Hod

Splendour, Glory

The Eighth Path is called the Absolute or Perfect Intelligence because it is the mean of the Primordial, which has no root by which it can cleave, nor rest, except in the hidden places of Gedulah, Magnificence, from which emanates its own proper essence.
The 8th Path, the Absolute or Perfect Intelligence: The 32 Paths of Wisdom, trans. Westcott

Correspondences

Number: 8 of the ten
Meaning: Splendour, Glory
Pillar: Pillar of Severity
Triad: Astral Triad
World: Yetzirah
Divine name (Atziluth): Elohim Tzabaoth אלהים צבאות
the God of Hosts
Archangel (Briah): Michael מיכאל
‘Who is like God?’; some Golden Dawn papers give Raphael here and Michael in Tiphareth
Angelic choir (Yetzirah): Beni Elohim בני אלהים
the Sons of God
Mundane chakra (Assiah): Kokab כוכב
Mercury, the Star
Colours: King: Violet purple · Queen: Orange · Prince: Red-russet · Princess: Yellowish brown, flecked white
Magical image: A hermaphrodite
Spiritual experience: The Vision of Splendour
Virtue: Truthfulness
Vice: Falsehood; dishonesty
Titles: Majesty; Glory; the Absolute or Perfect Intelligence
Symbols: Names and versicles; the apron
Tarot: The four Eights
In the body: The loins and legs (777: right hip)
Part of the soul: Ruach
Grade: Practicus 3°=8□
Qliphoth: Samael, the false accuser, the poison of God; arch-demon(s): Adramelech
Gods (777): Egyptian: Anubis, Thoth (as the lesser Mercury) · Greek: Hermes · Roman: Mercury · Hindu: Hanuman
Precious stone: Opal, especially fire opal
Plant: Moly; anhalonium lewinii (peyote)
Animal: Hermaphrodite; jackal
Perfume: Storax
Magical weapon: Names and versicles; the apron

In Jewish Kabbalah

Hod, splendour, is the left leg of the divine body and is identified with Aaron the High Priest, Moses’ brother and spokesman. With Netzach it is the source of prophecy. Where Netzach endures and conquers, Hod acknowledges and gives thanks: the root of the Hebrew word is also the root of hoda’ah, thanksgiving.

In the Golden Dawn and Thelema

The Practicus grade belongs to Hod and the element Water; the candidate travels the 31st and 30th paths to reach it. Hod is the sphere of Mercury and of ceremonial magic itself: of names, words of power, sigils, the Kabbalah of letters and numbers. Its weapons, names and versicles, are the magician’s spoken formulae. The Eights of the Thoth deck (Swiftness, Indolence, Interference, Prudence) show the intellect at work, quick but liable to get in its own way.

Dion Fortune

Fortune calls Hod the sphere of form in the astral world and of the concrete mind. Here the forces of Netzach are given shape, so all magic that works through symbol and ritual is Hod working. Its image, the hermaphrodite, shows that Mercury unites the opposites; its virtue is truthfulness, since a magician whose words are false undoes their own power.

In the Tarot

Each sephirah rules the four small cards of its number. From two to ten, each card is also one of the 36 decans of the zodiac, ruled by a planet in a sign, following the Golden Dawn’s Book T.

Card	Thoth title	Book T title	Decan
8 of Wands	Swiftness	Lord of Swiftness	Mercury in Sagittarius
8 of Cups	Indolence	Lord of Abandoned Success	Saturn in Pisces
8 of Swords	Interference	Lord of Shortened Force	Jupiter in Gemini
8 of Disks	Prudence	Lord of Prudence	Sun in Virgo

Paths from Hod

Read further

Hod on Wikipediaoverview of the Jewish and Hermetic sources
Sepher Yetzirah and the 32 Paths of WisdomW. Wynn Westcott, trans., 1887
The Kabbalah UnveiledS. L. MacGregor Mathers, from Knorr von Rosenroth’s Kabbala Denudata, 1887
Liber 777 RevisedAleister Crowley, 1909/1955
The Book of ThothAleister Crowley, 1944
The Golden DawnIsrael Regardie, ed., 1937–40
A Garden of PomegranatesIsrael Regardie, 1932
The Mystical QabalahDion Fortune, 1935
The Pictorial Key to the TarotA. E. Waite, 1910
The Tarot: A Key to the Wisdom of the AgesPaul Foster Case, 1947
A Practical Guide to Qabalistic SymbolismGareth Knight, 1965

Also in the background throughout: Gershom Scholem, Kabbalah (1974) and Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism (1941), for the Jewish tradition as historians understand it; Aryeh Kaplan, Sefer Yetzirah (1990); Kenneth Grant, Nightside of Eden (1977), for the Qliphoth; Robert Wang, The Qabalistic Tarot (1983).