Godforms and gods and goddesses

Occasionally, I forget one of my self-imposed rules of behavior, those rules of thumb I have to make my life easier or at least less exciting.

One of these rules is to never respond to a posting by certain people. It is a waste of time to respond to some people on the forums; they are just there to prove their point and will use everything you say (or don't say) as proof that you are against them. Or so it seems.

One of the people I do not respond to is Steve Nichols.

Or at least, I try to resist the urge to respond to his postings. Unfortunately, I occasionally give into temptation and then end up regretting it.

The latest topic I responded to is his "Adopt a deity for a day" campaign. I read the post, and replied that the idea reminded me of a procedure that some Chaos magicians have done.

First, Steve asks me what my point was.

Honestly, I am not sure that I had a point. And I admitted that to everyone.

Then he decides that I am accusing him of lifting the idea from Chaos magic.

Oy Vey.

That is why I don't reply to his postings.

Well, that and I have no clue why anyone so hostile to Golden Dawn posts on the Golden Dawn forums. One of his pet projects has been to divorce Enochian Chess from any Golden Dawn influences. He claims that it predates Golden Dawn and that all one needs to become an Adept to play Enochian Chess.

Of course, that was before he decided that the Ancient Egyptian game of Senet could be used for that task.

Part of the problem between me and Steve is that I don't believe that it is that easy. Sometimes games are just games. I used to be a role playing geek and a Magic the Gathering player. I have never gained anything spiritual from the games of Senet that I have played.

And I find some of his ideas underdeveloped and not to the point at all; I admit that my reviews of his books on Enochian Chess were not nice.

The other problem is that he spends a lot of his time trying to tear down Golden Dawn. He has never been an initiate of the system, yet he believes that he understands the system.

I am a member of the THAM (Theoricus Adept Minor 5=6) subgrade, plus have access to higher Grade stuff due to my office of archive officer (complete with a much higher oath and Administrative Grade); I don't understand the system completely, and I have been a member and student of the system since March of 1992.

Another of his pet projects is to prove that the godforms that Golden Dawn uses are wrong. Unfortunately, he does not realize that the godforms and the ancient deities of Egypt are not the same things.

(By the way, I am an Egypt pagan/wiccan, besides having worked with other pantheons.)

The godforms that Golden Dawn use are function based. They use a modified form of a god or goddess (angel or myth), and a selected piece of its mythology. They serve a ritual and energetic function. They are NOT the entity who they are named after.

But no amount of reason will convince him of that. Better and more learned people than I have tried. Which is why I have to remember not to respond to his posts.

Place your bets on how long it is before the next time that he suckers me into answering some discussion.