Readers, please enjoy this guest blog post by Donald Tyson, author of several books, including The Demonology of King James I, Necronomicon, The Power of the Word, and The Serpent of Wisdom: Essays on Western Occultism. The thing that has always fascinated me about magic is how it actually functions. What lies at the root of magic? Amid all the bewildering diversity of magical practices around the world, and throughout human history, what is the underlying core of magic that never changes? And how can we reconcile this most ancient of all the human arts with the materialistic and scientific viewpoint of modern times? I began my own magical odyssey nearly forty years ago with a study

Do you know James Arthur Ray? If the name is unfamiliar, events surrounding him may bring to mind why his name has been in the news. Ray was a "New Age Guru" preaching the gospel of The Secret with its revelation of the Law of Attraction to his well-heeled followers. Energetic and charismatic, he made lots of money, and perhaps developed a bad case of hubris. He apparently thought he knew how to run a traditional, Native American sweat lodge. He didn't. Of the fifty-five people who entered the lodge (two to four times what is usually practiced) after a day-and-a-half of fasting, nineteen had to be hospitalized with symptoms that included vomiting, trouble breathing, hallucinations,

As with most ancient traditions, everyone wants to claim that theirs is the oldest and that all other traditions came from them. In the Western Abrahamic religions, both Christianity and Islam arose out of Judaism. Interestingly—some claim due to the monotheistic approaches of these faiths—they all claim that their's is the real religion and their God is the real God. Well, this is not going to be a discussion of that. The world's third largest religion by number of adherents is Hinduism (about 1 billion followers) after Islam (about 1.5 billion) and Christianity (about 2.1 billion). However, I have to question whether it is appropriate to call any of these a single religion. Various

Tantra? It's that sex stuff, right? Chances are you've heard of Tantra. If you're involved in occultism, you've probably heard something like "it's an Eastern form of sex magick." If you're more involved in what might be called popular New Age beliefs, you've probably heard that Tantra is about having long periods of ecstatic sex. Either way, Tantra is still "that sex stuff." If you're into sex stuff you've probably looked at the "pop" books on Tantra with cute names published by enormous super-publishers. Otherwise, chances are you've primarily avoided it. When I first started studying occultism I ignored Tantra for a different reason. I was simply following what I thought was my