Welcome to the Street Prophets Coffee Hour cleverly hidden at the intersection of religion, art, science, food, and politics. This is an open thread where we can share our thoughts and comments about the day. Today’s topic is Word Magic.
Word magic involves the magical use of words and names. Some words are seen as having magical properties or power. In his 1934 textbook An Introduction to Cultural Anthropology, Robert Lowie writes:
“Spells—mere words recited or sung for their supernatural value—represent another type of magic.”
Regarding word magic, S.I Hayakawa and Alan R. Hayakawa, in their book Language in Thought and Action, write:
“…the notion that, by saying things repeatedly or in specified ceremonial ways, we can cast a spell over the future and force events to turn out the way we said they would.”
Joseph Williams, in his book Origins of the English Language: A Social and Linguistic History, writes:
“The Egyptians, for example, gave everyone two names, a public name and a secret one; they believed if someone knew a person’s real name, he would have power over the person. In other cultures, word-magic takes the form of taboos against uttering the name of a god, or the name of certain relatives, or even words that sound like those words.”
In an entry in The New Encyclopedia of Unbelief, Joe Edward Barnhart writes:
“Some versions of magic are a bet that words variously arranged can have a significant impact on whatever forces or beings affects human life. Words may in many cases combine with bodily movements that are also believed to be efficacious despite there being no apparent contact with the reality to be influenced.”
Regarding word magic in ancient Egypt, Christine El Mahdy, in her book Mummies, Myth and Magic in Ancient Egypt, reports:
“The very words used when reciting the sacred rites were considered to have power, for sound itself was an important mystical element. In the embalming and funerary rituals, the written word became reality as the priests spoke the spells, and spoke them in tones that imbues them with other-worldliness.”
Word magic is also found in ancient Greece where the names of people to be cursed would be inscribed on lead tablets or on pottery vessels. With regard to one curse pot dated 300 BCE, Jarrett Lobell, in a short report in Archaeology, writes:
“On the pot’s exterior are 30 full male and female personal names as well as letters or strokes of letters belonging to an additional 25 names.”
To curse the people whose names were written on the pot, the pot was pierced with iron nails and filled with the bones of young chickens.
An example of word magic in modern religions is given by George Wells who writes in an article in Free Inquiry:
“It is official Catholic teaching that when, at the Eucharistic celebration, the priest speaks the words of consecration, the substance of the bread and the wine is changed into the body and blood of Christ. It is thus supposed that the mere pronunciation of words in the ritual situation can effect a change in the character of material objects.”
Word magic is also closely associated with tabooed words—words which are not supposed to be spoken in certain social contexts. Tabooed words include the irreverent use of sacred names and obscene language. By avoiding these words, speakers are attempting to avoid any bad consequences resulting from the magic of saying the word. In his book The Stuff of Thought: Language as a Window into Human Nature, psychologist Steven Pinker writes:
“Incantations, spells, prayers, and curses are ways that people try to affect the world through words, and taboos and euphemisms are ways that people try not to affect it.”
Open Thread
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