Pagan Theology

Getting to work

In the last column I looked critically at the relationship between Gnosticism and Paganism. The conclusion was that, as transcendentalists1, we move beyond what we simply see in the world, but in doing that we don’t “leave” the world behind. Instead we see what is beyond ourselves. We see spirit, deity, and the sublime, in the world. This act of transcendence is not somehow better, it doesn’t elevate us to a more refined or desirable place, rather it shows us the true nature of what we have. We are sublime within the physical world.

All that said, we can then ask: “ok, so how do we actually transcend the world? “ What is the Pagan mystical system? How do we have a personal experience of the Gods and Goddesses? And what in those experiences makes us believe, convinces us that we’ve had a true experience of the sublime world?

There are many ways that we, as Pagans, attempt to get in touch with the Gods and Goddesses. You can reach outward toward the Gods and Goddesses, through prayer. You can reach inward, within yourself, through meditation. You can affect your senses, both inner and outer, through either esoteric or exoteric means. You can also affect the world through magical or ritual practices.

All of these share the goal of touching the Gods and Goddesses in the world. Of experiencing deity the same way you experience the trees, mountains, flowers, and your loved ones.

Most religions use a combination of these, and other, techniques to allow seekers to reach the divine. What we have to ask is: how do all these various mystical techniques and approaches relate to a Pagan religious view? What does it mean to be a Pagan seeker, and what, after all, do we find once our quest is over?

Building a mystical Pagan path should rely on the history of Pagan mystical experiences, a definition of the tools we need to do our work, and a description of the goals and destination that we seek. Like a builder we need the plans, we need the tools, and we need to know what in the end we will be constructing.

In this column I’ll talk about the some of the tools we use to connect with the divine, namely meditation, prayer, and physical disorientation. In the next few columns I’ll finish by discussing ritual and magic.

Historically Pagans have not been that much different that the Abrahamic religions in their approach toward connecting with the divine. They seek connection through intense inward experiences of the divine, however they define it.

In the eastern religions2, whose western interpretations generally emphasize the existential negation of worldly self as the core of the mystical experience, self-denying methods of meditation and prayer have been a primary way connection is made with the divine. This inner seeking is both a seeking and a nullifying. It seeks to remove the sensual input of the world, of matter and emotion, and substitutes a point like place of simple existence. Existence, the ability to comprehend your own presence and nothing else, is the ultimate reach of the individual and their knowledge. Inner knowledge, both from a western as well as an eastern viewpoint, is the fundamental ground of what can be known. All else may be lies, but you own existence will still be true. Finding this core of essential existence, whether through the eightfold way or nullifying meditation, brings you to a place where suffering has been eliminated.

Eastern mysticism has a long history of influencing Abrahamic and esoteric mysticism. From Blavatsky to Crowley, the lure of Yoga, Buddhism, and Taoism has been a strong influence in esoteric practice. Likewise meditation and eastern self-awareness techniques are common in both neo-Pagan and liberal Christian practice3.

Meditation can take many forms, from the self-denying meditation of the western, Zen, Buddhists, to prayer-like Christian meditation, to guided esoteric meditations. I would argue that there is a fundamental difference between meditation and visualization. And for Pagan theological purposes, the distinction is important. Self-negating inner meditations that seek to plumb the depths of existence are a fundamental aspect of western Buddhism4. These techniques seek to calm, and provide insight. But they do not require a specific visualization, on the contrary, they would have the mediator let go of stray thoughts, and not hang onto any one particular reality too long.

Visualizations are the opposite of a western Buddhist approach toward meditation. Here the goal is to form a mental image, and hold that image. The person meditating can then explore, interact with, or even enter into the concept that is being visualized. A visualization is a journey to some-place, while a meditation is a journey to no-place (in the existential sense).

While visualizations in meditation will take you to an experience with the material world, the ultimate goal is to use that experience to have a deeper experience with the divine. Visualization is one way to accomplish that reaching out by experience of the world. At the same time Prayer represents an alternative way to reach out to the divine. Prayer is more about belief, faith, and statement, while visualization is more about experience and dialog.

Pagans don’t usually have much luck with prayer. For those who have come to Paganism from the Abrahamic religions it smacks too much of what they are seeking to leave behind. It represents the hierarchal process of the supplicant asking the master for help. It does not come from a place of personal power and mutual respect; rather it looks as if you are a weaker, insignificant, being asking for a favor. I know Christians would argue with that characterization, and I’m sure that many forms of prayer exist. But it sure looks like that to many who have grown up in Christianity.

Hopefully, from past columns I’ve given some hint that the trappings of Abrahamic faith are not the most important things you leave behind when you come to believe as a Pagan. The outward elements of Abrahamic faith are, in fact, the least important things to leave behind. What is important is the nature and style of belief that you leave behind. It is the theology, not the pomp and circumstance. It is the judgment, the sense of supplication, and the lack of equality that are the things to leave behind. It’s the relationship with deity that changes. (Though leaving behind all your judgmental relatives may actually be the most important thing of all!).

If the relationship with deity is what has changed, then the idea of all the various ways of approaching the deity also changes, including prayer. Pagan prayer is not Abrahamic prayer, or at least the stereotype of Abrahamic prayer we have described above.

Historically Pagans have prayed consistently and urgently to our Gods and Goddesses. One common misperception is that Paganism was some sort of disorganized, or irreligious, group of people who held onto “myths” and didn’t do anything serious. On the contrary, Paganism in Europe was well organized, and as much a part of society as the Catholic Church is part of our society today. Ritual, sacrifice, obligations, and prayer, were an important part of pre-Christian Pagan institutions.

During a Roman invasion Druids raised their arms and gave prayers for deliverance while Priestesses chanted to raise storms5. The Greeks, like other Pagan religions, had a complex set of individual and group ritual observances. These included animal sacrifice6, gifts of fruit, votive7 offerings, libations of liquids8, and prayer9. Of all of these ritual actions, prayer was perhaps the most pervasive and most important. Saying the right thing, with the right words, was intimately linked to all ritual practices. The Gods and Goddesses could hear all prayers, even soft ones.

Thus the idea of prayer should not be anathema to Pagans. Instead the way we use prayer should be something that changes, dare I say, evolves as we journey into and on a Pagan path. Someone told me once that most prayer content can be generally categorized as “I want, thanks, and oops.” A prayer for wealth10, a prayer for forgiveness, or a prayer for thanksgiving all imply a particular kind of paternal relationship between the prayer-giver and the prayer-receiver. The Gods and Goddesses have, we want, and we ask as a supplicant.

We have a way to satisfy these desires. We can always take our destiny in our own hands, through magic. But that’s another column.

Prayers for stuff makes the Gods and Goddesses as kind of a giant casino in the sky, something we pray to for luck and parole. A more logical, Pagan, sort of prayer would substitute a seeking relationship for one of power. Praying so as to experience the Gods and Goddesses, to express our desire for a heartfelt relationship with them, or to ask for them to share wisdom or creativity with us are all more mature approaches toward prayer. Prayer as an experience, drawing ourselves outward toward the divine in the world, is a more logical and thoughtful way to approach Pagan prayer.

In praying as Pagans we are not asking, we are not supplicants. Instead we are seekers, who reach out consciously through prayer to experience the divine, the Gods and Goddesses in the world.

Physical effects that alter spiritual perceptions are used by almost every religious tradition. From long periods of meditation, to disorienting initiation and magical rituals, to the use of chemical substances like Peyote by Native Americans, there are many different ways that religious seekers have used the physical to try and affect or create a spiritual journey.

Theologically what should we make of this? It is a complex subject that probably demands an entire column or two on sorting it all out. In the meantime, I’ll try and sketch and argument about how perception can be influenced by action. When you do something that is supposed to trigger a mystical state you intersect the mystical and divine (for example, the experiences on shamanistic journeys) with the physical (altered mental states though the modification of neural inputs and pathways). It strikes at the heart of the question of what a “real” experience really is. If I dream something, is it “real?” If I encounter something on a journey that I have “induced” how “real” is the encounter? If I conjure up something in a visualization or through reading is it “real”?

Long meditations, vision quests, hallucinogens, and stressful rites (initiations) commonly come to mind when you think about physical effects on brain function. However, what is really going on is the physical is affecting the spiritual. The world is being tied into the “other” or occult world through the practitioner. If you look at the effect of what you are doing, you end up asking whether the world of spirit can or is tied to the physical world. If it is, then these effects are “real,” but if spirit is fundamentally different from the real, then these experiences are not much different than watching television. If you do not believe that the spiritual and physical worlds are linked, then you just think you’re going on a journey, but your really simply sitting on the couch.

This means we have to ask what is our view on the interconnection between spirit and reality. If the spiritual and real are co-mingled, as I have been arguing throughout these columns, then it makes sense that the spiritual and the physical can and should interact with each other. In other words, changes in the spiritual realm should be capable of manifesting in the physical (think magic) and things that affect the spiritual realm should be able to affect the spiritual. So, in this worldview, things like the use of stress in a vision quest to generate a journey in the spiritual world make sense, they can act as triggers or keys to unlock the spirit. I am not, however, advocating the use of drugs to enhance your spiritual progress. In fact I argue that there are many different ways to achieve a link between the spiritual and the physical worlds, and choosing to alter brain chemistry may be the worst way of accomplishing enlightenment11.

This mingling of the spiritual and real worlds through actions that you take is a fundamentally Pagan view of the world. The spirit and the journey you take are not independent of reality, but are all part of it. In a journey, or meditation, or prayer you don’t “leave” reality, but you experience it in a much more intense, knowing, and fulfilling way.

So in considering the tools we have to engage in mystical work we see that each is a tool that we can use. Looking inward with visualization, vice an empty meditation, allows us to see the spiritual realms that exist within consciousness. With prayer we reach outward from ourselves to touch the Gods and Goddesses in the world and bring their love into our hearts. And with actions that change us we merge the spiritual and the physical and bring back the ancient world of our Pagan ancestors, one where the world and spirit were not separated.

author: Porphyry