Greetings Aspirants!
From the Llewellyn Magick Blog, June 6, 2016:
The ritual use of offerings, especially in (but not limited to) the form of food items, is one of those “lost secrets of Western magick” you’ve likely heard me talk about before. A lot. It is an art I learned very slowly, over many years, but it was more than worth the effort. Knowing what to offer, what not to offer, when to offer, how to offer, and how all of these things will influence the spiritual being I am working with has been a “game changer” in my practice—as well as the practices of many others who have explored this method of magick.
In my writings on the subject, I have tended toward describing ritual offerings as a form of payment to the spirit. It not only shows fairness toward the entity, but also provides it with the energy necessary to accomplish your goal. I’ve compared it many times to hiring a contractor—you must negotiate a deal and make the payment, or else why would the contractor do any work for you? Even if you pay the spirit after the work is done—a common practice is to make a small offering before, with the promise of a larger payment afterward—it still acts as an energy exchange that gives the spirit what it needs to make changes in the physical world.
But, of course, not everything is so simple. A member of my Solomonic Group on Facebook recently pointed out an anomaly in the spirit-conjuring grimoire called the Goetia. Apparently, the mighty president Malphas should not be given “sacrifice,” as he will accept it “kindly and willingly, but will deceive him that does it.” This strikes me as counter-intuitive on the surface: is it saying that Malphas is willing to work for free, and will react negatively if you do try to pay him??
Read the Rest at: http://www.llewellyn.com/blog/2016/06/when-not-to-make-offerings/
Ananael (The Secrets of Wisdom) 
In practice, there’s a lot of spirits who does not requires an offering. Just being respectful and sincere is very Ok at first. IMHO.
And most of times, just a candle, a incense or a flower is very Ok.
For sure, always research about the spirits who will be working.
A more complete offering, when and only is the case, is something for a special event and often this can even be to be shared with all people in the ritual.
When you do contact the spirit during the ritual, again remember not all times you will get visible/physical appearence but can have signals, dreams, etc as reply. So is always good ask if something will be accepted as a demonstration of good intentions from your part.
I like to use incense at all rituals and so usually I offer the candlelight and the aroma as a demonstration of righteousness of my intentions. And I always let the candle burn at end (except for sure at some “special” works like black magic… mwhahahahahah…)
See, I see often people may about offerings like the idea of “payment”, in the human sense. I pay, you do. This does not work so. Except for lower spirits of course.
In practice, this “payment” to often can be just being gentle, like the time and effort to prepare the ritual and get the right things, like the tools and a incense for the ritual.
People must think a bit more about when they “lust for results” and because this, they try to pay a spirit to do what they want.
But the spirits may have a different message, or a sugestion for an alternate work, etc.
About Malphas, I took sometimes searching my files to find where this was saved (computers are good and bad when you have thousands texts saved… LOL), but I found it:
John R. King at his ImperialArts journal posted a comment about Malphas, when he asked the spirit about his Goetia text description, and received this reply, I found it to be very clear, as this spirit is a powerfull one:
Question-“…It is said he deceives those who make offerings:”
Reply-“There is nothing you can do, but I can do all of what you request.”
Get this? This is why he will deceive the magician. He does not need it and expect the magician have done HIS homework before calling him, just like know who is being called.
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