Magic: Who thinks they can do it, and why otherwise intelligent people buy it.

[East Coast Hustle]

I wonder if the catholics used sigils and robes and funny hats and arcane rituals to assist them in recruiting otherwise damned souls?

hmm, yeah, I think they did. I think they also burned the people who couldn't see their way clear to convert to that particular brand of funny-hat-ism.

those funny hats sure were useful tools.

[P3nT4gR4m]

They also used language and music and architecture. We ban those too?

[East Coast Hustle]

who said anything about banning anything? you've got censorship on the brain.

There are lots of things that should not be banned and yet aren't good ideas either. This is why we prefer reasoning with people over legislating them.

[East Coast Hustle]

also, I'm pretty sure the catholic church didn't burn people based on the language they spoke, the songs they listened to, or what their house looked like.

pretty sure it was all ostensibly based on whether or not they subscribed to the same funny-hatted rituals.

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

I wonder if the catholics used sigils and robes and funny hats and arcane rituals to assist them in recruiting otherwise damned souls?

hmm, yeah, I think they did. I think they also burned the people who couldn't see their way clear to convert to that particular brand of funny-hat-ism.

those funny hats sure were useful tools.

Are you confusing 'ritual' and religion? Were the funny hats the reason they burned people or were their dogmatic beliefs, political goals, and consolidation of power the reason they burned people? Protestants generally eschew funny hats and they killed lots and lots of people, in fact, they're still killing lots of people in some countries.

There is a huge gulf between "practicing magic" and "religion". Some religions include magic, the Catholics through ritual and props 'use' similar tools. Some Wiccans participate in 'magic' but many do not (nevermind that they don't grok ritual as magic... but meh, they're Wiccans).

The transcendental paradigm and the magical paradigm, however are not the same.... Some would argue that they're not really even compatible. In the bool Liber Null, Pete Carroll lays out three paradigms which humans tend to be involved in (obvious caveat when dealing with labels here).

Materialistic - The universe is believed to consist fundamentally and entirely of matter. Energy is but a form of matter and together they subtend space and time within which all change occurs strictly on the basis of cause and effect. Human behavior is reducible to biology, biology is reducible to chemistry, chemistry is reducible to physics and physics is reducible to mathematics. Mind and consciousness are thus merely electrochemical events in the brain and spirit is a word without objective content. The causes of some events are likely to remain obscure perhaps indefinitely, but there is an underlying faith that sufficient material cause must exist for any event. All human acts can be categorized as serving some biological need or as expressions of previously applied conditioning or merely as malfunction.

Transcendental - The essence of Transcendentalism is belief in spiritual beings greater than oneself or states of spiritual being superior to
that which currently one enjoys. Earthly life is frequently seen merely as a form of dialoque between oneself and one's deity or deities, or perhaps some impersonal form of higher force. The material world is a theatre for the spirit or soul or consciousness that created it. Spirit is the ultimate reality to the transcendentalist.

Magical - Reality can be manipulated as it is tied to our consciousness. Obviously, we're not talking about an 'Objective Reality', but rather the perceived reality. The 'magician' interacts with reality attempting to influence the direction. For the magician, all things contain 'information' (old magical systems used words like Mana, Aether... but they're basically talking about what we'd consider 'information' today). Information can be manipulated. Some parts of reality are very big, and have a lot of information, humans are not able to manipulate such large amounts of information, but they can perceive the information and capitalize on its likely flow/direction.

The materialist uses reality. The transcendentalist transcends reality. The magician plays with reality.

Now, there has been (particularly post-Renaissance and Victorian England eras) a lot of commingling of these systems, particularly the transcendent/magical paradigms. However, these systems are still generally focused on transcendence and merely use the 'magical' paradigm as a tool to recruit/manipulate their followers... or we get a hybrid like 'Wicca' where they believe in a transcendent reality and a subset of them believe in a 'participatory reality' where magic is a practicable art.

The vast majority of genocide, torture, conversion by the sword etc. are from views that are within the transcendental paradigm.

[P3nT4gR4m]

who said anything about banning anything? you've got censorship on the brain.

There are lots of things that should not be banned and yet aren't good ideas either. This is why we prefer reasoning with people over legislating them.

The people you need to reason with are the majority of tards who use it who, by their very natures, aint all that likely to wise up but, hey, you wanna troll MW or TCC or whatever - be my guest - I genuinely wish you all the best it's something I'd describe as a worthy use of time and may just impact positively to a greater or lesser extent. At the very least it's easy lulz.

The ones you are currently talking to aint going to stop using it just because the rest of the tards refuse to and may or may not be fucking up the universe with their stupidity.

Unlike probably the majority of wizards and witches and whatever elses on the face of this planet who come across as wanting to justify their bullshit worldview as some way of reinforcing it's validity to themselves, I don't have a vested interest in selling this concept to people. I happen to see another (non supernatural) side to all this shit so I'll chime in when a debate kicks off but, tbh, I think you and me both know by now what I'm getting at. If not then I don't think I'll ever make it clear.

What's the position we're arguing if it's not censorship? You want me to stop or admit it's a very bad thing? I'll happily admit that a great many things are very bad things, including the trappings of religion and the occult. Are we even debating anything here anymore?

[BabylonHoruv]

taht's from the illuminatus trilogy, right?

never noticed it was a cheerleader chant before wonder if they did it like that in the audio book version? [or maybe I didnt get to that part, I didnt entirely finish the audio book].

so um this might be a dumb question, but if there is only one god, and he is the sun god, why does the chant include Isis?

The cult of Ra (the Sun God) during the New Kingdom, esp under the rule of Akhenaten was a monotheistic one. The Sun God was worshiped over all other Gods by that cult (the other gods existed, but were weenies). Oddly, worshiping the Sun God (the Father) ended up behaving much like fundamental Christianity in Egypt. Some say its a factor in monotheism, if you KNOW Ra is the ONLY GOD, then you get pissed at everyone else (ala 2nd circuit)... Others that play with 'archetypes' find strong correlations between Ra as worshiped by Akhenaten and some aspects of the 'Father' in Christianity (and the Son in Osiris).

However, the really, real best bit... is that its a slam at Catholics.

Isis was the 'Mother Goddess', so the monotheistic Ra worshipers were also (in his chant) worshiping Isis... just as the 'monotheistic' Catholics pray to Mary:

monotheistic (not comparable)

  1. (religion) Believing in a single god, deity, spirit, etc., especially for an organized religion, faith, or creed.

polytheism (plural polytheisms)

  1. The belief of the existence of many gods.

Mary might be ascended, but shes not a goddess.

The only thing you could try to slide is that the "holy trinity" is a sign of polytheism in an apparent monotheism, but thats just spinning yarns.

Catholics tend to mix up their gods and their graven idols quite a bit. Virgin Mary is venerated, often to the point where the god(s) are ignored. Catholicism is thinly veiled polytheism, masquerading as monotheism. Considering its roots how could it be anything else?

Hehehe,  We had basically this exact debate on TCC. If Brigid gets dragged into it I am going to lose it.

[P3nT4gR4m]

taht's from the illuminatus trilogy, right?

never noticed it was a cheerleader chant before wonder if they did it like that in the audio book version? [or maybe I didnt get to that part, I didnt entirely finish the audio book].

so um this might be a dumb question, but if there is only one god, and he is the sun god, why does the chant include Isis?

The cult of Ra (the Sun God) during the New Kingdom, esp under the rule of Akhenaten was a monotheistic one. The Sun God was worshiped over all other Gods by that cult (the other gods existed, but were weenies). Oddly, worshiping the Sun God (the Father) ended up behaving much like fundamental Christianity in Egypt. Some say its a factor in monotheism, if you KNOW Ra is the ONLY GOD, then you get pissed at everyone else (ala 2nd circuit)... Others that play with 'archetypes' find strong correlations between Ra as worshiped by Akhenaten and some aspects of the 'Father' in Christianity (and the Son in Osiris).

However, the really, real best bit... is that its a slam at Catholics.

Isis was the 'Mother Goddess', so the monotheistic Ra worshipers were also (in his chant) worshiping Isis... just as the 'monotheistic' Catholics pray to Mary:

monotheistic (not comparable)

  1. (religion) Believing in a single god, deity, spirit, etc., especially for an organized religion, faith, or creed.

polytheism (plural polytheisms)

  1. The belief of the existence of many gods.

Mary might be ascended, but shes not a goddess.

The only thing you could try to slide is that the "holy trinity" is a sign of polytheism in an apparent monotheism, but thats just spinning yarns.

Catholics tend to mix up their gods and their graven idols quite a bit. Virgin Mary is venerated, often to the point where the god(s) are ignored. Catholicism is thinly veiled polytheism, masquerading as monotheism. Considering its roots how could it be anything else?

Hehehe,  We had basically this exact debate on TCC. If Brigid gets dragged into it I am going to lose it.

Well if you want to look at it that way then yeah, Brigid and her ilk were being used to control the stoopids long time before jesus and co showed up on the scene. All the one true god did was made globalisation and central control easier to administer which, lets not forget, was the whole point of the exercise in the first place. Not stopping the wycches from casting magiqual spells on people. 

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Are you confusing 'ritual' and religion?

There's no difference.

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

Also keep in mind that the Bible speaks of 'Gods'. That there is one Almighty God, doesn't mean that there are not other 'Gods'. Paul lists Satan as a God in 2 Cor. 4 (The God of this system of things has blinded the minds of the unbelievers).

Elohim in Hebrew was a name for God, but also a plural term used to denote powerful beings like angels. As Saints are considered greater than the Angels, they too would be elohim or 'gods' (as opposed to Almighty God YHVH).

Generally speaking Catholicism has an almighty God which they equate with YHVH of the Hebrews and Jesus. However, they use the Saints as some polytheistic religions of the past used 'lesser gods'... conduits to the Top Dude.

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

Are you confusing 'ritual' and religion?

There's no difference.

You're wrong.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Ra worshippers weren't monotheistic.  Someone is confusing "Ra" and "Aten".

ETA:  I'm gonna have to add an UNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNG! here, as the standard gesture of respect to the expert who gets everything wrong.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Are you confusing 'ritual' and religion?

There's no difference.

You're wrong.

No, U.

[Cain]

Its dildoes, all the way down.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

But Egyptian-style dildoes, with little cartouches carved into them, you know, for people who think Ankenaten worshiped Ra.