LR, Very cool. Thanks. I'm intrigued with the idea of a Sepherot alternately being male and female. I didn't exactly see how they could "fire up" independently. It can't be Binah and Chockhah at the same time--or maybe it can.
It can and is, and trying to wrap your head around that is pretty exciting! Imagine Keter as a Point. Now, since we are talking about very abstract terms, imagine that point as simultaneously all that there is, and Nothing, as a point can do nothing but Be. It simply Is, and nothing more. In that Is, is unlimited potential, but that's all there is at this point.
When the Point, in one sense, recognizes itself, it becomes a Line, two points facing each other. Now, as I said, these terms are quite abstract, so imagine there is nothing in the universe but that line. You can't, since it's an impossibility. In order for a line to go anywhere, it has to go somewhere. Make a fist and punch the air. You are Keter, your arm is the line (The Fool!) and your fist is Chochma. But did your fist simply hit emptiness? No, because it traversed a certain distance, so in this case, everything in the universe is the shell surrounding your fist, and that's Binah.
While the whole Tree occurs at once, the Supernal Triangle especially is formed simultaneously. Each positive (as in outgoing) male energy is instantly balanced by its reversed female negative (not bad, but ingoing) energy.
The ordering of the "fourness" of Chesed is upset by the dynamism of Geburah, and then all abstractions merge to perfection in Tiphareth. After that, sh*t gets real, and while Chesed is an outpouring of goodness and order, Netzach, its lower reflection, can be classified as lessons learned, or as Dion Fortune put it, "an act of Chesed meant to cause suffering." Netzach is primarily good things as a consequence of difficulty, so Hod balances that with difficulty after sweetness (think in terms of the pains of childbirth after a night in the sack). Yesod is a reflection of Tiphareth as kind of an "unmanifested ideal." Things look good on paper, just as Tiphareth is as good as it can get, but when things are finally made manifest in Malkuth... well, here we are, aren't we?
What makes the Tree so fabulously amazing for me is its utter, total, complete logic (probably some one will chirp in and say "but the GD got it all wrong..." but that doesn't matter, the ordering you use). Everything is perfectly balanced and in its proper place, and keeping that in mind helps study of it to no end.
