Franz Bardon, Book list and contents Options

FRANZ BARDON

The following are the books written by Franz Bardon with an overview of their contents:


Frabato the Magician

This is a story based around the facts of Bardon’s life, who was a great adept of the twentieth century. I recommend reading this first as it gives a feel for the greatness of this amazing man called Franz. His life is to be one long round of magickal battles during the 1930s as he is opposed by a black lodge. Bardon starts out as a stage magician although very much a magician in the true sense of the word.


Volume I - Initiation into Hermetics

This book is foundational and set into two parts headed: Initiation I – Theory, followed by Initiation II – The Practice of Magick.

Initiation I is the theoretical background to prepare the initiate for the magickal practice. In the first forty pages, this part introduces the beginner to the four elements: fire, water, air and earth and also looks at Karma, the Akashic/Etheric Principle, the human body in terms of its occult anatomy and descriptions of the physical, astral, spirit and mental planes, finally there are short talks on Truth, Religion, God and Asceticism.

Initiation II gets you practicing magic through exercises on the inner consciousness with thought control, auto-suggestion, sensing energies of the four elements, accumulation of Vital Energy. Tuition is then turned to outward consciousness and harmonising elements, passive communication, entity creation, clairaudience, clairvoyance and clairsentience. There is mental and astral work followed by use of magic mirrors and the loading of talismans, amulets and precious stones and volting through the electromagnetic sphere. There are short talks on telepathy, hypnosis, psychometry, invisibility to mention a few. Volume I ends with final words on the power of life and death.


Volume 2 – The Practice of Magical Evocation

This book follows on from volume I and introduces the magician to the communication with and evocation of entities and in fact, you will need to have studied Initiation into Hermetics before working through this volume. This material is divided into three parts: Magic, Hierarchy and Illustrations of Seals of the Principals, Intelligences, Genii and Beings.

Part I looks at what the practitioner needs to do magic, going into details about the circle, triangle, censer, mirror, lamp and wand and how to load them. Then it looks at the sword, dagger and trident, headband, robe, belt and other magical aids, finishing the first part with the Secret Book of Formulas, being in the sphere of beings, the advantages and disadvantages of evocation, servant spirits and last but not least, magical evocation.

Part II describes the beings that Bardon has experienced either by evocation or mental travel and there is a description of the 360 Principals of the Earth, Intelligences and genii of planetary spheres. Chapter 13 is the final chapter in with on Magical Talismanology.

Part III is a graphical representation of the seals of the principals, intelligences, genii and beings, listed in Part II.


Volume 3 – The Key to the True Kabbalah

This volume in Hermetic magic takes the magician through the Hebrew Kabbalah, again it is a book ordered into three parts: Part I – Theory, Part II – Practice and Part III – The Practice of Formula Magic.

Part I has chapters covering the Kabbalah, the Man as Kabbalist, The Laws of Analogy, The Esoterics of Letters, The Cosmic Language, The Magico-Kabbalistic Word –Tetragrammaton. Following on with The Mantras, The Tantras, The Sorcerers’ Formulas, the Theory of Kabbalistic Mysticism and finally Kabbalistic Magic.

Part II teaches the magician the practicalities of pronunciation and their vibrations to colour, number, elements and planetary spheres.

Part III on the practice of formula magic with the use of alphabetical keys to influence the mental, astral and material planes.

Phil Hine and Carroll you say. That is quite amusing since these two are of the same kind of writer as Bardon, judged from this only book I read. (To judge an author completely by one book would be an error, so I really need to look at his other books first.) However...
By same kind of author I mean an author doing guesswork and presenting it as if it was tested to work. Anyone who claims to do real progress within their systems I would personally dare say were delusional. It's just not information when the experience I get from reading their books, including Bardon's, that I myself could have, or more correctly most of the time, already have made up such ideas, only I would never be so dumb to publish them. I love speculation and free thought myself, but most of it is simply junk.

Your defence of that Bardon lived in a special time and place really won't pass as an excuse with me. You are right that I haven't looked upon his history, and from his Initiation to Hermetics I can only guess that he was very young, and only had a sudden urge to pass on second-hand information that he might have been hyped up about at the time. Because the book shows zero reflection in my opinion.

I am sorry to say I could not distract any gold from the book, but I will give his other books a chance one day. Too bad that their titles already tell me that the contents may be of the much too basic type.

edit: I know it would seem like I am only showing off my ego here, but I have always been short-tempered when it comes to bad occult literature.

This post has been edited by thief_and_a_liar: Jan 5 2006, 05:35 PM