The Truth about Evocation

Greetings walkers with spirits!

I’ve noticed people tend to have a general misunderstanding of what evocation is and for what it is intended. So many people seem to believe evocation is what Solomonic Magick is all about. It isn’t.

I understand why this view exists. In occult and fantasy fiction, it is necessary to make things look interesting – so the default is to always show a mage standing within his protective Circle, surrounded by incense smoke, wand or sword in hand, chanting in arcane tongues, calling forth frightening or awe-inspiring creatures from the astral mists. It’s no different than – for example – a cop show that only shows you the exciting chases and impressive sleuth techniques, but never shows you the hours of paperwork and waiting that actually make up most of the job. So it is with the popular depiction of grimoire magick. And, because you only ever see the mage doing that one thing – evocation – it tends to become what you picture when you think of the subject.

Another culprit, believe it or not, is the grimoires themselves. Or, I should say, the popular misinterpretation of the grimoires. As I explain in both Secrets of the Magical Grimoires and my online beginners’ course, the grimoires do not in fact present the whole of the Solomonic tradition. They are just the starter manuals (which is why they are called “grammars”), giving you instructions on how to establish first contact with the angels and spirits of the tradition. And how you do that is (to a large extent) by performing the evocations. Once you’ve established that contact, it is not necessary to perform the evocation over and over again. From there, the spirits take over and teach you the real magick – and it’s not just more evocation.

Evocation has two primary purposes:

1) to establish contact with a spiritual being (or group of beings). Once you have that contact, you never need to perform the evocation for that being again. Of course, you’ll need to perform it again for any new entities you want to meet. So I am by no means suggesting you’ll never perform another evocation! However, you will not need to repeat it for the spirit(s) you’ve already contacted. That is, as long as you bind that being to a Talisman, Ring, Tablet, Altar, etc and have a means to continue working with it.

2) For important matters that require directly questioning a spiritual being. Most specifically when you have a series of questions that need to be asked. This is why the grimoires often use evocation for the purposes of discovering hidden information, finding lost or stolen items or people, receiving specific instructions for something, to find buried treasure, etc, etc. I have said in the past that evocation – meaning its use for this specific purpose – is in itself a form of divination. You’re talking to the spirit in order to learn something you didn’t previously know. Otherwise – why are you calling it?

Therefore, evocation is something that is done MUCH more rarely than other aspects of the Tradition. For most purposes, you can make a petition to an angel, or create a Talisman for whatever you need, without going through the weeks- or months-long process of full evocation. If, that is, you have previously done the work of evoking the spirits you are working with and taken the time and effort to build a working relationship with them. In our house, we have altars to all seven Planetary Archangels (same guys you see in the Heptameron), not to mention to my HGA and Familiars, Carrie’s Prenda, her Ancestor Altar, and a few others as well. We don’t have to spend months performing full evocations of them when we need to ask for something – because we already did that and now they live here! We only have to evoke them to visible/audible appearance when we need to ask them specific questions and get their direct answers.

Another thing to consider, as well: there is NO need to evoke dozens of spirits! I’ve seen people who brag about summoning all 72 spirits of the Goetia. Or that they’ve evoked all the Shem haMephoresh and/or Tree of Life Angels. But, folks, that isn’t how this tradition works! You could be a successful Solomonic magus through your entire life and only contact one or two spirits. You have to find a spirit who works well with you, who likes you, and gets results – and keep working with that spirit. That spirit may or may not be able to do everything you need – and, if not, it can direct you to (or even introduce you to) another spirit who can, and now that spirit becomes part of your crew. The Angels and spirits of the grimoires aren’t Pokemon! You don’t have to collect ’em all. Your spiritual army should be something you build up very slowly and deliberately over years, and not treated like a call list at a phone sales company.

Yes, we have a LOT of altars in our home – mostly because we do this professionally. But, even with us, there are a smaller number of entities we go to for most things. For me it is first my HGA, then my Familiars. If directed to do so, I can take an issue to one of the Seven Archangels – and that often tends to be Sachiel and Iophiel, because somewhere along the way I became a Jupiter wizard. For Carrie, she’ll often go to Anael or Samael because she has a special relationship with them. That is not to say we never go to the other Archangels, only that it is a more rare occurrence in relation to the ones we work with the most.

And it is even rarer for us to perform full evocations for them. Instead, we spend our time tending to their Altars and Icons, making offerings to them, burning dressed candles and making petitions to them, and conversing with them either directly or via one form of divination or another. Sorry if that sounds more like work than the awesome fantasy of being a wizard – but it is the truth. And now you have it.