Miracles versus Magic

I wanted to delve into how I perceive miracles and magic. People made it pretty clear in class that God is associated with miracles and the devil is associated with magic. God creates miracles from nothing, which is precisely what makes them miracles. They happen at a time when there seems to be no hope for things to get better. Miracles are inherently good.
Magic, on the other hand, tends to be inherently evil. The "miracles" the devil creates are not miracles at all -- they are "lying wonders" (Kors & Peters, 101). The text on page 101 goes into further detail about miracles being wrought by some corporeal change. The article says that "demons are unable to change the nature of a body" (101), therefore they do not create miracles.
The magic the devil produces may come about like the miracles God produces, but it does not come from the same place and is considered a sin. In the third article of Aquinas' Summa theologia, he explains that all sins come from the temptation of the devil directly or indirectly. The devil tempted the first man to sin who then went on to tempt another and so on and so forth. The devil may not approach each person directly, but he is the cause of each sin someone commits.
The same may be said about God. One person decided to commit their life to living in a way that God approves of, and then went on to convince others. Although God did not approach each of these people, His interaction with the first person caused a domino effect.
Although the devil's magic and God's miracles are on the opposite end of the human decency spectrum, I think they are both interconnected. Each "phenomenon", if you will, causes a chain event that leads to a bunch of people following it. Even though the devil creates terrible things, he is able to make them seem decent, like something God would create, thus achieving a large number of followers. God's creations are always good, which makes it easy for people to praise Him and live by standards that he would accept.

Superstitions: Then and Now

Well, since everyone else seems to be talking about Thomas Aquinas, I figured I’d go back to our discussion about superstition and magic. In Magic in the Middle Ages, it mentions medieval superstitions such as:

“Those who found halfpennies or needles could congratulate themselves on their good luck, unless they were so foolish as to dispose of these discovered objects, in which case the luck would turn against them. It was lucky to find a horseshoe or an iron nail, or to meet a hare as it was escaping the hounds. To encounter a raven or an ass was unlucky. Some people believed it could be bad luck to meet a monk or a priest unless one made the sign of the cross.”(88)

While we don’t have many of these superstitions today, there are several that still persist in modern society like crossing your fingers, knocking on wood, walking under a ladder, and opening an umbrella indoors. But where did these superstitions come from? A quick Google search reveals a large number of websites with information on the subject. One that I found particularly useful is an article on the Reader’s Digest website which gives possible histories of modern superstitions as well as some others dating as far back as the Egyptians.

The practice of crossing one’s fingers or legs for luck might be traced back as far as the time of Jesus, and it is suggested that the motion is related to the crucifixion. Knocking on wood is sometimes related to the same thing, but the practice could also be traced back to the belief that spirits lived in trees. By knocking or touching the wood, the person would be invoking these spirits. The Reader’s Digest article relates the superstition of walking under a ladder to the ladder criminals would have to climb before they were hanged; however, another article traces it all the way back to the ancient Egyptians. This article on Livescience.com says that the Egyptians believed triangles to be sacred and a sign of the gods. As such, walking through the triangle formed by a leaning ladder was considered hugely disrespectful to the gods. Similarly, the Chinese viewed the opening of an umbrella indoors to be an insult to the Sun, who they considered a god. This slight could bring bad luck or even death.

There is a lot more information on the subject out there, even on these websites. If this interests you, I would encourage that you check out these two articles.

http://www.readersdigest.com.au/superstitions?page=1

http://www.livescience.com/33507-origins-of-superstitions.html

Astrology, then and now.

As I read Keickhefer I became very interested in the ideas presented on the subject of Astrology in the middle ages.  One thing that always would come to mind upon hearing of fortune telling and horoscopes is that many people still to this day focus on the same principles.  As stated in Keichefer (120) “the most basic use of astrology was in making horoscopes, which would indicate the influence that the stars and planets had on a person at birth or at any other juncture in life.”

 In this time the use of these horoscopes differ then from what they do today, kings would use Astrology to predict wars and their outcomes and even what their children were destined for in life.  The belief today is followed by many along these same lines with a few slight differences.  Although many read horoscopes they do not do so as fortune tellers for war or their destiny of what they will grow to become but to find a meaning to their life and which personalities are relevant to their astrological symbol.  Some followers even take this advice and put it to daily use. Does this mean that although we do not view it as magic, could these followers today have similar beliefs that the astrological symbols play some kind of supernatural role in their lives similar to astrological magic?

What is magic

I wasn't exactly sure what my first blog post should be about, so I figured I start with something basic. Perhaps as I write more, it will develop into something far more meaningful. What is magic? This question can never be answered because frankly, I don't think there is a real answer. Is it science, religion, superstition, technology, fate, nature, luck??? I feel like magic can be each and every one of those things. I think anyone could believe the magic in a a tiny little syringe of liquid that can prevent a deadly disease. Anyone before the technology boom of the 90's would see it as pure "witchcraft" that we can carry our own personal computer in our pockets! When unexplainable events take place, is it because of prayer, fate, luck? No one knows. Is this magic? 

All of these things have no explanation, yet all of them happen everyday. 

Science vs magic

Writing about magic is not something that I'm used to doing so this is very different for me.

I never really realized how life was during the time period we are looking at.  When I think of the 1200-1400's I think of the plague and terrible conditions.  But in addition to this the Catholic church and kings were fighting a different enemy.  This enemy was people being interested in science, or as it was called back then, magic. Studying things such as astronomy and astrology were looked as magic but are actually valuable items.  The things they associated with the stars as well as positions of the stars in the sky though, that was the magic.  There is just no proof behind Mars being close to the Sun is a good or bad time to go to war with another country.  Alchemy was a legitimate science back then as well.  It was a complete dead end though if you look at it with what we know today.  You couldn't possibly turn one element into gold back then.  We can today though.  No one from this time period knew this though.  Everyone just knew that it was hard and if someone claimed they could do it then they were lying.  Alchemy was the work of the devil in the Catholic church's eyes.

People accused of witchcraft or devil worshipping really were tortured or burned to death.  I don't know how people could really want someone to die like this but I guess they really were scared of what these devil worshippers were capable of.  I found it pretty funny that the devil worshippers claimed they ate like 60 babies for example but they never mentioned anyone claiming they were missing their children.  Maybe the parents just cut their losses back then, who knows.  The cults these people claim to be apart of sound like they actually could have existed apart from them eating more little kids and seasoning the kids with venom from poisonous animals.

Some of the stories from K/P are interesting so hopefully there will be more in future chapters.

Thomas Aquinasty reading

Alright, so here's the thing, to be completely honest, I realize just how difficult the reading by Thomas Aquinas (Thomas Aqui-Nasty) was, so I'm going to do the guys in my group for tomorrow a bit of a favor and arrange the section we were assigned into some more simplistic points. So guys, that's the reading of page 90-94. Here goes...

First off when Aquinas says "...the work of magicians result not only from the influence of heavenly bodies" (90) he means that magic is, essentially what you make it to be. Meaning, the witness who believes that they are seeing a process that they wish to believe is magic, they are giving this process power. Entertaining the idea that what you. Are seeing is magic.

"Now these conversations and apparitions are addressed to those who have free use of their external senses. Therefore these apparitions and speeches cannot be imaginary" (91). This means (and the paragraph before this one) that the reason that magic has it's power, is because observers believe it to be magic.

"...no imaginary forms can lead a person to intellectual knowledge beyond the nature or acquiring faculty of his intellect..." (91). This chunk is my favorite. Really what he means is humans acquire knowledge through the use of knowledge and facts. Without these facts, one cannot learn something. So it is impossible for someone to acquire knowledge by shear chance or "just cuz". Wow. That was a long run around for something so basic, right?

"...movement of its very nature is the result of having a soul: since it is proper to animate things to move themselves. Therefore it is impossible for an inanimate being to be moved by itself, through the power of a heavenly body" (91). Because things do not have a soul, they cannot move on their own. Therefore, phenomenons such as levitation are impossible. Also, things such as idols, that were built by man cannot more or grant "wishes" these idols or shrines were only created because the need for something to worship or prey to was present (92).

""...in the practice of their art they make use of certain significative words in order to produce certain definite effects...have no power except as derived from some intellect; either of the speaker, or of the person to whom they are spoken" (93). The only reason incantations have power is because the person reciting or the person listening believes them to have significance. No words have power. Events are the only things that can lead to a skill. Without these events, there can be no skill.

Later down in 93 to the top of 94, it Aquinas goes on further to say that is magic is generated by the power of thought (a power all men have), then why can't every Tom, Dick and Harry be able to make things happen with will power? Why can't everyone perform magic? Lack of actions cannot be taught to others, so in reality, they cannot be replicated. Ergo, magic is complete bullshit. The top of 93 states (the same thing, but phrased differently) that we cannot learn from things we cannot comprehend.

The idea that praying to an idol because you need a certain outcome will grant only what you believe it to. So when you say 'Heres a lamb because I want to be smarter." That will work based on the idea that you want the outcome of you being smarter (94).

In all reality, this reading may seem frightening but

The Connotation Discussion

This is a rather late reaction to our discussion about connotations but this has stuck with me since that class.

As a class we took a poll of what connotations we associated with witch and wizard; resulting is the majority thinking of witch with a negative connotation and wizard with a neutral if not positive connotation. What I found really interesting is that as an explanation for the results for wizard the Harry Potter series was provided.  I loved the Harry Potter series so I completely understand that jump to the positive; however I’m still surprised that this series hasn't impacted our views of witches (assuming of course we are restricting it to only female magicians).  We also seem to forget that the vast majority of the “evil” characters in Harry Potter are in fact male. There are a few females in Voldemort’s following, most notably Bellatrix and Alecto Carrow; and then there is Umbridge.  If you look at the “good” witches the list goes on for ages, Hermione, Professor McGonagall, Professor Sprout, Luna, Cho, Fleur, Molly, Ginny, Tonks, Madame Pomfrey,  Lily, even Narcissa can arguably be considered a “good” witch (these are just off the top of my head). Given that Harry Potter has had such an enormous impact on this generation one would think that all the “good” witches would have changed our view of witches as a whole. Even if we came to a conclusion that both wizard and witch were neutral terms would be better as there were both fighting on either side at the Battle of Hogwarts. Especially in the case of Harry Potter the number of named male participants on the "evil" side far exceeds the number of females; Voldemort, Fenrir Greyback, Amycus Carrow, Dolohov, the rest of the Lestranges.  I know personally that I still think of witches with a negative connotation but after thinking about this I think that I seriously need to re-think it.

[edit] This is just a thought that came to me after reading Ariels post that mentioned Kiki's Delivery Service. Growing up I loved watching Kiki, I wanted to be her so badly (still might do). This movie doesn't have any bad witches and Kiki is a fantastic role model. For those of you who don't know Kiki is a young witch who must become independent so she leaves home on her broom with her adorable cat Jiji to find her way in the world. She hits a few bumps but eventually creates a life for herself. I think that movie like this could continue to change the view of witches. In the movie they are just incredibly independent, sufficient women who are witches. We even see them readily excepted by society in this film.

Completely oppositely there is magic in Once Upon a Time. This show often shows evil magic being significantly more powerful than that of good magic. These opposite views of witchcraft show the conflicting ideas of whether or not magic is positive or negative in the media.