[Book] Thoughts on How to Pray the Rosary and Get Results

[jprussell]

After having it on my stack for a good long time, at last I got to reading How to Pray the Rosary and Get Results, recommended to me by open_space back when I first started poking at the Heathen Rosary undertaking.

Short take: some good, hands-on tips for bringing magical techniques into your prayer, but a bit short on some of the warnings I think ought to come with any use of magical techniques.

Comments

[boccaderlupo]

For what it's worth, I had been practicing sympathetic/planetary magic in the tradition of Ficino and the Picatrix, which has Christian/monotheist underpinnings despite a heavily Hellenic bent. I can't really say, then, what the impacts would be for other people. As with all things, though, I suspect "you will know them by their fruit."

There were attempts by some in the Renaissance to really distinguish between "natural" magic (simple alignment of correspondences that produced results) and "spiritual" magic (which involve spirits). This distinction was undertaken likely so as to allow magic to "pass," as it were, in Christian settings, and is less about controlling spirits (a la Goetia) than about the action of magic itself: when you're aligning those correspondences, who are the meditators of the action? After all this time, philosophically I have to say that they are (in my estimation) spirits (daimones), and therefore the disinction is spurious.

I wish you nothing but the best in all your endeavors, and Axé,
Fra' Lupo

[jprussell]

1) As with all things, though, I suspect "you will know them by their fruit."
- fully agreed there, as that's been my main lifeline in the crazy, mixed-up world of alternative spirituality.

2) Interesting, and I agree that the distinction is likely, in the end, not all that helpful - of course, I supposed whether that's a problem or not comes down to whether you think all daimones are demons (or, even if not, not a good idea to interact with for spiritual reasons), or if they're a class that includes divine and helpful spiritual beings.

Thanks very much for your well wishes, and likewise!
Jeff