Types of Magic

Blessings Darlings!

Let's settle in with a summer drink for a discussion of 'types of magic', and try to get this done before my husband drags me off to practice holding webinars using Webinar Jam (*I* am not looking to do webinars, but an organization we're involved in is, and the Chubby Hubby offered to do the tech stuff so ...)

Now I'm not going to talk about Green magic vs hedge witchery vs water witches vs whatthefuckever.  Personally I see those divisions as micromanaging.  YMMV.  Instead, I'm going to start with what are to me the Two Big Divisions, and then look at a hierarchy of approaches to magic.

The Big Two: Theurgy vs Thaumaturgy  

THEURGY:  "Theurgy describes the practice of rituals, sometimes seen as magical in nature, performed with the intention of invoking the action or evoking the presence of one or more gods, especially with the goal of achieving henosis and perfecting oneself."  (Wikipedia)  And henosis fundamentally means union with the Divine or Ultimate Reality.  Which is, really, what 'religion' means at its roots, that is re = again and lignon = uniting.  In short - Theurgy is magic for spiritual progress.  It's hard to measure results, as they don't easily translate into direct changes here in lovely Malkuth/earth/manifest reality.

[Side note - if you feel you're becoming perfected and other folks find that you've becoming a pretentious prat - go with THEIR feelings.  IJS.]

THAUMATURGY; This here is miracle working.  Measurable changes on Earth/shared reality from magical actions.  More money. New relationships. Measurable reduction in violence.  Healing/reduction of physical ailments (debate on whether 'feeling better' is theurgy or thaumaturgy is something I'm not going to cover here.)

 Those two categories are the Big Two.  I'm not usually into dualities, so savor the moment.   

A Brief Hierarchy of Magic

This hierarchy is about power, pure and simple.  

Basic Bitch Level Magics include chants and herbal/oil/etc mixes.  Making a potpourri to cleanse or bless your house.  Doing a chant for some purpose (didn't we ALL start off as kids doing the 'rain, rain go away" chant?)  Amulets. Sachets. Soaps. Washes.  Most crystal use. Herb use in food - heck, everything in the proposed "First you take a dead chicken" cook/spellbook.  I'd even add doing magic by planetary hours here.   Any time you are taking some item that is associated with your purpose and putting it together with other items associated with your purposed and that is the bulk of the spell.  Certainly these things can be layered like flavors, so you take your herbs and oils and do a chant over them.  That can help.  But it's still Basic Witch Level.

Intermediate Bitch Level Magics start when you consciously start raising/tapping, shaping, and sending energy.  You're not just doing a chant over that amulet - you tapped energy and charged that amulet.  You threw the ingredients for an herbal salve into the Instant Pot to slow cook ... but also charged a candle to power a specific magic into that salve while it cooks.  You 'woke' the Florida Water so it could do its thing. 

It can also include involving magical helpers with your magic.  Having spirits that you have alliances with help power the spellwork or the promise of offerings to the spirits involved if the spell works.

Badass Bitch Level Magics and you're going what you want, when you want, and only use herbs/other tools when you want to for the pleasure of using them. n You can do magic stark naked in Times Square with no tools while walking to an appointment and avoiding the police bothering you for indecent exposure.  OTOH, you might still choose to do 3 hour deeply ceremonial ritual timed to start in a 8 minute window between the end of a retrograde and the start of a full moon if that is what you choose to do another time for some specific reason.

 I am NOT Badass enough to do successful magic naked in Times Square, that's for sure.

Frondly, Fern