One of the most controversial topics in the arena of Witchcraft, Paganism, or other forms of Occultism is the consideration of unverified personal gnosis, or UPG. This term is defined as a vision, insight or paranormal experience which an individual experiences that is used to develop or support certain beliefs or practices without any corroborative evidence. Of course, such a definition would pretty much define a lot of the beliefs, theology and practices of most religions, occultism and magic. It would seem that the sources for practically everything that is spiritual or magical in the world was at some point originally based on unsupported or unverifiable allegations.
Science cannot prove most of the tenets of religion, metaphysics, spirituality or the occult, so that would be the ultimate kind of verification, and in most cases, it is unavailable. However, there are other forms of verification including the participation of groups or even communities of individuals engaged with a specific religion, metaphysical teaching, or occult tradition. A certain degree of objectivity can occur when groups of people have similar experiences while undergoing an extraordinary spiritual occurrence. Additionally, a form of verification can be derived if an experience agrees with written texts, sacred writings or agreed upon tenets or theology, particularly if that agreement is with doctrines that have an historical provenance. I believe that these kinds of verification are the only kinds that are available to Witches, Pagans, magicians and occultists. Does a particular experience, derived belief or visionary insight agree with what is written or accepted as a fact in a spiritual or magical context? If it doesn’t, then it is unverified.
Now, I am not saying that something has to be verified in order to be considered legitimate, since a profound personal experience is certainly authentic. However, because it is something that someone actually experienced, it should be accepted as a truth, but only narrowly within the context of that experience. If an experience such as this is later found to be backed up by something in print or discovered to be unknowingly shared by others then that experience can be cautiously put forward as a verified and supported experience. If it gets adopted by other practitioners then it slowly evolves into an article of accepted practice or doctrine. The reason why I am saying the words “cautiously” and “slowly” when talking about a vision, experience or insight becoming an accepted part of a practice is because it needs to be vetted by more than a few or just one individual before it can be considered verified. This is where authentic experience meets legitimacy within a given tradition or practice.
There is a balance between an idea or a vision in getting slowly accepted as opposed to taking everything at face value and assuming that it is legitimate simply because it is accompanied by a powerful emotional experience. This is a problem in our Witchcraft community, and I suspect that it is a problem in other occult and esoteric communities as well. For Witches, our creative endeavors have shaped what we are practicing, particularly because it is an underdeveloped religious and magical tradition. We need visions, inspirations, new ideas and new practices, but not just anything will work. There has to be some kind of validation process as well, whether that is by community consensus or by some kind of corroborative textual proof. However, some do not agree, and this has led to all sorts of half-baked and even crazy beliefs and practices being shared as truths around the various communities.
Examples of this kind of spurious activity abound, but I refuse to point them out and name any names. Instead I will use myself as an example. When I first started out on my magical path I had developed out of my fevered dreams a system of magic that I believed was the visionary and inspired Atlantean beliefs and practices, long forgotten but now fully realized. I have reams of barely legible writings with all of these types of simple magical operations cobbled together from various sources, primarily Egyptian with a lot of imaginings sandwiched between. It had no relation to anything that was being practiced, either at that time (1970's) or even previously in antiquity. It was based wholly on my creative inventiveness and visions that I had at the time.
I fervently believed in the veracity of this Atlantean magic, at least for a few years, until I found actual occult writings that seem much more interesting and realistic to me. The imaginary Atlantean system of magic was abandoned for the real thing. Still, I would have sworn up and down at the time that I had received these visions from a past life when I was an Atlantean high priest and magician. Looking at them now, they are laughably slim on actual useable occult lore and yet full of hyperbole and visionary excess. I quickly and quietly outgrew my obsession with Atlantis and my supposed past lives, and continued to grow and develop my personal system of magic based on sound occult lore and experimentation.
However, could you imagine what I would be like today if I had persisted in that belief and developed my magic in that vein, using my imagination and ignoring available occult lore while stealing and padding what I had with whatever seemed to work in terms of my egotistical pursuit of fame and glory in the public arena. We can laugh at that kind of characterization which would satirically manifest when considering such a crazy person and their mad quest.
Still, there are some systems of occultism, magic, magical orders and even traditions of Witchcraft that were created in this manner. Are they wrong headed? Ultimately, that depends on the people who follow such an imaginative, volatile, crazy and creative leader, since it would be up to them to revise a practically insane system into one that worked on a functional basis which managed to agree in part with what is practiced by other groups.
I believe that this is what happened when Doreen Valiente took on the task of revising Gerald Gardner’s vision of a Witchcraft tradition in the 20th century. What he had was cobbled together from various sources. What she did was give that vision a practical and inspired set of lore, accessible to many, and it was her work that actually started the witchcraft religious revival.
The whole point of having powerful and visionary experiences is that they ultimately need to be translated into intelligible and practical lore, whether that would be mythic poetry, artwork, theater, music, or ritual and occult metaphysics. Visions are part of another realm altogether, but in order to be truly useful, they need to be interpreted and grounded in the reality of doctrine and established practice. That will cause the vision to be diluted, and it will lose some of the power that it had when it was initially experienced. However, translation is the only way for high level visions and insights to be made available to others and subject to peer review.
This whole process of vision translation is a major part of the Hero’s journey. The vision that is translated is the boon made manifest for all to realize and use. The Hero’s journey is, of course, associated with the cycle of transformative initiation, so the stage where the boon is translated into a medium intelligible to others outside of this cyclic process is the most difficult and important step in the whole process. Because this is a natural cyclic part of transformative initiation, it would seem that the process of verification and validation is built into the process of achieving a world transforming vision and then translating it into something that is recognizable and accessible to others. One could consider that all of the world’s great religions followed this pattern.
What this means is that if someone has a powerful visionary experience and they don’t bother to translate or mediate it so that it fits into the current tenets and doctrines or is accepted as valid by other practitioners, then they have not completed the most important part of having that vision in the first place. They, more or less, have failed in their quest! This is something important to consider when seeking to popularize the results of visionary experiences. In such a situation, context is important, where the beholder makes certain that others are aware of how these insights and new perspectives came about. That they were part of a visionary or paranormal experience and that they are, as of yet, unverified by either practice or doctrine. I think that such an approach is the most ethical, but it does diminish the power of the experience.
Since my days as a prophet of the Atlantean system of magic, I made an effort to let people know if something that I have discovered or insightfully experienced was derived through a visionary experience or was the product of the conversations that I have had with various spirits and Deities. Some of things that I have been told appear to be groundless or even foolish, while others have opened doors to new practical lore or new ways of thinking about a topic. Not everything that I experience within a magical operation is prophetic, profound or pure genius. Most of it is just the debris of my magical avocation, and if it is useful, it is often only useful to me. When presenting such an idea I make certain that my colleagues know my sources and whether or not such ideas are validated, or as of yet not validated. I don’t pretend that something is a fact until I discover corroborative evidence, and even then, it is still subject to peer review and possible disputation.
I believe that this is way we should all behave when we encounter powerful visionary experiences or paranormal occurrences that impart to us new perspectives and possible lore. While the emotional investment is very high, the path of translation and validating should be equally gratifying, although requiring a fair amount of time and effort. What we don’t need in the present age are hair-brained ideas, ridiculous pronouncements or practices that are based on unsubstantiated or unverified personal gnosis. I know that such experiences can be compelling, but often what we receive under such circumstances is for our own personal consideration. Not everything that we receive from the Deities is prophetic or profound, except to ourselves, and only in that moment of divine inspiration.
Frater Barrabbas
