Espiritus

Evocation can be defined as the calling forth of an entity from another plane of existence to an external manifestation in either the astral or physical plane.

INTRODUCTION
magician felt a surge of excitement run through him as he icked up the leather-bound book. He carefully opened the old diary to the section marked "Conjuration," and began to read by the red light of the filtered lamp onthe altar. When the oration was completed, the magician glanced at the painted wooden triangle he had positioned outside the magic circle. Toward the center of the equilateral triangle, smoke rose from a brass censer in a steady stream, filling the entire room with the scent of peppermint. Scattered about this glowing bowl were pieces of iron, garnet, and red jasper; to the right of the censerstood a metal figurine of a scorpion that cast moving shadows on the floor as the glow of the coals illuminated it. Slowly, the magician's gaze fixed upon the small object at the base of the triangle. The red light in the room, combined with the faint glow of the censer, clearly showed the symbol drawn on the round piece of paper. It was this sigil that the magician began to focus on as he closedhis eyes. In a few moments, the magician held up his wand and slowly started opening his eyes. The name "Phalegh," which he had been repeating mentally,

escaped his lips as a whisper, and he continued calling the Mars spirit out loud. With each repetition of the name, the magician opened his eyes a little more, and his voice grew in volume and resonance. Hovering in the smoke before him, a tall,muscular man with glowing orange eyes was staring at the magician. He was dressed in red and held a long brilliant sword in his right hand. A low rumbling sound began to fill the room, and continued to grow louder as the figure standing in the triangle became clearer. The magician pointed his wand at the spirit and greeted him. The evocation was a success, and the magician could now communicatewith the spirit freely. Magical evocation is one of the most fascinating yet misunderstood practices in the occult world. The idea of calling forth a spirit from another plane to visible appearance, and of consequently commanding it to perform some deed, has fascinated occultists since at least the beginning of written history, and most likely before. But why the fascination? Ask anyone who hasread a grimoire such as the Goetia or the Necronomicon and they'll tell you why. These books promise great power and wealth to the would-be evoker. Most of the spirits presented within their pages are described as being able to grant the magician a number of remarkable things, including the locations of hidden treasures, the admiration of others, supernatural abilities (such as teleportation,enormous strength, and even flight), and all forms of knowledge from languages to sciences, making it pretty clear why the practice of evocation has maintained its hold on the minds of magicians all over the world. What could .be more exciting than rea9.ing a few lines from a book and having some supernatural being grant you anything your heart desires? All you have to do is make sure the words arepronounced correctly, right? Wrong. The grimoires of ancient times weren't meant to teach someone how to do evocations. They were more like notebooks or magical diaries. A magician would only write in them the things he or she experimented with, or didn't have time to memorize. Because of this, these tomes of mystical knowledge are terribly incomplete and utterly useless to the uninitiated magician.The wordy conjurations found in them are only part of a systematic, magical process. Of course, when I was younger I didn't know this. Like many others before me, I bought my copy of the Goetia (one of the books of the Lesser Key of Solomon) and decided to practice conjurations. Using a piece of chalk, I drew a rough facsimile on the floor of the magic circle shown in the book (boy, did that...