I don't know much about the country folk religions of North America, but most things I see in trying to look things up are like TikTok witches and things. I'm not convinced those are the best definitive sources on the wise men and dowsers that agricultural communities utilized.

So are there any of them still around? How do Appalachian or other North American wise men and women get started? What are the rituals like and what do they do? Do they try to get new members? Where do the powers come from (like is it spirits or something you're just born with)? Do/Did they follow any particular religion or did you have Christians and everyone just dowsing and that was the way of things?

Pic unrelated.

>>40530581 (OP)
Meh. Mostly Norfolk who came from Europe with their own native magic. Typical cone and crystal types like in your picture. My suspicions are that they consolidated their power during Salem under the guise of the Christian Witch Trials. After all. Why mostly persecute witches and not all mages? Qui bono? They must have been sipping tea in their high towers while everyone was out killing each other. Maybe even heading the inquisition themselves. After all, who would suspect the Lord Inquisitor of being the very thing he went out to get!

>>40530581 (OP)
Yeah old wise men/wizards/shamans are still around. Well you won't see them on tiktok cause anyone with self respect keeps their work hidden. As for new members, its apprentice/master system, so if you want to learn, you got to first find 'em

>>40530597
https://youtu.be/9tcaM06eGrY

>>40530597
https://youtu.be/qXEiUcBa45Q

>>40530597
https://youtu.be/7T4uI9Kde4U

>>40530593
So was it like odenists or was it just ritual as that was how it was done?

>>40530639
Sort of. The Medeans were the first Magi in the Crescent. Think Babylon and before then. Before then they were Sages in India. Plural of which is Sagi. Before then? The cataclysm pushed them from their homes in the Antarctic. It's a long and tragic tale. Billion died Anon.
https://youtu.be/qKqOwWwOHKc

>>40530597
So what do the rituals entail or how do you find them? I feel like going out into the local woods at midnight and yelling "any wizards want to be friends?" Isn't the most productive way of finding mentors.

>>40530639
Close your eyes and imagine a cataclysm so large, so horrendous, that it even makes you hate logic and creativity you once loved Anon. A machine so cruel, it even tore continents apart. Now imagine it still existing. Still slumbering. Waiting under Antarctic ice. Now open your eyes, and you're there. Never mind Satanists and their "Death Cube". There are far worse things than Death.
https://youtu.be/CYrQr0auPDM

>>40530746
Oh I wouldn't do that if I were you. Crying out to the forest black is a good way of drawing in the wrong attention. Then again. In this game of illusions and mystery, the light can be just as treacherous.
There were gods once Anon.
There will be again.
https://youtu.be/RWnaWpBCAC0

>>40530593
>Why mostly persecute witches and not all mages?

Because the historical use of the word witchcraft was specifically for antisocial magics intended to harm the community.

>>40530581 (OP)

Hello, I call myself an occultist for simple phrasing.

I’m from the south US and have always been clairvoyant, able to see and feel spirits, and very comfortable with interacting with entities.
Grew up Southern Baptist before converting to paganism, always dabbled with magick though.
One of my aunts had visions from G-D, other family had “guardian angels” around them that they swore they could hear the footsteps of around their homes.

My mother is a Christian witch, believing that G-D gave us magick and it comes from Him.

I believe the pagan approach of magick coming from within us and it being part of us that we can channel. I believe that the Gods and spirits of many kind can aid us.

I do not work with my ancestors and believe they are not very present, most likely in Heaven and not worried about this realm anymore.

I taught myself, and personally I have no interest in teaching or recruiting anyone. I actually tend to direct people to Catholicism these days, I believe The Father is all loving and that most people don’t have the backbone to be an occultist or shaman.

If I met someone already on the path I would be happy to aid them if they ask for it, but I would not want to get anyone started who isn’t naturally meant for it.

>>40531155
Based

>>40531155
That's an interesting perspective, especially why Catholicism specifically since you were raised southern Baptist?

Also what do your rituals entail or is it more mediation and things like that?

>>40531155
The direction to Catholicism is rather interesting because what your belief is about magick coming from within or being channeled through us also isn't too far off from more contemporary sects of Quakerism.

My maternal grandmother was the self-professed spellcaster in our family, and I have some reason to believe there was truth in it although what makes me differentiate for her was that what she did was more akin to hexing. Nothing inherently malicious, but more as a means of expediting the natural process of karmic resetting or making people regret their actions or words I guess. I wouldn't be surprised if my own intuitive traits or occasional uncanny ability to speak things into reality came from her.

By comparison do you or your mother see have any interpretation on spellwork or intention needing to be inherently good, or is it instead an expression of His will?

I will respond to these questions shortly, wrapping up my workday at the moment.

>>40531449
I think there is a lot of value in ritual and rites, Catholicism has this while Southern Baptism does not.
I don’t trust how people become leaders outside of Catholic and Orthodox faiths either.

I also do not feel the presence of G-D in Baptist churches. I feel the Demiurge and the Egregore of G-D that mainstream American Christianity invented.
In Catholic churches I feel The Father, I feel that warm and healing presence and that feeling of being held that something greater and all loving.

I’m sure not every Catholic church is this way, I haven’t been in many Orthodox churches to scope the out, but I trust their leaders more and like that their leaders are encouraged to have families.

I also believe strongly in working with Saints and Angels and asking them to pray on your behalf. The local Southern Baptists regard even speaking to a Saint as evil, which I find a ridiculous notion.

The last reason is the take on suffering, Baptists believe that suffering is because you are not following G-D’s will. This is foolish, we all know suffering is part of being human. That is why Christ had to suffer.
Within Catholicism, suffering is regarded as part of the human experience. It is not something that determines your closeness to G-D or how “good” you are. You can endure your suffering just as Christ and the Saints endured their suffering.

As for my rituals, it depends. I do a lot of astral work and dreamwalking. Rituals can be more simple or extreme depending on what I’m trying to do. I leave a lot of offerings out for the land and fae.

>>40532773
In a sense, it sounds similar to how Christianity was incorporated into European societies, maybe kinda in reverse, but similar in going where they felt actual presences.

>>40530581 (OP)
>reddit

>>40532946
Yes that makes perfect sense, I can see how it comes off that way. I admire early Christianity in Rome, how many people kept their household and regional Gods while following Christ.

I believe in the Gnostic prospective that The Supreme Being/The Father/G-D sits with a council of gods, and I think with the correct work many gods and spirits can be worked with, and you can pick your afterlife with enough work and good karma.
I also believe in the concept of Samsara, that most come back, you have to be enlightened to escape or truly downright evil to be punished.

>>40530581 (OP)
You mean like hoodoo, granny magic, Pennsylvania Dutch braucherei, brujeria, etc?

>>40531548
>Quarkerism
This is something I haven’t looked into very much, I would love to know more about concept within it.

I think bloodlines have a lot to do with magick and spirituality, I would agree you probably got it from her or it’s been passed down many generations.
Karmic approaches are interesting, I think if someone has wronged you there is nothing wrong with asking the universe to speed it up, but it’s something to tread lightly with. I think it’s easy to cast more harm than just karma onto someone, and then that gets paid back to you.

I’m not sure my mother’s view on this, she will be home later and I can ask. I think she’s mentioned before that prayers are spells to her, and she’s very interest in herbalism. She’s said before G-D gave these plants a purpose, we should use them for it.

I think it has more to do with the intention of the spellcaster and their own belief in themselves. If you ask The Lord or a god like Odin or Aphrodite for aid to hurt someone for no reason they will likely not, but an ancestor or darker spirit might aid you.
I think some people are strong enough on their own they don’t even need help, I worry about people like that desiring to do harm. I think we have free will for the most part, and our next lives depend on what we do with it.

Not trying to say it's real,leave that up to you, but The Tales of Alvin Maker had a good and thought provoking model.
Europeans bringing their hexes and knacks and witchcraft to bump up against the Native American's Green Song and the African voodoo.

>>40530581 (OP)
>shadow wizard money gang

>>40533256
Yeah, I guess hoodoo seems almost like meditating on intent, which I understand, but that could just be my interpretation of pop culture things.

I was mostly talking about granny magic and braucherei, which all seems like it's out of left field.

I don't know anything about brujeria. It seems very mixed with neopaganism, though.

>>40533662
There's still pockets of culturally authentic and magically potent traditions that survive here and there within families or extended families. I wouldn't trust books too much on this, with some exceptions for dedicated ethnographers. Best way to answer your own questions would be to get out in the field and get your hands dirty. Make a youtube series out of it or something. Who knows, it might become the most important thing you'll do in your life.

>>40533729
Getting out and getting my hands dirty sounds good in theory, but it seems like practitioners tend to be pretty tight lipped. After all, it isn't like those actually doing it wear "I'm a motherfucking wizard" shirts to really tip me off that they might have something interesting to tell. So what would be a good way to recognize them?

>>40530593
Your mistake is thinking witch means woman

bump because this is a cool thread

>>40534151
Honestly, the only real way to know if you're knee deep in bullshit is to actually wade out and find out.

>>40539159
this

>>40541178
{must}

>>40535101
witch means "to stop the work of boundaries"
witches are jews, they tear down borders to create an entrance (en-trance) for demons to enter

this is why women must be kept silent or avoided.
not because they have authority, but because if they're not good women, they'll work to undermine the men in their lives.

chose your women carfully or avoid them at all cost.