“Whenever dharma declines and the purpose of life is forgotten, I manifest myself on earth. I am born in every age to protect the good, to destroy evil, and to reestablish dharma.” — Krishna, Bhagavad Gita
Magik. If you spell it with a “k” then people know you’re serious. There’s a scene in “The Witcher” series on Netflix that gives you a peak behind the curtain into how magik really works. Hollywood has always been primarily a magikal enterprise don’t you know. Traditionally magik wands were made from the wood of the holly tree, “Hollywood”, get it? Moreover the etymology of “entertainment” means, quite literally, “mind control.” Enter from the latin, intro, for inside; tain, from teneo, to grasp, possess, or control; and ment, from mens, mind. Entertainment. To enter and seize the mind. Which, if you think about it, is what it does, no? You get deeply engrossed in a movie your mind is seized. You’re not thinking about anything else. Hollywood. Magik.
Look, they always have to tell you.
So anyway, The Witcher.
There’s a scene where young aspiring witches are being taught the basics of magik, maybe you’ve seen it. On the desks before them are two items, a stone and some flowers. The teacher asks the students to use an incantation to levitate the stone. Only one young witch succeeds. Chanting the spell, over and over again, the stone on her desk begins to rise. For a brief moment she is ecstatic with her success, then, her left arm promptly shrivels.
You can’t get anything for nothing. That’s the message.
There are rules which govern the universe. The physical ones known to Science are but the simplest. The rules beyond that have gone by other names, “Natural Law”, “Metaphysics”, “Dharma.” None of these terms are strictly synonymous but they dance around one another well enough. I like the term Dharma and it’s my blog so…
One of the rules of Dharma is the concept of Transference. The results of one’s actions may be transferred to another person, or to another thing. For example, according to the Dharma outlined in the Old Testament, certain sins were punishable by death. And, that always had to be observed. The guilty party, however, didn’t necessarily have to be the one who died. You could kill an animal, for example. Or many animals if the sin was quite bad. This is the concept of a scapegoat. The results of one’s sins, one’s karmic debt, can be transferred onto another being. This principle, in fact, is the entire reason the sacrifice of Jesus can have saving power. The sins of the world can be transferred onto him. We can be cleared of them if he takes them on himself.
Every ancient culture understood this principle. In former times, men had not yet completely forgotten dharma. They didn’t always do it perfectly, but the principle was always there. The Aztecs performing human sacrifice were practicing transference. It’s one of the elementary principles of magik.
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