The Anatomy of Egyptian Magical Script by Inner Seeker

[Dept of PMM Artists & things]

(from Ancient Egyptian Divination and Magic by Eleanor Harris)

It was the hope of the magician to imitate the creator’s powerful utterance of words that had prompted all gods and life in to existence.  Through words, the magician sought not only to summon gods and other beings, but to control them to do his bidding.

The actual words spoken in a spell are called scripts.  The instruction of how to use the script is called the rubric.  In script for divination and magic, every single word and sentence serves a purpose for the
magician.  There are four primary uses of
words of power in Egyptian magic:

• ·        To invoke gods, goddesses, or otherworldly beings by the use of magical names;
• ·        To enable the magician’s mind to focus and concentrate to work magic;
• ·        To shape-shift into a god-form or being –form to work magic;
• ·        To charge a talisman, amulet, or spell.

Some spells begin with a dialogue between two gods, a short mythical story, or with an invocation.  In an invocation, a god is called to intervene on behalf of the magician or the
seeker for whom the magician works magic, or to be commanded into action as
desired by the magician.

The scripts repeat assertions and commands several times, which prompts and requires concentration of the magician’s will.  It was thought that, by stating the desired results of the magic repetitively and with intense concentration, the results
would indeed be realized.  Through this
process, the client of a magician became convinced, with great confidence that
the magician’s spell would succeed.

Negotiations and threats are also found in many magical spells.  Threats were not meant as malicious, but as an enforcement of a divine contract the magician believed was
made with deities during magic. 
Sometimes the invoked deities were threatened with abandonment or
desecration of their temples if the magician’s will was not satisfied.  Usually, threats of sending demons or vicious
deities were made toward human or unworldly enemies.  In one such spell, the aggressor is to be
stuck with the arrow of the Goddess Sekhmet, penetrated by the magical power of
Tehuti, cursed by Auset, and blinded by Heru. (Geraldine Pinch, Magic in Ancient Egypt, p 72.).  Magical scripts often maintained a precarious
balance between upholding the principals of Ma’at – truth and divine order -
and tipping the scales toward chaos to achieve a magical aim.

Most scripts provide instructions on what words are to be said during phases of a divination or magical ritual as well as the number of times the script should be recited – usually four, seven, or nine times.