[Opinion] Academic Rigor in Occult Texts

[Khoren_]

Okay, I know I'm probably the odd man out here, but why the F*** do most "Occult" texts not reference other historical documents/other texts/etc in a more academic method, or hell, even in a slight "By the by, this is expanded upon in x text from 18-whatever". Like I'm not looking for "OH yeah, by the way, Richard Bigly did this on his youtube channel and you can SEE the octarine light spewing from his fingertips!" BUT at least be like "hey, so this idea that I'm talking about is actually talked about in this book I read a decade ago and they offer xyz opinion, however I differ in abc" etc.

Sure, I get there are some things that are straight up UPG and have no references elsewhere, but if I'm reading a book on "Norse Magic" and they start talking about x spell or y spell, but offer little "historical" references, I'm going to start thinking you're just making shit up (which is fine, but at least admit it) ((LOOKING AT YOU CONWAY)). Like sure, again, there's some stuff that's just passed down from generation to generation verbally with little "evidence" towards it, but if you start saying that the chaos star is a Norse Symbol, I'm just going to start laughing. (This actually happened.)

I was reading a book on "Black Mirror Scrying" and it just threw some ideas that even my own UPG just balks at without any supporting evidence.

Maybe it's just me being a Chaos Magician and looking for some level of rigor in my magic, or the Scientist in me looking for support to my beliefs, but does anyone else find books/texts/claims that you just go "and your evidence is...?"

(I'm looking at you God Spouses)

P.S. sorry for the... griping but holy f*** you can't just claim whatever whenever without people just going "what"

P.P.S. UPG is a valid position, but if your UPG doesn't vibe with my UPG, I'll reject it from my own personal mythology. But there are some claims that just make me reel back in horror.

 

[KjEno186]

Most modern occult texts were written for a quick buck? Probably. There are authors like Don Webb and John Michael Greer who seem to take their craft more seriously, providing references to further reading and bibliographies at the end of their books. In the internet age, well, we have unprecedented access to books, so there's really no excuse not to peruse the contents before buying and supporting authors who are still alive and provide useful (or at least entertaining) books.

 

[Taudefindi]

I think most occult writers aren't scholars, reason why they lack in references and resources outside their own.
They may practice the craft they're talking about, but that isn't enough to make someone a scholar over it.

 

[Khoren_]

I think most occult writers aren't scholars, reason why they lack in references and resources outside their own.
They may practice the craft they're talking about, but that isn't enough to make someone a scholar over it.

Is "being a scholar" something that a lot of practitioners regularly avoid? I'm really not trying to sound big brained here, but I definitely spent years studying magical theory before I even did my first spell, often terrified I'll fuck something up.

I can understand the paths of those who are trained from childhood not really thinking "reading a book" about magic being a necessity, but for some reason I feel like a lot of authors shy away from even reading each other's texts.

Post automatically merged: Jul 2, 2024

Most modern occult texts were written for a quick buck? Probably. There are authors like Don Webb and John Michael Greer who seem to take their craft more seriously, providing references to further reading and bibliographies at the end of their books. In the internet age, well, we have unprecedented access to books, so there's really no excuse not to peruse the contents before buying and supporting authors who are still alive and provide useful (or at least entertaining) books.

Like I get those from the 70s, 80s, etc. being unable to really cite other works, most of them either nestled away behind esoteric cults like Thelema and Theosophy, but the book about scrying I mentioned earlier was written three years ago.

Furthermore, I feel like cults like Gardnerian Wicca and O9A would have forced people to really evaluate their UPGs, or even their traditions, under a microscope to see what exactly is going on there. I mean, dang, even Crowley (as much as he made stuff up) managed to at least reference general occult texts in his writings, or at least vaguely gesture towards them. Sure there were groups like the Egyptian Freemason offshoots that the guy was literally just making stuff up that couldn't be checked because most of the history was either sourced from f***ed up "academic" sources.

I don't know, it might just be a general gripe here because I've had more than my fair share of people blatantly not knowing historical symbols, blatantly claiming things are "tried and true fact" when the facts are easily disproven, and people just making up history just to justify their UPGs or trying to create a lineage when there is none.

But then again, we do live in the age of Hyperborea and Flat Earth...

(sorry I wasn't quicker than the time limit...)

 

[Taudefindi]

Is "being a scholar" something that a lot of practitioners regularly avoid?

I don't know, I guess it depends if a person if the curious and studious type or if they just want something they can use/do.A scholar usually is someone that is passionate about a subject to the point of researching it in-depth, not everyone will be like that(and specially not so if what they do already works for them, so why would they seek to learn more about it?).

for some reason I feel like a lot of authors shy away from even reading each other's texts.

It can be from something as simple as them not feeling like it will add anything to their own work, up to an ego issue(not wanting to feel like they know less than others or aren't "as good" as them).

 

[Xenophon]

Okay, I know I'm probably the odd man out here, but why the F*** do most "Occult" texts not reference other historical documents/other texts/etc in a more academic method, or hell, even in a slight "By the by, this is expanded upon in x text from 18-whatever". Like I'm not looking for "OH yeah, by the way, Richard Bigly did this on his youtube channel and you can SEE the octarine light spewing from his fingertips!" BUT at least be like "hey, so this idea that I'm talking about is actually talked about in this book I read a decade ago and they offer xyz opinion, however I differ in abc" etc.

Sure, I get there are some things that are straight up UPG and have no references elsewhere, but if I'm reading a book on "Norse Magic" and they start talking about x spell or y spell, but offer little "historical" references, I'm going to start thinking you're just making shit up (which is fine, but at least admit it) ((LOOKING AT YOU CONWAY)). Like sure, again, there's some stuff that's just passed down from generation to generation verbally with little "evidence" towards it, but if you start saying that the chaos star is a Norse Symbol, I'm just going to start laughing. (This actually happened.)

I was reading a book on "Black Mirror Scrying" and it just threw some ideas that even my own UPG just balks at without any supporting evidence.

Maybe it's just me being a Chaos Magician and looking for some level of rigor in my magic, or the Scientist in me looking for support to my beliefs, but does anyone else find books/texts/claims that you just go "and your evidence is...?"

(I'm looking at you God Spouses)

P.S. sorry for the... griping but holy f*** you can't just claim whatever whenever without people just going "what"

P.P.S. UPG is a valid position, but if your UPG doesn't vibe with my UPG, I'll reject it from my own personal mythology. But there are some claims that just make me reel back in horror.

Depends on which ones you read. I hold no brief for the Temple of Set, but magi having their roots there are generally pretty good about referring one to sources. (See Stephen Flowers, Donald Webb, Mickael Kelly and many more.) These guys/gals have founded schools in a great many traditions, so it's not like you're tied to the Sex/Xeper readings. I recently read Webb's book on Vampyrism and came away with a few dozen other works to look into (and I considered myself well read.)

Like a few posters above hint 1) a lot of books are written for a quick buck; 2) the target audience are the dumbed-down hoi polloi; 3) the line between erudition and entertainment has been erased in this culture of entitlement, and erased to the detriment of the former.

Post automatically merged: Jul 2, 2024

Sorry. Forgot to edit. In the above, I meant "...tied to Set/Xeper," not "Sex." De Sadeian slip, I guess.

 

[stalkinghyena]

Skinner and Tyson have tried regarding the classics. The Warnock-Greer Picatrix and also Dan Atrell's are good. But I know what OP means - when I started out I would be lucky to get even and index (this includes Skinner and Tyson).

Kenneth Grant can be quite rigorous except that none of his references are originally from this planet.

 

[Xenophon]

Skinner and Tyson have tried regarding the classics. The Warnock-Greer Picatrix and also Dan Atrell's are good. But I know what OP means - when I started out I would be lucky to get even and index (this includes Skinner and Tyson).

Kenneth Grant can be quite rigorous except that none of his references are originally from this planet.

Yeah, I recall long series of Grant quotes of transcripts of a medium for some arachnadine entity. Which is fascinating, indeed I imagine an historian would call these "primary documents."

 

[stalkinghyena]

Yeah, I recall long series of Grant quotes of transcripts of a medium for some arachnadine entity. Which is fascinating, indeed I imagine an historian would call these "primary documents."

I don't suppose it would count as UPG if more than one person is involved.
History is written by the victors.

 

[Xenophon]

I don't suppose it would count as UPG if more than one person is involved.
History is written by the victors.

Well, yes. Group testiminy is considered more worthy of attention than, "Baphomet whispered to me in a private colloquy..."

Actually, a good deal of history is written by sycophants to the victors, witness Flavius Josephus' histories, Gregory of Tours making Clovis out to be a pious monarch, Speer's oeuvre, and many more.

 

[Jackson]

They are. Or they do.

In occult works that take a more academic approach.

 

[HoldAll]

I hear you. There's a lot of what historians call 'invented traditions' around, and whenever I read "… an unbroken line of wisdom that stretches all the way back to ancient (whatever)…", I smell a big fat rat. Lucky for us, anthropologists and other scholars have disovered magic and witchcraft as a serious field of study in recent years so there are lots of books brought out by Brill or Routledge that are quite thorough in their research and methodology, which in turn leaves occult authors a lot less leeway in passing off their pet theories as actual historical fact. You may even notice sometimes that state-of-the-art scholarship begins to seep into occult books nwo, for example when occult authors start to allow that Gnosticism is a highly inaccurate term for various doctrinally completely disparate groups of believers, or that much of what the Wiccans claimed about the

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. Other times, purely invented or distorted premises get debunked by other occult authors, and I think it has become harder for dubious writers to pass off their UPG as 'ancient sacred knowledge' because anybody with internet access can check whether their wild claims have a factual basis. Serious occultists are a lot less credulous than the average NewAger, I'd say.

Still, the majority of readers probably doesn't like footnotes taking up three quarters of a page (which can easily happen with those Brill or Routledge tomes), or doesn't like footnotes, period. What's more, the books written by PhDs are among the worst occult-fairytale offenders as if their academic title gave them license for unrestrained bullshitting. The occult book market niche probably offers the greatest opportunity to learn proper discernment…

 

[Robert Ramsay]

In thirty years of research, I have had to wade through a lot of crap. My shorthand for this is usually "and ofc the gipsies came from Atlantis".

I did agonise about putting a formal bibliography in my own book, but most of the time I just quoted my sources in the text.

 

[Xenophon]

In thirty years of research, I have had to wade through a lot of crap. My shorthand for this is usually "and ofc the gipsies came from Atlantis".

I did agonise about putting a formal bibliography in my own book, but most of the time I just quoted my sources in the text.

As long as a writer gives an author's name and a title that's plenty. Even an author's name is an anchor. Often a gateway as well. (Mixed metaphor, but true all the same.)

 

[Khoren_]

They are. Or they do.

In occult works that take a more academic approach.

Yeah, there are definitely those that do, but they are definitely the exception rather than the rule...

Post automatically merged: Jul 3, 2024

There's a lot of what historians call 'invented traditions' around, and whenever I read "… an unbroken line of wisdom that stretches all the way back to ancient (whatever)…", I smell a big fat rat.

Something something Taoist and Buddhist traditions stretching back to the dawn of time something something. Religions that hold a very high regard for "lineages" all end up starting when some dude claimed to watch another dude transcend to the next plane and then never being able to replicate that...

or example when occult authors start to allow that Gnosticism is a highly inaccurate term for various doctrinally completely disparate groups of believers

I literally have a book called The Gnostic Bible that literally does this and it's just like "so you are just saying that you think everyone who claims the world is a fuck is gnostic..."

Serious occultists are a lot less credulous than the average NewAger, I'd say.

When I was first getting into this whole shebang, I found that there are a lot of Neo-* who just go with whatever

LOOKING AT YOU BUCKLAND YOU F***ING TWAT

the majority of readers probably doesn't like footnotes taking up three quarters of a page

I mean, I find the best practice is just placing them all inaccessibly at the end and making the reader constantly flip their book back and forth until they give up in frustration because you could have just as easily placed it at the bottom and made it easier to reference.

the books written by PhDs are among the worst occult-fairytale offenders as if their academic title gave them license for unrestrained bullshitting

OH GOD THE LACK OF SCHOLARSHIP IN ACADEMIA
HOLY F***

 

[Xenophon]

I hear you. There's a lot of what historians call 'invented traditions' around, and whenever I read "… an unbroken line of wisdom that stretches all the way back to ancient (whatever)…", I smell a big fat rat. Lucky for us, anthropologists and other scholars have disovered magic and witchcraft as a serious field of study in recent years so there are lots of books brought out by Brill or Routledge that are quite thorough in their research and methodology, which in turn leaves occult authors a lot less leeway in passing off their pet theories as actual historical fact. You may even notice sometimes that state-of-the-art scholarship begins to seep into occult books nwo, for example when occult authors start to allow that Gnosticism is a highly inaccurate term for various doctrinally completely disparate groups of believers, or that much of what the Wiccans claimed about the

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. Other times, purely invented or distorted premises get debunked by other occult authors, and I think it has become harder for dubious writers to pass off their UPG as 'ancient sacred knowledge' because anybody with internet access can check whether their wild claims have a factual basis. Serious occultists are a lot less credulous than the average NewAger, I'd say.

Still, the majority of readers probably doesn't like footnotes taking up three quarters of a page (which can easily happen with those Brill or Routledge tomes), or doesn't like footnotes, period. What's more, the books written by PhDs are among the worst occult-fairytale offenders as if their academic title gave them license for unrestrained bullshitting. The occult book market niche probably offers the greatest opportunity to learn proper discernment…

To paraphrase Oscar Wilde, footnotes are the finest thing the Anglophone peoples have done in fiction.*

*Wilde said this of the weighty tomes of The Peerage.

 

[HoldAll]

Yeah, there are definitely those that do, but they are definitely the exception rather than the rule...

Post automatically merged: Jul 3, 2024

Yeah, there are definitely those that do, but they are definitely the exception rather than the rule...

Post automatically merged: Jul 3, 2024

Something something Taoist and Buddhist traditions stretching back to the dawn of time something something. Religions that hold a very high regard for "lineages" all end up starting when some dude claimed to watch another dude transcend to the next plane and then never being able to replicate that...


I literally have a book called The Gnostic Bible that literally does this and it's just like "so you are just saying that you think everyone who claims the world is a fuck is gnostic..."


When I was first getting into this whole shebang, I found that there are a lot of Neo-* who just go with whatever

LOOKING AT YOU BUCKLAND YOU F***ING TWAT


I mean, I find the best practice is just placing them all inaccessibly at the end and making the reader constantly flip their book back and forth until they give up in frustration because you could have just as easily placed it at the bottom and made it easier to reference.


OH GOD THE LACK OF SCHOLARSHIP IN ACADEMIA
HOLY F***

Two

Yeah, there are definitely those that do, but they are definitely the exception rather than the rule...

Post automatically merged: Jul 3, 2024

Something something Taoist and Buddhist traditions stretching back to the dawn of time something something. Religions that hold a very high regard for "lineages" all end up starting when some dude claimed to watch another dude transcend to the next plane and then never being able to replicate that...


I literally have a book called The Gnostic Bible that literally does this and it's just like "so you are just saying that you think everyone who claims the world is a fuck is gnostic..."


When I was first getting into this whole shebang, I found that there are a lot of Neo-* who just go with whatever

LOOKING AT YOU BUCKLAND YOU F***ING TWAT


I mean, I find the best practice is just placing them all inaccessibly at the end and making the reader constantly flip their book back and forth until they give up in frustration because you could have just as easily placed it at the bottom and made it easier to reference.


OH GOD THE LACK OF SCHOLARSHIP IN ACADEMIA
HOLY F***

Two Books (in the Library):

Joshua Gunn - Modern Occult Rhetoric: Mass Media and the Drama of Secrecy in the Twentieth Century

Olav Hammer - Claiming Knowledge: Strategies of Epistemology from Theosophy to the New Age

The authors aren't primarily out to debunk dubious claims (though they often do so in passing), they rather describe the way such claims (or whole systems) are formulated. You get the feeling that most esoteric teachings don't have a leg to stand on when viewed through the academic lense.

 

[Xenophon]

Two Books (in the Library):

Joshua Gunn - Modern Occult Rhetoric: Mass Media and the Drama of Secrecy in the Twentieth Century

Olav Hammer - Claiming Knowledge: Strategies of Epistemology from Theosophy to the New Age

The authors aren't primarily out to debunk dubious claims (though they often do so in passing), they rather describe the way such claims (or whole systems) are formulated. You get the feeling that most esoteric teachings don't have a leg to stand on when viewed through the academic lense.

Of course, they systems' proponents claim that antecedents are a red herring; that the litmus test is the system's results.

Or, again, C.S. Lewis once wrote a persuasive argument in finest academese proving that the 20th century scholar named C.S. Lewis who wrote volumes on English literature's history could not have been the children's fantasy writer, nor could he have been the Christian apologist. The "stylistic differences alone" were too glaring. I could multiply examples. The point is that academics can prove or disprove a great many things depending on the winds of cultural fashion.

 

[HoldAll]

Of course, they systems' proponents claim that antecedents are a red herring; that the litmus test is the system's results.

Or, again, C.S. Lewis once wrote a persuasive argument in finest academese proving that the 20th century scholar named C.S. Lewis who wrote volumes on English literature's history could not have been the children's fantasy writer, nor could he have been the Christian apologist. The "stylistic differences alone" were too glaring. I could multiply examples. The point is that academics can prove or disprove a great many things depending on the winds of cultural fashion.

Those books are more about describing certain phenomena in the NewAge scene and the occulture, less about proving or disproving doctrines. Academics have become very respectful towards magic, and nobody uses the S-word (superstition) anymore.

 

[Robert Ramsay]

I mean, I find the best practice is just placing them all inaccessibly at the end and making the reader constantly flip their book back and forth until they give up in frustration because you could have just as easily placed it at the bottom and made it easier to reference.

This is another reason why I love my Kindle. You click on the footnote marker, it takes you to the footnote, you read the footnote, you close the footnote and then carry on