Understanding the Left Hand Path and the Right Hand Path

Understanding the Left Hand Path and the Right Hand Path is crucial if you are to begin practicing magick.

Sometimes, the religious paths and Occult are categorized into two classes: the right hand path and the left hand path. Although there are quite a number of spiritual and religious practices in each of the paths and they differ a great deal, they hold a few items in common. Notwithstanding, these phrases are not void of bias and controversy.

Understanding the LHP and RHP. 

The Left Hand Path (LHP) is actually an expression used to mean some alternative religious movements as well as religious practices concerning magic. The LHP movements are known to include self-development rather than communal matters, self-analysis rather than a group meditation, self-advancement for material purposes instead of spiritual ones. The target is on free thought, intelligence, individualism and individual abilities as well as gifts. Practitioners of Chaos Magic and Thelemic Magic (advocated by Austin O. Spare and Aleister Crowley in that order) usually call themselves LHP1 and sometimes Satanism is one of the rare left hand path religions. From history, some LHP societies have gone beyond the boundaries of tolerable conduct. Apart from the left hand path, there is also the Right Hand Path (RHP)

Fundamentally, the left hand path and right hand path are two different and opposite belief regularities which incorporate particular secret topics. These phrases were first employed by a 19th-century occultist called Madame Blavatsky who was also the founder of Theosophy.

There some qualities which describe the right hand path and the left hand path. From point of view, these qualities are a bit subjective. For instance, the major idea is that they express duality. The “Dark or Negative” belief systems are known as the left hand path. On the other hand, the “Light or Positive” belief systems are known to be the right hand path. Actually, in conventional culture, it is considered that the left side stands for the forces of the evil and the opposite (right side) stands for forces of good. However, evil and good to an extent are simply subjective terms and ideas.

Although the right rand path and the left hand path and distinct, some occultists acknowledge that both the two ways can be pursued because of the fact that both have the same objectives. These were applied in regard to the practitioners of White Magick (RHP) and Black Magick (LHP).

In another case, Stephen Flowers suggests another explanation for these two perspectives. He proposes that the Left-Hand Path systems are utilized to become a Divinity yourself (God-like or a God) while the Right-Hand Path systems are applied to become one with Divinity. It is significant to get it that they do not mean Deification in the real sense (they do not become God) but instead observe a spiritual process of alchemical that leads to a grown stage of detachment, individualization and deliverance.

The view about the Left hand: The Left is Feminine, Sexual and Lunar 

Stan Gooch stresses the fact that in the broad majority of religions, from each continent from Asia, Africa, Europe, Americas and the Australasia, the “left” is normally linked with femininity and on the other hand, the “right” is linked with masculinity. This is notwithstanding the point that nearly twice as many males as females are usually left-handed. But it appears that these are minor facts and should not conflict with the gullible religions of the world. Certainly, the logic for this correlation is lost in time. Further, Gooch explains that since the left hand is generally weaker compared to the right this might have presented itself to the relation to womankind.

More so, the left has often been linked with the lunar sphere. With that, it implies that the bad, the night and devilry and the uncanny spirits of the universe are also part of it. Quite a number of religious traditions have included either nature-cycle symbolism or sun-worship: The sun is the one that makes crops mature and is food, and on the other hand, the moon stands for hard times, dark and is usually Satanic.

Dinu Roman who is a tantra practitioner writes, “Tantra is also known as Vama Marga, in other words, the Left-Hand Path because of the fact that ladies, who are of lunar impact, the left or negative polarities have a significant role in this science”

Additionally, a “left-handed whore” was a Roman phrase that means masturbation. In many cultures including Buddhist and Hindu, “Left” has had some sexual meanings.

The left hand path traits and characteristics: 

• One objective of the LHP would be spiritual liberation or freedom.
• It utilizes magical methods that are considered as taboo in the conventional way of reasoning.
• The LHP makes use of sex in rituals and spiritual purposes.
• It questions or rejects religious morality and dogmatism.
• It values nature and seeks to bond with it.
• The left hand path is regarded as an individual way.
• It is egocentric
• It concentrates more on own evolution, instead of veneration

The major left hand path systems are thought to be Luciferianism, Satanism, Sethianism, Witchcraft, Demonolatry, Thelema, Paganism and Chaos-Magick.

The right hand path traits and characteristics: 

• It sticks to social customs and avoids taboos
• Adheres to a particular moral system and to a faith in judgment, for instance, the threefold law or karma.
• One objective is to build a spiritual relationship with Divinity
• The RHP is altruistic o It concentrates more on adoration as opposed to personal evolution.
• It disbelieves or rejects nature.

The major right hand path systems are thought to be: Buddhism, Esoteric, Mystical Judaism and Islam, New Age belief systems, Christianity, Wicca, Neopaganism, Druidism and Theosophy.

While the left hand path and right hand path might seem insignificant in the modern world, there still some things that adopt the ideas of the RHP and LHP. For instance, an adoption of the negative identity took place in the old days when non-Chrisitan individuals of the Western world were identified as pagan’ by the Christian class which was ruling. Many years later, (some centuries) the Neo-Pagans approved and made use of the label for their personal obligations. And exactly like Neo-pagans and atheists, the Satanists have taken their trademark and made it a component of their perpetual social identification.