Any one here knows or perhaps can point to a list of countries or civilizations that practiced sorcery not necessarily in abundance but any known accounts similar or maybe even different to olmecs? Im interested to know more about the history.
Any one here knows or perhaps can point to a list of countries or civilizations that practiced sorcery not necessarily in abundance but any known accounts similar or maybe even different to olmecs? Im interested to know more about the history.
32 Comments
Almost every single primitive culture has had shamanism, and even witchraft/sorcery of a kind. The trouble is finding any sources that aren't either dry and academic, or cash-grabby guru-ish. It's really quite difficult, and I expect that's a reason Castaneda's books are so popular. Just try searching 'shamanism' on Amazon and see what you find.
But if anyone has any non-Castaneda sources on shamanic practices, I'd also love to know.
Yess i meant authentic forms of sorcery or shamanism the type with no labels just dealing with the pure abstract
Youre always going to have labels. People need to call it something.
True, but thats not what i meant. I meant mislabeling it as sorcercy when its part of human awareness. forgive me english isnt my first language so misword things sometimes.
Right I remember now. Your english is fine. I could not tell you are not a native writer.
It has been a while for me since I last thought about the term labels. You're right. A Label is a incorrect description.
In regards to sorcery being part of human nature, or part lf god's nature which we share a part of: the ancient egyptians used "magic" as part of medicine. They did not think of it as such, it was not a seperate idea from the medicine, but apart of it. They believed that humans shared a part of the Gods' nature.
I guess the work of carlos truly is whats left thats accessible.
Here is a little video explaining briefly what im talking about.
As long as you have all of this excess inventory, you will not achieve anything here.
None of what you have discussed is in any way useful to you and is actively harmful to your success.
https://www.reddit.com/r/castaneda/wiki/inventories/
Thank you for your help. You're completely right.
The closest thing that I can think of is Of Water and the Spirit: Ritual, Magic, and Initiation in the Life of an African Shaman by Malidoma Patrice Some. It about an indigenous African man that goes through Initiation as way to reconnect with his tribe after been kidnapped and educated by French Jesuists. It's very impressive, but we are already in colonial times, so everything is seen in comparison the to West.
You can pick any book on comparative religion/anthropological reports from Siberea or e.e and you will find many examples, which look remotely similar to magic this sub is about. Many cultures emphasized role of silence and many stiill do. I think keeping silence is still a thing in certain monasteries. Also, certain deprivation techniques, fasting, the use of psychodelic plants, etc are also very common. Shamans of the ancient mexico Castaneda was writing about, however, took this on the whole other level - they managed to turn vague religious practices into kind of technology. its the question worth asking, if mexican shamans were the only ones who managed such a feat.
Can you give any specific example of books with this info about Siberian shamans?
Shamanism: Archaic Techniques of Ecstasy by Mircea Elidade. It contains many references to the works of Russian anthropologists/historians of the early XX century however I'm not sure which of them are available in english. Most likely, very few. In any case, appendix may serve as guide to other works on the subject.
Thanks! This is interesting because I was just about to read Elidade's work on Alchemy. But honestly, after getting back into Castaneda and this subreddit, I'm going to focus on shamanistic practices for a while.
In 40 years neither Carlos, nor I, nor anyone who visited any of our social media, could point to any sorcery or magical system outside here, which actually works.
They're all totally obvious scams so far.
And it's not like anyone in here makes money from being "exclusive". In fact, it's a terrible burden to have the only real magic left. Full knowledge of that, pretty much takes over your life.
So we'd all welcome the real thing out there. We could relax and stop worrying so much.
It just doesn't seem to be visible. We're sure there's some, somewhere.
But maybe it's never seen on the internet. Perhaps mostly because, real magic can't be sold. You can't profit from it, or else you'll never be able to learn any.
Or if you somehow learned and became corrupted, you certainly wouldn't be able to teach anyone else that way.
Even our own system hid from outsiders, until the 1970s.
And it's easy to see that outside magical systems are frauds, most of the time, just by asking the AI key questions. About their history.
Daoism for example is so ludicrous in its origin, and so horrible in practice in Chinese countries, that anyone who falls for it is hopelessly lost in pretending and greed.
BUT, don Juan's lineage seems to have believed that prior to 10,000 years ago, there were in fact other forms of working magic.
And I once got a lecture (fully awake, eyes open, completely sober!) from a 100,000 year old entity which claimed there was a transportation center located around my home, presumably used by pre-humans like Neanderthals and Denisovans.
They could transport themselves, but not solid matter.
So they found a way to "tickle" the earth at key spots, and get it to fling their bundles of stuff for vast distances.
True?
Who cares! Imaging having a 100,000 year old entity materialize in front of you for real, and explain such a thing to you!
It even beats watching Studio Ghibli!
Except maybe the ones featuring cats...
The entity also claimed there were once "Eight Great Magical Systems" among humans.
Or proto humans... Modern man isn't the one that invented tools, fire, boats, and all sorts of wooden products and garments that didn't survive in the fossil record.
Those go back millions of years.
And real magic comes naturally to humanoids who live in the wilds. You can't help but run into spirits, who love to teach us.
I suppose they're a bit like a kid running into an older man in the public park, who "loves" to play with you.
But spirits don't have human motivations, so in the long run both parties benefit.
holy moly..
This reminds me of something. Is this a accurate depictio of what you saw:
From the Desk of George Barnard.
November 13, 2001
Our recent transmission, "Increased Spiritual Energy for Urantia", brought this email comment from one of our valued subscribers:
"The idea of Midwayers traveling through 2 dimensional channels is way beyond my understanding. I would never have considered such a thing. I have read copious amounts of Science Fiction all of my life, so I think I might have an edge over the majority of people in imagining and comprehending alternate realities… I've always felt more comfortable in imagining living in many of those alternate realities than the one I live in…"
Midwayers are unusual creatures in the sense that they are located in our space, but occupy a different, "nearby" facet of time to their human cousins. To be of any assistance as intermediaries between their Seraphic Superiors and their human charges, they, at times, need to arrive at short notice. They need to excel at many tasks.
In reply to our subscriber's inquiry, I can only try to answer the question on how they travel to the limited understanding through observation of my semi-material work mates of decades. Watching them arrive, do their work, and depart, I learned they have the ability to "manipulate" time and distances, just as easily as they manipulate the animal mind, including that of Homo Sapiens Sapiens.
As a platoon of Celestials with just one single human, the Midwayers functioned as much as co-workers, as they did in being my eminent Teachers. However, there was a long way to go from the point of my believing they were just ghosts, who had forgotten their names, yet, remarkably, retained their sense of humor, to my referring to them as the Spirit Guardians, and my seeking to assist them, as well as my soliciting their advice.
On one occasion, and when about to make a serious mistake, I was reminded of the folly of the move I was contemplating. The red-skinned Midwayer Chief turned up with a live squirrel -- a (rather unwanted) present for his human understudy.
"Nuts for the squirrels, squirrels for the nuts," he was trying to tell me. It was a kind warning that my plan for action bordered on the utterly foolish. But if my Platoon Leader could transport an animal across the oceans, then, surely, he could also take me anywhere. Aha! Adventure!
Imaginative, and almost fearless, I proposed he take me along on his haunts. It took months before my proposal was finally accepted, but between the middle of 1972 and until about 1985, we did many healings, and on almost every continent on the planet. We visited and remote-viewed relatives and friends, mostly in the presence of a throng of spirit student visitors from other planets.
One of the most remarkable aspects of these interstate, and intercontinental, travels was the fact that almost no time was taken up in actual traveling. No sooner had we left, or we had already arrived. In the late seventies I was finally allowed to tarry in mid air and view the pathways our Midwayer regularly traveled. They were wide, broad bands of an iridescent electric blue -- flat, two-dimensional, really. And they stretched from continent to continent, country to country, city to city, in great loops that reached right into the stratosphere.
It was an awesome sight, making the entire planet Earth look like it was loosely gift wrapped in shiny blue ribbons. These are the super-highways along which our Midwayer friends travel at almost the speed of thought. Always in a hurry, they are alerted to their next tasks by the instantaneous, reflective communication of Seraphim or Primary Midwayers.
They "dissolve" into a stream of ultimatons, the smallest and fastest-moving building blocks of the universe, to reassemble, perfectly, precisely as they were, and just a few feet from the ground. They ease to terra firma, and glide towards the patient, the TR -- anyone who may have urgently called for their assistance.
The old Startrek saying, "Beam me up, Scotty", is hardly as dumb as it sounds.
This (above) is as clear an explanation of their mode of travel as I can give.
If you are motivated to help others, ask for the assistance of the 1,111 Secondary Midwayers, and many others. Be courageous, persistent. If you are truly serious about your plans, this is a great and practical way towards Spirituality. You may only ever hear them, perhaps even see them, or do little more than catch their trademark 11:11 Reminder Calls on your clock, microwave, or computer. But they'll be there.
Doubt not. Fear not. The Midwayers are here to stay, help, guide, coerce, lure, and cajole, their human cousins toward greater spirituality as they have done for ages untold. It's their job. It's their life.
And it's just a small thought from George Barnard.
https://1111angels.net/old_files/E_Desk/GB12.htm
I asked chat gpt how old the concept of countries and civilizations was, it responded-
Civilizations vs older human reality-
For ~95% of human history, people lived:
without countries
without states
without borders
without centralized authority
Identity was based on:
kinship
landscape
seasonal movement
ritual obligations
stars, rivers, animals, winds
In that sense, countries are an abstraction laid over a much older human world.
According to Don Juan the Ancient Seers were at their prime about 6/ 7 thousand years ago, before the emergence of " civilizations ".
So I guess any record of them practicing sorcery would sooner be written in the stars than in our history books.
Chat wouldnt point at something other than whats already speculated by historians
I myself was curious as to how global their golden age was. Was it like the Toltecs were having a ball and the Irish a hard time..or were they all having a ball in their own way?
Difficult to say, any accounts would instantly be removed by whatever abrahamic that took over. Im surprised don juan's lineage survived all those conquests and occupations.
..yet, apparantly the lineage ended with Carlos. Perhaps the freeing of the blue scout marked that event somehow..idk
DJ said " I'm sure it happens all the time, but not in such an overt fashion".. or something like that.
Also interesting to note what Carlos says in an interview published in 1997 by Kindred Spirit
"I have never been able to draw conclusions about shamanism because in order to do this one needs to be an active member in the shamans' world. For a social scientist, let's say a sociologist for example, it is very easy to arrive at sociological conclusions over any subject related to the Occidental world, because the sociologist is an active member of the Occidental world. But how can an anthropologist, who spends at the most two years studying other cultures, arrive at reliable conclusions about them? One needs a lifetime to be able to acquire membership in a cultural world. I've been working for more than thirty years in the cognitive world of the shamans of ancient Mexico and, sincerely, I don't believe I have acquired the membership that would allow me to draw conclusions or to even propose them.
I have discussed this with people from different disciplines and they always seem to understand and agree with the premises I'm presenting. But then they turn around and they forget everything they agreed upon and continue to sustain orthodox academic principles, without caring about the possibility of an absurd error in their conclusions. Our cognitive system seems to be impenetrable."
Its the numerical world we have to blame 😂
I have no idea what to make of that. Could you elaborate?
Apparantly our numbers come from India. Trade helped with that.
Sorry for not replying, i saw your comment but got carried away, yea what i meant is that people nowadays are consumed by numerical tangible results, and are quick to dismiss anything beyond (most people at least) some font waste time and ponder about abstract things which is mostly the realm of philosophy and psychology( however this too became neumerical)
No apology needed.. I get it. I've been down many rabbitholes.. it just gave me a chance to refresh where numbers came from.. youtube came up with an interesting thing from " robwords" about numbers.. a channel about.. words. I find that it helps to watch things like that to educate myself and also to steer away from other peoples internal dialogue. I got a tip from someone on the discord not to concern myself with that and just stop my "own" ruminating.
I know some of the native americans practiced some kind of sorcery that enabled them to change into birds, wolves, coyetes, etc. That is where the legend of the skinwalker came from. A skinwalker is person who didnt want to go through the 15 year training in order to shapeshift. They would then kill someone they loved and put on their skin and do a ritual.
Interesting, i didnt know the origins of skinwalkers
This indian guy says it right here:
Thanks for the link🙌