Incense Magick (5 page)

Ethical Concerns

Whether you use synthetic or natural incense, both kinds present ethical considerations. I don't include ethical concerns in a book to try and force my opinions on others, but I do hope these comments will cause you to stop and consider the implications of your choices. Act according to your own feelings, but at least take a few moments to ponder your decisions so that you are an informed incense user.

Synthetic incense might contain harmful chemicals and you essentially have no way of knowing what or how much there is. Is that enough reason to avoid using synthetics? That's a choice for you to make. Personally, there are a few brands of synthetic incense that I'm comfortable using. Although I once banned all synthetic incense from my house, I've come to learn that some of them don't offend my nose. I don't use them often, but there are times when synthetic is appropriate for me. It remains important that you understand the risks and some possible underlying causes of people's discomfort with synthetic ingredients (such as the extender DPG).

Natural incense does offer its own ethical considerations. The most notable might be the endangered nature of some incense ingredients. I have watched the ethical arguments on this topic rage in the incense world for years now. Some are convinced that certain incense ingredients have no acceptable substitutes. They argue that, although immediate conservation is needed, the incense industry uses such tiny amounts of these materials that there is no harm in their continued use. Another group argues that we should suspend use of endangered materials completely, regardless of their usefulness in incense. Most incense users, once made aware of the concerns, are somewhere between the two extremes. I think it's important for incense users to remain informed and exercise care in selection of incense or incense ingredients. Luckily, some of these concerns are being addressed by the free market (such as the growing availability of Australian sandalwood).

Another ethical concern of natural incense is the use of animal materials. Once again, my personal position has moderated over the years. For the most part, I prefer not to see animals exploited for their use in incense. I would never support the use of an animal product where the animal's death was required for harvesting. On the other hand, the use of animal products where the animal is unharmed (such as ambergris) seems quite acceptable to me. I have been exposed to forms of magick that include the use of biological products taken from the magician himself. I certainly see nothing unethical about that. Again, this is a matter for self-education. Perhaps one day the incense-using community will be large enough to support a book that explores these ethical questions in-depth. Until then, research on your own and make informed choices. Search your own feelings and ethics and I know you'll arrive at the right decision for you.

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2

Scent

O
f the five senses, scent is perhaps the most elusive and least understood. There are legions of artists and others who understand how to pleasure our sight. Armies of musicians will cater to all the desires that your hearing might have. Generations of chefs have built a vast knowledge of pleasing the sense of taste. Of course, satisfying the sense of touch is one of the oldest of all professions. Where are our noses in all of this?

We bombard our sense of smell with overwhelming fragrances on a daily basis, from deodorants and cleaning products to artificial air “fresheners.” For the most part, we are stabbing blindly to satisfy our sense of smell. There are historic and cultural reasons for this “scent gap.”

The Despised Sense

Once humanity became “civilized,” the largest motivators for addressing the sense of smell were negative. The birth of cities meant that people were living in very crowded conditions for the first time. When you combine that with animal smells, a lack of sanitation, and a lack of bathing facilities, you can imagine that many civilizations were primarily concerned with blocking out unpleasant odors rather than creating pleasing ones. While a variety of civilizations overcame many of these problems, the focus of dealing with scent remained for a long time to minimize its offending aspects.

Incense in particular first rose to historical use because of animal sacrifices. It is easy to imagine the stench of rituals where many animals were burned whole. The priestly castes in many cultures learned that the addition of fragrant materials to an animal sacrifice could greatly reduce the negative impact on the sense of smell. Incense and perfumes were then widely used to cover a variety of unpleasant smells.

It seems that in some cultures, especially Western ones, the sense of smell was considered “base” and uncivilized. While the sense of taste was often celebrated, scent was seen as animalistic. It is well known that many animals have a much more sophisticated sense of smell than humans. Perhaps a type of “nose envy” drove some of the common beliefs about the sense of smell being subhuman. It is difficult to pinpoint why some cultures absolutely deplored the sense of smell whereas others celebrated it.

Another obstacle is the difficulty in discussing scent. English and most other European languages lack a sufficient lexicon to allow discussions about the huge variety of scents detectable by even the inferior human nose. Personally, I think this bias is the result of a spiraling combination of many factors. The end result is that the study of the sense of smell lagged far behind that of the other senses in the West.

In some parts of Europe, the sense of smell and the desire to cover unpleasant odors gave birth to the manufacture of perfume. Perfumery has been lifted to a very sophisticated art, but it is generally only practiced by a small group of artisans. Happily there is a growing movement in the United States for the making of perfumes by amateur perfumers and hobbyists. Many of this new generation of home perfumers focus on the use of natural materials. Perfumers do possess a language for discussing scent, but obviously they make up a tiny fraction of the population, so their specialized language is unknown to most of us.

It is also fortunate that this wasn't the philosophy in all parts of the world. In the East, scent enjoyed a far more respectable station. The art of scent grew along with the other arts. As you will see later in this book, the study and pursuit of scent took on no higher elevation than it did in Japan. The finest incense in the world comes from that island nation and is a direct result of hundreds of years of study and experimentation.

Evolutionary Change?

The sense of smell is possibly the most ancient of all of our senses. As you will see a little later in this chapter, the primitive physiology of the sense is one of the reasons for this belief. When complex life forms first began to root around for food in the ancient oceans of Earth, the ability to detect odors provided an evolutionary leap. Smell allowed life forms that used the chemically active sense to prosper by guiding them to ample food supplies. Even today many animals use scent as one of their primary hunting or foraging tools.

Perhaps as humans learned to walk upright and moved further away from nature, the need for sight and hearing was more important to survival than the sense of smell. This is just my own conjecture, of course, but at least one reasonable explanation for our loss of refinement in our sense of smell grew out of our very survival needs and evolutionary path. This might even explain some of the prejudice against scent as being animalistic, since it is associated with our distant evolutionary changes.

The Physiology of Scent

The way that the mind receives messages from the nose is unique among our senses. Scents are transmitted from the nose to the olfactory bulb (directly behind the nose) and onto the olfactory cortex. From there scent information is sent to the area of the brain that controls behaviors and thoughts. Although very little study has been done on the direct physiological impact of incense, existing research does show that incense impacts our scent receptors much the same as an animal steroid or pheromones. If this research stands the test of time, it might explain why incense can have such an impact on our mood, including its ability to reduce depression. The reason for this is that our brains actually process scent through two different organs. In addition to the olfactory bulb and cortex, humans also have a vomeronasal organ. This ancient organ directly processes scents like steroids and pheromones. This certainly implies that incense could easily have impact on the mind in ways that we do not completely understand yet. This organ would not process scent as we normally think of it, and it's completely possible that modern humans wouldn't understand those impulses—our response would be on a purely unconscious level. Research has been done testing the impact of incense on sensuousness and depression, with some positive results. Incense may be helping us in many ways beyond the simple perception of a pleasant smell.

The Language of Scent

While cultures that have placed a high value on incense have developed many descriptive words to describe scents (specifically from incense), that is not something present in most Western languages. Although perfumery has developed its own language, this has not been widely adopted in the incense community nor is it an ideal vocabulary because of notable differences between incense and perfume.

As a result, incense enthusiasts have borrowed words from other disciplines and languages. Cooking, baking, perfumery, and even gardening terms are often applied to incense (“spicy,” “sweet,” “top note,” “bouquet,” etc.), but they are used inconsistently from one person to another. Even I am guilty of this, although I have worked hard to ensure consistency in my writing to avoid confusions that are so common in the incense world.

The Psychology of Scent

Scent has an emotional and psychological impact on us that I imagine everyone has experienced. Does the odor of a certain meal make you think of holidays as a child? Does a whiff of a particular perfume remind you of a love long past? The impact of scent on our minds and states of being is dramatic no matter how hard we may want to believe that we are beyond this primitive sense. Not all researchers agree on this point, but I find it to be logical and certainly accurate in my own life.

Smell can have more influence over how we feel about a room than the color or décor. Even a drab room can be warm and inviting when “dressed up” with the proper scent. Our minds easily associate scents with particular places or events. I personally experience this every time I step into an elementary school. That unique combination of scents from crayons, paste, books, and cafeteria food always brings back a flood of memories from my own childhood.

This scent memory not only plays a key role in the magickal use of incense but is also important to our memories of people and places. The fact that a church has a particular scent constantly reminds visitors of where they are and their own particular history in such places. Retailers use various scents to generate calm and happiness, and to create the most relaxing and comfortable environment to help loosen customers' grips on their wallets.

The Magick of Scent

The connection between working magick and the use of incense was revealed long before the advent of written history. Undoubtedly prehistoric shamans of both genders passed the understanding of incense to their protégés thousands of years before such knowledge was ever recorded. Incense touches us in a deep way, and it is easy to see why incense is such a potent magickal tool.

The Power of Botanicals

Botanicals, in the view of the incense user or maker, are any organic materials used in incense. Most natural incense is made using nothing but botanicals and water, but occasionally natural incense includes minerals (like talc or potassium nitrate). Botanicals are the heart of incense's power that touches us on many different levels. They are the reason that I never use synthetic incense in ritual or when doing any magickal work. It is not that synthetic incense will inhibit the process but that synthetic ingredients add nothing to the process. Natural botanicals, on the other hand, bring tremendous energy.

Gifts from the Deities

Botanicals are indeed gifts given to us. Although many different attributes have been ascribed to different botanicals, those attributes are often debatable. While traditional uses for botanicals are often very appropriate, some traditions view the same botanical with different and sometimes opposing sets of attributes. While there might be disagreement about those attributes, there is never any argument about the power contained within.

How to best use that power depends on your traditions, training, and personal discovery. A botanical is often said to “speak” to the user. As a result, different people will use it in different ways, and none of them are incorrect. Whether you view botanicals as a natural result of the evolutionary process or you see them as magick incarnate, the tremendous power of botanicals is easy to experience. I personally find it impossible to deny the Divine after having used natural incense. The divinity of the universe is never clearer to me than when I am sharing a wonderful botanical with someone I care about.

The Power of Nature

One of the sources for the tremendous power of botanicals comes directly from Nature. The various woods, resins, and herbs that comprise natural incense are laden with natural energies. The power of the sun, rain, wind, and moon are all stored within the botanicals, awaiting release. Magick is a symbolic approach to the use of energy, so symbols are very important. Consider, for a moment, the symbology that these botanicals possess. A tree not only grows tall, reaching for the sky (air), but it also sinks its roots deep into Mother Earth (earth). Year after year, the rains (water) fall upon them, and the sun (fire) shines down to bring new growth. Thus, botanicals are the symbolic representation of the four elements.

Beyond symbolism, botanicals are also the physical representation of the elements. Some of the energy that the sun and rain bring is quite literally stored within the botanicals. Nutrition is drawn from the soil and the energy from respiration is required for all organic life. Therefore, botanicals are both the literal and figurative representations of the elements.

Magickal Atmosphere

While natural incense is a powerful way to access or raise energy, it has a much more immediate physical and magickal influence upon us. While discussing the way that botanicals represent the elements is a wonderful, somewhat intellectual, way to discuss their power in magick, the immediate impact of incense on us as animals is another potent part of the magick of incense.

Since scent is quite unlike other senses and the impact of scent upon us is nearly instantaneous, you can observe how your body responds. When you encounter a soothing odor, your shoulders relax, your breathing becomes deeper, and your mood is elevated. Likewise, when you enter a room harboring a foul odor, your body instantly recoils. Your breathing becomes shallow, you avoid inhaling through your nose, and most of us will grow physically tense. A bad smell can certainly affect your mood as well.

This physical response to scent is a powerful tool for magick as well. One element of magick is the mental state of the mage, or magician. A shift from “normal” perception to a magickal frame of mind is one of the important steps to seeing through the Veil and working magick. The physical impact of incense can quickly facilitate the transition to magickal vision. If you use a particular blend of incense exclusively for magickal purposes, you will discover that simply smelling that scent will begin to shift your perspective.

Personally, I use several blends this way. I use one specific blend for cleansing space that I plan to use for magickal work and another any time I call upon my patron deities. Not only does that create a magickal atmosphere for me, it also creates a positively charged environment for the powers I call upon. It is a form of magickal preparation. Just as you would clean your house before guests visit, incense creates a welcoming magickal atmosphere and provides a type of energetic cleaning. In its own way, incense “magickally decorates” the spaces in preparation for a visit from great powers. Not only is it a cleaning process, it also serves as a sort of magickal announcement to the universe. You might think of it as hanging out a “welcome” sign for magickal powers. Incense creates an environment that is easy for those powers to enter and welcomes them into your space. Many mages use specific scents or blends to invite specific powers into their space.