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Occultism as a serious intellectual pursuit

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  • 25-02-2008 11:00pm
    #1
    scop
    Closed Accounts Posts: 687 ✭✭✭


    Hey all,

    Just a quick set of rambling thoughts. I've recently developed an interest in occultism. Now I'm not a crank, and I hope not a fool. For example I am pursuing a PhD in a field where skepticism in the default position. That being said I recently came across the work of some of the traditionalists, and am working my way though a book on the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. Now its clear the basis of the society rests on a forgery, but the fundamental drive for knowledge felt by its members nonetheless seems real. It produced in Yeats some of his finer work, and attracted some of the finest classicists and physicists of Victorian London.

    Now my question to the forum (and I had no idea where to post this) is whether one can ever truly pursue occultism and not be a charlatan. Are the grades simply arbitrary considering they were 'constructed' and one rose through time via accumulation of knowledge which I presume most able minded people could attain (Hebrew, some spells, history of symbolic usage etc.).

    Second is there any occultists in Ireland? I have a hard time finding anybody who would discuss this on a serious level...


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    #2
    Nevyn
    Closed Accounts Posts: 43,045 ✭✭✭✭Nevyn


    Hi.

    I think that if you pursue it as purely intellectual pursuit then it is pointless, at some stage you need to get your bum out of the armchair and practice.

    You can read everything ever written about the LBRP but it does not compare to correctly prefrorming ine esp for the first time.

    It is not just the accumulation of knowledge but it is also the application and the experience from those appliactions.


    http://occultireland.createforum.net/index.php?mforum=occultireland


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    #3
    scop
    Closed Accounts Posts: 687 ✭✭✭scop


    Oh I agree on that. Theory is nothing if praxis is not the aim. I was unaware there was an Irish occult forum so thank you for the link. Is it fairly active?


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    #4
    Sapien
    Closed Accounts Posts: 997 ✭✭✭Sapien


    Hi. I'm doing a PhD in Physics, and I've been deep in the esoteric for many years.

    While charlatanism is rife in the occult, a discerning reader can generally spot it, and most of the writers who get published are quite in ernest.

    There is little or no organised Art Magick in Ireland, and in the absence of a lodge, I see very little point in adhering to the grades. Have you read any Chaos?


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    #5
    scop
    Closed Accounts Posts: 687 ✭✭✭scop


    Ah I see. My subject is Philosophy so like yourself the bent is analytic and therefore a tough thing to get over. I'm still dipping my feet in so all I have encountered are some books on Crowley and the Golden Dawn lot. I know very little about the magick itself, but chaos sounds interesting. Any relation to chaos theory/fractals/or the modern developments there or is it an old school?

    I was just wondering about the grades in general. Very odd things. And its a shame there are no organizations in Ireland if a few of you dig it.


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    #6
    Nevyn
    Closed Accounts Posts: 43,045 ✭✭✭✭Nevyn


    There are some courses run here and there are some groups but what they are like you will have to ferret out yourself.
    There was a residential course advertised on some of the pagan mailing lists a while back for a weeks worth of training and ritual.

    The occult Ireland forums is quiet but ticks over they have ocassional meet ups as well.


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    #7
    scop
    Closed Accounts Posts: 687 ✭✭✭scop


    Ah I will try so. 'Tis obscure and I'm used to finding obscure stuff, but this has been one of the harder challenges.


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    #8
    Nevyn
    Closed Accounts Posts: 43,045 ✭✭✭✭Nevyn


    Seekers are ment to seek.

    So what drew you to be reading such stuff ?


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    #9
    Sapien
    Closed Accounts Posts: 997 ✭✭✭Sapien


    scop wrote: »
    Ah I see. My subject is Philosophy so like yourself the bent is analytic and therefore a tough thing to get over. I'm still dipping my feet in so all I have encountered are some books on Crowley and the Golden Dawn lot. I know very little about the magick itself, but chaos sounds interesting. Any relation to chaos theory/fractals/or the modern developments there or is it an old school?

    I was just wondering about the grades in general. Very odd things. And its a shame there are no organizations in Ireland if a few of you dig it.
    Chaos magick isn't really related to mathematical Chaos Theory, but they were both en vogue around the same time, and the magick took on many of the totems and some of the concepts of the theory - mostly in the metaphorical way that magick does. Chaos Magick is not very old. At the very earliest it can be traced back to Austin Osman Spare, an artist who died in the 50's, and it reached its peak in the 70's and 80's. But it is certainly where magick is going, if you ask me, and it is free of the formalism of grades and initiations that makes the lodge system so inaccessible. I would definitely recommend looking into it before settling on a system. Try Condensed Chaos by Phil Hine.

    I have never felt the need to "get over" my scientist's analytical tendencies. Though the kind of thinking in magick is very different, I have never found it to be in conflict with the reductionism of science or philosophy. It feels more like an expansion.


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    #10
    scop
    Closed Accounts Posts: 687 ✭✭✭scop


    Thaedydal wrote: »
    Seekers are ment to seek.

    So what drew you to be reading such stuff ?

    I came across the occultism section of the library a few weeks back, and I'd been avoiding it for years. Took the time to delve into it properly and realized I felt a sense of kinship with a lot of the people involved. I'm not sure I can explain it all that rationally.

    Heidegger, perhaps the most mystical of philosophical thinkers, talks about wege or ways/paths (Holzwege=to be off the beaten path) and so I tend to place a certain, although limited, amount of faith in being guided by questions. In Dublin I suspect the wege are quite lonely...


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    #11
    scop
    Closed Accounts Posts: 687 ✭✭✭scop


    Sapien wrote: »
    Chaos magick isn't really related to mathematical Chaos Theory, but they were both en vogue around the same time, and the magick took on many of the totems and some of the concepts of the theory - mostly in the metaphorical way that magick does. Chaos Magick is not very old. At the very earliest it can be traced back to Austin Osman Spare, an artist who died in the 50's, and it reached its peak in the 70's and 80's. But it is certainly where magick is going, if you ask me, and it is free of the formalism of grades and initiations that makes the lodge system so inaccessible. I would definitely recommend looking into it before settling on a system. Try Condensed Chaos by Phil Hine.

    Thanks for the recommendation. I suppose one could say the 'theme' of chaos was at work during that period. In terms of the Kali Yuga we may even say it was a tipping point into some final stage.


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