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From: paulhume@my-deja.com
Newsgroups: alt.magick
Subject: Re: which qabalistic tree?
Date: Sun, 20 Feb 2000 06:00:48 GMT
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> The Qabalistic system that I know is based on Wescott's translation of
> the Sepher Yetzirah and I excepted it in my heart. I recently
purchased
> a copy of Kaplan's translation.  Much to my suprise, I discovered a
> major difference in the placement of the Hebrew letters on the Tree.
>
> Kaplan's version sure does explain the concept of Mother letters more
> clearly.  Shin above, Mem below, and Aleph as the mediator.
>

There are numerous models of the Tree, both in the Judaic Qabala and
its bastard offshoot that we all know and love, the Hermetic Qabala.
Within Hermetic, for example, you have the Tree used in the GD, based
on a design first found in the writings of Athanasius Kircher, you have
the variations in Trump placement Crowley experimented with to resolve
the "tzaddi is not the Star" verse in Liber AL, you have Charles
Stansfield Jones' "inversion" of the Paths (which still derives from
the Kircher Tree). And I was just re-reading a study by Robert Stewart
which disposes the Trumps along the Paths based on a magical study of a
mediaeval mystical prose/verse piece. In Judaic Qabala you have the
Zoharic version of the Tree, which is similar to the Kircher, the
symmetrical Tree proposed by Luria, and on which Kaplan builds, and
other approaches.

Each model explicates a particular view of the Universe prpounded by
the qabalist or school of thought which uses it, and each has great
utility. One analogy I've always found useful was a reference (Ben
Rowe's maybe) to the Tree as a circuit diagram, so that these different
layouts are useful (to the irredeemably what-is-it-good-for types like
me) in different roles, for different ends.

Paul


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