Book Review: Encyclopedia of Mystics, Saints & Sages (Illes, 2011)
Book Review: Encyclopedia of Mystics, Saints & Sages (Illes, 2011)
All Saints Day 2024
If you are looking for a book that presents the lore surrounding mystics, saints, and sages as sacred stories that have relevance to us, then I have the book for you. The Encyclopedia of Mystics, Saints & Sages: A Guide to Asking for Protection, Wealth, Happiness, and Everything Else!1 by Judika Illes is that book, and it speaks to those of us who engage with this material like it might offer an opening into the world of spirits as though we are not only thoughtful and rational to do so, but also wise. It was published in 2011, so it’s been around long enough to become a treasured resource to anyone who works with mystics, saints, or sages in their magickal or religious practices, as well as to folklorists and to anyone else who may be interested in the wealth of stories and legends that surround these figures. The book is incredibly well-researched and beautifully put together, and it is unapologetically intended to be a resource for witches and spell-casters.
First, a word about the author and a mention of the other works that she is known for. You will find some of her writing published under the name Judith Joyce2. Judika Illes3 (pronounced like Phyliss without the ‘Ph’) had her start in esoterica with a deck of tarot cards at the age of six. As an adult, she worked with psychic hotlines for three years offering her services in tarot and dream interpretation before going on to establish herself as a prolific writer of metaphysical books including titles such as Encyclopedia of 5,000 Spells4, Encyclopedia of Spirits5, The Element Encyclopedia of Witchcraft6, The Weiser Field Guide to Witches7, and The Weiser Field Guide to the Paranormal8.
My own start with her writing was Magic When You Need It9. And so it was one fateful day when I suddenly found myself urgently needing magick that Illes taught me, through this relatively small volume (a short 192 pages whereas Mystics, Saints, & Sages is a whopping 736 pages), how simple it can be to cast a spell, and a wonderful journey into spell-work began.
From October through the end of December, I tend to spend more time drawing inspiration from and spending time with the dead, including those that are typically thought of as ancestors10, and those that we may adopt as ancestors due to an affinity of spirit found in life purpose or through shared life experiences or because they are our predecessors of one kind or another. The dead are always with us, and always part of my practice. But we have limits on what we can accomplish in a day and where our attention goes, and with that in mind, I purposefully place more of my focus here at this time of year. It falls naturally with global celebrations around Halloween, All Hallows, The Days of the Dead, the Celtic festival of Samhain, and the like, and feels appropriate as the darkness of winter sets in.
For the curious, I have written a beginner’s guide to All Hallows and the Powerful Dead. If you are wanting a place to start with a few tips on how to set up a simple practice, this is the simplifying guide I would have liked when I started out and the things that I would currently share without hesitation with any interested loved one.
As a resource, the Encyclopedia of Mystics, Saints & Sages is focused on those beings that go on to be readily accessible as wonderworkers to anyone and everyone after death. The book is broadly divided into three significant sections. The beginning is an introduction and guide to working with the body of the text. The body of the text is a generous A to Z of mystics, saints, and sages. And at the end, we have the appendices, both of which are incredibly useful and complementary tools for confirming feast days and for determining in a pinch which saint among the many in the body of the text might align with one’s specific situation. If you do not have a searchable copy of the digital text, the appendices are indispensable.
Most lingering souls of the dead are not dangerous; rather they are potentially extremely beneficial. Souls of the dead categorized as ancestors, spirit guides, and saints remain among the living for benign motives—including love, concern, kinship, and responsibility—or because, while still alive, they made sacred vows to protect, guide, and provide for people.
— Judika Illes11
Illes distinguishes ancestors—not the focus of this book—in the usual way, as the group defined by their familial relationship to us. For a greatly expanded vision of ancestors and a more in depth discussion, I recommend The Mighty Dead12 by Christopher Penczak. But her definition is well-suited to the needs of her book, which is to add definition by way of contrast to what a saint is.
So what is a saint?
If you are a Catholic, the word will have a specific meaning, and it will strictly indicate those individuals that the Catholic Church has canonized. If you are a former Catholic, a Christian, a former Christian, or even just a speaker of English, the word is probably going to be rooted in Christian Catholic connotations. If you apply a folkloric approach to the word and to the spirit beings it points to, however, none of that need be off-putting or limiting. It can, instead, be a starting place and a springing board.
A saint’s official status, or lack thereof, is only significant to those for whom such official endorsement is important.
— Judika Illes13
In vernacular cultural studies, a field of study that I enjoy, we turn away from a view of folklore as quaint relics from the past and give our attention to why the lore is still in use because lore that serves no purpose and that yields no benefit tends to quickly fall out of use and become forgotten. Lore that continues to be in use over hundreds of years or a millennia or more is worth serious attention, not derision, not dismissal. There is no place for assumptions about religious indoctrination, the lack of intelligence, lack of education informed by modernity, or the lack of access to scientific explanation when it comes to people and their unsanctioned folk beliefs and practices. Folk14 maintain folk beliefs and practices because of the meaningful results those beliefs and practices produce in their lives, not because of religious institutions, or lack thereof, nor because of low IQs.
Syncretism
Illes provides a wonderful summary of the syncretism that takes place when a new religion takes power with the force that Christianity swept the world15. She describes the different types of people inevitably responding to the culture change. There will be those that never cared much for holy beings and sacred stories for whom replacing the Old Ways with New Ways makes little difference. There will be those that will quite literally suffer torture and die for their holy beings and sacred stories. And their will be those who subvert the New Ways with the Old Ways, integrating their local deities and their religious practices in every place that the smallest opening might allow for it. Previously worshipped local deities do not disappear; they take on new faces, and in fact, this is why the Catholic Church created the canonization process. It was, and to some extent remains, an attempt to control and protect against precisely this subversion of the authorized faith and church teachings. Where relevant, Illes clearly tracks the history when such syncretism has taken place along with the shifts in given aspects of personality and diversity in devotional paths that the saint might have in relation to the people who venerate them as a result.
The book includes the mystics and sages—the saints—of other world cultures alongside the large body of recorded Christian saints. Illes notes that one of the outcomes of the Catholic canonization process is that wonderworkers that might have otherwise fallen out of cultural memory are remembered longer. This does not mean that other cultures have had a smaller share of people remaining accessible to the living after death.
A Word on Gender
In the A to Z entries, rather than labeling the saints patrons and matrons of particular people and causes, Illes uses the label FAVORED PEOPLE and then lists the people and causes that particularly fall within that saint’s realm of care. She makes a brief note about patronages in the introduction16, however. Because of the history of social power in the world, the word does have male connotations, but more importantly the word patron17 indicates a person with power to advocate on behalf of another, the power to provide favors for another, the power to give jobs to another, the power to provide financial support and prestige to another. Historically, people with that kind of power were men—fathers or fatherly. But I disagree with Illes when she says that a female saint would be a matron18. A matron is someone defined by their relationship to a man and their relationship to children, a married woman and a mother, a chaperone—motherly. I would, therefore, argue that women who are saints act for the most part as patrons, and that if one wants to use the word matron in a modern context, they might also consider who among the sainted men fit that definition rather than assign it strictly to women based on traditionally assigned gender dynamics.
Intermediaries
Whether the saints are, themselves, fulfilling prayers, petitions, magick, spells, miracles, and other forms of unsanctioned wonderworking, or whether they act only as intermediaries as the Catholic church teaches, is open to interpretation best arrived at through direct experience. In any case, they do respond, and if you want to make contact with them, this book is the place to start.
Seasonal Banqueting Table
Election Season
Christopher Penczak, author, teacher, and healing practitioner working in the traditions of Modern Witchcraft, has offered several thoughtful serial pieces this week from working with our ancestors to an in-depth look at Agatha All Along. But with election day fast approaching, his stand-alone meditation on the cultural moment in which we find ourselves struck a chord.
Christopher Penczak. “A Politically Inspired Post.” Facebook, 30 Oct. 2024.
Freedom From Fear Sigil
Laura Tempest Zakroff who regularly offers powerful sigils for public use posted “The Freedom From Fear Sigil: To Build Stronger Community.” Some of the benefits and protections built into the sigil include safety, the amplification of truth, open-minds, protection from harm and ignorance, and the promotion of education and understanding.
Laura Tempest Zakroff. “The Freedom From Fear Sigil.” A Modern Traditional Witch, Patheos Pagan, 30 Oct. 2024.
Weaving Fate: The Fever Stone
Aiden Wachter, author and teacher, shared an excerpt from his book Weaving Fate (2020) called “The Fever Stone,” which he describes as a cornerstone of his ancestral work. You can read about the practice on his Patreon page.
Aiden Wachter. “The Fever Stone.” Patreon, 26 Oct. 2024.
Necromancy, Mortuary Work, and Magick
This is a podcast by Mat Auryn, witch, professional psychic, and occult teacher, and Rachel True, American actress and tarot deck creator, with Mortellus, author of The Bones Fall in a Spiral: A Necromantic Primer, Third Degree Gardnerian High Priestex and mortician, as the featured guest. As a nonbinary person who grew up in a similar-sounding Christian cult to what Mortellus mentions, this has probably been my favorite episode from The Circle is Podcast so far. Mortellus even lightly brushes over what sounds like an exorcism, something I’ve experienced first hand but rarely find much mention of from the point of view of the one being exorcized. But the real focus of the episode is on their work with death and the dead, and it’s well-worth your time.
Mat Auryn and Rachel True. “S1 Ep20: Necromancy, Mortuary Work, and Magick w/ Mortellus.” The Circle Is Podcast, 31 Oct. 2024.
Peatmoor Books
I launched an independent publishing company in October. Peatmoor Books currently has two books in its catalog, Hughes Guides for the Curious: All Hallows and the Powerful Dead and Endpoints Not Included.
Judika Illes. Encyclopedia of Mystics, Saints & Sages. Harper Collins, 2011.
The about page on her website, which has not been updated in a while and seems to have some technical errors related to the host platform, indicates that she has written under this name: http://judikailles.com/?page_id=115
Wikimedia contributors, “Judika Illes.” Wikipedia, 25 Jan. 2010, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judika_Illes.
Illes. Encyclopedia of 5,000 Spells. Harper Collins, 2011.
---. Encyclopedia of Spirits. Harper Collins, 2010.
---. Encyclopedia of Witchcraft. Harper Collins, 2015.
---. The Weiser Field Guide to Witches. Weiser Books, 2010.
Judith Joyce. The Weiser Field Guide to the Paranormal. Weiser Books, 2011.
Illes. Magic When You Need It: 150 Spells You Can’t Live Without. Weiser Books, 2008.
People from whom we are descended.
Illes. Mystics, Saints, and Sages (2011) p. 7.
Christopher Penczak. The Mighty Dead. Copper Cauldron Publishing, 2013.
Mystics, Saints, and Sages, p. 75.
Another word for people.
Mystics, Saints, and Sages, p. 82.
Mystics, Saints, and Sages, p. 26.
“Patronage,” Etymonline, https://www.etymonline.com
“Matron,” Etymonline, https://www.etymonline.com; See also “Matron,” The Britannica Dictionary, https://www.britannica.com/dictionary/matron.