The Hermetic Hour

The Hermetic Hour for December 29th, 2011, with host Poke Runyon, will feature a wrap-up of the years' shows, highlighting some of our best that you might want to listen to again. We will also venture a preview of some special shows coming up next year. Topics will include Carl Jung and his influence on modern magick, the science fiction philosopher-mystic Philip K. Dick and his Gnostic visionary writings, the PantheaCon event in San Jose with Feraferia and Jo Carson, J.R.R. Tolkien and the recovery of western folklore, to name a few -- and Frater  Limbeck has suggested Jack Parsons, and Julius Evola -- both fascinating subjects. We will also discuss the next year's Associate Member course, which will include our Pathworkings, so be sure and tune in for what's coming up in 2012 (before Planet X in December).

The Hermetic Hour for Thursday December 15th, 2011 with host Poke Runyon will feature a discussion on our Winter Solstice pageant Baal Samin, from  the Neo-Canaanite tradition. We will also mention Winter Solstice in the Feraferian Neo-pagan seasonal round. We offer an invitation to our regular listeners, and especially our new listeners, to call in and question or discuss any topic we've covered this year -- and to suggest ideas for next year's shows. What guests would you like us to interview? What  aspects of magick would you like to hear more about? We'll also review our Associate Member program, and up-date you on it's progress and its benefits. Now that the year is drawing to a close, we want to hear from you. Our listening audience is steadily growing, and we need to get your reactions, and suggestions. So, tune in, call in and interact.

The Hermetic Hour for Thursday December 8th, 2011 will purify the air after our Necronomicon show with a discussion on the Golden Dawn and Regardie's Middle Pillar ritual. We will trace its origin back to Felkin's Stella Matutina  (second generation Golden Dawn) in the early 1920s, then Regardie's expanded meditational version published in 1932. We'll mention the 1991 edited version compared to the original. We will compare this Sphere based system to Paul Case's chakra system based on the Golden Dawn's Path attributes. The Middle Pillar was the inspiration for our 1970s' Hermetic Caduceus, the fully developed Sephirotic chakra system based on "The Lightning Flash" upon the Tree of Life -- so tune in and let's bring down The Light.

Following our show on Chaos Magick, The Hermetic Hour for Thursday December 1st, 2011, with host Poke Runyon, will feature a discussion on the writings of Howard Phillips Lovecraft and their influence on modern magick, especially that of the Kenneth Grant, and Chaos Magick traditions. We will summarize the "Cathulu Mythos" and the history of the fabulous "Necronomicon." Although both are essentially fiction, we will discuss Lovecraft's dream recall method, and the idea, purposed by Kenneth Grant, that Lovecraft actually created  what must now be considered a genuine mythology. Lovecraft's demons, loved and feared by millions, have become as real as those of the Goetia -- at least in the subjective realm of magick. We will recount some humorous episodes involving Necronomicon fabrications, and we will read from the most complete text of the Mad Arab's hellish book, the alleged "John Dee Translation."  So, tune in and shudder at the blasphemous ravings of Abdul Al Hazred.

The Friday following Thanksgiving, November 25th, 2011 -- on a Solar Eclipse -- the Hermetic Hour, with host Poke Runyon, will explore the history, the philosophy and the methods of Chaos Magic(k). Our special guest will be Maestro Andrieh Vitimus, author of "Hands-On Chaos Magic"  from Llewellyn Publications. We will trance the origins of the Chaos tradition from Crowley, through Austin Spare, Kenneth Grant, and Peter Carroll, who formally launched the modern Chaos tradition with his classic "Liber Null." Without making value judgments we will try to define what the Chaos system offers in comparison to more traditional forms of magick. We will discuss its relation to Thelema, shamanism, yoga and astrology. We'll discuss the use of nuerolinguistics, and Freudian psychology in comparison to the Jungian orientation in modern Hermetics. The unique sigil and talisman techniques will be mentioned, and the influence of Bardon, Crowley, Grant and Lovecraft will be discussed. So, if you want to learn what the Chaos Illuminati are doing, and how they are doing it, tune in and get your Eschaton Immanentized.

On Thursday, November 17th, 2011 the Hermetic Hour, with host poke Runyon, will present a discussion on the relationship of the Hermetic Tradition with Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. This topic was suggested by one of our listeners who wanted to know "Where does Jesus fit in the Hermetic scheme of things?" A very good question. The Hermetic Tradition interpenetrates, incorporates, may have influenced, and certainly enhances the mystic and philosophical aspects of all three of the great religions --- and especially the tradition of Freemasonry. The Hebrew Kabbalah is especially compatible with Hermetic concepts and Gnostic cosmology. Alexandria in classical times, a hundred years before the "Common Era" saw the birth of the Hermetic tradition, and may even have influenced Jesus -- more so than Buddhism, which was not familiar to the Greco-Roman world. The similarities between Christian and Hermetic philosophy led to the popularity of the Hermetic writings in the early Renaissance, and their brief acceptance by the Roman Church. Christians, Jews, and Sufi Muslims who are not prisoners of their dogma, find no problems working systems such as the Golden Dawn. If one can abide Freemasonry, one can enjoy the Way of Hermes. We will discuss early forms of Christianity that fit well with Hermetic doctrine. And we will discuss Jesus' teachings in relation to Hermetic philosophy -- So, tune in and we'll Witness for Hermes, and -- to quote Reverend Bobby-John: "We'll all be saved!"

On this Thursday's Hermetic Hour host Poke Runyon will welcome Wor. Frater Osiris, P.M. from Georgia, one of our Associate Members who recently staged an O.T.A. seasonal rite there. Mike will tell us just how he went about it, and how it was received. We have another Associate Member in Texas, Frater Heracles, who has also staged a seasonal, and will call in with his comments. This warms the cockles of my heart!  We've been putting on these delightful pageants four times a year, on the solstices and equinoxes, since 1974, and we are so happy to see the tradition spreading out across the country. Mike and John have been able to do very effective rituals by following the scripts and details in our Seasonal Book, and using their own ingenuity in the staging. This is very important because we have gotten more elaborate at Montsalvat and Rivendell over the years, and we need fresh talent to do it their own way -- like Wagner in modern dress. Same words and music, but a fresh, new look. Mike has even translated our musical theme, scored in the book, on a synthesizer, which he will play for us. This will be a fun and inspiring evening. Tune in and find out  how you too can turn your back yard into a Sacred Grove and honor the Lord and Lady in the most ancient of modern seasonal rites.

On the 27th of October 2011 the Hermetic Hour, with host Poke Runyon, will present a discussion of Halloween from the Hermetic perspective. Actually this is more of a Pagan holiday  but we Hermetics are Pagan as well as Biblical, so we celebrate anything we want. Our sister lodge Feraferia had a Samhain ceremony -- which I will briefly cover -- and since they departed for Northern California, we have developed at Samhain rite of our own, evoking Mot,  the original "Grim Reaper" Himself. We will also recall the 1974 and 1975 Tom Snyder Halloween Special on the old NBC Tomorrow Show, featuring Fred Adams, Ed Fitch, Issac Bonewits, and your host, in which we aired Feraferian and O.T.A. rites filmed by the distinguished Pagan film maker Jo Carson. I'll mention my strange adventure atop the Pyramid of the Sun in Mexico on the Day of the Dead in 1988, and we'll give a preview of this years "Dark Mother of All Halloween Parties" coming soon to a National Forest near you! (if you are in Southern Califoirnia). So, tune in and get Trick-or-Treated.

The Hermetic Hour for October 20th, 2011, with host Poke Runyon, will present a discussion on Vampires, then and now. We will look at the vampire legend from ancient times up to the 18th century when it took on its present form: somewhere between a ghost, a monster, and a seductive incubus. We'll look at the magick of the blood and its power,  from ancient human sacrifice to the mass animal sacrifices in today's religions. We'll discuss vampire-like personages in the past: Gilles d' Reis, Countess Bathory and Vlad Dracul. Victorian age fascination with vampires, and the present vampire craze among the gothteens. We'll discuss those unfortunates who really do have a disease that mimics some vampire symptoms. The spiritual aspects of the vampire mythos: a very dark immortality. We will carefully mention a modern form of  vampirism we suspect is going on today -- so join us for an hour with the undead.

The Hermetic Hour for Thursday the 13th of October, 2011, with host Poke Runyon, will be a lively and controversial discussion on a recent aspect of the magical revival called "Old School Magic(k)." This is a development that came about after the 1990s revival of Solomonic Magick following the publication of Donald Kraig's "Modern Magick," and our book and video on the source of the evocation methods Craig described. Steve Savedow's "Goetic Evocation" came out at the same time, representing a more medieval approach to the same operation. In very simple terms we  can say that we were reviving Solomon's ceremonial magick on a Renaissance neo-Platonic Hermetic model, whereas Steve Savedow, Stephen Skinner, and Joseph Lisiewski seemed intent on reviving it on a Judeo-Christian model, attempting to recreate a medieval dualistic mindset. You will super naturalize yourself in the course of this work, but you can choose 500 years ago, or 1000 years ago. We should recall that the Hermetic writings were not available to the medieval magicians -- and yet Renaissance magicians, steeped in Hermetic monist-solipsistic philosophy, were intent on reviving medieval ceremonial magick, but  where the medievalists had conjured in smoke, the Renaissance magi preferred crystals and dark mirrors. We are going to delve into these different approaches and perhaps discover that "The Old School" has a good point to make: in the middle ages they believed in God, and miracles. So that is a very effective mindset for ceremonial magick. You might also join the SCA and enjoy an idealized revival of medieval culture, otherwise we'll see you at the Renn Faire. Good morrow, Lords and Ladies!