Glossary of Magical & Qabalistic Terminology (5)

 

 Ruach: One of the five parts of the human soul in the Qabalah. On the Tree of Life the Ruach comprises the seven sephiroth from Chesed to Yesod, the latter being its point of contact with the part of the soul called Nephesch. Ruach is the Hebrew word for “breath; scent; fragrance”. The word Ruach is used for “spirit”, the breath of life forming and animating creation. In the Old Testament, this spirit is described as the primal force emerging from chaos: “And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters” (Genesis 1: 2). The Ruach radiates out of the centre of consciousness called Khabs in Liber AL vel Legis, and permeates creation. (See also Current; Khabs; Nephesch; Soul) Scarlet Woman (the): The name “Scarlet Woman” originates from St. John’s book of Revelation, in which it is given to the great prostitute Babylon (Rev. 17: 17–18). Together with the “Beast” she represents the force ruling the material universe. The name Babylon derives from the Hebrew word “Babel”, meaning “anointed” as well as “mix, mingle and confuse”. As manifested existence, she is multiplicity, the illusory Maya of Eastern mysticism. Her name is also related to the ancient Egyptian word for the soul, Ba. Her sacrament is bread, the visible manifestation of the spirit and the preserver of life which, having many grains in one substance, represents multiplicity.
Bread and cakes (see Liber AL vel Legis, III: 25) are the traditional sacrament of the goddess in most, if not all of her aspects. Revelation tells the allegorical story of her initiatory death, through which she is taken as bride by the Lamb and transfigured into the heavenly Jerusalem (or renewal of the Word at the spring equinox of Aries – see Revelation, 21). The nuptial feast that follows the hour of doom of the Scarlet Woman is a celebration of the soul’s victory over death and world illusion, of her union with the eternal. 
Aleister Crowley spelt the name Babylon as “Babalon”, the Chaldean word for “gate of the god”, a name which qabalistically adds to 156. This is also the number of Zion, the sacred mountain that the Initiate must ascend to triumph over the “word of Sin” that is “Restriction”. Liber AL vel Legis reveals that Hadit, the giver of life, manifests Nuit as the Scarlet Woman, the supernal Khu and creative world of Briah. In manifesting her, he manifests life, the body or matrix in which he comes into existence as the Beast, the supernal Khabs and world of Atziluth. In the Scarlet Woman “is all power is given” (Liber AL vel Legis I: 15). This power is that of Hadit, the serpent or 93 current animating the life of the Scarlet Woman and radiating from the Khabs contained within her. 
Above the Abyss the Scarlet Woman is the body of Nuit, the company of heaven, the intelligence referred to as Neschemah in the Qabalah. In her underworld aspect the Scarlet Woman is manifested as the great dragon, the material and visible world (Assiah) at the base of the Tree. Therein dwell man, demons, and the Qliphoth or shells of the dead. However, in earlier Sumerian depictions of the Scarlet Woman it is clear that the underworld was not then seen as a place of evil ipso facto – as it was in later times when scriptural interpretation became the sole means of conveying knowledge.
The descent of the Scarlet Woman into the underworld was originally not seen as a “fall from grace”, but as a heroic act. By so doing, she is able to awaken the power of the Beast for the purposes of Initiation. So far as the ‘sinful’ nature of the Scarlet Woman is concerned, it is interesting to note that in Hebrew the word “sin” actually means “thorn” and “clay”. Thorny plants such as the acacia or rose symbolise the horns of the crescent moon. The moon itself, like the clay shaped by the hands of the divine potter, is a symbol of the body and the natural soul. Liber AL vel Legis describes the Scarlet Woman as being “a moon” (I: 16); as a moon, she is containment and receptivity, as well as the division into parts of cyclical, phasic existence. She is the placenta feeding the magical embryo or Khabs.
By analogy with atomic theory, the Scarlet Woman in the underworld is as the neutron in the atom nucleus; the celestial Scarlet Woman as the electron cloud. (See also Atom; Beast; Briah; Electron Cloud; Khabs; Khu; Nephesch; Neschemah; Neutron; Soul) Set: The primordial god of the Egyptians, whose name has the meaning, “black”. Set is the son of the great mother goddess Nuit-Typhon-Draco. He embodies the principles of dividing, cleaving, breaking, slaying and reversing. He is the means of ingress and egress between the worlds, and of passing backwards and forwards between time and eternity. Set is the “slayer of the real” who breaks the circle of infinity to beget creation. 
Conversely, Set moves through creation as the destroyer perpetually annihilating the forms he created out of chaos. His dwelling place is the desert, the burning and transforming expanse of the Abyss in which knowledge and the contents of mind turn to dust. 
Set is the double; he is always where consciousness, embodied by his twin brother Horus, is not. Thus he drives consciousness forwards – which may mean backwards, depending on one’s point of view! 
Through polarisation, Set both restores equilibrium where there is excess, and creates movement where there is inertia. He is the opposer, the accuser, the dark sun who presides over all that is opposite and “outside” – all that is other, alien, unseen and unexpected. 
He is the “sun of midnight” who is “ever a son” (Liber AL vel Legis III: 74). He is the beginning and the end, the Alpha and the Omega. As such he is the Lord of Initiation eternally moving consciousness beyond its own boundaries, whether towards or away from manifestation. Together, Set and Horus, the sky by night and the sky by day, form a ladder between heaven and earth. 
Appointer of life and death, Set is the Lord of Hell or Amenta. Evoker of the nigredo, he presides over the alchemical dross, the transmutation of which is the magical secret of the Great Work. The Setian forces of dispersion and change are the power that enables the cyclical renewal of the physical universe. Set is closely associated with Hadit and his manifestation, the Beast. 
The polarity of Set and Horus was known at Aunnu or On (Heliopolis) as the double god Heru-Set, whose attributes are similar to those of Heru-ra-ha. Aunnu was considered to be the birthplace of Horus, the Word. (See Heru-ra-ha; Hoor-paar-kraat; Horus; Ra Hoor Khuit) Soul: The Hebrew word for “soul” is Nephesch, meaning literally, “to take breath”. In the Old Testament’s book of Genesis, the creation of the soul is described as follows: “And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul” (Gen. 2: 7). The life-giving breath taken in by the soul is called the Ruach, a Hebrew word that means breath but also smell, scent, or fragrance. The soul may thus be defined as matter animated by the divine breath or Word. 
In classical Greek the soul is called Psyche that, like the Hebrew Nephesch, means the breath of life. The Greeks used the word Psyche to generally refer to everything in which there is life. They regarded the soul as the vital force that animates the body and shows itself in breathing. The meaning of the word Psyche thus covered the twin principles of force and form, the life-giving power of the divine breath or Ruach and the living creature or Nephesch it animates. 
In biblical writings the Nephesch is sometimes simply referred to as “the flesh”. In Liber AL vel Legis, life and the life-giving power of the divine breath or Word are associated with Hadit, who declares that he is “Life and the giver of Life” (Liber AL vel Legis, II: 6). Hadit is the power hidden behind the life of the soul, whom he manifests as the Scarlet Woman. His life-giving power he manifests as the Beast. Liber AL vel Legis also uses two Egyptian terms to refer to the matrix of life who takes in the divine breath and the source of this breath. These are called the Khu and the Khabs. 
Owing to the division of consciousness or “fall”, these twin principles are themselves doubled. The Khabs and the Khu each dwell at once in eternity, where they are celestial and in perfect union, and in time, where they are separate from each other. The natural soul, called Ka by the ancient Egyptians, is granted freewill. Her life is individual and personal. She is the seat of the mind, will, appetites, desires and passions. The life of the fallen soul is in nature, and is consequently mortal, mutable and perishable. To achieve Hadit the natural soul must be reunited with her double that dwells in the immutable realm of spirit. Through magical incarnation her substance is transmuted; no longer bound to that which perishes, she becomes one with the word of her True Will. This life cycle of the soul is summed up in the qabalistic formula of Tetragrammaton. 
In the Qabalah, the soul of man is represented as having five parts: the Yechidah, Chiah, Neschemah, Ruach and Nephesch. (See also Beast; Chiah; Fall; Hadit; Yechidah; Khabs; Khu; Nephesch; Neschemah; Ruach; Scarlet Woman; Tetragrammaton) Sphinx: An ancient Egyptian stone figure situated on the plateau of Giza near the Pyramids. The Egyptian Sphinx has a lion’s body and a human face, representing the dual nature of creation and the interaction of matter and spirit, of the bestial and the human. The lion and the man are symbols of the Kerubs of the astrological signs of Aquarius and Leo, the “Star” and the “Snake” of Liber AL vel Legis. These are the attributes of Nuit and Hadit, and of their manifestation, the Beast and Scarlet Woman, or the Khabs and the Khu. 
The mystery of the Sphinx is that of the mutable, cyclical nature of the life of the universe and the human soul. This passes through four stages: creation in eternity; creation in the world of matter or time and space; death and dissolution of material existence or the “end of time”; and finally, redemption or return to eternity. This quaternary cycle emerges from the doubling of the primal polarity, Nuit and Hadit – a doubling that takes place through creation in matter. 
The universe, both unmanifest and manifested, thus comprises of four cardinal points, two of which are in eternity, and two in time. The cardinal points representing eternity are the North and the South, Aquarius and Leo, Nuit and Hadit manifested as the Beast or Khabs, and Scarlet Woman or Khu. Together they form the vertical axis of the cross – another symbol of the universe. The cardinal points representing time are the East and the West, the astrological signs of Taurus and Scorpio, the Beast and the Scarlet Woman in the underworld. These stand at each end of the horizon and form the horizontal axis of the Cross. 
In classical mythology, the Sphinx is sometimes represented as a fourfold creature, bearing the attributes of all four cardinal points. With a human face, the body of a bull, the feet of a lion and the wings of an eagle, this form of the Sphinx developed from the original image of the dual Egyptian Sphinx. The word “sphinx” itself comes from the Greek sphingein, a word that means, “to draw tight”. Creation is a contraction of infinity. Sphingein is also the root of the word “sphincter”, which points to the relationship between the symbol of the Sphinx and the aperture through which eternity flows into time. This aperture is referred to in Liber AL vel Legis as the Khabs or Beast; in the Qabalah, it is referred to as the world of Atziluth and the sphere of Chokmah. 
One of the images of this metamorphic cycle of life, with its four cardinal points, is the circle of the zodiac, symbol of the celestial Khu. The Sphinx stands at the heart of its twelve signs, of which four are fixed: Leo, Aquarius, Taurus and Scorpio, the four aspects of the Sphinx. The number 12 lies at the basis of the ancient Egyptian description of the great life cycle of the universe, the macrocosm, and of its microcosmic counterpart, the human soul. The macrocosmic cycle was referred to as the Great Year, the precession of the equinoxes through which the earth’s pole travels across twelve “months”, the twelve astrological ages that together extend over a period of approximately 26,000 years. The microcosmic cycle of the soul was described as having twelve hours, the sixth hour being the halfway mark at which the soul begins her descent in the underworld. The ninth hour was that of the transmutation of the elements of the physical body, which was followed by the hour of judgement. 
It then took three more hours for the justified soul to rise from death and return to eternity. 
The date at which the Egyptian Sphinx was built is speculative, but the constellation of Leo the Lion was rising in the direction which the Sphinx is facing around 10,000 BC. At this time, the Sphinx – or its predecessor – would have been perfectly aligned with the polarity formed by Leo and Aquarius, or Hadit and Nuit. 
Taking the starting point for the Sphinx from that “First Time” (as it was referred to by the ancient Egyptians), the astrological Age of Aquarius represents the 6th hour, the beginning of the descent into the underworld. It is fitting that Liber AL vel Legis should have been transmitted when it was, as it contains the keys required by the soul for her triumphant emergence from the underworld that she may pass into the eternal Aeon of Horus. Horus is the god of the Sphinx, his many forms corresponding to the various stages of transformation through which passes the life of the universe, and of the soul also. The name Horus is closely related to the Greek word hora, meaning “season, hour”, the very principles of division into time. (See also Ankh-af-na-khonsu; Beast; Fall; Hadit; Horus; Khabs; Khu; Scarlet Woman) Sirius: Also known as Sothis (meaning “Soul of Isis” in Greek), or the Dog Star. This vast star is sometimes referred to as “the sun behind the sun”, the source of the universe, the duplicator and the renewer of time-cycles. It is the star of Set, whose mother is Ahathoor. In ancient Egypt, Sirius was called the “opener of the year” as its rising corresponds to the rising of the Nile, the river whose waters bring life to the land and announces the renewal of life. (See also Ahathoor; Set) Go to Glossary 6 Return to the top of page Ordo Astri home pageGlossary_2.htmlGlossary_4.htmlGlossary_4.htmlGlossary_1.htmlGlossary_2.htmlGlossary_2.htmlGlossary_2.htmlGlossary_2.htmlGlossary_4.htmlGlossary_4.htmlGlossary_4.htmlGlossary_4.htmlGlossary_4.htmlGlossary_3.htmlGlossary_3.htmlGlossary_3.htmlGlossary_4.htmlGlossary_2.htmlGlossary_2.htmlGlossary_2.htmlGlossary_2.htmlGlossary_4.htmlGlossary_4.htmlGlossary_4.htmlGlossary_4.htmlGlossary_6.htmlGlossary_1.htmlGlossary_2.htmlGlossary_2.htmlGlossary_2.htmlGlossary_3.htmlGlossary_4.htmlGlossary_4.htmlGlossary_1.htmlGlossary_6.htmlOrdo_Astri.htmlshapeimage_2_link_0shapeimage_2_link_1shapeimage_2_link_2shapeimage_2_link_3shapeimage_2_link_4shapeimage_2_link_5shapeimage_2_link_6shapeimage_2_link_7shapeimage_2_link_8shapeimage_2_link_9shapeimage_2_link_10shapeimage_2_link_11shapeimage_2_link_12shapeimage_2_link_13shapeimage_2_link_14shapeimage_2_link_15shapeimage_2_link_16shapeimage_2_link_17shapeimage_2_link_18shapeimage_2_link_19shapeimage_2_link_20shapeimage_2_link_21shapeimage_2_link_22shapeimage_2_link_23shapeimage_2_link_24shapeimage_2_link_25shapeimage_2_link_26shapeimage_2_link_27shapeimage_2_link_28shapeimage_2_link_29shapeimage_2_link_30shapeimage_2_link_31shapeimage_2_link_32shapeimage_2_link_33shapeimage_2_link_34shapeimage_2_link_35shapeimage_2_link_36shapeimage_2_link_37shapeimage_2_link_38shapeimage_2_link_39shapeimage_2_link_40shapeimage_2_link_41shapeimage_2_link_42shapeimage_2_link_43