English Letter Values for Literal Qabala

Enochian Equivalents | Grifasian Phonemes

Using the techniques of Literal Qabala to find relations between words and phrases in non-Hebrew languages isn't as pure as Literal Qabala in Hebrew, and is generally not recommended. It is best to study the relationships between words and phrases in Hebrew, then have them translated into your language for conscious understanding.

With the great influx of revealed texts written in non-Hebrew tongues, however, it became apparent that such passages could also contain "hidden" messages. But translating the words/phrases into Hebrew, then applying traditional Qabala, and then translating back into the original tongue would lose most of the original meaning, thus various qabalists/organizations have developed straight values for non-Hebrew letters such that the techniques of Literal Qabala can be used within that non-Hebrew language.

Here are the most popular values for English.

Enochian Equivalents for Literal Qabala in English

These values are based on the same base-ten system as the Hebrew language and are thus considered by some to be more accurate.

Grifasian Phonemes for Literal and Philosophical Qabala in English

Others simply transliterate non-Hebrew words phonetically into Hebrew characters to garner literal and/or philosophical meanings. While the Hebrew "words" created are not necessarily words at all, and usually do not have the same meaning as the non-Hebrew words, some see this method as more "pure." However, one must be careful not to transliterate phonetics incorrectly (i.e: letter for letter instead of sound for sound).

The Grifasian interpretation of Qabala is based on the concept that language is fundamentally spoken, not written. Thus sounds are more meaningful and the words simply follow. When applied to Qabala, the Hebrew letter-numbers are seen as phonetic rather than lingusitic tools, meaning that any symbol with the same sound (no matter the language) acquires the same literal and philosopical values as the Hebrew.

The reasoning behind this model is that, at one time in the remote past, all people spoke the same language, before the Biblical "Babel" occurrence when the various peoples were split up, each with their own tongue and rituals. Assuming this to be true, all langauges can then be distilled back to Qabala, and are thus related to the Hebrew words.

The difficulty with this system arises when non-Hebrew phonemes have no Hebrew equivalent, such as the vowels in English, the letter X, and the "ch" (church) sound. In these cases, the vowels and "ch" are dropped and KS substituted for X. The only exception to the vowel rule is the "aahh" sound (as in "father"), which is rendered as aleph.

For example: "cobra" = K(hard)BRA; "crowley" = K(soft)RWL; "star" = STAR; "light" = LT; "dharma" = DhARMA; "able" = BL; "church" = R

The hardest part is listening to the sounds of the words, rather than going purely on the letters ("light" is not LGhT, for example). Once a word has been rendered phonetically (without the vowels), substituting the letters for the Hebrew alphabet becomes simple and qabalistic renderings can thus be instituted.

Of course, the system is not perfect -- Hebrew can only be truly rendered in Hebrew, meaning all non-Hebrew equivalencies fall short. The validity of qabalistic readings is thus purely in the eye of the beholder, but since this is the case even when using the original Hebrew, some see no real disparity with the practice.