I. VAMA MARGA Foundations Of The Left-Hand Path - staticfly.net

is a neglected divinity linked to a form of archaic shakti feminine power, a
door to the shadow realm of the interdicted pre-human consciousness.
The legacy of the Lupercalia persists in typically defanged
Christianized form in the original St. Valentine's Day tradition of boys
"hunting" girls with Valentine's hearts or sweets; a far cry from the sacred
affirmation of sexuality's predatory aspect once observed in Classical times.
Just as the Saturnalia created a liminal sacred space allowing the
orgiasts to briefly experience the idealized freedom of anterior time, the
ferocious chase of the Lupercalia ritually returned its celebrants to the
atavistic, pre-human state of being. Essentially a period of enforced
lycanthropy, the ceremonial donning of the wolf-skin and ritual flagellation
permitted the youths and maidens of the town to reconnect with the
animalistic and predatory aspects of the sexual chase that predate the more
civilized courting rituals performed on Valentine's Day.
The Christianized West, with its religious affirmation of absolute
human superiority over the animal allows for nothing like the spiritual
acknowledgment of the bestial roots of mankind celebrated in the Lupercalia.
The left-hand path magician, who freely explores the full spectrum of his or
her bestial, human and divine consciousness in its totality, has much to gain
from breaking the taboo of identification with the bestial atavism that lurks
beneath the thin veneer of civilization that the Lupercalia venerates. The
difference, as with the Saturnalia, is that initiates of the sinister current do not
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delve into such primordial states of being at the behest of socially dictated
cues but according to their own free will.
A Lupercalia-themed orgy among a closely-knit group of sex
magicians has proven to be a welcome initiatory diversion from the insipid
commercialization of Valentine's Day, so long as it is carried out in the
ancient spirit of lascivious fun referred to above. To say that such a magical
working requires a high level of trust and rapport between its celebrants, as
with almost all orgiastic working, is an understatement.
Dionysia And Bacchanalia
Perhaps the best-known of the ancient orgiastic festivals were the
Bacchanalia. In Rome, these wild revels were held in honor of Bacchus, the
god of the new wine, who originated from the elder mysteries of Dionysus in
Greece. Like much of the organized erotic magic of antiquity, these
Dionysian orgia were motivated by an eminently pragmatic purpose: the
successful growth of the crops so necessary to the survival of a basically
agrarian people. It is easy for modern magicians to be distracted by the
legendry and exoticism of ancient spiritual customs, which leads one to
forget that orgiastic magic through the ages has almost always been
motivated by very straightforward goals.
While most modern magicians needn't be overly concerned with the
cultivation of his or her crops these days, the sexual energy activated and
harnessed by magical orgies can still be effectively applied to very practical
needs, as well as more specifically initiatory purposes. For instance, the orgy
is particularly well-suited to providing vital energy to the inauguration of any
new project, or long-range undertaking.
Just as the male celebrants of the Lupercalia were transformed into
an animalistic state during the festival, so were the female adherents of
Dionysus, the maenads, metamorphosed by theolepsia, or communication
with the god, into feral creatures usually described in ancient accounts as
"raving women." The state of divinely inspired intoxication reached by the
dancing maenads was such that they were actually held to be dangerous to
encounter.
Chronicles tell of the maenads literally tearing animals and humans
apart with their bare hands while experiencing the Dionysian sexual frenzy.
The maenads are closely related to the nymphs, ecstatic followers of the