HOLY LIFE

Truth and Virtue, in the contemporary Arte Magical

We live in a society of grey tones, in which relativism has taken over our lives, and the notions of right and wrong are lost amid ambiguities that pursue condescending tact toward sensitive and faint-hearted minds; where the need for freedom of action and thought must outweigh any transcendent and truly important idea that requires sacrifice and resignation to achieve its goal. This is part of the current error of considering that every opinion is valuable and counts, and therefore every voice must be respected; such an argument is based on an egalitarian fallacy that ignores the differentiation between human beings. No, not everyone’s opinion counts, and it is not relevant, despite the comment box on social media that invites any poor inept person to emit the infertile and battered seeds of their ossified minds.

The day I write this entry I am reflecting on the decline in the quality of fantastic literary works, with adaptations focused on satisfying modern political agendas, which usually involves a gross disrespect for the original authors. I am thinking, of course, about the literary work of Professor Tolkien, and how it is being mutilated, dismembered, solely for the sake of profit and the proliferation of hypersensitive sentimentality that seems to infect contemporary society.

It is therefore worth asking: What does this have to do with the Arte Magical?

A lot, actually.

The Hieratic Art, understood as the sacred science, and gift, of the gods, is a hallowed craft, as its name suggests, steeped in a traditionalist, somewhat rural, and—I dare say, despite the scandal it might cause to some—conservative worldview. We have techniques, what I’ve called magical technology, e.g., wands, daggers, circles; these have been maintained, with very few modifications, for millennia. Although some external nuances may have changed due to cultural and geographical adaptations, they generally remain exactly the same, a testament to the effectiveness of such methods, after all, “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” Even with the transfer of magical knowledge from Alexandria to Constantinople, and from there to Venice and the rest of Europe, with all the mutations and omissions that may have been made, the essential foundation of the Arte Magical remains exactly the same; we find that techniques such as the creation of the Magic Circle are so successful and effective that they are present from Mesopotamia, through Egypt, reaching Persia and India, and even the magic of the Chinese Taoist magicians.

This preservation of techniques does not come alone, but is accompanied, not as a mere addition but as an inherent element, by a particular way of seeing and acting in the world. I have emphasized, to the point of satiety for some, although I will continue to do so for your boredom, that magic can only be fully exercised by an individual complete in themselves, characterized by adamantine discipline, resilience, self-control, elevation above common desires and longings, and adherence to a path of virtue; All this implies that his life is sui generis, not trapped in a specific time, as the fingers that will point at me childishly as a retrograde and austere conservative would claim, but rather in a timeless stage, where the values, ethics, and character are still maintained, in a pristine form, crystallized in the living membrane that pulsates in the formative structure of the Hieratic Office, and that help the practitioner to become magnetized to such eternal principles, for the benefit of both his immediate temporal well-being, as well as his most apotheotic aspirations.

In the Arte, there are no half-truths. The argument “truth is a point of view” is not valid. No, truth simply is what it is; such is its purest philosophical definition. What you may say or think about a particular subject may hurt another, but that will not change the facts, nor will hiding it to avoid pain. In this, we must be careful, in the sense that opinion is not necessarily truth. Greek philosophers were very careful to separate opinion from facts and from truth itself, understanding that the latter can only be dimly glimpsed through phenomenal means and grasped only by the soul. However, the Arte Magical, understood as that divine science, emanating from supernal principles, is inextricably tied to Truth; where the latter is not found, Art is absent. This is one of the reasons why, after a genuine initiation, the initiate’s life is undone, passing through traumatic moments of dissolution, because his existence, until now dominated by the mundane and illusory, must give way to the true, to the absolute mystical experience; the foundations of fallacious clay must be demolished in order to build new, true foundations.

To align oneself with this subtle structure, which vivifies and nourishes the effectiveness of magic—and I am referring to the true magic of the gods, not the mere folkloric sorcerous exercise, of a mood and nature subordinate to the former—the practitioner must not only adopt, but fully and organically live, a way of life conducive to the craft one wishes to master. In this, the Subjective Synthesis, a term coined by Dr. Joseph Lisiewski, plays a very important role, but this is not the time to delve into it, although keep it in mind for future presentations. Along with this, leading a life with timeless ethical values, attached to what is correct and not to what is circumstantial, is an irreplaceable mechanism for being able not only to commune effectively with the Powers, but also to wield magic in its highest manifestations, which allow one to achieve liberation from the Wheel of Destiny and the deification of the individual. The mage must, and there is no possible alternative, live a Holy Life.

By the phrase “Holy Life,” I do not mean, although it may be part of it, an ascetic, asexual, sober, and isolated existence (clearly boring for modern man); no, but a life appropriate and conducive to the practitioner’s ends if he or she aims at intimate communion with the gods, the understanding of the Mysteries, and the practice of higher forms of magic, whose complexity is not measured solely by the material requirements of its ceremonies, but in what is required of the officiant to obtain victory and not endanger himself or herself before, during, and after them. There is a popular saying: “You must dress for the office you want, not the one you have,” although a banal quote, it applies, with the appropriate corrections and perspective, to the subject at hand; if you want to be a magician who is in fellowship with the gods, you must aim your life at the divine, moving away from the unclean and inferior, and toward the pure and transcendental.

I was recently telling this to a group of my private students:

The gods do not reveal their mysteries to slaves, but to free men.

There are many forms of slavery, and most of you reading this still have shackles on your feet, imposed by yourself, trapped in your own compulsions and defects.

All of this doesn’t mean that the Holy Life will make everything easier; in some instances, it will be quite the opposite; it will impose difficulties that could easily be avoided by being one of the flock. For example, all my life I have carried internally a series of values, many of them instinctive, reinforced by external education, but whose origin I have always perceived lies in something much deeper, which have brought me heartfelt clashes with the attitudes and character inclinations of many contemporary individuals. I am a man of my word, because the magician is his word, and when I say something, for me it is already a fact. Every expression I make, no matter how frivolous, is an oath. This is not common in the modern individual, full of various excuses and insubstantial justifications, which is why there are not a few occasions to meet those who, with extreme levity, change even their promises made with the highest rigor. I have even known violators of official magical oaths; they never end well in the medium and long term.

I recently received an offer from a certain Spanish-American “magic school” to teach classes with them. One of their instructors wanted to call me on my personal phone to discuss the terms, despite the fact that we had never exchanged a single word, and the invitation came from a third party. I refused such a conversation without first receiving a proper email, which would serve as an official introduction between us. The person clearly resented it, and in the subsequent online meeting that followed the necessary letter, he evidenced a certain predisposition. Although the impasse was overcome, I completely declined the offer, as I was not convinced by their methods in general, and I am extremely protective of my project and anyone I am involved with, precisely because I am faithful and firm in my values and ethos. Some might presume it is a matter of ego, a laughable notion considering that I consider myself, first and foremost, a servant of the Powers and have abandoned all external titles. My students call me master only because they want to; I don’t impose it on them, or need it. The only appreciation that matters to me is that which comes from the deities I serve. A smile from one of my divine allies is worth more than the shining title of Magister or Ipsissimus.

This can be summed up simply as follows: some things are correct and others are not; some are appropriate and others are vulgar; some are false and others are true; the practitioner must know which side to take, remaining true to the living fiber of the Arte Magical, whose timelessness makes it incompatible with the fickle ravings of modernity.

The pursuit of virtue is non-negotiable, which leads to defending positions that may go against the grain, but we already know by now that the opinion of the masses is irrelevant; as Seneca would tell us:

(…) there will be no use for you to reply to me, as if it were a matter of votes: “This side seems to be in a majority.” For that is just the reason it is the worse side. Human affairs are not so happily ordered that the majority prefer the better things; a proof of the worst choice is the crowd. Therefore let us find out what is best to do, not what is most commonly done—what will establish our claim to lasting happiness, not what finds favour with the rabble, who are the worst possible exponents of the truth (De Vita Beata, chapter II).

The modern sentimentality and relativism that creates men who are effeminate and weak, physically and mentally, and women who seem to want to flee in horror from roles that are natural and traditional to them, without this implying that they lose their freedom of action, is not in keeping with a Hieratic Craft that remains immaculate in an aureate aegis of well-defined values, where protocol; the word; the cultivation of body and mind; the search for the divine; respect for the sacred; romantic chivalry (in fact, medieval imagery preserved the ideal of the practitioner quite well, although in a veiled form); veneration of ancestors; loyalty; the fight to the death for what is good and right despite personal danger; honoring parents; the saturnine melancholy for the indeterminate past; fidelity to the beloved; Caring for nature, characterized by a careful admiration, aware of its destructive capabilities, as well as a bucolic attachment to its landscapes; are both crucial and integral to the path itself.

The Arte Magical is tradition, custom, and to a certain extent, conservatism, though the latter has no political implications, as it adheres to ephemeral and transcultural principles. We’re not talking here about liberals and conservatives from governmental and social perspectives; we’re talking about virtue and its absence, to the sad benefit of those harmful constructs that the modern inferior man, who composes the masses, raises like a flag.

Over the years of practice, I have encountered several self-proclaimed magicians who were obese, liars, unfaithful, slackers, smokers, alcoholics, and drug addicts; leading ordinary lives and behaviours, not unlike any bum on a rotten street corner, giving in to every desire or impulse, destroying their bodies and minds through vain pleasures.

In ancient Persia, the highest magi were considered such not only because of their mastery of the most elaborate and difficult rites, but also because they possessed the greatest possible self-control; they were absolutely self-possessed. This made them truly free, for they had conquered their greatest slave master: themselves.

The Holy Life offers such liberation, but only to those who wish to walk the most superior and difficult of paths, that of divine magic, reserved only for the best, those men and women of excellence, kings and queens among common men, subjects of the senses.