Candle Magic for Beginners: The Simplest Magic You Can Do

by Richard Webster, Sharon Leah (Editor)

Anyone who has made a wish before blowing out birthday candles has practiced candle magic. Quick, easy, and effective, this magical art requires no religious doctrine or previous magic experience. Anyone can practice candle magic and Richard Webster shows you how to get started. Learn how to perform rituals, spells, and divinations to gain luck, love, prosperity, protection, healing, and happiness. Also included are tips for which kinds of candles to use, candle maintenance and preparation, best times for magic, and how to make your own candles.

Genres: Witchcraft, Spirituality, Nonfiction, Wicca, Paganism, New Age, Occult

264 pages, Paperback

First published August 1, 2004

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. See this thread for more information.

Richard Webster is an author, ghostwriter, mentalist, hypnotist and magician.

Reviews

[Min · Rating 4 out of 5]

It begins with a discourse on the history of candles, leaps into the significance in Jewish, and Christian rituals before proclaiming several, useful, definitions of magic. His favorite is from Frances Farr, of the Golden Dawn: "Magic consists of removing the limitations from what we think are the earthly and spiritual laws that bind or compel us. We can be anything because we are All." That said, he later states emphatically about "white" magic is the best one to practice, and "black" magic is only by the wicked. The quote should make it clear that such distinctions are a part of what makes for limitations.
When discussing the materia most common for candles, he only mentions paraffin, and beeswax, which are indeed the most common, however, soy, and palm oil are becoming easier to find. He does mention several types of candles for magical purpose such as altar, astral, cat, cross, offertory, skull, phallus, etc. He offers excellent points about proper care of the candle, and proper burning procedure- including several points of safety along the way, and a full chapter on cleansing, dressing and winding the candle. Following that are chapters for additional methods to boost the potency of the Work at hand, such as timing, sigils, energies, yantras, and fragrance-- always important.
Under Colors, he lists the seven colors of the rainbow, then several more using the template of Planet, Golden Dawn attribution, Archangel, Element, and Keyword. At the end of the chapter, he lists three different attributes for the zodiac.

The book contains many practices for personal growth, healing, divination and development using candles, as well as rites for success, contacting spirits, and several more. A helful section on making one's own candles is included.
The Appendix with Chinese Zodiac and elements has slight errors, so should be double checked; for example for my year, the date is correct, but the month is wrong.

[Kayli · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was not simple. At all. I picked up this book hoping for an easygoing guide on how to use candles magically. Instead, I found myself very overwhelmed by the wealth of information and excruciating detail author Richard Webster gives. You would think this would be a good thing but from where I was reading, I wished he would have sliced and diced it all into two separate books. Webster covers everything from choosing and preparing the candles to all the different ways you can infuse/embed the candle with magic. Webster explains how you can use numerology, color, fragrance, magic squares, magic alphabets etc. in a long-winded, overwhelming way. There are examples on examples and this would have been a good time to just drop a quick blurb about a subject then indicate to a second book. Personally, I didn't need a lecture on magic squares to understand candle magic. In addition to everything else, Webster includes a lot of religious commentary mainly from Christianity and Judaism. This isn't a terrible thing; I just wasn't expecting it and was left confused. I gave this book 2.5 stars (rounded to 3) because it did fulfill its purpose but I was left more overwhelmed than informed. I'm not even sure I'll be keeping this book since I could probably find what I want in a succinct format elsewhere. That being said, I wouldn't really recommend this book as a starter to candle magic and, if you do want to read it as an introduction to the practice, then I wouldn't read cover-to-cover.

[Alan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Richard is not only a good writer, but also a good teacher. So his books are always worth reading.
I trained in ritual magic within a well known teaching lodge & later joined a mystic lodge.
For me candle magic combines the best of both the ritual & mystical approach. Magic is about intent & not about being grand. Candle magic is simple & allows for a deep level of quiet visualisation & intention to be built up.
For me Candle magic is very very under rated & this book allows the novice to learn something potentially very potent.

[Emily · Rating 2 out of 5]

I bought this book to help me put together some information for a class. It looked helpful when I was looking at it at the store. But this is not a useful book. The majority of the book has nothing to do with candle magick. Page 63 through 228 are about creating sigils, the elements, scrying, and how to make your own candles. Page 229 on is just notes and bibliography. There is very little information about actually dressing a candle and burning it for candle magick. There are a couple of basic "rituals" in the back part of the book, but nothing about spells really. I do not agree with Webster's correspondences for colors and candle types, and after doing some research, I can't find some of the information listed in those sections anywhere else. To me, that makes me think the information is false or comes from personal gnosis which varies from person to person. Overall, save your money. Any information you want on candle magick can be found online, for free, and you are likely to find more useful information there than you will in this book. It's not a great beginner's book either, as the information in here is likely to set you on the wrong track if you can't spot the inconsistencies and bad advice.

[Tristain · Rating 1 out of 5]

No wonder I put off reading this book so long. Anyone who describes mental health diagnoses as “mental problems” shouldn’t be offering advice on magic. Also “this MUST be done. That MUST be done.” My guy, everything depends on one’s practice, beliefs, etc.

Didn’t even donate this one. Put it in the trash.

Don’t bother.

[Kaylin Matekovic]

1

[Ary Lewis · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's easy to follow and has a nice basic format but it feels like it lacks actual passion on the topic. Almost like everything was googled and compiled into one book

[Victoria Lambrinoudis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very insightful on more than just candles. Numerology, colours, astrology and many other aspects in that realm come to play. Have came back to this for quick reference.

[amy · Rating 1 out of 5]

Didn't ACTUALLY finish this book due to a passage in reference to a scenario that the author had built that insinuated that a bank teller help the person in line because "they were rude to close their window when they were next in line" and that "we are the ones that pay their salary". I was livid, not to mention the bible verses that were mentioned at least once per chapter, too much for my liking. It seems as if the author did not think about the audience that would be reading this book, about candle magic, and that some of those audience members, like myself, would have some level of religious trauma.

[Willow · Rating 5 out of 5]

love, Love, LOVE this book !