more popular grimoires for demonology in the last ten to fifteen years. Many say they prefer its approach and its use of demonic hierarchies to the approach used in the more Solomonic texts.

 

There are also some opportunities available to learn with people.

 

Alexander Moore of Practical Occult offers consulting and coaching services as well as a series of courses through Practical Occult. I have spoken with Alexander many times over the years, have spent time with him in person and also with people who have spent much more time with him and who have encountered other magical associates of his. I highly trust his capabilities and his knowledge.

 

I also offer a self-paced course on grimoire magic “How to Do Grimoire Magic for Free (or at least Inexpensively)” Most courses on grimoire magic are rather costly but this one is $7.77. In addition to several hours of audio instruction there is a syllabus to walk you through how to explore the practices and recommend supplemental readings, which are mostly available for free, and it comes with a free book in PDF format. While the course is in grimoire magic overall, it does include the conjuration of demons.

 

So if you’re really itching to get started with demonic magic, you might want to do an uncrossing and take a bath to deal with the itching… 😉 and then pick up one of the aforementioned books, hop over to esoteric archives and start reading a grimoire and avail yourself of one or both of the opportunities for instruction listed above.

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Top Ten Spell Books to Tap Into the Ancient Power of Magic

I’ve often joked with myself about titling blog posts as listicles and click-bait. This one seemed like a fun option for it.

 Witches, NeoPagans and Magicians have been saying for decades that the power comes from within you. The power isn’t in the tools, or in what you say. As a result, the best way to communicate what you truly want and need is to speak from the heart…or at least, to craft your spells yourself.

 There is some merit to some of that. But some of it is also pretty bogus. It’s easy to demonstrate that this wasn’t how people looked at magic prior to the last several decades. It’s also easy to shoot holes in the reality of some of those statements.

 Even if we accept that the power comes from within you, and that your experience, perceptions, and conscious engagement with the magic are what’s important…and in some ways, this is all true…we still have to recognize that what you’re doing, and what tools you’re using will impact all of that inner experience. If you’re not confident in what you created, or if you feel like something that has survived through time will be more potent, then you’re better off using something you didn’t fully create yourself. If we recognize that what you use and what you do has meaning beyond just your inner experience then drawing from existing knowledge becomes even more important. 

 The idea of a spellbook is cool. The idea of examining a collection of magical secrets and using them to solve problems or to increase your enjoyment of life is exciting. Even if it’s all about the inner experience, there is value to that excitement.

 I don’t think it’s all about your inner experience though. Not everything is just about any one of us, and the world works and moves in the ways it is designed to. We have to work within those structures to break and rebuild them to what we want.

 Looking at existing methods of magic is a good way to learn how to build magical rituals and spells. Examining what’s been done before is a good way to look at how things work and what tools to use.

 There is a point where saying you want a spell book feels silly because we’ve all been told several times that we don’t need such things and that’s not how this works. Eventually, you reach a point where you realize books like that can be awesome. Not only are they neat and interesting, but they are useful in multiple ways. Not just in the sense of learning, but in the sense of having ready to go solutions, or templates to start building your own solutions from. Spellbooks provide utility while being fun and exciting.

 Having seen someone ask for a good spellbook this morning I’ve decided to do a list. Following the standard, it is in descending order. Not following the standard, my top ten has twelve items.

 

12. The Long Lost Friend

A lot of people really like this one. I’m not a huge fan. I have not spent a ton of time with it though. It is a general collection of Pennsylvania Dutch folklore. If you’re interested in exploring folklore generally, you will enjoy this. If you’re mostly looking for spells, there are spells, and there are things that straddle a line between spells and less overtly magical folklore. I prefer Romanus Buchlein, which I believe is a related text. Romanus Buchlein is primarily spells. We'll revisit the translator for Long Lost Friend later. 

11. Nummits and Crummits

Nummits and Crummits is also a folklore collection, but from the perspective of a folklorist instead of a practitioner collecting it like Long Lost Friend. As such, it is better organized. This collects folklore from a region in England. There are chapters on magic and counter magic. Most of it is not immediately useful but can be adapted to being useful, or can be used for inspiration.

10. The True Black Magic

 The name is a bit misleading. This is not some Left Hand Path wet dream, nor it is a collection of mischievous diablery. It’s just a Key of Solomon as packaged by the salacious French press of the Biblioteque Bleu period. It is similar to the popular Mathers version of the Key of Solomon, but it retains the section of spells which Mathers omits. There are other better Key of Solomon options, like TheVeritable Key of Solomon, but this is a good accessible slim volume for people who want to look at grimoire spells in the context of a major grimoire. Joseph H. Peterson has put out an edition of this. For an alternative look at a classic grimoire with a collection of spells, Peterson also released Secrets ofSolomon, a version of the Ars Rabidmadar, which is the basis of the GrimoiriumVerum.

9. The Discouerie of Witchcraft

Reginald Scot wrote this text to point out how ridiculous belief in witchcraft was. He wasn’t saying witches are stupid for believing in witchcraft, but that everyone was stupid for believing in witches, and it was all superstition. A lot of his invective regarding superstitious beliefs focused on blaming Catholics for bizarre rituals and inventing bugbears to scare children. If you ignore most of the explanations and commentary, the book is filled with popish papery (Catholicism) which it turns out is just a detailed description of and instructions for performing conjurations, spells, and rituals. The book became so popular with people interested in learning magic, that later editions had essays on magical philosophy appended to it. The Goetia of Solomon is largely based on this book.

8. The Cambridge Book of Magic

 This is not an important book, but it is a favorite of mine. The Cambridge Book is a working magician’s notebook, likely from around the time of the English Reformation. It contains a combination of grimoire style rituals and spells. While the translator noted that it did not include examples of faery magic, it does, in fact, include a conjuration of a faery queen. This came in at the eighth spot because it is slim and accessible and hones in on the type of grimoire magic material which is included in Scot, but it doesn’t have all of the extra stuff. Subsequent books that present working magician’s notebooks are more thorough and larger than this one though.

7. The Works of Daniel Harms et al

 Daniel Harms has been involved with the publication of several grimoires and cunningman’s notebooks. These tend to be well laid out and present copious interesting material. TheBook of Oberon, which was done with Joseph Peterson and James Clark is very popular and reflects a working grimoire added to by several magicians. His recent release, The Book of Four Occult Philosophers, is similar, and passed through the hands of some of the same magicians as The Book of Oberon. Angels Demons and Spirits is another great one which presents the grimoire of a cunningman. David Rankine released The Grimoire of Arthur Gauntlet, which is also a cunningman’s notebook. It has similar material to the one released by Harms but is also worth exploring. Its layout is less user oriented though. Stephen Skinner also released A Cunningman’s Grimoire, and Jim Baker, along with David Rankine, released A Cunningman’s Handbook which was perhaps one of the first popular releases of such a text.

 

6. Saint Cyprian

St. Cyprian, the Sorcerer Saint, was a legendary magician who converted to Christianity to gain its power. Despite his reason for converting, Cyprian was devout and became a bishop and a martyr. Despite his hagiography describing him abandoning and rejecting magic, the folk-memory of him describes a Christian bishop who retained and integrated his magical knowledge into his Christian life. As a result he remained one of the consummate icons of magic. There was a mythical book containing the ultimate magical secrets attributed to him. The book was believed to be so magical that people began names magic books “cypriani.” Throughout Northern Europe, black books, or collections of magical practice, were associated with his name even though they did not necessarily contain references to him. In Iberia, he was more of an icon, and there was an array of pamphlets and booklets of folk magic which were associated with him. This continued in Spanish colonies in the Americas, and he is a significant figure in some ADR magical traditions. Humberto Maggi released a Book of Saint Cyprian collecting some Cyprianic material, Jose Leitao has released multiple books of Cyprianic material. I like the layout of Leitao’s collections better, in particular the latter collection which is huge. Leitao organizes the material based on the source so you get more of a sense of the way the material is collected and presented in pamphlets and booklets which would have been used in folk practice.  Leitao's two main texts are The Book of Saint Cyprian: The Sorcerer's Treasure and Opuscula Cypriani: Variations on the Book of Saint Cyprian

5. The Sporting Life

 This is a very short but useful text by Charles Porterfield which presents information on Hoodoo specifically related to things like money, gambling, sex, and avoiding the police. It presents correspondences and ideas so you can build your own techniques, but it also presents several spells for various general and specific purposes. Chapters are arranged based on the area of life the magic relates to. Some of the language may be off-putting for some readers but the book is very useful and straight to the point.

4. The Secret of the Psalms

This book provides magical applications of the psalms. Some instances provide particular spell or ritual components to do with the psalms, but generally, the psalm’s power is explained, sometimes with multiple effects it can have. You can recite the psalm to try and apply its power, or you can incorporate the psalm with other spellwork. The text is essentially copied from another book of psalm magic which was included in the German collection of magical texts Das Kloster. The German text also contains The 6^th and 7^th Books of Moses, which like The Secret of the Psalms, became a popular and influential text in Hoodoo.  

3. Greek Magical Papyri

 The Greek Magical Papyri refers to several separate and distinct collections and fragments of writing on magic spanning several hundred years (about the 1^st or 2^nd Century BCE through about the 5^th century CE). These texts are primarily from Roman Egypt. By the point these texts were created, Egypt had been under Greek (Macedonian) control prior to becoming a client state for Rome and then eventually coming fully under Rome’s control. Roman control does not seem to have created cultural impact reflected in the texts, but the texts show a blend of Greek and Roman influences. There are also other Near Eastern elements reflected in some texts. There are two major English language presentations of several of the papyri. The standard for several years has been The Greek Magical Papyri by Betz et al. A new larger text is available from Faraone and Toralles Tovar The Greek and Egyptian Magical Formularies. Both primarily present translations of the spells and rituals presented in these texts. If you want ancient, or late antique examples of magic the papyri are one of the most popular sources.

2. Svartkonstboecker

This is the work of a folklorist who unfortunate died before its publication. The text is huge. It collects together several “black books” or magical notebooks often passed along through families, in Sweden. It is a great collection of folk magic practices. For people interested in this flavor of spellbook but want something smaller, The Black Books of Elverum are an option.

1. The Works of Judika Illes

 I will admit, I don’t have these books. Everything else on the list, I do. When I was a kid starting out, Modern Witches Spellbook was the well known spell book. It had the spooky witchy feel of 1970s/1980s witchcraft. They seemed a bit naughty and old fashion, which was exciting, but I also felt like as a middle schooler they weren’t the books I should be buying. Judika Illes’s books have a nicer more friendly aesthetic. Because of that and their titles, I just ignored them. I thought they were just coffee table books that might not even be by a magician, similar to the magical picture books Barnes and Noble has in their bargain section. By the time I became aware of Illes’s books, I was probably also in that phase where I would have thought “why do I want a random spellbook?” Since then, I have known numerous people who have met her and respect her deeply. I’ve met more people who have her books and think they’re great. They’re on my list of books to consider picking up. I’ve heard they contain spells from a wide range of sources covering many places, times, and traditions. For that reason, if someone just wants a spellbook and is not interested in a particular structure or tradition, this is probably the broadest general presentation of spells. Some of her books are, The Encyclopedia of 5,000 Spells, The Big Book of Practical Spells: Everyday Magic that Works, and Emergency Magic! 150 Spells for Surviving the Worst-Case Scenario. 

Hopefully, you have enjoyed this list and it will provide you with some options if you’re looking for books from which to draw examples for building your own magic, or from which to draw completed spells to use. If you want books for exploring magic here is my Getting Started in Sorcery list. At some point I hope to have some more getting started guides for specific approaches to magic. In the meantime, hopefully these are helpful.

 

Thanks for reading.  If you enjoyed this please like, follow, and share on your favorite social media!. You can also visit our Support page for ideas if you want to help out with keeping our various projects going. Or follow any of the links below.

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 Check out my newest book, Familiar Unto Me: Witches Sorcerers and Their Spirit Companions

If you’re curious about starting conjuration pick up my book – Luminarium: A Grimoire of Cunning Conjuration

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Not (Just) a Beginner Book

           Before posting announcements about my new book, Familiar Unto Me: Witches Sorcerers and Their Spirit Companions, my last blog post was about intermediate and advanced books and training.

          People often bemoan the lack of advanced books on magic and NeoPaganism. It's easier to write beginner books, and with a beginner book, you don't have to wonder if people will have the background to understand or use what you're writing. It's still important to have books that move out of that beginner comfort zone.

          In my post on intermediate and advanced materials, two of the options for advanced work and advanced material were either perfection of basic elements or in depth focused exploration of a specific subject.

          Familiar Unto Me falls into the latter category. The text covers just about everything you could cover on familiars and treats ideas often related to familiars. We look at practical elements, the nature of the idea and the nature of the relationship. We explore the history of ideas and beliefs that build a worldview in which familiar spirits can exist. We look at several options for acquiring them across several different approaches to magic. We look in depth at a particular case of a group working with a familiar, and we look at how familiar spirits can tie into efforts to create new living traditions of spirit work.

          It is a deep dive that covers a broad range of elements of a specific topic.

          So the book is well suited to intermediate and advanced audiences because of its thorough treatment of a singular topic. It can also be useful for beginners, not necessarily people reading their first book or two, but people who are starting off and figuring things out. Exploring specific topics in depth can still be useful and interesting in that phase. This will also introduce a lot of more intermediate concepts, ideas, and practices, which will give readers who are still in the beginning phases of their explorations some direction around where to explore. Since it covers a range of traditions, it will still serve the beginner who wants to add work with a familiar to their spiritual experience.

          It does not introduce beginner techniques. There is no grounding or shielding, there is no work on energy, or scrying, or clairvoyance. We don't introduce what conjuration is, or what spirits are, or how to communicate with them. Readers intending to work the material in this book will need some skills and knowledge in those areas. This post will include some suggestions at the end for books which will help establish those elements for people who need them.

          The book does cover all the elements needed to acquire a familiar in several systems of magic, and so anyone with basic magic skills will find a method which is workable for them.

          It also breaks down benefits and difficulties of different types of spirit work. While this is an underexplored discussion, it's important, and well suited to intermediate practitioners trying to decide what directions to focus on. This will also be useful in guiding beginners who are starting to explore spirit work.

          The wide range of perspectives addressed and the far reaching depth of exploring every corner of the idea of familiars means the book has a wide range of audiences it can serve, but will also have material that just isn't for some of its readers. Hopefully, people will appreciate the thoroughness and enjoy the parts that are relevant to them, and find interest in looking at approaches outside of their practice. With this wide range, while the book serves advanced and intermediate practitioners, it has a lot to offer for those starting their journey as well.

          If you find yourself looking for an introduction to some of the elements and skills that underlie this book and the practices contained, here are some options. You don't need all of these. Most readers will be ready to pick up Familiar Unto Me and just run with it, but if you're feeling like you need some more background, any one or two of these will probably close the gaps.

 

The Sorcerer's Secrets: Strategies in Practical Magic by Jason Miller - a general introduction to the skills and practices of modern sorcerers

 

Living Spirits: A Guide to Magic in a World of Spirits by BJ Swain - includes introductions to scrying and spirit conjuration and explains a wide range of spirits and how to work spirits into practical magic

 

Seven Spheres by Rufus Opus - an immersive, potentially initiatic, approach building relationships through spirit conjuration designed to be simple and user friendly. Introduces new students to conjuration and spirit work

 

Luminarium: A Grimoire of Cunning Conjuration by BJ Swain - avoids a lot of theory and ideas and focuses on laying out simple skill building practices to make you more capable at spirit conjuration. Provides a simple system of spirit conjuration. Designed to be able to take a complete beginner through introducing the idea, using preparatory practices, and gathering tools into readiness for their first conjuration in as little time as possible.

 

Folk Witchcraft: A Guide to Lore Land and the Familiar Spirit by Roger J Horne - a collection of witchcraft folklore and introduction to witchcraft ideas which can be used for building witchcraft practices drawing on historical content and ideas

 

Consorting with Spirits: Your Guide to Working with Invisible Allies by Jason Miller - This book covers many elements of spirit work and several useful ideas to consider while exploring spirit work. It presents a couple approaches to working with spirits. Many of the ideas and practices here can be pair with approaches to working with a familiar. 

Sex Sorcery and Spirit: The Secrets of Erotic Magic by Jason Miller - will introduce elements of sexual magic which may help the magician with spirit work and provide more background for those looking to use the sex magic practices described in Familiar Unto Me

Image: High King Margo. From SYFY's The Magicians. Went with this photo because Margo is in grad school for magic, so it fits the theme of intermediate and advanced work...also...Margo is the ultimate bad ass and I'd be honored to have her reading my work on Familiars. 

Where are all the Intermediate and Advanced Books? What even is intermediate and advanced...?

 

          Sometimes, my friend likes to look at reviews of my books. Living Spirits: A Guide to Magic in a World of Spirits has a rating of 4.7 out of 5 on Amazon, I feel pretty good about that. There are a lot of reviews I'm pretty proud of. I watched closely when the book first came out because it was new and I really wanted to see what people thought. I try to check still sometimes, I appreciate the reviews and would love if more people who liked my books reviewed them. A lot of the time now it's my friend who brings them up. He's been popping over to scope them out off and on for the last two years. He's not a magician, but he finds the reviews interesting and will comment on ones that seem odd. Last night, he brought up one that I don't think I'd noticed before.

 

" I haven't finished the book yet. I am only on chapter 7 but already feel like some of the information is a tad bit hard to retain because it's so detailed. This is definitely not a book you can just pick up and read straight through. I do think the author has alot of knowledge on the subject and I like that there are rituals listed"

 

          He felt like the review, which gave the book 4 stars, basically downgraded it for not being a beginner book. 4 stars isn't bad. In a world of actual ratings, 4 out of 5 isn't bad, in a world of algorithms and statistics, yeah, everyone wants as many fives as possible. I like the content of the review though. Having rituals is good, author has lots of knowledge, and it's very detailed. The draw back, it's not really an easy read for someone beginning to explore this and you have to take your time reading it. That, can still a good thing depending upon the goal of the book.

          I kind of like the idea of Living Spirits as a semi-intermediate book. It grew from a series of posts introducing concepts and approaches to spirit work. It formed into a book as I expanded, reassembled and added to them in order to create an explanation of a worldview, and approach to that worldview, and serve as a kind of magical field guide to several types of spirits and spirit-work. It kind of presumes some magical practice and is intended to build a deeper layer for that practice even if it could be approached without that background.

          Luminarium: A Grimoire of Cunning Conjuration was written with kind of the opposite intention. Someone who has no magical experience, or who has magical experience but no experience with conjuration or spirit magic could take Luminarium and hit the ground running within a week or so. If someone reading it has magical experience or conjuration experience it tweaks and arranges some stuff in new ways, and short-cuts some things which should hopefully present new ideas to experiment with. It's written more for a beginner with the intention of being used as a handbook or working manual rather than an instructive text, but with the goal of also being useful for an experienced magician.

          I think a lot of magic books feel like they need to be written with the intention of being an accessible how to book that can be picked up by anyone. It makes sense, the market for magic books isn't large, so it's easier to have an audience if every book works for every reader. It's still probably good to have an idea of an experience level in mind, and it's probably good to sometimes have the intention of writing with the expectation that the reader should have some experience. Jason Miller's new book Consorting With Spirits, openly talks about expecting the reader to have experience. I would still feel very comfortable handing it to a beginner and it is a book I'd happily recommend if a friend asked me for books to start with. It's very accessible and it presents ideas that make a good foundation for thinking about spirit interactions.

          My friend's comments that the review sounded like the only issue was that my book isn't a beginner book lead to me talking with him a bit about how "so what do we recommend as intermediate or advanced material?" is a question that gets asked every few months on the magical internet.

          More and more these days people seem to shy away from actual answers. Learning from spirits, or all books are beginner books have become more popular answers. In reality, learning from spirits can also be a beginner activity, and all books don't have to be beginner books.

          I think part of the issue is, as I mentioned, that it's easier to write something accessible for beginners. Partially, because of the audience, partially because we can feel more confident that we're writing something meaningful to that audience. We also don't have to strain our depths as knowledge holders or researchers if we're writing for beginners. Keeping language simple, direct, readable and clear could be something that some people find easier with beginner material, or it could be something some people struggle with regardless of the level of the material. It should probably be a goal even in intermediate and advanced material though.

          I think another element of the issue is "what constitutes beginner, intermediate, or advanced?" There isn't a set firm answer for that. We don't have set curricula for all of magic. As we progress, things that seem advanced to others seem like simple beginner info to us. I was once part of a group where we were doing series of 101 and 201 classes in a local store. We frequently got feedback that the 101 material was much more advanced than people expected in a 101. We thought we were keeping things super basic. Beginner, intermediate, and advanced can be very subjective things. I think this is true in lots of disciplines, not just magic. People want to know what material is really advanced, when often the answer is there is no advanced material, there are advanced approaches to material.

          When I was first getting serious as a fencing coach, or really, a little before I got serious, I put together a curriculum which I thought was basic foil. I told some foilists I could work with them but I could only teach basics in foil since my background was sabre. Later, those experienced foilists pointed out that I was explaining stuff they thought was intermediate or advanced. The curriculum I put together really constituted the bulk of anything anyone would learn while training as a foilist and was sufficient for taking people from beginner to what would be considered an "elite" athlete by some measures.

          I would still say my foil curriculum covers beginner and intermediate material, not advanced material, because there isn't advanced material. Advanced is instruction modifies approach and perspective. Either way, it kind of illustrates how beginner, intermediate and advanced are based on your own self-assessment. I assumed my background in foil was less extensive than it was so I limited my self-assessment to being capable of work with beginners.

          Breaking down my current assessment of beginner, intermediate, and advanced in fencing is pretty simple. Beginners learn to move, they learn basic footwork, they learn the essential concepts and rules of the sport, and they learn simple fundamentals that give them a few basic actions. They have enough to move around and try the sport and fence some bouts.

          Intermediate training is a much bigger range and can have intermediate-beginner, intermediate, and advanced intermediate as subheadings if that's helpful to you.  Intermediate students start learning how to more or less correctly execute and use those fundamentals. They learn some contextual ideas that form basic tactics. They learn a wider range of techniques and that wider range of techniques is what lets you break down those subheadings. Eventually, your wider range of techniques starts to become more about details and variations and more tactical elements of application.

          An advanced student has learned essentially all the techniques. So lessons for an advanced student will often just be very demanding very detailed execution of fundamentals. Advanced students perfect the things they will rely on. They work on determining what techniques to lean into and begin to specialize those and learn to create opportunities to make those specializations more useful. They deepen their tactical and ideological understanding and how to apply that understanding. They might work on filling specific gaps or wholes, but usually with new ways of applying or correcting existing knowledge. Advanced isn't about new techniques or secret moves, it's about going deeper and becoming more perfect with what you already know.

          Magic can be the same in a lot of ways, but it also has some differences in how we might look at concepts of beginner, intermediate and advanced.

          The A.'.A.'. curriculum, and those curricula which led to it and which stem from it are based on this kind of structure. The magician initially learns some basic rituals and meditations, and a lot of basic ideas as a beginner. The intermediate magician puts those techniques and ideas together and contextualizes them in more involved systems of techniques that involve more powerful and effective approaches. The advanced student has learned all the techniques of the system and pulls it all together into a complete understanding of the system and the magical universe which contextualizes it. They express this understanding and let that lead them to a space in which they more deeply engage that magical universe as a context for understanding their work and their existence.

          We don't have to look at the A.'.A.'. or other ceremonial magic systems for that approach to make sense. A beginner in witchcraft or sorcery learns some basic ideas and basic skills. Frequently they learn a few spells or rituals to try out. They get enough of a sense of things to try it out, see that it works, and realize that they want to explore more. They might not even really know what direction they want to take that exploration.

          The intermediate beginner starts exploring different systems and experimenting with them. They try different techniques and ideas and experiment with what suits them. An actual intermediate student might pick a system or two to really study and explore and experiment with and start really diving into or identifying with it. An advanced intermediate student gains real traction and success with that system, and maybe has some fair understanding of a few other systems.

          An advanced student might dive in deep with specific aspects of a system they're working with. They might explore more deeply the development of ideas and practices and what that reveals about how we engage and use them, what they mean, and how to expand them or get more out of work with them. They might be proficient in a few disciplines and begin looking at how those disciplines inform an understanding of each other and how one can innovate and develop better approaches without compromising, harming or misappropriating the systems they're being drawn from. They gain a level of mastery over their system which lets them explore, compare, innovate and create ways in which to engage, use, and teach their system of working.

          When we approach concepts of beginner, intermediate and advanced this way, it remains that there are materials and teachings out there which are good for beginners and good for intermediate students of all levels. Spirits can teach at all of those levels, but so can books and teachers. Throughout the course of beginner through the range of intermediacies there are new techniques, knowledge, interpretations and approaches to learn. As we move into being legitimately advanced, there are still materials which will help, but I would argue that the materials might not be advanced so much as our relationship to how we explore and use them. I suppose some materials might be legitimately advanced on their own though, but would be more inclined to assume certain experiences, lessons from spirits, and maybe lessons from embodied teachers would approach the space of advanced material.

          We can all recognize the types of books that are beginner books. Intermediate beginner books might still kind of look and feel like beginner books to people with more experience. They still go deeper in their knowledge. They present more complex ideas or methods or a more thorough explanation. They might give a firmer basis on which to build ideas and practices. As we get to more legitimately intermediate work then we might start to see more specialization on particular aspects of traditions. There might be more particular information that gets missed elsewhere, more attention to correcting errors and assumptions, or techniques that have more impact or require more experience or attention to explore.

          As we move to advanced intermediate and advanced material we start to move outside of texts that are written for magicians. Academic books, history, anthropology, philosophy, botany, biology, medicine, and more might be things that inform a deeper exploration of more refined technique and refined thinking about the systems and approaches we're using. Some of these sorts of materials might also be useful for an intermediate student. There might also be some practical texts that are useful at these stages because of how specialized they are, or because of how much depth of experience the author communicates within the particular fine tuned area of the subject or system.

          Where particular materials fit in isn't necessarily a hard and fast delineated thing because there aren't set curricula and the way we engage these systems and this information will vary from person to person as well. We might also find books that seem really specialized but are still kind of intermediate-beginner because the author's depth of knowledge or skill just doesn't let it go beyond that point. Thinking about materials from this kind of perspective can also help us evaluate materials. Does something seem like it should be focused and taking a deeper approach and should therefore be more of an intermediate or advanced intermediate work, but the material it provides is still basic stuff you'd find in beginner books, riddled with errors, or just ungrounded speculations? Is it just material that isn't useful because it's the author expressing an aesthetic or an enjoyment of the feelings that something provides rather than practical lived experience with ideas or methods which can have practical impact? Then maybe those books really are beginner books even if they seem more specialized, or maybe they're just not good. Looking at where work fits can help us evaluate it.

          Because there are so many different approaches to magic this model of how we engage information isn't the only way to consider when classifying something as beginner, intermediate, or advanced. One system might be viewed as more advanced than another. Sometimes that is warranted and sometimes it is a misapprehension. Since I came up through the A.'.A.'. system I had an impression that Abramelin and grimoire work were more intermediate or advanced material that needed to be approached once you did the grade work. Now I realize there are more spirit driven approaches which could place this work much earlier in someone's magical development. Some people might say devotional work with spirits is for beginners, where conjuration is more intermediate and things like trance possession are more advanced, whereas other people might have different views because of how their systems approach those things. Differences in point of view and in systems of training can make these classifications harder.

          We might also need to consider the aptitude of the student. Some people are well suited to the most basic and mild systems of magic. Everything they ever explore and encounter might seem like beginner material to other people. This doesn't mean that there isn't some gradation for them as far as the material is concerned. Some of this gradation is a false structuring. For example, it has become popular in the eclectic Wicca community to treat working with deities as an advanced idea that beginners should avoid and should be cautious in approaching. There isn't a good reason for this if you have good material explaining that kind of work. It should probably be one of the first things being explored. It's viewed as advanced because people are told it is, not because they need to work to understand it. In that context, learning a system of divination might be more intermediate because the student needs to expand their grasp of beginner material to understand how divination works, and then they need to learn all the features of the divination system. The need to explore and increase understanding and assimilate a broader range of material might make that a more intermediate study for some people. Many of us might dismiss that as still being a beginner element of work. Maybe for those people who approach it as intermediate, things will click, they'll expand further and their frame of reference will change. It might still be good for us to be patient with other levels of ability and understanding and recognize that there are many framings for these hierarchies of complexity, or more appropriately phases of development.

          All in all, I think modeling beginner, intermediate, and advanced with the type of nuance referenced above where works might fall into different categories dependent on how they're approached or what purpose they're serving is going to give us the most mileage. Acknowledging that particular systems, tasks, or techniques might be contextualized as beginner, intermediate or advanced depending on the student is important too. There is also simple space for saying something like _Wicca: A Guide for a Solitary Practitioner_ is a beginner book, but maybe _Obeah: A Sorcerous Ossuary_ is an intermediate book (although a beginner book for that particular system), and the entire Brill catalogue could be taken as advanced books. Ultimately, the answer isn't that there is no intermediate or advanced material because no one writes it. The answer isn't that all material is really beginner material - some material would be ridiculous for a beginner, some material could be used by a beginner but applied more reasonably by an advanced or intermediate practitioner. The answer isn't, books are for beginners and spirits will teach intermediate and advanced material. The answer comes down to framing those terms and understanding what they mean. From there we can understand what to look for as we move ourselves, or help move others through those phases of development.

          As authors and teachers we can think about what it looks like when we create beginner material, intermediate, or advanced material. If we have a clear framing we can get closer to effectively building those materials. If we just say "this subject is more intermediate" then, we'll have people who find the subject to still be a beginner subject and others who think its advanced. If we can say "how do I handle this material and who is my audience and what should they get out of it? how should they be able to approach it? who will be able to approach it?" Armed with questions like that we can approach building material that more effectively addresses those developmental phases.

 

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