Odd Insights into Hekate

Syncretic Egyptian / Graeco-Roman magic from the collection of texts known as the Papyri Graecae Magicae.
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Pleiades
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Re: Odd Insights into Hekate

Post#101 » Sun May 27, 2018 1:28 pm

monsnoleedra wrote:Wonder if this part of the discussion wouldn't be a good subject for the PGM part of the forum. Anyway, not debating that the subject of love spells is a part of the PGM or is coercion in practice only that the use of Hekate is relatively small in usage in them.

Not my site but an excellent site of reference http://voces-magicae.com/2015/04/17/hekate-in-the-pgm/ and if I recall it belongs to a member here already.

PGM IV. 1390-1495 Love spell performed in necromantic setting (with the help of “those who have died a violent death”). Invoked by herself (also as Hekate-Persephone) for three days while making the initial offering at the place of death. Later invoked with many other Chthonic deities for a secondary offering.

PGM IV. 2708-2784 Full moon hymn. In this case the petition is to secure the affections of a lover, but could be used for any form of petition or prayer. Hekate is once again identified with Artemis, Persephone and Selene.

PGM IV. 2943-2966 Love spell to cause a lover to “lie awake for me for all eternity”. In this spell it appears that Iope (Cassiopeia) is called forth to perform the deed through the authority and power of Hekate

PGM CXVII. Fragment of historical significance. It is is likely one of the earlier papyri of the collection and speaks to an already well established syncretic Greek and Egyptian tradition. Thought to be a love spell mentioning Hekate.


Basically 4 spells that could be said to be love spells and 1 of those could be claimed to be punishment of a lover more than a true love spell. So 4 out of 14 spells are potentially love spells. Then of the 4, 1 is done in the name or power of Hekate not actually calling upon her. Which sort of places it in a testament of faith sort of thing

Kimberly B. Stratton in her book DAUGHTERS OH HECATE Women & Magic in the Ancient World Oxford University Press 2014 ISBN 978-O-19-534271-0 has discussed several of these aspects already. Chapter 5 Magic, Abjection, and Gender in Roman Literature goes into some detail about this very subject. Still reading the book so may go into it more in later chapters.


Just been re-reading an article by Ellen Reeder on the statues,terracota art and bronze matrix in the late Hellenistic period during which a synthesis of Mother images with those of Artemis,Demeter and Hekate began to emerge.Not entirely sure if these conflations impacted on later depictions of Hekate or indeed the figure of the Mother or how far they influenced the ideologies of later writers.Anyway,thought I might mention it.

Reeder, E. (1987). The Mother of the Gods and a Hellenistic Bronze Matrix. American Journal of Archaeology, 91(3), 423-440.

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monsnoleedra
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Re: Odd Insights into Hekate

Post#102 » Sun May 27, 2018 4:41 pm

Pleiades wrote: Just been re-reading an article by Ellen Reeder on the statues,terracota art and bronze matrix in the late Hellenistic period during which a synthesis of Mother images with those of Artemis,Demeter and Hekate began to emerge.Not entirely sure if these conflations impacted on later depictions of Hekate or indeed the figure of the Mother or how far they influenced the ideologies of later writers.Anyway,thought I might mention it.

Reeder, E. (1987). The Mother of the Gods and a Hellenistic Bronze Matrix. American Journal of Archaeology, 91(3), 423-440.


Stephanie Lynn Budin in her book Artemis (ISBN:978-0-415-72541-5 (hbk)) Routledge Press (2016), touches on this subject as well. She thinks Artemis takes quite a shift in how things are presumed regarding the mother influence of her cultus status. Much of the statuary images of Artemis and children is misconstrued as Artemis is not actually seen holding any children or actually touching them. Just parents presenting their children to the goddess as a norm or occasionally children touching a statue. So instead of a mother goddess it's more of women appealing to her for intervention of some sort. Yet because of the imagery of those women presenting their children to Artemis she is seen as a mother type goddess or protector.


The book is part of the Gods and Heroes of the Ancient world series. There is an older book written for Diana that I have not been able to get a copy of. Unfortunately no one had written one about Hekate nor has the credentials I suppose to do so. From the other books in the series I've looked over, credentials seem to be a major requirement for publication.
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blackpheonix
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Re: Odd Insights into Hekate

Post#103 » Sun May 27, 2018 9:04 pm

Pablo wrote:
primalsage wrote:Any views on Mark Alan Smith's system of Hekate as Goddess of the Tree of Light and Death? Also the Mother of Lucifer and Belial.


My Views on Mark Alan Smiths writing are far from polite and would probably get me thrown of this forum. I thik it is far better to go back to ancient sources.


Dark McWiccan fluff sells look at 218 and BALG. I don’t put too much weight on his “blood” ritual stuff since from my own gnosis I was told that she doesn’t need that to work even in her higher aspects. But I did find the seals and some of the story interesting but it going through a “cough” fucked up filter can lead to bad interpretations. I do own the whole set more a a novelity and not as a working grimlrie though. I did have a very intense dream as her protector of children aspect. Although I know the Goddess is with me I see her more as a divine overseerer who guides my personal work not too active but also not absent. I feel she has strong correlations to MAAT, the Western Mother, Mama PG, Bridget and others but that’s from my own exportable not historical fact. Sorro De Este has some scholarly works on Hecate which are good but imo like any other mystery you have to do the work with her to uncover her under current.
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Silenciumetaurum
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Re: Odd Insights into Hekate

Post#104 » Mon May 28, 2018 4:27 am

blackpheonix wrote:
Pablo wrote:
primalsage wrote:Any views on Mark Alan Smith's system of Hekate as Goddess of the Tree of Light and Death? Also the Mother of Lucifer and Belial.

My Views on Mark Alan Smiths writing are far from polite and would probably get me thrown of this forum. I thik it is far better to go back to ancient sources.

Dark McWiccan fluff sells look at 218 and BALG. I don’t put too much weight on his “blood” ritual stuff since from my own gnosis I was told that she doesn’t need that to work even in her higher aspects. But I did find the seals and some of the story interesting but it going through a “cough” fucked up filter can lead to bad interpretations. I do own the whole set more a a novelity and not as a working grimlrie though. I did have a very intense dream as her protector of children aspect. Although I know the Goddess is with me I see her more as a divine overseerer who guides my personal work not too active but also not absent. I feel she has strong correlations to MAAT, the Western Mother, Mama PG, Bridget and others but that’s from my own exportable not historical fact. Sorro De Este has some scholarly works on Hecate which are good but imo like any other mystery you have to do the work with her to uncover her under current.BP


I'm with you on this, BP. The mysteries only reveal themselves through work.

I think Mark Smith's Hekatean trilogy are beautifully made books. But his rituals and prose in general are overheated dark fluff. His use / characterization of Lucifer and Belial is idiosyncratic in the extreme and uselessly UPG-ish.

The latter half of Queen of Hell makes use of "toadbone" style craft which is interesting but which can be found more substantially in the works of Robin Artisson (USA) and Gemma Gary (UK), to say nothing of British Traditional authors like A.D. Mercer (The Wicked Shall Decay - https://bit.ly/2GU6gCN) and Graham King (The British Book of Spells and Charms - http://a.co/iYddhLx).

All this is to say that Smith reads like a mishmash of Kabala-Qlippoth, various forms of witchcraft, and superficial demonolatry with a seriously weird Wiccan undertone. Whenever I doubt myself and think there might be something of value in his books, I come away with a bad taste.
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Pleiades
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Re: Odd Insights into Hekate

Post#105 » Mon May 28, 2018 6:21 am

monsnoleedra wrote:
Pleiades wrote: Just been re-reading an article by Ellen Reeder on the statues,terracota art and bronze matrix in the late Hellenistic period during which a synthesis of Mother images with those of Artemis,Demeter and Hekate began to emerge.Not entirely sure if these conflations impacted on later depictions of Hekate or indeed the figure of the Mother or how far they influenced the ideologies of later writers.Anyway,thought I might mention it.

Reeder, E. (1987). The Mother of the Gods and a Hellenistic Bronze Matrix. American Journal of Archaeology, 91(3), 423-440.


Stephanie Lynn Budin in her book Artemis (ISBN:978-0-415-72541-5 (hbk)) Routledge Press (2016), touches on this subject as well. She thinks Artemis takes quite a shift in how things are presumed regarding the mother influence of her cultus status. Much of the statuary images of Artemis and children is misconstrued as Artemis is not actually seen holding any children or actually touching them. Just parents presenting their children to the goddess as a norm or occasionally children touching a statue. So instead of a mother goddess it's more of women appealing to her for intervention of some sort. Yet because of the imagery of those women presenting their children to Artemis she is seen as a mother type goddess or protector.


The book is part of the Gods and Heroes of the Ancient world series. There is an older book written for Diana that I have not been able to get a copy of. Unfortunately no one had written one about Hekate nor has the credentials I suppose to do so. From the other books in the series I've looked over, credentials seem to be a major requirement for publication.

I think like many ideologies,artifacts and remnants from the ancient world,Hekate herself has bee re-interpreted in modernity to suit individual belief systems.There are many examples of the Artemis-Demeter-Hekate synthesis with Cybele being added commonly in the 5thC and on coins and medallions of silver designed to be worn or carried as seemingly portable votives.

Today I doubt any New Age type pendants will depict Hekate as the nurturing Mother but will be keen to portray her later associations with the Underworld and death.

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monsnoleedra
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Re: Odd Insights into Hekate

Post#106 » Mon May 28, 2018 7:30 am

Pleiades wrote: I think like many ideologies,artifacts and remnants from the ancient world,Hekate herself has bee re-interpreted in modernity to suit individual belief systems.There are many examples of the Artemis-Demeter-Hekate synthesis with Cybele being added commonly in the 5thC and on coins and medallions of silver designed to be worn or carried as seemingly portable votives.

Today I doubt any New Age type pendants will depict Hekate as the nurturing Mother but will be keen to portray her later associations with the Underworld and death.


Yeah, her rule over the oceans and heavens has pretty well been forgotten or omitted in favor of her underworld and death persona by today's practitioner's for the most part. When earth is talked of the fertility / fecundity aspect is definitely gone.

Which is ironic when you hear so much talk about "Reclaiming" or "Rediscovering" her. Yet so little is actually focused upon either. Sad by today's slant seem's unlikely she'd hear Persephone's cries as she's carried into the underworld by Hades. In that role she is more of the Maiden, not the aged crone the New Age try to see her as.
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blackpheonix
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Re: Odd Insights into Hekate

Post#107 » Mon May 28, 2018 7:39 pm

The other issue with her rule over the under world is we tend to consider it in a Abrahamic way which can’t fit into how Hecate works. The Chutluthonic deities that are there have jobs and it’s only a small portion of that is to correct for lack of a better term past transgressions of the souls that are ferried through. This is assuming of course the landscape of the underworld isn’t changing and the majority of what it is is already written about through past spiritual practitioners whom journied there. There is a come kind of connection a door or key from the underworld to the other realm of the deities it seems that the fires below feed what is above. This is why ancestor and underworld work is so important and newsicary for us in our personal journey. Some specific traditions require a animal to appease the gatekeepers but that is following the guide line of how that lineage was handed down through its first contact to the patriarch or matriarch then down to the initiate. I have a lot of respect for those traditions but I have found that for me I can petetion the gatekeepers to get safe passage without anything like that. Mostly some incense and silver. Hecate tradition is a living one imo and she picks whom she wants to work with and how. But I think all of us are at a cross roads per say with the tradition and many others and we need to choose wisely where we go and how we go from here. It might be innocuous personally to own these books and dawn a rob and do magick until people who think you are the devil find out and then tshtf. The same problem can happen if it’s done in secret lol. Magick isn’t like the omen or a Stephen king novel us who do it know that but the majority think you are a character from the happening and it seems the more I personally do the work the more the card of the fool and hanged man come into play for the social setting maybe just maybe it’s part of the guardians of the work collecting a toll from us to do work or perhaps maybe it’s something else entirely.

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Bumper
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Re: Odd Insights into Hekate

Post#108 » Tue May 29, 2018 6:06 am

For what it is worth, here is the start of my invocation to Hekate:

I call on the Great Goddess Hekate, favoured Titaness, Queen of Heaven, Queen of Hell, Queen of the Underworld, Earth and Sea. Queen of Magic, Queen of the Night. Queen of the Crossroads, Spirits and Keys, Keeper of the Divine Flame. It is with great happiness and joy that I invite you to this circle, Great Goddess of the Witches....
Your mileage may vary - and that's ok

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monsnoleedra
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Re: Odd Insights into Hekate

Post#109 » Tue May 29, 2018 6:59 am

blackpheonix wrote:The other issue with her rule over the under world is we tend to consider it in a Abrahamic way which can’t fit into how Hecate works.


Just my opinion but I don't think most really understand her role in the underworld. I do agree that for many the idea of the underworld is seen upon an Abrahamic backbone more than a Hellene or Latin type backbone.

The Chutluthonic deities that are there have jobs and it’s only a small portion of that is to correct for lack of a better term past transgressions of the souls that are ferried through.


I always find it interesting that anything under the soil is chthonian and the underworld. Yet very little of it is actually dealing with the realm of Hades and the dead specifically. Fertility and growth of new life is hardly the domain of the dead yet most associations seem to paint the underworld to the land of the dead.

This is assuming of course the landscape of the underworld isn’t changing and the majority of what it is is already written about through past spiritual practitioners whom journied there.


If I were to speculate, I'd say the underworld is changing more to an Abrahamic structure more than anything. Well, at least in the structure of many pagan's and occultist. Even if one considers the idea of the three realms upon the so called tree of upper world, lower world and middle world the lower is more familiar to an Abrahamic hell now. It seems the land of the dead, demon's or other demonic type entities when you hear people speak. At least from what I tend to hear and read.

There is a come kind of connection a door or key from the underworld to the other realm of the deities it seems that the fires below feed what is above.


Sort of my point, the fire's below feeds into that Abrahamic imagery.

This is why ancestor and underworld work is so important and newsicary for us in our personal journey. Some specific traditions require a animal to appease the gatekeepers but that is following the guide line of how that lineage was handed down through its first contact to the patriarch or matriarch then down to the initiate. I have a lot of respect for those traditions but I have found that for me I can petetion the gatekeepers to get safe passage without anything like that. Mostly some incense and silver.


I am curious about needing an animal to appease the gatekeeper? Never needed an animal to appease so that statement intrigues me to be honest. Have used an animal guide as a guide to pass through various gates. Some gates one passes through via transformation not petition. Other gates one can pass through via sort of a family crest and ancestral lineage by blood. Yes, others one passes through by selection as you point out below.

Hecate tradition is a living one imo and she picks whom she wants to work with and how. But I think all of us are at a cross roads per say with the tradition and many others and we need to choose wisely where we go and how we go from here.


I'd agree there.

It might be innocuous personally to own these books and dawn a rob and do magick until people who think you are the devil find out and then tshtf. The same problem can happen if it’s done in secret lol. Magick isn’t like the omen or a Stephen king novel us who do it know that but the majority think you are a character from the happening and it seems the more I personally do the work the more the card of the fool and hanged man come into play for the social setting maybe just maybe it’s part of the guardians of the work collecting a toll from us to do work or perhaps maybe it’s something else entirely.


I presume your talking about Mark Smith's works here but not sure. Personally I have no use for his works. I've read them and get a sour taste in my mouth and put them back down and move on. Occasionally try to re-visit them again and get the same bad taste and put them back down again. Figure fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me.
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monsnoleedra
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Re: Odd Insights into Hekate

Post#110 » Tue May 29, 2018 7:15 am

Silenciumetaurum wrote: I'm with you on this, BP. The mysteries only reveal themselves through work.

I think Mark Smith's Hekatean trilogy are beautifully made books. But his rituals and prose in general are overheated dark fluff. His use / characterization of Lucifer and Belial is idiosyncratic in the extreme and uselessly UPG-ish.

The latter half of Queen of Hell makes use of "toadbone" style craft which is interesting but which can be found more substantially in the works of Robin Artisson (USA) and Gemma Gary (UK), to say nothing of British Traditional authors like A.D. Mercer (The Wicked Shall Decay - https://bit.ly/2GU6gCN) and Graham King (The British Book of Spells and Charms - http://a.co/iYddhLx).

All this is to say that Smith reads like a mishmash of Kabala-Qlippoth, various forms of witchcraft, and superficial demonolatry with a seriously weird Wiccan undertone. Whenever I doubt myself and think there might be something of value in his books, I come away with a bad taste.


I try to read Mark Smith's stuff and give it a serious consideration and then walk away rubbing my head. Figure I must have mistaken something so figure I'll try again and and it's even worse the next time. I've read some supper fluffy "white" light stuff about Hekate before that drives me nuts. His I tend to place on the "dark" side of fluffy but a different sort of fluff.
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