Talk:Éliphas Lévi

Levi influence

At the end of the documet it is said the Levi is mentioned severall times by Loveraft in "The Case of Dexter Charles Ward". Reading Lovecraft's text, although, Eliphas Levi name is found only twice.

Many supposedly "ancient" occult or neo-pagan traditions in fact originated with Eliphas Levi. AnonMoos 17:53, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

The French Wikipedia article has a lot of material... AnonMoos (talk) 19:58, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

A quote (haven't personally verified it yet): AnonMoos (talk) 22:42, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Occultism was "in a moribund condition when Lévi started to revivify it by his books about it. The astonishing fact is that his work formed the narrow channel through which the whole Western tradition of magic flowed to the modern era... Lévi completed the task, begun in the Renaissance, of synthesizing the various ingredients of the Western tradition of magic; it was he who finally made it a single tradition" ..."the Qabala, alchemy, Hermetism, astrology, magnetism and even a little black magic from the grimoires" -- from A Wicked Pack of Cards by Ronald Decker, Thierry Depaulis, and Michael Dummett.[1] ISBN 0312162944

Crowley Fetus

The bit about Crowley being the reincarnation of Levi is odd. It assumes the possibility of reincarnation, and then it goes on to assume that if reincarnation is possible, the transfer must take place instantaneously after death. If you're going to accept reincarnation as a possibility, why would it matter how long it took for Soul A to migrate into Body B? --76.83.249.234 03:46, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

I think it's of interest to know chronology when there is a claim of reincarnation. If I claim to be the reincarnation of Princess Diana of Wales, for instance, people are less likely to believe me than if I claim to be reincarnated from someone who died before I was conceived. That death needs to occur before reincarnation is of course an assumption, but it's one many people make. Here the sequence is a bit more subtle: death before birth, but not death before conception. It's still interesting to note. Fuzzypeg☻ 03:56, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

This also strikes me as odd, and inappropriate commentary. There's an implicit assumption that the mechanism of reincarnation is understood enough to cast doubt on Crowley's claim. The historical fact worthy of encyclopedic mention is Crowley's claim. An aside about the plausibility and chronology of reincarnation is better relegated to the article on reincarnation, where this particular claim could serve as an illustration. I'm removing it from this article. Danielsteinbock (talk) 08:56, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

This condition would be comparable to the supposed soul possession of Cyril Hoskins by the Tibetan monk T. Lobsang Rampa, which "Rampa" nee Hoskins claimed happened after a tree climbing accident. The date is undocumented, although the book The Third Eye (book), in which the claim was made, was published in 1956. giggle 20:25, 23 February 2013 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Gregory.george.lewis (talk • contribs)

Adding bibliography

Could we possibly have a bibliography of Levi's works? Senoraraton 04:54, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

There is no mention in the article of the very interesting Paradoxes of the Highest Science - link at Sacred Texts Archive: http://www.sacred-texts.com/eso/levi/phs/index.htm Steve Harnish (talk) 18:16, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

WikiProject class rating

This article was automatically assessed because at least one WikiProject had rated the article as start, and the rating on other projects was brought up to start class. BetacommandBot 14:24, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

'Book of Splendors' (partial translation of Zohar)

Some years back I had a thin paperback book attributed to Levi, purporting to be his translation / commentaries on Zohar. I no longer have it and am thus unable to provide publisher, date, etc. Is this something that should be included in his bibliography, or a red herring? Shimjung1 (talk) 01:22, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

Pronunciation of Lévi

I think this article should specify the correct pronunciation of Lévi. I assume it's pronounced "le vee?" and not like the popular brand of denim trousers?Smiloid (talk) 02:36, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

Neither. It's pronounced the way French people pronounce it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.171.176.132 (talk) 17:45, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Spelling of name with or without acute accent79.50.227.37 (talk) 10:37, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

Title of entry refers to "Levi" while main body refers frequently to "Lévi", the name under which he published. Which should it be?

It should be "Lévi" with the accute accent. This is how his name appears on his books. Unfortunately, the page "Eliphas Lévi" redirects to the page "Eliphas Levi" without the diacritic mark. This should be fixed. RoyAlcatraz (talk) 02:54, 17 September 2012 (UTC)

As I was reading my copy of The Ritual of Transcendental Magic, the Introduction is prefaced by the illustration titled "The Sabbatic Goat", which is synonymous with Baphomet. If you look at the signature at the bottom of the illustration, "Eliphas Levi Del", what do you see when that name is read backwards? leD iveL, or le Divel. It's not le Devil, but it is close. Why would Levi have signed the name "Eliphas Levi Del"? I don't think this anagram was an accident, but that opinion has no foundational basis, other than a sneaking suspicion. By the way, as the author's name appears on both volumes of Transcendental Magic, as well as how it appears as a signature on The Sabbatic Goat, there is no accent mark in the name. giggle 20:15, 23 February 2013 (UTC) -- User:Gregory.george.lewis

First off, the word for "devil" has a "v" in few other languages than English (certainly not in French). Secondly, "del" is a standard recognized abbreviation for delineavit, Latin for "he drew (it)". In the context of pre-20th century illustration printing, the person who made the original drawing on which the illustration was based, and the person who translated this drawing into a form which could be used in printing, were usually two separate people. If so, the person who made the original drawing signed "Delineavit" (abbreviated "del."), while an engraver might sign sculpsit etc.[2] -- AnonMoos (talk) 13:08, 24 February 2013 (UTC)

Section for deletion (possible copyright violation)

Greetings! I'd like to propose the section Definition of Magic to be deleted. It currently relies on excessive direct quoting, and only one of the direct quotes is actually sourced. I think the current section make constitute a {{copyvio}} violation of some sort. Cheers! Jayaguru-Shishya (talk) 09:08, 22 June 2015 (UTC)

If it consists quotes from Levi's writings, then it could be excessive use of primary sources contrary to Wikipedia policies, but it's not a copyright violation (unless recent, still-copyrighted, English translations of the original French are used). AnonMoos (talk) 14:23, 20 July 2015 (UTC)

Good point AnonMoos. There is currently only one direct quote sourced (Levi, Constant & Blavatsky, 2012), but the first edition seems to date back to 1922 so we should be able to use that one, shouldn't we? Or does it hold only for the specific edition? I also don't know if the other direct quotes are sourced to pre-1923 material, so they are possible copyright violations.

Well, copyvios or not, they might still constitute excessive use of primary sources as you said. Thanks AnonMoos, cheers! Jayaguru-Shishya (talk) 17:42, 20 July 2015 (UTC)