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Internet Book of Shadows, (Various Authors), [1999], at sacred-texts.com
Notes on the role of the historical Egregore in modern Magic
by Fra.: U.D.
It is quite easy to poke fun at the historical claims of most
magical and mystical orders, especially when they purport to have
derived from "very ancient", possible even "Atlantean" or, to top it
all, "pre-Atlantean" brotherhoods for whose existence even the most
sympathetic historical scholar worth his name would be very hard
pressed to find any significant proof. Actually, it is rather a
cheap joke to cite, for example, AMORC`s claims that even good old
Socrates or Ramses II (of all people!) were "Rosicrucians". However,
the trouble only starts when adepts mistake these contentions for
_literal_ truths. "Literal", of course, derives from literacy and
the letters of the alphabet. And, as Marshall MacLuhan has justly in
his "Understanding Media" and perhaps even more so in "The Gutenberg
Galaxy", western civilization has a
very strong tendency towards _linear_ thinking, very probably due to
- at least in part - the linear or non-pictographic nature of our
alphabet. The very structure of this alphabet informs us at quite a
tender age to think in terms of linear logics such as cause and
effect, or, more interestingly in our context, PAST-PRESENT-FUTURE.
This is not at all a "natural necessity" as most people are wont to
think, for the ideographic or pictographic "alphabets" as used for
example in ancient Egypt or even modern China and Japan tend to bias
the correspondingly acculturalised mind towards what MacLuhan terms
"iconic thinking" - a perception of holistic factors rather than
the systematization into separate (preferably indivisible) single
units. Western thought has formulated this problem as the dichotomy
of the _analytic_ and the _synthetic_ approach. But it is perhaps no
coincidence that our contemporary culture tends to associate
"synthetic" with "artificial" , vide modern chemistry.
Now magical and mystical thinking is quite different; in fact it is
not half as interested in causality as is linear thought. Rather, it
strives to give us an overall, holistic view of processes within
our perceived space-time continuum; an overall view which includes
the psychology of the observer to a far stronger degree than even
modern physics seems to have achieved in spite of Heisenberg`s
uncertainty principle and Einstein`s earlier theory of relativity.
In other words, mythological thinking is not so much about literal
("alphabetic"?) truth but rather about the "feel" of things. For
example, a shaman may claim that the current rain is due to the rain
goddess weeping because of some sad event. He might predict that her
phase of mourning will be over in two days` time and that the deluge
will then end. A Western meteorologist might possibly come to
similar prognoses, but he will of course indignantly deny using any
of "this mystic stuff" in the process. His rain goddess takes the
form of barometric pressure, wind velocity and direction, air
humidity and the like - but who is to say which view is the "truer"
one, as long as abstract and mystic predictions prove to be
accurate? From an unbiased standpoint, the modern demons "barometric
pressure", "wind velocity" and factors of a similar like are just as
abstract and mythic as the shaman`s hypothetical rain goddess -
especially so for us laymen who religiously follow the daily
indoctrination via the TV weather forecasts and satellite photograph
divination: all we can do is _believe_ in what the expert tells us
is the truth. The non-shaman in a shamanic society shares a very
similar fate when he has to believe simply that the rain goddess
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wants to be comforted say, by a substantial donation of meat or
tobacco in the course of a fully fledged tribal ritual.
There _is_ an important difference however. If we accept the model
(strongly propagated by A.O. Spare, who was, of course, in his very
special manner, quite an orthodox Freudian) of magic primarily
taking place within the subconscious (Freud) or, less
ambiguous, the unconscious (Jung); and if we furthermore agree that
said unconscious is not only the source of personal magical energy
(mana, or, as I prefer to term it, _magis_) but tends to think and
act in symbols and images, we might come to the conclusion that our
shaman`s explanation may perhaps not be scientificly more
satisfying in Western terms, but it is surely more in accord with
the way our unconscious tends to perceive reality. In that sense it
is not only more "natural" but, one suspects, even downright
_healthier_ for psychic hygiene. It is, so to speak, more
"ecological and holistic" in terms of psychic structure.
As an aside I might mention that it is the better explanation for
practical magical reasons as well. For at least rain goddesses can
be cajoled into happiness by magical technique, ritual trance and
the like until they stop weeping, a task a meteorologist will hardly
be able to imitate. (Actually I have preferred the magic of rain
prevention to the more classical example of rain making because it
is far more relevant to our own geography and experience).
In recent years Rupert Sheldrake`s theory of morphogenetic fields has
raised quite a hue and cry, not only within the confines of the
scientific community but strangely enough among occultists too. I
find this latter reaction quite astonishing, because a lot of what
Mr. Sheldrake basically claims is nothing more than the old, not to
say ancient, tenet of philosophical idealism: namely that there is
what in both German and English is called "Zeitgeist", a form of
unique time-cum-thought quality, leading to surprisingly similar
albeit completely independent models of thought, technical
inventions, political truths and so on. One would rather expect the
people to be profoundly intrigued to be among materialist/positivist
biologists or physicist rather that occultists who have traded in
the Zeitgeist principle ever since occult thought proper as we
understand it arose in the Renaissance.
From a pragmatic point of view Mr. Sheldrake is behaving very much
like our meteorologist, replacing mythic explanations with
crypto-mythic "scientific" factors. Unfortunately, most scientific
scholars tend to fear a devaluation of scientific termini tecnici;
once they are mentioned in the wrong "context" (almost invariably
meaning: by "wrong" people) they are readily labelled as "non-" or
"pseudo-" scientific - which is, after all, precisely what happened
to poor Mr. Sheldrake amongst his peers in spite of all his academic
qualifications. This example goes to show how very much estranged
occultists can be from their own sources even when working with
them daily.
Reality too is always the reality of its description: we are marking
our pasts, presents and futures as we go along - and we are doing it
all the time, whether we are conscious of the fact or not, whether
we like it or not, we are constantly reinventing our personal and
collective space-time continuum.
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Space seems rather solid and unbudging; even magic can do very
little it seems to overcome its buttresses of solidity and apparent
inertia, occasional exceptions included. (May it be noted that I
include matter in this space paradigm, because solid matter is
usually defined by the very same factors as is space - namely width,
length and height.)
Time, on the other hand, is much more volatile and abstract, so much
so in fact that it is widely considered to be basically an illusion,
even among non-occultist laymen. And indeed in his famous novel
"1984" George Orwell has beautifully, albeit perhaps unwillingly,
illustrated that history is very little more than purely the
_description of history_. (Which is why it has to be rewritten so
often. It seems that mankind is not very happy with an "objective
past" and prefers to dabble in "correcting" it over and again. This
is quite an important point I shall refer to again later on.)
History is, after all, the defining of our past own roots and our
_present_ position within our linear space-time continuum in
relation to past and future. Very often, unfortunately, the
description and interpretation of history seem little more pathetic
endeavour to obtain at least a minimum of objectivity in a basically
chaotic universe. The expression "ordo ab chao" is more or less a
summary of Western thought and Weltanschauung, of the issues
straining and stressing the Western mind since ancient Greece. Chaos
is considered "evil", order on the other hand is "good" - then the
political philosophy, if you care to dignify it by this terms, of
"law and order", appeals to people`s deeply rooted fears of loss of
stability and calculability. ("Anarchy" is another widely
misunderstood case in point.) The ontological fact that everything
is transitory has never been particular well-received in Western
philosophy and theology.
Now before you get the impression that I am only trying to impose a
typical exercise in heavyhanded Teutonic style philosophical
rambling upon your overbusy reading mind, let me hasten to point out
that if past, present and future are, at least in principle, totally
subjective, we as magicians are locally perfectly free to do what we
like with them. For the magician is a) the supreme creator of his
own universe and b) the master of Illusion (ref. the Tarot card "The
Magician/Juggler"). This freedom of historical choice, however, is
seldom realized let alone actively applied by the average magician.
Maybe one of the reasons for this has to do with the somewhat
pathetic fact that most of us tend to live our lives in a more or
less manner, being mild eccentrics at best, distinctly avoiding
becoming too much over the top. There are a number of possible
explanations for this, ranging from "every magician is just another
guy/gal like me" to "prevention of insanity". As we deal all the
time with insanity - i.e. extremely unorthodox states of
consciousness by bourgeois standards, we magicians prefer some
stability in our everyday lives and makeups, but this is not really
our topic.
Rather than delve into social normality of the average magician I
should like to investigate the many bogus claims to antiquity as put
forward by a multiple of magical and mystical orders from this point
of view. Such orders range from Freemasonry, Rosicrucianism and
Theosophy to such venerable institutions as the O.T.O., the Golden
Dawn and many others. Their historical claims are usually quite
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stereotyped: the spectrum covered includes Atlantis, Lemuria, Mu,
Solomon, Moses, Dr. Faustus, St. Germain, the Gnostics, the Knight
Templar,the Cathars, the Illuminati, the Holy Grail myth,
prehistoric witchcraft, matriarchy, shamanism etc.
Now it is quite common for shamans, to cite one example, to claim
that in the good old days (usually, of course, dating back to a
non-calibrated, non-defined time immemorial) things used to be much,
much better. One of the more profane reasons for this contention may
be the fact that most of these shamans have already achieved quite a
venerable age in their trade; and don`t we all know the typical
attitude of old crones towards modernity ? It may not sound
particular spiritual or holy but maybe all we are seeing here is the
primitive`s parallel to the "Now when I was in Poona with Royal
Indian Army, young lad..." reported occasionally to be heard in some
of today`s pubs.
But there is more to it, I think. By calling up "bogus" ancestors
from Moses via Solomon to Dr. Faustus and St. Germain, the magician
not only reinvents his own history, he also is summoning up the
egregore of these "entities" (along with all their powers and
inhibitions of course) - or, to put into Mr. Sheldrake`s
terminology, their morphic fields. By violating all the
painstaking endeavors of the meticulous historian, by simply
ignoring a number of tedious and possibly contradictory facts and
questions (such as whether Moses and Solomon have ever _really_ been
sorcerers of some standing in their own time) the magician becomes
God in the fullest sense of the expression: not only does he choose
his relatives in spirit quite arbitrarily, he even claims the right
to do what not even the judaeo-christian god of the old testament is
ever described as doing, namely changing "objective past" at will.
This type of creative historicism appeals, so it seems, very
strongly to the unconscious mind, supplying it with a great deal of
ideological back-up information, thus reducing its
conscious-mind-imposed limits of "objectivity" to at least some
modicum of superficial probability. It is only when the occultist
mixes up the different planes of reference, when he purports to
speak of "objective linear truth", instead of mythic or
symbological, decidedly non-linear truth, that serious problems
arise.This should be avoided at all costs in order not to strain our
psychic set-up by contradictory evidence, which can easily result in
an unwilled-for neutralization of all magic powers.
But this, of course, is the same problem as with occult scientism.
"Rays" are quite a convincing hypothesis to base telepathic
experiments on, as long as you don`t try to overdefine said rays by
epitheta such as "electromagnetic" or the like. For if you do, you
become the victim of scientists`zealous inquisition boards. Or, as
Oscar Wilde might have put it, it is not truth which liberates man`s
mind but lying. (Which, again, is one of the reasons why Aleister
Crowley entitled his magnum opus "The Book of Lies" in the first
place...)
Let us then resort to _creative historicism_ whenever we find it
useful. Let us not have "historical objectivity" dictated to us by
the powers that be. Let us accept our fuzziness of expression which
is, after all, little more than a honest acknowledgement of the
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fact that symbols and images are always more than just a little
ambiguous, as our dreams well prove every night. As in divination,
it does not pay to become overprecise in magic: the more you try to
define a spell, the higher probability of failure. It is quite easy
to charge a working talisman quite generally "for wealth"; it is
quite another to charge it to "obtain the sum of $347.67 on March
13th at 4.06 p.m. in 93, Jermyn Street, 3rd floor" and still expect
success. While the latter may strangely enough succeed occasionally,
this is usually only the freak exception of the rule. However, by
systematically rewriting our past in fuzzy terms, possibly eventing
past lives and biographies for ourselves consciously or arbitrarily,
we are fulfilling the final demand of Granddaddy Lucifer`s "non
serviam". Let nobody impose his or her time and history parameters
on you!
And for practical exercise, allow your clock occasionally to be well
in advance of your contemporaries`; let it sometimes lay behind for
a few hours _and_ minutes (do not just change the hour hand as this
would make it easy to recalculate into demiurge`s "real" space-time
continuum, making you yet again its slave!) Do this to learn about
your former ill-advised humility towards the current time paradigm -
and about the illusory character of time and its measurement in
general. Rewrite your personal and family history daily, invent your
own kin and ancestors. "Problems with Mom and Dad? Pick a new
couple!" Experiment with retroactive spells, try to heal your
friend`s flu before he even contracted it. But do this in a playful
spirit lest your censor should whack you for your constant
violations of the rules of this game by again confusing the frames
of reference. Jump from one parallel universe to the next one, never
permit yourself to stand still and become enmeshed by Maya`s veil
(you are supposed to be the _Master_ of illusion, remember?). And
don`t panic: for nothing is true, everything is permitted.
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