Gabriel and the Cherubim

Despite the fact that summoning Magic is more widespread than calling, and, accordingly, ritual interaction with ministering spirits occurs far more often than with the free ones, knowledge of the gods is much fuller and more extensive than that of the demons, and all the more so of the angels.

This is, above all, connected to the summoners’ broader outlook, to their desire to learn and to describe the field of creative forces.

At the same time, whereas the goetic magi at least made efforts to describe the spirits they interacted with, the theurgists — angelic seers — limited themselves to the most general reflections on how those forces operate.

Of all the angelic hierarchies, only the activity of the Archangels is more or less known, and that only because they themselves often insistently initiate contact.

Even the correspondences between different angelologies — the Christian and the Jewish — are rather vague and indeterminate. Thus, if the Kabbalah assigns the Seraphim to the sphere of Jupiter and Chesed, Christian angelology assigns them to the highest heaven (that is, formally, to the sefirah Chokhmah or even Keter); the Cherubim, for Kabbalists, are spirits of Yesod and sometimes Hod, while for Christians they are of the second heaven (that is, associated with Chokhmah or Binah).

Moreover, Christian sources generally restrict their descriptions of angels to indicating that they somehow perform God’s will

“The name of the Cherubim denotes their power — to know and contemplate God, their capacity to receive the highest light and to behold the Divine beauty at its very first manifestation, their wise art — to teach and to abundantly communicate to others the wisdom granted to them. (Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite. ‘On the Celestial Hierarchy’)

 

Occult descriptions often confuse the functions of this angelic hierarchy with the properties of the sefirah they belong to, and, speaking of the functions of the Cherubim,

“Their influence spreads through the choir of Angels called by the Jews the Kerubim, within the sphere of the Moon. They produce the ebbs and flows of all things, care for the genii and keepers of men, and bestow them (upon men). Their intelligence is Gabriel… (Agrippa, Book 3)

in fact, merely describe manifestations of Yesod.

At the same time, it is clear that Yesod as a primary sphere, Gabriel as the Archangel of Yesod, Gabriel as archangel of the Moon, and the Cherubim as the Intelligence of the Lunar Sphere — though they lie on the same axis of analogies — are nevertheless by no means identical in their influence on human perception.

A clear understanding and differentiation of the spheres of influence of various powers is crucial for the magus, since only under that condition can he possess enough authority for effective results that expand his consciousness, rather than merely producing showmanship and spectacle.

Let us, for example, try to sort out Yesod and its manifestations.

The sefirah itself as a primary sphere is described fairly extensively and in detail.

Problems begin when one defines the scope of particular agents’ activity — and if the image of Gabriel is relatively clear, the Choir of the Cherubim presents certain difficulties.

The quadripolar structure of this Choir (Eagle-Lion-Bull-Serpent) indicates their connection with the Primary Elements, and with the creative activity of the material plane (which also belongs to the sphere of Yesod).

Not forgetting that in this case we are speaking of ministering vortices, and not of elementals, one can specify that the Cherubim (also called Terhor) carry out the materialization of the elements — their embodiment, concrete manifestation, and correct blending.

This is precisely what Agrippa has in mind when he says that “by the help of the Cherubim Shaddai created humanity.”

And it is this embodying, materializing activity of the Cherubim that conditions the participation of their chief, Gabriel, in the incarnation of the World Logos.

The participation of the Cherubim in the “lifting of prayers,” in fact, also signifies their materializing activity — in response to the practitioner’s act of will they coagulate matter into the corresponding forms.

And this same activity is denoted by the “ploughing” work of the Cherubim — the Shedu — the winged bulls of Assyria, “civilizing” the chaotic surroundings.

It follows that invoking the Cherubim is necessary when elemental, primary forces are forming.

And conversely, when it is necessary to deconstruct certain material manifestations, the Cherubic forces must be bound and deprived of power.

Similar reflections should be applied to the other angelic choirs, and then a clear understanding of their nature and the character of their activity will allow the Magus to be an effective creative agent.