The Magic of the Orphic Hymns

Introduction: An Experiment with the Orphic Hymns

1 The Mythology of Orpheus
2 Mysterious Orpheus
3 The Severan Dynasty
4 The Pagan Orpheus
5 The Orphic Mysteries
6 The Golden Leaves
7 The Night Gathering
8 Orpheus in the Renaissance
9 The Occult Orpheus
10 More Popular Than Ever
11 The Backward Glance
12 The Evolution of Eurydice
13 The Mystical Purpose
14 A Note on Incense
15 A Note on the Translation

Orphic Charms and the Sacred Songs of Orpheus

Orphic Charms
Messages on gold leaf buried with the dead, and a grand invocation.

The Sacred Songs of Orpheus
A poetic interpretation of the Orphic hymns with added details about the sacred correspondences of the gods.

Annotated Bibliography

Index of Orphic Charms and the Sacred Songs of Orpheus

Index

Tamra Lucid, a documentary film producer, including the Emmy-nominated End of the Line: The Women of Standing Rock, is author of Making the Ordinary Extraordinary: My Seven Years in Occult Los Angeles with Manly Palmer Hall. She and Ronnie are founding members of the experimental rock band Lucid Nation. Ronnie Pontiac worked as Manly P. Hall’s research assistant, screener, and designated substitute lecturer for seven years. Author of American Metaphysical Religion, he wrote the biographical introduction to Letters to the Sage. He’s written for several esoteric journals and has produced award-winning documentaries.

“Tamra and Ronnie have outdone themselves! This book is the most comprehensively intelligent and pleasurably accessible portrait of Orphic mythology now available. Their modern translations of the Orphic hymns yield fresh fruit from an ancient vine. The culmination of their historical and practical research yields a book that testifies to the 21st century: this music is magic, and the magic is real. Anyone interested in the intersections of music, myth, and magic will delight in this work.” Matt Marble, author of Buddhist Bubblegum

“This book is a marvel of pagan revivalism. Tamra Lucid and Ronnie Pontiac have created a symphonic and learned study of the Orphic mythos encompassing history and meaning; translation of key odes; and reconstructed practice. If you yearn for evidence that the old deities are with us today, look no further than The Magic of the Orphic Hymns.” Mitch Horowitz, PEN Award–winning author of Occult America and Uncertain Places

“This fascinating, lively, and erudite exploration of Orphism is a superb entrance point to this treasure trove of lore and knowledge.” Richard Smoley, editor of Quest: Journal of the Theosophical Society in America and author of A Theology of Love

“Tamra Lucid and Ronnie Pontiac have produced a beautifully clear and elegant version of the ancient Orphic hymns, preceded by a meticulously researched mythic, historical, and magical overview of all things Orphic past and present. They are passionate and thorough, their tone contemporary and accessible, creating a wonderful example of what Jeff Kripal calls ‘the gnostic classroom,’ which is rigorously scholarly yet deeply sympathetic to the universal wisdom of the Orphic tradition. A great resource for students and practitioners alike.” Angela Voss, editor of Marsilio Ficino (Western Esoteric Masters Series)

“A wonderful book for anyone interested in metaphysics and mythology. Not only a fascinating and easy-to-read history but also an exhaustive work of scholarship—and in the translations of the poems that make up the second half of the book, a mind-blowing work of creativity. A must for any visionary’s library.” Tod Davies, author of the History of Arcadia visionary fiction series and editorial director of Exterminating Angel Press

“The Orphic hymns are among the most beautiful and effective invocations that have been handed down to us from the ancient Greeks. But, while Taylor’s classic translations are both admirable and eloquent in practice—that is, used ritualistically—they can seem clumsy and, at times, even cumbersome. Pontiac and Lucid’s welcome interpretive renditions have changed all of that. Theirs have quickly become my go-to translations for using the hymns in practical theurgic rites.” P. D. Newman author of Theurgy: Theory and Practice

“Ronnie Pontiac and Tamra Lucid, musicians and metaphysicians both, the inheritors of Manly P. Hall’s blessings. Who better to reveal the living magic of the Orphic hymns to a new generation? The Orphic hymns are not spells but poetic and magical evocations aligned with the understanding of pantheism, that all of nature is divinely infused and revealed through its kindred correspondences. Although the book chases the figure of Orpheus through history in a scholarly fashion, the author is not identified, the story is too complex and veiled. The magic is to be encountered in the song, not the singer, so take up the invitation and softly sing to the world outside your window.” Naomi Ozaniec, author of Becoming a Garment of Isis

“This book delivers what its title indicates: the translations of the Orphic fragments and hymns are rendered in clear modern English, easy to understand for the contemporary reader. The review and analysis of scholarship on the contested ‘Orphic’ religion is wide ranging and comprehensive. All scholarship is taken into consideration from skeptical classicists to engaged occultists. The book presents a ‘feeling’ of the Orphic tradition and at the same time an analytic and critical overview of ‘Orphism’ from ancient to modern times. From the ancient poets to the modern painters of Orphism; from Plato and Plotinus to Ficino, Thomas Taylor, and E. R. Dodds; from Monteverdi to Philip Glass to modern pop culture—it is an accomplishment. I give my warmest endorsement.” Jay Bregman, author of Synesius of Cyrene

“I have often said that history is not a linear line, but instead a complex web. The goal of the historian is to make that web feel linear to the non-specialist. Tamra Lucid and Ronnie Pontiac have done exactly that, producing a stellar work, including passages so gorgeously written, I found myself returning to previous pages for a reread. Impeccably researched and beautifully written, The Magic of the Orphic Hymns is a wild ride through history, ritual, and the mysteries of the human mind and soul. As Lucid and Pontiac took me through the many ages and evolutions of the Orphic Mysteries, I could almost hear the sweet strings of a lute accompanying the many discoveries I made while reading—such is the strength of this timely work. Highly recommended to those who like their history neat, engaging, and filled with a page-turning allure that can only be described as magic.” Thomas Hatsis, author of The Witches’ Ointment and Psychedelic Mystery Traditions

Occult / Esoteric

“Tamra and Ronnie have outdone themselves! This book is the most comprehensively intelligent and pleasurably accessible portrait of Orphic mythology now available. Their modern translations of the Orphic hymns yield fresh fruit from an ancient vine. The culmination of their historical and practical research yields a book that testifies to the 21st century: this music is magic, and the magic is real. Anyone interested in the intersections of music, myth, and magic will delight in this work.”
– Matt Marble, author of Buddhist Bubblegum

As famous Renaissance philosopher Marsilio Ficino wrote, “No magic is more powerful than that of the Orphic Hymns.” These legendary teletai of Orpheus were not simply “hymns”—they were initiatic poems for meditation and ritual, magical, and ceremonial use, each one addressed to a specific deity, such as Athena or Zeus, or a virtue, such as Love, Justice, and Equality. Yet despite the mystical concepts underlying them, the original hymns were formulaic, creating an obstacle for translators.

Recapturing the magical vitality that inspired mystery cults through the ages, Tamra Lucid and Ronnie Pontiac present new versions of the teletai that include important esoteric details and correspondences about the being or deity to which each hymn is addressed. The authors also include a new version of a lost hymn called “Number” and messages that were inscribed on golden leaves meant to be passports for the dead, reinventions that preserve the original magical intent and mysticism of the teletai. Revealing the power of the individual hymns to attune the reader to the sacred presence of the Orphic Mysteries and the higher order of nature, the authors also show how, taken together, the Orphic Hymns are a book of hours or a calendar of life, addressing every event, from birth to death, and walking us through all the experiences of human existence as necessary and holy.

Tamra Lucid, a documentary film producer, including the Emmy-nominated End of the Line: The Women of Standing Rock, is author of Making the Ordinary Extraordinary: My Seven Years in Occult Los Angeles with Manly Palmer Hall. She and Ronnie are founding members of the experimental rock band Lucid Nation.

Ronnie Pontiac worked as Manly P. Hall’s research assistant, screener, and designated substitute lecturer for seven years. Author of American Metaphysical Religion, he wrote the biographical introduction to Letters to the Sage. He’s written for several esoteric journals and has produced award-winning documentaries.