The Origin of Enochian Magick

The road to knowledge has always been an elusive one and scarcely is it easily tread. Only those lithe of mind can navigate the oceans of information we find ourselves in; discerning, scouring the horizon for truth's dim glow. For such aspirants, the task becomes a balancing act of intuition and the forging of a logical congruence of one's own. Few seekers find their solace; some grow old and tired, and surrender themselves to the mystery. Some flock to the stale, modern notion of the Scientific Method; one that leaves little if any room for such things as sacredness or divinity. Others yearn to deepen their spirituality and gravitate to the religious spheres, often becoming plagued with cognitive dissonance as faith replaces logic. Less common is the mind that, unsatisfied with it's academic and religious conditioning, turns to occult wisdom in search of counsel.
John Dee, a man regarded as one of the most brilliant minds of the 16th century, was one such seeker. His quest for what he referred to as "radical knowledge", or knowledge of that which was beyond the normal understanding of reality, took him from a world of royal luxury and social status to the enigmatic and forsaken realms of what some call black magick. He's been described as the quintessential magician and his work has influenced everything from Shakespeare, navigation technologies, Elizabethan politics, to the current world of the occult.

John Dee was known as the greatest scholar of his time and from 1558 through to the 1570s, he served as advisor, consultant, and astrologer to Queen Elizabeth I. He was a respected astronomer, renowned tutor and enthralled mathematician, known to have taught commoners and those unprivy to higher education of the splendors of math. Quite the numerologist, Dee believed that numbers were a divine and sacred alphabet, universal and intrinsic to the fabric of the cosmos. This conviction would become the infrastructure of his spirituality as he embarked upon the Great Work; the transcendence of the self in gaining proximity with the divine. As the queen's spy, he wore the badge number 007, symbolically representing himself as the eyes of the queen. The seven may have been included for it's mystical Kabbalistic qualities as Dee, a devout Christian Kabbalist himself, sought not only knowledge, but to further his spiritual growth through union with the divine. To the Christian mystic, this is known as henosis. He had studied the ancient ways of Egypt and believed that their incredible feats had been accomplished through connection with the god mind via ritual magick. Dee felt that man's understanding of the world had since begun slipping away and he wished to re-establish such understandings. By his early 50's and after having amassed and compiled Europe's largest library, a total of 5000 volumes, he began to realize that the mainstream educations of the day offered him no resolution. Unafraid of being charged with heresy, he ventured into the esoteric where his studies eventually led him to the magickal practices of alchemy, Hermeticism, divination and ultimately, angelic communion.

Building upon the writings of occultist Cornelius Agrippa, Dee's focus became communicating with the spirit plane and the various methods of doing so. From esoteric teachings, he had learned of an original language believed to have been spoken in the Garden of Eden, the holy tongue of the angels. If he could commune with such celestial entities, perhaps the radical knowledge he so fervently sought could be attained. Meddling with the spirits was considered highly dangerous and heretical in the eyes of the church as the conjurer, through the very nature of the ceremony, would become vulnerable to the energies of other dimensions, both benevolent and malefic. Obsessed with the prospect of discovering such a tongue, it became clear that scrying, or the practice of conjuring other-worldly energies with crystals, would be a necessary magick to employ. By 1582, this investigation along with the shared alchemical pursuits of the Hermetic sciences, such as the Philosopher's Stone, led him to work with a mysterious and unscrupulous magician that went by the name of Edward Kelley. A self-proclaimed spirit medium, alchemist, necromancer, psychic and talented scryer, Kelley would become Dee's link to divine communication. Although initially weary of Kelley, Dee's trust solidified after a compelling seance wherein upon gazing into a shew-stone, Kelley was overwhelmed by visions of angelic contact. So convincing was this experience for Dee that the two men would go on to conduct highly intensive, mystical experiments for the next 5 years.

In preparation for theurgy, the floor of the ritual space would be thoroughly cleaned. Four wax tablets and a sigil of Emeth (Hebrew for 'truth') would then be placed on the ground. Another sigil was placed atop a four-legged table, over which a rainbow-colored cloth was draped. In the middle of the table sat either a crystal ball, 2-3 inches in diameter, or an obsidian mirror, both of which were powerful tools of the scryer. Dee & Kelley would begin with an extensive set of prayers meant to sanctify the soul and ward off pernicious energies. As the summoning commenced, Kelley would consult the spirits on Dee's behalf, Dee simultaneously participating in forms of divination and meticulously noting every detail of the ritual in his journal. Sometimes involving the use of astral projection, Kelley's changelings began to reveal a language and the two men appeared to be making direct contact with angelic forces. Dee's journal is said to contain secrets from the apocryphal book of Enoch, as well as encounters with prophetic apparitions. They had worked in three concentrated periods of dedicated study, the third and final of which yielding most of the magickal system that would much later become known as Enochian Magick. 

Perplexing and notoriously bewildering in it's intricacy, the novice magician may find the Enochian system laborious to comprehend. However, not too reductively, it can be simplified to having 3 unique sets of different but interconnected planes. One is planetary and is based on the energies of the 7 planets of our solar system. Another is grounded in the Zodiac and works with the 12 astrological signs. The third and most powerful plane is that of the four elements; Earth, Water, Air, and Fire. It is on this plane that the deepest revelations are to be had. So powerful and fascinating was this magick, that it saw revival in the late 19th century through occultist and magician Aleister Crowley and has since been integrated into the magickal systems of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn.

Sources

http://hermetic.com/enochia/system_enochian_magick_1.html

http://hermetic.com/enochia/enoch-ref.html

http://www.llewellyn.com/journal/article/2321

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5s7OoMORW4Q

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aghX8pK7oAs