Toward A Taxonomy of Magical Beings, Notes from A Field Journal
An Exercise in Creative Imagination
Now for an exercise in creative imagination.
We are a research team of occult anthropologists from the Ancient Future.
We are identifying and classifying magical species indigenous to Gaia in the early 21st Century.
Based in a secure, undisclosed location, relying heavily on the works of J.R.R. Tolkien and J.K. Rowling as source material, we immerse ourselves in social media, searching for specimens to catch, examine, tag and release. One team member is scrolling through Instagram, another is scrolling through Facebook, another is spelunking in You Tube. Occasionally one of us will encounter an intriguing countenance or an unusual aura, and call in fellow team members to work together in an attempt to classify the creature. Magical or muggle? If magical, which species or sub-species? Is it muggle-afflicted? Is it entity-afflicted. Is it a hybrid?
These excerpts are from the research notes recorded in our field journals.
The ultimate goal is a Taxonomy of Magical Beings …
A Few Words About Muggles
The human race divides two distinct categories, “Muggle” (i.e., “Non-Magical”) and “Magical."
Muggles don’t recognize the magic all around us, they don’t feel it, they don’t hear it, they don’t work with it, when confronted with it, their initial response is typically fearful.
However, it is important to note, that our research indicates that the Muggles play some mysterious but vital role in the vast magical eco-system. Further research is called for.
It should also be noted that Muggles are often healthier, happier, more prosperous, of higher morals, even kinder than Magicals; they are however hardly ever as beautiful.
The ratio of Magicals to Muggles is open to debate, it is a subject of ongoing research.
Although our team has no interest in exploring the different species of Muggle, if there are indeed different species (or sub-species), we have identified two curious types of Muggle, the Heroic Muggle and the Magical Muggle. These two types of Muggle exhibit qualities of a mythical or mystical nature, but are not actually genetically Magical. They are occasionally mistaken for Magicals. They are often found in close proximity to Magicals, sometimes collaborating or cohabitating with Magicals. We do not know what percent of the Muggle population is “Magical Muggle” or “Heroic Muggle” but it is clear that it is a rare condition.
It should also be noted that Hobbits are sometimes mistaken for Muggles, but they are, of course, a magical species.
On the Nature of Magic
Although the definition of Muggle is straight-forward, i.e., a non-magical being, the definition of Magical is somewhat more elusive, since of course it is dependent upon a definition of Magic itself, which is arguably an impossibility. We have no intention of losing ourselves in a futile attempt to render such a definition, but we will instead offer some clues concerning its nature.
"The basis of herb magic—and all magic—is the power. This power has worn many names and forms through the centuries; at times even its existence was kept secret; at others it was common knowledge. The power is that which generated and maintains the universe. It is the power that germinates seeds, raises winds, and spins our planet. It is the energy behind birth, life, and death. Everything in the universe was created by it, contains a bit of it, and is answerable to it." — Scott Cunningham (Cunningham's Encyclopedia of Magical Herbs (Cunningham's Encyclopedia Series)
"It is no secret. All power is one in source and end, I think. Years and distances, stars and candles, water and wind and wizardry, the craft in a man's hand and the wisdom in a tree's root: they all arise together. My name, and yours, and the true name of the sun, or a spring of water, or an unborn child, all are syllables of the great word that is very slowly spoken by the shining of the stars. There is no other power. No other name.” ― Ursula K. Le Guin, A Wizard of Earthsea
Yes, magic is vibration, vibration is power, magic is sound, sound is power, all the true names, the “syllables of the great word that is very slowly spoken by the shining of the stars”
“The bottom line is that magic is communication: communication between yourself, Earth and all the other life forms with whom we share our Earth Mother.-- Judika Illes The Big Book of Practical Spells: Everyday Magic That Works
In “Dreaming the Dark: Magic, Sex and Politics,” the great witch Starhawk declared, “When we practice magic we are always making connections, moving energy, identifying with other forms of being … Magic could be called the applied science that is based on an understanding of how energy makes patterns and patterns direct energy. To put it another way, at its heart is a paradox: Consciousness shapes reality; Reality shapes consciousness.
Yes, magic is actionable and interactive. Willful from within the Reality to work upon reality
“Consciousness shapes reality; Reality shapes consciousness.”
Yes, actionable, interactive AND dangerous.
The ratio of Magicals to Muggles is open to debate, it is a subject of ongoing research.
Although our team has no interest in exploring the different species of Muggle, if there are indeed different species (or sub-species), we have identified two curious types of Muggle, the Heroic Muggle and the Magical Muggle. These two types of Muggle exhibit qualities of a mythical or mystical nature, but are not actually genetically Magical. They are occasionally mistaken for Magicals. They are often found in close proximity to Magicals, sometimes collaborating or cohabitating with Magicals. We do not know what percent of the Muggle population is “Magical Muggle” or “Heroic Muggle” but it is clear that it is a rare condition.
It should also be noted that Hobbits are sometimes mistaken for Muggles, but they are, of course, a magical species.
On the Nature of Magic
Although the definition of Muggle is straight-forward, i.e., a non-magical being, the definition of Magical is somewhat more elusive, since of course it is dependent upon a definition of Magic itself, which is arguably an impossibility. We have no intention of losing ourselves in a futile attempt to render such a definition, but we will instead offer some clues concerning its nature.
"The basis of herb magic—and all magic—is the power. This power has worn many names and forms through the centuries; at times even its existence was kept secret; at others it was common knowledge. The power is that which generated and maintains the universe. It is the power that germinates seeds, raises winds, and spins our planet. It is the energy behind birth, life, and death. Everything in the universe was created by it, contains a bit of it, and is answerable to it." — Scott Cunningham (Cunningham's Encyclopedia of Magical Herbs (Cunningham's Encyclopedia Series)
"It is no secret. All power is one in source and end, I think. Years and distances, stars and candles, water and wind and wizardry, the craft in a man's hand and the wisdom in a tree's root: they all arise together. My name, and yours, and the true name of the sun, or a spring of water, or an unborn child, all are syllables of the great word that is very slowly spoken by the shining of the stars. There is no other power. No other name.” ― Ursula K. Le Guin, A Wizard of Earthsea
Yes, magic is vibration, vibration is power, magic is sound, sound is power, all the true names, the “syllables of the great word that is very slowly spoken by the shining of the stars”
“The bottom line is that magic is communication: communication between yourself, Earth and all the other life forms with whom we share our Earth Mother.-- Judika Illes The Big Book of Practical Spells: Everyday Magic That Works
In “Dreaming the Dark: Magic, Sex and Politics,” the great witch Starhawk declared, “When we practice magic we are always making connections, moving energy, identifying with other forms of being … Magic could be called the applied science that is based on an understanding of how energy makes patterns and patterns direct energy. To put it another way, at its heart is a paradox: Consciousness shapes reality; Reality shapes consciousness.
Yes, magic is actionable and interactive. Willful from within the Reality to work upon reality
“Consciousness shapes reality; Reality shapes consciousness.”
Yes, actionable, interactive AND dangerous.
“Faerie is a perilous land, and in it are pitfalls for the unwary and dungeons for the overbold...The realm of fairy-story is wide and deep and high and filled with many things: all manner of beasts and birds are found there; shoreless seas and stars uncounted; beauty that is an enchantment, and an ever-present peril; both joy and sorrow as sharp as swords.” – J.R.R. Tolkien, On Fairy Stories
Yes, magic is fierce, magic is dangerous. But not in an aggressive way, or in a pathological way. Magic is fierce and dangerous, like mountain climbing, like trekking through a wilderness …
Occult Sciences
Yes, magic is fierce, magic is dangerous. But not in an aggressive way, or in a pathological way. Magic is fierce and dangerous, like mountain climbing, like trekking through a wilderness …
Occult Sciences
Our research here on Gaia in the 21stCentury touches on several occult sciences, including occult cosmology, occult anthropology (our principle discipline) and occult earth science.Just as the human race divides into two categories, Magical and Muggle, the nature of reality itself is best describing as having two modes: lower case “r” reality and upper case “R” Reality. Lower case “r” reality is defined by the three-dimensional space (i.e., height, width and depth) and linear time, which we will count as a fourth dimension. Upper case “R” Reality is constituted of not just three-dimensional space and linear time as the fourth dimension, but many more dimensions, which blow up our default concepts of space and time.
The lower case “r” reality is the domain of the Muggle but also the baseline of the Magical. Both share the experience of lower case “r” reality. The upper case “R” Reality is the domain of the Magical, and is beyond sensory perception or mental constructs.
Thus we say the Muggle World and the Magical World occupy the same space.
It is beyond the purview of this research project to utterly demolish the Genesis story as it is told in the Old Testament. But what we can say here is that if you turn the Genesis story inside out and upside down you will get closer to the truth of it all.
Could anything be more absurd than the notion that a Father God created Adam in “his own image” and then fashioned “Eve” from one of Adam’s ribs? Furthermore, just as Morgan Le Fay was wrongfully demonized in the patriarchal, Christianity-tainted versions of the Arthurian legend, so Lilith, the first mother, was demonized in the Old Testament’s patriarchally perverted Genesis story. All you need to know in the context of this research is that transhistorically, the Magicals are the Children of Lilith and the Muggles are the Children of Eve.
Now the Magicals and the Muggles are not alone, within this space of reality/Reality, there are of course the animal, plant and mineral queendoms, all throbbing with life, all shimmering with sentience of their own, all with their own remarkable relationships to the nature of Magic, just waiting to be explore. but there is more, there is more to the supernatural dimensions of it all …
There are, of course, the Elementals.
Related to or embodying the powers of nature.
"a thunderstorm is the inevitable outcome of battling elemental forces"
synonyms: natural, atmospheric, meteorological, environmental
"a thunderstorm is the inevitable outcome of battling elemental forces"
-- Google Dictionary
In the 16th Century, the great occult philosopher Paracelsus identified four categories of elementals: gnomes, undines, sylphs and salamanders, corresponding to Earth, Water, Air and Fire. The fifth element, Ether, is the space itself, the space in which all of this plays out, there are no elementals attributed to the Etheric, it is the Skin of the All Herself.
And then there is also the realm of the Toxic Entities, the Shells, the Shards, the Demon Spawn. It is all too common that these things might be called “Dark Entities,” but that is a misnomer we are breaking up the Table of Erroneous Correspondences, Dark and Light are not the duality of Good and Evil, they are the dynamic duo of Yin and Yang, they can symbolize. We are liberating Darkness from this wrongful association, so we call these Toxic Entities …
Some ancient traditions, e.g., among early Egyptians, it is taught that you aren’t born with a soul, that you have to create your soul in your life … I understand what those teachings are pointing to, but I don’t buy into that view … What I do know is that you can lose your soul … You can become soulless …It isn’t easy, but it can happen, it does happen … Think of your soul as something like a creature that has chosen to stay with you and live with you, it has become part you and you have become part of it, you are vital to each other, symbiotic, it is dependent upon you and you are dependent upon it, like a service animal, now this service animal, this soul is strong, fiercely loyal, dedicated, it won’t leave you easily, it wants to be with you and help you, it wants to nourish you and be nourished by you, but if you mistreat or neglect yourself, or allow yourself to be neglected or mistreated, or if as a child you are helpless to resist such cruelty, or you are in some other way helpless to escape it, then you soul can get sick and die, serial killers are soulless, mass murderers are soulless, well, what happens really is more like your soul gets suck out of an air lock into the cold emptiness of space … and once it has been sucked through and out into nothingness, it is torn to pieces, these are the shards and shells, the remnants of souls that have been lost, they are sucked through the cracks in the circle of the life, the cracks in the world …. And all of these shards and shells fly around in a bardo of their own outside the periphery of the circle of life, below the world, but they are drawn back again, of course, they are attracted to the play of light and dark, and in the green garden of the world, they seek energy, they want to feed, they are drawn back the life of senses, so they fly back in through those cracks in the circle of the life, and they attach themselves to someone vulnerable, someone weakened, someone who has opened themselves up unconsciously, to the wrong influences or the wrong kinds of appetites … and they glom on, and take hold, and feed parasitically off your life force, and over time they warp you in different ways … so some classifications can become very complex, you can have, for example, an entity-afflicted Magical or an entity-afflicted Muggle ..
Also occasionally numerous shards and shells will aggregate to form a demon, a thing that has a life of its own in a way, and these demons will return to the edge of the circle of life, to dwell among the magicals and the muggles, some will occupy the shell of a muggle or the shell of a magical, some will actually have their own incarnation, there types of demons, species and sub-species which evolve out of the various strains of shard husks shells soul remnants …
Both Sauron in Lord of the Rings and Voldemort in the Tales of Harry Potter were soulless and disembodied and yet over time returned to once again threaten the circle of life …
Notes from a Field Journal
Partial List of Magical Species Identified, Cataloged and Tagged in Our Research: Dakini, Fairy, Pixie, Sprite, Mermaid, the Spectrum of Fey, Centaur, Unicorn, Pegasus, Peris, Jinn/Genie, Garuda, Brownie, Dwarves, Valkyrie, Elves, Sorceress/Sorcerer (Species), Vampire, Wyrwolf, Amazon …
Yes, there are many sub-species, e.g., one isn’t simply mermaid, our research has detected different kinds of mermaids … And yes, there are hybrids too, resulting from the inter-twining of different magical strains …
We have identified what we call the “Spectrum of Fey.” In the beginning, and before the beginning, what we now identify as Dakini and what we now identify as Fey were the same, it was one species, BUT over the bloody, insane course of three to five patriarchal millennia, the species bifurcated East and West, and because of numerous, profound mass crimes, e.g., the Spanish Inquisition, what was once all Dakini, went underground, broke up into sub species indigenous to particular regions, morphed, mutated, intertwined with other magical creatures, lived on taking different names and styles, developing diverse strains, and yet always on the edge of annihilation … much of what we understand as “witches” and “sorceresses” and “priestesses” down through the ages are made up of one sub-species of Fey or another … we call this range of sub-species “the Spectrum of Fey” and it reaches from a strong strain of Fairy-Fey intertwining at one end of the spectrum to a strong strain of Elven-Fey intertwining at the other end of the spectrum …
The current state of species identification work relies heavily on legends of East and West, but deeper study of North and South will reveal many new species and sub-species
Within the last 72 hours we have classified an incubus occupying the shell of a muggle projecting herself as a magical being and a “tantra teacher” living in Northern California and an Amazon/Pegasus hybrid witch living in New England as a wife and mother …
The Secret Engine of the World
In closing, here is a new poem --
What are you called? Bruja? Baul? Bodhisattva? Tantrika? Aghori? Troubadour? Dakini? Bhakta? Curandera? Yogini? Wizard? Sorceress? These are all just cover stories. Your true designation is beyond human speech. Authentic, mystical love, real love, is the secret engine of the world. But this authentic, mystical love, this real love, does not act like fire or water; it does not incinerate or drown that which it encounters. Authentic, mystical love, real love, moves like a vast glacier; whatever it does not crush or bury, it pushes forward. Yes, this love glacier levels mountains and forges canyons, it breaks the unbreakable and reshapes the earth. The love glacier is so massive that it takes a lifetime just to glimpse it, and even then it can only be seen as far as the horizon; it moves so slowly it is almost undetectable, and so it takes a lifetime to measure its grinding progress. Authentic, mystical love does not act like fire or water; it does not incinerate or drown that which it encounters. this love moves like a vast glacier; whatever it does not crush and bury, it pushes forward. This is the secret engine of the world. How utterly empty and free you must be to revel in the movement of this glacier, knowing that all you have ever had or wanted will be torn up and ground under, and that then in the glacier's aftermath there will be only a long fathomless silence, in which you will be no more than the shadow of a raven on the white stillness of the deep snow.
-- Richard Power
Dragon Bone Broth: On the Nature of Magical Beings and the Structure of the Magical World