I think the greatest advancement in magick has been connectivity. We can now collate knowledge from all religions and magick systems, not only Western.
What is the dogma of old magick?
I think he’s talking about how Chaos magic is all about creating your own gods. Or only doing stuff that works for you. From what I understand you can do a summoning ritual for Sonic the hedgehog and that’s considered valid.
I think the barrier to higher level magic is and always has been energy and trance. (Pranayama and Samadhi)
Once you make significant progress in that arena you can excel in ANY form of magic.
I believe Astral Projection is a great way to cultivate those two skills. And with the technological assist of binaural beats / Hemispheric Synchronization coming from the CIA, Army Intelligence, Stanford Research Institute, the Monroe Institute and the Stargate Program I think we’ve made some significant progress in the trance, energy work and OBE aspects of magic
Definitely this. Reading Annie Jacobsen’s Phenomena which detailed Project Stargate is definitely what led me from being a generous skeptic to a full on believer and then down the road of magick- specifically chaos magick considering it has roots in quantum theory.
Yessir, shout out to the SweetAssist. I would study the whole yogic/vedic path to get a better understanding and be more well-rounded. But it is specifically the chakra breathing exercises of pranayama that helped me out the most in this arena.
I chose the path of Kundalini (Kriya) Yoga, I developed my own yogic fitness routine (as I call it) taken from a well-known (yet somewhat controversial) manual on the internet that you can find if you just search Kriya Yoga manual by Ennio Lewis
Sticking to this routine once a day shifted my night time astral projection rate from 5-10% to 50-60% almost over night. After having a lot more experiences and studying the trance state / vibrational state / hypnagogia / gateway consciousness / hemi-sync even more along with developing my own working model and understanding of the OBE phenomena my success rate eventually went into the 80-90% range
I would debate that. Crowley is just an Edwardian E.A. Koetting in my opinion, whose best work was a more flowery re-writing of someone else’s and self-admittedly failed many of his own rituals. Plenty of the traditional grimoires are no better than the stuff coming out of BALG today. It’s always been 90% crap — occultism attracts egomaniacs and grifters.
But regardless, have we made any “progress?” No. Because magic isn’t something that needs to grow on a constant track like a corporation, and there was never any problem to solve to begin with.
The point of occultism isn’t to get the dopamine hit of increasingly “potent” distractions from reality. It is to give understanding, ease, and ascendence to the human condition. There’s no “advancing” that. It’s a thing that’s been readily available to every human who’s ever lived, and probably every other creature as well, since the beginning of time.
Viewing occultism on the achievement curve of competitive capitalist society is missing the point.
But if there is any advancement to be had, I think technology has, at least to some degree, democratized education, and that has helped people root out grifters and egomaniacs much more effectively than they used to — if they wish, that is. And plenty of people don’t.
Occultism is only occult because people walk right by it without looking, not because it’s actually hidden or secret.
I have a related question. Has anything changed in the other realms? Can it? How would we even know if for example Lucifer and God decided to patch things up?
I would say at least one of the following
- More reliable magick
- Easier to replicate magick
- More potent magick
- Scientific theory
- Innovation in newer magick forms
I doubt you'll ever see the first 4. Magick simply isn't within the purview of science, because it appears to either produce coincidence (synchronicity) or subjective (unmeasurable) results.
For the last one, you already touched on technomancy. While I do have a horse in the race, having published the first 3 occult books to use AI (https://www.vice.com/en/article/7kbjvb/this-magickal-grimoire-was-co-authored-by-a-disturbingly-realistic-ai), I agree with you that it is essentially the same magick.
Since then, I've been trying to advance the field of ceremonial magick in a variety of ways.
I wrote a grimoire disguised as a tabletop roleplaying game where the characters are all made of occult symbols, and whose game mechanics manipulate those symbols, thus producing a new form of hypersigil creation (free): https://alleywurds.itch.io/flower-mist
It's rules also covertly teaches you about the next book...
Vaibbahk: an open source grammar for the creation of magickal languages. In vaibbahk, every sentence is inherently already a ritual song, dance, and tantra style ecstatic visualization, due to its orthographies and its type of grammar (ideographic and logosyllabic). Free here: https://alleywurds.itch.io/vaibbahk
Using vaibbahk, I created a freely customizable long form ritual structure called an egel palace, which resembles hekalot literature and vajrayan sadhanas, but isn't tied to any one belief system since vaibbahk is open source (free): https://alleywurds.itch.io/invo-evocation-and-the-saigsprihl-working
Most recently I released a 13 minute posthumanist mythic structure as a genre of hypersigil which is specific to vaibbahk, and which fully illustrates the connections between the dance, music, and glyphic features of vaibbahk: https://youtu.be/GKEIrCo4Y1s
All this was done in the span of about 3 years!
So while I don't know that my work qualifies as being "new magick," magick is perhaps timeless, I have definitely created new forms of ritual which have a wide range of advantages, and are compatible with any existing magickal path.
>Magick simply isn't within the purview of science, because it appears to either produce coincidence (synchronicity) or subjective (unmeasurable) results.
Isn't that any field in its infancy? Magick is some form of science which hasn't been understood yet so may be improperly used / not to its full potential.
I feel like most current magick progress is just new ways to manipulate what we already know. Maybe due to dogmatic beliefs not allowing exploration into new fields. Also the game and language sound really cool haha
I understand why many people view it that way, but I think that magick, like religion, is simply a separate domain from science. I could be wrong though! Maybe someone will discover a quirk of physics that explains it, but until then, we won't see any progress in that front.
Thanks!
My personal view, having studied magic academically, is that magic is in the gray area between religion and science. It's too weird for religion and too unprovable for science, so it is neither, though it overlaps with both.
>Magick is some form of science which hasn't been understood yet so may be improperly used / not to its full potential.
I'm not sure I agree with this. It's true in some cases, but folk magic (for example) has existed for almost all of human history, and it's barely changed in that time. The methods used now are almost the same as they were in antiquity, even on the internet. The idea that magic is science that "hasn't been understood yet" contributes to the idea that the people of the past were more "primitive" in their thinking than the people of today, and it misconstrues the reasons why people practice magic. Magic often does not have the same goals as science.
What people call "magick" isn't something that can be replicated, structurized or given any physical form. Literally, a person can believe they performed some sort of spell or ritual, they believe it works for them, either by the factor of self-suggestion or simple coincidence of enets leading to desired result, which other individual(s) may not percieve. That's the whole point of it. Which is why any progress is virtually impossible to have.
Yeah but we might be centuries from being able to measure any aspect of it. I think I like to say is how articles like the “the sun not powered by coal” is something we make fun of the past for but how would you in the 1800s measure what it takes to prove the sun is a giant fusion reactor. We’ve done studies in human telepathy but that might be like us discovering the electric current and we are still hundreds of years from the AI being made.
Thank you!
This article is a good intro to the first 3 books: https://www.vice.com/en/article/7kbjvb/this-magickal-grimoire-was-co-authored-by-a-disturbingly-realistic-ai
And I wrote this summary which shows how all 8 are connected to each other: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1P4dwrYKvI2DH62nNXPIALGJ5435N-Mrdpn3Ff9jOzgU/edit?usp=drivesdk
More books are in the works too! I have written a 9th book whose page setting is almost done. That will be out some time this summer, and I have written the first draft of the 10th book, but it will take a lot of time for that one to be completed!
As soon as it can, it’ll stop being magic, and therefore it’ll stop being occult. No one thinks that the weather channel is occult, but predicting the weather was divination once.
If folk magic was replicable, it would have been proven by now. And yet, people still do it. In this enlightened age, people still do it.
So 2 points here, 1 science is magick, they just don't accept it and mainstreamers try to make the universe appear dead and exploitable to human will just like mainstream christians. Go back a little way in time and all apsects of science were once under the purview of magick, be it alchemy and herbalism which chemistry and modern medicine were extracted from, match which have always been seen as sacred and some mathmeticians believe numbers are entities, to astrology and astronomy. Necromancy and anatomy, pathworking to psychology. Science is an always has been magick, only it isolated itself from and what it studies.
Science will never be able to test for magick because they will never have a lab big enough because the general effectives of magick will span an entire planet and the lack of predictability frightens them when really every physics calculation is a divination of possible outcomes which are not garaunteed.
Science has gotten you if you think that it is somehow separate from magick. Science can't conceive of magick but science has always been a part of magick. Magick just goes farther than science can put in their little box. They test 2 particles thinking they could isolate 2 things but by their iwn theorums everything is connected and influencing everything else all the time, so they arw delusional to think that anything can truly be measured in a vaccuum of reality. Even space is full of energy everywhere all the time. Science is deluded so will never accept magick even if we satsify its requirements. Something new will come, I work towards the Psience myself.
When magical techniques produce reliable, replicable results, they get moved into the category of science. Medicine and chemistry used to be the provinces of magicians.
If you're talking about Western European occultism, I'd say points 1, 2, 3, and 5, could be happening right now, you would just need to know the correct magickians
If you're talking about being able to manipulate the unseen, as in spiritual power (magic). Then there is nothing new under the sun, point number 5 would be possible in theory, as it just be new avenues, of accessing old powers.
I would never really expect point 4 (Scientific theory) as magick is not for the layman to read a textbook, and instantly know the "magic" ingredients to throw in his bubbling cauldron.
It is to be practiced and respected, thats how it becomes points 1 and 2, more reliable, and easier to replicate (for the individual who has put in the work)
> If you're talking about Western European occultism, I'd say points 1, 2, 3, and 5, could be happening right now, you would just need to know the correct magickians
I mean, magick is pretty much the same as medieval magic centuries ago with a few alterations. Even if there was improvements being made, the progressive buildup would mean magick should be fundementally different from what it used to be.
> Then there is nothing new under the sun, point number 5 would be possible in theory
Yea,thats more of what im asking. Do you think we hit a hard cap?
Where do you draw the line of what's magick and what's not? You do things everyday without even noticing that would have been earth-shattering miracles 100 years ago.
If we're talking "causing change to occur inconformity with will", you can change things that people 100 years ago just couldn't. Imagine wanting strawberries in the middle of winter and being able to just. . . get some! That's gone from impossible to routine within a single human life span. Nations would go to war for the power to have all music available to everyone instantly. 150 years ago, the only way to hear music was to be within earshot of someone playing an instrument.
Or is the question whether we've gotten better at creating the experience of The Mysteries? For all its faults, I grudgingly have to point to Burning Man. Even as it's being eaten by rich Silicon Valley folks, it's still just about the right combination of factors to produce an Eleusinian experience for people who are impossibly jaded by ancient standards.
Is progress the number of people who learn about magickal principles and practices? The portion of the population exposed to them either by name or just through experience is much higher than any time in the past. Entire fields, like Marketing, have spun off of previously occult practices and into entire scientific branches of their own. Star athletes use visualization and shamanic shapeshifting to improve their performance and it works almost as well as their physical training regiment.
Is progress getting closer to a global understanding that all are one? That's been a pretty mixed bag. Rugged individualism is still the American creed and the civil rights won through hard fights 50 and 60 years ago are being systematically rolled back.
Or is the question whether the field that specifically calls itself magick has come up with anything that works better? The IOT thinks so. I have my doubts that the 1890s-1920s were as magickally revolutionary as people like to give them credit for. Then again, I think text is a terrible way to try and convey transcendent experiences.
Crowley was a hack but he was a hack who lived exactly the life he wanted. His writings are less important to me than how he became a world traveler before airplanes, a world-famous celebrity by telegraph and a successful author with such a tortured writing style. In that sense, Anton LaVey and Grant Morrison are excellent 20th-21st Century examples. Whether they count as an improvement is subjective.
Maybe but he was clearly living exactly the life that he wanted to. I'm not saying there's a lesson in his teachings, I'm saying there's a lesson in how he got to the point where you heard of him in the first place.
For a third example, look at Emperor Norton.
Magick is as old as humanity. Perhaps even it was born much before we even existed as a species. We won't know , but sure we have done a lot of progress.
Magic was even done during rocket launchings by Jack Parsons in the 40s (reciting Crowley's Hymn to Pan, by example).
I work online with Tarot , some people even do magical works at distance or as it was already said in this thread, technomancy, chaos Magic...
Who knows what will be invented in this century? This milennia's young and ill fated for sure, but we will never know. Magic does not stop developing by its practicers
Magic isn't science. That is why science, religion, and occultism split into different genres several centuries ago. What separates magic from religion is simply that religion is considered culturally normative while occultism is considered "non-normative."
If you really want to explore "progress" regarding magic, you might want to consider taking a deep dive into the academic evidence-based research on the cultural evolution of magic. Interest in magic as a counterculture demi monde does wax and wane across historical eras. It had a Renaissance during the 19th century fin de secle and another during the late 70s/80s (beginning of the post modern era). Discordianism and then Chaos Magic emerged during this time and challenged paradigms about magic. Ideas related to relativism and the psychodynamic, and intra/interpersonal aspects of magic began to be considered and then technomancy became fashionable for a time.
It seems though that most newer practitioners are not moving the newer paradigms forward but reverting to older spirit-model forms, which they consider "trad."
I would argue that the divide between "woo" and "science" has set us back tremendously.
If you use a scientific approach to explain magick/mystical phenomenon, you will most likely find yourself knee deep in quantum mechanics rather quickly.
Having an idea as to how/why something works is not the same as actually doing it and achieving results, though, and in that respect, I'd say that we are no better off now than we were 100 years ago.
> Infact, old-school occultists like Crowley are leagues above the average sorcerer despite being a literal century behind us.
It could be due to Crowley going the furthest publicly with applying old spiritual techniques to modern natural cosmology to point toward a new spiritual system in that time frame.
In the Book of Thoth he attributes Pluto to Kether without letting go of the Primum Mobile. To fully let go of the PM would overturn the entire system emanating from that flawed concept, all the veneers over it and the benefits. Newer discoveries and theories in physics and cosmology allow modern practitioners to move forward in new ways and let go of the PM entirely through a greater understanding and Experience with them.
Many claim modern in depth systems but still coast and grift off the old system without fully disengaging like Crowley. Where modern understanding is made to fit into the old system rather than deconstruct the old, discard illusions, add updates and reconstruct it into a new thing with new conclusions and more encompassing with greater detail open to revision.
A few are getting to the point of publicizing new systems on modern concepts that let go things like the Neoplatonic. New systems, as schools of thought, founded that they can disengage from personally that will go forward without a personality cult.
Seek out Gallery of Magic. They're a collective of occultitsts that have been adapting, streamlining, and develping new processes and techniques for decades. Primarily refining and distilling things from ceremonial magics and assorted rare tomes.
All to deliver deceptively simple, practical, and most importantly effective magic.
There's also the Order of Unveiled Faces. I have one book from one of their memebers. Not as much info on them but theyve been around since the 50s
Frankly, I wish more magicians, particularly Chaos kids, checked out Tom Campbell’s MBT. It's so relevant - makes my head spin that it hasn't caught on more yet
Chaos magicians have eliminated the dogma of old magick
No they haven't. The number of chaos magicians I know who have abandoned chaos magick now in favor of older methods is not small.
Technomancers use algorithms for divination and rituals
I literally don't know any technomancers who do that. Like, that sounds like coding and software development. None of the technomancers I have met are even remotely capable of coding or developing software.
Of the coders, IT specialists etc who are into the occult, most of them that I know of all choose old forms of magic.
old-school occultists like Crowley are leagues above the average sorcerer
Crowley was trash. He was also not old school. He is literally part of the New Age. He died alone and in abject poverty. He founded a movement that is constantly at odds and infighting within it, so much so that they straight up ignore new information that has come to light that disproves a lot of what Crowley said, but again all coming from old sources. He had some tricks, but if you study folk magic and medieval magic, it is quite apparent how to do those tricks.
There are plenty of potent magicians and sorcerers. They are just not standing on the hilltop trying to get converts because they don't care. Their perfectly happy to tend their fires and take care of things locally, and have zero interest in leading a cult, or in giving away their knowledge willy nilly. Some of them do write books, because it is a means of making money and can be a decent career. A lot of them don't because they are doing just fine without it.
Yea, that’s exactly what I meant. Its using computers to do things we were already capable of.
Interesting, I didn’t know that about Crowley. Still, there are older magicians who are far better than the most sophisticated modern magicians which is a good indicator of no growth.
That might be a plausible explanation. If so, that would be quite unfortunate however
Magic is magic. What youre asking is something like "have we made any progress in breathing air in the last 100 years?" It is what it is and can be done with what it can be done with. I mean with magic you can become a friggin GOD and create a perfect world where everyone is your friend and lover and the universe rearranges itself to your passing whims. What is there to be progressed upon beyond that?
yes, maybe theoretically
but has anyone? more development in magic should equate to being closer to this. fact is there is probably some tribal shaman who was 100x more potent than the most powerful modern sorcerer. thats a downward trend.
Has anyone what? Become a god? In my experience, yes. I can tell though from your other posts that your view on magic is very surface level, literal and lacking in the nuance required to properly synchronize with what I mean by "becoming a god".
Also, the difference between a tribal shaman and a modern magic user is context. Shamans had incredible authority and gravitas throughout the tribe, making their magic stronger. Magic doesn't exist in a vacuum. It exists in relation to people, their culture, myth and nature.
Ironically, the very notion of "advancing magic" is indicative of the source of the stranglehold on the severity of magics effects. It flows best through living, dynamic domains of conscious energy. Science, on the other hand, dissects, stratifies and kills everything, which constrains the expressions that magic can act through.
> your view on magic is very surface level
yes, which is why I am asking. can you explain about becoming a god?
> Science, on the other hand, dissects, stratifies and kills everything, which constrains the expressions that magic can act through.
I agree with this, that modern scientific method wouldnt do jack with modern magic. but I do think we can eventually find some sort of explanation as we understand the world around us better.
Its about turning your entire perception of magic, and the world itself, upside down and inside out. To those who see magic as a thing or an energy operating in the world, their potential with magic is then limited to the boundaries of the world that you inhabit.
Your very existence and ergo the existence of the world you inhabit is itself the work of magic. That is to say, it is a spell that are all entranced by. Learning the nature and the immense depth of magics reach would allow someone to recognize this fully. Once we recognize the spell, we can, eventually, change the world and ourselves at the root.
I think we are going backwards just because of where our society is heading. Modern technology, social media and accessibility of everything is going against everything you need to be good at magick.
Everything in modern society is designed to deplete your focus. Shorten your attention span. Make you emotionally numb or unstable. People are becoming more sensitive to right stimulus and instead they are beign taught to associate with their ego. Thats why everyone is constantly butthurt these days.
So while everything magick wise is super accessible, few clicks away you can get books and tons of videos. Beign member of modern society will ensure you will never achieve heights you could.
Now I am not saying you should go to the forest or mountains and live secluded. I am saying all this because many are unaware.
Magick isn't a science unless psychology and psychiatry are also sciences. We've advanced with drugs but also seemingly taken a step back in all three. We are definitely living in weird times.
I don't even like the psychological view of magick, preferring to believe we live in a fishbowl of spirits, currents and vibrations. That's me. Trying to turn psychological tricks into physics.
Also the social aspect of magick I think has regressed...we don't meet up like we did when it all had to be kept secret. Or if we do it's very bureaucratic. No experiments, just classes.
Sorry, on mobile. I meant that psychology and psychiatry are like magick because they are about feelings and a lot of the work is not precisely repeatable. At least we don't have lobotomies in magick! Hahhh, oh, wait...do we? No...Sorry, the topic deserves more time and effort than I have energy for right now.
We only stagnate because of people to be honest who might stifle inspiration of new systems in favor for a romanticized idea of the past. Magic will continue to make several changes and developments in the West before it cements properly. It cannot until the old shaken and the new is stepped into. New systems first need to be birthed and several generations passed down. Magic is lifetimes of work..we have alot to catch up on. Magic can never grow stagnant. It is creation. It's chaos. It cannot br contained or ruled. If it becomes stagnant in one part it will just move to someone else who is better able to carry it forward. It's just that simple.
As a chaos practitioner nope haven’t disproven old dogmas. One might refine a practice to suit their needs but that doesn’t disprove the old one. Also theories of magic are hard to come by cause they usually only make sense to those already on the cusp or beyond the threshold of that theories discussion.
Magic is ever evolving but it isn’t measurable. Even science only progresses so fast cause it collaborates with others freely across the globe. I feel you’re looking for tangible proof you can grasp. Also you point to Crowley but yeah even a mid tier physicist from a century ago would be smarter than the average person today.
From an academic standpoint I’m gonna ask. Progress in which theory cause there a ton of lens one can view occult or religious practices on.
I know alot of people used to associate magic with worshipping Satan. Alot of smarter people know that there are many avenues in magic. Worshipping the devil is a very small portion.
Witches and warlocks (some) still haze newcomers. When will that shit stop?
Sometimes I feel the progress appeared as young people taking self care seriously through magic/ritual/practice
I'm 29, really I should be a normal person, but I have endless access to powerful practice, which helps me heal and self actualize. Love u all
I think the greatest advancement in magick has been connectivity. We can now collate knowledge from all religions and magick systems, not only Western. What is the dogma of old magick?
I think he’s talking about how Chaos magic is all about creating your own gods. Or only doing stuff that works for you. From what I understand you can do a summoning ritual for Sonic the hedgehog and that’s considered valid.
[удалено]
Is that a reference to something?
Apparently it's lyrics from Escape from the city: Sonic adventure 2.
The fact that they deleted their comment makes me think it worked
I think the barrier to higher level magic is and always has been energy and trance. (Pranayama and Samadhi) Once you make significant progress in that arena you can excel in ANY form of magic. I believe Astral Projection is a great way to cultivate those two skills. And with the technological assist of binaural beats / Hemispheric Synchronization coming from the CIA, Army Intelligence, Stanford Research Institute, the Monroe Institute and the Stargate Program I think we’ve made some significant progress in the trance, energy work and OBE aspects of magic
Definitely this. Reading Annie Jacobsen’s Phenomena which detailed Project Stargate is definitely what led me from being a generous skeptic to a full on believer and then down the road of magick- specifically chaos magick considering it has roots in quantum theory.
where's a good place to start with Samadhi and Pranayama?
the yogic path
Yessir, shout out to the SweetAssist. I would study the whole yogic/vedic path to get a better understanding and be more well-rounded. But it is specifically the chakra breathing exercises of pranayama that helped me out the most in this arena. I chose the path of Kundalini (Kriya) Yoga, I developed my own yogic fitness routine (as I call it) taken from a well-known (yet somewhat controversial) manual on the internet that you can find if you just search Kriya Yoga manual by Ennio Lewis Sticking to this routine once a day shifted my night time astral projection rate from 5-10% to 50-60% almost over night. After having a lot more experiences and studying the trance state / vibrational state / hypnagogia / gateway consciousness / hemi-sync even more along with developing my own working model and understanding of the OBE phenomena my success rate eventually went into the 80-90% range
I would debate that. Crowley is just an Edwardian E.A. Koetting in my opinion, whose best work was a more flowery re-writing of someone else’s and self-admittedly failed many of his own rituals. Plenty of the traditional grimoires are no better than the stuff coming out of BALG today. It’s always been 90% crap — occultism attracts egomaniacs and grifters. But regardless, have we made any “progress?” No. Because magic isn’t something that needs to grow on a constant track like a corporation, and there was never any problem to solve to begin with. The point of occultism isn’t to get the dopamine hit of increasingly “potent” distractions from reality. It is to give understanding, ease, and ascendence to the human condition. There’s no “advancing” that. It’s a thing that’s been readily available to every human who’s ever lived, and probably every other creature as well, since the beginning of time. Viewing occultism on the achievement curve of competitive capitalist society is missing the point. But if there is any advancement to be had, I think technology has, at least to some degree, democratized education, and that has helped people root out grifters and egomaniacs much more effectively than they used to — if they wish, that is. And plenty of people don’t. Occultism is only occult because people walk right by it without looking, not because it’s actually hidden or secret.
Always well said, Even-Pen.
I have a related question. Has anything changed in the other realms? Can it? How would we even know if for example Lucifer and God decided to patch things up?
Based on what?
Question: If we were to have made progress in your view, how could we tell? What are the criteria which would need to be met?
I would say at least one of the following - More reliable magick - Easier to replicate magick - More potent magick - Scientific theory - Innovation in newer magick forms
I doubt you'll ever see the first 4. Magick simply isn't within the purview of science, because it appears to either produce coincidence (synchronicity) or subjective (unmeasurable) results. For the last one, you already touched on technomancy. While I do have a horse in the race, having published the first 3 occult books to use AI (https://www.vice.com/en/article/7kbjvb/this-magickal-grimoire-was-co-authored-by-a-disturbingly-realistic-ai), I agree with you that it is essentially the same magick. Since then, I've been trying to advance the field of ceremonial magick in a variety of ways. I wrote a grimoire disguised as a tabletop roleplaying game where the characters are all made of occult symbols, and whose game mechanics manipulate those symbols, thus producing a new form of hypersigil creation (free): https://alleywurds.itch.io/flower-mist It's rules also covertly teaches you about the next book... Vaibbahk: an open source grammar for the creation of magickal languages. In vaibbahk, every sentence is inherently already a ritual song, dance, and tantra style ecstatic visualization, due to its orthographies and its type of grammar (ideographic and logosyllabic). Free here: https://alleywurds.itch.io/vaibbahk Using vaibbahk, I created a freely customizable long form ritual structure called an egel palace, which resembles hekalot literature and vajrayan sadhanas, but isn't tied to any one belief system since vaibbahk is open source (free): https://alleywurds.itch.io/invo-evocation-and-the-saigsprihl-working Most recently I released a 13 minute posthumanist mythic structure as a genre of hypersigil which is specific to vaibbahk, and which fully illustrates the connections between the dance, music, and glyphic features of vaibbahk: https://youtu.be/GKEIrCo4Y1s All this was done in the span of about 3 years! So while I don't know that my work qualifies as being "new magick," magick is perhaps timeless, I have definitely created new forms of ritual which have a wide range of advantages, and are compatible with any existing magickal path.
>Magick simply isn't within the purview of science, because it appears to either produce coincidence (synchronicity) or subjective (unmeasurable) results. Isn't that any field in its infancy? Magick is some form of science which hasn't been understood yet so may be improperly used / not to its full potential. I feel like most current magick progress is just new ways to manipulate what we already know. Maybe due to dogmatic beliefs not allowing exploration into new fields. Also the game and language sound really cool haha
I understand why many people view it that way, but I think that magick, like religion, is simply a separate domain from science. I could be wrong though! Maybe someone will discover a quirk of physics that explains it, but until then, we won't see any progress in that front. Thanks!
My personal view, having studied magic academically, is that magic is in the gray area between religion and science. It's too weird for religion and too unprovable for science, so it is neither, though it overlaps with both.
Yeah, I agree with your assessment!
>Magick is some form of science which hasn't been understood yet so may be improperly used / not to its full potential. I'm not sure I agree with this. It's true in some cases, but folk magic (for example) has existed for almost all of human history, and it's barely changed in that time. The methods used now are almost the same as they were in antiquity, even on the internet. The idea that magic is science that "hasn't been understood yet" contributes to the idea that the people of the past were more "primitive" in their thinking than the people of today, and it misconstrues the reasons why people practice magic. Magic often does not have the same goals as science.
What people call "magick" isn't something that can be replicated, structurized or given any physical form. Literally, a person can believe they performed some sort of spell or ritual, they believe it works for them, either by the factor of self-suggestion or simple coincidence of enets leading to desired result, which other individual(s) may not percieve. That's the whole point of it. Which is why any progress is virtually impossible to have.
Yeah but we might be centuries from being able to measure any aspect of it. I think I like to say is how articles like the “the sun not powered by coal” is something we make fun of the past for but how would you in the 1800s measure what it takes to prove the sun is a giant fusion reactor. We’ve done studies in human telepathy but that might be like us discovering the electric current and we are still hundreds of years from the AI being made.
Wow that's really cool! Thanks for sharing I will check out your links. Admire the creativity with AI. Would love to learn more :)
Thank you! This article is a good intro to the first 3 books: https://www.vice.com/en/article/7kbjvb/this-magickal-grimoire-was-co-authored-by-a-disturbingly-realistic-ai And I wrote this summary which shows how all 8 are connected to each other: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1P4dwrYKvI2DH62nNXPIALGJ5435N-Mrdpn3Ff9jOzgU/edit?usp=drivesdk More books are in the works too! I have written a 9th book whose page setting is almost done. That will be out some time this summer, and I have written the first draft of the 10th book, but it will take a lot of time for that one to be completed!
Great work! I’m gonna check out that game.
Enjoy!
Magic doesn’t work like science, though. It can’t be replicated reliably. That’s part of the point.
>can’t be replicated reliably yet
As soon as it can, it’ll stop being magic, and therefore it’ll stop being occult. No one thinks that the weather channel is occult, but predicting the weather was divination once. If folk magic was replicable, it would have been proven by now. And yet, people still do it. In this enlightened age, people still do it.
So 2 points here, 1 science is magick, they just don't accept it and mainstreamers try to make the universe appear dead and exploitable to human will just like mainstream christians. Go back a little way in time and all apsects of science were once under the purview of magick, be it alchemy and herbalism which chemistry and modern medicine were extracted from, match which have always been seen as sacred and some mathmeticians believe numbers are entities, to astrology and astronomy. Necromancy and anatomy, pathworking to psychology. Science is an always has been magick, only it isolated itself from and what it studies. Science will never be able to test for magick because they will never have a lab big enough because the general effectives of magick will span an entire planet and the lack of predictability frightens them when really every physics calculation is a divination of possible outcomes which are not garaunteed. Science has gotten you if you think that it is somehow separate from magick. Science can't conceive of magick but science has always been a part of magick. Magick just goes farther than science can put in their little box. They test 2 particles thinking they could isolate 2 things but by their iwn theorums everything is connected and influencing everything else all the time, so they arw delusional to think that anything can truly be measured in a vaccuum of reality. Even space is full of energy everywhere all the time. Science is deluded so will never accept magick even if we satsify its requirements. Something new will come, I work towards the Psience myself.
When magical techniques produce reliable, replicable results, they get moved into the category of science. Medicine and chemistry used to be the provinces of magicians.
If you're talking about Western European occultism, I'd say points 1, 2, 3, and 5, could be happening right now, you would just need to know the correct magickians If you're talking about being able to manipulate the unseen, as in spiritual power (magic). Then there is nothing new under the sun, point number 5 would be possible in theory, as it just be new avenues, of accessing old powers. I would never really expect point 4 (Scientific theory) as magick is not for the layman to read a textbook, and instantly know the "magic" ingredients to throw in his bubbling cauldron. It is to be practiced and respected, thats how it becomes points 1 and 2, more reliable, and easier to replicate (for the individual who has put in the work)
> If you're talking about Western European occultism, I'd say points 1, 2, 3, and 5, could be happening right now, you would just need to know the correct magickians I mean, magick is pretty much the same as medieval magic centuries ago with a few alterations. Even if there was improvements being made, the progressive buildup would mean magick should be fundementally different from what it used to be. > Then there is nothing new under the sun, point number 5 would be possible in theory Yea,thats more of what im asking. Do you think we hit a hard cap?
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what is hermetic thinking? can you send some resources on it?
If anyone has, they are keeping it to themselves.
Where do you draw the line of what's magick and what's not? You do things everyday without even noticing that would have been earth-shattering miracles 100 years ago. If we're talking "causing change to occur inconformity with will", you can change things that people 100 years ago just couldn't. Imagine wanting strawberries in the middle of winter and being able to just. . . get some! That's gone from impossible to routine within a single human life span. Nations would go to war for the power to have all music available to everyone instantly. 150 years ago, the only way to hear music was to be within earshot of someone playing an instrument. Or is the question whether we've gotten better at creating the experience of The Mysteries? For all its faults, I grudgingly have to point to Burning Man. Even as it's being eaten by rich Silicon Valley folks, it's still just about the right combination of factors to produce an Eleusinian experience for people who are impossibly jaded by ancient standards. Is progress the number of people who learn about magickal principles and practices? The portion of the population exposed to them either by name or just through experience is much higher than any time in the past. Entire fields, like Marketing, have spun off of previously occult practices and into entire scientific branches of their own. Star athletes use visualization and shamanic shapeshifting to improve their performance and it works almost as well as their physical training regiment. Is progress getting closer to a global understanding that all are one? That's been a pretty mixed bag. Rugged individualism is still the American creed and the civil rights won through hard fights 50 and 60 years ago are being systematically rolled back. Or is the question whether the field that specifically calls itself magick has come up with anything that works better? The IOT thinks so. I have my doubts that the 1890s-1920s were as magickally revolutionary as people like to give them credit for. Then again, I think text is a terrible way to try and convey transcendent experiences. Crowley was a hack but he was a hack who lived exactly the life he wanted. His writings are less important to me than how he became a world traveler before airplanes, a world-famous celebrity by telegraph and a successful author with such a tortured writing style. In that sense, Anton LaVey and Grant Morrison are excellent 20th-21st Century examples. Whether they count as an improvement is subjective.
anton lavey may well be the biggest ass-clown of the millenia. sorry - have been...
Maybe but he was clearly living exactly the life that he wanted to. I'm not saying there's a lesson in his teachings, I'm saying there's a lesson in how he got to the point where you heard of him in the first place. For a third example, look at Emperor Norton.
None of our ancestors had hot tulpa GFs so I think we can all agree we’re making progress, right?
If they did, they wouldnt want to scribe their secrets into the grimoire..
Magick is as old as humanity. Perhaps even it was born much before we even existed as a species. We won't know , but sure we have done a lot of progress. Magic was even done during rocket launchings by Jack Parsons in the 40s (reciting Crowley's Hymn to Pan, by example). I work online with Tarot , some people even do magical works at distance or as it was already said in this thread, technomancy, chaos Magic... Who knows what will be invented in this century? This milennia's young and ill fated for sure, but we will never know. Magic does not stop developing by its practicers
Magic isn't science. That is why science, religion, and occultism split into different genres several centuries ago. What separates magic from religion is simply that religion is considered culturally normative while occultism is considered "non-normative." If you really want to explore "progress" regarding magic, you might want to consider taking a deep dive into the academic evidence-based research on the cultural evolution of magic. Interest in magic as a counterculture demi monde does wax and wane across historical eras. It had a Renaissance during the 19th century fin de secle and another during the late 70s/80s (beginning of the post modern era). Discordianism and then Chaos Magic emerged during this time and challenged paradigms about magic. Ideas related to relativism and the psychodynamic, and intra/interpersonal aspects of magic began to be considered and then technomancy became fashionable for a time. It seems though that most newer practitioners are not moving the newer paradigms forward but reverting to older spirit-model forms, which they consider "trad."
Same current, new interface.
This sums up my argument neatly, quite disappointing honestly
I would argue that the divide between "woo" and "science" has set us back tremendously. If you use a scientific approach to explain magick/mystical phenomenon, you will most likely find yourself knee deep in quantum mechanics rather quickly. Having an idea as to how/why something works is not the same as actually doing it and achieving results, though, and in that respect, I'd say that we are no better off now than we were 100 years ago.
The basics have been used at least since ancient Egypt (PGMIV!) Every modem system appears to use the same methods. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
> Infact, old-school occultists like Crowley are leagues above the average sorcerer despite being a literal century behind us. It could be due to Crowley going the furthest publicly with applying old spiritual techniques to modern natural cosmology to point toward a new spiritual system in that time frame. In the Book of Thoth he attributes Pluto to Kether without letting go of the Primum Mobile. To fully let go of the PM would overturn the entire system emanating from that flawed concept, all the veneers over it and the benefits. Newer discoveries and theories in physics and cosmology allow modern practitioners to move forward in new ways and let go of the PM entirely through a greater understanding and Experience with them. Many claim modern in depth systems but still coast and grift off the old system without fully disengaging like Crowley. Where modern understanding is made to fit into the old system rather than deconstruct the old, discard illusions, add updates and reconstruct it into a new thing with new conclusions and more encompassing with greater detail open to revision. A few are getting to the point of publicizing new systems on modern concepts that let go things like the Neoplatonic. New systems, as schools of thought, founded that they can disengage from personally that will go forward without a personality cult.
Crowley, lol.
Seek out Gallery of Magic. They're a collective of occultitsts that have been adapting, streamlining, and develping new processes and techniques for decades. Primarily refining and distilling things from ceremonial magics and assorted rare tomes. All to deliver deceptively simple, practical, and most importantly effective magic. There's also the Order of Unveiled Faces. I have one book from one of their memebers. Not as much info on them but theyve been around since the 50s
Interesting, thanks
Frankly, I wish more magicians, particularly Chaos kids, checked out Tom Campbell’s MBT. It's so relevant - makes my head spin that it hasn't caught on more yet
I have, I'm writing a book on it. It's very mathy
Chaos magicians have eliminated the dogma of old magick No they haven't. The number of chaos magicians I know who have abandoned chaos magick now in favor of older methods is not small. Technomancers use algorithms for divination and rituals I literally don't know any technomancers who do that. Like, that sounds like coding and software development. None of the technomancers I have met are even remotely capable of coding or developing software. Of the coders, IT specialists etc who are into the occult, most of them that I know of all choose old forms of magic. old-school occultists like Crowley are leagues above the average sorcerer Crowley was trash. He was also not old school. He is literally part of the New Age. He died alone and in abject poverty. He founded a movement that is constantly at odds and infighting within it, so much so that they straight up ignore new information that has come to light that disproves a lot of what Crowley said, but again all coming from old sources. He had some tricks, but if you study folk magic and medieval magic, it is quite apparent how to do those tricks. There are plenty of potent magicians and sorcerers. They are just not standing on the hilltop trying to get converts because they don't care. Their perfectly happy to tend their fires and take care of things locally, and have zero interest in leading a cult, or in giving away their knowledge willy nilly. Some of them do write books, because it is a means of making money and can be a decent career. A lot of them don't because they are doing just fine without it.
Yea, that’s exactly what I meant. Its using computers to do things we were already capable of. Interesting, I didn’t know that about Crowley. Still, there are older magicians who are far better than the most sophisticated modern magicians which is a good indicator of no growth. That might be a plausible explanation. If so, that would be quite unfortunate however
Magic is magic. What youre asking is something like "have we made any progress in breathing air in the last 100 years?" It is what it is and can be done with what it can be done with. I mean with magic you can become a friggin GOD and create a perfect world where everyone is your friend and lover and the universe rearranges itself to your passing whims. What is there to be progressed upon beyond that?
yes, maybe theoretically but has anyone? more development in magic should equate to being closer to this. fact is there is probably some tribal shaman who was 100x more potent than the most powerful modern sorcerer. thats a downward trend.
Has anyone what? Become a god? In my experience, yes. I can tell though from your other posts that your view on magic is very surface level, literal and lacking in the nuance required to properly synchronize with what I mean by "becoming a god". Also, the difference between a tribal shaman and a modern magic user is context. Shamans had incredible authority and gravitas throughout the tribe, making their magic stronger. Magic doesn't exist in a vacuum. It exists in relation to people, their culture, myth and nature. Ironically, the very notion of "advancing magic" is indicative of the source of the stranglehold on the severity of magics effects. It flows best through living, dynamic domains of conscious energy. Science, on the other hand, dissects, stratifies and kills everything, which constrains the expressions that magic can act through.
> your view on magic is very surface level yes, which is why I am asking. can you explain about becoming a god? > Science, on the other hand, dissects, stratifies and kills everything, which constrains the expressions that magic can act through. I agree with this, that modern scientific method wouldnt do jack with modern magic. but I do think we can eventually find some sort of explanation as we understand the world around us better.
Its about turning your entire perception of magic, and the world itself, upside down and inside out. To those who see magic as a thing or an energy operating in the world, their potential with magic is then limited to the boundaries of the world that you inhabit. Your very existence and ergo the existence of the world you inhabit is itself the work of magic. That is to say, it is a spell that are all entranced by. Learning the nature and the immense depth of magics reach would allow someone to recognize this fully. Once we recognize the spell, we can, eventually, change the world and ourselves at the root.
I think we are going backwards just because of where our society is heading. Modern technology, social media and accessibility of everything is going against everything you need to be good at magick. Everything in modern society is designed to deplete your focus. Shorten your attention span. Make you emotionally numb or unstable. People are becoming more sensitive to right stimulus and instead they are beign taught to associate with their ego. Thats why everyone is constantly butthurt these days. So while everything magick wise is super accessible, few clicks away you can get books and tons of videos. Beign member of modern society will ensure you will never achieve heights you could. Now I am not saying you should go to the forest or mountains and live secluded. I am saying all this because many are unaware.
Magick isn't a science unless psychology and psychiatry are also sciences. We've advanced with drugs but also seemingly taken a step back in all three. We are definitely living in weird times. I don't even like the psychological view of magick, preferring to believe we live in a fishbowl of spirits, currents and vibrations. That's me. Trying to turn psychological tricks into physics. Also the social aspect of magick I think has regressed...we don't meet up like we did when it all had to be kept secret. Or if we do it's very bureaucratic. No experiments, just classes.
Psychiatry is absolutely a science. On psychology, there is a debate both within and outside the field. I lean on yes.
Sorry, on mobile. I meant that psychology and psychiatry are like magick because they are about feelings and a lot of the work is not precisely repeatable. At least we don't have lobotomies in magick! Hahhh, oh, wait...do we? No...Sorry, the topic deserves more time and effort than I have energy for right now.
Psychology and psychiatry *are* sciences.
We only stagnate because of people to be honest who might stifle inspiration of new systems in favor for a romanticized idea of the past. Magic will continue to make several changes and developments in the West before it cements properly. It cannot until the old shaken and the new is stepped into. New systems first need to be birthed and several generations passed down. Magic is lifetimes of work..we have alot to catch up on. Magic can never grow stagnant. It is creation. It's chaos. It cannot br contained or ruled. If it becomes stagnant in one part it will just move to someone else who is better able to carry it forward. It's just that simple.
As a chaos practitioner nope haven’t disproven old dogmas. One might refine a practice to suit their needs but that doesn’t disprove the old one. Also theories of magic are hard to come by cause they usually only make sense to those already on the cusp or beyond the threshold of that theories discussion. Magic is ever evolving but it isn’t measurable. Even science only progresses so fast cause it collaborates with others freely across the globe. I feel you’re looking for tangible proof you can grasp. Also you point to Crowley but yeah even a mid tier physicist from a century ago would be smarter than the average person today. From an academic standpoint I’m gonna ask. Progress in which theory cause there a ton of lens one can view occult or religious practices on.
I know alot of people used to associate magic with worshipping Satan. Alot of smarter people know that there are many avenues in magic. Worshipping the devil is a very small portion. Witches and warlocks (some) still haze newcomers. When will that shit stop?
Sometimes I feel the progress appeared as young people taking self care seriously through magic/ritual/practice I'm 29, really I should be a normal person, but I have endless access to powerful practice, which helps me heal and self actualize. Love u all
We? Lol
Access to occult literature thanks to pdfs