Something I hadn't considered...

[avevale_intelligencer]

Alan Moore, in an interview to which cherylmmorgan links, says, among other things:

"To me, all creativity is magic,” he says. “Ideas start out in the empty void of your head – and they end up as a material thing, like a book you can hold in your hand. That is the magical process. It’s an alchemical thing. Yes, we do get the gold out of it but that’s not the most important thing. It’s the work itself. That’s the reward. That’s better than money.”

So far so good, and I tend to believe that myself. What he does not add, but as a practising occultist will certainly know (let's face it, people who watched Charmed know it), is that there is a rule about magic: you aren't allowed to make money from it*. I genuinely hadn't made that connection...but I'd be very surprised if he hasn't.

Hmmmm.

*As with everything in this area, there are many different interpretations of this. Some occultists figure it's okay to charge for materials, but not for the actual spellcasting. Some discriminate between things like divination, which is mostly looking at what's there and interpreting it, and actual magic. Some think it's all right to ask for donations but not to set a fee. And some simply don't give a toss, possibly because they know they are not actually doing magic. EDIT: and, as I should have pointed out, there are innumerable different types of magic and their attitudes to doing it for cash are all different. I was speaking from my own, largely indirect, knowledge, which because it comes from books is automatically suspect (see Pratchett passim).

Comments

[cleverthylacine]

You say that's a rule of magic like it's a natural law, and in fact it is not; that's a rule of some traditions. You go to Hong Kong or even to Chinatown and there will be loads of people who are perfectly willing to cast you a spell for money. Heck, open up the back of any tabloid.

I don't believe there is anything wrong with doing things for money that you wouldn't have an ethical problem with doing in the first place; the reason the lines get so messed up with people who cast curses and the like for cold hard cash is, first of all, hello, curses, and second of all, if you're being paid you are only hearing one side of the story so you may or may not be doing enough research before you take a case.

I've been paid for magic; I gave readings and tried to solve problems for money for years, particularly when I was in graduate school and the terms of my assistantship were such that I couldn't have outside paid employment but I didn't make enough money to pay for all the necessities. It didn't ruin MY life. I was a phone psychic, too.

This is one of those things that the whitelighters, usually privileged people who do what they do as a hobby or a spiritual practise, would like people to believe. I can well believe it made it into a TV show like Charmed. But um. A short stroll down any number of Chinatown or New Orleans neighbourhoods should be sufficient to disabuse you of the notion.

[zanda-myrande.livejournal.com]

Fair enough. Some traditions, the ones I know best, regard it as a rule, with interpretations as I said. I don't see an ethical problem with charging for it myself, but since I'm not a magician (except in the sense of being creative, if you look at it that way) the question hasn't arisen.