Category: traditional witchcraft

Ancestor Veneration When It Isn’t Your Father’s Wish

On By benebellIn Fu talismans, I Ching, I Ching The Oracle (book), Magical in the Mundane, personal spirituality, Tao of Craft (book), Taoism, traditional witchcraftLeave a comment

I received a question by letter, which I wanted to answer privately, but didn’t have an e-mail address or even mailing address. So here’s to hoping this post is seen by who it’s intended for. ❤

The question presented:

Dear Benebell,

I am a Taoist witch, but my religious family thinks I am a Baptist Christian and therefore against non-Baptist religious practices.

Last night my dad and I were watching a Taiwanese movie and an ancestor veneration scene came up. My dad began a conversation about Taoist traditions and said, “When I die, please don’t venerate me like a Catholic or Taoist would.”

I am a strong believer in ancestor veneration and plan to venerate both of my parents when they pass away.

I do not want to go against my father’s personal wishes as I love and respect him, but I also do not want his spirit to go un-venerated because I love him dearly.

What, in your opinion, is the best way to go about this?

Continue reading “Ancestor Veneration When It Isn’t Your Father’s Wish” →

A Curious Herbal (1737) by Elizabeth Blackwell: Hand-colored engravings

On By benebellIn create your own deck, free download, grimoire, oracle deck, personal, traditional witchcraft3 Comments

These hand-painted engravings of healing herbs and garden vegetables are a delight, and I’m sure at least one creative person seeing this will get ideas, download, and do something lovely with these illustrations, so here you go.

They’re from Elizabeth Blackwell’s A Curious Herbal (1737). Below you’ll find a zip file you can download of high-res images from the book. Or view it in the entirety, courtesy of The British Library, Catalogues & Collections.

A Curious Herbal (1737)

Download Zip File

About the Book:

Elizabeth Blackwell’s A Curious Herbal is notable both for its beautiful illustrations of medicinal plants and for the unusual circumstances of its creation.

[It] contains illustrations and descriptions of plants, their medicinal preparations, and the ailments for which they are used.

The first herbal was written by the Greek physician Dioscorides in the first century AD.

Elizabeth Blackwell was born in Aberdeen in about 1700, but moved to London after she married. She undertook this ambitious project to raise money to pay her husband’s debts and release him from debtors’ prison.

Blackwell’s Herbal was an unprecedented artistic, scientific and commercial enterprise for a woman of her time.

She drew, engraved and coloured the illustrations herself, mostly using plant specimens from the Chelsea Physic Garden.

It was highly praised by leading physicians and apothecaries (makers and sellers of medicines), and made enough money to secure her husband’s freedom, although she later had to sell the copyright as well.

This finely-bound copy of A Curious Herbal is from the collection of King George III, held in the British Library.

British Library 34.I.12 -13

Crafting with a Ba Gua Mirror in Traditional Asian Witchcraft

On By benebellIn grimoire, Magical in the Mundane, personal spirituality, Tao of Craft (book), Taoism, Tinkering Bell, traditional witchcraft8 Comments

Learn a little more about this common ritual tool in traditional Asian folk magic. I’m inviting you to give the ba gua or eight trigrams mirror a try.

This video covers a few pointers on how to use a ba gua mirror to tell whether you’ve been hexed or cursed (a folksy practice that’s interesting to learn about, at the very elast), how a ba gua mirror can amplify your spell-crafting techniques, a simple intention-setting candle spell, how to make your own ba gua mirror if you can’t source one, and how to integrate this one tool and folk practice into what you’re already doing.

Continue reading “Crafting with a Ba Gua Mirror in Traditional Asian Witchcraft” →

Elemental Directional Correspondences in Ritual Magic, East vs. West: How Do You Reconcile Conflicts?

On By benebellIn astrology, cartomancy, divination, free download, grimoire, Learn the Tarot, Magical in the Mundane, opinion, personal, personal spirituality, promotional, Tao of Craft (book), Taoism, tarot, tarot card meanings, tarot community, tarot exercises, traditional witchcraft12 Comments

One of my favorite personal rewards from launching the Witchcraft Fundamentals course is the Google Group, where all of us are exchanging insights, asking tough questions, trying to answer tough questions, and getting to know each other. To give you a sampling of what that e-mail list-serv group is like, I’m sharing something I wrote on there in one of the threads started by a practitioner of both Eastern and Western metaphysics.

The question presented is, in short, how do you reconcile Eastern elemental-directional correspondences with Western elemental-directional correspondences?

By the way, scroll all the way down for the PDF downloads of this post, which you can then print out and tuck into whatever reference manual for your metaphysical studies you have going on.

IN THIS WESTERN WITCHCRAFT COURSE, you’ll learn fairly soon that there are different systems of elemental-directional correspondences even within the umbrella of Western occult philosophy, and we cover three of them in this course:

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The Witch’s Power to Bless (and the Magic Chain)

On By benebellIn free download, personal spirituality, promotional, traditional witchcraftLeave a comment

This is a supplemental lecture in Module 11 of the Witchcraft Fundamentals course, titled “The Magic Chain.” If you’re working through the course in the order outlined by the syllabus, then watching this video lecture would come after having watched the video lecture for Chapter XI in the Doctrinal Basis workbook.

However, this supplemental lecture is being provided for free public access.

Download the LECTURE NOTES (PDF):

The Magic Chain & The Witch’s Power to Bless

PURCHASE THE COURSE PACK:

Witchcraft Fundamentals: Doctrinal Basis

Getting Mad at Our Reflection in the Mirror: Responding to Ceri Radford’s “I spent a week becoming a witch”

On By benebellIn opinion, personal spirituality, traditional witchcraft11 Comments

There’s an article in the Independent that has riled up the witchcraft community: Ceri Radford’s “I spent a week becoming a witch and the results were worrying,” where she culled tips and instruction from a book she cites, Luna Bailey’s The Modern Witch’s Guide to Happiness.

The community’s response on Twitter?

  • “vapid anti-witch bullshit”
  • “poor journalism”
  • “This bitch has no clue”
  • “written by an idiot only looking to be trendy through appropriation”
  • “hot mess of an article”
  • “absolutely shameful”
  • “ignorant and frankly disappointing and offensive”
  • “piece of shit”
  • “articles like this just piss me the fuck off”
  • “a smug shithead”
  • “I just read the vomit in question and I am fucking livid”
  • “dipshit sneer piece … 85% dumb jokes”
  • “complete horseshit”
  • “wildly offensive article”
  • “fucking idiot”
  • “hex that bitch”

Love and light, apparently.

The salient takeaway point from the article, however, is the one fueling the anger and animosity: Radford’s conclusion that witchcraft is in “dogged resistance to logic” and requires a “suspension of belief in the scientific underpinnings of the universe.”

And my private response to myself after reading her article? Oh, man…  We as a collective (so clearly I’m not saying we unanimously believe, but the dominating voice after averaging high and low and everything in between together) have put out a particular narrative about modern witchcraft, and then when we see exactly that narrative being reflected back at us tinged with a smidge of snark, we go off our rails because clearly none of the shadow work or meditation we’ve been doing has had any success.

Continue reading “Getting Mad at Our Reflection in the Mirror: Responding to Ceri Radford’s “I spent a week becoming a witch”” →

1: The Candidate [from the online course offering, Western Witchcraft I]

On By benebellIn free download, grimoire, Magical in the Mundane, personal spirituality, traditional witchcraft1 Comment

The Candidate

This is the second module of Western Witchcraft I: Fundamentals and Doctrinal Basis online course  provided for free preview. Learn more about that course and how to enroll by clicking here.

VIDEO LECTURE:

DOWNLOAD LECTURE NOTES:

Click here to download the lecture notes (pdf)

WORKBOOK READING:

Chapter 1: The Candidate (pdf)

Continue reading “1: The Candidate [from the online course offering, Western Witchcraft I]” →

0: Introduction [from the online course offering, Western Witchcraft I]

On By benebellIn free download, grimoire, Magical in the Mundane, personal spirituality, traditional witchcraft2 Comments

INTRODUCTION

This is the preliminary module to the Western Witchcraft I: Fundamentals and Doctrinal Basis online course. Learn more about that course and how to enroll by clicking here.

VIDEO LECTURE:

DOWNLOAD LECTURE NOTES:

Click here to download the lecture notes

WORKBOOK READING:

Continue reading “0: Introduction [from the online course offering, Western Witchcraft I]” →

Seal to Defeat All Foes

On By benebellIn free download, grimoire, Magical in the Mundane, traditional witchcraft6 Comments

A “Seal to Defeat All Foes”? Oh, snap. That sounds badass. We definitely need to give this one a try, right?

You’ll find my write-up of this in one of the back-end appendices of Key of Solomon and Collected Studies on Spirit Conjure. It’s a free e-book download here, and if after checking out the pdf version you realize you want it in physical hard copy paperback, that link will give you instructions on how to order one.

In the pdf, check out p. 505.

Continue reading “Seal to Defeat All Foes” →