Babylonian Magic - The Maqlu Ritual - Invoking the Gods to Destroy Evil Magic

With the demented scribbles of demonologists.

So in deference and in respect for those that practice witchcraft now, and for whom witch is actually a title of deep ethical and spiritual commitment, I'm going to avoid translating Kashabtu and Kishbe as witch and witchcraft.

In fact, I'm just going to mostly use the Akkadian terms themselves.

So, for this episode, I'm going to use the term kashaptu and kishbi, and the similar terms apeshu and ipeshtu, typically rendered as sorcery or sorceress, to mean something like malevolent magic, and the noun form to mean something like malevolent magic doer person.

Though, for my Akkadian fans, you'll notice that both terms are in the feminine gender.

While the text does mention masculine-gendered evil magic-doer people, or kashapu, usually rendered as warlock in the English, from time to time the text overwhelmingly uses the feminine gender term because, well, misogyny.

At any rate, I hope these choices make sense, and I even hope you pick up some Akkadian grammar because...

This channel ain't called Esoterica for nothing.

As I mentioned a moment ago, the Maklu is a counter-magic ritual preserved in numerous manuscripts and various scripts from Old Babylonian to Neo-Assyrian, from both northern and southern Mesopotamia, thus all of this really attests to the popularity of this ritual in the area.

The ritual occupies an impressive nine cuneiform tablets, eight of which contain the countermagic incantations, with the ninth being the instructions for the overall ritual itself.

The ritual is even mentioned in a private letter by the Apishu, or exorcist healer, Nabu Nadin Shumi to King Esaharadan in early August of 670 BCE.

So we have both the ritual and the incantations and references to the ritual in this ancient literature, which is really just amazing.

The ritual appears in a number of manuscripts from the first millennium BCE, and the most important manuscript was recovered from the library of Ashurbanipal, which was destroyed in 612 BCE.

While other libraries like the Library of Alexandria and, to a lesser degree, the Beit al-Hikmah of Baghdad get all the press, the Library of Ashurbanipal is incredibly important.

It contained roughly 10,000 texts, including the Epic of Gilgamesh, the creation account of the Enuma Elish, and a ton of other scientific, cultural, literary, and along with thousands of political documents.

All I'm saying is that the Library of Ashurbanipal is gonna get its own episode at some point.

It's so unknown it's practically esoteric despite being so important.

The Maklu ritual itself was performed in the month of Abu, which is roughly cognate to the Hebrew month of Av and falls sometime around July or August for individuals that felt that they were victims of malevolent magic.

Indeed, this period of the year was thought to be especially prone to supernatural evil, as the barrier between this world and the underworld was thought thin.

Perhaps I think an analogy could be made to Halloween or Samhain here.

The maklu was carried out by an ashipu, or ritual expert, this often gets translated as an exorcist, over the course of the night, with the final parts of the ritual taking place in the early morning.

Originally, it appears that the maklu itself was a shorter ritual of about 10 incantations that took place during the day, in fact, but at some point it got moved and greatly expanded to an overnight performance.

This shift also leads to some confusion.

With the demented scribbles of demonologists.

So in deference and in respect for those that practice witchcraft now, and for whom witch is actually a title of deep ethical and spiritual commitment, I'm going to avoid translating Kashabtu and Kishbe as witch and witchcraft.

In fact, I'm just going to mostly use the Akkadian terms themselves.

So, for this episode, I'm going to use the term kashaptu and kishbi, and the similar terms apeshu and ipeshtu, typically rendered as sorcery or sorceress, to mean something like malevolent magic, and the noun form to mean something like malevolent magic doer person.

Though, for my Akkadian fans, you'll notice that both terms are in the feminine gender.

While the text does mention masculine-gendered evil magic-doer people, or kashapu, usually rendered as warlock in the English, from time to time the text overwhelmingly uses the feminine gender term because, well, misogyny.

At any rate, I hope these choices make sense, and I even hope you pick up some Akkadian grammar because...

This channel ain't called Esoterica for nothing.

As I mentioned a moment ago, the Maklu is a counter-magic ritual preserved in numerous manuscripts and various scripts from Old Babylonian to Neo-Assyrian, from both northern and southern Mesopotamia, thus all of this really attests to the popularity of this ritual in the area.

The ritual occupies an impressive nine cuneiform tablets, eight of which contain the countermagic incantations, with the ninth being the instructions for the overall ritual itself.

The ritual is even mentioned in a private letter by the Apishu, or exorcist healer, Nabu Nadin Shumi to King Esaharadan in early August of 670 BCE.

So we have both the ritual and the incantations and references to the ritual in this ancient literature, which is really just amazing.

The ritual appears in a number of manuscripts from the first millennium BCE, and the most important manuscript was recovered from the library of Ashurbanipal, which was destroyed in 612 BCE.

While other libraries like the Library of Alexandria and, to a lesser degree, the Beit al-Hikmah of Baghdad get all the press, the Library of Ashurbanipal is incredibly important.

It contained roughly 10,000 texts, including the Epic of Gilgamesh, the creation account of the Enuma Elish, and a ton of other scientific, cultural, literary, and along with thousands of political documents.

All I'm saying is that the Library of Ashurbanipal is gonna get its own episode at some point.

It's so unknown it's practically esoteric despite being so important.

The Maklu ritual itself was performed in the month of Abu, which is roughly cognate to the Hebrew month of Av and falls sometime around July or August for individuals that felt that they were victims of malevolent magic.

Indeed, this period of the year was thought to be especially prone to supernatural evil, as the barrier between this world and the underworld was thought thin.

Perhaps I think an analogy could be made to Halloween or Samhain here.

The maklu was carried out by an ashipu, or ritual expert, this often gets translated as an exorcist, over the course of the night, with the final parts of the ritual taking place in the early morning.

Originally, it appears that the maklu itself was a shorter ritual of about 10 incantations that took place during the day, in fact, but at some point it got moved and greatly expanded to an overnight performance.

This shift also leads to some confusion.