Enochian Magick and the Left Hand Path

In my own study of Enochian Magick as I re-read the transcriptions of the magical seances
conducted by John Dee and Sir Edward Kelley (which has been an on-going process for over 30 years
now), I have come to gradually change my focus. To be specific, I have found myself becoming
increasingly interested in the implied messages of the sloane ms XLVI, 3188, better known as the True
and Faithful Relation, in particular, and Sloane 3189 or the transcribed version of The Libri Quinti
Mysteriorum (as these form the bulk of the magical diaries that have for the most part informed and
shaped the system of Enochian Magick as it has become widely known today). My reasoning is
manifold for this approach. For one thing, there is no shortage of studies focusing solely on the
substantive content of the Enochian Calls, the construction of the magical table, etc., etc.. And while
these areas of research have been anything but exhausted (The book of Soyga for instance containing
49 tables of grids 49 X 49 that have yet to be adequately explained) I believe that part of the role of the
magician is to be a good detective and to focus on the less-than-obvious components surrounding the
reception of the Enochian system as it stands extant thus far. In short, the Enochian system of Angelic
Magick, for anyone not familiar with it, was received by Dr. John Dee and his seer Sir Edward Kelly in
the late 16th century. The fundamental rituals of the Golden Dawn in large part have derived from this
system. In fact, the Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram, itself is an offshoot of this brand of
magick (the invocation of the 4 archangels in particular). Its influence on traditional western magick
has been ubiquitous. However, for the most part Dee and Kelley's system by default has been
associated with solar or white light magick, and erroneously dissociated from the Left Hand Path.
However, there is a darker dimension nested within this system. In fact, the surrounding details, tone,
breadth, minutiae, and accompanying notes to the Enochian calls are as significant as the English
version of the magical incantations themselves in navigating and fleshing out the darker polarity
contained therein.
Let us turn to the True and Faithful Relation Diaries, or Sloan MS XLVI from the

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British Library / Museum as these contain the account of the 48 Enochian Calls to
Creation which are central to this magical system
There is, in fact, one passage in particular of the True and Faithful Relation I continue to return
to because it is so laden with significant implications, It is, in my opinion, not merely addressed to Dee
and Kelley but to anyone contemplating Enochian Magick or magick in general, (to be honest I've just
found it plain difficult to exhaust its multiplex meanings yet).
There are two kind of visions, the one by infusion of
will and descending, the other by infusion of permission
and ascending. The first is the image of the Will of God
descending into the body, and adjoyned to the soul of
man, whose nature is to distinguish things of his own
likenesse, but shut up in prison in the body, wanteth that
power; and therefore being illuminated by spiritual
presence, inwardly, seeth now in part, as he shall
hereafter do in the whole.
But not, that every vision is according to the soul of man
in power: and so is received of him that seeth. The bo[d]y
of man feeleth nothing spiritual until he be of incorruption:
Therefore useth no sense in and illumination. The other is
to be found out by his contrary (T&FR 88). The Archangel
Gabriel to Dee and Kelley on April 14th, 1584. right after
the reception of the English version of the First Enochian
Call to Spirit (432nd anniversary quickly approaching,).
Rather than merely offer an interpretation of this passage I will first expand
on my method and rationale. Contemporaneous to Dee and Kelley was the
philosopher and magician Giordano Bruno, and it his thought that I have found
best suited to analyzing the content of this passage.
Giordano Bruno, most well known for his work on visually cued mnemonics Umbris Idearum,
(similar in certain respects to Spare's atavistic resurgence and notion of sigisl The Sigilus Sigilorum or

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The Figure of Figures, Bruno's unique syncretic approach to learning, magick, and science of the
Renaissance based on neoplatonism, hermeticism, and planetary magic, was well known in England in
the latter half of the 16th century. Now in 1583 he was one of the first from the continent to lecture on
Copernicanism at Oxford where he was met with disapproval. (Interestingly enough Dee was an
adamant geocentrist at this time). However, from 1583 to 1584 Bruno's work saw a flurry of activity as
a good number of his seminal works were published in London. Two of his pieces, were dedicated to
the scholar and poet Sir Philip Sidney who was in fact a student of John Dee's (he was his private tutor
for several years). Furthermore, Sir Philip Sidney and Albrecht Laski attended some of Bruno's
lectures at Oxford in 1583 (and Laski was a patron of Dee's and figured prominently in part Dee's True
and Faithful Relation: Dee and Kelley were actually guests at Laski's estate in Cracow when they
received the Enochian Calls just one year later in 1584. Bruno himself was in Prague where he wrote
his short but important work On Magic in 1588).
Bruno also traveled to Alnwick castle, the estate of Henry Percy, the IXth earl of Northumberland (or
the Wizard Earl, as he was known because of his vested interest in magic, alchemy, and astrology).
And although there is no record of Dee and Bruno ever having met there is a better than even chance
that their paths would have crossed at some point in their many travels. And at the very least they
would have most certainly had access to one another's writings.
Bruno himself was greatly influenced by the work of Nicholas of Cusa, and his Of Learned
Ignorance wherein Cusa established the philosophy of coinciding opposites. In short, Cusa felt that
for any truth that the opposite of that truth was itself part and parcel of it itself especially in matters of
divinity. Cusa believed that much of what one can come to know about God cannot not be expressed in
ordinary discourse. But by fusing the rational and the supra-rational one could acquire some inkling of
the god-head's true nature. This manner of thinking eventually filtered into a new approach to the
negative theology or the apophatic (literally saying against or unsaying)the use of descriptions of
how God defies description through antithetical discourses to arrive at a more accurate picture of God's
true nature (reminiscent of what is inferred by the ain soph, or veils of negative existence of the
Cabalists). In particular, it is Bruno's Cause, Principle, and Unity which entails a way of reading
magical and mystical discourse that provides an extremely useful tool for access to the angelic texts of
John Dee.
Bruno's philosophy is one of reciprocity and circularity. He was unique in

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that he did not believe in a division between the micro and macrocosm (to my
knowledge this had him in a stand-alone position during the Renaissance). There
was no room in Bruno's discourse for the notion that the world was composed of
separate essences. Form determines and defines matter and in turn matter
defines and determines form in his metaphysics. And speaking of the apophatic,
Bruno felt Contraries coincide both in principle in reality. He offers the example
of antivenin derived from snake's venom that can be used to heal the wound a
snake's bite produces, or a type of pharmakon. In a fairly enlightened maneuver
he even went so far as to insist that there was no division between the corporeal
and incorporeal bodies. For Bruno, all of these multiplicities come together in a
single indivisible being which is beyond any dimension or the continuous body.
This unified being is only seen as divided because of the vision or lack thereof in
man. With this brief overview in mind we are now ready to set Bruno's thought
loose on Dee and Kelly's angelic dialogues.
But not, that every vision is according to the soul of man in power: and so is
received of him that seeth. The bo[d]y of man feeleth nothing spiritual until he be
of incorruption: Therefore useth no sense in and illumination. The other is to be
found out by his contrary. This part of Gabriel's cryptic message now begins to
open up given the Brunoian perspective. On one hand Gabriel suggests a
paradox, namely that man will not achieve anything spiritual until he's free from
corruption, which is obviously impossible (so it's time to give up on these silly
proceedings John Dee, time to head home and get drunk). Well, not quite,
because we get the extremely telling and pregnant resolve at the close:
Therefore useth no sense in and illumination. The other is to be found out by his
contrary. There appears to be a coincidence of opposites here, implicitly as well
as explicitly. Do not use the senses, or common sense, sense period in
illumination, or in and with the light. The other, (whatever that may be, the
opposite, the dark,) is to be discovered by that which is contrary to illumination).
The embracing of the fallen condition as a means of attainment is replete in this
section. This passage potentially appears to come across as a calling to the sons
and daughters of Cain to gather awareness of their condition as a method of

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insight into the fallen state as potentially elevating. (When we come to the
example of the 9th Enochian Call, shortly this connotation will become more
evident).
The first half of this angelic discourse is equally revelatory in this expanded
context as well. Two types of vision being illuminated by spiritual presence,
inwardly, seeth now in part, as he shall hereafter do in the whole. Hereafter
could possibly be referring to the great hereafter, death, or the condition arrived
at after some illumination by spiritual means takes place. At that point the vision
becomes expanded. What was initially seen in part is then seen in the whole.
The whole then contains the spiritual and the physical, form and matter, but in
particular the light and the dark. So, in just this one passage a broadly
encompassing but sublime vision of left-hand path initiation begins to emerge.

The Enochian Calls and their Dark Side (Sigilic Interpretations)

Within this expanded context it may now be fruitful to look at the actual
content of one of the calls. As I have written extensively in Volume 1 of my work
The Sacred Alignments and Dark Side of Sigils, the English versions of the
Enochian calls are interesting tools in and of themselves. They are renditions but
not precisely what I would call translations of the Enochian because as Gabriel
suggested There are two kind of visions, the one by infusion of will and
descending, the other by infusion of permission and ascending. And it is the
latter that concerns the matter of translation. Dee and Kelley being heavily
influenced by their Protestantized christian approach to prayer and devotion the
permissibility of the version / vision of the calls is very much attuned to an
apocalyptic (as in the apocalypse of John, book of Revelations) interpretation of
the forces they were summoning and or summoned by. In this same vein I am
reminded of Edmund Husserl's view of the story within a novel. In his Phantasy,
Image Consciousness, and Memory lectures Husserl adroitly suggest that the
story that is within the story or the novel is not actually a story but a representation of one. This is a key observation regarding a specific mode of

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phenomenological interpretation. So with Dee and Kelley their English Rendition
or Re-presentation of the calls is one that is molded and or in-formed by a biblical
view of the magical processes. It is my contention that the initial 18 calls to
creation are invocations geared toward the destruction of the ego, in part. So in
one sense, they represent a means to embody or subject the self to an
apocalypse (an equivalent in the east would be aspiring to the state of Shiva
Darshana or obliteration of the ego resulting in the opening of the third eye, eye
of Shiva). From over 30 years of applied work with these calls I would contend
that the Enochian version of the calls act as a protracted mantra, much like the
bornless one ritual (Crowley's liber Samekh), and the Barbarous names of
evocation, the original hellenic headless one invocation as found in the Hans
Dieter Betz, Greek Magical Papyri in translation. However, the Enochian calls tend
to act as phasic installments of the process of attaining an egoless state as a
whole. [Many would contend that the Golden Dawn assignation of the 4 elements
and 14 sub elements correspond to the calls. Again I would contend that they
may, and they may not].
So let us now (going to the handout) turn to the infamous 9th call (air of
water), and see first-hand precisely what this Englished rendition of the call has to
say:

The Ninth Call

1

MICAOLZ BRANSG PURGEL1

A mighty

Fire of Air

guard

of fire,

NAPTA IALPOR DS

BRIN EFAFAFE

with two-edged swords flaming, which have

3
1

P VONPHO

OLANI

vials

OD OBZA SOBCA

Dee T&FR p. 127 L. Col. _P..gel, R. col. Purgel; Laycock 256 prgel.

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eight of wrath for two times and a half,
4

UPAAH CHIS
wings

5.

TATAN

OD

whose

TRANAN

are of wormwood, and of the marrow

BALYE

LUSDA SOBOLN2 OD CHIS

ALAR

of salt, have settled their feet in the west,

6.

HOLQ

NOQUODI CIAL UNAL

measured with their ministers

7.

ALDON

MOM

9996, These

CAOSGO TA

gather up the moss of the earth,

8

LIMLAL AMMA CHIIS

his treasure, cursed

9.

CHIS

as the rich

CNILA

BUTMONI PARM ZUMVI

DAZIZ

rain

ETHAMZ

seas

CHILDAO

OD

with diamonds,

and

OZOL CHIS3 PIDIAI COLLAL

upon their hands

13

they

are millstones, greater

CAOSGIN OD

MIRC

doth

OOANOAN CHIS AVINY DRILPI

of blood: their heads are covered

12.

man

SOBCA MADRID Z

than the earth, and from their mouths

11.

LAS OLLOR GNAY

are they whose iniquities

are. In their eyes

10

and were

ULCININ

are

marble sleeves

A SOBAM

UCIM

BAGLE

IAD

Happy is he on whom they frown not because the God

14.

BALTOH CHIRLAN
of Righteousness rejoiced

15.

2
3

for

OD IP

in them. Come away and not

OFAFAFE BAGLE A COCASB I CORS

your vials,

16.

PAR NIISO

the time

CA UNIG BLIOR
Dee T&FR p. Soboln; Laycock p. 256 sobol.
Dee T&FR p. 129 Chis; Laycock p. 256 chi..

is such

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as requires comfort.
We almost need to remind ourselves that this is one of the calls to creation. For,
as we can see it is redolent with violent, foreboding, and clearly destructive
connotations. Therefore, this is one of the calls I refer to as being part of the
creative destruction current. For instance, the final foreboding mention of vials in
the call brings to mind Revelation 16.1: And I heard a great voice out of the
temple saying to the seven angels, Go your ways, and pour out the vials of the
wrath of God upon the earth. The reference to wormwood is also loaded,
(Revelation 8;10: 11, 8: 1: 7, and so on) the wormwood star, the meteor
landing in the earth's waters thus contaminating them, embittering, poisoning,
etc.. So, one can get a general idea of purging, cleansing, winnowing and ridding
of impurities, (namely people), etc., via these references. Insofar as attempting to
interpret the contents of the English rendition of the call are concerned the 9 th call
is not something that lends itself to a straightforward explicative approach. In
fact, I would argue that taking such an inroad into the call as a magical tool (as
opposed to merely a historical artifact) is one that will prove frustrating and
meiotic or a diminished one in the end.
So subsequently what I am suggesting is that there is a sacred semantic
alignment between the English and the Enochian. Austin Spare's notion of In
Betweeness is key here in that the magical force of the calls lies in between
the aligned English & Enochian versions when the call is viewed as a whole.
Sigil and Enochian White on Black
With Austin Spare's approach in mind we will now shift gears and move into a more recent or
modern rendition of the system(Refer to handout) When we look at the Enochian version by itself in
Enochian characters alongside the sigil the complexion of the magical tool alters drastically. As
described in The Sacred Alignments and Dark Side of Sigils I essentially perceived specific sigils
corresponding to the 18 Calls to Creation. In essence my experience with this system helped to fill in
the missing gap: the Yantra. Following the eastern yogic paradigm most forms of modern magick are
synaesthetic following the formula of Mantra Yantra Tantra. Mantra being the audible portion of the
rite, in this case the actual Enochian Call. 2Nd, and this is of particular interest to devotees of the left

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hand path is the yantra, or in this case, their western counterpart: sigils. And third Tantra essentially
broadly referring to the overall weave or method of drawing down or earthing of the invoked energy
whether it be through hatha: discipline, raja devotional or through prayer, or sex magic, etc.. Tantra is a
much abused and often poorly understood term with ancient roots from Tan, to bend or stretch, tanu or
body, hence tantra the altering or manipulating of the warp of realty. Therefore, I would contend that
there is no magick or yoga that is not tantric given that basic context (and I would also contend that
there is not such thing as magick that is not Left Hand in nature). So by becoming aware of the sigilic
component of the Enochian Calls I was thus able to bridge the gap between the visual and the
subconscious or supraconsciousness, etc., within the Enochian Framework. After all this is what sigils
provide, the conduit to the shadow or latent realms of awareness.
So, now that you've looked at the Sigil and the Enochian Call in Enochian think for a minute.
Consider, when you looked at the English and Transliterated Enochian version of the 9th call how did
you read it as compared to how you read this version now. (How many people know Enochian?) Ok,
so essentially you're looking at a magical language that you are not readily able to translate. What's
your read on it. Rather than a synthetic approach of reading, ie decoding and interpreting words, when
faced with a visual representation--reactions, feelings, a vibe, etc.. We are left our feelings and
intuitions-- our reaction to the image to read. Then now I would suggest to you to recall your reading
of the first Enochian / English and then combine that with the reading of Sigil / Enochian tablet. This
is something that is worth taking time with, engaging in meditation upon because what I am suggesting
may prove of value is investigation and realization of a nexus or rather nexuses of consciousness (not
necessarily to be quantified) with multiple strata of in-betweeness evident. Where these various
reading techniques, actions, reactions coincide and converge, this is a potential point of expansion,
experience, theophany.
[Action of reading vs. reaction. We all have a way of aligning ourselves with such magical
eidolon.]

Q&A and Observations

Clearly there are limitless ways to work with such tools. 1. Feel and sensation (hot , cold, light, heavy,
magnetic, repellant, etc..) Foreground as opposed to background. The black background space as a

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focal point for a different perspective and reaction. Methods of trance induction. Use of the mind's
eye, internal vision of reaction, etc.. There is an array of alignments and patterns one situates oneself
within. This often determines ones reaction to a given form of magical art. Some work well with the
visual silently, others go for the full synaesthetic experience. There is no better method other than the
one that appeals to oneself. However, the apperceptual act of getting a handle on the read, how you see
yourself interpreting and reading such artifacts can be revealings well whether one possesses an affinity
for it or not. Also, we should bear in mind the notion of the divine signature, or signatura rerum
(Boehme). As part of this philosophy it was held that words are not arbitrary but that they an endowed
with the essence of the things they signify through sympathetic vibration. Al kindi: All things contain
rays given off by all things. Again I am suggesting that there are alignments that occur between the
cognitive process of reading, the somatic field of sensation, and the extra-sensory means of
experiencing the callsall are part of the sphere or continuum of the magical space evoked by this
brand of magick.
Reverse Sigil Logic
So why use sigils to explore the Enochian Calls to Creation ( Why not just do the calls and
experience them. I would mainting that Sigils in the case of the Enochian calls operate on various
strata. Following Giordano Bruno's circular logic ( of the continuous body, that which contains all
form but has no dimension ) we can perhaps see it more clearly. Sigils are tools that activate the optic
nerve, the phantasy, visual cortex, brain, subconscious. Essentially I found a way to reverse the
process. Instead of starting off with a desire and then devising a sigil to manifest or materialize the said
desire (as per Austin Spare's formulary) I allowed, through meditation, lucid dreaming in sushupti delta
wave or deep sleep, etc., for the sigil that was already in place, latent and manifest to come to fore of
consciousness. (this is easy enough to achieve through various practices). I became aware of the sigils
with no desire to manifest anything, but merely to experience currents, energies, etc., as manifest by the
calls. Then with the sigil in place I found it could be used as a tool to explore the magical realm of the
specific Enochian call or air, a conduit to conscious awareness. The reason? Because the English
version, as I mentioned is a result of the 2nd type of vision by ascent and permission, and I was
allowing for infusion of will and descending. Intoning the call energizes the sigil and the energized
sigil in turn helps to inform the call via the visual cortex, subconscious or shadow realm of awareness,
etc.. [This is somewhat connected to why I did all the calls and their corresponding sigils in white on

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black creating a more striking image (impressae signatura) as in this capacity they can be utilized
simply by just gazing upon them. (Look at the 9th call, see hand-out)].
Left Hand Path magick should be a reflection of the fluid formlessness of the shadow realms of
consciousness it aims to forge bonds with therefore the need to not set specific hard and set parameters
for these practices I am suggesting is apparent. To reiterate: Bruno posited that form defines and
determines matter and vice versa. Consequently, within the left-hand path the concern is with the darkmatter of consciousness as it were, therefore the form of the method for making contact with this
antithetical realm should ideally be part and parcel or rather a reflection of its mechanics. The black
background is the ground, the UR field for left-hand-path practitioners Such mechanics are a result of
alignments, how we align and or find ourselves juxtaposed with the magick we focus on.
Juxtapositional magick, in fact, is a very unusual but powerful form of magick pioneered by Joel
Birocco. In essence he asserts that juxtapositional magick is not something you can go about
intentionally. It has to come to you or rather, one has to be open to it and it's myriad of possibilities.
The only reason I believe I'm qualified to even mention it is because I chanced upon the technique and
wrote about it for Edgar Kerval's Qliphothic Journal in a piece entitled, Sigil Inversion and
Quliphothic Gestalt. In this essay I was concerned with the fact that often what we perceive as the
background to a ritual or process is merely something we allow to be dictated to us by our waking
perception. So, in the case of Enochian Magick we have the Call which many would perceive as the
ground or basis of the rite. In so doing one determines the underpinning energy or logic behind the
ritual. But when we factor in the use of sigils, dreams, etc., then these elements may inform the ritual
too. And by focusing on any one given element such as those mentioned or other minutiae such as
heart rate, breathing, these factors can then become much more significant than a background factor but
by will and attention be brought to the foreground of the process. This is what left hand path magicians
do, bring the invisible, shadow elements, or simply the overlooked things and minutiae to the forefront
of attention and expand upon them in an act of magical resurgence. The atavisms as a result live again
to touch and move us for us.
With the paired sigil and Enochian flashing tablet, as it were, of the 9th call we have the verbal,
the non-verbal and the visual, as well as the verbal/visual. These tools can simply be gazed upon as
trance inducing tools (some people are non-verbal visually oriented). Or the sigil may be used 2 ways

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simultaneously. The sigils as I have perceived them, that accompany these calls may be used in the
modern context of imbedding them within the mind by means of visualization or sigilization as it is
most commonly referred to (ala Austin Spare) and projecting them outwards into the astral or void.
Combining the two (in the Brunoian sense of the continuous body where the macrososm and the
microcosm are seen as one and not separate or divided) allows for a complete circuit between the inner
being or depths of consciousness, and the external or world soul or anima mundifostering a type of
panpscyhism, or consciousness without boundaries. So what I am suggesting is with expanded
awareness more alignments will be perceived and ultimately activate new levels of consciousness and
so forth.
The method of combined sigil and Enochian Call is geared to foster and
generate this expansive sort of awareness. As left-hand path practitioners we are
keenly attuned to working with Yantra or sigil as a porthole to the vast potential of
the depths of consciousness, the subconscious, or rather the shadow-intellect of
the body as I like to conceptualize it (Bruno, for supernatural things cannot be
reasoned except in how they are reflected in natural things). And eventually the
process of reflection is seen for what it can be, reciprocal, expanding ad-infinitum.
Boundaries are then illusory as the intellect and higher consciousness align to
comandeer these various nexuses. Or as William Blake put it so well in his There
is No Natural Religion, Man's perceptions are not bounded by organs of
perception, he perceives more than sense (tho' ever so acute) can discover...He
who sees the infinite in all things sees God.

Robert Podgurski