Tamsin Davis-Langley

So about Jake Stratton Kent, this is his bio that I found on The Witch's Almanac.

Jake Stratton Kent has been called the most notorious necromancer in England and described himself as a very late pagan.

He died 17th of January, 2023, aged 67, having made a significant contribution to the current magical revival.

He championed a spirit-centered approach and the importance of the grimoires for the Western magical tradition.

He will always be associated with the Grimorium Verum, the book which was central to his practice for over 40 years.

He wrote numerous articles, pamphlets, and books beginning in the mid-1970s.

He published the Encyclopedia Goetica, a three-volume work comprising the true grimoire, a reconstructed and extensively commented edition of the Grimorium Verum, J.S. Sophia, an extensive two-volume survey of the Greek origins and mythic background of Goetia, and the Testament of Cyprian the Mage, an analysis in two volumes of the roots of the grimoires and their spirit hierarchies in late antiquity.

His background in the youth radicalization and free festival movements of the 1970s never entirely left him.

And so a little bit more about Jake's work in general, and this is by Cadmus, who's the author of True to the Earth and Learning from Legendary Practitioners, both of which are fantastic, by the way.

When considering my claim that Jake provided the basis for making paganism the very heart of the recent occult and grimoire revivals, we need look no further than Jake's own description of his work in the 2016 article Grimoires for Pagans.

Unlike a lot of ceremonial magicians

who employ the grimoires, I don't do angels.

I also don't employ conjurations rehearsing the exploits of Moses and the other leaders of Israel, be they kings or prophets, which they accomplished through this, that, or the other name of their god.

I also don't threaten spirits with knives while hoping the names of the god of love will protect me, as I prefer to be a little more consistent, not to mention a good deal more sincere, in my combination of magic with religion.

I am, for want of a better word, a pagan.

We should be careful not to misread this.

Jake was openly critical of unhistorical attempts at pagan reconstructionism.

which can amount to little more than concealed modern monotheism with different god names plugged into monotheistic metaphysics.

Relatedly, he also was concerned that the gods and practices that had been best preserved and which contemporary attempts at reconstruction frequently latch onto were often those that had been divinities and practices of oppressive and imperialistic states.

It was important, Jake suggested, to attempt to uncover what the religion and practices that predate large state domination look like.

what the religion of small homes and communities and the practices of free individuals look like.

In magical grimoire practice, Jake understood himself to be engaging in the type of ceremony out of which relationships with personal household spirits and gods, as well as local cults, developed.

In all this, he was far from uncritical of the pagan and polytheistic community, which can at times drift into the terrain of role-playing a past which never existed.

Which I agree with.

Pretty good conversation.

So about Jake Stratton Kent, this is his bio that I found on The Witch's Almanac.

Jake Stratton Kent has been called the most notorious necromancer in England and described himself as a very late pagan.

He died 17th of January, 2023, aged 67, having made a significant contribution to the current magical revival.

He championed a spirit-centered approach and the importance of the grimoires for the Western magical tradition.

He will always be associated with the Grimorium Verum, the book which was central to his practice for over 40 years.

He wrote numerous articles, pamphlets, and books beginning in the mid-1970s.

He published the Encyclopedia Goetica, a three-volume work comprising the true grimoire, a reconstructed and extensively commented edition of the Grimorium Verum, J.S. Sophia, an extensive two-volume survey of the Greek origins and mythic background of Goetia, and the Testament of Cyprian the Mage, an analysis in two volumes of the roots of the grimoires and their spirit hierarchies in late antiquity.

His background in the youth radicalization and free festival movements of the 1970s never entirely left him.

And so a little bit more about Jake's work in general, and this is by Cadmus, who's the author of True to the Earth and Learning from Legendary Practitioners, both of which are fantastic, by the way.

When considering my claim that Jake provided the basis for making paganism the very heart of the recent occult and grimoire revivals, we need look no further than Jake's own description of his work in the 2016 article Grimoires for Pagans.

Unlike a lot of ceremonial magicians

who employ the grimoires, I don't do angels.

I also don't employ conjurations rehearsing the exploits of Moses and the other leaders of Israel, be they kings or prophets, which they accomplished through this, that, or the other name of their god.

I also don't threaten spirits with knives while hoping the names of the god of love will protect me, as I prefer to be a little more consistent, not to mention a good deal more sincere, in my combination of magic with religion.

I am, for want of a better word, a pagan.

We should be careful not to misread this.

Jake was openly critical of unhistorical attempts at pagan reconstructionism.

which can amount to little more than concealed modern monotheism with different god names plugged into monotheistic metaphysics.

Relatedly, he also was concerned that the gods and practices that had been best preserved and which contemporary attempts at reconstruction frequently latch onto were often those that had been divinities and practices of oppressive and imperialistic states.

It was important, Jake suggested, to attempt to uncover what the religion and practices that predate large state domination look like.

what the religion of small homes and communities and the practices of free individuals look like.

In magical grimoire practice, Jake understood himself to be engaging in the type of ceremony out of which relationships with personal household spirits and gods, as well as local cults, developed.

In all this, he was far from uncritical of the pagan and polytheistic community, which can at times drift into the terrain of role-playing a past which never existed.

Which I agree with.

Pretty good conversation.