Some fun patterns I’ve been learning about in magic!

Magicians tend to talk about these structures as if everybody already knows about them, but they were new to me and I want to share them with other beginners (and even people who don’t consider themselves magicians) because they’re kind of neat!

So there are the planets and luminaries. When people looked up at the night sky, they noticed the stars, and the the stars were always in the same positions relative to each other. They recognized these patterns and decided that they represented images, grouping them into constellations.

They also noticed other lights in the sky. Notably, the Sun, which is hard to miss, and the Moon, which lights the night and is always changing phase. These are the luminaries.

There were also lights that looked like stars, but moved relative to their neighbors, night by night.

Where the Sun and Moon moved perfectly regularly (West to East) relative to the background of fixed stars, these would move forward, stop, go backward for a bit, stop, then resume their forward progress. These are the planets.

People could only see the 5 closest planets: Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn. (Neptune is barely visible to the eye unaided by a telescope, and seems to have escaped notice.)

There is an order the planets and luminaries: the speed with which they move (night by night) relative to the background of stars.

Saturn is slowest, then Jupiter, then Mars, then the Sun (which takes a year to move through the whole sky — in fact, that’s what a year IS). Venus and Mercury are next (they can overtake the Sun when moving forward), then the Moon, which (relatively) zooms around the sky once per month.

(Which is what a month is.)

This sequence is called the Chaldean Order and it shows up all over the place in astrology and magic. In astrology, the faster moving a planet or luminary moves, the more personal and specific it tends to be, and the more it varies between the natal charts of people born around the same time.

(The fastest changing and most personal element of a birth chart is the Eastern horizon, or ascendant, which takes a day to circle the sky — in fact, that’s what a day IS).

The location of the planets and luminaries relative to the stellar background, each other, and the horizons are an important element in magic. Careful decisions about WHEN to do magic can greatly enhance its power.

If you are doing magic about Love, the moment when Venus rises, sets, or is at the highest point in the sky might be a good time to do it. (Note that Venus is only actually visible at one of those times (at best, and it’s never at midheaven because the Sun is so bright))

You can’t always see planets (during the day or when they are hidden from view by the Earth under our feet), so we invented a weird counting/timing game — it doesn’t have much to do with what is going on in the actual sky, but can be used effectively to time magical operations: Planetary Hours.

Planetary hours aren’t the sixty minute clock hours we’re used to: they are slices of the actual length of the day or night. The day is divided into 12 equal intervals starting at sunrise, ending at sunset.

The night is similarly divided. So a daytime planetary hour is longer during the summer than the winter, and the reverse is true for nighttime hours.

Planetary hours start with Saturn on Saturday morning (this is why it is called Saturday) and then tick through the planets in Chaldean order, wrapping around from the Moon back to Saturn again. By sundown we are on… uhhh…

1 Saturn
2 Jupiter
3 Mars
4 Sun
5 Venus
6 Mercury
7 Moon
8 Saturn
9 Jupiter
10 Mars
11 Sun
12 Venus
13 Mercury

So just as Saturday is associated with Saturn, Saturday night is associated with Mercury.
14 Moon
15 Saturn
16 Jupiter
17 Mars
18 Sun
19 Venus
20 Mercury
21 Moon
22 Saturn
23Jupiter
24 Mars
1 Sun

So the hour after the next sunrise is attributed to the Sun. It’s Sunday.

THE DAYS OF THE WEEK ARE SPECIAL CASES THAT FALL OUT OF THE GENERAL SYSTEM OF PLANETARY HOURS

In Latin-derived European languages days of the week are more closely tied to Roman god names, but in English, we have substituted Norse gods who are similar is some respects. (In French, for instance, Monday is Lundi, Tuesday is Mardi, Wednesday is Mercredi, Thursday is Jeudi, Friday is Vendredi)

Saturday : Saturn
Sunday: the Sun (Sol)
Monday: the Moon (Luna)
Tuesday: Mars (Tyr’s Day — Tyr is a Norse war god analogous to Mars or Ares)
Wednesday: Mercury (Wotan’s Day — Wotan is like Mercury or Hermes — he received the runes)
Thursday: Jupiter (Thor’s Day — a thunder god, like Jupiter or Zeus)
Friday: (Freya’s Day — Freya corresponds with Venus or Aphrodite)

So the order of days of the week are the result of modulo (division remainder) arithmetic. 24 modulo 7 is 3. So each day of the week is 3 steps forward in the Chaldean order.

---

OK, but then there are decans! The Chaldean Order is also (one system) used to assign subregions of the Zodiac called “decans”. A decan is a 10 degree arc of each Zodiac sign. A sign covers 30 degrees of the sky.

(There are 12 signs, and 12 x 30 = 360, a full circle). A decan is like an arc of the sign’s story. Beginning, middle, end. Initial onrush of the sign’s quality, its full stable establishment, its faltering and giving way to change into the next sign.

Each Zodiac sign has a “ruler”, a planet or luminary that is most at home in it. (These are also Chaldean order influenced). Each decan also has a ruler, kind of a sub-ruler for that part of the sign.

The Decans are assigned (according to one system) to each planet in Chaldean order, starting with Mars in Aries Decan 1. (Aries is kind of the start of the year — the Sun starts to pass in front of the arc of the sky associated with Aries at the Spring Equinox

(which, as non-astrologer journalists love to discover every year or two: is not where the constellation Aries appears in the sky anymore))

Anyway: Aries is good at kicking things off. So is Mars. It’s a good way to start the year.

So the decans go
Aries 1: Mars
Aries 2: Sun
Aries 3: Venus
Taurus 1: Mercury
Taurus 2: Moon
Taurus 3: Saturn
Gemini 1: Jupiter
Gemini 2: Mars
Gemini 3: Sun
etc

They end on Pisces 3: Mars. So there is a weird little seam at the Spring Equinox where we get to Mars Decans in a row before and after. (Because 36 modulo 7 is 1.)

The Golden Dawn used this system to determine the meaning of the Minor Arcana (the numbered cards). The two most common Tarot decks in British and American occultism, The Smith-Waite and Crowley-Harris (Thoth) deck use this system of correspondences.

Each suit corresponds to an element: Wands are Fire, Cups are Water, Swords are Air, Pentacles are Earth.

(Wands as Fire and Swords as Air was the an invention of one of the Golden Dawn’s founders, William Wynn Westcott - the sword as a magical tool had traditionally been associated with Fire and the wand with Air for centuries. I’d be curious to read anything about why he decided to make this change.)

The Aces are left out of this system as the pure seed or implicit potential of each element. Cards 2 through 4 are associated with the 3 decans (and their rulers!) of Cardinal sign of its element. 5-7, the Fixed sign, 8-10 the Mutable sign.

So:
the 2 of Wands is Mars ruling Aries 1
the 3 of Wands is Sun ruling Aries 2
the 4 of Wands is Venus ruling Aries 3
then we continue into Taurus:
5 of Pentacles is Mercury ruling Taurus 1
6 of Pentacles is Luna ruling Taurus 2
7 of Pentacles is Saturn ruling Taurus 3

These attributions combine with numerological connotations of the number from Hermetic Kabbalah and traditional meanings from earlier European tarot interpretation systems to determine the card’s meaning.

(which, oh, boy if you like complicated mystical number games — but this post is getting kinda long)

---

Other weird planet number fun: Magic Squares.

So there is this cute math puzzle game. You take a grid, say 3 x 3. And you put the numbers 1 through the square of the length of one of the sides. For a 3 x 3, that’s nine. (This is why the number is called a square.)

The rule of the game is: the sum of each column each row, and both diagonals of the square have to add up to the same number.

I’d been aware of this puzzle since I was a kid. It’s called “Magic Squares”. I didn’t realize the Magic part of Magic Squares was LITERAL MAGIC.

Like, this game is super important to magicians and has been for hundreds, maybe thousands of years. (Cross culturally. Apparently Egyptian, Greek, Arab, Chinese magicians all used them.)

And: they are associated with the planets. In Chaldean order, starting with the 3x3 square. (There is no 2x2 magic square.)

So: 3x3 is Saturn’s square
4x4 is Jupiter’s square
5x5 is Mars’s square
6x6 is Sol’s square
7x7 is Venus’s square
8x8 is Mercury’s square
9x9 is Luna’s square

So these numbers all have planetary associations now: 3: Saturn. 5: Mars. 7: Venus. etc.

But there are other numbers that fall out of these squares. There’s the number of cells in the square (the square of the number on each side)

Saturn: 9
Jupiter: 16
Mars: 25
Sol: 36
Venus: 49
Mercury: 64
Luna: 81

Theres the sum that each row/column/diagonal ads up to.
Saturn: 15
Jupiter: 34
Mars: 65
Sol: 111
Venus: 175
Mercury: 260
Luna: 369

There’s the sum of all the numbers in the grid.
Saturn: 45
Jupiter: 136
Mars: 325
Sol: 666
Venus: 1225
Mercury: 2080
Luna: 3321

These are the “mystical numbers of the planets” and are used to do things like: validate / discover the names of angels / spirits / demons / associated with the planets.

Also, magicians will translate the numbers to letters and then trace the patterns described by the positions of these numbers in the magical square to generate / discover sigils or seals from the names planetary entities and use them in rituals to establish communication.

Anyway: the Chaldean order is super interesting. Once you know about it, you’ll see it popping up all over the place in magical and astrological systems.