The Magical Family
We have already mentioned the notion, central to the magical myth, of the Families of Monads and their significance in incarnation.
Indeed, magi of all ages and cultures sought to reproduce this important part of the myth, and organized into special groups traditionally called Magical families.
Unlike other organizations, these families are formed according to a strict principle of mutual correspondence among their members, and are always limited in size.
The covens of medieval magic, the «Circles» of Magi, the Lodges of Magical Orders, magi parties in Latin American fiction — all of these are more or less successful forms of the existence of Magical Families. Magi have long known that an egregore isn’t the only way to combine forces, and they always sought to create fundamentally different organizations.
At the heart of the principle behind such families lies the notion that when kindred Monads resonate, their power increases geometrically rather than arithmetically, and, moreover, the power of the Family attains a new level of existence, neither reducible to the individual nor to the collective.
This last point requires some clarification: a magical family is formed according to a fundamentally different law than an egregore: it is not a superstructure that includes the individualities of its members; it is a new level of being, in which each member of the family is simultaneously its axis and, accordingly, contains the family’s entire energy. In other words, instead of giving part of themselves to an Egregore, a magus in a family absorbs others into himself, so that each family member is, in a sense, both the family and each of its members. This principle of union is essentially Pleromic in character: energies unite «indivisibly and unmerged», as in the world’s fullness.
It is clear that joining families is not for all magi – many of them prefer the solitary way.
Nevertheless, those practitioners for whom the advantages of a pleromic organization are clear should, in their common progress, adhere to ‘family’ union, avoiding the formation of ad-hoc groups, authoritarian centers, and egregore-based structures.
Any Egregore is vampiric – it helps only to the extent it hopes it can feed on participants’ energy; the family, however, is self-enclosed; it does not feed predators, it prevents any loss of power. At the same time, effectively being a single entity energetically, the Family must allow accumulation of power – and in this sense, it is clear that with the family’s full energy reserve, each of its members gains the chance to hunt for power more effectively.
The idea and method of forming magical families throughout magic’s history have been a central part of the Way of Power, and the importance of this is hard to overstate.
Family = Order = Lodge = Party of Magicians. Don’t these structures form their Egregore?
They should not form an egregore. However, in reality, unfortunately, most of them are built on an egregoric principle.
One should not think that a magical family ‘does not feed’ the egregore. It does! And usually not just one!
A family that feeds the egregore is built incorrectly. That is why the proper formation of families was one of the most important areas of Magical myth – avoiding egregoric influences is indeed extremely difficult. Nevertheless, such a possibility exists.
Creating one’s own – probably possible, but not interacting with existing ones – is impossible… at least for the reason that we are still in bodies and perform a lot of social functions. I believe that we should distinguish between ‘subordination to the egregore’ and ‘conscious interaction’ with various egregores. We need to ‘ponder’ in our spare time if we already have or still need to have… :))
Exactly, interacting with foreign egregores does not necessarily mean feeding them. The art of a magician lies in interacting with various forces while not binding connections with them.
Every magical family can consider and see itself as independent if it does not know or does not want to know what it actually depends on.
I agree, unfortunately, most families indeed fall into dependence. But this is not about them. It’s about the principled possibility. The fact that most people make mistakes does not imply that these mistakes are obligatory. Otherwise, Magic would make no sense. To avoid mistakes, one needs to know what to strive for.
As for me, forming a family is the most correct decision, as it was millions of years ago, it has not lost its relevance to this day. It offers a lot more opportunities and strengths, not to mention the actual UNDERSTANDING and unity, spiritual and emotional, which is sometimes impossible to find in other people, magicians, creatures.
Of course, the family imposes its own problems that need to be resolved and that require dragging even some others in, taking on foreign states, supporting, experiencing collective transformations, and so on… however, the fist has always been stronger than a nameless finger.
Family = Order = Lodge = Party of magicians. Don’t these structures form their own Egregore?
They form it for sustenance; for themselves, there is another structure; highly developed (older races, deities, various embodied spirits) operate on a different principle, leaving egregores for feeding purposes. (magical forums, branches of orders, etc.) A center of power certainly exists in the family, and their own energy field with their eidetic connections as well. Pure egregores are formed by novices because they do not know how to create something of a different kind, limiting themselves to such. All sorts of ‘orders of sacred Himalayan goats’ and so on.
One should not think that the magical family ‘does not feed’ the egregore. It feeds! And usually not just one!
Of course, it feeds, with certain egregores one must interact (but does not create its own; for this, again, a different form of energy union is used), which should be tracked, while cutting off from overly vampirizing egregores. The higher the development of the family, the more egregores, beings, spirits, and forces desire to interact with it.
Any magical family can consider itself independent and see itself as such, but it doesn’t know or doesn’t want to know what it depends on.
Falling into dependency is really not worth it; it’s helpful to pass through the AV Devil, which will help identify attempts to create dependency and get rid of it in time.
But independence on a global scale is nothing more than an illusion, especially when you see those who stand ‘at the helm’ of this system, the participants of which sleep a quiet sleep with erased and shackled memories… so independent families, in principle, do not exist (in this reality); everyone somehow depends on each other within a family, and the very structure is a mechanism within a higher organization that carries out observation and control.
Is the concept of the star family in Contact (dreams… voice… automatic writing…) identical to the concept of the magical family? Mine constantly steer me away from any collective actions.
How I want to meet fellow travelers! Teachers! Family!