Rufus Opus

Posts by frredactumopus

Author: frredactumopus

  • Holy Cow!

    I’m having the best weekend ever. It’s totally funliness.

    I got the pool set up yesterday, I’ve got the grill cleaned up and ready for burgers, hot dogs, Italian sausage, I made the potato salad, and there’s a buttload of corn in need of a salt-water bath, and they’ll be ready to grill as well.

    Did I mention the cherries?

    My is annoyed that I keep grinning like a Cheshire Cat. I can handle that.

    The best thing about the weekend is that it isn’t over tomorrow! I’ll still be off! Ahhhh, blessed Memorial Day.

    Oh, no long sermonizing about Memorial Day for me. Either you know why we celebrate and get it, or you don’t. Doesn’t matter in the pupil of the Eye. If you died defending our country, though, thanks. You’re totally R.O. Approved.

  • Snerk

    Ok, so the other day on Facebook, I took a quiz called “Are you on a Boat.” It turned out I was on a boat. I had no idea what the fuck it was about.

    Today I found out. Saturday Night Live has these little movies and I had no idea. Digital Shorts. Hulu, thanks for rotting my brain the rest of the way. If you get a chance, check out Dick in a Box with Justin Timberlake and Andy Samberg. And Motherlovers.

    But the most important thing you can watch today…

    Ok, not the MOST important. Watching other people perform isn’t that important, really. yOu should be all performing your duties as a magician, fulfilling your roles and responsibilities as the Image of God, you fuckin’ slacker…

    But in between conjuring angels and demons to rule the world, take a break and watch a day in the life of Natalie Portman. For all the fans of Star Wars, V for Vendetta, and … did she do anything else? Who knows. But this I like.

  • 1.1 – Neo-Platonic Cosmology: How it all started

    The best encapsulation of the neo-platonic creation story that I’ve found is in the second book of The Divine Pymander by Hermes Trismegistus. (Check wikipedia for his story.) It’s simple and to the point. Christians like myself can identify enough parallels to feel at ease in it, and pagans can find enough other gods that they feel at home too. It’s a good little catch-all, and that makes sense when you study its history. Which I won’t get into here. Lots of debate around that, and I’d rather get to the point.

    My understanding of the Creation is summarized below. There’s a lot I’m omitting for the sake of brevity, but I’m trying to include the required pieces to to lay the foundation.

    In the beginning was essential God-the-Progenitor, dwelling in perfect darkness. In that perfect darkness, God still and always resides. By its nature, it radiates infinite pure light. In The Divine Pymander, Hermes Trismegistus is given a vision of the creation of the material realm. Within the infinite light appeared a great darkness, smoking as if it were on fire. Out of the infinite Light leaped a “certain holy Word” and that Word joined itself to the dark mass of Matter that came into being. When this holy Word entered the darkness, it separated into four realms. Fire leaped up highest to be closest to the infinite light, followed by Air, which seemed to hang between the Fire and Earth-Water below.

    Next, God created a Workman. This guy created seven governors, each with their own sphere, surrounding the realm of Matter. When he did, the Word leaped up and cohabited with the Workman. This being then set the spheres in motion, and the natural world began creating animals and plants.

    Meanwhile, God made Man in Its image. Man was the honored and beloved “brother” of the family. Eventually, after a lot went down (!), Man entered the physical realm, containing a spark of infinite God within, and yet also loving and being loved by Nature. We’re of two natures, mortal and immortal.

    The Spark of the Divine within is what gives us “authority” overt the elements, and the seven governors. We’re coworkers though, not masters and slaves.

    Ptolemy laid out the basic cosmology of the NP system. the center sphere is the sphere of Earth, surrounded by the sphere of Water, then Air, then Fire. Then there are the seven Spheres of the Governors. Each of these spheres is associated with one of the seven planets of classical astrology, the Moon, Mercury, Venus, the Sun, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn. Around these are the “fixt stars,” whose influence is primarily felt through the planetary governors. Beyond the stars is the realm of eternal light, and sitting in eternal divine darkness, radiating the light outwards and willing existence is the Primum Mobile, God.

    The following image displays the basic cosmology of the NP system:

    As you can see, there’s a hierarchy involved. Each successive sphere heading “outward” brings you further from the realm of matter and closer to the realm of God. This is the structure brought to Creation by Logos, the “holy Word” created or uttered by God-the-Progenitor.

  • Neo-Platonic Basic

    I’m in a bit of a quandary. I’ve been Working with this syncretic Judeo-Christian/Neo-Platonic system for a while now, based almost entirely on the the Three Books of Occult Philosophy by Agrippa. I’ve been reading Plato’s Timaeus,

  • Modern Angelic Grimoire Presentation

    This post deleted due to some annoying issues I’m having with it. I still need to figure out how to use www.authorshare.com‘s cooler features.

  • Why artists rock

    Do you know why artists rock so hard?

    Me neither. But they totally do. Here’s an example of what an Artist can do with the strangest of materials. I’m talking about my book, the Modern Angelic Grimoire, not the baby. I totally would love to mass produce what she did with this. Thing is I can’t even remember to send out a Spriit Bottle that I’ve had made for a month. It’s in the box with the address… I just ahven’t mailed the effing thing.Sorry, diude, but I’m terrible at online business. If I can’t email it, I get all distracted.

    Well, anyway, the Modern Angelic Grimoire is being put to good use. If you haven’t ordered a copy and want one for yourself, feel free to buy one from me.

    Also, look for the upcoming Modern Goetic Grimoire companion piece. I’m about 3000 words into it, and I fully expect it to be done in a couple of months. Or a year.

  • Holistic Wholeness and Perfect Goodness

    Good news, everyone, I got it! I mean, I got it. I really got it.

    I had an epiphany last night and early this morning. I’ll try not to
    wax all mystical and ecstatic on it, but it was beautiful. It made
    sense of everything. Literally, everything. Birth, life,m death, struggles, woe, time, death, eternity, bliss, joy, it all wrapped up together around 4:30 a.m. in the following. The glyph is the key, ultimately.

    I’m not getting into the boring details at the moment, I’m just going to summarize. I posted this to Ritual Magick, so if you’ve been there, you’ll be wasting your time unless you want to hear me talk more about it. You should be working on this shit. I’ll be coming down with a minor messiah complex for a few days, but I DID do some conjuring in the name of Messiah at daybreak, so hey, what can you expect?

    Anyway, the result of my moment is the following layout for the altar:

    In the center, you place four sealed vessels that have the spirits
    of the Four Kings of the elements bound within, each in their
    appropriate quadrant:

    • South – Mahazael, sealed with the name Uriel
    • North – Azael, sealed with the name Gabriel
    • West – Azazel, sealed with the name Raphael
    • East – Samael, sealed with the name Michael

    Make sure you seal these demons in using something that you can let
    them out if you need them later in your existence, but you want them
    sealed unless they are actively performing something you’ve told them
    to do.

    Around these four sealed vessels, you place the following talismen
    in their appropriate quadrant:

    • South – Uriel~Ariel Talisman
    • North – Gabriel~Tharsis Talisman
    • West – Raphael~Cherub Talisman
    • East – Michael~Seraph Talisman

    These talismen should NOT use the seals of the angels as attributed
    in other grimoires. These are the four elemental Kings, not the
    Archangels of the planetary spheres that share the same names. To
    get the appropriate seal, conjure each of the Elemental Kings
    separately.

    Beside each of the Elemental Kings’ talismen, place the appropriate
    elemental weapon. The wand in the East, the Cup in the North, the
    Knife in the West, and in the South your own personal seal.

    You now have two circles on your altar, the infernal circle in the
    center, and the elemental circle around that. These two spheres
    *are* the material realm, and at the exact same time they *are* your
    personal Sphere as a magician.

    Starting in the South, place 7 planetary Talisman in the following
    order clockwise, 51.429 degrees apart (give or take a hundredth of a
    degree):

    • Moon
    • Venus
    • Jupiter
    • Mercury
    • Saturn
    • Sun
    • Mars

    These are the seven spheres that surround the magician’s sphere.
    These create the table of practice.

    That’s the physical manifestation of the Key. The Lamp should be
    placed outside this circle to the east. The Divine Darkness that
    Dionysius the Areopogate is outside the light.

    The altar is now complete.

    This is what mine looks like:

    As you can see, I’m using the four elemental kings of the Tarot as temporary placeholders for Michael, Uriel, Raphael, and Gabriel.

  • Working Magicians

    So when I started Rufusopus.com and the blog, I figured I’d get some odd requests, people looking for riches, love, power, revenge, you know, all the shit in the grimoires.

    I’ve gotten my fair share of those things, mostly from people in Africa, South America, and the Phillipines, where people know what magicians are supposed to be able to do.

    Some pet peeves I have managed to gain:

    Make me 10X more Pow’rful!

    “Will you just do magic to make me a powerful magician like I used to be when I was 16? Ever since I hit 27 and moved back home with my mom, it’s been like the magic’s gone.”

    NO! You do the Magic, you get the power. And what you had when you were 16? That was “sex appeal to 15 year old girls.” That’s all over now. Grow up.

    What surprises me is how many people are like this. I’m picking on one dude, but really, he’s not alone. People had this great role playing thing going on with their occulty friends in their teens, and everyone was a reincarnated astral warrior fighting demons. And nothing happened. And they couldn’t figure out why. And now they want a real magician to make them back into their old characters. Grow the Eff Up.

    Bossy Beggars

    Please! I am on bended knee and contemplating suicide! Help your brother I am counting on you! Get me business in my store. Send your spirits to get me $10,000 by Friday. I sent you four emails yesterday telling you what I wanted, why haven’t I gotten it yet? Waiting for your reply.

    I understand when you’re in a fix you need immediate attention. I understand that you think I’m sitting around doing nothing but waiting for opportunities to do magic for people. I know you think you’re doing me a favor by giving me an opportunity to do magic for you for free. But I have three kids and a spouse who hasn’t worked in 9 years. My father in law is going in for open heart surgery. I have a job I work at for 50 hours a week. I have a lawn to mow, cars to fix, and bills to pay. These things take time. My magic has been relegated to a part-time pursuit. When I have time for it, fixing your bad business decisions isn’t that high on my list of things to do. Don’t get snitty with me.

    The Quaking Pseudo-Noob

    Gee, Mr. Opus, I’ve been practicing for years, but I haven’t got a blog and I’m not published, so even though I’ve conjured more spirits than you know exist, I’m still all nervous about talking to you.

    This isn’t a pet-peeve as much as it is a shock. I’m no expert. Every time I think I know more than I do, God provides people like Jason or Optimystic or someone like that to remind me of the depth of my ignorance. I tend to think I’m a Goetia expert because I’ve Worked with 18 spirits from the Lemegeton’s Goetia. Then I meet people who have gone much deeper into their research and practice, and I find out that ok, I’ve worked more than most people, but I’m still a ways away from being an expert.

    So if you’re nervous about talking to me about something because you think I’m special, I’d just like to remind you that I’m not. I’m a magician like you.

  • The first guy I knew who was a mother

    In my youth, I was homeless for a while, hitch-hiked across the states for a while, and lived on an organic commune for a while. While I was there, I met some uber-neo-hippies, and this one was a white kid with dreads who lived in Maui in the national parks, and in Nicaragua in the rain forrest for a while, just living off the land and being one with nature.

    This guy stank. Big time. What holds white-people’s dreads together? Dirt. Dirty dirt. Smelly dirty dirt. It’s not cool, it’s just dirty.

    But he had this scar on his shoulder. It was about the size of a nickel. While he was sleeping in the rain forrest, a little bug came along and used its numbing saliva to render the insertion of its eggs under his skin painless. It deposited a few eggs in his back, and flew merrily away. The dude… ok, he had issues. But he let them incubate in his flesh and hatch. They burst through his skin painlessly, he claimed, and flew away. He said he felt like he had given birth. Only his babies were bugs.

    I had started this post to be about the anger thing. However, Jack Faust recently posted a link to an article about the holographic culture we live in. Some hippy who lives in Central America was going on about how Americans are stupid and live in a bubble. I responded that there’s nothing better that anyone has to offer, and questioned the validity of the opinion that we should return to living in dirty grubby nature. Jack suggests that it’s better to get back in touch with Nature. I’d like to offer the above anecdote as a major reason to appreciate our alleged disconnect from Nature.*

    When humanity was supposedly in tune with nature, we died young. The main reason for this young death was insects. Filthy nasty germy insects. They suck. They swim up your urine stream and block your urethra. They lay eggs in your flesh. They carry malaria and plague. Insects are the dominant species of the planet.

    People who advocate returning to nature to get back in touch with their alleged role in the planet’s ecosystem have forgotten the basics. Jack accused me of being a yuppie. I don’t have a problem with that. I’m kind of flattered with the “young” part of Yuppie. Yuppies recycle more, buy more hybrid vehicles, and generally contribute less to the destruction of the planet than your average college student, after all. We bathe more regularly too.

    Having actually lived on a commune where I was very much a part of an agrarian subculture, living in tune to the seasons and phases of the moon, living dirty, living grubby, I can attest that soap ROCKS. Insecticide? ROCKS! Clean house, nice clothes, central heating and air conditioning? They all ROCK! They rock out loud. Maybe I appreciate these things more for having been a part of the alternative life cycle than the average American, but so what? Who says living dirty and dying younger of infections caused by insects is a better option than living longer and being out of tune with Nature? Some hippy? Fuck him. I’m eating me a Ho-Ho. Mmmm.

    *I say alleged because we aren’t really disconnected from Nature. As Hermetic Magicians, we know that the Archetypal Man took on human flesh out of Love for the Image of God. We are mortal for Love’s sake. We are part and parcel of Nature. We aren’t separated. As such, everything we make out of nature, every adaptation of nature, every chemical, plastic, landfill-filling item we discard is, technically, Natural. We can’t get out of touch with Nature any more than we can decide to stop having bowel movements. As long as the heart beats, the blood flows, the brain fires electrical impulses through tubes of water matching the salinity content of the ocean, we are very much natural beings. Cars, planes, computers, and global warming are natural. Being out of tune with the planet’s cycles is natural. Whatever “solutions” we come up with to address whatever “man-made problems” we created are going to be natural too.

  • Famed Physicist Schedules Appointment With God

    Well, folks, it’s about that time again. The scientific community will lose a great mind, but the new age believers of the future will have someone they can claim to have been in a past life.