Cartomancer
More about the ten stems and twelve branches
The correspondences between the alphabet and the Chinese ten stems and twelve branches may have been obscured by the antiquity of the symbols and their meanings, but Moran did see a correspondence between the zodiac constellation Sagittarius and the alphabetic letter tsade, as both have a connection to an arrow. Moran was not able to capitalize on the tip given him by his venerable master Yeh Hsien Seng regarding correspondences between the twenty-two Chinese horary signs and the early alphabet, but did make another discovery that became the basis of his thesis.
When Moran compared the alphabet to the Chinese lunar calendar he found a correspondence that matched. When he consulted the Chinese astrological book called Yung Tai Ta Ch’eng he noticed that the twenty-eight lunar characters were matched with stars that were drawn as circles and connected by lines. Figure 6 in his book shows a Map of the River of Heaven from the Yung Tai Ta Ch’eng and depicts the lunar asterisms with the Milky Way as the "River of Heaven" stretched across the northern sky. He immediately noticed that the Chinese character 'nui' meant ‘the ox’ and decided that it corresponded to the Hebrew letter aleph, which means ‘the bull’. He went around the circle of the Chinese lunar signs and found startling correspondences that he postulated could not have arisen from chance. He then investigated the correspondences and noted the similarities in meanings between the letters of the Hebrew alphabet and the Chinese lunar signs.
Moran then went on to investigate the meanings of the Hebrew letters and Chinese lunar signs from the point of view of a dualistic philosophy. He tied the two systems together using word meanings of the letters and their possible correspondences to the word meanings of the Chinese lunar signs. He also took into account the letter forms and resemblances to constellations and ‘subconstellations’ or minor asterisms. He noted that the letters of the Hebrew and Greek alphabets have both a numerical and phonetic value and suggests that the use of the alphabet for numerical purposes may have predated its use as a phonetic tool. He also states that the letters of the alphabet could have been directly derived from constellations. He simply saw the alphabet arising from astrological signs.
Moran theorized that writing was first used to record astronomical information that corresponded to harvests, equinoxes and solstices, lunar phases, lucky and unlucky days, and events such as eclipses. The writing system that evolved into the alphabet could have been based upon the existing symbols used to record celestial symbols such as the sun, moon, and constellations. Moran notes that the phonetic symbols used by the Chinese, Sumerians, and Egyptians could have had an astrological basis. He suggests that the alphabet was a form of shorthand that was inevitable as the written form became simplified and presents a theory about a clever priest or leader that experimented with written characters and developed a form of shorthand using the astrological symbols available in his local area, but only used twenty-two symbols because that was all that was necessary for the Semitic languages they used at that time. Could the alphabet symbols found in Egypt have been created by a clever Canaanite priest who knew Egyptian hieroglyphic writing? Could the Tarot have later been created by another clever priest or scholar who knew the secret of the alphabet and wanted to encode that information for future generations. Next, diffusion of the alphabet will be investigated. Could the Tarot be the result of cultural diffusion much in the same way that the alphabet was spread around the world?
- Cartomancer (Lance Carter)
The correspondences between the alphabet and the Chinese ten stems and twelve branches may have been obscured by the antiquity of the symbols and their meanings, but Moran did see a correspondence between the zodiac constellation Sagittarius and the alphabetic letter tsade, as both have a connection to an arrow. Moran was not able to capitalize on the tip given him by his venerable master Yeh Hsien Seng regarding correspondences between the twenty-two Chinese horary signs and the early alphabet, but did make another discovery that became the basis of his thesis.
When Moran compared the alphabet to the Chinese lunar calendar he found a correspondence that matched. When he consulted the Chinese astrological book called Yung Tai Ta Ch’eng he noticed that the twenty-eight lunar characters were matched with stars that were drawn as circles and connected by lines. Figure 6 in his book shows a Map of the River of Heaven from the Yung Tai Ta Ch’eng and depicts the lunar asterisms with the Milky Way as the "River of Heaven" stretched across the northern sky. He immediately noticed that the Chinese character 'nui' meant ‘the ox’ and decided that it corresponded to the Hebrew letter aleph, which means ‘the bull’. He went around the circle of the Chinese lunar signs and found startling correspondences that he postulated could not have arisen from chance. He then investigated the correspondences and noted the similarities in meanings between the letters of the Hebrew alphabet and the Chinese lunar signs.
Moran then went on to investigate the meanings of the Hebrew letters and Chinese lunar signs from the point of view of a dualistic philosophy. He tied the two systems together using word meanings of the letters and their possible correspondences to the word meanings of the Chinese lunar signs. He also took into account the letter forms and resemblances to constellations and ‘subconstellations’ or minor asterisms. He noted that the letters of the Hebrew and Greek alphabets have both a numerical and phonetic value and suggests that the use of the alphabet for numerical purposes may have predated its use as a phonetic tool. He also states that the letters of the alphabet could have been directly derived from constellations. He simply saw the alphabet arising from astrological signs.
Moran theorized that writing was first used to record astronomical information that corresponded to harvests, equinoxes and solstices, lunar phases, lucky and unlucky days, and events such as eclipses. The writing system that evolved into the alphabet could have been based upon the existing symbols used to record celestial symbols such as the sun, moon, and constellations. Moran notes that the phonetic symbols used by the Chinese, Sumerians, and Egyptians could have had an astrological basis. He suggests that the alphabet was a form of shorthand that was inevitable as the written form became simplified and presents a theory about a clever priest or leader that experimented with written characters and developed a form of shorthand using the astrological symbols available in his local area, but only used twenty-two symbols because that was all that was necessary for the Semitic languages they used at that time. Could the alphabet symbols found in Egypt have been created by a clever Canaanite priest who knew Egyptian hieroglyphic writing? Could the Tarot have later been created by another clever priest or scholar who knew the secret of the alphabet and wanted to encode that information for future generations. Next, diffusion of the alphabet will be investigated. Could the Tarot be the result of cultural diffusion much in the same way that the alphabet was spread around the world?
- Cartomancer (Lance Carter)