Sitri, the Demon of Love’s Agony: Who is He and Why Does He Fear the Image of the Mother of God?
"Sitri, otherwise called Bitru, is a great Prince, and appeareth abroad with the face of a leopard, and he hath wings as a gryphon. When he taketh humane shape, he is exceeding beautiful. He inflameth a man with the love of a woman, and stirreth up a woman to the love of a man. Being commanded, he willingly discovereth the secrets of women, mocking them and flouting them, that they may make themselves naked. Sixty legions of spirits obey him."
I have already mentioned this spirit when describing my first experiments with him in my book, Love Magic in Different Traditions and Cultures. However, today that past experience seems far too superficial and primitive to me. That is precisely why I am writing this post, as I prepare for a new, larger-scale evocation of this undoubtedly powerful and dangerous adversary.
So, who is Sitri in reality? What constitutes his true essence, and what connects him with the other demons of the Goetic hierarchy?
What does a person under Sitri's influence actually feel?
The Key to Control: The Icon of the Mother of God
Why do I need two wands?
Why are two rods needed in the ritual of the invoking hexagram? We all know that the process of drawing the hexagram in the air has two stages; it is not uninterrupted. And the name of the God (Ararita) is chanted twice: once for the ascending triangle and once for the descending one. Over the years of practice, I’ve come to the conclusion (or, more precisely, the spirits directly told me this—I wouldn’t have figured it out on my own, since I’m a person without much imagination) that two wands are needed, each serving a different function. The green-and-blue wand is made according to a recipe very similar to the one given by Eliphas Lévi (Abbot Louis Constant) in his book "Doctrine and Ritual". It is a copper tube with a copper core running down the center, and the entire interior is filled with consecrated wax. The wand is divided in half into blue and green sections marked with the letters J and B. The letter J signifies the ascending flow, from earth to heaven, from death to eternity, the pillar of Jachin, the solar principle, expansion, will, fire, and the positive pole. Therefore, at the top of the blue side is a light-colored stone, and the letter itself is gold. On the other side, the rod is painted green with a silver letter B. This represents the descending flow, from God to earth, from the spiritual to the material, from eternity to mortality—the pillar of Boaz, the lunar principle, contraction, materialization, fate, water, and the negative pole. Therefore, the stone at the top of this side is black. And they are connected in the middle by the image of a hexagram. As E. Lévi writes, knowledge of these two fundamental currents in the macrocosm is the foundation of all magic. The realization of the famous magical and alchemical formula “Solve et Coagula,”—which generations of masters have tried to uncover (and about which I previously posted on Instagram)—is impossible without mastering these energy flows. So, this wand also underwent two stages of consecration. In a sense, this was its polarization. That is why it is kept in its case with silver and gold pads at both ends. Inside these pads are herbs, paper with spells written on it, and other items. As you’ve already understood, to draw the ascending triangle of the hexagram, I hold it in my left hand with the blue side facing up, gripping it by the green end. In this way, I “capture” the ascending current and channel it while drawing the triangle with another wand in my right hand. I’ve come across countless pieces of advice suggesting that one should perform such actions using their astral energy (because this isn’t just waving a sigil or hexagram—it’s the process of “writing by energy in space”). Well, don’t do it that way. It’s exhausting and ineffective. The method I’m describing allows you to manifest symbols in space not through meager human strength, but through the forces of the macrocosm, which the magician simply channels in the right direction. As for the white wand—its recipe is entirely different. It is made from the trunk of a young oak tree, and a piece of bark from the oldest oak tree I found in my region—a piece of the 800-year-old “oak of glory”—is glued to its handle. Its purpose is to act as a condenser of power, though that’s a very simplistic way of putting it. As one spirit said - after I met him and gilded the top of the staff: “Whatever is written with this staff below will also be written with it above.” As I practiced, the wand changed; new elements appeared and disappeared, it turned white, and the spirits symbols were added to it. Here are their names and functions: Tasta (the spirit of attraction), Kashka (the spirit of expulsion), Evarashka (the spirit of transitional states, the spirit of catastrophes and changes), Siontaka (the spirit-guide of light), Solon (the spirit-clothing, which gives form). There is also a guardian spirit of this instrument, whose name is written on the material in which it is stored, but I will not reveal it.