Ritual Space Options

Greetings all,

I practice alone, am not a member of a group, and have a question re: ritual space. For several years I've had the luxury of having an entire room in my home dedicated to ritual use - large and empty, save for window coverings, a ritual circle painted on the floor, and an altar. I have been forced by economic necessity to rent a room out in my home, and my former ritual room is now also my music room and library, furnished with books, antiques, paintings, etc., none of which have occult connotations.

Question: Many (including a former teacher) believe that ritual space should be used ONLY for that purpose, or that ritual tools and the like should be hidden from view if non-practitioners are to be in the room for any reason. Must this always be so? The room is not a place of heavy foot traffic. I keep the door closed. I may at times have friends over for music making (a harpsichord is in the room) but they are aware of my interest in the occult, and are respectful of it and of things related to it. I tried rolling a large rug down over the circle, but it doesn't completely cover it. I've also hidden things from view when others are in the room, even though those who come into the room (not many) have no problem with them. Some might say that even just MY using the room for non-ritual related purposes is "wrong". I read in front of the fireplace for example, or listen to music with a glass of wine. Prior to every ritual conducted in the room, I do cleanse the space.

I suspect the most ceremonial magicians and others, over the centuries, rarely had the luxury of a dedicated room for ritual use. How do you deal with the necessity of having ritual space that must do double duty? In my experience at least, my dual-purpose ritual space is still potent when I conduct rituals, and even when it was a dedicated space, "outsiders" still had to come in at times - landlord and electricians for example - and I just rededicated and purified the space after wards.

Very few of the older systems (The Sacred Magic of Abra-Melin, for example) require a room set aside for occult practices where all others are forbidden to enter and nothing else can occur. More commonly, you are required to go far away from civilization. Sometimes it is not specified, but rather obviously there are things to be done in private, and in these cases there are no rules given in regard to the use of the area outside the ceremonies.

The more modern systems (Eliphas Levi to the present) seem to depend more on the condition of the magician and/or preliminary invocations and purifications. Levi mentions some of his most potent work being done at the end of a hallway in someone else's house. Austin Spare is reported to have conjured "something" abominable on his dinner table, and that was well before TV dinners. Crowley bought a whole house explicitly for performing rituals, but by his own accounts his best works were done at a tourist attraction, in a hotel room, and while walking about in the desert.

Aside from living persons, the fantasy archetype of magicians is that of a person of great power whose home is almost always a total mess. Books, skulls, zoological artifacts, rocks, plants, equipment, and anything else can be imagined in the sanctuary of a wizard. Imagine Gargamel the magician in a clean house with a spare room for conjuring!

Unless you are making a devoted effort to work with a system that explicitly forbids intrusion, as I gather you are not, feel free to make your own regulations as to how you manage ritual space.