dream about Yesod to Netzach

isthmus nekoi

Hi Venicebard,

Thanks for your reply! It seems we have very different discursive backgrounds, so I admit I only understand half of what you're saying in regards to the details, so if I misinterpret, please excuse me!

- BoT can seem a mishmash of various systems, so I take no offense lol.

- Lacan (not a type, I meant that in a colloquial sense) was a post-Freudian philosopher who basically took all the biology out of Freud, but used all the same concepts by applying them to language. To crudely sum up his writing, he believed the acquisition of language, of difference = the acquisition of consciousness. That's not all of course, but for the purpose of this thread, that should suffice.

- OK, I find this very interesting that 10 is where consciousness is. And I agree, there's really no going backwards from that. I think the reason I saw a backwards progression from 10 to 1 was b/c I relate 10, the material, to the body, the unconscious. I think I was thinking that 1=spirit and 10=flesh, like they are different poles of the same thing and the tree was showing the change from matter to energy, energy to matter.

Would you say then, that instead of this polar model, the tree is a representation of BOTH the development of mind/body, that they are one and the same?
 

venicebard

Well, the two are a single whole in the round itself, the traversing of the round being the means of 'differentiating' them, of distinguishing one's acting from one's ability to act (a particle does whatever it can, whereas the hero does only what is heroic, shunning all other possibilities).

But as for spirit-to-matter progression (1-10), this is not too off the mark: it is progression from one Whole to one ten-fingered. What makes it end in 'matter' is the Fall: as individuals, we have each undergone the Fall, meaning we are doers led by the senses, rather than by conscience (for which 'God' is an inadequate substitute, being external). This has produced a 'broken-and-extended' zodiac (round), S-shaped, in which scorpio through pisces continue on down the legs to the feet rather than up the spine to the head. This turns the last three Sefirot (8th-9th-10th) down, rather than up, signifying the doer hypnotized by the senses, rather than fully awake. It is the broken-and-extended zodiac that caused Lurianic Kabbalah to call 7th and 8th the legs and 9th the male member (dragged down from its circumcised station, 8th or scorpio), methinks.
 

isthmus nekoi

Ah that is interesting. Totally unrelated system but this is very much like Taoist thinking in which "energy" is lost when it spills out (and is wasted) either as semen or menstrual blood (instead of running back up the spine).
 

venicebard

Yes, or the doctrine of kundalini. In spite of Crowley's claim to the contrary, Light of the Intelligence is 'lost' to nature via the sexual act, though when lawfully invoked it at least leads to the creation of a new body.