The Warlock and Truth-Breaking

Manray, "Leave me Alone"

There is a wonderful blog post over at Summer Thunder on the pros and cons of using the word "Warlock" to describe a male occult practitioner. I encourage you to check it out. The heart of the conversation revolves around two issues. First, that Warlock is a gendered term (a point the blog discusses brilliantly, but which I have little to say about here) and second that although it was originally a negative term it is worth reclaiming. The most likely original meaning of the term Warlock was "oath breaker". As the blog at Summer Thunder states its perspective: 

"I like the term “Warlock”. It retains a counter-cultural charge, an unassimilated, deviating quality, some semblance of mystery and outlawhood. And it is a male term, and that is a valuable relief from the femino-centrism of so much neopaganism and Wiccan derived Paganism. It is not a term which speaks of male sacrifice, usable chivalry, soldiery and war service or a reproductive donation of sex or semen. Oath breaking is a good thing, when your oaths are coerced and in service to an oppressor. So I have to ask, if this term is an insult, who is it an insult to? A free man, or a good slave?"

A Mystic, Magician and Theologian Talk to an Angel

A Mystic, Magician and Theologian meet an angel.

The Mystic asks to be one with God, the universe and everything. With truth. He goes away having become one with the angel.

The Magician demands to direct the power of God, the universe and everything. To create truth. She goes away having directed the power of the angel.

The Theologian asks to know God, the universe and everything. To know truth. He spends the next thirty years talking with the angel and learns nothing.

The obvious message here is don't go to a Magician, Mystic or Theologian for answers. The Magician can give you power, the Mystic experience. The Theologian will give you answers, but you better have thirty years to spare and low expectations.  But my intended topic is Enochian magic and the Theologian's Mistake.

The Astral Journey: Where the Mystic and Magician Meet

Come visit my new website! www.starandsystem.com

Despite my promise at the end of my last post to discuss the topic of Cosmic Weirdness in the context of Enochian Magic, I am putting that post off for a moment. Instead, I was asked for some advice on astral traveling and would like to share some thoughts here.

The world of the occult can be theorized as divided between the two great realms of Mysticism and Magic. Many people move between these realms, there are often very good trade relations across their borders, but they do not share the same aims or methods. I have found that most people, although they may practice both mysticism and magic, find one of the two terrains more in line with their talents and proclivities. 

What is Magic(k)?

1. "Magick is the Science and Art of causing Change to occur in conformity with Will."
 Aleister Crowley Liber Aba

Esoteric Qabalistic Considerations: The Shattering and the Abyss

The shell we know best is ourselves, trapped in the seas of restriction.

Castaneda, Crowley and The Trick of Turning Luck

Most of the posts I have shared thus far have been rather heavy or heady, but I would also like this blog to be about more concrete considerations and applications. As a first stab in that direction, here are some thoughts on how to turn your luck around or get over writer's block from the view point of Carlos Castaneda and Aleister Crowley.

The Thelemic Wisdom of Heraclitus

“The way of writing is straight and crooked.” (Fragment 59)

Dog Days, Sirius and Vega

HRUMACHIS (Medium -Pen, blood.) (c) 2001 Orryelle Defenestrate-Bascule

The Dog Days have always been a time of heavy occult work for me. It may be that I am partially inspired by Robert Anton Wilson in this, since he spent years receiving unusual occult teachings and experiences during the Dog Days. Check out a sampling of Wilson's writings on the Dog Days and the star Sirius, as well as texts he found useful on the subject, here. I have chosen these, the Dog Days of 2013, to begin this blog.