Q. Can you tell me what you know about druids,monks,mages and sages? A. Druids were male priest and members of a religion called Druidism. This religion was practiced by the ancient Celtic inhabitants of Gaul and the British Isles from the 2nd century BC until Christianity was brought to the area in approximately the 3rd and 4th century AD. The Druids were very close to nature and had a great respect for nature. They saw the oak tree as a sacred tree. They held many of their services in forest of oak trees. Monks are also members of religious groups. Basically a monk is a man (and in some places women) who lives in a community of other monks and follows a strict disciplined way of life according to the practices of their particular religion. They are often referred to as "monastics", and they live in monasteries. Many of the major world religions have monastic communities as part of their religion. Woman's communities are sometimes referred to as convents and the women are called nuns. In the Eastern Christian churches both men and women use the title of "monk". There are many monastic communities in the United States and elsewhere in the world. The most famous type of monastic community in the Christian religion in the Benedictine. This form of monasticism was founded by Saint Benedict in the 6th century in Italy. It is the largest of the monastic orders in the Christian church. The monks follow a rule based on three main vows: Stability, Obedience, and Conversion of Manner (which includes celibacy, and poverty.) Their day is a round of prayers and manual labor, with all things done to the glory of God. Often a monk may also be a mystic. A mystic is something like a wizard in that the mystic has a connection with the world outside of normal reality. There are many famous mystics who were monks and nuns including St. Benedict, his sister St. Scholastica, St. Teresa of Avila, and St. John of the Cross. Magi were wise men (wizards) and members of an ancient religion called Zoroastrianism in the county of Persia. They were also astrologers. The Magi who followed the star to the Christ child were from this group. The word "magic" comes from the word "Magi". Sages are wise men or wise women. Often times now days it referrers to someone who is wise, not necessary one who is a wizard. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Q. If I am angry with someone and think a bad thought about them and something bad happens to them, does this mean that I am a wizard? A. This is a complicated question. First it depends on your age and level of psychological development. It is normal for small children to have what psychologist call "magical thinking". Magical thinking is not magic and it does not mean that a person is a wizard. It is a developmental phase of childhood in which children think that their thoughts can create actions in the world. Some times older children and even some adults will see something happen to someone they are angry with and assume that their thoughts caused it. 99.99% of the time it is just magical thinking and nothing more. Many times when something bad happens and a person is experiencing magical thinking he/she feels bad about him/herself and feels guilty because he/she thinks that he/she has caused the bad thing to happen to someone. It is very important that a person understand that thoughts DO NOT cause bad thing to happen to other people. What really happens is that something bad happens and the person seeing it remembers that they were angry and having bad thoughts and put the two events together in their mind. But these are not really cause and effect events. "Magical thinking" can be a real serious problem for a child when a death occurs for example. If a child was angry with his father and the father left the house and got into a car accident and died, the child might think that it was his fault. Some times a person might carry this unnecessary guilt with them for their whole life until they get professional help to see that their thoughts did not cause the tragedy. Having said all of this, let us now turn to the .01% of the time when thoughts can have an effect on the physical plane. There is a phenomenon called the Poltergeist phenomenon in which on a very rare occasion a troubled young adolescent can generate enough psychic energy to move objects at a distance. This is extremely rare, and in all likelihood an event like knocking over a glass is really a "magical thinking" event and not really a poltergeist phenomenon or an indication that you are a wizard. In the Harry Potter books what happen to Harry when he was younger and angry or frightened was rather remarkable and shows that Harry can generate a lot of psychic energy which he had not yet learned how to control. Please remember that Harry is one of the greatest wizards of all time (but readers don't know this yet) and the gift that he has is a very rare gift even in the wizarding world. In class at Hogwarts it took a great deal of concentrated psychic energy for Hermione to move a light feather, so even in the wizarding world this sort of thing does not happen easily. In summary, magic has to do with consciously directing magical power for a defined and specific purpose. Strong feelings that correlate with events do not constitute doing magic and may not necessarily mean that the talent to do magic is there. In the Muggle world positive thoughts can generate positive energy in ourselves and in the people around us. You know that when you are happy you feel better and have a better day than when you are not happy. Also we all tend to feel better and are happier when the people around us are in a positive mood. Most of us feel down and grumpy when the people around us are down and grumpy. So in this way our thoughts influence our behavior and to some extent the behavior of others. It is best to have positive thoughts as much as possible. In the Wizarding world there is a saying that what you give out comes back to you 3 fold. This means that one should not have negative energy directed towards an enemy because it will come back to the one sending it. So in the wizarding world positive thoughts are even more important!! |
