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Eliphas Levi

1810–1875 · France
Eliphas Levi

Description

Éliphas Lévi Zahed, born Alphonse Louis Constant, was a French esotericist, occultist, poet, and writer. Initially pursuing an ecclesiastical career in the Catholic Church, he abandoned the priesthood in his mid-twenties and became a ceremonial magician. At the age of 40, he began professing knowledge of the occult. He wrote over 20 books on magic, Kabbalah, alchemical studies, and occultism.

Facts

BornAlphonse Louis Constant, (1810-02-08)8 February 1810, Paris, First French Empire
Died31 May 1875(1875-05-31) (aged 65), Paris, Third French Republic
Resting placeIvry Cemetery, Ivry-sur-Seine (later disinterred and placed in a common grave)
SpouseMarie-Noémi Cadiot ​ ​(m. 1846; ann. 1865)​

Life & work in brief

Summarised by section — one row per topic, for fast reading.

Work / contributionSignificance
LifeBorn Alphonse Louis Constant, he was the son of a shoemaker in Paris.
As a ceremonial magusOf his initial experience with British esotericists, in 1854, Levi wrote: "I had undertaken a journey to London, that I might escape from internal disquietude and devote myself, without interruption, to science.
Theory of magicIn the preface to The History of Magic, translator A.
Socialist backgroundIt was long believed that the socialist Constant disappeared with the demise of the Second Republic and gave way to the occultist Éliphas Lévi.

Contribution to the celestial-alphabet tradition

French occultist who revived the Tarot–Qabalah correspondence and theorised the 'Astral Light' as the agent of magic. He re-encoded the Agrippan stellar-kabbalistic system for the 19th-century occult revival, the direct source of the modern Hermetic-Kabbalistic ritual corpus.

In the Luco Library
Transcendental Magic (Dogme et Rituel de la Haute Magie)
Eliphas Lévi (tr. A. E. Waite)

The planetary kameot — the apparatus they worked with

The 7 magic squares ↔ 7 doubles ↔ 7 planets (Sefer Yetzirah §4). Each square's order n gives a distinct sigil modulus; the constant is M = n(n²+1)/2. Saturn 3×3 = the Lo Shu (M=15), the basis of the Aiq-Bekar sigil method. Caveat (§6.3 / §15b.3): the sigil-over-kamea method is Renaissance (Agrippa, 1531), not medieval Jewish.

♄ Saturn3×3
8
1
6
3
5
7
4
9
2
double ב · M=15
♃ Jupiter4×4
16
2
3
13
5
11
10
8
9
7
6
12
4
14
15
1
double ג · M=34
♂ Mars5×5
17
24
1
8
15
23
5
7
14
16
4
6
13
20
22
10
12
19
21
3
11
18
25
2
9
double ד · M=65
☉ Sun6×6
35
1
6
26
19
24
3
32
7
21
23
25
31
9
2
22
27
20
8
28
33
17
10
15
30
5
34
12
14
16
4
36
29
13
18
11
double כ · M=111
♀ Venus7×7
30
39
48
1
10
19
28
38
47
7
9
18
27
29
46
6
8
17
26
35
37
5
14
16
25
34
36
45
13
15
24
33
42
44
4
21
23
32
41
43
3
12
22
31
40
49
2
11
20
double פ · M=175
☿ Mercury8×8
64
2
3
61
60
6
7
57
9
55
54
12
13
51
50
16
17
47
46
20
21
43
42
24
40
26
27
37
36
30
31
33
32
34
35
29
28
38
39
25
41
23
22
44
45
19
18
48
49
15
14
52
53
11
10
56
8
58
59
5
4
62
63
1
double ר · M=260
☽ Moon9×9
47
58
69
80
1
12
23
34
45
57
68
79
9
11
22
33
44
46
67
78
8
10
21
32
43
54
56
77
7
18
20
31
42
53
55
66
6
17
19
30
41
52
63
65
76
16
27
29
40
51
62
64
75
5
26
28
39
50
61
72
74
4
15
36
38
49
60
71
73
3
14
25
37
48
59
70
81
2
13
24
35
double ת · M=369

Lineage — influence tree

Where Eliphas Levi sits in the magi lineage: who shaped this figure, and who this figure shaped in turn. Mage names link to their own ficha.