NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #16/NN_1992_16.iso/spool/alt/magick/3552

Text File | 1992-07-29 | 7.5 KB | 167 lines

Newsgroups: alt.magick
Path: sparky!uunet!usc!rpi!usenet.coe.montana.edu!news.u.washington.edu!milton.u.washington.edu!rjb
From: [e-mail] (LeGrand Cinq-Mars)
Subject: Re: The Middle Pillar ritual, help needed
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Organization: University of Washington, Seattle
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Date: Wed, 29 Jul 1992 16:03:48 GMT
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Someone or other (I downloaded alt.magick without any
headers whatsoever, which makes for an interesting
read) made the following remarks, which I extract from
their context in a state of wonderment.


  "... I will not use Kabbalah in ritual.  (I
  believe that using Kabbalah in ritual, other
  than devotional ritual, is contrary to the
  intention of the Jews who developed the Kabbalah
  ....".

  "One other caveat: while there are some folk,
  for example Crowley, who say that these Hebrew
  letters, names, and other correspondences are
  part of the inherent nature of the universe,
  *most* experienced magical practitioners, of any
  style, recommend that one only use forms which
  one has an understanding of.  ...  I have
  developed a similar ritual form, without any use
  of Hebrew or other concepts which are not
  natural to the dominant Western Culture.... It
  would also only make sense in a context of what
  is meant by the "middle pillar".  IMO, forms
  without context are forms without power."

                          Questions

1.  "Forms without context are forms without power."
But isn't it common enough in esoteric training to
begin with forms -- without context -- of practice,
and encourage the student to generate the context
through practice?  Isn't that one way that forms
acquire power?

2.  "...recommend that one only use forms which one
has an understanding of."  And how much of an
understanding is enough?  And how does one know what
percentage of understanding one has?  And whether
one's understanding is incorrect?  Wouldn't one have
to know the correct understanding to know that one's
understanding was incorrect -- and isn't one of the
hallmarks of having an incorrect understanding *not*
understanding how incorrect one's understanding is?
If one knows that one only understands something 50%,
but must understand it (say) 75% or better in order to
use it, how does one know this?  Wouldn't one already
have to understand it well to understand how little
one understood it?  Leaving aside the notion that this
kind of injunction is deliberately paradoxical, isn't
it true that it's generally after passing one's
driving test that one really begins to learn how to
drive?  Or, not to be too metaphorical and allusive,
that one generally comes to understand things by using
them?  Didn't Eliphas Levi repeat approvingly the
advice to people with "doubts" that they kneel and
pray -- and by praying encounter faith?

3.  "...without any use of Hebrew or other concepts
which are not natural to the dominant Western
Culture...."  What in the world can this mean?
Certainly embedded in it are the propositions that (a)
cultures have things that are natural to them and
things that are not, that (b) it is improper to have
any truck with things not natural to one's culture (or
perhaps to things not natural to "the dominant Western
Culture"?), and (c) that one language (Hebrew:  what
then about Aramaic?  Arabic?  Greek?  Latin?  German?
French?  Scottish English?) and certain (unspecified)
concepts are among those unnatural things.  Whose
"Western Culture" are we talking about here?  The
Western Culture of Dionysius the Areopagite, Hildegard
of Bingen, Thomas Aquinas, Dante, Ramon Llull, Anne
Conway, Theresa of Avila, John of the Cross, John
Milton, John Donne, Emmanuel Swedenborg (to get away
from the Johns:  this isn't just about Johns' culture,
after all),  Isaac Newton, Adam Mickiewicz, Jacob
Boehme, John Pordage, William Blake, Goethe (another
John!), Jane Leade (a female John?!) Longfellow, Yeats
(etc.) -- or the Western Culture of Bart Simpson?  To
*whose* Western Culture are these things not
"natural"?  Speak for yourself, John.

4.  "...I believe that using Kabbalah in ritual, other
than devotional ritual, is contrary to the intention
of the Jews who developed the Kabbalah ...."  About
taste and beliefs that do not claim any foundation
there is of course no arguing, but let's turn this
into a proposition or two anyway -- it's more fun that
way.  If it were not an inconsequential expression of
personal taste, it would contain at least the claims
that (a) that nothing (especially any cultural
product) should be used in a way other than (or merely
contrary to?) the intention of the person or people
who developed it, (b) that there is one, unitary
Kabbalah [there isn't], (c) that it was developed by a
unitary group of people with a unified intention ["it"
wasn't], and that (d) this intention allows anyone to
use it in ritual as long as that ritual is only
devotional [see (b) and (c)].  Now (b) through (d) are
historical claims, and (at best) thoroughly
problematic; (a) on the other hand is ... well, just
silly.

If it were not, it would mean that various American
Indian religions (not to mention Santeria) had
improperly used elements of Christianity (against the
wishes and intentions of the copyright holders), that
Luther had violated the Pope's copyrights, that the
works of Mohammed's followers should be repossessed by
Jews and Christians, that Christianity should yield
its royalties in turn to Judaism and the school of
Alexandria (which would also acquire a controlling
interest in several varieties of Judaism, some long
out of circulation), that the School of Alexandria
would be obliged to offer some of its royalties to the
gymnosophists and the Buddhists (though its parent
corporation, the Platonic Academy) -- but that the
Tibetan Buddhists at least would be in hock to the
Nestorians for their tulku complex, the Sufis in hock
to the Buddhists as well, along with the later
Taoists, although the later Buddhists would be in hock
to the earlier Taoists, and so on...  And where did
the Tree of Life diagram come from, anyway?  The
question of who has the copyright on that user
interface is still in litigation, though the
Kabbalists and the Neoconfucians are probably out of
the running, the Neoplatonist claim seems to be based
on a never-implemented prototype, the Idries Shavians
and the Castanedistas have been adjudged without
standing:  the major contest will probably be between
certain joint ventures of the Buddhist and Taoist
enterprises.

And then of course there are all the non-religious
notions and customs that drift from one group of
people to another.  The felonious Mr Farouche would be
in debt to the executors of the estate of Augustine of
Hippo, Newtonian physics would be the preserve of
alchemically-oriented crypto-Arians supervising Her
Majesty's coinage... Who has the patent on neckties?
Are the Japanese infringing on the British patent on
suits?  What about golf and baseball?  How much do we
owe India for the zero?  And which community in India?

I can imagine something like a central patent office
for cultural notions of all sorts -- with patents
granted in perpetuity.  Or maybe something like the
licensing that allows radio stations to play recorded
music, or the use fees on library books in Britain.
What fun!  What guaranteed employment for lawyers and
bureaucrats!

--LeGrand