Spirit in Giordano Bruno's magical works

In Bruno's works, the term "spirit" covers a large semantic area, ranging from the strict physical gust of wind and the biological "flatus" (vital breath), to the cosmic, vitalistic principle of the world-soul and eventually the nature of divinity itself. It is just the non-univocal definition of "spirit", universal "efficiens" causality (associated both to the "anima mundi" and the nature of the elements, deprived of its physical nature and overlapping with the entities indicated by Bruno as "immaterialia") which in the later works on magic allows single it out as a principle of extraordinary effectiveness on an operational level. The article focuses on the following issues: 1) the coincidence of "spiritus" with the "anima mundi", which in these works is the fundamental presupposition of magical action; 2) "spiritus" as medium between soul and body, in which the possibility of binding the intelligence is actualized by means of magic; 3) the use of the term "spiritus" to indicate superior entities, intermediary between the human and the divine realms, that can be identified with the demons that pervade the entire universe.

Significativa è la rimodulazione dei temi connessi al concetto di spirito nell'opera di Giordano Bruno, che rielabora, in maniera personale, pressoché tutti i significati del nomen impiegati dalla tradizione precedente. La determinazione non univoca dello spirito, efficiens universale ora associato all'anima del mondo, ora alla natura degli stessi elementi, ora depotenziato della sua corporeità, consente di individuare in esso, soprattutto nelle opere tarde dedicate alla magia, un principio di straordinaria efficacia sul piano operativo.