More Pagan Traditions of the Elder Brothers: Birkat ha-Levanah (Blessing of the Moon)

It is still customary to rise on the tips of the toes in the direction of the moon while reciting three times "As I dance toward thee, but cannot touch thee, so shall none of my evil-inclined enemies be able to touch me." This is followed by "Long live David, King of Israel" (also pronounced three times) and by the greeting Shalom aleikhem ("Peace be to you") which is extended to those standing around who respond Aleikhem shalom ("to you be peace"). [Encyclopaedia Judaica, "Birkat ha-Levanah" (Blessing of the Moon)]

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There is a theurgic ritual preserved in the Talmud, intended to ensure good fortune, called the Blessing for the New Moon.

Medieval Jewish works of astrology list a variety of human spheres that the moon affects with its waxing and waning. The ideal time for sexual intercourse is the new moon, because it would have a positive influence on a child conceived at that time. The best time to construct an amulet is determined by the phases of the moon; the same is true for performing certain medical procedures. The moon represents Malchut/Shekinah in the sefirotic Godhead [Sof. 4:5; Suk. 29a; Sanh. 42a; Zohar1: 236b]. (The Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic and Mysticism, "Moon")

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R. Aha b. Hanina also said in the name of R. Assi in R. Johanan's name: Whoever pronounces the benediction over the new moon in its due time welcomes, as it were, the presence of the Shechinah ... (Sanhedrin 42a)

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The Shekhinah, or Malkhut, is the tenth and last in the hierarchy of the [Kabbalistic] Sefirot. In the divine world it represents the feminine principle, while Tiferet (the sixth Sefirah) and Yesod (the ninth) represent the masculine principle. All the elements and characteristics of the other Sefirot are represented within the Shekhinah. Like the moon, she has no light of her own, but receives the divine light from the other Sefirot.(Encyclopaedia Judaica, "Shekhinah")

Related to the above mentioned Judaic tradition of timing the conception of children with the phases of the moon is the occult tradition of the moonchild or homunculous. Aliester Crowley and Jack Parsons of the Masonic OTO and Jack Parsons' partner in magic ritual, the founder of Scientology, L. Ron Hubbard were obsessed with the tradition of the homunculous. As we can see, the rabbis of Orthodox Judaism were promoting this occult practice in their "holy" texts long before Aliester Crowley, Jack Parsons and L. Ron Hubbard adapted it.