Magick and the Occult

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Have you studied Salem at all? I wrote a paper on that once - as usual, it boils down to social strife and enmity between individuals. The accusers inevitably have some personal grudge against the accused, and sympathetic hysteria takes off from there...

The Amish are also into that superstition stuff. "Hex" signs on the barns, etc.

[Animavore]

Did Jesus do the 'sawing a lady in half' bit or did that come later?

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Did Jesus do the 'sawing a lady in half' bit or did that come later?

Penn says one thing, Teller says another, so I'm not sure.

[electricwhiteboy]

Firstly here’s the difference between Magick and Magic. Magic is the stagecraft of performers which intends to create the illusion that they are performing the impossible, conjuring tricks like pulling a rabbit out of a hat, or sleight of hand. Magick, the term coined by Alistair Crowley, is to my understanding entirely synonymous with Art in all its forms. I feel it needs to be said that I’m not a fan of Crowley, the man was a shite example of a human being, and a bit of a mad bastard. Magick under my definition is not about breaking, or bending the laws of the universe. Horribly pretentious piffle alert! Magick is the making of a personal truth into a universal one, or Vice-versa, thereby illuminating an area of the human condition by the use of language and symbolism, is art not then one and the same thing?

Why then bother to call Art, magick, isn’t it all a bit pretentious? Completely, but certainly it’s a more down to earth, and damn sight more rational, view of the Occult. We are quite happy to use magical terms for art, evocative, ethereal, spellbinding, charming, or even saying that a concert was “magical”. If we take these from being a metaphor to actually defining what art is by these terms, then you’ll get what I’m talking about. When art has an actual purpose then I would call this magick. So if you want what my definition of Black Magic is then I would say, with tongue in cheek, advertising. Attaching a tribe like devotion to a particular logo on a sweatshirt, associating their product with an unrelated pleasant image, chocolate or perfume with sex, diesel engines belching out flowers, jeans with rebellion or sex, or both. If you can imagine art trying to be as persuasive, as cunning and manipulating as advertising, to actually try to create a beneficial end then you’ve got magick.

That’s all very poetic and wanky, but what is Magick? To put it into scientifically acceptable terms magick is the attempt to create a meme with the purpose of having a deliberate effect. A protest song, a polemic or allegorical piece of fiction, or a satire on a politician would be a good example of this. How does any of this relate to what we traditionally associate with magic? Let’s have a look at recent portrayal of the magician archetype. Gandalf the latest retelling of the Merlin myth probably fits in with what you expect a magician to be. If you take the core of what that character does, it’s riding around on a white stallion making speeches, inspiring others to do great things, and very little in the way of casting real spells.

Very strongly associated with magic is the idea of magical words, or the power of the voice. Kabballah, which has nothing
to do with wearing a piece of red string or drinking expensive bottled water, essentially comes from the idea that the Hebrew alphabet is holy. The word and the name of God are supposedly the keys to understanding and manipulating the universe. If you take a literal take on what is meant by “in the beginning was the word, and the word was with God and of God” then you’re along the same idea.

Well that's what I define magick as.

I'll go into the history and what the wingnuts believe next.

[Feck]

I have a signed limited edition of some of Crowley's lousy poetry, would that help?

I also used to be a witch. (I know, )

Witch poems Bella ? ssrsly

To know to Will and to oh um....

[Bella Fortuna]

I have a signed limited edition of some of Crowley's lousy poetry, would that help?

I also used to be a witch. (I know, )

Witch poems Bella ? ssrsly

To know to Will and to oh um....

This is the book I have - rather valuable, apparently.

http://www.biblio.com/books/229936999.html

My witchery had nothing to do with him, though... someone gave me the book years ago. I was far more benign.

[Feck]

I have a signed limited edition of some of Crowley's lousy poetry, would that help?

I also used to be a witch. (I know, )

Witch poems Bella ? ssrsly

To know to Will and to oh um....

This is the book I have - rather valuable, apparently.

http://www.biblio.com/books/229936999.html

My witchery had nothing to do with him, though... someone gave me the book years ago. I was far more benign.

I'm off in a jealous sulk now

[Bella Fortuna]

I have a signed limited edition of some of Crowley's lousy poetry, would that help?

I also used to be a witch. (I know, )

Witch poems Bella ? ssrsly

To know to Will and to oh um....

This is the book I have - rather valuable, apparently.

http://www.biblio.com/books/229936999.html

My witchery had nothing to do with him, though... someone gave me the book years ago. I was far more benign.

I'm off in a jealous sulk now

Guess I won't tell you that I have his embalmed head in a jar that I use as a paperweight...

[Feck]

I have a signed limited edition of some of Crowley's lousy poetry, would that help?

I also used to be a witch. (I know, )

Witch poems Bella ? ssrsly

To know to Will and to oh um....

This is the book I have - rather valuable, apparently.

http://www.biblio.com/books/229936999.html

My witchery had nothing to do with him, though... someone gave me the book years ago. I was far more benign.

I'm off in a jealous sulk now

Guess I won't tell you that I have his embalmed head in a jar that I use as a paperweight...

"Heart of my heart come out of the rain soak me in cognac sex and cocaine "

[leo-rcc]

At first I though you were talking about an add-on for the card game.

[Pappa]

I have a signed limited edition of some of Crowley's lousy poetry, would that help?

I also used to be a witch. (I know, )

Witch poems Bella ? ssrsly

To know to Will and to oh um....

This is the book I have - rather valuable, apparently.

http://www.biblio.com/books/229936999.html

My witchery had nothing to do with him, though... someone gave me the book years ago. I was far more benign.

No sex magick then?

[Bella Fortuna]

I have a signed limited edition of some of Crowley's lousy poetry, would that help?

I also used to be a witch. (I know, )

Witch poems Bella ? ssrsly

To know to Will and to oh um....

This is the book I have - rather valuable, apparently.

http://www.biblio.com/books/229936999.html

My witchery had nothing to do with him, though... someone gave me the book years ago. I was far more benign.

No sex magick then?

I don't need no stinkin' book for that, my lad.

[electricwhiteboy]

I have a signed limited edition of some of Crowley's lousy poetry, would that help?

I find his poetry nigh on unreadable wank, actually I find his writings on the occult unreadable wank too, his constant piss taking and obfuscation almost completely counter balance any insight the man had. People treat him like he was the authority on the occult, or famously in the press as “The Wickedest Man In the World”, neither of which are really true.

[Bella Fortuna]

I have a signed limited edition of some of Crowley's lousy poetry, would that help?

I find his poetry nigh on unreadable wank, actually I find his writings on the occult unreadable wank too, his constant piss taking and obfuscation almost completely counter balance any insight the man had. People treat him like he was the authority on the occult, or famously in the press as “The Wickedest Man In the World”, neither of which are really true.

His writing inspires the phrase "hoary dreck" in me.

[electricwhiteboy]

No sex magick then?

Ummmm.... read a bit and dabbled, shall we say. It's all fairly ludicrous yogic nonsense, with chakras, guided meditation, hilarious and deeply unsexy breathing exercises designed to make you almost hyperventilate. It’s Tantric Sex with added woo basically, as an atheist and rationalist the whole “mystical and spiritual union of sex” bullshit is rather off-putting. That said there might be something to it, whether or not it’s possible to achieve the same effects with different and less risible techniques is open to conjecture.

Actually, put it this way I've never had sex on poppers, but I imagine the effects are somewhat comparable to that which is achievable through Sex Magick.