Solar Grammatomantic Calendar

September 13, 2013 By polyphanes in creative, link, occult Tags: algorithm, alphabet, calendar, conversion, date, grammatomancy, greek, haab', mayan, planetary, solar, time, tzolk'in 2 Comments

So, based on that last post where I discussed possibilities of forming a divinatory cycle of days based on the grammatomantic meanings of the Greek letters, I came up with my first draft of a kind of grammatomantic calendar, based on a simple cycle of the letters. In many ways, this functions much like the tzolk’in calendar of the Maya, but with a little bit of their haab’ thrown in, too. Essentially, I’ve created a cyclical calendar capable of dating many years into the future or, with some modifications, to the past. For simplicity, I use the Greek alphabet itself as the core cycle used for this calendar, which is tied to the spring equinox every year. In effect, I’ve developed a solar grammatomantic calendar, or SGC. While an interesting little system of noting dates and times in a really obscure fashion, it is at heart a divinatory tool expanding on the methods of grammatomancy applied to a general flow of time, noting how a particular person or event might be affected by the forces at work in the cosmos at that particular time.

So, let’s set some rules and definitions to calculate dates and times in the SGC:

Letter-day: Duration of time starting at a particular sunrise and the next sunrise. The first value in a cycle of 24 letter-days is Α, then cycles around as expected
Letter-month: 24 consecutive letter-days. The first value in a cycle of 15 letter-months dependent on letter-year, and cycle around as expected:
- Α if letter-year is Α, Ι, or Ρ
- Π if letter-year is Β, Κ, or Σ
- Η if letter-year is Γ, Λ, or Τ
- Χ if letter-year is Δ, Μ, or Υ
- Ν if letter-year is Ε, Ν, or Φ
- Δ if letter-year is Ζ, Ξ, or Χ
- Τ if letter-year is Η, Ο, or Ψ
- Κ if letter-year is Θ, Π, or Ω
Letter-year: 15 consecutive letter-months, or 360 consecutive letter-days plus some number of intercalary days. The first value in a cycle of 24 letter-years is Α, then cycles around as expected. Begins from the first sunrise after or coinciding with the spring equinox
Intercalary day: Days used to align the cycle of 15 letter-months with the solar year. Not associated with any particular letter, nor are they considered letter-days or belonging to a letter-month. Placed at the end of the letter-year, after the last day of the 15th month of the current year but before the first day of the 1st month of the next year. There are as many intercalary days as needed to fill the gap between the number of letter-days and the number of days in the solar year.
Letter-age: 24 letter-years, 360 letter-months, or 8640 letter-days plus some number of intercalary days. The first value in a cycle of 24 letter-great-years is Α, then cycles around as expected
Letter-era: 24 letter-ages, 576 letter-years, 8640 letter-months, or 207360 letter-days plus some number of intercalary days. The first value in a cycle of 24 letter-ages is Α, then cycles around as expected. At most 13824 years can denoted using only 24 values for the letter-era.

A table for converting one of the larger units of letter-dating into smaller ones shows the relationships between the units. Note that asterisks in the letter-day column indicate that intercalary days will cause this number to increase as the number of letter-years increases.

	Letter-day	Letter-month	Letter-year	Letter-age	Letter-era
Letter-day	1
Letter-month	24	1
Letter-year	360*	15	1
Letter-age	8640*	360	24	1
Letter-era	207360*	8640	576	24	1

Of course, even though I’ve listed only five place values for a SGC date, we’d end up with a weird kind of Y2K-esque problem once we finish the ultimate letter-era Ω completely, approximately 13824 years after the first possible date. Although it’s unlikely to be needed, further spans of time may be indicated by adding larger units, such as a letter-eon which is equivalent to 24 letter-eras; 24 letter-eons would be equivalent to 576 letter-eras, 13824 letter-ages, or 7962624 letter-years. This easily reaches up into geological or cosmological timeframes, but could be useful for indicating distant, mythological, or astronomical/astrological phenomena.

As noted above, all the cycles have 24 values, each lettered according to the Greek alphabet starting at Α and ending with Ω, with the exception of the letter-months. Instead, the cycle of letter-months within a letter-year is dependent on the value of the letter-year itself. Though this seems arbitrary, this is to preserve the cycle caused by there being 15 letter-months within a letter-year. For instance, the first letter-month of the overall cycle of letter-months is Α, the first letter in the Greek alphabet; the last letter-month of the same year is Ο, the 15th letter in the Greek alphabet. The second letter-year continues the pattern of assigning letters to the letter-months: since Ο was the previous letter used, Π is the letter assigned to the first letter-month of the second letter-year. Continuing this cycle, the first letter-month of the third letter-year is assigned with Η, the first letter-month of the fourth letter-year is assigned with Χ, and so on until the last letter-month of the last letter-year is given to Ω, after which the cycle begins anew with Α. This produces a cycle of eight letter-years; since there are 24 letter-years in a letter-age, this cycle repeats three times. By taking the remainder of dividing the letter-year ordinal value by eight (substituting 8 for a result of 0), the table below shows the letters associated with the letter-months for a given letter-year in the cycle.

Year

1
Α, Ι, Ρ

2
Β, Κ, Σ

3
Γ, Λ, Τ

4
Δ, Μ, Υ

5
Ε, Ν, Φ

6
Ζ, Ξ, Χ

7
Η, Ο, Ψ

8
Θ, Π, Ω

As for the epoch, or the reference date from which the letter-calendar is calculated, I’ve settled on April 3, 1322 BC as the first date in this letter-calender system. My readers will likely be utterly confused as to why I chose such a distant year and date. Since I’m a fan of ancient Greek history and civilization, I decided to look back as far as I reliably could, and recalled dimly somewhere in my memory that archaeoastronomers had calculated a date in the Trojan War based on mentions of eclipses in book 17 of the Iliad as well as Hittite and other archaeological records. As it turns out, such an eclipse happened on November 6, 1312 BC at around 12:35 p.m. Since the Trojan War took about ten years according to the myths, I wanted to set the epoch date to the day after the spring equinox ten years before the year in which this eclipse occurred. Looking at an ephemeris for the year 1322 BC, we know that the spring equinox (Sun ingress Aries) occurred sometime on April 2, 1322 BC, making the following dawn of April 3, 1322 BC the start of the first official day of the SGC. Negative dates, or dates that come before April 3, 1322 BC would not be possible in this system, making the first day “day zero” and anything before prehistory or mythical. If reverse calculations were desired, the rules to convert dates could be adapted for this, with some kind of inversion applied to the notation (writing it upside down, for instance).

To mark a given date using the SGC, let’s use the notation A.B.C.D.E, where A indicates the letter-era, B indicates the letter-age, C indicates the letter-year, D indicates the letter-month, and E indicates the letter-day. Each of these could be represented equally well in Greek letters (Α.Ρ.Ψ.Χ.Ε) as they could in Arabic numerals (1.17.23.22.5), so long as one uses the ordinal placement of the letters in the Greek alphabet in mind as well as the funky letter-month 8-year cycle given above. For intercalary days which don’t belong to any letter-month, a dash, dot, or zero is used for the letter-month position and a Greek letter to indicate the intercalary day. So, for the fourth intercalary day on the letter-era Α, letter-age Ρ, and letter-year Ψ, we might use the notation Α.Ρ.Ψ.–.Δ with the dash, Α.Ρ.Ψ.•.Δ with the dot, or Α.Ρ.Ψ.0.Δ with the zero. Arabic numeral representations of the intercalary “month” should use the numeral zero.

Now that we have the units defined, the cycles understood, the epoch proclaimed, and the notation set up, it’s time to begin our rules for converting dates from this letter-calendar to Gregorian dates and back. Let’s use E, A, Y, M, and D to indicate the ordinal values of the letter-era, letter-age, letter-year, letter-month, and letter-day in these conversions; in other words, these variables represent the Arabic numerals associated with the place values, bearing in mind the funky ordinal values associated with the Greek letters for the letter-month.

To convert a Gregorian calendar date to a letter-calendar date:

Find the number of years elapsed (J) between the Gregorian calendar year (GY) and the epoch year (EY). If the Gregorian calendar date falls on or after the first sunrise after or coinciding with the spring equinox in its year, J = GY − EY. If the Gregorian calendar date falls before the first sunrise after or coinciding with the spring equinox in its year, J = GY − EY − 1.
Divide J by 576 and take the whole part to find the number of letter-eras that have passed (JW), and take the fractional part to find how much other time has passed (JF).
Calculate the letter-era: E = JW + 1. E should be a whole number between 1 and 24. Assign E the Greek letter according to its ordinal value.
Multiply JF by 24 and take the whole part to find the number of letter-ages that have passed (AW), and take the fractional part to find how much other time has passed (AF).
Calculate the letter-age: A = AW + 1. A should be a whole number between 1 and 24. Assign A the Greek letter according to its ordinal value.
Multiply AF by 24 and take the whole part to find the number of letter-years that have passed (YW), and take the fractional part to find how much other time has passed (YF).
Calculate the letter-year: Y = YW + 1. Y should be a whole number between 1 and 24. Assign Y the Greek letter according to its ordinal value.
Find the number of days that have elapsed (T) between the Gregorian calendar date (GD) and the most recent spring equinox date (ED).
If T is greater than 360, this is an intercalary day. Set the letter-month M = 0 or missing. Calculate the intercalary day D = T − D.
Otherwise, if T is less than or equal to 360, this is a letter-day.
1. Divide T by 24 and take the whole part to find the number of letter-months that have elapsed (TM), and the fractional part to find the number of days that have elapsed (TD).
2. Calculate the letter-month: M = TM. M should be a whole number between 1 and 15. Assign M the Greek letter according to its ordinal value according to the eight-year cycle above based on Y.
3. Calculate the letter-day: D = TD × 24. D should be a whole number between 1 and 24. Assign D the Greek letter according to its ordinal value.

To convert a letter-calendar date to a Gregorian calendar date:

Sum together the year-based units multiplied by their coefficients to get the number of years elapsed since the epoch: S = (576 × E) + (24 × A) + Y
If the date refers to an intercalary period, sum the total number of letter-days plus the intercalary days: Z = 360 + D
If the date refers to a non-intercalary period, sum the count of letter-days plus the number of letter-months multiplied by the number of letter-days in each month: Z = D + (24 × M)
Add the number of elapsed years S to the epoch year to find the year of the Gregorian calendar date.
Add the number of elapsed days Z to the date of the first dawn after or coinciding with the spring equinox of the Gregorian calendar year to find the month and day of the Gregorian calendar date.

Since we’ve already done this much work to clarify letter-days, we can focus our attention on dividing up individual days into smaller units. I don’t think it’ll be necessary to get into the magnitude (or lack thereof) of seconds, but having letter-hours might not be a bad idea. Since there 24 letters, we can create 24 letter-hours for each day. The process for this would be nearly the same as calculating planetary hours. Let’s define a letter-hour to equal either 1/12 of the time between sunrise and sunset of the current letter-day or 1/12 of the time between sunset of the current letter-day and sunrise of the following letter-day, whichever period the letter-hour is found within. Each letter-hour is assigned to one of the 24 letters in the Greek alphabet, in the order of the Greek alphabet starting with Α. We might augment our notation of date to also include time using the notation A.B.C.D.E:F, where F indicates the letter-hour.

To convert a modern time to a letter-hour or vice versa for a given date and location:

Find the time of sunrise and sunset for the given date and location, and the time of sunrise for the day following the given date and location.
Divide the total length of time between sunrise and sunset by 12 to find the length of the diurnal hour (DH).
Establish the divisions of the diurnal hours starting at sunrise according to DH, assigning them the letter values Α through Μ or number values 1 through 12.
Establish the divisions of the nocturnal hours starting at sunset according to NH, assigning them the letter values Ν through Ω or number values 13 through 24.
Locate the time given among the letter-hours to convert the modern time to a letter hour, or establish the time limits on the given letter-hour to find an approximate modern time.

So, examples! Let’s take September 1, 2013 at 10:35 a.m. for Washington, DC, USA and convert it into SGC date:time notation.

Letter-day and letter-month: on this year, the spring equinox occurred on March 20, 2013 after dawn; thus, the first day of this year began on March 21, 2013. There are 166 days between these two dates. 166 ÷ 24 = 6.91666…, indicating that the letter-month is 6 and the letter-day is 0.91666… × 24 = 22, or Χ.
Letter-era, letter-age, and letter-year: between 2013 AD and 1322 BC, there are 3334 years. 3334 ÷ 576 = 5.78819444…, indicating that the letter-era is 6 (5 + 1). 0.78819444… × 24 = 18.91666…, indicating that the letter-age is 19 (18 + 1). 0.91666… × 24 = 22, indicating that the letter-year is 23 (22 + 1).
Letter-hour: on this day, sunrise was at 6:37 a.m. and sunset at 7:38 p.m., with the next sunrise at 6:38 a.m. The length of a diurnal hour in this day was about 65 minutes long, and a nocturnal hour was about 55 minutes long. 10:35 a.m. falls during unequal hour 4.
Notation: the full Arabic numeral notation for this date is 6.19.23.6.22:4. The full Greek letter notation for this date is Ζ.Τ.Ψ.Ω.Χ:Δ. The letter-month is Ω, not Ζ as might be expected for the ordinal value of 6, due to the letter-year being Ψ (see the chart above).

In the opposite way, let’s convert the SGC date Η.Ρ.Λ.Ο.Υ:Α for Washington, DC, USA to Gregorian notation.

Conversion to Arabic numerals: The date Η.Ρ.Λ.Ο.Υ:Α resolves to 7.17.11.9.20:1, using the table above to resolve the letter-year.letter-month combination Λ.Ο to 11.9. Since the letter-month is not blank or missing, this is not an intercalary date.
Sum the years: There have been (576 × 7) + (24 × 17) + 11 = 4451 years since the epoch date.
Find the year and spring equinox: 4451 years elapsed from the epoch year 1322 BC refers to the year 3130 AD. The spring equinox occurred at night after March 20 that year, so the first day of the SGC year would be on March 21.
Sum the days: There have been (9 × 24) + 20 = 236 days since the year’s first dawn after or coinciding with the spring equinox.
Find the day: 236 days after March 21, 3130 AD leads to November 12, 3130 AD.
Find the time: The letter-hour Α indicates the first unequal hour of the day, sometime just after dawn. Sunrise for this day in Washington, DC, USA occurs at 6:47 a.m., and sunset at 4:56 p.m.; an unequal diurnal hour here would be about 49 minutes long, so the letter-hour Α indicates a time between 6:47 a.m. and 7:38 a.m.

Well, this was all well and good, and despite the complexity only took a day to hash out all the major parts of forming a new calendar system from scratch. However, while this was a fun exercise in computus of a sort, this doesn’t actually say much about why it was made to begin with: divination using the flow of time itself! Since I’ve ranted on long enough about the minutiae of date conversions, let’s leave that for next time when we start putting the SGC in practice and making use of its mechanisms for divination, as well as seeing how it lines up with other solar or theophanic phenomena.

Crying of Calls 49: Saturnine Recap

August 25, 2013 By polyphanes in occult Tags: crying of calls 49, jason miller, planetary, report, saturn, writeup Leave a comment

I mentioned recently that I got Jason Miller’s excellent “Advanced Planetary Magic”, which, again, you should totally get, since it’s worth far more than the cost. It’s a collection of 49 short prayers or invocations to be used during different combinations of the planetary hours and days for different ends (so there’s a Moon/Saturn call to be done in an hour of the Moon on the day of Saturn, a Saturn/Moon call to be done in an hour of Saturn on the day of the Moon, etc.). As part of his goal to get this magic out in the world and practiced by the masses, Mr. Miller started up a project called The Crying of Calls 49, where people participate by calling out one of the calls each for 49 consecutive days in the proper hour for a given week. So, the first week is for the Moon calls, the second week for the Mercury calls, and so forth. I’m posting my results in the Facebook group for the project, but I also thought I’d share my results and experiences with you all as well. I won’t share what the Calls are or what they’re for, since you should go buy the ebook and find out for yourself, but the astute among you will figure it out.

This last and final week, Monday 8/19 through Sunday 8/25, we did the calls to Saturn. Below are my experiences and thoughts:

8/19: Saturn/Moon

Made the Saturn/Luna call tonight in the third hour of Saturn. Standard operating procedure, myrrh/jasmine incense. For Saturn, I’m repeating the call three times.

Heavy, certainly, which is fitting for Saturn. It’s like the smugness of the past */Saturn calls is from being self-important or beyond judgment, which now I’m starting to get more on that side of things. Still, heavy and fixed as Saturn is, the Moon gave everything a rapid, fluid feel, like I was a rock at the center of a whirlpool, or a fixed point in space and time. I felt like being able to reach out and gathering whatever it was I needed from the world outside of me, like everything was circling around and to me instead of me having to catch up to it. For the intent of this call, this is certainly one way to keep up with time, but not the expected one. Inhaling the visualization of the sigil of Saturn lead on violet was…sticky, like trying to breath in wet jello, but it tasted sweet enough due to the incense blend (which lends itself well to each other). This is less a mischievous feel (as in Luna/Saturn) and more of a…confident overseer feel. Interesting.

8/20: Saturn/Mars

Made the Saturn/Mars call twice today, first in the first hour of Saturn at work (just under my breath) and again in the second hour of Saturn, standard operating procedure with pine/myrrh incense.

This one has a kick to it; the heat of Mars is strong, but it’s heavy and restricting in a Saturnine way I haven’t yet felt in this project. Visualizing the sigil of Saturn lead on red made it seem much more…not necessarily sinister, not quite despondent, but something between the two; it felt like a grill or a net, and inhaling it didn’t quite work, but it wrapped around me as a chain blanket and seeped into my bones, which now feel denser and hotter. The heat built up in this isn’t painful, but it is discomfortingly deep. In that regard, it’s probably good paired up with the Jupiter/Mars call to get off one’s ass, especially if one’s weakness (like mine and others, certainly) is sloth.

8/21: Saturn/Mercury

Made the Saturn/Mercury call today in the second hour of Saturn. I’m visiting a friend today out of town, so I made the call outside in the sunlight; a change, but a pleasant one. Otherwise, standard operating procedure with cinnamon/myrrh incense.

This is a weird feeling, but perhaps mercurial me doesn’t often like shutting up, with either my voice or my mind. If Mercury deals with circuits and channels of communication, the normal connections and flows I feel changed drastically; it was like all channels of communication were thrown open and flowing towards me. The heaviness of Saturn made me feel like the bottom of a well or a lake, with all the buzz of Mercury flowing to me like water to a low spot. Between feeling low and looking up and this weird centralized-stillness-external-buzzing, this feels like a weird kind of spiritual adderall. Probably good to use before meditation, classes, or any period of observation that requires focus. Visualization of the sigil of Saturn lead on orange didn’t have any unusual effects or signs this time, but inhaled smoothly and made me feel solidified and more “here”.

8/22: Saturn/Jupiter

Made the Saturn/Jupiter call tonight in the second hour. Standard operating procedure with myrrh and cedar incense.

Like the Jupiter/Saturn call last week, this feeling of combined forces is difficult to discern in differentiation (oh my god Jason, confound you for getting me stuck alliterating endlessly), and the feeling is really similar: guarded kingship, decisiveness, clarity. The breeziness and coolness of Jupiter mesh well with the heaviness and cold of Saturn, although this call is the exact opposite of the other; while Jupiter/Saturn was about expanding within contraction, Saturn/Jupiter is about contracting on expansion. It’s almost the same sensation, and I feel like I have everything spiritually or metaphorically at hand in a kind of “waste not want not” atmosphere. Inhaling the sigil seemed odd tonight; visualizing the sigil of Saturn lead on blue ended up getting wrapped around my head, looping through my spinal column and forming a kind of ring through my nose, like it’s circulating and pushing stuff down and away from the head elsewhere in the body. Probably some good information in that symbolism, I’ll wager.

8/23: Saturn/Venus

Made the Saturn/Venus call today in the second hour of Saturn. Standard operating procedure with rose/myrrh incense. I tailored my preceding prayer with a specific intent to solidify and make permanent and transcendent my relationship with my partner.

Unlike the other Saturn calls, this one isn’t heavy at all, though it has an interesting other effect; I feel like there’s some weird chain or cable pulling from within my chest out towards the back elsewhere; I know where it ends, my own partner, or my link to him, rather. The heaviness is definitely around my chest due to this weird tethering, but it’s not unwelcome; unlike the Venus/Saturn call, this one is actually fairly pleasant, if not sobering. The kindness of Venus certainly cancels out the otherwise harsh feeling of Saturn, but the way they combine here is almost surprising, showing a weird kind of sober, somber, dedicated love that (for someone as young as I am) I wouldn’t expect to feel anytime soon. The incense has a type of wine-like twinge to it tonight missing from before, and the sigil seemed as normal as ever besides shooting into and through me to form the chain instead of just inhaling it as usual.

8/24: Saturn/Saturn

Changed things up today. Opened up with an invocation of Saturn from the Picatrix and used my lead Saturn talisman from an election a while back as a focus for the ritual. Used three candles and three sticks of myrrh incense, and anointed my palms and the talisman with myrrh oil. Beyond that, standard operating procedure, but with nine repetitions of the Call (three times three): three out loud, three quietly, three silently.

This one knocked me on my back, or rather, on my front; I ended up lying down prostrate on the ground before my altar for a while after making the call, since the heaviness of Saturn turned into a deep, profound sense of falling. Entering the Abyss, indeed. I’ll reserve most of my thoughts on this for later; I don’t even really know where to begin with this tonight. Visualizing the sigil of Saturn lead on black tonight was sharp, and inhaling it into my energy body felt painful or like being macerated inside. Everything is calm, but…

8/25: Saturn/Sun

Made the Saturn/Sun call today in the first hour of Saturn. Performed a ritual cleansing and full Sevenths-calling beforehand, and got out the fancy censer and grains of myrrh and frankincense resin (partially because I ran out of frankincense sticks). Otherwise, standard operating procedure.

After last night’s heavy and depressed call, this one was sorely, sorely needed, but having done it, I feel recharged in the deepest and most thorough way possible. It’s a weird kind of joy; not a temporary or emotional joy, but an existential, survivalist joy that doesn’t quite match up with words or laughter. The stillness of the Sun provides a kind of crystal clarity to the world around me, while the solidity and heaviness of Saturn this time has turned into a kind of support and guide, a chain bridge or a ladder to help me. The visualization of the sigil, though dark like coal on gold, inhaled in among the densest and most spiritually forceful way yet; it seemed to form a chain extending from infinitely above me to infinitely below me, a kind of shivalingam of gold and black that I can neither escape nor lose myself from.

And that does it for me! All 49 Calls have been made, and this project is drawn to a close for me. This has been a fantastic trip for me, you guys, and I give my deepest and sincerest thanks to Jason Miller for writing up this set of prayers. I wouldn’t’ve thought to combine the planets like how he did, and I’m glad he shared his work with the world. If you haven’t gotten your copy, do so immediately and start putting them to use. I can’t emphasize how powerful yet simple this stuff is; it may be Hermetics Lite, but it has no small punch for your Work.

Crying of Calls 49: Jovial Recap

August 18, 2013 By polyphanes in occult Tags: crying of calls 49, jason miller, jupiter, planetary, report, writeup Leave a comment

This past week, Monday 8/12 through Sunday 8/18, we did the calls to Jupiter. Below are my experiences and thoughts:

8/12: Jupiter/Moon

Made the Jupiter/Luna call in the last hour of Jupiter, the hour just before dawn on Tuesday. Standard operating procedure with cedar and jasmine incense.

This is…for some reason, weirdly calming. The Luna/Jupiter call was deeply calming as well, but for some reason, this just feels weird, though I don’t know why (I wasn’t expecting anything else). On the one hand, it feels so calm and peaceful, almost sleep-giving like light opium; on the other, it feels like it’s produced an awakeness and benevolent alertness that keeps me grounded. Between these two smooth and light influences, the harmony between them is a delightful mix, but it’s still something that I have this internal headtilt at. Visualizing the sigil was simple enough, picturing bright tin on (royal) purple, and inhaled like an icy cool yet thick drink, spreading all throughout me and supporting me in my bones with a kind of bright chrome-silver light. Interesting feeling; maybe this is the inner grace described in the annotation.

8/13: Jupiter/Mars

Made the Jupiter/Mars call in the second hour of Jupiter tonight. Standard operating procedure with cedar and pine incense.

It’s weird that the Mars/Jupiter call seemed to have the Jupiter force dominant, and that the reverse is true here, too: the Martian force seems to be stronger than the Jovian one. There’s definitely a lot of heat in this call, but it’s all surface-heat, nothing deep; rather, the coolness and “breeze” of Jupiter seems locked in deep (much like Jupiter/Luna), but lends its lightning and storminess to the outward expression of this Call. A good phrase for this feeling might be “martial law”, though maybe that’s because it’s my own rulership of my kingdom that needs work instead of defense from outside. I feel regally warlike, or martially professional, like a top-tier officer issuing orders and having things set aright. Inhaling the sigil was interesting; the tin of the Jupiter sigil seemed to melt like solder in the red heat of Mars, and it seemed to seal my joints and around my head like a helmet. The eliminating nature of Mars and the expanding nature of Jupiter here don’t seem to be at odds, but work complimentary to that of Mars/Jupiter: whereas Mars/Jupiter gets one’s ass in gear on the things that matter, Jupiter/Mars orders things to matter and get done. It’s like two sides of the same coin.

8/14: Jupiter/Mercury

Made the Jupiter/Mercury call tonight in the third hour of Jupiter. Standard operating procedure with cedar and cinnamon incense.

With respect to the elements, I go with Agrippa’s association and give Mercury to water and Jupiter to air; with the quickness and sharpness of Mercury combined with the coolness and airiness of Jupiter, this Call feels ice cold, but in a completely rejuvenating, refreshing way. It’s as if someone dunked an overheating processor into a supercooled ice bath, improving processing speed like whoa. It’s like the frost that develops at superhigh altitudes when any moisture is present, gathering more and combining with other moisture to form precipitation that then falls down, which heats up to repeat the cycle. In a sense, it feels like an unusual metaphor of the cycling and recycling of money to produce money. That said, the expansiveness of Jupiter doesn’t mesh so great this time with the connectivity that Mercury brings; while the Mercury/Jupiter call was relaxing and well-connecting, this just feels overactive and overinvolved, like the predecessor of a fast-acting storm. It almost feels uncomfortably ungrounded and easy to get confused in this state.

8/15: Jupiter/Jupiter

Made the Jupiter/Jupiter call tonight in the third hour. Went with a full blown conjuration of the angel, intelligence, and spirit of Jupiter tonight with the Trithemius ritual in conjunction with a Gate of Jupiter rite and adoration of Zeus, within which happened a bottle of good chardonnay and the Jupiter/Jupiter call. Preceded with donning a new ritual robe and a complete set of prayers, ablutions, meditation, and energy work.

Honestly, after all that, it’s hard to pick out what was from the Call and what wasn’t. Since this was a “pure planetary” Call, it approximates any other purely jovial working, and since this was just one big Jupiter ritual, it blended in nicely. Besides, the similarities between this Call and Jason Miller’s prayer to Jupiter are fairly high (I can’t fathom why). All the same, I’m feeling pretty shiny and golden and good right now. Hail Zeus, and hail to you all!

8/16: Jupiter/Venus

Made the Jupiter/Venus call tonight in the third hour of Jupiter. Standard operating procedure, rose/cedar incense.

I feel wet. Like, covered in humidity wet. It’s weird, but refreshing and embracing at the same time; this is a truly good feeling produced from this call. It’s sensual and smooth, as expected from Venus, and cool and airy, as expected from Jupiter, but the moisture from the two combined is much closer this time than in the airy breezy feeling made from the Venus/Jupiter call. I feel safe and embraced, yet at the same time there’s this stimulating, sensuous feeling along my spine. Everything seems precious, everything seems needed; I made a small request beforehand, adapting the info text with the call specifically for my partner and myself, so we’ll see what comes of that. Seeing the sigil of Jupiter tin on green tonight was interesting; unlike the baroque filigree of Venus copper on blue from the Venus/Jupiter call, this had an organic, almost naturally-formed look. Inhaling it was just as sensual and exciting in its own way as the rest of the air around me, and filled me with this neat kind of joy.

8/17: Jupiter/Saturn

Made the Jupiter/Saturn call tonight at the end of the third hour of Jupiter. Standard operating procedure, myrrh/cedar incense; I may have gone over in time into the hour of Mars, but I didn’t let that stop me. Just in case, I made a quick reading of the call beforehand to make sure I got it in time.

This is an interesting combination of forces, and it’s hard to tell where one begins and the other ends; Jupiter is normally airy as I’ve felt it, but it’s noble airy with this kind of gravitas of force. Saturn is heavy and smug as usual, but this is a weird kind of cheerful call in its own manner, like resolution in the face of adversity, brushing the dust off one’s shoulders and keeping on, like a king faced with problems solving them one at a time. I felt like weights were attached to me all around me, but that I was standing and growing tall. Inhaling the visualization of the Jupiter sigil tin on black was interesting; it went slow, though the tin was exceptionally bright (almost magnesium-burning white), and it gave me this kind of weird inner exoskeletal feel, like I was growing a layer of armor just underneath my skin with a kind of fullness under it. Then again, this Call was about expansion within limits, and the skin is certainly the limit to the body.

8/18: Jupiter/Sun

Made the Jupiter/Sun call in the first hour of Jupiter today after my morning rites and purifications. Fittingly, I also anointed myself with King Solomon oil; not as commanding as High John, but suitable for this call. Otherwise, standard operating procedure with cedar/frankincense incense.

This is a GOOD call, dang. Unlike the Sun/Jupiter call which was really mild though posh for me, Jupiter/Sun feels extraordinarily lively and good. I feel energized and charged, active and awake, deeply happy and content. For me, it’s as if the airy joy of Jupiter combines with the golden stillness of the Sun and penetrates deep within me, radiating outwards without heat but with much light and Good Feels. Visualizing the sigil today made the sigil of Jupiter tin on yellow look…I dunno. Ideal? As if it wasn’t anything actually made or constructed or designed, but Original. Inhaling it seemed to actually have it pass through the crown of my head in a shower of light and descend totally through me and every part of me. The slow light-bearing fire of the Sun and the fast lightning-bolt gold of Jupiter combines exceptionally well in this call for me.

Crying of Calls 49: Martian Recap

August 11, 2013 By polyphanes in occult Tags: crying of calls 49, jason miller, mars, planetary, report Leave a comment

This past week, Monday 8/5 through Sunday 8/11, we did the calls to Mars. Below are my experiences and thoughts:

8/5: Mars/Moon

Made the Mars/Luna call tonight in the third hour, standard operating procedure with pine and jasmine incense.

This was a subtle effect, and I’m unsure whether that’s due to the midnight hour and vague sleepiness I had or whether it’s the actual force. It was oddly sharpening, though not in any active or boisterous way. The image I got was running along a field with an earthquake, the land shifting and swaying under my feet; I was able to run forward safely, but the land on either side of me was either collapsing or falling under debris, crushing any others on the battlefield. The sigil inhaled easily enough, despite the mental iron of the visualization, possibly due to the lunar influence here; it seemed like the Martian energy is what really got inside me, with the Lunar energy wrapping around me as a shield or barrier. Unlike the Luna/Mars call, which triggered a massive wave of pointed and manageable emotion, this seems like the complete inverse: it’s very deep, very calm, yet still pointed. I’m feeling a bit hot, so the burn of Mars is certainly there.

8/6: Mars/Mars

Made the Mars/Mars call in the first hour of the day today, dawn on Tuesday, after my full morning rituals. Was already feeling pretty empowered, and anointed myself with High John the Conqueror oil, because why not. Standard operating procedure with two sticks of pine incense, but made the Orphic Hymn five times instead of just once.

Nothing particular special or spectacular, but this definitely delivers a good impulse of Martian force. I’m feeling sharp, like a fresh blade: honed, directed, ordered, quick, alive. There’s a general heat around me that I don’t otherwise normally feel, which is weird since I otherwise feel cool (giving off heat to the world). Images in my mind are like they’re set to high-contrast: everything seems white and black, no greys or in-between. That’s something of Mars I’ve noticed in the past: it cuts with the sword into two parts, no halves or gradients, no middle-ground. Unlike the Sun/Sun, Venus/Venus, or other pure Calls so far, this one seems fairly low-key. Then again, that could be due to its direct, get-shit-done intent. The sigil inhaled fairly easily, and the iron image of the sigil definitely seemed to glint and spark in the red light of Mars. I thought I could hear battle and fights while making the call, too. Now to see what office life is going to be like this week…

8/7: Mars/Mercury

Made the Mars/Mercury call tonight in the second hour, standard operating procedure with cinnamon and pine incense.

I like this one, though I’m probably not physically well enough to properly handle this force (bad back pain and dizziness today from a mild hangover). The sharpness and heat of Mars is an interesting, spicy balance to the buzz and quickness of Mercury; I feel like my mind is racing, even when there’s little to think about, and everything seems boring unless I’m actively doing something. It’s kinda like really hyper adderall in that it gives me a strong jolt to focus on something; multitasking and quick thinking on your feet would be greatly benefitted by this call. Still, it gives me an uncomfortable agitated feeling unless I’m actually working on something, and with my mind racing, it’s making time seem like it’s going slower (more time to act and react!).

8/8: Mars/Jupiter

Made the Mars/Jupiter call in the first hour of Mars, standard operating procedure with cedar and pine incense.

This one was subtle: the sharpness of Mars and the coolness of Jupiter seem to balance each other out, even though there was power aplenty in the Call. If anything, it seemed like the power of Jupiter is dominant here; there’s very, very little heat in this call, like standing next to a space heater outside in the dead of winter. Still, it provides a cooling edge to otherwise heated activity, which is a nice contrast. We’ll see how today goes, I suppose; I was hoping for more buzz with this one, since this is a call I can see myself using frequently in the future. I’ll try it again in the other hours of Mars today and see if I can’t get more of a charge out of it.

8/9: Mars/Venus

Made the Mars/Venus call tonight in the second hour of Mars, standard operating procedure with rose/pine incense. I prefaced the call itself with a supplication for it to work with my relationship with my lover, to give it a more specific edge.

Can’t say I got much out of this one, but then, I’m not in the best of health (severe back pain and fever mitigated by heavy doses of ibuprofen); this was similar to the Venus/Mars call, which also felt fairly subdued. I had to “force” things through an intellectual channel in order to process what was going on, but it still works all the same. The primary images that came to my mind were the interplay of the geomantic figures Puer (the Boy, Mars, Aries) and Puella (the Girl, Venus, Libra); definitely appropriate, considering the topic. This seemed to create a balance of extremes within me more than anything else: feminine emotion combined with male aggression, and vice versa. Visualizing the sigil seemed “hot” to the point of glowing a coppery-red, fitting for the combination of forces, and inhaled without a problem. The heat of Mars is there (not great considering my already-existing fever), but the sensuality of Venus is giving it a more pleasurable feeling than it’d otherwise have (hot wax play, anyone?).

8/10: Mars/Saturn

Made the Mars/Saturn call in the very last hour, the final hour of the day of Saturn and the third and last hour of Mars. Standard operating procedure with pine/myrrh incense, though I did a banishing afterward due to other rituals that followed that I didn’t want touched by the violent vibe from this call.

This one…packs a punch. The heat of Mars plus that smug darkness of Saturn lead to a pretty evil-feeling sensation, like I had just authorized a fatal strike on some colony of enemies. I mean, yeah, that is the point, but…well, it’s a good thing I only generalized this to anyone who would stand in my way. If I really wanted to off someone, this is probably the call I’d be using in addition to other heavy work (combining the two malefics, after all). It wasn’t exactly a heavy feeling, but the heat is what really propelled me; even so early in the morning, I was sweating from the call. The sigil, like the other curse-based calls, didn’t exactly imbue itself into my sphere; rather, the iron-on-black Mars sigil seemed to wrap itself around me, form into little quills, spikes, or missiles, and shot out from me outward to places unknown. I don’t expect good things to happen where they land.

8/11: Mars/Sun

Made the Mars/Sol call tonight after offerings to spirits in the second hour of Mars. Standard operating procedure with pine and frankincense incense, with extra thanks afterward for the god’s/planet’s help over these past seven days.

The best way I can describe this feeling is “crystalline fire”. The stillness of the Sun, the golden frozenness of spirit and time, is like an eternal, perfect Light from fire, while the heat, desiccation, and cauterization from Mars is like Fire from light. Combining the two is interesting, and is radically different from the energy rush from the Sol/Mars call, which was like a powerhouse of fiery force jacked into my sphere. This is much more focused, much more on-point, like a laser affecting a part deep within me than a torch burning from all out of me. I feel lighter, in a way, both in terms of weight and illumination; the heat of Mars seems “frozen” around and within me, like both a shield and a central jewel at the heart, and it…well, it kinda hurts, actually, like a strain or a cut. I know there’s a lot of attachments I hold, especially to habits (some of which I specifically named in the ritual buildup to the call), and they seem to give me a bad taste in my mind when I think about them now. Maybe this is the most direct of the calls I’ve done so far. I’ll judge how well it works by seeing how much easier it is to stop those habits I named, I suppose, and brush up on this call fairly often. The sigil visualization seemed to turn to fire first before inhaling, and didn’t quite inhale as much as it did set me on fire in this weird, slow-yet-instant way. Definitely an interesting feeling, and not what I expected.

The Digital Ambler

Always Forward Between Heaven and Earth

Tag Archives: planetary

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