III-19 Lughnasadh 2009

“The study of magic is, by and large, the study of paradigms. The Witch — by whatever title she or he may adopt — steps beyond the default worldview presupposed by the surrounding society, and instead cultivates a unique paradigm which resonates with her or his deepest intuitions. This line of inquiry constitutes an ever present challenge for the practicing Witch. …” Read more…

“The teacher heaved himself from his stone seat. “Enough sitting. My knees are aching. Let’s walk and talk together,” he said to his few disciples. Other teachers had more — some as many as thirty students — but Aristotle took his pleasure in selecting the six or seven students who could best understand his teachings. Used to their teacher’s habit of wandering while he lectured …” Read more…

“Now is the time of the embarrassment of riches. Summer heaps abundance upon us — an abundance of heat and sunlight, of long golden days that stretch into steamy twilights, of the fertile Earth heaping the treasures of flower and fruit for all to see. In the garden, the tomatoes weigh down the vine, the zucchini and pumpkin push their creepers further out as their fruits …” Read more…

“Initiation in the New Aeon is “the Child Growing to Maturity” by the slaying of the ego-self whose “death is life to come” for the True Self. But what is the nature of that True Self? Essentially, the True Self transcends dualities. Specifically, the True Self transcends the moral duality of Good and Evil. People have a common tendency to imagine their goal as their “Higher Self” …” Read more…

“For decades witches and other modern pagans have been in a war of words, which sometimes escalates to a war of fists, with the Christian churches. Christians are berated in the most uncivil language on New Age Web sites and in Wicca zines for being malicious fools incapable of thinking for themselves, who allow their pastors, priests, and other Christian spokespersons to …’” Read more…

“By the time the Great Galaxy of Andromeda was coming around for its second pass through the Milky Way, before that final series of events that would lead to the merger of two great spirals into one stochastic elliptical galaxy of Milkomeda, we’d managed to irritate two galaxies worth of interstellar civilizations. When the first merger began, things were already dicey for …” Read more…

“Christopher Fish just wasn’t built for a normal life, though he did his best. He tried to ignore the stares his pale skin, white hair and faded gray eyes earned him. He learned to stop following certain people around whenever he caught some strangely familiar scent of decay clinging to their skin. He pretended in conversation that he slept like regular folks do, knowing better than to tell …” Read more…

“Each issue, Gerald del Campo offers up his unique take on ten esoteric terms – some you’re familiar with, and others he’s created. …” Read more…

“I had a nightmare last night — about bugs. Scorpions, spiders, biting flies, centipedes, and other creepy-crawlies that could potentially do damage to the soft flesh wrapping my endoskeleton. (Why couldn’t it have been butterflies? Or snails?) Back when I was a kid, I spent countless days when the weather was warm overturning rocks to catch various insects and other bugs …”Read more…

“I first met Isaac Bonewits a few years ago at the Fall Gathering of the Tribes in West Virginia. It was quite interesting to talk with him and it was at that time that I was introduced to his work. Bonewits has been involved in the occult since the 1960s. He’s the only person to have graduated from a university with a degree in magic. …” Read more…

“H.P. Lovecraft, a writer of weird fiction for the pulp magazines of the first quarter of the twentieth century, created for his fiction a pantheon of demonic deities and their debased cults. This collection of beings and lore are known today as the Cthulhu Mythos, and have been expanded, first by Lovecraft’s friends and fellow pulp authors, and also by later …” Read more…

“As I was reading this book, I was trying to figure out where to fit it into the categories on my blog. On the one hand, it’s purportedly a reconstruction of a culture 6,000 years old; this includes extensive research into botany, mythology, history and other scholarly studies. But, when you get right down to it, it’s also a fascinating set of stories with well-developed characters …” Read more…

“Poetry usually isn’t my preferred reading material, but every so often I find a book of it that I truly enjoy. Dancing God is the second volume of poetry that’s caught my attention in such a way, the first being The Phillupic Hymns by P. Sufenas Virius Lupus. In this particular text, I was treated to a lovely variety of verses, some of which are strongly flavored by …” Read more…

“It’s been a while since I’ve reviewed a totem deck/book set. I’ve had this one sitting in my personal collection for a while, and figured it was about time to take a break from my review stacks. I also wanted to give myself a fresh look at it, because someone I respect as a totemist gave it a pretty scathing review last year, and I didn’t want that biasing my approach …” Read more…