High Magick: A Guide to the Spiritual Practices That Saved My Life on Death Row - Damien Echols 2018

The Qabalistic Cross
Fundamental Practices of Magick

The next exercise to master before moving on to more complicated practices, such as astral projection, is the Qabalistic Cross. In fact, it’s the first step of the next major practice — the Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram — which is also known as the “Philosopher’s Stone” of ceremonial magick. However, the Qabalistic Cross is more than the first stage of an advanced technique. As a stand-alone practice, it offers a number of benefits on its own:

•It centers our consciousness and helps us focus.

•It breaks us out of habitual patterns of anxiety and stress.

•It stabilizes and balances our aura.

•It clears debris from our energy centers and prevents stagnation.

•It preps us to receive an influx of divine energy.

•It protects us from any negative energy we encounter in the environment.

In other words, the Qabalistic Cross comes highly recommended.

Most people are familiar with the sign of blessing made by Catholics around the world — the right hand touches the forehead, moves to the chest, and briefly lands on each shoulder to make a cross. Before we begin, I want to acknowledge that some of you are going to feel a little weird or resistant to making this sign. That’s perfectly understandable. If anybody can relate to that particular discomfort, it’s me. However, that internal struggle eased up a lot for me when I learned that the cross symbol predates Christianity by thousands of years, showing up in Neolithic cultures long before the cross came into regular usage in Egypt and Babylon. In its usage prior to Christianity, the cross symbol was associated with balance — of the elements, the seasons, the cardinal directions, and so on — and that’s how we still use it in magick. For us, the cross represents the absolute balance of all aspects of the psyche. When we attain perfect balance, it’s quite difficult for anything outside us to cause any disturbances or influence us negatively. So practicing the Qabalistic Cross is a way to remain steady, calm, and peaceful — no matter what’s going on all around you.

The Qabalistic Cross is a way to remain steady, calm, and peaceful — no matter what’s going on around you.

The Qabalistic Cross is a deceptively simple practice that’s easy to perform and doesn’t take long to memorize. The more you perform this technique, the more powerful it will become. In this stage of your development, aim to do the Qabalistic Cross twice a day (and more if you have the time). Remember: like everything else in life, the more you put into magick, the more you will get out of it. If you go to the gym just once or twice a month, you shouldn’t be surprised when nothing happens. Make the Qabalistic Cross an everyday routine for a while and you’ll be astounded by your progress.

Also keep in mind that you’re beginning to exercise parts of your psyche and energy system that you’ve never used consciously before. We all progress differently, and each of us faces our own particular internal battles. Be patient with yourself during this practice and all of the others. Awakening the deepest parts of your being means struggling at times, and it doesn’t help to expect yourself to become an all-powerful wizard by the end of a week’s worth of practice.

I was in solitary confinement for nearly a decade. For all intents and purposes, I existed in a void — cut off and isolated from the rest of the world. On the rare occasions when I encountered energy outside of myself, it often came in harmful or poisonous forms. Since I seldom had access to any healthy or nurturing energy, I had to learn to master energy techniques just to stay alive.

One of the ways I did this was by astral projection. Before trying it out myself, I had this idea that astral travel was something like leaving the body and flying around like some kind of ghost. What I quickly realized, though, is that all my life I had been led to believe that my body was the focal point of my consciousness, that my mortal form was some type of container separating a “me” from everything else outside of me. It took me about two years of unsuccessful attempts before I learned that astral projection didn’t have anything to do with leaving my body.

Here’s the trick: consciousness isn’t spatially bound. That means that it’s omnipresent throughout time and space — infinite. All astral projection entails is shifting the focal point of where your consciousness resides. For some people, this means visualizing a sense of travel, but that’s just one way to experience it.

In the Qabalistic Cross, we’re going to be using mantras you might not be so familiar with, just as we did with the Middle Pillar. Most of the Western mantras we use are in Hebrew — an ancient language infused with mysticism right down to its syllables. Those of you who aren’t comfortable with making the sign of the cross are going to be doubly unsure about this next part, so get ready: you’re going to be reciting a Hebrew version of what’s commonly called the Pater Noster, or the Lord’s Prayer — namely, the part that says, “For thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory forever, amen.” Although the New Testament of the Bible presents this as how Jesus taught his disciples to pray, the individual parts of the prayer show up all over the place in the Jewish Bible and deuterocanonical books. And it probably goes without saying that when we use these words in magick they carry entirely different connotations. As I mentioned in the Middle Pillar practice, we say these ancient words of power to remind ourselves that we are God in miniature.

As I point out in the sidebar about astral projection, our consciousness is omnipresent and universal. Vibrating these mantras, then, is a way to help the subconscious and unconscious aspects of our mind realize that we are huge — we’re not just these tiny things confined to insignificant bodies on some dead rock hurtling through space. In this ritual, vibrating the Lord’s Prayer isn’t a religious declaration, it’s a wake-up call. Essentially what we’re doing is awakening the deepest parts of our psyche and informing them that the Divine is already here within us. It’s saying that God isn’t an outside force. We are not separated from the source of all creation — never were and never will be.

By performing this mantra, we wake up the God essence that lies dormant in each of us. Saying the Lord’s Prayer is a way to remind your consciousness that you are an aspect of divinity — yours is the kingdom, yours is the power, and yours is the glory. You are God, albeit the tiniest of pieces. But even the smallest piece of God contains every part of the whole, just as an acorn entails everything it means to be a tree. By practicing the Qabalistic Cross, you nurture this aspect of the Divine (or, again, whatever name works best for you) and enhance it, move toward the whole, and return home to your true nature.

On a practical note, I want to say a little more about how to say the mantras, because now you’re going to take a step beyond the vibrations you did in the preceding practices. At this point, it’s time to learn how to use your magickal voice. When you use your magickal voice, you don’t simply pronounce words with your mouth — you actually use your whole body. You feel the vibrations everywhere, but especially wherever you place your hand during this practice. Wherever your fingers rest, let the mantra vibrate more strongly there. As before, it helps to use a much lower voice than you normally do.

Masaru Emoto was a Japanese researcher and photographer who studied the effects of human consciousness on the molecular structure of water. He played different types of music in the presence of water as it froze and then used a microscope to take pictures of the results. Emoto found that different types of music result in different molecular patterns. For example, when he played heavy metal, the ice looked chaotic and disorganized under the microscope, whereas classical music caused the ice to form in harmonious, regular patterns. Think about the implications just on the physical plane: our bodies are mostly water (as much as 75 percent in our muscles). The types of vibration we surround ourselves with are incredibly important, and the intention and quality of our voices as we vibrate them have a profound impact on our physiology, as well as our consciousness.

Here are the Hebrew mantras you’ll use in the Qabalistic Cross, as well as a quick explanation of what the words mean:

Ateh: Thou Art

Malkuth: The Kingdom

Vegeburah: The Power

Vegehdula: The Glory

Le Olam: Forever

Amen: So Be It

So again, when we vibrate these words of power, we’re announcing to ourselves and the universe that we are an aspect of the whole — of God, the creator, the universal consciousness, and so on. In magick, this is our way of reminding other forms of divine intelligence (for example, angels) that we are Divine and that they are tasked with assisting us when we ask for it, just as if the source of divinity had personally made the request. It’s also our way of reminding ourselves that we are children of creation, no matter how we interpret that. As such, we have a particular responsibility and authority regarding the physical plane of existence.

Some information about using your hands in the Qabalistic Cross: In general, your hands are incredibly important — they’re involved in almost everything you do in life. In most representations of the energy system that I know of, there’s an energy center in the palm of each hand. Holding hands with another person means linking your energy system with theirs, which is why it can feel so good to hold hands with someone you love and so uncomfortable to hold hands with someone you don’t like — even if that dislike is temporary.

In the directions below, I say to use your right hand to make the sign of the cross. Traditionally, the right hand is taught to be the projective hand, whereas the left is receptive: look at statues that depict the Buddha teaching, bearing witness, expressing fearlessness, and so on, and check out what his right and left hands are doing. There are anatomical reasons for this, of course — most people are right-handed and therefore use that hand to project energy, pick things up, and do things in the world. Additionally, the left hand is closer to the heart, which is centered slightly to the left side of the middle of the chest, and your heart is where you receive energy from other people. (Note that hugging involves bringing your heart close to someone else’s.)

So, in these ceremonies, we’ll use the right hand to project energy and the left hand to receive energy. You can also try this out in your day-to-day life — for example, opening your left hand to get a read on a situation, as if catching energy from the atmosphere in order to get a feel for what’s going on. But don’t get too hung up on this, especially if you’re left-handed. And it’s not like if a person loses their right arm in a car accident that they suddenly lose the ability to project energy. That’s taking things too literally — technically, you don’t even need a body part to send or take in energy. So, anybody can use either hand to do either activity, but it helps in the beginning to follow particular guidelines (in this case, project with your right, receive with your left) to become familiar with the practices. After that happens, it’s up to you to modify and try other things out, just as with the other exercises and techniques.

Okay, so all of that being said, here are two different ways of performing the Qabalistic Cross. The first is the traditional way, the second is of my own making. Try both of them to see which works best for you.

PRACTICE ” QABALISTIC CROSS MEDITATION: VERSION 1 (TRADITIONAL)

1.Stand up, close your eyes, and feel the ground beneath your feet. Keep your spine aligned and relax.

2.Inhale and visualize your body growing. Don’t just see it happen visually — feel your body physically expanding. Imagine your body growing in this way until the town or city where you live is tiny beneath your feet.

3.Breathing in, you grow larger and larger. Before long, your body stands above your state, and soon you enlarge until the entire country is small below you. You expand more and more, larger than the planet. Inhaling, you expand into the cosmos, until Earth is no more than a speck beneath your feet — yet you remain connected to it, as if held by gravity.

4.Now you are massive in size, larger than even the greatest of stars. You see the stars of our galaxy and others all around you — in every direction for as far as you can see. Inhale and relax.

5.Turn your attention to the top of the universe. There’s that blinding white light you encountered in the Middle Pillar. It’s the source of all creation, shining brilliantly. As you inhale, see the light descend in a shaft to the top of your head, traveling billions of light-years through the universe.

6.When the light finally reaches you, touch your forehead with the first two fingers of your right hand. The light penetrates down into your forehead, but the shaft of light is still connected in a shining column all the way up to the top of the universe.

7.Inhale and watch as the light glows brighter and brighter.

8.Now vibrate the first mantra, which is Ateh (ah-tay). The shaft of light vibrates with your voice and then becomes more solid.

9.Inhale again, and see the shaft of light descend into your body — all the way down — until it exits at the bottom of your feet. From there, it travels all the way down to the bottom of the universe, anchoring you there.

10.Now bring the same fingers of your right hand down in a straight line to the middle of your chest, close to where your heart is. As you inhale, the light connecting you to the bottom of the universe grows incredibly vibrant.

11.Vibrate the second mantra: Malkuth (mahl-kooth). The light vibrates and grows stronger.

12.Now draw the first two fingers of your right hand across your chest, touching your right shoulder. As you do so, a shaft of light moves from your center in that direction, leaving your body to travel to the far reaches of the universe, anchoring you there.

13.Breathe in, and watch as the light grows more vibrant.

14.Vibrate Vegeburah (vey-geb-boo-rah). The light becomes clearer, stronger.

15.Now draw your fingers across your chest, over to your left shoulder. A shaft of light follows from your center, beaming out your left shoulder and tying you to that side of the universe. Inhale and see the shaft glowing incredibly bright — as brilliant as you can make it.

16.Vibrate the mantra Vegehdula (vey-ged-dool-lah) as the light glows brilliant and vivid.

17.Now fold your hands over your heart. In this case, it doesn’t matter which hand goes on top.

18.You now have a cross of light running through your body, and your body is the center point of this celestial cross. Pay attention to the light — how it comes down from the source of creation and anchors you to the bottom of the universe, how it beams through your shoulders on each side and ties you to those opposite poles of the universe.

19.Inhale. The cross grows impossibly bright.

20.Vibrate Le Olam, Amen (lee oh-lom ah-men). The cross grows even brighter — as bright as you can make it.

21.Exhale. Let the image fade as you slowly open your eyes. Clap your hands to mark the transition in modes of consciousness.

22.Pay attention to your current physical form, and look around at your present surroundings. You are stronger now — more anchored, more focused.

23.Move around a little, and get as comfortable as possible in your physical body. After performing the Qabalistic Cross, some people like to exert themselves physically in order to regain contact with the physical world.

Again, I’m presenting two versions of the practice to help you find something that works best for you, but I recommend spending a little time with each so that you get familiar with what each has to offer. That being said, here’s version two:

PRACTICE ” QABALISTIC CROSS MEDITATION: VERSION 2

If you started by using the traditional version of the practice, some of these steps will be familiar to you. This version is one that I developed, based on the traditional one.

1.Face east and stand in silence. Close your eyes, inhale, and envision your body growing larger and larger.

2.Relax and take your time with the visualization. Every breath you take makes you even more immense than before. Before long, the planet is just a tiny dot beneath your feet. Keep breathing and growing, until the entire universe is miniscule below you.

3.Focus on the center of your chest. You see a golden sphere there, shining warmly. This is the energy center that corresponds with Tiphareth on the version of the Qabalic Tree of Life. (Tiphareth is the center sphere on the Tree of Life; it’s also the energy center that corresponds with your heart in ceremonial magick.) This sphere represents your consciousness.

The Qabalistic Cross

4.Take slow, deep breaths, and see the golden sphere glow increasingly bright with each breath.

5.The energy in the sphere builds and builds until it explodes. From the center of this explosion, a shaft of white light shoots out of the top of your head, traveling through infinity, attaching to the very end of whatever lies out there beyond the known and unknown realms.

6.Now, with the first two fingers of your right hand, touch your forehead and vibrate the first mantra: Ateh (ah-tay).

7.Turn your focus back to the center of your chest. Breath into it again and see it grow brighter and brighter.

8.Exhale. Another beam of brilliant white light explodes from the bottom of the golden center, but downward this time. It shoots through your pelvis, legs, and feet, continuing downward through space. Somewhere down there in the reaches of infinite space, the light anchors you to a point.

9.Now you are attached above and below with such incredible force that nothing external can ever move you.

10.Lower the two fingers on your forehead to the middle of your chest. Vibrate the next mantra, which is Malkuth (mahl-kooth).

11.Bring your attention back to the central sphere. Take slow, deep, and even breaths. The golden sphere grows even brighter than before.

12.Eventually, the sphere explodes, as it did before. This time the white light shoots out of your right shoulder and travels to the end of infinity. Now you are attached and anchored over there.

13.Touch your fingers to your right shoulder and vibrate Vegeburah (vey-geb-boo-rah).

14.Turn your attention to the golden sphere again. Once more, inhale and intensify it with energy. After three inhalations, watch the light explode again, but this time out of the left shoulder and to the far reaches of infinity out in that direction.

15.Bring the two fingers of your right hand now to your left shoulder and vibrate the mantra Vegehdula (vey-ged-dool-lah).

16.Visualize the cross of light. Inhale, relax, and see the light travel in the four directions, affixing you throughout the reaches of time and space.

17.Now bring your attention one more time back to the golden sphere in the middle of your chest. Fold your hands over that point (it doesn’t matter which hand goes on top), and vibrate the final mantra: Le Olam, Amen (lee oh-lom ah-men).

18.End as you did in the first version of the practice. Open your eyes, clap your hands, and take your time to reorient your consciousness to the place in the physical plane where your body resides. Stretch, walk around, or do something else physical to come back to your normal senses.

The Qabalic Tree of Life

After you’ve become familiar with the Qabalistic Cross, you’re ready to move on to the next practice. Again, I recommend doing whichever version of this practice suits you best, and do it at least twice a day for weeks or months before moving on. The better you get at the Qabalistic Cross, the more powerful your practice of the Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram will be. Like I said, the Qabalistic Cross is the first step of that practice, but you can use the Qabalistic Cross as a stand-alone practice to center yourself, clear out your energy centers, and optimize your psyche to perform other forms of extremely powerful magick.