"In the science of magic the pentalpha is called the holy and Mysterious pentagram. ...the pentagram in the star of Magians; ...by virtue of the number five, it has great command over evil spirits because of its five double triangles and its five acute angles within and its five obtuse angles without, so that this interior pentangle contains in it many great mysteries." (Encyclopedia of Freemasonry, pp.762-763.)

The pentagram or pentacle. It has five points and the number "5" has always been regarded as mystical and magical, yet essentially "human".
We have five fingers/toes on each limb extremity.
We commonly note five senses - sight, hearing, smell, touch and taste.
We perceive five stages or initiations in our lives - eg. birth, adolescence, coitus, parenthood and death.
In Christianity, five were the wounds of Christ on the cross.
There are five pillars of the Muslim faith and five daily times of prayer.
Five were the virtues of the medieval knight - generosity, courtesy, chastity, chivalry and piety as symbolised in the pentagram device of Sir Gawain.
The Wiccan Kiss is Fivefold - feet, knees, womb, breasts, lips - Blessed be.

A circle around a pentagram contains and protects.
The circle symbolises eternity and infinity, the cycles of life and nature.
The circled pentagram is the passive form implying spiritual containment of the magic circle, in keeping with the traditional secrecy of witchcraft, and the personal, individual nature of the pagan religious path, of its non-proselytising character.

The pentagram has long been believed to be a potent protection against evil, a symbol of conflict that shields the wearer and the home.
The pentagram has five spiked wards and a womb shaped defensive, protective pentagon at the centre.
There are five elements, four of matter (earth, air, fire and water) and THE quintessential - spirit. These may be arrayed around the pentagrams points.
The word "quintessential" derives from this fifth element - the spirit.
Tracing a path around the pentagram, the elements are placed in order of density - spirit (or aether). fire, air, water, earth. Earth and fire are basal, fixed; air and water are free, flowing.
Single point upwards signifies the spirit ruling matter (mind ruling limbs); is a symbol of rightness. With two points up and one (spirit) downwards, subservient, the emphasis is on the carnal nature of Man.

A pentagram without a surrounding circle is the active form symbolising an outgoing of oneself, prepared for conflict, aware, active.

History of the Pentagram

The pentagram has long been associated with mystery and magic. It is the simplest form of star shape that can be drawn unicursally - with a single line - hence it is sometimes called the Endless Knot. Other names are the Goblin's Cross, the Pentalpha, the Witch's Foot, the Devil's Star and the Seal of Solomon (more correctly attributed to the hexagram). It has long been believed to be a potent protection against evil and demons, hence a symbol of safety, and was sometimes worn as an amulet for happy homecoming. The potency and associations of the pentagram have evolved throughout history. Today it is an ubiquitous symbol of neo-pagans with much depth of magickal and symbolic meaning.

To the Gnostics, the pentagram was the 'Blazing Star' and, like the crescent moon was a symbol relating to the magic and mystery of the nighttimes sky.
For the Druids, it was a symbol of Godhead.
In Egypt, it was a symbol of the "underground womb" and bore a symbolic relationship to the concept of the pyramid form.
The Pagan Celts ascribed the pentagram to the underground goddess Morrigan.

Early Christians attributed the pentagram to the Five Wounds of Christ and from then until medieval times, it was a lesser-used Christian symbol. Prior to the time of the Inquisition, there were no "evil" associations to the pentagram. Rather it's form implied Truth, religious mysticism and the work of The Creator.

In Medieval times, the "Endless Knot" was a symbol of Truth and was a protection against demons. It was used as an amulet of personal protection and to guard windows and doors. The pentagram with one point upwards symbolised summer; with two points upwards, it was a sign for winter.

During the long period of the Inquisition, there was much promulgation of lies and accusations in the "interests" of orthodoxy and elimination of heresy. The Church lapsed into a long period of the very diabolism it sought to oppose. The pentagram was seen to symbolise a Goat's Head or the Devil in the form of Baphomet and it was Baphomet whom the Inquisition accused the Templars of worshipping.
In the purge on witches, other horned gods such as Pan became equated with the Devil (a Christian concept) and the pentagram - the folk-symbol of security - for the first time in history - was equated with "evil" and was called the Witch's Foot.

The Old Religion and it's symbols went underground, in fear of the Church's persecution, and there it stayed, gradually withering, for centuries.

AFTER THE INQUISITION
In the foundation of Hermeticism , in hidden societies of craftsmen and scholarly men, away from the eyes of the Church and it's paranoia, the proto-science of alchemy developed along with it's occult philosophy and cryptical symbolism. Graphical and geometric symbolism became very important and the period of the Renaissance emerged. The concept of the microcosmic world of Man as analogous to the macrocosm, the greater univese of spirit and elemental matter became a part of traditional western occult teaching, as it had long been in eastern philosophies." As above, so below" The pentagram, the 'Star of the Microcosm', symbolised Man within the microscosm, representing in analogy the Macrocosmic universe. The upright pentagram bears some resemblance to the shape of man with his legs and arms outstretched. In Tycho Brahe's Calendarium Naturale Magicum Perpetuum (1582)occurs a pentagram with human body imposed and the Hebrew for YHSVH associated with the elements. An illustration attributed to Brae's contemporary Agrippa (Henry Cornelius Agrippa von Nettesheim) is of similar proportion and shows the five planets and the moon at the centre point - the genitalia. Other illustrations of the period by Robert Fludd and Leonardo da Vinci show geometric relationships of man to the universe. Later, the pentagram came to be symbolic of the relationship of the head to the four limbs and hence of the pure concentrated essence of anything (or the spirit) to the four traditional elements of matter - earth, water, air and fire - spirit is The Quintessence.
No known graphical illustration associating the pentagram with evil appears until the nineteenth century. Eliphaz Levi Zahed (actually the pen name of Alphonse Louis Constant, a defrocked French Catholic abbé) illustrates the upright pentagram of microcosmic man beside an inverted pentagram with the goat's head of Baphomet. It is this illustration and juxtaposition that has led to the concept of different orientations of the pentagram being "good" and "evil".

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