Jake Stratton-Kent doth schreibble :
>
> Oddly enough, if we are to harmonise Western Magic with the magical
> traditions of the New World (rooted in African Christianity), we first
> need to examine the pre-Christian roots of the Western Tradition.
Hi, Jake ~
Weighing in from the Kaatskills in New York State ( haunted
by the likes of Andrew Jackson Davis, Emma Hardinge Britten
and Paschal Beverly Randolph ), where African and Indigenous
( including the Caribbean - see : http://tinyurl.com/25mjv6n )
magical practices mingled with those of the Shakers, Witches
and Spiritualists ( among others ).
Spiritualist practices involving conversations with those
who have passed on were and are rather common in certain
pre-Wiccan strains of Craft here in the States, strains that
tend to be more eclectic and agglutinative with regard to
Indigenous practices around the globe ( including things
like Max Freedom Long's Hawaiian 'Huna', for example ), rather
than basing themselves on Fringe-Masonic Egyptological /
Hellenic / 'Celtic' practices.
They are also more trance ( and "drug" ) positive than the
Gardnerians that followed ( see again, for example, the Taino,
who still employ their psychoactive sacrament when conversing
with their ancestors and the zemies ).
But I also recollect that there was a Minoan Wiccan 'dumb supper'
held a ways back, celebrating Ed ( Lord Gwyddion ) Buczynski's
place among the 'Mighty Dead'.
See also :
PaDeva :
A Neo-Pagan Wiccan Ayahuasca Church
http://tinyurl.com/36xy5uv
Eleusis :
Journal of Psychoactive Plants & Compounds
http://tinyurl.com/2blu7ra
According to Aryeh Kaplan and Lionel Ziprin, the practice of
conversing with discarnate Maggidim is still quite common, as
is the practice of 'gathering the sparks' by laying prone upon
the graves of 'heroic' Rabbis. And there is also a tradition
that involves spending time in certain caves that figure in
the transmission of certain Kabbalistic teachings.
See :
Israel's Beneficent Dead :
Ancestor Cult and Necromancy in
Ancient Israelite Religion and Tradition
by Brian B. Schmidt
http://tinyurl.com/276wsr6
And since you are already familiar with Philo's take on the
equivalence of souls and daemons and angels, I will simply
pass over that here ;)
Cors in Manu Domine,
~ Khem Caigan
<[log in to unmask]>
"Heat and Moisture are Active to Generation;
Cold and Dryness are Passive, in and to each Thing;
Fire and Air, Active by Elementation;
Water and Earth, Passive to Generation."
*Of the Division of Chaos*
-Dr. Simon Forman
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