Magical Letter Harmony, the Language of Holiness

ט״ו בסיון תשע"א
Alban Heruin 17

Last night before bed, after I created and listed this ENEIT oil at my Etsy shoppe WITCHCRAFTS and on my shoppe blog, I did something I haven't done is several months. I blindly reached in and drew a mystical rune from my runebag to see what cosmic energy was afoot in my world, according to my magical runes. I drew Kenaz, in complete synchronicity with the oil I had just created. Kenaz is the rune of the artisan craftsman and of the master of the technical aspects of magic, knowledge, cunning, creativity, illumination, observation, intellect, skill, occult female secrets, controlled fire and kinship. Kenaz is the torch of enlightenment. Kenaz is clarity.

Also symbolic of the teaching-learning dynamic and study, this Kenaz rune drawing was also synchronous with my dream from earlier this week, namely Lamed, where the magical Hebrew letter Lamed (ל) is likewise linked to the dynamic of teaching-learning. As with Lamed, Kenaz symbolizes Divine Inspiration. As with Lamed, Kenaz symbolizes the power to control the fire which fuels creativity.

There is wholeness in harmony. Now, I have a clear thought about holiness. Interestingly, this insight, brought into focus through the complexity of Kenaz, was born from the pentacle number five, the Hebrew letter hei (ה) and the Middle Welsh word ENEIT.

Samaritan Script

כ"ב בשבט תש"ע
Imbolgen 23

Information excerpt from Omniglot, script samples from Omniglot and Ancient Scripts.

The Samaritans claim descent from the northern tribes of Israel. Evidence from recent DNA tests supports this claim and shows they are related to the Israelites through the paternal line.

The Samaritan alphabet is still used by Samaritans in the city of Nablus and in the Samaritan quarter of Holon. There are currently just over 700 Samaritans.

Notable Features

* Type of writing system: abjad / consonant alphabet. Vowels indicated with diacritics.
* Direction of writing: right to left in horizontal lines.

Used To Write

Samaritan Hebrew, a descendant of Biblical Hebrew used by Samaritans as a liturgical language.

Samaritan Aramaic, a dialect of Aramaic used by the Samaritans in their sacred and scholarly literature.

Samaritan Script





Download free Samaritan font here.

More information on Samaritan script and its optional vowels here.

Related post/comments.

The Hei Connection

י"ט בכסלו תש"ע
Shamash 21

Interestingly, my waking vision this Sunday morning (The Seed), my Shabbat dream (The Comet), and the new banner I designed for my blogspot (Walking on Fire) on Friday are all connected to the magical Hebrew letter hei (ה).

In The Seed, I took a seed ... הֵא-לָכֶם זֶרַע (Bereshit 47:23). The name of the letter hei, namely הא means to 'take seed.'

In The Comet, the King and I behold ... the name of the letter hei also means 'behold.'

In my new blogspot banner, the letter hei in cursive Hebrew script is seen to give birth to the proverbial 'light from darkness' and to all other letters. All of the Hebrew, Ogham and Rune letters in the banner were intuitively and mindfully chosen.

Here is a smaller version of the banner:

Communion

ה' בכסלו תש"ע
Shamash 6

From my previous entry Working Magic, one particular quote from Carl Sagan:

What an astonishing thing a book is. It's a flat object made from a tree with flexible parts on which are imprinted lots of funny dark squiggles. But one glance at it and you're inside the mind of another person, maybe somebody dead for thousands of years. Across the millennia, an author is speaking clearly and silently inside your head, directly to you. Writing is perhaps the greatest of human inventions, binding together people who never knew each other, citizens of distant epochs. Books break the shackles of time. A book is proof that humans are capable of working magic.

A friend of mine recently brought to my attention the fact that many popular books on witchcraft and magic just rehash the same information (data) and contain nothing new. Yes, as she wrote, this is true - it is indeed sometimes very challenging to find a book containing new data to think about. Even the ancient texts of our ancestors, including the Bible, may rehash old data. For example, the Hebrew name of the book of Deuteronomy, namely Mishneh Torah, pertains to a retelling of the traditional legends.

Importantly, we must remember that books are not only useful for providing data, but also are useful for providing unique contacts with the spirits of the authors through whom even old data may acquire new and profound meaning. The magic isn't just in the data. Magic may be transmitted through the communion of souls.

Equal to the challenge of finding a book containing new data, is the challenge of finding communion and new meaning through old data - be it found in a stone tablet, a papyrus scroll, book, a video or on the internet.

The Wyrd Numbers Of Urcanaan

ז' ברמחשון תש"ע
Phasma Priscus 8

Yesterday, early shabbat afternoon, I wrote my Torah commentary on parashat Noach, The Mystery of Urcanaan. Immediately following that, I wrote Samhain Mitzvah Runes, designating runes for this mystery through which the darkness of a curse is transformed into the light of illumination. Bear with me for the rest of the story.

Just last weekend, my brother and his wife turned me on to a television series I had never seen before called Lost. Last weekend and this past week, I started watching episodes of the past five seasons to learn the story and prepare for transmission of the final and sixth season beginning May 2010. After the first episode, I was hooked. This series is an amazing mystical mythology. I love it. The mystical connections in it are real.

Thursday night, I dreamt of an ancient ever-changing mystical mechanical structure hidden in the ground from which I emerged through a normally impenetrable door in the ground penetrable through a secret code only known by a few. The next day, I didn't make the connection of this dream to the hatch found in Lost, but after Shabbat's precognizant blog postings and the episodes I watched Saturday evening right after making the postings, I saw the connection.

Motzei shabbat I watched the episode called Numbers - the numbers (4 8 15 16 23 42) in the episode are believed to be cursed, just like Canaan was believed to be cursed (in the Torah portion of my commentary) until I transformed that 'irrevocable' curse into a manifest blessing through the stones of transformation (וַיֹּאמֶר, אָר וּרכְּנָעַן) in my first precognizant blog post, The Mystery of Urcanaan. The 'cursed numbers' are revealed in Numbers to be written on the side of the mechanical structure hidden in the ground (like in my dream Thursday night), excavated by a few of the lost survivors.

Motzei shabbat, after watching the episode Numbers, I watched the episode Deus Ex Machina. This episode ended with "Locke disappearing into the jungle to return to the hatch. Pounding on the door and screaming in anguish atop the hatch, Locke laments what has happened. Suddenly the hatch window is illuminated, sending a shaft of light into the sky," - just like the uruz rune was illuminated, sending a shaft of light into the world in my second precognizant blog post, Samhain Mitzvah Runes!

Totally wyrd. The dream of the hidden mechanical structure and the blog postings occurred before I watched Numbers and Deus Ex Machina.

I emerged from 'the hatch' in my dream. I haven't yet seen the Lost episode where the hatch is opened, but in researching it, I see that through the hatch is found The Swan. In Celtic tradition, swans possess the healing powers of the sun and water. Swan also represents radiant divinity and feminine royalty.

Rune Studies

י"ט באב תשס״ט
Lughnasadh 20

I have many books in my library on the magical Hebrew and Ogham alphabets, the systems used by my Jewish and Celtic-English ancestors. Integrating these mystical alphabets into my spiritual practice has been a blessing. So much have I discovered through them.

Now, having just acquired my own set of magical Runes, the magical alphabet of my Celtic-Germanic ancestors, and as I enter into the mystical art of runecasting, I have added some books to my library which explore authentic Celtic-Germanic runelore, philosophy and magic. May integration of this alphabet of my ancestors into my spiritual practice also be a blessing, and open up greater understanding into the mysteries uniquely entrusted to the Divine Spark which enlivens my soul.

These books by Edred Thorsson are those I have chosen with which to begin my rune studies.

Futhark: A Handbook of Rune Magic
Runelore: A Handbook of Esoteric Runology
Runecaster's Handbook: The Well of Wyrd

Quietly Under The Apple Tree

י"ט באב תשס״ט
Lughnasadh 20

The traditional home of the unicorn is known to be beneath the apple tree. Legend teaches that if a pure woman sits quietly beneath the apple tree, the unicorn will come, lay his head in her lap and allow her to fed him apples.

In follow-up to my earlier entry, Still Alive In Me, and in honor of my Celtic-Germanic ancestors, I now own a handcrafted stunning set of magical runes made in the traditional way from a single continuous length of wood from a fruit-bearing apple tree. My set also includes a (blank) wyrd rune. Each rune has the bark still attached and was sawn and sanded by hand, without the use of power tools. Each rune symbol was pyrographed into the wood (also without the use of an electric pyrography tool) by heating in a flame various metal straight lines of different lengths before applying them to the bare wood.

When the time is right - perhaps around Samhain - each rune will be traditionally consecrated and stained with drops of my own blood mixed with red ochre on a white cloth (which will be ritually burned after the runes dry).

I am making my rune bag in the traditional way as well - sewn by my own hand and fashioned from an article of my own clothing.

I invite all my ancestors to attend the ritual preparation and consecration of my mystically magical runes. We are alive. May we all be a blessing and be blessed.

Leying The Entire Array Of Sacred Knowledge

כ"ט בסיון תשס"ט
Mab 29

Yesterday's (Leying The Land) Midsummer's Eve magical Ogham (Coll), drawn during the planetary hour of Mars (ג), is followed today on Midsummer's Day, drawn just now also during the planetary hour of Mars, by the magical Ogham, Koad (pronounced kawt). The letter Koad represents not one tree, but an entire Sacred Grove - an entire array of esoteric Hidden Knowledge:

Koad, representing the Sacred Grove:

represents all knowledge, a sacred place where all is linked and becomes clear in togetherness and unity - just as the old Groves contained tree sense and bound their users together in a common purpose ... the Grove gathers together for your journey all the knowledge hidden in the trees. It holds comprehension of all that you already know or are capable of learning.

What beautiful magic are the Oghams bringing forth for this summer solstice sabbat!

The names of Koad:

Koad (Breton)
Coill, Garrán (Irish)
Coedwigoedd, Coedwig (Welsh)
Cus (pronounced kawz), Cos, Kelly (Cornish)

The color of Koad:

shades of green

The 'planet' of Koad:

the Sun

Leying The Land

כ"ח בסיון תשס"ט
Mab 28

Today I initiated my newest card deck consisting of Ogham letters, the Celtic Tree Oracle.

Just now, during the planetary hour of Mars (ג), I opened my new deck, shuffled the cards of magical Ogham letters, and drew out one card - drawing forth with it, the initiatory energy which shall characterize this deck.

The card holds the letter Coll, corresponding to the Hazel tree, mediation, measurement and calculation. In Celtic mysticism, Hazel/Coll is associated with the Druids, who:

are inheritors of the knowledge of measurement and calculation of the earlier 'dodmen', the prehistoric surveyors of the ley lines and trackways portrayed in the ancient chalk-cut figure of the Long Man of Wilmington, shown holding staves or rods. Also skilled in the Law, the Druids were called upon to mediate disputes concerning property and land boundaries, much as present day surveyors.

In other words, the magic of this card pertains to laying out mystical pathways and setting up the boundaries of the Land. This card Coll resonates in perfect harmony with my earlier parsha entry about the Land - Walking With Giants.

The word dodmen comes from the Welsh word dodi meaning to lay or place.

Coll means life force within as a channel for creative energy, to catalyze and mediate manifest transformation.

Hazel/Coll in Celtic Folklore

Letters Of Fire

ג' ניסן תשס"ט
Raven 3

Commentary on Tzav from Garden of the Dark Moon Jubilee - Letters of Fire.

Sha'arim Hashamayim - Gates Of The Overworld

ה' אדר א' תשס"ט
Keolwulf 6

I don't recall much about my dream last night, but these ticklers of it I do remember (which I wrote down during the night last night after waking up and before going back to sleep):

*before and after, the difference is in the magic letters.

*the key is in the wooden box of Celtic knot design in which I am storing the resins I will be using to prepare the first two ritual treasures for WITCHCRAFTS by Liorah Lleucu, namely dragon's blood in pomegranate seed oil and petrified amber in pomegranate seed oil.

*I rode a magnificently beautiful crocodile down a luminous river (nahar hashamayim [river of heaven], rechovot hanahar [garment of heaven], sha'arim hashamayim [gates of heaven]) whose 'water molecules' were made of pure sparkling crystals of light.

With Six Letters, Three Cauldrons Of One Torah

י"ז תמוז התשס"ח
Faunus 19


Scribal oddity of two 'n's as found in Torah scroll (shown aove).

The Celtic Ogham alphabet of the Druids is called Beth-Luis-Nuin. Through designating the Ogham alphabet beth-luis-nuin, in some manner then, the three letters (beth, luis, nuin) call out the soul of the Ogham into active creative manifestation. In other words, the letters symbolize the three creative rays of Awen, and the creative energy of the Divine Feminine known in kabbalah as hashra'ah.

From the perspective of a Jewitch, beth-luis-nuin have correspondences to the Hebrew letters Beit-Lamed-Nun. In Torah, beit-lamed-nun symbolize the soul of Torah.

Beit-Beth, with a 'b' sound, is the first letter (בְּ) of the first word 'bereshit' (בְּרֵאשִׁית) in the first book of Torah, Genesis (called in Jewish tradition 'Bereshit'). The six letters of the word 'bereshit' can mean 'with six'.

Lamed-Luis, with an 'l' sound, is the last letter (ל) in the last word 'Yisrael' (יִשְׂרָאֵל) in the last book of Torah, Devarim (Deutereonomy). The word "Yisrael' is a mystical codeword for the collective soul of humanity to whom Torah belongs. 'Torah' is a mystical codeword for the 'keys to creative messianic consciousness'.

In the Hebrew language, the letters lamed-beit spell the word לב, pronounced 'lev' (a hard beit is pronounced 'v', a soft beit is pronounced 'b'), a word meaning 'heart'. The 'heart' of Torah, comprising the soul of Torah, symbolizing the entire Torah, from the last letter to the first letter, the alpha and the omega, speaks forth the realization of humankind's messianic potential and inherent Divinity.

Nun-Nuin. The messianic and Divine consciousness of humankind is symbolized by the 'n' sound, represented actively by the Hebrew letter nun and the Ogham letter nuin.

Two letters with the 'n' sound comprise a significant and unique scribal oddity found in Torah. The two odd 'n's are called nun hafucha (inverted nun, like an introspective 'n' among the Hebrew alphabet) and nun m'zuneret (isolated nun, like the 'n' among the Ogham alphabet set apart from the Hebrew alphabet). Between the two n's are set apart two verses (Numbers 10:35-36) within the midst of the entire Torah. The two verses are said to comprise a link to an entirely new inner arrangement within Torah, one which will be revealed during the golden age of messianic consiousness among humankind.

Taken together, with six letters from both the Hebrew and Ogham alphabets, are three cauldrons of Torah creation letters called forth. Brewing within the three cauldrons of Torah creation letters is the birthright of humankind - Divine messianic consciousness.

Six Letters, Three Cauldrons, Two Alphabets, One Torah

The heart of Torah is the heart of the Ogham. Hebrew and Ogham (shefifon) are elucidations of the same root soul (serayah) of the Divine soul of humanity.

With six letters (beth, beit, luis, lamed, nuin, nun), through three cauldrons (of emanation, creation and formation) is the entire atzilutic-messianic Torah called forth and made manifest.

Holy Holy Holy Host

ח' באדר ב' תשס"ח
Raven 9

Tzav, Pakod, Meumah - Holy, Holy, Holy

In Unblemished Mitzvah I brought down the idea that the vulnerability of meumah to blemish (mum) is neutralized by the presence of tzav (command of mobilization), and that materiality neutralized of potential blemish is actualized through the endless action pakod. Remembering.

Interestingly, as mentioned in the earlier entry, meumah and tzav each have a gematria of 92. The digit sum of 92 is 11. Eleven is the number of Temple incense spices corresponding to the rectification of Tohu (the state from which the vessels may shatter and become seemingly disconnected from Wholeness), the elevation of Tohu back into the realm of Holiness, and the "distillation and transformation of all corporeality and physicality into supernal luminescence."

Torah instructs us not to duplicate the Temple incense compound for personal use, lest s/he be "cut off" (shattered and seemingly disconnected). In other words, the duplication of meumah implies that bringing down the power of meumah without tzav (bringing down something from something), may shatter the personality, while the power of meumah tempered with tzav (bringing down something and nothing), does not shatter the personality. The personality remains whole in the case where the 92-compound meumah is not itself duplicated, but tempered through a different 92-compound, namely tzav.

Tzav tempers meumah by adding it's own digit sum of 11 to the 11 of meumah, bringing down the whole essence of the 22 Creation Letters of the aleph-beit.

Thus, meumah is not duplicated for personal use, it is completed in a wholistic bodily realization (a Host) of Intelligent Creative Consciousness.

Importantly, with respect to the upcoming observance of Purim, the word-set tzav-pakod-meumah corresponds to the "holy, holy, holy" descent of my soul through all contractions of the created world, while yet still remaining bound to the Divine Essence.

Replicating Messianic Consciousness

כ"ה באלול תשס"ז

In follow-up to a previous entry, Line Letter Key, where I wrote:

On the 14-letter row, the only line letter that was definitely an Ogham letter was the final letter, the 14th letter.

I need to be clear. The only line letter that was definitely an Ogham letter was this 14th letter in the first row of letters. None of the other letters are any I've ever seen before.

The remaining letters were line-like in form-structure as are Ogham letters, but they were not Ogham letters.

The remaining letters were written with the force-flow as are Hebrew letters, but they were not Hebrew letters.

I think the 13 remaining letters of the 14-letter row and the unnumbered letters of the row below it represent a mysterious hybrid where both form (Gevurah) and force (Chesed) are One. Importantly, the union of opposites (Gevurah and Chesed) is a function of Da'at, an expressive "external" partzuf of Keter.

An "internal" partzuf of Keter is Atik Yomin. This partzuf is concerned with the coming and transmission of messianic consciousness:

Atik Yomin is the internal partzuf of keter, corresponding to the super-conscious power of pleasure in the soul. The term Atik Yomin (in Aramaic) appears explicitly in the Bible, in the book of Daniel, connoting God Almighty in Daniel's vision of the coming of Mashiach.

The term Atik Yomin, "the Ancient of Days," implies absolute transcendence in relation to "the days of the world," the normative consciousness of created reality. The word Atik in addition to "ancient" means "to copy." It is the Divine power "to copy" a higher reality or world onto a lower. Thus, the Atik of a world serves as a totally superconscious DNA-like code to copy higher reality onto lower.

Wow. All this and more in the incredible mystery letters of my dream.

Line Letter Key

כ"ה באלול תשס"ז

I dreamt.

My son Michael was going to fix my car. He needed a key to do it. I saw the key he needed to fix the car.

There were two rows of line letters (like Celtic Ogham), each written from right to left as Hebrew is written. Ogham is normally written left to right like English or in a vertical down-to-up arrangement.

Although each line letter of both rows was made of lines (similar to but not eactly like the Ogham), the letters were not on a druim stem-line as Ogham letters are. Each line letter was distinctly separate from (yet touching) the letter next to it (reminds me of a chatoteret).

The top row of 14 (yad hagedolah) line letters was longer than the row below it. I didn't with intent count the number of letters in the top row, I just knew it. The number of line letters in the shorter bottom row was not revealed. The top row of 14 letters was the key my son needed to fix the car. The row below of hidden number was my secret alone.

On the 14-letter row, the only line letter that was definitely an Ogham letter was the final letter, the 14th letter. It was a Huathe, the sixth letter of the Ogham.

I woke up.

Huathe has an "h" sound, is represented by the Hawthorne tree, suggests an obstacle (like a locked lock) or desire, corresponds to dark blue or purple, and is a symbol of both protection and female sexual power. As a positive force, Huathe rewards past action and brings one to encounter life filled with Divine Benevolence.

Abracadabra

י"א באלול תשס"ז

Dave of Balashon writes on the etymology of the magic word abracadabra:

Despite the temptation to connect the term to Hebrew or Aramaic, I'm inclined to follow Klein, who writes: [the word is] "Late Latin, from Greek abracadabra, in which the letter c (= s) was misread for k. It was originally written as a magical formula on abraxas stones, whence its name."

Interestingly, this bit of magical information connects to my entries Perspective On Ceridwen Transliteration, Torah Of Peace, Deal With It and Chest Of Manifestation.

אברא כדברא - avra k'davra - I create (peace) as I combine, and that's not "Greek" (in terms of "foreign") to me

Perspective On Ceridwen Transliteration

כ"ח באב תשס"ז

Elisheva commented on my Livejournal regarding today's earlier entry, Distinctive Cover, that she envisions the correct Hebrew transliteration of Ceridwen to be קרידואן because a Gaelic "C" seemingly always has a "K" sound. Consequently, I should clarify my chosen Hebrew transliteration (שׂרדון) of Ceridwen.

There is no rule that says I must use a Gaelic "K" sound in my Hebrew transliteration of Ceridwen as it pertains to my own archetypal experience. I am an American-Celtic Jew whose primary spoken language is English, an Indo-European derivative (as is Gaelic). The American English letter "C" certainly may have an "S" sound. Consequently, as far as my own soul experience is concerned, it is quite legitimate for me to ascribe the "S" sound to the "C" of Ceridwen. I don't have to use a Gaelic "K" to describe my intimate experience of the Ceridwen archetype. I can legitimately use the sound which truly correlates to my experience of the archetypal reality in my own life. I'm admittedly not of purely Gaelic/Celtic ancestry. I am a tapestry of many ancestries, including Gaelic/Celtic - all of my ancestries rightly influence my experience and perspective of the Ceridwen archetype.

Thus, regardless of other equally valid ways to transliterate Ceridwen into Hebrew, in my life the Ceridwen archetype manifests through the shoresh שׂרד (being distinctive) and not through the shoresh קרד (to cut off). My vision of Ceridwen comes through שׂרד. In this way, Elisheva and I differ. Our experience of Ceridwen is not the same.

Reflections On Sacred Symbols

י"ד באב תשס"ז

Reflections on Sacred Symbols
By John Caris
July 29, 2007

Symbols, whether sacred or secular, pervade human culture and are frequently found in the arts. They are keys that open the door to higher consciousness, codes that winnow the kernel from the chaff, seeds that contain hidden knowledge.

A basic idea underlying symbols and their power is the micro-macrocosm relationship. What is above is reflected in what is below, and so too what is below is like what is above. A commonality and unity, whether physical or spiritual, exist between the two.

Read the full article on Witchvox.

Message From Ehyeh

ו' באב תשס"ז

I dreamt a many layered-dream.

In one part of the many-layered dream, 4 men approached me. Each one had a mark engraved like a frontlet (Devarim 6:8) on his forehead. They said they had come to help me.

This is the symbol I saw upon the forehead of each one:

It reminds me of the seals of the planetary angels of Sefer Yetzirah (chapter 4) and of the angelic alphabet some kabbalists use, although this particular symbol doesn't look like any specific symbol I've seen before in books (although it does resemble Poseidon's trident) [1]. This symbol is a composite of the letter tet (ט) and two vavim (ו, one up and one down) and has a combined gematria of 21, the same gematria as the Divine Name, Ehyeh (אהיה). I saw the symbol 4 times, on the foreheads of 4 "angels" who appeared as men, representing the 4 universes of created reality (atzilut, beriyah, yetzirah and assiyah).

The 4th multiple of 21 is 84, the same gematria as Hanoch (חנוך), the angel Metatron.

Footnote:

[1] Poseidon is the Greek god of earthquakes, i.e., earth-shaking like in my dream-vision Storm Brewing and in the Manhattan explosion as described in Sympathetic Telepathy.

Technorati tags: Torah Talmud Torah Judaism Kabbalah jewish mysticism mysticism jewish meditation meditation shamanism kabbalah iyunit kabbalah maasit witchcraft jewitchery jewitch witch sacred feminine divine feminine shechinah lilith spiritual development spirituality kosher spirituality

A Simple Phosphenetic Magical Act

ב' באב תשס"ז

Interesting. In my dream last night, the warm salt was kept under pressure and then released into the cold sea, culminating in seeing a storm in my dream which materialized in physical reality. This is interesting because before I went to bed last night, I posted about phosphenes as they pertain to magical alphabets. Today, to add a link to the phosphene phenomenon, I googled phosphenes and found out that the most common type of phosphene is called a pressure phosphene.

You know what? I did rub my eyes once as I was typing the entry on the neurophysiology of magical alphabets. I imagine this makes rubbing my eyes before sleeping a significant magical act now.

Technorati tags: Torah Talmud Torah Judaism Kabbalah jewish mysticism mysticism jewish meditation meditation shamanism kabbalah iyunit kabbalah maasit witchcraft jewitchery jewitch witch sacred feminine divine feminine shechinah lilith spiritual development spirituality kosher spirituality magical alphabets phosphenes