Peter Grey’s Lucifer: Praxis is a profound and original study of spiritual power in the western magical tradition, explored through the evolution of the figure of Lucifer – as the archetype of rebellion, liberation and, ultimately, transformation and renewal. The work continues the trajectory of Lucifer: Princeps, Grey’s meticulous study of the origins of the figure of the light-bringer and the myth of the rebel angels at the root of our occult tradition.

In this volume, Grey traces the development of magic as praxis, through a critical engagement with the Christian vision of the spiritual world and its heritage of compulsion, binding and exorcism. Grey also rejects the post-Christian materialist dismissal of spiritual encounters, and instead advocates for a counter-tradition of spiritual antinomianism and intercourse. Praxis presents magic as a dynamic pact with spirits, whilst recognising that authority requires the exercise of power.

Opening with ‘The Angelic Principate,’ Grey examines the twenty named angels of 1 Enoch, giving their genealogies and functions, and revealing them as tutelary spirits and teachers, elemental forces and sublunary epiphanies of wind and storm, immanent in starlight, stone, flora and fauna. Grey emphasises the power of storytelling, place and ritual to evoke and commune with these spirits, and gives oaths, initiations and protocols.

Subsequent chapters examine magical authority and practice through such figures as St Paul and Simon Magus, as the daimonic is actively demonised and exorcism becomes a tool of eschatology and conquest. Proposing a Luciferian praxis, Grey provides rituals for engaging with spirits at different time depths, patterned on the Greco-Egyptian magical papyri and the Solomonic grimoires. Particular attention is given to the Ars Goetia, the Livre des Esperitz and the Red Dragon, with revised conjurations for those who wish to operate outside the dominant Christian paradigm.

Lucifer enters the modern era through the line of prophecy as revolution shakes England, Europe and America. The archetype transforms from the rebel against God into the scourge of tyrants. William Blake’s visionary assault on John Milton’s sublime Paradise Lost gives permission to the Romantic poets to invoke Lucifer as illuminator and liberator.

Lucifer: Praxis is both a scholarly and poetic guide, offering a framework for magical practice that is rooted in historic precedent yet contemporary; an innovative fusion of Enochic lore, the line of prophecy, and contemporary ritual craft. Grey charts the emergence of a new Luciferianism which blooms from the ritual texts and revolutionary fire that have shaped our modern world.