The Origin & Evolution of Correspondences in Witchcraft
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If you’ve been a witch for a while, you’ve probably asked yourself: where do correspondences come from? Who decided that lavender was good for calming, or that obsidian was good for absorbing negative energy? Where does the concept of correspondences come from in the first place? To answer these questions, we must first look at something called “correlative thinking”: Marcel Granet (1884-1940), a French sociologist, coined the term “correlative thinking”, which can be defined as “thinking of an item of one class by correlating it with an item of another class”, typically organizing and relating “natural, political/social, and cosmological data in highly ordered arrays or systems of correspondence.” Sound familiar?
Correlative thinking takes many forms throughout religion, philosophy, and humanity – even showing up as early as Mesopotamia, where they believed events on earth ran parallel to events in heaven: “each city-state had its own patron god and every change in the balance of power between the city-states was seen as the direct reflection of a change in the relationship of the gods.” (Cavendish, pg. 12) In ancient Greece and among Hellenic philosophers, they came up with the “macrocosm/microcosm” analogy, which describes the relationship between the smaller, human being (the microcosm) with the much bigger, seemingly infinite cosmos (the macrocosm).
This correlative thinking is prevalent in many magical texts throughout the years – including The Emerald Tablet (late 8th-early 9th century), The Picatrix (a 9th century Arabic grimoire), The Key of Solomon (1312), and the Three Books of Occult Philosophy (1533). After the publication of The Three Books of Occult Philosophy and the boom of new-age spiritualism in the 1970s, there have been a massive number of publications related to witchcraft, correspondences, ritual magic, and more. For the purpose of this post, however, we’ll be focusing on these foundational texts to better understand the evolution and origin of correspondences.
The Emerald Tablet, dated around the late 8th-early 9th century, is one of the most highly influential texts within the philosophical and occult realm. An English translation of a line of text within The Emerald Tablet provides one of the most popular terms among new agers and modern pagans: “That which is above is like to that which is below, and that which is below is like to that which is above”. A shortened version of this phrase, “as above, so below”, can be found in Helena Blavatsky’s work, Isis Unveiled (1877), where it became massively popularized among the modern pagan community. This phrase, along with terms related to correlative thinking, tie back to many cultures – including China, India, and more.
The Picatrix, 9th-century Arabic grimoire on astrological magic, is yet another influential piece of text. This text contained astrological magic, magical potions and spells, and different Hermetic, Neoplatonic, and Aristotelianism philosophical passages – and it also included the explanations of links between planets and intangible objects such as colors and perfumes/fragrances.
After a few series of translations in the 12th and 13th centuries, the information within the Picatrix (and other sources) were recorded and arranged by Henry Cornelius Agrippa (1486-1535) in his work, Three Books of Occult Philosophy in 1509 (not being published until 1533). From there, Dr. John Dee (1527-1604) expanded on Agrippa’s work in the 1580s and 1590s.
Shortly after, in 1620, the Magical Calendar was published, which compressed much of the previous material. This calendar, amazingly recorded on one page, “contains tables of correspondences arranged by number, from one to twelve. The material is based largely on the extensive tables in Agrippa, book II, but goes beyond this, especially in its inclusion of sigils.” (Skinner, pg. 14)
Moving onto another incredibly influential text, The Signature of All Things, published by Jakob Bohme in 1764, covers a similar concept to correlative thinking known as ‘the doctrine of signatures’: God created everything on Earth with a “signature”, or sign, that tells you what that object’s purpose is. The idea is that any plant, herb, or object on earth should resemble what it’s purpose is – for example, walnuts (which look like brains) are used for brain health, and tomatoes (which are red, plump, and contain ventricles like the human heart) are used for heart health. Obviously, this concept was adopted in the context of medicinal use – by looking up an object’s signature within this book, a physician could theoretically find treatments for specific illnesses. While the contents of this book (and similar texts) have been debunked as pseudoscience, the influence of the doctrine of signatures is prevalent in witchcraft correspondences today.
In 1888, the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn was founded, and during that time S L MacGregor Mathers (1954-1918) and Dr. Wynn Wescott (1845-1925) prepared knowledge lectures for the Order, which eventually led to the generation of a Book of Correspondences (unpublished). According to Adam McLean in his edition of The Magical Calendar, this book circulated among members of the inner order of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, and was later published by Aleister Crowley as his own work, Liber 777 (1909). Meanwhile, in 1908, The Kybalion (an anonymously written text, though often attributed to William W. Atkinson [1862-1932]) was published, including topics like “The Principle of Correspondence” and “The Planes of Correspondence”.
From here on, we have an uproar in magical texts, thanks to the new-age/spiritualism movement of the 70s and 80s – popular authors like Gerald Gardner, Scott Cunningham, Ray Buckland, and many others published works on the subject of magic, often including their own correspondences, typically influenced or inspired by the works of Crowley, Mathers, and Atkinson. Of course, the contents of these modern texts are what is most recognizable to practitioners today – we usually find tables of information, relating astrological signs, herbs, planets, feelings, colors, and more to their “meanings”: protection, anti-stress, happiness, love, etc.
As it stands, correspondences are a by-product of the ‘correlative thinking’ concept we covered earlier – this correlative thinking shows up in Mesopotamia, and evolved throughout magical texts and grimoires, eventually becoming these “tables of magical correspondences” that we are familiar with seeing in modern witchcraft and pagan books and resources.
As I round off this post, I want to share a quote from Richard Cavendish in his book, The Black Arts: “Man is a tiny replica of the universe. If two things are naturally associated together in the human mind, which is an image of the ‘mind’ of the universe, this is evidence of a real connection between the two things in the universe. Many of the important magical analogies and connections are not natural to most people’s minds today, but have been handed down by tradition from the remote past. This enhances their value for occultists, who believe that humanity was a great deal wiser in these matters in the remote past than it is now.” As practitioners, particularly modern practitioners, I feel we put too much emphasis on older concepts and traditions. While there’s nothing necessarily wrong with sticking to traditions and building off of older magical systems, I think it’s just as important that we work on our own magical systems – what does the color red mean to you? What about the planet Jupiter? Find out what works for you – you may find that it makes you feel more connected to your craft and your practice, and your workings could become more powerful, too.
Sources/Further Reading:
Dictionary of Gnosis & Western Esotericism by Wouter Hanegraaff
Three Books of Occult Philosophy by Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa
The Signature of All Things by Jakob Bohme
The Black Arts by Richard Cavendish
A History of Magic, Witchcraft and the Occult by DK
The Complete Magician’s Tables by Stephen Skinner
Neurobiology, Layered Texts, and Correlative Cosmologies: A Cross-Cultural Framework for Premodern History by Farmer et al
https://youtu.be/p0z3MuuB9uc
https://youtu.be/gYSGSjU84vE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gx1av438mLY
https://www.patheos.com/blogs/matauryn/2018/06/03/magickal-correspondences/
https://howardchoy.wordpress.com/tag/correlative-thinking/
https://www.researchgate.net/figure/An-abstract-diagram-meant-to-illustrate-the-perfectly-correlative-structure-of-the_fig4_237249544
https://swedenborg.com/emanuel-swedenborg/explore/correspondences/
