Petition to make a "No-Hand Path, Path-working and Matter Manipulation" subsection

[Khoren_]

Now I have nothing against the general idea of "Angel Contact" and "Demon Worship", but I think the whole "Left vs Right" and "Black vs White" magic is a little,,, leaving something to be desired.

As someone with less... traditional views on magic, I find myself wondering at what point do I put x question into which subsection, but it's too specific for the "general" subsection or the "occult Q&A". So Can we get a third section???

 

[HoldAll]

What if I wanted to create a curse that heals someone waggles eyebrows

Psychologists talk about a phenomenon called 'morbid gain' where a sick person perversely derives pleasure and satisfaction from all the sympathy and attention he's getting from his fellow men because of his pitiful condition (my dad would have been a prime example, he would have found it hard - at first - to find other grievances to bitch about if he would have become healthy all of a sudden). Yes, there are grey areas and borderline cases but my opinion remains unchanged - if the subject is not unequivocally LHP by traditional, admittedly arbitrary criteria, it's RHP by default.

Although I wonder how to classify magic which involves entities that are said to be morally or behaviourally ambivalent like djinns or the fae, or that are known as tricksters prone to playing rough… or magic that can have both positive and negative consequences, or involves some kind of zero sum game. Should we call it 'grey magic' then? Would the main criterion for differentiation be ethics or rather the methods used? Best to spare us (and the Forum Staff) such classification headaches and lump all such magic together in the RHP rubric as a rule of thumb.

 

[Xenophon]

Psychologists talk about a phenomenon called 'morbid gain' where a sick person perversely derives pleasure and satisfaction from all the sympathy and attention he's getting from his fellow men because of his pitiful condition (my dad would have been a prime example, he would have found it hard - at first - to find other grievances to bitch about if he would have become healthy all of a sudden). Yes, there are grey areas and borderline cases but my opinion remains unchanged - if the subject is not unequivocally LHP by traditional, admittedly arbitrary criteria, it's RHP by default.

Although I wonder how to classify magic which involves entities that are said to be morally or behaviourally ambivalent like djinns or the fae, or that are known as tricksters prone to playing rough… or magic that can have both positive and negative consequences, or involves some kind of zero sum game. Should we call it 'grey magic' then? Would the main criterion for differentiation be ethics or rather the methods used? Best to spare us (and the Forum Staff) such classification headaches and lump all such magic together in the RHP rubric as a rule of thumb.

I have seen the term "gray magick" used. As you perhaps hint, the term---as the coloration implies---befogs rather than clarifies.

 

[Aeternus]

Psychologists talk about a phenomenon called 'morbid gain' where a sick person perversely derives pleasure and satisfaction from all the sympathy and attention he's getting from his fellow men because of his pitiful condition (my dad would have been a prime example, he would have found it hard - at first - to find other grievances to bitch about if he would have become healthy all of a sudden). Yes, there are grey areas and borderline cases but my opinion remains unchanged - if the subject is not unequivocally LHP by traditional, admittedly arbitrary criteria, it's RHP by default.

Although I wonder how to classify magic which involves entities that are said to be morally or behaviourally ambivalent like djinns or the fae, or that are known as tricksters prone to playing rough… or magic that can have both positive and negative consequences, or involves some kind of zero sum game. Should we call it 'grey magic' then? Would the main criterion for differentiation be ethics or rather the methods used? Best to spare us (and the Forum Staff) such classification headaches and lump all such magic together in the RHP rubric as a rule of thumb.

While it would essentially make a good classification, still, Grey magic in my opinion is just like swimming in a whirlpool of practice, choosing once Left Hand and then Right Path and vice-versa.

That is why I don't like the alignment with "Grey magic". You mostly can't combine certain parts of the Practice.

Demons are Demons and with all their infernal subordinates, while Angels, Gods and other celestial beings, are of the Light completely.

However, for testing purposes only, Grey Magick can be a good thing for seeing what aligns with your soul. Just don't keep doing it for too long, or else you will get into the almost never-ending whirlpool of switching paths continuously, which isn't a good thing

 

[Khoren_]

Psychologists talk about a phenomenon called 'morbid gain' where a sick person perversely derives pleasure and satisfaction from all the sympathy and attention he's getting from his fellow men because of his pitiful condition

Oh, I don't think you understand me. In a my coven, we once cursed someone with excessive empathy. We determined that it was the thing they lacked, and ultimately caused them to hurt other people, so the curse forced them to find more than the usual connection with others.

Zohar systems and Laurian Kaballah but mostly Zohar perfectly define the fact that the Qlipoth is realm to the most mind-tricking demonic spirits.

Isn't this related to the gnostic ideology that the world is ultimately evil and separates us from the divine? Or am I getting the kaballah mixed up with my gnosticism.

Post automatically merged: Friday at 9:37 PM

Grey magic in my opinion is just like swimming in a whirlpool of practice

This is also why I'm looking for something that exists beyond the current dichotomy. I'm okay with just throwing it into general for now, but it very clearly sparked something in the community to have two pages of responses

 

[Xenophon]

Oh, I don't think you understand me. In a my coven, we once cursed someone with excessive empathy. We determined that it was the thing they lacked, and ultimately caused them to hurt other people, so the curse forced them to find more than the usual connection with others.

Isn't this related to the gnostic ideology that the world is ultimately evil and separates us from the divine? Or am I getting the kaballah mixed up with my gnosticism.

Post automatically merged: Friday at 9:37 PM

This is also why I'm looking for something that exists beyond the current dichotomy. I'm okay with just throwing it into general for now, but it very clearly sparked something in the community to have two pages of responses

What I did was simply find a species of practice (via books and articles in that tradition) that spoke to me and---to some degree---worked. I did not fret myself whether it was LHP or RHP. I swear, sometimes we magi are worse than old-fashioned Catholics vs. Protestants.

 

[Aeternus]

Oh, I don't think you understand me. In a my coven, we once cursed someone with excessive empathy. We determined that it was the thing they lacked, and ultimately caused them to hurt other people, so the curse forced them to find more than the usual connection with others.

Isn't this related to the gnostic ideology that the world is ultimately evil and separates us from the divine? Or am I getting the kaballah mixed up with my gnosticism.

Post automatically merged: Friday at 9:37 PM

This is also why I'm looking for something that exists beyond the current dichotomy. I'm okay with just throwing it into general for now, but it very clearly sparked something in the community to have two pages of responses

You are mixing your Kaballah studies with Gnosticism, a little. Not essentially bad, but still, has its little errors.

Looking for something that exists behind dichotomy is a both wonderful and dangerous or not so fruitful thing. It depends what you really want to discover, if it is really worth discovering and, how dangerous and risky is the road of achieving beyond dichotomy discoveries and wisdom. Like the question goes in some types of divination: Is it a blessing, or a curse, a reward or a punishment.

 

[HoldAll]

Oh, I don't think you understand me. In a my coven, we once cursed someone with excessive empathy. We determined that it was the thing they lacked, and ultimately caused them to hurt other people, so the curse forced them to find more than the usual connection with others.

There is a magical duel scene in Terry Pratchett's "Witches Abroad" where to good witch casts a spell making the bad one see who she really is which at first shocks her to the core but then she quickly recovers saying something along the lines of "But I like who I am!"

Post automatically merged: Saturday at 9:37 AM

It seems to me that we are not really discussing the (traditional but admittedly arbitrary) Forum section divisios here but rather the inadequacy of such obsolete dichotomies like "white vs. black magic", which in itself is nothing new but still makes for interesting discussions… and what about the dreaded 'blessing in disguise' curse btw?

 

[Xenophon]

There is a magical duel scene in Terry Pratchett's "Witches Abroad" where to good witch casts a spell making the bad one see who she really is which at first shocks her to the core but then she quickly recovers saying something along the lines of "But I like who I am!"

Post automatically merged: Saturday at 9:37 AM

It seems to me that we are not really discussing the (traditional but admittedly arbitrary) Forum section divisios here but rather the inadequacy of such obsolete dichotomies like "white vs. black magic", which in itself is nothing new but still makes for interesting discussions… and what about the dreaded 'blessing in disguise' curse btw?

"Before creating a new internet forum category, one must first determine whether anything can be fitted into it."---Albert Einstein to Nelson Mandela, 8 July, 1947 (Letter on file with this poster.)