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I hold to the idea that we can learn more and better about a thing by learning what it is not. To that end, we would be best served when we understand what a thing is and what it is not, and what other things are that are not a particular thing.
This idea comes to me from being in an Afro-Cuban religious context, where we try to be careful about not ending up with "sancocho" (Spanish for "soup"), which is what happens when you blend practices and ideas from various traditions that aren't compatible with each other even if they might seem like it. Whether or not these things are compatible on one level or another, they're all part of different "reglas", different protocols and practices that are independent, clearly-defined, and which support themselves by themselves without needing anything from an external source. As someone initiated in an African diasporic religion (ADR), where we keep firm and clear well-defined boundaries between different ADRs as well as ADR and non-ADR practices so as to neither dilute one tradition or another, neither the one being borrowed from nor into. Admittedly, this is not an approach common in a lot of modern occult contexts, where everything becomes not just a soup of various bits but a blended smoothie of esoteric sludge. Boundaries are healthy. It's good to have them when discussing or thinking about the things we do.
Along similar lines, there's this one Facebook post I remember by the espiritista and palero Eoghan Craig Ballard that sums it up nicely:
All is not one big spiritual melting pot. If something exists in one practice, do not assume it does in another. There may be parallel practices, but the notion that one will find equivalents across traditions for everything even in related traditions is probably the result of taking comparative approaches too much to heart. There are differences. Often they are significant differences. If in Congo rituals a muerto doesn't show up, it is questioned. If in Ocha a muerto does show up, that's it, the ritual is over. Hoodoo may do a lot of cemetery work but in Espiritismo there is none. Each should be considered the equal of the other. None requires anything from the others. Again it should not be assumed they all contain parallels. Similarly, while it is common to assume that there are "correspondences," they are mostly a waste of time and do not contribute to a nuanced understanding of various traditions. There is a lot that can be said about a cookie cutter approach to traditions, none of it is good. Each tradition has its singularities. This is why the only way any of it works is by maintaining a healthy set of boundaries. It's kind of like when you go to a family reunion.
It's not a view common in a lot of modern occult stuff, but in my view, it really ought to be more common.
To be sure, this isn't about enforcing purity in practices as it is recognizing that different things can just be different, have different origins or purposes, or work in different ways. Not everything needs to be jammed into a universal theory of everything, but all too often people try to make everything out to always be everything else, and that everything must necessarily be compatible with everything else. That's a problem, one for which having boundaries and recognizing what a thing isn't helps against. As a case in point, consider: people don't go to a Buddhism forum to talk about the Qur'ān, or to Islam forum to talk about the Daodejing. They recognize that these are traditions unto themselves, right? And yet, so many go to (specifically) Hermeticism forums to talk about esotericism generally, how everything blends together for them, and so on without being willing to admit that Hermeticism is an actual thing on its own with its own beliefs, teachings, texts, and the like that aren't all-inclusive of everything else. In other words, just because they want whatever they want to be Hermeticism doesn't mean it's going to be Hermeticism, and just because they call some mishmash of stuff Hermetic doesn't mean it's meaningfully Hermetic. That thinking, to me, results from making sancocho.