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Underground > Temple >

As an experienced person, (how) Would you explain magic to someone who knew nothing about it?

All Acting Regiment

19:44 / 27.06.03

Would you keep it all a secret? Have a test to see if they were ready to know? Eh?

And if you were explaining it, what method would you use?

Spyder Todd 2008

19:51 / 27.06.03

If they seem moderately interested in it, I'd tell them that it;s everything. Everything is in fact magic. And anyone can do it, if they try. I'd tell them to read some books if they want to know more, and I'd turn them loss on Barbelith.

Who's your Tzaddi?

14:41 / 28.06.03

Take the red pill.

Tryphena Absent

15:37 / 28.06.03

Well obviously I'd throw a knife at someone and wait for them to put their psychic, telekinetic shields up to stop the thing.

And when they'd done so I would transfer all known information to them telepathically.

Spyder Todd 2008

17:27 / 28.06.03

Anna, you're a dangerous girl, you know that?

17:43 / 28.06.03

Ooh, Anna...talk about you direct transmission!

That's one way.

01:15 / 29.06.03

I went on about this briefly in another thread (which effectively put a stake in the heart of the conversation, but there we go), but what are we talking about when we say magic? Forget this person who knows nothing about it (unless this is going way off topic, if so, I apologize and will retreat), how are we explaining magic to each other? Is magic the attempt to contact and intigrate with the Godhead? The dealing with paranormal spirits? The Frazerian laws of association and sympathy? A Jungian way of dealing with subconscious archetypes and concepts? The underlying linguistic structure of religious cosmologies? I sortof get the impression taht people are on the same page on this board when they talk about magic, as the word is bandied around with a good deal of impunity with the apparent assumption that people know what's being talked about, but I'm not sure which page this is? Is there a working definition that people have agreed on in order to facilitate discussion? What are people's assumptions when the word magic comes up? Sorry if I've led this thread to a bloody death as well. Feel free to talk around me.

17:25 / 29.06.03

Well, I'd say magic can be all of the above. It's a big term, like 'religion' or 'science' or 'art', with all of which it has some things in common.

How to explain it?

1) Ask them what they desire.

2) Draw a sigil for this.

3) Tell them to go, focus their attention on the sigil in an ASC, then destroy it.

4) Next time they ask what magick is, just go 'I dunno. You're a magician; you tell me.'

5) Duck.

20:31 / 29.06.03

Sorry if I'm flogging a dead horse here, but saying "magic is all of the above" doesn't seem particulairly helpfull, really. If magic is a category unto itself like religion, there still are perimeters you can cast around it. Otherwise discussion on "magic" in general is almost completely useless. We can discuss aspects of magic (the above mentioned sigal magic, for example), but to say that if you understand sigal magic (which is fairly simple, sympathetic wish fufilment), you understand magic seems imposibly reductionairy. I don't mean to sound either pedantic or hostile, and I realize the argument could be put up that i'm wanting to define the irrational (which magic isn't, percisely, or at least not from a Frazerian, Enochian, or Hermetic sense of the word. Which once again accentuates my problem). I'm not asking really for a consensus on definitions here, but a general idea about what directions people are coming from when they use the word magic. (Which probably means this belongs on another topic post, though I have no idea how to move it.)