Kierkegaard and Levi: Part Two

"Unless you make yourself equal to God, you cannot understand God; like is understood by like" from the "Corpus Heremeticum" (translated by Brian Copenhaver). In the first part of this essay on Kierkegaard and the previous essays on German Idealism we saw attempts to understand the mind of God. The above quote is taken from a magical source, which seems fitting since in this part of the essay, we are going to examine the magical philosophy of Eliphas Levi. In order to gain an understanding of Levi let us review the ground we have already covered. Schelling thought through the use of the dialectic of freedom and necessity that he had discovered a method for discovering the absolute knowledge: the mind of God. It seems Schelling thought that absolute knowledge would be subjective; that it was the freedom term that moved the dialectic. Therefore the dialectic would end in absolute knowledge and absolute freedom. In Hegel we have the opposite position that it is necessity that is the moving term. To say that Hegel said the negative term moved the dialectic is somewhat unfair. What Hegel was trying to say is that the dialectic demands completion, but that the completion is always the universal, The universal is always limiting, thus absolute knowledge is necessity and negation. This is why it is said for Hegel, that it is the negation that moves the dialectic. For our purpose, what is important about Hegel is that absolute knowledge is objective knowledge: the universal. That when the cosmos can be grasped in a universal, we shall have achieved absolute knowledge. the trouble is there are flaws in objective knowledge. The flaw that was pointed out in part one of this essay is McTaggart's question: why this universe and not another? Kierkegaard also made the same point as McTaggart, but expressed it in a different way. Kierkegaard said about Hegel's system: that it was like a beautiful house, but a house that the builder cannot live in. McTaggart's question also shines a spotlight on the controversy in theoretical physics on the anthropic principle. Fed Hoyle would represent one side of this controversy; that there seems to be directionality of design in the cosmos. That the cosmos was somehow designed or directed to create life and intelligence. The other side of the debate could be represented by Stephan Hawking. This is the view that our cosmos is one of a multiverse of universes. It just so happens that our universe is the one where life and intelligence could arise. Neither side in the debate seems to have considered the possibility that the flaw is in objective knowledge. As Kant understood the objective view is a created view. To create the objective view, knowledge must be universalized by logical categories. When the data is universalized, aim is one of the first things to be lost. Appetition and desire are always properties of individual subjects, thus subjective. ther are other flaws in objective knowledge, that have to do with selection of data, and that of dynamism versus static knowledge. So Kierkegaard rejected objective knowledge as an adequate way of understanding the cosmos. There are of course, problems with subjective knowledge. The problems are very basic; like what is subjective knowledge? There is no, and can be no consensus of what constitutes subjective knowledge. In the first part of this essay we examined Kierkegaard's answer to this question. His answer was that subjective knowledge consists of a relationship. That the subject cannot be separated or alienated from the object, but must be in a dialogical relationship with the object. These relationships are Kierkegaard three spheres of the aesthetic, the ethical, and the religious. The religious sphere consists of a person's relationship with God, and sublates the other two spheres which represent freedom and necessity. We must now move to the view of magic, which is the view of Eliphas Levi. Levi did not invent the magical view of the cosmos; instead he was a reformer of a very long and ancient tradition. Let us take a brief look at Levi the person. After Levi was expelled from seminary he seems to have had no aim or purpose. The nineteenth century was a century of scientific advance, but it was also a century of religious and Utopian political movements. In the United States there was rapid technological advance, but there were also religious revivals and the birth of new religions; examples would be the Millerites and the Mormons. In Europe there was the rise of many political-religious Utopian movements; communism being the most famous. The young Alphonse Louis Constant, he had not yet hebrewicized his name, got involved in one of the strangest of these political-religious movements; that of Ganneau. Ganneau claimed he was the reincarnation of Louis XIV and his wife was the reincarnation of Marie Antoinette. Thus he was the legitimate ruler of France. From this it should be easy to see young Constant was well on his way to becoming Eliphas Levi the Professor of High Magic. Before examining the occult philosophy of magic, there are some issues we must deal with first. The first issue is the Tarot cards, play an important part in Levi's thought. The book all Levi quotes shall be taken from"Transcendental Magic"(translated by A. E. Waite), is organized in that each chapter deals with a Tarot trump, one chapter on theory and another on practice. So the reader may wonder if there is a Tarot deck that captures the spirit of Levi, and can be examined while reading the essay. Since there seems to be no end to Tarot decks the two I can recommend are the venerable "Rider-Waite Tarot" deck. A.E. Waite was Levi's principle translator. The other is the "Medieval Scapini Tarot:" deck. The other issue we must deal with is the worthlessness of Levi's scholarship. Waite's footnotes in the translations of Levi's works form a running commentary on the inaccuracies of Levi's scholarship. It is not for accurate history or scholarship that we read Levi, but for his reformation of occultism. It also must be said much of Levi's writings seem to be bipolar. There are sections that have surprising power and clarity, and there are sections that are confused and obscure. To get some feeling for Levi at his best let us take a look at Levi's advice on how to win a woman. This is a topic where one would imagine a Magus would recommend spells and love potions. Instead Levi gives practical advice. This is from a chapter on the Tarot trump:XVIII-The Moon: " The man who seeks to compel love-we attribute such unlawful maneuvers to men only assuming that women can never have need of them-must in the first place make himself observed by the person whom he desires and must contrive to impress her imagination. He must inspire her with admiration, astonishment, terror, and even horror, failing all other resources; but at any cost he must set himself apart in her eyes, from the rank of ordinary men and, with or against her will, must make himself a place in her memory, her apprehensions, her dreams." We move to the occult or magical tradition. Magic is the oldest method humans have tried to both understand and to control the cosmos. The basic belief of magic is animism; that there is an energy or force that pervades everything, and that this energy can be used by those who know how to manipulate the energy to bring about desired change. It is often said magic is the art of causing change in conformity with the will. Animism is of course, the most primitive form and belief of magic; that is found in all primal societies. This almost everyone knows; what most people do not know is magic like all traditions evolved. The quote that opens this section is taken from the "Corpus Hermeticum" which can rightfully be called the Bible of Magical philosophy. The goal of the Magus is to know the mind of God. It is subjective knowing, because the Magus tries to make the emotions and aims of God his or her own. In other words, the Magus tries to know the cosmos from the inside. In magical philosophy animism developed into emanationism. For the Magus the cosmos is the thought of God. The material cosmos is God's thoughts made visible. This is why the Renaissance Magus Giordano Bruno titled one of his books: "Shadows of Ideas." The material comos is the shadow of God's thinking or emanating the cosmos. The problem becomes: how does one achieve the mind of God? This is magic. The Renaissance Magus realized that information in the human mind was carried on the emotions. So using the doctrine of the microcosm and the macrocosm the magical philosophy posits a correspondence between the human mind and the mind of God. The task now becomes what emotions carry what information. So the Renaissance Magi set up a system of correspondences. This was usually done by using the classical planets of the Zodiac. Each planet becomes an emotional nexus for a series of correspondences. It must be said these correspondences are connected by emotional and physical resemblances, and not function and origin as in reason. The nexus for each series of correspondences is one of the classical planets.Many Renaissance Magi also used a memory theater for the same purpose. When one mastered this technique of organizing knowledge around a nexus, the correspondences then could be moved around to make more connections. In other words, The Magus could compare the correspondences of Mercury and Venus. In this way it was thought new knowledge could be discovered. That is new connections could be made, thus discovering the mind of God, by making the human mind a microcosm of God's mind the macrocosm. This is where occult philosophy was before Levi's reformation. So let us examine Levi's reformation. The energy that pervades the cosmos becomes the Astral Light in Levi's philosophy. This is the energy that creates and and holds the cosmos in existence. This is Levi's reformation of animism. Levi symbolizes the astral light in his most famous drawing. This is of course, the drawing of "The Sabbatic Goat" or "The Baphomet of Mendes." Let us go to Levi for an explanation of the drawing: "A pantheistic and magical figure of the Absolute. The torch placed between the two horns represents the equilibrating intelligence of the triad. The goat's head, which is synthetic, and unites some characteristics of the dog, bull, and ass, represents the exclusive responsibility of matter and the expiation of bodily sins in the body." The quote goes on, but this is enough for our purposes. It is not hard to observe the influence of German Idealism on Levi in the above quote. Levi refers to God as the absolute, and uses the triadic scheme of the dialectic to explain the nature of God. By using the terminology, and ideal of German Idealism; Levi liberated magic from any particular religious tradition. This allowed Levi to use whatever tradition he found useful to reform magic. Magic has always practiced syncretism, but Levi allowed magic to do it openly and honestly. With Levi syncretism became open, instead of magic being seen as the underground of some religion. As I said earlier none of Levi's historical linkages can be taken seriously, but it seems even Levi did not realize what he had done. This reform allowed him to use whatever ideas he found useful. Not all of Levi's inheritance from German Idealism were as happy as the dialectic and syncretism. Much of his writings rival Schelling and Hegel for obscurity. The most important and lasting contribution of Levi made was the reformation of the correspondences and the emotional nexus that holds the correspondences together. Levi abandoned the older mnemonic systems; instead he made the Tarot the nexus for the correspondences. The Tarot trumps act like Kant's categories organizing all of experience. The is probably why Waite decided to translate the title of Levi's most important book as "Transcendental Magic" the original title was "Dogma et Rituel de la Haute Magie." The use of the Tarot allows for an easy way to combine the correspondences by manipulating the cards: the Tarot spreads. This got rid of the elaborate and complex wheels of correspondences of the Renaissance memory systems. Levi call the Tarot deck the "Book of Thoth." Let us go to Levi to explain: "This book, which may be older than that of Enoch, has never been translated, but is still preserved unmutilated in primordial characters, on detached leaves, like the tablets of the ancients." Levi again: "a book which is the summary of all sciences, which can resolve all problems by its infinite combinations, which speaks by evoking thought, is the inspirer and moderator of all possible conceptions, and the masterpiece perhaps of the human mind." Like Kierkegaard, no one ever said Levi was humble, also like Kierkegaard this makes Levi great fun to read. So we can now appreciate Levi's contribution to occultism. By abandoning the elaborate and complex memory systems of the Renaissance, Levi was in the best tradition of nineteenth century thought. Levi took an ancient, arcane, elaborate tradition and simplified it, and democratized it. Few people have the time, effort, and ability to master the memory systems of the Renaissance, but anyone can buy a deck of cards. By simplifying magic, Levi democratized magic, insuring its survival for a new generation. A generation that scorned ornamentation and prized function above decoration. A striking example of the change in people's attitudes towards the ornamental is how couples dance. Compare how couples danced at the end of the eighteenth century to how couples danced at the end of the twentieth century. So we can now observe the contributions, Levi made to occultism; he simplified it and democratized occultism. Occult practice became available to everyone. We have one more issue to deal with in this essay. Levi like most nineteenth century thinkers was concerned with how social and societal change came about Levi believed that change started with individuals. This is of course, consistent with occult philosophy through the ages. It is the genius or the Magus that starts change. Levi addresses the issue under the Tarot trump: XI-Strength: "To make a magic chain is to establish a magnetic current which becomes stronger in proportion the the extent of the chain" That is social movements act like a magnetic chain or force attracting more and more people. Back to Levi: "The magic chain of speech was typified among the ancients by chains of gold which issued from the mouth of Hermes. Nothing equals the electricity of eloquence. Speech creates the highest intelligence in the most grossly constituted masses" It is interesting to compare Levi's concept of a magic chain to the words Plato put into the mouth of Socrates in the dialogue "Ion" (translated by Lane Cooper): "But it is the deity who through all the series draws the spirit of men wherever he desires, transmitting the attractive force from one to another" Levi's scholarship may not have been deep, but it was wide. It is easy to dismiss Levi as an occult crank. Before dismissing Levi we should recall the last line of Stephan Hawking's book: "A Brief History of Time": "for then we would know the mind of God" Levi like Fichte pushed the limits of the human intellect, like Schelling and Hegel, he tried to discover the mind of God. Like Kierkegaard he worked in an ancient tradition he tried to infuse with new life thorough subjectivity. A better way to access Levi is to ask the question: Can we do better? END