Historical Veritas / V-Society Magick Articles archive
Article metadataArchival notice: This is an archival republication of a historical forum article. The text is preserved for research, citation, and continuity; authorship remains with the original forum author where identifiable, and dates/replies/views reflect the surviving capture or Wayback-era ledger where available.
- Author: Prophecy
- Original post date: March 08, 2007, 12:49:14 PM
- Author quote / captured profile/signature line: Hermetic Magician / Veritas Teacher / Posts By Osmosis
- Article title: Qabalah I
- Length: 2725 words (~13 min read)
- Replies / views: 0 / 963
- Last visible board activity: March 08, 2007, 12:49:14 PM
- Source archive: Forum topic archive
- Local capture source: res/The Qabalah.rtfd
- Archival flag/tag: historical archive; Veritas Society; Magick Articles; preserved forum post
Additional archival context
- Archivist abstract: First article in the Qabalah sequence, likely introducing the Tree of Life, Sephiroth, paths, correspondences, and use of Qabalistic structure in Western magic.
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The Qabalah
Lecture I
Before we begin considering some of the finer details of the Qabalah, let us first take a look at some of its background. The word "Qabalah" comes from the Hebrew QBL, Qoph-Bet-Lamed, meaning "to recieve," particularly "to recieve orally." This alone shows us that from the beginning it was thought that the Qabalah was recieved, and never thought of. Who recieved it initially? The mythology holds that the patriarch Abraham recieved this knowledge from an angel of The Lord. It is held that the power of this knowledge was necessary if Abraham was to do the things which Hashem(God) desired him to do. When he was given the knowledge, Abram's name had the letter "heh" added to it, making Abraham. The numerical number of this new name is 216, the number of parts in the Supernal Man, Adam (according to the theology). The reception of this knowledge, and its mastery, is then thought to have restored a human being, Abram in this instance, back to the glory of Adam in the Garden before The Fall. It is also said of this power that "[Abraham] made souls in Hiram." Via a knowledge of the building blocks of the universe, characterized and summarized by the twenty-two Hebrew letters, the Qaballistic tradition maintains that Abraham in fact created human souls using this knowledge, for it imparted a piece of the Creator into his authority. The creative aspect of this power, called the Yetziratic power, was only one aspect however. If man is restored to some microcosmic and understandable degree of his prior glory, then all of the authority promised to him by God initially is restored. What is this authority? Authority over "the beasts of the field." It reinstates man as the divine power on Earth.
To move on to lighter subjects, let us consider now a little bit about the nature of the Qabalah in its more technical aspects.
We may essentially divide the Qabalah into four parts: the speculative, the mathematic, the magical/practical, and the unspoken.
The speculative Qabalah is that part which is concerned with Genesis, with the nature of The Ineffable, how He came to be known by His creations, and other such things of a philosophical and theological nature. The mathematic Qabalah is that part which deals with the arrangement and rearrangement of hebrew letters in words according to their numerical values, and also the considerations of these values and what they may mean.
The practical Qabalah, rightly called the Magical Qabalah, is again divided into two subgroups: The Maasah Merkaba, and the science of Natural and Spiritual Laws.
Maasah Merkaba literally means "Wheels of the Chariot," and refers to the vision of Elijah when he was taken up physically from the world into heaven. It is called "The Way of Return," for it consists of the series of meditations and applications necessary in order to gradually bring the human soul back to its original state of development. It is thought that Enoch was privy to this same development, and it is therefore written in The Gospel of Nicodemus that when Jesus led those who had been lingering in purgatory up into heaven, the two human beings awaiting them were Elijah and Enoch, for all they alone possessed the knowledge of returning to Heaven.
This process of spiritual evolution which gives the soul its authority once more, sheds the veils and mucus esponged by this world and its ways, and allows one to travel freely in supernal worlds is called "The Way of Return," as it is the secret of the Maasah Merkava which brought Elijah into heaven. To where does it return? The supernal Eden. This is what the practical Qabalah is first and most importantly occupied with, for the power of the magician is directly related to his knowledge and his authority. The only way to obtain authority is through spiritual evolution, developing the spiritual powers which are the rights of every human being. This is why when you have seen me speak of the true aim of magic, I have said that it is evolution, and to return closer to the heavens, per se. It is the path of making one's self a true Son of God once more. It brings the soul from the lower levels up into the higher levels, and therefore closer to the concept of God, which is the name applied to that universal point of Supreme Light.
The other aspect of the practical Qabalah concerns itself with natural and spiritual laws. In Qaballistic doctrine there are many laws and rules presented by which means the universe is held together, structured, ruled, etc. It contains the information of which angels or demons rule which forces, how they may be sought, how they may come into submission and obliged to do what you desire, and how you may obtain knowledge and wisdom from them. It also presents a series of glyphs and theurgic images which, if focused upon, open a mental and spiritual vortex into the higher worlds for the forces which those images represent to be channelled by. In this sense it is a matter of putting one piece of a hose of the proper size up to another piece of the same size and connecting them, so that water may flow freely down to where it is being directed.
Finally there is the unspoken Qabalah, so called because it is never given from person to person, but instead inspired directly from the Divine. Likewise the Unspoken Qabalah is never written down, and one who possesses some of it never reveals it without permission. It may seem that such oaths of silence are impractical and ineffective, but for generations nothing was written down about either the Qabalah or the Tanakh. It is only in the less disciplined cultures that such oaths have no effect.
Now then, knowing a thing or two about the basic divisions of the Qabalah, let us move on to some terminology:
Sephiroth: A "fruit" on the Tree of Life, representing a particular stage of creation and the state of existence within that sphere. In represents, per se, a stage of evolution in the constant ebb and flow of the universe. The plural form is "sephiroth."
Etz Chayim: The Tree of Life. A symbolic expression of the arrangement of forces in the cosmos, physically, mentally and spiritually on its respective levels. Maasah Merkaba: As discussed, this is the Wheel of the Chariot which drew Elijah up into Heaven, and is used by Qabalists to represent The Way of Return.
That should be enough basic Hebrew terminology, as I do not intend on using much more (apart from the names of the sephiroth).
Now, let us consider the simplified process of the creation of the universe according to the Qabalah. This is important not because it tells us how things began, but because it is a diagram of the constant process which the universal energies are perpetually engaged in.
We must begin with the Three Negative Veils. The negative veils are three substrata of existence, meaning that they were before existence was technically concieved, in a negative state of being, meaning that they can only truly be defined by what they are not, much as the Tao of the East. The names of these negative veils were Ain, Ain Soph, and Ain Soph Aur; Nothing, Endless, and Endless Light, respectively. Of Ain, nothing can be thought; it is room that is merely theoretically provided for on account that something infinite and infathomable is said to be the subject. It is an account taken for a likely probability that can not be understood. Ain Soph, the following level of negative existence, was the state of pure existence where God's being extended "forever and ever." Nothing but this core essence existed. Through a desire, some motion caused by an idea, a series of movement, vibrations if you will, began to occur within Ain Soph. These vibrations increased and refracted, until the universe was filled with Light, and God became considered Pure Light. This was the stage of Ain Soph Aur, Endless Light, for the entire universe was merely the essence of the Unknowable, undivided and undefined.
When a desire emerged to create something, God withdrew this Endless Light from the universe, and this process was called The Constriction. In the vast amount of now "empty" space, considered darkness, God drew out a single bead of Light from his being. He did this so that something could exist besides Himself. In other words through this Great Constriction (called Tzimtzum), He allowed other things to have room, though nothing else existed yet.
This single bead, this single spark even, of light that he drew out from Himself at this point was sufficient for the creation of all the universe. It is said "He placed this point in a circle," meaning that he gave the Infinite a symbolic form, and so this spark became the first sephira on the Tree of Life: Kether.
Remember during this entire lecture that all apparent personifications here are only metaphor, and I allow you to weed them out on account that they are fairly evident, and I believe the original metaphoric personifications to have great value in understanding the natures of the forces at work.
Though Kether was a start, it was still too supernal for God to work through it upon the worlds he eventually intended to create. Therefore, from this first point of what may be called "existence" in some blurred line between finite and infinite, he drew out a line of light and with it created Chokmah. Chokmah then became the seat of the hitherto nameless God, referred to at this point only as "Ancient of Ancients." From this seat, Chokmah, which is called "Wisdom," God was able to begin to concern Himself with the process of creation. From this Supernal Light he drew another beam, and concealed it within another Sephira, called Binah. This is why Solomon says in Proverbs "The beginning is Wisdom (Hebrew: Chokmah)," for Chokmah was the first knowable thing to emerge, and the first point from which God worked on existence. Binah was the feminine aspect of supernal existence, and so with the creation of Binah and Chokmah was polarity established in the universe. Binah is the female, or Supernal Mother, and Chokmah the male, The Father. At this point we shall skip over one part of the creation process as it has no impact upon the constant ebb and flow of energies, which we are here considered with. The next thing we need to know, then, is the process of creation down the Tree of Life.
This process of creation is depicted by "The Flaming Sword," which shows a sword of fire zigzagging down to the Tree in the order which the worlds were created in. Following Binah came Chesed, which means Love. This sephira depicts the initial state of existence as one of complete "love" in a cosmological sense, meaning one of union. Coming out of love, Chesed, emerged Judgement, which is the sephira Geburah. This allowed love and mercy to be checked and weighed, and so a "filter" of sorts was created and judgement came into existence. This was the Second Day of Creation in Genesis. What does this tell us cosmically? This is the beginning of Karma, the universal law of Cause and Effect, which says that for every action there must be a reaction. Until the creation of Geburah there was only action, with no consequent answer. Existence naturally can not sustain itself on such a principle, and so judgement was created.
When the cosmic forces channeling into Chesed from Binah had been properly weighed, and those which are agreable for creation are sorted out from those which are not, the power decends down into a sphere called Tiphareth, which means "beauty." Why is it beautiful? Because this is the perfected, finished product of the universal forces which came down from the supernal levels. Tiphareth is also the only Sephiroth which is connected to every other Sephiroth on the Tree of Life, shining Divine Light upon them all. At this point of existence, energy is in its most vibrant state. This was the first uniting of opposites, the first synthesis between left and right per se. Following Tiphareth, down and to the right on The Tree, comes Netzach. Netzach, which means "victory," is the state of energy that is beginning to be readied for channeling into Malkuth, which is the physical world. From here this somewhat blind force passes into Hod, Intelligence, and it is here that the forces are given actual direction and purpose in regards to their operations in the physical world. Both Netzach and Hod connect to Yesod, which is between and below them, and means "foundation." This is the level of the astral world in magic, for it combines thought(Hod) with form(Netzach) and allows them to coexist in a manner that influences the physical world.
Finally, below Yesod, is Malkuth, "Kingdom." This is the Kingdom of the physical world, the world of manifestation, which is the culmination of all the other forces. It is the "end of the journey" per se for most of the celestial energies, thought there is a constant interaction of back and forth between them all.
Speak freely. Ask questions, comment, etc.
Questions and Answers (Q&A)
Q: Why is Netzach "Victory"?
A: It is the first stage where the energy is able to directly connect to Malkuth. Because this was the original aim of all energy sent from the heavens, reaching this state is called "victory."
Q: Do the specific names associated with the Sephira reflect the state of mind the magician is to be in at the time of achieving that emanation?
A: They depict a phase that the magician is in, as well as how he appears to the Cosmos. A magician in Tiphareth, then, is considered "beautiful" by The Creator.
Q: Are Ain, Ain Soph and Ain Soph Ur the veils also encountered between the three triangles on the tree?
A: No. Those are called The Portals.
Q: Does Da'ath play any role in this?
A: Daath is not a sephira in the sense of the word; it is a state of transition. Daath is the Abyss, the necessary seperation from the created sephiroth from the creating sephiroth (Kether, Chokmah and Binah).
It is also the point of connection between the Qlipothic Tree, which is the Tree of Evil, and the Sephirothic Tree, which is the Tree of Life.
Q: This might sound like a pretty basic question. But does the Qlipothic Tree exist for the same reason that anything which comes into existence must be 'born' simultaneously with its opposite?
A: It exists so that mankind may have free will.
Q: When the Creator worked through Chokmah, is He at that time working as the being Tetragrammaton?
A: Mindwarp: At that time the Tetragrammaton has not yet been brought into existence. YHVH was not a name of God until Chesed was established, and this is why it is not until Abraham, who is called the "Love (Chesed) of God", is presented in the Bible that the name YHVH first appears.
Q: Isn't Tiphareth not considered adepthood?
A: It is the beginning of the Adepthood. The first step in the door, per se. However, as soon as you open this door and go to take the first step, those on the other side of the door behold you for the first time directly, even though they may have heard your coming from the other side.
For this reason he is considered Beautiful who comes through Tiphareth, as for the first time The Creator sees directly that particular creation, and He holds all of His creations as beautiful, for we are made in His image. Therefore when He sees us, he says that we are beautiful.
« Last Edit: March 08, 2007, 01:24:30 PM by Prophecy »
Logged
The magician becomes filled with God, fed upon God, intoxicated with God. Little by little his body will become purified by the internal lustration of God; day by day his mortal frame, shedding its earthly elements, will become in very truth the Temple of the Holy Ghost. Day by day matter is replace
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Archivist note: Preserve corrections as appended notes where possible. Avoid silently modernizing terminology, spelling, or claims unless a moderator intentionally creates a separate edited edition.