The Druid’s Honey Jar

This charm is derived from a famous spell of the hoodoos. In its original it is a love-charm, and so is this example, but in broader terms it uses the technique of creating a jar-fetish. This sort of spell, in which a vessel is filled and sealed for a specific magical purpose, is common to African magic. (Does that bother me as a Neo-Celtic sorcerer? Not much…) By combining all the symbols and items of the charm’s several layers a complex store of Bua (the gaeilge term for the sort of magical power which is accumulated, rather than the inate Bri) is established, which is treated as being functionally awake as a ‘spirit’ of some sort. As animists we need not concern ourselves overmuch with how that happens – whether a store of power of that sort gains a new ‘personal’ awareness, or whether sympathetic spirits are simply attracted to the ‘flavor’ of the symbols and of the offerings. The object itself, and its spirits, are then the object of offerings that focus and prolong the influence of the spell.
Starting with the Hoodoo original, I reworked the forms with more iron-age ingredients, to please our Celtic sensibilities. In the same vein it uses no written components at all – this simplifies some of the work compared to the traditional spells. I mean to replace this, to some extent, with mantra-like repetition of the gaeilge ‘voces magicae’.
It’s still a love-spell, but mainly focused to increase the attraction and success of the magician. It could be varied for a specific target, but wisdom questions the idea. It can also, of course, be varied for other results, by varying the stones, herbs and magic words.

Needed:
- a small pottery jar or bowl, with a lid that can be waxed shut
- honey in a bowl with a spoon.
- a birch leaf (leaf of tree proper to the work)
- red thread
- three red stones
- hawthorn flowers, vervain & periwinkle (herbs proper to the work)
- a beeswax candle
- offering oil made of floral oils in olive or hazel oil (scented oils proper etc…)

On a Monday at sunset, at the Moon’s first quarter, set your Hallows, and lay the birch leaf before the Fire.
Place a bit of the herbs on the leaf, and then the three stones. As you place each stone, say, in turn:

Milis (milish)
Bind (short ‘i’)
Caraid ( kahrad)

Then fold the birch leaf around the stones and herbs, into a packet, always folding toward yourself. Take up the read thread and wind it around the packet. As you wind the thread, tying the packet tightly, chant, 27 times:

Milis; Bind; Caraid

Take up the honey and taste a little, then offer a little into the Fire, (or an offering bowl) saying:

As this honey is sweet to me, so may I be sweet to my love.

Spoon some of the honey into the jar, and place the leaf-packet into the jar as well.
Offer a bit of the oil into the fire, and pour a little into the jar, (keep plenty for later) saying:

As this oil brightens the Fire, so may I feed my love’s love.

Offer the rest of the herbs into the Fire, saying

As this smoke is sweet, let me be sweet to my love

Put the lid on the jar, and light the beeswax candle. Use the wax to seal the lid firmly to the jar. Use plenty of wax. As you bind the jar, envision your goals, and, if you wish, speak to the spirits in your own words about your goals. Of course if this speech can be expressed in poetry, it is that much the stronger. Set the jar above the Fire, and make an offering of the oil into the fire, saying, nine times:

Now bound is bound and wound is wound
Below, between, above
Sweet as honey I shall be
Harmony, sweetness and love.

Every two or three days following, until the Full Moon, light a fire and offer oil, or burn incense before the jar, and recite the charm, if you have no result by Full Moon, resume the offerings after the first crescent, until you’re sure it has worked.