Is neo-paganism just LARPing or is there more to it? Could these

If their children are raised in it are they larping? Their grandchildren? Their descendants 100 years in the future?

>>1981653
The thing is that it doesn't even seem to genuine. Just looks like a bunch of people playing pretend.

>>1981649
Neo-paganism is literally either a special snowflake middle class hobby or for feminists who want to worship the goddess.

>>1981649
LARPing? What makes it less viable than other man-made religions?

Don't listen to anyone else, this board is infested with villainous pagans.

It is just larping, but they will still justly burn for eternity because of it.

>>1981649
Half of then are neo nazi metalheads and tge other half are liberal new age cucks. Joke either way.

Like any religion, there are people that get into it for the wrong reasons, and there are genuine adherents. Next question.

>>1981776
>man-made

As opposed to the Word of God?

>>1981789
Prove it.

>>1981793
Prove what?

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>>1981789

>>1981787

>neo nazi metalheads
kekd so hard

>>1981812
yes, new atheism is a religion.

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>>1981649
Looks like the pagans didn't learn their lesson the first time around.

All religions are just LARPing.

>>1981649
honestly
lack of religion will probably win in the end. i don't see any new religion gaining any ground in current year

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>>1982070

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>>1982083
>i don't see any new religion gaining any ground in current year
Chinese Christianity m8.
>But anon, that is just Christianity-
It is extremely loaded with Chinese syncretism, it might as well be something else. And we're talking syncretism that is beyond Catholic Missionary levels like Jesus being in a pantheon of gods or him having mortal demigod descendants on earth.

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>>1982086

>>1982088
>Chinese Christianity
Christianity is gaining ground everywhere in the world, outside of the west. Although here atheists are dying out because of their low birth rates and Christians still have the birth rates.

>post yfw Christians will be the only native westerners left in 100 years because of natural selection

>>1982098

Right, because births are the only way to distribute ideas.

Makes you wonder how atheists emerged out of a Christian society in the first place. It's almost like being born a Christian isn't a guarantee someone will forever remain Christian or something

>>1982098
>Although here atheists are dying out because of their low birth rates and Christians still have the birth rates.

The percentage of atheists increases every year.

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>Is neo-paganism just LARPing?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5LgCuvb79eQ
to 99% yes.
The more genuine groups are from the furthest fucking right and might make it little ethnoreligious cults in 50 years if they manage to pass to their cildren.

>COuld these religions take over
No, not a chance.
They are based on victim complexes or hippiedom, bad understanding of history, zero theology whatsoever and would never hold a spine should Ahmed decide to take their mushrikin heads as a trophy.

>>1981649
>Is neo-paganism just LARPing
Is it really much worse than the Catholics on here?
>We put gold and pretty stones everywhere, that means our churches are better!
>Lmao, stupid proddies, actually believe the bible
>I am a proud reactionary and believe that all Europe's egalitarian movements was a disaster. That don't include Catholicism, because of reasons.

>>1982098
>Not reading everything I said.
What I was saying is Christfaggotry in China is fast turning into something else.

When the Chinese are basically violating meme Christian doctrine (i.e. the fact that there is only one god) you know that you're somewhere else entirely, a fanfiction of Jesus / Jade Emperor.

>>1982107
The world is going to end soon then don't say that

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>>1982215
So you expect something crazy like cao dai coming from it?

>>1982244
>Expect
IT HAS ALREADY HAPPENED.
>Taiping Heavenly Kingdom
AND HAS ALREADY BEGUN
>New Chinese Christian Movements.
>Church of the Eastern Lightning
>Denominationless Churches of Casual Christians casually throwing in Christian dogma to Chinese traditional folk religion & or Buddhism. Called "House Churches" and is thought of as to make the other half of China's Christian population because they are underground and not part of the approved Churches.

>>1982098
He thinks atheism/religion is hereditary
Every atheist I know including myself was raised Christian
Book filled with mistakes and contradictions + freedom of information is a deadly combo for Christianity
The only way you could have an all-Christian nation was if it were a theocracy modelled after Iran or Saudi Arabia or if evryone had the iq of a sub-saharan African

>>1982250
*Desire to know more intensifies*
Inb4 Pope Francis comes in and tell them that they true Christianity means open borders and giving your daughters in marriage to Mahmoud.

>>1982250
>Church of the Eastern Lightning
>The denomination was founded by Zhao Weishan who later went to the United States from where he continues to lead the church.
>went to the united states

Into the trash it goes, sounds more like a CIA asset to destabilise them as they see the chinese government as the great dragon to overcome.

>>1982277
Bishops of Chinese Catholicism are chosen by the party.

Just look at what the Han managed to twist Islam into. I have no idea why any Christian would want that done to his religion.

>>1982277
Nope.jpg.

Catholicism in China is handled by the Chinese Patriotic Catholic Church. Because the last thing China wants is to have foreign appointed entities (i.e. Rome appointed Cardinals) sitting in positions of influence in China.

So consistently the Chinese has pissed off the Roman Catholic church for a long time now, telling them that Chink Catholics are the responsibility of a Chinese appointed cardinal, not Rome.

That said, the weirdest is the Church of the Eastern Lightning. It got its name from a Mathew passage: "For as the lightning cometh out of the east, and shineth even unto the west; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be."

The group believes that the child of god is reborn as a young Chinese woman somewhere in China (THE EAST) and it is their mission to find her, topple the Peoples Republic of China, and recreate China into a Heavenly Kingdom (Taiping rebellion flashbacks) which will then cleanse the world of unbelief (including other Christian groups who refuse to acknowledge the seocnd messiah).

They are- rightly so- classified as a terrorist group, and China has hunted them down like rats after a series of serial killings done by the group so they're probably gone by now. Many of the group have gone into death sentences and life in prison by this point.

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>>1981649
Religion is indicative of the culture it comes from; conversely, it also can determine what a society becomes.

Old world religions focused on nature rather than progression. To the old world, man himself was perfect as he was. The gods of the old world were as perfect as the humans; and in a modern sense, neither were perfect, because the gods were just as gluttonous and lustful as the humans who worshiped them. The old world religions reflected a society that was built ground-up, and reflected the family, honour morality, etc. Honour (as it is today) has no meaning, or a changed meaning; the only word that could best describe what the world called "Honour" would be "Mania", or (in terms of Dishonour) "Depression". Manic people suffer delusions of grandeur, they're elevated in mood, and they are more energetic and outgoing; such is the symptom of someone with grandiose honour (like a king). Honour isn't functioning well in modern society, because our system of law has replaced the biological urge for honour and loyalty. When you're cramped together in a city full of multi-racial and multi-ethnic people, the only person that matters is yourself, and you have to follow the law of the city to protect yourself; what this does is conflates your moral senses with the law, and it changes how you feel towards other people. I'm from a small island off the east of Canada; Up until the 70s, the only way to get to the island was by boat; we still have the old smalltown-English hospitality and sense of loyalty. That loyalty (that exists outside of the rule of law), creates an honour system, and we live honourably. For me personally, it's easy to understand the old world religions, because they were intuned with the sense of honour that is forgotten by most people.

>>1982311
This goes to show that a religion can be anything you want it to be, regardless of what the so-called sacred texts say.

>>1981649
>Look at me! I am special and spiritually deep!
>I am a real life version of Gandalf with my staff and beard, the green wizard :DDDDDDDDDD
>If I raise my hands it will look like I am doing religious stuff, I perform Celtic rituals, 2deep4u
>I haz the most white hairs, therefore I iz leader of this mob, also dont overlook how much in a trance-like state I am, guys
>Dam bad hair day, oh fug diz, I will just wear my black cowboy hat, nobody will mind, lalala I evoke goddesses
>Oh goddam, was the dresscode white?

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>>1982426
You sure you wanna play this game son?

>>1981649
Neo-paganism is a type of new age spirituality and thus only accessible/relatable to only a tiny minority of counter-culture practitioners. As a mystery cult its sermons are short on practical application and long on ritual and esoteria which are designed to impress and retain the already faithful, but is totally lacking in any kind of galvanizing mechanism that presents a canonically unified ethical narrative for its followers to strive towards. Often times it becomes some variant of "be nice" or some other watered down and bastardized version of the golden rule.

It is a continuation of the western mystic tradition, having been relegated to the fringe of society thanks to the mainstream domination of secular thought and methodologies in the western tradition, as most westerners were raised in an environment of scientific skepticism and are quick to dismiss mysticism as obsolete to modern sensibilities.

>>1982426

>Look at me! I judge others for stuff I don't do myself!

>>1981649
>Is neo-paganism just LARPing
Depends on what you mean. In that pic there are probably a few there who are pagans or occultists at home.

A lot of this is a problem of terminology. There are plenty of neopagans who only read from the new age section of Barnes and Noble, or get their praxes from odinsfury.info.

There are also a number of reconstructionists. These guys occasionally get flak for filling blanks to the best of their ability to ascertain. Provided it's not just ahistorical garbage I have little problem with this.

Then you've got folks like Jake Stratton Kent who are practicing out of the Greek Magickal Papyri. I've got copies of the Pyramid Texts and Coming Forth by Day I lift rituals from. There's a HUGE movement to publish old texts like the Galdrabok or the svartkonstbockers.

>>1981659
What is 'genuine' in this context? Define it and give a metric of determination.

>>1982964
The push for a 'new' Paganism happened well before the "New Age" movement started.

If you can direct me to Neo-Paganism's mystery cult, I'd appreciate it. In reality, it appears that just like in the past, some are initiatory and some are not. Some seek to simulate old initiations, others do not.

>but is totally lacking in any kind of galvanizing mechanism that presents a canonically unified ethical narrative for its followers to strive towards
Only because we're using the blanket term 'neopaganism' rather than stratifying who and what we're talking about.

>>1981802
That whatever you believe is the word of god.

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>Could these religions take over in the face of declining Christianity?
let me laugh at you
hah
HAH

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>>1982098
Western Christians have the exact same abysmal birthrates atheists do.

>>1981649

All religion is LARPing. Some neopagans actually believe what they claim to believe, same as some religious people do, but for most of them the appeal is more in the theatre and community they find, same as most religious people.

I imagine the future of western/ northern Europe will see atheists, people who convert to dharmic religions, neopagans, christians and muslims mixed each in roughly similar proportions
Neopaganism isn't as stupid a meme as 4chan believes, it can be spiritually deep and is growing quickly.
But Islam is also growing quickly, atheism is growing quickly (but will then decline due to low birth rates), and people often overlook this now but Buddhism is still gaining white converts. In fact a third of British Buddhists are now white.

>>1982104
>Right, because births are the only way to distribute ideas.

Some people convert, but the vast majority are indoctrinated from birth.

>>1981649
I don't think so, not on any large scale or widespread use in any one perosns life.

The act of communion can be replaced by neo-pagan practices though, just like hobbies can act as a communion replacement for people.

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>>1983716
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpKachYTr-4

>>1981649
the most LARPingest of LARPers. I had this Greek history professor in college who said that most of their religion was incorrect, baseless speculation and it made no sense

Why is Wicca still considered a meme religion again?

It's ideas and practices aren't that odd compared to older traditions and certainly make as much or as little sense as any other faith.
In fact it's much more logical and scientific than Catholicism for example.

I think the stereotype of its demographics is probably the only thing putting people of learning about Wicca properly as they would learn of other religions.

In short, its beliefs are:
>An unknowable deist God split into interactive Male and Female Polarities, each with their own manifestations which are known as the old pagan Gods and Goddesses
>Gods aren't seen as good or evil, but capable of and responsible for things we interpret as such
>Believes in reincarnation with a pause to rest and reflect between incarnations
>Believes in karma
>Celebrate the Eight Seasonal Sabbats and 12/13 Esbats
>Embraces sex and sexuality
>Has rules against harming any living things
>Practices magick, which is simply just doing rituals, acts, prayer and meditation for trying to cause good physical changes in the world through willpower alone and isn't at all considered supernatural
>Accepts science 100% and claims all things that appear supernatural are natural but just haven't been investigated by proper respectable science in depth yet so to understand it

>>1983777
>unknowable god
>claim to know about it

if your not living through it, if its not a material process, and it's just a theoretical category one's amorphous identity ascribes to [once and a while], its all role-play

How many Christians role play out their ideal? All of them. Even the popes change the rules or break them viciously.

Religious belief is just an emotive critique of other's faith, unless youre living as the faith.

>>1981653
According to /pol/ Italian-American Catholics under age 70 who to mass are LARPers

>>1983777
>unknowable deist God
Bullshit, BTW is Gnostic, hence the initiations.

>Gods aren't seen as good or evil
Gardner set out a more or less coherent morality (implying at least good and bad) with harm as the limiting factor, we quote him:
>witches are inclined to the morality of the legendary Good King Pausol, 'Do what you like so long as you harm none'
>Karma
Really depends on what you mean by this. Karma is not always a force of retributive return in Eastern systems and is often conceptualized in terms of obscuring dust.
>Practices magick, which is simply just doing rituals, acts, prayer and meditation for trying to cause good physical changes in the world through willpower alone and isn't at all considered supernatural
Gardner was a direct student of Crowley who absolutely believed in the powers of the supernatural.
>Accepts science 100% and claims all things that appear supernatural are natural but just haven't been investigated by proper respectable science in depth yet so to understand it
You're thinking of Crowley, see Magick in Theory and Practice, 'Definitions and Theorems'.

>>1981852
It may have many prophets but at least it has no gods.

>>1983998
I'm an First Degree Alexandrian and pretty much everything that I've read or been taught from our perspective has been to say that all magick is entirely natural and not supernatural, and that the prime mover is like a deistic non interventionist God, not like the Gnostics' God.
Also of course Wicca has a clear moral code in the Rede but in the Alexandrian view we also recognise the God and Goddess can be misused for forbidden Black / left hand purposes.
Also Crowley was never a Witch, and was very specifically told he wasn't suitable to become a member of the Craft.
And Gardner wasn't right about everything and he took more information and ideas from Crowley than most of his contemporary Wiccans were happy about.

Seeing as your views are so clearly different from mine, I'd be interested to hear which branch in BTW you're coming from exactly.

Also if magick works it works. If solitary eclectics can get results, while discussing our theological differences may be interesting it is of little real value.

>>1981649
>>Is neo-paganism just LARPing
No, there is genuine belief among at least some of the adherents of these faiths.

>>Could these religions take over in the face of declining Christianity?
No, because science killed supernatural explanations for day to day events. This is the self same reason you will not see a revival of christian belief in the first world any time soon.

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>>1981659
>just looks like a bunch of people playing pretend
if anyone said this concerning the monotheistic religions they would get blasted with fedora memes

when the larping gets to the big leagues they call it faith

>>1983707
>In the future there might be more white Buddhists than Asian Buddhists, and Christianity will be a Chinese religion.

>>1981653
Still Mormon tier

There aren't any actual Neopagans. Not a single one of them actually believes in the things they claim to. There's no genuine belief in it.

>>1986386
How do you know this anon?

>>1985123
>Chinese ''''''''''Christianity'''''''''''

>>1981668
thats just not true

any genuine neopagans on /his/ want to chip in?

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>>1982113
>based on victim complexes or hippiedom

That's rich coming from a judeo-christian, lel. Pot meet the kettle


>The Jewish Tanakh (acronym for Torah-Neviim-Khetuvim, "Law, Prophets, Writings") is the same as what Christians call the "Old Testament."

There is a slightly different arrangement of the books, but they are the same books, e.g., the Christian "Old Testament" ends with Malachi, the Tanakh ends with 2 Chronicles. But there are not more or less books; they are just arranged differently.

So in content, there is no difference.


Q: What is the difference between the Tanakh and the Old Testament?

A: THERE IS NOT A SINGLE FUCKING DIFFERENCE BETWEEEN THE JEWISH TANAKH AND THE CHRISTIAN OLD TESTAMENT! THEY'RE ONE AND THE SAME THING!

>judeo-christians
>white

JESUS WAS NOT A REAL PERSON

There is no historical reference to Jesus' life, death or the crucifixion―nothing at all. The only information of the life of Jesus comes from Judeo-Christian believers.

http://www.jdstone.org/cr/files/nohistoricalevidenceofjesus.html

Christians have said to Jews who reject Jesus, 'OK…let's see you provide historical evidence for the existence of characters in the Hebrew bible. i.e. Moses or Noah. However, in this line of reasoning, Christians forget that they have already accepted the Hebrew bible; that the episodes told therein actually happened. That is why a version of the Old Testament is located at the front of the Christian bible for reference and authority.

Those 21 great writers of the Greco-Roman world, whose combined work would fill a library did not write or allude to any thesis that god became man, walked the earth, died, was resurrected, and is now the Invisible Man in the Sky. There is not a single third party historical witness for confirmation, and not one single mention of a god walking the earth in any of the volumes of the combined work from the great writers of the period.

>>1984418
>Also Crowley was never a Witch
Not according to Crowley.

>was very specifically told he wasn't suitable to become a member of the Craft.
But suitable enough to devise rituals with Gardner after he was elevated to the 7th Degree OTO and given a charter to form a camp of Minervals?

I'm coming from a slightly more 'orthodox' Gardnerian position, there's decent overlap between the OTO and Gardnerians.

Are you guys LARPing about religion or are you serious about it?
It is hard for me to understand how educated and intelligent people can genuinly believe in god

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>>1986641

>>1986460
Again, define your terms.

Some folks here would classify what I do as 'neopaganism', others as 'reconstructionism' and still others as 'synchretism'.

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>>1983777
>Practices magick

Most people, even believers find religious practices a little absurd. When you use a buzzword like that, it gets cranked to 11.

>>1981649
Is Christianity just LARPing or is there more to it?

>>1986660

>beliefs that draw from ancient paganism didn't care about postmodernism or LGBalphabetsoup people

Holy shit I never would have guessed that

>>1986660
>>1986870
While it's not explicit in some exegesis, there's a fair amount of material on nonduality in gender and nonessentialism, particularly in things like Cultus Sabbati and the works of Kenneth Grant, not to mention the Tantrik practices integrated by the former and its cousin systems from Kalachakra Tantra, Kaulajnananirnaya and Matrikabheda Tantra.

I can imagine in some scenarios, especially with immigration, that well established eastern traditions such as Buddhism, Islam, Baha'ism and Sikhism could grow significantly among westerners (people are already converting to these faiths to a limited extent)
But I just can't imagine neopaganism becoming a major force. It's just too irrelevant and small too make a major impact at this point.

>>1986870
>ancient paganism
>Wicca
Pick one and only one

>>1984063
>prophets with out gods
How scary is that

All religion is glorified role playing games.

>>1981649
No, it is the one true religion, all of them and people genuinely believe in Wodin, the god of boulders and the rest.

I've been a Germanic heathen for almost 7 years. I don't wear goofy clothes or hold autistic ceremonies in parks, I'm of a normal weight, and have a girlfriend who is also of a normal weight and is agnostic.

It's true there Internet is overrun with faggots who just want to be in a year round renaissance festival, but there are those of us who prefer to practice an actual belief system. Actually the worst one are the wiccans/goofy new age people, it's packed with radfems and numales and become insufferable because they think we're somehow "allies".

>>1987452
>it's packed with radfems and numales

Neo-"""pagans""" are either this or neo-Nazis canting about Thule and muh Aryan masterrace

>>1987476

I'm neither though

>>1987488
Well aren't you a special snowflake

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>>1982088
>Chinese Christianity m8.
>Christianity can't even win against Islam spreading by word of mouth
>Christians have missionaries, government support and ton of propaganda money
>Still outmeme'd by Islam

>>1987506

If being a normies in all other respects makes you a snowflake, then I guess so. I'm more of a reconstructionist anyhow, ritual has its place but being a pageant fag is lame and frankly, just insulting.

>>1981649
everything is LARPing
everything is a spook

>>1986531
>pagans
>mostly white

Mostly Japanese and Indian surely?

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>>1981787
>neo nazi metalheads

>>1984418
>Also Crowley was never a Witch,

Neither was Gardner who repackaged crowley`s thelema with an OFFENSIVE pseudo-celtic glaze to legitimize his affair. The rede is literally copy pasted from crowley.

>>1986641
euphoric

>>1987452
great

what kind of theology to you subscribe to if you don't mind sharing?

>>1988865

Yeah no problem. First off, heathenry is an orthopraxic system, meaning what matters is right action, as opposed to an orthodoxy, which is a focus on right belief. I think that's a big sticking point for many people trying to understand the theology in this, they approach it in the mindset of Islam vs Christianity vs Judaism and whatnot. Anyhow, we're similiar to Shinto as far as ancestor reverence goes, a lot of folks tend to think we're all about Thor and Valhalla and such but really the gods are normally only worshipped in a group or community setting. We don't really have a concept as sin, really, instead of things being "what's good for me and mine?" being good, and "what's bad for me and mine" being the "sin" as it were.

I feel like I'm just rambling, Is there anything specific you'd like to know?

>>1988179
>Neither was Gardner
Spare might be if we put stock into the older reports of Craft practice.

>>1987519
They just said it was rising. Rising numbers of X in China always means a million people.

>>1981649
Esoteric Kekism has managed to make it past the LARP phase and has true believers now.

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It's only LARPing when they're pulling shit out thin air. Pagan is an umbrella term for non Abrahamic. If someone is practicing a European religion like the Roman one (I've been for years) then it's based entirely in recorded history, story and fact. Neopagans are fucking cancer and make based reconstructionists look bad.

>>1989108
>Roman one
Civic or initiatory?

>>1989113
The two don't have to be mutually exclusive.

>>1988913
unlikely; It amazes me that no one seems able to take a step back and question why the "craft" has more in common with the golden dawn than folk magick aka witchcraft .

>>1989127
No but it ballparks me the idea of your practice more than 'Roman' which can mean anything from pre-Civic late Etruscan folk paganism to State Religion to late Neoplatonism to Elagabalus' Baetylus worship.

>>1989137
Why is it unlikely?
Both made use of witch-bottles. Both made use of Agrippan sigilzations. We have evidence of both in museums, found after Spare's time. Both made use of speaking stones. Both claim Essex transmission. Saducismus triumphatus reads like a Spareian program of magick in long chunks.

Spare probably didn't pull this out of his ass, and it's even less likely he picked this shit up from Crowley, though AC did occasionally claim with the same group(s?) that Spare asserted lineage from.

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Neo paganism is just atheism with watered down spiritual beliefs attached to it.

For it to become a serious religion, people have to actually fucking believe in it.

>>1989151
Directly classical Roman "paganism". Jupiter, Janus, Mars, the early state religion.

>>1989159
how do you know there aren't some genuine believers?

>>1989159
What's funny to me is the assertion that positive "belief" is a core component of all religions because in most times and in most cultures through history the question wasn't 'do you believe' but 'do you have a relationship with [alterity]?'.

The spirits or Gods were active whether you accepted or rejected them. "Belief" in our modern understanding had fuckall to do with things, it was about cultivating relationships (through devoted praxis, which a certain subset of what's usually called 'neopagan' actually does).

>>1981649
LARPing. They could be legit, but 99% aren't.

>>1989159
>Neo paganism is just atheism
You're incredibly ignorant. There are "atheist" or nastika schools of Hinduism, and they're no less Hindu because they don't believe in the gods. Non-Abrahamic religions are clearly too much for your narrow paradigms to process.

>>1989178
Source?

>>1989151
>AC did occasionally claim *brief contact* with

>>1989165
Thanks, just curious.
Janus is a dank godform.
I also dig Juno as genii. In line with some of Claudia Canuto de Menezes' speculations on the Holy Guardian Angel.

>>1989181
>There are "atheist" or nastika schools of Hinduism
Don't forget Carvaka.

>>1989184
Look at the beliefs of the people following it. Asteru fags, "druid" fags, and other ones are people with no idea about these things, and just project their own views on to them to seem different.

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Anyone who doesn't truly believe that the religion they follow is the "true" religion is simply a LARPer. They're roleplaying either because it makes them feel good, some kind of social pressure, they think it will get them somewhere, or some combination of those three.

>>1989202
Then what do we make of Vajrayana Buddhism whose early tantras assert that the methods of Saivist worship are perfectly capable of getting an aspirant to Attainment?

>>1989202
This.

Most Mormon converts probably just do it for the business contacts.

>>1989209
I don't understand the question. Religions incorporating parts of other religions into their own or attempting to bring followers of other religions into the fold by saying "See, you can still keep doing your thing after you join us!" is pretty common. Whether or not the individual is just LARPing or not is a case by case thing.

>>1989233
By the time these referenced Tantras were put to leaf, the Buddhists had already gotten as many Saivist converts as they could (and the same holds true for Buddhists into Saivism after state sponsored debates and synchretism).

The tacit admission here is that Buddha is not the only way. This doctrine gets retrofitted at later points to explain that the Saivist heads were Buddhas, but early on that wasn't case. My point is rather that having "the Truth" is just as modern a notion as "Belief" being the litmus test, as there are plenty of religious groups that see Truth in other methods.

>>1989242
What I was trying to say is that a person must truly believe that their religion is real. They cannot simply follow the religion and worship a deity just because they think the morals the religion espouses sound good. If they do not believe that the teachings of their religion are "true" then they are merely roleplayers.

It's a reactionary movement that happened because of the collapse of white identity.

I have Norweigan ancestry so I'm partial to it, I'll raise my kids Christian and everything, but I'll still practice things like the Nine Noble Virtues.

>>1989151
Have you done any research on the western magic tradition from which golden dawn and later crowley then spare came from? Sigil creation is not somehow a unique thing nor is the burying of charms . Literally everything related to the history of "the craft" is pseudo history based on out dated rejected theories or takes something from another system and claims "we invented dat" . I mean fuck half the theology is a corruption of the work of Robert Graves

>>1989344
>Have you done any research on the western magic tradition from which golden dawn and later crowley then spare came from?
Shitloads, I keep a library with 5k religious source texts, academic commentary, and the first public presentation of the Yorke Microfilms of the Warburg Collection. I'm probably the most well versed person on Crowleyana on this site.

>Sigil creation is not somehow a unique thing
No but Agrippa's usage was an obscure footnote until Spare, with the curious exception of recently found witch-bottles.

>pseudo history based on out dated rejected theories
Um, care to tell me how the newly discovered usages of Agrippan sigils on witch-bottles have been rejected? If you're talking about the Murrayan witch-cult hypothesis, yeah, it's been BTFO ages ago but this does not rule out an Ashmolean transmission in the vein of the Grimoire of Arthur Gauntlet. If you can refute the plain existence of that Cunning Crafter's grimoire, in Ashmole's collection, I'll pay-pal you a thousand bucks.

>Robert Graves
You're waaaay behind mate, most modern conceptions of witchcraft are routing through Carlo Ginzburg, Norman Cohn, and Emma Wilby (the last two I highly recommend).

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Why are a bunch of Druids worshipping at ruins built by Pre-IE peoples?

>>1989647
shhhudup

>>1989647
''''''''Druids""""""*

>>1989626
I guess you can add Éva Pócs to that list too but I liker her less than the other three.

In any case, here's a folder with:
>Oxford Handbook of Witchcraft
>Agents of Witchcraft in Early Modern Italy and Denmark
>Icelandic Magic
>Witchcraft and Belief in Early Modern Scotland
among many others: https://mega.nz/#F!wJAnXb4J!4Hkn5E4LJz0c6UYSrj3y5g

And this one with:
>Hutton's Physical Evidence for Ritual Acts of Sorcery and Witchcraft
>Anglo-saxon Charms
>superstition and magic in early modern europe
Plus some dupes and modern synchretic takes on this shit:
https://mega.nz/#F!hUAiHTSK!7zcl8cs3IhCd5QqEOCmrPg

Then there's some Ginzburg and Willby in the Chumbley folder:
https://mega.nz/#F!kNZVmZoY!yZzTozqFeVDWu77BS4dWSQ

>>1989647
Because monumental structures get used by whoever's near them, if able?

>>1989652
^That too.

>>1989653
^This may also apply to some of them.

How could they be purporting to be accurately performing Druidic rituals when they're not known to history?

I mean, Hellenistic Paganism makes a modicum of sense, because those rituals are known, mostly.

>>1989710
Next to nothing is a touch of an overstatement:

>The archaeologist Stuart Piggott, author of The Druids (1968), accepted the Greco-Roman accounts and considered the druids to be a barbaric and savage priesthood who performed human sacrifices. This view was largely supported by another archaeologist, Anne Ross, author of Pagan Celtic Britain (1967) and The Life and Death of a Druid Prince (1989), although she believed that they were essentially tribal priests, having more in common with the shamans of tribal societies than with the classical philosophers. Ross' views were largely accepted by two other prominent archaeologists to write on the subject, Miranda Aldhouse-Green—author of The Gods of the Celts (1986), Exploring the World of the Druids (1997) and Caesar's Druids: Story of an Ancient Priesthood (2010)—and Barry Cunliffe, author of Iron Age Communities in Britain (1991) and The Ancient Celts (1997).

>>1981649
Religions doesn't mean shit nowadays.
Christianity is still strong though.

Unless there is an actual unbroken line of pagan practice, it's just LARPing. It's no different than some Ameriblob discovering his great grandpappy was German so he starts dressing up like Hitler.

>>1989768
>Christianity is still strong though.
u wot

>>1989768
>Christianity is still strong though.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5bWHSpmXEJs

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>>1989787

>LEFT WING PAGANISM
350 lbs morbidly obese bulldyke with purple hair, likes feminism, rallies for important social issues such as transgender bathrooms and government funded birth control, is a nudist, owns a small quirky corner shop where she sells magic crystals and organic vegemilk enchiladas. Hates Christianity because it represents oppressive cispatriarchy and toxic masculinity.

>RIGHT WING PAGANISM
Pizza faced 20 something who listens to NSBM, is a major nerd and posts on Stormfront and /pol/. Hates Christianity because it is a foreign Jew cult that represents slave morality and weakness.

In all cases, modern paganism is more of a butthurt "FUCK CHRISTIANITY" movement than a genuine faith.

>>1983354
this pic related

WE

>>1989721
>accepted the Greco-Roman accounts
Trouble is how few those are. We only have one very questionable one via Caesar's turncoat, and at best (depending on how you look at them) two or three others.
And they're all everyone uses, just from different angles so it looks like there's more.
>t. Big fan of Druidry, and member of OBOD, AHOD, and a few others.

>>1981649
Paganism was great. You treasured the goodies of life and a healthy community. You had an idol for everything ranging from procreation to war to partying to the sun itself. Then it was replaced by some Jewish bully. Luckily, the Christians preserved some of the things I just mentioned through icons and saints.

Sadly, I don't think the true nature of paganism can be revived; it will only be rebranded Christianity or LARPers who listen to the Skyrim soundtrack thinking it's ancient Viking music.

>>1990098
There's the myth that pagans never adopted foreign practices and gods before Christianity which is 100% bullshit, the Romans for example often prayed to various Egyptian or Iranian gods just because it was fashionable at the moment. Christianity was one of these fashion trends, except it for some reason stuck.

>>1990109
Well didn't pagan religions focus on local patron gods?
Wouldn't this leave them divided and easy picking for an Emperor looking for a rising monotheistic religion to unite all the regions of the empire?

>>1981781
the religion of peace and love

>>1990217
Pagan religions adopted shit from all over. Even Judaism has a shitload of Indo-European borrowings in it.

>>1990228
>Even Judaism has a shitload of Indo-European borrowings in it.
Like what

>>1990217
>Well didn't pagan religions focus on local patron gods

Yes, and no. Pagans did often have local patron deities, but they often had rites for all the other gods as well, except if they were like henotheists or something and only paid nominal tribute to other gods.

On top of that, the Romans had a practice of Conflating their gods with other Pagan Gods.

For example, Taranis is just the Gaulish Jupiter, and they had very few bones about it, except for the Druidic Human sacrifice which they stopped.

The bigger ordeal came about when they encountered the strictly Monotheistic Jews who would chimp out when the Romans tried to practice their Religion near them.

>>1990254
Slaying the serpent myth, for one.

>>1990269
I don't think you can pin something as common as that as specifically Indo-European

>>1990282
You very much can.

>as common as that
Common in IE religions.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaos_(cosmogony)#Chaoskampf

>>1990254
Satan, the Final Judgement, the Messiah, angels are all borrowings from Zoroastrianism.

>>1990441
Pretty sure it's the other way around.

>>1990441
Blasphemy.

>>1981653
will ''''paganism''' have this kind of longevity?

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>>1981649
>LARPing

Why do people make this insult?

The only reason why people call it "LARPing" is because its not popular, which is to say, its not as marketable to the asses of masses out there.

Religion used to be an artistic/metaphorical representation of a tribal attitude towards life, only with christianity and the other abrahamic/monotheistic religions we see a disconnect from the grounding in blood/tradition and an adherence to PURE ABSTRACTION, disconnected from the real.

The problem with the idea of pure abstraction is that it evolved from observing patterns in reality.

Pattern recognition developed the very perfect ideal conceptions, retards would then use to deny the reality from which they were derived from.

>>1990453
>Why do people make this insult?

It's to imply that faith isn't genuine, that you didn't get into it because you believe in the claimed account of divine truth. It's the same reason people call people hipsters, only a religion thing.

>>1990453
>Why do people make this insult?
It's accusing the tools of not actually believing in, practicing correctly, or even really understanding that which they profess. Rather, they're just in it for the window dressing.

>>1990453
because a lot of the people in it are there for social exposure to play dressup to connect with fellow sjw feminists
there ARE genuine believers, not sure of %

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>>1990462
>>1990463
Ive seen the term used as a catch all for anyone who is Pagan and does not subscribe to any of the popular slavish ideals of the day.

>>1990465
I dont consider "liberal pagans" or anything that denies or denigrates the earthly masculine spirit as Pagan, i see it more as semetic who reserves the masculine spirit to the one alpha male abstraction.

>>1990474
>Ive seen the term used as a catch all for anyone who is Pagan
Because it's a pretty safe bet. You can be reasonably certain that there aren't too many "pagans" who believe that Zeus is chilling up on Mt Olympus, or that Morgan and Lugh are hanging with the fae in particular groves, or that it's Thor causing every bolt of lightning.

>>1990442
>>1990443
Pretty sure it's not.

>Most scholars, Jewish as well as non-Jewish, are of the opinion that Judaism was strongly influenced by Zoroastrianism in views relating to angelology and demonology, and probably also in the doctrine of the resurrection, as well as in eschatological ideas in general, and also that the monotheistic conception of Yhwh may have been quickened and strengthened by being opposed to the dualism or quasi-monotheism of the Persians.

http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/15283-zoroastrianism

>Zoroastrianism seems to have exercised a strong influence on the development and eschatological notions in Second Temple Judaism. Christianity, an offshoot of Judaism at the end of this period, got most of its eschatological ideas through the apocrypha of the Old Testament, the Jewish writings of the period just before the emergence of Christianity.

http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/eschatology-i

>>1983354
Literally the guy who drew Happy Merchant.

>>1989804
>In all cases, modern paganism is more of a butthurt "FUCK CHRISTIANITY" movement than a genuine faith.
The vast majority of the world is raised in paganism, not to mention most Euro-paganism isn't politically motivated. I see no politics behind a dude thumbing through GMP or Galdrabok for rites.

>>1990067
I feel ya, I'm just pointing out 'almost nothing' is less than we actually have.

>>1990442
Fucking LOL.
Qayin is probably a mirror of Zahak.

>>1990624
^This.

>>1990474
>earthly masculine spirit as Pagan
This is hilarious to me as shitloads of pagan cultures actually have words and social space for the intersexed and a few extra socio-linguistic genders. Not ALL of them, but enough for it to make you look like what this guy was bitching about: >>1989804

>>1991265
And? Zoroastrianism is almost 1000 years younger than Judaism. Zahak was inspired by Cain.

>>1991275
Yahwehism arises in about the 9th century BCE with the establishment of Samaria and Judah with YHVH as the national godform with oral histories going back to who fucking knows.

Meanwhile, Foltz puts the origins of Zoroastrianism around the second millennium BCE, and lays out mechanisms of transmission from Zoroastrians to Hebrews via Babylon getting its shit pushed in by Cyrus, pretty well in line with Second Temple scriptural history.

>>1991265
>The vast majority of the world is raised in paganism
the biggest maybe pagan group is hinduism, which is less than a sixth of the world.
Unless you mean irreligious, or something, and even that doesn't make sense.

>>1991316
This is what I mean by people needing to clean up their terminology.

Pagan, without any other connotation, simply means non-Christian, though you could extend this to other abrahamics, and even by that latter metric just a touch under half of the world is born into paganism.

>>1991316
Or maybe you are referring to the original version of the word "pagan", which means peasant, since city-folk had jumped on the whole monotheism thing in one form or another, and most of the remaining pagans were rural hillbillies;)

>>1990619
To be fair, that's a completely unreasonable standard. Do you expect Christians to believe literally every aspect of their faith to be "genuine?"

>>1981649
It's a big thing in the military weirdly enough.
Ranger batt even has a whole group of dudes that worship odin.

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>>1991538
That's really interesting. Thanks for sharing.

The majority of hymns in the Rig Veda is directed to Thor's Indian counterpart, the warlike Indra. The priestly Agni comes only in second, even though the it was the priestly caste that redacted the Vedas. That's because the early Indo-Aryans were warring, nomadic pastoralists. War was a huge part of their society, and soldiers need gods that help them in battle. Catholicism, before it became a green-pink global NGO, was well aware of this, hence the cult of the military saints, like Saint George (the Christian Indra, with echoes of the Thracian Horseman, pic related), Saint Michael, Saint James the Moorslayer, etc. Zoroastrianism also has a warlike "angel" or yazata, named Verethragna, with echoes of both Indra and Vishnu (he's born in the primordial ocean and one of his incarnations is a boar). Very cool.

Soldier spirituality would yield a decent chapter in a book about comparative religion and mythology.

>>1989279
Nordics truly are autists

>>1987425
lel

>>1991778
Outstanding post.

>>1991778
It's just kinda one of those things. Christianity and killing some motherfuckers don't really mix that well. So, it's not exactly sincere 'worship' so much as it is a heritage thing. Like you said, soldiers need gods that help them in battle, some ranger kicking in a door might not really believe Thor is fighting besides them, but slapping on a Norse tattoo and doing some Viking chants before stepping off is good for morale.

>>1991778
Indoeuropean Poetry and Myth by M.L. West has a lot of chapters that are, how should I put it, relevant to /tg/'s interests.

It's an amazing book.

le ebic larb meme
also
>tfw christianity is finally dying out

at last, justice

>>1981781
You good there buddy?

>>1981649

no they are just filler used by 60s liberal boomer scum

>>1992240
euphoric

>>1982311
>The group believes that the child of god is reborn as a young Chinese woman somewhere in China (THE EAST)

I never understood this. Wouldn't "the east" be the US to them?

>>1992685
Maybe they are thinking about it as in relation to the holy land?

>>1991537
>Do you expect Christians to believe literally every aspect of their faith to be "genuine?"
Yes. Why the fuck would that be unreasonable? If one doesn't actually believe in and understand something, why would they lie and say they do, except for the image associated.

>>1990619
Didn't already the ancient Pagans hold many of their beliefs to be merely allegorical?

>>1993001
That's a pretty recent claim. Also very spurious. Otherwise they spent a lot of time building fuckhuge temples to allegories, as well as praying to them, sacrificing to them, and beseeching their guidance.

>>1981649
>Could these religions take over in the face of declining Christianity?
Islam already does that far more efficiently

>>1993066
Islam is a form of Christianity.

>>1993074
>Violates everything in the Apostles Creed past "I believe in God, the Father Almighty."
>A Form of Christianity.
Christcucks being delusional as usual.

>>1993074
>rejects Christ's death on the cross and thus his martyrdom
>Christian
Rastafarianism is closer to Christianity than Islam

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>>1983777
>more logical and scientific than Catholicism
lolno

Hunt down terrorist groups.

>>1993361
???

>>1993368
Earth liberation front.

>>1992938
Well, I mean most Christians believe Genesis is allegorical these days. That's not literal belief. So why is this belief in metaphor worse than any other?

>>1993430
>the bible is wrong
>Christian

>>1993433
God's word can't be translated accurately by a human being through writing, it must be preached

>>1993430
That's not really a bad thing though. Understanding the allegory strengthens faith. The core parts of Christianity are belief in God, and the sacrifice of Christ. Doubting if Lot's wife really turned to salt doesn't preclude being Christian the same way doubting Odin was a dude who sacrificed an eye for knowledge and can actually see through ravens precludes being an Odinist.

>>1993854
Why shouldn't I read Christ's sacrifice as an allegory? Why stop at the OT? Genuinely curious.

>>1981649
It's just larping because there is no real tradition.

>>1987785
Euronymous had it coming

>>1993884
what if they pass it on to their children
how many generations do you need for a religion

>>1993884
>no real tradition
Of what? There's an easily traceable grimoire tradition that can easily be described as pagan particularly in Nordic, French, and Italian traditions, be it Grimorium Verum, Galdrabok, or Svartkonstböcker.

>>1993885
That doesn't mean Varg didn't too.

Are people who actually believe the Roman pantheon/etc. insane?

>>1993863
It is an allegory too, but that doesn't mean it didn't happen.
And mostly, you just have to go with what's logical. Like, why would God need Noah to take two of each animal? Omnipotence could have just given them gills for forty days and nights.

>>1993884
define 'real' tradition
>>1993908
>are people who believe in christianity insane?

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>>1993908
Like, as per DSM/mainstream definition, if it's not interfering with your ability to function in society, it's probably not mental illness.

>>1993921

Listen, I get that people are indoctrinated into Christianity as kids. But to somehow land on Roman pantheon as something to believe in?

>>1993935
As opposed to Christian converts somehow landing on the Trinity as something to believe in?

>>1993935
>people don't convert to religions
>religion is insanity

*tips fedora*

>>1993939
>>1993987

I don't get why converts believe either, just that I have more lenience for those who were indoctrinated.

>>1994046
>I don't get why converts believe either
Usually theophany.
See Levinas' Totality and Infinity.

>>1981852
How bout' old atheism?

>>1994055
That's just religious apathy.

New Atheism is a religion about denouncing religion.