Recently, I was working with sigils (again). I was
reviewing the methods used by modern Hoodoo practitioners to make Key of
Solomon-style sigils. It’s fascinating stuff, but there are some elements that
are shortcut. I’ll explore sigils here in an attempt to provide connections
between several very deep topics.
I apologize in advance if something I write seems
as if I’m being cursory. One could likely write a long book about all this.
However, as this is only a blog, my goal is to show you the connections, so that
you will better experience the wonder that I felt when all this began to become
meaningful for me.
Mankind began with sounds, which he modulated in
the mouth. That led to an attempt to make symbols to represent the sounds – as
stated in the movie, The Dark Crystal, “words that stay.” Writing was born. Let’s
explore speech and writing separately.
Since much of what comes down to us in the Western
Mystery schools comes from the Kabbalah, we should start in the Ancient Near
East. Kabbalah was highly influenced by Babylonian numerology and astrology,
which was also influenced by ancient Hindu principles through trade routes. Kabbalah
then lent its systems to Greece. A bit later,
I’ll show a tiny bit how each of these cultures contributed.
Speaking is represented in myth as a very special and
creative event. Yahweh created the universe by speaking it into being. The
Memphite (Northern Egypt) creator, Ptah, created things by what was described
as an act of the heart and the tongue. It’s important to note that the people
of the ANE didn’t view ideas as living in the brain. Mummification (and
warfare) gave people an understanding that there was an organ in the skull, but
no one knew what it did. Thinking was done in the chest – in the heart – where
ideas lived. So an action of the heart and the tongue was an action of generating
an idea and then making it known to the world. This was such a powerful concept
that it led to the esoteric idea that knowing the name of a thing could give you
power over it. Certainly, it gave you
the power of creating it, because until it was named, its creation process was
not complete and so it was not a real thing. For this reason, Yahweh brought
all of the animals to Adam to be named. Each of them needed an identity.
The Hindus have mantras. Mantras are phrases spoken
over and over, perhaps thousands of times, to bring a desired change to your
life by manifesting what is needed. Mantras are made up of “seed sounds.” These
are the basic and core sounds used to form more complex words. Yet these sounds
are not simply utterances. They are mystical vibrations that modulate the resonance
of the universe to bring things into being. By speaking these seed sounds in
the correct order, vibrations move out into the universe to bring about the
desired changes. Often, these changes occur in the mind of the speaker.
But why does the power to create something give
you power over it? To the mythic mind, creation and destruction are the same
process. Raw materials are destroyed and remade as something else. What was mud
or an elder tree became man. What was the body of a titan, became the land, sea
and sky. To gain the power over a thing, you simply need to know what it is
called. This is the reason secret societies (like witches in covens) have
inner-circle names that are never shared. This is also the reason why divine
names become magic words of power. (A completely acceptable charm is to write
the name of a deity on paper, then fold it into a bundle to be tucked into a
mojo bag or a fold in your clothing, to summon the powers of that deity.) Any
word can be used as a magic word because it identifies an essence.
Many cultures believed, and so represented, the invention
of writing as a sacred event, often telling tales of writing systems as gifts
from their gods. Odin brought the runes to mankind; Thoth brought
hieroglyphics. Because writing was a lasting representation of a sound, which
was the word of power naming a thing, the glyph itself had the power of the
sound. It was a representation of the very essence of the created thing.
Just as alchemy was the forerunner of chemistry,
so numerology was the forerunner of mathematics. The Babylonians loved their
numbers so much that they would actually use numbers to refer to their deities
as a kind of short-hand honorific. To use a mundane example, if the number that represented
you was the number 123, I could simply refer to you in conversation like this, “123
and I had a great time in circle,” which would be a gesture of respect, because
your number is your essence. Transmitted from the Babylonians throughout the
ANE was the idea that the glyphs of sounds correspond to numbers.
Pythagoras was a clever Greek when he discovered
music theory. Vibrations could be created by mathematically dividing a
vibrating string. Interestingly, the vocal cords are simply vibrating strings
that are similarly modulated like the stretched stings of a lyre (singing). This shows a
deep connection between mathematics and vibration; as such, every sound
corresponded to a particular numerical value. If every sound has a glyph and
every sound also has a numerical value, it means that every glyph has a value.
Because speaking, singing, writing, language and
mathematics are not enough, let’s bring astronomy into this. The Magi of
Babylon were expert astronomers as well as accomplished mathematicians. In the Babylonian
sky were seven dominant heavenly bodies. Their gods ruled over sections of the
sky and were embodied by the seven observable heavenly bodies, which were
mathematically chartable. To state that they believed numerals to be divine was
an understatement! The Babylonian custom used mathematical sums as a
substitution for the names of their gods as a kind of respectful short hand - an honorific, as mentioned above. So
numbers represented their gods, but also the planets.
They assigned a number to each of the planets
based on its speed through the heavens. Saturn, the slowest planet observed,
received the smallest number, 3, followed by Jupiter, Mars, The Sun, Venus,
Mercury, and finally The Moon, which was the fastest body gaining the number 9.
Each of the assigned numbers were used to create
magic squares, or “kamea.” Kamea are traditional Babylonian and Kabbalistic grids
that contain both rows and columns equal to the planetary number. In each block
of the grid is placed every numeral from 1 through the square of the planetary
number. For example, in the kamea of Saturn, there are 3 rows of 3 columns
containing the digits 1 through 9 (32). The numerals are placed so
that every row and column, as well as the major diagonals, have the same sum.
In the case of Saturn, each row and column has the sum of 15. However, there
are many different ways to arrange the numerals in the kamea to still
accomplish the uniform sum. So there are traditional arrangements of the digits
that have been passed down. Below are the traditional kamea of all the planets.
Aside #1: the order of planets mentioned above is also how and why the planetary hours are ordered in ceremonial magic charts. I have also seen some schools of thought that use this planetary rulership for the seven chakras.
Aside #2: the short-hand honorific number of each planet is found by summing all the numbers of the planetary square. Thus, the honorific number of Saturn is 45 (1+2+3+4+5+6+7+8+9=45). This also means that the honorific of the Babylonian high god, the Sun, is 666. This is why the Bible uses this number as the "number of the beast." It is the honorific of the chief god of the oppressing culture.
The idea that names held power permeated the
Kabbalah, which was used to compose some of the most famous source books for
magical systems in the world, The Keys of Solomon. Anyone who has ever opened a
cover of these books knows they are filled with Solomon’s “seals.” These seals
are simply arrangements of sigils creating designs that can be inscribed on
metals to create charms. Often, the charms are purported to allow the holder to
gain power over certain spirits or intelligences. The designs accomplish this
because they contain the names of these spirits and intelligences represented
as glyphs. The method for creating these glyphs uses sound and numerology to
create a written symbol of power.
In Kabbalah, each of the planetary intelligences
and spirits have a name made up of a string of sounds, just like your own name.
Their name is their word of power. Each spirit is associated with a ruling
planet, which has a kamea. If we convert the sounds in the name into numbers, then connect
the numbers using the correct kamea, we create a glyph for each name that
magically represents each spirit.
Observing just a few standards, you can use the
same method to make a sigil of your own name, or of any other word that is
powerful to you. Contemporary Hoodoo uses an adaptation of this method. It is an
easy method, but it does deviate from the Kabbalist method just a bit. I’ll
describe the Kabbalist method mentioned above a bit later.
For the hoodoo method, use the following table to
convert all the letters in your name to numbers.
Now choose the kamea that rules over your natal
zodiac.
Now simply draw lines to connect the numerals in the
kamea in the order of the name. Here are the drawing standards that seem
apparent to me based on the sigils in the Keys of Solomon. First, no line
should ever be back-traced, which means that every time you visit a block, you
should use a unique line. It also means that when returning to a block that
already has a line-stop, you should stop at some other place in that block.
Second, double numbers should have a small wave or bump to show that the block
was marked twice (or more). Finally, the first numeral should be marked with a
small circle.
Here is an example of the sigil
for Hagiel, the intelligence of Venus, which shows a repeated letter and parallel
lines, but no lines are completely back-traced. Notice that returning to block 3
required that we put a stop in a different part of the block, rather than
intersecting with the one that was already there.
Despite the rules, you can flex your creativity a
bit. It appears acceptable for the stops in each block to be rounded rather
than sharp points, or to go from block to block using arcs, rather than
straight lines, so long as the arcs are consistent. The last numeral can be
marked in many ways, such as with a final circle, a small perpendicular line, a
wave, a chevron, or simply stopping. The sigil is your creation and it carries
the power you put into it.
You can also build sigils for other words that are
powerful to you, such as “health” or “money.” You would simply use the kamea
appropriate for those purposes. These are the accepted hoodoo associations of
each of the planets.
Sun: Health,
vitality, ego, power, success, advancement, leadership, and growth
Moon:
Clairvoyance, sleep, emotions, astral travel, imagination, women, birth, and
reincarnation
Mars:
Male sexuality, strength, lust, anger, destruction, medical issues
Mercury:
Communication, intellect, writing, contracts, information, wisdom, science,
memory
Jupiter:
Success, abundance, money, growth, gambling
Venus:
Love, pleasure, female sexuality, arts, music, beauty, luxury, social
affairs
Saturn:
Real estate, banks, debt, obstacles, binding, knowledge, time, discipline
If you are feeling a bit nefarious, you can also
build a sigil to represent another person to gain power over them.
The difference between the hoodoo version and the
Kabbalistic version is that the latter relies on sound, rather than just
letters. Rather than the names being converted based on the letters used to
write the name, they are converted based on the sounds that are used to
construct their utterance. The values of each sound can be found in the
following table (Mathers, 3). Note that the values for the sounds k, m
and n differ when they are final
sounds than when they are elsewhere in the word. For the sound made by w, use v. There is no letter e.
Short vowels are generally ignored, which leaves the sound created by an e represented by either the long a or the long i, depending on which
sounds closer.
Also note that there are values that are too large
for some kamea. In that case, simply drop zeroes until the number fits. For
example, the name “Tom” would be a strong T (9), then O (70 or 7), then a final
M (600 or 60 or 6, not 40). The name “Steve” would be S (60 or 6), a strong T
(9), a long ee sound, represented by
the I, Y (10 or 1), then a V (6). The final vowel is silent.
Oddly, the numerology table used in hoodoo is the one
also used in so-called “Pythagorean numerology.” This is an odd name to me
because the Greeks had an alphabet of sounds,
just as in Kabbalah, and were big fans of assigning numbers to the sounds made by their alphabet. This was
a very popular process called Isopsephy and was used even for very mundane
affairs. They did not have letters that made
multiple sounds as we do in English. It seems to me that the best Pythagorean
numerology table would be based on sounds and would use the original
isopsephographic values that the Greeks used so often. That translated table
would look like this.
The value for
each row in the table increases by a factor of 10. So G is worth 3 and L is
worth 30, while T is worth 300.
Whether you
use the Hebrew, the Isopsephy or the “numerology” table to assign values, you
now have all you need to move forward in sigil magic.
For more information on the numerology of the
Babylonians, investigate Trail of the
Serpent by Christian writer, Murl Vance.
References:
Mathers, S. L. Mac Gregor.
The Kabbalah Unveiled. Theosophical Publishing Co., New York. 1912.
If you have any interest in diving into a more mathematical look at the kameas, feel free to look at my next entry,
found here.
