venicebard said:
Interesting: I have the 'Work of the Chariot' edition of Sefer Yetzirah from the 70s (first copy I owned), and it has a Tree diagram of the same configuration (as Rosanne's). I'll go get it from storage today (along with Leat's book) and describe it next time I'm here.
Next time is here.
1970 edition (I think I got it about a year after it was published, but don't tell anyone I'm that old):
Book of Formation (Sepher Yetzirah): The Letters of Our Father Abraham. Mishnah 3 (p. 1) begins: "There are TEN INTANGIBLE SEPHIROT the number of the ten fingers, five opposite five," to which it appends note 3: "This is illustrated in page 3, and obtained by cupping the fingers opposed to each other pointing towards one's face."
The illustration referred to is the Tree in the form we are discussing (without a 'dangling Malkut'), but the order of their generation is quite different:
- - - - - - - - - YHV
- - - - - - - - 5th Up
- - - - - - - - HEIGHT
- VHY - - - - - - - - - - - - - HYV
10th Left - - - - - - - - - 7th Forward
NORTH - - - - - - - - - - - - EAST
- - - - - Covenant of Unity
- - - - - - - - - 1st
- - - - - Spirit of Living Elohim
- - - - - - - - FIRST
- Shin - - - - - - - - - - - - - Mem
4th Fire - - - - - - - - - - 3rd Water
- EVIL - - - - - - -- - - - - - GOOD
- - - - - - - - Aleph
- - - - - - - - - 2nd
- - - - - - - - - Air
- - - - - - - - LAST
- - HVY - - - - - - - - - - - VYH
8th Backward - - - - - - - 9th Right
- - WEST - - - - - - - - - - SOUTH
- - - - - - - - - YVH
- - - - - - - - 6th Down
- - - - - - - - ABYSS
ALL CAPS are the permutations of yod, heh, and vav with which extremities are said to be sealed (I believe the one presented here is the genuine tradition concerning this, though different versions differ) and the extremities of the five axes: that of logical progression (first-last), that of morality (good-evil), the vertical (height-abyss), the axis of motion (east-west), and the axle of the wheel
of that motion (south-north).
I still don't have a clue how the Sefirot apply to the 10 fingers. I know that primes and not-primes are in symmetrical balance in 10 (only number for which this is so): 1-2-3-5-7 vs. 10-9-8-6-4. The left would presumably be the not-primes . . . or not, I just haven't a clue at this point.
I have, however, recently solved the mystery of which mother letter goes with which axis in relation to man:
Mem-sofit is the right-left axis, for its wheel is
the wheel.
Shin is the up-down axis, for it is (the part of the self that relates to the macrocosm
and) the Cauldron, whose rim is the wheel whose axle is vertical.
Alef is the forward-back axis, for it is the one that is left (and for other reasons I won't go into here [unless asked]).
And intermediate mem, then, would be the point where they meet, I suppose. But the axis represented by mem-sofit isn't
really the right-left axis, for right and left are both
out and mem-sofit's wheel (the all-encompassing Monad) goes from up to
out to down to
in to up. (Perhaps in this sense intermediate mem can be thought of as the right-left axis once it differentiates itself.)