Nighside Represetations

Although some magicians as Austin Spare and Kenneth Grath sought a nightside methodically, as always there were many like Lovecraft who gave up into him accidentally.

Some representations of nightside in manga Berserk:

  

Difference between GBM and MBM

Before definition of MBM (Medial Black Magic) all MBM was called GBM (Greater Black Magic), so it can bring some confusion between the two.

In Black Magic Book of Aquino, Medial Black Magic, is discussed as follows:

" It is easy to focus strongly and exclusively on either one or the other of these two categories, so much so that we miss that grey area wherein they blend. Let us call this Medial Black Magic (MBM).

MBM involved the use of the Magical Link in its simplest, most direct form in an operative context. Unlike LBM, in which the magician uses forces and features which are of the objective universe to accomplish his goal, MBM has similar goals but uses metaphysical means - the Magical Link - to realize them. It is not as "pure" as true GBM.
"

The difference between GBM and MBM is a difference in intent. 
MBM plans to change the subjective universe to cause a change in the objective universe. 
GBM intends to change the subjective universe  to perceive oneself (own SU) or cause a change in the subjective universe, although it can cause an unintended change (good or bad depending on the perspective) in the objective universe through synchronism.

The final objectives of MBM and LBM are the same.

THE PRINCE AND THE MAGICIAN

"THE PRINCE AND THE MAGICIAN

Once upon a time there was a young prince, who believed in all things but three. He did not believe in princesses, he did not believe in islands, he did not believe in God. His father, the king, told him that such things did not exist. As there were no princesses or islands in his father’s domaines, and no sign of God, the young prince believed his father.
But then, one day, the prince ran away from his palace. He came to the next land. There, to his astonishment, from every coast he saw islands, and on these islands, strange and troubling creatures whom he dared not name. As he was searching for a boat, a man in full evening dress approached him along the shore.
“Are those real islands?” asked the young prince.
“Of course they are real islands,” said the man in evening dress.
“And those strange and troubling creatures?”
“They are all genuine and authentic princesses.”
“Then God also must exist!” cried the prince.
“I am God,” replied the man in full evening dress, with a bow.
The young prince returned home as quickly as he could.
“So you are back,” said his father, the king.
“I have seen islands, I have seen princesses, I have seen God,” said the prince reproachfully.
The king was unmoved.
“Neither real islands, nor real princesses, nor a real God, exist.”
“I saw them!”
“Tell me how God was dressed.”
“God was in full evening dress.”
“Were the sleeves of his coat rolled back?”
The prince remembered that they had been. The king smiled.
“That is the uniform of a magician. You have been deceived.”
At this, the prince returned to the next land, and went to the same shore, where once again he came upon the man in full evening dress.
“My father the king has told me who you are,” said the young prince indignantly. “You deceived me last time, but not again. Now I know that those are not real islands and real princesses, because you are a magician.”
The man on the shore smiled.
“It is you who are deceived, my boy. In your father’s kingdom there are many islands and many princesses. But you are under your father’s spell, so you cannot see them.”
The prince returned pensively home. When he saw his father, he looked him in the eyes.
“Father, is it true that you are not a real king, but only a magician?”
The king smiled, and rolled back his sleeves.
“Yes, my son, I am only a magician.”
“Then the man on the shore was God.”
“The man on the shore was another magician.”
“I must know the real truth, the truth beyond magic.”
“There is no truth beyond magic,” said the king.
The prince was full of sadness.
He said, “I will kill myself.”
The king by magic caused death to appear. Death stood in the door and beckoned to the prince. The prince shuddered. He remembered the beautiful but unreal islands and the unreal but beautiful princesses.
“Very well,” he said. “I can bear it.”
“You see, my son,” said the king, “you too now begin to be a magician.”

"
- John Fowles, The Magus

The setianism don't is a path of deny of OU Universe.

In my eyes "Principe and Magus" is tale what says how we can live separated from OU universe.

If ilusion is everywhere, we have that embrace it and live through it. Through ilusion we can grow and Xeper, or we can deny it and die petrified in our Subjective Universe. The contrary position of acceptation of ilusions is a idealistic and irrealistic position. Each one communicate and create art through disponible means.

"Why does isolate intelligence matter?" - Or - "To Whom does it matter?"

"Setian philosophy focuses upon the isolate self consciousness. This is an individual phenomenon. You are either alert to it, aware of it, committed to an ever-increasing apprehension and expansion of it; or you are indifferent to it just as you are to breathing. In the former case you become a god with eternal existence and the ability to create your own universes. In the latter case you are simply a temporarily assembled meat machine, metabolizing for awhile until it disintegrates and recombines into other OU elements.

If, as with your example of a preoccupied OU manipulator such as Steve Jobs, your entire force of will is outwards to the OU, you will remain defined by it. Your mind will be a kind of stimulus/response computer, which like all other OU machines will function until it breaks down.

So this is the answer to the first revised question: It matters because it determines which future awaits you: divinity or animalism, eternal existence or temporary metabolism, Xeper or Nothing.

The "to whom?" follows from this. It matters or does not matter only to you, each isolate self consciousness. As many others as you know, including as family, close friends, 600Cers; all of these exist in their own SUs, of which your existence, whether divine or animal, is of no enforced consequence to theirs. To them you are only what meaning they assign to you, whether consciously as gods or as they just bump into you animalistically from time to time. You may assume for the sake of comfort and reassurance that you are "part of them". This is delusion. You are utterly sole, utterly alone against all else. Most people, particularly noninitiates, find this frightening and go to great self-deceptive lengths to deny it, sublimate it [as in the profane religions], blot it out. The Setian does not.

As for Set: As I daresay has been explained here before, this is the neter, Pythagorean/Platonic Form, or general principle. We call it "Set" because that is the lens through which we first became aware of it in 1975. You could call it by that or any other name which communicates its existence and essence to you as one of its particularizations.

You matter to Set because here you are, created with this divine option which only he can bring into being. He matters to you only if you are aware of, and appreciate his Gift. Otherwise he is just a cartoon figure with a long nose found on a few crumbling Egyptian ruins."

- Michael Aquino, 600club

Difference between LBM and GBM

"By 1970 this "Satanic tent revivalism" was already history. BM was being refined into LBM and GBM: the former involving operational goals by setting in motion whatever OU forces, known and obscure, necessary to achieve them or at least increase their probability; the latter being a focus and intensification of consciousness, enhanced by "ritual chamber" sensory reinforcement, to perceive oneself and the contents of one's SU with greater intelligence and precision.
...
While my MindWar book is written for exoteric audiences, it could from an esoteric perspective be considered a LBM "grimoire"; and it constantly emphasizes the ethical issues of its application. It will give you some idea of just how dark and deep an ocean you're diving into if you really want to venture into this subject."

- Michael Aquino in 600 club


In "Black Magic" Dr. Aquino writes on Lesser Black Magic:

Lesser Black Magic (LBM) is the influencing of beings, processes, or objects in the objective universe by the application of obscure physical or behavioral laws.

LBM is an impelling (encouraging, convincing, increasing of probability) measure, not a compelling (forcing, making inevitable) one. The object if to make something happen without expending the time and energy to make it happen through direct cause-and-effect.

and on Greater Black Magic:

Greater Black Magic (GBM) is the causing of change to occur in the subjective universe in accordance with the will. This change is the subjective universe may cause a similar and proportionate change in the objective universe (MBM).

Later two divisions between the kinds of GBM that exist is made:

You undertake a GBM working because you want to understand something or because you want to change something. The former type may be referred to as an illustrative working, while the latter is often called an operative working. Each takes effect by expanding and/or altering your subjective universe, which then exerts a corresponding and proportionate influence upon the objective universe - and other subjective universes - via the Magical Link phenomenon.

GBM, what is?

"It is now appropriate to explore the phenomenon of GBM itself.

 What is it, how does it work, and how may the Setian begin to experience it? 

 Greater Black Magic (GBM) is the causing of change to occur in the SU in accordance with the will. This change in the SU may cause a similar and harmonious change in the OU. 

 Examine this definition.

A deliberate effort is made to alter one's subjective frame of reference, so that a thing which used to be conceptualized one way is now conceptualized in another. 

A distasteful situation may be adjusted to produce a favorable outcome; a live enemy may be adjusted to be thwarted or nonexistent; a desire of any sort may be realized. Magical manuals from the medieval grimoires to the Satanic Bible have discussed the use of imagery as an aid to this process.

Perhaps the most stereotypical example of this is the sticking of pins into a wax effigy to cause harm. In Walt Disney's Dumbo the little elephant was given a feather to hold with his trunk. He was told that it was a magic feather which would enable him to fly - and he did so by flapping his ears. 

When he eventually lost the feather, he started to fall, until he was told that the feather was really nothing more than an ordinary feather. As soon as he realized that he was the source of the "magic", he flapped his ears again and regained altitude. Photographs, wax images, talismans, music, fires, swords, statues, and indeed entire ritual chambers have no more intrinsic magic in them than Dumbo's feather. 

Their effectiveness in magic, again like Dumbo's feather, comes from their significance to the magician. If he grants them certain powers in his SU - if he credits them with atmospheres, auras, curses, or blessings - they will assuredly have them. 

They will possess these qualities absolutely in the SU. Once this occurs, the phenomenon of the ML between the SU and OU will transfer a portion of the quality to the items' objective mass. The potency and endurance of the transfer depends upon the skill and willpower of the consecrating magician, the scope of the working, the amount of distortion in the OU attempted, and a wide variety of physical and environmental factors which may range from sunspot activity to a sore toe which intrudes upon the magician's concentration. 

Perception and activation of the imbued qualities by another magician will similarly depend upon the skill and willpower which he brings to bear upon such objects. 

The implications of this principle are fascinating. Among other things it explains why sophisticated magical workings based on a variety of different gods or pantheons have worked. It makes no difference whether the gods be socially generated (like those of ancient Greece) or personally created (like those of H.P. Lovecraft). 

It makes no difference whether the Enochian Keys be phrased in honor of YHVH (as in John Dee's diaries), in honor of Satan (as in the Satanic Bible), or in honor of Set (as in the Word of Set). 

Accusations of heresy, blasphemy, and/or inauthenticity - whether historically justified or not - are simply barking up the wrong tree from a magical standpoint. Another implication of the operational principle of GBM is that there is a large amount of it "loose" in the OU by individuals who are generating it without calling it by that name and without even realizing what they are doing. 

Every time we have an "objective impression" of something possessing a quality which its physical characteristics do not substantiate, we are sampling the results of a GBM operation on the OU. 

 To take a few common examples: Snakes and rats are usually thought to be sneaky and evil, birds and cats beautiful; smog and sludge unnatural, trees and flowers natural. Many SUs agree upon and reinforce such interpretations, and in the OU it becomes increasingly difficult to identify the phenomenon in question without the subjectively-imposed "overlay". [Such overlays may also be called "biases", "prejudices", or "points of perspective".] 

 We are thus the victims of a world-wide GBM epidemic which has manifest itself as political ideologies, artistic aesthetics, advertising, social morality, etc. We cannot honestly say that we "live" in the OU, but rather in a crazy-quilt of SU overlays on the OU. 

The first thing the magician must do is realize this; the second thing he must do is attempt to see and understand the actual OU through all the layers. The third thing he must do is attempt to change parts of the OU carefully and precisely through his own magical workings, both LBM and GBM. 

 The "unconscious" GBM of profane society works because of sheer mass, as a herd of buffalo will break through a fence that would easily stop any one of them. At the same time this profane effort is chaotic, unreliable, and ultimately random in its consequences. Attempts to control such massive social forces have been made by many political and religious leaders throughout history. 

All have failed in  whole or in part, even when the illusion of control could be created.

 The individual Black Magician cannot change the OU through raw force; his is only a single, isolate will. He does possess, however, an understanding of how GBM works and the consequent ability to narrow his use of it to a precise, directed focus. It is this focus that enables his workings to succeed. If you have never undertaken GBM Workings before, some of the preconditions for them may strike you as unnecessary, even adolescent. Be patient, and you will come to see why they are not. You may think that you possess great powers of imagination, particularly if you have some skill at art, music, writing, or some similar form of creative expression. Consider, however, that your soul - which communicates with the OU through your brain - constantly receives reinforcement of OU reality through your five physical senses. 

This reinforcement tends to act as a kind of "shock absorber" to your mind, cushioning and compensating for all ideas that do not correspond to OU parameters. What you will be doing in a formal GBM working is to change the signals which are received by your five senses, bringing them into synchronization with the concept on which you intend to focus. 

Thus you prepare for a working by constructing an artificial environment in the OU most closely attuned to it: a ritual chamber. There is no "official" design, nor required contents for a Setian ritual chamber. Our Reading List exemplifies how widely our interests vary, and a working emphasizing any one Category of that List [or any other concept] would require appropriate accoutrements. Thus a "classic Black Mass" in the most delicious tradition of Gothic horror novels might recreate the atmosphere of a gloomy, medieval crypt. 

A ritual utilizing spacial/dimensional concepts might make use of odd, Expressionistic angles, optical illusions, mirrored or irregular lighting effects, and atonal or unharmonious sound effects. Workings concerned with space may take place under the starry sky in a desert, where the absence of reflected light from cities reveals the cosmos in all its glory ... or in planetariums, observatories, or astrophysics laboratories. The more care you take to find or create the proper environment, the more potent the working itself will be...
" - Michael Aquino, Black Magic 1975-2010

Is Occult Bogus?

"“OCCULTISM”- by Michael A. Aquino VI°
The Scroll of Set, August 1993 CE
Temple of Set

Over the last 27 years of the Æon of Set we have come a long way in terms of the occult arts and sciences. Much of our Church of Satan period was devoted to separating sense from nonsense - both in terms of old/traditional occultism and in the current context of pseudosciences and “new age” occult interests and fads. Whatever else may be said about him, Anton LaVeydeserves credit for putting the torch to “occult” concepts that were nothing more than lingering relics from medieval nonsense - and looking instead for authentic and practical principles of a “hidden/forbidden” nature.

By X/1975 we had pretty much sorted through the “old” occult - at least within the Judæo/ Christian tradition, which was conclusively exposed as nothing more than imperfect plagiarism from pre-existing Mediterranean religions and philosophies. Into the sewer it went in its entirety - save that we chose to use some of its “demonic” symbols for our own illustrative, artistic, or sometimes mischievously-entertaining purposes.

Here I should add that this was by no means a simple, one-time operation. Periodically we have had to re-flush the toilet because the contents of the bowl keep backing up. There are a few obvious reasons for this:

(1) The Temple of Set exists primarily in countries and cultures in which J/C is not only the dominant social religion, but also the tacitly-acknowledged basis for civic morality generally. Hence the prescriptions of the Enlightenment’s social-contract philosophers for some blend of pulp-feed Christianity as a way to keep the masses quiet and obedient.

(2) Persons who enter the Temple of Set generally come from some degree of J/C psychological conditioning in their youth and adulthood. They bring J/C values and precepts along with them, either consciously or unconsciously, either positively ["I don’t have to abandon all my good moral principles, do I?"] or negatively ["I can hardly wait to get into the Temple so I can get even with that hateful, hypocritical J/C which has wrecked my life to date!"]. Such persons tend to see the Temple of Set through J/C “glasses” and to conduct themselves within it accordingly.

(3) As a religion designed to appeal to and control stupid and/or uneducated people, J/C has the best “Marvel Comics” imagery. It is much easier and more emotionally gratifying to construct fantasies, art, and pageantry based upon the well-known “toons” of Satan, Jesus, JHVH and other J/C characters than upon Ahura Mazda, Quetzalcoatl, etc. And of course in dramatic relations with profane [J/C-trained] society, it is far easier to impress or shock someone by saying “I’m a Satanist” [which makes people scream and run] instead of saying “I’m a Quetzalcotalian” [which makes people just blink and stare].

So there are various reasons why all of us, myself included, tend to lapse into J/C imagery from time to time. It’s not a problem as long as we know what we’re doing and why, and don’t allow ourselves to be governed by it, either consciously or unconsciously.

Take Enochiana as an example. This was a system developed by John Dee based firmly on J/C imagery: angels, demons, and a Hebrew Cabalistic schematic of “creation”. If you believe in it as John Dee wrote it down, you’re a good little amateur Hebrew.

First Mathers, then Crowley, then LaVey saw it for what it was: a collection of confusing gobbledegook which they could reword here and there and use as an LBM device to impress their followers. And so it did. People would read the Satanic Bible and say of the first half, “Yeah, he’s got a point, but all this social critique stuff doesn’t look very ‘occult’ to me.” Then they’d reach the Enochian Keys, be properly mystified by both the Enochian and the English versions, and say, “Wow, this is spooky & weird stuff. Apparently he does know something ‘occult’ that the rest of us don’t.”

And of course the “Dumbo’s feather” principle [cf. "Black Magic" in the Crystal Tablet] applied beautifully. We dutifully used the Enochian Keys in C/S rituals and they did exactly what we expected them to do [i.e. what Anton said they would do!] without realizing that they held no intrinsic power at all, but instead served as “keys (apt name!) to unlock” certain dormant/latent powers within our own beings.

The Word of Set Working with the Keys was thus a “pure” working with them, in which the original Dee “Enochian” and “translations” were used as a “magical trigger” to get at a coherent reality underlying Dee’s J/C-filtered thoughts. [For a detailed discussion of the principles involved, see Plato’s Meno and other dialogues concerning the recollective basis of abstract knowledge.]

The same holds true for any other “system” of magic, whether a poem, painting, incantation, Tarot reading, I Ching wand-casting, or whatever: It is a “trigger” or “key” to unlock, inspire, or activate a certain power, level of consciousness, and/or mode of existence within yourself or others. Dumbo’s feather. As long as you understand this, you won’t go wrong with magic [or make a fool - or tool - of yourself].

At our present point in social time - the 1990s - what does it mean to be an “occultist”?

It should mean what it always has: to seek after, possess, and apply secret knowledge [for whatever purpose]. Think about that. Think about how you might go about doing it [and I’m not talking about going to the “New Age” section of your local bookstore].

Secret knowledge is either (a) stuff that exists but hasn’t been discovered or made coherent yet, or (b) stuff that exists but has been suppressed or distorted by people with the power to do so, because it conflicts with their interests. Sometimes occult knowledge is a mixture of both (a) and (b).

Books get on the Temple of Set’s reading list because they contain (a) or (b) information. But the reading list, like everything else about the Temple of Set, is a guide, a nudge in the right direction: a tool. You can find authentic occult knowledge almost anywhere - although never where the public is told that it exists.

Reality within reality. This is why the Temple of Set is at once a simple thing [in that we have a commitment to speaking the truth plainly] and a complicated thing [in that simple truths, when examined carefully, often contain a sub-universe of factors which aren’t nearly so simple].

Another aspect of this: the role of “religion” in one’s intellectual state of being.

I see every letter that comes to the Executive Director requesting admission to the Temple of Set. Some are very impressive. Some include a comment something like this:

"I was raised in Christianity but became disillusioned with it. So I tried Buddhism, Wicca, blah blah, and finally I found the Temple of Set, and this is clearly the religion for me!"

That’s nice, but it implies that the Temple of Set occupies roughly the same niche in one’s mental makeup that the ding-dong religions did; we just do it better. Consider this:

The premise of all ding-dong religions is that you start with them and allow rational, logical, and scientific knowledge to “fill in the cracks” where they are conspicuously inadequate, or where their doctrines are at flagrant odds with common sense.

The Temple of Set is 180° away from this. To “do the Temple of Set right”, first you start with a sound rational, logical, and scientific knowledge base - both social and technical. You keep “religion” the hell out of this area [except in your analysis of social phenomena as a tool for popular control - see above].

Once you have explained everything you can using rational, logical, and scientific tools, and see that there are some things “left over”, then you are at the point where you need to construct a tool to (a) make those things comprehensible to you and (b) perhaps apply some of them to your interaction with existence. Then and only then should you bring the Temple of Set into your life.

Remember how we keep harping on the Temple of Set’s being only a tool? Well, this is when you apply that tool - to address those rarefied subjects that ordinary tools cannot.

“Metaphysical philosophy” (or GBM) is this tool used for understanding and analysis.

“Magic” (or LBM) is this tool used to affect your environment.

Because this is a realm of existence which is incompletely and imperfectly known, the tool to render it comprehensible and controllable is also imperfect. It works well in some ways, not so well in others. It also varies from individual to individual, from perspective to perspective, from perception to perception. This is why the “same” Temple of Set appears to be so many different things to different Setians.

Sum-up time:

(1) Recognize your pre-Setian conditioning for what it is, good or bad. Bring it to the surface. Keep the good [without apology for its source]. Chuck the bad.

(2) As a Setian, strive to control yourself for consciously, carefully, and deliberately-decided [by you!] reasons and goals.

(3) Be a real occultist.

(4) In the pyramid of your consciousness, put religion on the top, not the bottom. "
- Posted by michael aquino in http://www.the600club.com/topic84425-2.html

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I am not a member of the temple of Set.
The opinions expressed on this blog are those of the authors alone and do not officially represent the Temple of Set.
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