Ayumi said:
Several interesting notions Venicebard, particularly the idea about Mars being "a mother defending her offspring". I've never thought about Mars from that perspective before. Would you mind listing your sources, so we can explore further?
Ayumi
Well, the planetary cycles are as they are given in Hermetic Kabbalah (that and the letter-paths being all I trust it on), with the proviso that the sun is not just the year (6) but the great year (2) that coordinates year and day (ecliptic and equator), which is, by the way,
forward rotation of the heavens about the zodiac in
effect, though indeed it is precession of the latter about the former in terms of what
causes it of course.
Beyond that, it was my own deduction from first principles (number, etc.) based on knowledge from other aspects of (bardic) Qabbalah that those fashioning the system knew the atomic numbers and what these signified in terms of both valence and human use.
As for the Tree in Cups, this is my interpretation of it based in part on what is set forth in the book
Thinking and Destiny, by Harold W. Percival, but also simply on logic: from a neutral (1) come male and female (2-3), which become a new male and female (4-5) to produce offspring (6), and a third male and female type (7-8) when producing dual (unagreed-upon) offspring (9-10). This produces four 'earths', in the pattern of the tetraktys of Pythagoras: 1, where Adam Qadmon dwells, 2-3 where the test of balance occurs, 4-5-6 where the test is failed and creation is replaced by procreation (mortality), and 7-8-9-10 where desire-to-procreate is replaced by lust (hence suffering). We, of course, inhabit this fourth 'earth'.