The Great Outdoors

          One of the things I have commented on several times about Luminarium, and which my test group noted as well is that it is, to a degree, modular. The texts presents at once a system which can be used, more or less, as a stand-alone approach to magic or an example of adaptation which allows for additional adaptation.

          The entire system of preparation is presented ala carte with an invitation to bring your own. The tools are somewhat minimalist, but they can be adapted. The system presents conjurations for angels and aerial spirits, but with a little adjustment it can be used for other purpose as well.

          If you sort out what each piece of the conjuration ritual is doing, you could easily substitute equivalent functions from a preferred spiritual system or a preferred magical text.

          It’s setting up a model for a system of conjuring – a framework; as much as it is presenting a grimoire you can roll out of bed and chat up some cosmic powers with.

          My intention over the next few posts is to present some of these adaptations. The first one is inspired by a friend, who was one of the testers, who is spending a few weeks out in the wilderness. While thinking about him out there I considered suggesting he try out Luminarium in a more natural context, but realized he might not have some of the stuff he would need for the standard context. This got me thinking of how to change things.

         

The Ancestors

          The big thing that would be missing if someone were on the road or in the great outdoors and wanted to use Luminarium is the ancestor altar. The shrine to the ancestors essentially consecrates a temple space and becomes our in between space for working in the spirit world without needing a circle set up. It also sets the grounds for a particular sort of spirit leverage and connection.

          In my case I have a handmade rosary consecrated to my ancestors, Mary, Hekate and St. Benedict. If I wanted to work in a context similar to working at my ancestor shrine I could wear the rosary or I could place the rosary on the ground and put the bowl and other implements within the loop of the rosary. The space it outlines would be a hallowed space dedicated to those powers so long as the rosary was laid open in that spot.

          Another approach I might take is a spirit candle. While I light candles on my ancestor shrine to help make contact with them, I also have a pillar candle which I used for working with a particular ancestor before setting up my ancestor shrine. Once I began working with the shrine regularly I used that candle to ask that ancestor if I could work with him and his candle as a link to my ancestors over all if working in an instance where placing the candle in my working space made more sense than working at the altar.

          So if you have some tool along those lines which is portable and which you take with you then you could simulate the space of your ancestor work while working away from home.

The Nature Spirits

          The possibility of not having some sort of ancestral link – other than yourself – could easily come up during unplanned workings while exploring the wilderness for an extended period. So, with that being the case, maybe recontextualizing amid the spirits in your locality makes sense.

          I think if you approached from the perspective of engaging the nature spirits it would kind of shift a few things. In my experience, nature spirits are good at connecting you with other nature spirits and spirits who interact with them closely, but perhaps less so with a broad range of spirits. So, their ability to create leverage to help call upon spirits and bring spirits to work on your behalf might not be the same as when working with ancestors. Nature spirits also are not human, so they don’t have the same inside track as to what human needs and experience are like. They’re not your family so there is not the same natural investment.

          On the flip side there are benefits to nature spirits as a context to engage for this work. If your goal is to work with some natural or elemental spirit, or to conjure a faery or a dead person then nature spirits might be very useful in helping facilitate that connection. Nature spirits have influence over the spaces they protect and the areas of nature they connect with. So, while they might not guide things from a human perspective, they may be able to help influence what will and will not easily manifest within their spaces. Nature spirits are sometimes depicted as frightening and dangerous, but other-times as loving caregivers, guardians, and providers for the human communities within their environment. I believe a lot of this has to do with what kind of relationships humans are maintaining with them. With this in mind they may have an investment in your – albeit of a different sort than your ancestors – if you’re maintaining a good relationship with them.

Building a Relationship

          If you’re going to work with nature spirits as your context, which makes a lot of sense if you’re working out in nature, you need to build a relationship.

          The first step in this process is going into natural spaces and introducing yourself. Once you’ve introduced yourself, sit and listen. Appreciate the space. Be a part of the space and accept and adapt to it rather than trying to make it adapt to and accept you. Once you’ve done this, make offerings. Water, incense, appropriate food. Be mindful that your offerings don’t damage the space. Be a good steward, clean things up, take care of things in the space, don’t be part of the problems damaging the space. Make more individual introductions, meet the rivers, the trees, the rocks, the wind, whatever else makes up the space. It’s not just the spirit of the overall place, or an over all guardian spirit of the place, but the lives of the myriad pieces that make up the environment with whom you will need to engage.

Place

          If you’re working in nature, find a spot that seems conducive to your work, get to know the spot and anything in it. Build a connection. You don’t need to consecrate it so much as you need to awaken your awareness of its life and bring that awareness into engagement. You could build up ritual structures, but if you can find a place that is naturally suited that’s better. If you’re building, ask permission to do so, and ask permission to use the natural materials you need. Ask those materials to be your working partners and part of what you’re doing.

Tools

          You might streamline the tools some. Maybe just the lantern instead of the candles. Maybe a natural pool of water instead of the bowl. Maybe a spot on the ground or a rock instead of a table. You’ll have to look at what you have available, what the space provides, and what feels right and make those three influences work together.

The Ritual Itself

          Most of the ritual would remain the same. The ancestor service might be replaced by offerings and work with the spirits of nature, but there should still be a point where you at least call on and acknowledge your ancestors. When you get to the conjuration that might shift if you’re shifting what you’re conjuring. Maybe you want to talk to the guardian of that space? Maybe you want to call on a faery, or a dead person connected to that space? The conjuration prayer you write would focus on the powers of nature and show respect to those as well as to whatever you’re calling. If calling angels, aerial spirits, or demons, you might not have to adjust anything except using the rite for the nature spirits instead of the ancestor service rite.

Try it out and let me know how it goes!

If you’re curious about the method being discussed pick up my new book – Luminarium: A Grimoire of CunningConjuration

If you want some help exploring the vast world of spirits check out my first book – Living Spirits: AGuide to Magic in a World of Spirits

If you enjoyed this please like, follow, and share on your favorite social media! We can be followed for updates on Facebook.

Wolfenoot is Here! Some reflections on the spirit of the Great Wolf

          So before I get into today’s post, I have to note that it’s been a long time since I’ve done a blog post. I appreciate that you’re still here reading. I have been busy working on a book, Living Spirits: A Guide to Magic in a World of Spirits, it will be out soon so I hope you’ll follow us on Facebook so you’ll get all the updates and announcements about it.

          With that out of the way…Wolfenoot. I would say that if you’re unaware of Wolfenoot you’ve probably not been on social media in the last six months, but yesterday was apparently when Rufus Opus first discovered it, after seeing me comment on the lack of Wolfenoot cakes at the grocery store. So in case you have not heard the story of Wolfenoot…

A little boy in New Zealand explained to his parents that November 23^rd was the anniversary of the Great Wolf’s death, and to commemorate it there is a holiday celebrated then, Wolfenoot. On Wolfenoot the spirit of the wolf goes around and leaves presents for everyone. People who are kind to dogs or who keep dogs get better presents. You eat roast meat, and cakes decorated like the full moon to celebrate.

          Pretty simple, and yet, pretty awesome. You might wonder why I’m writing a blog post about it…but if you’ve followed Glory of the Stars on Facebook you’ll have noted that we’ve shared quite a few Wolfenoot oriented posts. I’m pretty excited about the idea. New holidays are cool…a calendar full of holidays is also cool and is in keeping with more traditional Pagan experiences. The holiday originating with a child is pretty cool, and the fact that his parents put it out into the world to see how far his idea would spread is amazing. The huge positive response and massive number of people ready to adopt the holiday is also pretty nifty. So it’s got a certain coolness factor.

          Beyond the coolness factor though it’s pretty germane to stuff we talk about here. The holiday celebrates wolves and dogs, but in particular the spirit of the wolf, who sounds like some sort of animal guardian spirit, is a central figure. So you basically have a holiday for a nature spirit. It’s even possible that the boy was inspired by a nature spirit. Children are often more perceptive to such things. As far as I know the boy hasn’t explained much about where the holiday came from. So we’ll never really know. But in my mind, it’s a good opportunity for engaging certain nature spirits.

          John Beckett on Patheos wrote a good piece on the idea of natural religion and spirituality and used Wolfenoot as an example of how even if we had a world devoid of religion humans would find ways to celebrate meaning and connection. He talked about the Pagan feel of the holiday, which itself is not Pagan, as he also noted. The holiday does not come from any traditional Pagan canon, and the boy’s family has not, to my knowledge, expressed any Pagan affiliation. The holiday is just there for everyone, especially people who love or care for dogs. This openness has an element that reflects man’s earliest religious experiences, before competing cultures created concepts of religious affiliation. For people working in a world of spirits this kind of approach is entirely sensible, because the spirits are there doing their thing regardless of your religion or beliefs.

          So the spirit of the wolf. Since this was originated by a little kid there is not a lot of detail. So we have to look at some other sources to build a concept. So…what is the wolf to us?

          If we look at mythology and folklore, for me the first obvious thoughts are Garm and Fenrir. Both wolves are associated with the Ragnarok, the Doom of the Gods. Garm guards the entry way to the land of the dead, howling as a herald of the Ragarok. His howl is associated with the breaking of Fenrir’s bonds, after which Fenrir, the ravener, will run free, eat corpses, and swallow the sun, all before he kills the Allfather, Odin, in the battle which will take the lives of many gods.

          Garm and Fenrir certainly don’t seem like the spirit of the great wolf who gives presents to those who are kind to dogs, but they are not the only important wolves in the North. Odin himself is accompanied by two wolves, Freki and Geri. Odin is described as living on wine alone, and giving all the food of his table to his wolves. Some scholars have suggested that Odin, his wolves, and his ravens, form a sort of singular entity representing the symbiosis of hunting allegiances from our prehistoric past. In the case of Odin his ravens bring him knowledge and hold it for him, his wolves, who are called greedy or ravenous, bring nourishment.

         

There is a cyclical element to this. Fenrir is also called “ravenous” and Garm, and Geri have names tied to the same linguistic origin. So the wolves that are the companions of Odin are mirrored in the wolves that spell his doom. This is so much the case that while Odin feeds Freki and Geri, he will eventually end his life as food for Fenrir.

This still doesn’t tell us much which is too linked to the Spirit of the Great Wolf, at least not at first glance, but it does tell us something about nature spirits. While Fenrir is not a nature spirit and neither is Freki, they both have the form of a powerful symbol of nature, the wolf. If we look at stories of nature spirits we will often find within the same culture stories in which a single type of nature spirit appears as a wonderful ally for the people, and in other stories the same type of spirit is a horrible and dangerous monster. Much like these mirrored sets of wolves.

My interpretation of this is that it reflects the community’s relationship with the spirits. When we have good relations with nature spirits and when we respect their spaces they are wonderful allies. When we forget our bonds with them, and our relationship to their space becomes one of trespass, ingress, or destruction then they become foreboding and harmful spirits whose dangerous intentions towards us provide cautionary tales.  

The wolf was one of our earliest allies, and one who is perhaps a significant contributor to our survival and development. The wolf became an ally for early humans to help us hunt and help us defend ourselves in a time that was much more dangerous for us. These wolves to whom we were allied traveled with us into our settled lives as we developed agriculture and became dogs. As we became more civilized and left the wild and the hunt, some wolves remained part of that more wild natural world. They became a symbol of the danger of the wild and those woodland spaces beyond our agrarian boundaries.

So when we consider the Spirit of the Great Wolf, who leaves gifts for those who are kind to dogs, there is definitely an element of strengthening the alliance between man and wolf. Humans who have been good to dogs and wolves will be rewarded, but so will other humans so they are reminded they have the opportunity to be kind to dogs and wolves. Kindness begets kindness. A cyclical relationship of guest and host is honored. This is a shining example of a right relationship with the spirit world.

We can also look at another example of the wolf in modern mythos who might help us consider the nature of the Spirit of the Great Wolf, and this example also provides us with a great wolf’s death:

“Akela, the great gray Lone Wolf, who led all the Pack by strength and cunning”

--Kipling, the Jungle Book

For anyone who grew up in cub scouts, Akela is an important foundational symbol in our youth. He is the guide who teaches us the importance of the pack and how we are to develop and learn and how to treat each other in that process.

Akela eventually leaves the pack to go on his own when the pack betrays him, but he still returns, and ultimately dies for the pack to help save the pack.

Where the contrast between Fenrir and Garm juxtaposed to Freki and Geri helps illustrate for us the relationship between men and wolves and also men and the spirits of the land, Akela helps us understand what the spirit of the wolf reflects for us. As the lone wolf, the great wolf, Akela both leads the pack and is also his own wolf. He teaches the importance of the pack but also the importance of understanding oneself and one’s own principles. He leads both by strength, and by cunning, showing that physical prowess and intellect are two hands that must work together. He illustrates self reliance but also duty to one’s community.

If we really think about what wolves represent, Akela is a pretty great illustration. We value the lone wolf, but we also value the honor inherent in commitment to one’s pack. We think of the wolf as the powerful dominant hunter, a king of the woodland spaces, but we also think of the wolf as a clever hunter who can stalk his prey as easily as he can hunt it down.

The form of a nature spirit sometimes reflects what their relationship is to the land, to the animals and plants there, and to the humans near the land. In my thinking if we sought to engage a local spirit in the form of a wolf, or perhaps the spirit who rules and watches over wolves and dogs, these qualities would be the qualities we would recognize in that spirit, and those qualities would be the lessons we would learn from that spirit, along with how to walk side by side and benefit each other like early men and the ancestors of our current canine companions.

So obviously, celebrate Wolfenoot with some roast meat and a full moon cake. Maybe make a donation to a charity for wolves or dogs as John Beckett recommended.

But maybe also take a moment and explore it as an opportunity for magic.

Go to a wild space and introduce yourself to the spirit of the wolves and the local nature spirits there. Not deep into the wild space, but at that liminal boundary space where the wild meets the tamed. Cut off a bit of the meat you’ve roasted and offer it to the spirits of the land. Introduce yourself and let them know you want to have a good relationship with them. Specifically call upon the spirit of the wolves and ask it to help inspire you in this relationship with both the tame and the wild parts of nature.

Don’t take anything with you.

The spirits of wild spaces should live in their wild spaces. Work to understand those spirits and your relationship with those spirits safely adjacent to their space rather than in your own space because not all spirits are spirits you need in your home.

Happy first Wolfenoot.

If you enjoyed this blog follow us on Facebook. And keep an eye out for the book.

The First Spirit

One thing that comes up in traditional systems of witchcraft and magic is the idea of introduction. Either a spirit or another magician, perhaps even some event, that introduces the magician to the spirits with whom he will work. Spirits are often approached in some sort of “spirit court” or a group of spirits with which the magician and his family or his fellow magicians work. Even magicians who don't work in that context will often talk about “my spirits” or the spirits with whom they have a working relationship. Even looking at the grimoires, particularly the personal miscellanies which survive, we find descriptions of handfuls of spirits with whom the magician worked for various purposes. More sweeping systematic grimoires often have larger lists collected together as if to be comprehensive, and of course some miscellanies have large collected lists, and some systematic texts only have a few. But most magicians will have a core group of spirits they work with, even in the large lists we see a lot of spirits that do the same or similar things. We see spirits which have structural elements for ruling and summoning other spirits or facilitating other spirit magic. While there are an array of spirits which need to be part of our world, we don't necessarily need to be in contact with all of them all the time, and we don't need to necessarily conjure every spirit under the moon.

So how do we know who to talk to? How do we approach our group of spirits initially? How do we transition from one to several?

Jake Stratton-Kent has done a lot with advocating for the return of the intermediary spirit to modern ceremonial magic and spirit conjuration. He has pointed to this being an element of the Grimorium Verum which is lacking in other grimoires but likely points back to older magic not necessarily recorded in the grimoires themselves. He has also presented a way of working this into modern ceremonial work by preserving Scirlin's function in his Goetic Liturgy system. As to intermediaries or introducing spirits being a part of traditional magic, we can see signs of this in the Greco-Egyptian Magical Papyrii, so it is a fair assumption that this occurs in older magical systems. We also see it in living sorcery traditions in the Caribbean. To some degree the Abramelin operates in this way, the angel granting authority to call the Kings and the kings then introducing the rest of the spirits...but arguably this is working through a hierarchy rather than an intermediary.

The Testament of Solomon is probably the easiest clear example of such a thing existing in a source that directly feeds into the Solomonic literary tradition. In the Testament of Solomon we see the presence of thwarting angels, or angels who can be called upon to subdue unruly demons. This can be cited as existing in earlier magical systems and we see it echoed if not outright present in some later grimoire traditions. We also see the archangel Michael present Solomon with a ring and with the divine authority to command spirits. These two features are the ones which are arguably familiar with grimoire magic in a ritual sense, and otherwise the book is largely like a spirit catalogue presented in a mythological form.

A significant component is the introduction to the spirits. Michael doesn't bring Solomon a demon, or introduce him to a spirit. Michael gives him tools and authority. Solomon encounters the spirit Ornias because Ornias is harassing a boy whom Solomon cares for. He naturally experiences a supernatural event which creates a spirit encounter and he then uses his position to compel that spirit to introduce him to other spirits and learn how to command them.

This is the clearest example of an intermediary. The spirit introduces Solomon to the ruler of the infernal spirits and is used by Solomon to call upon the spirits. Ornias is sometimes associated with Oriens; there may or may not be a relationship. In the Clavis Inferni Oriens is given as Urieus, and in the Testament Ornias says that Uriel is his father. Ornias is given as a spirit of the East in the Hygromanteia and in the Testament he falls under the sign of Aquarius linking him to the East and the element of Air. In Livre Des Esperitz Oriens is given as the first spirit of the group of spirits following the chief spirits. Part of his office is to bring the other spirits to the magician. This is of course the function Ornias serves in the Testament.

Whether Ornias or Oriens are related or not it still illustrates for us that the spirits may be encountered by way of introduction. Clearly magicians also just conjure spirits. But developing a relationship based on the existence of a pervasive and developed spirit world which surrounds us and is part of our lives allows magic to be interwoven into everything. In a world where spirits maintain their existence and work regardless of our psyches, while they might work with us when we randomly call them up, it's an easy assumption to think things with personalities might not just jump all in for any stranger that beckons. So a spirit who can be like “Hey, here's my bro, get to know him, he might need your help sometimes” can be a useful ally.

I posted about this concept previously in my spirit conjuration guide. But there I talked mostly about picking a spirit based on that function, like for example crossroads spirits. Here I want to talk about your “first spirit.” You first spirit is a spirit you're able to encounter and naturally develop a relationship with, not necessarily one whose job is introductions by way of his ordained function. For me when I was a very small child, about three, the spirit of one of my grandfathers came to me. I didn't understand who it was at the time, just that he was a spirit who cared about me and would help me when I needed it. When there were other more problematic spirits he helped me navigate them and avoid them. When I got a little older he helped me with meeting nature spirits and starting to learn magic.

When people ask me about how to learn witchcraft my first thought is to tell them to go meet some spirits and ask the spirits to teach them magic. That's really at the core of witchcraft. We have some of our access to magic because of our connection to our ancestors and the spirit world connections they can broker for us. Certain ancestors will connect with us because they cared about us in life. Others maybe because of some circumstance. Either way, they make for the easiest spirits to build a natural relationship with. The initial one you connect to can help connect you with the other ancestral spirits, and the overall group of ancestors can back you up in your work with the spirit world and help you negotiate relationships with spirits.

But maybe you haven't encountered an ancestor. Maybe you have to reach out and work to make contact with them. You can pick a person you knew, or maybe someone you've heard stories about. Or maybe your first spirit doesn't have to be an ancestor. Emma Wilby in Cunning Folk and Familiar Spirits begins the book by recounting the story of Bessie Dunlop, a 16^th Century Scottish Witch. She worked her magic by way of a familiar spirit, not one of her ancestors but the spirit of a dead man she encountered one day. The story implies that the spirit needed help with issues with his family and used his relationship with Bessie to resolve those issues. The relationship was formed because of a mutual need for aid. Your first spirit can be a spirit you encounter where it needs to encounter you just as you need to encounter it. The world has an abundance of spirits, so it's a matter of being able to make contact and be aware of them, but it's also important to be cautious to ascertain the nature of the spirit and the relationship being formed.

Aside from spirits of the dead, faeries are a traditional familiar spirit for witches. Exploring encounters with the fair folk can also be a way to obtain a first spirit, and traditionally faeries have connections with the dead and with those spirits more commonly conjured in the grimoire systems, so they are positioned traditionally to broker those connections and aid in teaching magic. The familiar spirits given to witches in the trial accounts often seem to be fairies rather than the demons inquisitors wanted them to be. Even the Black Man who gave witches their familiars had a relationship with the Elf Queen. The overlap between the fairies and other spirits shows up in Reginald Scots's compendium of spells. He explains that magicians might make pacts with condemned criminals and then raise their spirits, creating a rather natural first spirit encounter since the encounter is prearranged while the person is living. The spirit of the dead can then go find one of the primary sisters amongst the seven fairy sisters, Sibilya, and retrieve her so the magician can make contact.

So maybe you don't know any condemned criminals, or dead people, or ways to find fairies. Nature spirits may be the easiest to approach in this case. The first spirits my First Spirit introduced me to were nature spirits, and nature spirits were the first spirits to teach me any magic. They mostly just concern themselves with their natural functioning and so what they want in the relationship is less of an issue. They will mostly also just teach you about magic of interacting with them and related nature spirits. Depending upon their function they may or may not be particularly helpful in navigating other spirit conjuration, but they can be helpful as companions and in dealing with basic areas of life and house holding. To clarify these nature spirits are not necessarily fairies.

With them being the easiest to connect with, they're the easiest ones to give examples of how to approach them, and familiarity with working with them could at least build the skills needed to bridge into openness to encountering other types of spirits. Sarah Ann Lawless has recommended that a witch should go into their environment and just introduce themselves to the local spirits. I think this suggestion is a great way to start. Maybe add to it making some small offerings, milk, corn or some sort of meal, honey, flowers, or a little shrine. None of those things will necessarily introduce you to a spirit but they might start building a relationship where the introduction could be a little easier.

A next step might be putting yourself in a place for the encounter. When I was entering adulthood I wanted to further explore hereditary witchcraft and began working with a woman I had met who married into a family that had their own magical practice. The beginning of witchcraft for her was “becoming a good animal,” which involved becoming in touch with your surroundings, the natural currents, and the spirits that were there. The first step to doing this was to just go sit outside and be open. Look, listen, breathe, and observe; feel. If you don't have a natural propensity to seeing or observing spirits, and no spirit has naturally approached you, and you have no dead folk to reach out to, but you want to dip your toe in rather than go the conjuration route right away, this may be your entry point. Introduce yourself to the spirits of your back yard. Make some offerings, go out and say hello periodically, and then, like a good animal, get to know your surroundings. Sit and be open to what's there.

So yeah, traditionally, a witch would be able to connect with spirits, a sorcerer would be introduced by the sorcerer initiating him...but, maybe you don't have either of those as an option. Maybe no spirit has naturally approached you and so you've got to take it upon yourself. If you've been sitting on the sidelines waiting to figure out this whole spirit magic thing, start with your dead, and if you have no dead, start with your back yard. Build a relationship that can help build your confidence in spirit communication, and can also help create a position in which you're more ready to meet more spirits.

If you've already jumped in and work with spirits, maybe revisit who the first spirit you worked with was. Was your first encounter a natural one, maybe even one not connected to your magical practice now? If so maybe it's time to look at why you had that encounter and whether or not that spirit should have a place in your work. If your first encounter was a spirit you conjured, why did you start with that one? Was there a good relationship, and do you still maintain it? If you don't still work with that spirit should you touch base and maybe see how they fit into the rest of your model?

In the end it kind of depends upon you and your situation. Maybe the encounter that introduced you to spirits just served to show you spirits are real and you should learn magic, but it did so because the encounter was awful. Maybe that's not a spirit to go pursue looking up. Kind of like people in our lives. Sometimes those foundational people stick with us, sometimes they drift out and reconnecting would be good. Sometimes they're gone and it's good they're gone, but reflecting on their impact can still tell us something about where we are now and maybe help us plan for where we're going. 

If you liked this and want to see more like us on Facebook, and if you enjoyed this post please share with friends.