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randomactsofkarmasc) wrote2023-07-11 08:03 pm
randomactsofkarmasc) wrote2023-07-11 08:03 pm
Thoughts on the Cube (part 1)
Last month, on JMG's commentary on The Ritual of High Magic Chapter 2, Jon G shared an intriguing thought about the nature of the Cube:
I decided I needed to start back at the beginning. So I re-re-read the chapters of Levi that the book club has already discussed. I re-re-read JMG's commentaries on those chapters. I read Virgin of the World, by Hermes Trismegistus, which Levi recommended we read. And I re-re-read some Cosmic Doctrine, by Dion Fortune.
I found all sorts of ideas and descriptions that I missed my first time (and second time) (and third time) reading, but still couldn't make things fit together until I decided to trust in JMG: there are no wrong answers in meditations. :-)
So this post (or perhaps series of posts) will describe ideas that I've studied and how I've organized them so they make sense to me. I've made some diagrams, too, and will post them below the explanations.
In JMG's commentary on The Doctrine of High Magic: Chapter 4, he posted a version of the Tree of Life based on Levi's version of the tree.
Levi's version has Yod-Heh in the upper triangle, Vau in the central hexalpha, and then Heh in the square/circle, spelling YHVH, the Tetragrammaton. JMG's version doesn't include Hebrew letters, but it is color-coded. The upper triangle is yellow (typically associated with Air), the hexalpha is made of a red triangle and a blue triangle (typically associated with Fire and Water), and the square/circle is green (typically associated with Earth).
The Hebrew alphabet (and the Tarot, according to Levi), do not start with Yod. They start with Aleph. And there is a Tetragrammaton that starts with Aleph... Aleph-Heh-Yod-Heh. I have read various translations of AHYH and YHVH, but my favorites are "I will be" (AHYH) and "I am" (YHVH).
It seems logical that AH would precede the YH on Levi's Tree, but the closest thing he has for that is some roundish shading behind the upper triangle. I suspected that was a sneaky reference to Ain/Ain Soph/Ain Soph Aur, the universe (for lack of a better word) prior to Tzimtzum. Somehow those were related to AH, but how?
The images of the cabalistic Tree of Life that I have encountered in my readings and in Internet searches either do not include Ain/Ain Soph/Ain Soph Aur or include them as concentric circles around the Supernal Triad (the upper triangle) or as concentric circles around the entire Tree. The idea of concentric circles around the Tree (or part of the Tree) did not help my understanding, but Hall (Secret Teachings of All Ages) explains the Spheres as a series of concentric circles instead of a Tree. That still didn't help me with understanding AH and Ain/Ain Soph/Ain Soph Aur, but it did give me an idea. The Spheres, normally represented as a Tree, can be represented as concentric circles. Well, as below, so above... then Ain/Ain Soph/Ain Soph Aur, normally represented as concentric circles, can also be represented as a Tree.
It seemed like a slightly heretical thought at first, and I spent much time trying to come up with an alternative, but I couldn't. I tried using a circle first (to have symmetry with Malkuth), but that didn't work. Then I tried a triangle. But which way to orient the triangle? Would the Supernal Triad mimic the "Ain Triangle" exactly, or would it be a reflection?
At the time, I was operating with a 'definition' of Ain being "One". So I drew an upward-pointing triangle, with Ain at the top. Ain Soph was assigned the bottom right of the triangle; Ain Soph Aur was assigned the bottom left. Aleph and Heh were in the middle of the triangle, reminiscent of Yod-Heh for the Supernal Triad.
Ain is frequently described as the Unmanifest. It is One. (At least, that was my thinking at the time.) Ain Soph is frequently described as Limitless. Ain Soph Aur is described as Limitless Light. Ain Soph contracted from Ain, leaving Ain Soph Aur. (The contraction is the Tzimtzum.) I struggled with the duality of Ain Soph and Ain Soph Aur. I understood they both came from Ain (a Unity), but they don't really seem to be on the same scale. For example, hot and cold are two extremes of temperature. Wet and dry are two extremes of moisture. But what is the scale for Limitless and Limitless Light?
Fortune (The Cosmic Doctrine) provided a clue. She states that the prime duality is Movement and Space--Movement being Active, Space being Passive. So the Unity of Ain did not create the duality of Ain and Ain Soph; it created the duality of Movement and Space. My Ain triangle could then be an Ain hexalpha! The Unity of Ain resolves into the Duality of Movement and Space. And I would need a Duality to resolve into a Unity. Again, help from Fortune. After Movement and Space, Fortune describes the creation of Ring Cosmos and Ring Chaos, which result in Ring Pass Not. So my resolution would be Ring Pass Not. Ain Soph (Limitless) seemed a good fit for the active side of the tree. But Ain Soph Aur still didn't seem like a good fit.
Happy synchronicity! Steve T, on another JMG post, discussed Plotinus and his description of the One. The napkin-sketch version of my understanding of Plotinus' One is that we cannot really describe it, because any description implies something it is not and that is incorrect, because it is a unity. So I researched to see if there was another translation of Ain and I found one: No. (because nothing can describe it!) Ah! So Ain Soph really doesn't mean "limitless", it means "no limits". And what is the other extreme? "limits". So Ain Soph for the active, Soph for the passive, resolving into Ring Pass Not.
Interestingly, Ain is spelled Aleph-Yod-Nun, Nun having a similar gematria as Heh (Nun = 50, Heh = 5) and a similar meaning. And another interesting tidbit (from The Body and Its Symbolism by de Souzenelle) is that after AHYH and YHZH comes Yod-Shin, which she translated as 'to have'. I will be, I am, I have? I didn't like that. But an online Hebrew translator translates Yod-Shin as Yes. So we start with No and end with Yes. That I like.
Below is my first diagram. I have a few more and will work on getting them (and their explanations) posted soon.
Thanks for reading!
"Each axis on the cube reveals a dimension of the divine in the human: YHVH/Solomon is divine wisdom; Adam/Eve is the divine impregnating matter and AZOTH/Jesus is the eternal in the temporal."
The more I thought about his comment, the more I wanted to understand the nature of the Cube. I started re-reading earlier chapters of Levi, focusing on anything relating to the Cube. But the Cube is related to the Great Work. And the Great Work is related to the Great Magical Agent. And the Great Magical Agent is related to the Great Magical Arcanum. And the more I read, the more I realized I didn't understand things that I thought I understood.I decided I needed to start back at the beginning. So I re-re-read the chapters of Levi that the book club has already discussed. I re-re-read JMG's commentaries on those chapters. I read Virgin of the World, by Hermes Trismegistus, which Levi recommended we read. And I re-re-read some Cosmic Doctrine, by Dion Fortune.
I found all sorts of ideas and descriptions that I missed my first time (and second time) (and third time) reading, but still couldn't make things fit together until I decided to trust in JMG: there are no wrong answers in meditations. :-)
So this post (or perhaps series of posts) will describe ideas that I've studied and how I've organized them so they make sense to me. I've made some diagrams, too, and will post them below the explanations.
In JMG's commentary on The Doctrine of High Magic: Chapter 4, he posted a version of the Tree of Life based on Levi's version of the tree.
Levi's version has Yod-Heh in the upper triangle, Vau in the central hexalpha, and then Heh in the square/circle, spelling YHVH, the Tetragrammaton. JMG's version doesn't include Hebrew letters, but it is color-coded. The upper triangle is yellow (typically associated with Air), the hexalpha is made of a red triangle and a blue triangle (typically associated with Fire and Water), and the square/circle is green (typically associated with Earth).The Hebrew alphabet (and the Tarot, according to Levi), do not start with Yod. They start with Aleph. And there is a Tetragrammaton that starts with Aleph... Aleph-Heh-Yod-Heh. I have read various translations of AHYH and YHVH, but my favorites are "I will be" (AHYH) and "I am" (YHVH).
It seems logical that AH would precede the YH on Levi's Tree, but the closest thing he has for that is some roundish shading behind the upper triangle. I suspected that was a sneaky reference to Ain/Ain Soph/Ain Soph Aur, the universe (for lack of a better word) prior to Tzimtzum. Somehow those were related to AH, but how?
The images of the cabalistic Tree of Life that I have encountered in my readings and in Internet searches either do not include Ain/Ain Soph/Ain Soph Aur or include them as concentric circles around the Supernal Triad (the upper triangle) or as concentric circles around the entire Tree. The idea of concentric circles around the Tree (or part of the Tree) did not help my understanding, but Hall (Secret Teachings of All Ages) explains the Spheres as a series of concentric circles instead of a Tree. That still didn't help me with understanding AH and Ain/Ain Soph/Ain Soph Aur, but it did give me an idea. The Spheres, normally represented as a Tree, can be represented as concentric circles. Well, as below, so above... then Ain/Ain Soph/Ain Soph Aur, normally represented as concentric circles, can also be represented as a Tree.
It seemed like a slightly heretical thought at first, and I spent much time trying to come up with an alternative, but I couldn't. I tried using a circle first (to have symmetry with Malkuth), but that didn't work. Then I tried a triangle. But which way to orient the triangle? Would the Supernal Triad mimic the "Ain Triangle" exactly, or would it be a reflection?
At the time, I was operating with a 'definition' of Ain being "One". So I drew an upward-pointing triangle, with Ain at the top. Ain Soph was assigned the bottom right of the triangle; Ain Soph Aur was assigned the bottom left. Aleph and Heh were in the middle of the triangle, reminiscent of Yod-Heh for the Supernal Triad.
Ain is frequently described as the Unmanifest. It is One. (At least, that was my thinking at the time.) Ain Soph is frequently described as Limitless. Ain Soph Aur is described as Limitless Light. Ain Soph contracted from Ain, leaving Ain Soph Aur. (The contraction is the Tzimtzum.) I struggled with the duality of Ain Soph and Ain Soph Aur. I understood they both came from Ain (a Unity), but they don't really seem to be on the same scale. For example, hot and cold are two extremes of temperature. Wet and dry are two extremes of moisture. But what is the scale for Limitless and Limitless Light?
Fortune (The Cosmic Doctrine) provided a clue. She states that the prime duality is Movement and Space--Movement being Active, Space being Passive. So the Unity of Ain did not create the duality of Ain and Ain Soph; it created the duality of Movement and Space. My Ain triangle could then be an Ain hexalpha! The Unity of Ain resolves into the Duality of Movement and Space. And I would need a Duality to resolve into a Unity. Again, help from Fortune. After Movement and Space, Fortune describes the creation of Ring Cosmos and Ring Chaos, which result in Ring Pass Not. So my resolution would be Ring Pass Not. Ain Soph (Limitless) seemed a good fit for the active side of the tree. But Ain Soph Aur still didn't seem like a good fit.
Happy synchronicity! Steve T, on another JMG post, discussed Plotinus and his description of the One. The napkin-sketch version of my understanding of Plotinus' One is that we cannot really describe it, because any description implies something it is not and that is incorrect, because it is a unity. So I researched to see if there was another translation of Ain and I found one: No. (because nothing can describe it!) Ah! So Ain Soph really doesn't mean "limitless", it means "no limits". And what is the other extreme? "limits". So Ain Soph for the active, Soph for the passive, resolving into Ring Pass Not.
Interestingly, Ain is spelled Aleph-Yod-Nun, Nun having a similar gematria as Heh (Nun = 50, Heh = 5) and a similar meaning. And another interesting tidbit (from The Body and Its Symbolism by de Souzenelle) is that after AHYH and YHZH comes Yod-Shin, which she translated as 'to have'. I will be, I am, I have? I didn't like that. But an online Hebrew translator translates Yod-Shin as Yes. So we start with No and end with Yes. That I like.
Below is my first diagram. I have a few more and will work on getting them (and their explanations) posted soon.
Thanks for reading!