Tzaddi is not the Star
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@Her said
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@Jim Eshelman said
"Oh, I see: You wanted a literal zodiacal sequence all the way through the 12. Yeah, you're right, I don't think it's important that it isn't quite that."How so? In the Book of Thoth (p.9-10) Crowley claims the double loop in the zodiac is the "most convincing evidence possible that the Book of the Law is a genuine message from the Secret Chiefs.""
<sigh> We're just going in loops, here, so I'm probably about ready to stop responding.
He just had the wrong loop. It isn't in the zodiac, it'/s in the relationship of the trump numbers to the Hebrew letters. The Book of Thoth is the worst-proofread major work Crowley ever wrote. There are numerous errors, little slips and goofs all the way through it. The essential work is sound - it just never had an editor or even solid proofreading.
"The diagram on page 11 really does show a double loop in the zodiac. Unfortunately it messes up the Hebrew letter and card sequences."
Yes. It's a goof. The final result, however you draw it, has to reflect (the zodiacal parts of) the following table:
0 -- The Fool -- Air -- Alef
1 -- The Magus -- Mercury -- Beyth
2 -- The Priestess -- Moon -- Gimel
3 -- The Empress -- Venus -- Daleth
4 -- The Emperor -- Aries -- Tzaddiy
5 -- The Hierophant -- Taurus -- Vav
6 -- The Lovers -- Gemini -- Zayin
7 -- The Chariot -- Cancer -- Cheyth
8 -- Adjustment -- Libra -- Lamed
9 -- The Hermit -- Virgo -- Yod
10 -- Fortune -- Jupiter -- Kaf
11 -- Lust -- Leo -- Teyth
12 -- The Hanged Man -- Water -- Meym
13 -- Death -- Scorpio -- Noon
14 -- Art -- Sagittarius -- Samekh
15 -- The Devil -- Capricorn -- A'ayin
16 -- The Tower -- Mars -- Peh
17 -- The Star -- Aquarius -- Hé
18 -- The Moon -- Pisces -- Qof
19 -- The Sun -- Sun -- Reysh
20 -- The Æon -- Fire -- Shiyn
21 -- The Universe -- Saturn -- Tav"The diagram that Gnosomai Emauton posted is in reality not much different from Crowley's. It gets the Hebrew letters and card sequence right but at the expense of the zodiac. It's just an inverse image of Crowley's diagram but with the same fundamental flaw. It's the exact same data set just displayed in a different way."
It correctly portrays the pattern, which (despite that badly worded phrase in The Book of Thoth) is about the Tarot trump numbers and the Hebrew letters.
"The fact of the matter is that it is not possible to have perfect symmetry in all three sequences"
Exactly! That's what I've said all along. The one that is not rigorously mapped is the zodiac (though, even there, the essential pattern is evident).
@Aleister Crowley said
"For "The Star" is referred to Aquarius in the Zodiac, and "The Emperor' to Aries. Now Aries and Aquarius are on each side of Pisces, just as Leo and Libra are on each side of Virgo; that is to say, the correction in the Book of the Law gives a perfect symmetry in the zodiacal attribution, just as if a loop were formed at one end of the ellipse to correspond exactly with the existing loop at the other end."
Yes, as you've correctly quoted before. But it's wrong (as I've said before). It's bad proofreading (though it does make his broad point well enough.)
"The problem with the above statement is that the "correction in the Book of the Law" only mentions cards and letters."
Yes, because that's what's actually looping rigorously.
"But according to Crowley this 'correction' also has a knock on effect on the zodiac as well."
Yes, his statement is sloppily composed.
"But this would only be true if the IV-XVII swap exactly matched the VIII-XI swap. It's a very simple point of logic proven by both diagrams."
Your "simple point of logic" collapses when one of its veiled premises collapses: You are presuming that the passage in The Book of Thoth is correctly written. It isn't. You are building an argument on an invalid premise.
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@Her said
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@Takamba said
"It seems rather simple to me, I don't understand the argument against it. Here's what I'm seeing (the blue arrows represent the order of the signs and numbers, the red arrows show the order of the letters). This seems quite beautiful to me."Take a second look. Since when did the order of the zodiac go from Cancer to Libra or from Leo to Scorpio?
"It doesn't, you're looking at the wrong arrows. It goes from Leo to Virgo and Libra to Scorpio (red arrows the Zodiac, blue arrows the letters). It's a symmetry of two different motions. You look again.
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@Takamba said
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@Her said
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@Takamba said
"It seems rather simple to me, I don't understand the argument against it. Here's what I'm seeing (the blue arrows represent the order of the signs and numbers, the red arrows show the order of the letters). This seems quite beautiful to me."Take a second look. Since when did the order of the zodiac go from Cancer to Libra or from Leo to Scorpio?
"It doesn't, you're looking at the wrong arrows. It goes from Leo to Virgo and Libra to Scorpio (red arrows the Zodiac, blue arrows the letters). It's a symmetry of two different motions. You look again."
Take another look now that you've changed your mind about the arrows. You've simply swapped one problem for another. On the red arrows you've now actually got a double loop around Virgo. Great!
But at the other end you've got a mess. Capricorn going to Aries!
And Aquarius going to Taurus. -
@Jim Eshelman said
"<sigh> We're just going in loops, here, so I'm probably about ready to stop responding."
Yeah, I know. Most of the points you repeat I know but some new things/questions pop out sometimes.
@Jim Eshelman said
"Exactly! That's what I've said all along. The one that is not rigorously mapped is the zodiac (though, even there, the essential pattern is evident)."
I would not call that a pattern because it does not repeat - it's just a zodiac circle crippled at 1 point.
@Her said
" But this would only be true if the IV-XVII swap exactly matched the VIII-XI swap. It's a very simple point of logic proven by both diagrams."
@Jim Eshelman said
"Your "simple point of logic" collapses when one of its veiled premises collapses: You are presuming that the passage in The Book of Thoth is correctly written. It isn't. You are building an argument on an invalid premise."
I would say you, Jim, are building an argument on an invalid premise because (see my post from before) Crowley's post-CCXX The New Comment (c. 1921) chap. 1 line 57 talks in same words about the topic as The Book of Thoth. They both can't be wrong can they? Crowley even tells us that he changed not only the letters but the zodiac signs too making 4 Tzaddi Aquarius The Emperor, 17 He Aries The Star. I got the same in my 2007 Book of Thoth print on page 278.
Sorry if I'm disturbing someone, I am just trying to make factual arguments in the discussion and see what are others factual arguments.
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@Her said
"Take another look now that you've changed your mind about the arrows. You've simply swapped one problem for another. On the red arrows you've now actually got a double loop around Virgo. Great!
But at the other end you've got a mess. Capricorn going to Aries! And Aquarius going to Taurus. "Oops, haste makes waste. Here's the corrected diagram (Gnosomai's design with my arrows)
https://i1352.photobucket.com/albums/q648/Takamba93/TarotDoubleLoop_zps88d03abc.jpg
Below is using the order Crowley drew them in
https://i1352.photobucket.com/albums/q648/Takamba93/CrowleysTarotDoubleLoop_zps732a6950.jpg
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@Modes said
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@Jim Eshelman said
"Exactly! That's what I've said all along. The one that is not rigorously mapped is the zodiac (though, even there, the essential pattern is evident)."I would not call that a pattern because it does not repeat - it's just a zodiac circle crippled at 1 point."
You can't say it doesn't have a pattern just because it has a different pattern than the one you want to see. (And you're only using one half of your cerebral cortex. Get the right hemisphere in play. Don't be so left-sided.)
"I would say you, Jim, are building an argument on an invalid premise"
Start with the attributions (see table in my last post). Then see what patterns exist in them.
"I got the same in my 2007 Book of Thoth print on page 278."
The Book of Thoth is not reedited when it is republished. None of the many small errors have ever been fixed.
"Sorry if I'm disturbing someone, I am just trying to make factual arguments in the discussion and see what are /others factual arguments."
I'm rather lost on what your goal is. I thought it was to understand the pattern. It seems, instead, that you are trying to prove some position of your own instead.
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"Sorry if I'm disturbing someone, I am just trying to make factual arguments in the discussion and see what are /others factual arguments."
@Jim Eshelman said
"I'm rather lost on what your goal is. I thought it was to understand the pattern. It seems, instead, that you are trying to prove some position of your own instead."
I think I understand now the pattern you are trying to show/advocate but I can't see enough factual arguments for me to endorse it myself. I don't have a position myself - I just like to compare/discuss/understand various positions on the topic. Thanks for your help.
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Found it. From the Zohar.
"26. Subsequently, the letter Tzadik appeared before the Creator and said: “Master of the world, You should create the world with me, for Tzadikim (the righteous) are marked by me. You, who is called a Tzadik (righteous one), are also recorded within me, for You are righteous and You love righteousness. Therefore, my properties are suitable to create the world by.”
The Creator answered: “Tzadik, you are truly righteous, but you must remain concealed and not be revealed to the extent required were the world to be created by you, so as to not give the world an excuse.” The concealment of the letter Tzadik is necessary, for first came the letter Nun, which was then joined by the letter Yod from the Creator’s Holy Name Yod-Hey-Vav-Hey (HaVaYaH), who stood above it as a mark of the bond between the Creator and His creations, mounted the letter Nun and joined it on its right hand side, thereby creating the letter Tzadik."
It's... not as suggestive as I thought it was, but somebody tried to make the point once, and it stuck with me.
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Aion, are you sure you aren't thinking of the same remark about Tzaddiy?
Or maybe the paragraph on Heh in 32vPaths of Wisdom? I'm not remembering quote but recall tone as similar.
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Aion, now that I'm not commuting and can look something up... I wonder if you were remembering the tone (more than the specific language) of the paragraph on Hé from The 32 Paths of Wisdom. It translates as follows:
@32PW on H said
"The Fifteenth Path is called the Constituting Consciousness, because it constitutes the Substance of Creation in pure darkness. According to masters of contemplation, this is that darkness referred to in Scripture, “and thick darkness its swaddling band.”"
The phrase I translated “pure darkness” is arafeley tahor. Kaplan, who translated it “Glooms of Purity,” remarked that this expression is found in the Musaf service for Rash Hashanah at the beginning of Shofrot, relating to the revelation at Sinai. Arafeley comes from a similar word meaning “the darkness of clouds” or “thick clouds;” hence Kaplan’s “gloom.” Tahor, “pure” (=220), is the name the mode of consciousness attributed to Y’sod.
"Masters of contemplation" likely means those that have mastered dhyana, and certainly no one without this capacity is likely to be able to perceive the condition described.
The closing phrase. “thick darkness its swaddling band,” is a direct quote from Job 38:9, va-arafel ḥathoollatho.
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@Jim Eshelman said
"Aion, are you sure you aren't thinking of the same remark about Tzaddiy?"
I'm not sure why that version I cut and pasted uses "Tzadik" with the k on the end. But, yes, I'm referring to the letter.
Thanks for the quote from 32 Paths of Wisdom as well.
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I wasn't worried about the K. You said you were looking for a quote on Hé being hidden, and I was asking if maybe you meant the passage I referenced about Tzaddiy being hidden (from the Zohar, in the story of how Alef got to be the first letter of the alphabet).
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@Jim Eshelman said
"Aion, are you sure you aren't thinking of the same remark about Tzaddiy?"
Yes, that's the one. I think maybe you missed where I quoted it above your post. It's the first post after the page break, so.. Unless I'm completely missing your intent.
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I am fascinated that this thread has had over 80,000 views!
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@Jim Eshelman said
"I am fascinated that this thread has had over 80,000 views!"
I imagine the subject matter is quite a search-bot magnet. It's also quite a long thread, which means many of us have viewed it again and again and again.
I see it as 80,666 views. 
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Sorry to bump this behemoth back into life, .... but I've been digging into this whole mess lately, and would like to take a stab at summarizing this in as clear a manner as possible (and to verify I have this correct in the first place!)
1: Prior to the Golden Dawn, the generally accepted trump order was that of Eliphas Levi (I won't bother detailing the earlier arrangements), which has the curious quirk of placing '0 - the Fool' between XX and XXI,
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To make it quite clear to initiates that they did not understand the meaning of the card called The Fool, they put him down between Atu cards XX and XXI, for what reason it baffles the human imagination to conceive. They then attributed the card number I, the Juggler, to the letter Aleph. In this simple yet ingenious manner they got the attribution of every card, except The Universe, XXI, wrong.
-- Crowley
"2: Golden Dawn makes two key changes; '0 - the Fool' is promoted to the first of the trumps, advancing all other cards by one letter (which also brings the letter=zodiac attributions in line with the Sepher Yetzirah), and 2: Mathers swaps the ATU images around for Strength (Fortitude) and Justice to 'fix' their images with the zodiac, which pretty clearly depict Leo/Libra. The Roman numbering is preserved by natural order of the cards.
3: "Tzaddi is not the Star", and here we are. Crowley swaps the Emperor & the Star cards, keeping the roman numbers IV & XVII attached to them, and additionally 'restores' the original numerals of Justice as VIII and Strength as XI (his reasoning undoubtedly reinforced by his Qabalistic interpretations of these numbers). It is this arrangement of the 'original' roman numerals, when the zodiac cards are ordered by their hebrew letters, which gives rise to the infamous 'double loop' pattern.
It should be noted though how this change was made, for Crowley has not moved the hebrew letters around for the Tzaddi switch - as HEH remains on path 15 and TZADDI on path 28 - but he has swapped all the other attributes of the Tarot cards: the ATU, roman numeral, and associated zodiac sign. In switching the zodiac signs with his change to IV & XVII, however, he has broken with the Sepher Yetzirah attribution of TZADDI=Aquarius and HE=Aries, and created a one-sided 'loop' in the zodiac.
Situation sound about right?
This is most clearly illustrated as a whole; (see attached image);
center -> out: path#, hebrew letter, zodiac, atu, roman numeral -
Yes, you got it right - in so many words. We have two designs:
Waite Tarot: letters, numbers and zodiac forming a circle
Crowley Thoth Tarot (Jim picked this one): letters, numbers forming a double loop and zodiac forming only a single loop at Leo & LibraAnd My picked imaginary Tarot: letters, numbers and zodiac forming a double loop thus requiring recoloring and change of symbolism the card The Emperor being Tzaddi - Aquarius and The Star - He - Aries. That is why I bought the Marseille's deck.
To put it simple I re quote Jim and myself:
Me: I see in Waite's arrangement a harmony of letters, numbers and zodiac forming a circle.
Jim: Unfortunately, it's wrong. His biggest weakness was in being overly mentally formal (i.e., stuffy).
Me: The double loop in Jim's arrangement has the harmony of letters and numbers but not the zodiac.
Jim: Exactly. The letters vs. numbers pattern seems to be what matters. (Think of it from the point of view of Tarot's designers.)