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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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

[daveotn]

Catholic Encyclopedia has a good article on the history of the change from the Catholic Church's perspective (https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/15235c.htm). In practice of course I think the material benefits of a little bit of finance have shifted the culture. Yes, lending at interest is intrinsically tied to infinite growth and all the environmental problems attendant in that, but it's also allowed pretty much all of the entire Industrial Revolution. Without loans at interest not only would most regular people be unable to ever buy a house or a car, but most of the businesses that brought about modernity would have never made it.

Still, with the push towards loan forgiveness by some parties, with many years of zero- or low-rate interest rates, and with the need to move at some point away from constant growth and towards a more steady-state society...maybe the time has come to dust off usury from the list of sins?

[(Anonymous)]

I agree that usury will more likely seen in an increasing negative light as the economy changes again. It will be interesting to see if it goes back to being an actual sin, which only has bite if everyone or nearly everyone is religious or if it will be an ethical violation, with social pressure pushing back against it. Loan sharks have never gone away and may play an unpleasantly large role in our future.

JLfromNH/Crimson Obtuse Ouroboros

[(Anonymous)]

I think we are already inching in that direction. Notice the recent political skirmishes over student loans.

[(Anonymous)]

Which, if it happens, will be another own goal of epic proportion. Why should student loans be forgiven but not, ex, business loans? Once loan forgiveness is implemented as a policy, people will be less inclined to lend money, sending rates up. All of which will hurt the financial sector, which is what the current elites use for their base of power...