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abracadabra

  (ăb'rə-kə-dăb') pronunciation
n.
  1. A magical charm or incantation having the power to ward off disease or disaster.
  2. Foolish or unintelligible talk.

[Late Latin, magical formula.]

WORD HISTORY   “Abracadabra,” says the magician, unaware that at one time the thing to do with the word was wear it, not say it. Abracadabra was a magic word, the letters of which were arranged in an inverted pyramid and worn as an amulet around the neck to protect the wearer against disease or trouble. One fewer letter appeared in each line of the pyramid, until only a remained to form the vertex of the triangle. As the letters disappeared, so supposedly did the disease or trouble. While magicians still use abracadabra in their performances, the word itself has acquired another sense, “foolish or unintelligible talk.”


 
 
Thesaurus: abracadabra

noun

  1. Unintelligible or nonsensical talk or language: double talk, gibberish, gobbledygook, jabberwocky, mumbo jumbo. See clear/unclear, words.
  2. Esoteric, formulaic, and often incomprehensible speech relating to the occult: gibberish, hocus-pocus, mumbo jumbo. See clear/unclear, supernatural, words.

 
(ăb'rəkədăb') , magical formula used by the Gnostics (see Gnosticism) to invoke the aid of benevolent spirits to ward off disease and affliction. It is supposed to be derived from the abraxas, a word that was engraved on gems and amulets or was variously worn as a protective charm. Handed down through the Middle Ages, the abracadabra gradually lost its occult significance, and its meaning was extended to cover any hocus-pocus.


 

A magical word said to be formed from the letters of the abraxas, written thus:
A
AB
ABR
ABRA
ABRAC
ABRACA
ABRACAD
ABRACADA
ABRACADAB
ABRACADABR
ABRACADABRA
or the reverse way. The pronunciation of this word, according to Julius Africanus, was equally efficacious either way. According to Serenus Sammonicus, it was used as a spell to cure asthma. Abracalan, or aracalan, another form of the word, is said to have been regarded as the name of a god in Syria and as a magical symbol by the Jews. It seems doubtful whether the abracadabra, or its synonyms, was really the name of a deity.

Sources:

Lévi, Éliphas. Transcendental Magic. London: Rider, 1896. Reprint, New York: Samuel Weiser, 1970.

 
Devil's Dictionary: abracadabra
A cynical view of the world by Ambrose Bierce


v.t.

To shorten.

        When in the course of human events it becomes necessary for 
    people to abridge their king, a decent respect for the opinions of 
    mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel 
    them to the separation.
                                                       Oliver Cromwell


 
Wikipedia: Abracadabra

Abracadabra (sometimes spelled Abrakadabra) is a word used as an incantation.

History

The word is now commonly used as an incantation by stage magicians. In ancient times, however, it was taken much more seriously as an incantation to be used as a cure for fevers and inflammations. The first known mention was in the 2nd century A.D. in a poem called De Medicina Praecepta by Serenus Sammonicus, physician to the Roman emperor Caracalla, who prescribed that the sufferer from the disease wear an amulet containing the word written in the form of an inverted cone:

A B R A C A D A B R A
A B R A C A D A B R
A B R A C A D A B
A B R A C A D A
A B R A C A D
A B R A C A
A B R A C
A B R A
A B R
A B
A

This, he explained, diminishes the hold of the spirit of the disease over the patient. Other Roman emperors, including Geta and Alexander Severus, were followers of the medical teachings of Serenus Sammonicus and are likely to have used the incantation as well.

Etymology

Theories about the source of the word are:

"I create as I speak"

A possible source is Aramaic: אברא כדברא avra kedabra which means "Creating as speaking" which is thought to be in reference to God creating the universe (in some belief systems, ex nihilo), by speaking (see also Fiat Lux). An alternative spelling is avda K'Davarah. One may also view it as "I transgress as I speak" in the Aramaic עבריה כדבריה which is phonetically closer.

The curse and the pestilence

There is the view that Abracadabra derives from the Hebrew, ha-brachah, meaning "the blessing" (used in this sense as a euphemism for "the curse") and dabra, an Aramaic form of the Hebrew word dever, meaning "pestilence." They point to a similar kabbalistic cure for blindness, in which the name of Shabriri, the demon of blindness, is similarly diminished. Other scholars are skeptical of this origin and claim that the idea of diminishing the power of demons was common throughout the ancient world, and that Abracadabra was simply the name of one such demon.

Other phrases that have been suggested as possible origins

Abracadabra may have been from:
• a corruption of the Hebrew avar k'davar which means roughly "it will be according to what is spoken;"

abrakha adabra - Hebrew for "I shall bless, I shall speak."

abreq ad Habra - Arabic meaning "hurl your thunderbolt even unto death."

Disappear like this word

Some have argued that the term may come from the Aramaic אבדא כדברא abhadda kedhabhra, meaning 'disappear like this word'. Rather than being used as a curse, the Aramaic phrase is believed to have been used as a means of treating illness.

Abraxas

It has also been claimed that the word comes from Abraxas, a Gnostic word for God (the source of 365 emanations, apparently the Greek letters for Abraxas add up to 365 when deciphered according to numerological methods). It has also been claimed to come from Abracalan (or Aracalan) who is said to have been a Syrian god.

Thelema

Main article: Abrahadabra

The occult movement of Thelema spells the word "Abrahadabra", and considers it the magical formula of the current Aeon. The movement's founder, Aleister Crowley, explains in his essay Gematria that he discovered the word (and his spelling) by kabbalistic methods. He appears to say that this happened before his January 1901 meeting with Oscar Eckenstein, one of his teachers. (At this meeting, Eckenstein ordered him to abandon magick for the moment and practice meditation or concentration.) The Word Abrahadabra appears repeatedly in the 1904 invocation of Horus that led to the founding of Thelema. (The Equinox I, no. 7. 1912) It also appears in a 1901 diary that Crowley published in The Equinox.

The essay Gematria gives Hindu, Christian, and "Unsectarian" versions of the problem that Crowley intended this magick word to answer. He also gives a kabbalistic equivalent for each phrasing, and a brief symbolic answer for each. The unsectarian version reads, "I am the finite square; I wish to be one with the infinite circle." Its equivalent refers to "the Cross of Extension" and "the infinite Rose." Crowley's numerological explanation of ABRAHADABRA focuses mainly on this last formulation and the answer to it.

Jamrach Holobom, quoted by Ambrose Bierce, The Devil’s Dictionary (1911)


   By _Abracadabra_ we signify
       An infinite number of things.
   'Tis the answer to What? and How? and Why?
   And Whence? and Whither? -- a word whereby
       The Truth (with the comfort it brings)
   Is open to all who grope in night,
   Crying for Wisdom’s holy light.
   Whether the word is a verb or a noun
       Is knowledge beyond my reach.
   I only know that 'tis handed down.
           From sage to sage,
           From age to age --
       An immortal part of speech!
   Of an ancient man the tale is told
   That he lived to be ten centuries old,
       In a cave on a mountain side.
       (True, he finally died.)
   The fame of his wisdom filled the land,
   For his head was bald, and you'll understand
       His beard was long and white
       And his eyes uncommonly bright.
   Philosophers gathered from far and near
   To sit at his feat and hear and hear,
           Though he never was heard
           To utter a word
       But "_Abracadabra, abracadab_,
           _Abracada, abracad_,
       _Abraca, abrac, abra, ab!_"
           'Twas all he had,
   'Twas all they wanted to hear, and each
   Made copious notes of the mystical speech,
           Which they published next --
           A trickle of text
   In the meadow of commentary.
       Mighty big books were these,
       In a number, as leaves of trees;
   In learning, remarkably -- very!
           He’s dead,
           As I said,
   And the books of the sages have perished,
   But his wisdom is sacredly cherished.
   In _Abracadabra_ it solemnly rings,
   Like an ancient bell that forever swings.
           O, I love to hear
           That word make clear
   Humanity’s General Sense of Things.

Avada Kedavra in Harry Potter

The "Killing Curse" in the Harry Potter stories may have been taken by J. K. Rowling from an Aramaic form "avada kedavra" or similar, which roughly means "what I speak is destroyed," influenced by the Latin word cadaver, meaning "corpse". This form differs from the "I create as I speak" form ("Avara Kedavra") by a single letter in the English transliteration; it is one of the few spells in Harry Potter not derived entirely from Latin.

(see also possibly "Disappear like this word", above.)

References

    External links

    See also

    Wikisource has an original article from the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica about:

     
    Translations: Translations for: Abracadabra

    Dansk (Danish)
    int. - hokuspokus, hokuspokus-filliokus, abracadabra
    n. - trolddom, trylleri, magi

    Nederlands (Dutch)
    abracadabra, wartaal, jargon

    Français (French)
    int. - abracadabra (excl)
    n. - abracadabra

    Deutsch (German)
    int. - Abrakadabra, Hokuspokus
    n. - Abrakadabra, Kauderwelsch, Hokuspokus

    Ελληνική (Greek)
    n. - μαγικό ξόρκι, (μτφ.) ακαταλαβίστικα

    Italiano (Italian)
    abracadabra

    Português (Portuguese)
    n. - abracadabra (m)

    Русский (Russian)
    бессмыслица

    Español (Spanish)
    int. - abracadabra
    n. - abracadabra, jerigonza

    Svenska (Swedish)
    n. - hokuspokus

    中文(简体) (Chinese (Simplified))
    变!, 驱病符, 胡言乱语, 咒语

    中文(繁體) (Chinese (Traditional))
    int. - 變!
    n. - 驅病符, 胡言亂語, 咒語

    한국어 (Korean)
    int. - 애브러커대브러(글자를 삼각형으로 쓴 주문)
    n. - (옛날, 병을 막기 위해 부적으로 썼던) 주문, 헛소리

    日本語 (Japanese)
    n. - アブラカダブラ, 呪文

    العربيه (Arabic)
    ‏(الاسم) تعويذه, كلام غير مفهوم‏

    עברית (Hebrew)
    int. - ‮אבראקאדברא - מילה הנאמרת ע"י מכשפים ובעלי-אוב‬
    n. - ‮לחש-קסם, הבלים‬


     
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    Dictionary. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition Copyright © 2007, 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2007. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.  Read more
    Thesaurus. Roget's II: The New Thesaurus, Third Edition by the Editors of the American Heritage® Dictionary Copyright © 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.  Read more
    Columbia Encyclopedia. The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition Copyright © 2003, Columbia University Press. Licensed from Columbia University Press. All rights reserved. www.cc.columbia.edu/cu/cup/  Read more
    Occultism & Parapsychology Encyclopedia. Encyclopedia of Occultism and Parapsychology. Copyright © 2001 by The Gale Group, Inc. All rights reserved.  Read more
    Devil's Dictionary. Devil's Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce, 1911  Read more
    Wikipedia. This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Abracadabra" Read more
    Translations. Copyright © 2007, WizCom Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved.  Read more

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