Precedence Does Not Mean “Correct”.

People write all kinds of wacky stuff about magic and the occult. Some people probably find my stuff just as wacky and even wrong, as I find some other stuff. Subtle arts are harder to pin down than hard sciences – go figure.

It’s easy to dismiss new things that you find nutty or wrong, but what happens when its ancient? Imagine for instance that someone wrote some darke fluffe, or new-age craziness that we would otherwise poke fun at, then buried it. The book get’s unearthed 300 years later. Suddenly it stops being someone easily dismissed baseless idea and starts being a primary source.

Occultists will:

• Claim that its success is proven by “lasting the ages” even though it was buried for most of that time. “This codex would not still be around if people did not have success with it.”
• Justify their ethics by it: “The codex Craptasticus says it’s ok, so any REAL witch should be ok with it”.
• Start denying the validity of approaches not contained in it. “I don’t care that all asian magical traditions, as well as new world traditions talk about important bodily spots like the ‘3rd eye’ – its not in this ancient codex, therefore its not true”.

Old texts are wonderful, they really are, and age is certainly of interest. Having a link with the past is important, and some practices really are time tested. Sometimes though there are disadvantages to age too, even living ones. Western occultists fetishize living traditions a lot, but sometimes living traditions can become ossified and weighed down with ever expanding dogma to the point where the original magic, creativity, and freedom gets lost. I owe a lot to Tibetan teachers, especially the ones that guided me to not adopt every piece of Tibetan ecclesiastic trapping.

Anyway, just some food for thought. If age is your only criteria for magic, maybe there are other things to consider.