Sefirot Color Visualization

Thanks to Aharon Varady for posting this

An important quotation in Moshe Idel, "Mystical Techniques": 

The earliest texts explicitly referring to this technique are those connected to the name of
R. David ben Yehudah he-Hasid, a Spanish Kabbalist of the late thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries:

"R. David said: We are not allowed to visualize the ten Sefirot, except in accordance with the rashey perakim which reach you, such as Magen David to Ḥesed and Ḥonen ha-Daat to Tiferet. Therefore, you should always visualize that color which is [attributed to the Sefirah according to] the rashey perakim, that color being the ḥashmal of the Sefirah, the ḥashmal being the covering217 [or dress] of that very Sefirah around [it]. Afterward you shall draw [downward] by your visualization the efflux [shefa] from the depth of the river to the worlds down to us—and this is the true [way], received [in an esoteric manner] by oral tradition."

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Cervantes on Translation

It seems to me that translating from one tongue into another, unless it is from those queens of tongues Greek and Latin, is like viewing Flemish tapestries from the wrong side; for although you see the pictures, they are covered with threads which obscure them sot hat the smoothness and gloss of the fabric are lost.
(Cervantes, Don quixote, 2.62)
yet another quote stolen from http://borbor-chan.livejournal.com/

Foucault on the fantastic

"The fantastic is no longer a property of the heart. Nor is it found among the incongruities of nature; it evolves from the accuracy of the knowledge, and its treasures lie dormant in documents. Dreams are no longer summoned with closed eyes, but in reading; and a true image is now a product of learning."

http://publicdomainreview.org/2013/03/07/the-redemption-of-saint-anthony/

Anthropology of "real" magic

compiled by Robert Mathiesen, sent to Academic-Study-Magic e-list

"Here are some anthropologists' encounters with magic that seemed to be (or actually was) effective, as well as a few other related items:

(1)  Anthologies:

David E. Young & Jean-Guy A. Goulet, edd.  Being Changed by Cross-Cultural Encounters; The Anthropology of Extraordinary Exeprience.  Broadview Press, 1994.

Jean-Guy A. Goulet & Bruce Granville Miller, edd.  Extraordinary Anthropology: Transformations in the Field. University of Nebrasks Press, 2007.

Philip M. Peek, ed.  African Divination Systems: Ways of Knowing.  Indiana University Press, 1991.

Michael Winkelman & Philip M. Peek, edd.  Divination and Healing: Potent Vision.  University of Arizona Press, 2004.


(2)  Monographic Studies:

Paul Stoller and Cheryl Olkes.  In Sorcery's Shadow: A Memoir of Apprenticeship among the Songhay of Niger. University of Chicago Press, 1987.

Edith Turner et alii.  Experiencing Ritual: A New Interpretation of African healing.  University of Pennsylvania Press, 1992.

Barbara Tedlock.  The Woman in  the Shaman's Body.  Random House (Bantam), 2005.

Elizabeth Lloyd Mayer.  Extraordinary Knowing.  Random House (Bantam,) 2007.


(3)  Various articles:

Michael Winkelman.  "Magic: A Theoretical Reassessment," Current Anthropology, 23/1 (Fenruary 1982), 37-66.

Bruce T. Grindal, "Into the Heart of Sisala Exeprience: Witnessing Death Divination," Journal of Anthropological Research, 39 (1983), 60-80.  --  Perhaps the most important article of them all.

Barbara Tedlock.  "From Participant Observation to the Observation of Participation: The Emergence of Narrative Ethnography," Journal of Anthropological Research, 47/1 (1991), 69-94.

Edith Turner.  "The Reality of Spirits: A Tabooed or Permitted Field of Study?" Anthropology of Consciousness, 4/1 (March 1993), 9-12.

James McClenon & Jennifer Nooney.  "Anomalous Experiences Reported by Field Anthropologists: Evaluating Theories Regarding Religion," Anthropology of Consciousness, 13/2 (2002), 46-60.

Edith Turner.  "Advances in the Study of Spirit Experience: Drawing Together Many Threads," Anthropology of Consciousness, 17/2 (2006), 33-61.  --  Has large bibliography."

William Blake Saw the Fnords

Sebald on Sense of Place

A sense of place distinguishes a piece of writing. It may be a distillation of different places. There must be a very good reason for not describing place. -Max Sebald

Foucault on knowing "what you are"

‎"I don't feel that it is necessary to know exactly what I am. The main interest in life and work is to become someone else that you were not in the beginning.”
― Michel Foucault