Post#3 » Fri Mar 26, 2010 6:11 pm
I have no answer for Cyberpower's question above, but I wish to vent a frustration I've in me that gets agitated when I come across this good/evil construct.
What seems clear to me is that such distinctions and definitions as that good spirits will not attack or do harm to people, just don't cut it. I feel that for such formulations to make sense, these definitions would have to be cast in iron and their meaning accepted by all. Let's say I conjure up some entity and charge this one with seeking out my downstairs neighbour and making sure he dies and I work this conjuring in such a way that the result of this death is that I end up with my dead neighbour's widow as my girl and all his worldly goods as mine.
Now, if my victim was Harry Potter and Ginny my object of lust - all of J.K. Rowling's fans would be out for my blood. If, on the other hand, my victim was a Joseph Frietzl-like character and my ensuring his demise afforded me with a chance to execute a gallant rescue of the poor woman in question, well then, I'd be quite the hero.
My point here is that our moral and ethical guidelines have their value in being just that - guidelines. They'd lose that value were they to be cast in iron, because no two situations are the same... everything happens only once, so we have to evaluate each new situation with it's composite parts and pass judgement only after having weighed and measured these parts by the standards of our guidelines. In my example, as simple as it is, already good and bad become interchangeable from an objective point of view and therefor useless in any validatory capacity. I claim, therefor , that good and bad, in actuality are simply personal reactions made manifest in a someone as a way of classifying whatever is happening to them. If I do something that somehow affects you, you will feel it either as good for you - or as bad for you. And that won't necessarily determine whether or not it is of any harm to you... or benefit... depending on your perspective.
I'm too lazy to find it right now, but I do believe that there's a good discussion along these lines in the planetary & angel magick forum. I'd be surprised if this isn't touched upon in some way elsewhere too.
People will believe anything - either because they wish it to be true,
or because they fear it might be so...
- wizards' 1st rule