Liber Null & Psychonaut: An Introduction to Chaos Magic - Peter J. Carroll 1987

Evocation
Liber LUX

Evocation is the art of dealing with magical beings or entities by various acts which create or contact them and allow one to conjure and command them with pacts and exorcism. These beings have a legion of names drawn from the demonology of many cultures: elementals, familiars, incubi, succubi, bud-wills, demons, automata, atavisms, wraiths, spirits, and so on. Entities may be bound to talismans, places, animals, objects, persons, incense smoke, or be mobile in the aether. It is not the case that such entities are limited to obsessions and complexes in the human mind. Although such beings customarily have their origin in the mind, they may be budded off and attached to objects and places in the form of ghosts, spirits, or “vibrations,” or may exert action at a distance in the form of fetishes, familiars, or poltergeists. These beings consist of a portion of Kia or the life force attached to some aetheric matter, the whole of which may or may not be attached to ordinary matter.

Evocation may be further defined as the summoning or creation of such partial beings to accomplish some purpose. They may be used to cause change in oneself, change in others, or change in the universe. The advantages of using a semi-independent being rather than trying to effect a transformation directly by will are several: the entity will continue to fulfill its function independently of the magician until its life force dissipates. Being semi-sentient, it can adapt itself to a task in a way that a non-conscious simple spell cannot. During moments of the possession by certain entities the magician may be the recipient of inspirations, abilities, and knowledge not normally accessible to him.

Figure 4. Creating an elemental by combining appropriate symbols to form a sigil.

Entities may be drawn from three sources—those which are discovered clairvoyantly, those whose characteristics are given in grimoires of spirits and demons, and those which the magician may wish to create himself.

In all cases establishing a relationship with the spirit follows a similar process of evocation. Firstly the attributes of the entity, its type, scope, name, appearance and characteristics must be placed in the mind or made known to the mind. Automatic drawing or writing, where a stylus is allowed to move under inspiration across a surface, may help to uncover the nature of a clairvoyantly discovered being. In the case of a created being the following procedure is used: the magician assembles the ingredients of a composite sigil of the being's desired attributes. For example, to create an elemental to assist him with divination, the appropriate symbols might be chosen and made into a sigil such as the one shown in figure 4.

A name and an image, and if desired, a characteristic number can also be selected for the elemental.

Secondly, the will and perception are focused as intently as possible (by some gnostic method) on the elemental's sigils or characteristics so that these take on a portion of the magician's life force and begin autonomous existence. In the case of pre-existing beings, this operation serves to bind the entity to the magician's will.

This is customarily followed by some form of self-banishing, or even exorcism, to restore the magician's consciousness to normal before he goes forth.

An entity of a low order with little more than a singular task to perform can be left to fulfill its destiny with no further interference from its master. If at any time it is necessary to terminate it, its sigil or material basis should be destroyed and its mental image destroyed or reabsorbed by visualization. For more powerful and independent beings, the conjuration and exorcism must be in proportion to the power of the ritual which originally evoked them. To control such beings, the magicians may have to re-enter the gnostic state to the same depth as before in order to draw their power.

Any of the techniques of the gnosis can in theory be used in evocation. An analysis of some of the more common methods follows.

Theurgic Ritual depends solely on visualization and concentration on complex ceremonial to achieve focus. However the effect of increasing the complexity is often to create more distraction rather than draw attention to the matter at hand. Will becomes multiple and the result is often disappointing. Conjuration by prayer, supplication or command is rarely effective unless the appeal be desperate or prolonged till exhaustion ensues. This type of ritual can be improved by the use of poetic exaltation, chanting, ecstatic dancing, and drumming.

The Goetic tradition of the grimoires uses an additional technique. Terror. The grimoires were compiled by Catholic priests, and much of what they wrote was deliberate abomination in their own terms. Transport the whole rite to a graveyard or crypt at midnight and one has compounded a powerful mechanism for concentrating the Kia by paralyzing the peripheral functions of the mind by fear. If the magician can maintain control under these conditions his will is singular and mighty.

The Ophidian tradition uses sexual orgasm to focus the will and perception. It is interesting to note that poltergeist activity invariably centers around the sexually disturbed, usually children at puberty or, more rarely, women at menopause. During these periods of acute tension, intense excitation can channel the mind and allow the life force to manifest frustration outside of the body by hurling objects around.

To perform evocation by the Ophidian method, the attributes of an entity in sigilized form are concentrated on at orgasm and may be afterward anointed with the sex fluids. The process is rather like the deliberate creation of an obsession. If enough power can be put into it, it will be capable of independent existence.

Incubi and succubi are pre-existing entities created by other peoples' pathological sexuality. Incubi traditionally seek sexual intercourse with living females and succubi with males, often in sleep. However both forms are almost invariably male though succubi may make some slight attempt to disguise themselves as females. Unfortunately they are both predatory and stupid, with little power or motivation for anything but sex.

Sacrifice has been used in the past to create fear or terror, or to invoke the gnosis of pain in support of Goetic type evocations. However, this method easily exhausts itself and the sorcerer may end up wading in oceans of blood, much as the Aztecs did, for very little result. Blood sacrifice is most effective and most easily controlled by the use of one's own blood, which is customarily allowed to fall upon the sigil or talisman of the demon. However, the power to control blood sacrifice usually brings with it the wisdom to avoid it in favor of other methods.

Conjuration to visible appearances to prove to oneself, or others, the objective reality of spirits is an ill-considered act. The conditions necessary for its appearance will always allow the retention of the belief that such things are the result of hypnosis, hallucination or delusion. Indeed they are an hallucination, for such things do not normally have a physical appearance and have to be persuaded to assume one. Fasting, sleep, and sensory deprivation combined with drugs and clouds of incense smoke will usually provide a demon with sufficiently sensitive and malleable media in which to manifest an image if commanded to do so.

The medieval idea of a pact is an over-dramatization, but it contains a germ of truth. All one's thoughts, obsessions, and demons must be reabsorbed before Kia can become one with Chaos. However useful such things may be to him in the short term, the sorcerer must eventually recant.