A Different Take Options

Almost every magickal paradigm shares one basic practice with regard to a complete Noob: they require the Noob to take on a new name as a symbol for referencing a new “magickal personality”.

Considering this has caused me to start wondering and contemplating this common practice.

Seems to me that this “magickal personality” is an Artifical Entity. By “artifical” I do not mean what fake, which how that term is popularly used. Instead, I mean created. Specifically: a “magickal personality” is that which a Noobie Mage names and creates – and then subsequently gradually grows through various stages through working the Art.

Yet that Artifical Entity is not a servitor.

That which basically differentiates a servitor and a “magickal personality” compared to each other is: a servitor is created for operating independent to a Mage – while a “magickal personality” is not created for operating independent to a Mage. Indeed, a "magickal personality" is that which a Mage puts on, enters into, operates from within... etc...

Another difference is that servitors can be grown to become egregores – while a “magickal personality” are grow to become something else. But before I get into what “magickal personalities” grow to become, I am going to associate a single, and ancient, term here for simply referencing “magickal personalities” and for providing an intuitive ledge from which you might be able to leap ahead and grasp what I am getting at here before I spell this out a bit more.

Instead of being a servitor, a “magickal personality” is an Avatar.

Yeah – I know that specific term has been hurled around according to all kinds of ways over the years. And I know where the word originally is from – and how it is most often popularly used these days to reference either picture icons, or video game personae. Yet I hope that, given the flexibility of the term over time, you will be able to allow me to use it here as I have (and will) - and that you playfully will be able to try it on, and “run with it” a bit as I am using it here - without mistakenly thinking that I am talking about Hinduism, picture icons, video games, or however else anyone else has used the word avatar.

So – to move on – in a nutshell, here is what I discern:

A Noobie Mage creates and names an Avatar. The Avatar is a vehicle through which a Mage then successively cultivates during magickal work. To use the differentiation of magickal work as I have been elsewhere in these forums: such methods can generally be considered as either thaumaturgical or theurgical.

Theurgical magick work results with growing the Avatar for eventual consummation with the so-called “Higher Self” or “Holy Guardian Angel” or “Divine Genuis” (or whatever a specific pathway prefers to call it).

Okay – what do you folks think about this assessment and explanation?

I can already have some questions of my own further along this line that I am considering, such as:

1. Is said consummation a communion with the “Divine Genuis”? Or is it a different scenario? i.e. Does the matured Avatar become the vehicle through which the “Divine Genuis” can fully, and optimally, incarnate through the Avatar – which in turn interacts with events in this world via the physical vechile (the body)?

Note on #1: those questions rest upon discerning a difference between communion and incarnation. In the case of the former, the result is a fusion of Avatar and “Divine Genius” – such that the two become one with no further distinctions between them being possible. A new entity is created. This differs compared to incarnation, because - in the incarnation scenario - although the “Divine Genius” operates through a matured Avatar, a difference would continue to exist between Avatar and “Divine Genius,” in the same way that a difference exists between a spirit incarnating through a human body. This however leads to other questions connected with those that follow in #2.

2. What exactly is a Mage, such that one can create an Avatar for such consummation? Is a Mage merely a human fooling around with various personas? Or is a Mage really some other kind of entity, in relation to the “Divine Genuis”, with the penultimate purpose of creating and growing an Avatar for the purposes (whether fusion or incarnation) of said “Divine Genius”?

Note on #2: the rub with these questions is – if a Mage creates and grows an Avatar for full incarnation by the Mage’s “Divine Genius”, then what happens to the Mage? Is the Mage just pushed out, annihilated, something else entirely… when the “Divine Genius” fully incarnates? Or what? A similar issue exists with regard to considering the outcome as being communion, instead of incarnation: once Avatar and “Divine Genius” fuse, what then happens to the Mage who created and cultivated the Avatar component of the newly created “Divine Genuius+Avatar”?


Insights, questions, and comments most welcome.

Update



Since I had the above conversation with bym five years ago, I have done a lot of further contemplation and experimentation about this topic. About a year ago, when talking this over with a buddy, he brought up that my speculation about Mages being associated with Avatars was really close to something that a company called White Wolf did with regard to an old RPG.


Needless to say, I was simultaneously intrigued and dismayed - because once some form of popular entertainment gets ahold of, and showcases, something - suddenly no one can think that one is talking about anything different than that public media version. As examples - consider what comes to mind when anyone talks about making magick rings (they think you're trying to be Sauron or some such foolishness); consider what happens when someone uses the word "matrix" (they think you're trying to be Neo); consider what happened soon after Madonna announced that she was into the Kabbala in the mid 90s (they thought anyone who was studying it was just a Material Girl's fanboi); hell - the fact that I used the term Avatar will have some people who don't realize I used it before the movie came out will more than likely erroneously to think that I was talking about blue monkey-cat people from the planet Pandora; etc...

Nevertheless, I did a bit of research about White Wolf's explanation for the usage of the terms "Mage" and "Avatar" and found this:


http://whitewolf.wikia.com/wiki/Avatar

The Avatar (also Daemon, True Genius) is the source of an Awakened individual's ability to perform magic, and which grants the possibility of Ascension.
Mages experience the Avatar as a separate personality which is connected to the mage's soul, and which drives the mage toward Ascension. It will often speak to the mage, as a "voice in the head" or via dreams. Avatars generally take on a humanoid form of the opposite gender to the mage, though this is not always the case and is highly dependent on the mage's interpretation. Avatars are also in control of a mage's Seekings.

Avatars were historically guided to their mages by spirits known as psychopomps. The presence of psychopomps was direct result of the appearance of the Entelechy, and they radiated forward and backward in time from that point. During this time (which includes the Dark Ages), psychopomps chose mages and Avatars so perfectly matched that many mages were completely unaware of the presence of the Avatar, referring to it only as a sort of mystical Fount of energy. Unfortunately, this often meant the inner voice of the Avatar was rendered silent, and mages were free to pursue their own petty personal agendas. However, as time progressed away from the Entelechy, psychopomps become less common, leaving it up to Avatars to find their own mages.

During the Renaissance, Avatars were referred to as Daemons, but even then different mages interpreted them in different ways.

While some mages see Avatars as extra-dimensional entities, others (notably the Celestial Chorus) see them as facets of a greater consciousness, or even of the Tapestry itself. Along these lines, the Traditions often teach that Avatars are soul-shards of the "Pure Ones", ancient mages who Ascended long ago and who now seek to aid modern mages.

Amongst Technocrats, the Avatar is not seen as a separate entity but rather "True Genius", a higher comprehension of the natural world which allows them to understand and use Enlightened Science. The voice of the Avatar is explained as the Technocrat's own subconscious, though most agents undergo frequent psychological evaluation to make certain they are not developing schizophrenia or multiple personality disorder.

Ah, well - they beat me to it (wryly grins)
Still, I find the subject and topic interesting.

This post has been edited by Praxis: Nov 14 2011, 06:56 AM