Alchemical and Esoteric Tweets part 2 - older stuff, Angelology, Mysticism, Philosophy

Proclus -- collected tweets

Pico della Mirandola, whose dependence on Proclus was clearly shown by Michael Allen's studies http://bit.ly/fuNXMh

many of the facilities created by Proclus had a usefulness in describing the action, creative + mysteric, of the Christian God -Booth about

Eric Perl: Like Plotinus and Proclus, Dionysius explains that the very existence of all things depends on, or rather consists ... [1/2]

objective links between Proclus+Dionysius must be noted. But we must examine nature of relationship betw these two systems of thought-Boland

Proclus, as w/ Dionysius, may indicate general concept in which specific takes part. In a discussion on participation http://bit.ly/etYDhw

Pico does not mine Iamblichus+Proclus for theurgy terminology as Pseudo-Dionysius did, although he's looking for metaphysics of PD in I+Pr.

When Pico read Proclus' Platonic Theology he was reading the Neoplatonic version of the Summa Theologiae, but in a style closer to Dionysius

Proclus' magic is very important to study of Ficino's magic, but less important to study of Pico's magic. He went Proclus for Theology+angel

Pico discovers so much of interest in Neoplatonic discussion of angelic orders(Proclus,Syrianus+Iamblichus)because it was foundation for PD.

Pico misses many opportunities to cite Proclus+Iamblichus on magic from texts he knew well. He was trying to develop a different concept.

Proclus:For it is requisite that we should define what the nature is of their providential energy, since it is not, like that of the Gods...

Edelheit Heptaplus was an esoteric decoding of Genesis using an allegorical key inspired by Proclus, Dionysius, Cabala+other Jewish sources.

... and calls God: "the unifying Henad of all henads,"55 recalling the term of Proclus "Henad of the ... http://bit.ly/gNIJxJ

Pico's planned Poetic Theology would have developed his Christianized theory of allegorical reading inspired by reading method of Proclus+PD

Pico wasn't only Renaissance philosopher to develop resonance of Proclus + Dionysius. Cusa's "On God as not-Other" has Pr+PD students dialog

If one is to obtain participation in the divine light, the recurrent theme of Proclus' hymns,one has to fully realize the position one is in

And about every God there is an appropriate number of angels, heroes and daemons http://bit.ly/eZ9sjd Full View of Proclus Platonic Theology

"For what the monad is among gods, this a number is among angels" http://bit.ly/ifgcT7 Proclus, commentary on Plato's Timaeus

Proclus assigns to [the helping hand of the gods] a special function in the ascent of the human soul http://bit.ly/hKFEo3 in Proclus' Hymns

the gods who fathered the angels are in their turn the forefathers of the daemons http://bit.ly/hkE5o2 in Proclus'Hymns by R.M. Van Den Berg

Images vs. Symbols http://bit.ly/fWxlHA in Proclus' Hymns By R. M. Van Den Berg

The relation between the leader gods and theurgy http://bit.ly/fONvUq in Proclus' Hymns By R. M. Van Den Berg

Proclus and the Continuation of Theurgy in Neoplatonism http://bit.ly/f5tw5U in Proclus' Hymns By R. M. Van Den Berg

Mania and the unification of the human soul http://bit.ly/ihRZ33 in Proclus' Hymns By R. M. Van Den Berg

The Unification of the Soul http://bit.ly/faK1lT in Proclus' hymns: essays, translations, commentary By R. M. Van Den Berg

Proclus' Hymn to Athena:"Hear me, and save (for power is all thy own) A soul desirous to be thine alone." Thomas Taylor

http://bit.ly/fFSBMl

...divinities; possessing the former through the Apollonical monad,but its all-perfect subsistence through the number of the Muses. -Proclus

Jean Trouillard L'activite Onomastique Selon Proclus http://bit.ly/hX3izn in De Jamblique a Proclus

Trouillard, Proclus, Pico+Ficino http://bit.ly/hDTa1f

Majercik+once beyond/twice beyond in Proclus http://bit.ly/g9R9OH Damascius' Problems+Solutions Regarding First Principles Sara Ahbel-Rappe

Ruth Majercik on Theurgy in Proclus, Iamblichus + The Chaldaean Oracles http://bit.ly/eITVCd

Pico similarly selected from a large amount of Proclus only the metaphysical, never the magical or polytheist material--55 conclusions plus

two recent great studies on Dionysian theurgy are on Dionysius+Proclus by Dylan Burns + on Dionysius+Iamblichus by Rebacca Coughlin

@masonictraveler Absolutely. it's all there in the texts of Plato+Aristotle thru Plotinus+Proclus. We have all we need to do the real thing.

Pico saw Iamblichus, Proclus, Syrianus, as well as Kabbalah + other ancient eastern "theologies", as readable Dionysian mystical theology.

articles on Giordano Bruno http://bit.ly/dJeH0B Alchemy http://bit.ly/ePRAr3 Western Esotericism + Renaissance Magic http://bit.ly/eDrBR6

Robert Segal on Science+Myth, Tylor http://bit.ly/f274Hu Myth:a Short Intro http://bit.ly/iaYFix is Segal Reductionist? http://bit.ly/gOPBUk

Robert Segal, Reductionism in the Study of Religion http://bit.ly/hGss7e

Must Professors of Religion be Religious? Comments on Eliade+Segal http://bit.ly/gJepEN in Religion and Reductionism by Idinopulos, Yonan

Bronislaw Malinowski, Myth in Primitive Psychology http://bit.ly/gir89T

Robert Segal on The Myth+Ritual Theory http://bit.ly/ibIJlY Jung on Mythology http://bit.ly/gd4Fcr Myth and Religion http://bit.ly/foHnZi

Robert Segal, The Poimandres as Myth: Scholarly Theory and Gnostic Meaning http://bit.ly/eFXeUE

Dan on Christian Kabbalists: "They did not seek experience of God, but rather knowledge of his secrets in esoteric methodologies."

Joseph Dan on Christian Kabbalah as magical not mystical http://bit.ly/fb6qXi in The Heart and the Fountain, an anthology of J.Myst.Exp.

Dan:In Christian kabbalah,the balance between magic+mysticism was completely changed.Christian kabbalists can hardly be described as mystics

Moshe Idel:Jewish Magic from early Renaissance period to Hasidism http://bit.ly/dWAdP3 in Religion,Science+Magic: In Concert and in Conflict

Idel: By Jewish magic I mean a system of practices and beliefs that presupposes possibility to achieve material gains http://bit.ly/fbL7Jh

Moshe Idel: Does magic preclude an intense mystical life, or vice versa? http://bit.ly/ecswLm Hasidism Between Ecstasy and Magic

The Potency of the Name http://bit.ly/fLjusU in Jewish magic and superstition: a study in folk religion By Joshua Trachtenberg, Moshe Idel

Reuchlin cites Pico on magical power in sounds http://bit.ly/eGIj05

Reuchlin: So when the masters of Kabbalah could not derive meaning from the name of any angel, they used the whole of a name of God...

The earliest mention of the angel Raziel is found in Chanoch. deals w/ attributes + holy names of God+angels http://bit.ly/fYaVKR

influence of Rosenzweig on Scholem's concept of magical potential of language http://bit.ly/eUNYgq

Joseph Dan on Reuchlin + "magical possibilities inherent in angelic names" http://bit.ly/i7UuQU

Cabala of Athanasius Kircher -- God names and Angel names http://bit.ly/hBzXQo

The Angel Metatron in Moshe Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives http://bit.ly/gQZyq7

Zohar (Kedoshim 16:108) "there is not even a blade of grass in the ground that does not have a supernal force upon it in the upper world.”


Alchemy By Eric John Holmyard http://bit.ly/hOXUbY Transmission of Alchemy from Islam to Western Europe

Ramon Lull's Theory of the Continuous and Discrete http://bit.ly/gtZU3L in Late medieval and early modern corpuscular matter theories

Is Magic false science or meaningful performance? http://bit.ly/fJEZ0t in Magic, science, religion+scope of rationality, Stanley J Tambiah

Richard Kiekhefer, The Specific Rationalisty of Medieval Magic http://bit.ly/dWXWDI Levack, New Perspectives on Witchcraft,Magic+Demonology

Bruno+Atomism http://bit.ly/gSsVOU http://bit.ly/gOiJvX http://bit.ly/fyj26b http://bit.ly/hptR6I http://bit.ly/e1nucK

Ramon Lull Chapter http://bit.ly/h9xLEE in Blum, Philosophers of the Renaissance

Medieval Religious Rationalities: A Weberian Analysis By David d'Avray http://bit.ly/gdft4P

Paolo Rossi, Hermeticism, Rationality, and the Scientific Revolution http://bit.ly/gDjQ1W

Astrology, Magic and Optics: Facet's of John Dee's Early Natural Philosophy http://bit.ly/dUCnxF

Paola Zambelli, Magic and Radical Reformation in Agrippa http://bit.ly/hDjPL6 in Brian Levack, Renaissance Magic

Moshe Idel: Needless to say, Kabbalists were aware of erotic magic, and sometimes they were critical of it. http://bit.ly/hUVeje

certain forms of Jewish magic were markedly anti-Aristotelian or even anti-Christian http://bit.ly/g22MbV

Thomas Aquinas on Sorcery and the Nature of Evil http://bit.ly/hbztTa

Kieckhefer: We cannot start with the assumption that magic is irrational. We must ask... why it fit w/rational view http://bit.ly/fAcvd3

Peter Schafer, Scholem, Merkavah Mysticism+Magic http://bit.ly/f5nQGH

Joseph Dan, Gershom Scholem: Between History and Historiosophy http://bit.ly/fAQzsG

Idel: the return to Scholem's acceptance of Abulafia's distinction in 1941, is not productive+sufficient in 1991 http://bit.ly/emBUZJ

review of Steven Wasserstrom, Religion After Religion: Gershom Scholem, Mircea Eliade, and Henry Corbin at Eranos http://bit.ly/e9QpY6

Christopher Celenza reviews Noel L. Brann, Trithemius+Magical Theology http://bit.ly/icviuy

Claire Fanger reviews Western Esotericism and the Science of Religion. Edited by Antoine Faivre & Wouter J. Hanegraaff. http://bit.ly/i30PcX

Stanley Krippner Hypnosis http://bit.ly/fXvsc3 Shamanism http://bit.ly/hmERbd 'Self-Organization in the Dreaming Brain' http://su.pr/6B0Muk

Mirandola’s Cabalism and the Languages of Science http://bit.ly/hTaKzs

Brian Copenhaver Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy article on Pico della Mirandola http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/pico-della-mirandola/

# trippy animation of Llullian wheels http://warburg.sas.ac.uk/mnemosyne/Bruno/yates.html

Christopher Lehrich on Frances Yates's notion of "man the operator" http://bit.ly/hlkAXh

Frances Yates and The Scientific Revolution. http://leninology.blogspot.com/2004/03/frances-yates-and-scientific.html

Frances A. Yates resources on the Web http://www.robotwisdom.com/jorn/yates.html

review: Bacon's Magic by Frances Yates http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/1968/feb/29/bacons-magic/

recent Pico tweet http://t3dy.livejournal.com/1693484.html http://t3dy.livejournal.com/1692464.html

Call for Papers: Princeton Conference on Renaissance Magic ...; http://bit.ly/fKUhte

Pico's Cabalistic Conclusions http://www.cmrs.ucla.edu/brian/research/unfinished/unfinished_books/pico_cabala.pdf
Copenhaver on Pico's magic+theurgy http://bit.ly/gZcMtf http://bit.ly/eOVezs http://bit.ly/eI6Ioh or http://bit.ly/eeh41Z
Copenhaver: the Cabala that Pico knew was a theurgy as well as a theosophy http://bit.ly/gZcMtf
Copenhaver on Pico :magic is preliminary to higher+supernatural magic of theurgy+Cabala http://bit.ly/eOVezs
Mebane is an example of the kind of "theurgic" interpretation of Pico I'm criticizing http://bit.ly/ff1Lwi
Craven on Pico: Hints of theurgy are not warranted. http://bit.ly/eHCZvW
Copenhaver on Pico theorizing magic "without being guilty of theurgy" http://bit.ly/eeh41Z
Michael Allen "The Birth Day of Venus" Pico as Platonic Exegete in the Heptaplus and Commento http://bit.ly/eH0xpi

Lehrich: Reuchlin's Kabbalah not greatly at odds with Scholem's http://bit.ly/euelCa

Neoplatonists' mystical experiences? http://groups.yahoo.com/group/neoplatonism/message/2646 Greg Shaw answers

Moderatus on Number (part of a huge Pythagorean discussion on Neoplatonism elist) http://groups.yahoo.com/group/neoplatonism/message/3811

Bryn Mawr review of "Syrianus et la métaphysique de l'antiquité..." http://groups.yahoo.com/group/neoplatonism/message/3237

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/neoplatonism/message/3832 funny fake dialogue between time traveler+Neoplatonist philosopher by Michael Chase

Zeke Mazur responds to critics of his work on Plotinus+Gnosticism http://groups.yahoo.com/group/neoplatonism/message/3919

Irreducible Mind -- preview http://bit.ly/g3R7Ws Greg Shaw recommends http://yhoo.it/eMhm3A blog post on NDEs in it http://bit.ly/gMfNS8

davidbmetcalfe @cole_tucker this site covers Raymond Lull's techniques: http://lullianarts.net/

Aleister Crowley describes a practice of annihilating thoughts, then the source of thoughts: http://hermetic.com/crowley/libers/lib16.html

Video of rare appearance of Holy Mountain director Jodorowsky talking to Daniel Pinchbeck @ gathering in NYC: http://tinyurl.com/33fr7cg

buncha sacred geometry images + videos http://innergetic.org/2010/07/potential-geometry-in-quantum-physics-and-vision/

# Burns& Moore 2007 "The Hieroglyphic Monad of John Dee Theorems I-XVII: A Guide to the Outer Mysteries" http://www.jwmt.org/v2n13/sign.html

Olympic Spirits, the Cult of the Dark Goddess, and the Seal of Ameth http://www.jwmt.org/v2n13/book.html

Despite being named after Plato, the "platonic mindset" goes back http://ideafoundlings.blogspot.com/2010/01/context-of-gromovs-program.html

http://www.jwmt.org/v2n17/kupperman.html Tarot and Kabbalistic Sacred Geometry

Angel Magic issue of Journal of the Western Mystery Tradition http://www.jwmt.org/v2n18/intro.html

The Delian Problem and Transcendence in Theorem XX of John Dee’s Hieroglyphic Monad http://www.jwmt.org/v2n19/Delian.html

A Golden Storm: Attempting to Recreate the Context of John Dee and Edward Kelley's Angelic Material http://www.jwmt.org/v2n19/golden.html

http://unurthed.com/2009/06/21/brunos-mathesis/ 3 figures said most ‘fecund’, not only for geometry but all sciences+contemplating+operating

http://www.suite101.com/content/the-extraordinary-life-of-abraham-abulafia-a177750

Who is Ramon Llull? http://www.am.ub.es/~jmiralda/llull.html containing a lot of links to Ramon Llull

# Cratylus Medievalis: Ontology+Polysemy in Medieval Platonism http://bit.ly/fjyQ4N Poetry+philosophy in Middle Ages:festschrift->Peter

Dronke

Llull http://bit.ly/f8vvza The art of conversion: Christianity and Kabbalah in the thirteenth century By Harvey J. Hames

Arbor scientiæ venerabilis et cælitvs illuminati patris Ravmvndi Lvllii ... By Ramon Llull (Full View) http://bit.ly/g8g2g9

Raymond Lull, Magic Squares and the Talismanic Art http://bit.ly/hwl8mY in Magical Alphabets By Nigel Pennick

The Book of the Lover and Beloved http://bit.ly/gWazUl in Doctor illuminatus: a Ramón Llull reader By Ramón Llull, Anthony Bonner

The art and logic of Ramon Llull: a user's guide By Anthony Bonner http://bit.ly/h3aOgo

The Great Art basically formalizes techniques of contemplation... http://bit.ly/elTmRX Ramon Llull's new rhetoric by Mark David Johnston

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ramon_Llull_-_Ars_Magna_Fig_1-4.png

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Arbor_scientiae_%28Ramon_Llull%29_using_A_porphyrii_structure.png

Renaissance psychology of magic gives us insights into strategies for dealing with ASCs + religious problems contemporary occultists suffer.

Back to Esoteric Industrial question-to reformulate, which albums might make good background to writing about magic? how not too distracting

should we look at Renaissance Magic in Ficino+Bruno as being about theorizing+manipulating altered states of consciousness? Avoiding Saturn.

@SimonMagus is it safe to write about drugs? is it necessary? I study drugs in religion but not enough info on drugs in Renaissance Magic

since I'm not writing for an academic audience (thank "Bob") I find it fun to use tools from Renaissance Magic to make jokes+weird metaphors

Pico doesn't seem to have anticipated so much suspicion that he was dabbling in angel magic. Rules out possibility briefly, w/ distinctions.

Each of Pico's later texts refer back in some way to his project of angel comparison-he stops writing about magic but not this-its nonmagic?

Since there is so little magic to Pico's angel even in the 900 Theses, we must move past these problems of theurgy,KBL+magic to angelology

Pico's 900 Theses are full of interesting enigmas concerning Pico's angelology. A small handful of these concern Kabbalah+angels, few magic.

Theurgy gives a misleading impression of what Pico was looking for in Magic+Kabbalah. Theurgy doesn't have same religious meaning for him...

More interest in Kabbalah+magic correlations, theories of divine language, than angel magic--

Pico is not doing angel magic so he's not interested in Kabbalist angel magic.

Pico gives us no more than a hint of practical angel magic to come. practical metaphysics is mystic contemplation for experience+inspiration

If Pico has any theurgy it is only a hint. Perhaps some subtle magic of angels is part of his mysticism+magic of div.language. not Conjuring

Pico's Commento doesn't deal with problems of magic, but is an essential source for information about his angelology. Is it thus a nonmagic?

Pico's Commento hasn't been considered much for angel magic question, but contains much unique material on Angelic Mind-of magical interest?

Renaissance Magic has much to say about Memory so I try to learn as much relevant info as I can about Memory studies--Music especially prod.

I'm theorizing Renaissance Magic as Art as well as philosophy so I bring insights from video game theory, comedy, visionary traditions, food

@Kalieezchild @WuTangTulku I'm chiefly interested in Castaneda as an influence on Robert Anton Wilson's put-on method + magic/shamanism grok

@Kalieezchild Since I'm working on Renaissance Magic, I deal with app/src problem of transmission from Jewish KBL to xtian CBL to occult QBL

I'm thinking of theories of magic like R.A. Wilson's "method acting" "fake it til you make it" type analysis, not attacking CC

@Kalieezchild I'm interested in RAW's dedication of SC trilogy to CC:he joked it's a novel showing shamanic techniques+theorizes magic fraud

Pico's Kabbalah is remarkable for the ways it conveniently leaves out Kabbalis theurgy, not in the ways it implies magic.Sanitized Practical

Now my reading of Pico is that his position as head of "Christian Cabala" is complicated, his influence on Renaissance Magic ambiguous, dark

@Chonnymo I'm not saying I don't think CC can be an element in a contemporary esoteric syncretism. Magic is a synthesis of real+fake.

@Chonnymo I'm not saying I don't think Castaneda can be useful magic or psychology or existentialism. It's fun. I just don't think it Yaqui.

I'm an advocate of reconstruction of Renaissance Magic for aesthetic+practical as well as historical purposes, but don't suggest buying into

I'm interested in Pico's angelology because while it sketches the universe of later Christian Cabalist angel magic, it seems not to do magic

# David Metcalfe davidbmetcalfe RT @t3dy: Raymond Lull, Magic Squares and the Talismanic Art http://bit.ly/hwl8mY in Magical Alphabets By

Nigel Pennick

Pico was one of the most influential thinkers who wrote on "Magic+Kabbalah" but didn't practice magic himself-though he inspired in readers?

Renaissance Magic doesn't always refer to a figure's specific magical practice. Some of the theorists of magic probably didn't practice it.

Renaissance Magic can be seen as a natural outgrowth of certain tendencies in Christian Philosophy+Theology, especially Dionysian texts.

Structurally, the most important common element in Renaissance Magic is not some occult leaning, but simply being a Christian.

Renaissance Magic is not a stable category that describes a set of thinkers with a blanket stereotype.They all differed in use of magic idea


For the actual thinkers and writers who lived and produced Renaissance Magic texts, the meaning had nothing to do with where we are now.


We learn much from appreciating Renaissance Magic roots of certain elements of scientific/modern consciousness, but shouldn't skry teleology

Renaissance Magic psychology, art of memory, formal systems etc. are interesting not only as proto-systems to be adapted but in own context.

# soundhunter soundhunter @t3dy trying to figure out which tracks by Genesis P Orridge throbbing gristle/psychic tv to share w/ occult.magic

unless u already

know it

Pico's contributions to philosophy included discovery of Kabbalah, application of magic to theological problems, but there's much more to it

# I'm interested in the dialogue between gnosticisim and neoplatonism, and the notion of renaissance magic as gnostic esoteric trad.

What is most interesting about Pico's angelology is not the possible implications or angel magic or hints of theurgy, but contribution to NP

Pico attempted to bring this ProclanDionysian style back into theology but it seems from what I've observed that he keeps NP magic out of it

The differences between the angelologies of Ficino and Pico are important and illuminating for the study of Renaissance Magic. A rivalry...

Unlike Ficino Pico is a harsh critic of magic, + emphasizes distance of man from angels, anagogy as work of Jesus rather than astral harvest

Proclus' magic is very important to study of Ficino's magic, but less important to study of Pico's magic. He went Proclus for Theology+angel

Perhaps Pico's magic goes beyond the theories of Albertus Magnus, Roger Bacon, + Thomas Aquinas, but his turn begins from those constraints.

I'm interested in interdisciplinary study of Renaissance Magic-which I'll need to follow my bliss-but now mostly looking through philosophy.

Pico misses many opportunities to cite Proclus+Iamblichus on magic from texts he knew well. He was trying to develop a different concept.

Pico didn't bring magic+kabbalah theses in order to establish himself as an expert in those disciplines, but as theology topics to dispute.

Pico doesn't think Philosophy can take you all the way, but relies on Dionysius' mystic solution+isn't trying to pioneer any radical magic.

@eglinski My argument is that we don't know enough about medieval + renaissance magic, but practitioners could help discover things about it

@eglinski I'm not saying modern Goetists don't have excellent texts. I'm just trying to explore the problem of doing a 17th century magic.

@eglinski that's a good way to put it. I'm interested in the apparent fact that so many practitioners appropriate but don't like Ren. Magic.

# Don Eglinski eglinski @t3dy Will pursue conversation later; sleep calls. I’m curious as to the pragmatism of Renaissance magic w/ today’s

individualistic

mindset.

@eglinski I'm not interested in following Dee into practice of doing Christian angel magic, but I think his formal systems otherwise useful.

@eglinski I think even the boring abstract philosophical Dee is very important, should be taken into magic account+appreciated aesthetically

@eglinski I think that all forms of medieval+renaissance magic, as well as modern interps, deserve study as formal systems/games/head media.

@eglinski I think all the modern interpretations of Enochian+Goetic magic are very interesting but rarely read somebody who illuminates Ren.

eglinski @t3dy Dee pioneered Enochian magic, opposed to QBLH. I like reading Enochian, but inclined to Goetia. @chinagrrrl plays with the

former. :)

# @eglinski re: "pragmatism of RM to individualistic mindset" one of my problems working w/ Pico is notion he's a radical individualist magus

@eglinski I'd like to better understand the distinction KBL vs. Enochian... Karen de Leon-Jones on Dee and Kabbalah http://bit.ly/gPLLwz

articles on Giordano Bruno http://bit.ly/dJeH0B Alchemy http://bit.ly/ePRAr3 Western Esotericism + Renaissance Magic http://bit.ly/eDrBR6

11:33

Does anybody have a question about Renaissance Magic, Pico della Mirandola, Philip K. Dick, Alchemy, Philosophy of Mind, Media Theory,Curry?

@devolveart Great Dee link thanks. Do you think contemporary use of pp gives info about phenomenology useful for study of Renaissance Magic?

@eglinski Thanks.I'm sure whoever stole it has only purest intentions,plans to do Frances Yates style white "safe magic" under Cabala angels

@devolveart I look at power pl.theories--especially post-William James 20thCent mystics like Crowley+Leary--for inspiration theorizing magic

@devolveart power plants are not a part of this Twitter project but I'm interested in learning about them as a religious studies+magic topic

Even if one were to consider Crowley all magic no mystic, he's still stealing ideas from mysticism to do this magic.

@mason_mem as for the people I RT, I like to imagine that some of them find notion amusing that somebody's stealing to reconstruct Dee magic

@devolveart I dunno I'm all for giving "gifts of power" + deconstructing shamanic cues but my project is academic study of Renaissance Magic

@wwjimd In my Renaissance Magic work I've got to do a ton of theory of science + history/archaeology of ideas, hoping to dig up useful intel

The John Dee theft is significant b/c it tantalizes w/ possibility that it wasn't about antiquarian interest alone. Who steals for magic?

Dr. Dee's crystal stolen. http://www.culture24.org.uk/science+&+nature/medicine/art25176 What dark angel magic will the culprits pull off?

When I say Pico didn't do angel magic+his contribution to angelology was philosophical, I'm not saying he didn't inspire later magicians...

@heidiko44 @davidbmetcalfe learn about what specifically? question which assumptions? many of mine on Ren.Magic have changed dramatically!

Welcome to all my new followers. Does anybody have any questions for an MA student working on Renaissance Magic and Alchemy? Fire away...

occultist interpretation inflates importance of problem of Pico's magic. Pico scholarship has moved on to consider his theology/cog.ascent

@plutopsyche I don't think any color should be considered the least magical. They all have associations we need to do a complete magic work.

# @plutopsyche While it's true that New Agers have made the "white light of the void" sound corny+passe, it still plays a role in legit

magic.

There is no magic to be found in Pico's Commento, Heptaplus, or De Ente, but we do find important further explanations of his angelology

@clerestories one of my long unfinished projects is a latin grammar study book based on examples from magic and alchemy. need one, so I make

@clerestories I think it's very important to look at exactly what they meant by art. Alchemists didn't think of their craft as "mere magic".

link collection and recent tweets - scholarship on Pico della Mirandola's magic, kabbalah, angel http://t3dy.livejournal.com/1693484.html

@cole_tucker it's also interesting (perhaps a crypto-theurgy point) that obviously unhistorical approaches to magic get results that compare

Perhaps Pseudo-Dionysian theurgy can help us understand Pico's Magic+Kabbalah in this way-like PD Pico sees magic/theurgy as divine activity

Whether or not there is a magical approach to angelic names in Kabbalah, Pico doesn't seem to import it. he theorizes magic of divine speech

Pico della Mirandola made some interesting discoveries comparing Kabbalah+Christian Theology but he did not import Kabbalist angel magic.

#FF Medieval Magic Scholars: Claire Fanger, Richard Kieckhefer, Frank Klaasen, Sophie Page, Benedek Lang, Valerie Flint, Owen Davies

#FF Renaissance Magic Scholars: Ioan Couliano, Wouter Hanegraaff, Christopher Lehrich, Stephen Clucas, Arthur Versluis, Joscelyn Godwin

@Jason_Scroggins I'm interested in Biosemiotics in a kinda remote way - general semiotics fan but not writing it,applied to theorizing magic

Giordano Bruno

Picture Logic in Hillary Gatti, Giordano Bruno and Renaissance Science http://bit.ly/hV5nJd

Bruno considered magical... the ability to translate the belief in the animate universe into ethically unifying action http://bit.ly/dGLdpD

Imerti--brief mention of scholars on Giordano Bruno's magic: Shumaker, Aquilecchia, Coudert, Clucas http://bit.ly/ghI8wM

Arielle Sabir, Giordano Bruno+ the Mathematics of Language: "Giordano Bruno gave magic a special mathematical feature" http://bit.ly/g1jytu

"the moral problem raised by magic in general seems to take on a new aspect here" -intro to Giordano Bruno magic essay http://bit.ly/e6SIhQ

Rather than solving individual problems, this magic looked for general principles to explain the workings of the world. http://bit.ly/g8oADo

Hillary Gatti on G.Bruno's "quest for a kind of magic which acts in harmony with the processes+metamorphoses of nature" http://bit.ly/dJReFY

Ioan Couliano: "the *invention* of a demon is equivalent to its coming to life" http://bit.ly/gYMB9r

Paola Zambelli: Hermeticism and Magic in Giordano Bruno. Some Interpretations... http://bit.ly/gm0T3y

magic's a means of control over the individual+themasses based on deep knowledge of personal+collective erotic impulses http://bit.ly/id4FDG

Henrik Bogdan: Western Esotericism and Rituals of Initiation http://bit.ly/id4FDG

"magic or occult philosophy was for Agrippa not a goal in itself, but something that should be used as an aid in the evangelical reform" -HB

"For Bruno the primary structure of magic was cosmology." -Karen Silvia de Leon-Jones, Giordano Bruno and the Kabbalah http://bit.ly/hfFGPI

The light-metaphysics of Patrizi+Bruno(/Proclus+Dionysius) has been considered a forerunner of Galileo's distinction... http://bit.ly/eiuiAn

Christopher Lehrich: Analog Signification http://bit.ly/dMm3lq "The Occult Mind" http://bit.ly/hMOCCx

Lull+Art of Memory http://bit.ly/gUFUhb http://bit.ly/dTBuot http://bit.ly/gyEYy4 http://bit.ly/hGR9PE http://bit.ly/hAu81d

FRANCES YATES AND THE MNEMONIC WORKS OF GIORDANO BRUNO http://bit.ly/clGp3q

Plotinus'essay on matter led Bruno to assume the immanent existence of Ideas in matter.These Ideas also exist in memory http://bit.ly/i3xUaR

Essays on Giordano Bruno By Hilary Gatti http://bit.ly/f836ip ... Giordano Bruno Philosopher/Heretic by Ingrid Rowland http://bit.ly/ibmy8m

Paolo Rossi "The Imaginative Logicof Giordano Bruno" http://bit.ly/h2vvlG in Logic and the art of memory:the quest for a universal language

Christopher Lehrich -- "Sign Sigil Text" in The Language of Demons and Angels: Cornelius Agrippa's Occult Philosophy http://bit.ly/hcaSVi

For one man, for Giordano Bruno, the rupture of the stellar vaults was a liberation. -Jorge Luis Borges http://bit.ly/goBJLz

T3dy:
@erik_davis What do you make of contemporary practitioners who see Iamblichus as giving a philosophical justification for their own theurgy?

t3dy
@erik_davis what exactly is your academic project? I used to think my Renaissance guys were a big influence on moderns. I do no longer.
t3dy
@erik_davis I like Lehrich's Agrippa but have trouble following the heady argument of Occult Mind. Met him at a conference, very encouraging

@erik_davis Greg Shaw's work is amazing. But even from reading Iamblichus directly
what I see is a beautiful mysticism, not much magic.

about 1 hour ago via web in reply to erik_davis
@erik_davis Iamblichus was anti-goetia in the De Mysteriis. It seems like contemporary magicians following him would have to buy gods/union.

@erik_davis I've been corresponding w/Jake Stratton-Kent about Iamblichus and contemporary Goetia. I just don't think the connection works.

@erik_davis I was also a big Derrida fan(until I read Searle--who Lehrich told me he thinks was beaten by Derrida)don't buy "languageprison"

@erik_davis We can always use more good religious studies on PKD. I'm working on a PKD+Religion blog project myself. What's your PKD focus?

@erik_davis I just don't think contemporary magic looks to Renaissance/Medieval very much. It has modern concerns now.

erik_davis
@t3dy I just started my PhD program. I am interested in magic and skepticism, relativism, counter-culture. I will probably do a diss on PKD.

erik_davis
@t3dy Hard to say on modern influence. Ficino still seems pretty important. Why do you think the Renaissance is less important?

erik_davis
@t3dy I was infected with mucho Derrida as a youth, so I can hang with Lehrich. I don't totally do the "linguistic turn," but I like D.

@t3dy One I know is working to trace contemporary practice from Iamblichus through GD. Not sure how we threads through the Renaissance.

erik_davis @t3dy Iamblichus, esp post-Greg Shaw, is increasingly important as a source of Neoplatonis theurgy for some contemporary mages.

erik_davis @t3dy Lehrich is impressive. I read about half The Occult Mind, thought he was spot on about Derrida and theory-as-magic. Read his

Agrippa?

erik_davis @t3dy That seems like a great goal re NP. I work more on modern stuff, but am definitely into the theurgic current. And I love

demons!

erik_davis @t3dy Love this exchange--so many points of launch off! Just discovered Clark's Thinking with Demons, a masterpiece.

t3dy
@erik_davis Pico+Origen rehab http://bit.ly/hTa2Jm http://bit.ly/eJv6ov http://bit.ly/e25ggJ http://bit.ly/hUugl1 http://bit.ly/i1T19X

t3dy
@erik_davis ever read Levi-Straussian Christopher Lehrich? Analog Signification http://bit.ly/dMm3lq "The Occult Mind" http://bit.ly/hMOCCx

t3dy
@erik_davis What I like best about Clark's TWD is an impressive theoretical justification for allowing the medieval mind to speak for itself

t3dy
@erik_davis Thanks! I've appreciated your responses. Clark blacks me out. My scholarly goal is to make boring Aquinas+NP stuff entertaining.

# erik_davis
@tedfriedman hmm. Sources: I dunno. Jungians no like phil. Not sure where the contemporary neo-Platonists are either. At the movies?

@erik_davis lots of contemporary Christian egghead mysticism students+scholars are neoplatonists. at least ones I've met in grad school

# erik_davis
@t3dy Good to know! I will keep my eyes out for contemporary Christian egghead mystics now that Im in grad school!

t3dy
@erik_davis I hang out with Dominicans in Berkeley, some have come around to the growing scholarly consensus on Thomas Aquinas' neoPlatonism


# erik_davis
@t3dy Aquinas seems like such an Aristotle man in his method and arguments. He kept his inner Platonist tucked behind thickets of scholia.

# erik_davis

I haven't read much Aquinas myself, impressed with the mind but put off by the style. In some ways, philosophy is all about style!

# erik_davis
Amazing reading the mutations of Aquinas in late witchcraft texts like the Malleus. Science=what is the nature of demons?

# erik_davis
Maybe its the Aristotle that sorta puts me off from a lot of post-Plotinus Neo-P. Rather read Origen, though I do love Iamblichus.

# erik_davis
Dionysius a slave to Aristototle? How odd: perhaps his own anxiety of influence.

T3dy
@erik_davis I don't deny that Aquinas'style is dense+dry but I think he's the greatest medieval Platonist in terms of mastering the material

@erik_davis Proclus is bad as Aquinas being logic-chopping ontotheology but his metaphysic is key to Renaissance neo-pythagorean arithmology

@erik_davis I think Aquinas is a key to Renaissance magic because Pico accepted his modification of Dionysius, whom all Christian magi loved

@erik_davis I got into Aquinas not b/c I like his method (although I'm growing fonder) but to understand RM:Pico, Ficino, Agrippa, Bruno+Dee

@erik_davis check out Fran O'Rourke's "Pseudo-Dionysius+Metaphysics of Aquinas" for a model of hermeneutic violence mitigating the esoteric

@erik_davis Agreed about Aquinas+Witchcraft"Science"Have you read Stuart Clark's Thinking with Demons? William R. Newman on Alchemy+Malleus?

@erik_davis Iamblichus is in many ways more attractive than Proclus for certain esoteric minds, Proclus is lovecraftian baroque systematics

@erik_davis Late Neoplatonism is a disobedient reading of Aristotle. Plotinus+Iamblichus inverted him and invented theology as we know it.


@erik_davis Rosemary Arthur's book on Pseudo-Dionysius as Polemicist reads him as an Origenist.

@erik_davis I agree that Aquinas was a great disciple of Aristotle, but I think his Neoplatonism has been overlooked, his ontology misread.

@erik_davis Proclus for example is just as scholastic as Aquinas, and he's the basis for so much of esoteric tradition. Ar.vs.Pl.is a canard

@erik_davis Neoplatonism is already very Aristotelian.Thomas thought Neoplatonism was "theology of Aristotle" so he's not so bad a Platonist

@erik_davis a platonist told me Aquinas flattens henology of Proclus he gets from Dionysius. But post-Plotinus is very Aristotelian

@erik_davis It's interesting how much violence Aquinas does to the platonism of Dionysius, whom he claims "everywhere follows Aristotle"

My favorite Renaissance Magic Proclan moment: John Dee's Euclid preface: powerful case for relevance of NP number theory to cognitive ascent

# @cole_tucker furthermore I think we can learn from Crowley mistakes+adjust our ethical considerations accordingly, know better what to

avoid

@cole_tucker fortunately one can read Crowley disobediently+use methods to construct compassionate/loving mysticism without allergy to other

@cole_tucker Crowley's claim to any attainment of Chesed-consciousness strikes me as laughable considering his utter lack of compassion

@cole_tucker the permissiveness of Chesed doesn't have to be about allowing vice, it can be opening to pleasurable but useful paths as well

@cole_tucker RAW tuned me into Crowleyan methods of designing experiments in Chesed--how to brainwash yrself into thinking yr magic-powered

@cole_tucker Chesed vs. Din is like Huxley's "mind as reducing valve" (was his mescaline vision influenced by his knowledge of Crowley's?)

@cole_tucker I've been thinking a bit about how RAWilson turned me onto this Chesed aspect of Crowley--it's all about opening mind to allow

@cole_tucker at first I missed your reply re: Chesed. That's very interesting and I don't remember reading it before, so doubly good. link?

Ironically Crowley's appropriation of the Kabbalah resembles nothing more than the already violent hermeneutics of the Christian Cabalists

The idea that Kabbalah is a mysticism of play with gematria was born in Pico's violent distranslation of Kabbalah. Crowley doubles the pain.

@cole_tucker OTO is a weird paradox, a system of individuals freeing themselves, but Crowley as Magus is in Control. Only met a few myself.

# Cole Tucker cole_tucker
@t3dy re:Crowley what about the structure of the OTO, attempting to remake society with a spiritual aristocracy

When Conjuring, Don't Bully Spirits: Jake Stratton-Kent vs. Crowley http://www.hadeanpress.com/a-conversation-with-jake-stratton-kent/

@cole_tucker whether or not Crowley is autotheist, his concept of aspiration is key--he's trying to improve something, but mostly himself

# Cole Tucker cole_tucker @t3dy Crowley claimed to fall into Chesed; vices - tyranny, bigotry, hypocrisy and gluttony

@cole_tucker Crowley said you shouldn't interfere with anothers'True Will,proceeded to dominate+betray all who loved him.Based on principle?

@cole_tucker But Crowley's behavior seems to betray his true intentions. Is he trying to free people or help them be Crowley subordinates?

@cole_tucker I said the other day Crowley's Higher Intelligence (/Univ.Will) seems to get him out of solipsistic problem "only about self"

@cole_tucker problem is that Crowley wasnt consistent as a non-black brother.I don't think Crowley was a good guy or true to his own ethics.

@cole_tucker I agree that these notions might save Crowley from autotheism. But can they be taken at face value? Good problem...

@cole_tucker on the other hand some atheists like Crowley's method, which can be seen as will-development, psychedelic, sexy to materialists

@cole_tucker what's interesting about Crowley is he's pro-science and simultaneously pro-weird theology. Chemistry trained but anti-material

@cole_tucker Crowley is certainly exploring alternative (radical/heretical) theologies--one can find several in his texts--+anti-materialism

@cole_tucker I agree. Crowley's still a mystic, although autotheistic. His rabid anti-xtianity's something in common with militant atheists

cole_tucker @t3dy i'm reading Moonchild right now, and don't see Crowley identifying as our common notion of an atheist

@cole_tucker Crowley synthesizes Christian Mysticism radical notions of becoming one with God, such as Eckhart's w/ Kabbalistic prophecy

Saturday, November 20, 2010 10:45:25 PM via web in reply to cole_tucker

@cole_tucker Crowley's magic might be seen as the logical consequence of a mysticism that takes "union with God" seriously--divinization

@cole_tucker Crowley said "thank God I'm an atheist" and sometimes seems to have a perverse piety, but comes off as an autotheist/solipsist

@cole_tucker I think it's a good line to take. Crowley embraced worst aspects of Frazer's "magic as opposite of religion" but inverted value

# Cole Tucker cole_tucker
@t3dy i'm fascinated by this reading of Crowley as attempting to place self ahead of God

@cole_tucker Crowley's a poor negative theology theorist: his veil concept strikes me as more useful for eclipse of self than eclipse of God

@cole_tucker any serious student of Crowley's Qabala must go beyond the old man's limited understanding of the material,correct his mistakes

@cole_tucker I don't think Crowley understood kabbalah/sefirotic metaphysics so it's hard to comment on the meaning of his Kethers/veils.

can anybody recommend (or opine) info about studies of William Burroughs' influence on Ballard, R.A.Wilson? Or influence of Crowley on WSB?

Josh Lind,“Vessels of Spiritual Transformation: C.G. Jung and Philip K. Dick.” reads Galactic Pot Healer http://bit.ly/asmIaa

@tedfriedman PKD is my absolute fav. Jungian. He gets into it in Letters+Exegesis. Jung+PKD was discussed recently here http://bit.ly/bzbD9I

@tedfriedman check out chapter 5 of Samuel Umland's book http://bit.ly/9Xzfw0 also Gabriel McKee http://bit.ly/bL4sKK + Sutin's PKD bio


Now Wait For Last Year is (like Scanner) an overlooked drama of Christian redemption. PKD uses far-out SF instead of deconstruction to probe

I love the way Game Players of Titan interrogates the games that are always already involved in making decisions about social arrangements.

Because Galactic Pot Healer is a deliberate effort at Jungian-style myth-craft I find it the best PKD novel for allegory of interior journey

PKD, RAW, WSB are great successes as American writers in part b/c
they can pull of Lovecraft-style cosmic horror, research as crazy-driving.

@DavidRozansky SF was liberating to PKD b/c it gave him metaphors to
explore his mystical+philosophical themes. redemption's a neglected key

t3dy: PKD+RAW share interest in strategies folks use for dealing w/
neuroses and psychopathology--also in each case tied up with
philosophy/occult

Dick studies characters who lose reality in order to illuminate
humanity which is based on kind response to vulnerability of loss

Terence McKenna took inspiration from PKD's fictional altered states:
"we must imagine what we can imagine"

While I admit that A Scanner Darkly is most faithful adaptation of
PKD to film so far, I think it misses theme of redemption, humor of book.

@rfamovie Kafka is good as PKD precursor but I would emphasize
Lovecraft (American horror tradition)+Borges(reality permutation)

PKD's exploration of ASCs is not Faustian quest to gain gnosis/power
but more xtian project to become compassionate:understand vulnerability

PKD inverts paranoia--outside world demonstrates crazy symptoms
according to rational tests that prove character isn't hallucinating

PKD "didn't know" that he was writing mystical allegory to trigger
deconditioning beam of pink light, illuminate paranoid cerebral heights

PKD stories use weird SF ideas to do mystical allegory in order to
trigger Altered States of Consciousness. Like Crowley, he claims unconsc.

PKD+Religion themes are conspicuously missing from PKD-based movies
(Exception--Waking Life!) instead he appears to be secular/cyberpunk-ist

PKD movies have been seen as cinematic style "failures" but this
might cause us to miss items of phildickian interest that do make it thru.

Like PKD stories, we can appreciate dys[/u]topian ideas/worlds in the
movies, although they may fail to fully capture or work as whole films

Like PKD's hastily-written and stylistically uneven writings, PKD
movies are often "bad" but not in a way that interferes with appreciation.

PKD movies are not always as polished as critics would like due not
to laziness but the difficulty in translating his ideas onto the screen.

PKD movies are generally narratively flawed but each successfully
portrays at least some aspects of the dystopian world projected by PKD.

I suggest that camp value of macho performances in Screamers,
Impostor, even Paycheck+Next has been underappreciated. Need to apply
PKDirony

Unlike Blade Runner, other PKD movies unlikely to get cult following,
will always lack same degree of cultural importance, but still worthy.

I agree w/ "Future Imperfect" author: PKD movies are under-rated +
more effective/interesting than critics have allowed. Still much to study

Many of the insights of Plotinian psychology which were important to
Dick are compatible with the esotericism of Jung which PKD also dug.

Looking at the influence of philosophy and theology on PKD's earlier
work, we must take into account influence of Plotinus,Christian Mystics

"PKD and Platonism" is a vital topic but it has been overshadowed by
"PKD and Gnosticism" -- his younger and deeper commitments are neoplat.

PKD flirted with heresy the way he flirted with dark-haired
girls--clumsily. His gnostic interests don't override his Plotinian
commitments.

Interesting to contrast PKD w/ Lovecraft--PKD's "agnostic" version of
cosmic horror sometimes allows for possibilities of gnosis, redemption

Is PKD bringing Plotinian ideas into the thought-experiments of his
novels? Seems to me he opts for down-to-earth love over mystical union.

Influence of Plotinus on PKD deserves study. Difficult to do because
he never finished a formal ontology or systematic theology, but we can.

PKD's hermeneutic imports SF methods-- "what if," mindfuck, reality
breakdown, narrative twists as dialectic, applies to mystical problems.

PKD as allegorist: Jung is a start, Christian neoplatonism,
gnosticism, perhaps alchemy, but also SF allegory--application of what if
to God

PKD+Religion:why PKD interests practicing occultists-gnosticism in
action, mystical allegory, ASC jokes, imagination exalted,trip reports...

PKD applies a homebrew mystical hermeneutics to his own novels,
giving us not only information about the content but a method of decoding.

PKD deserves study as a theologian, but his mystical project is of
interest beyond theorizing God--also as process/methdology and practices.

PKD's Galactic Pot-Healer contains Jungian allegory but due to
typical Dickian inversion/destabilization can't reduce it to that.

PKD: need to deal with reality of experiences as well as mystical
studies of PKD and presence of religious/gnostic ideas in stories/novels.

Fallout3 Android Quest deserves serious study as literary allusion to
PKD, probably first great success in adapting a PKD theme to hypertext

Fallout3 Quest succeeds as PKD allusion because it challenges player
to think thru android/human problem in order to decide quest outcome

Fallout3 Quest works as an interesting detective story/bounty hunt
like Blade Runner+PKD's Androids, forcing player to decide about finding.

PKD did serious theology. Drugs and Mental Illness don't change that.
Failing to build a system doesn't make his project less valuable.

What is jazz esotericism? David Gill suggested that PKD "jams" with
theological ideas. This is a great tool for thinking about syncretisms.

PKD version of HGA would be "you can heal stuff you are a healing
terminal" then proceed to grok and heal various programs in noetic space.

The time traveling hero in PKD's "Dr. Futurity" is an "anthropological" character who must reason about strange cultures and languages.

PKD's Bruno -- magical art of memory necessary to reflect universe in
mind of "operator." This helps PKD explain the mega-memory visions.

PKD knew Giordano Bruno through an encyclopedia article that relied
heavily on Frances Yates' version of the Art of Memory, which PKD used.

we should take PKD's paranoia into account but this should not cause
us to overlook the seriousness of his philosophical-theological thought

I wonder if anyone has applied Girard's mimetic theory to the study
of Religion in Philip K. Dick (both his beliefs and his writings) I will

PKD vs. C.S. Lewis could be treated as gnostic fictionalizer vs.
orthodox fictionalizer of religious belief and experience. also (post)colon

enjoying Solar Lottery by PKD, dig the fealty oath and telepathy
stuff, the game theory and the dialectic. Nice RST angle. Typical PKD forms

Solar Lottery shows PKD's early mastery of suspense progression and
psychedelic skill with psionic scenes, sets up his key themes+objects

PKD's esoteric allegory employs metaphors of neurosis and entropy
drawn from contemporary psychology and physics, framing divine invasion.

PKD's main influence as a "mystic" was Plotinus. Tho not a deep
neoplatonist, he explored the metaphysics and ontology of unitive
experience

Post-PKD occultism: hermeneutics of signals received from "trash
stratum" of pop culture+decaying social forms synchronicity participation

PKD board game - teeps and precogs

PKD+Religion study-PKDRST-needs to look at Dick's influence on weird
occultisms of dudes like brother blue Terence McKenna chaos/cyber jung-

PKD novels form a continuous series when decoded as esoteric allegory. incorrect to call it philosophical/metaphysical: this is hermeneutics

t3dy: I sunk PKD-did-it-first, pomo PKD, mindfuck film, mystic as crazy,
lazy gnostic Jungians, nonreaders who write PKD. "fuck yr short memories"

not many PKD readers want to follow him into radical pantheism. atheists have no metaphysic. Christians don't like tampering. But esoterics!

kinds of esoteric PKD fan--occultists decode his novel mysteries,
scholars dig wordplay, gnostic epistemologists, visionary fellow travelers

PKD novels can be studied not just for allegory of PKD myst.exp. but
also in terms of ASC tweaking fx on the reader. cult author 4 acidheads

PKD schizognostic hermeneutic: religious ASC as visionary pathology
vs RAW paranoid metaprogram hermeneutic: religious ASC as useful idiot

PKD did the formal ontology as he felt necessary (which seems like
too much even to his average fan) but then proceeded to new theism quests

PKD's theology has been exagerrated as too heady. It's not
excessively metaphysical. Shares the hastily summarized character of
enc.articles

PKD theologized on a heavy metaphysical level but also on a very
human level, in terms of the me-other relation between man and strange God.

PKD+LSD has not gotten a fair shake as a topic. Few readers want to
learn about the dark places of the mind thus explored. Many voyeurs tho'

PKD compared religious states of altered consciousness to
phenomenology of drug, stress, and mental-illness induced ASC. Got sense of
humor.

PKD exegesis-lots of great stuff, esp. one-liners+gnostic novel
decode. dialog w/ God about infinity is so important and such classic Dick.

PKD on the future: much weirder than Heraclitus Eastern myth
Schopenhauer, even post-Bergson. He's para-Plotinian, freed from syntax of
time

McKenna's metaphysics and theology are strongly influenced by RAW and
PKD and must be understood in the literary universe of those types











# peterbebergal @t3dy Would you say that Crowley and Renaissance magicians had completely different intentions?


t3dy@peterbebergal maybe not completely different. Crowley was deeply influenced by Christian mysticism, but extremely disobedient finding

stuff


@peterbebergal thanks very much excellent question. what's your opinion?


# peterbebergal @t3dy for one the ultimate aim is God, the other it's Self.


# Peter Bebergal peterbebergal @t3dy but in terms of intent, knowledge of God versus will for its own sake, didn't C. kind of ruin magic as a

mystical path?


@peterbebergal Yeah that's a good way to put it. This would make Crowley magical rather than religious. But he has some religion, if of self


@peterbebergal "Did Crowley ruin magic as a mystical path?"Great problem. We don't have to buy his self-obsession to find his methods useful


@peterbebergal I guess if Crowley redefines mysticism as inwardly directed toward self alone we could see it that way. I'm not sure he does.


@peterbebergal Crowley is able to show how one can use the dark side of mysticism against it. As a ruthless criticism this has mystical use.


@peterbebergal Crowley's appropriation of the Kabbalah does what you say but he does exploit mystical self-aggrandizing tendency of Abulafia


@peterbebergal I do think Crowley's synthesis of Yoga+Ceremonial Magick can be useful for a mystical-magical project-just needs a hot shower





peterbebergal @t3dy part of the prob also lies in the appropriation of Kabbalah, divorced of Judaism by Pico etc and even further from

religion in Crowley


@peterbebergal Oh yeah Pico's appropriation of Kabbalah is terribly violent + disrespectful. He misses many mystical modes that he might use


@peterbebergal I used to think post-GD occultism was rooted in medieval grimoire magic, but now I'm not so sure. Hard to follow their logic!


@peterbebergal Crowley was all about himself. But he also believed he was acting under orders from Higher Intelligence. So still theurgic.


@peterbebergal Crowley might not ruin magic as a mystical path but he usually doesn't help the cause. Is autotheism a legitimate mysticism?


@peterbebergal Iamblichus defined theurgy as aiming toward mystical union w/ the One. Crowley summoned spirits to become his own One.


@peterbebergal Crowley imports mystical practices (that strengthen will for example) for magical purposes. Does this ruin them entirely?


# @peterbebergal Iamblichus described theurgy as exchanging the mortal life for the divine: Did Crowley?or steal fire from gods for human

life


@peterbebergal many of the Renaissance magic theories and practices were technical methods of consciousness change--like what Crowley built?


@peterbebergal Renaissance Magic as a post-Aristotelian tradition shares something with Crowley who developed an alternative rationality


@peterbebergal Pico della Mirandola shares with Crowley hermeneutical violence-allows for radical twisting of Kabbalah using its own methods



@peterbebergal Giordano Bruno shares much with Crowley in terms of the nasty but extremely productive sense of humor but he was still theist


@peterbebergal Crowley's modernism is mitigated by his medievalism, just as the medievalism of Renaissance Magic is by proto-science spirit


@peterbebergal I wonder if there were medieval+renaissance magicians like Crowley who became self-obsessed and traded religion for selfmagic

18 minutes ago via web in reply to peterbebergal


@peterbebergal Crowley's mysticism (if it's still a mysticism) is closer than comfortable to Abulafia's messianism, antinomianism, prophecy.


Crowley + GD magic follow certain Kabbalists in taking sefirot as tools for mapping human experience/ASC's rather than divine body/ontology


Scholem has a great line on Crowley's Kabbalah: "brilliant misunderstandings" I'm working on distranslation+re-memberment metaphors for this


@peterbebergal Crowley's number speculation is a fascinating system+isn't entirely untrue to the spirit of neo-pythagorean cosmic tripping


@peterbebergal Crowley picks up on the kind of shady gematria Pico pioneered in his 900 Theses, shows how to use it for engineering projects


@peterbebergal Then again, if Crowley is right and the sex instinct is indistinguishable from God, maybe he has a point about how to worship


@peterbebergal Crowley doesn't seem to understand the mystical theology of the Christian Neoplatonic tradition, just how it can turn one on.

about 1 hour ago via web in reply to peterbebergal






# @tedfriedman Zizek's very interesting+reminds me of esoteric humor of Paracelsus, Crowley+Burroughs etc. but has a lot of cake+eats it too

@tedfriedman word. I'm just as nervous about logocentrism as I am about mythocentrism. Academia can always use better, simpler RST theory.

@tedfriedman absolutely, I like these guys although it's hard for me to get much from them. I like criticism of Jung b/c it's so productive

@davidbmetcalfe Thomas Vaughan is a model of alchemical zeal, gets my vote for "most fun" magical writers list

TV is one of my favorite alchemists for lectures: protofeminist,readable+funny,imbued w/spirit of Ren.Magic but early modern mind

Thomas Vaughan in Coelum Terrae: Nature is a free spirit that seeks no applause; ...
...she observes none more than herself but is pleased with her own magic, as philosophers are with their secret philosophy. 16 minutes ago

via web

Thomas Vaughan's alchemical insight into Neoplatonic ontology: ...
"This is true; as the air and all the volatile substances in it are restless, even so is it with the First Matter."

[Thomas Vaughan:] Raymund Lully, in his Compendium of Alchemy, calls the principles of art magic
:certain fugitive spirits, condensed in the air, in the shape of diverse monsters, beasts and men, which move like clouds hither and thither

18 minutes ago via web


1st matter:there is an universal patient, and this passive Nature was created by the Universal Agent. This general patient is the immediate

20 minutes ago via web
...catholic character of God Himself in His Unity and trinity. In plain terms it is that substance which we commonly call the First Matter.
Vaughan's post-Neoplatonic Creation: But having infinite inward ideas or conceptions in Himself, as He conceived so He created...
...that is to say, He created an outward form answerable to the inward conception or figure of His mind. -Thomas Vaughan, Coelum Terrae

there'sa universal agentWho when He was disposed to create had no other pattern or exemplar whereby to frame+mould His creatures but Himself
T.Vaughan compares Platonists to Don Quixote "who knew Dulcinea but never saw her," criticizes some NP magic as "pack of small conspiracies"


The passive universal Nature was made in the image of the active universal one. -Thomas Vaughan, Coelum Terrae
Said the Kabalist: "The building of the Sanctuary which is here below is framed according to that of the Sanctuary which is above."T.Vaughan

# davidbmetcalfe
COELUM TERRAE - Or The Magician's Heavenly Chaos, by Thomas Vaughan. http://ow.ly/38hVY (thanks to @weiserbooks for the reminder)



# NewMindMirror
MAPS Catalysts Conf, The Impact of Psychedelics on Culture, Cognition & Creativity Dec 10-12 Los Angeles http://su.pr/1nupiw 32 minutes ago

via web Retweeted by you and 1 other

illuminatus! offers subliminal training in various strategies of catching oneself breaking that often turn out less reliable than advertised
illuminatus! as incantation: magically attacking conditioned reflexes that inhibit mystical consciousness, training in dubious counter-plays
illuminatus! synthesizes literary strategies from Joyce+Burroughs in effort to open reader to possibilities reader won't allow self to exp.
allegory: illuminatus! trilogy a giant polemic incantation vs having "serve the masters" attitudes toward one's own brain chemistry 39

minutes ago via web

# SteveMartinToGo
Hey, it’s get it right Friday! Did you know the first definition of the word “peruse” is “to look through carefully” and not “to browse?”

about 3 hours ago via web Retweeted by you and 100+ others
@SteveMartinToGo I am bemused by the misuse of peruse

@PsychedelicLozo thanks for your podcasting efforts. I've been a fan for years and will dedicate my first book on McKenna to you about

# PsychedelicLozo
“The bizarre, the unthinkable is where creativity comes from.” –Robert Anton Wilson . . . http://www.matrixmasters.net/salon/?p=233

# philo_quotes

There is nothing good or evil save in the will. ~ Epictetus

# mister_quotes

Montesquieu “To love to read is to exchange hours of ennui for hours of delight.” http://goo.gl/fb/JqSqh
# philo_quotes

Philosophy would render us entirely Pyrrhonian, were not nature too strong for it. ~ David Hume http://bit.ly/philq

@davidbmetcalfe Reason has this abusive history of unfairly ruling out emotions+enthusiasms, but now science is more comfortable w/Vis./ASC

@davidbmetcalfe rationalism is a problem for esoteric seekers when it causes us to rule out possibilities, prevents opening into useful ASCs

@davidbmetcalfe apt Leade quote. I think the problem is conditioned habits of scientism-wisdom poorly applied-not necessarily reason itself

about 4 hours ago via web


# davidbmetcalfe

@t3dy "rational Wisdom...the grand Adversary of Virgin Wisdom's Magicians." - Jane Leade, Revelation of Revelations ; )

Jung's method is good for generating esoteric knowledge about one's inner world, bad for reductive pigeonholing of others' experience

# davidbmetcalfe

"the Stag-God...was brought to Anatolia by the early Indo-Iranian peoples" - http://bit.ly/9Me7TB via @mthing


to be fair its probably better to think of Jung in terms of alternative rationality(like his dudes Heraclitus/Nietzsche/Neoplatonists)

@davidbmetcalfe I think that enthusiasm leads to the pseudoscience. Call me a stuff old 18th century rationalist! But enth. has its uses...

# davidbmetcalfe

@t3dy @tedfriedman seems J/JC were working with more operative modes, they're front line w. the people/opposed to deep theory of academy

# davidbmetcalfe

@t3dy @tedfriedman it changed the way I looked at JC's work after I realized what he was describing, puts him in a diff. category.

# RichardMetzger

Aerosol Amoeba: 144 hours of color from spray paint condensed into 4 minutes http://t.co/GXjfd15

While I'm very skeptical of gnostic readings of early modern esotericism I'm sympathetic to Eric Davis' "gnosis behind pop culture" approach

In my early 20's I was very excited by (say Tobias Churton's) applying "gnostic" to renaissance magic, now I see these guys as pious xtians a

@davidbmetcalfe thanks for the "serious joke" angle I will think about that as I go reread some Kripal... Maier looked for what we also want


@davidbmetcalfe I'm honestly not sure about the disinfo question. Sometimes I see the whole Eranos school as an end-run vs. scholarly values


@davidbmetcalfe good discussion all around. I think JC's mistake is also in the "forced categorization" category. CompRel was his format...

@davidbmetcalfe JC wants to offer what I see as fundamentally religious attitudes as if they were scientific findings. thus disinfo/ps.sci

Pico della Mirandola has been hailed as emphasizing "the theurgic" for the Renaissance; ironically his avoidance of theurgy's more important

we are stuck with contemporary notions of "the gnostic" although they are often unhistorical. anachronism doesn't make them useless

@davidbmetcalfe obviously I need to read more Kripal. I'm cautious but don't mean to be anti- "gnostic reflections on the study of religion"

# davidbmetcalfe

@t3dy @tedfriedman that's something that makes Jeffrey Kripal's idea of analyzing anomolous/estoeric topics as narratives really powerful

Jung's Red Book will advance the study of visionary+altered states of consciousness once we figure out how to study it for what it reveals
Jung was a great visionary: I don't see the need to force him to fit some academically-approved model, or call him a scientist
my biggest problem with Jung/JC is that they're "generating knowledge that's universally applicable about human nature"-I prefer S. Pinker

@davidbmetcalfe my problem with Joseph Campbell is not the esoteric/subjective but the pseudoscientific pose and faulty logic/assumptions

Jung should be read disobediently (like any esotericist!) b/c he has much to teach us, although the methodology has issues

@davidbmetcalfe problem w/ JC's work is he presents it as though it were a Freudian theoretical framework for theorizing myth. it's disinfo a

# davidbmetcalfe@t3dy @tedfriedman Same thing with Jung, Red Book takes him out of the purely academic realm. Scholars looking for obj. won't

find it.

@davidbmetcalfe Red Book's interesting because it gives us information about Jungs visionary experiences which are worthy of objective study

@davidbmetcalfe I don't deny that JC HAD esoteric knowledge, or put it into practice in his work. loved his "I know too much to be agnostic"

@WeiserBooks see Dickson's edition of the Vaughans' Aqua Vitae (google has a cache of full text from archive.org) on wife's int. property

@davidbmetcalfe @weiserbooks another thing the Wiki doesn't mention is Vaughan's love for and defense of Agrippa (combined w/Paracelsus)

Eliade is another interesting example. One can learn a great deal from his alchemy+shamanism, especially what he got wrong. about 5 hours ago

via web

Jung+Joseph Campbell's theories do not construct the kind of knowledge about myth that I'm looking for but are "good for the soul" about 5

hours ago via web

@tedfriedman @davidmetcalfe I don't see "co-opted' as a problem but J+JC theorized myth poorly:takes special pleading to buy it about 5 hours

ago via web in reply to tedfriedman
Enjoyed the audible gasp from my students as I revealed that the kissing number(# spheres that can touch a sphere) was easier in 8d than 3d!

Wednesday, November 10, 2010 2:40:01 PM via Tweetie for Mac

"the stones are so pretty with the lights wrapped around them" -my wife overheard me say something like this last night in my sleep

# aureliomadrid "with every idea born in us, something in us rots." —e.m. cioran

# aureliomadrid "many grains of frankincense on the same altar: one falls before, another falls after, but it makes no difference." —marcus

aurelius

been a long time since I've had a dream so "long"+remembered it so well, after waking I made connections with varous prior dream locations

high info nap dream (after Kindergarten teaching) was epic/terrifying: several endings,mostly coherent,conspiracies, woke up feeling awful.

The meaning of peace is the absence of opposition to socialism. ~ Karl Marx

"You're sitting in a chair in the sky. Stop bitching." Louis CK

@erik_davis I very much appreciated "Cthulhu, you and I are not so different" as well as the use of "...even death may die"

Man has to awaken to wonder - and so perhaps do peoples. Science is a way of sending him to sleep again. ~ Wittgenstein

"When you know the words the world is made of, you can make of it what you will." Terence Mckenna. The essential function of the universe,

which is a machine for making gods ~ Henri Bergson http://bit.ly/philq

The wise man does at once what the fool does finally. ~ Machiavelli

"The cat does not offer services. The cat offers itself." -William S. Burroughs

# kevin_nealon I can't tell the difference between meditating and plain worrying. Monday,

by thinking of the mind as an alchemical substance that can be worked on, spiritual alchemists anticipated self-help psychology

Alchemy is about transmutation, whether physical or spiritual, providing a wealth of metaphors useful for psychology or psychedelia

Spiritual Alchemy is already a distranslation just like gnostic+Kabbalist Bible reads we should take it further to our own purposes

Spiritual Alchemy didn't go far enough: alchemical illustrations+weird ren-art should be disobediently read as if intended surrealistically

Alchemical illustrations may be bizarre, surreal, colorful, disturbing, but they have nothing on human imaginative+visionary faculties

If a man neglects education, he walks lame to the end of his life. ~ Plato http://bit.ly/philq
Belief creates the actual fact. ~ William James http://bit.ly/philq

(5 comments) - (Post a new comment)

art of memory tweets
[info]t3dy
2010-12-20 08:11 pm UTC (link)
# Medieval Music+Art of Memory: although writing allowed composers to work out pieces in the mind...

...it did not make memorization redundant but allowed for new ways to commit material to memory. http://bit.ly/bnQ7nJ

experimental science prophesied by Francis Bacon has now given us cybernetics whose computers are belated sisters of Lulls ambitious circles
"As was to be expected, all these combinatory mechanisms served no purpose whatsoever." -Borges

art of memory blog posts http://aprendizdetodo.com/time/?item=20030331 http://thenightshirt.com/?page_id=186 http://bit.ly/d6nihJ

http://msemmamorris.blogspot.com/2010/04/art-of-memory-machine-for-thinking-and.html

more art of memory blog posts http://geekymuse.com/?p=304 http://andrewbwatt.wordpress.com/2009/11/05/art-of-memory/

"computer games of MYST class are simply most recent examples of long tradition of works designed for the mind's eye" http://bit.ly/cR7zsF

"key aspects of "memoria" can be helpful in creating memorable, universal, and easily retrievable computer icons." http://bit.ly/9V2oYJ

Remember the Things with Method of Loci Q+A (gets into Yates,Bruno,Carruthers) http://hi2en.com/article.aspx?Id=44

"Lull's memory system is the occult origin of the modern computer" http://www.natashamostert.com/books/sotw/memory/index.php

i'm interested in art of memory problem: how much light to use each room? / Hakim Bey's "cabalistic light" shines thru palimpsest

inventors of art of memory didn't have "brain is like a computer" model but used metaphors from writing, optics, architecture

we should differentiate formal systems used by art of memory to train brains vs computer programs: must avoid enchantment by metaphor

art of memory + hypertext http://trex.id.iit.edu/visiblelanguage/Feature%20Articles/ArtofMemory/ArtofMemoryPt4.html

art of memory should also be of great interest to contemporary occultists who use "Qabala" which Crowley+Regardie explained as memory art

# I'm surprised not to see more art of memory research in light of contemporary cog.sci.--how come nobody's badass enough to work it?

the art of memory can be studied as an educational system--we can especially learn from what it gets wrong--that built interesting tools

# systematic rigor of Renaissance Magic+root in Hi-Neoplatonic ontology makes it of philosophical interest(same as mod.phil.we don't agree

w/)

I don't think you need to drink any kool-aid in order to appreciate value of RM, which tho' pseudosci is admirable as formal system

however I want to avoid falling into trap of apologizing for RM. better to point out what is valuable even to the uninitiated

I try to rehabilitate those aspects of Renaissance Magic that have been unfairly maligned+rescue its sincere Christian piety

# methinks esotericists often protest too much when complaining of academic criticism of non-falsifiable ideas. don't seekers want truth?

esoteric secrecy isn't here to protect tradition from criticism, but to preserve mystery which ensures seeking+puzzling out truth

(Reply to this)


[info]t3dy
2011-01-12 04:03 am UTC (link)
Renaissance Magic+Contemporary Occultism - collected tweets


Does anybody have a question about Renaissance Magic, Pico della Mirandola, Philip K. Dick, Alchemy, Philosophy of Mind, Media Theory,Curry?

@devolveart Great Dee link thanks. Do you think contemporary use of pp gives info about phenomenology useful for study of Renaissance Magic?

@eglinski Thanks.I'm sure whoever stole it has only purest intentions,plans to do Frances Yates style white "safe magic" under Cabala angels

@devolveart I look at power pl.theories--especially post-William James 20thCent mystics like Crowley+Leary--for inspiration theorizing magic

@devolveart power plants are not a part of this Twitter project but I'm interested in learning about them as a religious studies+magic topic

Even if one were to consider Crowley all magic no mystic, he's still stealing ideas from mysticism to do this magic.

@mason_mem as for the people I RT, I like to imagine that some of them find notion amusing that somebody's stealing to reconstruct Dee magic

@devolveart I dunno I'm all for giving "gifts of power" + deconstructing shamanic cues but my project is academic study of Renaissance Magic

@wwjimd In my Renaissance Magic work I've got to do a ton of theory of science + history/archaeology of ideas, hoping to dig up useful intel

The John Dee theft is significant b/c it tantalizes w/ possibility that it wasn't about antiquarian interest alone. Who steals for magic?

Dr. Dee's crystal stolen. http://www.culture24.org.uk/science+&+nature/medicine/art25176 What dark angel magic will the culprits pull off?

When I say Pico didn't do angel magic+his contribution to angelology was philosophical, I'm not saying he didn't inspire later magicians...

@heidiko44 @davidbmetcalfe learn about what specifically? question which assumptions? many of mine on Ren.Magic have changed dramatically!

Welcome to all my new followers. Does anybody have any questions for an MA student working on Renaissance Magic and Alchemy? Fire away...

occultist interpretation inflates importance of problem of Pico's magic. Pico scholarship has moved on to consider his theology/cog.ascent

@plutopsyche I don't think any color should be considered the least magical. They all have associations we need to do a complete magic work.

# @plutopsyche While it's true that New Agers have made the "white light of the void" sound corny+passe, it still plays a role in legit

magic.

There is no magic to be found in Pico's Commento, Heptaplus, or De Ente, but we do find important further explanations of his angelology

@clerestories one of my long unfinished projects is a latin grammar study book based on examples from magic and alchemy. need one, so I make

@clerestories I think it's very important to look at exactly what they meant by art. Alchemists didn't think of their craft as "mere magic".

link collection and recent tweets - scholarship on Pico della Mirandola's magic, kabbalah, angel http://t3dy.livejournal.com/1693484.html

@cole_tucker it's also interesting (perhaps a crypto-theurgy point) that obviously unhistorical approaches to magic get results that compare

Perhaps Pseudo-Dionysian theurgy can help us understand Pico's Magic+Kabbalah in this way-like PD Pico sees magic/theurgy as divine activity

Whether or not there is a magical approach to angelic names in Kabbalah, Pico doesn't seem to import it. he theorizes magic of divine speech

Pico della Mirandola made some interesting discoveries comparing Kabbalah+Christian Theology but he did not import Kabbalist angel magic.

#FF Medieval Magic Scholars: Claire Fanger, Richard Kieckhefer, Frank Klaasen, Sophie Page, Benedek Lang, Valerie Flint, Owen Davies

#FF Renaissance Magic Scholars: Ioan Couliano, Wouter Hanegraaff, Christopher Lehrich, Stephen Clucas, Arthur Versluis, Joscelyn Godwin

@Jason_Scroggins I'm interested in Biosemiotics in a kinda remote way - general semiotics fan but not writing it,applied to theorizing magic

(Reply to this)


[info]t3dy
2011-01-12 04:04 am UTC (link)

The differences between the angelologies of Ficino and Pico are important and illuminating for the study of Renaissance Magic. A rivalry...

Unlike Ficino Pico is a harsh critic of magic, + emphasizes distance of man from angels, anagogy as work of Jesus rather than astral harvest

Proclus' magic is very important to study of Ficino's magic, but less important to study of Pico's magic. He went Proclus for Theology+angel

Perhaps Pico's magic goes beyond the theories of Albertus Magnus, Roger Bacon, + Thomas Aquinas, but his turn begins from those constraints.

I'm interested in interdisciplinary study of Renaissance Magic-which I'll need to follow my bliss-but now mostly looking through philosophy.

Pico misses many opportunities to cite Proclus+Iamblichus on magic from texts he knew well. He was trying to develop a different concept.

Pico didn't bring magic+kabbalah theses in order to establish himself as an expert in those disciplines, but as theology topics to dispute.

Pico doesn't think Philosophy can take you all the way, but relies on Dionysius' mystic solution+isn't trying to pioneer any radical magic.

@eglinski My argument is that we don't know enough about medieval + renaissance magic, but practitioners could help discover things about it

@eglinski I'm not saying modern Goetists don't have excellent texts. I'm just trying to explore the problem of doing a 17th century magic.

@eglinski that's a good way to put it. I'm interested in the apparent fact that so many practitioners appropriate but don't like Ren. Magic.

# Don Eglinski eglinski @t3dy Will pursue conversation later; sleep calls. I’m curious as to the pragmatism of Renaissance magic w/ today’s

individualistic

mindset.

@eglinski I'm not interested in following Dee into practice of doing Christian angel magic, but I think his formal systems otherwise useful.

@eglinski I think even the boring abstract philosophical Dee is very important, should be taken into magic account+appreciated aesthetically

@eglinski I think that all forms of medieval+renaissance magic, as well as modern interps, deserve study as formal systems/games/head media.

@eglinski I think all the modern interpretations of Enochian+Goetic magic are very interesting but rarely read somebody who illuminates Ren.

eglinski @t3dy Dee pioneered Enochian magic, opposed to QBLH. I like reading Enochian, but inclined to Goetia. @chinagrrrl plays with the

former. :)

# @eglinski re: "pragmatism of RM to individualistic mindset" one of my problems working w/ Pico is notion he's a radical individualist magus

@eglinski I'd like to better understand the distinction KBL vs. Enochian... Karen de Leon-Jones on Dee and Kabbalah http://bit.ly/gPLLwz

articles on Giordano Bruno http://bit.ly/dJeH0B Alchemy http://bit.ly/ePRAr3 Western Esotericism + Renaissance Magic http://bit.ly/eDrBR6

11:33

(Reply to this)


[info]t3dy
2011-01-12 04:04 am UTC (link)

Renaissance Magic has much to say about Memory so I try to learn as much relevant info as I can about Memory studies--Music especially prod.

I'm theorizing Renaissance Magic as Art as well as philosophy so I bring insights from video game theory, comedy, visionary traditions, food

@Kalieezchild @WuTangTulku I'm chiefly interested in Castaneda as an influence on Robert Anton Wilson's put-on method + magic/shamanism grok

@Kalieezchild Since I'm working on Renaissance Magic, I deal with app/src problem of transmission from Jewish KBL to xtian CBL to occult QBL

I'm thinking of theories of magic like R.A. Wilson's "method acting" "fake it til you make it" type analysis, not attacking CC

@Kalieezchild I'm interested in RAW's dedication of SC trilogy to CC:he joked it's a novel showing shamanic techniques+theorizes magic fraud

Pico's Kabbalah is remarkable for the ways it conveniently leaves out Kabbalis theurgy, not in the ways it implies magic.Sanitized Practical

Now my reading of Pico is that his position as head of "Christian Cabala" is complicated, his influence on Renaissance Magic ambiguous, dark

@Chonnymo I'm not saying I don't think CC can be an element in a contemporary esoteric syncretism. Magic is a synthesis of real+fake.

@Chonnymo I'm not saying I don't think Castaneda can be useful magic or psychology or existentialism. It's fun. I just don't think it Yaqui.

I'm an advocate of reconstruction of Renaissance Magic for aesthetic+practical as well as historical purposes, but don't suggest buying into

I'm interested in Pico's angelology because while it sketches the universe of later Christian Cabalist angel magic, it seems not to do magic

# David Metcalfe davidbmetcalfe RT @t3dy: Raymond Lull, Magic Squares and the Talismanic Art http://bit.ly/hwl8mY in Magical Alphabets By

Nigel Pennick

Pico was one of the most influential thinkers who wrote on "Magic+Kabbalah" but didn't practice magic himself-though he inspired in readers?

Renaissance Magic doesn't always refer to a figure's specific magical practice. Some of the theorists of magic probably didn't practice it.

Renaissance Magic can be seen as a natural outgrowth of certain tendencies in Christian Philosophy+Theology, especially Dionysian texts.

Structurally, the most important common element in Renaissance Magic is not some occult leaning, but simply being a Christian.

Renaissance Magic is not a stable category that describes a set of thinkers with a blanket stereotype.They all differed in use of magic idea


For the actual thinkers and writers who lived and produced Renaissance Magic texts, the meaning had nothing to do with where we are now.


We learn much from appreciating Renaissance Magic roots of certain elements of scientific/modern consciousness, but shouldn't skry teleology

Renaissance Magic psychology, art of memory, formal systems etc. are interesting not only as proto-systems to be adapted but in own context.

# soundhunter soundhunter @t3dy trying to figure out which tracks by Genesis P Orridge throbbing gristle/psychic tv to share w/ occult.magic

unless u already

know it

Pico's contributions to philosophy included discovery of Kabbalah, application of magic to theological problems, but there's much more to it

# I'm interested in the dialogue between gnosticisim and neoplatonism, and the notion of renaissance magic as gnostic esoteric trad.

What is most interesting about Pico's angelology is not the possible implications or angel magic or hints of theurgy, but contribution to NP

Pico attempted to bring this ProclanDionysian style back into theology but it seems from what I've observed that he keeps NP magic out of it

Renaissance psychology of magic gives us insights into strategies for dealing with ASCs + religious problems contemporary occultists suffer.

Back to Esoteric Industrial question-to reformulate, which albums might make good background to writing about magic? how not too distracting

should we look at Renaissance Magic in Ficino+Bruno as being about theorizing+manipulating altered states of consciousness? Avoiding Saturn.

@SimonMagus is it safe to write about drugs? is it necessary? I study drugs in religion but not enough info on drugs in Renaissance Magic

since I'm not writing for an academic audience (thank "Bob") I find it fun to use tools from Renaissance Magic to make jokes+weird metaphors

Pico doesn't seem to have anticipated so much suspicion that he was dabbling in angel magic. Rules out possibility briefly, w/ distinctions.

Each of Pico's later texts refer back in some way to his project of angel comparison-he stops writing about magic but not this-its nonmagic?

Since there is so little magic to Pico's angel even in the 900 Theses, we must move past these problems of theurgy,KBL+magic to angelology

Pico's 900 Theses are full of interesting enigmas concerning Pico's angelology. A small handful of these concern Kabbalah+angels, few magic.

Theurgy gives a misleading impression of what Pico was looking for in Magic+Kabbalah. Theurgy doesn't have same religious meaning for him...

More interest in Kabbalah+magic correlations, theories of divine language, than angel magic--

Pico is not doing angel magic so he's not interested in Kabbalist angel magic.

Pico gives us no more than a hint of practical angel magic to come. practical metaphysics is mystic contemplation for experience+inspiration

If Pico has any theurgy it is only a hint. Perhaps some subtle magic of angels is part of his mysticism+magic of div.language. not Conjuring

Pico's Commento doesn't deal with problems of magic, but is an essential source for information about his angelology. Is it thus a nonmagic?

Pico's Commento hasn't been considered much for angel magic question, but contains much unique material on Angelic Mind-of magical interest?

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Alchemy articles+chapters via Google Books

Edward Kelley's Heiroglyph + Basil Valentine's Emblem as Key http://bit.ly/fR7GO6 in Emblems and alchemy By Alison Adams, Stanton J. Linden

Number, Weight, Measure and Experiment in Chymistry http://bit.ly/eFAINs Alchemy Tried in the Fire: Starkey, Boyle and the Fate of Helmontian

Chymistry

Gehennical fire: the lives of George Starkey, an American alchemist in the Scientific Revolution By William R. Newman http://bit.ly/fe8ZP0

William R. Newman: "Alchemy, Domination, + Gender" in A House Built on Sand: Exposing Postmodernist Myths about Science http://bit.ly/hu9MXh

Lawrence M. Principe: Reflections on Newton's Alchemy in Light of the New Historiography of Alchemy http://bit.ly/h6uRMi

Distilling knowledge: alchemy, chemistry, and the scientific revolution - By Bruce T. Moran http://bit.ly/fOIioe

Lawrence Principe on metaphor, "Revealing Analogies: Descriptive+Deceptive Roles of Sexuality+Gender in Latin Alchemy" http://bit.ly/e76mwf

Lawrence Principe and William R. Newman -- Some Problems with the Historiography of Alchemy http://bit.ly/gnumdT

Peter Forshaw, "Alchemical Exegesis: Fractious Distillations of the Essence of Hermes" http://bit.ly/eetQsy in Principe Chymists+Chymistry

Bruce Moran"The Less Well Known Libavius:Spirits Powers and Metaphors in the Practice of Knowing Nature" http://bit.ly/h0XpWe

Wouter Hanegraaff,Pseudo-Lullian Alchemy+Mercurial Phoenix:Correggio... De lapide philosophico http://bit.ly/f1pBb2 Chymists+Chymistry

Urszula Szulakowska: The Semiotic Structures of Renaissance Alchemical Imagery http://bit.ly/gjGmCG in The Alchemy of Light

The book of the secrets of alchemy By Constantinus (Pisanus), Barbara Obrist http://bit.ly/gFLoyE

Prospero's America: John Winthrop, Jr., alchemy, and the creation of New England culture, 1606-1676 http://bit.ly/ekAE2M

Prophecy, alchemy, and the end of time: John of Rupescissa in the late Middle Ages By Leah DeVun http://bit.ly/h4S701

"Human Heaven" John of Rupescissa's Alchemy at the End of the World Leah DeVun http://bit.ly/e0HSK4

"The atomism of Libavius was a rather evasive hybrid of alchemy, Renaissance Neoplatonism+Aristotelian mixture theory" http://bit.ly/hccOp8

William R. Newman, “The Homunculus and His Forebears: Wonders of Art and Nature,” in Natural Particulars http://bit.ly/hIqBBz

William R. Newman -- "Artificial Life and the Homunculous" in Promethean Ambitions http://bit.ly/eO8lCc

William R. Newman -- "Alchemy and the Art-Nature Debate" in Promethan Ambitions http://bit.ly/hetkNp

Retrying 17thC. Alchemy http://bit.ly/brMvDK How to Write about Alchemy workshop http://bit.ly/igGvTh 18thC. Chymistry http://bit.ly/gBwger

Paracelsus http://bit.ly/eM1upP http://bit.ly/fR0f40 http://bit.ly/hJPZub http://bit.ly/dLiJ9X http://bit.ly/flJyNV http://bit.ly/hJpIM6

Allison Coudert, "Probing Women and Penetrating Witchcraft in Early Modern Europe" http://bit.ly/fsjWr7

the metaphor of torturing nature is prevalent in the alchemical tradition http://bit.ly/foUAVZ

Atalanta Fugiens in "Emblems and Alchemy" http://bit.ly/dF0Y42 Frances Yates http://bit.ly/dY7KWm Joscelyn Godwin http://bit.ly/fMooXB

Urszula Szulakowsi on Atalanta Fugiens http://bit.ly/ex6S3y Versluis on AF http://bit.ly/fY0RmZ Hereward Tilton on AF http://bit.ly/eaJLkL

Atalanta Fugiens-17th century multimedia:alchemical emblems each with its own poem and fugue,this edition has the music http://bit.ly/gcMTFM

academic esoteric studies reads via Google Books preview

Picture Logic in Hillary Gatti, Giordano Bruno and Renaissance Science http://bit.ly/hV5nJd

Ars notoria, sive Flores http://bit.ly/gnSesS Visual Art in two manuscripts of the Ars Notoria http://bit.ly/eHDIfe

Claire Fanger,Plundering the Egyptian Treasure:John the Monk's Book of Visions+its relation to Ars Notoria of Solomon http://bit.ly/fof5Vt

Richard Kiekhefer, The Devil's Contemplatives:Liber Iuratus,Liber Visionum+Christian Appropriation of Jewish Occultism http://bit.ly/eIeQQf

Frank Klaasen survey of English Magic Manuscripts 1300-1500 http://bit.ly/fHSwU5

Safe Magic and Invisible Writing in the Secretum Philosophorum http://bit.ly/fWaRHf

"Creation in the thought of Helmont+Fludd" in Alchemy and chemistry in the 16th and 17th centuries By Piyo Rattansi http://bit.ly/dNfjFu

Stephen Clucas, 'Wondrous Force and Operation': magic, science, and religion in the Renaissance http://bit.ly/fcnmiy

William R. Newman: "Alchemy, Domination, + Gender" in A House Built on Sand: Exposing Postmodernist Myths about Science http://bit.ly/hu9MXh

Lawrence M. Principe: Reflections on Newton's Alchemy in Light of the New Historiography of Alchemy http://bit.ly/h6uRMi

Distilling knowledge: alchemy, chemistry, and the scientific revolution - By Bruce T. Moran http://bit.ly/fOIioe

Nicholas Clulee, "Astronomia Inferior: Legacies of Trithemius+John Dee" http://bit.ly/fo0n64

The Geometrical Kabbalahs of John Dee+Kepler: The Hebrew Tradition+the Mathematical Study of Nature http://bit.ly/gDRZC5

Bruno considered magical... the ability to translate the belief in the animate universe into ethically unifying action http://bit.ly/dGLdpD

Imerti--brief mention of scholars on Giordano Bruno's magic: Shumaker, Aquilecchia, Coudert, Clucas http://bit.ly/ghI8wM

Arielle Sabir, Giordano Bruno+ the Mathematics of Language: "Giordano Bruno gave magic a special mathematical feature" http://bit.ly/g1jytu

"the moral problem raised by magic in general seems to take on a new aspect here" -intro to Giordano Bruno magic essay http://bit.ly/e6SIhQ

Rather than solving individual problems, this magic looked for general principles to explain the workings of the world. http://bit.ly/g8oADo

Hillary Gatti on G.Bruno's "quest for a kind of magic which acts in harmony with the processes+metamorphoses of nature" http://bit.ly/dJReFY

Ioan Couliano: "the *invention* of a demon is equivalent to its coming to life" http://bit.ly/gYMB9r

Paola Zambelli: Hermeticism and Magic in Giordano Bruno. Some Interpretations... http://bit.ly/gm0T3y

magic's a means of control over the individual+themasses based on deep knowledge of personal+collective erotic impulses http://bit.ly/id4FDG

Henrik Bogdan: Western Esotericism and Rituals of Initiation http://bit.ly/id4FDG
"magic or occult philosophy was for Agrippa not a goal in itself, but something that should be used as an aid in the evangelical reform" -HB

"For Bruno the primary structure of magic was cosmology." -Karen Silvia de Leon-Jones, Giordano Bruno and the Kabbalah http://bit.ly/hfFGPI

The light-metaphysics of Patrizi+Bruno(/Proclus+Dionysius) has been considered a forerunner of Galileo's distinction... http://bit.ly/eiuiAn

Wouter Hanegraaff--Western Esoteric http://bit.ly/fvPWQ1 http://bit.ly/hkM0nG http://bit.ly/hbWAGf http://bit.ly/eKQQuw http://bit.ly/hhcowK

Lawrence Principe on metaphor, "Revealing Analogies: Descriptive+Deceptive Roles of Sexuality+Gender in Latin Alchemy" http://bit.ly/e76mwf

Allison Coudert, "Probing Women and Penetrating Witchcraft in Early Modern Europe" http://bit.ly/fsjWr7

the metaphor of torturing nature is prevalent in the alchemical tradition http://bit.ly/foUAVZ

Pico+Origen rehab http://bit.ly/hTa2Jm http://bit.ly/eJv6ov http://bit.ly/e25ggJ http://bit.ly/hUugl1 http://bit.ly/i1T19X

Augustine and Theurgy http://bit.ly/hHSuMX

Michael Chase, "The Medieval Posterity of Simplicius' Commentary on the Categories: Thomas Aquinas and Al-Farabi http://bit.ly/f1Gaue

Moshe Idel: On Judaism, Jewish Mysticism, and Magic http://bit.ly/idsg5e in Envisioning Magic

Sarah Iles Johnston "Rising to the Occasion: Theurgic Ascent in its cultural milieu" http://bit.ly/fj0lpz in Envisioning Magic

Negative or Apophatic Language(on Dionysius) http://bit.ly/gGUBt9 Christian Mysticism:An Introduction to Contemporary Theoretical Approaches

Christopher Lehrich: Analog Signification http://bit.ly/dMm3lq "The Occult Mind" http://bit.ly/hMOCCx

Lull+Art of Memory http://bit.ly/gUFUhb http://bit.ly/dTBuot http://bit.ly/gyEYy4 http://bit.ly/hGR9PE http://bit.ly/hAu81d

Retrying 17thC. Alchemy http://bit.ly/brMvDK How to Write about Alchemy workshop http://bit.ly/igGvTh 18thC. Chymistry http://bit.ly/gBwger

Paracelsus http://bit.ly/eM1upP http://bit.ly/fR0f40 http://bit.ly/hJPZub http://bit.ly/dLiJ9X http://bit.ly/flJyNV http://bit.ly/hJpIM6

Deborah Harkness on John Dee's Angel Conversations http://bit.ly/hYszoz Dee's annotations to Pseudo-Dionysius http://bit.ly/i50HOf

Rist on Pseudo-Dionysius: "Theurgy completes Theology" http://bit.ly/fApODV Hudson vs. Rist on theophany http://bit.ly/h7Vuyv

Pseudo-Dionysius+Theurgy Struck http://bit.ly/gaCeVf Sweeney http://bit.ly/dXVqHm O'Meara http://bit.ly/i7Zr1Q Janowitz http://bit.ly/fp5geF

Pseudo-Dionysius+Theurgy -- Rorem http://bit.ly/gc4uB5 Coakley http://bit.ly/igBNza Arthur http://bit.ly/hzVLei Boland

Plotinus on Magic http://bit.ly/fCao10 http://bit.ly/ffwprT http://bit.ly/dZjAdG http://bit.ly/dLA0XF http://bit.ly/dKADrq

vs. Frances Yates on Pico della Mirandola -- Doughert http://bit.ly/ieHiYS Craven http://bit.ly/hOkSQ7 Copenhaver http://bit.ly/fpc7Tt

Frances Yates+Pico della Mirandola http://bit.ly/f1M8Bo http://bit.ly/gamQD1 http://bit.ly/elX8jL http://bit.ly/gFHIdn http://bit.ly/fB2Ozl

vs. Frances Yates on Pico della Mirandola http://bit.ly/eUmWhT http://bit.ly/hvstGF http://bit.ly/eLxveV http://bit.ly/g2DmM5

FRANCES YATES AND THE MNEMONIC WORKS OF GIORDANO BRUNO http://bit.ly/clGp3q

Atalanta Fugiens in "Emblems and Alchemy" http://bit.ly/dF0Y42 Frances Yates http://bit.ly/dY7KWm Joscelyn Godwin http://bit.ly/fMooXB

Urszula Szulakowsi on Atalanta Fugiens http://bit.ly/ex6S3y Versluis on AF http://bit.ly/fY0RmZ Hereward Tilton on AF http://bit.ly/eaJLkL

Atalanta Fugiens-17th century multimedia:alchemical emblems each with its own poem and fugue,this edition has the music http://bit.ly/gcMTFM

Plotinus'essay on matter led Bruno to assume the immanent existence of Ideas in matter.These Ideas also exist in memory http://bit.ly/i3xUaR

Essays on Giordano Bruno By Hilary Gatti http://bit.ly/f836ip ... Giordano Bruno Philosopher/Heretic by Ingrid Rowland http://bit.ly/ibmy8m

Paolo Rossi "The Imaginative Logicof Giordano Bruno" http://bit.ly/h2vvlG in Logic and the art of memory:the quest for a universal language

Christopher Lehrich -- "Sign Sigil Text" in The Language of Demons and Angels: Cornelius Agrippa's Occult Philosophy http://bit.ly/hcaSVi

Allison Coudert: "The Kabbalah and Monads" in Leibniz and Kabbalah http://bit.ly/dVBQvu

Allison Coudert The impact of the Kabbalah in the seventeenth century:The life+thought of Francis Mercurius van Helmont http://bit.ly/h2z6PL

"The atomism of Libavius was a rather evasive hybrid of alchemy, Renaissance Neoplatonism+Aristotelian mixture theory" http://bit.ly/hccOp8

William R. Newman, “The Homunculus and His Forebears: Wonders of Art and Nature,” in Natural Particulars http://bit.ly/hIqBBz

William R. Newman -- "Artificial Life and the Homunculous" in Promethean Ambitions http://bit.ly/eO8lCc

William R. Newman -- "Alchemy and the Art-Nature Debate" in Promethan Ambitions http://bit.ly/hetkNp

Lawrence Principe and William R. Newman -- Some Problems with the Historiography of Alchemy http://bit.ly/gnumdT

collected tweets on Iamblichus (and theurgy, Pico) -updated+edited

Peter Struck: Iamblichus' De Mysteriis includes a sophisticated argument on the limits of human reason http://bit.ly/f4CAV5

Ruth Majercik on Theurgy in Proclus, Iamblichus + The Chaldaean Oracles http://bit.ly/eITVCd

Rather than being magic... Iamblichus' theurgy was a subtle intellectual practice http://bit.ly/gO1BrV

John Bussanich: Philosophy, Theology and Magic: Gods and Forms in Iamblichus http://bit.ly/e93tjV

Iamblichus carefully distinguishes theurgy from magic in De Mysteriis--like Pico he makes clear that he's not doing coercive power conjuring

(Iamblichus) 23.6. When the soul is assimilated to the intellect in an elevated fashion, motion in the vehicle becomes perfectly circular.

How much 'magic' actually went on under Iamblichus' own presidency is not know.n -John Dillon http://bit.ly/dT6Chr
When Iamblichus talks about mystical prayer in DM he talks up the benefits like people who talk about LSD.

@erik_davis Iamblichus is in many ways more attractive than Proclus for certain esoteric minds, Proclus is lovecraftian baroque systematics

Bussanich: Iamblichus still doing Plotinian mysticism. Mazur: Plotinian contemplation is interiorized theurgy. These interps show complexity

Bradshaw:Iamblichus is at pains to emphasize theurgic rite doesn't operate on gods but rather is means by which gods execute their own will.

Gregory Shaw: Iamblichus's distinction between theurgy and theology is crucial for understanding his Platonism.

Iamblichus gives a philosophical justification for "religious magic" if you want to describe it that way, better "theurgy" as mystic ascent.

Veenstra: "Iamblichus' theurgy gives philosophical justification for magic."

Iamblichus' theurgy, philosophy and theology each had proper object-gods seen by religious interaction, metaphysical entities, the One

vs BPC: Pico recognized in KBL an NP-powered metaphysics and theosophy, but not the theurgic as professed by Dionysius or even Iamblichus.

# @cole_tucker here's a guy defending Goetia vs. criticism of Agrippa + Iamblichus http://headforred.blogspot.com/2010/03/more-on-goetia.html

Like Iamblichus Dionysius emphasizes man's low/disconnected state-Angelic Hierarchy is needed to explain how man gets help from higher power

@erik_davis Late Neoplatonism is a disobedient reading of Aristotle. Plotinus+Iamblichus inverted him and invented theology as we know it.

@peterbebergal Gregory Shaw in his Iamblichus+Dionysius article says in a footnote that the Idel school of Kabbalah scholars misread theurgy
@peterbebergal E.R. Dodds thought that theurgy was a magical power grab, but his view doesn't jive with Iamblichus. See Gregory Shaw's work
The trend in Neoplatonic scholarship is moving toward understanding theurgy as religious ritual believing Iamblichus who said it's not magic

Theurgy is still controversial in Neoplatonic scholarship. John Dillon understands Iamblichus very well but still thinks magic not religion.

Theurgy was never ritual magic or angel/daimon conjuring. In Iamblichus it is religious ritual given by gods, powered by gods, unifying us.

Coughlin on Iamblichus: The object of prayer is to raise the supplicant up towards the gods through what he calls "harmonious persuasion."

...Iamblichus identifies this harmonious persuasion with the source of the efficacy of all prayer and all ritual. “Theurgy, Prayer... "

@peterbebergal Iamblichus defined theurgy as aiming toward mystical union w/ the One. Crowley summoned spirits to become his own One.

t3dy @peterbebergal Iamblichus described theurgy as exchanging the mortal life for the divine: Did Crowley?or steal fire from gods for human

life

Coughlin on Iamblichus: The object of prayer is to raise the supplicant up towards the gods through what he calls "harmonious persuasion."
...Iamblichus identifies this harmonious persuasion with the source of the efficacy of all prayer and all ritual. “Theurgy, Prayer... "

Iamblichus' De Mysteriis gives a theoretical justification for theurgy as religious practice but not goetia which must be otherwise defended
I'm not aware of any explicit Crowleyan uses of Iamblichus but he
does use term "Augoeides" for HGA...does NP theurgy help explain thelema?
Jake Stratton-Kent pointed out that Crowley refers to spirits
appropriately coerced due to their violent nature--Iamblichus parallel?
in his 900 theses on Syrianus, Proclus, Iamblichus, Pico rereads late
Neoplatonic concept of participation in light of Aquinas' developments
Proclus appeals to Pico not only b/c late NP resonates w/ PD
mysticism but also b/c constructed cathedral of theology like Aquinas
Plotinian mysticism can't be exalted as "more rational" than
Iamblichean anymore: better to admit Iamblichus is just as religious
Bussanich: Iamblichus' differences from Plotinus have been
misunderstood/exaggerated, he's still doing mystical union, Platonism
Iamblichus' theurgy isn't sorcery/coercive power grab although
theurgist enjoys practical benefits above fate, among demiurgic
intellections
Iamblichus' theurgy is better explained as a religious ritual with a
mystical aim. I don't see where magic even comes in.

Iamblichus' theurgy takes into account influence of superior
entities, but he's careful to distinguish from "magical" approaches he
dislikes

t3dy: Iamblichus' theurgy rests on NP high ontology, develops sophisticated
angelology to explain mysticism of prayer, illumination, symbol

t3dy: The theurgy of Iamblichus is at great remove from medieval and modern
"theurgy," which is why I raise questions of definition, application

t3dy: @peterbebergal this emphasis of mystical vs magical is a good place
to start. Iamblichus said theurgy has ultimately mystical, not magic aim

Iamblichus is a wonderful model+inspiration for esotericists who want to do Magical Theology, but doesn't justify magic as power techniques.

Iamblichus has been misunderstood as an apologist for magic but his defense of theurgy is as a religious practice (not much modern magic is)

@arcanamanor best is reading Iamblichus himself http://esotericarchives.com/oracle/iambl_th.htm His worldview could inspire many great games

@arcanamanor I'm interested in application of Iamblichean philosophical defense of ritual to video game studies,theurgy's close to "ergodic"

@arcanamanor ah, thanks. That's not such a reliable guide to the theurgy of Iamblichus (although medieval interp's are very interesting too)

Iamblichus--Embodiment+Theurgy, "Shifting Selves in Late Antiquity" http://bit.ly/hJLU5W in Religion+the self in antiquity David Brakke+...
Valerie Flint: For both Porphyry and Iamblichus, the marks of the unacceptable in supernatural exercise, and of 'magic' and evil demons ...
Pico's Christian Cabala is a genre of Dionysian Mystical Theology but within the specific class of Aquinas-influenced Christian Platonism+MP

@tevet I asked about "Thomist Kabbalah" because Pico della Mirandola demonstrates acceptance of Aquinas' angelology-a constraint on his KBL?

Gregory Shaw on "The Platonizing of Popular Religion" http://bit.ly/fcqfdg in Theurgy and the Soul: The Neoplatonism of Iamblichus
ref for Greg Shaw quote below http://bit.ly/gO1BrV
Shaw: Iamblichus developed a soteriological practice that by its very name theourgia defines not what soul does but what gods do to the soul
Janowitz: Rituals Iamblichus rejects are labeled, as expected, magic, for these by definition cannot have any spiritual or pious aspect. p11
Naomi Janowitz: Iamblichus revealed his philosophical snobbery in his rejection of sympathy http://bit.ly/gAaDWX (covers Shaw vs. E.R.Dodds)
Gregory Shaw on Naming the Gods in Iamblichus http://bit.ly/f12l5c in Theurgy and the Soul
[Theurgy / Iamblichus] Sarah Iles Johnston, "Fiat Lux, Fiat Ritus: Divine Light and the Late Antique Defense of Ritual" http://bit.ly/f5m4uP
Gregory Shaw on Ficino following Iamblichus http://bit.ly/gtQeI2
John Dillon, The Platonic Philosopher at Prayer http://bit.ly/ijOZXF
Subjugating the Divine: Iamblichus on Theurgic Evocation http://bit.ly/fVpzPX in The power of religion in late antiquity
Iamblichus in De Mysteriis: spectacles of the gods distinguished from "apparations of technical magic" http://bit.ly/hUgEeY
It was Iamblichus' determination to distinguish between worthless magic and divine theurgy http://bit.ly/h2Dz0u

How does philosophy prepare the soul for mystical union? Copenhaver
draws analogy to NP theurgy, but need to take PD theurgy into account.

"Pico's Mystical Ontology": intellectual process of philosophizing
unity/perfection of angels/number/transcendentals prepares for mystic uni


footnotes on Dionysius and Neoplatonic/Iamblichean theurgy http://bit.ly/f7KSJd

The Theurgic Turn in Christian Thought: Iamblichus, Augustine, Origen, and the Eucharist http://bit.ly/dTsdZt by Jason Parnell


two recent great studies on Dionysian theurgy are on Dionysius+Proclus by Dylan Burns + on Dionysius+Iamblichus by Rebacca Coughlin

Shaw, Gregory, Neoplatonic Theurgy and Dionysius the Areopagite http://bit.ly/eSV4bA

# Pico looked to Iamblichus for metaphysics not magic practices, recognizing a Neoplatonic "divine" philosopher analogous to "angelic"

Aquinas

Pico's felicity via cognitive ascent -- his original take is we learn
how to imitate angels/God by doing ontology at highest level
Does Pico advocate a mysticism of prayer?Although prayer is important
to Iamblichus-Proclus-Dionysius Pico doesn't treat their prayer theory
Pico did not regard Iamblichus as a superstitious magician, but
rather as a metaphysician and fellow theologian, although "occult"

Dionysian theurgy is part of the explanation of how humans can
receive illumination from unparticipated God through material/sensible
world.

Shaw argued Dionysian theurgy same as Iamblichan--not because PD is
magical but b/c Iamblichus is religious--so is Pico correct to like NP?

Pico refers to Iamblichus as doing occult theology, but he doesn't
take an interest in Iamblichean theory of theurgy (or Proclan theurgy)
I don't find any evidence that Pico thought of Iamblichus as a "magical source" in the way that some Renaissance historians have alleged.
When Pico discusses Iamblichus as revealing "occult theology" of the ancients, does he mean something like mystical theology of Dionysius?
Pico does not suspect Iamblichus as an idolatrous sorceror--he never
read Dodds!--nor does he apologize for using Platonists, even "occult"
Does Pico understand Kabbalistic theurgy as non-magical because he
already understands Dionysian theurgy as non-magical? Or not a problem?
Does Pico resonate with KBL theurgy because he recognizes something
similar to his own PD/NP theurgy?Probably not but he saw something there
Does Pico resonate with NP theurgy because he has already absorbed
the theurgy of Dionysius? Probably, but we need to be careful with terms

more senses of theurgy 7)E.R. Dodds vs. Iamblichus on theurgy 8)Dillon takes Iamblichus' protests into account but still finds him magical
Copenhaver: To make his case for natural magic, Pico cites Porphyry but not Iamblichus, and Plotinus gets most of his overt attention.

We need to be careful b/c Iamblichus was anti-[bad]magicWe do not have good enough reason to suspect angel magic because Pico comes close to

theurgies of Iamblichus, Dionysius, KBL: none are magic

Neoplatonic theurgy is not inaccurately described as a method of
transforming sensibles/matter into experience of divine, so is PD theurgy

more Crowley Tweets collected

# @cole_tucker furthermore I think we can learn from Crowley mistakes+adjust our ethical considerations accordingly, know better what to

avoid

@cole_tucker fortunately one can read Crowley disobediently+use methods to construct compassionate/loving mysticism without allergy to other

@cole_tucker Crowley's claim to any attainment of Chesed-consciousness strikes me as laughable considering his utter lack of compassion

@cole_tucker the permissiveness of Chesed doesn't have to be about allowing vice, it can be opening to pleasurable but useful paths as well

@cole_tucker RAW tuned me into Crowleyan methods of designing experiments in Chesed--how to brainwash yrself into thinking yr magic-powered

@cole_tucker Chesed vs. Din is like Huxley's "mind as reducing valve" (was his mescaline vision influenced by his knowledge of Crowley's?)

@cole_tucker I've been thinking a bit about how RAWilson turned me onto this Chesed aspect of Crowley--it's all about opening mind to allow

@cole_tucker at first I missed your reply re: Chesed. That's very interesting and I don't remember reading it before, so doubly good. link?

Ironically Crowley's appropriation of the Kabbalah resembles nothing more than the already violent hermeneutics of the Christian Cabalists

The idea that Kabbalah is a mysticism of play with gematria was born in Pico's violent distranslation of Kabbalah. Crowley doubles the pain.

@cole_tucker OTO is a weird paradox, a system of individuals freeing themselves, but Crowley as Magus is in Control. Only met a few myself.

# Cole Tucker cole_tucker
@t3dy re:Crowley what about the structure of the OTO, attempting to remake society with a spiritual aristocracy

When Conjuring, Don't Bully Spirits: Jake Stratton-Kent vs. Crowley http://www.hadeanpress.com/a-conversation-with-jake-stratton-kent/

@cole_tucker whether or not Crowley is autotheist, his concept of aspiration is key--he's trying to improve something, but mostly himself

# Cole Tucker cole_tucker
@t3dy Crowley claimed to fall into Chesed; vices - tyranny, bigotry, hypocrisy and gluttony

@cole_tucker Crowley said you shouldn't interfere with anothers'True Will,proceeded to dominate+betray all who loved him.Based on principle?

@cole_tucker But Crowley's behavior seems to betray his true intentions. Is he trying to free people or help them be Crowley subordinates?

@cole_tucker I said the other day Crowley's Higher Intelligence (/Univ.Will) seems to get him out of solipsistic problem "only about self"

@cole_tucker problem is that Crowley wasnt consistent as a non-black brother.I don't think Crowley was a good guy or true to his own ethics.

@cole_tucker I agree that these notions might save Crowley from autotheism. But can they be taken at face value? Good problem...

@cole_tucker on the other hand some atheists like Crowley's method, which can be seen as will-development, psychedelic, sexy to materialists


@cole_tucker what's interesting about Crowley is he's pro-science and simultaneously pro-weird theology. Chemistry trained but anti-material

@cole_tucker Crowley is certainly exploring alternative (radical/heretical) theologies--one can find several in his texts--+anti-materialism

@cole_tucker I agree. Crowley's still a mystic, although autotheistic. His rabid anti-xtianity's something in common with militant atheists

# Cole Tucker cole_tucker
@t3dy i'm reading Moonchild right now, and don't see Crowley identifying as our common notion of an atheist

@cole_tucker Crowley synthesizes Christian Mysticism radical notions of becoming one with God, such as Eckhart's w/ Kabbalistic prophecy

Saturday, November 20, 2010 10:45:25 PM via web in reply to cole_tucker

@cole_tucker Crowley's magic might be seen as the logical consequence of a mysticism that takes "union with God" seriously--divinization

@cole_tucker Crowley said "thank God I'm an atheist" and sometimes seems to have a perverse piety, but comes off as an autotheist/solipsist

@cole_tucker I think it's a good line to take. Crowley embraced worst aspects of Frazer's "magic as opposite of religion" but inverted value

# Cole Tucker cole_tucker
@t3dy i'm fascinated by this reading of Crowley as attempting to place self ahead of God

@cole_tucker Crowley's a poor negative theology theorist: his veil concept strikes me as more useful for eclipse of self than eclipse of God

@cole_tucker any serious student of Crowley's Qabala must go beyond the old man's limited understanding of the material,correct his mistakes

@cole_tucker I don't think Crowley understood kabbalah/sefirotic metaphysics so it's hard to comment on the meaning of his Kethers/veils.

http://travelbetweenthepages.com/2010/09/20/more-burroughs-aleister-crowley-jimmy-page/

can anybody recommend (or opine) info about studies of William Burroughs' influence on Ballard, R.A.Wilson? Or influence of Crowley on WSB?

Collected Tweets on Angelology of Aquinas, Biblical Angel

An angel can do nothing outside the entire order of creatures; but he can outside some particular order of nature -Aquinas ST 111.4

An angel causing an imaginative vision, sometimes enlightens the intellect at the same time, so that it knows what these images signify 111

Aquinas ST 111.3 Both a good and a bad angel by their own natural power can move the human imagination.

But sometimes he is instructed by angelic illumination, both that this act is good and as to the reason why it is good -Aquinas

http://www.aeriagloris.com/Resources/quotes/AngelQuotes2.htm

more perfect intellectual life in angels:intellect doesn't proceed to self-knowledge from anything exterior, but knows itself through itself

An angel can illume thought+mind of man by strengthening power of vision+by bringing w/in his reach a truth which angel himself contemplates

We can know God because there is some likeness of Him inside us. -Aquinas St 1.12.4

The created intellect cannot see the essence of God unless God by His grace unites Himself to the created intellect. [Aquinas ST 1.12.4]

God's in all things by his power since all th's are subject to his power...by His essence b/c He is present to all as cause of being.[1.8.3]

angels propose the intelligible truth to men under similitudes of sensible things/human int as inf is strengthened by action of angelic int

the inferior intellect is strengthened by the action of the superior intellect, and according as the intelligible species...grasped -Aquinas

The modes of each of these kinds of enlightenment are in one way alike and in another way unlike. -Aquinas ST 111,1 answer

consider 2 things in words we use to attribute perfections to God-perfections themselves that are signified+way in which they are signified

Aquinas ST 3.7.obj3 "Above the human intellect, in the natural order, are the angels. Therefore the final perfection of the human intellect

is to be united to the angels by contemplation" reply obj3: The lower nature may reach the higher in two ways. First, according to a degree

of the participating power: and thus man's final perfection will consist in his attaining to a contemplation such as that of the angels.

"Man resembles angels, but the intellectual power of an angel is greatly superior to that of a man." Aquinas, Summa Theologiae 2a2e, 180, 7

"Dionysius assigns circular movements to angels so far as they see God uniformly and unceasingly, without beginning or end" -Aquinas, Summa

Theologiae 2a2e, 180, 7

"He attributes the spiral movement to the angel as composed of the circular and the straight so far as the angel attends to lower angels in

conformity with his contemplation of God."

Summa Theologiae 2a2ae, 180, 7 quoted in "Action and Contemplation"

"the name Cherubim comes from a certain excess of knowledge ... possessing this knowledge fully, they pour it forth copiously upon others" ST

108

Dionysius: "The name Seraphim clearly indicates their ceaseless and eternal revolution about Divine Principles."

angels are multiplied not according to numerical division but according to "multitude."

Leo Elders:The question of participation is of great importance in Aquinas' metaphysics

That God wills a creature means that he views it as a possible way of imitating his essence.

Zsolt: the logico-ontological investigation of Aquinas is modified radically by Pico through giving the arrangement of beings an ethical turn

'There would not be a perfect likeness of God in the universe if all things were of one grade of being.'

Stang aim of hierarchies is deifying union of each rank or order with divine source that both permeates and escapes the created hierarchies.

all that is such by participation is reduced to that which is such by its essence. But spiritual substances are forms essentially, corp by p

Bradshaw: Aquinas transforms PD language from ascent tool into emphasis on limits of theology. Does Pico take Dionysian power back?

Aquinas transforms what for PD had been a means of ascent toward God into semantic device for clarifying limitations of theological language

Whatever is received is received according to the nature of the recipient. ~ Saint Thomas Aquinas

Q65. The work of creation of corporeal creatures A3. Whether corporeal creatures were produced by God through the medium of the angels? ST

The perfection of a thing formally consists in its actuality. -Te Velde "Aquinas on God" p.88

The language of participation which is key to the Platonism of Aquinas was developed in the neoplatonism of Proclus and Iamblichus.

"the Platonists said that the separate intellects obtain diverse intelligible species from participation in diverse separate forms" -Aquinas

ST50. THE SUBSTANCE OF THE ANGELS Creatures exist in a series of grades. They participate and represent the goodness of God in various ways.

ST58 mode of angelic knowing lays out human limitations of discursive reasoning vs. angelic knowing all at once--vs. Pico boundaries, hi-int

ST111 ACTION OF ANGELS ON MEN b/c sup. they can enlighten man. They can strengthen the understanding of human beings and make men aware...

In ST 108 Aquinas explains and defends logic of breaking angels into higher middle and lower ranks of hierarchy, but warns our knowledge imp

In ST 61 on "creation of the angels" Aquinas does not see angels as created first and separately, but with world. Existence by Participation

In ST108 Aquinas accepts Dionysian 3-level hierarchy, rules out becoming angels but discusses how by grace humans merit glory of angels


biblical angel tweets

Acts 7:53 Who have received the law by the disposition of angels, and have not kept it.

Matthew 24:26 But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but my Father only. Luke 1:19...[Gabriel]

+the angel answering said unto him,I am Gabriel,that stand in the presence of God+am sent to speak unto thee+to shew thee these glad tidings

Isaiah6:8 Above it stood the seraphims:each one had six wings;w/twain he covered his face,+w/ twain he covered his feet,+w/ twain he did fly

Psalm 103:20 Bless the LORD, ye his angels, that excel in strength, that do his commandments, hearkening unto the voice of his word.

Collossians 1:16 For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible,...

...whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him:

Hebrew 12:22 an innumerable company of angels Daniel 7:10 thousand thousands ministered unto him Luke24:29 a spirit hath not flesh and bones

Hebrews 1:14 Are they not all ministering spirits, sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of salvation?

King James Psalm 6:5 For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honour.