The Brass Goggles Occult Society...The Esoteric Order of the Brazen Dawn...

[rovingjack]

had a grand old adventure tonight. Started for reasons I'm struggling to recall at an island continent sunk beneath the waves some 8200 years ago (fascinating to remember the people of that land lived with the likes of the unicorns). and the fleeing from those lands being about the right time for Fomorians to appear on the nearest body of land. While ineresting to note the stories of Utrost to be taking place in about the same region.

Which leads to the Huldufolk, which meanders through one of the orgin tales for them, which has a stark similarity to the story of Lilith. Which I've often wondered might be the source of the people in the land of Nod.

Then Back around to sunken islands for some exploration of orichalcum, which for all I've been able to figure out is a form of copper that is often golden and harder than standard copper... aka brass (or at the very least a form of natural yellow bronze).

Interesting to note that tin and zinc deposits come from that same regions about that time and right around that time the first honest metalworking starts to take off. along with agriculture and the first cities.

but I still find it especially amusing that orichalcum might actually be brass.

[MWBailey]

Could be what's sometimes called "red brass." I'm not much of a metallurgist, though.

[Inverurie Jones]

See, that's where Skyrim really missed a trick; 'Dwemer metal'? Really? And 'orichalcum' is..green plasticine?

[Khem Caigan]

Hi, All -


I read The Beat Godfather, The Great Beast,
& the Necronomicon over on RealitySandwich.com
a while back (and thanks for the link - you know who
you are).

It's over here :

http://tinyurl.com/k8nnzlp

Seeing as it's excerpted from the [ now released ]
Mandrake offering, The Magical Universe of
William S. Burroughs, it's too late for any
more corrections to be made to the text.

Hopefully, it will see another edition where some of
the more egregious errors will be corrected. I take
work as a proofreader, among other things ( I proofed
the American editions of Kenneth Grant's books while
I was living at the Samuel Weiser warehouse in
Manhattan, shortly before the production of the
'Con ), and this sort of thing irks me.

So, for the record, it's Schlangekraft, not
"Schlangenkraft".

And I didn't assist Harry Everett Smith in an
attempt at compiling a concordance of Enochian -
we produced the darn thing, basing it upon the
then-recently released Casaubon excerpts of Dee's
manuscripts (A True and Faithful Relation of What
Passed for Many Years between Dr. John Dee and
Some Spirits, Magickal Childe Publishing, Inc.,
1992), with shoeboxes to contain all of the pieces
of Chelsea Hotel stationery that we employed.

Our concordance had absolutely nothing to do with
anything that Crowley had produced.

If anybody wants to take a look at it, presumably
the Getty has it under lock and key, along with
much else, owing to the depredations of someone
that used to bring Harry beer and cigarettes upon
occasion.

Next, the author goes on to misquote me :

" It was about that time that William Burroughs
dropped by, having caught wind of a "Necronomicon"
in the neighbourhood. After going through the
pages and a few lines of powder, he offered the
comment that it was "good shit." He might have
meant the manuscript too . . ."

What I actually wrote was :

" It was during this time that William Burroughs
dropped by, having caught wind of a "Necronomicon"
in the neighbourhood. After going through the
pages & a few lines of powder, he offered the
comment that it was "good shit." He might have
meant the manuscript, too - check out the
'Invocation' on page xvii of his Cities of the
Red Night: Humwawa, Pazuzu and Kutulu are listed
among the Usual Suspects. "

You may still access the webpage from which this
quote derives at Archive.org :

http://tinyurl.com/kbn2lxt

Some of the links still work, thanks to the
magic of Archive.org but, strangely, the Cities
of the Red Night page is missing.

That, too, may be viewed here, on another
version of the webpage, then hosted on Flash.net
following its tenure on Bway.net :

http://tinyurl.com/mooe859

So much for proofreading / picking nits.

I have upon occasion been portrayed as somehow
distant from all of the personalities and
goings-on around the creation of the 'Con.

Fact is, I slept on a couch outside the temple
that Jim Wasserman and I built in Jane Nelson's
loft on Howard Street ( the locked temple door
that was discovered mysteriously 'opened' was
just across from my couch - make of that what
you will ).

I heard the rats running overhead across the tin
ceiling every night on their scavenging rounds.
There was a factory upstairs, with lots of yummy
garbage available. Like many of the buildings
around Canal Street, we were infested with rats
- long before the 'Con came along.

And I occasionally bunked downstairs from Jane
and Jim with Bonnie Nielsen and Lia Colla, aka
'Feint Type'. They set the text of the 'Con on
the old word-processor that I had lugged to their
loft from the Weiser warehouse on Broadway, a
little ways north of Houston Street.

I was at Bonnie and Lia's loft on one occasion
when Burroughs dropped by for a look at the 'Con
(the incident related above, with the powder)
and, awhile later, escorted over to his "Bunker"
for a visit by James Grauerholz, Burrough's
assistant and Bonnie's ex. I was invited to sit
in the infamous Orgone Box, and did so.

We discussed the work of George de la Warr,
Solco Tromp, Cleve Backster, L'Abbe Nollet,
Cecil Maby - Bill was widely read and his ideas
on magic were, and sadly still are, ahead-of-
the-curve. Bill and Harry [ Everett Smith ]
knew and spoke about a lot of the same military
-industrial folks who were also involved in the
'human potential movement', such as Arthur
Middleton Young - inventor of the Bell Helicopter.

Anyhow, apart from my peeves, I am looking
forward to receiving a copy of The Magical
Universe of William S. Burroughs.

Cors in Manu Domine,


~ Khem Caigan

[Khem Caigan]

Another text from the E.'.O.'.B.'.D.'. Archives :

A Complete Book of Magic Science
transcribed by Frederick Hockley, 2008.
( 18.6 MB .PDF )

This file may be downloaded from the URL
provided below :

http://tinyurl.com/zn398zm

This file will be up until January 25.

Following that, if anyone would like
a copy, please feel free to message
or email me.

This text is Hockley's edition of the
Grimoire of Turiel.

[Khem Caigan]

As with grimoires in general, the Complete
Book of Magic Science contains a great
deal of useful information interspersed with
scribal errors in the form of misreadings,
misspellings, interpolations and confused
attributions.

For example, on page eight we find :

" Make the pentacles, lamens, and
provide all other things necessary.

And let the circle be increasing. "

In the Grimoire of Turiel, we find :

" Make the pentacles forthwith and
provide the other things necessary,
with Incensing. "

Which is to say, all of the implements
ought to be Perfumed prior to your
Working.

The sentence referring to the "circle"
has been badly truncated owing to scribal
error ( presumably before this text ever
came into Hockley's hands ), and should
read :

" Let the circle of the Moon be
increasing and equal, if it can be done;
but especially let her not be Combust,
or in Via Combusta, which is between
fourteen degrees of Libra and fourteen
degrees of Scorpio, and let the Moon
be aspecting a Planet favorable to your
endeavour. "

[Athanor]

According to author Colin Low, whose work deserves to be much better known than it is, the real Necronomicon hasn't been written yet; it is not a grimoire in the traditional sense because it assumes a level of scientific (and especially cosmological) knowledge that simply did not exist before the 20th century.

From http://digital-brilliance.com/kab/essays/pressure.htm ;

One difficulty I have is that as a practising magician and industrial researcher for over thirty years I have learned that some ideas have a kind of ontological pressure behind them. It is like holding an acorn and asserting that the oak tree exists. A statement of this kind may violate many of the common sense rules of language, but for me this shows that common sense language lacks subtlety of expression, and there are many kinds of useful statement I would like to make without a huge pedagogical preamble. The oak tree does exist in potentia, and the real argument is about how we rank existence in potentia versus bark and bird’s nests. It is in precisely this sense that I am prepared to state that the Necronomicon is a real book.

This is not the kind of answer that many people want to hear however so I have made the more satisfactory argument that the Necronomicon hinted at from the contextual framework of Lovecraft’s fiction is not a book that could have existed in the ancient world. It is an outcome of Lovecraft’s modern consciousness of the universe. It has attained a powerful mythic credibility precisely because it squares the circle: in a modern world where no grimoire has authority, the Necronomicon has this awe-inspiring authority while still being a grimoire. It is like the Cretan who stated that all Cretans are liars. An essential aspect of its authority is that it is content free - had Lovecraft provided any substantial content other than the vague hints we have, we would tear it to pieces like any other supposed work of authority.

I believe a book like the Necronomicon could not have existed in the past, and cannot exist in the present. It will exist in the future.

The reason I believe this is that my radar as a professional researcher tells me that a new enlightenment is in the offing. The first enlightenment transformed our relationship with the universe, so that instead of a living cosmos maintained by a divine hierarchy of being we found ourselves in a dead machine to be investigated using scientific method.

The new enlightenment is a non-dualist understanding of matter, life, and human consciousness that transcends to vocabulary of the past, where the key concepts are emergence, simulation and information. The reductive, mechanistic language of mid-twentieth century science will be discarded. The universe will once more become a place of unfathomable mystery and complexity, where life is not a frail accident but one of the most important physical processes, alongside gravity and stellar fusion. It is a new gnosticism without the inherent dualism of the past. In this vast, utterly alien, terrifying, unfathomably complex universe, Lovecraftian protagonists will journey and record their travels and experiences. One thousand years from now someone will be able to read the Necronomicon. Not a spoof, nor a fabrication... it will be the book Lovecraft intuitively grasped.

Someone alive today may be its author. In potentia of course.

Colin Low's other essays are also well worth reading. You can find them at
http://digital-brilliance.com/kab/essays/index.htm

Believe nothing; question everything; think for yourself!

Athanor.

[Athanor]

...... but then, on the other hand, there is the Pseudonomicon, by Phil Hine, well known writer on Chaos (or Kaos) Magic; it is downloadable from
 
http://thexlibrary.com/index.php/viewdownload/53-chaos-magic/387pseudonomicon-phil-hine

....described by TheXLibrary as

Short and rare-ish text dealing with the Kaos aspects of the Lovecraft tradition.  Brief but concise and powerful.  Arguably more informative than the Simon Necronomicon in dealing with Lovecraftian modalities.

........ or in other words, a sort of modern version of a possible Necronomicon, and perhaps more useful than the so-called "Simon Necronomicon", or any of the other recent books claiming to be the "real" Necronomicon. Anyway, definitely worth perusal.

Hail Azathoth!

Athanor.

[Oakley]

Count me in.

[Athanor]

Greetings and welcome to BGOS-EOBD Oakley. If you read this whole thread you'll find all manner of fascinating information regarding the shadowy world of occult studies.... but, as with all things;

Believe nothing; question everything; think for yourself!

Athanor.

[Atterton]

In this months edition of Fortean Times, there is an article on window pane ghosts. Images of people showing up within the windows of houses. In some cases said to be people who died in the houses. As this mostly relates to the 1800s, I hoped someone here might have knowledge of it? Apart from windows made from recycled photographic plates, is there anything else that might have caused a window to retain an image? Some kind of "bomb shadow" phenomenon?

[Khem Caigan]

In this month's edition of Fortean Times, there is an article on window pane ghosts. Images of people showing up within the windows of houses. In some cases said to be people who died in the houses. As this mostly relates to the 1800s, I hoped someone here might have knowledge of it? Apart from windows made from recycled photographic plates, is there anything else that might have caused a window to retain an image? Some kind of "bomb shadow" phenomenon?

Apparently lightning is capable of striking a portrait in a pane of glass.
See, for example :

Lightning Portrait Etched in Window

THE FACE IN THE WINDOW

[Karloff1962]

I'm very interested in the Occult, myths and legends, demonology. I have had an interest since I was about 9 years old I'm 56 now. I've got quite a collection one of my obsessions being horror cinema, horror fiction, and comic books, I sort of took interest in it. I'm pagan myself, but I am also a rationalist and I believe that metaphor plays a big part in Myth so I'm more a believer in Science than anything else however, I do write a lot of fiction where magick is just another branch of science and I'm not totally closed minded. in fact the older I become and the more I see of this world the more open minded I become.
   

[Athanor]

Long, long time with no posts to this thread - a state of affairs that obviously cannot be allowed to continue.

I've been wondering about something for some time now, and I can't believe I'm the only one to have thought about this. H.P.Lovecraft, originator of the Cthulhu Mythos, always claimed to be a strict materialist, and totally opposed to any belief in the supernatural or the occult; but was his claimed materialism merely a subconscious defence against the gruesome entities - Cthulhu, Azathoth, Nyarlathotep and the rest - that he had (perhaps inadvertently) invoked and released upon an unsuspecting planet? He always claimed that his horrific visions occurred to him in nightmares - but was this more like a case of primal entities, banished from the Earth aeons ago, finding a way to manifest themselves through the dreams of an eccentric New England recluse?

Before you dismiss this notion out of hand, think carefully of the history of the 20th and early 21st centuries; increasingly destructive wars, the Nazi holocaust, increasing religious and political extremism, Aleister Crowley and his invocation of the Demon Choronzon, Anton LaVey, the so-called Satanic Panic, Kaos Magick, Neo-Naziism, expanding interest in witchcraft and the occult generally, and now Coronavirus . . . . .

 . . . . all due to The Great Old Ones, their manifestations filtered through the subconscious minds of tens of thousands, perhaps millions, of susceptible humans, trying to break through into into this world that was once theirs . . . .

. . . . . not that I'm trying to scare you or anything, but in the introduction to the "Simon Necronomicon", the pseudonymous author suggests that we need knowledgeable wizards to monitor the Gates between our world and the world of the Great Old Ones, and guard against unwelcome manifestations . . . .

Also, remember; in many ancient traditions, it is stated that "the one thing the Devil cannot bear is laughter."

Be warned; and be aware.

Believe Nothing; Question Everything: Think for Yourself!

Athanor

   

Edit: On checking back, I found it wasn't the introduction to the "Necronomicon", but in the later book, "Dead Names", at page 315 of the Avon edition of 2006.

 "Perhaps the prophecies are right; perhaps the world is coming to an impasse, a spiritual conflagration if not an actual physical Armageddon some time in the next fifty years. Perhaps there is a need for someone to monitor the Gate, for a talented person or persons in every country to guard the planet against forces coming upon us from some other reality . . . or from deep within our own sick and saddened souls."

The prescience feels slightly chilling today . . . .

Athanor

[Athanor]

 

"Vero vobis dico, qui quaerit, inveniet eius. Et saepius, parum volet."

 

Truly I tell you, he that seeks, shall find. And sometimes, he shall wish he hadn't.

[Miranda.T]

Given that we don't know what 96% of the universe is made of, you would be forced to conclude that we don't truly know what is lurking out there. After all it's even called dark energy and dark matter. Maybe we should be careful where we look...

Yours,
Miranda.

[Athanor]

  I'm pretty much a total sceptic, myself. My philosophy, when it comes to occult matters, can be expressed in seven words: "Believe nothing; Question everything; Think for yourself!"

So: I believe nothing. I suspect a great many things; I suspect that some of my suspicions might even turn out to be true, in some sense; or at least, to point towards some kind of truth; but I don't believe in any of them.

When I expressed this philosophy on a "Skeptics" forum, some years ago, one of the contributors became very upset, for reasons that were never made clear. He (I'm pretty sure it was a "he") insisted that I really do believe in some things; in fact, he seemed to be claiming that he knew my mind better than I knew it myself, which I rated as impertinence at best, if not outright insulting. He even proposed to follow me around for a day, in order to point out to me situations in which I did by-God believe in something; I told him if he followed me around for a day I'd have him arrested for harassment, and there the matter rested; but I often wonder why my claim to not believe in anything was so upsetting to him.

These humans are a weird species.

Athanor, TOAOTAGO 33^o

[rovingjack]

I would say that splitting hairs would result in the point being put forward that without belief in absolutely anything one would do such things as drink drain cleaner, and try to fly from roof tops because they don't believe these are dangerous things.

but perhaps more grounded than that, are things like you likely work for somebody on the belief that at a certain point in your future you will be paid for the work, and more specifically paid in some form that is accepted by most everybody around you as payments you can use to meet your needs. If you didn't believe these things then would you do the work?

Imbedded in that is a certain belief in certain constants. Gravity will still be here in the next few days, the sun will shed light to produce days that you will experience. The seasons will not suddenly reverse.

These things may perfectly be true regardless of your belief in then, but a person who doesn't believe them cannot usually function well enough. It's a severe delussional state that holds absolutely no beliefs.

and a great many of us hold some of those beliefs that we hold as basic truths, but are in error.

Just some thoughts on the topic. no conflict intended.

[MWBailey]

I would say that splitting hairs would result in the point being put forward that without belief in absolutely anything one would do such things as drink drain cleaner, and try to fly from roof tops because they don't believe these are dangerous things.

but perhaps more grounded than that, are things like you likely work for somebody on the belief that at a certain point in your future you will be paid for the work, and more specifically paid in some form that is accepted by most everybody around you as payments you can use to meet your needs. If you didn't believe these things then would you do the work?

Imbedded in that is a certain belief in certain constants. Gravity will still be here in the next few days, the sun will shed light to produce days that you will experience. The seasons will not suddenly reverse.

These things may perfectly be true regardless of your belief in then, but a person who doesn't believe them cannot usually function well enough. It's a severe delussional state that holds absolutely no beliefs.

and a great many of us hold some of those beliefs that we hold as basic truths, but are in error.

Just some thoughts on the topic. no conflict intended.

Well, the sun rose here, and continues to shine, which means that if I don't hurry up and lick the ice cream thats on my stick, it will presumably melt, and gravity, if it is working the way that I expectit to, will cause the melted ice cream to  run down onto my hand.

We shall see...

[Deimos]

...
So: I believe nothing. I suspect a great many things; I suspect that some of my suspicions might even turn out to be true, in some sense; or at least, to point towards some kind of truth; but I don't believe in any of them.
.....

Athanor, TOAOTAGO 33^o

But you believe  that your thoughts exist, that your thoughts (and opinions) are real, do you not?
They are real enough that  you can express them in the written word, are they not?
And since you are expressing them, i.e., writing them down and posting them in this thread, does that not make you real, and not just "suspected" real?
After all, a figment cannot do that.  

And I am reading them and commenting on them; and I am not part of your conditional, "suspected" existence, because other people respond to my posts, so does that not make all of that "suspected" existence objectively real, concrete?  

Just askin', juneau....  

[J. Wilhelm]

I would say that splitting hairs would result in the point being put forward that without belief in absolutely anything one would do such things as drink drain cleaner, and try to fly from roof tops because they don't believe these are dangerous things.
*SNIP*

Some people are definitely doing those things. But is believing that some true logical statement is false, equivalent to believing in another false logical statement? Because my impression is that people who do those things do in fact believe in *something*. It's just not what most people believe in. A good example is that fellow who told me over the counter that he didn't believe he needed the vaccine. His reasoning is that he believed that the illness was a lie, and further, that in the event he got sick, his superior mental powers would pull him through. So in order for him to reject a logical statement, he needed to believe in two other logical statements. I've never met a human being who didn't believe in anything. If you are an atheist, you still believe there is no creator, whether you have proof of that or not! One of the reasons I never close my mind completely lest I paint myself into a corner.

[Deimos]

Reminds me of a Professor of Philosophy, Dr Ralph McInerny (PhD awarded by Laval University, Quebec) who taught philosophy at Notre Dame University, (Indiana) his entire career.
He said that one of his philosophy professors was notorious for logically proving to every freshman class --within the first week of instruction-- that the walls of the classroom did not exist.
But then, McInerny and his classmates noticed, that at the end of the period, the professor always exited the classroom through the doorway.  

[Sorontar]

So if you believe in something, does that make it the truth? Do we need to believe in the truth, or is the truth a fact, independent of whether we believe in it or not?

One view of scientific research is to reveal the truth about everything. Another is to reveal the lack of truth in the previous research. One looks for the truth. The other is looking for revolution.[1]

We believe in gravity, but is it the truth? In Ancient Greece, the concept of the world being made up of small things (or atoms) was proposed. Rutherford showed the truth was that an atom is actually multiple small things, with the electrons being separate from the nucleus. Since then, the concept of what is in the nucleus and the electrons has been changed a number of times, including protons, neutrons, quarks, etc.

Sorontar
[1] These are not the only approaches to research, scientific or otherwise

[Deimos]

So if you believe in something, does that make it the truth? Do we need to believe in the truth, or is the truth a fact, independent of whether we believe in it or not?

One view of scientific research is to reveal the truth about everything. Another is to reveal the lack of truth in the previous research. One looks for the truth. The other is looking for revolution.[1]

We believe in gravity, but is it the truth? In Ancient Greece, the concept of the world being made up of small things (or atoms) was proposed. Rutherford showed the truth was that an atom is actually multiple small things, with the electrons being separate from the nucleus. Since then, the concept of what is in the nucleus and the electrons has been changed a number of times, including protons, neutrons, quarks, etc.

Sorontar
[1] These are not the only approaches to research, scientific or otherwise

Belief (or disbelief) in something makes it neither true nor untrue.  
This can apply to both material and non material "things".

So, using your example of the truth of gravity: There is the physical phenomenon that we observe, to wit, solid things fall downward if you drop them, water flows downhill.
You can disbelieve what your eyes are seeing all you want, but it doesn’t change the reality.
If someone says he doesn’t believe in the law of gravity,  I would invite him to step to off the edge of a rather high cliff.
If he refuses then it’s quite obvious that he does, in fact, believe in the "law of gravity", call it what you will.

Science is the study of phenomena, and their relationships, which requires knowledge acquired through observation, either directly through the senses, or by means of instruments. Instruments can be crude or sophisticated.
The lack of precise instruments doesn’t necessarily result in incorrect deductions (tho’ it can) but can limit the amount of information.

The ancient Greeks had, by our standards, crude measuring instruments.
Yet they accurately determined the diameter of the earth, the distance to the moon and its diameter, and the distance to, and diameter of, the sun 3 centuries before Christ.
 
Democritus’  theory about matter being made of solid little spheres could not be taken further because there were no instruments by which he could do experiments/make measurements. He could only conjecture.
Two thousand years hence  Rutherford had the means to observe  and measure matter to show that atoms weren’t solid little balls of substance.
Rutherford’s discoveries do not make Democritus wrong. Democritus was correct, as far as it went. Rutherford took it further.

Newton’s three laws of motion were and still are correct at speeds well below that of light (c); speeds that  all of us deal with everyday of our lives.
Einstein’s laws super-cede Newton’s only at speeds approaching c, speeds about which you need not bother while motoring through the countryside  on your way to a steampunk extravaganza.

You could use Einstein’s equations in calculations using sub-sub-sub-light speeds, but all the extra (Einstein) terms would drop out,  and you’d be left with Newton’s equations.
Again, Newton was right as far as he was able to go with the technology available at the time.  Einstein had the advantage of another 300 years in science and technology.

[Athanor]

...
So: I believe nothing. I suspect a great many things; I suspect that some of my suspicions might even turn out to be true, in some sense; or at least, to point towards some kind of truth; but I don't believe in any of them.
.....

Athanor, TOAOTAGO 33^o

But you believe  that your thoughts exist, that your thoughts (and opinions) are real, do you not?
They are real enough that  you can express them in the written word, are they not?
And since you are expressing them, i.e., writing them down and posting them in this thread, does that not make you real, and not just "suspected" real?
After all, a figment cannot do that. 

And I am reading them and commenting on them; and I am not part of your conditional, "suspected" existence, because other people respond to my posts, so does that not make all of that "suspected" existence objectively real, concrete? 

Just askin', juneau.... 

Well, it's all a matter of subjective probabilities, I guess. I seem to be real, as far as I can tell, so I suspect that I give myself a high subjective probability of being real; probably approaching 100%. You're replying to my posting, Deimos, and making points that seem quite intelligent, so I suspect that the probability - for me - of your existence is also quite high, but not quite as high as my subjective probability of my own existence. I suspect that you're not one of the moons of Mars . . . but, obviously, I can't be 100% sure of that . . . .

I suspect that you might see these things differently, and that's perfectly fine. Or am I getting just altogether to convoluted???