The fourth Venus pentacle claims power to compel the planet’s spirits and bring a chosen person at once. Its divided diamond is enclosed by Genesis’s words about bone and flesh, giving the command a distinctly bodily setting. [1]
Mathers 1889 · Book I, chapter XVIII; printed p. 67; figure 42, Plate X; plate PDF page 92
To compel the spirits of Venus to obey and force a chosen person to come immediately. [1]
Design
A diamond encloses curved bands and a nine-part central grid, with Hebrew letter groups inside and a verse band around it. [1]
Source reproduction The 4th Pentacle of Venus. Hebrew names occupy the divided diamond, and Genesis 2:23 runs around the circumference. Mathers 1889, Plate X, figure 42; notice on p. 67.
A command to come at once
Mathers’s fourth Venus pentacle makes two linked claims: it compels the spirits of Venus to obey, and forces any person the operator desires to come immediately. The urgency is explicit—“on the instant”—and the language is one of command. Its subject is the compelled arrival of a person, rather than a general promise of affection. [1]
The surrounding Venus notices show how specific that purpose is. The third attracts love when shown to someone, while the fifth is likewise shown to excite love. The fourth’s own notice gives no such showing condition. The book’s broader construction scheme associates Venus with copper for metal figures, green for paper, and the planet’s day and hour; no additional material or special hour is stated in this individual notice. [1]
A divided diamond and its names
The principal outline is a diamond—a square turned on its point—inside a circle. A central grid has three rows and three columns, with Hebrew letter groups in its corner compartments. Curved double bands frame the grid, and the diamond’s sides continue through small crossing compartments at its four corners. More Hebrew letters occupy the surrounding spaces. A small six-pointed star interrupts the upper part of the outer verse band. [1]
Mathers identifies the four letters of IHVH at the figure’s four angles and reads other groups as names of spirits of Venus, giving Schii, Eli and Ayib as examples. [1]
Bone, flesh and the Genesis passage
The visible Hebrew circumference follows Genesis 2:23, the man’s recognition of the woman: “bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh”. The verse goes on to connect the Hebrew words for woman and man with her being taken from him. In the surrounding narrative, God has made the woman from the man’s rib and brought her to him. These are words of bodily kinship and recognition, placed around a pentacle whose notice demands a person’s arrival. [1][2][3]
Mathers’s note cites Genesis 2:23–24 and adds “And they two were one flesh” to his English quotation. That ending draws on the following verse about a man leaving his parents and cleaving to his wife. It extends the quotation beyond the wording visible on the circumference. [1][2][3]
S. L. MacGregor Mathers, 1889; printed edition, including editorial restoration of Hebrew characters. Book I, chapter XVIII, printed p. 67; figure 42, Plate X (PDF p. 92); neighbouring notices, figures 41 and 43; general Venus materials and timing, pp. 56–57
