Induction

Esoteric knowledge applied as magic allows the realignment of causal patterns in accordance with acausal processes, producing willed synchronicity.  Those patterns inherent to the magician, including will, desire, and belief, form a medium by which the acausality of the operator can intrude into the causal patterns of the self and the world.  Anyone conscious of how consciousness impinges upon the body can understand what this means by analogy, but only someone who has not only personal experience of acausal synchronicty, but also the capacity to apprehend its correlation of the subjective with the objective, the internal with the external, and the unmanifest with the manifest, can have the gnosis of it.

In that the magical consciousness is itself acausal, the debate between theories of innate gnostic predisposition and universal illuminatory potential founders at the outset, based as it is on conceptions of an essential fixed nature which can coexist along with relative qualities of the manifest world.  By definition, such a quality would be atemporal, nonlinear, unmanifest except by its effects.  These effects, being themselves apparently acausal synchronicities, may manifest anywhere and anywhen in connection with the consciousness in question.  As such, it is not a matter of whether one is ‘born with the gnostic soul’ or ‘capable of enlightenment,’ but it is also not a matter of whether one has or has not done the necessary ‘work’ to fulfill one’s ‘human potential.’  Rather, it is a question of whether or not one embraces and actualizes whatever one’s destiny might be, and a further question of whether it is one’s wyrd to embrace, fulfill, and overcome one’s wyrd.  Genetics provides a much better analogy for magical talent than metaphysically literalist soul-conceptions, and arguing about whether or not anyone and everyone can become a magician is about as sensible as debating the question of whether everyone can become a concert pianist.

However, magic is a totalizing art, and esotericism a totalizing worldview.  Arcane knowledge can function as a ‘meta-craft,’ and if analogized to the field of education, it would be comparable to those formulations of neuro-linguistic programming which teach people how to learn.  That this suggests that persons talented in magic would have a generic advantage is no more unfair or cosmically imbalanced than observing that those with a genetic disposition toward intelligence are also unusually advantaged.  It is, however, another and more encompassing order of elitism, in that the magical arts themselves can enhance the native qualities of the practitioner, including intelligence but certainly not excluding other physical attributes, along with talents and skills.

Are we then proposing a simple aristocracy of magic?  Only in the sense that advocates of cognitive enhancement propose a universal aristocracy of intelligence. Much as intelligence itself can be infinitely subdivided into sub-categories, so can the disposition toward the arcane.  That we cannot all be magicians is exactly akin to the impossibility of everyone being a genius.  The laws of the unequal distribution of power, capability, and fitness among a species can never be overcome except to the detriment of that species’ ability to thrive, adapt, and evolve.  As such, should the entire human race achieve what is now considered genius intelligence, some people would still be definable as morons according to the new scale of evaluation.  In this, the magical arts are no different.  Similarly, those who excel in the arcane may nevertheless remain utterly inept in every particular, and relying upon esoteric knowledge to emulate every natural ability, talent, and skill would be like assuming that universal access to all the world’s stored knowledge would make one an expert in everything.  On the other hand, anyone with such success would have a generic advantage over competitors equally qualified in other ways.

The problem can be further clarified by distinguishing predispositions toward esoteric wisdom from the predisposition useful to applied magic. The former are as applicable to mystics as to magicians.  To a great extent, the manner in which the predisposition is expressed and developed is as influenced by natal circumstances, upbringing, life experience, personal will, and the intervention of other arcane powers and esoteric influences, as the normal development of intelligence and other attributes, skill, and talent.  All these factors are interrelated in ways mainly unknown to science and esoterically explicable only in arcane terms.  Thus, it may prove to be the case that certain aspects of the arcane predisposition are heritable and others not – in the same way that there is little one can do to ensure that one is born a genius, but that there is much one can do in order to achieve any conceivable modification of the profane self, with sufficient knowledge, training, will, and desire.

Finally, it is necessary to consider the extent to which these faculties must be associated with profane self-awareness, self-understanding, and self-consciousness.  It is known that there can be ‘unconscious magicians,’ ‘natural mystics,’ and so forth.  How is this possible if magic depends upon arcane consciousness?  The ‘consciousness’ being referred to in the case of the arcane is a category of consciousness, much as dreaming consciousness, hypnotized consciousness, trance consciousness, and so forth, and is not to be confused with ‘consciousness itself.’  As such, a person’s profane consciousness may be entirely unaware of and unable to apprehend other faculties of consciousness available to the same body. The analogy is that of the somnambulist or the savant.  Thus, in the same way that the savant may achieve greater feats than the expert, albeit often with less consciousness and control, so the ‘natural magician’ might achieve the extraordinary.  It is best to reserve the designation of the ‘natural magician’ for the fully paranormal, rather than endeavor to apply it to all ‘great men,’ since it would be presumptuous to seek out the arcane in the mythology of history without direct, specific, situational gnosis of the persons and events in question.  Contrarily, it may nevertheless be a useful construct or hypothesis to propose that the arcane predisposition in general, as distinct from more specific dispositions toward magical talent, may be either identical to, similar to, or related to the mysterious quality of luck and fortune which seems to attend on the great movers of history as well as those generally uncanny persons who seem to be blessed with success rather than fame.  All of these speculations aside, it can be known experientially and through sufficient observation that the faculty can be specifically and consciously apprehended as a faculty allowing for willed synchronicity.  This alone is an astonishing feature of at least some conscious beings, and appears to be in some way heritable and in other ways communicable.

As such, ‘heritability’ does not necessarily refer to simple ‘genetics,’ in that various ephemeral qualities are traditionally understood to be passed down ‘spiritually’ through families.  In the same way, initiations, magical ‘currents,’ and the ‘spirits’ themselves seem able to confer the quality in general, or particular sub-qualities and their faculties, through arcane influence.  By analogy, this may be equivalent to the circumstances which activate certain heritable traits, but it may also be equivalent to the condition that some geniuses seem to be gifted with the ability to inspire and train others; in some cases the greatest particularization of the talent may indeed lay in that very ability.  In other cases, the more appropriate analogy may be genetic engineering itself.

The subjective and personal nature of magic makes it impossible to quantify or even qualify who ‘should’ become a magician, or whether you should.  Unlike scientific propositions which can be objectively valid given known conditions (if you are malnutritioned you should eat healthier food if you want to get better), and religious propositions which are self-referentially validated by the consistency of collective beliefs (if you want to receive communion in the Catholic fashion you should be baptized and confessed beforehand), magical propositions are entirely situational and personal. There is no situational category which can describe what one should or should not do with magic to achieve a certain effect or personal transformation; each individual practitioner or would-be practitioner must evaluate this based on circumstance.  This is not to say that another individual practitioner may not be able to offer insight, even superior insight, into how magic may be utilized in a given personal scenario; the point here is not to advocate solipsism or relativism, but rather to point out that, much as in the case of esoteric medicine, the specific takes precedence over the general.

While magical gnosis can be pursued and achieved without corresponding mystical gnosis or philosophical wisdom, it is not independent of esoteric knowledge itself.  Nevertheless, one who seeks only for magical power will not necessarily achieve total understanding of the esoteric milieu or even apprehend the totality of the Sole Arcanum.  Conversely, acquisition of esoteric knowledge alone does not guarantee an ability to apply it.