Thirteen Pathways of Occult Herbalism

Daniel A Schulke, Benjamin A. Vierling

• Publisher: Three Hands Press
• ISBN:
  9781945147326
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Biological Sciences
• Subtopic: Natural History
• Index: Biological Sciences

The discipline of Occult Herbalism encompasses the knowledge and use of the magical, spiritual, and folkloric dimensions of plants. This perennial wisdom animates many global spiritual traditions, especially those which have maintained their integrity of transmission even in the face of industrial development and cultural destruction. Often concealed within the deepest strata of the Western Esoteric Traditions, this green strand of wisdom is a potent legacy of all magic, sorcery, and occult science. In addition to the hard sciences of botany, ethnology, agriculture and ethnopharmacology, a number of pathways can assist the magical herbalist in furthering the depth of understanding and integrity of personal approach. 'Thirteen Pathways of Occult Herbalism' circumscribes the metaparadigm of herbal magical practice, providing useful examples of its manifestation, as well as demonstrating its time-honored routes of inquiry.

Thirteen Pathways of Occult Herbalism

MAGICAL OPERATIONS make their appearance in the earliest of human writing, and some of the most ancient inscriptions of mankind are formulae extolling the virtues of certain plants. A certain leaf is prescribed for the binding of a demon, or a specific root for making an animated statue; this knowledge is presented as authoritative and therefore worthy of preservation. We also accept that the use of plants in magical practices pre-dated writing systems, for this is increasing supported by archaeological evidence. What is more difficult to ascertain is the knowledge base that led to this ancient sorcery, the understanding of what gave plants their magical power, what spirits they embodied, what was required to work with them, and the correct manner to make use of their properties. This body of knowledge, which we might call a magical philosophy of trees and herbs, I refer to as Occult Herbalism. Though much of this elder knowledge is lost, most of these powerful plants are still with us, and despite the wreckage of civilizations, some of their traditions have been passed down through millennia, sometimes in the form of writing, and sometimes hand to hand, from master to apprentice.

It is tempting to conceive of Occult Herbalism based purely upon the more lurid and profane depictions of the occult arts, as they appear in popular culture: plants used for drugs, murder, and magic. We reject this characterization in the first instance because of its context: with the vast exposure and wide acceptance of a thing, or its reduction to entertainment, it ceases to be ‘occult.’ Occult, meaning ‘hidden’ is by its nature umbral, immaterial, private, encrypted, ineffable, mystical, and, importantly, concealed from the eyes of those who would abuse it.

One may also argue that the concerns of the plant world, by their nature, are ‘occult’ or ‘esoteric’ given their distance and state of estrangement from most human hearts. To many, the greensward is something to walk across, not to contemplate as a haven of lore and occult power. The cornfield similarly is an agrarian concern, abstracted from daily life and only conceptually related to sustenance, and the roses bought from the florist an ephemeral spot of color and fragrance serving to make a statement that words cannot. All of these things, however, have ancient associations and a related retinue of invisible powers, interweaving the spiritual and religious currents which feed the present. The pervasive state of apathy which often attends upon all matters vegetal has created shadows about them, and, in part, this has nourished their occult or hidden nature.

There is also, despite the legacies of the Age of Enlightenment, the persistence of magic and religion in the world, the traffic with divine power, and plants form an important part of this. In religion, herbs are powerfully crystallized in complex symbolism and theological narrative, as well as serving roles in the various rites of each canon. In magical practice, the study of plants has immediate applications in several established occult streams. Among the most prominent of these are traditions of spirit healing, or indigenous practices which outsiders call ‘shamanism.’ In the occult heritage of Europe, the strongest strands of esoteric botany occur in Alchemy and renaissance Natural Magic, which have several important schools specifically focusing on plant work, as well as witchcraft and herbal folk magic preserved at the local level. These systems are usually part of larger magical frameworks that include many other non-plant practices, such as angelic conjuration, planetary magic, kabbalah, and the corpus of Solomonic spirit-conjurations. As a discipline unto itself, Occult herbalism itself may also form the singular marrow of esoteric study and practice, focusing wholly on plants. In such cases the older exemplars of these teachings often do not define themselves as ‘occult herbalism’, rather one learns to become an ‘herbalist,’ or ‘one who knows the secrets of plants’ or ‘herb-wise.’

In the course of study, the contemporary pupil of magic and occultism is often faced with plant references in the midst of a magical operation, even if it does not specifically concern plants; what is usually not apparent is the complex traditions which lie behind the herb and its acknowledged spiritual powers. In other cases, more cohesive bodies of occult plant doctrine present a bewildering array of teachings and lore, and the seeker naturally must consider how best to comprehend and implement this knowledge.

The model I propose represents an approach to learning, and it contains four essential features. The first of these are Pathways, of which I have for these purposes enumerated thirteen. There are also Gardens, for the purposes of this book accounted as thirteen, but their true number beyond count. The third feature of course is that of the seeker, the pilgrim in Elysium, and the fourth is the plants themselves. This formula represents a metaphysical model of a very physical process, a means by which the sublime power of plants can be approached in a meaningful and active way. The operation is dynamic, and ongoing, ever so much as the processes of Nature, which must be understood to unite its variables. In this, we resolutely identify with and thereby honor the axioms of Natural Magic.

The Pathways, as here exposited, are routes of approach to the mystery. Each presupposes a spiritual and philosophical stance, but also a momentum. In considering these pathways, it is important to note that each has a static emanation. Knowledge of the Pathway thus entails how it is expressed in motion, and also how it functions as a set of first principles. If we consider monuments in the landscape, the meaning of the Pathway becomes clearer: a mountain may be approached by many routes, affording different vistas; the mountain is singular but one’s experience of it differs based on the road leading there.

If the Pathways indicate essential philosophical routes, the Gardens in turn are the zones of knowledge the Pathways lead to. Many of these overlap each other, and share arcana. The Gardens, thus, are concentrations of specified power; the Pathways are the routes leading there. Any Garden can thus be reached by one or more Pathways; likewise a single Pathway may perambulate multiple gardens. However, as all pilgrims know, a path may be trod in pursuit of a destination without arriving there: the path may turn, stray, or, by the nature of its demands, forcibly drive one to other by-ways, or into the thorny tangle of the wayside thicket.

The Pathways

Κάθαρσις • Katharsis

THE PATHWAY OF THE VIRGIN

All roads have their beginning, and that which penetrates the gardens of plant-mystery is no different, having a point of origination and emergence, if only in the flame of desire and aspiration. The recollection of early or ‘first’ experiences is universal: smelling the scents of certain flowers, the sudden and unexpected puncture of a thorn, tasting one’s first cup of wine, and other altered states of consciousness brought on by plants. Aside from the innate characteristics of the thing encountered, the tabula rasa contributes power to this experience, the lack of individual epistemology more fully forming the experience of communion with the Other.

Thus is the Pathway of the Virgin—a road of our Art whose associated word katharsis, Greek for cleansing or purification, implies a state of the zeroth path, the point preceding all pathways. Admittedly the hallowed state of virginity is often scorned and ridiculed, regarded as naïve, inexperienced, and ignorant: these are but the bumptious out-gassings of the sexually atrophied. This fundamentally cowardly stance does not obtain within a magical framework, for it cannot admit that all things at one time or another are virginal. In the occult view, there is yet the Virgin in exaltation—the onset of maturity, of sexual ripening, desire, and most importantly, the state of all-possibility.

Purification or cleansing often presupposes a prior state of filth or defilement, but this is an imprecise and unnecessary position. All practitioners must examine their own relationship to such states as ‘purity’ and ‘impurity’ and discover whether these notions serve learning and personal evolution. All too often in such reflections, one discovers the taint of the religious, such as the Christian doctrine of Original Sin. The point is not that such concepts are useless in the work of esoteric circles, but rather that they are frequently present in the psyche of the practitioners without their knowledge, and thereby reverberate into their work without their conscious knowledge. The Pathway of the Virgin thus mandates rigorous self-examination to reveal exactly what one is composed of: points of past failure, as well as success, can be instructive in this process—if one is willing to learn.

For the present considerations of katharsis, let us consider the Pathway of the Virgin to be swept clean or cleared of previous spiritual states. Practically, this involves the dissolution of accreta functioning as unneeded admixtures to our communion with plants. Included among these are presumptions, suppositions, fantasies, and other psychological artifacts which often accompany exposure to that which is new and desirable. Among these too are self-importance, and the need to impose familiar structures on the unfamiliar, as well as the tendency to over-analyze. Any one of these is difficult enough to confront, let alone change: how then may all be addressed?

A valuable consideration is what one brings to the process, the Offering of Self, for this is one part of purification. In the act of the offering, the Virgin not only desires, but is desirable. In tutelary congress, there is the teacher and student; the latter must radiate desire as the furrow, the former must emanate desire as the seed. Where this mutual desire obtains, the passage of power will be accomplished to ward the singular goal of emergence. Lest we stray too far from the verdant source of our knowledge, we return to the plants themselves as teachers, and observe that all in Nature is fecundated, awash in the sexual spoor of pollen, nectar, and aroma. Such is the lay of the land, as surveyed from the Pathway of the Virgin.

Having considered the substance of the Offering of Self, and made of it the best sacrifice possible, we also consider the nature of our desire. Is knowledge sought for progression of the Pathway, or for pathological purposes? Are there emotional attachments to acquiring the knowledge? If, as a seeker after power, one can assume a state of mind in which all expectations of outcome are broken, one attains a state of placidity and pristine emptiness, likened to the Virgin, in readiness for the awakening of experience.

This ‘cult of the perpetual neophyte’ as I personally refer to it, is aligned in the magical orders with the grade of 0º, and is represented by the symbol of the empty vessel, or the magical circle. It assumes a constant station of receptivity toward all experience, and is assumed not only by the Virgin, but also by the Master.

Παράδοσις • Paradosis

THE PATHWAY OF TRADITION

Humanity is a matriculating species, and the biological sciences increasingly observe the teaching of distinct skills among our animal brethren. The ascent of schools of thought, and traditions of knowledge, is thus a phenomenon of our nature. Masters command their art in an exemplary fashion, and those of the correct aptitude are chosen as apprentices to pass the Art to via instruction.

Where occult herbalism is concerned, a number of pathways of tradition exist, especially in animistic cultures whose religious and magical practices have survived into the modern era. Admittedly, however, most of these traditions rigorously protect themselves from those outside the culture, for various reasons that are as valid as they are severe. Such knowledge, therefore, is admittedly not available to everyone.

However, there are also worthy traditions in education and the sciences which may be aspired to: pharmacognosy, folklore, pharmacy, medicine, chemistry, botany, perfumery, ecology, agriculture, anthropology, the culinary sciences, and theology. Occupying a middle ground between learning from a traditional healer and attaining one’s M. D. are schools of herbalism, a number of which have emerged in the past fifty years. Each of these represents an empirical and academic approach to these subjects, a way that, in my own culture, is nothing if not ‘traditional,’ and also offers considerable breadth in the study of plants and their esoteric properties. In undertaking the Pathway of Tradition, one might, for example, decide to pursue learning the art of botanical illustration. On the surface of things, one may wonder how such an activity would lead to esoteric knowledge. Yet the creation of art by necessity involves non-ordinary states of consciousness, and for many serves as a meditation. In the formation of images through hand and eye, a certain resonance with the plant is attained.

The tradition of the passing of knowledge from master to prentice must emerge from that most rare of virtues—care. In other words, concern for the stewardship of the knowledge passed that it, like a seed, be sown in good soil. But if we liken knowledge to a seed, care and respect must also be present for the plot in which it is sown. The great institutions of higher learning do not always require this from teachers and professors, but our Way cannot flourish without it.

To walk this pathway, one must be willing to accept the rules, protocols, and decorum of the informing tradition—for tradition in fact constellates a set of rules and governances applied to its focus discipline. There will be, among some, a resistance to this. Taking occult herbalism as a point of contemplation, any rule which provokes a sense of restriction or rebellion may be considered as both a challenge to the sorcerer’s level of self-control, as well as a sacrifice for the gain of knowledge. In a more immediate example, plants will impose greater rules upon the seeker than any human. Monkshood (Aconitum napellus) will kill if abused—that is its rule. If its rule is respected, I may safely use it to relieve the pain of a sprained ankle.

Obstacles on the Pathway are numerous, and foremost among these are maladies of the student-teacher relationship. Among these, is the ego of the teacher becoming central to the process—a problem which may stem from the master, or from the student, and often both. A strong craving for the appearance of knowledge is a pathology unfortunately all too common in esoteric circles, as is the desperate need to be ‘saved’ or ‘given the secrets,’ symptoms of shriveled spiritual virility and infantilism of the ego. At its best, the process of teaching is less about conveying facts than facilitating an experience wherein the seeker ‘learns to learn’ in a manner peculiarly suited to him or her. As each of us knows from personal experience, teaching is an Art which has both masters and pretenders; the true master regards instruction as a sacred process, and is willing to learn, as the Pathway of the Virgin embodies. Similarly, being a ‘learner’ or a student is also an Art, though it is seldom cognized as such: both teaching and learning magnify the power of this Pathway.

Another caution on the Pathway is accepting the value and limitations of anecdote. Another person’s personal experience can be valuable on many levels, especially if approaching the breadth of a constant. The value of anecdotal teachings, however, must always be weighed against the voice that disseminates them, its authority, biases, and personal agenda. For example, it is easy enough to hear a teaching and accept or reject it, but less easy to ask why that teaching was given. Beyond a necessary engagement with basic critical thinking, common sense shall illuminate.

Aside from respect, the great responsibility for the student of Tradition is to become a House of the Ancestors. This is to say, maintaining the flame of the transmission of knowledge. In doing so, one honors one’s master or teacher, and thus as...