b'l - Baal the God of Renewal

By Alessandro A. Borio

Baal is the God of Renewal. His majesty is still alive: from III millennium BC to III millennium CE, through the Semitic Near East towards the Monotheistic era and Goetia. This book is the utterance of the re-manifestation of the principle of regeneration and creation, hidden in the cosmology and cosmogony of the deity Baal: single rituals, daily and monthly rituals, for the strenght and development of the Self and the body.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Nov 3, 2016
• ISBN: 9781326804923

Book preview

A.A.Borio

b’l

Baal the God of Renewal

B’l Ba’al Ba’lu Baal Baalzebul Belzebub Bael

God of Renewal

From III millennium BC to III millennium CE through the Semitic Near East, towards the Monotheistic era and Ars Goetia.

Author and Editor: A.A.Borio

Written under the flash of inspiration by the Daemonic Self of b’l Alexein

Index.

Premise.

Introduction.

Canaan: history and biblical sources.

Peoples and Religion.

City-State and Culture.

Religion: Canaanite pantheon.

B’l (Ba’al; Ba’lu; Baal).

B’l Cycle.

B’l and other writings.

The term b’l: deities, titles and names.

Synthesis on functional features of B'l.

Syncretism with other deities.

The others main gods of Ugarit.

Rituals and Hymns.

From B’l, Baal-Zebul,…to Beelzebub and Bael.

Magical Conclusions.

Cultic Language.

Bibliography.

Premise.

I want to spend few words in the premise on the attitude that conduced me to write this book: the re-manifestation of the principle of regeneration and creation. What we are seeing is the story and the magical (or metaphysical) approach to the most debated and denied deity of all times: Baal.

The story of Baal began in Canaanite territories at least from the III millennium BC and it comes until now through the books, called Goetia.

This work is dedicated to all Initiates in the black arts to understand and practice the self-exploration and self-development: the philosophy of the archetype god Baal is the struggle and the re-creation as well as must be for the black magician.

Before I speak about the terminology used in this book: the etymology is the most important object before every discussion or debate between Initiates in both esotericism and exotericism questions; the definitions must be clear, for not creating misunderstandings or wrong ideas and actions.

The word magic derives via Latin, from the Greek adjective magikos (μαγικός) used in reference to the astrological, divinatory and necromantic arts of the Persian moğ (Greek: singular mágos; Latin: singular magus), attested by the Zoroastrian priests of the ancient Persian Empire.

Likewise, sorcery was taken in ca. 1300 from Old French sorcerie, which is from Vulgar Latin sortiarius, from sors (fate), literally meaning one who influences fate.

In Initiatory terms magic, sorcery and mage are related; in this book the practice for the struggle with fate and self-stasis is linked to the re-creation and renewal of the Self.

Goetia is common term derived by Medieval Latin, from Greek γοητεία, goitia sorcery. It refers to a practice that includes the invocation of angels or demons, and usage of the term in English largely derives from the 17th century grimoire The Lesser Key of Solomon⁸⁵, which features an Ars Goetia as its first section. It contains descriptions of the evocation of seventy-two demons, first of them is Baal⁷²,⁷³, famously edited by Aleister Crowley in 1904 as The Book of the Goetia of Solomon the King.

Ancient Greek γοητεία (goitia) means charm, jugglery and γούρι (goúri) means charm, spell, while γόης (goes) means in ancient Greek literature sorcerer, wizard.

The word may be ultimately derived from the verb γοάω (goao) to bewail, howl.

Latinized goetia, via French goétie, was adopted into English as goecie, goety in the 16th century. A revised English edition of the Ars Goetia was published in 1904 by S.L. Mathers and A. Crowley as The book of the Goetia.

The history of Baal is well drawn in a threefold aspect: in primis the mighty god in the Ancient times; in secundis the powerful god opposed to the Hebrew’s god (the Bible is the largest producer of sources); in terzis the re-manifested god as demon (like bad Christianized term) in the Medieval times until the 20th century.

My intent is creating a magical link (in sorcery and story) from III millennium BC until now for understanding: who Baal was…

and what His power be!

Introduction.

In the introduction of The book of the Goetia, Crowley argues that the work of demonic⁸⁶ evocation is merely a form of psychological self-exploration.

Here is the realm of esoteric journey: Touch the Self! Raise the true Self! Build the Self! Carve the self like a stone wax can be shaped!

The psychological drama of evocation/invocation is also due to speak with the pronunciation of words in Ancient Semitic Near East, Greek or magical words (Voces Magicae).

The literary traditions and scribal conventions, which continued from the Bronze Age and Biblical literature, are enough rich of illustrated Ugaritic literature. These linguistic forms were also parallels with Akkadian scriptures. Parallelism is a feature of Ugaritic, Akkadian and Hebrew poetry – like in Ugaritic texts is easy identificable⁶⁹.

A small number of Ugaritic texts were excavated at the small port site of Ras Ibn Hani, south of Ras Shamra (example in fig.1). A few short texts using a cuneiform alphabet have been found elsewhere in the western Mediterranean area on Cyprus (Hala Sultan Tekke, near Larnaca), in Syria (Tell Sukas, Kedesh), Lebanon (Kamid el-Loz, Sarepta), and Israel (Mount Tabor, Taanach, Beth-Shemesh). There are also texts that were found at Ugarit but originated elsewhere (like the letter from the king of Tyre). Thus, while the language is conventionally labeled Ugaritic (owning to the circumstance of the discovery), the alphabetic cuneiform script and the Ugaritic language were in much wider circulation than simply the kingdom of Ugarit during the late II millennium⁶⁹. The Ugaritic language is written in alphabetic cuneiform. This was an innovative blending of an alphabetic script and cuneiform. The development of alphabetic cuneiform seems to reflect a decline in the use of Akkadian as lingua franca, and a transition to alphabetic scripts in the eastern Mediterranean. Ugaritic, as both a cuneiform and alphabetic script, bridges the cuneiform and alphabetic cultures of the ancient Near East. The Ugaritic cuneiform was probably derived or influenced by Akkadian cuneiform, the first alphabetic cuneiform written in history⁶⁹,⁸⁷. There are no less than seven languages in Near East area: Akkadian, Cypro-Minoan (after Mycenaean), Egyptian, Hittite, Hurrian, Sumerian and Ugaritic (after Phoenician)⁶⁰,⁹⁷ (tab.1):

Tab.1

The Ugaritic cuneiform alphabet contained thirty letters, which usually appear in the order of the following school text (fig.1)⁶⁹ and bilingual Ugaritic-Akkadian Abecedary (fig.2)⁶⁹:

Fig.1:school text

Fig.2:Ugaritic-Akkadian

The Phoenician alphabet, called by convention the Proto-Canaanite alphabet for inscriptions older than I millennium BC, is probably the oldest verified consonantal alphabet⁶⁸ (fig.3).

Fig.3: from the site The Language Gulper. Author Alejandro Gutman.

Until now we may notice a couple of important things:

First, the alphabetic-cuneiform scripture was characterized by a prevalence of consonants, for that it is called by scholars consonants alphabet.

Second, the Ugaritic and Akkadian language was written left to right; in contrast to Hebrew and Phoenician.

So we have notice that the peoples and languages in the Near East were a blending of social and political cultures, as well as the religion probably was polluted in the same way: hence may be very hard to obtain pure results by the study of ancient deities but what is important is to understand and to know the roots of them for achieving