Imagination

Imagination The creative faculty of the mind, which in Magic is the formative power for bringing things into manifestation. Imagination is an orderly and intentional mental process. It is distinguished from daydreaming and fancy, which consist of random thoughts and desires. It is not unreal but is a powerful creative force that becomes reality, especially when stimulated in deliberate ways by Ritual. Imagination is the power of self-healing and MIRACLES, Prophecy, and Clairvoyance.

Imagination works in tandem with will as a team of the two most potent forces employed by the magician. Iamblichus, writing in The Mysteries, said that the imagination is:

. . . superior to all nature and generation, and through which we are capable of being united to the Gods, of transcending the mundane order, and of participating in eternal life, and the energy of the supercelestial Gods. Through this principles, therefore, we are able to liberate ourselves from fate.

Imagination creates Thoughtforms on the astral plane or higher planes, which are as objective and real to the entities existing on those planes as are earthly surroundings to humans. The thought-forms created by imagination must be vitalized, powered, and directed by the will, otherwise they will be transient.

An example of how imagination is employed in occult practice comes from the writings of Dr. Edward Berridge, a homeopathic physician and member of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. Berridge’s occult name was Frater Resurgam. Berridge was consulted by a man who said that several years prior, he had been in the frequent company of a man who made constant use of a certain profane expression. The words had stuck in his mind, and he could not rid himself of them. Berridge believed that the words were like a mantram and had the effect of vitalizing an elemental entity that had attached itself to the man. He prescribed a magical remedy:

I advised him the next time the phrase troubled him— first to imagine he saw before him some horrible creature as the embodiment of the profanity itelf—next to hold this creature firmly before him, and then to send forth an occult dynamite shell, penetrating into the elemental, and then exploding and blowing it to atoms.

The man did as instructed. He said that he had not succeeded in destroying the elemental, but he did manage to send it away, though not permanently. However, he was seldom bothered by it.

See also tarot; tattvas.

FURTHER READING:

• King, Francis (ed.). Ritual Magic of the Golden Dawn. Rochester, Vt.: Destiny Books, 1997.
• Regardie, Israel. The Tree of Life: A Study in Magic. York Beach, Maine: Samuel Weiser, 1969.

The Encyclopedia of Magic and Alchemy Written by Rosemary Ellen Guiley Copyright © 2006 by Visionary Living, Inc.