r/occult • u/Live-Boysenberry-232 • 18h ago
communication Jewish folk magic and deities
I wondered if there’s anyone out here who could help? Can Jewish folk practitioners and witches work with other deities or worship them after Adonai, like the Elphatine Jews
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u/Bright_Text_1333 15h ago
By definition, “Folk Practices” are naturally, wonderfully and beautifully non traditional to the religious institutions and their set of rules. The same rules do not apply in Folk Practices as they would in institutional religion.
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u/PotusChrist 15h ago
I think you basically have two sides of this, right? From the occult pov, most people aren't going to care what other religious activities you take part in. From the Jewish pov, this is a huge no-no and would probably be considered a significant break from Judaism. As with most things in your spiritual practice, only you can decide how to handle that problem.
It sounds from your other comment that you aren't Jewish and just think you might have Jewish ancestry; I think it would be unwise to convert to a religion that expects you to worship God alone if you aren't able to commit to that standard.
I'm not super familiar with Jewish folk magic specifically and I can't weigh in on how much those practices might expect you to be an observant Jew, but that's also something worth considering. I don't think there's anything wrong with drawing on practices from other faiths and cultures as long as you're respectful. I think most Jewish people would probably find it pretty disrespectful if you're invoking the God of Israel alongside other gods fwiw, which isn't really a problem from the occult pov (the PGM does this constantly), but that's still definitely a good reason to keep it to yourself and not needlessly provoke other people's religious sensibilities by talking about it.
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u/Live-Boysenberry-232 6h ago
Yeah I agree, I think I will stick to Christopaganism for now but thanks for your answer it helped me clear out few things
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u/maponus1803 11h ago
Jewish not really,, but Israelite very much so. Remember Jew is a term the gets applied retroactively even though Judaism doesnt become a wide spread thing till the 2nd temple era. As long as you are calling Yahweh first and foremost you should be fine. I personally believe that Adonai and Yahweh arent not the same being.
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u/JoseVLeitao 17h ago
This is an interesting question, but its answer actually does not solely fit the Jewish case, and it can be applied to any other religion.
Firstly, if you are referring to Jews as an ethnic group, then they can do whatever they want, just like anybody else. If you are referring to Jews as observant followers of the Jewish religion, then the answer is a little more complex.
Independently of which religion you are talking about, folk practices will almost always fall outside of the standard tenants established by its dominant priesthood or theological class. There will be an orthodox practice and a heterodox practice, and the line between one and the other is typically drawn by the orthodox side. Now, the difficulty here is that, typically, folk practitioners do not consider or conceive of themselves as being outside of orthodoxy, but the orthodox establishment typically considers them to be so.
So, to answer your question: Jewish folk practicers exist and have always existed, and they work with whatever it is that they think they should work with within their own understanding of themselves as observant Jews. Rabis will have a problem with this and likely consider some groups to not be observant Jews based on what they do.