Sex, Sentiment and Wonder

According to Anton La Vey there are two types of magic: High Magic and Low Magic. High Magic refers to ‘ritual magic’ and Low Magic to the magic of ‘situation-manipulation’. In La Vey’s system ritual magic is performed in a similar way to that which many contemporary magical practitioners would be familiar with: there is a general circle format, an evocative setting, supernatural beings are asked to assist, symbolic tools are used, and the practitioner needs to be specific about and concentrate on their goal. The point is — unlike a lot of other types of modern magic — to actually achieve a result, not to just revel within a magic ritual, that being enough of a result for many people.

In addition, the High Magic system of La Vey has only three types of ritual: rituals for Compassion, for Lust and for Destruction. In each of these rituals the practitioner is required to be fully involved emotionally with the purpose of the ritual, for example in a recent Lust ritual I needed to become physically lustful — La Vey says that if you can’t achieve an orgasm over the person you are lustful toward within a ritual designed to attract that person, then you don’t deserve to have them! So what one is meant to do in these sorts of rituals is to evoke as best as possible the real-world scenario of the desired result and become immersed within that — essentially fantasy — world as if it is real.

If I want to attract someone sexually I need to be actually desirous of them, otherwise I need to analyse whether I should be doing, say, a Compassion ritual instead. It depends on what I want the person for. La Vey liked to pare back human needs into simple categories: desire, hunger, anger. He believed that humans are simply clever animals — which we are — and so when you take on his type of system you have to do a lot of analysis of yourself and of the situations you find yourself in and then try and work out what kind of ritual approach is the best one, or if ritual actually is the correct approach to a problem or situation. I need to stress that many La Veyean Satanists do not do a lot of structured ritual, certainly not a lot of group ritual, because effective ritual needs intense concentration and that’s not easy to achieve in a group, unless you are very close. 

As for the ‘Low Magic’ which really is the type of magic I like best these days and, in my opinion, is actually more difficult than the more formal ritual magic which is just a case of following procedure. La Vey’s Low Magic also involves a three-fold category, the Witch or Warlock (yes, La Veyean male Witches are called Warlocks) need to assess themselves first because they are their own tool in this type of magic. You need to assess your effect on other people — because this is really about interacting with other people and getting them to conform to your will — so you need to be well-informed about your appearance, your sound, your smell, the subtle and not-so-subtle animal cues that people give to each other all day without thinking about it.

La Vey believed there are three general categories that people fit into: Sex, Sentiment and Wonder. Sex is pretty self-explanatory, sentiment means that you evoke pleasant memories in another thus making them open up to you and wonder can incorporate a range of reactions ranging from admiration to fear. Other people will view you and classify you (semi- or subconsciously) into one or a combination of these categories. La Vey believed that there are predictable responses different types of people have to the Sex, Sentiment and Wonder categories and you need to assess yourself in regards to those categories and assess your quarry and how their type is known to react to those qualities. You need to work out which category you fit into and then take it from there. It’s about appearing to become a ‘package deal’ and people thinking they have you all worked out, when they actually don’t.

Basically it is about acting. For example, I seem to come across as a mixture of sex and wonder, I don’t think I project any sentiment. Depending on whom I am dealing with and what I want from them I may have to modify my ‘normal’ projection to one that they will be responsive to. For example, an overconfident, macho he-man would be more receptive to a coy ingénue who appears to think everything he says or does is “really amazing”; a submissive male would be more likely to shiver with delight if I were to come across as very stern, dominating and no-nonsense—neither of those are the ‘real me’, it’s a case of me assessing a quarry and then putting on an act. 

But is it magic? Well, Aleister Crowley defined magic(k) as the art and science of causing change in accordance with your will — he never specified a particular way to achieve that change, just that you do achieve it. So my opinion regarding La Vey’s Low Magic system is that while it is not a ritual procedure, it is definitely ‘magic’.

Strange Days have found us...

I swiped this photo from Facebook because I thought it was so unusual. What's going on here? Does anyone know the history of this photo? Is it a real event? Anyway, despite its rather destructive imagery, I rather like its composition...

The Hwicce

I'm surprised that Stephen J. Yeates' books on the Hwicce aren't having more fuss made about them from within the Wiccan/Pagan scene - at least not so as I could notice. I would have thought that they'd be a wonderful source of potential evidence for the historical authenticity of British Wicca beyond the 1950s when Gerald Gardner claimed to have met some witches. Especially seeing as since the publication of Ronald Hutton's book, The Triumph of the Moon, many of the historical claims of Wicca have been shaken and stirred - to quite an extent (although, see an interesting new critique by an Alexandrian witch of Hutton's book here). One would think that Stephen Yeates' books might redress Hutton's historical destabilising of Wicca somewhat. At the least, he has specifically used the word 'witches' in his title, suggesting that he's wanting to point the books in that direction. I've searched quite a bit for reviews of his books and have only come across the Cambridge Archaeological Journal review on the first book, a review of both of them on The Twisted Tree, and apparently there's a forthcoming review of the second book coming out in British Archaeology Nov/Dec 2010 issue (which I don't have yet). There might be others that aren't showing up in my search, so I'd be interested to hear of more. There are some quite good reviews of the books on amazon.com and amazon.co.uk. Apparently 'Hwicce' means, according some 'chest or trunk' and according to Yeates, 'vessel or cauldron'. Either way, it sounds like it means something to do with a container. Plus I've always been told that 'wicce' is the feminine form of the Anglo-Saxon word for 'witch' (and that 'wicca' was the masculine form). Why sure, the Hwicce might not have anything to do with Wiccans (as we know them today)... but then again they might - we all know how much part a sacred vessel plays in modern Witchcraft. Frankly, I need to read these books myself, which I am about to do. Then I'll post a review of them. The third book pictured here The Anglo-Saxon Landscape also covers the territory of the Hwicce, which is why it is included.

Major Nostalgia

Ever since my article on the reception of The Book of the Law by Aleister Crowley got accepted by The Pomegranate (in press), I've been haunted by My Past just "appearing". This has led me to re-visit that past, which is weird, as I usually cut the past off with a guillotine blade... I don't usually look back at it. There are simply heaps of people I used to hang out intensively with that I now don't. Anyway, I have followed it up and come across my very first magickal instructor, various past friends (some of whom are still friends) and weird ancient memories from when I lived in the country, particularly 1987 at Mount Franklin. Why is this so weird... Can't I have a past? I guess I have such intense experiences with people - whether lovers or close friends - we tend to "break up" quite dramatically, so to see or hear from them again is surprising, but it probably shouldn't be. Anyway, I've gone through some of my past photo albums, three pics from which are shown here: Me and pals at Mount Franklin; me, MJ and DGM somewhere in Central Victoria where we used to live; and me with herbalist-witch David O'Connor, he and I shared a flat for about a year. I suppose I've been such an antisocial hermit for the last decade... Hmm, maybe I should re-think that.

Books, BOOKS, and MORE BOOKS !!!

When I first got a blog I'd just missed a blogging trend where people had posted photos of their piles of books onto their blogs. I really wanted to do it too, but I think I must not have had a digital camera at that stage or something. I was recently reminded of these pics of books, while looking through some year-old photos - they actually date to 2009. So I thought I'd post 'em up here. I love books, I now have some new bookshelves in my 'office' - yay! - but before that some of my books (as you can see in these photos) were stacked up in the most messy and crazy way... on the floor, on a desk... But now they are in bookshelves. All the other books in the domus are in bookshelves, starting with the blue bookshelf in the last pic that I got for only $20 from some student in the next street - bargain. Then all down the hall, into the lounge room, bookshelves everywhere. I'll leave those pics for another day (primarily because I haven't actually taken them yet). Can one actually have too many books? I don't think so. I do think I need a new house to put them in though. I'm thinking the 'white cube' look might be good, like an art gallery, with books lining all the walls. My ‘office’ is also somewhat re-arranged now too. The desk is under the fresco paintings calendar now, and in the corner are my bewdiful Officeworks bookshelves. (Despite the many bookshelves in this domus, we really could still do with more…).

Do Minority Religions Own the Past?

Modern Druids are making a fuss about ancient human remains on display in museums in Britain. How it is any of their business one cannot begin to guess. I suppose they need to think of ways to stay in the media's ever-hungry headlights... and claiming to be 'new indigenes' - likening themselves to colonised peoples such as Australian Aboriginals or Native Americans who do have a legitimate claim to have their actual relatives owned by museums re-buried - seems to be working for them. It is difficult however, to see how Druid claims regarding museum objects such as, for example the Babylonian plaque, the 'Queen of the Night', are actually 'Druid'. The behavior of Honouring the Ancient Dead (HAD), the group spearheading this activity, is unnecessary, appears contrived, and smacks of self-publicity under the guise of a virtuous ‘cause’. Not all contemporary Pagans are pro-reburial of human remains in museums however, see Pagans for Archaeology ,

Calling the Great God Pan: The Horned God in Witchcraft Today

“Hear me, Lord of the Stars.
For thee I have worshipped ever
Witch stains and sorrows and scars,
With joyful, joyful endeavour.
Hear me, O lilywhite goat
Crisp as the thicket of thorns
With a collar of gold for thy throat,
A scarlet bow for thy horns.”
-Aleister Crowley.

“Our way is the way of the serpent in the underbrush,
Our knowledge is in the eyes of goats and of women.”
-Jack Parsons.

In the last decade or so Witchcraft’s membership has swelled considerably, making it one of the fastest growing spiritual paths in the Western world. Many of the new recruits are female and this has led the media and other outside observers to adopt a skewed image of just who Witches are. Witchcraft is frequently portrayed as a women’s religion: indeed, many people are surprised to learn that men can be Witches at all. Within the Craft itself there has also emerged a strong tendency to promote the Goddess over the God and to see the feminine as more worthy than the masculine. One of the reasons for this is to correct the imbalance incurred by thousands of years of women’s oppression by patriarchal society, and this is admirable. However, we need to take care that we don’t make men into second-class citizens in the Craft, or the Horned God into a scapegoat.

I asked prominent Pagan, Hawthorn, if he thought the Craft was too girly? “The relative lack of attention to the male aspect in some forms of modern Craft is unfortunate. When I got into the Craft there were a lot more men than women involved in the groups I was aware of, particularly in positions of responsibility. That situation has changed considerably since then. There are now many more active women facilitators and I think that is a good thing. However, the apparent perception that the Craft is women’s business is a worrying trend. The Craft has much to offer men and men have much to offer the Craft.”

One of the most attractive things about the Craft for women is undoubtedly the emphasis on a female deity, the Goddess. It is so empowering to discover God in our own image, a Goddess who actually understands us. Unlearning all the traditional taboos of femininity – submissiveness, silence, sin – and reclaiming menstruation and sexuality become spiritual journeys in themselves that Witchcraft actively encourages. It’s therefore no wonder that women feel like we’ve “come home.” Witchcraft can be a welcome respite from the “men’s world” so prevalent in contemporary society, and a haven for many women who, quite often, have been so turned off the idea of any sort of male Gods that they see no reason to include them in their practice.

Witchy woman, Briar, says that: “When I first came to realise my Path as a Witch, it was through discovering women’s spirituality and Goddess worship. I come from a particularly negative Christian church experience, which also involved an abusive marriage, and I didn’t want anything male in my sacred space... It’s only now, five years down the track, that I can even consider the thought of learning about and working with male Gods. I will always primarily work with Goddesses but I am in a place now where I am moving toward accepting God energy into my life.”

Many men also welcome the chance to see deity as female. Regional Pagan Alliance coordinator, Kim Robertson, explains that: “For the last year or so most of the magickal work I have done has been with Luna, the Moon Goddess in her raw and natural form, and also with Gaia, Mother Earth. Both of them are gentle. Luna is a wise teacher of those on the path to spiritual growth and is also a great deity to work with in ritual – she is like an older sister or young aunt. Gaia is more the one who is with me all the time, letting me know that I am loved as a person wherever I go, that I am the child of the Gods and will never be alone.” It can also be exhilarating for men to work in partnership with the Goddess’s priestesses – strong, assertive, intelligent women. Indeed, according to Hawthorn: “being surrounded by lots of powerful, self-confident women is a big turn-on for many Pagan men, myself included.”

Unlike many female Witches however, as much as Pagan men love and revere the Goddess, they are less likely to exclude her consort, the masculine aspect of deity known as the Horned God – and why would they? One of humanity’s most ancient deities, the Horned God of Witchcraft has a great deal to offer men, including a model of masculinity which rejects patriarchal “power-over.” In her ground-breaking book The Spiral Dance Starhawk describes the Horned God as “the power of feeling, and the image of what men could be if they were liberated from the constraints of patriarchal culture.”

Hawthorn explains that: “A lot of male Pagans are attracted to Paganism partly because the ideal of manliness doesn’t buy into a lot of the aggressive male stereotypes that mainstream society does.” Auld Hornie is strong but not violent, playful yet deep, sexual but not sleazy, loving without being possessive, and emotional without fearing disintegration. He is a God, a man, an animal, a plant, even a soil-bug, and is so connected to the Earth that if he lies down for too long he is likely to sprout leaves!

The Horned God also has a lot to give women. As a male paradigm which exists outside the cabal of stern father Gods and their sons, the Horned One offers a way for women to learn about, make peace with, and embrace masculinity if they choose to. Obviously no one should be coerced into acknowledging the traditional male aspects of the Witch Gods, and certainly within the Craft there are perfectly satisfying, exclusive women’s mysteries honouring the Great Goddess. But that is only half the story. In Traditional Craft, alongside the Goddess there is an equal presence of a male deity: he of many names and faces, Lord of Life and Death. Like the Chinese symbol of Yin and Yang, the Goddess and God of Witchcraft are complementary and inseparable, the two sides to the one coin.

Even if women choose to ignore male deities, and men in general, the masculine principle in nature is not simply going to disappear. Fathers, brothers, sons, the man in the local diner – men are unavoidable and the Horned God exists, whether we choose to acknowledge him or not. Maybe we are a bit scared of him? Pagan writer, Gavin Andrew, proposes that: “...a lot of women (and men) exploring the Craft are dealing with a great deal of cultural imprinting as it relates to the Horned God/Devil paradigm. I’d suggest that the reason why the Goddess is more appealing is that the fear factor, learned at Sunday School or other places very early in life, isn’t there. I think that men as well as women should look into the God of Witchcraft more, if only to help identify and alter this cultural imprinting within themselves.”

The Goddess image provides a divine personage for women who extol the special attributes of being female. Yet I feel that it is important to balance the feminine force with the masculine, as night is complemented by day and the moon by the sun. According to a Jungian interpretation of the Craft, for in individual to attain inner unity, unrealised aspects of our inner self must be acknowledged and embraced – for women the animus or inner male, and for men, the anima or inner female. So, for women, invoking the God is actually psychologically healthy, just as it is for men to invoke the Goddess. Meeting the divine opposite becomes a personal alchemical marriage. In Kim’s experience: “As a man and an active eclectic magickal practitioner, I have evoked and invoked Gods and Goddesses and played all parts in ritual. I find that playing either gender role in ritual is a journey where you learn, either about your own gender, or that of the opposite.”

Restricting the deities we work with to a single gender decreases the number of magickal experiences available to us by half. Why limit ourselves in this way? If we refuse to let biological gender determine the other aspects of our lives, why would we allow it in Witchcraft? Through familiarity with an energy which is dissimilar to our own, we grow and become wiser, our sphere of consciousness becomes broader – and connecting with the Horned God doesn’t have to mean abandoning the Goddess!Katherine, a Witch who is very much involved in women’s blood mysteries, says: “I relate to the Horned God as a lover mostly, the face of the primal, sexual masculine, erect, virile, powerful... He’s a big part of my pantheon. Him, the Green Man, Pan and Odin are the faces of the Gods that I relate to the most at present. The Gods don’t tend to have much to do with Menstrual Magick, although Odin has his own relationship with it, sly bugger.”

The Horned God can be approached in many ways and it might be more useful to meet up with him in trance, before going all out and invoking him. Environmental activist and Witch, Indigo, describes a vision she had in which she encountered a Hunter figure: “He stands to face the growing light of sunrise, and from behind I see that what I took to be a headdress is the mass of his own tangled hair with a small set of horns protruding from his skull. As I watch, the horns change from one form to another. They are the horns of a goat, the antlers of the elk, the curved horns of the ibex, the heavy burden of the buffalo. They are the weapons of the bull, the curled protection of the ram, the tines of the stag, and the pointed scimitars of the oryx. In this half light, he is all these things, the hunter, the hunted, prey and predator, poised to both flee and fight, the wild and free, and the beast of burden.”

Or he may come to you of his own volition. I love this description of an epiphany which Hawthorn had: “I’ve always felt a strong relationship with the God. The last time I was in England I went to see the Cerne Abbas Giant. Whilst wandering around the site I saw an amazing beech tree that was bent so that the upper trunk was at 90 degrees to the lower trunk and parallel with the ground. The top branches of the tree were brushing the top of a small earthen mound. I don’t know if it was natural or man-made, ancient or modern – it could have been a midden for all I know – but the tree drew me to it. I sat on the mound and closed my eyes. Within a short time the area around me as filled with the sounds of footsteps and rustling vegetation, but there was no wind. I heard and felt footsteps walk up behind me and felt an overwhelming presence. I opened my eyes and noticed my shadow – jutting out from my head were the shadow outlines of a pair of horns. The feeling was uncanny, I did not look around, but stayed there in a sort of trance for an indeterminable time.”

One of my own favourite manifestations of the Horned God is Pan who reminds me that we are all animals – smart ones, but animals nevertheless. The ancient Greeks represented Pan as having the legs and horns of a goat but his appearance can actually range from that of a real goat standing upright, through to a man with a goatish face, human torso and goat legs, to a wholly human form sporting curved horns upon his head. A very popular deity in antiquity, Pan survived in medieval Europe as the goat-footed God of the Witches. The Christian church turned him into the Devil and the cloven hoof, once the sign of fertility and abundance, was regarded as evil. Anyone who has had much to do with real goats will know why they have a reputation as consorts of Witches. A buck goat looks like a man with a beard and wants to hump anything – including human females! Female readers, you might try going up to the fence next time you spy a billy goat and see if he doesn’t curl his lip in an epicurean fashion whilst inhaling your woman scent! It can be quite confronting for a city-dweller, but that’s Nature in all her incomprehensible glory.

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By Caroline Tully. This article is first appeared in Pop! Goes the Witch: The Disinformation Guide to 20th Century Witchcraft. By Fiona Horne (Ed). (New York. Disinformation. 2004). Available online from www.fionahorne.com