Filling in your own Tree of Life

Richard

......I wish I knew more about the significance of the relative positions of the paths in the GD (and Thoth) arrangements. I have come across a snippet here and there, but my questions have met with silence.
Maybe it would help to know about the role of each connecting path (and corresponding trump) in the grade system of the initiatory return path. A convenient source for this would be Part Two of The True and Invisible Rosicrucian Order by P. F. Case.

Any arbitrary arrangement of the trumps on the connecting paths can be justified in one way or another, but the experiential value of any particular order is another matter, which goes beyond theoretical considerations.
 

Zephyros

In addition, while I respect your arrangement as you see fit, I don't understand your logic at times, at least when it comes to procedure. The card meanings in the GD Tree derive from the Tree itself, not the other way round. If Temperance is "healing," as you say, it is because the "tent peg" is where it is (showing, in my opinion, the idea that change and synthesis is the mainstay of creation) and not somewhere else. Were it to be placed on a different path, the forces described would be different.

Any arbitrary arrangement of the trumps on the connecting paths can be justified in one way or another, but the experiential value of any particular order is another matter, which goes beyond theoretical considerations.

One can create a completely personal Tree, with attributions and symbolism that are unique to the person creating it. Perhaps the experiential value in such a construct would be subjectively useful, as much as any standardized Tree, if we assume the personal development is in the process. However, in order to communicate this kind of knowledge to others concessions, among them that same standardizations, have to be made.
 

Cheiromancer

Maybe it would help to know about the role of each connecting path (and corresponding trump) in the grade system of the initiatory return path. A convenient source for this would be Part Two of The True and Invisible Rosicrucian Order by P. F. Case.

Case seems inclined to talk about discrete units of the tree: one path or sphere at a time. A quick skim doesn't indicate much attention to systematic patterns in the tree. Well, except for which spheres a path connects. But not the kind of thing that would let you know that a path was mislabeled.

Shouldn't it make a difference, when meditating upon path 28, whether it is the Star or the Emperor? (speaking of which - does the color stay the same in both the GD and the Thoth arrangements? Or does it follow the trump?)

Any arbitrary arrangement of the trumps on the connecting paths can be justified in one way or another, but the experiential value of any particular order is another matter, which goes beyond theoretical considerations.

I am not sure it is completely arbitrary, but there is an awful lot of discretion. The debates about where the Fool goes can be multiplied many-fold. Just recently I read something by Ronald Decker on the third septenary, where he argues that the Devil is Saturn, the World is Jupiter, the Star is Venus, and the Angel is Mercury. (Also, Tower = Mars, Sun = Sol, Moon = Luna. Which to me is less startling.) Given the domino effect, who knows what a Tree based on these correspondences would look like?

But a definite yes to your point about experiential value. I will have to start experimenting with my tree, once I have the theory worked out to my satisfaction. The biggest obstacle right now is that I don't know how to assign the colors to the paths: especially the diagonals. Well, actually the biggest obstacle is that I don't know how to tell the difference between success and failure. Case says he "sat for more than ten months in periods of a half-hour at a time, twice daily, working at concentration before he saw the slightest indication of a result." If I practice with my tree for six months and get nothing, it seems that I could not conclude anything about whether my method has experiential validity or not. If a few years pass without result, then maybe I could conclude I had made one or more serious mistakes. There ought to be a better way!

In addition, while I respect your arrangement as you see fit, I don't understand your logic at times, at least when it comes to procedure. The card meanings in the GD Tree derive from the Tree itself, not the other way round. If Temperance is "healing," as you say, it is because the "tent peg" is where it is (showing, in my opinion, the idea that change and synthesis is the mainstay of creation) and not somewhere else. Were it to be placed on a different path, the forces described would be different.

I thought that Kabbalah, Astrology and Tarot were all more or less independent, in that none can be completely described in terms of the others. They reveal affinities and synergies when you line them up, but one arrangement might conceal what another reveals.

But are you saying that if the Trumps were unnumbered it would be possible to assign them to the correct paths on the tree just based on the Tree's own balance of energies? That there is something about the Tower that means that path 27 is the only place it could go?

One can create a completely personal Tree, with attributions and symbolism that are unique to the person creating it. Perhaps the experiential value in such a construct would be subjectively useful, as much as any standardized Tree, if we assume the personal development is in the process. However, in order to communicate this kind of knowledge to others concessions, among them that same standardizations, have to be made.
Well, I am using the same Kircher tree, with the same Sephirot, the same planets, the same signs of the zodiac and esoteric elements, the same letters. There is all kinds of standardization of vocabulary. Granted, the assignments are often quite different, but there are still many patches of commonality. Mars is still the Tower and Peh. Mercury is the Magician is Beth and the Priestess is Gimel. Etc. And it shouldn't confuse anyone why I would say that, say, the 7 planets are on the 7 vertical paths, or that the Moon is assigned to Luna. I am doing my darnedest to make this set of correspondences intelligible.

The overall pattern is different, sure, but where I know the significance of certain patterns in the GD or Thoth trees (the wedding of sun and moon in path 25, say) I have tried to express them in terms of my tree. But there do not seem to be many such patterns in the public domain.
 

Richard

........Case seems inclined to talk about discrete units of the tree: one path or sphere at a time. A quick skim doesn't indicate much attention to systematic patterns in the tree. Well, except for which spheres a path connects. But not the kind of thing that would let you know that a path was mislabeled.

Sorry, I must be on different pages of a different book.

......But are you saying that if the Trumps were unnumbered it would be possible to assign them to the correct paths on the tree just based on the Tree's own balance of energies? That there is something about the Tower that means that path 27 is the only place it could go?.........

I most certainly am not saying that, nor do I have the vaguest idea of what you mean by 'correct' paths. However, don't mind me. In all sincerity, I am in total awe of anyone who can work out all the intricacies of the path assignments of the trumps. I have neither the requisite wisdom nor the chutzpah.
 

Cheiromancer

Sorry, I must be on different pages of a different book.
I'll look more closely.

......But are you saying that if the Trumps were unnumbered it would be possible to assign them to the correct paths on the tree just based on the Tree's own balance of energies? That there is something about the Tower that means that path 27 is the only place it could go?.........

I most certainly am not saying that, nor do I have the vaguest idea of what you mean by 'correct' paths. However, don't mind me. In all sincerity, I am in total awe of anyone who can work out all the intricacies of the path assignments of the trumps. I have neither the requisite wisdom nor the chutzpah.

Sorry, I meant to respond to closrapexa. I was referring to the GD/Thoth assignments - 'conventional' would have been a better word. And in any event, I withdraw the question: it is perfectly conceivable for one thing to completely determine another without the second being deducible from the first. The example of atomic number determining chemical properties occurred to me during dinner. Six protons (plus enough neutrons to be stable) determines the chemical properties of carbon. But I don't think anyone could derive those properties.

But I had kind of thought that adepts knew the reasons for things. They didn't just sketch a pentagram, they knew how to construct one using compass and straight-edge. They didn't just use the seal of a goetic spirit, they knew (from Agrippa) how to derive it from the spirit's Hebrew name and the appropriate magic square; and which magic square to use was also something that could be determined. Etc.. I thought the assignments of the tree would be something that would not just be a brute fact inherited from the ancients, but would be something that could be worked out. Or at least tested as a hypothesis.
 

Zephyros

There ought to be a better way!

I would guess you're on the right way, not that I know the right way.

I thought that Kabbalah, Astrology and Tarot were all more or less independent, in that none can be completely described in terms of the others. They reveal affinities and synergies when you line them up, but one arrangement might conceal what another reveals.

I think they are, depending on your usage and practice. The GD Tarot, together with the card meanings, were superimposed on to the Tree, together with the assigned astrological attributions, not the other way 'round. The result of this forms a kind of equation in which a card can be expressed by the sum of its parts, for example Strength is what it is because it is the path leading from Chesed to Geburah, attributed to Tet and Leo. However, I wouldn't say Leo alone is Strength, nor can it be expressed merely as a serpent. Each attribution serves to shed light on the other, as you say, but I wouldn't go so far as to define the cards in a kabbalistic Tarot as only one element.

The reason I ask is that, while valid, you seem to be doing some reverse engineering, placing the paths according the card meanings. Now, I don't have any problem with that, I'm just used to the structure defining the makeup of the path. For example, I could see Temperance as healing, as you say, but there isn't anything inherently healing-ish about a tent-peg, or even about Sagitarius. That Temperance is Samech does not automatically make it Temperance, but only in a combination with the other factors. Move Temperance to, let's say, path 11 and attribute it to Gemini, would it still be Temperance? It ultimately depends on the narrative you're trying to tell with your Tree.

But are you saying that if the Trumps were unnumbered it would be possible to assign them to the correct paths on the tree just based on the Tree's own balance of energies? That there is something about the Tower that means that path 27 is the only place it could go?

The cards are pretty flexible, at least when compared to the alphabet. Once they were unnumbered, then they were numbered for (officially) non-esoteric reasons, then came others who said that in the seemingly arbitrary numbering there was actually meaing, as long as they were allowed to change the order. I wouldn't say that the Tower can only be in the place where it is, but rather that Peh has reasons for being there, and when connected with Mars the whole package "becomes" the Tower, because there is nothing inherently tower-like about a Mouth.
 

Cheiromancer

...you seem to be doing some reverse engineering, placing the paths according the card meanings.

That's a very succinct and accurate way of describing what I am doing. I am taking the Tarot Majors, with their basic RWS/TdM complex of meanings, and reverse engineering their placement on the Tree of Life. I don't buy the GD/Thoth arrangement because the 3-7-12 pattern of the paths (horizontal, vertical, diagonal) do not correspond to the placement of the elements, planets and signs of the zodiac.

I describe my procedure in the first post. If you have any questions, I'd be happy to elaborate. I think my placement of the zodiacal signs on the tree is pretty solid; the tarot cards maybe could be assigned differently (e.g. Decker thinks that the Devil is Saturn, and Venus the Star), but I'm used to them now and it would be discordant to change. The Hebrew letters have only a superficial role in the tree as I present it. The "referrals" provide interesting connections and symmetries, but aside from that it is just word associations and visual puns.

...Now, I don't have any problem with that, I'm just used to the structure defining the makeup of the path. For example, I could see Temperance as healing, as you say, but there isn't anything inherently healing-ish about a tent-peg, or even about Sagitarius. That Temperance is Samech does not automatically make it Temperance, but only in a combination with the other factors. Move Temperance to, let's say, path 11 and attribute it to Gemini, would it still be Temperance? It ultimately depends on the narrative you're trying to tell with your Tree.
I don't quite follow what you mean by "the structure defining the makeup of the path". But I think your last sentence is vitally true; the Tree tells a narrative (or maybe more than one; path of creation and path of return would be two) and much of that narrative is by virtue of the trumps.

And so whether key 14 is primarily a virtue, an allusion to reincarnation/resurrection or a good angel depends a lot on what is going on around it. If it joins two extremes, it will seem like the virtue of temperance. Especially if other virtuous cards are arranged to suggest a pattern (particularly Justice and Strength, with bonus points if the Priestess and/or Hierophant are also in the same pattern). Its native placement after key 13 suggests that it 'trumps death'. The water going from one vessel to another might be an allusion to the soul going from one body to another - reincarnation, or the resurrection of the dead on the day of Judgment? Either way it is new life. If it is placed opposite the Devil, then the aspect of the Good Angel gains weight. Structural considerations were enough for me to change its assignment to Aquarius from Sagittarius; I tried to keep the GD attributions, but the 3-7-12 pattern and domino effects often prevented me, and the emerging narrative of the tree led to other changes.

The cards are pretty flexible, at least when compared to the alphabet. Once they were unnumbered, then they were numbered for (officially) non-esoteric reasons, then came others who said that in the seemingly arbitrary numbering there was actually meaning, as long as they were allowed to change the order. I wouldn't say that the Tower can only be in the place where it is, but rather that Peh has reasons for being there, and when connected with Mars the whole package "becomes" the Tower, because there is nothing inherently tower-like about a Mouth.

I am pretty happy about how Peh ends up in my arrangement. Visually it is a sum of Beth and Yod, and if Yod is a divine spark/flash, it could well be expressed as lightning striking a house, which is basically what the Tower depicts. Decker's Esoteric Tarot argues that the Tower is Mars (pp 147 & 160), but the appearance of violence and destruction seems sufficiently warlike to require no argument. It's not a difficult assignment. Sagittarius, though - that's a head-scratcher.

Still, what are the reasons that put Peh and Mars on path 27? If Temperance were there, I could buy it; it reconciles the two halves of the tree, and symbolizes a harmonious blending of Reason (Hod) and Desire (Netzach). Hmmm... maybe it symbolizes the conflict between the two sides of the tree, and the difficulty of combining reason and desire? Sort of an anti-Temperance?

In my tree the Tower is a barrier to ascent. It warns the Magician not to build a tower of Babel to reach the heavens: such will inevitably be knocked down. In the GD system... hmm. It doesn't quite want to gell into a narrative.
 

Richard

The Tree is upside down. (The Hanged Man 'is a summary of the whole Path of Return' [Case: The True and Invisible Rosicrucian Order].) The roots of the Tree are at the 'top'. Driving in reverse seems unnatural. Bicycles don't even have a reverse gear. The body of a mountain climber is better adapted for the ascent than for the descent.

'Reversal' is the movement of the Tao.
'Weakness' [gentleness] is the function of the Tao.
The things of the world originate in being,
And being originates in non-being.
[Te-Tao Ching]​
 

hoomer

I have not found any particularly close connection between Kabbalah and Tarot. Perhaps I am not looking in the right places (its mostly what I find with simple google searches), or perhaps modern Kabbalah has taken pains to avoid the astrological and numerological conceits of modern occultists. Or perhaps there never was any connection, and it is merely a coincidence that the number of Trumps is the same as the number of Hebrew letters. After all, there are also 22 chapters in the Book of Revelation. Does that mean that they correspond to the Major Arcana?

There probably is NO grand origin of the connection between tarot and qabbalah... tarot appears to have been moulded to fit the tree, so yes the majors fit the tree.

There does sem to be a tendency to make the tree into a huge shopping list. I think this is a mistake.