Rank: President · Legions: 36 · Element: Air · Direction: South · Enn: Elan tepar secore Glasya-Labolas
Glasya-Labolas, written also Caacrinolaas, Caassimolar, or Classyalabolas in the older books, is the twenty-fifth spirit of the Ars Goetia — a mighty President and Earl who commands thirty-six legions of spirits. He shows himself in the form of a dog with wings like a gryphon, and his gifts are among the strangest mixture in the whole catalogue. He teaches all arts and sciences in an instant; he tells all things past and to come; if it be desired he causes the love both of friends and of foes; and he can make a person go invisible. And the grimoires name one thing more, and name it plainly: he is called an author of bloodshed and manslaughter. In Glasya-Labolas the seeker meets a spirit of startling swiftness and startling contradiction — the winged hound who pours knowledge into the mind in a flash, who can make enemies love one another, and who is also named for the worst that people do to each other. He is approached, in the reverent tradition, for the swift gift of learning, for the reconciling of even an enemy, and for the going-unseen — and never, in any part, for the bloodshed the old texts name, which honourable practice disowns absolutely.
He descends to the modern practitioner through the long chain of grimoires, his name written in many forms — Glasya-Labolas, Caacrinolaas, Caassimolar, Classyalabolas. He appears among the presidents of the infernal hierarchy in Johann Weyer's Pseudomonarchia Daemonum of 1577, and was carried over as the twenty-fifth spirit when that material was gathered into the Ars Goetia, the first book of the Lemegeton or Lesser Key of Solomon in the seventeenth century. Samuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers and Aleister Crowley fixed the modern English text in their edition of the Goetia in 1904, and Jacques Collin de Plancy kept his memory among the spirits of his Dictionnaire Infernal. Across all of these the account holds firm: the mighty President and Earl in the form of a winged dog, the instant teacher of all arts and sciences, the author of bloodshed, the teller of past and future, the causer of love among friends and foes, and the giver of invisibility, ruling over thirty-six legions of spirits.
The grimoires describe Glasya-Labolas as a dog with wings like a gryphon, and the image is a telling one. The dog is the oldest of the companion beasts — loyal, close, quick, the creature that runs at a person's side and knows them well. The gryphon's wings are the wings of the great composite beast of the heights, the eagle's soaring power grafted onto the earthly hound. Together they make a creature of the ground lifted into the air: the familiar companion given sudden flight, the close and loyal thing made swift and soaring. It suits a spirit whose knowledge arrives in an instant and who can carry a person out of sight. To picture him rightly is to see this winged dog, near and quick and airborne.
Glasya-Labolas holds a double rank: he is named both a mighty President and an Earl. The presidency is an office of presiding authority, held by spirits who govern, reveal, and teach; the earldom is a title of nobility and command. Together they mark him as a spirit of unusual standing, ruling over thirty-six legions of spirits. To call upon him is to come before a doubly-titled power of swift knowledge and sharp contradiction.
The first of his gifts, and the one for which the reverent tradition most values him, is the swiftest teaching in all the Goetia: he teaches all arts and sciences in an instant. Where Marax makes a scholar through patient study and Buer through the long labour of philosophy, Glasya-Labolas is said to give the knowledge whole and at once — the art understood in a flash, the science grasped in a single stroke, the understanding arriving rather than being built. It is a startling claim, and it has made him a favourite among those who must learn quickly. Practitioners today most often describe the gift in a subtler key: not knowledge conjured from nothing, but the sudden click of comprehension — the moment when a subject one has circled for weeks abruptly resolves into sense, when the whole shape of a thing is seen at once. His is the lightning of understanding.
The grimoires say plainly that Glasya-Labolas is an author of bloodshed and manslaughter, and honesty requires that it be named without softening: this is the darkest thing said of any spirit in the catalogue, and it is a claim of killing. The old malefic rites turned such a power outward, against an operator's enemies. It must be said as plainly as the grimoires say the power itself: honourable practice disowns this absolutely and without exception. The taking or harming of a human life is the gravest wrong there is, and no working, no tradition, no spirit, and no framing makes it anything else. There is no reading, symbolic or otherwise, under which the causing of harm to another person belongs to this or any working. It is named here because the tradition names it and because this Vault does not hide what its sources say; it is disowned here because there is nothing else an honest practice can do with it.
And yet the reflective tradition does find a use for the fact of his darkness, and it is the opposite of the old one. A spirit who is named the author of bloodshed is a spirit who knows where bloodshed comes from — the rage that rises, the grievance that curdles, the moment in which a person becomes capable of what they would never have believed of themselves. To sit with Glasya-Labolas in this aspect is not to invoke that capacity but to look at it: to understand one's own anger and its roots, to see clearly the place in oneself where harm could begin, and to master and refuse it. This is hard and honest work, and it is the only thing the reverent path does with his darkest name. The winged hound that the old texts made a killer is met, here, as the mirror in which one recognises and disarms one's own violence. What he authored, the seeker refuses.
Glasya-Labolas tells all things past and to come — the span of what has been and what is coming. This prophetic sight sits naturally with his instant teaching, for both are knowledge that arrives rather than knowledge laboured for. He is sought for the understanding of a matter across time, and as with all such gifts in the tradition, his telling is understood as insight and counsel to guide wise action rather than as fixed and unalterable decree.
Set against his darkest name, and in the same breath, the grimoires give him one of the gentlest offices in the catalogue: if it be desired, he causes the love both of friends and of foes. Not merely peace with an enemy, as Botis makes, but love — the turning of an adversary's heart toward affection, the healing of enmity into something warm. That the spirit named for bloodshed should also be the one who makes enemies love each other is the great paradox of Glasya-Labolas, and the reflective tradition makes much of it. He holds both the wound and its healing; both the moment where harm begins and the turning where it ends. Which of the two a seeker draws upon is the seeker's own choosing, and the honourable path chooses, always and only, the love.
The last of his gifts is concealment: he can make a person go invisible. In the old accounts this is the literal marvel of vanishing from sight. Modern practitioners most often approach it in a subtler key — the going-unnoticed, the passing-unremarked, the drawing of attention away from oneself when one needs not to be seen. It is the winged hound's other swiftness: not only the flash of knowledge but the quiet slipping-past. It is sought for privacy, for moving through a difficult situation without being singled out, and for the peace of not being watched.
What defines Glasya-Labolas above all is that he holds opposites in one shape. He teaches in an instant and he is named for the slowest and worst of human undoing. He is called an author of bloodshed and he is the one who makes foes love each other. He is the loyal dog and the soaring gryphon. In him the tradition sets the wound and its healing side by side and leaves the choice to the one who calls him — and it is precisely this that makes him a spirit of moral seriousness rather than of mere power. To work with Glasya-Labolas honourably is to stand before both of his faces and to choose, deliberately and every time, the swift knowledge, the reconciling love, and the quiet passing — and to refuse, absolutely, the other.
Within demonolatry and the modern left-hand path, Glasya-Labolas is honoured as the winged hound of swift knowledge and reconciling love — and met with clear eyes about his darkest name, which the reverent path disowns entirely. The practitioner does not regard him as a slave to be coerced by threats, as the older exorcists' rites would have it, nor as an instrument of any harm, but as a swift and contradictory being to be met with sincerity and a firm conscience. He is widely held to be quick and capable with those who come to him honestly, and especially close to those who must learn fast, who would reconcile with an enemy, or who need to pass unseen. To work with him in this spirit is to gain the lightning of understanding and the turning of enmity into warmth.
The journey from the medieval and renaissance grimoires to the modern altar has changed how Glasya-Labolas is approached, and in his case the change is a moral one. The old rites framed every Goetic spirit as a danger to be bound and compelled, and turned his darkest power outward as a weapon. The modern reverent practitioner refuses that use utterly, and comes instead with the seal, the Enn, and an honest need — for the swift gift of learning, for the understanding of a matter across time, for the reconciling of a friend or an enemy, or for the going-unseen. His darkest name is met only as a mirror for one's own capacity for harm, and only in order to refuse it. The forms have softened and the weapon has been laid down; the spirit described is the same winged hound who has answered seekers for four centuries and more.
In contemporary demonolatry Glasya-Labolas is approached through his seal and his Enn — the chanted phrase Elan tepar secore Glasya-Labolas — by which practitioners open the way to him and hold his presence near. He is called upon for the swift and instant grasp of an art or science, for knowledge of things past and to come, for the causing of love between friends and even between foes, and for the going-unseen when one needs not to be noticed. Those who keep company with him describe a presence that is quick, near, and startling — a sense of a winged hound at one's side, of knowledge arriving whole and at once, of a swiftness that is both companionable and unsettling. He rewards honesty and a firm conscience, and he asks — the honourable tradition insists upon it — that his darkest office be refused absolutely.
What endures across every telling is the double face of him. Glasya-Labolas is contradiction made a President: the winged hound, the lightning of understanding, the one who makes enemies love, and the one the old texts named for the worst that people do. He is swift where many spirits are slow, gentle and terrible in the same breath, and close to a hard truth — that the same nearness which can wound can also reconcile, and that the choosing is ours. He asks for honesty, a firm conscience, and the deliberate refusal of his darkest name, and to those who bring them he is, by the steady witness of the grimoires and of those who work with him still, a mighty President and Earl: the winged hound whose knowledge arrives in a flash, and whose truest gift is the turning of an enemy's heart to love.
The grimoires describe Glasya-Labolas as a dog with wings like a gryphon. The dog is the oldest of the companion beasts — loyal, close, quick, the creature that runs at a person's side; the gryphon's wings are those of the great composite beast of the heights, the eagle's soaring power grafted onto the earthly hound. Together they make a creature of the ground lifted into the air: the familiar companion given sudden flight, the close and loyal thing made swift and soaring — fitting for a spirit whose knowledge arrives in an instant and who can carry a person out of sight. Those who work with him today describe a presence that is quick, near, and startling — a winged hound at one's side, knowledge arriving whole and at once, a swiftness both companionable and unsettling.
Enn: Elan tepar secore Glasya-Labolas
Working with Glasya-Labolas is the meeting of a swift and contradictory spirit — a winged hound whose knowledge arrives in a flash, who can turn an enemy's heart to love, and who can carry a person out of sight. Before anything else, one thing must be settled and never unsettled: the grimoires name him an author of bloodshed and manslaughter, and honourable practice disowns that office absolutely and without exception. The harming or taking of a human life is the gravest wrong there is, and no working, framing, or tradition makes it otherwise. There is no symbolic reading under which harm to another person belongs to this work. His darkest name is met only as a mirror in which one recognises and refuses one's own capacity for violence. What follows is a guide to the rest of him: how to approach the President and Earl, how to receive his instant teaching, his reconciling love, and his concealment.
Come to Glasya-Labolas as you would come to a swift and double-natured power whose better gifts you genuinely need — with respect, honesty, and a firm conscience. He is not a spirit to be summoned idly, and he is not one to be approached with any ambiguity about what you will and will not ask of him. Settle in yourself, before you begin, that you seek his knowledge, his reconciling love, and his concealment, and that you refuse his darkest office entirely. Approach him with respect for his swiftness and his contradiction, steady and clear, neither grovelling nor presuming. The relationship with him is built upon honesty and a firm conscience, and the seeker who is clear in themselves he tends to meet with a quick and capable aid.
Prepare a clean and quiet place where you will not be disturbed, and prepare yourself with a clear and settled mind. Many practitioners cleanse themselves and the space beforehand and set out his seal as the single focus of the working. Settle your breathing and your thoughts, and bring with you a clear statement of what you seek: the art or science to be grasped, the matter to be known across time, the friend or enemy whose heart you would turn toward love, or the situation in which you need to pass unseen. Come clear in conscience about what you will not ask.
Open the way to Glasya-Labolas by setting your attention upon his seal and reciting his Enn — Elan tepar secore Glasya-Labolas — slowly and steadily, letting the chanted words carry your intent and call his presence near. Repeat the Enn until you feel the air of the working change: a gathering of quick, near presence, a sense of a winged hound close at hand, a startling swiftness. Do not rush this; let his presence gather and settle, and hold your own clarity of purpose before it.
The gift most valued in him is the swift teaching, and to seek it, name the art or science you would grasp and ask him for the understanding of it — not merely facts but the whole shape of the thing seen at once. His is the lightning of comprehension, and in practice it most often comes as the sudden click: the subject you have circled for weeks abruptly resolving into sense. So bring your study with you — the thing you have been labouring at, the problem you have turned over — and ask him for the flash that resolves it. Then attend, in the hours and days after, for the moment when the whole shape of it arrives.
Glasya-Labolas tells the whole span of time, and to seek this, name the matter you would understand and ask him to show its truth — its roots in the past and its course into what is coming. Ask honestly and without a wished-for answer already fixed in mind, and attend to what comes. Treat his telling as counsel for wise action rather than as fixed fate.
The gentlest and most remarkable of his offices is the causing of love among friends and even among foes, and it is the one the honourable path most gladly draws upon. To seek it, name the bond you would warm — the friendship grown cold, or, in his most striking gift, the enemy whose enmity you would see turned to something better — and ask him to turn the heart toward love. Seek it in the spirit of genuine reconciliation rather than manipulation, and with a care for the freedom of the other; ask that enmity be healed rather than that a person be bent. Then do your own part in the warming: reach out, make amends where amends are due, and meet the other as one who genuinely wants the peace. Of all his gifts this is the one that most answers his darkest name, and the honourable seeker chooses it every time.
To seek his concealment, name the situation in which you need to pass unnoticed and ask him for the going-unseen. In practice this is most often the drawing-away of attention — moving through a difficult circumstance without being singled out, keeping a matter private, having the peace of not being watched. Ask for what you genuinely need rather than for concealment to do a wrong under, for a cloak sought to hide a harm is no honourable working. Then move quietly and let the unnoticing do its work.
The only use the reverent path makes of his darkest name is a mirror. A spirit named the author of bloodshed knows where bloodshed comes from — the rage that rises, the grievance that curdles, the moment a person becomes capable of what they never believed of themselves. To sit with him in this aspect is to ask, honestly and with courage, to see your own anger and its roots, the place in yourself where harm could begin. Ask to understand it, to master it, and to refuse it. This is hard work and it is not for the faint or the unsteady, and its whole and only purpose is disarming: what he authored, you refuse. If any part of you seeks this work in order to use what it shows rather than to lay it down, do not undertake it at all.
This must be held without ambiguity and without exception: the harming or taking of a human life is the gravest wrong there is, and it is no part of this or any honourable working. His office of bloodshed is named in the old texts and disowned here; it is never a licence, an instruction, an excuse, or a symbol under which harm may be done. Do not seek it, do not ask it, do not use his concealment to enable a harm, and do not use his love-turning to manipulate a person's will. Draw upon his knowledge, his prophecy, his reconciling love, and his quiet passing — and refuse the rest, deliberately, every time. A seeker who holds this line gains a swift and remarkable ally; one who does not has abandoned the work entirely and does grievous wrong.
Practitioners describe the signs of Glasya-Labolas's presence and favour in quick and startling terms fitting to a winged hound. There may be a gathering sense of near, swift presence, a feeling of something loyal and airborne close at hand, a startling quickness in the air. In the days that follow some report the sudden click of a subject resolving whole, an insight arriving rather than being built, an unexpected warming where there had been coldness or even enmity, or a stretch of welcome unnoticedness. Keep a written record of what comes during and after the working — the flashes of understanding, the turns toward warmth, the quiet passages — for his gifts arrive suddenly and are easily forgotten.
Work with Glasya-Labolas honestly and with an unwavering conscience. Refuse his darkest office absolutely: no harm, no violence, never, under any framing. Do not use his concealment to hide a wrong, nor his love-turning to override another's will; seek reconciliation genuinely and with care for the other's freedom. Take his instant knowledge as the resolving of what you have honestly laboured at rather than as a substitute for all labour. Treat his telling of time as counsel rather than fate. If you sit with the mirror of your own capacity for harm, do it only to disarm it, and only if you are steady enough to lay it down. Come to him always in good faith and clear in what you refuse — for he is a mighty President and Earl who answers honesty and a firm conscience with swift knowledge and reconciling love, and who offers a darker road that the honourable seeker declines, every time.