Magickal Languages

So there I was, procrastinating as usual. I’m supposed to be preparing an important draft for something, but I didn’t really feel like working and was browsing YouTube instead.

“But you said you would be working” says the Higher Self.
“But I hate working. I just want to chill out and relax and eat a chocolate and sleep”
“Then why don’t you? Why are you watching a YouTube video while thinking about work?”
“Well, you got me there. But it’s not even midday”

And suddenly, I saw something that caught my eye. There’s a band called Warduna. It’s a Nordic band who make a lot of folk, pagan songs. If you have ever watched the hit TV series Vikings, then a vast majority of the music in that was made by Warduna.
And they had put out a trailer for a virutal release show called “First Flight of the White Raven”. Basically, it’s a virtual concert. They called it “age defining”, since this is quite a novel, and somewhat revolutionary concept (if they pull it off). Very much in line with the Age of Aquarius which we have now entered into.

But my mind was focused on just one thing, First Flight of the White Raven. Releasing mere days after the Spring Solstice. And so I think to myself “I think the Universe is trying to tell me something”.

For about a month and a half, I’ve been working on the great secret of magick part 2. However, it’s very long and elaborate, and will take longer to complete, making sure all my facts are right. This made me realise that if I focus solely on the longer, elaborate posts, the blog will move along very slowly. Additionally, there are many, many shorter concepts I want to write about. Some I’ve been sitting on for years, and unless I get them out they’ll be on the back-burner forever.

So while you wait for the next part of the secret of magick, here’s a much shorter post.

Secondly, I want to make a short announcement, although a formal one will follow soon. Last July, I published an e-Grimoire titled “The Tree of Life: A Beginner’s Guide”.

I wrote and edited the book myself, and attempted to put a decade of Kabbalistic study into a few condensed pages. However, I am currently editing it, and a new version will be available shortly, Of course, it will be freely available to anyone who has already purchased the book, and those who purchase the book from then on, will receive the second version. There will be corrections, and some new material. I am not satisfied with how certain concepts have been explained, so I will be expanding on various things, and clarifying many more.

Anyway, let’s get to today’s post.

The Evolution of Languages

There are many languages spoken in the world today, and all are different. As far as anyone can guess, human language is extremely unique compared to other animals. We do not know exactly how it came about. The general opinion is that the first humans living on the African continent must have had a single, common language. Then, through migrations and the fracturing and expansion of human culture, languages diverged and evolved separately. This process continues even today, and all new languages are born from older ones. Every language begins as a dialect of an older language, but then if any time is spent separated, they may become completely separate from one another. Sometimes the separation is not so obvious.

The other opinion, of course, is that language emerged independently in many different places. There’s already indication that things like agriculture, writing, the wheel and fire were invented/ discovered multiple times. Meaning these things were discovered independently by different groups at different times. However, language is much more ancient. It’s so ancient that it’s difficult to be sure if there is one, single root language or multiple ones.

Research shows that when a infant is learning to speak, it isn’t making meaningless noises. When it “babbles”, it is slowly going through every single sound that it can make, and from observing its parents it is learning a ‘language’. Basically, it’s almost like you’re born with the ability to pronounce every single imaginable language. As you learn your ‘mother tongue’, your speech becomes more fixed and linear. I mean, to me that sounds like language is not learned, nor inherited. Rather, it is so old it is simply part of our genome. If language really is that old, all of them probably emerged from a single language. Human beings are genetically able to speak language. Sophisticated language is part of our very nature, and it isn’t learned. This may be why it is so hard to ‘teach’ language to animals.

English and Scotts are separate languages, but they are also often treated as just two dialects of the same language. Meanwhile, Urdu and Hindi really are just separate dialects, but treated as different languages due to the script they are written in. Italian and Spanish are completely separate languages, but have common ancestry and are mutually intelligible. Meaning, an Italian can understand a Spanish speaker (to an extent) and vice versa.

Meanwhile, Spanish and Mexican Spanish are the same language, but centuries of separation has almost made them mutually unintelligible. Chinese and Japanese Kanji are the same script and language, but pronounced completely differently. Persian and Russian have a common heritage, but for all intents and purposes they are entirely different.

Hebrew is a derivation of Aramaic and Coptic. Greek is derived from it, and Latin from it. Yet, of these languages only Greek and Hebrew remain commonly spoken, and due to cultural differences you can barely see any similarity.

The point is, there are many, many languages. Some old, some young, and each equally valid to those who speak it. There is a phenomena where if you hear someone speaking a language very differently from you, or speaking your language with an accent, your brain perceives them as being ‘childish’ or ‘uncivilised’.

Throughout history, many cultures have had such tendencies. This is very odd, but you can see why it is such. Maybe our brain perceives a foreign language as “babbling”, and interprets it as the utterances of a toddler. The word “barbarian” literally comes from the Ancient Greeks, who remarked that non Greek languages sounded like gibberish, or ‘bar-bar’. The Ancient Vedic people had a similar term ‘mleccha’ for non-Sanskrit speakers, indicating how the languages sounded crude and random.

In other words, language is intimately tied to culture. We may even say that language IS culture, and most languages evolved with a culture, and are intimately tied to it. The characteristics ascribed to a culture, are also often ascribed to the language. In fact, it is often that the characteristics of the language define many behaviors and mindsets found in it’s speakers.

Language Affects the Brain

The example I gave above is just one example to show how language profoundly affects our brain. This is a known and proven fact that the way we use language determines the way we think, and speaking multiple languages enhances this.

To all magicians and occultists, this should be something to take note of. Our magick is the manifestation of our mind. The way we think, determines our reality. And if our way of thinking is determined by our language, then we’d do well to understand this.

As far as I can tell, there is no clear scientific consensus on this yet, and many opinions, and here I cannot present evidence, but only tell you what I have channeled during magickal work.

Terrence McKenna had once stated “reality is language”. This is a very deep, and profound statement. It means that the reality that an individual lives in, is defined by them. When we label, judge, describe, categories things mentally, we are basically creating our own reality, our own universe. Mercury, the planet ruling speech and communication, also rules magick. Mercury was depicted with winger sandals, because speech is like Mercury. It travels through the air, taking our will and intentions into the Universe, and into the minds of others.

Maybe this is why so many religious scriptures describe the Universe as being “spoken” into existence. Thoth, the Egyptian God who is the Patron of ceremonial magick, is regarded as the throat and voice of Amun-Ra. Da’ath, the most important Sephirah of the Tree of Life, is placed on the throat of the individual. This whole idea of naming, and categorizing things is important.

Speech is also important, and in magick/ yoga you are asked to vibrate words of power for both manifestation and self transformation. During magickal initiation, the student is also encouraged to break down the words they use so carelessly. For example, by not using their own name, or using words like “I” and “me”, they can begin to break down fixed ways of thinking and bring about spiritual evolution. In ancient Egypt, they refused to put negative or horrific events into writing. They realised that language dictated reality, and this is one reason why there is no hieroglyphic depiction of the death of Osiris at the hands of Set, although his resurrections is often shown.

During channeling I was told that language, both in form of speech and writing, dictate our neural pathways, and determines how our mind works. A powerful magician/ yogi can alter reality by mere utterances, and this is also why Adepts remain silent more often than not. They are able to generate a lot of energy, and understand that what they say, will manifest. The purpose of drawing in and building up spiritual energy in oneself is so that it may be projected, in the form of speech.

You remember how, when you were young, you were forced to learn “cursive” writing? Depending on how archaic your education system was, you may or may not have. Those of you who did, may remember that it was a pretty annoying task. For me, I could NEVER get it right. It was very difficult for me to replicate things exactly as I saw them, and this is something that is reflected even today in my artwork (I struggle at still life drawings. I don’t like replication. Instead, I simply use things as reference and draw them spontaneously, building them up from basic forms instead of ‘copying’ them as they are).

Due to this, I was branded as having ‘bad handwriting’ until I was about 11 years old. And in my school, these sorts of things were considered really important for some reason. My mother would often sit me down and make me go through handwriting exercises. But I remained bad, and hated having to replicate the same sentence over and over, and in an exact, pre-specified pattern. When I was in 6th grade, one teacher probably noticed my awful, almost unintelligible notebooks filled with cursive, which often I myself couldn’t read. She called me over and asked if I’d ever considered writing in block letters. No, I hadn’t. She asked me to try it, and the result was almost like magick. After 11 years of painstaking gibberish, the words and letters I made actually looked…clean, and legible. I was rather proud of myself then, and have continued writing in block letters since.

Now consider this: every ancient language, and pretty much every language until the middle ages was written in block letters. The first languages, Sumerian, Harappan, Chinese, Mycenean and Egyptian were all like this. This is largely because cursive was not possible until paper and ink was common, cheap and easy to source. You cannot do cursive on clay, stone or wood.
All ‘magickal’ languages, like Hebrew and Runic, are written in blocks, and not cursive. The greatest Empires of the world, like Rome, used block letters. Enochian, the only magickal language that was directly channeled and is the single most powerful magickal language today, is written as blocs, with no cursive version possible nor available.

Remember that I am simply relaying what was told. I am not criticising anyone. I was told by the Spirits that forcing people to write in cursive is basically a tool of enslavement, and of ensuring obedience. You know how Spirits often tell magicians that we can’t understand certain things because we think in a very ‘linear’ manner? In fact, creativity itself requires lateral, not linear thinking.

Well, I was told that the cursive script basically conditions and programs the brain to think linearly and categorically, and the standardization of cursive script limits individual expression. There’s a reason why magicians, mystics and shamans did not write using cursive or employ repetitive calligraphy.

We are told to write in a fixed, linear pattern. The words are joined to one another, and separated by spaces. Through this, we condition ourselves to view the world categorically, and moving through linear time. The spirits literally called modern English “the language designed for bureaucratic administration“. Recently, I was in the midst of a deep trance, and channeling some stuff from an Enochian King. He paused, and remarked how tedious the English language was. He said that he would much rather speak in symbols or impression, and each impression I received had to be laboriously unpacked into many words. So many words to say so little. So many needless vowels. I asked if I should employ Hindi instead, but no. After that, he encouraged me to write in keywords instead, not using a singe complex term. Problem is, in English only elaborate and complex phrases can be used for intricate ideas. The simple words indicate simple, crude ideas. Unlike in ancient languages, words for complex emotions, concepts and modes of thinking do not exist in modern tongues. This problem is also present in Indian and Middle Eastern languages, such as Hindi, where words are joined using straight lines after being written, and Arabic which generally cannot be written without continuous connection. Arabic and Farsi do not even have bloc forms, as far as I know.

I was told that this makes most languages unsuitable for true magickal use, since a person is simply unable to break away from fixed ways of thinking, even though their mother languages etc. allowed for this. Keep in mind that I’m only referring to the way the scripts are commonly taught, not criticising the languages themselves.

Even previously, the Angels had remarked that many of their teachings were misunderstood along the ages due to the English language. This happened when we were talking about ‘failure’ and they showed annoyance at that word. What even is ‘failure’? The correct words should be success and un-success, they remarked, since a failure is either something that wasn’t meant to be, or something that hasn’t worked out yet. I’d once even asked about free will, asking if we were truly free, or was our life determined. Here too, they shows confusion and discomfort, saying that such a question made no sense.
“When one is in service of their Highest Ideal, then their Will is free. And when not, it is un-free, since it is controlled by lesser ideals and desires” they said.

This reminded me of ancient Sanskrit, where words often were like that. Often, a word would be a concept, and its opposite was the same word, with an ‘a’ or ‘un’ before it. For example

Shubha: Auspicious
Ashubha: Unauspicious

Anta: Ending
Unanta: Not ending (eternal)

Jeevit: Breathing (word for alive)
Ajeevit: Not breathing (word for dead)

Unlike modern Indian languages, which are joined together using strokes and very ornately formed, ancient Sanskrit was written in a much simpler, bloc letters. One such discovered script is Brahmi. Look at the differences between Brahmi, and modern Devanagari, used often for Hindi, Bengali and Sanskrit these days.

I was told that this is why groups like the Golden Dawn insisted on using Hebrew, which is a language free of such cursive repetition and joining. And yet, it has it’s own problems. If you go and try to learn Hebrew, you will most likely be told that you should use a special flat tipped, calligraphy pen. If you’ve ever seen Hebrew letters, you’ll know why. There is a specific way to form each letter, and early in my magickal practice I spent an entire week learning to draw each letter. But it wasn’t perfect, and I don’t use it often. Sometimes, while making talismans, the letters I drew would turn out wonky and imperfect, and this bothered me. Often, I’d even remake entire talismans if I got the lettering wrong or made mistakes.

I was told that this too was just me enslaving myself, and become subservient to arbitrary methods. Lately I’ve been working on a new magickal circle, and was told that I should use the old Aramaic or Coptic script instead of Hebrew. Aramaic is the root of the Hebrew script, and is written as bloc letters. I’ve often seen advanced magicians using it in place of the modern Hebraic script. I was also told to write Hebrew plainly, and without any elaborate flairs.

These dogmas and ‘sophisticated’ methods were originally out of necessity. The ancient Hebrew scholars would have used flat tipped reed pens, hence their specific style of writing. Today, it makes no sense for us to buy special calligraphy pens.

I was told that one language which had escaped this treatment was Japanese. Anyone who knows a bit about Japan and Japanese will know that Shinto is among the few religions where magick, spirituality and religion are still enmeshed and unseparated. Japan is also the centre of a staggering amount of occult activity, and many occultists. Far, FAR more than anywhere else, except maybe Northern Europe. Somehow, Japanese enables its users to more easily understand magick.

Japanese is a complex language, containing 3 separate scripts. Kanji is the Chinese characters which were carried over into Japanese. It is a pictorial language, rather than alphabetical. Yet, it also has an alphabetical counterpart (unlike Chinese) called hiragana. Most Japanese know roughly 1000 Kanji, and each characters represents a concept. Words and sentences are the expressions of compound concepts, made from simpler concepts. Sometimes, even simple Kanji are put together to form more complex Kanji. Words can be interpreted many different ways, and there is a great ability to play around with and use words in interesting and unique ways, making literature and poetry quite interesting. It is a language that conditions the brain to be fluid, open minded and lateral. This is perhaps why Japanese culture encourages creativity and problem solving far more.

And yet, I was told that even here there was an problem. When I was learning Japanese, one thing that struck me as odd is that Kanji must be drawn in a very specific way. Meaning, you don’t just draw what you see. Instead, there is a fixed sequence and hand motion that is made for every stroke or every character. Yes, it is exactly as crazy as it sounds. Imagine if there was a single way to draw the letter “A” and every stroke had to be memorised, and most native speakers could tell if it was drawn wrongly. Additionally, many rules and regulations exist in how the language must be used, and there’s many, many ways to offend people. This is one of the reasons I haven’t done any Japanese study in about 10 months. I simply did not have the time to memorise how to draw the Kanji.

The sequence of strokes is again, simply the carrying on of an old tradition. In old days, Kanji were written using an ink brush. The strokes and their order was simply to ensure the letter was clean, used minimal ink and did not smudge. In modern times, it is senseless and needless, as are many feudal formalities and behaviors.

The Enochian King told me “do not get obsessed with methodical and intricate ways of doing things”.

I was told calligraphy may be used as an art form, but here it should be an individual expression. So it should not have dogmatic or rigid methods that have to be adhered to. It really does not matter how you form letters as long as you can read it. If you want to be artistic about it, it should be a personal, artistic expression, not a repetition of someone else’s methods.

Language has become a tool of enslavement and control. As George Orwell would say, by controlling language, you control the mind. You control thought, and the ability to think. In order to keep a population in check, language is the best thing to standardize. At this point, the Angels tell me to just create my own language and use it for channeling and magick. This brings me to a new point.

Sacred and Mundane Languages

Anyone who has practiced any spiritual path will see a rather odd occurrence. Very often, we use ‘exotic’ terms within spirituality and magick, often words that originate from the culture where the tradition comes from.

For example, I am an initiate of Hermetic Kabbalah. And yes, Hebrew and Coptic are given tremendous importance, and frequently used in ritual. For Rosicrucians, this may be Greek and Latin.

If you practice Yoga or Tantra, chances are your tradition employs many Sanskrit and Tibetan words. With Daoist and Shaolin traditions, it’s Chinese. With many neo-pagan traditions, it’s old Norse and Greek, and so on.

Why? Is it just exoticism? Just because these languages feel ‘fancy’.

Sometimes, this is absolutely the case.

Vincent Bridges, a great Occultist from recent times, once stated that Sanskrit, Hebrew, Tibetan, Persian and Ancient Greek are all highly effective languages for “programming the Matrix” (for doing Magick). It’s not just these languages that work, but he picked out these languages since they are ancient.

It is not that ancient languages are better. But we can imagine that language was historically used for both mundane life, as well as for sacred ritual work. Naturally, the documents and manuscripts which were often recorded and preserved related to the sacred part of life. The Vedas, the Book of the Dead, the Shabaka Stone, all of these are highly mystical and mythological in nature, partly because the ancients believed that these things needed to be preserved and replicated.

Second came legal and political documents, but these are generally simple and contain lists, inspections and such. I think the Sumerians are one culture which seem to have produced more legal and political documents, than spiritual ones. They really liked taxation.

Documents of mundane activities were, perhaps, not so important. Even if this was put to writing, it was unlikely to be, say, placed in a Temple and preserved for centuries. Ask yourself, what is our primary source for studying ancient Hebrew and Biblical Aramaic? Well, it’s the Jewish and Gnostic holy scriptures, documenting their rituals and containing magickal symbolism of the old Hebrew mystics. You probably won’t find the personal diary of some random Hebrew peasant who worked as an ironsmith.

Put simply, we use ancient languages in magick because they represent that language used in its most exalted and sacred state, designed specifically for ritual work. Often, it contains words of power and other important concepts in an unaltered state. Indeed, the Golden Dawn believed that Hebrew was descended from ancient Egyptian, and that the Hebrew godnames were, in truth, Egyptian words of power, which had remained unchanged, even as the language had evolved.

Samuel Mathers had once remarked “..for Hebrew is but a copy of Egyptian, and a many times faulty copy at that, save the holy names of God..”. This mentality is not new, and has been common throughout history. In medieval Europe, Kabbalists would often use Hebrew since it was considered sacred, even when the language was not native to them. The Catholic Church still insists on using Latin for its ritual ceremonies. We can imagine that when the Roman Church was founded, Latin was used simply because it was most common in Rome and surrounding regions. But the Church preserved its sacred Latin perfectly, while the common Latin continued to evolve and eventually became various different European languages, and most people could no longer understand the sacred hymns. A similar thing happened in India, where Vedic Sanskrit was carefully preserved, only for ritual use. Common Sanskrit, which is called Prakrit, was used by ordinary people and evolved to become the various languages spoken today in North India.

So, are ancient languages better than modern languages? Not precisely. Rather, some languages are better for use in magick, because of how they influence the brain. Sacred and magickal languages tend to have unique properties and characteristics, and their usage conditions the user’s mind to comprehend and perceive spiritual phenomena. It just happens so that most of these languages are ancient, but many are more modern too. Take the Theban script, for example, or Enochian. The language is not sacred because it is ancient, but because it is powerful and exalted. And if a language truly is powerful, it is likely to be preserved in a more exalted state over long periods of time, while mundane languages grow out of it, evolve, and fade away. This is why Latin is still around and used for rituals, more or less exactly as Romans used it, while the much more recent Anglo-Saxon is a dead language, and has been replaced by English.

The Pronunciation of Magickal Languages

Finally, we have come to the last and most important part, the usage of magickal language.

First, I would like to draw your attention to Hebrew. Hebrew scriptures tells us that YHVH is a powerful godname. It is a word of power that is ineffable, meaning ‘unpronounceable’. There is some evidence that YHVH is derived from a very ancient expression of divinity in that region.

But Judaism has made an error. It has mistaken “cannot be pronounced” with “should not be pronounced”. Like most modern religions, mainstream Judaism is more concerned with adhering to outdated tenets than actual, magickal work. So, many Jews simply do not pronounce the name, and call it Tetragrammaton instead. Christians just crudely butcher it as ‘Jehovah’ or ‘Yahweh’.

Even in the Golden Dawn, the Adepts either did not understand this, or (more likely) they DID understand the truth but did not put it into writing. They pronounced it as ‘Yehovah’. By the way, for most magickal purposes you should use this pronunciation, since it is a word free from religious connotations, and unlike the previous two terms its energy has not been tainted by dogma.

You see, I discovered in my channeling (and also working with a more experienced channeller) that there are two ways of using magickal languages, and this was their intended use.

The first is what I have decided to call ‘the guttural noises’. When the magician enters into a deep trance, he begins doing what Christian mystics call “speaking in tongues”. No, there is no difference between “divine” and “demonic” speech. It’s all just various different forms, depending on what the magician, mystic or yogi is invoking. In this state, the words spoken by the magician are difficult to ascertain.

What you’ve probably commonly seen is not the true version, but rather a tame version, where conscious effort is made to ‘speak gibberish’ and enter into trance. However, this is not guttural noises, but barbarous speech instead. Barbarous because it’s literally gibberish, and designed to enter trance and ‘turn off’ the conscious ego. The barbarous names from the Bornless Ritual are these. However, the guttural noises I’m talking about happen in deep trance, and naturally. It’s practically impossible to decipher or record it, and even if the best attempt was made, it would merely be a meaningless string of letters, which would seem un-pronounceable. It sounds very similar to the way that Serpent tongue thing was depicted in Harry Potter, whose name I cannot recall. It’s also similar to the “black speech” from Lord of the Rings (which, by the way, is a fantastic depiction of how magick works, if you read the books).

THIS is the truth behind the “ineffable” names of God, such as YHVH. Even if I wanted to tell you how to pronounce it, I couldn’t. But if you Will yourself to read it in deep trance, you’ll be able to, as well as learn the true pronunciation of other words of power. Of course, don’t worry about not being able to. This is one of the purest forms of speech with Higher powers, since they do not speak in language or symbols, but rather in impressions. These noises are simply manifestations of those impressions, which are understood by the speaker in quick succession. In a few utterances, the speaker, even in trance, understands the full context of the message being delivered. Vibrating the names normally also has power, and most magicians will spend years vibrating words of power before they learn to enter deep enough trance to make the guttural noises, and this is totally normal and the experience for everyone. No matter how you pronounce them, words of power are words of power, and can be vibrated. Intent and emotion contain the real force behind them.

This brings me to the second mode of magickal speech, which I call “mystic vibrations”.

Consider the human throat, vocal chords, mouth, tongue and lips to form a complex, elaborate and wonderful musical instrument. It is simultaneously a wind instrument and a string instrument. Like a trombone, flute and harp all merged as one. The guttural noises are made by the throat, blowing out air. The contractions of the throat form words, and the tongue and mouth push it out. The vibrations, then, are musical notes played by the vocal chords. Here, trance is not needed, but helps. Keep in mind that I am not a singer, and have no formal training. Generally, I can’t raise my voice beyond a single octave. However, when I am in deep meditation I can go up and down the octave with ease, even playing little melodies with them as I would on my guitar.

The musical notes and keys, of course, are related to the 7 Chakras, and 7 Septenary spheres in various ways. There are seven notes in your standard octave 9since the 8th is simply the first note of the next octave). They relate to the 7 chakras.

The most effective usage of this was in ancient Greece, where they employed various “modes of chanting” to invoke the energies of the Seven planets, This practice was later adopted by both the Catholic and Orthodox Churches, and even today these “Gregorian modes” are used very, very effectively to invoke planetary energies, and I am certain that many Christian mystics are also aware of this. However, the most potent mode of this chanting I have ever encountered was by the early Satanic folk movements of the mid-20th century. Since it is “Gregorian”, you can bet the Cathars had a hand in reviving it.

Perhaps, if you had a key, or created one, you could translate magickal languages like Hebrew, Sanskrit and Runic into musical notes. You could then, perhaps, arrange and compose melodies using the Gregorian modes of chanting. You could play this on an instrument, or those of you who can actually sing well could use this to chant. If I can generate as much energy as I do by merely going up and down a single octave, imagine what a proper singer could do with 5 octaves.

Perhaps, the purest magickal language would be a combination of both guttural noises and mystic vibrations. I have often heard that something of the sort is done in Mongolian throat singing, but I don’t know enough about it to confirm. I can, however, confirm that I have witnessed an arrangement of Chinggis Khaani Magtaal being used to channel Chinggis Khan himself (who, by the way, was a Shaman and ascended master. His history and life is grossly distorted, since the Mongols, like Vikings, did not write their own histories and all history comes from accounts by their enemies. Despite the efforts of historians, popular myths stick around. I will soon have a complete article on Tengri shamanism). Maybe, if there is a Mongolian throat singer reading, you could try this.

Now, guttural noises can only be used in trance. Enter into trance and have, say, Hebrew godnames before you. Have these as they are in ORIGINAL Hebrew, meaning without vowels. So, rather than Yehovah, Adonai, Ahaayah and Agla, just have YHVH ADNI AHIH AGLA. In trance, attempt to speak them. Call for guidance if you must, and you shall pronounce them correctly.

As for musical keys, I will leave that to another time.

Artificial Languages and Daily Life

There are many artificial languages in the world, made for various purposes. Many of you have perhaps seen LOTR or read the works of J.R.R Tolkien. All the languages depicted in his stories are real languages, and he put a lot of effort into them. In fact, there’s a joke that he didn’t create the languages for the stories, but rather created the stories so he’d have somewhere to use his languages.

The most famous are, of course, Theban and Enochian. Theban is not really a language, but rather a cypher system. Meaning it’s still English, but written with an alternative script. I’m pretty sure the occultist Donald Tyson has also created a similar set of glyphs.

But Enochian is truly unique. It is a complete, comprehensive language, and very similar to the condensed, ancient languages like Sanskrit or Egyptian. Perhaps if one could learn and use it, it would condition our minds to be very much aligned with magick. Sadly, I do not know of any such attempts made to teach the language or use it in daily speech. However, there is still something we can learn from all this.

First, it is entirely possible to create a system of glyphs for your personal use, like Theban is. It is also possible to create or channel a language entirely of your own for magickal use. It may take a little study of linguistics. At the very least, knowing more than one language helps, but Tolkien made several. I don’t see why you can’t make one.

The ancient, sacred languages are condensed and simple. Meaning you can say a lot with just a few words. They are usually written with bloc letters (Hebrew/Sanskrit) or pictorial symbols (Japanese) where each letter/symbol represents a whole concept in and of itself, and words are compounds of concepts, while sentences are an expression of multiple concepts. This is very sophisticated compared to modern, alphabetical language use. We use many words to say little, and lack words to express complex emotions, and express things not as fluid concepts, but as categorical “objects” which all proceed from each other in a linear fashion. We express things as they happened or things as they are, rather than ideas and impressions and emotions. It is very obsessed with categories, labels and the idea of reality being fixed and systematic, with a hard separation between past, present and future. Very un-magickal.

For this I have no remedy, I can only share my own experiences. Reading lots of magickal literature, and especially invocations written by the Golden Dawn, has had an effect on me, and that ornate, grimoire style of English comes very easily to me these days. I mean, yeah, 8 years of study of magickal literature will do that. I find this English to be more refined, and when I go into my ritual space and start doing magick, I can switch to this style of speech almost spontaneously, on a whim.

This is generally the way I speak during ritual, but never in daily life. This keeps the style ‘sacred’ and free of profanity. In daily life, I take a very different approach.
Additionally, I try to avoid speaking about things that I don’t want happening, especially to other people or online. Words have power, and the intention of others has even more power. I also avoid listening to or filling my head with disempowering thoughts, ideas and symbols. I try to use simple, straight forward vocabulary, to keep mainly my own mind clear about what I want and what I mean. I try to speak less, and don’t waste energy talking about pointless things. Sometimes, I do get lost in thought or conversation, but this leaves me a bit drained, and I abstain from speech after this. Finally, learning other languages has helped me open and expand my mind to other ways of thinking about the world. I’ve found Japanese to be especially interesting, and very different from my usual speech. It’s a shame I haven’t had much time to study it since last July.

I have said my piece.

Until Next Time
White Raven Invictus

2 thoughts on “Magickal Languages

  1. This was just throughly interesting to read. It was very knowledgeable. Loved the way you explain and break down things. I’m a Hindu myself. I think me stumbling upon your blog was supposed to happen as an answer to my question I’ve had since a very long time. I have one question, I hope you answer it. You’re a Hindu and still you practise magick of various sorts and channel many beings. Does it not come in the way of our Hindu gods? Like don’t we need to follow a single pantheon ?

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    1. Depends. First off, the word “Hindu” is simultaneously a religious, and an ethno-cultural term. For me, “Hindu” is my cultural identity, similar to Jewish or Nordic or American. I do not consider myself a follower of “Hindu-ism”. In fact, I don’t consider myself to be religious at all, and I do not maintain any religious observances. This is due to my opinion that right now we are moving into a new astrological age, and all modern religions must give way to new ones, including new sorts of Hindu traditions.

      As for “coming in the way”, that also depends. Unlike Abrahamic religions, Dharmic religions are not scriptural. There is no single Hindu holy book that all Hindus agree to, except maybe the Bhagawat Gita, which does not require the following of any single pantheon. If anything, it encourages the abandoning of religious worship in favour of Yoga (which is the same as magick).

      I mean, MOST Hindus do not follow a single Pantheon anyway. Krishna, Indra, Ganesha…all these gods originate from different pantheons and cultures that have fused together over many centuries. It’s difficult to discern a single, conclusive pantheon. Hinduism is the product of extreme syncretism, similar to Greco-Roman paganism in the past. So I’d say it all depends on which scripture you take to be an “authority” on this subject, or which sect you belong to, if any. For me, I neither accept any scripture as singular authority, nor belong to any sect. I also reject the traditional religious hierarchies of priesthood and worship. Again, not because they are ‘wrong’, but simply belong to the previous Age. Hmm, maybe I will write a post on the shift in Astrological Ages.

      There’s no ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ path, only what you need to do at a given moment. Maybe you are at a stage in your spiritual development where you must be religious, or maybe a stage where you need to practice rejecting religion. The same goes for culture and society. Sometimes, a culture needs to be devout, and at other times rational.

      -WRI

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