Alphabets with esoteric meanings

venicebard

Ross G Caldwell said:
Great! That's a good price for both volumes.
Well, Ross, as a sign of your credibility, I just shelled out nearly $30 bucks for just vol. 2 (paperback), as it looks quite useful. (I shall soon know whether I should thank you or not, but thanx in advance.)
 

venicebard

Dave's Angel said:
For example in our alphabet, "M" is just the sound /mm/, . . .
just the sound "mm" meaning in and of itself 'sweetness'?
. . . but in Hebrew and Greek it was also the number 40, in lots of systems it denotes the sea, in Egyptian hieroglyphs it was represented by an owl, in the runes it's "Man", and so on.
Suppose, just suppose, that several alphabets of old, covering quite a wide geographical area (Near East to northwest Europe), sprang forth from a common underlying esoteric tradition adapted for use by this people and that. It then becomes immediately apparent what many of the letter-shapes in these alphabets signify. For instance: Irish calendar of tree-letters has (13) months, beginning at winter solstice, of B-L-N-F-S-H-D-T-K-M-G-P-R (or -Ng-R). Immediately it becomes apparent that the first and last letters in Libyan refer to this: B is a circle with a dot in the center (birth of sun), R a circle without said dot (returning for a recharge). Further, it becomes apparent why this differs from the earlier Scandinavian version of Tifinag, in which the solar symbol does not appear till F, the time of year the sun appears in the far north. Third, the midpoint in both alphabets is a doorway (upside-down squared-off U), while the Hebrew letter-name dalet means 'door' or 'page', things that swing about, and this in turn links up with the Phoenician D, which was a jib, although at this point one must admit that this triangular jib form arose from the simplified (hieratic) form of the Egyptian hieroglyph of a hand extended (in friendship). This is jovial Jupiter's tree, the oak, from whose wood doors are made.

This hypothesis generates scrumptuous riddles, such as this one, which occupied me for nearly a decade: what have Hebrew ox alef and Egyptian eagle and ogham's A-ailm the silver fir all have in common? I would welcome you proffering an answer, then I will tell you what I finally figured out.

Rabbis fail to understand their own letters (even amidst many genuine traditions concerning them) because they see them in a vacuum more or less, shunning even the older form of Hebrew itself (tradition has it Torah was given in square Hebrew!). Yet many mysteries of letter-shape are easily solved once reference is made to the possibility (probability, rather) of that greater tradition. Examples:

Q in old Hebrew -- the dropped koppa of Greek -- is in the shape of a circle on top of a stem. In tree-ogham it is apple and symbolizes fruit, and in square Hebrew, then, it is quite apparent that its shape is that of the womb in profile, along with the two openings relevant to it, namely the navel and birth canal.

Yod in square Hebrew is suspended above the line, just as its 'tree', mistleoe or loranthus, is rooted in another tree, not in soil. (Graves's The White Goddess postulates an II-mistletoe and AA-palm to add to ogham's KK-apple and SS(St)-blackthorn, but he associates I-yew with yod, due to similarity of name).

Western Greek H (eastern eta) is cheyt and shows a section of fence or a roadblock: just so, H is hawthorn, a hedge that separates, and its number (Graves, The White Goddess, page 295) is 'no number', meaning no-thing, space, that which separates, and its time of year is gemini, the shoulders, which are pictured in the square-Hebrew form.

Kaf corresponds to coll the hazel, compressed wisdom ('in a nutshell'), and its form in square Hebrew is the curved hand or hollow that contains it.

Lamedh in square Hebrew is obviously arms swinging while walking seen from above, as when teaching an infant to walk: just so, L-rowan is the second month and signifies 'learning, teaching' (1st month B-birch being birth), as indeed does also its name in Hebrew (by bardic numbering, XIIII Temperance, i.e. tempering). Indeed, it is also linked to 'ox-goad' and its Phoenician form looks like a riding-crop, whereas rowan was used to make whips to tame bewitched horses.

And shin's place in the calendar is atop aries the head in the zodiac of the seated torso, its seated status linking it in Merkabah tradition (pre-Kabbalah) to the Throne, hence shin looking like a crown perhaps?

Indeed, digging deeper yields even greater clarity, that is, if we seek to find indication of preserved knowledge from before man was thrust (evidently by cataclysm circa the 11th millennium B.C.E.) into savagery and ignorance, before scientific knowledge underlying the number-tradition of bardic letters faded. Three brief examples, for now:

Peh shows a mouth in speaking, the Phoenician an ear in hearing. Just so, its bardic number is 7, atomic number of nitrogen, or the bulk of the air emitted in speach. Bardic SS or St, blackthorn, was numbered (I have surmised, though Graves does not give its number) 20, its trump (it means 'strife') XX Judgment (Armageddon): this means calcium, controlled by parathyroids in the throat, which is the sign (taurus) of S-willow, which SS doubles so that S itself can be pulled back (as it is in ogham order) to aries the head to be shin, the crown. And dalet's signifying the sign straight ahead, towards the horizon without, conforms to its being numbered (by bards) 12, magnesium, which burns with highly actinic light and thus is used in signal lights and flares, just as D-oak is lightning's tree. [One more: the number 8, oxygen, is associated with F-alder, whose sign is aries the head or straight up, being the only atom-type without which there is no up.]

I am convinced of this tradition's existence because it explains every shape in old Hebrew and runic: how many authors have failed to see that the first rune, being Bran's (cognate with Scandinavian Fro, Freyr) alder and thus standing for the Corn Spirit, shows a stalk of corn? And it explains most shapes in Tifinag, Libyan, Meroitic, and square Hebrew. Moreover, the actual connexion to Egyptian 'bardic' tradition (that of the scribes, in other words) becomes quite perceptible when the hieratic forms generating the old Hebrew forms are carefully traced: in the original Egyptian system, for instance, I can authoritatively say that the first four signs of the Cauldron (months cancer through capricorn, the year's bottom half) are all horizontal signs and in the sequence hand, tongs, basket (of fruit or nuts), mouth. Hand grasps tongs with which to take fruit from basket to mouth.

If any of this is of interest to you, we can chat further (no one will shut us up, I think). If not, well, join the crowd (he says cynically).

Ciao,
Gary

PS. The letter M of "mm" or sweetness, by the way, is muin the vine, whose grape yields the juice used to sweeten that of other fruits. In Egyptian this would mean the sweetness of the owl's wisdom or knowledge (ability to see in the dark and move silently), while M's being water makes it the sweetness of Torah to the Habiru.
 

Ross G Caldwell

venicebard said:
Well, Ross, as a sign of your credibility, I just shelled out nearly $30 bucks for just vol. 2 (paperback), as it looks quite useful. (I shall soon know whether I should thank you or not, but thanx in advance.)

Gee, thanks ;) (ducks for cover)

I think you'll be repaid in one way or another. Your theoretical framework is very different from Hulse's, and of course in most ways you are more advanced. But the sheer amount of ground he has covered, even if not to profound depth, is bound to turn up some useful nuggets. Think of it as a preliminary archeological surface survey.

If you can read German (or even just use it), Dornseiff "Das Alphabet in Mystik und Magie" (1925; Reprint 1994, Teubner, Berlin) ISBN 3-8262-0400-X is classic and still a basic text for these questions.
 

Dave's Angel

Ross G Caldwell said:
But the sheer amount of ground he has covered, even if not to profound depth, is bound to turn up some useful nuggets. Think of it as a preliminary archeological surface survey.
This is a great relief to know as that puts the book far more on my level. Thanks for this Ross.

Ross G Caldwell said:
If you can read German (or even just use it), Dornseiff "Das Alphabet in Mystik und Magie" (1925; Reprint 1994, Teubner, Berlin) ISBN 3-8262-0400-X is classic and still a basic text for these questions.

I saw that book in the Bibliography of Kieran Barry's "Greek Qabalah" that got me so fascinated, and I was trawling for books that carried on in the same vein. Boy I was gutted when I saw it was in German!
 

Fulgour

Alphabets, in order to make sense, and survive,
have to be simple, direct, and live beyond time.

*

Anyone can complicate it all, but communication
is not an option, and survival depends on basics.

The Phoenician alphabet gives a map of the Earth
and Heavens in 22 simple characters that anyone
can relate to almost instantly, without prior study.

The sands of time wash all away repeatedly, but,
from oblivion is reborn civilisation, and fully intact.

Look no further than the point of your pen for the
real truth of the letters~ with an eye to the stars.
 

Dave's Angel

I think in recent posts we've been going a bit wide of my original need in starting the thread, so it might help to restate it here....

Dave's Angel said:
I'm trying to study all this and especially find something (website or book) that tells me more about the correspondences of each letter in any alphabet that had this extra dimension. I'm not so interested about learning the history of the alphabets outside of any esoteric meaning (if that's possible).

Can anyone give me directions? I'm looking for reliable resources that can tell me more on the correspondences of each letter, be that for alphabets already listed, or for any I don't know about. I'm a comparative beginner, but not shy of something that I need to get my teeth into.

Thanks again.
 

Rosanne

Hi Dave's Angel!
Firstly, I am not sure that you will get a book about Alphabets that does not carry the History of that alphabet.
Aside from writing systems of China and Japan, most writing in the world belongs to one family of marks on a surface, as far as is known. The first one we know about is called a proto- semetic 2000 BC- then that one had a daughter called the Phoenician 1000 BC. In the next 200 years that daughter was borrowed by five other languages to describe them. They were Greek/Hebrew/Aramiac/Brahmi/Etruscan. They were called Abjads as they had 18-24 consonant sounds.
They described the sounds that our mouths make by relating that sound to a shape, we now call a letter. They were for conveying information, that could not be heard orally. It does not appear that these marks originally were used to explain anything esoteric. After all pictograms(first writing) seem to be about the convenience of counting stores and stock; abjads about directions, Gods, stars and the like.To make a mark understandable- it had to relate to the sound of the word- so Ox was the word that sounded like an outbreath AAAA- so you drew a head with horns -that was an ox.
Once this happened- esoteric explanations were overlaid on that letter. It was also a powerful tool to become powerful with this secret knowledge.So you are looking for books on that overlay of esoteric knowledge?
On Runic Script : Rune Power by Kenneth Meadows (thought to come via Etruscan branch)
Ogham and Coelbren by Nigel Pennick
Johanna Drucker's The Alphabetic Labyrinth: the letters in history and imagination, isbn 0500280681.(offered by jmd) - excellent!
The Alphabet Abecedarium by Richard A Firmage (gives bits and peices of esoteric)
The Hebrew Alphabet:A Mystical Journey by Edward Hoffman
and Ross Caldwell's offering "The Key of It All" by David Allen Hulse.(I think the best)
These are very easily read books, will not get you bogged down and have excellent bibliographies.
~Rosanne
 

Rosanne

IN THE SEARCH FOR MEANING- it also depends whom you ask :p
A quick drawing to illustrate below~Rosanne
 

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Debra

Rosanne said:
IN THE SEARCH FOR MEANING- it also depends whom you ask :p
A quick drawing to illustrate below~Rosanne

You crack me up, Rosanne.

Emoticons. Hmm. :thumbsup:
 

Dave's Angel

Thanks for this Roseanne.

I had been thinking that there's only so far a book's going to go into the esoteric stuff in alphabets without doing the history and development. I think what I was trying to say was "I'd like to avoid linguistics for linguistics' sake". You've guessed me right, it's the "overlay" on the alphabets I'm interested in, and I'm happy with the way that's always going to be secondary to the actual sound of the letters (ie invented afterwards).

Alphabet Abecedarium is a book I've been slowly getting tempted by for the last couple of weeks, especially as I've seen it somewhere - can't remember where - for 40p plus p&p!

I'd definitely like to know more on Runes and I've been following threads in the Divination section on this - I own two Rune books, "Runes For Beginners" by Kristyna Arcarti, which is very basic (and frankly, very crap in many places) but was good enough at the time I got it, and good old "Runelore" by Edred Thorsson - a fascinating book, very deep with plenty of meat, but nothing on the more "everyday" rune meanings.

Pennick - I have two of his books, and while they're interesting, I advise people to avoid him as he tends to say stuff without explaining why, so you have to take his word for it, which I find very offputting.

Now a second person has recommended Drucker to me, I might have to give it a look (Amazon ahoy!).... and as for Hoffman, I've never heard of it so I'll have to have a good look for it!

Thankyou very much, dear!