BIBLIOGRAPHY
The most comprehensive work yet written on Spektor’s life is
Ephraim Shimoff’s “Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Spektor: His Life
and Works” (Ph.D. diss., Yeshiva University, 1959). Samuel
K. Mirsky has also written an article, “Isaac Elchanan Spek-
tor,” in Guardians of Our Heritage (New York, 1958), edited
by Leo Jung. While both these pieces provide valuable infor-
mation for an understanding of Spektor’s life, a definitive
critical study remains to be completed.
New Sources
Rakeffet-Rothkoff, Aaron. “Rabbi Yitshak Elhanan Spektor of
Kovno, Spokesman for ‘agunot.’” Tradition 29 (1995):
5–20.
DAVID ELLENSON (1987)
Revised Bibliography
SPELLS belong to the general context of magical thought.
They consist of words or sets of words that issue a command
that is efficacious merely because it has been pronounced.
Spells represent one of the many techniques used to control
nature and the evils arising in a given society. They are found
universally and are probably as old as language itself, having
been in existence since the Lower Paleolithic.
The basis of the power of spells is the primitive idea that
nothing exists without a name and that to know the names
of things is to possess them. Thus, to give orders with the
appropriate words is to ensure success, made even more cer-
tain when the speaker is a witch, shaman, holy person, or
anyone else whose profession it is to deal with mystery.
Stated in other terms, spells are all-powerful spoken for-
mulas, words, or phrases of power. They are definitive: Once
uttered, the desired chain of events is set irrevocably in mo-
tion. Each word, once enunciated, has a magical value and
weight that none can control.
The order given in the spell, addressed to deities, spirits,
or the forces of nature, can be creative, destructive, protec-
tive, or medicinal; it can demand triumph over an enemy,
or the attainment of impossible powers or things. It can be
used to break spells, cast spells, or obtain love.
CONDITIONS OF SPELLS. According to magical thought, only
prayers can be spoken by anyone at any time and remain ef-
fective. Spells, by contrast, and other such magical activities,
have many prerequisites. Spells in particular must be pro-
nounced by a person who is initiated into the mysteries or
endowed with supernatural powers, and who is sexually, di-
etetically, and socially pure. The person casting the spell
must know with precision the words he or she will pro-
nounce, the time when they must be uttered, the cardinal
point toward which one will face, what one will stand or sit
on, how his or her person must be arranged, the clothing,
colors, ornaments, and objects to be used, the number of
times one must repeat the words, and the psychological
attitude and manners one must assume. Everything must be
precise. As a part of religious and magical activities, spells
sometimes require musical backgrounds, specially prepared
settings, appropriate instruments, prudent timing, and atten-
tion to taboos that might be violated, such as sex, the lack
of initiation, or impurity.
Spells can serve either collective ends, such as victory in
battle, the banishing of plagues and epidemics, or the bring-
ing of rain, or they can serve personal ends, such as the at-
tainment of love, health, power, wealth, virility, fertility,
finding out who has stolen something, or causing harm to
an enemy. The former collective spells require a complex cer-
emony and initiates. The latter, usually carried out on a pop-
ular level, generally need only to be repeated continually or
for a magical number of times.
As a general rule, spells accompany the preparation of
potions, amulets, weapons, magical paraphernalia, scepters,
and objects of sorcery. They are recited over sick people, ad-
dressed to the natural elements one wants to control, or mur-
mured softly and continuously. Rarely are they repeated
by large groups of people, although this does happen occa-
sionally.
POWERFUL SOUNDS AND WORDS. Many scholars have con-
centrated on the study of the word as a symbol. These schol-
ars include linguists, sociologists, anthropologists, philoso-
phers, educators, psychiatrists, and occultists. Many of these
researchers are inclined to give an onomatopoeic value to
sounds: For example, /m/ and /n/ are related to the mother
because of the sound made during breastfeeding; /g/ is relat-
ed to water, because that is how it sounds when swallowed;
and /a/ is an imperative for calling attention. Since ancient
times, philosophers such as Plato (in his dialogue Cratylus)
have remarked on how words somehow take on the form of
the things they name.
Nevertheless, a serious analysis yields very few sounds
or words that have the same value in all cultures. Greater uni-
versality can be found, perhaps, in the language of gestures:
assenting by moving the head up and down, negating by
moving it from right to left, beckoning with the arm and
hand, pointing things out with the index finger or the eyes
and brows, or threatening by raising a fist.
In Qabbalah, the interest in a knowledge of sounds,
written letters, and words was intensified. Each sign was
given a magical value that had a religious meaning and a nu-
merical relationship. For example, the Hebrew letter alef be-
came the symbol of humankind and the abstract principle
of material objects; it is the trinity in unity and its numerical
value is 1 (Scholem, 1974). Freemasonry also produced spec-
ulations in this field, but it assigned many meanings to the
same letter. The letter A became an emblem of the first of
the three faculties of divinity—creative power—in addition
to being the abbreviation for the word architect (Powells,
1982). This association of the word with creation is found
among many peoples of the world.
The history of religions has provided several words or
short phrases that have been believed to be particularly pow-SPELLS 8675