Major Project 1
The Magic of Incantation Bowls: A Cultural Analysis
Briana Jones
Professor Clasby
ENG170
26 April 2023
Many people stress about the spiritual world and because of this, we get many ceremonial objects related to the spiritual, like Ouija boards or burning incense. One ceremonial object that will be the focus of this essay is incantation bowls.
Incantation bowls were a form of magic that was believed to protect against the negative and unwanted, like demons. Other than demons’ incantation bowls could be used for wishes and needs, that were wanted by the specific person using the bowl. Used from 401 AD to 700 AD they are very rare to find as of now. One reason that these are now rare to find is because they were buried, upside-down, to trap the spirits. Called what they are, incantation bowls, were written words on the surfaces of the bowls, with some having images created in the middle surface of the bowls. By studying the rare history of incantation bowls, one can see how they had many mental and spiritual aspects, which is important because they were used during a time when magic may have not been totally accepted, in different religions, mostly being associated with Jewish culture, and should not be forgotten but instead still studied. This research will dive into the psychological aspects that happened.
incantation bowl w/drawing in middle surface
I first draw upon Siam Bhayro’s article, “The Reception of Mesopotamian and Early Jewish Traditions in the Aramaic Incantation Bowls,” to show the similar traditions between the incantation bowls. Secondly, I will dive into three parallels using Bhayro’s article to show examples of them being used. Next, I will use Harriet Walker’s article, “Possible Psychological Roles of the Aramaic Incantation Bowls: Therapeutic Functions of Belief in Demons and the Practice of Incantations,” to help show that there were also similar demons that these bowls were trying to protect against. During this topic of similar aspects, I will show the similar psychological effects these demons had on humans. I first will show how demons could bring upon negative effects like anxiety. After this I will show how they could also have positive effects by calming the anxiety with the incantation bowls. This will then lead me into the social relationships created through using the bowls. To do this I will use Simcha Gross’ article, “Babylonian Jewish Society: The Evidence of the Incantation Bowls.”. While using his article it will help to show how the community did not only include the scribes and clients, but also the rabbis. Then moving on from the rabbis, I will talk about the scribes and client’s relationship by using Dieynaba Young’s article, “1,500-Year-Old ‘Magic Bowls’ Seized in Jerusalem Raid.” I then will use Gross’ article another time to help rebuttal an argument that I mention. This will lead me to incantations as a whole by using Theodore Ludwig’s encyclopedia entry titled, “Incantation .“. Finally, concluding why these bowls are worth investigating more.
Many different religions used incantation bowls, which used similar traditions. Bhayro claims these, “are drawing on a common ancient Mesopotamian tradition. In this case, we are fortunate to be able to identify that tradition as coming from the canonical incantation series Utukkü Lemnütu” (189). These traditions all relate to Jewish texts and parallels with rabbinic texts. Three of these parallels are terminological parallels, encountering beliefs using related words; conceptual parallels, encountering beliefs without using related words; methodological parallels, encountering different methods that can be compared. (Bhayro 191-195).
Here an example of the terminological parallel being used is in relation to the demon known as the ‘blast demon’; using the word ‘zâqu’ which means ‘to blow,’ and the word ‘ziqu’ which means ‘blast of air’. Bhayro sees this as, “the first case, the original imagery of the hot desert wind is maintained, with the demons being described as flying within it. In the second case, there has been a clear shift from the idea that blasts of hot wind are a metaphor for demons to the term actually referring to a specific type of demon.” (191). This is important to note because it shows the Jewish scribes switching to using a more poetic tone in the second example; Showing how these terms can be used for the traditions throughout the duration of the bowls without using the same words and having the same syntax.
For the example of a conceptual parallel we will use the phrase ‘the three of you, the four of you, the five of you’. There is not much context as to what this phrase was being used for, but it can be seen in an incantation bowl related to Lilith. It is not explained what this phrase meant but when looking at the Qumran, Psalm 91, we can see the list of twelve dangers. This infers that the phrase was hinting to the twelve dangers mentioned in Psalm 91 (Bhayro 194). This is meaningful to include because it shows how conceptual parallels, in this case the Qumran, were popular enough to include relating to incantation bowls.
Incantation bowl related to Lilith
An example of a methodological parallel is the “head to foot” arrangement mentioned by Bhayro. It is written in Mesopotamian Cuneiform, ‘the spirit that reclines in her head, in her temple, in her eyelid, in her eye, in her ear, in her heart, in her stomach, in her lungs, in her liver, and in her kidney, and in all the sinews of her body, in the point of her loins’. This method, according to Bhayro is organizing, “lengthy corpora whose transmission and usefulness would be otherwise overly complicated.” (195). What this is saying, in easier words to understand, is that the words are getting ‘dumb downed’ per say. This is relevant in including because it shows the connection between scribes and the language used in incantation bowls. Furthermore, looking at these traditions is helpful to see what mattered for the incantation as well as show related demons from the bowls, such as the Ardat Lillî.
The Ardat Lillî is known as a virgin demon going to men to make advances towards them. Walker says how being haunted by this demon can have the psychological effect, where the individuals’ own desires for immoral sex has snuck back into the mind in the form of the demon (100). This gives a sense of anxiety and guilt. Since the desire has come back in the conscious and unconscious mind it is known as the third phase of repression. This helps to show that some of the demons can be related not because of religions, but because of the deeper conscious mind. This example used for the Ardat Lillî is just one of many effects the incantation bowls had on their users.
Other than causing anxiety the bowls could also calm the anxiety. A demon who can be shown doing this is Lilith. This demon is like that of the Ardat Lillî but instead of only being shown as a female it shows up as a female to males and as a male to females. Lilith however also takes the lives of kids, which Walker relates to rates of infant mortality in his article. While the demon itself does not relieve anxiety, the making of incantation bowls related to it does. This is because according to Walker it is, “effective simply against the fear of losing one’s children. In this sense the presence of the incantation bowl would, by alleviating that fear, have a therapeutic effect on the people who requested it.” (107). These incantation bowls were made for people who have not tried for any kids yet as well as for parents who lost their children already too. So not only could this calm the fear of losing children, as well as future children, but it could also ease the guilt one may have for losing a kid. This relates to two things. The first is the unconscious mind again, relating to that of suppressed guilt; the second is that of social relations. This is because it shows how no one bowl or demon had to be related to one specific topic or group of people, which can bring a sense of community.
This community included not only the clients who wanted the incantation bowls and the scribes, but the rabbis as well. In fact, while the scribes had different cultural values Gross had commented how the incantation bowls that, “lack non-Jewish invocations suggests that some scribes, at the very least, shared a world of discourse with the rabbis.” (19). This is significant because, as mentioned earlier, the bowls followed many rabbinic traditions. Therefore, showing how the scribes may have gotten these traditions right from the source. Not only that but this also helps to show how the rabbis tolerated the incantation bowls; making it okay for people to use them even though they were considered magic.
Since it was okay for the scribes to use the incantation bowls the next thing to comment on would be how the clients chose who to use to write their incantation bowls. Since the incantation bowls were used for different things according to Young, they were, “Customized to fit individual clients’ needs, the talismans were used to fight off bad luck, financial struggles and even severe migraines.” (Young). This meant that the clients could choose which scribe they would want to work with, similarly to how someone would choose who to work with when getting a tattoo done. This is similar because the artists have different styles for tattoos that differentiate who to work with (like black and grey tattoo style or fine line style); in the same way that scribes had different traditions they engaged in which would also differentiate who to work with. Some traditions are more important than others to clients when getting an incantation bowl, like casting away demons or someone who maybe specialized in incantation bowls of needs being met.
Before concluding this essay, I would like to suggest one argument against the thesis. Incantation bowls are popular mostly in Judaism. Although this is true it does not mean we should belittle the research that was made, not only in this essay but also with the research done before and after this essay. This is because according to Gross, “the bowls represent our only material evidence from Babylonian Jews in Late Antiquity. Moreover, the incantations on the bowls are our only Jewish literary source from this period and region outside of the Babylonian Talmud” (4). This is crucial because without the bowls that means that a chunk of history would be missing and along with-it Jewish society and culture, which includes the practices and traditions used like the ones mentioned.
The research shown can further make connections to other religions, like Christianity, because of incantations as a whole, instead of just incantation bowls. Ludwig says, “Incantations are special verbal formulas that in a variety of ways, depending upon the particular cultural tradition, tap into sacred power.” (Ludwig). Although the cultural tradition for Judaism during this time was to have the incantation bowls (a physical object) it can be seen how other cultures could have used affirmations (positive statements said aloud) as their incantations. Since these are words only there would be little to no evidence to help show these being used. They still could have been related because of the demons related and the sense of spirituality that connected the people.
The above points illustrate how incantation bowls had unsuspected effects that were not only related to the protection of the clients, which is what they were mainly used for. Showing how the culture used traditions very heavily with different positions regarding intellect. The question of why the history of incantation bowls and Judaism during this time is so rare is worth exploring to further investigations about this time; also helping the cultures of Judaism now to relate to the culture of Judaism back then.
Putting an incantation bowl together
Works Cited
Bhayro, Siam. “The Reception of Mesopotamian and Early Jewish Traditions in the Aramaic Incantation Bowls.” Aramaic Studies, vol. 11, no. 2, July 2013, pp. 187–96. EBSCOhost, https://doi-org.libdatabase.newpaltz.edu/10.1163/17455227-13110210.
Gross, Simcha, and Avigail Manekin-Bamberger. “Babylonian Jewish Society: The Evidence of the Incantation Bowls.” Jewish Quarterly Review, vol. 112, no. 1, Winter 2022, pp. 1–31. EBSCOhost, https://doi-org.libdatabase.newpaltz.edu/10.1353/jqr.2022.0000.
Ludwig, Theodore “Incantation .” Encyclopedia of Religion. . Encyclopedia.com. 20 Mar. 2023 <https://www.encyclopedia.com>.
Walker, Harriet. “Possible Psychological Roles of the Aramaic Incantation Bowls: Therapeutic Functions of Belief in Demons and the Practice of Incantations.” Aramaic Studies, vol. 13, no. 1, Jan. 2015, pp. 95–109. EBSCOhost, https://doi-org.libdatabase.newpaltz.edu/10.1163/17455227-01301008.
Young, Dieynaba. “1,500-Year-Old ‘Magic Bowls’ Seized in Jerusalem Raid.” Smithsonian.com, Smithsonian Institution, 10 Mar. 2022, https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/1500-year-old-magic-bowls-seized-in-jerusalem-raid-180979705/.
The downloaded file of Essay:
Jones Cultural Analysis Final Project
I do think the formatting may have gotten messed up when it downloaded onto my computer because my computer has been messing up this month. If that has happened I am terribly sorry.