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Page 1 of 51944 · PDF PAGE 177
… the endless band. THE FOUR THREES These cards are referred to Binah; in each of them is expressed the symbolism of Un‐ derstanding. The idea has become fertilized; the triangle has been formulated. In each case, the idea is of a certain stability which can never be upset, but from which a child can issue. The Three of Wands is accordingly the Lord of Virtue. The idea of will and dominion has become interpreted in Character. The Three of Cups is called the Lord of Abundance. The idea of love has come to frui‐ tion; but this is now sufficiently …
1944 · PDF PAGE 36
… attributions, was designed as a practical instrument for Qabalistic calculations and for divination. In it is little place for abstract ideas. The subject of the book—the Tarot is called The Book of Thoth or Tahuti—is the influence of the Ten Numbers and the Twenty‐two Letters on man, and his best methods of manipulating their forces. There is therefore no mention of the Three Veils of the Negative, which was dis‐ cussed in the description of the Tree of Life. The description begins with the “small cards”, numbered I to 10. These are divided i…
1944 · PDF PAGE 21
…diagram.) This picture represents the Tree of Life, which is a map of the Universe. One must be‐ gin, as a mathematician would, with the idea of Zero, Absolute Zero, which turns out on ex‐ amination to mean any quantity that one may choose, but not, as the layman may at first sup‐ pose, Nothing, in the “absence‐of‐anything” vulgar sense of the word. (See “Berashith”, Paris, 1902). “THE NAPLES ARRANGEMENT” The Qabalists expanded this idea of Nothing, and got a second kind of Nothing which they called “Ain Soph”—”Without Limit”. (This idea seems …
1944 · PDF PAGE 199
Of necessity, the realization of the idea in the Four (as the suit develops) will gradually diminish the purity of its perfection.
1944 · PDF PAGE 219
SCIENCE SIX OF SWORDS Tiphareth shows the full establishment and balance of the idea of the suit. This is par‐ ticularly the case with this card, as the intellect itself is also referred to the number Six. Mer‐ cury, in Aquarius, represents the celestial Energy influencing the Kerub of the Man, thus showing intelligence and humanity. But there is much more than this in the symbol. The perfect balance of all mental and moral faculties, hardly won, and almost impossible to hold in an ever‐changing world, de‐ clares the idea of Science in its full…
1944 · PDF PAGE 22
…as been no approach at all to the conception of a really existing thing. No more has been done than to make definitions, all in a purely ideal and imaginary world. Now then comes The Abyss. One cannot go any further into the ideal. The next step must be the Actual—at least, an approach to the Actual. There are three points, but there is no idea of where any one of them. is. A fourth point is essential, and this formulates the idea of matter. The Point, the Line, the Plane. The fourth point, unless it should happen to lie in the plane, gives The…
1944 · PDF PAGE 178
… the Constitution, with no aggressive element. THE FOUR FIVES In the “Naples arrangement”, the introduction of the number Five shows the idea of motion coming to the aid of that of matter. This is quite a revolutionary conception; the result is a complete upset of the statically stabilized system. Now appear storm and stress. This must not be regarded as something “evil”. The natural feeling about it is really a little more than the reluctance of people to get up from lunch and go back to the job. In the Buddhist doctrine of Sorrow this idea is…
1944 · PDF PAGE 63
…pon her knees is the bow of Artemis, which is also a musical instrument, for she is huntress, and hunts by enchantment. Now, regard this idea as from behind the Veil of Light, the third Veil of the original Nothing. This light is the menstruum of manifestation, the goddess Nuith, the possibility of Form. This first and most spiritual manifestation of the feminine takes to itself a masculine correlative, by formulating in itself any geometrical point from which to contemplate possibil‐ ity. This virginal goddess is then potentially the goddess o…
1944 · PDF PAGE 191
tees who wished to identify her with Nature. The idea of sexual cruelty is often inherent in the highest divine nature; compare Bhavani and Kali in the Hindu system, and observe the Shiva‐ Sakti coition portrayed on many Tibetan banners. See also Liber 418, 4th, 3rd, and 2nd Aethyrs; and the description supra of Atu XI.
1944 · PDF PAGE 204
…tood in its highest sense: it implies well‐being, harmony of natural forces without effort or strain, ease, satisfaction. Foreign to the idea of the card is the gratification of natural or artificial desires. Yet it does represent em‐ phatically the fulfilment of the sexual Will, as shown by the ruling Sephira, planet, element, and sign. In the Yî King, Sol in Scorpio is represented by the 20th Hexagram, Kwan, which is also “Big Earth”, being the Earth Trigram with doubled lines. Kwan means “manifesting”, but also “contemplating”. The Thwan ref…
1944 · PDF PAGE 158
…maddened steed, he drives down the Heavens, the Spirit of the Tempest. In one hand is a sword, in the other a poniard. He represents the idea of attack. The moral qualities of a person thus indicated are activity and skill, subtlety and clev‐ erness. He is fierce, delicate and courageous, but altogether the prey of his idea, which comes to him as an inspiration without reflection. If ill‐dignified, the vigour in all these qualities being absent, he is incapable of decision or purpose. Any action that he takes is easily brushed aside by oppositi…
1944 · PDF PAGE 54
… virtue of the contradiction that is contained in itself.” It is characteristic of all high spiritual vision that the formulation of any idea is imme‐ diately destroyed or cancelled out by the arising of the contradictory. Hegel and Nietzsche had glimmerings of the idea, but it is described very fully and simply in the Book of Wisdom or Folly. (See citation, below, Appendix.) This point about the crocodile is very important, because many of the traditional forms of “The Fool” of the Tarot show the crocodile definitely. In the commonplace interp…
1944 · PDF PAGE 32
…ee Decans in the sign were probably due to an analogy with the course of a man’s life. 4. The above remarks constitute a fairly complete idea of the arbitrary, or mostly arbi‐ trary, presentation of the Cosmos by the Ancients. First of all, the division into Four Elements. These Elements pervade everything. They would argue something like this about the Sun. They would say that he was principally Fire, for obvious reasons; but he would have also in him the Airy quality of Mobility. The Watery part would be shown by his power to create Im‐ ages;…
1944 · PDF PAGE 35
numbers, but not by any lesser number, one can arrive at a positive description of any given object or idea. So far, the argument has been erected on a rigid, mathematical basis, with only the slightest tincture of philosophy to give it form. But it is at this point that, for the purpose of describing the objects Thought and Sense, one is compelled to join hands with the astrologers. The problem now is: to assign to Pure Number the moral ideas which go with it. This is partly a matter of experience, partly tradition derived from older experienc…
1944 · PDF PAGE 202
An idea of a totally different Order is necessary to carry on the series. Note also the refold‐ ing4n‐upon‐itself suggested by the “Magic Number” of Four 1+2 + 3+4 which is Ten. i;:. Four is the number of the Curse of Limitation, of Restriction. It is the blind and barren Cross of equal arms, Tetragrammaton in his fatal aspect of finality, as the Qabalists knew him before the dis‐ covery of the Revolving Formula whereby the Daughter, seated upon the Throne of the Mother, “awakens the Eld of the All‐Father”. For the meanings of Via and Populus, …
1944 · PDF PAGE 60
… thereof. He is, in the language of modern physics, that electric charge which is the first manifestation of the ring of ten indefinable ideas, as pre viously explained. He is thus continu‐ ous creation. Logically also, being the Word, he is the law of reason or of necessity or chance, which is the secret meaning of the Word, which is the essence of the Word, and the condition of its utterance. This being so, and especially because he is duality, he represents both trnth and falsehood, wisdom and folly. Being the unexpected, he unsettles any es…
1944 · PDF PAGE 98
…The Formula of Tetragrammaton”. They are linked as no other two planets, since 32=9, and each contains in itself the extremes of its own idea. (See also Appendix: Atu xxi.)
1944 · PDF PAGE 89
…rriage. But in this card the only question is of the “redemption” of the submerged element, and therefore every‐ thing is reversed. This idea of sacrifice is, in the final analysis, a wrong idea. “I give unimaginable joys on earth: certainty, not faith, while in life, upon death; peace unutterable, rest, ecstasy; nor do I demand aught in sacrifice.” “Every man and every woman is a star.” The whole idea of sacrifice is a misconception of nature, and these texts of the Book of the Law are the answer to it. But water is the element of Illusion; on…
1944 · PDF PAGE 167
…y indeed with the Fire of Earth attri‐ bution in the Qabalistic system. To the Chinese sages, moreover, the shape of the figure gave the idea of a bird. The meaning is, accordingly, modified by human influence of the more frivolous and irresponsible kind, Shakespeare’s “little wanton harlotry”, the French cynic’s “Souvent femme vane”, and the fickle mob of Coriolanus; indeed, of History itself. But Mercury in Virgo symbolizes Intelli‐ gence (and even creative Idea) applied to Agriculture; and this (once more!) harmonizes per‐ fectly with the Te…
1944 · PDF PAGE 48
Maut, the vulture goddess, who is an earlier and more sublime modification of the idea of Nuith than Isis. There are two legends connected with the vulture. It is supposed to have a spiral neck; this may possibly have reference to the theory (recently revived by Einstein, but mentioned by Zoroaster in his Oracles) that the shape of the Universe, the form of that energy which is called the Universe, is spiral. The other legend is that the vulture was supposed to reproduce her species by the in‐ tervention of the wind; in other words, the element…