Recently, Jason Miller admitted that not all of his magick works. Frater RO posted his thoughts on his blog as well. RO says all of his magick works all of the time but not always in the way that he expected. He gave credit to his Christian beliefs for this wonderful feat. This gives credit to the brush over the painting and the painting over the artist. The fallacy in the good frater's argument can be found in any Philosophy 101 course. Post hoc ergo propter hoc, before this therefore because of this. Frater RO believed in his god before his magick and then assumes his god is the cause of the effect.
Frater RO's magick works as often as Jason's no more no less. Frater RO deems magick to work when he can see an effect. Jason deems magick to work when he sees the intended effect. Neither of these need give credit to any other force, belief or faith.
My magick always works by Frater RO's definition and I am not Christian. From Jason's perspective, my magick works reasonably often and close enough more often than that. The odd thing is that the occasional dud is often illusory. I've considered some acts of magick a success only to realize their long term effects to be much greater. I've considered some acts of magick failures only to realize the magick created a seed which flowered only in the passing seasons.
So RO may give credit to his god if he so wishes. I credit the doing of the magick. Magick is a verb.
(picture from: http://media.pureprofile.com/wordpress/?cat=1)
1 comment:
Blasphemy! And I must not have made the point as clearly as intended. I perform Christian Magic, and I am a Christian. God has revealed himself to me over a period of years, and my beliefs have been formed around the sequence of revelations.
These all fit within a neo-platonic christian framework, and so I practice Christian magic. Operating within the belief system you're born to is one of the admonitions in the Book of Abramelin, and while I don't think it's absolutely necessary, I do think it helps.
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