Looking at
Liber O, it is not immediately obvious how we might ritually invoke a specific path on the “Tree of Life”. The elemental grade rituals of the Golden Dawn are of little help, either. This is actually somewhat surprising, since each grade is explicitly tied to those paths descending upon that grade's associated
sephirah. Each opening invokes the element that the Golden Dawn associated with that grade's sphere, but not the paths.
Some paths are seemingly obvious, such as those associated with the signs of the zodiac.
Liber O says:
“For the Zodiac use the hexagram of the planet which rules the sign you require (777, Table I, Col CXXXVIII); but draw the astrological sigil of the sign, instead of that of the planet.”
We might therefore invoke a zodiacal sign, while knowing its place on the Tree, but without needing or explicitly using that information.
Other paths seem to present a greater challenge. Consider the 23
rd path, that of the Hebrew letter מ,
mem, connecting the 5
th and 8
th spheres,
Geburah and
Hod. On some level, the water we associate with this path must be the same elemental water we normally associate with the west and the western watchtower. But, in practice, we need to make some sort of distinction between invoking a path and invoking an element, even when the two are nominally the same.
One method is to designate the two spheres or
sephiroth connected by the path of interest before invoking the path itself. To accomplish this, we turn once again to Col V of
777, the “God-Names in Assiah”. Using path 23 as an example, we look up the god-names for the appropriate
sephiroth and find them to be ALHIM GBVR and ALHIM TzBAVTH, for
Geburah and
Hod, respectively.
The most obvious way to designate a
sephirah might be to use a hexagram, but we require a hexagram that corresponds to the
sephirah, and not the planet associated with that
sephirah. A possible solution is to take advantage of the Golden Dawn's attribution of the elements to the spheres.
In Col XI of
777, we find that
Geburah is associated with the element of fire, and from previous posts we may recall that
Hod is associated with water.
So, to explore the 23
rd path, we might prepare ourselves and a suitable space as before. To our altar, we might add the appropriate tarot card, in this case the trump usually known as, “The Hanged Man”, associated with the Hebrew letter
mem. Open the temple as before, with as much ceremony as seems appropriate.
Facing the altar, take up the weapon and trace the “Hexagram of Water” invoking Mercury while vibrating “Elohim Tzabaoth”. Then trace the “Hexagram of Fire” invoking Mars while vibrating “Elohim Gebur”. Having designated the two ‘ends’ of the 23
rd path, trace the invoking pentagram of water while vibrating the god-name “Al”. Repeat this pentagram and god-name three more times for a total of four.
This should provide a suitable space in which to meditate upon the path of
mem and the “Hanged Man”. If you have experience with astral projection, you might meditate on the tarot card itself for a while, then close your eyes and, holding the image in your mind's eye, use it as a doorway to “travel in the spirit vision” to that path.
When finished, close the temple as before. If you think it desirable to banish the path you invoked, before closing simply reverse the process. Use the god-names with banishing hexagrams and the banishing pentagram of water. One repetition this time should be sufficient.
We repeated our invoking pentagram of water four times because the letter
mem represents the number 40, so four repetitions seems appropriate (forty seems excessive). The basic forms of the “Hexagram of Fire” and “Hexagram of Water” are found in
Liber O, but in the “Lesser Ritual of the Hexagram” only the invoking hexagrams of Saturn are illustrated. To invoke Mars using the fire hexagram, trace the lower triangle first, clockwise, beginning at the lower-left point (attributed to Mars). Then trace the upper triangle, clockwise, beginning at the lower-right point (attributed to Venus). To invoke Mercury using the “Hexagram of Water”, trace the lower triangle first, clockwise, beginning at the lower-left point (attributed to Mercury). Then trace the upper triangle, clockwise, beginning at the upper-right point (attributed to Jupiter).
To banish, trace the triangles
counter-clockwise beginning at the same points and in the same order. On the “Hexagram of Air”, the point attributed to Mars is the upper-left point of the lower triangle, and Mercury is the lower-left point of the upper triangle. I shall leave working out the remaining planets of the three forms as an exercise for the student. The seven invoking and seven banishing forms of the “Hexagram of Earth” are illustrated in
Liber O. In all cases, begin the first triangle at the point associated with the desired planet, then trace the second triangle beginning at the planet opposite. For our purposes here, Saturn is opposite Luna; Jupiter is opposite Mercury; and Mars is opposite Venus. For
Chokmah and
Kether, we might use the hexagram of Saturn.
When exploring the paths associated with the planets (Key Scales 12-14, 21, 27, 30, and 32 of
777), we encounter a different problem. The method we used for invoking the path of
mem may be easily adapted to invoking a planetary path by substituting the appropriate invoking hexagram and god-name for the invoking pentagram. The problem is that the Golden Dawn's attributions of the planets to the letters of the Hebrew alphabet, and consequently their attributions of the planets to the paths of the Tree, are almost certainly wrong. There is a table illustrating the problem at
this site.
How and why the Golden Dawn made this mistake is beyond the scope of this post. Their assignment of the Hebrew letters to the paths of the Tree seems workable. The attributions of the planets to the letters, however, are more likely to be as follows:
Beth, “house”: Saturn
Gimel, possibly gamlu, “throwing stick”: Jupiter
Dalet, “door” (or *dag, “fish”): Mars
Kaph, “palm of the hand”: Sol
Peh, probably “a builder's square”: Venus
Resh, “head”: Mercury
Taw, possibly from Egyptian “mark”: Luna
Topic: Ceremonial Magic 102 (Read 2150 times)