LESSON FOR THE NOVITIATE : A SESTINA

Nine is the number for the Kabbalistic sephirah (sphere of emanation) called Yesod, whose metaphysical energy comes from the Moon.
In like manner, eight is the number of the sephirah called Hod, the sephirah of the planet Mercury.
Seven is the number for Netzach, the sephirah of the planet Venus.
Six is the number for Tiphareth, the sephirah of the Sun.
Five is the number for Geburah, the sephirah of the planet Mars.
Four is the number for Chesed, the sephirah of the planet Jupiter.

Blue is the color of the metaphysical energy emanating from the sephirah of the planet Jupiter.
Grey, white, black, and especially silver are all found among the metaphysical energies emanating from the sephirah of the ever-changing Moon.
As red is the planet’s physical color, so red is the color of the sephirah of the planet Mars.
Orange is the energy emanating from the sephirah of the planet Mercury.
Yellow is the energy emanating from the sephirah of the Sun.
Green is the energy emanating from the sephirah of the planet Venus.

Copper is the sole metal associated with Venus,
Though all valuable minerals, metal or gem, emanate from the treasury of King Jupiter,
Save gold, the metal of the Sun
And silver, the metal of the Moon.
Quicksilver gets its very name from Mercury,
And what but cold iron could serve the swordsman Mars?

All Gods of War be not swordsman, but all in all they all be one: the Norse war god Thor wielding not a sword but a hammer; Egypt’s falcon-headed Horus; Yama, the Vedic superman so good at killing that Shiva the Destroyer made him a god; Quetzlcoatl, the flying serpent whose uncoiling tongue absorbs the souls of his followers’ enemies slain in battle; the old strongman cults that grew up around the myths of Gilgamesh and Hercules; and, Hercules himself contemporaneous to the Greek war god Ares called by the Romans Mars.
And Ares’ beloved, Aphrodite! Like the others, she is not one, but one-in many : the Norse goddess Freya, most beautiful of Asgard’s many beauties; Egypt’s Hathor, pregnant cow finding her joy in the pregnant green earth, goddess of all procreation, vegetable, animal, or divine; India’s Shakti, mistress of the Serpentine Fire, the Kundalini that fires both libido and creativity…and so, as long as one is attracted to another, as long as desire leads to the creation of new human beings, human beings will be worshippers of Venus.

Other deities, while less necessary, are more portentous: gods of intellect and learning but also of knowledges forbidden, of initiation into dark and terrible
secrets, gods like ibis-headed Thoth, scribe of the gods who gave to humanity writing and, thus, civilization; India’s monkey-god Hanuman and North America’s Coyote, both cunning tricksters who display the power of mind both to rectify and to injure, both brothers of the Roman Pantheon’s intelligencer, Mercury.
And each pantheon must have a king, be it the Egyptian Amon, Norse Odin, or the Grand Met of Voodoo; even the Western monotheisms conceive their God with royal symbolism, right down to the scepter/thunderbolt, borrowed directly from Zeus, aka Jupiter.

Where lunar deities are concerned, goddesses like Artemis and Diana tell only part of the story: the other side of the young virgin Artemis, symbolic of Luna’s waxing phase, is the waning crone Hecate, a wisewoman, keeper of women’s mysteries and, like Astarte and Cybele, wielder of the sorceries of the Moon!
Neither can the whole story of solar deities be gleaned from the depictions of gods like Phoebus Apollo, for since the tale of Egypt’s Osiris, of his dismemberment and resurrection, the solar cycle of rising and setting has meant the rebirth and redemption not only of the earth but of the individual soul: thus, solar deities are not only solar charioteers but are also redeemers, like that Man from Nazareth…a Son as well as the Sun?

To wield the Lamp of Spirit as a Magical Weapon is like controlling the Sun.
The Sword, consecrated after having been dutifully inscribed with the proper symbolic formulae, becomes demon bane – this keeps demons out of the circle if the concentration wavers – but the Sword can only slay the vermin once they’re struck, the Magician must do the rest: take up the Sword and bellow war like Mars.
The Athame, the Crystal Ball, the Witches’ Broom…many are the Weapons of the many-sided witch queen of the many-phased night sky coursing Moon.
The Scepter or Staff of rulership, badge of high rank in the Orders of the Western Mystery Tradition, and a symbol of the Magician’s power, for does not the scepter become a thunderbolt in the hands of King Jupiter?
The Receptacle: long before Freud, the Cup symbolized that part of a woman’s body from which life emerges…as the Magician takes sacramental wine from the Chalice, so he kisses the Goddess Venus.
Magic Wands : the ibis-headed Staff of Ibis-headed Thoth , without limits to its power ; Aaron’s rod ; the Winged Caduceus given to Hippocrates by its original owner, Hermes called Mercury.

Divinatory foreknowledge and several other ceremonial forms of magic are the province of Mercury.
Accomplishing the Great Work, the Union of Microcosm with Macrocosm, is a power beyond power given initiates as surely as rises the sun.
Achieving great wealth is allegedly achieved by invoking Jupiter1
While destroying one’s enemies is allegedly achieved by invoking Mars
And winning love, they say, requires supplication to lovely sky-coursing Venus
While all witchcraft is the province of the Moon.

To preview the next lesson, I will give a few examples : the Kabbalistic Tree of Life tells us that the Tarot card called The Sun is generated by the reverberations between the energies of the Moon and the energies of Mercury
While the card called Death lies on the path between Venus and the Sun
And Strength lies between Mars and Jupiter.

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