Magic Monday

[ecosophia]

It's nearly 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've been tracing my lineages back as far as I can, and last week took my Martinist lineage back as far as they can be documented. The next step -- and it's the last step in the entire process -- involves a fair bit of speculation, but it's speculation backed up by some evidence. It's been suggested by some historians, Marsha Keith Schuchard foremost among them, that the mysterious Knight of the Red Feather who conferred the Templar lineage on Baron von Hund, last week's honoree, was none other than Charles Stuart, the Bonnie Prince Charlie of Scottish song and story. The claim is that in the years immediately before 1745, when the House of Stuart made its last (and disastrously unsuccessful) attempt to reclaim the British throne, Charles and his inner circle of supporters used various forms of clandestine Freemasonry to raise funds, engage in espionage, and gather arms and supporters for the planned rising. Baron von Hund's initiation was an incident in that process. Martinez de Pasqually, who was honored a couple of weeks back, also claimed to have a charter signed by Charles Stuart as the basis for his occult Masonic order. So it's possible that what lies behind one of the great traditions of Western occultism is a failed political intrigue that got picked up and repurposed by a couple of canny occultists. Stranger things have happened in the history of occultism.

...And with this, the rambling tale of the odd lineages that I've inherited comes to an end. Now I'll have to think of something else to use as illustrations to Magic Mondays!

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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!***

***Please note -- when Magic Monday is closed, IT'S CLOSED.  I just had to delete a flurry of attempted comments posted up to eleven hours after I shut things down. I do need some time to write and do other online chores, you know, so please don't keep trying to post after 12:00 am Monday night/Tuesday morning -- there'll be a new Magic Monday in a week, you know. ***

Comments

revising a book

[(Anonymous)]

I have been working on my book for many years. I know that the essence of revision is effort and hard work. But I'm also wondering about any magical things I might do to help my book become the best it can be. I've finished Learning Ritual Magic and started Circles of Power, but have small kids so need to keep my workings simple. Wondering if you have ideas about things I might do.

Some of my ideas include planetary charity to Mercury and/or prayers to St. Raphael and the intelligence of Mercury.

Thanks.

Re: revising a book

[ecosophia]

Your best bet is simply to concentrate on doing your best with the revision, rather than trying to gimmick it with magic. Planetary charity and prayer won't hurt, but I'd leave it at that, and simply give the project your best shot.

[(Anonymous)]

Hi JMG,

I have a couple of odd questions for you. Firstly, can spells be drawn? A recent appearance of graffiti around my neighbourhood has the usual scrawled tags, but there are also what I can only describe as intricate drawings of multiple lines/shapes that don't look like much in particular - maybe half-drawn stick figures as part of a couple. They're fluid and make me feel wary. Might be nothing.

Second, and there may be a rational explanation for this, I was doing the cleaning in my unit on Sunday when I noticed a small patch of earth at my front door, as if someone had swept some spilled dirt to one side. Not me, and I'd swear it wasn't there when I got up (and how would it have got there in the first place). I binned it, wiped the spot with vinegar and did a quick banishing. Nothing since. Have you heard of anything like this? I initially wondered if it was linked to my dad who's been hospitalised recently, but he's still kicking on.

With thanks and blessings for your time.

[ecosophia]

1) Yes, they can. The usual term for a drawn spell is a sigil, and a lot of people these days in some odd places know how to make and use them.

2) Hmm! No, not as such. If it happens again, you might consider divination.

A book on karma

[(Anonymous)]

To JMG and the commentariat,

Are there any introductory, cursory, or superficial-level books that list as many as possible all the varying karma that comes about a a result of being/doing ____?

I'm thinking of such a book that's formatted in a similar way to "The 48 Laws of Power," or Penguin Random House's " Complete Idiot's Guides," or Wiley's "For Dummies" guides.

Or even novels, where the protagonist goes through his or her karma in detail. I haven't read "Crime and Punishment," but I assume (wrongly?) that it would be an example for the karma of murderers or criminals.

Thanks!
-Eugene

Re: A book on karma

[ecosophia]

No, I've never heard of any book like that.

Some questions

[(Anonymous)]

Dear JMG,

1) have you heard of the white eagle lodge? If yes, what do you think of them/their teachings?

2) To divine if I should do the reverse memory review before sleep, what house signifier should I use?

3) Why is Jupiter justice and Saturn karma when karma is a type of justice? To extend that, Jupiter’s expansion and Saturn’s restriction seem to be related / mirrored, though Saturn’s is highest before the firmament, thus wisdom is closest to heaven?

Curious if you can share some thoughts on their relation and their place in spiritual life.

Re: Some questions

[ecosophia]

1) Yes, I read some of their books. It's an interesting outfit, and I know of no reason not to explore their system if it appeals to you.

2) I'd do that as a 9th house divination, as it's a spiritual practice.

3) Jupiter is the kind of justice that is generous, balanced, and takes the circumstances into account. Saturn is strict retributive justice -- you did X and you will pay for it to the last farthing. It's worth meditating on the difference.

Prayer regarding surgery today

[tunesmyth]

If I may advertise a particular prayer that has just come in, with a short time frame.

Brother Kornhoer's son, who has been on the prayer list for several months for his empty nose syndrome, is getting surgery today to help to deal with the condition. May the surgery go excellently, and may he heal quickly.

(A reminder for those who sometimes combine planetary timing with their prayers: today is Tuesday, which is the day of Mars, who rules surgery.)

Re: Prayer regarding surgery today

[(Anonymous)]

How did it go?

—Princess Cutekitten

[(Anonymous)]

JMG,

1) In my life, I have come to suspect that my now elderly mother is what European culture used to describe as a witch. It’s difficult to explain why I have that suspicion without getting tedious. But I think it’s fair to say that she has an imbalanced inner life that she can communicate to her surroundings in unconscious, subtle, and harmful ways.

Would you recommend journaling about this, or is my suspicion so stupid that I should just ignore it and move on? Should I just be aware of this without dwelling on it? I’m interested in this mostly to see if any karmic consequence from past lives comes to the surface.

2) This is unrelated, but do you have any thoughts on whether Crowley’s Lam was an astral being of the sort that others have experienced as grey aliens?

Thank you for your books and for making yourself available like this.

[ecosophia]

1) Have you done divination on the subject? That would be my first go-to.

2) It seems very likely to me that he was, yes.

[(Anonymous)]

Something has bothered me lately, and I'm really hoping you can tell me where I'm wrong. But, since 2020, we've engaged in what amounts to a massive amount of ridiculous cultural posturing over a virus; and in particular, a lot of people on the Left spent much of 2020-2022 acting as if if people did not follow along with their delusions, they would die. I'd like to quote something from Surfing the Astral Light, an essay you wrote about on The Well of Galabes:

"That’s one of the two factors behind ritual magic. The other is applied psychology, and this latter is probably the more important of the two; a vast amount of what can be done through magical practice depends utterly on the use of emotionally charged symbols, dramatic action, and an assortment of other means to reorient the unreasoning levels of the human mind."

There is also the Nocebo Effect to consider; so, a very large number of people on the political and cultural left did heavy rituals to the effect of "We're all going to die (from Covid!) without masks and lockdowns!" So, what happens when we remove the lockdowns and masks? It strikes me that this may, without invoking anything about vaccine efficacy, help explain the rise of Covid illnesses among the vaccinated, as many of them were tied to the left; and they may very well have unwittingly created an emotional link in their minds between living normally, and Covid.

However, when we consider the scale of the thing, it also seems plausible this could create a major amount of psychic energy, which could fairly easily earth out with ADE inducing vaccines; but ADE inducing vaccines which don't kick in right away, but rather only take effect once life is largely back to normal. Is it possible that what happened since 2020 essentially transformed a large swath of society into a large scale magical working aimed at their own death?

[ecosophia]

I've been aware of that possibility since not long after I wrote my original post A Hypothesis in the summer of 2021. We'll just have to see -- but the way that death rates are climbing dramatically above normal in heavily vaccinated countries does not give me any reassurances.

Atoning / clearing karma for stealing

[(Anonymous)]

Hi JMG,

What’s the best way to atone / clear the karma for stealing something?

The context was that I visited a farm where you paid for a container to pick fruit and could pick as much as fit into it, however after I ate some I went back, bought another container to take home, but then also refilled the first.

I almost can’t understand why I did this, regardless I did it knowingly and I feel extremely bad about it.

So I wanted to ask is there a standard way of atoning for this? I rather deal with it consciously than have it hang about in my karma until it returns.

Re: Atoning / clearing karma for stealing

[ecosophia]

You need to pay back the people from whom you stole it. You can do it anonymously -- just stick some cash and a brief anonymous note explaining what you did into an envelope with a fake return address, and mail it to them. That will take care of it.

Geomancy Program.

[(Anonymous)]

Dear JMG,
I'm a computer programmer and I was wondering if I could write a computer program for myself that would cast and do the calculations. Since I would push the button every time the program runs, I was hoping that the divination would work although somewhat automated.

Regards,
Programmer.

Re: Geomancy Program.

[ecosophia]

Sure. There are a couple of dozen geomancy programs already out there, but it's quite possible yours may be better.

Dream

[(Anonymous)]

Dear JMG and commentariat,
I have just woken from a strange experience, which I would like to share and ask about.
I had a dream, a sort of nightmare, probably a sort of attack (from something in the lower Astral?) which I have already had several times in my lifetime; but this time it was somewhat different (Thank you! I will explain below.). The typical “dream” is: I wake up into the dark room, which resembles my bedroom, but it is a little bit scary, so I go to the switch and try to turn on the light, which does not turn on. I get unquiet and wake up again – to the same room, again very similar to my bedroom and dark, only I am more uncertain and scared this time – I try to turn on the light, alternatively my cell phone, which again does not work. After several such attempts I get so scared I try to scream to call for help – any help – (but I cannot make a sound) which does not come, and when I wake to my world I am scared, with irregular and fast heartbeat. This is a typical sequence – sometimes (this time too) I also get the impression that the cooker or oven are on and I am in a danger of fire, if I do not manage to turn them off. However, this time as I “woke up” for a third time with a sufficiently strange feeling of an uncanny presence, I got up not so much in fear but a strong determination, walked to my usual LRP space and did the RoR (my voice was very feeble and croaky, and I could not feel the vibration, but I decided to go on the best I could) and went on to the tracing the BPs – quickly and with urgency and strong determination; the directions around me shifted once, but I finished the tracing and woke up to my proper bedroom, without sweat, with normal regular heartbeat and feeling – even emotionally - well. During the LBRP I could see Golden Light – not in any shape, just coming through the darkness towards me (I have seen this Light before, and I consider it a protection from a Higher Being). I consider this Light to be the one to drive that unfriendly entity away. It also protected me emotionally.
1) Is it possible to tell, what that nightmarish thing was that visited me several times in my life?
2) How to relieve/reestablish a nice, gentle, healthy flow of energy in my throat centre? About 10 years ago I relived a strange thing – like if my head was cut off, recently I relived something connected with choking to death – I do not have any reasonable recollections of past life, but these feel uncomfortably like recollections of past death… I love singing, but apart from that? (I also have asthma, if that’s connected…)
3) I have thanked and in thanks lit a candle to the Source of the Golden Light. Is there anything else I could do to express my gratitude?
JMG, thank you for teaching me the LBRP! The difference between my past experiences and this one was mainly due to this protection-and it was all the difference in the world, so to speak.

With deep regards,
Markéta

Re: Dream

[ecosophia]

1) It requires a fair amount of skill with clairvoyant experiences to do this. Keep practicing and you may get there.

2) It's very common for people who are hanged, decapitated, or strangled in one life to have throat problems in the next life. Careful massage can help, but you'll probably have to deal with some difficulties there until the end of this incarnation.

3) That's what I would do. You can always ask the Source if there's anything else it would like you to do, and listen for the answer.

Quite the Pic!

[(Anonymous)]

No questions this week, JMG, but I’ve gotta say that the moment I saw the portrait of Bonny Prince Charles on your page I just about fell off my chair! (“Crikey!” as my mother would have said) What a colourful tale you have included: most interesting. I do wish, however, that the loopy lad had had some equivalent of Merlin by his side; it might have saved quite a few of my ancestors’ lives!

Ron M

Re: Quite the Pic!

[ecosophia]

Mine too. Greer's a Clan Gregor name, and we had people on both sides of that fight...

[(Anonymous)]

I am a CGD practitioner. For health reasons I was unable to complete the winter solstice ceremony and the following (second) ritual of Merlin's Wheel. When rituals that are part of a yearly cycle like these are missed, can you pick the sequence up from the next ones or is it better to wait until the following year to start again to keep things more balanced?

[ecosophia]

Just pick it up with the next ritual and keep going. You'll be back around the wheel of the year soon enough.

[(Anonymous)]

JMG, do you have an opinion on the Law of Attraction? I never could make it work. Positive thinking is great, but just thinking about whatever I wanted without actually doing something as well was no help.

Has anyone here had success with the Law of Attraction? Maybe I was doing it wrong.

JMG, spellcheck wanted to change “positive thinking” to “positive 🦏 rhino,” so there’s another silly band name for you. I suggest you have the Positive Rhinos play on a double bill with the Charming Onions.

—Princess Cutekitten

[ecosophia]

The Law of Attraction is crap. Well, not completely, but the way it's presented in New Age literature these days? Extreme crap. No, the universe doesn't want to give you whatever you want, and it doesn't matter how hard you try to convince yourself that it will. If your attitudes are getting in the way of what you want? Sure, then affirmations can help a lot. If it's something more external than that? Sorry.

I like the Positive Rhinos. They may just feature on a bill with Tubular Swine, one of the bands I've already come up with.

[pleiadesdreaming]

What's a good way to consecrate a copper sickle for magical herb harvesting? I'm familiar with natural magic (obviously) and am working through the WotGS currently.

[ecosophia]

Get a handheld folding fan, some incense in a burner, some water, and some salt. Use the fan to blow air across it and say, "I consecrate you with the element of air." Hold it over the incense, letting the smoke flow over the blade, and say, "I consecrate you with the element of fire." Sprinkle some water over it with your fingertips and say, "I consecrate you with the element of water." Sprinkle some of the salt across it and say, "I consecrate you with the element of earth." Then breathe on it three times and say, "I consecrate you with the element of spirit."

You can make the words fancier than that, call on spirits or deities, etc., but that's your basic Universal Gnostic consecration and it works quite well.

Naming a child

[(Anonymous)]

Are there any metaphysical dimensions to naming a child? So for example if I give my child a name that means strength will said child be more likely to be stronger?

Re: Naming a child

[ecosophia]

Names have influence, but they're not omnipotent. You can name a girl "Mercy" and it may not make her merciful, but it'll push gently in that direction; as long as the rest of her upbringing doesn't push in the opposite direction, it may accomplish something!

[(Anonymous)]

I'm planning to get a job in another country to get out of Canada; for somewhat complex reasons, my heart is set on a job in the Middle East. Everything has been falling perfectly into place: I had exactly enough money for the Arabic class I plan to use, which fits perfectly into my schedule. The class has a week long break during the week when the next interview for the job is planned, and the interview will be held where my grandparents live. The Arabic class will be taught by someone from the same country as the job will be in; as a result of several totally bizarre events several years ago, I have experience living in a third world country, which will look remarkably good when talking about how I'll adjust to life in another country; and the list of weird coincidences keeps growing.

What sort of things can lead to this sort of remarkably good luck? I've never been especially lucky before; in fact, my luck has consistently been mediocre at best, and I'm quite enjoying whatever this is, but it's frankly baffling and more than a little weird.

[ecosophia]

Any of a hundred different things could cause that. It could be your destiny to go there; you could have subconsciously been saving up good luck for this; someone else's luck or destiny or karma could depend on your being there, and so on.