Path: shell.portal.com!shell.portal.com!not-for-mail From: tyagi@houseofkaos.abyss.com (nagasiva) Newsgroups: alt.pagan.magick,alt.magick,alt.magick.tyagi,tx.religion.pagan,alt.christnet,alt.magick.moderated,alt.religion.wicca Subject: Theurgy v. Thaumaturgy (was Re: RCath Magick is an Oxymoron) Followup-To: alt.pagan.magick,alt.magick,alt.magick.tyagi,tx.religion.pagan,alt.christnet,alt.religion.wicca Date: 20 Aug 1996 13:43:06 -0700 Organization: Portal Communications (shell) Lines: 102 Sender: tyagi@shell.portal.com Approved: tyagi@houseofkaos.abyss.com Message-ID: <4vd80q$f5@jobe.shell.portal.com> References: <4sb11a$i5p@jobe.shell.portal.com> <4somfi$7de@newsbf02.news.aol.com> <4su0ca$die@jobe.shell.portal.com> Reply-To: tyagi@houseofkaos.abyss.com (nagasiva) NNTP-Posting-Host: jobe.shell.portal.com Xref: shell.portal.com alt.pagan.magick:1340 alt.magick:81606 alt.magick.tyagi:10088 tx.religion.pagan:2789 alt.christnet:133776 alt.magick.moderated:501 alt.religion.wicca:36725 kaliyuga 49960820 AA1 nagasiva (tyagi@houseofkaos.abyss.com): #> comparisons don't make the grade. without intentionality and the force #> of the will from the mage in doing the change themselves, there is no #> magick happening. #> #> compare theurgy with thaumaturgy. Barbara : # Paraprasing Webster - # # Thaumaturgy - The magickal practitioner achieves magickal results # through their own talents (through focus of their own will?) # Theurgy - The magickal practioner persuades some diety to perform # the magickal act for them that is the point of my assertion, yes. # But how can we know how a work of magick is accomplished? we cannot except by intention and by experience. if we are to attempt to categorize all magical acts according to one scheme (rather than as the means by which the act is *intended by the mage*), then what shall we select? the RCatholic might say that it is "the Devil" which provides the power in the case of nonRCaths, and so by this categorization it seems neither participates in 'thaumaturgy' as defined above. # 6 months ago I posted questions to alt.magick asking questions asking # "How does magick work? What are the mechanisms?" # The many eloquent answers led me to conclude most people who practice # magick agree that we can not actually know the answer to the questions # in the above paragraph. knowledge is a tricky thing to isolate. there is of course the 'knowledge' which comes from certainty (a flimsy sort of knowledge). there is also a 'knowledge' which is an experiential reservoir that is much more difficult to put into words (and thus support the assertions we're discussing). people can 'know' in both senses, without being able to express absolute or universal Answers to the questions you raise. # If this is the case, how can we ever know how some magickal act is # accomplished? in any absolute sense? I don't think we can, and my intent was not so much to support an absolute knowledge that "RCath magick is an oxy-moron" so much as that this is what RCath authorities (who are supposed by good RCaths to know their stuff) say about their religion and "magick", placing a strong emphasis on the FACT that its organization (quite powerful, btw) OPPOSES magical acts as it defines them. it may be quite convincing to speculate on our presumed ideologies, but this doesn't make them true. it may *also* be quaint to associate the role of the powerful (mage) with the oppressor (in this case the RCath Church and its lackeys), but this doesn't make it any less controversial a claim, nor does it faithfully represent the mage's relationship to the attempted magical licensing-bureau of the RCath power-pyramid). # Even if there is intentionality on the part of a magician, how can we # know that the magickal act was not accomplished by some intervening # god/dess :> we cannot, though I'm sure someone will arrive who has a 'gnosis revelation' to prove me otherwise. # What about subconscious will? typically this is related as a 'true will', inasmuchas one would wish to separate it from a conscious 'whim'. there are those of us who feel that the 'will' is a power within us which may be directed (of which 'whims' are but meek reflections), and that the 'true will' is merely a projection based upon scientific examination of the context of our action, discerning our most productive and pleasurable orientation and movement over time. # Do magickal results arrising from motives not yet brought up to the # subconscious level count as thaumaturical events? you are asking, as I understand it, whether 'significant coincidences' "count" as magick. I think without intention that they are best classed 'the workings of the gods' and that even with intention we are less self-deceived if we follow Crowley's _Moonchild_ recommendations to verify this ability and current of ourselves through a multitude of repetitions (when we can choose it and it works consistently then we are more reasonably identified as a 'thaumaturge' and 'mage'), indeed, a thoroughly scientific endeavor. tyagi@houseofkaos.abyss.com nagasiva -- CC public replies to email - see http://www.hollyfeld.org/~tyagi/nagasiva.html (emailed replies may be posted) ---- and check: http://www.paranoia.com/coe/ * * * Asphalta Cementia Metallica Polymera Coyote La Cuckaracha Humana * * *