31 replies to this topic

[Starcomet]

So one can actually summon forth Cathulhu? I always thought HP Lovecraft just made him up for the story and mythos. Any personal encounters with this being? Anyway to know for sure if it is Cathulhu or just some other being?

[Caliban]

Is Huckleberry Finn an actual being? What about Mickey Mouse?

They are fictional, but they are real as fictional beings.

Cthulhu was imagined, invented, made up - however you want to put it - by an early 20th Century American author of pulp horror fiction named Howard Philip Lovecraft. He was writing stories for magazines, not intending them to be taken seriously as anything but fiction. The fact that he attained a large cult following (pun not intended, but apt) assured that his work would be known in the same general circles as paranormal phenomena, occultism and things of that sort. I don't know of anyone working experimentally with Lovecraft's imaginary entities in a magical context earlier than the 1970's, when the "Simon" Necronomicon was assembled out of ideas from Lovecraft and fragments of actual Sumerian myths and magical formulae.

That said, it seems that one can work to a certain extent with fictional entities just as readily as established "genuine" entities. New gods like St. Expedité occur all the time, and if one's imagination and curiosity is aroused by the notion of working with Cthulhu, then one is apt to have results working with Cthulhu. Those results will not, however, involve the drowned city of R'lyeh being raised from the deep, or the great old one, who is not dead but dreaming, coming forth to visit destruction and madness upon an unsuspecting world.

[Starcomet]

Caliban said:

Is Huckleberry Finn an actual being? What about Mickey Mouse?

They are fictional, but they are real as fictional beings.

Exactly, they are real in terms of fictional "beings" but not so in reality.

Caliban said:

Cthulhu was imagined, invented, made up - however you want to put it - by an early 20th Century American author of pulp horror fiction named Howard Philip Lovecraft. He was writing stories for magazines, not intending them to be taken seriously as anything but fiction. The fact that he attained a large cult following (pun not intended, but apt) assured that his work would be known in the same general circles as paranormal phenomena, occultism and things of that sort. I don't know of anyone working experimentally with Lovecraft's imaginary entities in a magical context earlier than the 1970's, when the "Simon" Necronomicon was assembled out of ideas from Lovecraft and fragments of actual Sumerian myths and magical formulae.

That is interesting.

[VIRAL]

You must be talking about Cthulhu, 'cos Cathulhu is a cat version/parody of him.

[Starcomet]

Could you explain more about it?

[voidgazing]

Quote

Exactly, they are real in terms of fictional "beings" but not so in reality.

Erm. Fictional is the wrong word to think of this with.

Gods, spirits, etc exist on another plane- one that intersects with our own, but is not the same place. The points of intersection are not geographic. They are the things of Dream, of Song, of Dire Circumstance and The Happiest of Days. If a woman calls out in ecstasy to Dionysus, He is there. If a man prays to Jesus from behind his blindfold as he hears the bolts of the firing squad being shot, He is there. Consider now the first person to do so. To have a vision and tell the others. Was it fiction?

Are you?

Less poetically, but (it is to be hoped) no less accurately:

These entities exist superpositionally to our reality. They interact with it when observed to do so.

The Old Ones are no more (or less) fictional than Gee-hoe-va, Vishnu, Miroku, or Yo Mamma.

They can and do have material effects in our plane. Reality is not an is/isn't proposition. It is a possibility/probability cloud.

If you call out to Chthulu in a moment of madness, It is there.

[Caliban]

voidgazing said:

Erm. Fictional is the wrong word to think of this with.

No. "Fictional" is precisely the correct word to describe something that an author invented in a story that not only is not true, but was related by the author without expectation of being believed, as a form of entertainment.

Cthulhu is fiction. The story he appears in was published in 1926. Unlike Vishnu, there was no attempt by Lovecraft in this story to attempt to explain the actual workings of the universe, or to promote veneration of Cthulhu as a means of bettering oneself as a person and achieving a fortunate reincarnation.

People can interact with fiction in a meaninful, even magical, way. Dion Fortune and her associates did some very serious and effective magical work with the legends of King Arthur and his knights while understanding that these were fables, stories. Fiction.

Cthulhu is as real as Romeo and Juliet. As real as the Grinch. As real as Darth Vader. But no more real than that.

[Tenebrae]

-Some view the works of H.P. Lovecraft as pure fabrication.
____
-Some view the works of H.P. Lovecraft as pure fabrication but the thought forms behind that fabrication as pseudo entities in which one can work with despite the fact that they are not real in a true sense of the word.
____
-Some view the works of H.P. Lovecraft as fabrication based upon truth amongst the astral obtained through sleep, meaning that the works of the author reflect a reality that he touched upon without realizing...that the Old Ones exist on some level as does much of what he wrote of, experienced through his dreams. Most of his work was fabricated from dreams that he had, so who's to say that there isn't something he touched upon without realizing due to his overly skeptical nature. Would a skeptic whom has forsaken spirituality for science know that they were astral traveling...or simply believe that they were dreaming? .
____

All three are potentially "true" and as plausible as anything else metaphysical in nature... so, decide for yourself.

[Caliban]

And I maintain that the same can be said for the faculty of creativity in general, and applied equally to all art and literature which achieves some resonance with the imagination of its audience. What else do we make our stories out of? Again, what makes Darth Vader so iconic a villain that a stone carver, sculpting gargoyles to adorn the national cathedral in Washington DC with its traditional grotesque guardians, was moved to include one made in the likeness of Darth Vader's signature mask, if not that he understood that in creating a movie villain, George Lucas had reached deep into the realm of archetype and brought forth something that struck people as true, while certainly fictional?

I am not arguing that Cthulhu cannot be the object of valid magical work. But I do insist that it be recognized that as a fictional entity, Cthulhu is a product of the human imagination - specifically the imagination of a not especially unusual or exceptional man from Rhode Island, who liked to entertain himself and others by thinking up weird tales.

[Tenebrae]

Which is a distinct possibility and falls into the second segment of my three. However, it's still just as likely that Cthulhu is an actual entity in which H.P. Lovecraft gathered from unknowing astral projection and then fabricated in his works as fiction because he, quite simply, didn't realize that what he was dreaming about was something beyond imagination. This could be said for all works of fiction...but it's up to the individual to decide what could be based upon truth and what is simply a pure fabrication of an imaginative mind.

If I wrote a story about a man named Caliban whom frequented Occult forums and then deviated into a fabricated story about you...would it make you any less real a person, or do you become a product of my imagination simply because I placed you within a fabricated story? Or even if I used myself, for that matter...would I then become a product of my own imagination...or simply be using something real to base such upon?

[VIRAL]

Caliban said:

...Cthulhu is a product of the human imagination - specifically the imagination of a not especially unusual or exceptional man from Rhode Island, who liked to entertain himself and others by thinking up weird tales.

Not unusual or exceptional?!?!?! I suppose Winston Churchill would fit your bill of "exceptional" or "unusual" then, huh? And Molly Brown, because she had more books written about her, no? The world is a big place, we can't all rate like Ozzy Osbourne or Ellen Degeneres. Fame and fortune and bitches and slaves do not make one exceptional, the "best and brightest" is also a defective term.
Not that I don't still luvya, but sometimes you're just dead ass wrong


Personally though, I prefer being treated as fiction or as a mystery beyond plumbing by my peers, not to mention all sentient beings. Except sometimes when I'm lying on purpose.

Cat-thulhu is a recent trope, moreso than Lolcats and Trojan commercials.


.....Pokethulhu is a much more delicious and insidious trope :thumbup::thumbup::thumbup:
http://archive.games...lic/pokethulhu/
http://www222.pair.c.../pokethulhu.htm

Edited by VIRAL, 29 March 2011 - 11:04 AM.

[Qryztufre]

Ones man's usual, is another's unusual, no point in bickering about it... both views are wrong

Caliban said:

I am not arguing that Cthulhu cannot be the object of valid magical work. But I do insist that it be recognized that as a fictional entity, Cthulhu is a product of the human imagination - specifically the imagination of a not especially unusual or exceptional man from Rhode Island, who liked to entertain himself and others by thinking up weird tales.

I fully agree... maybe?

I think that the term "thought form" needs to be mentioned here.

If I wrote a story today about some fictional entity, it would hold little to no power, it's just a story that very few people have read.

If I wrote a story 100 years ago and it was read by millions, and believed by thousands of those millions, it would hold a little more power. The thought form is thus created, and the Big C is more real then most Servitors, and in this case, more powerful then some "real" spirits.

But I do fully agree, that he's still very much fictional...

[voidgazing]

I am arguing against using the conceptual frame of "fictional" here because, as we all know, fictional means not-real. The word carries a lot of baggage with it, a frame that says "gosh, that Stephen King story was sure scary. Good thing none of it is true!".

Approaching this from a magical perspective, that is not the way to think of it.

Would you approach the worship of Kali by thinking "she is not real"? No- you would think "here is this Goddess that I am going to contact" which is exactly how to approach working with a fictional entity. Cthulhu is no more fictional than Kali. I recognize there are those who would disagree with that on the basis of faith- to which I must call bullshit, as faith is a choice to believe in the absence of evidence. If you would disagree on the basis that Kali has been around longer and is thus more valid... meh. If time is what confers 'realness', what is the cutoff? When does Popeye become a god?

You say HPL made up his mythos- and I don't disagree but I do wonder what that means. Many writers report an experience more akin to discovery than... architecture?

Who discovered Vishnu? Does it matter that one used a typewriter and the other didn't, that one conceived of the entrained visionary state as a mystical experience and the other as a way to become an author? If your answer is yes, then why?

So instead of "fictional" I would definitely recommend approaching "fictional" characters as "archetypes or entities illuminated by the vision of human discovery. Like David, they awaited in the marble all along."

[Tenebrae]

Let us hope that when Popeye does become a God...that I am not dating one by the name of Olive Oyl.

[Starcomet]

But again my question is that if Cthulhu is indeed an actual being, how would you be able to identify it? If HP Lovecraft never intended it to be seen or venerated as a real being what could you go off of that leads you to believe it is the actual being itself? With Vishnu, Ahura Mazda, Mab, and other entities you have tons of sources that describe their behavior and characterisitic that can help you identify it.

I will however agree that the power of belief cannot be ignored and that it seems such a being could hold some weight in terms of magickal experimentation if enough willpower is put into it.

[AEternitas]

Alot of the mythos concepts were literally "dreamed" up by Lovecraft. One theory asserts that he was piercing the veil in dreams and, not being a trained occultist or even a very enlightened thinker, was horrified by what he conceived in his dreams, hence the horrifying aspect of these entities. So in that regard, they can be viewed as "real" entities encountered by lovecraft in dream.
On another note, these beings represent certain fears that we humans harbour, such as the fear of the dark and the unknown, being under water in the dark, and being in a dark enclosed space such as a tomb. The theme of being driven mad by visionos of these entities is also a common theme, so we can add fear of madness. These fears are all very very real. SO we can also regard these beings as real in this regard as well.

There is an odd psychology of antinomianism that cmes with the mythos magic.

Here's another point often overlooked by alot of Pagans and occultists that mock Lovecraft mythos magic....mythology!
Zeus and Olypus as conceived by Homer=real gods and real mythology
Cthulhu and the city of R'yleh=not real and purely fiction

I find that funny.

[AEternitas]

Starcomet said:

But again my question is that if Cthulhu is indeed an actual being, how would you be able to identify it?

I have a feeling you would know it if you experienced it.

[voidgazing]

Sure, there are lots of sources describing lots of characteristics for lots of entities. And as time passed, many were smooshed into one another or alternately fragmented into more than one. So how would you identify them? The Original Flavor Kali, or the Post British Kali? You call them, find them, by the characteristics. Don't worry what the song is called, worry whether or not it sounds like jazz. In other words, if you cannot conceive of an entity at least in part, you can't get ahold of them- and the reverse is true. If you understand Kali to be a loving mother figure, and call upon her- you will meet a loving mother figure that you call Kali. Somebody else might think of her as The Destroyer, and that is what they will get.

Think of it as an infinite convention full of every description of gods and spirits. Nobody is wearing a nametag. Think of it in terms of essence. That is the actual.

It might also help to start treating actuality as a continuum rather than an is/isn't.

To wit: I am sure that my dog is an actual dog. I have good evidence for this- I have never had to pick up poop from a pretend dog. This is one end of the continuum. Somewhere in the middle is your dog. You tell me you have one- I have no reason to think you are lying, but... still, this dog is at least partially fictional to me. I have never seen it, and never picked up its poop. Further down the line is dark matter. There are smart people who say that it must exist for their maths to work out right, and they are pretty sure their numbers are good (of course, so were the people who came before them). Nobody has actually found it yet, of course. Pretty fictional- not totally, right, but still. At about the same point on the continuum is Jesus. People who write books tell me there once was such a person, and that he had magical powers, and that their cosmologies don't work out right if he didn't exist. Never picked up his poop, though, and that was a long time ago.

Gods and suchlike can be characterized as information entities- ideas. They are as actual as any idea. Since when you are performing magic, you are manipulating the material world (including you) using ideas... They can get a lot more actual for you than for the average schmoe.

[ChaosTech]

I agree that HPL's entities are fictional, that is he made them up. He mixed some occultism into his writings to make them even more scary as they sound real, thus why the next step was made by occultists to make them real.

I think all mythological, folklorish, and pure fantasy and sci-fi are not real, but the differences is that in the mythological these are supposed to be real, in the folklorish, these are maybe real, and in pure fantasy/sci-fi these are completely untrue.

HPL's works dispite the occult references, are fantasy/sci-fi catagory.

But wait. What about Jung's discovery of archetypes in the psyche or collective psyche of every man and woman? Thus a power of the cosmos might be real like outer gods/monsters made from spacial matter, who come from the void. What we call that power and associate with myth and imagry is what could be off, to a greater or lesser extent, but the being of the cosmos whatever it is, is still real. Not only beings work this way, but sentient forces (like fields of lifeforce/energy). So the notion of archetypes is probably true, and human archetypes are definately true as some man or woman past or present or even future fits the archetypical role of any given personality archetype (like aphrodite for love), more than anyone else does. And even the others which are close but not as close can be seen as this archetypes spawn, handmaidens, demons, angels, etc.

Titans from greek mythology are underworld/void/chaos archetypes, and so are the Great Old Ones, like Cthulhu. Any symbol is, if the magician makes it so and applies this microcosmic reality to the great macrocosmic reality, as who really knows all the actual beings and forces in the cosmos and there actual symbols/names, so we shoot for what must be there with our own interpretation.


This is why fucking around with lovecraftian magic is dangerious, the neophyte really does call upon real objective powers of darkness, and they come.

[VIRAL]

Anyone remember "the Bloop?"

LOL Here:
http://www.occultcor...on-Google-Earth
http://www.occultcor...craft-A-Prophet