Showing posts with label Jewish. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Jewish. Show all posts

Wednesday, 3 April 2013

Gate of the Stars: A short magical treatise

Following my collaboration with Rabbi Yosef Cohen, I am now publishing his full transcript and translation of the short magical treatise in Vital s manuscript, entitled Shaar ha-Kochavim, or The Gate of the Stars.
The Hebrew transcription can be found here:




Shaar HaKochavim 
(Gate of the Stars)  
Day one: Sun. 
Day two: Moon. 
Day three: Mars. 
Day four: Mercury. 
Day five: Jupiter. 
Day six:  Venus. 
Day seven: Saturn.  

Shaar HaMalachim 
(Gate of the Angels) 

Day one: Ruqiayil  and his attendant, the servant of God, Al Madhab. 
Day two: Moon, and his angel Gabriel and his attendant Murrara Ibn El Khrith. 
Day three: Mars, and his angel Samael and his attendant Al  Ahmar Aba Mekhrais.
Day four: Mercury, and his angel Michael and his attendant Berqan. 
Day five: Jupiter and his angel Tzedeqel and his attendant Shamhoriz. 
Day six: Venus and his angel Anael and his attendant Zawbah. 
Day seven: Saturn and his angel Qapfziel and his attendant Maymun Aba Nukh.  

Another version (2)
 
Madhab or Madhab and Ruqiayil. 
Shamhoriz and Ashrpil [Ashrfil?]. 
Edom and Dardyyil. 
Burqan and Tzedqyel. 
Danhosh [Danhash?] and Michael. 
Laban and Gabriel or Hirel. 
Maymunn and Azriel.

Another version (3)

These are the names of the judges: 
The ruler over Saturn [is] Ruqiayil. 
On Jupiter: Bachara. 
On Mars: Dahyyail. 
On Sun: Calmitha. 
On Venus: Olil. 
On Moon: Fachar.  

And these are the names of the Masters of Light: 
Yelemdub [Yelemduv?] 
And the name [of the] Master of Darkness: 
Tziyachashechal. 

And these are the Masters of the Days: 

Day one his superior angel Azriel. 
Day two Shrntiyel. 
Day three: Mahqieil. 
Day four: Dardyyil. 
Day five: Ashrpil [Ashrfil?]. 
Day six: Gavriel. 
Day seven: Metataron.  

And these are the names of the [zodiacal] seasons: 
In Aries, Taurus,  Gemini: Azrimon and say to him Shareb.   
In Cancer, Leo and Virgo: Ahrehun and say to him Rahun. 
In Libra, Scorpio and Sagittarius: Iyrar and say to him Arima [Adrima]. 
In Capricorn, Aquarius and Pisces: Mahmin and say to him Bachirath. 

And this is the nature of seven stars and their seals:

  
 For Saturn:





For Jupiter:




For Mars:




For Sun:



For Venus:



For Mercury:




For Moon:





Another Version (4)

Know, that the Sun has 63 names and Jupiter has 73 names and Mars has 63 names and Sun and Mercury [both] have 63 names. And the Moon has 66 names. And they are the aforementioned 472 names in the 7 tables. 

And behold, there is an amulet that you need to perform thus: Write seven tables and on each table write the name of his judge and the name of the solar season and the seal and the “season” of the month, that is, the quarter [of the month]. Write below the name of the judge, and the name of the king [n. the jinn] that rules on that day and the the name of the king that rules on that star and the Master of the Light if it is day. And now I will write to you the seven kings that rule on the seven stars and every name of these seven of the kings there are under them many servants. And this is there order Shaythach Legechag Yadameshechegagiyniytha Yalturesh ‘allematitash Metitash. And there is an eighth name that rules over all seven and it is from the eight letters Maschagenitha משכגניתא 
[End of text]


Notes of the translator:

 -Ruqyail: In the margin not from Vital's handwriting it says "scribal mistake, its really Refael."
-Burqan: but the punctuation in Hebrew reads Berqan. 
-Fachar:  the “ch” here is not a ח, it is the tʃ sound which is foreign to Hebrew. E.g. chew, chip, chest, the same with Tziyachashechal. We opted for noting this sound with a CH, while CH will note the Chet sound, throughout the text.

Notes of the editor:

Changes have been made to the original transcription to make the text more fluent, it was edited to ease reading and certain notes that were in my opinion superfluous were omitted.  

I have kept Rabbi Cohen reading of the names and I shall present my own version of reading the names below. 

The text is a summary of about four treatises of Arabic origin, detailing astral planetary magic.

Below is a synthetic table using the original Hebrew and my transcriptions:

(document to be posted)



Thursday, 10 January 2013

Collectanea of kabbalistic and magical texts.



Edit: from two sources (Lloyd Graham and Rabbi Yosef Cohen) I find this is the famous treatise  Sefer Shoshon Yesod Olam of Rabbi Yosef Tirshom.

This very interesting manuscript was made available in electronic format by the  Library of Geneva (Bibliothèque de Genève), where it is kept, under the name Comites Latentes 145. The extremely careful and comprehensive description on its website was made by Yael Okun, and its existence was brought to my attention by professor Lloyd Graham, to whom I am extremely grateful.
It contains magical, kabbalistical and other miscellanea ranging from the 15th to the 18th centry, by a multitude of scribes. 
This is a short overview of its contents:
Contents:
  • pp. 1-17 Israel Sarug Commentary on the Sabbath hymns by R. Isaac Luria.
  • pp. 21-598 Joseph b. Elijah Tirshom Kabbalistic compendium.
    • (pp. 22-58) Indexes
    • (pp. 60-84) Harba de-Moshe (Sword of Moses)
    • (pp. 85-92) Magical texts associated with Harba de-Moshe
    • (pp. 61-70) (lower margins) in a different hand: Sefer Razim (Book of Secrets).
    • (p. 61) (lower margin): The beginning of Ma'ase Bereshit Rabba.
    • (pp. 93-107) Seder Shem 'Ayin-Bet. A treatise in Arabic on the mystical uses of the Holy Name of seventy-two letters. Seven chapters.
    • (p. 97) An amulet attributed to a R. Menahem
    • (pp. 107-114) A treatise on the invocation of angels who have authority over the seven days of the week.
    • (pp. 115-118) Ha-Ne'elavim Treatise on magical therapies for the treatment of epilepsy.
    • (pp. 118-612) Collection of charms, amulets, holy names and other recipes, mostly magical or kabbalistic and dissertations on philosophical topics.
  • pp. 601-611 Divine Names, Biblical passages and permutations of letters for magical uses.
  • p. 612 At the bottom of a blank page, the copyist, Joseph [Tirshom] added instructions for asking a query of heaven in a state of awakeness, attributed to R. Simeon the Great and other formulas.
  • pp. 613-627 Charms (segulot), amulets, queries to heaven to be answered in dreams and short kabbalistic works in §§109.
  • p. 629 End of a treatise on astrology.
  • pp. 631-653 Collection of kabbalistic and magical pieces.
  • pp. 654-656 (in a different 17th cent. hand): Spells, including incantation bowels with drawings, instructions to exorcise possessing spirits from the book Or Tzach u-Metzuchtzach
  • pp. 657-668 Kabbalistic treatise on the Holy Names. End missing.
  • Pp. 629, 669-672 Treatise on astronomy. Incomplete. 

We reproduce here the pages of interest to us, namely the diagrams and seals (for larger versions, right click and view image).


p.115

p.116

 p.117

p.151

p.152

  p.169

 p.174

 p.205

p.221

 p.222

  p.223

p.238


p.263

 p.280

p.322

 p.323


p.324

 p.401

p.409


p.426


p.448

p.462

p.468

p.516

p.552
p.553


p.599

p.630

p.654


p.670

p.671 

p.672