“A depth of good and a depth of evil.”
2002 – 2003 Leicester
Before discussing the Letter study itself, I want to mention the study of the Sefirot themselves which accompanied the Angel study. So much can be gained from a study of the theoretical Qabalah as it relates to the Sefirot that it would be foolish of me toattempt to list all that I learned through the study of Ch.1. of the Sefer Yetzirah so I will attempt to synthesise what I believe are the most important points
- Depths
- Polarity
- Unification
Depths
The Sefirot are referred to as “Ten Sefirot Belimah”, the word Belimah being a word which is often inferred (within this context) as meaning “nothingness” so the verse reads “Ten Sefirot of Nothingness” , which are derived from Nothingness (or No End, En Sof) as the modes through which God (Elohim) acts in the world. An alternative interpretation of this phrase “Ten Sefirot Belimah” can mean Ten Sefirot “without anything” or rather “Ten Sefirot without consonants” implying the vowel sounds as opposed to the mothers, doubles and simples which are explicitly united withconsonants (after working with the SY I favour this second interpretation – you will see why later). In one particularly powerful verse we read about ten depths – “a depth of good and a depth of evil” and so on with a depth for all six spatial directions (NWSEand Up and Down) as well as the two temporal ones (Beginning and End). Meditation on this idea produces a profound sensation of being “inside” an infinite universe of possibility and freedom of movement in time, space and morality. It also yields a realization that a loose abstraction of morality, i.e. that you are good or bad as an absolute fact about you, fails the self in question, and it’s more of a case of “how good can you be?”, the answer of course being that “there is no end to your Good”. The greatest realization for me, building on this idea, is that human intelligence is better thought of as a depth, an emptiness, or rather a “capacity” for idea, for sensation, for action – as opposed to a list of information one has acquired and which one can regurgitate on cue, or a flair for logic or reason – and also an appreciation that all human life has thisdepth or capacity although it often lacks an awareness of the “depth within”. What room the mind has!
Polarity
The ten Sefirot are then conceived of as a system of opposites, of five polarities (up/down, north/west, good/evil, etc) which extend to infinity. Out of these polarities emerge the structure of Etz Chaiim – The Tree of Life, which is a model ofinterconnectedness of the system of Sefirot via Hebrew letters. The specific letter attributions themselves are so much up for debate that the only important point to recognise at this point is that letters do connect to paths although exactly how so we willreturn to later at the end of this essay. For now we should just realize that the Sefirot areinterconnected and this interconnection leads from polarity to relativity. “Good” then, is connected to and defined by “Evil” as “East” is defined by “West”. Long hours of meditation on this system leads to the construction of a “mental compass” and a significant development of the internal communication system of the mind; one, quite literally, builds neurological bridges in the mind, connections are made that weren’tthere before as in the development of any skill. From my own work on the theoretical structure of the Tree of Life, I would argue that my reflexes have quickenedalongside my thoughts, and my ideas are developed much more fluidly and fluently than they were before. There are numerous other changes I could cite, buthey, enough about me!
Unification
“The end is in the beginning and the beginning is imbedded in the end” so reads Ch.1 v.7 of the Sefer Yetzirah. Via the Sefirot we have meditated on both the infinity of direction, spatial, temporal and moral, and the connection between those directions inthe sense of self – Am I in the north? Am I good? Am I young? We find that whatever direction we move towards extends into infinity and therefore the meeting point of all directions, moving outwards from the self, is infinity itself, En Sof or No End. Sincean equal amount of Good and an equal amount of Evil, or an equal amount of any pair of opposites are tantamount to 1 + -1 = 0 we find that the meeting point of all Sefirot moves towards the self is indeed nothingness – “Belimah”. Through extension andcontraction of the sense of self, towards infinity and towards nothingness we have identified a new polarity – infinity and zero which we combine into the conceptof the Sefirot. Each Sefira has the capacity of both infinity and zero. The Sefirot now, have been reduced to a singular form “Sefira” and it is with this concept of “Sefira” we have established our Foundation.
The relationship between one, infinity and zero is interesting and underpins all mathematics.