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Ongoing practice niggle
Liking the aesthetic of ceremonial/occultist traditions - Egyptiana, quasi-demonic-imagery, planetary and talismanic work, shoving Hebrew letters everywhere, rigorous practice routines, Kenneth Anger, chanting, LBRP, Babylonian deities, just-enough-Satanism-to-scare-the-neighbours, ass-clenching pedantry
but
all of them rely on a core cosmological views I don't share, and find utterly anathema.
For example, anything based on the Tree of Life invokes an essentially Christian sense of the divine - an almighty white light above the head, a sense of celestial divinity, a higher sphere purer-than-mortals that we aspire to become one with. That doesn't fit into my religion at all. My religion is earth-centric, grubby, physical, rooted, and strange.
I love the aesthetic and experience of performing the LBRP, but in terms of what that ritual is - it's basically like chucking bleach all over my garden and harrowing the earth so that nothing can survive there with angelic forces. It's totally at odds with everything else I do, totally at odds with the most important and holistic parts of what I believe and know to be true.
It's definitely A Problem - if only for me.
The structure and the rigour, and the pedantry, and the silliness of ceremonial traditions really works for my brain. And oh, the power! Like, it really works for me. But I can't reconcile it with my religious convictions. Like, I've got no business conjuring angels in my living room one day, and expecting the spirits of my heart and soul to take me seriously the next.
I've done some experiments with trying to replicate what I like about Ceremonial stuff but in a tradcraft context, and they didn't work well. Just swapping out the angels and replacing them with Arthurian imagery should work, right? I'm frankly pretty annoyed, and also curious - as a chaote, I definitely think one can combine stuff on the fly like this and make it work, but I've not struck upon how yet. Even though it should work on paper. Perhaps it's the totality of the system, and the fact i believe in it - ceremonial magic is, of all traditions, the least encouraging of individual improv.
V befuddling.
but
all of them rely on a core cosmological views I don't share, and find utterly anathema.
For example, anything based on the Tree of Life invokes an essentially Christian sense of the divine - an almighty white light above the head, a sense of celestial divinity, a higher sphere purer-than-mortals that we aspire to become one with. That doesn't fit into my religion at all. My religion is earth-centric, grubby, physical, rooted, and strange.
I love the aesthetic and experience of performing the LBRP, but in terms of what that ritual is - it's basically like chucking bleach all over my garden and harrowing the earth so that nothing can survive there with angelic forces. It's totally at odds with everything else I do, totally at odds with the most important and holistic parts of what I believe and know to be true.
It's definitely A Problem - if only for me.
The structure and the rigour, and the pedantry, and the silliness of ceremonial traditions really works for my brain. And oh, the power! Like, it really works for me. But I can't reconcile it with my religious convictions. Like, I've got no business conjuring angels in my living room one day, and expecting the spirits of my heart and soul to take me seriously the next.
I've done some experiments with trying to replicate what I like about Ceremonial stuff but in a tradcraft context, and they didn't work well. Just swapping out the angels and replacing them with Arthurian imagery should work, right? I'm frankly pretty annoyed, and also curious - as a chaote, I definitely think one can combine stuff on the fly like this and make it work, but I've not struck upon how yet. Even though it should work on paper. Perhaps it's the totality of the system, and the fact i believe in it - ceremonial magic is, of all traditions, the least encouraging of individual improv.
V befuddling.
no subject
I would think that using Arthurian or ancient Briton imagery would do the trick for your purposes.
A fascinating post - thanks for sharing!
no subject
See, you'd think that replacing the imagery would work - in fact, I think I've read descriptions of ceremonial people actually doing this. But I've not been able to make it hum. Perhaps this is my failing - I don't really *believe* it enough?
But overnight I was musing on your reply, and I think I'm going to try it with non-angel-but-still-in-the-zone imagery - either Egyptian or quasi-demonic, something that still "feels occult" and isn't so jarring with the rest of the aesthetic. But which isn't quasi-Christian.
I'm increasingly appreciating how ceremonial traditions, both the medieval ones and the Victorian ones, grow out of people who are still participating in Christianity, and who want something coherent with it - and literally designed it with that in mind.