2. Tarot and the Qabalistic Tree of Life
"The Tree of Life—This figure must be studied very
carefully, for it in the basis of the whole system on which the Tarot is
based. It is quite impossible to give a complete explanation of this figure,
because (for one thing) it is quite universal. Therefore it cannot mean the
same to any one person as to any other.”—Aleister Crowley’s The Book of Thoth
The Tree of Life is comprised
of ten spheres (called Sephiroth) joined by twenty-two lines or Paths.
From top to bottom, these spheres are numbered from one to ten, respectively,
and appear in the following order: 1-Kether, 2-Chokmah, 3-Binah, 4-Chesed,
5-Geburah, 6-Tiphereth, 7-Netzach, 8- Hod, 9-Yesod, and 10-Malkuth. While a
Major Arcana card is ascribed to each of the twenty-two Paths that join the
Sephiroth on the Tree of Life, the Ten Sephirah themselves are encapsulated
within the Minor Arcana of the tarot.
In the tarot deck, the Major
Arcana card called “The Fool” is usually labeled “zero”, while the remainder
of the twenty-two Major Arcana cards are numbered one through twenty-one.
The Fool is a unique card. It is both the beginning of existence, the end of
existence, and exists outside and throughout all existences. The Path of the
Pure Fool accomplishes All Things by doing No-thing, immersed in the Divine
Madness of Ecstasy. The Fool traverses The Path until he has become The Path
itself. This concept of Zero, a fundamental component of mathematics and the
Qabalistic system, is represented by a “triple veil of the negative” which
seems to float above the uppermost Sephirah, Kether.
In every creation myth, there
was “no-thing” before there was anything. Qabalah expounds upon this
numerical enigma of infinity by describing the triple veil of the negative
that exists above Kether on the Tree of Life, as described in the Bible’s
book of Genesis: Ayin (The Primal Cause, No-Thing, the absence of all known
qualities, a conception beyond the possibilities of human thought), Ain Soph (Endlessness, Boundlessness, No-Thing Without Limit, a qualified
No-Thingness, the Infinitely Great as in contrast to Ayin
as the Infinitely Small) and Ain Soph Aur (the Limitless
Light out of which the universe was molded, not as in contrast to darkness,
but as a vibration; the contracting and expanding energies of creation.)
Zero is both everything and nothing; it is Absolute Truth.
The Four Worlds
According to Qabalah, there
are Four Worlds on the Tree of Life: Atziluth, the Archetypal
World, represented by the Hebrew letter Yod, the element Fire, and the Wands
Suit; Briah, the Creative World, represented by the Hebrew letter
He, the element Water, and the Cups Suit; Yetzirah, the Formative
World, represented by the Hebrew letter Vau, the element Air, and the Swords
Suit; and finally Assiah, the Material World, represented by the Hebrew letter
Heh (as in YHVH, the Tetragrammaton). With
these attributions in mind, one level of Minor Arcana interpretation is to
consider each card as a particular Sephirah working in one of the Four
Worlds. For instance, the 2 of Wands might be looked at as Chokmah (2) in
the Archetypal World of Atziluth (Wands), just as the Six of Cups might be
viewed as Tiphereth (6) in the Creative World of Briah. In order to better
understand these associations, let us commence with a detailed study of the
Sephiroth (plural for Sephirah) on the Tree of Life.
Kether and the Aces
The roots of the four elements
of the universe—the Aces—correlate to the white Sephirah Kether, called “The
Crown,” which is Number One at the top of the Tree of Life. (Spirit is the
fifth element that serves as both the glue and the limiting factor for the
other four; in fact, it could be said that the four elements are simply
different levels of crystallization of Spirit.) Kether is the beginning of
the idea of existence, for now we have the first postulate (or creative lie)
of separation: “I Am.” Thus All becomes One, a Point or location from which
to gaze outwards, a static, a Singular Being. Kether is the Archetypal World
of Plato’s Cave, called Atziluth by the Qabalists, a world of Pure Essence without force
or form; all the other Sephiroth are emanations from the Number One, just as
cards two through nine within each of the four suits of the Minor Arcana are
emanations from the Ace of that suit. The Whirling Motion of the Universe
began in Kether.
Chokmah and the Twos
The Two’s of each suit
correspond to the gray Sephirah Chokmah, Wisdom, called the Father of the
Archetypal World of the Zodiac and the Fixed Stars, who is the reflection of Kether. Perhaps the best English word to describe
the Sephirah of Wisdom is the idea of Epiphany, for it is only in
moments of perfect epiphany, when everything in existence seems to align for
one split second as we cry “Aha!” that we abandon the confines of thought and
see beyond the curtain of consideration and form. With Chokmah we have the
commencement of dimension, as the second idea that there is another point of
existence that is separate from the One is postulated, creating the Line and
length. Now there is a separate point from which the One may view its own
existence, and as a result we also see the creation of the idea of
duality—for there is now the possibility of refusing to accept responsibility
(the ability to respond) for What Is. There can be no manifestation without
differentiation into pairs of opposites, and thus the Tree of Life (and
existence itself) demonstrates this equilibrium. Chokmah is the dynamic
principle and the seat of abstract ideas, the biblical Logos or Word of God,
for Wisdom is the Mediator between the Uncreated (Kether) and the beginning
of the Created (Chesed, the fourth Sephirah). Just like numerous
mythological figures (such as Horus of Egypt and Eros of Greece) Chokmah is
the Son that is also the Father—firstly, the Son of the Absolute, Kether, and
the Great Mother, Binah; secondly, the husband of Binah and the Father of
Tiphereth, the sixth Sephirah and Redeemer. From the Earthbound
perspective, Chokmah looks more like the number One than Two, because the
ability to view the manifestation of the elements begins with Chokmah; Kether
remains wholly concealed. In both Chokmah and the Twos of the Minor Arcana
we see the beginning of the Masculine, the Transmissive, the Active, the
Will. The Twos accordingly epitomize the manifestation of the element in its
most untainted, balanced form; their action is swift, intense, and
consuming.
The Shekhinah
One of the most significant
aspects of the Qabalistic Tree of Life is that it restores the vital Shekhinah (Hebrew for the feminine face and aspects of God) to the
generally misunderstood apparency of an otherwise lop-sided, male-dominated
system of beliefs. The Tree of Life has three “pillars”—the center pillar of
harmony and balance with a left and right pillar, each respectively
attributed to the female and the male. The God of Qabalah is All, and
therefore hermaphroditic rather than masculine. This restoration of the
divine feminine (the Shekhinah) begins with the third Sephirah, Binah. Each Sephirah
receives the influence of the previous one and in turn conveys its nature to
the next; hence, each Sephirah has both a positive, transmissive and a
negative, receptive quality. As Chokmah receives the influence of Kether, so
it transmits its own nature to the third Sephirah, Binah, which in turn
receives its influence and in turn transmits its own nature to the fourth
Sephirah, Chesed, and so on.
Binah and the Threes
The Threes coincide with
Binah, the black Sephirah of the Great Mother of “Understanding.” In Binah a
third Point is postulated, and the dimension of distance or surface is
created; now there is space between the two points, and so, geometrically, we
have the Plane, the Triangle. When Genesis records that the “Spirit of God
was moving over the surface of the waters,” it is referring to the Great
Waters of Binah, the Giver of Form; Binah gives form to Chokmah’s force.
Together, Chokmah and Binah shape the Creative World where the living
substance of creation waits for impregnation by the Will or Life of the
Father, called Briah by the Qabalists; Binah is the Feminine, the Receptive,
the Passive, the ideal yin to Chokmah’s yang. With Understanding we attempt
to bring into agreement two varying viewpoints (that, ironically, were
originally in harmony for they were once the same point.) With this third
point of view comes the stability of a context from which to differentiate,
as well as a gap in proximity and perspective. The labor of Communication
becomes necessary in order to achieve Connection and Understanding of the
divergent viewpoint, and concept is created. The Threes of each suit still
retain the basic power of the Aces and Twos, but in a more passive form;
inherent in each is the internal struggle to receive understanding and
balance as form is given to two differing points of view. Three is the also
number of the planet Saturn, and therefore the threes of each suit bring
opportunities of limitation in order to eventually produce, whether in the
areas of hard work (pentacles), duty (wands), choice (cups), or loss
(swords).
Chesed and the Fours
Now we leave what is called
the Supernal Triad and cross the Abyss, the invisible Sephirah Da’ath (meaning “Knowledge,” also called the “false Sephiroth” that spans the
Abyss and attempts to replace the living Wisdom of Chokmah with the deadening
knowledge of humanity) on the Tree of Life, which separates the Ideal from
the Actual, and enter the Formative World, a realm of symbols where the
perfected ideas have taken form but now await a material body, called Yetzirah. The root colors of white (reflecting all colors), gray (mixing all
colors), and black (absorbing all colors) are replaced with the primary
colors of blue, red, and yellow. Royal blue Chesed is the fourth Sephirah,
the Sphere of Mercy or Love, also called Gedulah. (Gedulah means “Greatness”
or “Magnificence” in Hebrew.) With Chesed we add a fourth point, so that we
now have the three co-ordinate axes to delineate the position of any point;
consequently existence now has substance, becoming Solid. Herein lays the
foundation of disagreement and the birth of conflict, for not only can one
Point’s determinism be in opposition to another Point’s determinism, but it
may also oppose the Solid (universe) as a whole. Within Chesed is the
concept of covenant, for we now have the Rule of the Law of Love, which in
its drive to harmonize begins to dictate the four dimensions of the universe
as creation begins to manifest as matter, dominating and stabilizing
everything; pure dispersal of postulates is replaced by the need for
negotiation, the essence of Law. (Crowley’s famous axiom, “Love is the Law,
Love under Will” may be understood here as Chesed, the Law of Love, being far
junior to the Will of Chokmah; yet Love is the limit of the carnal human’s
hierarchies.)
The Gnostics called this force
the Demiurge, for Chesed is not the actual Father, only His likeness,
yet many mistakenly bow down to the Law of Mercy. The Roman god Jupiter,
beneficent ruler and lawgiver of the cosmos, is attributed to Chesed for good
reason: it is a constant balancing (or juggling) act to bring order to the
chaos of existence. Jupiter is also the planet of foundations, spirituality,
and blessings that come from obeying the natural laws of the universe. In
Chesed, the Law constantly works to balance the contracting power of Love—the
great unifying factor of the universe—with the expanding force of Life—the
dynamic breaking apart and shattering of existing forms to make way for the
progression of existence. Within the fourth Sephirah (and the Fours of the
Minor Arcana as well) we have a temporary reprieve of symmetry as structure
and substance walk hand in hand with personal restriction for the good of the
collective. Chesed brings the concept that one does not own oneself or one’s
viewpoints; now authority is found in “we.” The Fours use the Law to achieve
a stable harmony, but are simultaneously weighted down by their dedication to
agreement with others and the world of forms.
Geburah and the Fives
The fifth Sephirah on the Tree
of Life is red Geburah, meaning “Strength” or “Severity;” it is also called
Pahad, meaning “Punishment.” Appropriately associated with the Warrior
planet Mars, Geburah cuts the solid balance of Chesed’s solidity of stabilized
structure, causing the much needed state of Movement, which produces upset,
disturbance, and most importantly, Change. The dynamic principle
of Chokmah reflects into Geburah, and so we have a break down of the complex
into the simple, releasing the latent, trapped energy of Chesed. We may not like the
Warrior’s influence, but its pressure and tempests are a necessary part of
growth and development. With Geburah, through the addition of Motion, the
points now have the capacity of time, change, and sequence; five is the
number of a spirit involved in the physical universe (the five points of a
pentacle represent this phenomenon), attempting to change the static square
of the number four by inserting the individual spirit (and therefore Change) back into the equation. Frater Achad wrote in Q.B.L., “WILL
is that which produces CHANGE which is LIFE. Stagnation or fixity is DEATH.
Therefore, fear not CHANGE, but embrace it with open arms, for all change is
of the nature of LOVE, which is the tendency of any two things to become ONE
thus losing themselves in the process.” Geburah offers the chance of a clean
slate from which to escape the heavy, stuck condition of Chesed, but in the
smaller playing field of matter, energy, space, and time. The Fives of the
Minor Arcana represent great change and upset of a fixed condition as a
precursor to revolution.
Tiphereth and the Sixes
Both Chesed and Geburah exist
on the same plane in the Tree of Life, but they are reconciled in the sixth
Sephirah, golden Tiphereth, which forms the bottom point of the second triad,
called the “Ethical Triangle.” Where the Supernal Triad is associated with
the Father of the Trinity, the Ethical Triangle represents the Redeemer;
Tiphereth (which means “Beauty” in Hebrew) is the Son of the Father, for it
is the only Sephirah below the Abyss that is in direct communication with
Kether. Tiphereth is connected with all the sacrificed deities of mythology,
and is the Manifested Son of Binah (the Great Mother) and Chokmah (The Great
Father), as well as the Perfect Image of Kether, the Absolute, in a form that
can be comprehended by Humanity; Tiphereth interprets the Father in terms
that the human mind may grasp. Correlated with the Sun, Tiphereth stands at
the center of the Tree of Life just as the Sun is situated at the center of
our solar system (and at the heart of most of our world religions). With
Tiphereth comes the tangible form of the Point that is
capable of experience, for it finally attains self-consciousness.
(Consciousness is quite different from Awareness—or
the ability to wholly see, recognize, and know—for if we become conscious of something, there is the intrinsic conviction that in
some way we do not
entirely know the thing.) The “I Am” of
Kether has evolved to the hypothesis that “I Am that I Am.” Now the Point is
able to define itself and shape an identity within the contexts created by
the previous Sephiroth. Six is the Qabalistic number of man, and Tiphereth
(and the Sixes of the Minor Arcana) represents man and the elements at their
practical best. Thus, each Six signifies great success or victory in the
matter at hand.
Netzach and the Sevens
The bottom Triangle,
attributed to the Holy Spirit and called the “Magical Triangle,” constitutes
green Netzach (7), orange Hod (8), and purple Yesod (9); the primary colors
of the Ethical Triangle now blend to form their secondary or complementary
colors: Chesed and Tiphereth mix to produce the Green of Netzach, Geburah and
Tiphereth create the Orange of Hod, and Chesed and Geburah combine to the
purple of Yesod. With the progression of this lowest Triangle into matter,
the Point begins to have a sensory experience of itself and
existence. In Netzach, meaning “Victory” (or some translate it “Triumph” or
“Eternity”) in Hebrew, the Point experiences Bliss (the Hindu concept of ananda); the seventh Sephirah is correlated to the planet Venus, the planet
of Love, but Netzach reveals Venus degraded to an entirely imbalanced state
as she loses her heavenly origin as the Morning Star and falls into the Veil
of Illusion (what the Hindu call maya.) The Motion of Geburah
now reflects into Netzach, often called the Lady of Nature and Sphere of
Illusion, which contains the chaotically free-flowing, elemental, inebriating
Dionysian wildness of the forces of Nature, as well as the natural birth of
reflexes, instincts, emotions, group mind, and the essence of thought forms
that are the creations of the created; in Netzach we discover the sensual use
of the arts, dance, sound, color, and the senses in the medium of Natural
Mysticism. Here lie the Forces of Attraction and Repulsion. Netzach (and
the Sevens of the Minor Arcana) is a powerful, unbalanced, primal force that
can only be steadied by the contrived intellect of Hod. The Sevens of the
Minor Arcana epitomize a basic state of messy imbalance, and expose the
greatest weakness of each of the respective suit’s element.
Hod and the Eights
Opposite to Netzach we have
Hod, meaning “Glory” or “Splendor.” Attributed to the Eights of the Minor
Arcana, Hod ironically is just as imbalanced as Netzach and the Sevens, only
Hod’s imbalance is in reaction to that of Netzach’s and errs on the extreme
opposite end of the spectrum. In contrast to Netzach’s reflection of
Geburah, Hod is the reflection of the balancing Law of Chesed, only beneath
the Veil of Illusion. Thus Hod, the Lord of Books and Learning, is the realm
where the cold, deadening, concrete force of the human mind has its origins
as it conceives its hierarchical forms and structures. Associated with
Mercury, in Hod the Point experiences Thought (the Hindu concept of chit) and,
at its best, Intellectual Mysticism—crucial for controlling the emotional
chaos of Netzach. Conversely, a state of mutual reciprocity exists between
the seventh and eighth Sephiroth: for Hod needs the raw power of Netzach just
as much as Netzach needs the commanding authority of Hod if anything is to be
both experienced and accomplished below the Veil of Illusion. The Eights of
the Minor Arcana, therefore, demonstrate an extreme reaction to the
imbalanced state of the elements in the Sevens, and because the Eights are so
low on the Tree of Life, they have almost completely lost their initial
elemental energy.
Yesod and the Nines
Yesod, the ninth Sephirah,
aptly means “Foundation,” for it is in Yesod (and in its corresponding
planet, the Moon) that we find the crystallization of energy (and spirit)
into manifestation as Yesod unites the imbalances of Netzach and Hod through
the illuminating influence of Tiphereth. Yesod is the stuff that dreams (and
imagination, the ability to perceive a reality beyond the physical world) are
made of, for it is the realm of our subconscious. Because Yesod is the final
Sephirah in Yetzirah, the formative world, the Nines of the Minor Arcana
demonstrate the full manifestation of the elemental force within the
stability created by the constant cycle of change—for change is what
ultimately keeps existence stable. The Zohar (Book of Splendor or Radiance), one of the fundamental
texts of Qabalah, tells us that everything in the material world has its
foundation in the spiritual and must, eventually, return to its foundation;
all energy ultimately returns to the foundation (Yesod) from which it
proceeded before being birthed afresh into a new (if briefly) altered
state. We are born into a human body from Yesod, all of us return for our
nightly partaking of possibilities as we dream, and when we die we shall
ascend to it once again. In Yesod we find psychicism, the astral plane, and
the ethereal double, for here is the birthplace of the Point into Being (the
Hindu concept of sat), pretending that this “briefly altered state” is
Actual. Now the hunger, passion, and drive of Being becomes paramount, as
the awareness of Truth becomes a dream within a dream. Nines disclose the
crystallization into form of each of the elements.
Malkuth and the Tens
Finally, we come to Malkuth,
the “Kingdom,” represented by four equal colors of russet, navy, citrine, and
olive, which hangs from the trinity of triads like a many-colored pendant.
Malkuth is the end of all energy emanations as the mixing (or some say muddying)
of all the elements into material manifestation creates Assiah, the world of Action where the fruit of the former three worlds now manifest
into a tangible form. Malkuth is the Kingdom of Earth and most humans’
concept of Reality. There is a weightiness to this world as the vast
collection of manifested Points must continually train their focus upon the
physical universe in order to maintain its persisting substance, as well as a
danger of each Point getting caught up in Beingness and simply playing out
its assumed roles rather than using the games, boundaries, and sensations of Assiah to discover Itself. The sacred gift of Malkuth, however, is the chance
for the Points to evolve and transform, for each Point is actually a Star.
The number Ten (1-0) is symbolic of the Unity (1) returning to Zero. The
corresponding Tens of the tarot are both positive and negative, for although
they demonstrate the full manifestation of each particular element into the
physical plane, each Ten is equally about to utterly lose its elemental
identity in the mixture of Malkuth; every Ten shows completion of the matter,
but contains a heaviness as imminent destruction of the concluded area is
just around the corner.
© 2005 by Juno Lucina
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