Ritual : The Magical
Perspective

Efficacy and the search for inner meaning
A free multimedia e-book (the ebook as a pdf here)

and now print book by Nirala Publications about why rituals do works by Luc Sala

The book can be ordered in print (19,95€ or 24,95€ hardcover) from your bookshop (Netherlands) via Centraal Boekhuis or from the distributor Boekencooperatie Nederland www.boekcoop.nl

For overseas delivery or the author email sala@dealerinfo.nl

And www.boekenroute.nl for the ebook versies (but free for a limited time via this download)

2014

This is an incredible and provocative book, bringing together innovative views and
profound connections, bridging worlds that seem far apart, but which Luc Sala unites
under the umbrella of ritual. Not only has he demystified the term "ritual," but
"shamanism" and "magic" as well, informing his readers how these ancient concepts have
taken on new meaning in the 21st century world of quantum mechanics, neuroscience, and
consciousness studies.
Stanley Krippner, Ph.D. Professor of Psychology and Integrative Inquiry, Saybrook University; co-author Demystifying Shamans and their World

This book is a must read for thoughtful people. It is surprising, confusing and challenging for all those who dare to take the risk of exploring new avenues in human thought. Luc Sala's book   confronts its readers with a crucial and often neglected dimension of human life: the ritual. The text is rich in the variety of viewpoints Sala offers and to which he always adds his own creative, critical and  innovative thinking.  Read the book and indulge in an exciting journey!

Dr Cees Hamelink, emeritus professor University of Amsterdam

,

This book is about one of the blind spots in our rational understanding. It explains and clarifies the way we create links and make contact with the extra-dimensional or spiritual plane by way of ritual. It offers a different perspective, taking the magical serious but in a rational way!

To discover and explain the world, being, knowing, consciousness, love, information is an unending quest; many great minds have pondered about the fundamental questions. Science has given us insight in many things, the subatomic minute and the infinitely large, but has trouble dealing with the intangibles like love, happiness, justice, feelings, the simple things that decide our daily lives much more than the Higgs particle or the Big Bang. It has, however, not looked into one of our fundamental tools, ritual.

Rituals, as I believe and will argue in depth, are effective and provide a crucial link in understanding how mind deals with matter and reality. Rituals deserve serious attention, as a phenomenon in itself, but also in relation to how our mind works, magic, play, praying, psychotherapy, theatre, entertainment and mental and physical health. They are meta-theater, reaching beyond the daily reality into the so strange otherworlds in our mind at large and beyond.

Rituals have psychological, social and magical effects, it's the magical that sets them apart, in my view, from ceremonies. The magical can only be addressed via the deeper layers of our psyche, the ritual state (kind of the inner child/soul state) where the mask/ego is bypassed. The defining characteristic of a ritual is thus that it aims at achieving this state, to allow the magical to happen. This approach goes far beyond current views of ritual and while acknowledging stages like the Liminality of Turner it can help to explain the mechanisms of ritual and why they can be effective in a magical sense.

This e-document is not yet final, it covers many aspects of ritual, magic and the efficacy of magic and consists for the moment of a series of articles and essays. The ideas and hypotheses developed are highly controversial, describe a new way to look at the metadimensional time and how humans interact with the "otherworld" and yet offer an explanation for many philosophical and practical questions about our relation with the metaphysical.

The book consist of two parts, a general volume about magic and ritual, and a second volume covering the fire ritual as an example and application of the theory in the first volume. There are also appenices, an index and bibliography.

all rights reserved © 2014 Luc Sala - Mindlift publishers

To get a quick overview, there are many graphs and diagrams in the book, they contain many of the ideas, click on the pictures to enlarge:

Download the ebook now!

there is a pdf here

another review!

Ritual, The Magical Perspective – Luc Sala

Reviewed by Catarina Queiroz

In this book Luc Sala defends that rituals are basically practical and effective magic, present everywhere even if we don’t acknowledge it. Through extensive explanations with reference to a large number of different sources that range from philosophers to magicians, Sala addresses the basics of rituals according to his research and personal experience with the spiritual realm.

The first volume points out that regarding rituals our focus should be on the magical, the spiritual world, which can be reached once we learn how to let go of our ego and access our true self or inner child. According to Sala, rituals existed before language, myth or religion. They were a decisive factor in the creation of cultural identity and helped pre historic men build a structured society, thus enabling progress and modern civilization as we know it. The author also attempts to make a connection between rituals and the notion of information, raising some good questions about rituals in virtual environments, cyberspace ethics and information freedom. The second part is practical and aims to elucidate the theories presented with the study of rituals related to fire.

This is an interesting book if you’re into the theme and are keen to find arguments in favor of the effectiveness of magic. On the other hand, it’s kind of overwhelming in terms of size and references to different thinkers, perspectives and historical moments. The approach is also very personal (the author makes a point of saying so) and I think that without a background on the various references that Sala mentions it’s difficult to have a clear understanding or position about the book. Nevertheless, the author’s intention is clear: it’s urgent that we embrace the magical aspect of life, accepting ritual as a bridge between the material and spiritual worlds.

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Some sample images:

Ir. L.H.D.J. Sala n.i., physicist, information technologist and critical thinker, takes the motto of the seventeenth century British Royal Society (1660) ‘Nullius in verba’, ‘Nothing that has been put in words / written has value” at heart, and aims at finding his own truth, but extends this beyond the materialist and empiricists notions of those days and the science of today to include the esoteric, the intuitive, the mystical. He believes we have, like in the days of Kant and Hume, to rethink everything, doubt everything and not limit the 'new philosophy' to critical correlations and analysis of previous thinkers, but start fresh, now, here, feel rather than know, intuit rather than deduct. Let's revive the intuitive wisdom we can and do access all the time, honor the dimensions, worlds and categories beyond the materialistic. Luc believes the “enlightenment” has in fact closed our eyes for the real light of transcendent connectedness, and it's time to let go of the fetters of “science”.

The cover design is by Tomas Sala