jmd
Of interest in Kabalah is whether what may be of greater relevance is a letter's ordinal (first, second, ..., tenth, eleventh, etc) or cardinal (1, 2, 3, ..., 10, 20, etc) value.
This has special sinificance if one considers some of the Kabalistic claims and counterclaims which have been made for Hebrew-Atouts correlations - irrespective as to whether Alef is to be associated with the Bateleur/Magician, the World, or the Fool.
For myself, in terms of Atouts/Hebrew letter correlations, I consider the ordinal value of greater importance - after all, the twelfth letter has a (cardinal) value of thirty, and there are not thirty Atouts (nor thirty letters, for that matter).
If the ordinal value is considered of greater merit, this does not of course show that there exists an intrinsic connection between the Hebrew letters and the Atouts, but rather that comments against correlations based on cardinal value are irrelevent.
This has special sinificance if one considers some of the Kabalistic claims and counterclaims which have been made for Hebrew-Atouts correlations - irrespective as to whether Alef is to be associated with the Bateleur/Magician, the World, or the Fool.
For myself, in terms of Atouts/Hebrew letter correlations, I consider the ordinal value of greater importance - after all, the twelfth letter has a (cardinal) value of thirty, and there are not thirty Atouts (nor thirty letters, for that matter).
If the ordinal value is considered of greater merit, this does not of course show that there exists an intrinsic connection between the Hebrew letters and the Atouts, but rather that comments against correlations based on cardinal value are irrelevent.