The Cauldron: A Pagan Forum

That's what I suggested, though. Why am I more depraved and morally bankrupt than you are? :p I promise you that I'm asking in all amusement and curiosity. Though this



partially answers it for me because as an inner alchemist, explosions are the best part because that means something is getting somewhere else very very fast.



To the title question: yes, philosophies are wildly irreconcilably and inseparably SO VERY different that I almost never know what two magicians are talking about anymore. There are so many more other magics than the type that you've been reading about, PrincessKLS.

 


Okay so there some good books and websites on those other magicks and philosophies. Recently I got some interesting Llewellyn books. One has a background of fairy tale lore with spells, another is a datebook. But I get that Llwewellyn is Wiccan, however, in his books he doesn't across as dogmatic or so that's a "no-no" spell.

Okay so there some good books and websites on those other magicks and philosophies. Recently I got some interesting Llewellyn books. One has a background of fairy tale lore with spells, another is a datebook. But I get that Llwewellyn is Wiccan, however, in his books he doesn't across as dogmatic or so that's a "no-no" spell.

For Ceremonial Magic type stuff, you might look at this thread.

"He"?  Llewellyn is a publisher, not a person.

(Do you mean "The Llewellyn Witches' Datebook", which is compiled from multiple different authors?)

 

Oh yes.

I always felt like they were tied together. Especially you grow up in a conservative Christian denomination.

 
But this suggest that only people who are dogmatic have ethical standards, which is clearly not true

Ethics can come from many places and it's a mistake to think they only come from bad sources of dogma.

I personally understand the irritation at how-to books that spiral into why-not-to if it claims to be a how-to, if it's not written by my mother or the clergy of my faith but someone who condescends to presume that either nobody taught me Right From Wrong or I wouldn't figure it out myself.

The OP's main concern seems to be not where ethics come from, but where they get to, and if a declaration of ethics gets between the OP and the goal, then the question becomes, "Which culture/philosophy will just let me do the thing already??" Or, not "let" so much as guided through the procedure to do the thing. So, it's accepting the security provided by the practices of a culture but rejecting the inevitable ground rules to ease the challenges of coexistence within that culture. (PrincessKLS, correct me if I'm mistaken in reading this.)

I think the matter is the OP wanting only the procedural part of magic, but somehow tying that to ethics, resulting in pursuing spaces inevitably conducive to generating and articulating ethics...and then complaining about all the ethics in here. That's just as irritating as how-to-but-here's-why-not to a 10/90 ratio.


Ethics do vary not only between individuals and groups, but over time as well. There's apparently an avenger-deity of unrequited love, Anteros, which I think is strange because it's not as if it's morally wrong and vengeance-worthy not to return romantic love.

...African "Witch-Doctors", while primarily using their knowledge to heal and protect, have no strictures against going on the attack, and no "laws of return".  ...

What's an African "Witch-Doctor"?