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A grimoire is a textbook of magic, typically including instructions on how to create magical objects like talismans and amulets, how to perform magical spells, charms, and divination, and how to summon or invoke supernatural entities such as angels, spirits, deities, and demons. In many cases, the books themselves are believed to be imbued with magical powers. The only contents found in a grimoire would be information on spells, rituals, the preparation of magical tools, and lists of ingredients and their magical correspondences. In this manner, while all books on magic could be thought of as grimoires, not all magical books should be thought of as grimoires.
Solomon, also called Jedidiah, was a monarch of ancient Israel and the son and successor of King David, according to the Hebrew Bible or Old Testament. He is described as having been the penultimate ruler of an amalgamated Israel and Judah. The hypothesized dates of Solomon's reign are from 970 to 931 BCE. According to the Bible, after his death, his son and successor Rehoboam adopted a harsh policy towards the northern tribes, eventually leading to the splitting of the Israelites between the Kingdom of Israel in the north and the Kingdom of Judah in the south. Following the split, the biblical narrative depicts his patrilineal descendants ruling over Judah alone.
Samael is an archangel in Talmudic and post-Talmudic lore; a figure who is the accuser or adversary, seducer, and destroying angel.
Asmodeus or Ashmedai is a king of demons in the legends of Solomon and the constructing of Solomon's Temple.
Shedim are spirits or demons in the Tanakh and Jewish mythology. Shedim do not, however, correspond exactly to the modern conception of demons as evil entities as originated in Christianity. While evil spirits were thought to be the cause of maladies, shedim differed conceptually from evil spirits. Shedim were not considered as evil demigods, but the gods of foreigners, and were envisaged as evil only in the sense that they were not God.
There have been various attempts at the classification of demons within the contexts of classical mythology, demonology, occultism, and Renaissance magic. These classifications may be for purposes of traditional medicine, exorcisms, ceremonial magic, witch-hunts, lessons in morality, folklore, religious ritual, or combinations thereof. Classifications might be according to astrological connections, elemental forms, noble titles, or parallels to the angelic hierarchy; or by association with particular sins, diseases, and other calamities; or by what angel or saint opposes them.
To Sumerians, Babylonians, Assyrians, and Jews there were male and female demons. In Christian demonology and theology there is debate over the gender and sexual proclivities of demons. These questions are referenced in Italian, French, Spanish and Portuguese phrases that imply that the question is pointless and unanswerable, akin to the English phrase How many angels can dance on the head of a pin?.
Pseudepigrapha are falsely attributed works, texts whose claimed author is not the true author, or a work whose real author attributed it to a figure of the past. The name of the author to whom the work is falsely attributed is often prefixed with the particle "pseudo-", such as for example "pseudo-Aristotle" or "pseudo-Dionysius": these terms refer to the anonymous authors of works falsely attributed to Aristotle and Dionysius the Areopagite, respectively.
The Life of Adam and Eve, also known in its Greek version as the Apocalypse of Moses, is a Jewish apocryphal group of writings. It recounts the lives of Adam and Eve from after their expulsion from the Garden of Eden to their deaths. It provides more detail about the Fall of Man, including Eve's version of the story. Satan explains that he rebelled when God commanded him to bow down to Adam. After Adam dies, he and all his descendants are promised a resurrection.
The Seal of Solomon or Ring of Solomon is the legendary signet ring attributed to the Israelite king Solomon in medieval mystical traditions, from which it developed in parallel within Jewish mysticism, Islamic mysticism and Western occultism.
One of the apocryphal books, the Psalms of Solomon is a group of eighteen psalms written in the first or second centuries BC that are not part of any current scriptural canon.
The Second Book of Enoch is a pseudepigraphic text in the apocalyptic genre. It describes the ascent of the patriarch Enoch, ancestor of Noah, through ten heavens of an Earth-centered cosmos. The Slavonic edition and translation of 2 Enoch is of Christian origin in the 8th century but is based on an earlier work. 2 Enoch is distinct from the Book of Enoch, known as 1 Enoch, and there is also an unrelated 3 Enoch, although none of the three books are considered canonical scripture by the majority of Jewish or Christian bodies. The numbering of these texts has been applied by scholars to distinguish each from the others.
The decans are 36 groups of stars used in the ancient Egyptian astronomy to conveniently divide the 360 degree ecliptic into 36 parts of 10 degrees each, both for theurgical and heliacal horological purposes. The decans each appeared, geocentrically, to rise consecutively on the horizon throughout each daily Earth rotation. The rising of each decan marked the beginning of a new decanal "hour" of the night for the ancient Egyptians, and they were used as a sidereal star clock beginning by at least the 9th or 10th Dynasty.
Frederick Cornwallis Conybeare, was a British orientalist, Fellow of University College, Oxford, and Professor of Theology at the University of Oxford.
Beelzebub or Baʿal Zebub, also spelled Beelzebul or Belzebuth, and occasionally known as the Lord of the Flies, is a name derived from a Philistine god, formerly worshipped in Ekron. In some Abrahamic religions he is described as a major demon. The name Beelzebub is associated with the Canaanite god Baal.
In the myth and folklore of the Near East and Europe, Abyzou is the name of a female demon. Abyzou was blamed for miscarriages and infant mortality and was said to be motivated by envy, as she herself was infertile. In the Coptic Egypt she is identified with Alabasandria, and in Byzantine culture with Gylou, but in various texts surviving from the syncretic magical practice of antiquity and the Early Middle Ages, she is said to have many or virtually innumerable names.
Naamah was one of the 700 wives and 300 concubines of King Solomon and mother of his heir, Rehoboam, according to both 1 Kings 14:21–31, and 2 Chronicles 12:13 in the Hebrew Bible. She was an Ammonite, and, as such, one of only two of all the Queen Mothers of Israel or Judah who was a foreigner. She was also the only one of Solomon's wives to be mentioned, within the Hebrew Bible, as having borne a child.
The Magical Treatise of Solomon, also known as the Hygromanteia or Solomonikê, is a collection of late Byzantine-era grimoires written in medieval Greek. A pseudepigraphon, the book purports to contain Solomon's instructions to his son Rehoboam on various magical techniques and tools to summon and control different spirits and their powers, astrological beliefs, select charms, different means of divination, and the magical uses of herbs. The Magical Treatise survives in fragments from a number of manuscripts dating from the 15th century CE. The book has been important for the history of European magic, serving as a link between the earlier Greek magical practices and the later grimoires of Western Europe. During the early modern period, the book begun to be translated in Latin, becoming the source for future European grimoires, most notably the Key of Solomon.
Enêpsigos (Enêpsigos) is a fallen angel mentioned in the Testament of Solomon who takes three forms as her abode is the moon, and at times is conjured as Kronos. In it, she is said to have been bound by triple-link chains and to have given a prophecy to King Solomon who did not believe the prophecy and then proceeded to rebound her in chains, this time, unbreakable.
References
- 1 2 3 Schwarz, Sarah L. (May 2007). "Reconsidering the Testament of Solomon". Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha. 16 (3): 203–237. doi:10.1177/0951820707077166. ISSN 0951-8207. S2CID 161837257.
- 1 2 University of St. Andrews. "Harding, J. & Alexander, A. | Old Testament Pseudepigrapha". Archived from the original on 2019-05-03.
- ↑ Dvoracek, Jiri (2016). The Son of David in Matthew's Gospel in the Light of the Solomon as Exorcist Tradition. Mohr Siebeck. p. 51. ISBN 9783161540943 . Retrieved 6 March 2019.
- ↑ Istrin, V. M. (1897–1898). Zami͡echanīi͡a o sostavi͡e tolkovoĭ paleĭ. Sbornik Otdi͡elenīi͡a russkago i͡azyka i slovesnosti Imperatorskoĭ akademīi nauk ;t. 2 kn.1 i 4, t.3, kn.2. Sanktpeterburg: Tip Imp. Akad. nauk.
- ↑ Dekane und Dekansterbilder by Wilhelm Gundel, pub. J.J. Augustin, Glückstadt und Hamburg, 1936, pp.49-62, 77-81
- ↑ Conybeare, F.C. The Testament of Solomon, The Jewish Quarterly Review, Vol. 11, No. 1, (Oct.,1898)p. 6-8
- ↑ From Acts 7:43 , a reference to Amos 5:25–27
- ↑ Brannon, M. Jeff (2011). The heavenlies in Ephesians: a lexical, exegetical, and conceptual analysis. Library of New Testament studies. London; New York: T & T Clark. p. 196. ISBN 978-0-567-57741-2. OCLC 712118560.
- ↑ Conybeare, F.C. The Testament of Solomon, The Jewish Quarterly Review, Vol. 11, No. 1, (Oct.,1898)p. 43
- ↑ Conybeare, F.C. The Testament of Solomon, The Jewish Quarterly Review, Vol. 11, No. 1, (Oct.,1898)p. 30
