Has qaballa been overtaken by science?

AmounrA

is the study of KaBaalaa and magic, in its wriitten (theory) side still important after a few years feet finding study?
Is it possible to miss the real tree (so to speak)because we spend our lives looking at a photograph of a tree?

Is deep study of the kabaalaa truely rewarding, has any one used it to real effect ? Or is it now defunct being over taken by the fields of science?
 

AmounrA

ka Baal AA

Having re read this thread I notice it sounds a bit harsh to the kabaala(i spell if different every time). This is not my intention.

I mean to say, the kabaala is for me undoubtableLY the tool by which i gained entry to 'MagICk' on a level where it was clear that something is going on. In many ways it left before me a series of doors which led off in various directions (on the great quest:)). But where it led me has never been to learn hebrew or the study of gematra.It more led me to science. More looking at the discoveries of science galaxies,electricity nevous systems etc.. with the view that everything is connected from 'within'. Nothing science has discovered points against it.. in fact it points to it.

My main use of kabaala is tree of life. My original point put better perhaps, is gematra, looking for double meaning in hebrew texts important to the 'kabalist'. Has the tree map now evolved well away from this medieval numbers game. Are the atomic numbers more important to deeper insight into the systems employed by nature (and then by proxy..'god').
 

jmd

Good to see you back, AmounrA.

To my mind, there are "maps" and then, there are 'maps', each mapping in some manner or other what it seeks to map.

With the Tree of Life, perhaps the mapping is more multilayered than some may want to make it - I'll follow through with this a little further, let me first try and explain what I mean my the various kinds of maps.

A terrain map basically shows an image of the landscape as it would be seen from above, with perhaps more abstracted or accentuated features depicted (for example, lines for roads, dots for towns or post offices, elevation lines, etc.). This kind of map is for a specific unique area.

A major city conceptual map would be more like an interconnected list of what makes a city finction effectively (educational and religious places, judicial, public and private transport, sewerage, government, stores, residential areas, etc.). This kind of map is more general, and applies to all major cities.

Another consideration is that a map of inter-relationships of still distinct elements may be applicable to more than one area. This is, to my mind, one of the brilliant effectiveness of the Tree of Life: on the one hand it is Adam Kadmon, thus archetypal Man; on the other a spiritual mapping of the whole manifested edifice.

To view, for example, the psychological dimensions of humanity as reflected in the various Sefirot is quite legitimate, though to 'reduce' the Tree of Life as solely a psychological 'model' is not. Similarly, the psycho-physiological-physical sciences may be viewed as reflected in the tree, but to 'reduce' the tree to it being 'simply' a model for the physical universe does not, to my way of thinking, do justice to its more essential characteristics.

In some manner, I personally would place all more physics within Malkut - to use a description of Dion Fortune (Mystical Qabalah, p 266) for this Sefirah (there is much of Dion Fortune's work I do not agree with, but this part I personally think she has captured brilliantly):
[Malkuth is to be understood as] the underlying noumenon of the physical plane which gives rise to all physical phenomena.​
As the underlying noumenon, the physical sciences investigate (even quantum physics) how this already manifests.

Of course, one may, using the Tree of Life in a different manner, analogically place various sciences in various Sefirot. This, however, is using the map provided in one manner that allows to perhaps see further inter-relationships that exists between the various sciences, rather than being the 'real' Tree (oops... what a concept to finish my post on!).
 

AmounrA

Thinking out loud..

Hello JMD :) And Kether is in Malkuth as Malkuth is in Kether.

"In some manner, I personally would place all more physics within Malkut"

The problem with this for me is it places the electron in the same sphere as say the Oak Tree. For me both are wildly different states of matter.one is perfect chaoes, one is (near) perfect order.

Study into sub atomic particles seems to imply in many ways that time does not effect them. That they can run forwards and backwards in time.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/story/0,3605,345099,00.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_slit_experiment

Once space and time are transcended, would that mean malkuth is transcended?Is a black hole a gateway out of malkuth. (and to jump science a little, is there tiny black holes at the heart of the subatomic world) It is believed that black holes lie at the heart of many galaxies, included the milky way.Does this mean anything spiritually? In many ways perhaps the perfect map would have only two spheres 'in' & 'out'.:)

In many ways the physical plane has a misty horizon.Perhaps 'god' needs space to think. Malkuth like a egg, inside which is the owl. That all the spheres below the abyss are very much dependent on there being a malkuth
(space with matter in it).
 

Philip

I feel the question is based on a incorrect assumption. The Kabbalah needs to be directly experienced, to study the kabbalah as one studies the theories of science is a wrong approach. The reason Dion Fortune wrote such a good book is because she awoke within those superior spheres of consciousness and directly perceived them.

To study the kabbalah in a purely intellectual manner is like reading a book to ride a bike and expecting to actually go somewhere. If you want to go, then you have to get on the bike and actually ride it. This is action. Sure, there is study involved, but it does not replace action. I state this because there are many people who have devoted their entire life to the study of the kabbalah, yet, what they achieved is nothing more than a head full of theories. Beautiful, intricate theories, yes, but ones that have never been directly experienced and are more or less useless at the end of day. How is that going to help someone? Alas, we have enormous books written on the Kabbalah that say this, or that, and the student is forced to suffer endlessly reading this theory and that theory, without ever knowing anything more than he already knew, and that is that really, he does not know anything at all. The young man grows old, his hair turns gray, and yet, he still never experiences any of the theories that fascinate him because he ignores the fact to study the kabbalah is not to live it.

Do you want to awaken with Yesod? Well, you know that Yesod is in your sexual glands, and palpitates within the universe as sexual-creative energy. Therefore, if you want to awaken within Yesod, transmute the sexual energy, sublimate it. Perform the first act of Jesus: Turn water into wine (Schamayim), and achieve Dionysian inebriation, god-intoxication. Then, you will know. Then, you can work you way up the spheres of the Tree of Life. Begin with Yesod, the foundation, the vestibule of knowledge, in order to receive the rest of the tree. Kabbalah is “to receive,” but not in an incipient, vague, theoretical, intellectual way, but in an experiential, living, profound, precise, clear and direct way.

It is said that the Kabbalah is the study of numbers, but if simple mathematics could achieve self realization, obviously the former task would be something mundane, ordinary and common. Authentic kabbalistic mathematical formula is intuitive and beyond what we ordinarily call “thought.” Therefore it is outside the scope of subjective science. Neither does it correspond to what is ordinarily considered mathematics – regardless, it is true mathematics. Kabbalah is the language of God, the language of dreams, the language of the superior words, the Verb of Gold, the voice of silence, the Pythagorean epistemology. The total self realization of one's existence is a kabbalistic mathematical formula that is solved through the awakening of the consciousness up and down throughout all of the sepheria.
 

AmounrA

Hello Philip. My way of introduction to the cabbala was through pathworking rather than books, so i completly understand what you mean by direct experiance.

I personally dont see kabbalah as the language of god. Perhaps the spirals within the sunflower are more the language of a god.1.618... is not a cabbalistik number, it is a number of science(math), as is the fibonacci chain. http://www.mcs.surrey.ac.uk/Personal/R.Knott/Fibonacci/fib.html
The language of dreams is not for me kabalistic either, all creatures dream. For me dreams are the abstract workings of the inner mind, helping the brain sort out data.(stressed people tend to have stressful dreams). That for me does not detract from the wonder of dreams. I am a devoted student of day dreaming.Kaballa symbolism, for me, is something that can show up in dreams, but is not the dream-master.

Saying "one's existence is a kabbalistic mathematical formula that is solved through the awakening of the consciousness up and down throughout all of the sepheria",for me does not ring true. Existance upon the physical plane does contain mathamatical formulas..but not gleamed from the quaballah.

For me science is no threat to the spiritually minded. All its discoveries for me, have only added to the wonder of universe & life within it.

The magick in life for me is if i desire a cup of tea i can make one. Not being able to levitate tables or turn water into wine.Perhaps the glue is synchronicity rather than the kabballah.
 

Dulcimer

AmounrA said:
The problem with this for me is it places the electron in the same sphere as say the Oak Tree. For me both are wildly different states of matter.one is perfect chaoes, one is (near) perfect order.
Hi AmounrA.

The Tree of Life is a universal model. Each sephirah on the Tree contains another Tree. Each of those sephiroth contains a Tree, and so on. Also, each micro-system is divided into its own Four Worlds. Therefore, the oak tree in Malkuth also contains the Tree of Life model in abstract, in which is contained another Tree of Life in each of its sephiroth. So a place can be found for the molecules, atoms, electrons, quarks, and strings both collectively and individually if you wish. But whether a charged particle would be in Malkuth would a matter [pardon the pun] for conjecture (I would put an electron, having a negative charge, on the left Pillar at, say, Geburah).

AmounrA said:
Study into sub atomic particles seems to imply in many ways that time does not effect them. That they can run forwards and backwards in time.
Correct! As matter approaches the speed of light its observable time gets slower and slower until, when it reaches light-speed, its observable time = zero. Therefore, time for a photon - or any electromagnetic particle - has no meaning.

AmounrA said:
Once space and time are transcended, would that mean malkuth is transcended?Is a black hole a gateway out of malkuth. (and to jump science a little, is there tiny black holes at the heart of the subatomic world) It is believed that black holes lie at the heart of many galaxies, included the milky way.Does this mean anything spiritually? In many ways perhaps the perfect map would have only two spheres 'in' & 'out'.
Firstly, its spacetime. It is all one thing.
Its a question I've often asked myself. I have contented myself with the following; if I can change and move around then I have, by definition, not left spacetime. Asleep and dreaming, ie Yesod, has different rules to my waking state, ie Malkuth, but things change so time must pass. And since time and space is really all one thing then I have not transcended spacetime even though I'm no longer in Malkuth :).

A blackhole will crush you into a singularity (an infinitely small point) so, yes it would be an escape from Malkuth. But any kind of "wormhole" bridge would only take you to another Universe. That is, another Malkuth. As Jesus said "If the Kingdom of Heaven were in the sky, the birds would precede you".

Blackholes are not only proving to be at the centre of most galaxies, but are now believed to be the cause of the galaxies! But no, there aren't likely to be tiny blackholes formed at the sub-atomic level due to the conditions necessary to create them. You should look into "string theory", however, which is a truly beautiful idea which any Kabbalist will find they are already in tune with [another pun. Sorry].

AmounrA said:
...all the spheres below the abyss are very much dependent on there being a malkuth
Daath isn't traditionally considered to be one of the sephiroth because it was actually the place occupied by Malkuth before the Fall, the removal of which created the Abyss. Also, the six sephiroth from Chesed to Yesod is the microcosm contained in Malkuth. So you might say that all the sephiroth below the Abyss are Malkuth!
Only by getting above the Abyss can you escape Malkuth. But whether that means you have even then escaped spacetime will have to wait until we experience it.

I remember reading someplace that the left Path of Severity is the path of science, the right Path of Mercy is the path of art, but that it is the middle Path of Balance which is the way of the Kabbalist.

Thanks for the thread. Its nice to talk physics for a change.;)
 

MichaelK

AmounrA said:
Is it possible to miss the real tree (so to speak)because we spend our lives looking at a photograph of a tree?

A lot of time I'm thinking about connection between sephirots and chakras for example.
All of the things, events and situations in this world can be placed within one of the sephirots and so each one has its color and value.
Similarly, all our feelings, emotions and energies can be placed under one of the chakras. I may be wrong but I'm thinking this is the "real tree" just because that one is your personal world.

Although, it can also be said that actions and procedures described for working with the tree of life and the ones for working with chakras are just two paths to the same place..
 

Dulcimer

MichaelK said:
...it can also be said that actions and procedures described for working with the tree of life and the ones for working with chakras are just two paths to the same place..

It can also be said that the Tree of Life and the chakras are two views of the same thing.
 

Ventrue

Dulcimer said:
Blackholes are not only proving to be at the centre of most galaxies, but are now believed to be the cause of the galaxies! But no, there aren't likely to be tiny blackholes formed at the sub-atomic level due to the conditions necessary to create them. You should look into "string theory", however, which is a truly beautiful idea which any Kabbalist will find they are already in tune with [another pun. Sorry].

I have read a few essays on string theory, and one in particular that related string theory to kaballist views. There were more than a few similarities. Thats why this grabs me so much I think, because it just MAKES SENSE to me. It's said every person is given a measure of faith, and since i began studying the kaballah I just couldn't have faith because it didn't make sense to me...<end rant>

Ven