Magic Monday

[ecosophia]

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. Papus and Chaboseau, the honorees of the last two weeks, each got their Martinist lineage by a tangle of mostly forgotten figures, so we can jump straight back to one of the founders of the tradition, Louis-Claude de St. Martin. St. Martin was born in 1743 in an aristocratic family and became a student of the elusive master Martinez de Pasqually, learning the distinctive system of theurgic magic Pasqually taught. Later in life, after Pasqually's death, he focused more of his attention on Christian mysticism, studied Jacob Boehme's writings, and penned a series of influential mystical tracts under the pseudonym "The Unknown Philosopher."

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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.

With that said, have at it!

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

Comments

Subtle bodies

[(Anonymous)]

Good evening, and thank you very much for taking questions.

(1.) Do you happen to know the earliest appearance of the
subtle bodies in western esoteric literature (after the Neoplatonists).

(2.) Is it likely that these ideas derived mainly from the
Neoplatonists or certain early church fathers, or were there also
influences from other traditions?

(3.) When did ideas about the subtle bodies from Upanishad or other
Indian thought begin to appear in western esoteric texts?

Thank you very much.

Re: Subtle bodies

[ecosophia]

1) Not off hand, no. The idea was certainly in circulation by the late 1700s, as Mesmerism assumed the existence of a "fluidic body."

2) While Neoplatonism and its Christian knockoffs were certainly influential, Western occultism began to absorb influences from points further east by the 12th century, mostly by way of Arabic occultism.

3) Direct influence from Indian sources begins with the first Latin translation of the principle Upanishads in 1801-1802. That was picked up by Western occultists almost instantly thereafter.