Lebola-Words--or Words Taken on a Digression to Lebola

In my vain search for dictionary entries for lebola, I did run across a few "leb/lec" words that alternately made me either smile and get hungry. So, let me begin with lebkuchen. Everyone knows this word, I think. It refers to that cakelike biscuit, coated or glazed and containing spices and honey, said to originate in Nuremberg, Germany. Well do I remember Christmas 1980, my first and only Christmas spent outside the States, when my wife (at the time) and I were enjoying our year-long jaunt in Germany courtesy of a DAAD fellowship. We spent a cold December day in Nuremberg at the Christkindles Markt and the only comforting thing about the day was eating lebkuchen and drinking warm cider. If I was back in the Swabian town of Tuebingen, where I studied, I would be drinking the fermenting new wine drink called Moscht, but let's leave the word and the memories right here, or I will begin to regret what I didn't learn in Germany in 1980-81...

Leboyer

I am skipping over a few other French names, such as Leblanc and Lebesgue, because I don't really want to dive into complex mathematical formulae or chemical/electrical engineering issues right now. But my eye fell upon Leboyer, and again memories flooded over me. The word Leboyer, a method of "painless" childbirth, is named after the French obstetrician, Frederick Leboyer (b. 1918), whose 1975 book (Birth without Violence), described his method of gentle delivery of babies. Crucial for him was delivery in minimal stimulation: low light and low noise, with a warm bath ready for the baby, possibly with sweet-music playing in the background. Perhaps, also a glass of wine would greet the newborn! In any case, I recall this word/method because it was all the rage when my ex became pregnant in 1981. There was always something Gaullic swirling around the delivery room, whether it was Leboyer or Lamaze or something else. I think we decided on Lamaze, a method emphasizing certain kinds of breathing. When I, her "coach" urged her to do that kind of breathing when she was in labor, she looked at me, told me to shut up and then had our first child without considerable effort. There went my career as a coach, I guess...

Lecanomancy

I will finish this digression-within-a-digression with lecanomancy. I actually love words ending in mancy, because they all relate to practices of divination by means of some objects--usually strange objects. I am fascinated by the various ways that people have to try to secure special knowledge about the world or their destiny. In the last few days, for example, I mentioned bibliomancy or stichomancy and had such a good time with those that I couldn't ignore the insistent cries of lecanomancy today [my favorite, by the way, at least today, is catoptromancy]. A lekane, in Greek, is a dish or pan, and lecanomancy is defined, in the OED, as "divination by the inspection of water in a basin." I wonder why the "water" idea isn't involved in the word... In any case, Healey's 1610 translation of Augustine's City of God first used the word in English: "Hydromancy..done..in a basin of water, which is called Lecanomancie." The "scientific" Century dictionary defined it as follows: "divination by throwing three stones into water in a basin and invoking the aid of a demon." Hm..."demonic" language in a dictionary is definitely pejorative.

So, I sought for more information on this seemingly curious practice, and it seemed to me as if catoptromancy (divination by looking into mirrors) and lecanomancy might have smushed into each other in antiquity. Here is a little on the latter, taken primarily from April De Conick's Seek to See Him. She mentions the definition in two words ("bowl-divination") and then quotes a text from the Greek Magical Papyri (PGM 4.154-285) where the suppliant contacts the god through bowl divination.

"You will observe through bowl divination on whatever day or night you want, in whatever place you want, beholding the god in the water and hearing a voice from the god which speaks in verses in answer to whatever you want," quoted in De Conick, p. 167.

It is here that the difference between lecanomancy and catoptromancy becomes blurred, for the magician, when bending over the bowl, supposedly sees a reflection of the deity in the bowl. So, the water is both a "basin divination" and a functional mirror. What is the result of this "bowl diviniation?" Well, in antique mystery religions, to which the Magical Papyri often point, the goal is the same: union with the deity. So, we have:

"I have been united with thy sacred form. I have been empowered by thy sacred name. I have received the effluence of thy goodness, Lord, God of gods, King Daimon, .....(meaningless Greek words follow). When you have done this, descend, having attained that nature, equal to God's, which is effected by this ritual union," Ibid., at 167.

She then goes on to try to point to Jewish practice of lecanomancy as seen in Joseph and Asenath 18 and other ancient texts. Asenath, for example, prepares herself for her wedding and is about to wash her face. She leans over the basin and regards her face on the water. When she sees it, she sees herself transformed and her face is like an angel. "And it was like the sun and her eyes (were) like a rising morining star."

Conclusion

This reference to lecanomancy (or is it a form of catoptromancy?) made me think immediately about St. Paul's words in II Corinthians--that those who behold the Lord, as in a mirror (!) are transformed from one degree of glory to another. While no "orthodox" Christian today would ever consider that Paul of Tarsus would have engaged in such 'shadowy' or 'demonic' practices as catoptromancy or lecanomancy, it is interesting that he uses language that would have been quite familiar in the magical worlds of his day to express what many Christians today feel is his most profound and memorable expression of the believer's union with Christ. Just goes to show you that theology often takes words "lying around" in the broader culture and tries to breathe new life into them. But, in the final analysis, has the taking over of the term been accompanied also with completely leaving behind the concept to which the term pointed? I don't think we should be so quick to exonerate Paul or declare his theological "innocence." Indeed, I think it makes a more powerful theological point to assume that he had brought in some meaning from the other realm, and that he was trying to explain the Gospel in terms that would be familiar to his hearers.

Now, I am ready to "return" to the Century's words around sephiroth, the real "goal" of my writing today. I think I may reach the Promised Land of that Hebrew term in the ubernachste essay.

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