What’s Left to Salvage in a Monument That Refuses to Accept the Sins of the Past?
BY KEITH LOWE
The Yasukuni Shrine is an island of calm in an otherwise bustling city. Mature pines and cypress trees surround it, screening it from Tokyo’s relentless traffic noise. Shady walkways, sacred ponds and dozens of cherry trees make it a public haven for the many Japanese people who come here to honor their ancestors.
But if you look more closely, you’ll find clues to the regional rage and global controversies that plague this place. The shrine is dedicated to all those Japanese soldiers who sacrificed their lives on the battlefield since the Meiji Restoration in 1868, most of them during World War II. On the face of it, there is nothing offensive about this: Every nation …
Transforming the Facility Into a Museum and Democracy Center Would Allow California to Remember Its Carceral Cruelty—And Create a Different Future
BY JOE MATHEWS
One of California’s most notorious jails could close in 2021. But if the state truly wants to leave its carceral history in the past and create a more open and democratic future, its building must be preserved—and transformed …
Why We Need Literature to Document Atrocities—at Home and Abroad
BY DAISY HERNÁNDEZ
For a long time, I cringed whenever I heard someone talk about a novel or a poem bearing witness. The word “witness” bothered me. It felt hollow and privileged. It felt like something an entitled American writer would say, a writer who could author a book and walk away. I was not that person, or at least I didn’t want to be …
WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—Full immunity from Donald J. Trump will require two doses of impeachment, Dr. Anthony Fauci has advised.
“One impeachment was a good start, but it didn’t get it done,” the esteemed virologist said. “If you want to keep this terrible situation from coming back, you’re gonna need that second dose.”
Acknowledging that two doses of impeachment, taken a year apart, have never been tested before, Fauci said, “We’re in an emergency situation here.”
The epidemiologist said that people are working on the second dose of impeachment “around the clock,” and that it could be ready as soon as Monday.
“It’s truly remarkable how fast they’ve been able to come up with it,” he said. “We’re talking warp speed.”
Andy Borowitz is a Times best-selling author and a comedian who has written for The New Yorker since 1998. He writes The Borowitz Report, a satirical column on the news.
Symphony No. 5 in C Minor, Op. 67: I. Allegro con brio (Live)
Artist
Klaus Tennstedt, London Philharmonic Orchestra
Album
Beethoven: Coriolan Overture & Symphony No. 5
Licensed to YouTube by
Harmonia Mundi (on behalf of London Philharmonic Orchestra); LatinAutorPerf, SODRAC, Warner Chappell, Sony ATV Publishing, LatinAutor, UMPG Publishing, and 6 Music Rights Societies
Song
Symphony No. 5 in C minor, Op. 67 – Andante con moto
Artist
Ludwig van Beethoven
Album
Beethoven: Symphony No. 5, Piano Concerto No. 3
Licensed to YouTube by
Supraphon; Warner Chappell, UMPG Publishing, and 6 Music Rights Societies
It’s the night before and I’m listening to Leonard Cohen being stoned and moving my hips. Couldn’t be better. Gonna go eat a coconut popsicle. Back in a minute. I need a symbol for when I pause. “1,000 Kisses Deep” plays. Made a Mom special. Butter and Jelly. We got it in more lunches that any other. (not really) So That was dinner tonight. I need to go take my nighttime Meds. Wow when you’re stoned you just walk around aimlessly. I couldn’t remember why I walked to the kitchen. What a deep mix this is. It was perfect that I got up to walk to the kitchen to take the meds. The universe telling me to move. So I gave mom a bad rap. She always tried to make that cream cheese and jelly. And well most of the time that’s what we had in our lunchbags. But butter and jelly was her backup. I do wish I could figure how to display picture on Medium as icons instead of the whole picture. The pictures take up too much writing room. And well some stories are short. I’m not gonna post pictures of all 4 of my 100 mile swim club t-shirts. Way too much space. I could not possibly talk that long to get past the stupid pictures. (But I would post icons if I could figure it out.) “Lady Midnight” plays.
It’s almost midnight. Want to feel tired soon. Not ready to take one of those pills but maybe some of CALM sleep stuff. brb.
So I hung Touchdown Jesus on the wall facing my bed today. Kinda moved a few pics around. Then hung these 2 more. I’ll just have to talk sbout something while I get down to them on the page. Icons would really be nice here too. The 2nd Pic is called “Play Ball”. I like it. Haven’t had it up in a while. and the third one is a mirror that I will walk past alot. In front of the bathroom. And with all this
water I am drinking well I get to spend a fair amount of time in there. I pee sittting down now mostly. tmi Just so much easier for me to relax and have a good piss.
I have BPH which is fairly common in men. Benign Prostate Hyperplasia. My prostate is enlarged and it crimps the urethra so it’s harder to pee. I get PSA done evey year.
As long as you check it and do something if something is OK. Gavin ignored his high PSA reading from what I know. And it had spread too far before he knew it and it took him out. Took an Ambien. Be nice to crash. Big day tomorrow. What a great mix of songs. I’m gonna go close my eyes and hope I stay there one way or another.I found a new place to publish these stories that might be earlier to follow. I can’t figure out how Medium works So shoot me a text if you’re interested in a different site. I hope that one works too. It will be a few days out of date but that’s OK if it’s easier to follow. Well really if you’ree interested in it. It’s just my little journey. This one is OK to write on but I have very little control of any technical details controling what you see and in what order. Its’ all good. Here’s a good Leonard Cohen song. Night.
Slept well til 10:30 AM. Did not take a sleeping pil just one Ambien. Feet OK. still wearing those fleece socks. Sue had lent me an electric foot warmer which worked well. Once I get the stuff I bought at Amazon, I’ll be set. Got this text from Sue this morning. “Over 100 folks praying for you on All Saints online service this morning” That’s the Episcable church Sue goes to. She and Louisa (the refugee minister) put me on the prayer list there It is just all so humbling. So powerful. So many minds focused as One. Touchdown Jesus scores again!!!
Busy day and I gotta get on with it. Let’s look at the Course in Miracles. I’m what now 3 days behind. So here’s LESSON 8. I’m gonna go listen. “My mind is Preoccupied with Past Thoughts” Nice.
11:30 now. back after I do some things. Social Hour is at 2 PM and Family FaceTime at 3 PM and then Da Bears. Gonna be a GREAT afternoon. Put Bill Evans on while I shower and eat and get my day going. “My mind is preoccupied with Past Thoughts.” And I have a home for my grand piano.
Another one that’s been on my wall for years. It’s by Joy. It’s very hard to photograph. It hides behind light reflections on the surface of the glass. Of course I know NOTHING about photography. I’ll show you a few more from my walls. None of these pics came out great. And Medium distorts them anyway but you see what you see.
Emi Painted this one. She was part of that Atlanta Group led by Ramon.
I’m such a bad photographer. I don’t understand the most basic principles of photography.
This is one of Bob’s photgraphs. I have 2 of his hanging in the kitchen. I might have told you what it is when I wrote about Bob. He beams at me from the refrigerator whenever I go by in the kitchen. Take a look and see if you can see what it is.
Like most spritual organizations, Shambhala had a series of classes you take to get to some big bad graduation point I guess I’ll call it. Not that you’re done but you get kinda get a rank I guess. I don’t know. hierarchy gets developed. Well after the first 5 classes — Level 1 is basic goodness, level 2–3–4–5. And then you go to the Sacred Path, and that’s more weekend classes. I don’t know another 5 of them. The one I liked the best was called MEEK and this print which I found in San Diego at an art exhibit of Chinese zodiac signs is the same symbol for as for MEEK — well at least in Shambhala. So I bought it and hung it on the wall.
Family call was a technical disaster. Couldn’t get everyone on FaceTime so went over to Zoom. Ronna calls me on FaceTime so I’m holding the phone while she talks to the folks on Zoom. Then Jan calls on FaceTime and so I try to add her and I lose Ronna. So we’ve got Dave and Peg and Terri on Zoom, Ronna and Jan on Facetime at different times and me on both Zoom and FaceTime. It was comical at best but it was a good visit.
Then I just got a really good call from an old buddy Tom. He didn’t know I had cancer so we caught up and just had a really good visit. Also got to talk to his wife Cheryl for a minute.
Just ate a couple of gummies and I am watching the Bears. So once the gummies kick in I’ll be sailing. Hope the Bears win. Gonna go take a hit off the vape pen and give the gummies a head start. They take a while to kick in.
Oh they’ve kicked in. 7–3 Saints at the half. And it’s all kicked in.
Game is virtually. I was just lazy. Now I’m thirsty. Gonna watch the end of game. I hear the sound. 21–9 Saints. The over/under was 48. I hope you bet the under.
Ok been gone a while. And angel came to my front doo this morning. The lady across the street, Debbie married to David, a minister, brought a bag to my front door and rang the bell I think and then waived good bye — it was cold this morning trust me. If it was another Amazon package I would have left it. I didn’t really see who left it as she walked away. So I went a got it and brought it in.I had been stumbing zaround the litchen trying to figure out what to make. Eggs again. Well this little bag was mana from heaven. My breakfast became oatmeal and especially tapioca. Divine. And she left a thing of potato soup for dinner and I just ate that. Oh my God. With dill on top. Amazing. Now I am a good cook in my own right right. This is my new mailbox just put
moisture, in the best of cicumstances a wooden mailbox post is not going to last more than 25 years here. I moved into my little house in 1996. So I decide I’ll go find some shims and see if I could pound them in the ground at the base of the mailbox to see if I keep it standing for a few more months. David walks over and asks what I am doing. I tell him plan. do you want some help. So he proceeds to tear out the old mailbox, dig out out and that meant breaking up the concerte footing I had poured when I put it in and I had made that way too big, so there was a ton of concrete to go after swinging a pick. So then he goes back hom with the old mailbox post. I know something was going to have to be done so had already been to Home Depot and getten a new green mailbox and the quickcrete to set the new footing. I was going to go buy a new post and ask Carlos to help me put it in. He proceed to build a mailbox post exactly like the one I had. the we pour the footing, set the post, level it out and let the quickcrete cure. I did so little to gelp on this project. It was a HOT summer day and David worked for hours. I stained the post the next day and got some brass numbers and did the cosmetic stuff. But the heavy lifting was David. So I don’t know how to say thank you. money not wanted, I found a lasagna That I had made for a Super Bowl party and that I still had in the feezer. Now this was a GOOD lasagna. I mean hot italian sausage with the ground beef. Sauce built from the ground up, 5 diffferent cheeses — let’s see if there were 5 — cottage, mozzarellas, provolone, parmagiano reggiano, Maybe just 4. Anyway the lasagna was good. So I gave to them with all my thanks. They did really enjoy it and their note said when they brought back my baking dish. So this morning this angel brings me tapioca and potato soup.
Tapioca is kind of a big deal in our family. You see my mom had her “go to” things. When I talk about mom I’ll talk again about how she did the food thing, but tapioca was one of the go to deserts. I mean pudding in general, but tapoca is what reminds me of mom whenever I have it. Now Debbie didn’t give me cooked tapioca like that, but it was nice to receive such a lovely surprise.
Got the Dead cooking. I watched 60 minutes after the Bears game. I guess a lot of shit’s been going on eh? I have not been paying attention to the news. So 60 Minutes is at least giving me the story that is what 5 days old and one segment was on the Georgia election oh and the last section was about Angus King from Maine. It was well worth the hour I spent giving in to TV. And now I know sort of I guess just how bad it got. I wasn’t there so I’ll never really know and that’s just OK.
So I have this friend that is a dinosaur. Mike now lives on Pine Island just off the coast of Fort Meyer. Mike doesn’t do email, doesn’t do computers, doesn’t do texting — none of that. Telephone only. He finally broke down and bought a cell phone, but wants me to only call on the landline. Mike and I worked together a company called Kentron during my second stint in San Francisco in maybe about 1981. It was after I was in Alaska but still had connections and pipeline expereince so I got on with a company that did “systems” for the pipeline. They hired me as Admin Mgr and put Accounting, Recruiting and Personnel under me. Now I had never really had a job like that before. each department had 1 employee. The accounting guy, Jimmy Kumagama was very good. The Recuiting guy was Glenn — lazy but had that good ole texas thing that made him easy to talk to and the personnel mgr was named… I forgot her name. Pat maybe. I had to fire her. She was completely incompetent. Now I had never done personnel but I knew she knew nothing about it. So I did. Well holy shit — I had not played the right politics AT ALL. I had no clue. She was the girlfriend of an Exec VP at the home office in Houston. Flynn was his name. They didn’t fire me then. They couldn’t. They needed help keeping the whole admin thing together so the company could work the project. The ended up demoting me to Contracts manager only. That’s right I was hired as Contracts manager and then they made me acting admin manager without ever using the word acting. And evetually they fired me. I worked with Mike there. He was an engineer. There were 3 engineering departments each working different systems for the pipeline. One was Telecom, one was SCADA and the other was where Mike worked, Distributed …something. I forgot what SCADA meant. but both SCADA and DCS — that’s it — were designing computer systems to do something. Mike and I have stayed in touch over the years. You know like a phone call one or twice a year. He’s from New York and he now passses though town going home once in a while and we have dinner with his wife Mary. So I know he’s never going to hear about it when I sent that first update out to family and a few friends. But I also knew he’ll never hear about it through the grapevine either since he’s not on the grapevine, he’s a dinosaur. So I called him and told him and he was sincerely shaken up and sorry. And we had a nice chat. Mike is who showed me Manhattan. He lived there and I went to Long Island on business alot since I was with that company ADDS (They made the dumb terminals I sold for some 12 years.) a division of NCR at the time. So wherever I went to a sales meeting or anything, I stayed the weekend and Mike and I ran around Manhattan. We saw a lot of music — at the Blue Note — all kinds of places. He even found Doc Watson playing in a high school auditorium one time. We went to Met together frequently. And NYC opera. I had the opera bug by then since I had experienced it from the inside out. Great times. Everything on foot. Exactly the opposite of LA where it’s all about the car. So Mike has all these lists. Top 10 concerts of all time, Top 10 best hitters in baseball, Top 10 female singers. You get it — the kind of thing that anybody could talk to anybody about for hours. Well I went to the Last Waltz and He want to BOBFEST at Madison Square garden. That’s a great concert to look at too. Let me go find you a taste or 2.
That made me feel good to listen to that again. So where was I. So we would talk about the football Giants and the Braves of Yankees – anything sports or music. We saw Rodney together someplace in San Francisco. We played golf when I went to his house down there in Ft Meyers once. Good guy but kinda a dinasour. I’m glad he knows at least. I know that people that know me really care about me.
At’s almost 2 AM and I have sleeping snce 3 PM or so. Did get up for a couple of hours, ate, watched PBS Newshour which gave both details and perspective on the events of the week that consumed you all in real time. I’m not ready to stop sleeping but I’m taking a break from it listening to Brahms. I took another sleeping pill so it will kick in sometime soon and I’ll crash for the rest of the night. So for Peg — it’s OK 1 pill at 3 PM and 1pill at 2 AM is OK. I’m not gonna OD.
The oncologist on Thursday told me this was a marathon not a sprint. I started to write about that yesterday — about being more comfortable with distance running than all out sprints. When you sprint, you get winded. And I got winded last night. I had nothing left. I was spent. When you run a distance you run with pace — I would take breaks — go smell the flowers so to speak. I think I have to learn to do that in this batttle as well. I can’t afford to blow my wad and not get the results I want and have nothing left to keep fighting. So I am going to keep writing, keep listening to beautiful music like this, let John and other friends (Kevin???) help me discover more classical music, watch a movie now and then and try to be less obsessive about mantras and translations and all that stuff. Just take a break now and again. I need to relax and breathe as Bob would and did say. This pill is kicking in. I’m gonna turn the Brahms down real low and go back to bed.
3:46 PM — Been a good day so far. Nothing like sleep. Thre is a reason they use sleep deprivation as a turture technique. It is fucking brutal. Sue came over with stuff for me. I ordered an electric blanket and some fleece sock on Amazon and will get my feet toasty and warm one way of another. Had a good couseling session. Might even get to start some online yoga next week. I’m nowhere as good at it as I used to be before my knee surgeries, but that’s the thing abut yoga — it is the least competitive thing you can do. You just do what you can. Tadasana is what I need to practice right now and I can start that today. I am going to be more relaxed about how I approach this journey now that I know it’s a marathon.. It came on so fast and was moving so quickly in the beginning, I felt absolutely driven to wrk on it 24/7. As I said above, now I can apporach it with more PACE. Might watch a couple of fottball games this weekend. Rams/Seahawks starts in a few minutes. What I do for games is put them on on both TV’s and then walk around in a little circle in my little house and I catch the game on both TV’s as I walk around from room to room. For anyone who’s been here you know what I’m talking about. I mute the sound during commercials. So I am actually moving during the game instead of just sitting like a bump on a log. And today I need to do some moving. So I will watch that game and The Bears/Saints tomorrow for another slow walk. Saints are the Falcons biggest rivals and have had the better of them for years now and cousin Joe in Chicago will be watching and probably my brother Jack so we can all talk about that game after the BEARS win it.
A good old buddy called today and it will be good to talk to him when we reconnect.
So Rams-Seahawks. The game is over and I’m pretty stoned. Paul has on text with me but he didn’t have much to say about the game. I am going to text Joe and Jack and tell them that I will watch the whole game. To the bitter end. Saints are the Falcons biggest rival, so I’m with the Bears on this one. But the Saints are really tough. Oh well. I do this with other buddy. Just text back and forth watching a game. It’s a great way to watch a game with a group. We’ll see who’s current on the blog. This is a test. But I’m letting Jack and Joe that I am wearing white and burnt orange and navy blue. If I can find any around here. Have some folks coming to the deck tomorrow at 2. And the family FaceTime now instead of Zoom. We’ll see if it works tomorrow. And then I’ll turn on the game at 4. There’s my afternoon. I’ll use the morning to get all the shit I have to do done. So there’s the day tomorrow. Really fine.
I’m still pretty stoned. Ate 3 gummies tonight. Game was great but the bad guys won. Oh I gotta go find some music. Leanard Cohen. I have everything. So its all on random play. So this will a be fun night.
I’m gonna go move a little more to the music this time. back later. Did walking meditation for one lap on my little indoor trail. And so here for rest. I did do alot of stretching and moving during the rams game. On my feet the whole game and will do that tomorrow too. but I do miss the movement that I had swimming at the Y evey day. Damn open sore on my leg. The bisposy site. That sore is still open sore but in a way it is a blessing in disguise in that without it how much longer would it have taken them to find out it was in my bones. So I immediately became stage 4. Got a text from the Aquatics Director over there, Beth. I have 4 long sleeve t-shirt to my name. Lots of short sleeve in cotton and that no sweat stuff. And that’s what I use most of the time. In fact I bought 2 more spring ones to work into the rotation this year and donate a bunch of the rest. IU gotta talk to Allen about this. I have some 6 boxes now but hee’s has a truck and I’d like to give him a truckfull. There is so much shit here that I don’t use or wear. so I’ll get a couple more boxes together next week with like that worthless comforter and some old clothes — Like that Triathlon shirt that I showed you yesterday just need to go.
But only these 4 long sleeve. And I got em all from Beth. She did a 100 mile swim club every year. Boy there are some deep deep cuts on the playlist. Now to a get a T-shirt you had to swim 100 miles within the year. That’s not that really a big deal big a deal. I used to swim 1 mile a day and it took me an hour to swim a mile.. I didn’t do all the timing shit except a looking at the wall clock. so I have to swim 100 days out of 365. And you get a long leeve T-shirt. Not bad. I have 4. Allen is going to drop off a bunch of wall calendars there. You know the kind with animals and and nature from organizations that you donate to. I use 3 per year and really only 1 where I record my weight daily. And I just put the rest (15–20) on the check out desk at th Y for anyone. What a waste of trees for these environmental charities to send out all these calendars for fund raising. It’s just such a waste of resources. I didn’t give any of them money this year. I was at 213 lb before Chemo but I think I’m down. I haven’t had appetite. I’ll weight myself tomorrow. Bird on the Wire. I set out a bagel and some almond butter and jelly to come to room temperature. Ill eat that before I go to bed. It’s 10 here and that is young in thenight for me normally. If I get tired I will take a pill and go sleep. But for now I’m gonna hang. still pretty stoned. Gummies take a little more time than I’d like to wear off. But they make me so much more aware of my body. So I just do all kinds of shit to move it in as many directions as I can. I was swimming every day at the Y before the second biposy. I had this unknow rash I guess on my leg but I swam. They have a great Covid protocol. 4 lanes — your reserve a lane time once per hour. It’s a mad dash in cyberpace.. I use the laptop cuz it’s faster than the phone so I usually get the reservation I want. So I was in a good groove before all this started. You get 45 minutes in the pool and the lifeguard theoretically disinfects everything for the group and gets some time off I think. Policy has changed to Pool time 55 minutes and 5 min for disinfecting. I haven’t been able to go back since the policy changed. And now with a cancer diagnosis I can’t go back at all even if this sore heals. They all know I have cancer but am doing OK. Well noone really knows anybody else by name.You sort of can’t hear or talk while you do it. I use a mantra that I got fom The Prosperos sort of from a a talk by unknow to me Roy Enguene Davis when I swim. Just one he put in the class. Beth knows I have concer. So that’s my Y. Been there a long time. Sometime I use it alot sometimes I dont at all but I keep paying dues because I want to give them money. I hope some of my very close friends that are little freaked out by all this come back to the blog. Come back to me.
So many stories to tell. Captain Underpants – That’s great one. OK I will work on that. I’m stoned but I’ll publish this and start a new narrative. I hope I remember Captain Underpants.
Bracha Goldsmith#astrology, #2021, #january2021, #marsuranus, #capitolsiege, #uranusdirect#marstaurus, #uranustaurus, The energies for the rest of this month are explosive, revolutionary and disruptive. Uranus goes stationery direct on January 14th, followed by the square with Jupiter and Uranus on January 17th, followed by the Inauguration on January 20th which is full of square aspects. How could all this play out personally and globally? On a personal level, be prepared for disruptions, sudden changes, challenges to your status quo. Unhealthy attachments may need to go. What are you holding onto that you no longer need, that is not for your highest good? What limitations are you arguing for that perhaps are not even yours? This is a time of learning to compromise, to see the other side no matter how obnoxious it looks. To find a way to see ALL perspectives – not necessarily to agree, but to allow others to have their viewpoint. These are very challenging aspects with great potential for huge change and awakening. I hope you will join me on my latest series of Webinars! Come and learn astrology with Bracha! https://yourastrologysigns.com/webina…0:00 Welcome + Introduction 04:04 Soothing 07:53 Square energy 12:00 Attachment 14:44 Magnify 16:55 Fixed energy 19:41 Comforts 23:34 Stamina + Release 26:43 Surprises 30:34 Drama 33:39 Hearts 36:42 Bring it on + Well wishes Thank you very much to everyone who supports Bracha’s channel! ? If you would like to contribute to help Bracha continue to share free videos, please consider the following options: A small, monthly donation on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/brachagoldsmith Click the link to see the perks available if you did wish to donate every month on Patreon. ? A donation via PayPal: https://yourastrologysigns.com/donate/ If you would like to deepen your astrology knowledge, Bracha has books and videos available to buy: https://yourastrologysigns.com/astrol… A personal astrology or channeled reading with Bracha: https://yourastrologysigns.com/astrol… Channeled Paintings: https://yourastrologysigns.com/astrol… Order an Astrology Report – your Year Ahead, Solar Return: https://yourastrologysigns.com/reports/ Join my Free Newsletter: https://yourastrologysigns.com/newsle… FOLLOW ME: Bracha’s Instagram https://www.instagram.com/brachagolds… Bracha’s Facebook https://www.facebook.com/barbaragolds… Bracha’s Twitter https://twitter.com/brachagoldsmith Thank you for liking, commenting, sharing and subscribing! Enjoy the video! https://yourastrologysigns.com/
QFrom Speranza Spiratos: Can you shed some magical clarity on the word abracadabra please?
A Let me wave my wand … Ah, a brief sputter, then nothing. It seems the origin isn’t known for certain.
These days it’s just a joking conjuror’s incantation with no force behind it, like hocus pocus and other meaningless phrases. But the word is extremely ancient and originally was thought to be a powerful invocation with mystical powers.
What we know for sure is that it was first recorded in a Latin medical poem, De medicina praecepta, by the Roman physician Quintus Serenus Sammonicus in the second century AD. It’s believed to have come into English via French and Latin from a Greek word abrasadabra (the change from s to c seems to have been through a confused transliteration of the Greek). Serenus Sammonicus said that to get well a sick person should wear an amulet around the neck, a piece of parchment inscribed with a triangular formula derived from the word, which acts like a funnel to drive the sickness out of the body:
A B R A C A D A B R A A B R A C A D A B R A B R A C A D A B A B R A C A D A A B R A C A D A B R A C A A B R A C A B R A A B R A B A
However, it seems likely that abracadabra is older and that it derives from one of the Semitic languages, though nobody can say for sure, because there is no written record before Serenus Sammonicus. For what it’s worth, here are some theories:
It’s from the Aramaic phrase avra kehdabra, meaning “I will create as I speak”.
The source is three Hebrew words, ab (father), ben (son), and ruach acadosch (holy spirit).
It’s from the Chaldean abbada ke dabra, meaning “perish like the word”.
It originated with a Gnostic sect in Alexandria called the Basilidians and was probably based on Abrasax, the name of their supreme deity (Abraxas in Latin sources).
Fans of the Harry Potter books will know the killing curse, Avada Kedavra, in which J K Rowling seems to have combined the supposed Aramaic source of abracadabra with the Latin cadaver, a dead body.
