tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6817682567561164198.post8775826414844915388..comments2024-02-20T09:54:37.105-06:00Comments on Talking About Ritual Magick: Evocation - Purists vs. Modern EclecticismFrater.Barrabbashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11689013897789072360noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6817682567561164198.post-31408917142028340142011-03-04T01:45:03.052-06:002011-03-04T01:45:03.052-06:00Fr. B., your sketch of what reconstructing a past ...Fr. B., your sketch of what reconstructing a past form of magic would require is lovely. It puts me in mind of a short story by Jorges Luis Borges called "Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote", in which a young literary type sets out to write a few pages from Cervantes' "Don Quixote" word-for-word, without ever having read the book himself! He does this by minutely studying Cervantes' life and trying to put himself in a precisely analogous life-situation (though of course, without being able to transport himself to early modern Spain). The real joke arrives when the character accomplishes this paradoxical task, for the words, penned by this new author, now express different sentiments, different colours of meaning, and different flights of emotion to the original words of Cervantes, <i>though they are precisely the same words</i>.<br />I guess in the same way, the 'meaning' of a Renaissance ritual performed today, even if done perfectly, would be different to the 'meaning' of the original ritual.<br /><br />Borges' little parable is a farce on writers and literary critics disappearing up their own bums through pedantry and pontification. Your humour, similarly sharp, stands as a grave warning to another breed of pedant and would-be pontiff.Ben Whitmorehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13956579362050671872noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6817682567561164198.post-87683572466703791282011-03-02T17:08:24.833-06:002011-03-02T17:08:24.833-06:00It doesn't surprise me to see old comments on ...It doesn't surprise me to see old comments on my blog anymore. When I have looked at usage in the past, I could see people reading 150 posts in a day. You could tell it was the same person as anything older than a few weeks only had one hit. Also, some titles attract web searches. One of mine mentions the Tribe of Dan. That is one of my all time most popular posts. Not because it is any better but because of the title.<br /><br />BTW, I did respond to your Pantheacon question on my blog today. http://doingmagick.blogpost.comRoberthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10144040453666802786noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6817682567561164198.post-77904180749910334192011-02-27T17:17:20.854-06:002011-02-27T17:17:20.854-06:00@Morgan - did this person have a problem with spel...@Morgan - did this person have a problem with spelling and punctuation? That would certainly clinch it. @Ananael - Thanks. Modernism does also include modern science and its various contributions. I was responding to the specific criticisms posted against me.Frater.Barrabbashttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11689013897789072360noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6817682567561164198.post-39113206736002225472011-02-27T16:56:51.509-06:002011-02-27T16:56:51.509-06:00The other day, I got a comment in an old post abou...The other day, I got a comment in an old post about Joseph Lisiewski’s book (I was commenting about something from one of the reviews that had been posted) calling me a New Ager and wishing me happiness in my materialism. (And when the moderation hit on the blog, they posted the exact same comment under a different user-name. Makes me wonder if there is a JL fan running around badmouthing everyone that said something negative about this book.)Morgan Drake Ecksteinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09258538066497554895noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6817682567561164198.post-82649519685666813242011-02-27T11:22:24.737-06:002011-02-27T11:22:24.737-06:00A big part of "modernism" is the use of ...A big part of "modernism" is the use of the scientific method - that is, empirically testing whether or not particular techniques work and how effective they are. This is precisely how one syncretic rituals are developed - you put components together, test them, and if the particular combination works well you keep using them. I have a hard time believing that anyone who advocates abandoning that method in favor of some sort of scriptural dogmatism regarding the old grimoires will ever become a particularly competent magician.Scott Stenwickhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12389664381513219613noreply@blogger.com