Jewish Magical Rings of Power

[Ring inscribed with the Hebrew "fire in his faith-he will live it", appearing at blingdomofgod.com]

J.R.R. Tolkien gave us the most famous magic ring in human imagination, but certainly not the first. Rings and seals of power have a long history in Jewish tradition, beginning with King Solomon.

According to the Testament of Solomon, a pseudepigraphic work of late Antiquity that serves as the basis for a whole genre of Solomonic magical lore, King Sol created a ring using a divine name of power and inscribed it with a seal, either a pentagram or hexagram (traditions vary). With this ring, he was able to enslave demons and he compelled them to help him construct the Temple in Jerusalem - a mythic illustration of the Jewish belief that there is nothing in the universe that is irredeemable, or cannot be bent to divine service.

But this is not the only ring of power in Jewish literature. Josephus also mentions a magical ring used to perform an exorcism in his native Judea (Antiquities 8).

In the Hechalot literature, rings and seals a recurrent theme. Both angels (Hechalot Rabbati) and adepts (Merkavah Rabbah) use rings with seals to tap into divine forces.

But it is Solomon’s ring that has captured the imagination of readers over the centuries. Not only is it good for exorcisms and demon management, but it also gives you the power to speak with animals. Discussions, recipes, and diagrams of the ring repeatedly appear in works such as the medieval work, Mafteach Shlomo (The Key of Solomon) and is invoked on amulets for protection against demons (Naveh and Shaked, Magic Spells and Formulae, p. 93).

In the 17^th-18^th centuries, during the height of the “Baal shems,” the wondering working shamans of eastern Europe, we find several references to silver rings of protection of healing, so-called “segulah rings.” They are mentioned in personal correspondence and a few published texts, such as Kav haYashar. The latter even describes the process of fabricating such a ring, these rings were credited with controlling epilepsy and proving “security” day and night. This may be just as it sounds, a shield against physical dangers, but also may be a euphemism for sexual incontinence (conscious temptations, erotic dreams, and nocturnal emissions). 

To learn more about the Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism, visit http://dracontius.net/ragwad/ejmmm

DIY: Do-It-Yourself Reality.

One of the special delights that have evolved in my life the past few years is a new hevruta of study companions. You have the fruits of some of our studies in past entries. Currently we continue our study of Kedushat Levi, the Hasidic commentary to the Torah of Yitzakh Levi of Berditchev. here is the translation of a wonderful reflection of prayer and the zug (partnership) of God and humanity:

[An] additional explanation: Bereshit - [read it as] bet (two/double) beginning. 

The Blessed Name bestows shefa [beneficent outpouring] and we through our prayers make an opening in the divine outpouring [allowing it to reach the prayer], each according to his [i.e., human] will. 

This one [for example] will make an opening by means of the letters of chayyim (life) for [enhanced] life; That one with the letters of chokhmah (wisdom) for [greater] wisdom; 

Another with the letters of osher (wealth) for wealth.[1] 

And thus [it is] for all goods, each [may be used] according to our will. 

Look, for everything that is [found] in the [the realm] of the spirit, there is something analogous to it in the [realm of] the physical. 

So look, in the physical [universe] there is sound and speech.

 The sound is the matrix/container,[2] while speech is the opening [3] for the sound made through letters [to activate the shefa].  

Thus [for example] on Rosh ha-Shanah, the sound of the shofar is [or signifies] the outpouring from the Blessed Creator - it is the matrix.

 And when we say the malchut, zechronot, and shofarot [4], it is the opening by which we shape the outpouring of the Creator through the letters/words, every individual according to his will. 

[Hands-on Judaism: young Kolamites making their own shofar]

See, this outpouring matrix that flows from the Creator, it is the aspect [we know as] the written Torah [which is given to us]. 

While this opening we make for the outflow through letters, this is the aspect of the oral Torah, it being the will of Israel, when they make interpretation of the written Torah  [5]. 

So this [is the meaning of] bereshit - "double beginning [to the universe]" - the [combination of] written Torah and the oral Torah [bring creation into being].[6]

1. This is based on the word mysticism of Sefer Yetzirah, which regards the letters of the Hebrew Alef-Bet as the building blocks of creation. Very much analogous to the periodic table, where elements can be combined to make useful compounds, it is taught that proper application of the letters and words of Hebrew allows the adept to construct reality from them. This is also a testimony to the Jewish notion of humanity dignity and power. God gives us the raw materials of the natural (and supernatural) order, but we may mold them and shape them to our needs and the needs of the world. 

2. the translation of calul here is debatable. I welcome a better suggestion, 

3. Tzimtzum literally means contraction/condensing. The image is a space created in the membrane between the spiritual and physical realms to allow the shefa to enter one's life, i.e., spoke prayer attunes us to the divine "frequency," while the words themselves serve as the access code for translating the spiritual bounty into physical reality. 

4. the three liturgies that accompany the blowing] consists of verses that refer to these three themes. Each verse is specifically selected for their upbeat message for Israel and the world. The liturgy, of course, is a Jewish creation, an addition to the purely biblical command to sound the shofar on the holiday. The significance of this will be evident at the end of the homily. 

5. Here the theme of partnership (and mutual dependency) really gets highlighted, and in a somewhat counter-tradition manner. Jewish thinkers have tended to treat all the two Torahs, the written Torah and it's on-going interpretation, as God-given. Rabbi Yitzakh unpacks that flattening, monistic thinking by reclaiming the oral Torah as a human creation, and the very thing that renders the divine gift of Torah (Torah = divine outpouring) meaningful on the physical plane. Without us and our wordy, argumentative ancestors, the Torah would be divine, surely, but inert and unable to benefit the world, like a heap of iron ore that need human intervention to refine it, reshape it, and make it into tools.

6. The biggest metaphysical claim of all - that only through the combined efforts of God and humanity that the universe exists. 

Obama Psalm: Curses in Politics

So I saw a bumper sticker the other day that read, "Pray for Obama" - a nice gesture - and is followed by the citation, "Ps. 109:8."

May his days be few; may another take over his position.

Pretty funny [though pointless, as of Nov. 6th]. But then one reads the context of the verse....

Let his children be fatherless, and his wife a widow.
Let his children be continually vagabonds, and beg:
let them seek their bread also out of their desolate places.
Let the extortioner catch all that he has;
and let the strangers spoil his labor.
Let there be none to extend mercy unto him:
neither let there be any to favor his fatherless children.
Let his posterity be cut off;
and in the generation following let their name be blotted out.
Let the iniquity of his fathers be remembered with the LORD;
and let not the sin of his mother be blotted out.
Let them be before the LORD continually,
that he may cut off the memory of them from the earth.


And things get considerably darker. And after a moment's reflection, another thought arises -- it that a curse? Yes it is. Turns out the Psalms, like the rest of the Bible, defies our stereotypes. The Psalms have all sorts of peculiarities. For example, Ps. 45 is neither a prayer nor a paean to God. It's a rather obsequious ode to a king. And the Psalms are sometimes just as surprising for what they don't contain. For example - the themes of brit (covenant) and mitzvah (commandment), so central to the Torah and post-biblical Judaism, are essentially non-entities in the Psalms. Virtually no psalm references these concepts as a framework for the writer's faith. Ps. 119 stands out as the exception. So does what does this imply for the centrality of Torah to ancient Israel?

And curses. There are actually several Psalms that are, or contain, extended curses. Ps. 35, 58, 137, all invoke hair-raising afflictions upon the writer's enemy, and 109 is the ultimate execration text.

This shocks our modern sensibilities...its seems so unreligious. But as I tell my students in my Bible as Literature course at UNT, this idea that religion only engages in the uplifting is a relatively modern rethinking of what constitutes "religion." For virtually every religion until very recently, God is expected to protect his own and punish their enemies. Truly, the idea that what God wants is the repentance of the sinner, not his destruction, is a theme already found in the Bible. But as for God's followers, well...they want satisfaction.

Of course some would argue that these aren't "curses" in the magical sense, but "prayers" venting anger. Perhaps. But, as I have discussed before in this blog, the distinction between an incantation and a prayer is very fine distinction indeed. Thus we read:

Moses is not mentioned in the parashah [Tetzaveh]....The reason for this is that Moses said to God: 'Wipe me out from Your book [Ex. 32:32]" and the curse by a righteous person is fulfilled, even if it is made conditionally. (Ba'al ha-Turim)

Many modern scholars of ancient religions would eschew the distinction entirely, lumping glamors and petitionery prayers together under the category of "rituals of power," speech-acts that will lead to constructive (or in this case, destructive) results. People want their pleas to be answered and the things they ask for, come to pass.

All this needs to be placed in historical context. Biblical Israel. The Psalms were written in a period of human history when most people lived either in a tribal environment, or one step away from it in farming villages or a fortified urban environment. Brutality from within and without the society was commonplace, armed conflict would visit people at least once in their lifetime, and at some point most tribes/nations fought using what amounted to atrocities directed against their rivals. The hope that one could escape persecution, plunder, or worse via the intervention of one's god was an understandable hope, and the idea that the deity would visit upon them what they planned to mete out to you was pretty appealing.

So much for history. We live in a different age, with different expectations for and from our enemies. In our time, law prevails by and large, and even the worst leaders are subject to election, re-election, and term limits. The time for asking for God's wrath to fall upon our political enemies and their families seems, well, a kind of curse of its own visited on our modern body politic. As Nahal Kedumim teaches, "...even if a person has good intentions, he should not allow a curse to escape his lips."

Esoteric Judaism Brought to the Public Eye

 It's been four years since I wrote the The Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism, and three years since it was selected as a Finalist for the Jewish Book Council Award, but it was only last week I was interviewed about the book by Aaron Howard for the Houston Jewish Voice. It is perhaps the best composed article yet written about the book and the subject, so I provide a link here:

jhvonline.com/do-you-believe-in-jewish-magic-p13768-96.htm

Possession: The Dibbuk Box - A Review

[The paranormal investigator will see you now]

So I finally got to see the new Jewish-flavored horror movie Possession, and my assessment is....meh. The centerpiece is really a domestic drama of a disintegrating family. The first two acts are dominated by this, and the box is, what, a symbol of the toxic emotions penetrating the family? Not that I object to deeper meanings, I rather like them, but I prefer more horror leavened with metaphor than melodrama spiced with horror metaphors.

And as for the Jewish part (which only really comes to the foreground in the third act), well, it feels like not so well-conceived window-dressing. For example:

• Dybbuks are a form of pneumatic (spirit) possession, not, as the movie indicates, demonic possession. We have become rather casual about how we use words. Spirits are usually some manifestation of dead humans, rather than infernal entities. This is actually important, and it is what make the dybbuk tradition of Judaism so distinctive from your run-of-the-mill Exorcist/Rite/Constantine possession. Because Jewish adepts (there is no office of exorcist in Judaism, the writers got that right) are dealing with two souls, the possessed victim AND THE DEAD SOUL, their project is doubly therapeutic - to help both regain the right path. This involves expelling the spirit, but also getting him/her on with the journey into the afterlife. 
• The "name" of the demon is a strange conflation of the dybbuk tradition with the much earlier greco-roman Jewish belief in named demons (ala The Testament of Solomon). 
• In Jewish dybbuk traditions, dybbuks do not possess "innocent" or "pure" souls, but invade those whose lives have made them vulnerable to such infestations through sin and lax observance of the Jewish faith. 
• The fearful shuffling of the elders is pretty silly. Dybbuks are not contagious. 
• Other than the little news story that inspired this movie, the "dibbuk box" itself is not a part of the authentic dibbuk tradition. WHAT WE DO SEE is a couple of accounts of Jewish exorcism where the adept forces the spirit into a bottle (ala the djinn tradition). This is taken as a sign the exorcism was successful. What did they do after that? I've never seen a "spirit disposal" report, but I assume the now takanah (repaired) spirit is released to continue its gilgul (transmigration). 
• Jewish rituals of expulsion are usually communal affairs - at least a minyan (quorum of ten) is present, and often the whole community that can fit in the house participates. 

So what did they get right?

• Jewish "exorcists" are any menschlik person (yeh, Matisyahu, nice film debut) with the knowledge to perform the rituals - rabbis, local holy men, the educated.
• The recitation of Ps. 90, the "Psalm of Affliction," along with Ps. 121, 16, and others, is the centerpiece of this Jewish ritual. 
• Though the explanation doesn't make a lot of sense to me, Jewish occult beliefs do regard mirrors as potential doorways between the living and the dead (Read Chaim Vital's autobiography, for example).
• Tallisim (prayer shawls), shofarot (rams horns) and other Jewish ritual objects are often integrated into the process. 

So what can I say, given this movie and the slightly older The Unborn, except perhaps Jews should simply be happy that we have "arrived" - Hollywood is finally as open to making crappy movies about Judaism as it is to making crappy movies about Catholicism and Protestantism. For something better, I suggest The Secret (Israeli), the golem episode of the X-Files, or even Keeping the Faith.

Oh, and you can read my book, The Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism. 

The Dibbuk Box: There's a Ghost in my Web Stats

["Dybbuk" by Elly Simmons, found at www.cre8tivez.org/interdis/interdis.htm ]

So I just noticed a strange spike in visits to the JMMM blog. This most often happens after a showing of the Demi Moore film, The Seven Sign. But this one is different. A huge number of visits to entries on Exorcism and Dibbuks / Dybbuks. I was puzzled, but now I understand. It's unusual for me to be caught off guard when it comes to movies, but it just happened -- I had no idea the horror movie Possession: The Dibbuk Box had a Jewish theme to it. Well, I haven't had a chance to see it yet (33% in Rotten Tomatoes - that's Ashton Kutcher bad!), but I thought I'd facilitate online seekers by grouping all the links to relevant topics on the JMMM right here...

The Dybbuk: Spirit Possession

Jewish Exorcism I: Defeating Demons

Exorcism II: A Jewish Ritual Against Demonic Posse...

Exorcism III: Battling Dybbuks and the Dead

Spawns of Satan, Children of Cain

Does the curse of Cain live on?

Demon Lovers, Sword of Power: The Other Children o...

...and, of course, you can do more leisurely study of the topic using my book, The Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050

Adam Kadmon I: Spiritual Man, Primordial Being

[illustration: The Creation of Man by E.M. Lilien]

A reader asked if the Jewish concept of Adam Kadmon that I mentioned in my earlier posting was the inspiration for the Christian concept of the “Mystical Body of Christ.” It’s an excellent question. In fact, we see what appears to be a statement by Paul (I Corinthians 15:45-50) about the Christ that has strong echoes of the Adam Kadmon tradition:

So, too, it is written, "The first man, Adam, became a living being," the last Adam a life-giving spirit. But the spiritual was not first; rather the natural and then the spiritual.
The first man was from the earth, earthly; the second man, from heaven. As was the earthly one, so also are the earthly, and as is the heavenly one, so also are the heavenly.
Just as we have borne the image of the earthly one, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly one.

What is most striking to me is Paul’s insistence on the “order” of being. Paul pointedly states the “spiritual Adam” was not first. I take that to mean that Paul is making sure his readers understand that what he is teaching is markedly different from what they might assume. And that indicates to me that Paul is both aware of and modifying for his own theologic purpose an already well-known doctrine of a “spiritual Adam” that people believed preceded the earthly Adam. Since Jesus came millenia after human creation, Paul finds it necessary for the spiritual Adam be the culmination of humanity, rather then its origin. So in response to the question, all in all, I would think that this idea of being incorporated into the "body of Christ" is likely a specifically Christian re-retooling of the Jewish esoteric doctrine.

The concept that there is a primordial man that encompasses all humanity (indeed, the entire universe) probably has its first basis neither in Judaism or Christianity, but in the Platonic theory of “forms,” the belief that there exists an ideal form of all the varied forms that manifest themselves in the material world. Thus, while there may be many types of chairs (swivel, French provincial, Stichley, folding, La-Z-boy), they all share an essential “chairness,” a quality that Platonic thought would say emanates from the ideal form of “chair.” Likewise, despite the obvious enormous variety of humans (Male, female, caucasian, negroid, dwarf, giant, etc.), there must be an essential, transcendant model of humanness that encompasses all these possibilities.

Esoteric Judaism developed this in the most elaborate and imaginative way:

The [human] body is composed in two worlds: the Lower World and the Supernal World (Zohar 2:23b)

and discovers it to be present in the two Biblical narratives of the creation of humanity (Gen. 1 vs. 2:6 >). Thus the Adam Kadmon (“Primordial Human”) - Also called Adam Elyon or Adam Ila’ah - the supernal, first creation of God that is made in the divine image is specifically described in Gen 1:26-27 (and not to be conflated with the humans created in 2:6-24). It is he that is the true “image of God,” a majestic vessel of divine glory, the ideal human (Deut. 4:32; PdRK 4:4, 12:1, Lev. R. 20:2). All earthly humans (Gen. 2-3) are in his image (B.B.58a). When he was created, in fact, he was so awesome the angels mistook him for God and began to worship him

Said Rabbi Hiyya: "When the Holy One created man to dwell upon the earth, he formed him after the likeness of Adam Kadmon, the heavenly man. When the angels gazed upon him [Adam Kadmon], they exclaimed: 'You have made him almost equal to God and crowned him with glory and honor.' After the transgression and fall of Adam, it is said the Holy One was grieved at heart because it gave occasion for repeating what they had said at his creation, 'What is man that You should be mindful of him, or the son of man that You should visit him.'" (Ps vii. 5.)

According to the Midrash, Adam Kadmon is androgynous, incorporating all the aspects of both genders (Gen. 1:27 can actually be translated thus, though it usually isn't). Inspired by the description of man extending from one end of heaven to the other (Deut. 4:32), he is also a macrocosm, extending from one end of the universe to the other and containing all creation:

The rabbis taught: The creation of the world was like the creation of humanity, for everything that God created in the world, God created in the human being. The heavens are the head of humankind, the sun and the moon are the human eyes, the stars are the hair on the human head (Otzar haMidrashim, Olam Katan 406).


For more on the rabbinic understanding of Adam Kadmon, see Gen. R. 8:1; Lev. R. 14:1, Chag. 12b, 14b.

To learn more, read the EJMMM, available at amazon.com. Click here - http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Jewish-Myth-Magic-Mysticism/dp/0738709050/sr=1-1/qid=1159997117/ref=sr_1_1/002-7116669-7231211?ie=UTF8&s=books


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