The Supreme Invoking Ritual of the Pentagram

The Supreme Invoking Ritual of the Pentagram (SIRP) is an advanced Golden Dawn ceremonial practice that calls all five elements into the ritual space by tracing the specific invoking pentagram for each element at its corresponding quarter of the compass, followed by Spirit pentagrams above and below. It is the invoking complement to the Supreme Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram (SBRP) and together with it forms a pair of complete elemental rituals that give the practitioner precise control over the elemental conditions of the working space. The SIRP creates a specifically and fully charged elemental environment appropriate for major ceremonial workings rather than the more general elemental invocation produced by the Lesser Invoking Ritual.

The critical difference between the SIRP and the simpler LIRP lies in specificity. The LIRP uses the invoking Earth pentagram at all four quarters as a general elemental call. The SIRP assigns each quarter its own proper invoking pentagram: the invoking Fire pentagram in the south, the invoking Water pentagram in the west, the invoking Air pentagram in the east, and the invoking Earth pentagram in the north, with the invoking Spirit pentagrams (active and passive) in the vertical dimension. This specificity produces a more fully differentiated elemental environment and requires the practitioner to know all five families of pentagram forms.

History and origins

The Supreme Ritual of the Pentagram belongs to the more advanced curriculum of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, as distinct from the Lesser Ritual which is introduced earlier. The system of elemental pentagram attributions, with each element corresponding to a specific point of the pentagram from which its invoking form begins, was developed as part of the Golden Dawn’s systematic mapping of all elemental, zodiacal, and planetary forces onto the pentagram symbol.

The invoking and banishing pentagram forms were formalised within the Golden Dawn teaching system and appear in the published documentation in Israel Regardie’s collected editions. Their logic follows from the association of each element with a specific point of the pentagram: Earth at the lower left, Water at the lower right, Fire at the upper right, Air at the upper left, and Spirit at the apex. The invoking pentagram for any element begins and ends at that element’s point; the banishing pentagram for that element begins at the opposite point and moves toward the element’s point.

This system is elegant in conception and demanding in practice, requiring the practitioner to memorise twelve distinct pentagram forms (invoking and banishing for each of the five elements, with Spirit in two versions) and to trace each one accurately in the course of the full ritual.

A method you can use

The SIRP presumes familiarity with the pentagram forms for all five elements and with the basic pentagram ritual procedure. It should be practiced after thorough mastery of both the LBRP and the LIRP.

Preliminary. Perform the Qabalistic Cross to align the personal energy axis. A preliminary LBRP may precede the SIRP when clearing and then charging the space in sequence.

East, Air. Face east. Trace the invoking Air pentagram (beginning at the upper left point, moving down to the lower right, up and to the right, across to the left, down to the lower left, and back up to the starting point). Vibrate YHVH (Yod-Heh-Vav-Heh). Visualise the pentagram blazing with the colour of Air (yellow in the Golden Dawn system). Trace the sigil of Aquarius (the zodiac sign associated with Air) in the centre of the pentagram and vibrate RAPHAEL.

South, Fire. Move clockwise to the south, maintaining the connecting line. Trace the invoking Fire pentagram (beginning at the upper right point). Vibrate ADNI (Adonai). Visualise the pentagram in fiery red. Trace the sigil of Leo (associated with Fire) in the centre and vibrate MICHAEL.

West, Water. Continue to the west. Trace the invoking Water pentagram (beginning at the lower right point). Vibrate EHIH (Ehyeh). Visualise the blue or blue-green of Water. Trace the sigil of Scorpio (associated with Water) in the centre and vibrate GABRIEL.

North, Earth. Move to the north. Trace the invoking Earth pentagram (beginning at the upper point, moving down to the lower left). Vibrate AGLA. Visualise the earthy green and brown of Earth. Trace the sigil of Taurus (associated with Earth) in the centre and vibrate AURIEL.

Spirit, active and passive. Return to the east and face east. Raise your implement overhead and trace the invoking Spirit pentagram (active form: beginning at the apex) downward toward the floor, vibrating EXARP (or another Spirit name from your tradition). Then trace the invoking Spirit pentagram (passive form) upward, vibrating BITOM. The Spirit pentagrams complete the five-element working.

The archangelic call. Return to the centre. With arms extended, call the archangels: “Before me Raphael. Behind me Gabriel. On my right hand Michael. On my left hand Auriel. For about me flames the pentagram, and in the column shines the six-rayed star.”

Close. Complete with the Qabalistic Cross.

In practice

The SIRP takes considerably longer to perform than the LIRP and requires confident knowledge of the pentagram forms before it can be conducted effectively. Practicing each elemental pentagram form in isolation, until the movement is automatic, is the appropriate preparation. Many practitioners spend several weeks or months working with the LIRP and the elemental pentagrams in study before attempting the SIRP in a complete working.

The fully charged elemental environment the SIRP creates is appropriate for elemental initiations, major invocations of elemental beings, the Opening by Watchtower ceremony, and workings of any scale that require the full complement of elemental forces rather than a general elemental presence.

In myth and popular culture

The pentagram itself has one of the richest and most contested symbolic histories of any figure in Western tradition. In Pythagorean communities of the fifth century BCE, the five-pointed star was a symbol of health and mathematical harmony, shared as a recognition sign among initiates. Medieval Christians used the pentagram as a protective symbol, sometimes called the Star of Solomon or the Sign of the Druid’s Foot, and it appears as a protective mark on Gawain’s shield in the fourteenth-century poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, where its five points are said to represent the five wounds of Christ, the five joys of Mary, and Gawain’s five virtues.

The ritual use of the pentagram in ceremonial magick was codified in the nineteenth century by Eliphas Levi, who depicted the inverted pentagram as representing the lower forces and the upright pentagram as representing the spirit’s mastery over matter. Levi’s illustrations influenced subsequent generations of occultists and contributed to the enduring visual association between the pentagram and ceremonial practice. The Golden Dawn, building on Levi’s work, systematized the invoking and banishing pentagrams that the SIRP employs.

In popular culture, the ritual drawing of pentagrams in the air is a recognizable shorthand for ceremonial magic in film and fiction. Doctor Strange in the Marvel films draws glowing geometric figures in the air during magical operations, a visual convention that draws loosely on the Golden Dawn tradition’s ritual gestures. The television series Supernatural features elaborate protective circles involving pentagrams, though the show’s demonology is its own invention rather than an accurate rendering of any tradition. These popular representations have the effect of making ritual pentagram drawing more widely recognizable, even if they rarely reflect actual ceremonial practice accurately.

Myths and facts

Several misconceptions about the pentagram and the SIRP appear regularly in popular and occult contexts.

• The upright pentagram is not an inherently Satanic symbol. Its association with Satanism derives primarily from the Church of Satan’s adoption of an inverted pentagram with a goat’s head (the Sigil of Baphomet) in 1966. The upright pentagram has centuries of use as a protective and sacred symbol across European, Pythagorean, and Christian contexts.
• The SIRP is not a more dangerous version of the LBRP. It is an invoking ritual rather than a banishing one, designed to fill a space with elemental energy rather than to clear it. A practitioner who is unsure whether to banish or invoke should banish first and only invoke when there is a clear purpose for the specific elemental environment the SIRP creates.
• The twelve distinct pentagram forms in the Golden Dawn system are not interchangeable. Beginning the invoking Earth pentagram at the wrong point produces a different pentagram associated with a different element, which is why memorizing the forms accurately before attempting the SIRP is emphasized in every serious treatment of the system.
• The SIRP is not an emergency or everyday ritual. Its scope and complexity are intended for major workings, initiations, and ceremonies that require a fully differentiated elemental environment. Using it as a routine opening ritual would be, as most Golden Dawn practitioners acknowledge, inappropriate to its weight and purpose.
• The archangels called in pentagram rituals are understood within the Golden Dawn framework as governors of the elemental quarters, not as personal guardians in the devotional sense. Their invocation is functional within the ceremonial context and should not be confused with the kind of personal archangelic devotion practiced in angelology traditions.