Path: typhoon.sonic.net!not-for-mail From: nagasiva@luckymojo.com (nagasiva yronwode) Newsgroups: alt.magick.tyagi,alt.pagan.magick,alt.religion.orisha,alt.magick,alt.magick.folk,alt.paranormal.spells.hexes.magic Subject: Theurgy and Magical Results (was New Crown ...) Organization: Sonoma Interconnect,Santa Rosa,CA(us),http://www.sonic.net Lines: 209 Sender: yronwode@sonic.net Message-ID: <8dkskp$hbv@bolt.sonic.net> References: <38FAA324.7972@luckymojo.com> <38FB1D45.F73B6CA6@bellatlantic.net> <38FDCA52.9029B9F3@bellatlantic.net> Reply-To: spam@luckymojo.com X-Newsreader: NN version 6.5.4 (NOV) Date: Wed, 19 Apr 2000 18:07:10 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 208.201.224.36 X-Complaints-To: abuse@sonic.net X-Trace: typhoon.sonic.net 956167630 208.201.224.36 (Wed, 19 Apr 2000 11:07:10 PDT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 19 Apr 2000 11:07:10 PDT Xref: typhoon.sonic.net alt.magick.tyagi:22811 alt.pagan.magick:22021 alt.religion.orisha:6469 alt.magick:189403 alt.magick.folk:4473 alt.paranormal.spells.hexes.magic:22016 50000419 IVom Christopher Warnock : >Well, well, well. I guess I should have known that mentioning God would >cause such a flurry. the ambiguity of the mention is typically disrespectful in its presumption that the 'God' in question is Christian and many who are inhabitants of technophilic societies are over-used to this kind of psychic assault, thus they may over-react. I hope you can understand. >It is interesting that we moderns seem to believe that >Christianity is entirely incompatible with magic. the term 'magic' is typically castigated and feared in Christian society outside a certain subculture of Hermetics who wish to portray their acts and beliefs as orthodox and a subculture of practicing Christian folk magicians who tend to conceal their activities from their churchmates. most Christians do not believe that magic has any part of their religion, considering it the 'work of the Devil' (which I believe it is, but the Devil isn't what Christians tend to paint Hir). sometimes the Christian will justify their own folk magic as 'the work of the Lord' or use some other euphemism to rationalize their use of magic as within the rules (when typically they will overtly agree with churchmates that it is not). modern belief of NON-Christians tends to be in reaction to this obvious and fairly consistent bias on the part of the Christian religious, whether Catholic or Protestant. >Certainly there was >antipathy to magic from elements of the pre-Reformation Church, but because >they saw it as demonic, not because they didn't think that it worked. of course, since spirits and gods other than Jehovah+ are characterized by Christians as demons and devils, effectively marginalizing and oppressing the religions and magics of others. this is the reason that some have taken to overlaying Christian identifiers upon their gods or spirits or however they see and characterize them (e.g. orishas, loas) so as to escape condemnation and persecution for 'worshipping wrongly'. >The great mages of the Renaissance, John Dee, Marsilio Ficino, Robert >Fludd, were Christians. Not narrow minded fundamentalists, but magi, >wise men who understood that there is an esoteric and magical side to >Christianity, as there is in all religions. what kind of magic did these Christians do? John Dee apparently worked out a system whereby he was communicating with spirits. he (or others after him) identified this as 'Enochian'. whether or not it was described as such it gives the impression of a consortment with Fallen Angels (as from The Book of Enoch) and therefore can appear to be anti- Christian. Ficino and Fludd I know less about, but at least Ficino appears to have wanted to capture and hijack Jewish mysticism (why?), recharacterizing it as a Christian enterprise. his approach to magic was mystical, as have been most Hermetic magicians that I can tell (inclusive of the edge-riding bad-boys like Aleister Crowley). while there may be "an esoteric and magical side" to many religions, not all of them have an ANTI-ESOTERIC/ANTI-MAGICAL SIDE. this seems to be the issue, since at least Christianity and Islam include strong antagonism to these types of activities, so described. >If God wills a cop out? Yes, I suppose it is, when looked at from the >perspective of a magician/magical practitioner for whom personal will is all >important. Without confidence in one's ability and power how can they be >manifested? what is the difference between personal and non-personal will? where is the dividing line? where does your God stop and your person begin? is there any area of overlap? these questions have occupied Hermetics for decades if not centuries. logic typically fails, using stereotypical assumptions about the divine. >Still my experience and the guidance of my teachers indicates to >me that there is a higher power than my own ego and personal will all but those who will find some identity between themselves and the cosmos will probably agree here. >and that >higher power is unitary in its essence even though it manifests in an >infinite number of ways, call them elements, loas, orishas, saints, powers, >principalities, demons, angels, gods, whatever. here is where you begin to see some differentiation amongst religious and magicians. are these divinities "merely manifestations" of a single, overarching entity ('God', 'Goddess', whatever)? or is this a means of co-opting a variety of cultural elements into a system whereby they may be described as subject to the will of one's preferred divinity? actions we may describe as having been taken by these divinities are at times easily identifiable as contrary to one another. will it be logical to then say 'the ways of are mysterious and difficult to understand'? or are these contradictions, like the blatant contradictions to be found in the supposedly "infallible, self-validating Bible", indicators that the entire paradigm is FALSE? >This is how personal magic is compatible with the existence of one >unified higher power. why aren't spells meant to achieve that which is not authorized by the Cosmic Monarch *religious sins*? what prevents the magician from ascertaining what is and what is not DESIRED on the part of their God/dess previous to potentially working against Hir? I don't understand why 'my spell didn't work because my God didn't want it to' should not equate to 'I sinned by trespassing the will of my God'. >My preference is to be an instrument of divine, rather than >personal will and divine rather than personal magic, 'instrument of the divine' implies that we take actions directly in RESPONSE to our God/dess. contrasting this with personal will indicates that there is some part of us which is at odds with this chosen divinity. as an instrument, why would we ever wish to do something that the Cosmic Manipulating Monarch didn't want? what is 'divine magic'? I have learned to call the manifestation of the Cosmic Monarch 'theurgy', wonder-working, as has been described in scriptures about prophets and saints doing fabulous (apparently today nonreplicable) things because the Monarch allowed them to bend or manipulate what today we call 'the Laws of Nature'. you know, like parting the Red Sea (Moses), or turning water to wine (Jesus), or raising (from) the dead (Jesus, among a number of supposed Hermetic magi). magic, as I understand it, is ALWAYS personal magic as you have contrasted it here, despite the tendency of theurges to divide it up so that there can be a separation between the divine and the human. either you are a thaumaturge doing magic or you are a mystic channelling the power of your Cosmic Monarch (theurge) and not truly responsible for what you do. and this is perhaps about what Dread_Not was complaining: the theurge is never responsible for the results of hir actions, since either the Cosmic Monarch allowed (and is therefore responsible for) or did not allow (and therefore prevented) the intended result. the theurge is never considered to have been culpable, acting against the divinity, or generally to to be 'wrong' within the theurge's (typically) moralistic system. it is TOO convenient, morally and scientifically. this type of "magic" (theurgy) is not really magic at all, but miracle- facilitation (when successful) and blatant charlatanry (when unsuccessful). we should consider the FAILED RESULTS of all such acts to be indications of deceit and fradulence regardless of whether there is some Cosmic Monarch described as the Fall Guy. >though I don't doubt the efficacy of personal magic and >even practice it. I think that it should be doubted. take a lesson from Tom Shuler. >I'd like to meet those magicians whose magic always works the >way they wanted it to. how often do they cast spells? is it possible that success rate is due in part to infrequency of spell-casting (i.e. that to try too many things results in failure)? >Basically, there are two explanations for failure: (1) I screwed >up; (2) A more powerful force interfered.... this is an EXTREMELY INSIGHTFUL analysis on your part. I agree quite strongly, and would encourage you to enlarge on your category number 1 ("I screwed up"). for example, the magician may simply not have done "enough", or have done it at the wrong time, or did some part of the spell wrongly, etc., some of which you also mentioned. >I am just this week getting something better which is a new private practice, >so I don't have to have a boss, or have to go to the office everyday or work >fulltime. Is it possible that I got what I was destined for and what I was >destined for was better for me than what my egoic desires wanted? "what I was destined for" precludes the effectiveness of magic. you could have not done the spell and "destiny" would still take place. this destiny (predestination; a facet of Determinism which includes a number of premises which appear impossible to substantiate) occurs whether or not you attempted to have the OPPOSITE effect to its content. predestination is *antagonistic* to magic, not a confirmation of magical prowess. >Is it also possible that if I hadn't done the Crown of Success spell >that I wouldn't get my new work? possible, not partaking of the destiny-model, yet this kind of 'evidence' is not convincing without a thorough analysis of repeated magical trial and error. such a study might not even be helpful if there is a general low threshhold on the will necessary to have consistent success (because repeated and contemporary attempts at success would deplete the will that may be necessary for consistent success). >This is more of an astrologer's perspective than a magician's view. The >astrologer sits back and watches the unfolding of Fate and its interaction >with Free Will. divination. Fate and Free Will are often incompatible ideas. >The magician must, however, will and act. false. the magician can also relax, reflect, receive information, and prepare for later action. blessed beast! nagasiva -- mailto:nagasiva@luckymojo.com ; http://www.luckymojo.com/nagasiva.html mailto:boboroshi@satanservice.org ; http://www.satanservice.org/ emailed replies may be posted; cc replies if response desired