Showing all posts tagged Baphomet

In art, sorcerer's workbench

From the Sorcerer’s Workbench: Samhain 2023

Author Satyr MagosPosted on


Hail and well met, friends. Thank you for joining me as I finally and proudly present my inaugural Samhain Line: six new designs and three unique pieces of jewelry perfect for spooky season.

Some of these have been in the works for a long time. Some of them were designed exclusively for this line. All of them are fantastic and much-needed additions to the Sorcerer’s Workshop. Would you like a tour?

Devotional Image of Persephone

An image of Persephone embracing her three aspects of Dread Queen (the skull), goddess of spring and flowers (the flowering vines), and patron of the immortalizing Eleusinian Mysteries (the skull’s mushrooms crown).

I received this image during an oracular session this spring, not long before Beltane, and is the flagship design of my inaugural Samhain Line.

The pendant is one inch across and 3/16ths of an inch thick, solid and made to last, with a loop that can be used to attach a cord or chain or any kind of bail.

The pendant is available in sterling silver or red bronze.

These pendants are not consecrated. That is your responsibility to perform in accordance with your traditions.

https://www.etsy.com/listing/1573405735/dread-queen-persephone-devotional

Devotional Image of Baphomet

A devotional image in my signature style, featuring my take on Eliphas Levi’s iconic image of Baphomet as the Goat of Mendes.

To me, Baphomet is the queer and genderqueer god/dess of witchcraft and chaos magick. Their sexual and gender ambiguity is the point. Their theriomorphic imagery is the point. The fact that they are on the one hand a newly-revealed divinity and on the other hand share imagery with gods more ancient than the written word are the point. Their passage through modern Gnosticism as a vision of Sophia and/or the God Above God is the point.

* Talisman is one inch in diameter with an image on each side.

* Available as a pendant with an upeye suitable for a 3mm chain or with three rings suitable for stringing as a rosary piece.

* Available in sterling silver, shibuichi (a 3:1 copper:silver art metal alloy), yellow brass, or red bronze.

This piece is not consecrated. That is your responsibility to do in accordance with your tradition or gnosis.

https://www.etsy.com/listing/1577711551/devotional-image-of-baphomet-samhain

Rattlesnake Vertebrae Earrings

Rattlesnake vertebrae earrings cast in silver or bronze with silver earrwires. The third design from my inaugural Samhain Line, perfect for goths, witches, and other lovers of dark vibes. Molds were taken from genuine rattlesnake vertebrae.

https://www.etsy.com/listing/1569028490/rattlesnake-vertebra-earrings-in-silver

Tourmaline and Sterling Silver Rattlesnake Vertebrae Bracelet

The fourth new design in my inaugural 2023 Samhain Line, this bracelet is made of rough tourmaline beads and cast sterling silver rattlesnake vertebrae strung on silver wire with a hook clasp. These materials and design are ideal for grounding and protection magic, and as a stylish witchy statement piece.

The bracelet is available at lengths from approximately six inches to nine inches. The pictured exemplar with eight tourmaline beads and four pairs of vertebrae is nine inches long; shorter bracelets will consist of fewer beads.

https://www.etsy.com/listing/1584459135/tourmaline-and-sterling-silver

Seal of Astaroth

A 1 inch coin depicting the seal of Astaroth as described in the Lesser Key of Solomon, better known as the Goetia. In the words of the anonymous author: “The 29th spirit in order is Named Astaroth, he is a Mighty & strong duke and appeareth in [the] forme of an unbeautifull angel, ridding on an Infernall like dragon, and carring in his right hand a viper (you must not lett him come to neare yu least he doe yu damage by his stinking Breath. Therefore ye Exorcist must hold ye Magicall Ring nere to his face and yt will defend him he giveth true answares of things present past & to come & can discover all secreets; he will declare willingly how ye spirits fell, if desired, & ye reason of his own fall. He can make men wounderfull knowing in all Liberall siences; he rules 40 Legions of spirits, his seal is this, wch weare as a Lamen before yu, or else he will not obey you.”

The front of the coin bears the image of the seal. The reverse may be polished or textured.

Use this talisman seal in your conjurations — traditional or modern — or as the core materia in a prosperity bag.

Work with demons at your own risk.

Each piece is hand-made to order and will include unique variations and blemishes.

https://www.etsy.com/listing/1571906436/astaroth-seal-goetic-coin-talisman

Seal of Asmoday

A 1 inch coin depicting the seal of Asmoday as described in the Lesser Key of Solomon, better known as the Goetia. In the words of the anonymous author: “The 32d spirit in order is called Asmoday. he is a great king, strong & powerfull; he appeareth wth 3 heads, whereof ye first is like a Bull The second like a Man, The Third like a Ram, [he appeareth also] with a serpents Taile, Belching or vomitting up flames of fire out of his mouth his feet are webed like a Goose, he sitteth on an Infernall dragon carring a Launce and a flagg in his hands, he is ye first & chifiest under ye power of Amaymon, & goeth before all others: when the Exorcist hath a mind to call him, lett it be abroad, and lett him stand on his feet all ye Time of action, wth his cap of [off], for if it be on, Amaymon will deceive him, and cause all his doeing to be bewrayed, But as soone as ye Exorist [Exorcist] seeth Asmoday in ye shape aforesaid, he shall call him by his Name, saying, thou art Asmoday, & he will not deny it; and by & by he will bow down to ye grownd &c he giveth ye Ring of vertues he teacheth ye art of Arithmitick, geomitry, Astronomy, and all handicrafts36b absolutly; he giveth full and True answares to yr demands, he maketh a man Invisible, he showeth ye place where Treasures layeth, and guardeth it if it be among ye Legions of Amaymon, he governeth 72 Legions of Inferiour spirits, his seal is thus, to be made and worne as a Lamen before [thee] on your Breast.”

The front of the coin bears the image of the seal. The reverse may be polished or textured.

Use this talisman seal in your conjurations — traditional or modern — or as the core materia in a prosperity bag.

Work with demons at your own risk.

Each piece is hand-made to order and will include unique variations and blemishes.

https://www.etsy.com/listing/1586084599/asmoday-seal-goetic-coin-talisman

Unique Devotional Image of Baphomet with Mexican Fire Opal

A one-of a kind image of Baphomet cast from a hand-carved wax, with a Mexican fire opal set over their head as the flame of gnosis. This image is, of course, a take on Eliphas Levi’s iconic drawing of Baphomet as the Goat of Mendes. It is also the product of my years of work with the god/dess, who is to me a deeply queer figure of creation – both creator and created.

To me, Baphomet is the queer and genderqueer god/dess of witchcraft and chaos magick. Their sexual and gender ambiguity is the point. Their theriomorphic imagery is the point. The fact that they are on the one hand a newly-revealed divinity and on the other hand share imagery with gods more ancient than the written word are the point. Their passage through modern Gnosticism as a vision of Sophia and/or the God Above God is the point.

The pendant is heavy, and the stone set in strong prongs.

The pendant is one inch across an eight of an inch thick.

I would be happy to add a jumpring to the arch bail at the top if you would prefer that.

It is not yet consecrated. That is your responsibility.

https://www.etsy.com/listing/1577722019/unique-devotional-image-of-baphomet-with

Unique Gorgoneion Prayer Beads and Protection Talisman

Prayer beads featuring my signature Gorgoneion protection talisman cast in bronze and strung on bronze wire with jet and tiger iron beadsbeads and bronze rattlesnake vertebrae and a bronze sword. These prayer beads were made in trance according to the whims of Spirit and will never be exactly reproduced.

The image of a Gorgon’s face, as seen on the front of the talisman, was a common protection symbol throughout ancient Greece and the Hellenistic world. The back of the talisman bears the names of the three attested Gorgons – Medusa, Sthenno, and Euryale – in Greek. This particular image was done in the Attic style, based particularly the Gorgon images found painted in kylix cups from the 4th Century BCE.

https://www.etsy.com/listing/1568402114/unique-gorgoneion-prayer-beads-and

Unique Hekate Prayer Beads with Bronze Talisman and Key, Genuine Rattlesnake Vertebrae, Tiger Iron, Jet, and Amber Beads

The third and final of the unique pieces in my inaugural 2023 Samhain Line of jewelry.

Prayer beads featuring my signature Eye and Six Hands devotional Hekate talisman and wardrobe key cast in bronze, strung on bronze wire, with genuine rattlesnake vertebrae and beads of tiger iron, jet, and amber. The total bead count is: six 8mm tiger iron beads, ten 10mm rattlesnake vertebrae, thirty-two 3mm jet beads, fourteen 2mm jet beads, and fifteen 2mm amber beads, for a total of seventy-seven beads.

The beads were chosen and strung as the spirit moved me: six sets of nine beads interspaced with five sets of three, with seven beads and a key hanging from the central talisman.

The central talisman is a one inch bronze circle bearing an image of Hekate on one side — “O Six Hands crowning a flaming eye,/ Extending in every direction;” and her crossroads sigil, name, and epithets in Greek — “Hekate, Atalos, Apotropaia, Soteira, Rexichthon” — on the reverse.

The key is two and a half inches long.

The beads are thirty-six inches long with a six and a half inch dongle.

https://www.etsy.com/listing/1584458759/unique-hekate-prayer-beads-with-bronze

In sorcerer's workbench

From the Sorcerer’s Workbench: Devotional Images of Baphomet

Author Satyr MagosPosted on

Good morning, friends!

Yesterday I got the second new design for my Samhain line cast up, along with the first of the season’s three unique pieces. All three depict Baphomet as iconically illustrated by French mystic and grade-A weirdo Eliphas Levi. (He was a legit mystic, but being a Catholic mystic who does fake Christianized kabala and takes a fake Jewish name makes him a weirdo and kind of an asshole.) I’m really pleased with how they all turned out, and I’m excited to finally have some Baphomet pieces in my line.

The stock design is done in my signature style, and will be available in all four of my usual metals: sterling silver and shibuichi (both pictured above) as well as yellow brass and red bronze. It’s a one sided talisman and will be selling for $153 in silver, $130 in shibuichi, $88 in brass, and $123 in bronze.

The unique design was cast from a hand-carved wax, one of my best yet, and features a gorgeous orange Mexican fire opal as the gnostic flame. It looks so much better in person, and I’m really frustrated with my inability to get a good photo. I will keep trying, but do need to get it out in the world in the meantime. This piece is selling and shipping for $340.

You can check out the Samhain Line at my Etsy store, with more pieces to be added throughout the next week.

In witchcraft

Working the Hekataeon: A Cacaphony of Gods

Author Satyr MagosPosted on

There are seven gods who receive daily offerings in my house. (Though I only speak of six with any regularity, there is also the Serpent Faced God of PGM XII 153-60.) As I have said before, I have no impulse toward exclusive worship – not henotheism, not monotheism, not even monism – so I had no notion of suspending those offerings when I sat down to resume the work of the Hekataeon. But it had been my intention to devote my active attention to Hekate alone. The gods, it seemed, had other plans.

In retrospect, this should not have come as a surprise.

Over the last two years, in particular, there have been times when my morning rituals have evoked intense visionary experiences. The visions that resulted in the triptych images of Baphomet, and the vision of Lucifer as the Dweller on the Threshold, were the most significant that I ever felt comfortable relating publicly. They were not, by any means, the most intense. I could feel the hands of the gods upon me, see their faces before my eyes, smell their headdy, uncanny musk.

But it seemed that I never had more than two or three visions of one god before other gods began appearing, as well. Already struggling to deal with the implications of the first visions, the addition of other powers to that mix was inevitably more than I could handle. I retreated from the experiences, and all the gods fell silent.

My friends who were raised with more religion than I was laugh at me when I wonder aloud if having been raised in a different environment would have better prepared me for these experiences. But I think they underestimate how alienated my upbringing was from divinity. In the same way I was raised vaguely aware that queer people existed, but with a strong implication that they were all far away and that I would never meet one, I was raised in a place where religion was just a social control mechanism, where people of strong convictions and intense experiences were alien and threatening. As a child, they were snake-handlers and madmen on television; as a teen, they were still that, and they were also Pat Robertson and the 700 Club: people who wanted me dead for being effeminate, for playing D&D, and for dabbling in witchcraft.

My earliest epiphanies were always of singular divinities, always months apart. They were also largely spontaneous: the presence of a god intruding on what had been intended to be some other sort of mystical experience. One of the earliest such was Rhea/Kybele appearing to demand I bring my then-friend Pasiphae to her. (I still wonder, sometimes, if that contact ever happened, or if Pasiphae’s commitment to a faceless generic Goddess was impenetrable to the real divine.)

Now, working my way through the first and then the second nine days of the Hekataeon, I am once more blessed/plagued by a cacophony of divinity. Baphomet shows me new faces every two or three days, revealing how the trinity/triptych aspects I have been shown unfold into seven (and nine) planetary epiphanies. Their Lunar aspect has much in common with the White Lady, and Saturnian Baphomet shares much with The Man in Black. Their Solar manifestation is Akephelos (Headless), and caries the Light of Creation, Phanes, like Eros. I have glimpsed their Martial aspect, bull-headed, armed and armored, which I so far call Korebantes, and that bull-headed vision gave way to another: a starry, mystical, Neptunian which I have (for lack of a better name so far) dubbed Asterion.

Aphrodite has blessed the photoshoot I did in her honor. Eros and Lucifer and Dionysos all loom large at their altars. My familiar spirits have begun speaking again on the regular, giving me practical advice for how to achieve my goals.

On days three and four and five and six of The Call, this was … unsettling. Distracting. Dissonant.

But, speaking with my compatriots at our regular New Moon Esbat, as we had all concluded our first round of The Call, those with more experience than I with the gods assured me that this was common. So, too, have a handful of people around the internet when I spoke of this problem. “Problem.”

So, even as I find the experience unsettling, I am reassured. As alien as this experience is to my upbringing and my expectations, it appears to be … typical. (As hurtful as that word is to us mystics and madmen.)

And so, as uncomfortable as it is, and as hard as it makes things from one day to the next, I am going to try to sit with that discomfort. To try to find the symphony in the cacophony.

After all, am I not a mystic? Am I not here for gnosis of the gods and the cosmos? Did I not tell Hekate, herself, that I am here to see where the road will take me? Did I not seek out each of these gods, too, even as I have sought out Hekate? Did I not seek out some of them – Dionysos, Baphomet – even before her?

This is the work. This is what I have come here to do. I have taken the names that I have taken. Each day I repeat them, both assertion and demand: I am [That Seer of Antiquity], I am [The Satyr Who Is a Magician], I am [The Sacred Companion]. I will live up to those ambitions. I will live up to those expectations.

When the gods speak, I will strive to listen.

If you want to get my posts a week before everyone else, to see the magical experiments that I don’t share with the public, to get first dibs on my elected talismans and fine art jewelry, or just want to support my work, you can do so through patreon. If you’d like to make a one-time donation, or don’t want to deal with all the non-occult content I post on patreon, I also have a ko-fi.

In art, witchcraft

Visions of Baphomet Cernunos

Author Satyr MagosPosted on

In the midst of our otherwise more light-hearted shoot, KaCee was willing to take a moment to pose for a set of devotional images depicting the god Baphomet.

Images like these were always part of my plan for this shoot, but I had originally intended a different set of horns. Unfortunately, the enormous curling papier-mache ram’s horns that I had brought out of storage had suffered a bit of damage that I didn’t notice until I was on site, and we weren’t able to use them at all. But, in a way, the antler crown was super appropriate.

My relationship with Baphomet began with the Mass of Chaos B from Peter Carroll’s Liber Null & Psychonaut, which I used to consecrate myself and a mask. The ritual conflates Baphomet with the Horned God of “the Second Age”, an ideosyncratic conflation of Crowley’s ages and Wiccan pseudohistory), an aspect which is not central to my experience of the god, but which I honor in these images, and by making sacrifice to him when my Horned God devotional images sell at the Sorcerer’s Workbench.

I still have a whole Baphomet-themed shoot that I want to do with Kraken, specifically, but we just haven’t managed to make that happen, yet, and in the interim I am very, very happy with these.

In art, witchcraft

Triptych Vision of Baphomet

Author Satyr MagosPosted on

I’ve mentioned a few times that my daily ritual includes an invocation of Baphomet, calling upon them to light their Gnostic fire with me, my familiars, and the world. I have mentioned that, on some days, I have been rewarded with visions of the god, and that I have attempted to reproduce those visions in art as a devotional practice. I have not been particularly successful at doing so *frequently*, but that practice has continued.

I may also have mentioned that the god has frequently appeared to me as a … triptych, for lack of a better word. Or I may not have. Frankly, I have struggled with the vision, in part because it is so different from the way Baphomet is depicted in any other source that I’ve seen. I have made a few attempts to render those images into art – as an act of devotion, yes, but also so that I can contemplate them, and try to understand them. These three pencil sketches from mid-May are the best that I have managed so far.

In the center, of course, is Baphomet as one usually sees them: goat-headed and goat-footed, in the magician’s pose, the sacred androgyne: both man and woman and neither; both divine and mortal and neither. Levi, who first drew this image, hid their phallus behind a magic wand. I suffer from no such cowardice. In this vision they are the Red God. No, I don’t know what that means.

On the right hand side (of my vision) is the White Lady, or perhaps White Priestess. She is crowned by the moon, and sometimes veiled or blindfolded. She tilts her head back toward the sky, and her arms hang down with her hand open, palms up.

On the left hand side is the Black Man, or the Man in Black, or both. His head is that of a deer, or perhaps the skull of a deer, with branching antlers. He holds his hands up in a gesture of power.

I don’t know what this means. I don’t know what any of this means. Didn’t I just write about how deeply uncomfortable I am with religious impulse and experience? And yet, mystic visions like these are what I live for. And if there are mystic waters unmixed with religion, well… I left those shallow shores behind years ago. When I wrote last, that thought made me angry. Today I am just … confused.

Of all the gods in my altar room, Baphomet is almost always the most present. Even as I have struggled with deep depression over the last weeks – a plain fact that deserves a post of its own – and I have struggled to feel the presences even of Dionysos and Aphrodite, gods who have been with me even longer, Baphomet has been there with me, reaching out, a palpable presence in the room.

The images above are still as much artistic flourish as mystic vision. I hope that, as I continue to struggle out of this emotional morass, I will be able to resume that work, the vision will return and I will be able to render it more clearly.

In witchcraft

Meditative Acts: Day 10: Baphomet 1

Author Satyr MagosPosted on

Tonight’s meditations opened up the second phase of my meditative acts: devotional ritual and prayer to the distinctly post-modern god/dess Baphomet.  If linear time were a thing, we would say that the god Baphomet began as an accusation whispered against the Templars — possibly a French bastardization of “Mohammed”.  The goat-headed androgyne we recognize today was first attested by Eliphas Levi.  (See Wikipedia for the short version; enjoy your conspiracy-greased rabbit hole of choice thereafter.)  Levi was, in fact, my first encounter with Baphomet — Doctrine and Ritual of Trancendental Magic was one of the first magical books I ever bought — but, like much of the world, my relationship with the god owes more to Peter Carroll’s “Mass of Chaos B”, as presented in Liber Null & Psychonaut.

I built the altar slowly over the course of the day, but I inevitably found myself fussing with it throughout the evening’s meditations, trying to attune it so as to best please the god.

As I had planned from the outset, I opened my week devoted to Baphomet by returning to Carroll’s “Mass…”  The effects were, in some ways, less spectacular than the last times I performed the rite.  At the same time, I think my magickal voltmeter might be calibrated somewhat differently since then, and I now have an established relationship with the god, making a dramatic reveal on zir part somewhat unnecessary.  The rite completed, I lit my candle and sat to listen.

Four things stood out.

Firstly, Baphomet’s presence in the room was far more immanent than that of Dionysos.  Not that the god was closer, per se, but perhaps that zie had less distance to travel?

Secondly, I was informed that tomorrow night’s meditation is to be a return (again) to DDRH’s Baphomet Ritual.

Thirdly, I as I was meditating I became acutely aware of the attention of the other magical masks hanging in my altar room.  I’m really really not sure what to do with that.  Hopefully clarity will come with time?

Finally, sitting still for that lone is getting much easier very quickly.  So, something of a victory there.

In art, Uncategorized, witchcraft

Hymn to Baphomet

Author Satyr MagosPosted on

baphomet

A new hymn for a god/dess of witches, sorcerers, and madmen.

 

Hymn to Baphomet

Io Baphometos!

 

Strange god!  Gnostic god!

Creator and destroyer!

Friend to the alienated,

lover and beloved

of artists and magicians!

 

You who reconcile false dichotomies:

mortal and divine; man and woman;

human and animal; of the Earth and of the Air.

You are of the Dark Moon and the Light.

Solve et coagvla.

 

You are the Sabbatic goat!

Winged, and crowned in horn and flame,

sacred hermaphrodite;

Thyrsus and caduceus, thy tumescence.

You are the Mysteries made flesh.

 

O you Hidden One!

You are ancient yet unfinished!

You are many formed, many natured!

Panphage pangenitor!

You are All-Father, All-Mother, All-Lover!

 

Io Baphometos!

All hail Baphomet!

In art

Photo story: the Mask of Baphomet

Author Satyr MagosPosted on

The first of many series exploring myth, ritual, and possession, I shot these photos around the first of the month with my first professional model, Felicity Houpte.  Inspired by my experiences with the Conjuration of Baphomet, this series depicts a simple rite of evocation and the donning of a mask, followed by possession by the god Baphomet and finally apotheosis.

Images below the fold for space considerations and because they are not safe for work.

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