Saturday, October 29, 2011

Annual Ancestor Time

For those of you who want to either kick off the beginning of your new relationship with your Ancestors OR for those who are looking for a simple way to make them happy, try today since it is Saturday, closest day to Samhain, All Souls day & Day of the Dead.

The Shrine Itself

Use a box, crate, card table, buffet, shelf or wherever you have space handy. It's a shrine, not a working altar. Drape it with a plain white cloth. You can use black if need be but white is the traditional color of the Dead.

The Offerings

Give your Ancestors their favorite foods, coffee, hard liquor, wine, beer/ale, cigars/cigarettes &/or smoking pipes (w/pouch of tobacco), candy, flowers (white carnations or Lilly's work well), non tap water (spring, rain), photographs of newly deceased family members, trinkets (favored lighters, combs, brushes, whatever) and so on. Just present the items to the Four Cardinal Points with a plain white tea light candle.

Interacting With Your Ancestral Shrine

Simply sit and talk with your Ancestors. Tell them what's going on in your life. Read them news articles from the paper. Inform them of what's going on in the world today. Tell them of your achievements (however small or insignificant they may seem) as well as your losses or failures. Tell them of your future plans, ideas, inspirations.

Feel free to tell your Ancestors to come to you in your dreams and talk with you anytime they feel moved to do so. Remember, this is about building (&/or maintaining) a relationship with your Ancestors more so than it is to do any sort of working.

But I Didn’t Like My Family When They Were Alive

Really? Well no one said that your family has to be on par with the Waltons for you to form a strong bond with them, did they? Family is family. We can choose our friends but not who we’re born into, right? When you’re dealt lemons, make lemonade.

When I tell folks to make amends with their Ancestors - parents, grandparents, aunts/uncles, cousins, siblings, all I usually hear is whining, resentment & downright anger at this notion.

“My aunt Judy was a horrible person while alive! Why should she give a rat’s ass about me after she’s dead?”

First off she will because Death changes people. It’s not final nor is it true entropy. Our souls & Spirits live on. There’s time to think, process & figure out our mistakes in life. Secondly, your other Ancestors will encourage her to make amends with you so you have to try to big about it & do the same in return.

There's a foolish misconception that some McWiccans & CM's have been passing around for years that if Uncle Joe was a rotten turd while alive, then he is so once he's dead. Says who?

Death is a time of CHANGE and that's not just a physical change but also mental one as well. Hello? It changes ones perspective. A lot of people leave this world feeling self-righteous but once over on the other side, they want to make amends so they can rest or move on. Give them the chance to do so.

If you notice, this is also about helping YOU change not just helping Cousin Abe to rest. It’s a symbiotic opportunity to mend things between you. Yes I know many family members may have done heinous things. Okay if you are unable to forgive them, then that is your choice.

I understand that you may have been sexual raped by a family member(s) and yes that would be very difficult to forgive. Okay do not place that family member onto your Ancestral Shrine. Reserve their space for other Ancestors who are worthy.

But I’m Adopted!

So what? Consider yourself fortunate because you now have not one but TWO lines of Ancestors who care about you!

Your adopted family’s ancestors would care for you. Why? Well you have been ‘adopted’ which means in this instance brought into the family. You’re now one of them and they will fight for you just as if you were a blood relative. Doubt me? Try it. See for yourself. Put photos of your adopted family’s ancestors on your shrine.

Then you also have your blood relatives that you don’t know BUT they know you! How? You carry their blood, their very DNA in your veins & body. They know who you are, where you are & who you’re with.

The way to make contact with them is simply to say something like, “Ancestors! I do not know who you are because I was adopted and therefore do not know your names. Please come & tell me who you are in my dreams so that I can know you!”

Then pay attention to your dreams. Eventually you’ll see images of people - possibly old photographs or someone in your dreams who walks up to you and tells you stories. That’s an Ancestor trying to communicate with you. No need for Lucid Dreaming here but more pay attention to your dreams & write them down upon waking. Eventually you’ll get better at remember them & then can spend time talking with your Ancestors.

In Summary

You want to have a relationship with your Ancestors because they are both your first & last line of defense against attacks, bad magic, mean Spirits and they can go to bat for you to the Spirits defending you when others want to persecute you for petty reasons.

Feed them. Give them liquids to drink. Give them what they liked in life. Coffee, tea, milk, pop, hard liquor, wine, beer, water - whatever. You don’t have to light up the cigar or cigarettes just put them on the shrine next to the photograph of whoever liked to smoke.

Wednesday, October 26, 2011

HOODOO Part 2

The other day I got an email from an individual who asked, “Brother Moloch, what makes a Hoodoo Trick effective?” To answer that, I had to say: Repetition.

Repetition by far is the single most important component to a Hoodoo practitioner that can be done. Repetition is important because it creates a path to the goal that does not deviate. Further it also shows the Spirits what it is you want by doing the same Trick daily such as a candle spell.

Of course a root bag is not made over & over again but when doing a spell for say a job promotion you will take time to burn the candle(s), recite the Psalms or prayers and the other factors (such as light the altar candles, light the incense, and so on).

Many folks say all you need do is ONE working & that should be sufficient. Well in some cases that does the trick, literally, but not for each and every practitioner nor every time the same spell is called upon. Once in a while when things are looking your way and you light the candles, like magic you got your desire almost instantaneously. The next time you may do the exact same spell it could take you several tries before your spell comes to fruition.

Other Factors Which Can Affect A Hoodoo Spell:

It should go without saying that a practitioner should have some knowledge of calming their mind, relaxing their body and other Metaphysical practices. But really are these practices truly Metaphysical?

We know that distractions have plagued people in the past. Consider what Jesus said in Matthew 6:6 “But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly.”

Thus one thing Jesus is saying here which is get rid of the distractions. By closet I don’t believe He meant a literal clothes closet but rather a special place to pray. If that’s your bedroom, okay; if the basement, fine; if the bathroom, so be it. But find a place you can be alone, lock the door then do your thing.

Prayer is essential in Hoodoo as it is a focusing of the mind onto a single thought. “God, help me pass my test this Monday! I’ve been studying for it for the past six weeks and I need to pass it!” Have you calmed your mind & stilled your heart? Have you pushed aside the rest of your daily to-do list so you can focus on your prayer?

Dr. Larry Dossey has a book that I highly recommend for people to read; it’s called Healing Words: The Power of Prayer & the Practice of Medicine. This is a great book for anyone wanting to study prayer more in depth as well as work more on their health and vitality. What you read about regarding prayer in here is easily transferable to the practice of Hoodoo, Sorcery, MagicK or any sort of Metaphysical discipline.

So aside from prayer, what else makes Hoodoo strong? Your mind set. What’s nagging at you most? Mom? Kids? Bill collectors? All of the above? Then it’s time to invoke the power of the Spirits with some simple candle practice. Obtain a simple white, jar candle; a bottle of Holy oil; some Meditation incense; picture of a Saint or Jesus (whichever you feel most comfortable with).

Find a spot in your home (garage or tool shed) where you can be alone without texting, calls, alarms, TV, radio and etc. Set the candle on the floor if you must. Light it. Light the incense cone/stick. Hold the incense & walk three times clockwise around the perimeter. Recite the traditional Catholic “Our Father” prayer.

Sit down. Anoint your temples & breast bone with the Holy oil. Again, recite the “Our Father” prayer. Take several deep breaths in through your nose and let them out slowly through your mouth. Relax as much as you are able to in your environment. Focus on the candle’s light. Just see it and nothing else. Close your eyes.

Now pray. If you prefer a standardized prayer, Catholic prayer books offer a wide variety of rote prayers which you can use & then when finished, speak aloud your desire at the end. In this instance you wish to have a clear mind so you can grasp what is going on in your life & fix it.

What you say is not as important as HOW you say it. Pour yourself into the prayer. Fill yourself with emotion. Is it regret? Anger? Sadness? Hope? What? Use it or lose it!

You may be sitting there going, “Yeah Moloch like I’m gonna cry over this situation!” and I say if it’s bothering you enough to do some old fashioned Sorcery, then uncork the bottle & let out all that emotion. If you feel like crying, DO SO! If you’re doing a spell, then do it right and that means emotion should be a large part of it.

Sunday, October 16, 2011

HOODOO

Hoodoo - it’s all the rage these days and with good reason. It’s just folk magic charms, incantations, prayers, and other folk lore from American Black culture from days long past and today many people are trying to use to supplement their other Spiritual/Magical practices with.

For instance McWiccans do not teach anything about Cursing or Hexing, so what’s a newbie to do when they’re bullied by some asshole? They turn to Hoodoo. Also Ceremonial MagicKians (CM) such as Golden Dawn or Thelema don’t teach (let alone advocate) the use of Curses & Hexes either so they too turn to Hoodoo for help.

Western Occultism is rife with Karmic horse shit with inept practitioners who simply couldn’t Hex their way out of a wet paper bag. Thus, Hoodoo comes to the rescue....

The problem with Westerners is that our minds are such that we tend to want structure to learn from and there is no true structure to Hoodoo. Typically it was taught from parent to child, neighbor to friend or more likely a technique or prayer was learned then shared from someone else. There are no true ‘Hoodoo rituals or ceremonies’ because of the lack of structure. Most of the time in the elder days someone would learn a quick prayer or a trick to somehow fix a situation that needed it. If no tricks or techniques were known, they’d go visit a Root Doctor.

Most (not all) of your old time Hoodoos did not call themselves ‘Hoodoo’ nor label themselves as such. Sure some did because they were looking to attract business but the majority of your old time, black Hoodoo practitioners labeled themselves ‘Spiritualist’ and did ‘Spiritual Work’ not Hoodoo. These are important distinctions that middle class, white Occultists are ignorant of. If you spend time talking to an old, black, Spiritual Worker, they will gladly set you straight on this fact.

Today, everyone and their brother call themselves Hoodoo. I find it humorous that 24 years ago when I was beginning to investigate the Occult, I could not find anyone involved in Witchcraft (let alone Hoodoo or RootWork!) Today they bump into you at the grocery store, coffee shop or laundry mat. Literally! And the funny thing is that they all tend to be white. Sort of like in the 80's when American Indian spirituality was at its peak, all you heard was talk about medicine cards, shamanism, what tribe was someone descended from, how many 16ths someone was American Indian, and so on. Who were the purveyors of this American Indian lore? Yup, white middle class folks.

Regardless I’ve always preferred RootWork-Conjure Sorcery to Hoodoo because RootWork has more to do with the herb and plant lore of folk magic; Conjure is about what it says: conjuring spirits. Hoodoo by contrast tends to be more about charms like lucky hands, rabbits/alligator/chicken foot, Catholic Saint’s medallions, candles, prayers, and other stuff. Most people tend to lump them all together under the blanket term Hoodoo but that’s like lumping Golden Dawn, Thelema, Builders of the Adytum, Society of Light, and other paths under Ceremonial MagicK - they’re all CM of course but each has its own ways, means, methods and protocols to observe. Aside from being fruit, they're not a true apples to apples comparison.

Many people put a lot of faith in a collection of books called Hoodoo, Conjuration, Witchcraft, Rootwork by Harry Middleton Hyatt. It is a five volume set which contains the transcripted interviews of hundreds of black folks from the South, about Hoodoo in their culture. In the early 20th century, Hyatt (an Anglican minister) took it upon himself to interview these black folks about their cultural beliefs and practices they referred to as Hoodoo. What he found was a huge amount of information. Some of it is worthwhile, other info is absolute garbage. Really it is four volumes of info with the fifth volume being an index to the other four.

Much of what the books offer in the way of spells or Tricks as they’re referred to in Hoodoo, are not viable today. Why? Well the lore is from a time and era when black folks were dirt poor, often living in hovels with outhouses, no indoor plumbing nor any of the modern conveniences like washers/dryers. It was easier to sneak into someone's home and hide a Trick to cause them harm. Or one may have been able to obtain dirty, unwashed clothing this way to use to put the jinx on them. Sometimes, things like human waste from chamber pots was stolen so that could be used in a Trick. Today that is all but impossible to obtain with modern housing & neighborhoods with crime watches and so forth. If you’re stupid enough to get caught, now you have to explain it to the judge why you were skulking in your enemy’s backyard.

So aside from being a historic look into the past of black Americans, these books are difficult if not impossible to put to use. Still people pay handsome sums of money to have them on their shelves with some booksellers charging ridiculous prices to the fools crazy enough to part with the money for them! $6,500 for the 5 volume set? That amount can do a lot more for you than a five volume set of books can! In some African Traditional Religious (ATR) groups, you could get initiated for that amount.

Now what’s really interesting is how many people are adapting Spirits from either Yoruban culture (Santeria, Ifa) or out of the Fon culture (Haitian Vodu, NOLA Voodoo) to fill in the missing info in Hoodoo. Most ATR do not recommend doing that since many of these Orisha's & LWA's need to be approached respectfully rather than trying to be used as CM's & McWiccans are wont to do. These are not archetypes to call upon for your Four Quarters of your circle or to be placed on your Tree of Life.

Hoodoo tends to use a lot of prayers from the Catholic church. The reason for this is that there are Saints for everything and each has prayers attributed to Them. Plus you can find the so-called 7 day jar candles (really burns only 5 days) at botanicas & grocery stores. Combine this with the plethora of metaphysical oils Hoodoo uses as well as incense, powders, sprays, colognes, perfumes, and so on and you have a very workable system for handling day to day problems that your McWiccan & CM paths do not.

If you look around on the Net, you’ll soon see what I’m talking about with magazines and sites devoted to Hoodoo, Conjure and RootWork. Spirits like Elegba, Elleggua, Eshu, Papa Legba are stirred up to open the gateway when in fact a generic opening of the gateway is sufficient. These people talk about leaving offerings at places like crossroads and cemeteries when they don’t know anything about the Spirit they’re trying to rouse. Same can be said for collecting Graveyard Dirt. One simply does not walz into a cemetery, find the oldest male or female grave, drop 3 pennies, take dirt and walz out - unless you want to take the chance of pissing off the Master & Mistress of the cemetery. (It's your choice)

But I’m not here to forewarn anyone. If you burn your fingers, not my problem. Nor will I say, “Told you so” like some would. Rather my suggestion is to use Hoodoo for things you need like job promotions, getting a job, selling a house, getting a neighbor to move, shutting the mouth of an asshole at work, and so on. CM are usually so focused on their inner planes work that they often neglect to teach their students anything practical to help them with their day-to-day lives. As if no CM's ever lose their job, eh? So is it any wonder that CM’s resort to Hoodoo? (If truth be told many of them use Wiccan spells for the same thing)

For Hoodoo to really work well for you, it’s suggested that you get rid of your pretenses about religion - especially any animosity you harbor towards Judeo-Xianity (re: Christianity) because there are Angels, Saints, prayers, Psalms, Biblical passages & so on that are used in Hoodoo, RootWork-Conjure Sorcery. If you have a real aversion to all things Xian, then you may want to leave Hoodoo alone & work with Wicca or other forms Sorcery.

Realize that most Spiritual Workers revere the Xian Bible as a talisman. In the Hyatt books, some passages from informants (which is what Hyatt called the interviewees) about the Bible tell of its power and how it comforts a person as soon as you read a passage from it. Let's face it, south of the Mason-Dixon line, you run into a LOT of folks who are reared in backwoods country church settings. Xian faith is strong there. Hoodoo is both revered & feared by many.

Back in the old days, before abolitionists came to the forefront, the religion was Xianity and the biggest sect of Xianity was Catholicism. It was (still is) considered to be THE Magical version of Xianity with its plethora of prayers, Saints, Spirits, Angels, litanies, creeds, and various incantations. There are other reasons I’m not allowed to go into but suffice to say old Catholic churches radiate power that the average Baptist church is wholly unaware of. Trust me when I say if an old Hoodoo Trick requires dirt from a church, do not get it from anywhere but a Catholic church.

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

Miracle of the New Avatar Power Part 3

This is my third and final installment for the Miracle of the New Avatar Power book written by the late Geoff Gray-Cobb. I was going to let the second installment be the last but I felt compelled to discuss this fantastic modern grimoire just a bit further.

One of the things Gray-Cobb included in his grimoire was the ‘Magic Mentor’. This was the author's attempt at bringing a NPE[1] into the waking consciousness of the practitioner. The method is simple yet many modern ceremonial magicKians would sneer at the simplicity believing that creating a NPE like that to be too easy.

Why shouldn’t it be? Frankly, according to the ARS (African Religious Systems), making a spirit actually is more complicated than that, however for purposes of just using Inner World Magic, it works well. Most ARS practitioners know that the spirits created/found on inner plane contacts as preached by organizations like the Golden Dawn to be too simplistic. However for the use of bouncing ideas off someone, this works well enough for our purposes.

There is an affinity here to the Max Freedom Long's Huna system’s Aumakua (re: Ow-mah-koo-ah) or the Higher Self. Long claimed that the Aumakua was simply there and it was already plugged into the all of everything or what he termed the Poe Aumakua (re: Poe-ay-Ow-mah-koo-ah) which Long likened to Carl Jung’s Collective Unconscious.

Gray-Cobb gives ideas on how to use the Magic Mentor and primarily focuses on using it to instruct yourself in Magic. You can use it to help you attain things, do some metaphysical things and so on. To me, this is a lot like my own Thralls where I create these artificial NPE’s to do whatever it is I desire them to do. It is just that Gray-Cobb's Magic Mentor is more complex than a Thrall is.

Central Pillar Ritual

By learning this ritual, Gray-Cobb next gives you a method of how to procure more out of life by invoking planetary intelligences, colors and sounds all through using the Central Pillar Rite.

Frankly, he could have gotten this idea from Israel Regardie’s The Art of True Healing where Regardie suggests using the Middle Pillar ritual with king and queen scale colors via the Golden Dawn to either receive or send energies which also would help you bring items or send assistance to someone else.

Does the Magic Mentor work? Yes it does! Why? It is an artificial construct you give life to then order it to become intelligent by commanding it to go find _ and learn _ then discuss _ with you. Some may think of this as an imaginary friend and is it? Yes and much more than that since It is capable of performing Magic for you.

While not necessary, you can give this Magic Mentor a candle as an offering on a regular basis[2] and tell It that you wish for It to go and learn greater Magic so that It can teach this greater Magic to you. Think of the Magic Mentor as sort of a squire to your knighthood if you will.

Gray-Cobb even tells you how to use a pendulum to communicate with Spirits. I was taught how to do that by the late Enid Hoffman and the late Ron Parshley back in the late 1980's. Using a pendulum to communicate with Spirits is natural and not too much different than using a planchette and Ouija board. You ask the question, wait while being still then allow the pendulum to move of its own accord over a letter/number wheel. Simple. Elegant. Works.

Testing Your NAP

In chapter 5, Gray-Cobb does something very few Metaphysical authors ever do: he teaches you how to test whether your NAP power!

He starts the chapter off talking about using NAP to guess cards, he quickly moves into testing NAP as a way to build self-confidence in that you know it works. Some of the tests he gives are:

Mail Box

Letter Contents

Telephone Caller

News Headline

Playing Card

He gives you a total of 15 tests in all. He gives you some idea of how the test should work and then you put your NAP to the test. You may not guess accurately right away but over time you should develop the ability to guess accurately.

The Radio State test goes something like: you tune your radio to your favorite station then shut it off. Relax. Allow your NAP to bathe you in power and then try to guess the song that will be playing when you turn the radio on.

The better you become is in direct proportion to how often you practice. Each test is a fun challenge and while little more than parlor games, still they do work, allowing you to build self-confidence while strengthening your Occult powers.

In closing I'd like to suggest you try NAP if you have not yet. It's a fun grimoire that offers the earnest practitioner a LOT for the time and effort invested. It is just as powerful as the Key of Solomon is. If you want wealth, riches, mind power, love, sex, influencing others and getting your way in life, this is a great modern grimoire to start with.

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Footnotes: 
[1] Non-Physical Entity
[2] My method of using a purple candle with Power oil on it should suffice; barring that, try a plain white candle dressed with Holy oil.