TEAGOGIA (Θεαγωγία, from Θεός = god and ἀγωγός = that which attracts, evokes). - It is a technical term of the theurgic liturgy, by which the evocation of a divinity, coercively effected by a priest, was denoted (Iamblichus, De myst., 2, 10; 6, 1; Porphyry, Ad Aneb., 29).
T. occupied a central place in that Neoplatonic philosophy which, after Plotinus, especially in the schools of Syria and Pergamum (Iamblichus, Aedesius, Priscus, Maximus), assumed a magical character. The art which taught how to make the gods appear by means of ritual formulas (ἀναγκαί) was called ἀναγωγή ἱερατικὴ ὁ ἱερατικὴ τέχνη (a work by Proclus, partially translated into Latin by Marsilio Ficino under the title De sacrificio et magia, is the Ἱερὶ τῆς ἱερατικῆς τέχνης; cf. J. Bidez-F. Cumont, Catal. des manusc. alch. grecs, VI). By its means the priest became κλήτως (evoker) and ἐπαναγκός of the divinity (cf. Porphyry, De philos. ex orac. haur., p. 158 VI), and performed the miracle of evocation (ἐπαγωγή; cf. Plato, Resp., 364 c.; Leg., 933 d). The divinity was compelled by the ritual-theurgic operation to enter a statue or the body of the evoker, who thus became the δοχείο of the numen, and to answer the questions addressed to it (cf. Firmicus Maternus, De err. prof. relig., 13). An evident opposition to t. is found in the Christian Neoplatonism of Ps. Dionigi l'Areopagita, De div. nom., 3, 1.