Thirteen Points of Advice for Those Starting on the Path

The following are thirteen points of advice and guidance I'd give to anyone starting out of the path.  They aren't exclusive, there are other things to know.  And they aren't original, they are drawn from many sources.  And they are from my point of view, so should not be taken as gospel.  I hope they help some who read them.  Before getting into them, four books I'd recommend before most others, and I have a very long recommended reading list, are the following:

• Visual Magick by Jan Fries (Paperback, Kindle)
• Drawing Down the Spirits by Kenaz Filan and Raven Kaldera (Paperback, Kindle)
• Mysticism: Initiation and Dream by Andrew D. Chumbley (J.D. Holmes - US, Three Hands Press - UK)
• The Robert Cochrane Letters by Robert Cochrane and Evan John Jones (Out of print but available through Amazon)

And that being said, here are the thirteen points of advice that are my intention if sharing this:

1. Mutual respect is essential. Respect the spirits, and expect respect in return. If you don't receive it, they're out, burnt, or cut off.
2. All things have a spirit, and that spirit can be worked with and learned from. Some work with them as servants, or worship them and become servants. I prefer to work with them as partners. There is an authority in knowing you are equal with all things.
3. People (and spirits) see what they expect to see. Open your eyes, then open them again. Observe. Perceive. Understand.
4. What conceals also reveals. Look beneath the surface, both in of what your senses (physical or otherwise) tell you and what teachings, lore, and myth tell you. What they hide is as important as what they say.
5. Learn to ask the right questions. Asking the wrong question will send you in the wrong direction. There are no bad questions, but often looking at the question in the right way opens doors. And always ask the next question, don't let the answer be the end of the question.
6. When all else fails, cheat. Don't assume that the traditional way to do something, the way everyone does it, or the way you've always done it is the only approach. If it doesn't work, do something else.
7. Divide and conquer. If something is baffling or seems to be concealing something you can't quite grasp or see, break it down, look at each part of it separately, determine where something is missing, concealed, or not working, and focus there.
8. Only you are responsible for your actions and words, no one else, and you aren't responsible for anyone else's. Do what is necessary, but accept the responsibility for it. Own what you say and what you do, regardless of the consequences or what you think of them later. Don't pass blame, and don't take it on.
9. Learn from all things. All beings, objects, persons, spirits, circumstances, lore, teachings, regardless of the source or pain or issues, contain beauty, knowledge, understanding, and wisdom, and can be learned from, if you ask the right questions, look beneath the surface, and separate what has value from what doesn't. There's a saying in Hawai'i that not all knowledge is found in one shed.
10. Be willing to consider any idea, no matter how different from your own. Examine it, understand it, but don't just accept it in you process. Hold on firmly to what you know, and only change it if there is good reason to do so.
11. Everybody lies, misrepresents, and hides things. This goes for spirits as well as living humans, and all things. Never assume you are being told the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. We all speak through our filters, understand based on our experiences, hide what we don't want seen, and mislead when it will gain us something. Make no assumptions about the truth of, completeness of, or accuracy of anything you are told. This goes for what you tell yourself as well. Look deeper, examine. Observe. Perceive. Understand.
12. What is yours, you need to hold, protect, defend. As Cochrane said, "What I have--I hold!" You are guardian and keeper of what is yours. Find what that is, and keep it against the storm.
13. What you put in, you get out. As we say in computers, garbage in, garbage out. Only you control what you get from the path. No effort, no result. No danger, no gain. Victor Anderson said anything worth doing is dangerous, and Cochrane said take all you are given, give all of yourself. Huna teaches that where your attention goes, the mana goes, and Taoist thought teaches similar, where the mind goes, the chi follows. Where you focus, that's where your energy is, what you think about and contemplate, that is where you will learn. It's all about you. You hold the reins. Make the most of it.

Hope these are helpful for some.

FFF,

~Muninn's Kiss

Practical Magic

Philosophy period, whether about magic or any other subject, is essentially useless.  It's an entertaining diversion among others that enjoy it.  And it is great to confuse the masses if you are trying to create a new political system, or make people think economics is predictable.  But it's useless in practice.

When I cook, I cook by instinct and feel, "what will do what I want to do", rather than "what does the recipe say".  I understand what each ingredient is used for, and how the proportions interact, which is the theory, but when I have them there, I put what seems right.  Egg thickens, yeast rises with enough time and sugar, baking powder rises was the acid and base in it react when being cooked, baking powder rises in reaction to acid in what it's added to while rising.  Acid, especially citric acid, brings out flavour.  Salt lowers the heat of spicy food.  Honey or sugar makes a smoother taste.  But the theory isn't what matters, it's the instinct and intuition as you combine the ingredients.  Knowing when it is done cooking based on how it looks, smells, feels, rather than a timer.  If you bake exactly to a recipe written for sea level, you'll fail a mile higher in Denver, or even higher at 7220 feet above sea level in Laramie, WY.

Magic based on theory is cookie cutter magic and is lifeless and it's luck if it works.  Magic based on intuition and instinct is living and changing.  The theory helps build instinct, but it's training wheels.  Circumstances change things.  The same spell or working or charm doesn't work the same way when circumstances change.  They must be adapted and changed as the need changes.

And the best way to cook is to use what's on hand, or to buy based on what's available, especially if you can get it locally.  Look at a piece of meet, or a vegetable or a type of bean or rice.  Ask yourself, what would taste good with this?  Add that.  What would taste good with both of these?  Add that.  Build or craft the meal, don't just go by rote.

Likewise with magic.  Use what's on hand.  You don't have to order something from half way across the world that's rare and expensive and hard to get a hold of just because it's used traditionally for something or you have a description from the 1800s or 1900s describing its use.  Local ingredients, tools, and objects tend to work better for where you're working anyway.  The theory is in the questions, why does that object work, the application of that theory is to look at what do I have in my house, my yard, the areas around me, local stores, that would do the same?  Or what if I changed other things in the method so I don't need that thing?  Adapt the working to your needs, your location, what you have on hand, the purpose you are after.  If you often need something that's not native and can't find an alternative, see what it would take to grow or raise it yourself.  Start a garden for herbs and plants you use often.  If you have no place for one, look into renting a plot in a community garden (being aware of what is safe to grow there).  Get your hands dirty.  Do.  Act.  Practice.

I enjoy the intellectualism, but if it becomes the point instead of a pass time, the work doesn't get done.

My dad is a geotechical engineer and can design the best bridges, dams, and retaining walls that will do exactly what they need to do and stand up for long time without modifications. Those designs are useless if they are never built, and those building them don't need to know where the weight will be applied and where it is transferred, all they need is, place a beam here, pour concrete here, etc.

My grandpa used to say that if you're going to be a ditch digger, be the best damn ditch digger you can be.

Put action to your words.  If you commit to something, don't just think about it, put in the effort, sweat, blood, and tears.  Magic no less than anything else.

When I go to do a working, I don't worry about the theory at all, typically I just do it on the fly, with whatever is on hand.  Later, I will sometimes say, ok, why did I do what I did, and why did it work that way? As Victor Anderson said, perceive first, understand after.

FFF,
~Muninn's Kiss

The Highs and Lows of Magic: A Look at the Terms High Magic and Low Magic and Their Usefulness as Labels

There are two terms tossed around a lot in the occult, esoteric, and pagan communities, sometimes with derision, sometimes in an attempt to explain differences.  Sometimes they are used descriptively, to define what is observed, sometimes prescriptively, to try to force a designation and discourage the practice of one or the other.  As with all labels, these terms can be restrictive or insulting if used that way, or useful in understanding used a different way.  While I discourage the use of any label to restrict or insult another, I find labels useful if they are used to better understand the subject without restricting it.  You get a bit of the wave or particle issue in quantum physics.  Can you apply the label without changing that which you are applying it to?  Can you observe that which you are labeling without changing it?

For a label to be useful, we must first understand the label itself.  What is meant by it?  The labels in question here are High Magic and Low Magic.  What do we mean by them?  They can also be called Superior Magic and Inferior Magic, but these terms have even more loaded meaning due to current understanding of the terms.  Superior means "above", inferior "below".  These have taking a meaning of above or below in value or in social power or in strength, but this was not the original meaning.  I'd point out a maximum used often at both ends of the spectrum.  "As above, so below, as below, so above."  High Magic and Low Magic are different in form, and often in goal, but not in essence, not in principle.

The meanings have changed since the original usage. High/superior does not necessarily mean better or more advanced, nor low/inferior mean lesser or more savage. Those meanings can be blamed on the Victorians. Consider a similar pair of terms (and actually having the same meaning as here), High Church and Low Church.

High Church (n)
(Christianity / Anglicanism) the party or movement within the Church of England stressing continuity with Catholic Christendom, the authority of bishops, and the importance of sacraments, rituals, and ceremonies

Low Church (n)
A group in the Anglican Church that minimizes the episcopacy, priesthood, and sacraments and favors evangelical doctrines, polity, and usages.

Basically, High Church is religion focused around set ritual and ceremony, with a priesthood and hierarchy. Low Church is religion minimizing those aspects, more ab lib and unstructured, more focus on the laity and non-ritualized worship.

Same goes for High Magic and Low Magic. High Magic is ceremonial magic, with set ritual and form, passed down through structured teaching. Low Magic is the more non-structured folk magic.

Another similar set of terms is High Fantasy and Low Fantasy. High Fantasy is a fantasy sub-genre where the events or characters can't exist in what is considered the laws of physics in our world. Elements like magic, dragons, elves, etc. Lord of the Rings is High Fantasy, as are the Mists of Avalon. Low Fantasy is fantasy that fits within the "real world", usually historical with minimized supernatural elements. Both Mary Stewart's Merlin books and Stephen Lawhead's King Arthur series are closer to the Low Fantasy end of the spectrum. I'm not saying High Magic is impossible fantasy. High Fantasy is more airy, Low Fantasy more earthy. High Fantasy typically uses the fantastic elements to facilitate the story, like High Magic and High Church using ritual to facilitate the worship or magic (and there's a fine line there), often focusing on inner transformation and more abstract gains and goals. Low Fantasy typically relies less on the fantastic and more on the day-to-day of living, like Low Magic and Low Church rely more of folk belief and practice, more on magic or religion for addressing mundane needs.

High Magic is an expression of ritual form and hierarchy, not a value judgement.  Low Magic is an expression of more every-day and less ritualistic practice, not a value judgement.  While many might use them as judgement, they are useful designators of two ends of a spectrum of form within magic and occult and esoteric practice.

FFF,
~Muninn's Kiss

*Definitions from http://www.thefreedictionary.com/

On Planets and Wandering Stars...

There are few people today that don't know the planets are not stars, that they are solid or gas bodies  that circle the same star as we do, that their light is the reflection of the sun's light, not light of their own.  But in ancient times, this wasn't known.  They looked like very bright stars, but they didn't move like stars, they changed location against the backdrop over time, giving them the name planetes in Greek, Wanderers.

There were five Wanderers, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn.  Neptune and Uranus and the other bodies beyond Saturn are not easy to find if you don't know they're there, as they move against the stars so slowly and are so dim.  The sky was populated by the myriad stars, the Five Wanderers, the Moon, and the Sun.  Seven bodies that wander against a backdrop of stars.

There is a god in Greek mythology worth noting here, Astraeus.  He is the Dusk, and his wife is Eos (or, Aurora), the Dawn.  Their children are what is to note here.  The stars, the Wanderers, and the Winds.  And Eos' brother, Helios, is the Sun, and sister, Selena, is the Moon.  The connection of the winds to the Wanderers and stars is significant, but I won't address that here.

Astraeus was a Titan, god of astronomy and all things in the sky.  His either sun of Krios (the Ram, Aries, and the Pillar of the South, Aries rising in the South in Summer, beginning of the Greek year) and Eurybia (mastery of the sea, sailing, navigation), or of Tartaros (underworld) and Gaea (earth), depending on the source.

The Wanderers are often used in magic and workings in many traditions.  Anyone who has studied anything about Western Astrology will find quickly that the location of the planets against the backdrop of the Zodiac is very important in Western Astrology, both their current position and their position at the time you were born.  Ceremonial magic and much of modern witchcraft (heavily influenced by ceremonial magic and by the grimoire tradition) work with not just the location against the stars and the time of rising and setting, but with the days and hours they are said to rule.  This is the main discussion I'd like to address in this article.

Now, Grimr is founded on personal observation more than anything, so the position against the stars, and the position in the sky and rising and setting are of importance to me, but the days and hours they rule less so.  I will come back to this after we look at the details of the ruling planet system below.  Do note this is a brief summary, not exhaustive, and that I don't necessary know all the details so may misrepresent or misstate details.  So, as always, do your own research if this speaks to you, figure it out yourself and how to use it, and experiment to see how it works for you.  The below is a summary of concepts, not a reference for workings.

As I discussed above, there are seven moving objects against the backdrop of the stars, the Wanderers, the Moon, and the Sun.

The sun and moon are often focused on when looking back at ancient religions and traditions.  We often look at them as Solar Cults or Lunar Cults, and talk of the struggle between matriarchal Lunar cults and patriarchal Solar cults.  This of course breaks down, as there are plenty of cultures with solar goddesses and lunar gods.  It also breaks down as you begin to analyze the stellar elements of the "Solar" and "Lunar" cults.  But we won't go there now.

The remaining five objects, the Wanderers, are of course our subject.  We have what are today named Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn.  These names are of course the Roman names, but the choices are a bit odd, as patterns between them are missing.  Saturn was the head of the Roman Titans, Kronos of the Greeks.  He was overthrown by the Olympians, led by Jupiter, Zeus of the Greeks.  But Venus and Mars, the goddess of beauty and love and the god of war are a different pattern from the first.  And finally, Mercury, Hermes of the Greeks, the messenger of the gods.

The above description of Saturn and Jupiter was translated onto the two from Greek myth.  Jupiter was Saturn's son, but the overthrow was missing in Etruscan and Roman myth before the bringing in of Greek myth.  There are two versions, one of Saturn ruling Rome or Italy and being overthrown by Janus, the other of Janus ruling and Saturn being overthrown by Jupiter in Greece and coming to Italy as a fugitive.  In the latter, he brought agriculture with him, introducing it to Italy.  He is a god of agriculture, and a law giver, bringing order to the fauns and nymphs of the hills of Italy.  Saturn had two consorts, Ops, Greek Rhea, goddess of wealth, abundance, and resources, and Lua, goddess of destruction, dissolution, and loosening.  These show Saturn's two sides, on one side, as god of agriculture, he creates and provides, on the other, he destroys.

Jupiter is also Jove.  He was the twin of Juno, his wife, Hera of the Greeks.  He was the god of the sky, or specifically of storms.  Numa Pompilius, born on the day of Rome's founding and elected King after Romulus' death, when bad weather threatened to ruin the harvest, got Picus and Faunus to assist him and evoked Jupiter.  He made a deal with Jupiter for a shield to protect from lightening, in exchange for sacrifices.  This is a basis for the sacrificial laws in Rome.  The Ides of each month, the midpoint, were sacred to him.  This is important, as the month was a lunar month originally, and the Ides are the Full Moons.  His consort, Juno, is protector and councilor of the Roman state.  The symbolism and a shield and of protector of Rome should not be ignored.

Mars, the god of war, does have a connection with Jupiter.  The earliest triad was Jupiter, Mars, and Quirinus, later changed to Jupiter, Juno, and Minerva.  Quirinus is the Wielder of the Spear, and was later used as an epithet for Janus.  Quirinus was probably the god of war of the Sabines, the people Numa was of, who joined with Romulus and Remes' people for the Roman state.  The month of March is named for Mars.  Minerva was born of Jupiter alone, from his forehead, but Mars was born of Juno alone, using a magic flower.  March was the first month in the Roman calendar, the the first of March, Mars' birthday, was the day for honouring childbirth.  Mars is not the destructive masculine force Ares is usually seen as, but a god of military strategy, of defending of agriculture, and of plant life.  Ares is said to be the father of Romulus and Remus.

Venus is not quite the same as Greek Aphrodite.  She is, as Aphrodite, the goddess of love, beauty, sex, and fertility, but also of prosperity and victory.  There's a martial aspect to her, as with all of the above.  The connection to Roman is interesting, as myth says her son was Aeneas, who survived the fall of Troy and came to Italy.  Romulus and Remus claim descent from him, through their human mother.  She was born of sea foam, so had no parents, unless you argue Neptune to be the sea itself. Her month is April, and her day is April 1.  She is a goddess of vegetation, also a common thread above, in relation to fertility.  In some myths, Ares is her consort, in others Vulcan.  But it's interesting to note that early myths describe the planet Venus, the Morning and Evening Star, as Lucifer and Vesper.  But Lucifer was said to be as beautiful as Venus, and later, Venus is used for the Wanderer.

Mercury, the messenger of the gods, the god of travelers, boundaries, commerce, financial gain, poetry, eloquence, communication, divination, luck, trickery, and thieves.  He is the son of Jupiter and Maia.  He was mediator between man and the gods.  His feast was May 15th, the Ides of May.  The progression of March for Mars, April for Venus, and Mercury's day in May is interesting. It's easy to see his importance in Roman, as mediator.

Most of the world has a seven day week.  This becomes fairly logical when you look at older cultures.  Each Moon cycle is about 28 days.  If you measure from the Dark Moon to the First Half Moon, from the Half to the Full Moon, from the Full to the Second Half Moon, and from the Half to the Dark Moon, you find four periods of approximately seven days.  Seven becomes a natural division point within each Moon, each Month, four seven-day weeks.  There's no proof this is the origin, but there's logic to it based on observation.  Other cultures used five-day and ten-day weeks, but these have faded from use in most places.  But Western Astrology, and most Western Mystery, Esoteric, and Occult traditions, and most Western religions (including Middle Eastern) grew up in or evolved into a seven day week.  The correspondences we are discussing are within that system.

The number seven for the number of days in the week and the number seven for the seven moving objects is an easy connection. Each day became dedicated to one of these, or more accurately, named for the god behind it.  Sunday is dies Solis, day of the Sun.  Monday is dies Lunae, day of the Moon.  Tuesday is dies Martis, day of Mars.  Wednesday is dies Mercurii, day of Mercury.  Thursday is dies Jovis, day of Jove, or day of Jupiter.  Friday is dies Veneris, day of Venus.  And Saturday is dies Saturni, day of Saturn.

But our English names are based on the Northern gods, not the Southern.  Sunday is Sunnandaeg, Sunna's Day.  Monday is Monandaeg, Mani's Day.  Tuesday is Tiwesdaeg, Tiw's Day, Tyr's Day.  Wednesday is Wodnesdaeg, Woden's Day, Odin's Day.  Thurday is Thunresdaeg, Thunos's Day, Thor's Day.  Friday is Frigedaeg, Frige's Day, Frigg's Day.  Saturday retains its Roman name.  It was Saeturnesdaeg to the Anglo-Saxons.  It was Laugardagr, washing-day.

The connection is quite obvious, as the Romans looked at all cultures around them and said, this god is this one, and this god is this one.  Helios is Sunna, the goddess who pulls the sun.  Selena is Mani, Sunna's brother who pulls the moon.  Mars is Tyr, who isn't necessarily the god of war, but was seen by the Romans as Mars.  Mercury is Odin, because Odin is a god of boundaries and crossroads and passing between, of wisdom and knowledge, of poetry and speech.  He's the closest parallel to Mercury.  Jupiter is Thor, because Jupiter is the sky and storm and the wielder of the thunderbolt, and Thor is the storm and thunder.  And Frigg, we have a direct connection to the planet, as Venus was Friggjarstjarna, Frigg's Star.

Classic Astrology attributes certain aspects to the moving objects and the days they rule.

Mercury is easy.  Commerce and communication, thinking and reasoning, knowledge and wisdom.  As the god rules these things, so does the planet.  As the god moves swiftly, so does the planet.  And so Wednesday becomes the day for such activities, both in a mundane sense and a magical sense.  In relation to commerce, if we associate Wednesday with a vice, it would be Greed.

Venus is easy as well.  Love, sex, fertility, romance, relationships, beauty, pleasure.  Once again, as the goddess rules these things, so does the planet, and this translates in classic thought and much of Western magic to Friday.  Of the "Seven Vices", Friday is Lust in this way.

Mars is a bit less obvious.  It's seen as a day for force and protection, courage and aggression, productivity and determination, and the like.  The aspects related to war, not normally war itself.  The connection from god to planet to seeing Tuesday as this is obvious.  Tuesday is Wrath.

Jupiter diverges a more from what's seen as the realm of the god.  It is related to big undertakings.  Looking carefully, we can see this.  Jupiter never did anything half way.  He was showy and extravagant.  Any action was a big action.  The planet fits this well, being the largest planet.  Thursday is the day ascribed to this, and is Pride.

Saturn is seen as the start of slower, long-term things, things requiring patience and perseverance, things you can't rush.  From the planet, this is easy to see, as it is the slowest moving of the seven.  For the god, this is seen in imagery of him with his legs bound except during the festival of Saturnalia. He bides his time throughout the year until the time for his release.  We also see his consorts.  Ops, as the building of wealth takes time.  Lua, as time and waiting wears things down, leading to destruction. This is then ascribed to Saturday.  It's interesting that in much of the Western world, Saturday is a day of no work, and that it is the Sabbath in Jewish practice, a day of rest.  Saturday would be Sloth if it was one of the Seven Vices.

The Moon is seen in relation to emotions and dreams, female cycles and changes, and to domestic activities.  This is of course related to the tides that change with the moon, the change of the moon itself through its cycle, and the menstrual cycle, which is typically 28 days just as the moon's is.  This of course is the reason for the association of matriarchy and the feminine with lunar cults.  Because of the similar cycle, the association between the moon and these areas is common through much of the world.  Most moon goddesses have direct connection to these same areas, and Monday is seen as connected to them.

The Sun is seen as anything involving gaining influence over things.  The sun brings forth life from the ground in the form of plants, and is the main influence on life on earth.  Helios was very handsome and had a lot of influence on everyone because of his looks.  Sunday is seen as this day.  It's interesting to observe that Christianity sees Christ rising on Sunday, and that that is the day many dress up, as though they are attempting to impress God/Christ. I would associate it with envy, for it's a day to gain influence to get something we don't have.

I included the Seven Vices because they stuck out to me on several of the descriptions I was writing.  Moon and Gluttony are left, but I don't think they relate.  The Vices are a side point anyway.

The idea the planets could be associated with the seven days, gave rise to further division.  The day is seen as divided into two parts, the day and the night, Dawn to Dusk and Dusk to Dawn.  Remember that the planets are children of the Dusk and the Dawn.  The year is divided into twelve months (twelve moons, but the year is really closer to thirteen moons), relating to the twelve signs of the Zodiac.  Likewise the day and the night were divided into twelve hours.  The planets are mapped onto these, progressing from Saturn to Jupiter to Mars to the Sun to Venus to Mercury to the Moon.  This was seen as the distance from earth, with Saturn farthest and the Moon closest.  This rotates though, using the day as the first.  It could be seen in reverse, of the hours giving the order of the days.

So, Sunday starts at Dawn with the hour of the sun, progressing to the end of the hour of Saturn at Dusk, then the night starting with the hour of Jupiter and progressing to the hour of Mercury ending at Dawn.

Monday starts at Dawn with the hour of the moon, progressing to the end of the hour of the sun at Dusk, then the night starting with the hour of Venus and progressing to the hour of Jupiter ending at Dawn.

And so on.

These hours are seen as having the same aspects I described above for the days.  Each day (dawn to dusk) ends with the hour of the day before.

As I said, many people use these in magical workings, beginning workings or rituals or rites on an hour that relates to the purpose of the working, and on a day that relates.  These are combined when possible, either using the same planet's day and hour, or a different planet for the day and the year to combine the aspects.  This is likewise, when possible, combined with Zodiac signs, and the planets that rule them.

This has of course been used this way for a long time, and there is obviously power in it, or it would have been dropped.  Magic workers tend to be very pragmatic.  If it doesn't work, it doesn't survive.  Add to this that repetition adds power, so the more they are used, the more effective they will become.  The question, of course, is why were the days laid out in that order to begin with, an order that works perfectly with the progression of the hours.  The answer to that will give the origin of the power found in the practice.  I don't know the answer.

Back to Grimr, the main principle is observation.  I can observe that the system described above works, but I can't see the layout of it from observation at this point.  The planets don't rise and set based on that layout.  As such, I don't use this system in my practice.

But I can observe the visibility of the planets, and I've found that which planets are visible do change the flavour of the energy I work with.  Their effects are weaker than the sun and moon, and less constant than the stars.  They create tides, both physically due to gravity, and spiritually in the energies around us.  The Sun is large and pulls strong.  The Moon is close and has more direct effect.  But the Wanderers do pull, and they change the energy tides as they move.  They should not be ignored.  The stars are even weaker, but they are more constant, progressing slower, over millennia.

And these tides, the solar and lunar tides, the tides of the Wanderers, the stellar tides, all these tides and the Winds they bring, effect our lives in very real ways, they bind and loose the Threads of Fate, weaving as they go.  This can be used to create change, to step out of the direct effects of their tides.  The momentum they create can be used to strengthen and increase the effect of small changes we create. An object in motion tends to stay in motion unless acted upon by an outside force.  It's easier to create change if you work with the tides than against them.

This is a principle that can be observed.  And can be applied.

FFF,
~Muninn's Kiss

Causes, Effects, and Responsibility in the Environment and in the Craft

This morning on the way to work, there was a discussion on the radio with an environmental expert regarding caring for the environment, motivations, and causes.  The statement was made that we shouldn't worry about is climate change man made or is it mother nature.  He discussed a couple examples.

One type of bird is breeding much earlier because spring comes earlier, and people are worried, thinking the bird shouldn't have to change the breeding times to adapt.  He said there's nothing wrong.  Adaptation is natural and there's nothing to worry about.

Another type of bird lives near the polar ice cap.  It gets its food from the edge of the ice, flying out, then bringing the fish back to its young.  It is now having to fly over 100 miles each direction, and can't keep up to keep its young fed.  He said this is a problem, because it's not adaptation, but being unable to adapt enough.  He said if we value the species, we should do so because of that, not because of climate change being caused by man or not caused by man.

That was his general premise over all.  If a species or habitat or resource is important to us, we shouldn't worry about what's natural and what isn't, we should take steps to preserve it.

While I agree that is is just as dangerous to assume all changes are man made and therefore try to stop them in all cases as it is to assume all changes are natural and should be let to happen regardless of the consequences, the idea we should intervene for those things we value and let those we don't be lost seems just as dangerous.  Are we able to truly make that decision?  I've seen examples of both the first two, living in the west.

For decades upon decades, the Forest Service fought every fire that started, putting out all of them they could.  This was bad because fire is a natural way that the forest rejuvenates itself, destroying the old and dead and deceased, and stimulating new growth.  In response to the realization of this, there was a swing to a "let it burn" policy, where fires were only fought when they directly threatened buildings and homes.  This was equally as bad, especially after years of putting out all the fires.  The fires spread out of control and were disastrous.

Another example is logging in Oregon.  For years, the big companies over-logged, clear cutting huge areas and not replanting.  The small companies cut much smaller areas and replanted because they couldn't afford the fines, but the big companies found it cheaper at that scale to pay the fines than to replant.  In response, the spotted owl was found as a reason to stop logging of old growth forests (I won't go into the issues of that, as, if it wasn't the owl, it would have been something else). The results?  Small companies went out of business because they couldn't afford to replace their equipment to handle smaller trees.  The big companies could, so continued to overcut and not replant but now had less competition.  The net result was preservation of old growth, but heavier impacts on the environment as a whole and expansion of big business.

And, an example of focusing on what "we" (in this case, people not living anywhere near enough to be impacted) value is the wolves in Yellowstone.  The environment had been without that type of predator for over 100 years if not longer.  The wolves were hunted down in Canada with helicopters, some mated pairs were separated, and the wolves were dumped into an environment they weren't used and wasn't used to them.  They multipled much quicker than expected because they had a tremendous food supply and no competition or threat.  Livestock were killed and ranchers retaliated, often in horrible or unnecessary ways.  A local wolf species vanished.  Several species suffered greatly.  In short, it was a mess.

The issue is, if we make decisions based on what things we like, we will most likely make things worse.  As Cochrane said, "Do not do what you desire, do what is necessary."  We need to analyze and understand before we act.  We need to minimize our impact on the environment, both when we would harm it and when we attempt to fix it.  Yes, we need to act to save and preserve in some cases, and definitely need to cut back on the damage we do, but to subjectively save things we like and let things we don't be lost can impact things in very destructive ways.  Imagine if we said, "we don't like stinging things or spiders, so we'll less all bees and spiders die out, maybe even try to kill them off."  The impact of that would be unimaginable.  Yes, that's an extreme, but we need to be concious of the effects of our actions, regardless of our intensions.

This is true in magic and witchcraft as well.  Magic and witchcraft are the process of creating change, and those changes ripple out.  There are effects of every action, even if it's a metaphysical or supernatural action, and they don't all become obvious right away.  We need to think through our magic before doing it, observe the results, both direct and indirect, and learn from those observations for future workings.  Caution and attention is necessary, magic should not be done unthinking and without observation.  Not to say that means to avoid all workings, just to be concious of our actions and of the effects, and to take responsibility for what we do.

FFF,
~Muninn's Kiss

Discs, Coins, and Pentacles: A Look at Money and Esoteric Traditions

There's an interesting dance among the the modern esoteric, occult, and pagan communities when it comes to money that is a bit contradictory. On one hand, many in the communities believe a practitioner should never charge for their services, and a teacher should never charge their students. On the other hand, many in the community are adamant that any unauthorised reproduction of books or other material of a magic, pagan, or occult nature is the worst sin ever, that an author deserves money for every copy of their book. Often, these authors that should get money for their books are also teachers who shouldn't charge to teach, or practitioners who shouldn't charge for their services. But this seems a bit schizophrenia  Why are written teachings supposed to be paid for but charging for oral teachings anathema? Why are writings okay to charge for, but workings not? Is writing a profession but teaching or workings hobbies? I'd like to consider these things a bit.

In thinking about money, the suits of the Tarot comes to mind. While most modern decks contain wands, swords, cups, and pentacles, older decks commonly had rods or staves instead of wands and discs of coins instead of pentacles. The modern names tie heavily to ceremonial magic, of course. A pentacle for protection, a wand for directing energy and power, a sword for the masculine, a cup for the feminine. The sword is often tied to Excalibur, and cup with the Graal. Ceremonial magic then ties them to elements and understands them based on ceremonial usage of the tools, and on the understanding of the corresponding element. The pentacle becomes earth, the cup water, and the sword and wand becomes fire and air, though which is which can vary. Talking in generalities of course, as each tradition varies. But the Tarot are usually seen through these eyes.

Other modern readers use Jung's ideas and work with them as archetypes psychological constructs. Pentacles become material concerns, employment or financial. Cups become emotion and romance. Wands become intellectual and thought. Swords become action and will.

But it must be remembered that the Tarot didn't appear in Europe in a ceremonial magic context, and psychology and archetype theory developed later.

To understand the suits, a good place to look is the Three Estates of the Middle Ages, those who pray, those who fight, and those who labour. Basically, clergy, nobles, and peasants. But as the Middle Ages drew to a close, classes changed. The nobles drew further and further away from fighting, and the bourgeoisie developed. The Tarot was more a court and merchant thing than a peasant thing, and appeared in the days of bourgeoisie, so this seems a likely context to understand the it.

Looking at the suits, we can see some clear connections. A rod is probably a sceptre, the symbol of rulership, so the wands, the staves and rods, become those who rule, symbolising the governmental influence on life. A cup is the sacramental chalice, the symbol of the Church, so cups become those who pray, symbolising the spiritual and religious influence on life. A sword in the symbol of the military, those who fight, symbolising the influence of war and conflict on life. And a coin is the symbol of merchants, those who buy and sell, the middle class, the bourgeoisie, symbolising the influence of money and goods on life.

Interestingly, during that period, Mercury is used to designate trade and merchants and goods and money. Mercury/Hermes is the crosser between places, just as merchants cross between cities, between nations and kingdoms. But Mercury is never associated with earth, as Pentacles are now. Both god and planet is air, and the metal mercury. The goddess referenced for commerce was Minerva (Athena of the Greeks).

Mars was of course the god associated with fighting and wars. He is fire to most modern ideas, but he is iron, and while fire shapes iron, iron itself is a thing of earth. Iron comes from earth, and when used as a weapon, sends people back to the earth. War brings fallow fields, it's impact is on the earth itself.

Modern interpretation of cups as romance would put Venus (Aphrodite) and Cupid (Eros) there, but the cups as the Church brings a more chaste perspective. The classical image isn't that of Aphrodite and Eros bringing love and sex, but of the Vestal Virgins changed to male priests with vows. The chalice of the Church isn't a chalice of water but one in which wine becomes blood. Alcohol and blood are both more often linked to fire than water, but by their red colour (red wine is used in sacrament), and by their heat. The chalice of blood easily can be seen as the Vestial fires and the fires of Hestia.

Last we have wands, rods, staves, sceptres. We have secular authority which is rulership and royalty, government and kingship. This becomes Zeus quit easily, king of the gods. And Zeus' sceptre is a bolt of lightning, and Zeus is a storm god, and the very storm, the bringer of rain. This links wands nicely with water.

But, back to money and esoteric, occult, and pagan services. As far as I can tell, the idea that a magic practitioner's magic will only work if they don't take money for it is a very new concept, maybe originating in the Golden Dawn proviso against the use of magic to bring material wealth, as this is often associated with the pleasures of the earth, and the Golden Dawn, much like the gnostics, focuses on rising out of the physical onto the spiritual. Most records, myths, legends, and folktales concerning magic users, however, seem to describe it being a profession, their main source of income or provision, their main contribution to their communities. As far as teaching goes, apprenticeships to magic workers seems to have worked the same as other apprenticeships, in what I've read. The parents of the prospective apprenticeship bought the apprenticeship, paying the master. Definitely money for teaching.

In societies without currency, of course, payment was in goods or services, but this was true for any profession. If there's no physical money, goods and services are the only possible payment, and goods are the only wealth, as services can't be stored. Currency developed as a means to set rates and values of diverse things. The old metaphor, comparing apples and oranges is literal if you are trading them. How many apples is orange worth? How many oranges is an apple worth? You can barter, work out a deal, but what if you need 100 apples and live half a day's travel from where you will trade your oranges for the apples? How many oranges do you need to bring? Currency solves this, as it's easier to bring enough coins. Bartering was still the norm, but you bartered to sell what you could bring, then battered to buy what you needed. You didn't need to worry about exchanging between the types of goods. But the real reason for currency is governmental and religious. Taxes and offerings are easier in currency. As a temple or church or government gets large, what are they going to do with the large amount of grain or animals or whatever? Currency makes this easier, both for storing and for accounting.

Exchange of goods and services could work in our society, if those using the services of the magic user gave toward a need in response. "I'll pay your rent in exchange for delivering our baby." "In exchange for that charm for love, I'll bring groceries and come over and cook you dinner." Same for teaching, it's entirely possible to exchange. "I'll mow your lawn every week if you'll teach me every week." "I'll update your website in exchange for being taught." "I'll buy you dinner once a week and you can teach me while we eat."

In societies that didn't have a concept of trade, all things were held in common by definition, regardless of what role you served. In this case, the magic user tended to be in a role like a medicine man, or a shaman, or a priest, sometimes a governmental or military type leader as well. Basically the village doctor and preacher in one, or those plus the chief or warband leader. They provided a need, and the village provided for their needs. If the magic worker or teacher was completely taken care of by the pagan or occult community, there would be much less need to charge for services. The community would care for their physical needs, and they would care for the community's religious, spiritual, magical, and healing needs. They would teach others' their skills as the need grows and to carry on the service. The students wouldn't pay per se, the training would be part of the service in exchange for being provided for.

So there are options going back to older ideas, but why should the magic user or teacher function differently than the rest of the community? Do those in the same community that have "mundane" jobs, the programmers, the system administrators, the plumbers, the mechanics, the school teachers, the college professors, the nurses, the doctors, the lawyers, the architects, the engineers, the construction workers, the editors, the writers, and all the other professions, do all these work only for goods and services, or do they work for free, with the needs outside their profession met by the community?

Not to say it's wrong for magic users or teachers to serve for free if they choose, but why is it okay to require them to, while not requiring it of other professions? It's something to think about.

Back to the original comparison, what about writing? There's a strong reaction in the community against pirating, though a lot of it goes on. The statement made, which is legitimate, is that when a book is pirated, and distributed, the author gets no money for these, and that a writer can't survive without the income from their books, that they should be paid for their work.

Three points seem to be ignored.

The first is that resold copies at high prices on the Internet of out of print books is considered horrible, while buying them in used bookstores are trumpeted. However, neither of these, nor loaning or giving copies legally bought, give anything to author. The author only makes money from the initial sell. If one copy is sold, then passed around to a thousand people, the author makes the same thing as if one copy is bought, scanned, then passed out on the Internet to a thousand people. The first is legal and not critisized, and the second is illegal, piracy, and copyright infringement. Yet both hurt the author just as much. Not to say the second is good and should be done, but the finances of the author is obviously not relevant to what is right or wrong or good or bad.

Second, the initial question of this article, if piracy is wrong because the author deserves pay for her work, why doesn't she deserve pay for magical work or teacher-student training? Why is the same information portrayed in a book worth money, but not presented orally or privately? Esoteric, occult, and pagan traditions tend to talk a lot about oral tradition being better than writing, yet at the same time belie this by saying you should get paid for your writing but not your oral teaching.

Third, what is the purpose of publishing esoteric or occult books? Is it to provide the material to larger audiences than you can in person? Is it to cast it out into the world so a few that are meant to have it will find it? Is it for the purpose of funding your magic work and teaching? Is it to make as much money as you can?

Piracy helps the first two but hurts the second two. Same with selling copies used, loaning them out, or passing them on. So if either of the first two are your main goal, piracy should be seen as a good thing to the author, as it widens distribution beyond what traditional sales can do.

If your main goal is funding your magic work and teaching, how is that different from charging for those services? It's not as direct, true, but presumably your book is consistent with your teaching and informed by your practice. How can it be seen as a separate entity from either?

And if your main purpose is purely bringing in money, it's hard not to fall into the trap of mass production and following the latest trend. This would of course diminish quality, and doesn't seem to be something anyone serious in the esoteric or occult community would laud and encourage.

Ultimately, the question becomes, do you reject the physical world and wealth and money with it, or do you consider the physical, along with money and wealth, to be equal to the spiritual? If the first, it seems consistent to not charge for magic work or teaching, but also to provide books and writing for free, not charging for these either. This would make sense for gnostic oriented traditions, like many ceremonial traditions, mystery schools, and mystery-based witchcraft traditions. But for those that consider themselves earth-based religions or traditions that don't reject the physical, charging for magic work or teaching doesn't seem like something to fight or criticize any more than charging for books.

FFF,
~Muninn's Kiss

Cup of Life, Cup of Death: The Two Hands of the Poisoner

Ding' sind Gift, und nichts ohn' Gift; allein die Dosis macht, daß ein Ding kein Gift ist. "All things are poison, and nothing is without poison; only the dose permits something not to be poisonous." ~Paracelsus

We live in a dangerous world, but most of as aren't aware of it.  Many think the world around us is ambivalent and is a loving mother, wanting to help us, to protect us, to heal us.  But, as some put it, "our mother is red in tooth and claw."  There are as many things in this world that can kill us as can heal us, and many times these are the same.

The Online Etymology Dictionary gives this about the origin of the word "poison":

poison (n.)
c.1200, "a deadly potion or substance," also figuratively, from O.Fr. puison (12c.) "a drink," later "a potion, poisonous drink" (14c.), from L. potionem (nom. potio) "a drink," also "poisonous drink," from potare "to drink" (see potion). The Old English word was ator (see attercop) or lybb. Slang sense of "alcoholic drink" first attested 1805, Amer.Eng. 

In many Germanic languages "poison" is euphemistically named by a word equivalent to English gift (cf. O.H.G. gift, Dan., Swed. gift; Du. gift, vergift). This choice might have been aided by Gk. dosis "a portion prescribed," lit. "a giving," used by Galen and other Greek physicians to mean an amount of medicine (see dose).

You'll notice that poison comes not originally from something to kill, but from something given to heal.  The more you study herbs, the more you learn that some of the best herbs for healing are some of the nastiest poisons at larger doses.  Choose any poisonous plant.  (WARNING, SOME PARTS BELOW CAN BE DISTURBING TO READ, AND NOTHING HERE IS A RECOMMENDATION TO USE ANY OF THESE PLANTS.)

Take for example my favourite poison, aconite, also known as monkshood, friar's cap, mousebane, wolfsbane, blue rocket, auld wife's huid, helmet flower, thung (Anglo-Saxon for any very poisonous plant), and iycotonum (Greek for wolf's bane).  My herb book of choice, The Herb Book by John Lust, says this for properties and uses:

"Anodyne, febrifuge, seditive.  Monkshood preparations are sometimes used for the pains of neuralgia, sciatica, and arthritis, as well as for gout, rheumatism, measles, nervous fever, and chronic skin problems.  CAUTION:  Monkshood is among the most poisonous of plants.  Small doses can cause painful death in a few hours."  And in preparation and dosage: "Do not use without medical direction under any circumstances."

From A Modern Herbal by Mrs. M. Grieve:

"Anodyne, diuretic and diaphoretic. The value of Aconite as a medicine has been more fully realized in modern times, and it now rank as one of our most useful drugs. It is much used in homoeopathy. On account of its very poisonous nature, all medicines obtained from it come, however, under Table 1 of the poison schedule: Aconite is a deadly poison."

And:

"The symptons of poisoning are tingling and numbness of tongue and mouth and a sensation of ants crawling over the body, nausea and vomiting with epigastric pain, laboured breathing, pulse irregular and weak, skin cold and clammy, features bloodless, giddiness, staggering, mind remains clear. A stomach tube or emetic should be used at once, 20 minims of Tincture of Digitalis given if available, stimulants should be given and if not retained diluted brandy injected per rectum, artificial respiration and friction, patient to be kept lying down."

And also:

"Some species of Aconite were well known to the ancients as deadly poisons. It was said to be the invention of Hecate from the foam of Cerberus, and it was a species of Aconite that entered into the poison which the old men of the island of Ceos were condemned to drink when they became infirm and no longer of use to the State. Aconite is also supposed to have been the poison that formed the cup which Medea prepared for Theseus. (Note---Aconite and Belladonna were said to be the ingredients in the witches' 'Flying ointments.' Aconite causes irregular action of the heart, and Belladonna produces delirium. These combined symptoms might give a sensation of 'flying.'---EDITOR)"

Reading the above, you see pretty easily both how dangerous and how beneficial aconite can be.  As it was mentioned in the last quote, let's look at belladonna next.  Belladonna is also known as black cherry, deadly nightshade, dwale, poison black cherry, devil's cherry, naughty man's cherry, divale, devil's herb, great morel, dwayberry, banewort, atropa (from the Greek Atropos, the Fate who cuts the thread of a human life).  Once again from Lust:

"Antispasmodic, calmative, diaphoretic, diuretic, narcotic.  The narcotic action of belladonna can produce paralysis by affecting the central nervous system.  Not to be used without medical direction."

Grieve says:

"Belladonna is supposed to have been the plant that poisoned the troops of Marcus Antonius during the Parthian wars. Plutarch gives a graphic account of the strange effects that followed its use."

And:

"Buchanan relates in his History of Scotland (1582) a tradition that when Duncan I was King of Scotland, the soldiers of Macbeth poisoned a whole army of invading Danes by a liquor mixed with an infusion of Dwale supplied to them during a truce. Suspecting nothing, the invaders drank deeply and were easily overpowered and murdered in their sleep by the Scots."

Also:

"Thomas Lupton (1585) says: 'Dwale makes one to sleep while he is cut or burnt by cauterizing.' Gerard (1597) calls the plant the Sleeping Nightshade, and says the leaves moistened in wine vinegar and laid on the head induce sleep."

And:

"Narcotic, diuretic, sedative, antispasmodic, mydriatic. Belladonna is a most valuable plant in the treatment of eye diseases, Atropine, obtained during extraction, being its most important constituent on account of its power of dilating the pupil. Atropine will have this effect in whatever way used, whether internally, or injected under the skin, but when dropped into the eye, a much smaller quantity suffices, the tiny discs oculists using for this purpose, before testing their patient's sight for glasses, being made of gelatine with 1/50000 grain of Atropine in each, the entire disk only weighing 1/50 grain. Scarcely any operation on the eye can safely be performed without the aid of this valuable drug. It is a strong poison, the amount given internally being very minute, 1/200 to 1/100 grain. As an antidote to Opium, Atropine may be injected subcutaneously, and it has also been used in poisoning by Calabar bean and in Chloroform poisoning. It has no action on the voluntary muscles, but the nerve endings in involuntary muscles are paralysed by large doses, the paralysis finally affecting the central nervous system, causing excitement and delirium."

Once again, we see many helpful uses for this deadly poison.  One more, then we'll move on.  Foxglove, also know as digitalis (from Latin digitabulum meaning thimble), American foxglove, dead man's bells, dog's fingers, fairy fingers, fairy gloves, finger flowers, folks' glove, lion's mouth, ladies' glove, purple foxglove, witches' glove, gloves of our lady, bloody fingers, virgin's glove, fairy caps, fairy thimbles, foxes glofa (Anglo-Saxon for the glove of the fox), revbeilde (Norwegian meaning foxbell), fingerhut (German for thimble), and dead man's thimbles (Ireland).  Lust says:

"Cardiac.  Foxglove contains glycosides which are extracted from the second year's growth of leaves to make the heart drug digitalis.  Even touching the plant with bare skin has been known to cause rashes, headaches, and nausea."

And:

"Poison.  Do not use without medical direction."

From Grieve:

"Digitalis has been used from early times in heart cases. It increases the activity of all forms of muscle tissue, but more especially that of the heart and arterioles, the all-important property of the drug being its action on the circulation. The first consequence of its absorption is a contraction of the heart and arteries, causing a very high rise in the blood pressure.

"After the taking of a moderate dose, the pulse is markedly slowed. Digitalis also causes an irregular pulse to become regular. Added to the greater force of cardiac contraction is a permanent tonic contraction of the organ, so that its internal capacity is reduced, which is a beneficial effect in cases of cardiac dilatation, and it improves the nutrition of the heart by increasing the amount of blood."

And:

"The action of the drug on the kidneys is of importance only second to its action on the circulation. In small or moderate doses, it is a powerful diuretic and a valuable remedy in dropsy, especially when this is connected with affections of the heart.

"It has also been employed in the treatment of internal haemorrhage, in inflammatory diseases, in delirium tremens, in epilepsy, in acute mania and various other diseases, with real or supposed benefits.

"The action of Digitalis in all the forms in which it is administered should be carefully watched, and when given over a prolonged period it should be employed with caution, as it is liable to accumulate in the system and to manifest its presence all at once by its poisonous action, indicated by the pulse becoming irregular, the blood-pressure low and gastro-intestinal irritation setting in. The constant use of Digitalis, also, by increasing the activity of the heart, leads to hypertrophy of that organ.

"Digitalis is an excellent antidote in Aconite poisoning, given as a hypodermic injection."

And also:

"In large doses, the action of Digitalis on the circulation will cause various cerebral symptoms, such as seeing all objects blue, and various other disturbances of the special senses. In cases of poisoning by Digitalis, with a very slow and irregular pulse, the administration of Atropine is generally all that is necessary. In the more severe cases, with the very rapid heart-beat, the stomach pump must be used, and drugs may be used which depress and diminish the irritability of the heart, such as chloral and chloroform."

Once again, like with aconite and belladonna, we see smaller doses of foxglove helping, but larger doses hurting.  This holds true for most poisonous plants, but even holds for non-poisonous plants.  Take for example tarragon, a common herb used in cooking, especially in Italian food, and found in many kitchens.  I use it in all my Italian sauces and I also add it to the water when I cook the noodles.  You can find plenty of breads with it in it.  Lust says:

"Diuretic, emmenagogue, hypnotic, stomachic.  In popular use, tarragon serves to relieve digestive problems and catarrhal difficulties, as a diuretic to stimulate the action of kidneys, and as an emmengogue to promote the onset of menstration.  The tea stimulates the appetite, especially when it has been lost because of illness.  Taking the tea before going to bed helps to overcome insomnia."

Innocent, non-poisonous, right?  However, tarragon contains a substance known as estragole.  It makes up about 60% of it's essential oils.  It is found in anise, star anise, basil, bay, chervil, tarragon, fennel, and marjoram, and also in turpentine.  Studies in mice have shown the development of liver tumours from it in large doses, and the way this comes about appears to be consistent between rodents and humans.  While it's not proven it can cause these tumours in humans, studies imply it is likely.  But we're talking large doses.  The amount of estagole in the spices used in cooking, or even in tarragon tea, aren't enough to worry about.  But the point is clear.  Even non-toxic, non-poisonous herbs can be dangerous in large enough quantities.

This also holds true outside herbology and herbalism.

Take alcohol for example.  Studies have shown that a glass of wine a night can help lower blood pressure.  My mother was actually prescribed by a doctor a glass of red wine every night, as was a man I knew.  But, "all things in moderation", if you drink too much alcohol over time, it can destroy your liver.  And too much at a time can cause alcohol poisoning, resulting in mental confusion, vomiting, seizures resulting from low blood sugar, slowed, irregular breathing, irregular heart beat, dropped body temperature, stupor, coma, choking, stopped breathing, stopped heart beat.  Basically, some alcohol will help your blood pressure, increasing your life span, but too much will kill you.

Or look at caffeine.  Caffeine can increase memory, detox the liver, cleanse the colon, stimulate hair growth, ward off alzheimer's, ease depression, increase stamina, and many other beneficial things.  But too much can cause nausea, anxiety, heart palpitations, insomnia, sweating, dizziness, vomiting, and even cardiac arrest.  It takes a lot to get enough to cause the more severe of these, and is virtually impossible with caffeine beverages, but can happen.  With pills, it gets more likely, and pure caffeine, it only takes about 500mg for the moderate symptoms.  One gram would kill just about anyone.

Even water shows this.  We all know the effects of not enough water.  Dehydration can cause loss of appetite, dry skin, constipation, increased heart rates, elevated body temperatures, fatigue, headaches, decreased blood pressure, dizziness, fainting, delirium, unconsciousness, swelling of the tongue, and death (a hangover from too much alcohol is actually not the lingering effects of alcohol, but dehydration caused by the alcohol).  So, obviously, we need water.  Water makes up about 72% of our body (about the same percentage as the portion of the earth covered by water), so of course getting enough water is important.  We should drink at least 64 ounces (1.9 litres) of water a day.  But, like all things, too much water is a bad thing as well.  Water poisoning (water intoxication) is caused when too much water is consumed and leaches out or dilutes the sodium and other electrolytes from the body.  In essence, electolytes control osmosis, the process by which water, carrying oxygen and nutrients, passes through the walls of the cells.  Too little electolytes (too much water) causes an imbalance and causes too much water to be taken into the cells, causing them to swell.  This can cause all types of health and other problems.  In the brain, it can cause changes in personality, confusion, strange behaviour, irritability, drowsiness, and sometimes hallucinations.  In the rest of the body, it can cause cramping, nausea, vomiting, weakness, and sensory issues.  It can lead to seizures, brain damage, comas, and death.  Also, pure water, completely void of impurities, like distilled water, can be deadly, because it absorbs just about anything, so will leach the body of minerals it needs to function.  This is why dumping water that is too filtered into rivers can kill fish just as fast if not not faster than polluted water.

But how does all this talk of doses and poisons relate to anything esoteric or similar subjects?  By a much disputed word.  The ancient Hebrew word כָּשַׁף, kashaph, is translated in most versions of both the Christian Bible and the Jewish Torah and Tanakh as either witch or sorcerer/sorceress.  It is considered a primitive root, and all related words are derived from it, not it from any.  Some of these include כֶּשֶׁף, kesheph, only found in plural form, translated as incantations, sorceries, witchcraft, and כַּשָּׁף, kashshaph, translated as sorcerer or enchanter.  Some argue it comes from two words, kash (herb), and hapalah (using), so meant "herb user".  Kash, however, is found nowhere in the Tanakh, it seems unlikely the Lamed would be dropped from the end of the word, since it is used either as part of a root or as a prefix, never a suffix.  The Heh on the end would indicate a doer, so dropping it would could happen but would imply it being a verb, not a noun.  However, the Septuagint seems to support this meaning, as it translates it φαρμακεύς, pharmakeus.  This was translated as maleficos in Latin, which literally means wrongdoers or criminals but is generally used for sorcerers or magicians.  In English, uses of pharmakeus in the Christian New Testament are translated witch or sorcerer in most cases, matching the English translation of kashaph.  But this word is connected to φαρμακεια, pharmakeia, meaning pharmacy, the practice of making and administering medication.  This fits well with "herb user", so this implies at least at the time the Septuagint was created, the Jewish understanding of the word was related to medicine and herbolism, not wrongdoing.

Now, many claim this meaning means that the word meant poisoner, but looking back at the root of poison at the top of this discussion, we find our word poison comes from the Latin potio.  Looking at potion, we find, also fro the Online Etymology Dictionary:

potion (n.)
c.1300, from O.Fr. pocion (12c.), from L. potionem (nom. potio) "potion, a drinking," from potus "drunken," irregular pp. of potare "to drink," from PIE root *po-/*pi- "drink" (cf. Skt. pati "drinks;" Gk. pinein "to drink," poton "that which one drinks," potos "drinking bout;" O.C.S. piti "to drink," pivo "beverage").

All the words potio are related to are words for drinking or a drink.  So the Hebrew word seems to be connected to herbs, and the English word ultimately to drinking.  The use that became potion and poison both imply the mixing of herbs into something that is drunk.  There is no real way to separate the words for poison mixture from those for a healing mixture.  If the assumption that kashaph means poisoner is used, it follows that it is also a word for healer.  There's no indication of wrong doing in the word in and of itself.

Now, lets look a bit deeper at kashaph, into the letter themselves and see if we find any hints.  The word is Kaph-Shin-Pe.  Literally, Open Hand, Palm - Tooth - Mouth.  Symbolically, Potential - Change - Communication.  Now, there's some interesting details in the symbolic meanings, of communicating the potential for change, which would imply prophecy, and for bringing for the potential for change by proclaiming it, or communicating with that which has a potential for bringing change.  All these have relevance to the Craft, but they are digging a bit when the goal is the meaning of the word.  Kaph, the open hand, the potential, is the act of giving, like the Germanic words for poison, connected to the Greek dosis, a potion prescribed or given.  Shin, change makes sense, something is given to bring about change.  And Pe, the mouth, that which will bring change is given through the mouth.  This could in fact imply either poison or a drug to heal.  So that meaning does in fact fit.  The other possibility, of course, is that the giving isn't of medicine or poison to the one needing change, but an offering to a spirit.  An offering to bring about change, combined with speech, muttering, a prayer or incantation.  This of course fits the idea or a sorcerer quite well.  From the meaning of the letters, each is as likely as the other.  Or both.  In a modern context, witchcraft can include either or both of these things.

A bit more mystic, 20 (Kaph) + 300 (Shin) + 800 (final Pe) = 1120, which reduces to 4.  1120 also represents the word for dragons, the word for sought, the word for sermons or lectures, and the word for to regulate or to formulate.  Dragons, that which is sought, that which is conveyed or communicated, that which is organized and analyzed.  With the exception of dragons, these all go together nicely.  Unless, of course, dragons are the spirits or the thing being sought, communicated about, analyzed.

The reduction, of course, 4, is Daleth.  Literally, the Door, figuratively, the humble man, the poor man, whom Gimel runs after to give to.  Daleth receives, both as the humble poor man receiving from Gimel, and as the door, receiving into Beit/Beth, the House.  But our kashaph gave, it didn't receive.  It gave healing and killing potions.  It gave sacrifices and offerings.  But here, in the hidden heart of the word, we see it receive.  The right hand gives, the left hand receives.  Daleth stands on the left hand of the Tree, connecting Understanding to Severity, Binah to Geburah.  Gimel stands on the right hand of the Tree, connecting Wisdom to Mercy, Chokmah to Chesed.  Chesed is unlimited giving, Geburah is unlimited receiving.  On the surface, kashaph gives, but underneath it receives.  What does this mean?  A witch does not give to the spirits just to make them happy, it is an exchange.  Read the stories of the Fae.  Every time something was given to the Fae, something was received in its place.  And vice versa, every time something was given by the Fae, there was a price.  The witch gives, the witch receives.  An offering is given to the spirit in exchange for something.  For knowledge.  For understanding.  For wisdom.  For power.  Like Odin giving up his eye to Mimir in exchange for a sip of the well that brings wisdom.  He didn't give his eye for nothing.

But what about the other side?  The witch gives herbs or potions, to change the one asking.  What is received?  Payment of some type.  It was a profession, not a hobby.  You went to a witch for a service, you paid for that service in some way.  In the same way that the witch went to the spirits on your behalf, and the spirits received payment in some way, the witch being the Bridge between you and the spirits.  And a witch didn't poison for nothing.  It was either paid for by another to poison on their behalf, or it was done by the witch to receive something by doing so.  And remember, everything has a spirit, even the herbs that are used to heal or hurt.

There's always two sides to everything, but they're never separate.  The separation is an illusion.  The different between a healing herb and a poison herb is only a matter of use, and of quantity.  I've often talked about Yin and Yang, and this another example.  There can be no Yin without Yang or Yang without Yin.  They are the same thing, just two different ends of it.  All things can be divided into Yin and Yang, and all Yin or Yang can be further divided into Yin and Yang.  Yin creates Yang and Yang creates Yin.  Yin transforms Yang, Yang transforms Yin.  Yin is withdrawal, rest, death, ending.  Yang is advancement, motion, life, beginning.  Healing is Yang, it causes increase.  Poison is Yin, to causes decrease.  But Yang turns into Yin with too much of the herb.  Yin turns into Yang if not enough is taken.  Interestingly, too much is a Yang thing, so too much Yang leads to Yin.  Interestingly, too little is a Yin thing, so too little Yin leads to Yang.

Even a doctor uses both Yin and Yang.  Even a doctor causes healing and harm.  The Hippocratic Oath soon becomes the Hypocritic Oath, when medical practice is weighed against the prohibition in the oath  of doing harm to anyone.  If a bone was not set before healing, it has to be re-broken to set it for proper healing.  Cancer is treated by either chemotherapy (poisoning the body to kill the bad cells), or by radiation (sending harmful radiation in the area of the bad cells).  Both of these do harm, both hurt more than just the bad cells.  If a wound gets infected and isn't treated, or if a wound is too large to repair, sometimes a limb must be removed to save the person.  Harm must sometimes be done to heal.  A doctor, a physician, is both a healer and a poisoner.

There is a common description used in the occult community which I've talked about before.  Some traditions, groups, and paths are described as Right Hand Paths and others as Left Hand Paths.  The name originally came from Hindu, but has been applied in the West to many things.  In Hindi tradition, Right Hand is the following of the prohibitions, the taboos, of the writings called the Vedas.  The Right Hand practitioners are described as Vedic practitioners.  Those who deliberately and intentionally break the taboos, following the writings called the Tantras, are Left Hand.  They are described as Tantric practitioners.  There are other Right Hand and Left Hand traditions in India, but these two main ones illustrate the concept well.

The concept gets confused in the West, because it gets conflated with the Right and Left Pillars of the Kabbalic Tree of Life.  This lends to misunderstandings of both the Pillars and the Hands.  The Pillars, as I've talked about often, are the Pillar of Mercy (the Pillar of Fire) on the Right and the the Pillar of Severity (the Pillar of Water) on the Left.  Many Westerners stick with the Left-Left, Right-Right language and never understand either enough to see where it breaks down.  The main reason for this is that the Pillar of Mercy, the Right Hand Pillar, is the more masculine side of the Tree and the Pillar of Severity, the Left Hand Pillar, is the more feminine.  This is partly because Kabbalah sees male as the giver and female as the receiver (a la the penis being received into the vagina, the sperm being received into the womb).  In Kabbalah Tree of Life, above gives to below that receives, and right gives to left which receives.  Hence the feminine pillar is on the left and the masculine is on the right.  Most Westerners equate Right Hand with patriarchal religions with male head gods and the Left Hand with matriarchal religions with female head gods.  Also, many Westerners associate Lilith with the Left Hand Path and Goddess Worship and Feminism, all of which have become conflated in the West.  But Lilith in relation to the Left Hand Pillar is part of Judaism and Kabbalah, which are patriarchal with a male god. Lilith is part of the Left Hand Pillar, because she's part of Geburah, part of Severity, part of Judgement. She is seen as a punishment for sin, not as a liberator.  She kills infants and breeds demons from the semen of men from wet dreams.  Not to say this it the only view of Lilith, or the only valid view, but using her association with the Left Pillar to show it being the Left Hand Path isn't a successful argument.  Kabbalah has the Right Hand Pillar, the Pillar of Mercy as unlimited expansion, unlimited forgiveness, unlimited mercy, unlimited allowance.  It is the side of no taboos, no rules, no restrictions.  The Left Hand Pillar, the Pillar of Severity is unlimited restriction, unlimited judgement, unlimited severity, unlimited restriction.  It is the side of all taboos, all roles, all restitutions.  The Left Hand Pillar is closest to the Right Hand Path, and the Right Hand Pillar is closest to the Left Hand Path.  But, that, too, doesn't really work.  The Right and Left Hand Paths are approaches to the Divine.  The Right and Left Hand Pillars are principles of how the universe works.  There is no direct connection between the Pillar and the Paths, they are describing different things.  In our discussion of poison, the Pillars describe the effects of the herb.  Poison is the Left Hand Pillar, it restricts life.  Herbs used for healing is the Right Land Pillar, it expands life.  But the Paths do fit the Pillars when looking at the poisoner and the healer.  The Poisoner is the Left Hand Path, because he breaks the taboo against murder or harm. The Healer is the Right Hand Path, because he follows the taboo.  But the Poisoner functions in the Right Pillar, because he isn't restricted, even though the poison functions in the Left Pillar.  And the Healer functions in the Left Pillar because he is restricted, even though the healing herb functions in the Right Pillar.  As I said, things get confusing when you try to link the Paths and Pillar.  With the Pillars, ultimately, Right is Yang and Left is Yin.  With the Paths, ultimately, Right is Yin and Left is Yang.

Now, leaving the Pillars behind and going back to the Paths, we have Victor Anderson's statement, "My magic is two handed."  This is a direct response to the people claiming traditions as Left Hand traditions and Right Hand traditions.  Some have claimed Feri to be a Left Hand Path.  With that statement, Victor declared it to be both, and neither.

There is a saying heard passed around in the occult community.  It is used in direct opposition of the often quoted line from the published version of the Wiccan Rede, "Eight words the Wiccan Rede fulfill, An it harm none do what ye will."  The saying is, "Who cannot hex cannot heal," or, "A witch that can't hex, can't heal."  This statement, while mostly used to separate from Wicca, outlines an underlying truth, which I've pointed to in different ways above.  The difference between healing and hexing is intent.  In essence, they are the same thing.  It's the same energy, same techniques, same processes, whether you're helping the person or hurting them.

This can be seen with blessings and curses.  A blessing is only a blessing if it gives what the receiver wants or needs.  A curse is only a curse if it gives what the receiver doesn't want or need.  Take for example healing, whether as a doctor with modern medicine, as a herbalism with herbs, or with a magical method with energy.  There are two ways to heal, with blessing or with curse, with creation or destruction, with help or harm.

The first is the route of blessing, doing something to help, strengthen, grow, a Yang approach.  This is seen with steroids, with stimulate the body to do the desired thing, to heal, to strengthen, to fight off bacteria or virus.  It is seen with vaccines, used to increase the body's immunity before the sickness.  It's seen with vitamins and minerals to increase health.  The goal is to increase the good, thereby combating the bad.  It can be seen in magic to help an enemy to get a dream job elsewhere to remove them from where you are.  It can be seen in me giving the dog a treat to get her to leave the cat alone.

The second is the route of cursing, doing something to hurt, to weaken, to shrink, a Yin approach.  This can be seen with antibiotics, a medicine given not to strengthen the body, but to kill the bad bacteria.  Too much, of course, will kill the good bacteria in our body to the point of causing more problems.  It is seen with chemotherapy and radiation treatments for cancer.  It is seen in amputating an arm to save the body.  It can be seen in a spell to make an enemy lose their job, forcing them to leave.  It can be seen in me grabbing the dog and putting her in her crate to get her to leave the cat alone.

An example of a blessing that's a curse is the much over-quoted Chinese proverb, "May you live in interesting times."  A curse that's actually a blessing would be for someone unhappy in there job and needing to move on, making themself miserable, but unwilling to leave out of fear and not wanting the change, to curse them with losing that job.

Back to witchcraft, all magic in my experience is either blessing or cursing, or to put it another way, all magic is loosing or binding.  For binding restricts.  It holds something back, reduces something.  It is Yin.  Cursing is binding, it's magic that reduces the options, it takes something away.  Loosing releases.  It allows motion, gives choices, expands possibilities.  It is Yang.  Blessing is loosing, it's magic increases the options, it adds something.  I see all magic, in all its forms, as loosing and binding the Threads of Fate.  These Threads tie us all together, and tie the past to us, and provide our options for the future.  When you bind, when you curse, you tie two or more Threads together, restricting the possibilities in the future.  When you loose, when you bless, you untie some Threads, allowing for more possibilities in the future.  Sometimes less possibilities is really a blessing, because we can't make any mistakes, and sometimes more possibilities is really a curse, because it can remove some of the protection we have.  When you nail down your property, this is a binding, it restricts the possible futures where you lose what is yours.  This is done for protection, is a major form of protection, actually.  The loosing of that removes the protection.  But that protection also restricts your options.  You *want* to loose those bindings if you want to sell your property and leave that place.  When you nail down the property, you are also nailing yourself to that place.  You are bound to it and it to you.  For good or for bad.

Magic is like poison.  Or, more accurately, like a poisonous herb.  It can be used to heal or to kill, to help or to harm.  It is both a healing draught and a poisoned chalice.  The witch or magician is both healer and poisoner, but for themselves and for others.

This brings to mind Shani Oate's article, the Poison Chalice, in her book The Star Crossed Serpent II: The Clan of Tubal Cain: The Legacy Continues: Shani Oates (1998-Preset).  She talks about the Graal in its evolution as the Chalice, and the contents as the draught of immortality and as the poisoned elixir.  This leads us to the ecstatic rites of Dionysus, with it's orgies and horrors, of extremes of life and death, of sex and murder, of tearing and ripping and blood, drinking from the cup of Dionusus.  Of Cerewyn's Cauldron of Inspiration, the draught within her cauldron which Gwion, her servant, accidentally sipped, and, after she ate him after a shapeshifting dual, becomes the bard Taliesin, the greatest Bard Wales ever knew.  This brings to mind Bran's Cauldron of Rebirth, Mimir's Well of Wisdom, Miriam's Moving Well, Urth's Well of Destiny, Jacob's Well, the Roaring Cauldron, Odin's Mead of Poetry.  Magic is a poisoned draught, a strong poison.  Some can handle it and not die.  Some can handle it enough not to die but are harmed by it in a way that can never be healed, driven insane.  Some drink of it and become poets.  It's like the Devil's Seat; if you spend a night on it, you will return dead, mad, or a poet.  This is the poison of magic.  And Witch is both Poisoner and the one poisoned, but also both Healer and the one healed.  As Cochrane put it, the Hunter, the Hunted, and the Roebuck in the Thicket are one.

What heals us can also kill us.  What kills us can also heal us.  The poisonous herb can be the most potent healer.  The best healing herb can be the most deadly of killers.  The cup that heals us, the Cup of Life, is also the cup that kills us, the Cup of Death.  There's a reason all initiation involves Death.  There is no rebirth if there is no death first.  There is no Yang if there is no Yin first.  Change requires both creation and destruction, both life and death, both healing and hexing, both nourishment and poison.  The path of Witch is one of dangers and delights.  It both heals us and poisons us, with each sip from the cup.

The Poisoner stands before us, a Cup in each hand.  Do we drink of the Cup from Her Left, or the Cup from Her Right?  Does one give life and one give death?  Is one a healing drought and the other dread poison?  Is there a difference?  We must drink.  Which will be choose?

FFF,

~Muninn's Kiss

Salt of the Earth

There is a term often used in this part of the country and other more rural areas of the US.  We describe certain people as salt of the earth.  A quick search online doesn't return this use at all, yet it is the way I've heard it used the most.  The closest I can find is a definition of "Those of great worth and reliability." (http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/salt-of-the-earth.html)  This appears to be the use of the phrase in the UK, and is stated as coming from Chaucer's usage in the Summoner's Tale.  Read in context, Chaucer's usage seems tongue and cheek.  The lord in the tale is sincere, using it the way the definition above describes it, but the narrator, the summoner, seems to intend it to be an insult, not at the friar in the tale, but at the friar in the party with the summoner, who had just told his tale.

The phrase comes from Matthew 5:13 in the Bible, from the Sermon on the Mount, "Ye are the salt of the earth: but if the salt have lost his savour, wherewith shall it be salted? it is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men."

The way we use it, while coming from the Bible verse, and being related to Chaucer's usage, has grown to indicate much more than either of these.  "Salt of the earth" doesn't just mean someone who is worthy or reliable, it implies someone whose whole life can be described that way.  It is someone who does "honest work", usually someone who works the land, like a farmer or a rancher.  This implies a hard worker.  It is someone who isn't young, though not necessarily old, who has devoted their whole life to working the land.  This implies commitment and persistence.  It is someone who is honest in every way, for whom a hand shake is binding, someone who would never cheat anyone in a deal, would lay everything out on the table, would make sure all the facts were known before accepting an offer, but also shrewd and cunning in negotiations, getting the most they can out of the deal without falsely representing anything, a good bargainer.  So, honesty, integrity, shrewdness, cunning.  Someone who keeps their word and vows, someone who will never go back on their word or cheat on their spouse, and always repays their debts to the best of their ability and accepts the consequences if somehow they can't, who would never run away for trouble and hardship. So, once again, integrity and commitment, but also humility and forthrightness.  Typically, it's used to describe a "good Christian man or woman", in terms of someone that embodies what was believed to be an ideal Christian in the early 1900s, which includes all the above qualities, plus love and hospitality and generosity.  "Down home country folk", rural, hardworking, honest folk.  Those who provide to the people of this nation the stuff of life, grains and vegetables, meat and dairy.  Family owned and operated ranches and farms.  Rising early before the dawn to get chores done and animals fed.  Large breakfasts and suppers (not lunches), and small dinners, going to bed early.  Of course, all these are stereotypes and ideals, but these are the things the term has come to represent.

As an example, when the Squirrel Creek Fire threatened many ranches about 30 miles west of Laramie, the fire fighters and other workers from out of state were shocked at the response they got.  I was not, I was shocked that it wasn't that way other places, giving them reason to be shocked.  They went to the ranches to ask them to evacuate.  Almost all agreed immediately, which surprised the people from out of state.  They said in other places, most people needed convincing.  Here, they responded with, of course.  We'll get our livestock ready and get out real quick.  Would you like some breakfast or coffee before you leave?  No?  Ok, well, once this is over, come by and have some coffee and we'll talk and you can relax.  Thanks for coming by, thanks for the work you're doing.  If you need water to fight the fire, use our water rights (which is a huge thing in the West, for those not familiar; people have died over water rights, and there is no bigger field for lawyers to specialize in that water and mineral rights).  If you need to build fire blocks, go ahead and use bulldozers on our land, we can restring fences as we need to, fighting the fire is more important.  Ranch after ranch, the same thing.  That is "salt of the earth".

So, what is salt?  Scientifically, a salt is any ionic compound that is formed from a reaction of an acid and a base that results in a neutral compound.  Not too helpful for those not already familiar with this definition.  An "ionic compound" is compound held together by ionic bonds.  An "ionic bond" is a chemical link between two atoms that is caused by an electrostatic force resulting from opposite charged ions.  Okay, keep getting deeper here.  An ion is an atom or molecule that has lost or gained one or more electrons, resulting in a positive or negative charge.  So, in an ionic bond, we have one atom that has lost an electron and another that has gained one.  Electrostatic purely means they are held together because of their charge, so we've accounted for that.  So, in a salt, what we have is an acid and a base coming together and reacting.  During the reaction an electron moves from one to the other, and the resulting unbalanced charges holds the two atoms together, resulting in a salt.

The salt most people think of is Sodium Chloride, commonly called table salt of rock salt.  This is what people use on food, and the salt most commonly used in both folk practice and religious practice world wide.  It comes from two sources, but ultimately one.  It is obtained either from salt water (usually sea water, but also some lakes like the Dead Sea in Israel/Jordan, and the Great Salt Lake in Utah) or from rock deposits.  I say ultimately one source, because the salty water bodies are salty because of water leaching salt out of rocks and washing it down the the body, so seas and lakes get their salt from rock deposits ultimately.  Of course, salt is formed by sodium and chloride in water reacting, so the rock deposits are created by water ultimately, so chicken and the egg here.

Now, "salt of the earth" is of course an interesting phrase.  Is it referring to salt that comes from the earth, or to having the effect on the world that salt has on food?  In the Greek in the use in the Bible, it says ΤΟΑΛΑϹΤΗϹΓΗϹ (there were no spaces or punctuation in the original Greek), to halas tEs gEs.  The sigmas on the end of "hala" and "gE" purely mean they are singular nouns.  "to" mean "the" and "tEs" means "of the".  "hala" does in fact mean salt, specifically salt used to season food, salt sprinkled on sacrifices, saline fertilizers, salt shared between two people, and speech that controlled and consciously intended to be polite. "gE" is the same word we usually pronounce as Gaea.  But Gaea and gE are not the world we live *in* but the world we live on.  It's used for arable land, for ground we stand on, for land as opposed to sea, as earth as opposed to heaven (ouranos, Uranus, as in the expanse of the sky), as the inhabited earth where men and animals live, as in the land enclosed in fixed boundaries as a country.  (Interestingly, "wasteland" is eremos, meaning lonely, desolate, uninhabited, desert, wilderness, uncultivated land, deserted, and is not gE, is not Gaea, who is only the inhabited and arable regions of earth.)  The second possible sense I started with, the world as a whole, is actually usually ouranos, not gE.  So we are talking about the salt of arable, inhabited land, the salt of fertile land.

Now, back to the chemical explanation of salt, we have a reaction between two opposite forces that ends in a strong bond.  Consider the use of salt as shared between two people to show a bond between them.  This is not based on the chemical structure of salt, obviously, because it would have been unknown when the custom developed.  What would have been known?  This ritual is more than just seasoning your food, it represents an unending bond (whether in reality it is unending or not).  Why salt?

Looking at the other uses for the word, obviously not as fertilizer for already arable land, as that implies a repeated process.  So that only leaves two things in the list above, season of food, and sprinkling on sacrifices.  The second is interesting, as a sacrifice obviously isn't lasting.  It seems to imply the same ritual as sharing salt, that you sprinkle the salt on the sacrifice to share salt with the god in question, to form a lasting bond and agreement, just like with a person.  But what about seasoning food?

Season.  The English word we use to understand this use currently means "to improve the flavour of by adding spices", and has since the 1300s.  But is comes from the Old French word assaisoner, meaning "to ripen, season".  We still use that sense, though not as often, for curing meat.  This Old French word comes from the root we get the noun season from, seison or saison, meaning "to sow", from the Latin sero.  This lent the sense of the changing of the seasons. So to season meat is to let it cure for a time.  This implies seasoning food with salt not being the prinkling on for flavour but the use of salt in curing meat, to preserve it.  To make it last.

So the ritual of sharing salt to form an alliance or cement a deal and the sprinkling of salt on a sacrifice for the same reason both seem to be connected to salt's ability to preserve. It's uncertain how this ability was discovered, but salt does so through the process of absorbing the water out of bacteria and other microorganisms keeping them from interacting with the meat, hence spoiling it.  Salt absorbs.  This is the other use we see in ritual and folk magic contexts, the use of salt to absorb, either to become a carrier for what we want, or to aid in the removal of what we don't.  This absorption would have been observed along with the preservation, because they really are one and the same.

Now, once more, back to the chemical explanation.  There's a principle in folk magic across the world that applies very obviously here.  It's that the surface appearance of something reflects its inner nature, and vice versa.  So, by observing what we can see, we can identify what we can't see, and by changing what we can see, we can change what we can't see.  Salt, seen to preserve and being therefore connected to lasting bonds, does reflect this at an molecular level, for the ionic bond that holds salt together is very very strong, and it is very difficult to break it back apart again.

The absorption, however, is actually the opposite of what it seems.  Salt does not absorb anything on a chemical or physical level, it is absorbed.  What happens with curing is that the salt on the surface of the meat contains a bit of water, or, more accurately, the water on the surface contains so much salt that is is undetectable.  The way osmosis and cell membranes work is that the water in the cell flows toward this super concentrated salt water, trying to delude it.

On a spiritual or magical level, these same things apply.  Salt does preserve, and does so the same way. When used to preserve (this includes using it for protection by sprinkling it across a doorway or using it for a protective circle around you), it doesn't repel the bad things, including negative energy and curses, it draws them in.  Think of it as ultra-salty bad water.  It draws the other bad stuff to delude it down to an equal amount of salt outside and in, so it draws the negativity and curses around the salt, keeping it from you.

Same for using it to absorb.  It doesn't really absorb, it holds the thing you put with it to it, it dissolves itself in it.  And works quite well for that.

Back to the salt of the earth.  We still haven't truly defined which way this means.  Obviously, people who are salt of the earth aren't salt of the sea. But is it a description for them coming from the earth, or of them preserving and holding the earth?  Are they a product of the earth, or an agent working on the earth?

I would say both.  They do come from the earth.  These are people that have lived on and depended on the land all their lives.  Their food comes from the land, their water comes from the land, their shelter comes from the land.  They depend day in, day out on the land.  Just like their crops or their animals.  They are as much a product of the land as the livestock and produce is.

On the other hand, these are people putting their attention and intention toward the land and the weather that controls the land.   These are people pouring their energy and power into the land.  There's a song by Rich Mullins called First Family, which really shows this, and is what I think of when I think of the farmers and ranchers:

Talk about your miracles
Talk about your faith
My dad he could make things grow
Out of Indiana clay
Mom could make a gourmet meal
Out of just cornbread and beans
And they worked to give faith hands and feet
And somehow gave it wings 

What comes forth from the ground is a partnership between the earth and the salt of the earth.  The salt, like the salt discussed above, pulls life up from the earth and around them.  Osmosis.  Salt of the earth.  And this process preserves the earth, for the rancher or farmer will die with the land if the land is over worked or not treated right.  The salt and earth are one.  The farmer and the land are one.  The rancher and the land are one.  The King and the Land are one.  Kether and Malkuth.  In a very real way, it's the vitality of the farmer or rancher that keeps the Land from being the Wasteland, Gaea from being Eremos.  Just like the Fisher King.

And so who are we, as Witch?  Are we the salt of the earth?  Do we work with the Land, work with the spirits, to produce what we need and keep it and them alive, or do we enslave the Land and spirits?  Are we the salt that is saline fertilizer, or are we the salt that too much kills the land?  How do we approach our practice, as partners with the spirits or as conquerors?

FFF,
~Muninn's Kiss