ecosophia | Magic Monday

Current Mood: working

Entry tags:

Magic Monday

It's getting toward midnight, so we can proceed with a new Magic Monday. Ask me anything about occultism and I'll do my best to answer it. With certain exceptions, any question received by midnight Monday Eastern time will get an answer. Please note: Any question or comment received after then will not get an answer, and in fact will just be deleted. (I've been getting an increasing number of people trying to post after these are closed, so will have to draw a harder line than before.) If you're in a hurry, or suspect you may be the 143,916th person to ask a question, please check out the very rough version 1.0 of The Magic Monday FAQ here. Also: I will not be putting through or answering any more questions about practicing magic around children. I've answered those in simple declarative sentences in the FAQ. If you read the FAQ and don't think your question has been answered, read it again. If that doesn't help, consider remedial reading classes; yes, it really is as simple and straightforward as the FAQ says.

The picture? I'm working my way through photos of my lineage, focusing on the teachers whose work has influenced me and the teachers who influenced them in turn. I'm currently tracing my Martinist lineage. That's rendered complex by the Martinist tradition that one does not name one's initiator, so we'll have to go back through less evasive routes. Last week's honoree, René Chambellant, became head of the Eglise Gnostique Universelle on the death of his teacher and consecrator, Constant Chevillon, whom I'm honoring this week. Martinist, Rosicrucian, Freemason, and Gnostic bishop, Chevillon was born in 1880, showed remarkable intellectual gifts in youth, but went to work in the banking industry while devoting his free time to occult and spiritual pursuits. He wrote seven books and many essays about Gnostic theology and practice, and his integrity and spiritual qualities won the respect not only of his fellow Gnostics but of Catholics and nonreligious people. In 1944, he and other leading citizens of Lyon were taken hostage by the Nazis in revenge for activities of the Resistance, and shot to death. He is considered a saint and martyr by most modern Gnostic churches; the day of his martyrdom, March 22, is his feast day.

Buy Me A Coffee

Ko-Fi

I've had several people ask about tipping me for answers here, and though I certainly don't require that I won't turn it down. You can use either of the links above to access my online tip jar; Buymeacoffee is good for small tips, Ko-Fi is better for larger ones. (I used to use PayPal but they developed an allergy to free speech, so I've developed an allergy to them.) If you're interested in political and economic astrology, or simply prefer to use a subscription service to support your favorite authors, you can find my Patreon page here and my SubscribeStar page here.

I've also had quite a few people over the years ask me where they should buy my books, and here's the answer. Bookshop.org is an alternative online bookstore that supports local bookstores and authors, which a certain gargantuan corporation doesn't, and I have a shop there, which you can check out here. Please consider patronizing it if you'd like to purchase any of my books online.

And don't forget to look up your Pangalactic New Age Soul Signature at CosmicOom.com.

***This Magic Monday is now closed. See you next week!***

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

Olá JMG e todos aqui na Magic Monday,

Espero que estejam todos bem e saudáveis!

Recentemente me deparei com os textos de uma figura interessante, poderosa e inspiradora: Robert Ogilvie Crombie. Que pessoa maravilhosa!

Tem mais alguém com os presentes dele?
E há alguma maneira de desenvolver esses dons e conversar com entidades na natureza?

Obrigado!

Good Evening,

To those who observe it, a very happy Fathers' Day!

To Share: I've had some thoughts on the question of authenticity versus validity brewing for awhile now, and reading a book review of a biography on Augustus of all things finally gave me the key I needed to bring them together. Drawing plenty on our host's post on the topic, of course, I hope I break some new ground on just why authenticity seems so shiny and important to folks looking into alternative spirituality: https://jpowellrussell.com/#the_trouble_with_authenticity

To Ask: In the Dolmen Arch version of the Solar Plexus exercise, it says to visualize "seven rays of light," one for each cantref. Does it matter what direction these rays go? Should they align with the compass points, with parts of the body, or is this something to experiment with?

As always, thanks very much to JMG and everyone else here for all that you do.

To any who will have them, I put forth my blessings and best wishes,
Jeff

You’ve written that you think that a lot of the various messes we’re in now, especially those that didn’t exist a decade ago, are the result of the inept use of malevolent magic by the Magic Resistance. I’m still quite early in my studies, and find it a little shocking that I’m already able to recognise major flaws and weaknesses in the Magic Resistance workings; which tells me they are stunningly bad. There is, however, a troubling question I’ve had, given that some of the analyses of the Magic Resistance I’ve seen say their work lacks any kind of source of power, and the discussion in the Cosmic Doctrine about how resisting something can lock something in place, while moving out of the way will things to run to the void, is it possible the various efforts made to combat the Magic Resistance might have played a role in how strong of an effect it had? Might the people opposing it have accidentally provided it with a power it would never otherwise have attained?

Thank you for this! I can read Portuguese tolerably well at this point but my vocabulary isn't good enough to write my response in it; I hope you won't mind a response in English.

Yes, Robert Ogilvie Crombie -- ROC, as his friends called him -- was a remarkable figure! I never had the chance to meet him but I've spoken with several people who worked with him. There are other people who have the same abilities he had, but the ones I know aren't public about their interactions with nature spirits. They -- and ROC, too, to judge by what I know of him -- would encourage you to develop those abilities yourself. Any system of esoteric training that involves the development of inner perception will give you those capacities, if you give it the daily work it requires.

My usual approach is to let the rays of light go in whatever direction they want to go. With me, at least, they usually flow toward places, either in me or around me, that need positive energy.

Excellent! You're paying attention. Yes, and that's why I went out of my way not to fight the Magic Resistance. I tried to encourage people to recognize the disastrous consequences of participating in its antics, but other than that I followed Dion Fortune's advice and built up what I wanted to encourage rather than trying to tear down things I didn't like. Of course there are others who chose differently, but they have the right to make their own choices, even if those are unwise.

Here are all of the requests for prayer that have recently appeared across the Ecosophia community. Please feel free to add any or all of the requests to your own prayers.

If I missed anybody, or if you would like to add a prayer request for yourself or anyone who has given you consent (or for whom a relevant person holds power of consent) to the list, please feel free to leave a comment below if before Midnight on Tuesday; or in the comments of the weekly prayer list post.

* * *
This week I would like to bring special attention to the following prayer requests.

It's a boy! Hippie Viking and his wife are the parents of a new baby; for blessings on the child according to his nature and the nature of the deity prayed to; and for good health for both mother and child. (Original request here)

Tanamous's friend's brother David got in a terrible motorcycle accident and has been diagnosed as a quadriplegic given the resultant spinal damage; for healing and the positive outcomes of upcoming surgeries and rehabilitation, specifically towards him being able to walk and live a normal life once more.

Nicole's (shewhoholdstension) 41 year brother Robert died suddenly in bed on May 15th; for a smooth and blessed journey on the other side. Robert was a single dad and he leaves behind three children: Hannah, Zack, and Jordyn; that they and Nicole be blessed and protected, and find what comfort they can during this very difficult time. (Update here.)

Lp9's request on behalf of their hometown, East Palestine Ohio, for the safety and welfare of their people and all living beings in the area. (Lp9 gives updates here and most recently here, and says "things are a bit... murky"), and the reasonable possibility seems to exist that this is an environmental disaster on par with the worst America has ever seen. At any rate, it is clearly having a devastating impact on the local area, and prayers are still warranted.

* * *

Guidelines for how long prayer requests stay on the list, how to word requests, how to be added to the weekly email list, how to improve the chances of your prayer being answered, and several other common questions and issues, are now to be found at the Ecosophia Prayer List FAQ.

If there are any among you who might wish to join me in a bit of astrological timing, I pray each week for the health of all those with health problems on the list on the astrological hour of the Sun on Sundays, bearing in mind the Sun's rulerships of heart, brain, and vital energies. If this appeals to you, I invite you to join me.

This is a good reminder especially with some of the issues I'm seeing in Geek/Nerd/Otaku culture.

Forgive me if I've said this before, but I think this is part of the Asatru Folk Assembly's success. They focus totally on their own organization and the gods they worship.

Hello JMG! And thanks again for all you do.
Could you expound a bit on the definition of Astral Light and if it could be compared to “prana”in Yogic systems?
From Jill C

Thank you for this as always.

Exactly. You can build your own scene or you can tear down somebody else's. You can't do both.

In occult theory there are several different levels of nonphysical reality that human beings can experience and work with. There are various ways of talking about these; the system I use talks about the etheric, astral, and mental planes or levels. If I understand the Indian concept of prana correctly -- and I'll gladly accept correction if I don't! -- prana is the life force, which flows along the nadis and keeps the physical body alive; this is what occultists call the etheric level, the level of life force. The astral level is one step further from dense matter -- it's the level of dreams, imagination, and visions -- and that's the level on which the astral light operates. The astral light is the substance of the astral level, just as the life force/prana is the substance of the etheric level, and matter is the substance of the physical level.

Isn't the Martinist goal essentially dissolution? When I first read up on them that was the sense I got.

Greetings, JMG! I wanted to follow up on last week’s discussion of soul and spirit. I’ve been meditating on this for quite some time and have read many of your writings on bodies but the terminology is still confusing to me. I’ve tried to map them to planes to sort this out. A “body”, as best I can tell, is actually composed of physical matter, plus etheric energy holding it together in a form held on the astral plain. It’s maybe an over simplification of your writings on bodies, and I offer my apologies if I’ve taken too much liberty here. It also seems consistent across different traditions that there is an enduring spirit that joins a body at various points in time (the details I won’t pretend to understand). Then there’s the matter of a soul, which I take to include at least the astral and mental planes. The most artistic version of all this would be a spirit that would encompass the planes of spirit, causal, and divine, and a soul would encompass the astral, mental, and mental planes. I picture three interlocking circles. Could you offer any clarity on terminology here? And what would be a good resource to investigate the differences (and relationships) of body, soul, and spirit?

No, not at all. Martinism has a very distinctly Gnostic teaching. Before our fall into matter, in what Martinist teachings call our First Estate, we human beings were high angelic beings; we lost our place of balance and power in the light of Omneity (the Martinist conception of the Divine) and so descended into matter, but it is our destiny through our wanderings in matter to not only recover our First Estate but to rise even higher than we were. We are all already one with the Divine; in our future state we will be conscious of that, as we were in our First Estate.

Okay, one source of confusion here is that these words "soul" and "spirit" get used by different traditions and teachings in different ways. Very often what one source says is explicitly contradicted by another source! So you need to check with each tradition means by those words.

In the system I use, human beings have three bodies -- material, etheric, and astral -- and are evolving the fourth, which belongs to the mental plane. These are all bodies, and they do not belong to soul or spirit. The spirit consists of the seed forms of the bodies we haven't evolved yet -- the spiritual and causal bodies we'll evolve in the far future -- gathered around the Divine Spark. The soul is something else again: it's the collected experience of all our previous lives, all the way back to the beginning, which serves as a template for the spirit when it creates the bodies it will indwell in each new incarnation.

Hi JMG,

A couple of weeks ago you gave me some excellent advice about dealing with an energy vampire:

https://ecosophia.dreamwidth.org/235714.html?thread=41419970#cmt41419970

As soon as I added the red bag (to the daily SOP and Judson exercise), my physical issues got considerably better within a day. Thank you very much for this!!

That has brought up a few more questions:

1. My (homemade) explanation is this: The physical issues were related to the kidneys. I know that in the Chinese system, the life force is seen as being related to the kidneys.

When I decided to severe ties once and for all, the energy vampire felt that and „clung“ to me even more than before, drawing too much life force for my kidneys to handle, hence the physical problems. And when I added the red bag, that interrupted the flow and helped with the issues.

Does this sound like a plausible explanation, or am I completely off the mark?

(I‘m not asking about medical advice, but about the occult perspective on things.)

2. Could the red bags, or something similar, also be used to protect the space within a house or flat, and everybody within it? E.g. by putting one into each outer corner, or at the „center“?

3. Somebody close to me would like to wear a red bag during this time, too, but is prone to fumbling on the nail until the cloth is pierced and the bag is losing salt.

Is there anything else you could recommend instead of a nail in a protective amulet? (If that matters, it‘s a teenager - although I presume people with toddlers might have the same question… :D ).

4. Finally, just wanted to say that all of this, especially the physical issues showing up and going away in such sharp timely coincidence, have been a bit of a shock - I hadn‘t realised that some people could draw quite as much energy from others (and I‘m fairly sure this person isn‘t even doing it consciously). Is this a common thing?

Thank you very much for your help!

Not OP. Fascinating, that part is I guess consistent with Fortune's tale of the involutionary or descent arc, with the rise back up being what follows the initiation of the nadir. Do the Martinist teachings recognise that potentially humans fell even lower than intended as a result of our own actions during the Lemurian Deviation or is that not part of the teachings?

I believe I had, or what I think, was an encounter with my Shadow, but it also could have been something else. Prior to Covid, I had the grand exciting plans to move to the country, and as well as working damned hard in agriculture I'd get some sort of spiritual revelation. Of course, in my still youthful naivety I thought that this would be all stars, light, and positivity, despite my years of reading your work and other works.

However, I got my revelation. It was the opposite, a battle of spiritual and intrusive thoughts which had me realise that no, I'm not that good, and as a human, I'm well capable of evil. It shattered me, sent me to bed for a couple of weeks shaking, and although I most certainly did not behave badly, I now realise a lot of what Jung and others have said about the shadow, the dweller, and various other little human demons. Encountering them, and trying to integrate them is harrowing.

I can see why people sometimes can't walk or function after these experiences. I certainly couldn't.

Three years on I'm far wiser, and interestingly, those types of people that would once waste my time or abuse me now don't even try, or have largely left my life.

It's got me thinking that something of the secret of the Great Arcanum, that 'terrible' secret is in it, it seems to be when humans have to move beyond the binary of morality, and that's terrifying? Am I on the right track here with this thinking?

Greetings JMG and All,

I had sort of a multi-part question over the last couple of weeks, and the
feedback from JMG and a few others on those has been pretty interesting.
I want to thank JMG and all the other responders for their replies to those
ponderous and possibly cumbersome questions! ;^)

Today, I'd like to put forth the final part of that conglomerate, so I'll
have a lot of stuff for discursive meditation, so to speak.

Postulate:
At the end of a physical incarnation the "persona" (insert traditional name),
is withdrawn from the "physical/etheric" (insert Your traditional names),
and through the so-called "second death" is integrated into the "soul/higher
self, lower genius, et al) so to speak.

N.B.
According to Dion Fortune sometimes etheric "vampirism" is practiced in order
to forestall the inevitable "second death". This is usually a big 'bummer' for
everybody. Once discovered though it's curable enough, if a trifle messy.

Time seriously passes*..., on the inner and outer planes, various and sundry
marvelous conditions culminate to resolve many things, or not.
Eventually, the "soul / higher self" feels conditions are right, and is drawn
toward the dense physical again. Unless, that was the final incarnation needed
to "graduate", and stay on the inner levels. So far, so good...

Which leads to the "summum arcanum" of this whole question, for "me"!
This also has possible "mystical" as well as "magical" ramifications.

Once the "Individuality" is freed from the "necessity" to incarnate, can it be
in actuality "Individual", though of course connected to, and a part of
"ALL THAT IS"? Will there come a time when it's dissolution into ALL THAT IS,
is inevitable? That is in contrast to the mystic's voluntary "Union with God".

When will everyone in this life wave attain the summum? I haven't particpated
in the "Cosmic Doctrine" discussions, hope to though. I'm aware JMG has high
regard for her production of that work. I've studied just about All her work,
while we are all "products of our time" to some extent, she's pretty remarkable.
Unless you're "Mina Mathers"! Thanks JMG for the link to that PhD dissertation!

I'm not asking to have this stuff answered, just garner some thoughts.
Why would anyone want to understand stuff like this? Seems Mighty Strange.
We all likely get intuitive insights from time to time as we practice.
Does anyone practice the "Bornless (Headless) Invocation" on a regular basis?
Or, for that matter even once? That's one you gotta work up to, whew! Inflame!

That's it, no more "dumb questions" from me!

* Ala, Douglas Adams: "Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency".
* A Great Book! ;^)

AFA supports the cleanup of a stretch of highway near me in N. California. I noticed the signs in passing. For those who don't know, Calif. has a program for organizations to sponsor a section of highway. Individuals, organizations or businesses can sign up and either volunteer to pick up trash themselves (under safety supervision) or to pay to have it done in their name.

Rita

It's not something I've encountered in the teachings so far, but I'm still finding my way in the tradition -- as seems to happen to me fairly often, I got tossed in the deep end (all three degrees in a single weekend!) and handed a vast stack of lessons and exercises to work with, and I'm still in the early stages of that latter process. (The main study course I've been given has no fewer than 100 monthly lessons, and they're not short ones...)

1) Yes, that sounds plausible.

2) Yes, very much so. I've done this, in fact.

3) It needs to be something sharp-pointed and made of iron to get the same effect. If that's not an option, you may need to look up other protective amulets -- my book on natural magic covers the ground, possibly in too much detail.

4) Yes, unfortunately.

Sounds like a classic Shadow encounter to me! As for the Great Arcanum, that's certainly a hypothesis worth exploring... ;-)

Let me see if I can pick out the questions from this.

1) The idea that the self finally dissolves into the Divine is a belief of some mystical traditions, but it's not supported even by most mystics. It's more a matter of realizing that you've been a part of All That Is all along; you don't stop being an individual, you realize what "being an individual" doesn't keep you from being part of the All.

2) Everyone in this life wave will achieve the summum bonum when they get there. There's no fixed time frame. You have all the time there is; have fun.

3) I dunno, I suppose some of us are just curious. ;-)

4) Good heavens, yes. I've done it weekly at certain times in my life for years at a stretch. I know other occultists who do it several times a week. It's potent stuff, but well within the reach of anyone who's learned to do serious ritual work.

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

Page 1 of 10

Magic Monday

Robert Ogilvie Crombie

The Trouble with Authenticity and the DA Solar Plexus Exercise Seven Rays of Light

no subject

Re: Robert Ogilvie Crombie

Re: The Trouble with Authenticity and the DA Solar Plexus Exercise Seven Rays of Light

no subject

no subject

no subject

Astral Light

no subject

no subject

Re: Astral Light

no subject

Bodies

no subject

Re: Bodies

Follow-up questions energy vampire

no subject

Encounter with the shadow, or something else?

no subject

Asatru Folk Assembly

no subject

Re: Follow-up questions energy vampire

Re: Encounter with the shadow, or something else?

no subject