Divine Names. A cross-cultural comparison - David Porreca

Divine Names: A Cross-Cultural Comparison (Papyri GraecaeMagicae, Picatrix, Munich Handbook)David Porreca

Magic, Ritual, and Witchcraft, Volume 5, Number 1, Summer 2010,pp. 17-29 (Article)

Published by University of Pennsylvania PressDOI: 10.1353/mrw.0.0168

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Editors Note: This article and the following one by Julien Verone`se were both origi-nally presented as papers in the session Divine Names and Traditions of Use at the43rd International Congress on Medieval Studies held at Western Michigan Univer-sity in May 2008.

Divine NamesA Cross-Cultural Comparison

(Papyri Graecae Magicae, Picatrix, Munich Handbook)

DAV I D P O R R E C AUniversity of Waterloo

What do these meaningless words mean anyway, and why are theforeign ones preferred to our own?

Porphyry, letter to Anebo

The celestial and infernal hierarchies have been part of the traditional sourcesof potency for ritual practitioners from the very beginning of the Westernmagical tradition. The names of angels and/or demons were seen as inher-ently powerful in themselves. Since ritual magic is, to an extent, illicit reli-gion, the names of supernatural powers employed in magical operations wereoften culturally marginal or from the outside, originating from neighbor-ing, alien cultures. The presence of Hebrew and Egyptian divine names inthe Greek Magical Papyri is one manifestation of this trend.

This paper examines the extent to which there was continuity in the trans-mission of divine names between the ancient Greek corpus of the Greek

An original version of this paper was presented at the 43rd International Congress onMedieval Studies, Western Michigan University, 9 May 2008. I am grateful to TylerChamilliard for his assistance in producing the diagram that appears in this paper, toJoni-Ann Tait for her revision of assorted drafts, and to Steve Brown for the inspira-tion to write it.

Magic, Ritual, and Witchcraft (Summer 2010)Copyright 2010 University of Pennsylvania Press. All rights reserved.

18 Magic, Ritual, and Witchcraft Summer 2010

Magical Papyri,1 the Latin translation of the Medieval Arabic magical treatisePicatrix,2 and the late medieval Latin/German text from MS Munich, Bayeri-schiche Staatsbibliothek, Clm 849, known as the Munich Handbook.3 Thetables and diagram below lay out the raw results of this study. Before high-lighting the discoveries themselvesexamples of continuity not only in thelexemes of divine names, but also in the understanding of the entities behindthe namesa few words are needed to address the methodology of this study.

In order to keep the volume of material under consideration to a manage-able size, only three corpora were chosen as sources on which to focus. Itshould be noted that a similar examination of other magical compilationswhether that be psuedo-Roger Bacons Thesaurus Necromatiae,4 the pseudo-Solominic Ars notoria,5 or the Hebraic magical texts from the Cairo Genizahcollection6may yield equally interesting results. The choice of sources forthis paper was motivated both by the availability of the material and by thedesire to compare texts originating in different yet related cultures. The De-motic and Coptic spells in the collection of magical papyri assembled byH. D. Betz were not included in this analysis because their cultural link tothe later Arabic and Latin worlds of Picatrix and the Munich Handbook islikely to be even more tenuous than that of the Greek material.7 In selectingthe names that appear in Table I below, only those that refer to nonterrestrial

1. Hans Dieter Betz, ed., The Greek Magical Papyri in Translation, 2nd ed. (Chicago:University of Chicago Press, 1992).

2. David Pingree, ed., Picatrix: The Latin Version of the Ghayat al-Hakim (London:Warburg Institute, 1986).

3. Richard Kieckhefer, Forbidden Rites: A Necromancers Manual of the Fifteenth Cen-tury (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997).

4. Pseudo-Roger Bacon, De Nigromancia, ed. and trans. Michael-Albion Macdon-ald (Gillette, N.J.: Heptangle, 1988).

5. Julien Verone`se, LArs notoria au Moyen Age: Introduction et edition critique (Flor-ence: SISMEL Edizioni del Galuzzo, 2007).

6. Gideon Bohak recently completed a survey of the entire corpus of extant frag-ments of the Genizah collection to identify all those related to magic. He presentedhis findings recently at the first Societas Magica conference held at the University ofWaterloo, June 1115, 2008, as a paper entitled Science, Magic and Religion in theCairo Genizah.

7. In Betzs collection, the Demotic material is identified by subpunction of thetext, while Coptic writing appears as underlined text. Examples of excluded materialare too numerous to list exhaustively. Here are some representative exclusions: PGMI.2523, in Betz, 9 (Coptic); PGM III.41820, in Betz, 29 (Coptic); PGM III.63387, in Betz, 35 (Coptic); PGM IV.76153, in Betz, 3840 (Coptic); PDM xii, inBetz, 15253 (Demotic); PDM xiv, in Betz, 195251 (Demotic); PDM lxi.1158, inBetz, 28690 (Demotic); PDM Suppl., in Betz, 32330 (Demotic).

19Porreca Divine Names: A Cross-Cultural Comparison

beings were included. It is for this reason that names such as Adam, Moses,Jacob, Abraham, Aaron, and Jesus have been left out, even though all of theseappear in at least two of the texts under consideration under the guise ofdivine names being invoked for their magical power.

It should be understood that the list of divine names picked for this studyis a tiny fraction of the whole corpus of thousands of different angels, demons,and other beings whose supernatural power and influence was sought by themagical practitioner. Despite the vast differences in time, space, and culturethat separate the three collections under examination, the fact that there isany overlap at all is remarkable evidence of cultural continuity at some level.These connections prove that there was a common thread of belief regardingnot only the power of words in magic generally, but of the power of divinenames, and of these divine names in particular.

The task of gleaning individual names from the various corpora of spellswould have been facilitated enormously by the existence of keyword-search-able electronic versions of the three collections examined here. David Pin-grees edition of the Latin Picatrix contains a handy alphabetized list ofcelestial names and magical words, and Richard Kieckhefer kindly suppliedme with an electronic version of his edition of the Munich Handbook, butno such systematic compilation is available for the Greek Magical Papyri. Asit is, however, human error and the sins of unintentional omission makethis study an expression of preliminary results, to be built on by the closerexamination of these and other collections of spells.

It is important to be aware of the limitations imposed by the nature of thesurviving material. Several hazards threaten the unwary reader:

1. Variant spellings and the textual artifacts of manuscript copying and trans-mission can make different names evolve to seem identical or, more fre-quently, can make a single name vary enough to be mistaken for differententities. This problem is particularly acute for names derived from Semiticlanguages, discussed further below.

2. The problem of variant spellings is exacerbated by the very reliance ofmagical practitioners on names from cultures different from their own.Their ignorance of the spelling of the name in its original language canonly have increased the likelihood of mangled transliterations, making thestudy of continuity in divine names more difficult for the modern reader.

3. It can also be a problem to distinguish between the meaningless syllablesincluded among the voces magicae from the names intended to designatesupernatural beings or to call on their power. Moreover, in some casesnames were either randomly generated, or, as in cabalistic texts, generated


according to defined methods.8 Creativity in the generation of divinenames is particularly remarkable in the use of verba ignota in the Ars notoria.9

4. The problems related to the identification of divine names are com-pounded by the inherent lack of meaning, for whatever reason, to thescribe of these portions of spells. Carelessness in the copying and transmis-sion of the texts is the direct result, further exacerbating problem 1.

5. The syncretism and the multilingual cultures from which the magical ma-terial emerged leads to multiple possible interpretations of the same name.Is a mention of Set referring to the Egyptian god equivalent to theGreek Typhon or is it the Gnostic Seth who is one of the Seven Archons?The shorter the name, the more acute this problem becomes.

The presence and prominence of foreign or mysterious names in magicalcollections is no accident. Indeed, it is their very foreignness that often grantsthem the aura of occult power. The magical power associated with foreignnations and, by extension, foreign names, is a trope common to all threecultures whose grimoires are examined in this paper. In Apuleius Metamor-phoses, the Egyptian priest Zatchlas is called on to resolve the cause of amysterious death by summoning the spirit of the deceased and questioning itby means of his magical powers.10 In al-Kindis De radiis, the author discussesat length the power of words,11 including that of foreign words, of namesattributed to a higher power, and of the names of God or of spirits or starsor signs.12 Thomas Aquinas seems to take for granted that verba ignota are anessential part of the magical procedures he condemns.13 The ars notoria is theexplicit target of his critique. The treatise entitled Ars notoria contains numer-ous passages where the author invokes the power of names originating fromopenly listed ancient foreign tongues: Chaldean, Greek, and Hebrew.14 Belief

8. Gershom Scholem, On the Kabbalah and Its Symbolism (New York: SchockenBooks, 1965), 3743.

9. The difficulty in dealing with divine names at the editorial level is addressedplainly by the editor of the Ars notoria: Nous avons du renoncer . . . pour ne pastrop alourdir lapparat critique, a` reproduire lensemble des verba mistica proposes parchacun des manuscrits, Verone`se, Ars notoria, 30.

10. Apuleius, Metamorphoses 2.28.11. Marie-There`se dAlverny and Francoise Hudry, eds., Al-Kindi: De radiis, in

Archives dhistoire doctrinale et litteraire du Moyen Age 49 (1974): 139260, at 23350.12. Ibid., 238, 245, 249, respectively.13. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae 2.2.96.1.14. Verone`se, Ars notoria, 36, 37, 41, 52, 266; ibid., 36, 266; ibid., 30, 36, 52,

266, respectively.


in the power of foreign, mysterious, and/or ancient words is therefore ademonstrably common feature in the magical traditions of Europe and theMediterranean from antiquity through the Middle Ages.

This affection for foreign words in magical writings tends to complicatetheir study. In the Greek Magical Papyri alone, the list of languages andcultures is daunting to consider: beyond the Greek, we see sections writtenin Demotic and Coptic, Hebrew names and characters, hieroglyphs, Aramaic,Phoenician, Babylonian, and Persian influences. Picatrix adds Arabic and In-dian names to the mix, not to mention Latin spellings of foreign names fil-tered first through Arabic, and then through the mouths and ears of medievalSpaniard team-translators.15 By comparison, the Munich Handbook is lin-guistically straightforward: Latin with some hints of German.

Other scholars have noted the problems involved in cross-linguistic analy-ses of ancient writings. Gideon Bohak rightly warns scholars of the hazard ofseeing Hebrew, Hebrew everywhere, and not a word makes sense.16 Hepoints out that a randomly generated word of two or three syllables is likelyto have a parallel in Hebrew. Moreover, nearly every root in the Hebrew andAramaic languages can be transformed into an angelic being by adding thesuffix -el; the angel governs whatever the root word refers to. So, any namethat happens to end in -el could be mistaken for an angelic being. The exer-cise of comparing the divine names from different texts allows one to weedout the false positives by correlating the presence of the same name acrossthe centuries. If a name was still worthy of being invoked more than onceafter several centuries, some power must have been attributed to it, even if ithad been merely a random collection of syllables originally. Its presence anduse at a later time helps to confirm the angels power and existence, at leastin the mind of the practitioner using the name. The same applies not only toHebrew-derived names but to all the voces magicae from the Greek MagicalPapyri, whether they had Greek, Egyptian, or any other etymological root. Itis the subsequent invocation of the same name that, from our contemporaryperspective, unambiguously gives meaning to that name in particular.

This argument leaves open the possibility that the same (or sufficientlysimilar) random syllables converged more than once in similar ritual/magical

15. B. Bakhouche, F. Fauquier, and B. Perez-Jean, eds. and trans., PicatrixUntraite de magie medieval (Turnhout: Brepols, 2003), 2427.

16. Gideon Bohak, Hebrew, Hebrew Everywhere? Notes on the Interpretationof Voces Magicae, in Prayer, Magic and the Stars in the Ancient and Late Antique World,ed. S. Noegel, J. Walker, and B. Wheeler (University Park: Pennsylvania State Uni-versity Press, 2003), 6982, at 82.


Diagram I: A Visual Representation of Continuity in the Use of Divine Names

contexts to give an impression of continuity when one is in fact absent. If theexamples of continuity in the use of divine names were isolated and small innumber, the probability of such random convergence in each case would begreat. But, as Table I and Diagram I show, there is a substantial number ofexamples in which the same name is invoked in two different cultural con-texts some 800 to 1300 years after first appearing in the Greek Magical Pa-pyri. Even if they represent a small proportion of the total population ofangels in the practitioners headspaces, they are sufficient to demonstrate thecontinued and perhaps even continuous use of certain names throughout thetime period spanned by the texts under consideration.

So, where does the cultural continuity lie? As the symbols on the left ofTable I indicate, broadly speaking there are five cultural springs for thosedivine names that end up having a life beyond their society of origin. By farthe most common source of divine names in all three of the collections ex-amined was the Hebraic tradition (see Table II). This should come as no


Table I: Continuity in the Use of Divine Names

Legend:U Hebraic name Greco-Roman name Egyptian nameVMuslim name Persian / Babylonian name

Greek Magical Papyri Picatrix Munich Handbook

? Achalich (IV, ix, 43) Achalas (p. 245)

U Adonai (II.146 et al.) Adonai (passim)

Aion (I.309 et al.) Ayn (I, v, 27) Eon (p. 261)Ayn (p.344)

U Anael (XC.10) Anael (IV, vii, 23) Anael (pp. 300, 305, 308,321, et al.)

Apollo (I.262 et al.) Apolin (pp. 193, 195)

? Araz (III, vii, 27) Arath (pp. 304, 340)Araz (p. 269)

U Aziel (XXXVI.174) Aziel (IV, ix, 53) Asyel (pp. 22930)

U Azariel (XXXVI.173) Azariel (p. 309)

U Baroch (XII.156) Baruch (p. 239)Barouch (XLV.2) Braruth (p. 344)

Baruth (pp. 337, 339)

U Basym (IV.1377, LXX.3) Baysyn (p. 261)Basemm (XIII.147) Brasym (p. 274)Basymm (XIII.593) Byasim (p. 274)Bessyn (XIII.166)Besen (XIII.478)

U Bel (IV.1030) Bel (pp. 229, 231, 290,2934)

U Bariz (III, vii, 24) Berith (pp. 193, 195, 201,225, 312, 334, 339)Berich (p. 195)Berit (p. 330)

? Beryenuz (III, x, 9) Berien (p. 222)Beryen (pp. 221, 223)

V Cabil (IV, ix, 33) Cebal (p. 287)

? Dius (IV, ix, 58) Dies (p. 330)

? Diruez (III, ix, 5) Dyrus (pp. 334, 339, 340)

? Eduz (III, ix, 11) Edus (p. 319)


Table I (Continued)


U El (XLVII.1) El (pp. 231, 250, 269, 318,320, 337, et al.)

U Eloai (I.311 et al.) Heloe (p. 230)Eloe (pp. 2489, 261, 269,337, et al.)Eloy (passim)

U Emanouel (XC.5) Emanuel (pp. 244, 269,274, 337, et al.)

? Foruz (III, ix, 2) Fyrus (p. 340)Feruz (III, ix, 12)

U Gabriel (IV.1815 et al.) Gabriel (IV, vii, 23) Gabriel (pp. 276, 318, et al.)

Helios (passim) Helyus (III, ix, 15)

? Helix (LVII.21) Heyluz (III, ix, 5) Halix (p. 320)

Horus (passim) Herus (IV, ix, 58)

Isis (passim) Esyon (p. 269)Usion (p. 269)Isiston (p. 289)

U Kattiel (XXXVI.172) Captiel (IV, vii, 23) Castiel (pp. 22930, 328)Captiel (pp. 300301,32728)

U Michael (IV.1815 et al.) Michael (IV, vii, 23) Michael (pp. 276, 318, 332,et al.)

Mithras (IV.475829) Mihyraz (III, ix, 13)Mehyras (IV, ix, 60)

U Moloth (VII.500) Meloth (p. 268)Mouloth (IV.1582)

On (XIII.171) On (pp. 248, 269, 274, etpassim)

Orion (CI.28 et al.) Orion (p. 248)

Osiris (passim) Usirion (p. 261)Usyrion (p. 274)

U Ouriel (IV.1815) Uriel (p. 194)

U Raphael (X.43 et al.) Raphael (IV, vii, 23) Raphael (pp. 276, 318, etal.)


Table I (Continued)


U Roubel (XXXVI.171) Raubeil (III, vii, 21)Raubel (IV, ix, 37)Raubeyl (III, vii, 25)

U Sabaoth (passim) Sabaoth (passim)

U Saoumiel (XXXVI.174) Samuel (IV, vii, 23) Samael (pp. 298, 301, 303,308)Samuel (pp. 308, 318, 321)

U Satquiel (IV, vii, 23) Sacquiel (p. 305)Sarquiel (pp. 305, 320, 326,327)Satquiel (pp. 300, 3023,308, 320, 328)

Selene (passim) Selehe (IV, ix, 35)

? Tamiz (III, ix, 2) Tami (p. 212)Tamyz (III, ix, 12) Tamy (p. 214)

Thooth (passim) Tos (IV, ix, 58) Toth (p. 287)Toz (III, ix, 1; III, ix, 11)Zahudaz (III, ix, 16)

U Thouriel (IV.1815) Turiel (p. 316)

Table II: Totals for Each Culture

Culture Number of Divine Names (from Table I) *

Hebraic 2122

Greco-Roman 79

Egyptian 4

Persian / Babylonian 03

Muslim 1

unknown 49

* Number ranges reflect the uncertainty of ascribing a cultural origin to certain names


surprise, since it is one of the few cultural traditions to have maintaineditself in a continuous process of evolution throughout the time periods underconsideration. Besides, many of the Jewish names had gained truly wide-spread currency during the Imperial period, becoming part what has beencalled the public domain of Hellenistic religious syncretism.17 Indeed, theyhad gained currency well beyond their Jewish origins, being adopted intoGnostic, Christian, and assorted pagan rites of all kindsif, that is, the GreekMagical Papyri are anything to go by in terms of their widespread use in theHellenized Egyptian pagan community.

As Diagram I illustrates, ancient pagan divinities, such as Mithras, Selene,and Helios, dominate the overlap between the Greek Magical Papyri andPicatrix (lobe Y), indicating that the disappearance of these powers was aslow, progressive evolution rather than an abrupt abandonment as the socialstructures of antiquity dissolved around the Mediterranean from the fifth tothe eighth centuries. The geographical factor of Arab communities occupy-ing the entire southern half of the former Roman Empire probably is a con-tributing factor to the presence of the above three deities. It is thereforequite likely that the author of Picatrixan eleventh-century Arab writing inSpainhad the cultural contacts and awareness to include these divinities inhis work. It is also noteworthy that the majority of the uncertain and/orunknown names fall into the category of overlap between Picatrix and theMunich Handbook (lobe Z on the diagram), perhaps a product of the tor-tured translation history of the Latin Picatrix text. The names have been dis-torted into something different enough from their origins that they remainunidentifiable. Picatrix is known to have drawn from Persian and Indiansources, so it is no surprise that the only three possibly Persian or Babyloniannames are part of this category.

Remarkably, four of the more prominent ancient Egyptian deities makeappearances in these later magical compilations, long after the heyday of theirreligious prominence in antiquity. Considering the geographical factors out-lined above, the surprise would not be so great if all four were part of theoverlap between the Greek Magical Papyri and Picatrix (lobe Y). However,two are part of lobe X in the diagram, skipping Picatrix entirely. That Isis andOsiris appear in the Munich Handbook should not be too surprising, as theywere mentioned reasonably frequently by the Latin church fathers, especiallyby Saint Augustine in his City of God.18 What is more unusual is that they areabsent from Picatrix while also being present in the Munich Handbook. The

17. Bohak, Hebrew, Hebrew Everywhere, 71.18. Augustine, De civitate dei 6.10; 8.26; 8.27; 10.11; 18.3; 18.5.


study of a broader sample of Arabic magical texts may fill the chronologicalgap, as the presence of Thoth in all three collections proves that such casesdo exist. The fact that Thoth goes from ubiquitous in the Greek MagicalPapyri to quite frequent in Picatrix (there are at least four instances) to a singlelonely example highlighted by Richard Kieckhefer in the Munich Handbookillustrates his relative decline in prominence, but nevertheless reveals the lon-gevity of the power associated with the name.19

The same conclusion applies to Isis and Osiris, who are also mentioned inthe Munich Handbook, albeit more obliquely than Thoth, as their namesappear within longer strings of invoked powers. On one hand, the perceivedantiquity and foreignness of these names were key factors in their continueduse; but on the other hand, it is by no means clear that the author of theMunich Handbook was aware of either the Egyptianness or even of thegreat age of the divine names he was using. The latter possibility is appealingas it keeps the focus on the efficacy of the names toward the desired result ofthe spell. Knowledge of the origins or age of a particular name may havebeen a positive sign of erudition, but it was by no means seen as necessaryfor any given spell to work.

Now that some examples of continuity have been highlighted, can it besaid that this evidence implies an uninterrupted understanding of the specificnature and powers of the divine beings to whom the names refer? Not all thenames yield any specific insight, so instead of providing a systematic examina-tion of all the names, a handful of representative examples have been selectedfor discussion. Certain names, like Sabaoth, Adonai, and Aion were so ubiq-uitous in the collections in which they appear that little can be gained fromexamining their individual contexts.

In the case of the archangels, Anael, Gabriel, Kattiel/Castiel, Michael, Ra-phael, and, to a lesser extent, Aziel and Samael, we see substantial consistencyin their use in all three collections (portion W of the diagram). When anyone of them is mentioned, at least one of the others is sure to appear in thesame context. At the very least, the association between these names re-mained part of the cultural memory for the authors of each of the threecorpora being discussed. These seven angels were linked conceptually withthe seven planets and the seven days of the week, giving them added numer-ological significance, magical potency, and consequently staying power.Moreover, only three of them, namely Gabriel, Michael, and Raphael, arebiblical, implying that the basis for the continuity spans beyond an awarenessof the Bible.

19. Kieckhefer, Forbidden Rites, 287 and note.


Other less well-connected divine names survived from the Greek MagicalPapyri into Picatrix, but not so far as the Munich Handbook. Significantexamples in this category include Mithras, the Persian god adopted so enthu-siastically by the Roman military, who appears twice in Picatrix among listsof names for invoking the power of Mars, the planet, but also the Romangod of war. This implies that a hint of cultural memory associating this namewith martial activities appears to have survived. Helios and Selene, deities ofthe two brightest celestial objects, also figure in the category of ancient pagansurvivals, but without as much of a conceptual link to their origins. Amongthe Egyptian divinities, Horus is mentioned in a list of powers invoked in aprayer to Saturn in Picatrix. The likelihood of this being a conscious referenceto Horus and not just a coincidence of syllables is increased by the presence ofThoth, or Toz, in the same list. The occurrence of Thoth himself in Picatrix isconfirmed by external associations in three of the four instances where he ismentioned. Beyond the example of Horus just cited, he appears associatedwith the pseudo-Aristotelian work entitled in Latin Antimaquis,20 which wasalso attributed to Hermes Mercurius Trismegistus, Hermes being the Helle-nized Thoth. Trismegistus himself is explicitly cited elsewhere in Picatrix.21

Thothpronounced approximately tehowti in ancient Egyptian22corresponds to the angel Zahudaz in Picatrix (pronounced as it would havebeen with the Iberian z equivalent to the English th) who is invokednot coincidentally in an invocation to the planet Mercury. All of these linkscan, to an extent, be explained by the geographical factors of AndalousianArab cultural connections with the ancient Mediterranean world.

The Book of Consecrations, which forms a significant portion of the materialin the Munich Handbook,23 represents an interesting case, as it contains ex-tensive lists of names that appear only in the Greek Magical Papyri, but notin Picatrix (lobe X in the diagram). This is not to suggest that the author ofthis book had direct access to anything like ancient papyri, but rather that theroots of the invocations used here seem to go back farther than those in therest of the collection in the Munich Handbook. It is acknowledged that theBook of Consecrations had a wider distribution during the Middle Ages, as

20. Liber Antimaquis, ed. C. Burnett, in Hermetis Trismegisti Astrologica et Divinatoria,ed. P. Lucentini et al., Corpus Christianorum Continuatio Mediaevalis 144c, HermesLatinus 4.4 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2001), 177221.

21. Picatrix II, xii, 39.22. Brian P. Copenhaver, Hermetica: The Greek Corpus Hermeticum and the Latin

Asclepius in a New English Translation, with Notes and Introduction (Cambridge: Cam-bridge University Press, 1992), 93.

23. Kieckhefer, Forbidden Rites, 25676.


several independently circulating manuscripts of it are known.24 Evidence forits peculiarity also comes from the combinations of names employed in theprayers it contains. These include two of the four Egyptian names uncovered,Isis and Osiris, as well as the Hebraic Basym, El, Emanuel, and Moloth, andthe Greek On and Aion. The combined presence of all these names, as wellas others that are employed extremely frequently in the Greek Magical Pa-pyri, such as Sabaoth, Tetragrammaton, Adonai, and Sother, hint at the factthat this collection seems to draw more consistently from a more ancienttradition of magical invocation than the rest of the material in the MunichHandbook. The presence of strings of nonsense syllables in this section addsto its aura of antiquity. This impression should be taken into considerationand explored more fully in future studies of the Book of Consecrations.

All the examples cited above seem fairly securely identified as divine namesof actual powers who had some distinct identity in the minds of magicalpractitioners. There are some, however, who appear to have no such com-mon identity. To highlight one example, the case of Helix/Heyluz/Halixseems to be the product of a random association of syllables that happens tohave converged in all three of the collections under consideration. The wordis short, is not associated with a known Mediterranean or Near Eastern deityof any prominence, and is only cited once in each collection, in totally differ-ent contexts each time. This combination of factors indicates that we areprobably not dealing with a real case of continuity, but rather an exercise inprobabilistic name-generation.

All of this, of course, does not explain why some of the most commonlyinvoked divine names in ancient magicsuch as Abrasax, Erbeth, and Paker-bethseem to disappear entirely from the tradition. With the study of abroader range of magical collections, a clearer picture will emerge of thethreads of cultural continuity that link the magical practice of three culturesthat were otherwise so different in terms of their public religious affiliations.

24. Kieckhefer, Forbidden Rites, 8 and note 25.

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Divine Names. A cross-cultural comparison - David Porreca