If you wish to enter the presence of the king
or any (great) man, or a judge, wash yourself with “living” water and taken
some of the blood and some of the wine and anoint your body, and place the lion’s
heart over your heart. If (you wish) to bring around the citizens of the city,
take the lion’s heart and hide it in the midst of the city, and write on a
(piece of) gold foil the name of the overseer and (the name of the angels) of
his encampment and say thus:
You angels who go around the circulate in the
world, bring around (to me) all your citizens of this city, great and small,
old and young, lowly and distinguished. Let the fear and terror of me be over
them as the terror of the lion is over all the animals. And as this heart is
mute while I am speaking, so let all of them listen to me, and let none of the
children of Adam and Eve be able to speak against me. (Sepher Ha-Razim: The Book of
the Mysteries [trans. Michael A. Morgan; Texts and Translations 25;
Pseudepigraph Series 11; Chico, Calif.: Scholars Press, 1983], 34)
In a note accompanying
the term “gold foil,” we read:
ציץ, gold plate, metal disc, or lamella,
often used for making amulets. (Ibid., 34 n. 49)
With respect to the dating of this text, as Morgan notes:
The consensus of those scholars
who have worked with the text is to support Margaloth’s dating of SHR to the
early fourth or late third century CE. (Ibid., 8)
