To Curse or Not to Curse?

The following is a post for my new spiritual blog on Facebook, Set of the Oasis. 

 To Curse or Not to Curse

𓋹֍֎𓋹

An interesting post on the Kemetic subreddit, asking whether or not casting a curse was within Ma’at, got me thinking about where I stand on curses. A lot of Wiccans and pagans will caution against doing curses due to the “Three-Fold Law” or whatever number-fold law they believe in, and some will carry this belief with them into Kemeticism. In my experience, karma doesn’t work that way. In fact I sometimes wonder if you first have to believe you’ve done something bad before you recieve negative karma for your actions, but I don’t know if that’s true. It just seems to me that people completely get away with committing all sorts of deplorable acts in this cold and indifferent world. I say this as someone who’s people, the Armenians, have endured centuries of continuous genocide with seemingly no external force choosing to step in to help the victims or punish the perpetrators, which was exact thing that made me first question monotheism. 

In Kemeticism there is no particular taboo against casting a curse. I find that a lot of the ancient Egyptian curses are of the “if you do x, all this bad stuff will happen to you” variety. Maybe that protects the caster from karmic backlash, at least partially, because it depends on the target committing a wrongdoing for it to be activated, so it’s not really an attack, it’s more like setting a trap. They had lots of curses that were more like the attack variety too, but I think I like the style of the Egyptian curses you would often find in tombs or on sarcophagi. Many Set followers I’ve spoken to have said that Set does not discourage His followers from casting curses, or in some cases actively encourages it. While it is like Set to go against the grain and never “turn the other cheek”, this hasn’t been my particular experience. Perhaps that’s because I haven’t really been compelled to cast a curse since making Him my patron. 

You see, the one time I decided to outright curse someone, I got negative backlash. Several years ago I was mistreated and fired from a workplace, and I was so furious that I cast a curse on the business. My wife and I were keeping hamsters as pets, and within the week, all four of our hamsters died of wet tail, a normally fatal disease they can get. I never got to revel in whatever negative consequences the curse may have caused the business either, all I was left with were dead pets. Since then I’ve found it safer to do binding spells, execration rituals, wear a protection amulet, or ask the Gods for help in exchange for offerings and hymns, and it’s worked for me thus far.  My life has improved since Set helped me climb out of the abyss that I was in. While there are people I know of who probably deserve to be cursed, I have not felt the need to curse anyone. I merely list those names during execration rituals to repel them from me, which is more of a binding spell than a curse. 

I think that rather than the “three-fold law”, a better way to understand karmic backlash from casting a curse is the Hermetic Principle of Rythm. Every action has an equal and opposite reaction. Like a pendulum. However, you can always choose to reach out and stop the pendulum, by not retaliating against every little slight, and making peace with an adversary, as Set and Horus did once their battles were over. That may not work for every situation, but perhaps there are other methods to stop the pendulum besides an attack or a curse. I see it as a last resort, a self-defense. I consider self-defense to be within Ma’at. Walking around cursing people left and right for every little offense would be isfet. While curses have their time and place, never curse someone over something petty, first think about the consequences of your actions. That’s my stance on curses. 

𓋹֍֎𓋹

~ Siamanto the Foreigner

 𓋷𓅁𓈖𓏏𓍯𓀭𓈖𓐎𓏺𓈉𓏏𓅂𓌙𓀀

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