The Star Sapphire

The Star Sapphire, formally published as Liber XXXVI in Aleister Crowley’s collected magical writings, is the Thelemic invoking ritual of the hexagram and serves as the macrocosmic complement to the Star Ruby within the Thelemic ritual system. Where the Star Ruby banishes, establishing a clear and protected ritual space by tracing pentagrams at the four quarters, the Star Sapphire invokes, drawing the forces of the macrocosm into the practitioner’s ritual sphere through the hexagram, the traditional symbol of the union of heaven and earth, traced in its specifically Thelemic unicursal form.

The unicursal hexagram, a six-pointed star drawn in a single continuous stroke, is one of the characteristic symbols of the Thelemic system and appears prominently in the imagery associated with Crowley’s writings and OTO. Its single-stroke nature, which distinguishes it from the traditional hexagram formed by two overlapping triangles, was understood by Crowley to express the unity underlying the apparent duality of the above and the below, the divine and the human, the macrocosmic and the microcosmic.

History and origins

Crowley composed the Star Sapphire alongside the Star Ruby as part of his project of constructing a complete Thelemic ritual system that could stand independently of the Golden Dawn framework he had trained in. The Golden Dawn’s hexagram rituals, including the Greater Ritual of the Hexagram as presented in Israel Regardie’s published version of the Golden Dawn material, use the hexagram in various forms to invoke and banish the seven classical planets and their corresponding sephiroth on the Tree of Life.

The Star Sapphire adapts this principle to the Thelemic framework, using the unicursal hexagram and the Thelemic divine names, particularly the IAO formula and the name of the Beast, to invoke the macrocosmic forces in a way that aligns with Thelemic rather than Kabbalistic theology.

In practice

The Star Sapphire is practiced after the Star Ruby has established the ritual space. It is structured around a central working in which the practitioner, at the center of the cleared space, invokes the macrocosmic forces by tracing the unicursal hexagram in each of the four directions with the appropriate divine name, and then performs a central invocation of the beast, the divine principle of will, and the Thelemic Trinity.

The ritual requires memorization of the specific divine names and their associated quarter attributions, as well as the ability to trace the unicursal hexagram fluently in the air. The unicursal hexagram begins at the top point and proceeds without lifting the working instrument (wand, dagger, or extended finger), moving through the six points and returning to the start in a single continuous movement.

A method you can use

Practitioners approaching the Star Sapphire should first have established a regular practice with the Star Ruby and have a working familiarity with the Thelemic theological framework, including the nature of the Thelemic Trinity (Nuit, Hadit, Ra-Hoor-Khuit) and the IAO formula. With that foundation in place, the following approach will begin the Star Sapphire practice.

Obtain the full text of Liber XXXVI from Crowley’s published works or from reliable OTO study materials. Learn to trace the unicursal hexagram smoothly before attempting the ritual, practicing the stroke in the air until it flows without hesitation. Study the divine names and their quarter attributions so that vibrating them at each direction is not a cognitive challenge during the ritual itself.

Begin incorporating the Star Sapphire after the Star Ruby in working sessions where you wish to invoke macrocosmic forces, draw down specific planetary energies, or work with the forces of the higher sephiroth as understood in the Thelemic system. The combination of Star Ruby followed by Star Sapphire establishes a fully operative ritual space that is both banished and charged.

The Star Sapphire in Thelemic practice

The Star Sapphire occupies an important theoretical position within the Thelemic ritual framework because it enacts the principle that magic is not merely the manipulation of unseen forces for personal ends but the deliberate alignment of the individual will with the macrocosmic order. Invoking the forces of the hexagram is understood as the practitioner’s will reaching upward to meet the forces reaching downward, the two triangles of heaven and earth meeting and interpenetrating in the unicursal hexagram’s single unbroken line. This is the practical expression of the Hermetic maxim “as above, so below” as Crowley understood it: not a static correspondence but an active, willed interpenetration.

In myth and popular culture

The hexagram as a symbol, which the Star Sapphire employs in its unicursal form, has deep roots in multiple religious and magical traditions. The Star of David in Jewish tradition, the Seal of Solomon in Islamic and Jewish magical use, and the hexagram’s appearance in Hindu tantric practice as the Shatkona representing the union of Shiva and Shakti all reflect the symbol’s widespread resonance as a form depicting the union of complementary principles. Crowley’s unicursal version, drawn in a single stroke rather than as two interlocking triangles, was his deliberate modification to express a specifically Thelemic theological position.

The unicursal hexagram has become one of the most recognizable symbols of Thelema in popular culture. It appears on OTO publications, in Thelemic visual art, and on the album covers and imagery of artists influenced by Crowley’s current, including the work of Jimmy Page and the imagery surrounding the band Tool, whose drummer Danny Carey has publicly acknowledged interest in Thelemic practice.

The concept of the macrocosm being invoked into the microcosm through geometric symbol and ritual speech draws on Renaissance Hermetic magic as formulated by figures including Marsilio Ficino and Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa, whose “Three Books of Occult Philosophy” systematized planetary magic in ways that directly informed the Golden Dawn tradition from which Crowley developed. The Star Sapphire stands at the end of that lineage as Crowley’s Thelemic reformulation of those earlier planetary invocation practices.

Myths and facts

Several misconceptions attend the Star Sapphire, particularly among those new to Thelemic practice.

• The Star Sapphire is sometimes assumed to be the same as the Greater Ritual of the Hexagram from the Golden Dawn system. The two rituals share a structural function, the invoking counterpart to a banishing pentagram ritual, but the divine names, theological framework, and specific hexagram form are substantially different.
• The unicursal hexagram is sometimes described as Crowley’s invention with no prior precedent. While Crowley popularized it within Western magical practice, the unicursal form of the hexagram has earlier appearances in sacred geometric tradition, and Crowley’s innovation was its placement at the center of a Thelemic magical system rather than the form itself.
• It is sometimes assumed that the Star Sapphire invokes specific individual planetary forces in the same way the Greater Hexagram Ritual does. The Star Sapphire has a more general macrocosmic invocation character in Crowley’s presentation, though practitioners working within Thelema have developed extensions of the practice that do work with specific planetary attributions.
• The ritual is occasionally presented as requiring a specific physical sapphire or ruby as a ritual tool. No such requirement appears in the ritual text; the names Star Ruby and Star Sapphire are symbolic designations rather than instructions to use gemstones.
• Because the Star Sapphire is less widely known than the LBRP, it is sometimes assumed that it is rarely used or of marginal importance in Thelemic practice. For practitioners working seriously within the Thelemic magical system, the Star Ruby and Star Sapphire pair functions as the foundational ritual framework in the same way the LBRP and hexagram rituals do in Golden Dawn-derived practice.