Order of planetary attributions in Hebrew Alphabet - what gives?

WolfSinger

Hey knowledgable ones,

I'm flummoxed :eek: that i only just noticed that the planets attributed to the double letters are not in the order that i always thought they were. I had assumed they were in the usual classical order, the way they are on the Tree:
Moon
Mercury
Venus
Sun
Mars
Jupiter
Saturn

But looking at the attributions to the letters, we find the planets a bit scrambled from the expected order:
Beth ~ Mercury
Gimel ~ Moon
Daleth ~ Venus
Kaph ~ Jupiter
Peh ~ Mars
Resh ~ Sun
Tav ~ Saturn

So does anyone know the reasoning behind this (and the history behind these attributions)? Thanks for any enlightment!

- WolfSinger
 

Zeroa

maybe there is some clues in the pairs of opposites assigned to the double letters and the meanings of the planets.
Beth-life and death
Gimel-peace and war
Daleth-wisdom and folly
Kaph-wealth and poverty
Peh-grace and hideousness
Resh-fruitfulness and desolation
Tav-dominion and slavery

Hope this helps some.
 

Lore347

I can't remember if those attributations come from the Sefer Yetzirah or if they were a G.D. discovery/invention. I do know that I have 4 versions of the Book of Formation at home (The Short, Long, Gra, and Saadia), and they ALL attribute the planets differently. Also the lists of correspondences are believed to be later additions in the versions that they appear in. Good luck with this one though, let me know if you actually find a dependable historic source!
 

rachelcat

Skinner, in The Complete Magician's Tables, suggests a different assignment of the planets to the letters. (Along with a Lurianic path structure.)

I haven't studied it yet. Only got as far as making a table about it!

Attached is my table with the planet changes highlighted.

I scanned the pages from the book, but maybe I shouldn't attach them here. (Besides, the file is too big . . .)

Hope it helps!
 

Attachments

  • Lurianic Tree Paths.pdf
    92 KB · Views: 466

Lore347

Interesting. I suppose I should not be surprised to see the Chaldean order turning out to be the oldest verified correspondences. It's also interesting to see the many other systems people have come up with as well. Thanks for the links! :)
 

basilikon

Planetary attributions and the Majors

Hi there, everyone!
Several years ago, I found the same set of inconsistencies in the various kabbalistic works concerning the association of planets to Hebrew letters (and Tarot Majors).
I should state here, that I follow the Lurianic kabbalistic model. Kabbalah is inherently a Hebrew/Jewish system, and was so long before the G.D. got hold of it (but I'm not here to knock the G.D. — actually, don't think I need to, as they did what any fool will do when you give him enough rope, LOL).
I should also add that the Lurianic kabbalistic model is perhaps the most highly esteemed "flavour" of kabbalah to be found amongst Jews who delve into such studies. R. Isaac Luria (AKA the AriZaL) has been (and continues to be) revered as perhaps the greatest kabbalist ever to have lived (at least in modern times), so his teachings tend to carry greater weight within the Jewish community.
Modern Western takes on the kabbalah often follow the Kircher model of the Tree of Life, which is inherently different from that of the AriZaL. I won't go into the differences here (there are many websites and books which cover either or both systems), but independent of the Tarot, I found the Lurianic model to be more sensible. Then I mapped the Tarot onto the attributions on the Tree of Life and came up with a model of the Tarot which I've not seen anywhere else: the Lurianic Tarot. I have a website for it out there; I won't post the URL here, but just google the name of the deck and you'll find it :)
 

Yygdrasilian

Holy Palace

Sepher Yetzirah said:
II.3 : Seven doubles: Bet, Gimel, Dalet, Kaf, Peh, Resh, Tav. Seven and not six, seven and not eight. Six sides in the six directions, and the Holy Palace ruling in the center. Blessed is the Eternal in His dwelling. He is the place of the universe and the universe is not His place.
The conversion of Hebrew double letter to Planet correspondences from Sepher Yetzirah to “The Cipher Manuscripts” follows a certain logic that is best understood spatially rather than numerically. Sepher Yetzirah gives the Chaldean order of planets to the sequence of doubles, which is the same sequence followed when planetary attributions are given the Sephirot on the Tree of Life.

Sepher Yetzirah_______________________Cipher Manuscripts
Beth : (3) Saturn (N) -------------------------> Mercury (SW)
Gimel : (4) Jupiter (NE) ----------------------> Moon (S)
Daleth : (5) Mars (NW) -----------------------> Venus (SE)
Kaph : (6) Sun :))) ----------------------------> Jupiter (NE)
Pe : (7) Venus (SE) ---------------------------> Mars (NW)
Resh : (8) Mercury (SW) ---------------------> Sun :)))
Tau: (9) Moon (S) -----------------------------> Saturn (N)

Tracing the conversions through these directions makes a lemniscate wrap around a staff shifting polarity:

........................N.......................
....................../....\.....................
..................../........\...................
...NW______/______\_____NE......
........\......../..............\....../.........
..........\...../................\..../..........
............\./.........;)........\./............
............/..\................../.\............
........../.....\.............../....\...........
....SW/____\_______/____\SE.......
....................\........./...................
......................\...../.....................
........................\../......................
.........................S........................

N <--- SW <--- :) <--- NE <--- S <--- N
+
NW (Male) <------> SW (Female)

So, in a way, "The Cipher Manuscripts" convert the Star of David into a mini-Caduceus
 

venicebard

Both...
WolfSinger said:
...looking at the attributions to the letters, we find the planets a bit scrambled from the expected order:
Beth ~ Mercury
Gimel ~ Moon
Daleth ~ Venus
Kaph ~ Jupiter
Peh ~ Mars
Resh ~ Sun
Tav ~ Saturn
...and...
Zeroa said:
maybe there is some clues in the pairs of opposites assigned to the double letters and the meanings of the planets.
Beth-life and death
Gimel-peace and war
Daleth-wisdom and folly
Kaph-wealth and poverty
Peh-grace and hideousness
Resh-fruitfulness and desolation
Tav-dominion and slavery
...are merely versions of these correlations. Indeed this is a puzzle that requires thought and research, for the different versions of the Sefer Yetzirah do not even agree amongst themselves.

A while back on this forum I achieved a tentative solution to the problem of the planets but have not yet satisfactorily solved the question of the pairs of opposites. Depending on memory alone, I believe it went something like this:

Beyt, B, is birch, hence birth (beginning, berashit), our B being the pregnant profile of the mother while Hebrew's is a house, as in 'house of' (offspring of). Yet its number in bardic tradition (which bases its numeration on symbolic import, not mere letter-order) is 5, placing it (I surmise) at Mars: this is because the ultimate symbol of the unyielding warrior is a mother defending her young at any cost.

Gimel, G, is ivy, the wandering serpent of desire (where desire takes us), but the serpent is chthonic (earthy), just as Geb the Egyptian earth god begins with a G: I tend to think it fits Saturn (exalted in libra or straight down, as we would expect of a plumb made of its metal, lead), which its Hebrew number would tend to confirm.

Dalet, D, is oak, the tree that most attracts lightning (Zeus's thunderbolt) and is sacred to Jupiter, as its Hebrew number confirms.

Kaf, K, is hazel, wisdom 'in a nutshell': bardic 9, it is probably therefore Luna yet has definite Mercurial overtones.

Peh, P, is the water elder, an obscure tree, but other considerations show it to stand for the poetic or prophetic mysteries, and indeed its Hebrew form is a mouth speaking (mouth with tongue therein): I therefore tentatively assimilate it to Mercury, the spirit of said mysteries.

Reysh, R, is the elder, a death tree (also medicinal), but reysh is through other considerations shown to stand for the gonads (organ of heredity, of what outlives us), and indeed its bardic number, 15, is the atomic number of phosphorus, which is the key ingredient in chromosomes: tentatively, therefore, it would appear to signify Venus.

Tav, T, is the holly, whose lesson is that of the phalanx (many small pricks becoming one big one), for it represents honor or discipline (fulfilling one's duty)--in most alphabets, it is one's X or mark (signifying one's honor), and the second T in south Semitic shows two small circles linked by a vertical line, that is, two individuals chained or linked by obligation. Where one might think its phalanx-aspect would make it Mars, what tav really refers to is conscience, which resides in the heart, and the heart is Sol (the sun being the center of things).

Ultimately, though, the planets reside in the pips of Coins or Money, the physical or material world (meaning the cycles that govern it): 2 is Sol, the great year (cycle of precession of equinoxes, the whirling of the stellar heavens forward about the zodiac itself); 3 Saturn; 4 Jupiter; 5 Mars; [6 the solar year]; 7 Venus; 8 Mercury; 9 Luna; [and 10, the diurnal cycle of earth or equator]--these are in descending order of duration, since they lead from 1, the eternal (the stellar generator or total energy of the cosmos, which is conserved), to 10, 'today' (diurnal cycle), the fleeting present instant. These attributions are fixed (meaning they can be seen from several viewpoints), and confirmation is in the exaltation of planets in astrology when correlated with male-female pairs in the Tree of Sefirot as usually pictured: 2 and 3, sun and Saturn, are exalted in aries (up) and libra (down), respectively; 4 and 5, Jupiter and Mars, are exalted in cancer and capricorn, respectively; and 8 and 9, Mercury and Venus, are exalted in virgo and pisces, respectively. (Each pair occupies opposite signs). By the way, attributing the sun to 6 is not incorrect, just incomplete: Sol is 2, 6, and 10 (carbon, 6, and the two inert gases enclosing its period in the periodic table), for 2 (the great year) is the relation between 6 (ecliptic) and 10 (equator).

Probably 'too much information', but there you have it.