Magic: the conjurer's art

[Anibis]

Okay, well, since I seem to be blazing a path into juggling, I thought I'd initiate a discussion on related performance arts which can also be seen as Yogas. So here I figure we can talk about 'Legerdemain', stage illusionism, Prestidigitation, sleight of hand etc.

Rather clearly, when people talk about 'magic', they usually see it in two camps: What we could call the conjurer's camp, and the occultist's camp. The divide is pretty strong, and though a few people seem to cross into both worlds, they are treated as separate from one another. Following the history of the evolution of juggling we see that there are ever so sleight hints that the two Magics do in fact relate to one another. Shaman's used to use sleight of hand to achieve what we would call a 'placebo effect' in order to heal their patients. Even Crowley, who uses a 'k' to separate the two, does at times seem to give magicians their due respect. For example in 'Moonchild' we have a scene in which the 'true' magickians engage in the debunking of spiritualists. This was a big activity for people such as Houdini, and survives today in the activities of 'The Amazing Randi', and the 'Skeptical Inquirer' folks. Also, in R.A.W.'s 'Masks of the Illuminati', Crowley rather baltantly uses conjuring techinique to achieve 'change in conformity with will'.

So this is the philosophical justification for the thread. Hopefully this will spark discussion. I have a few more things to say about this, so I will add more posts as I can...

-Ibisis-

[Anibis]

Well, I havent touched this for ages, but I thought I'd post an article here that I wrote for another forum. Basically I wrote this to respons to conjurers as regards their perception of magic. The question I was answering was 'Did you believe in magic before you got into magic'... Well... I decided to challenge the notion amongst conjurers that once you get into magic, you no longer believe in magic(k)... Thankfully many true conjurers are actually aware of and respectful of true magick, although most do not practice. Here is the article I wrote, since, nobody responded to it on that list, and to be quite honest, I didn't spend two hours crafting it just to kill a thread.

JustStarting wrote:
I used to, until my teachers started to teach my science in the 1500's...


Well they should have taught you about science IN the 1500s, byes, those guys were onto some heavy duty magick... At a certain point science itself was an 'esoteric art', it wasn't whether you believed in it or not, it was whether you did it. Then during the 'enlightenment' people came up with the belief that reason could explain everything, and 're-wrote' the image we all have of 'true magic' into a cartoon image of impossibilities. AND GUESS WHO COMES ALONG TO PLAY THE CARTOON? We do! The conjurers!

So basically, at a certain point Science, a 'branch of magic' says "We say what is and isn't possible. Magic is supernatural, therefore it is impossible." To prove it, we make 'magic' our own, by making it a 'gentleman's art' (Which I respect), which we know is always explainable! It's quite a takeover strategy, but it only succeeds because it makes a straw man out of it's opponent, and engaging a circular argument.

Let me put it this way. Back in the Day, Shamans in North America who were looking to heal someone would perform a 'Shaking tent' ceremony in which the Shaman would be bound and put in a tent which would then shake violently and all sorts of wierd sounds and various effects would come out of it, before, when it was finally opened, they were found to be securly tied. Sound familiar? I'd put money on that being the same thing as the Spirit Cabinet act of the Davenports et al... AND YET, and heres the point... the sickness would be cured!

Oh, Placebo effect, you say... 'still science'. Well, just cuz you name something doesn't mean you can explain it away... 'science' has so many lable for things that they have no explanation for... SO what is that? certainly not a rational account... more like rhetorical strategy if you ask me. There is no explanation for the placebo effect, except maybe... well magic! Belief changes reality! Just cuz you describe something in a certain way does not mean that you 'own' it, so to speak. A description is not an explanation... (an explanation is often a description, however!)

See, if we, as is the custom, define 'true' Magick as the use of 'supernatural powers', you are presupposing that there is an opposition between the natural and the supernatural... we have created a category which essentially by definition cannot exist. So what? Well, if magic is supernatural, then it can't exist, right? Or it doesn't obey the 'Laws of Science'... right... Laws of science... thats another loaded term... I feel like some lab-coated 'old boy' is gonna come and hit me with a billy club... Science doesn't have laws, people... it discovers patterns, it shows at higher and higher levels of resolution that when a certain action occurs, another can be assumed to follow it. Usually. The 'Law of cause and effect' cannot be proven to exist. I won't digress into that one, but look up David Hume, all you 'skeptics', cus HE was a MASTER SKEPTIC.

My point is that Magic may not actually be supernatural. It might be real, we may be able to alter reality through focusing our will on it. Now there's a definition of Magick that you will find harder to knock down, providing you appeciate it in its nuance.

In fact, skepticism is good, it preserves you from commiting youself to hallucinations, but halucinations an metaphysical realities are not the same thing, people. True Magic actually is quite rational, you can certainly be a skeptical 'wizard'. Reason cannot explain True Magic, but it can describe it, just like good science is supposed to do. Science IS a descriptive tool after all, not an explanatory one. Theology gives explanations, Science observes (and plays with) empirical phenomena and 'tortures out' (to use Francis Bacon's* phrase) their patterns... When 'Scientific Materialist' worldview starts to play theologian, and grants itself to tell us what is or is not impossible, and assumes the mantle of 'skeptic', byes, that's a dark day...

All I can say, is that if you, as a magician, don't believe in magick, its time for you to go and do some homework into its history, cuz it's not what you think it is. If nothing else, you will learn that even what we do, as magicians, including that emo moment of suprize in a child's eye, is magick.

Cheers;
-Mr. Ibis
*Bacon formulated the Scientific Method
_________________


-Ibisis

[m1thr0s]

I just finished watching The Illusionist a few days ago and couldn't help thinking how curious it was the Illusionism came to be called Magic at all. Now that the term is in vogue there seems to be no dislodging it and in a sense there will always be certain parallels, but I think you raise a good argument to explain the underscoring rush to call Illusionism something that it is not and never really was.

The shaman may or may not be using the same techniques as the illusionist version of the same *trick*...it's not uncommon to bind someone so that they do not hurt themselves in a trance state for instance. But we can identify certain underscoring motivations for wanting to call illusionism magic if we acknowledge the climate of the times in which that tag first started being used, so I think this *scapegoat* argument has merit...

m1thr0s

[Anibis]

Although, I'll wish to say that illusionism is a branch of the art... much like alchemy, or gematria, or whatnot... I mean look at places where the split between the two forms wasn't so antagonistic, like India... here we have lots of Illusionism, and trickery used to support mysticism and mystics... It's a bit of a runaway baby in the west, in a sense... trying hard to deny its parenting, but starting to clue into the fact that it is part of the lineage... Just like science itself is.. By *scapegoat* I'm not sure exactly who you mean is being scapegoated... I assume you mean the Magickians are being fleeced by the upstarts...

But further, lets take a more modern example of the 'Shaman' principle; Look at the branch of Magic called Mentalism. In a sense it is not even a branch of magic, but rather a whole tradition that was subsumed. It comes from the techniques of mindreaders and spiritualists (among others) who developed techniques to convince people that they had certain powers... often however, this would be done in conjunction with (and to help fortify) 'Readings' such as tarot, or palmistry and so on, with the very full understanding that this was a kind of therapeutic relationship; a guidance situation... Much like a village wise woman, or what have you... In the same way, I think, that many magickan have their true powers routed in skillful 'bending' of the mundane world to their wills. On the other hand, it was often people just fleecing other people, but that in itself does sort of class these techniques as a 'change-under-will' mechanism...

On a subtler level, when you realize the finer point of selective attention, and so forth which are the conjurers bread and butter, you also have a social psychology which is capable of (without deciept) very nicely selecting certain realities which are to manifest over others... Simply through skillful use of word and gesture. Just some food for thought... The previous article was of course 'dumbed down' a bit, as it was aimed at conjurers, but I thing there are many more nuanced levels to the art of Illusionism that have bearing on Magick as well as martial arts (or, if you like 'the Art of War' in general), as is demonstrated by the Historical record...

Lastly, if you haven't seen The Prestige, you really should... Blows The Illusionist squarely out of the water... I guarantee you will enjoy it, if the Illusionist was even mildly interesting to you... Much more 'real' depiction of conjuring as an art, I'd say... Cheers;

-Ibisis

[m1thr0s]

Lastly, if you haven't seen The Prestige, you really should... Blows The Illusionist squarely out of the water... I guarantee you will enjoy it, if the Illusionist was even mildly interesting to you... Much more 'real' depiction of conjuring as an art, I'd say... Cheers;So I have heard...I'll have to check it out...well I find this all a very interesting conversation really although I very much doubt it would ever much cause me to change my own course in things...but that's a separate set of issues and criterion. There are plenty of ways to justify magic as a kind of essential springboard to magick if one should choose to approach it that way. Magic really forces people to question the reliability of their own senses, and along with that, their own assumptions about the nature of reality itself I think. Yet it does this in the name of good fun and entertainment which is pretty damn brilliant in its own right.

Like some guy had an epiphany one night and suddenly came up with the idea of making a game out of exploiting logical fallacies on all possible levels at once or something...if he had tried to do this in the name of religion he would have been strung up and fed to the ants but since it was a game it caught on and has been with us ever since...

m1thr0s

[Anibis]

I think that it has alot to do with the fact that the modern gentleman conjurer can be traced fairly squarely back to Robert Houdin, who was a figure of the enlightenment... I think that the more reactionary side of conjuring is in essence an attempt on behalf of rationalism to prove that 'everything is explainable', and yet, the fallacy is that what is more or less un-explainable is the interaction between the presentation and the effect it has on the audience... What I mean is that the tricks are tricks, but the real power comes from presentation... much like when the shaman works an illusion to bring about a real change... In fact, theatre is closer to Magick in many ways than conjuring on its own... I'm not out to convert anyone, of course... these are thoughts I've had over the years... I started conjuring when I was 12... departed from it when I discovered that I could comprehend how Magick would work, and then came back to conjuring after 9 or ten years, to breathe a new life into it... It is kindof like the part that sometimes claims to be the whole... but for me, it is definitely subordinate to Magick as a whole... Yet my entire approach is colored by it. I tend not to go for the flashy paranormal claims, I tend to be attracted to accurate empirical description, and I tend to move through subtlety rather than flash... Definitely a halmark of conjuring... but Like I said, it's one branch of the art. It just happens to be one that people are willing to pay for, and which I have no moral bones about marketing (unlike more spiritual work, which I do not care to grind through the mill of mammon)... I go out, I bring my cards; the portable theatre, I call it... Free drinks, people's respect, general happiness... It works Magick... There are two sorts of audient: the mystery seekers, and the puzzle solvers... I have learned to play for them both at once... Cheers;
-Ibisis

[Anibis]

Oh yeah and people do do this in the name of religion... They are called Fakirs, or Spiritualists!
-Ibisis

[m1thr0s]

took a little time out to watch The Prestige tonight...interesting. Everywhere I go within the past few months Nikola Tesla's name keeps jumping up...I think it must be time to look into his work more closely...always meant to anyway...

m1thr0s

[One]

I very much enjoy illusion magic and have done it on and off for years. I will also say that illusion and mentalism is much more effective than most occult methods of rituals and drawing circles when it comes to getting things done. Mentalism being close to real mind reading using just your five senses. Therefore, you may not really need to separate the two (magic and magic"k") after all. Same effects, different methods.

[Anibis]

Cool. That's how I make my living... Mentalism in particular seems to touch on what Magick is in reality... but it's not all hucksterism, my friend... I suggest you look up Frances Yate's 'The Art Of Memory', for an interesting account of why all this 'mystical symbolism' might be very real, and very potent. Like you, I need my world to make sense... If science fails to make sense, I find another method, but yeah... who's gonna settle for anything less?
-Anibis

[One]

You're a magician as a profession? Nice! I love the art, but I don't find it completely stable for me as a professional career. I have respect for those that do, however. You keep the magic alive. And what makes you say physical methods to magic are hucksterism? You're only manipulating the physical senses and psyche of the individual instead of other substances when you engage in magick. They can be intermingled.

[Anibis]

I think you are misreading me. you last few statements are very confusing.. I mean 'it's not all about faking the ability to do the impossible', actually it's about giving the audience the capacity to realize that what they may see as the limits of the possible are illusions themselves... Wonder breaks reason, and reason can be a prison warden, hence for that, and for other reasons, being an illusionist is not just about making the appearance of the impossible. There is real Magick there too. THere are several high-profile magicians who would agree with me: McBride, Burger, Tamariz.... to name a few... the best magicians realize that there is something to the older magick, so to speak... What kind of work do you do? Close-up? stage?
-Anibis

[One]

Close-up. I need to pick it up again. It is a very good hobby.

It just seems to me that you are trying to convince me that "magick" is somehow different and also "real" than sleight-of-hand magic, and you are bothered with today's magicians being skeptics. If there is real magick, it is not as effective as mentalism and applied psychology when it comes to practical results. You also seem to be confused about the definition of "reason." There is sound reasoning and there is flawed reasoning. Reason does not mean dismissing something in disbelief.

One tip is that the most successful real magicians (sorcerers) are the ones that can manipulate through psychology, and you wouldn't even know it. The weak magicians are the ones calling spirits in circles and raising energy to mentally shift to another dimension to clean the aura. Real magicians are materialistic in their persuits, while the not-so-successful ones are finding excuses for their lives and escaping through mystical satisfaction of existance, or whatever.

[Anibis]

Interesting opinions you have... You don't really know very much about this field, I'm afraid... and you won't get alot out of the locals if you insist on lambasting their points of view with your, uh, 'perspective'... have a nice day...
-Anibis

[Anibis]

"Mystical satisfaction of existence"... the poor deluded chumps... what could they possibly see of value in that... I wonder... :p
-A-

[Naomi]

Close-up. I need to pick it up again. It is a very good hobby.

It just seems to me that you are trying to convince me that "magick" is somehow different and also "real" than sleight-of-hand magic, and you are bothered with today's magicians being skeptics. If there is real magick, it is not as effective as mentalism and applied psychology when it comes to practical results. You also seem to be confused about the definition of "reason." There is sound reasoning and there is flawed reasoning. Reason does not mean dismissing something in disbelief.

One tip is that the most successful real magicians (sorcerers) are the ones that can manipulate through psychology, and you wouldn't even know it. The weak magicians are the ones calling spirits in circles and raising energy to mentally shift to another dimension to clean the aura. Real magicians are materialistic in their persuits, while the not-so-successful ones are finding excuses for their lives and escaping through mystical satisfaction of existance, or whatever.


Yet....while I agree with Anibis initially something about this rings true to me....I personally love a good psychological manipulator at work, and i've met a handful of really clever Satanic ones. I recognize them instantly usually, usually, it's just like watching wildlife

However - there is nothing to sneeze about at calling spirits in circles - how big is the circle/your soul how big is your mind calling in/compressing entire regions of the galaxies...etc?

There's more to be said on conjuring I think, than simply to dismiss it as the typical triangle and circle stick.

[Anibis]

He's not 'wrong' in what he says. Only half-right, though... The two magic(k)s are indeed one, and yet to attempt to achieve this in such a 'supplantative', arrogant manner sort of goes to show that the 'point' is not quite had... What is 'practical' at the end of the day? Material possesion and success in the 'rat-race' world? Is not satisfaction itself emminently practical... Sounds like this guy cannot quite see the irony in his own arguments... Is not the pleasure of aethetic contemplation a good, itself? All magic is indeed one magick, and the principle is the same across the board with illusionism and mysticism alike, but I cannot agree that what Naomi rightly points out as the enlarging the circle of the soul, is an idle passtime that has no practical purpose.

It is the great and sacred well from which our desires find expression through inspiration... Inspiration has a deeper causal significance upon our world than he seems to think. The raw technics of a thing, any thing, are just that... maybe this is why he only ever did magic as a hobby...

I find myself looking at conjuring/illusionism now as almost the 'military wing' of magick, with it's emphasis on repeatable effects with little or no metaphysical, ethical, or moral content... But in the hands of a true wizard, this magic comes to life like nothing else.

And as I said, it's practical.

-Anibis

[Naomi]

Mmm, yes I see, well said Anibis.

[WDTSF]

I live in China, where the unseen is a bit more common to the people than in most western countries... the practice of martial arts, especially the internal arts, Taiji, Qi Gong, all talk about getting in touch with the universal energy known as "Qi" through concentration of thought and relaxation of physical body...

I do magic for fun and occasionally profit, and most of my audiences don't believe in magic in the sense that they know what I do are tricks even though they can't explain it... however, at the end of every show, there are always a couple of tricks that they walk away talking about as though it was "real magic"... simple tricks as old as the hills can be dressed up with a good presentation to inspire people to believe in something intangible, and that's always an enjoyable experience, and I believe that brings people a bit closer to real magic.

Personally, I believe in a lot more than just sleight of hand and smoke and mirrors even though that's pretty much all I use when I do my magic shows... The lighting of candles, burning of incense, summoning of spirits and interacting with universal energy like Qi are things I do before my shows to help me make things go smoothly... tweak my Karma in a way so that it aligns well for the most positive outcome of a show which is completely based on illusions.

I guess that's where I make the connection between the two "lobes" of magic... The tricks I do are seen, thus they are tricks... the real magic is something I do that my audiences will never know about, but indirectly they help the show go smoothly and at the end of the day, the audience experiences more magic...

[Anibis]

Thanks for posting. I almost never actually 'do magick' during performance, except in the general sense that I do magick all the time.... I am an invoker, magickal speaking, so I will often connect with a diety; Hermes usually, Maat often, Ganesha when I am beginning a big show or something, or lately mnemosyme, (In connection with Corinda, and Tamariz and other memory-magi). So there's that. I also use the word Abracadabra alot... I feel it's much more appropriate for the performance context than Abrahadabra... I think we have a slightly similar apprach to incorporating magic with magick, though it sounds like you are a bit more ritualistic... that's cool too... Isn't it interesting that conjuring itself is like an external 'exoteric' effect when compared with meditation/energy work.... they almost bear the same relation to one another that the hidden worrk of a magic trick does to the actual effect... Again, I will go on and on about Juan Tamariz, since I admire his vibe so much, but it seems he really brings the magick to his work... he told me that he was very interested in greek mythology, and I'm not suprized... also, he takes tricks which anyone could do, and then works them with such attention to detail, and performs them SO well, that it is almost totally stunning to see him work, and it's just card tricks! Definitely here's a man who can inspire people to believe in magic... used to be a film director... must be similar occupations: "Reality creationism", m1thros was talking about a few days ago... you definitely get with a good magic act a sense of reality creationism (Heck you get that with a bad act too, the difference is you'd rather live in the reality spawned by the good one). So there's food for thought... What would happen if conjuring (which controlls the 'public face of magic' and the rest of the occult world were to come to more friendly terms... it's happening... McBride appears to be involved in this thing called 'The Grey School of Magic', which is like a Hogwart's acadamy that has cropped up. I shit you not... All's fair in Love, War, and Magic, so it would seem... Well at least it's getting out of the hands of those evangelicals... creepy...
Cheers;
-Anibis

[Naomi]

I love both of your posts. I hope we can move towards a more balanced creation soon. I know everyone who is aware of the problem with this creation is working hard on it.

Yes all is fair....but even that has double meaning...I think if you can't see the beauty in everything through some lense - even if it is microscopic or simply comedy, you arn't there yet. But that's just extra commentary don't let me derail the topic.

The conjuring aspect of reality is heavily related to KRSNA consciousness too..if one can manage a healthy balancing act between acceptance and rejection : redirection, much in the same vein as the Ma'atian chamber principles, one has mastered Vishnuvian nature.

Conjuring from nothing does not exist of course...it comes from somewhere. By looping around into the Apsu or excuse me, original source of all outside the pierced veil of this illusory creation, one can pull on and conjure from alien realities that seem fantastic but which are merely unfamiliar with typical reality.

So like me, Anibis, are you anticipating when we have laid the first brick of a physical temple of Abrahadabra.com? Think we're good enough to conjure that up for our friend m1thr0s here and hang him by the ceiling so we can stick quarters in him and make him give us cool new magical techs from outerspace or wherever the fuck he comes from? ;)

As a side note, something I've been wondering, how long have you been involved with Ma'at Anibis? Do you see her as more of a sister or a consort or however? Feel free not to answer but the enitre Ma'at - Thoth/Hermes current is something alien to me and I don't think I know what it's about really....how does the Chamber of Ma'at arrangement relate to conjuring in your universe? Just curious....^_^

[Anibis]

Well, lets start with 'conjuring'... I think that you and I are using 'conjuring' differently here. I mean it in the technical sense that refers to illusionists: so Houdini, Keller, Vernon. etc... Entertainers... this is a common distinction... With that clear, I think we can talk a bit more coherently about the distinction between entertainment magic and the occult .You are of course using the term equally legitimately but, I think a little different: you mean the conjuration of entities, which of course, no card man, or 'assistant levitator' is going to believe in (unless it's me ;))...

Balance, yes... It's a long story, how I came to be a Maatian... Thoth Maat is of course a shiva/shakti type dynamic.... There was a time when I was VERY VERY horus... an uncompromising fireball of philosophical ferocity, so to speak. I took myself to be like Nietzsche's Lion in the opening chapter of 'Thus Spake Zarathustra'... I worked the Book of Thoth extensively... I first thought of maatianism as something intruiging but deluded, as per Crowley's famous ex-disciple Frater Achad... I knew, for example that he turned the serpent of wisdom upside down, which means he took the sequence of hebrew letters which correspond to the tarot and reversed them on the Tree of Life: so the fool is between malkuth and Yesod, and the Universe is between Chochmah and Kether... I knew that, but didn't really engage with it... I used to see hawks all over the place: they would flock to me, it seemed... Anyway, we conducted a rather large group working (which was part of a larger personal working which led to my encountering m1 in teh first place), which was a pathworking of the Book of Thoth. Over 32 consecutive weeks three (and sometimes more) of us would meet and meditate together on one of the paths of the tree, and then do various excercises as a group throughout the week (for example we took a 2 day vow of silence for 'The Hermit'... At one point we actually all burned our copies of Liber Al vel Legis on the 99th anniversary of it's writing (It is wise, says the comment to burn the book AFTER the first reading... well SOMETIME after, LOL... and yes, it's wise.) When we got to the last path, 'The Fool', we actually summoned Maat, using the number 11 to refer to the double wand of power which she weilds... We employed a LARGE Canadian monument as the central beacon for this operation, reasoning that Achad had declared the Aeon of Maat in Canada, and that Canada had some strikingly Maatian characteristics... The amount of battle that had accrued to us by that time was insane, and it was time to bring about justice.... Within 5 minutes of this, I played with the Achad arrangement, just to see what it would be like... and discovered the pattern of radial pairs which I talk about elsewhere. This convinced me to literally step into another Aeon, which I did... Completely re-wired my life... Ask Nuhad, he was there. I moved to a big frigging Island and joined the circus, I lost all my immediate power (only to grow a new kind) and I stopped being Neitzsche's lion (destroyer of false values) and became his Child (creater of new values)... later on I joined the Horus Maat Lodge, which is an online list serve hosted by Nema, who penned Liber Pennae Penumbra (here (http://www.horusmaat.com/) Click 'IPSOS').... My main interest is community building, and community building requires a standard of Justice. I think the number of Justice is 11, and so Abrahadabra, the 11-letter word is a word of just and ballanced energy... I believe that as one wills forth, so is that will evaluated and reflected back upon yourself by the myriad stars in the continuum, and the lady of justice who stretched across it. Maat is Dharma.

I developed the Thoth Count for the purpose of creating a time-zone that would facilitate this accountability, and further the construction of magickal community....

I Will through Maat, so I guess she is a consort... Right now, I am beggining to know Mnemosyme, as well... mother of the muses....

I have some attraction to Thoth, Maat, and Anubis (as well as Isis), and so it seems that a part of me is attuned to every part of the chamber of Maat, excepting maybe Ammit (which i know you work with)... Funny though that I have never read the book, LOL... I just vibe with the archetypes....

I might move this to another thread, if it continues... Thanks for asking...
-Anibis

It is time, I think, to build ourselves a just world. And yes, I'd help m1 build a temple, but no, I wouldn't do anything silly like hang him from the ceiling or worship him. He is my brother... Older brother...

[Naomi]

Well, lets start with 'conjuring'... I think that you and I are using 'conjuring' differently here. I mean it in the technical sense that refers to illusionists: so Houdini, Keller, Vernon. etc... Entertainers... this is a common distinction... With that clear, I think we can talk a bit more coherently about the distinction between entertainment magic and the occult .You are of course using the term equally legitimately but, I think a little different: you mean the conjuration of entities, which of course, no card man, or 'assistant levitator' is going to believe in (unless it's me ;))...

Kinda, to me there's no distinction cuz I come from a really Eastern point of view - very very close in nature to what you find in the Shangpa Kagyu school of Buddhism. Niguma, one of the founders, I'm sure you've seen me plastering her shit everywhere else like on Zoints etc....

Here's a quote - I hate this translation but it'll do:

"One's own mind, unwavering, is reality.
The key is to meditate like this without wavering;
Experience the Great [reality] beyond extremes.
In a pellucid ocean,
Bubbles arise and dissolve again.
Just so, thoughts are no different from ultimate reality. "

Balance, yes... It's a long story, how I came to be a Maatian... Thoth Maat is of course a shiva/shakti type dynamic.... There was a time when I was VERY VERY horus... an uncompromising fireball of philosophical ferocity, so to speak. I took myself to be like Nietzsche's Lion in the opening chapter of 'Thus Spake Zarathustra'... I worked the Book of Thoth extensively... I first thought of maatianism as something intruiging but deluded, as per Crowley's famous ex-disciple Frater Achad... I knew, for example that he turned the serpent of wisdom upside down, which means he took the sequence of hebrew letters which correspond to the tarot and reversed them on the Tree of Life: so the fool is between malkuth and Yesod, and the Universe is between Chochmah and Kether... I knew that, but didn't really engage with it... I used to see hawks all over the place: they would flock to me, it seemed... Anyway, we conducted a rather large group working (which was part of a larger personal working which led to my encountering m1 in teh first place), which was a pathworking of the Book of Thoth. Over 32 consecutive weeks three (and sometimes more) of us would meet and meditate together on one of the paths of the tree, and then do various excercises as a group throughout the week (for example we took a 2 day vow of silence for 'The Hermit'... At one point we actually all burned our copies of Liber Al vel Legis on the 99th anniversary of it's writing (It is wise, says the comment to burn the book AFTER the first reading... well SOMETIME after, LOL... and yes, it's wise.) When we got to the last path, 'The Fool', we actually summoned Maat, using the number 11 to refer to the double wand of power which she weilds... We employed a LARGE Canadian monument as the central beacon for this operation, reasoning that Achad had declared the Aeon of Maat in Canada, and that Canada had some strikingly Maatian characteristics... The amount of battle that had accrued to us by that time was insane, and it was time to bring about justice.... Within 5 minutes of this, I played with the Achad arrangement, just to see what it would be like... and discovered the pattern of radial pairs which I talk about elsewhere. This convinced me to literally step into another Aeon, which I did... Completely re-wired my life... Ask Nuhad, he was there. I moved to a big frigging Island and joined the circus, I lost all my immediate power (only to grow a new kind) and I stopped being Neitzsche's lion (destroyer of false values) and became his Child (creater of new values)... later on I joined the Horus Maat Lodge, which is an online list serve hosted by Nema, who penned Liber Pennae Penumbra (here (http://www.horusmaat.com/) Click 'IPSOS').... My main interest is community building, and community building requires a standard of Justice. I think the number of Justice is 11, and so Abrahadabra, the 11-letter word is a word of just and ballanced energy... I believe that as one wills forth, so is that will evaluated and reflected back upon yourself by the myriad stars in the continuum, and the lady of justice who stretched across it. Maat is Dharma.


Neat that is an awesome story. I can definately see the Ma'atian nature in Canada for sure. Ma'at always tends to seep into my life when I'm least expecting it, like she's my sister or something. I think she actually even gets me in trouble sometimes....heh heh....

I developed the Thoth Count for the purpose of creating a time-zone that would facilitate this accountability, and further the construction of magickal community....


It's a powerful tool, thanks for that, it is definately on par with the emerald tablet, that might be bold but whatever, I'm going to just say it I think it's an impressive piece of work.

I Will through Maat, so I guess she is a consort... Right now, I am beggining to know Mnemosyme, as well... mother of the muses....

I have some attraction to Thoth, Maat, and Anubis (as well as Isis), and so it seems that a part of me is attuned to every part of the chamber of Maat, excepting maybe Ammit (which i know you work with)... Funny though that I have never read the book, LOL... I just vibe with the archetypes....

Oh the book of going forth by day? Why do you think Thoth scribes and records in the chamber? I sort of tend to believe all of this stuff written down is in us somewhere, so hey, if you don't need to read the book that just means the 'wei" is already open in you somehwere and you don't need the crutch so vibeing is real cool, part of the magick.

I might move this to another thread, if it continues... Thanks for asking...
-Anibis

Thanks for answering, quite insightful...and interesting.

It is time, I think, to build ourselves a just world. And yes, I'd help m1 build a temple, but no, I wouldn't do anything silly like hang him from the ceiling or worship him. He is my brother... Older brother...

Oh it's a joke relating to something he said to me a couple of years ago. Yeah don't worship him, it'll scare him off. I think hermits like to be suspended from the ceiling though...like bats or something. Well It's nice to hear the family is sort of learning to get by again...neat.

Now back to laundry meditation. Why's Ammit so unpopular? Want to move this into a discussion about the chamber or smtg? I'm really curious about it and I had a surprise visit from Ma'at the other day which you might be able to decypher.

[imagenerator]

I can recall as a young child seeing a rope penetrate a human being. It was quite memorable, a moment that made me question reality as we know it. It seem to me that "magic tricks" are kind of paradoxical in nature because they are a deception that may lead us to a truth. For example, some mentalist tricks are sleights where no actual psychic powers are involved, but they inspire the audience to believe in psychic powers.

As an aspiring peformer of the variety type (baton/staff play, juggling, clowning, singing), the concept that magic is akin to magick is an inspiring concept. I like to think that it helps suspend disbeleif in magick. I have started to learn some close-up magic with everyday objects (elastic band, newspaper, napkin). Some possible elements of my show I consider magickal but not necesarily magical follow.

The first, I have a "wishing well", a can with some whater where people can deposit pennys (or more if I'm busking) in exchange for a wish. If someone makes a wish, I encourage them to share the wish with myself and others, contrary to popular belief because "how can you make your wishes come true if you don't tell the world what you need ?". So, this one is geared towards sharing a technique for manifestation of intention, or what my character sometimes calls " making the ideal real".

The second, (yet to be tested), I have a feather duster which I call the "head cleaner". So before the show starts, I ask people to stop thinking for a bit (a meditation) and offer to help them clear their head with my duster. This one involves visualization of intention.

Lastly, hypnotism. Hypnosis seem to be one of the most widely accept forms of affecting reality known to man. It is applied in both performance and therapy. I am intersted in learning hypnosis both for the purposes of entertainment and actualization alike.

[Anibis]

What interesting ideas. Thanks for sharing them... The head cleaner is quite funny and practical for it's purposes... The wishing well is brilliant as well. It will work...
-Anibis

[imagenerator]

What interesting ideas. Thanks for sharing them... The head cleaner is quite funny and practical for it's purposes... The wishing well is brilliant as well. It will work...
-Anibis

Thanks for the feedback. It was you that passed on the inspiration of penny magic, and it really grew out of that. As for the other, I am the "head cleaner" of a yoga studio and so I've got more than a couple of cleaning gags up my sleeve.

Oh, speaking of pennies, here's a little ditty by Malvina Renyolds I found when I decided to do a search for "magic penny" for kicks (source (http://www.wku.edu/%7Esmithch/MALVINA/mr101.htm)):

Magic Penny

Love is something if you give it away,
Give it away, give it away.
Love is something if you give it away,
You end up having more. It's just like a magic penny,
Hold it tight and you won't have any.
Lend it, spend it, and you'll have so many
They'll roll all over the floor.
For love is something if you give it away,
Give it away, give it away.
Love is something if you give it away,
You end up having more.
Money's dandy and we like to use it,1 (http://www.wku.edu/%7Esmithch/MALVINA/mr101.htm#1)
But love is better if you don't refuse it.
It's a treasure and you'll never lose it
Unless you lock up your door.
For love is something if you give it away,
Give it away, give it away.
Love is something if you give it away,
You end up having more.
So let's go dancing till the break of day,
And if there's a piper, we can pay.
For love is something if you give it away,
You end up having more.
For love is something if you give it away,
Give it away, give it away.
Love is something if you give it away,
You end up having more.