The Tools of Ritual Magic (priests, tradition, blood, myth)

[Runt]

What are the tools you know of? What are they used for? What is significant about them?

[Rex]

A big withches pot?

I have no clue!

An alter?

[Runt]

LMAO. The "big witches's pot" is usually referred to as a caudron... symbolically it represent's a woman's womb, and also has mythical connections to the "Cauldron of Dagda" (Dagda was the Celtic "God"...father of all Gods, the caudron was something from which no army ever left unsatisfied) of Celtic myth. It is also associated with the chalice (another feminine symbol) from which Wiccans and certain kinds of ceremonial magicians serve the wine in the Cakes and Wine ceremony (celebrating the bounty of the God and Goddess by ritually sharing bread and wine) and perform the symbolic Great Rite (sex as a spiritual act, representative of the mating of the Goddess and the God from which life springs forth into the world) with the athame (a phallic symbol).

The alter is where the tools used in a ritual are used (and is usually placed in the North, Northeast, or Eastern Quarter), and is generally where priests and priestesses address and call the God and Goddess. In some traditions it is representative of the female body (or sometimes the female body IS considered the alter... the coven described in "Witches Bible" has actually used a woman AS the alter in ritual). Other traditions put it smack in the middle of the circle. Others don't have a circle, but still have an alter... go figure.

[Master Hoomer]

Personally the only tools I use is a piece of chalk...a makeshift altar...some candles and the most important one...my imagination.....

I have a home made wand....which is used to help reach zero...but I hve never used it.....

SOme need tools...others do not...not to step on anyone's toes..I'll leavve it to depedant upon tradition...

Oh I burn incense...as I cant abide cleariong up the blood from a chicken......both serve the same purpose you see...to release ectoplasm,,..as Dion Fortune says....

[Runt]

My personal belief is that the tools are unnecessary to achieving spiritual or psychic ends. I believe that they merely HELP us to understand that we are doing something special, something "magical", and through the use of symbols we learn how to direct our energy and manipulate reality. However, if we IMAGINE that we hold a wand in our hands, or imagine that a circle surrounds us without physically drawing it, we can still have the same effect on the spiritual-physical level. The idea is that the actions we perform and the objects we work with in the physical world reinforce the visualization and imagination required to interact with the spiritual world, but if we are creative enough, we can ditch the physical and work just with visualization alone.

[welo]

Originally Posted by Runt

My personal belief is that the tools are unnecessary to achieving spiritual or psychic ends. ... The idea is that the actions we perform and the objects we work with in the physical world reinforce the visualization and imagination required to interact with the spiritual world, but if we are creative enough, we can ditch the physical and work just with visualization alone.

It should be pointed out this type of approach takes a remarkable degree of skill based on sheer practice, and relies entirely upon the weight of the intention you have supplied toward the visualization created by your thought processes (for now we'll disregard the level of emotional energy needed).

Thoughts are things. If you aren't extremely clear on the intention you have supplied to any thought form you have created, the situation can get ... uncomfortable. The consistent use of a ritual implement will provide a more solidified environment for a person's intention because it provides an immediate physical point of reference for what you are using it to accomplish, and this holds particularly true if you make the items yourself rather than buy them.

For instance, in Rune magic this becomes particularly important because the act of constructing and carving a gandr (wand), mead cup, or taufr (Rune lot) represents physically embedding an intention into space to align it with an already existing energy pattern, and it cannot be altered on a whim (unlike visualized constructs, where you run the risk of altering the intention every time you think about it differently or accidentally sling another thought form at it).

Sure you can accomplish the same results just by visualizing, but you better be good.

[Azhria Lilu]

I haven't used tools for around 5 years now... I found they hindered my visualisations a lot of the time, I have more success without them than I did with them.

But, welo is correct in that you need to be VERY GOOD at visualisation and had a lot of practice before throwing tools away as they do serve a purpose in aiding visualisation techniques.

[Runt]

In a large part I think it depends on the person. For example, I am able to literally visualize electric blue energy coming out of my hands and forming a circle... it takes INTENSE concentration (and for some reason I CAN'T visualize green energy or red as easily, but violet is about as simple). I think it depends on a variety of factors... how imaginitive you are, what kind of memory you have (I have a photographic memory... it also aids in MAKING images in your head and holding on to them... someone with an audio memory or one that relies on touch might visualize energy differently).

But then... you are right that it does take lots of practice. When I was really little my coven would often allow me to cast circles, but I was unable to actually visualize energy with my eyes open until I was in middle school. I had to do it with my eyes closed, or draw invisible boundaries in the air.

However, I actually prefer working with "tools"... not always literal athames and stuff, but physical representations of these things. Back in the days when I DIDN'T have an athame or chalice (and was distraught because I felt I was missing out on something) I was taught by my cousin that the hand alone can be used to represent the basic tools-- the index finger can represent an athame or wand, the cuped hand can represent the chalice, the flat hand can represent the pentacle, etc. I have actually used and seen these used in the circle instead of tools on occassions where either NOBODY had an athame, or when I was practicing solitary and didn't have tools of my own...

I guess it just depends on individual preference...