Plato’s Divided Line: The Two Faces of Thought and Thinking

The Division Between Love (Eros) and Thinking (Logos)

The most popular site on this blog is Plato’s allegory of the Cave. I am somewhat puzzled by this as the Allegory presents many difficulties as far as its understanding is concerned when it comes to relating it to the ethics and morals required by the Core of the Theory of Knowledge course. The Allegory cannot be properly understood without some knowledge of the Divided Line from Bk VI of Republic .(506c – 511e) Also, one requires some knowledge of Plato’s theory of the tripartite soul that he believed is the essence of human beings. For Plato, the human being was the zoon logon echon, the living being that perdures in logos which is language and number. Later, the Latins would identify the essence of human being as the animale rationale, the “rational animal”, the animal the perdures in “reason”. We shall try to come to some understanding of these definitions here and to show some of the consequences of our choosing the Latinate definition of the essence of human beings.

In the illustration above, the human soul’s proper “place” or “site” is at the centre of a sphere that is the being of Time and Space and the created things that are within Time and Space. The sphere itself is constantly in motion. The sphere is what Plato called “the moving image of eternity”, the sempiternal nature of created things.

The realm of “E” is the realm of the Good i.e. the Eternity that encloses or embraces the entirety of the cosmos or creation. The Good begets the Ideas which are in the realm designated by section “D”. The ideas can be approached through the Mind, the Nous, the Spirit, the Intelligence. The Ideas in turn beget the Eidei, the outward appearances of the things that “shine” and which we perceive through the sense of sight because of the “light” that acts as a metaxu or mean between our “eye”, the Sun, and the things that are. This occurs in section “C”. This light, as metaxu, is Eros; the ‘eye’ itself must have a quality that is ‘sun-like’ for there to be a possibility of a commensurable relation between it and the things beyond it.

From this perception occur our axioms and the principles that establish our understanding of the things that are in the world and those beyond it, what the philosopher Kant called the “transcendental imagination”. This perceiving occurs in the “C” section of the Divided Line and establishes our understanding of the things that are. It is the source of our trust, faith and belief in our interpretation of the reality of the things that are that they are as we say and think they are. This we understand as the true. Science, for example, is the theory of the real. “Theory” is a manner or mode of “seeing” and derives from the same root as “theatre”, “the seeing place”. The “theory” is a product or outcome of the “site” or the place from which the seeing is done. Section “C” is equal to section “B” in the Divided Line.

Section “B” is physis or the Cosmos, what we understand as Nature. It is the Cave in Plato’s allegory of the Cave. The Cave is “more real” than the shadows that are “thrown forward” or projected onto the walls of the cave by the artisans and technicians. Even the shadows require light to be produced, but this light is not directly from the Sun. It is a derived or borrowed light (such as that of the Moon, although the light in the cave is due to the fire which has been ignited, presumably, by the artisans and technicians). Fire is a product or derivative of the Sun. In the Cave, there remains a dim presence of the Sun itself but it is ineffectual.

Section “B” = Section “C” in Socrates’ discussion of the Divided Line. It is thought which gives us the things (the techne of the artisans and technicians, “the mind that makes the object” as Kant’s transcendental imagination would have it) and there are no things without thought, whether the thing be natural or artificial or as artefact, as the “work” we produce. The thinking that occurs in Section “C” is that representational thinking that is brought forward or ‘thrown forward’ from Section “A”, the Eikasia or Imagination.

Techne or “know how”, “knowing one’s way about or within something” is but one manner of thinking that the imagination produces. The thinking of the poets is also one manner of thinking that arises from the imagination. Poetic thinking is distinct from the techne of the technicians and still further a different type of thinking than that of the philosophers. This technological thinking of the artisans and technicians occurs on the outer circumference of the sphere, in the realm of the imagination. It is the farthest thinking from that of the philosophers.

Poetic thinking and techne are the diagonals given in the illustration of the sphere provided here. Both proceed from the “I” in the centre of the sphere which reaches out and “projects” to the circumference of the sphere. The circumference of the sphere is the ‘surface’ phenomenon of things, the deception of their ‘outward’ beauty. It is the thymoeidic part of the soul that is at the root of this projection. The thymoeidic part of the soul deals mostly with will, emotions and feelings, what the Greeks understood as pathos. Our projections are given back to us in the form of a ‘lighted up’ of things. It is eros that does the “lighting up”.

If we look at the statement of Aeschylus that “In war, truth is the first casualty”, we can say that war is evil for all evil requires deception, subterfuge, the hiding from the light. This deception is to be found on the surfaces of phenomenon. That which is thrown forward by the ‘self’ at the centre of the sphere to the circumference through the thymoeides is an ‘irrational number’ in mathematics, what we call pi (the ratio between a circle’s diameter and its circumference), since the two diagonals thrown forward comprise the diameter of the sphere. The movement of the soul outward toward the circumference is a widening gyre from out of the depths of the centre to a shallowness or dispersal of being, or a “shadowiness” of being on the circumference. In this shallowness, the soul is more easily susceptible to the influences of evil and to being led by deception and machination. The soul is furthest away from self-knowledge when it is mired in the outer influences of the sphere.

In Preface II to this writing on “The Prince of the Two Faces”, we noted the statement of the French philosopher J. P. Sartre that “Hell is other people” and said that it illustrated the gap between love or eros and intelligence (nous, spirit, mind) as well as “thinking” or “thought” and how these are presented through the logos in the modern age when thinking and thought are understood as “information”. How love and intelligence (nous, spirit, mind) have come to be understood and how they relate to logos and eros is what must be undertaken at this time. Of course, these writings are simply impertinent precis of what are some of the most complex and troubling ideas present in our being-in-the-world today.

Plato’s discussion of the Divided Line occurs in Bk VI of his Republic. In Bk VI, the emphasis is on the relation between the just and the unjust life and the way-of-being that is “philosophy”. Philo-sophia is the love of the whole for it is the love of wisdom which is knowledge of the whole or the aspiration towards knowledge of the whole. The love of the whole and the attempt to gain knowledge of the whole is the call to ‘perfection’, ‘completeness’ that is given to human beings. Since we are part of the whole, we cannot have knowledge of the whole. This conundrum, however, should not deter us from seeking knowledge of the whole and, indeed, this seeking is urged upon us by our erotic nature. It is the urge to be god-like and can lead to tyranny. All human beings are capable of engaging in philosophy, but only a few are capable of becoming philosophers. As human beings, we are the ‘perfect imperfection’. We are ‘perfect’ in our incompleteness.

The whole is the Good (A-E); and that which is is part of the whole so it must, at some point, participate in the Good of which it is a part to some extent. That which we call the ‘good things’ of life such as health, wealth, good reputation, etc. are subject to change and corruption because they are not the Good itself. These are the things that we love. They are wholly in Time. To only love the ‘good things’ is to love the part, and this love of the part channels one off in another direction from that initial erotic urge directed toward the whole or the Good. This is why the ‘good things’ in themselves can become evils and why we can become obsessed with, and succumb to, the urges we feel for their possession. The desire for immortality and the desire for will to power can become hubristic. They can lead to tyranny.

Eros is not the winged cherub or child named Cupid (which is derived from the Romans), nor is it merely the sexual urge which is the modern day focus, thanks primarily through the writings and works of Freud. “Love (eros) is the oldest of all the gods,” says an old Orphic fragment. Another Orphic fragment runs: “Firstly, ancient Khaos’s stern Ananke (Necessity, Inevitability) and Kronos (Chronos, Time) who bred within his boundless coils Aither (Aether, Light) and two-sexed, two-faced, glorious Eros (Phanes), ever born through Nyx’s (Night’s) fathering, whom later men call Phanes, for he was first manifested.” This Orphic fragment is saying the same as the Book of Genesis from the Hebrew Bible: “1 In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. 2 And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. 3 And God said, “Let there be light”: and there was light. 4 And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.” The “light” and Eros are born simultaneously, and this birth is the connection between the Good (God in the Hebrew Bible), the Logos (Intelligence, Mind, Spirit) and Love or Eros between the Intelligence and Love.

Eros is associated with Time; Logos is associated with Space. It is the Logos which grants and gives “form” and “shape” to the void that is prior to Being. Both Time and Space are associated with Ananke Necessity. Ananke is associated with Eros.

Acts of creation are ones that arise out of love, and sometimes that love can be misguided if it is not properly directed by the Logos. Love requires withdrawal and the allowance of things to be if it is to be true. It is an ‘owning’ that is a ‘disowning’ that allows care and concern to grow within its ‘space’, its site. Both Love and the logos allow themselves to be given shapes and forms that are necessarily further from the real truth of the things that are. These shapes Plato calls the shadows.

Plato’s Divided Line from Bk VI of his Republic is a visual representation of the journey of the individual soul that is outlined allegorically in Bk VII of the text in the allegory of the Cave. The Divided Line is the logos as a representation of enumeration or number, while the allegory of the Cave is the logos as mythos or “word” i.e. poetry, and in both cases we are meant to “behold” that which the logos reveals. Both the Divided Line and the Allegory of the Cave are abstractions. The Allegory is intended to be more ‘moving’ emotionally than the speeches outlining the Divided Line. In the Allegory, for instance, there is an emphasis on the physical pain that is involved in the turning toward the Good since we are beings in bodies. There is an emphasis on eros as pathos.

The Divided Line distinguishes between the two faces of the Logos and the two faces of Eros. This distinction is done with regard to how ‘reason’ or the logos (that part of the soul which is called the logistikon by Plato) is to be understood and, subsequently, how eros is to be understood in the concrete details of human living. These details are made even more explicit in the speeches related in the Platonic text Symposium. From these concrete details we can understand the gap that exists between Intelligence and Love in our modern understanding. One face of the Logos is language as rhetoric which is the language that informs the many. Artificial intelligence and its “reason” is rooted in “rhetoric”. The other face of the logos is rooted in dialectic: the “informing” that occurs between two or three individuals that assists the soul on its way to self-knowledge.

For Plato, Eros as Love is what distinguishes the higher Eros from the lower eros. While the higher Eros emphasizes withdrawal and “letting be”, the lower eros is a possessing, holding and consumption of that which is “loved”. The higher Eros emphasizes an engagement in but not a possession of that which is loved. In some of the myths regarding Eros, Psyche the human soul, first hopes to catch a glimpse of Eros and then to hold and possess him. When she does so, Eros disappears and she must begin a long and painful journey to find him again.

Love has no place in the political; it is anti-political in that it is primarily a private act and the political deals with public acts which are associated with the thymoeidic part of the soul and the community at large. The thymoeidic part of the soul is torn between the public and the private spheres. The political emerges out of the private individual things, just as the city emerges from out of the household, the community from out of the family, the family from the individual body.

The root of the agon or conflict between philosophy and the political, as it is for philosophy and poetry, is how Love or eros is understood and interpreted. Alcibiades, the ‘political beast’ who shows up uninvited in the Symposium, has a passion for Socrates, but this passion is not Love. Socrates knows who Alcibiades is and what his nature is so he spurns Alcibiades’ advances and yet at the same time tries to lead him to philosophy because Socrates is aware of Alcibiades’ exceptional nature. Socrates recognizes the greatness of Alcibiades’ ‘spiritedness’ (thymoeides) and tries to lead him to philosophy but fails to do so. Alcibiades’ failure is the result of his love for the polis and for the favours he receives from the many. That many historians attribute the fall of Athens to the Spartans to Alcibiades’ betrayal of the Athenians illustrates to us the importance of this event in the lives of the participants in both Republic and the Symposium and to the history of the West in general. It signified nothing less than the end of what we call the Golden Age of Greek civilization and culminates in the imperialism of Alexander the Great.

Thinking, thought and self-knowledge are co-related. The openness to love and intelligence are co-related. Where true thought is not present, there is no self-knowledge, there is no “intelligence”. Where there is no self-knowledge, there is no sense of ‘reality’. Where there is no sense of reality, there is no knowledge or recognition of good and evil. Where there is no knowledge or recognition of good and evil, there is no possibility of “human excellence” or arete. Without a sense of “human excellence”, there is no polemos or strife within the individual soul to resist the temptations to succumb to evil actions through the many urges of the lower eros and one is unable to move to a higher state of consciousness nor, in many cases, does one desire to move to a higher state of consciousness. One finds the pleasures of the lower eros enough. This satisfaction was found among the Epicurean philosophers and the later Empirical philosophers.

In its urging towards an ascent, Eros’ affect is to make us love the light and truth and hate darkness and falsehood. Care and concern for others and our sense of “otherness” develops from this higher Eros’ erotic urge. The ascent from the individual ego and its love of the part, experienced in the love of a single, beautiful other, to a knowledge of the whole and the love of the whole of things is a process that the immortal part of the soul (logistikon) undergoes in its journey towards “purification” from the love of the meeting of our own necessities and urges (epithymetikon) to the love of the Good. “Depth” arises from the ascent which is toward the centre of the sphere. The descent brings about our desires for the surfaces of things, which is the lower form of eros. These are located on the outer circumference of the sphere. Evil is a “surface phenomenon” and eros is a part of it, and evil is located and thrives on the outer circumference of the sphere. It is the given of the human condition, of its being-in-the-world.

The content which is given to us in the image of the Divided Line in Bk VI of Republic is emphatically ethical for it deals with deeds, not with words. The philosophic way-of-being is erotic by nature. To be erotic is to be in ‘need’; sexuality is but one powerful manifestation of the erotic in our lives and it illuminates our desire for immortality through the procreation of children. The procreation of children is the recognition of the ‘otherness’ that is our being- in- the- world. In general, the two faces of Eros have to do with mortality and immortality. They are bound together like two sides of the same coin. It is the awareness of our mortality that makes the desire for otherness a need.

The ‘spirited’ (thymoeides) part of the soul acts as a mediator or metaxu between the logistikon or “rational” part and the epithymetikon or “appetitive” part of our souls which in turn determine our various “militaristic” and sexual passions which manifest themselves in our love of sports and competition or our love of wealth among many other varied activities and pursuits in the various worlds that we participate in. This is eros as pathos in our human natures.

When such drives dominate the soul, there is a predilection for politics, for power within the community or polis to make such an acquisition of such goods or objects easier. Such a desire for power is rooted in a desire for immortality through ‘honour’ and ‘fame’ through the thymoeides part of the soul. The ‘procreation’ that is the root of sexuality is the desire for immortality through offspring. This desire for immortality through offspring is the desire for the Incarnation, the ‘procreation’ of the Good, the begetting of the Good in beauty. The separation of the desire for offspring from the orgasm that is the result of that sexuality is but one manifestation of that gap between intelligence (nous, mind, spirit) and love that is revealed in Sartre’s “hell is other people” statement noted above. It is a manifestation of the tyrannous soul.

The philosophic soul reaches out for knowledge of the whole and for knowledge of everything divine and human. It is in need of knowledge of these things, to experience and to be acquainted with these things. This noetic knowledge is a gnosis, an en-owning of the knowledge of which one has taken “possession”, not through consumption but through participation. It is an active being-in and concern-with and yet, at the same time, a “letting be” through a contemplative consideration of what is close at hand. The non-philosophic human beings are those who are erotic for the part and not the whole. They are deprived of knowledge of what each thing is because they see by the borrowed light of the moon (the images of the imagination that are our representations) and not the sun; their light is a reflected and dim light. They wish to control, commandeer and consume that which has emerged into being. The hubris of human beings, and their great danger both to themselves and to otherness, is to try to commandeer and control being itself.

Eros is the “sun-like” quality of the “eye” that allows the eye to perceive the Sun’s goodness. Eros acts as the metaxu or the “between” or the “in between”, the mean proportional of geometry, the “open” space that occasions or establishes a relation between two incommensurate properties or things. In the prison cells that are our ’embodied souls’, the ‘form’ that the logos takes acts as a barrier but it is also a way through. The metaxu are ‘means’, what we call the ‘goods’ of the world. As such, they are the ‘bridges’ to the Good itself.

Metaxu can also be translated as “among,” “in the midst of,” or “in the meantime”, the “in-between” space or that “open” region that is the realm of mediation between two distinct realities or concepts such as is shown to us in each segment of the Divided Line. “Metaxu” can be seen as a space of mediation between the divine and the human, or between the earthly and the spiritual. It is a bridge. It is Eros as the “space” or “site” of the longing and striving for the something that is beyond the immediate. It is the meeting point or place of Eros (Time) and Logos (Space) and from within it, truth as aletheia or ‘unconcealment’ occurs in the revelation of the beauty of the thing being observed which is further extended to the beauty of the world or the whole. The beauty of the world is the parousia or “presence” of the Good yet, at the same time, the metaxu form the region of good and evil. They act as barriers to the Good.

In the Allegory of the Cave the prisoners see the shadows of the artifacts carried before the fire that the artisans and technicians have ignited and tend. They have no clear pattern or ordering in their souls, and they lack the experience (phronesis or wise judgement) that is tempered with sophrosyne (moderation) that they have acquired through the experience of suffering or strife. The purpose of suffering is self-knowledge which is revealed, ironically, as the destruction of the “ego” or self. The best example of this that we have in English literature is Shakespeare’s King Lear. In the play, King Lear has become an “0”, a ‘nothing’, and the destruction of his pride and his loss of place in society allows him to gain a new sense of otherness and to be reborn. In his rebirth, the first thing that he apprehends is Cordelia, the living embodiment of truth and truth-telling in the play. From the play, it is clear that the process of re-birth is not an easy one.

The philosophic soul is one that has an understanding endowed with “magnificence” (or “that which is fitting for a great man” and is thus distinguished from the understandings of those who are not “great men”) and is able “to contemplate all time and being” (486a) i.e. the understanding that is in the soul of the philosopher is ‘prophetic’. The prophet speaks ‘the highest’ speech. The philosophic soul has from youth been both “just and tame” and is not “savage and incapable of friendship”. The philosophic soul is not ‘rough’, but ‘smooth’. The meaning of the statement above Plato’s academy is not that “No one enters unless he knows geometry” as a specific study of the mathematical arts, but that “No one enters unless he has the capability of being a friend”. (See the connection to The Chariot card of the Tarot where the two sphinxes, one white and one black representing the mystery of the soul, are in contention or strife polemos with each other.)

In looking for the philosophic way-of-being-in-the-world, Socrates concludes: “….let us seek for an understanding endowed by nature with measure and charm, one whose nature grows by itself in such a way that as to make it easily led to the idea of each thing that is.” (486d) The philosophical soul is as it is by nature. It grows by itself from out of itself. It is not a product of education alone, although education can assist it on its way in the same way a farmer attending his crops assists his crops on their way. Socrates sees his main task as being a mid-wife.

Is this all souls or only some souls? Are all souls capable of attaining the philosophical way of being? The modern answer to these questions, through the impact of Christianity and the modern philosophers, is a “yes” while the ancient answer appears to be a “no”. Saints and philosophers are rare plants to the ancients.

Shakespeare’s Hamlet may be said to be a play regarding this conflict in the thymoeidic part of the soul. Hamlet’s ‘doubt’, his need for certainty and surety, prevents him from seeing the reality in which he has been placed and from taking the proper action necessary which is the fate that has been given to him. Hamlet’s doubt gives him an ‘unbalanced soul’. In contrast, Horatio is shown by Hamlet to be an example of the ‘balanced soul’ who is in possession of what Aristotle called phronesis:

“…for thou hast been
As one, in suffering all, that suffers nothing,
A man that fortune’s buffets and rewards
Hast ta’en with equal thanks: and blest are those
Whose blood and judgment are so well commingled,
That they are not a pipe for fortune’s finger
To sound what stop she please.” (Hamlet Act III sc. ii)

Horatio is an example of a ‘just man’, for his “balanced soul” allows him to take actions that are well-considered, wise. He is able to take life’s goods and evils with equal thanks, and this dispassionateness allows him to make the proper judgements at the appropriate time. This ability to make proper judgements is the proper relation of the logistikon and thymoeidic parts of the soul. The epithymetikon part of the soul creates distortion and chaos for the judgement when it dominates. The flute or pipe, the wind instrument, is the musical instrument of Dionysus, the god of tragedy, while the lyre or stringed instrument is the instrument of the god Apollo. Apollo is the god associated with the Sun and with truth.

Socrates uses an eikon or image (A-B of the Divided Line) to indicate the political situation prevalent in most cities or communities. The eikon uses the metaphor of the “ship of state” and the “helmsman” who will steer and direct that ship of state. The rioting sailors on the ship praise and call “skilled” the sailor or pilot, the “knower of the ship’s business”, the man who is cleverest at figuring out how they will get the power to rule either by persuading or forcing the ship-owner to let them rule. Anyone who is not of this sort and does not have these desires they blame as “useless”. They are driven by their “appetites”, their hunger for the particulars which they perceive as ends i.e. what Plato describes as human beings when living in a democracy, oligarchy, or a tyranny. In the modern age, we have killed off the ship-owner and replaced him with the ‘helmsman’, the cybernaut.

This is the reason why Plato places democracy just above tyranny in his ranking of regimes from best to worst, tyranny being the worst since both these regimes, democracy and tyranny, are ruled by the appetites and not by phronesis and sophrosyne or what we understand as ‘virtue’. (Democracy’s predilection for capitalism is a predicate of the rule by the appetites and the lower form of eros. The soul’s power to distinguish between self-interest and the common good becomes weakened or corroded under democracy so that tyranny is the ultimate result. It is the destruction of the sense of otherness in the soul. Human beings are, as individuals, tyrannic by nature and this is primarily due to the influence of eros. Technology has a great impact in increasing this tendency toward tyranny and towards the tyrannic soul. We seek the ‘gigantic’ and ‘intense’ rather than the ‘pure’.)

The erotic nature of the philosophic soul “does not lose the keenness of its passionate love nor cease from it before it has grasped the nature itself of each thing which is with the part of the soul fit to grasp a thing of that sort, and it is the part akin to it (the soul) that is fit. And once near it and coupled with what really is, having begotten intelligence and truth, it knows and lives truly, is nourished and so ceases from its labour pains, but not before.” (490b) The language and imagery used here is that of love, procreation, and childbirth, and this indicates its connection to both the lower and higher forms of Eros.

The world of the sensible must be experienced through the body, the epithymetikon part of the soul. With regard to the Divided Line, the world of the sensible, the Visible, “is equal to” the world of Thought: the mathemata or “that which can be learned and that which can be taught”. That which can be learned and that which can be taught is initially the visible, that which can be sensed and experienced. Socrates sees himself as a mid-wife, helping to aid this birthing process that is learning. It is a birthing process because it is a poiesis or a “bringing forth”.

At Republic Bk. VI 508 b-c, Plato makes an analogy between the role of the sun, whose light gives us our vision, to the visible things to be seen and the role of the Good in that seeing. The sun rules over our vision and the things to be seen. The eye of seeing must have an element in it which is “sun-like” in order that the seeing and the light of the sun be commensurate with each other. Vision does not see itself, just as hearing does not hear itself. No sensing, no desiring, no willing, no loving, no fearing, no reasoning can ever make itself its own object. Eros as pathos cannot be grasped through human reason but can only be spoken of through human language.

The Good to which the light of the sun is analogous, rules over our knowledge and the real being of the objects of our knowledge (the forms/eide) which are the offspring of the ideas or that which brings the visible things to appearance and, thus, to presence or being, and also over the things that the light of the sun gives to vision: “This, then, you must understand that I meant by the offspring of the good that which the good begot to stand in a proportion with itself: as the good is to the intelligible region with respect to intelligence (D-E) and to that which is intellected (C-D), so the sun (light) in the visible world to vision (B-C) and to what is seen (A-B).” This “begetting” of the Good hints at its connection to Eros and to Logos.

Details of the Divided Line: Section A-B

Eros and Logos manifest themselves in the A-B section of the Divided Line as the mediation points or metaxu that unite the tripartite soul of the human being to the things that are. “A” of the Divided Line is Eikasia or Imagination. These are the likenesses, images, shadows, models, imitations, and icons that our vision produces. They are the “schema” and “plans” that human beings put forward in order to create their understanding of their worlds. “To produce” is to “pro-create”, to “bring forth”. The end of all procreation is the desire for immortality. Nature’s procreation is sempiternal: it exists eternally within Time. For Plato, Time is the moving image of eternity. Our desire for children is the desire for immortality on the natural level. Eternity is that which exists outside of Time. Eros functions as that desire for immortality through procreation manifested in sexuality on the physical level. When the desire for children is divorced from sexuality, this is but one example of where human beings enter that stage where their sense of “otherness” is gradually eroded and their desires become “tyrannous”, self-serving. For human beings, children are the fact of “otherness”. In literature, for example, the tyrant Macbeth and his wife have no children.

Section A-B of the Divided Line is what we understand as ‘civilization’, those artefacts created by human beings that are distinct from nature because they are made by human beings. They are the shadows on the walls of the Cave. Nature and convention are in opposition to one another, and it is by nature that we are measured even though we believe that it is we who do the measuring. This is why eikasia or imagination is placed below Nature on the Divided Line; Nature is of the higher order or a higher dignity when it comes to Truth and its unconcealment.

In the illustration shown, the two diagonals that emerge from C and culminate on the surface of the sphere at B are two types of thinking associated with techne that occur in the C section of the Divided Line: poetic thinking or the thinking of the arts, and the thinking that is the know-how of the artisans and technicians. In both types of thinking, there is a metaxu that is needed, a ‘light’ that is required, and that ‘light’ is studied through geometry and the dialectical discussions that surround geometry. “Depth” occurs by a movement towards the centre of the sphere, not from the “height” that is the sphere’s surface. This movement is provided by eros. Goodness is at the sphere’s centre; evil is on the surface.

In the cosmology of the poet and and painter William Blake, the scientist Newton is depicted at the bottom of the sea sitting upon a rock (which oddly looks like a urinal or toilet) creating a geometric cone upon a scroll. He is surrounded by darkness. There is a polypus or octopus swimming by, and this creature is equivalent to the Great Beast of Plato i.e. the political, or the social. The fact that Newton is not putting his geometry down in a book or in stone but on a scroll indicates that Newton is using the creative imagination. As a scientist, or rather the scientist for Blake, Newton is joined with Bacon and Locke who, as seekers of truth and despite their errors, appear in the heavens on the day of the Apocalypse among the chariots of the Almighty, counterbalancing Milton, Shakespeare, and Chaucer, the greatest representatives of the the Arts. Theses philosophers and poets are all English-speaking.

Plato has a similar line up in his Symposium with the greatest representatives of the arts and scientists present at the banquet in which the topic of Eros will be discussed. The subject of both the Arts and the Sciences is the beautiful: order, proportion, harmony. The Sciences deal with these in the realm of the suprasensible and the necessary while the Arts are concerned with the sensible and contingent. Chance and evil, necessity, are present in both.

The essential urge of Eros is the desire for immortality and this is shown in Eros’ affect on all three parts of the Platonic soul. The epithymetikon (appetite or desire, which houses the desire for physical pleasures, especially sexuality) partially realizes this desire through the begetting of offspring. This ‘begetting’ mirrors the begetting of the eidos through the ideas: the offspring, while appearing to be the same are different . In all cases, the ‘image’ of Beauty in the outward appearances of the mortal things is what attracts and urges us to ‘possess’ and ‘consume’ those things which we desire. Our belief is that in possessing and consuming such things, immortality will follow. It is Khronos (Time) who eats his own children.

The image of a thing of which the image is an image are the things belonging to eikasia or the “imagination”. This is what we understand as ‘civilization’. These are the things ‘procreated’ by human beings through the logos whether the logos be understood as representational thinking such as mathematics or logic, or the creative works of the technites or artists and technicians, such as writings or shoes. The idea that is to be the next pair of Nikes was always already there. It was waiting for the artisan and technician to give birth to it, to “pro-create” it, and bring it forward into being. This is the distinction between the procreation of Nature and that of human beings: nature’s procreation is in itself from out of itself, while human beings are a combination of this (sexuality, nature) and “in another for another” (techne) i.e. the next pair of shoes derives from materials that are not of human beings nor of human making.

We are ‘reminded’ of the original by the image: the Beauty of Nature is the “image” that reminds us of the Good. Just as Nature is sempiternal, eternally in Time, the Good is eternal, eternally outside of Time. Nature is a mirror-image of the Good while Nature is, at the same time, dominated by Necessity Ananke. Necessity is Time. And there is a great gap separating the Necessary from the Good; that gap is the whole of Time and Space. That gap is mirrored in the separation of Love from the Intelligence in the A-C section of the Divided Line. The mediation of what we call “Intelligence” (mathematical calculation, the principle of reason) is a mirrored image of the mediation of Love and the things that are. The Intelligence that is the principle of reason is a “possessing”, commandeering logos, while the Intelligence that is Love is a ‘letting be’ and a contemplation of the things that are. In our being-in-the-world, we wish to consume the objects of our senses. The beautiful is that which we desire without wishing to eat it. We desire that it simply should be. To do so requires the renunciation of the imagination and the products of the imagination. This is not an easy thing to accomplish.

The sphere of Space encloses the beings that are in Time. It is the logos that encloses beings within Time. It is the Logos that establishes limits and brings the things that are to a ‘stand’. The soul, psyche, of human beings is eternally in Time. When the soul is assimilated into the One that is the Good, it ceases to be in time. Nature is eternally in time. Time is the moving image of eternity. Eros is a moving image of the Good that is beyond time. Nature is sempiternal, everlasting, endless.

The thymoeides part of the soul (spiritedness, which houses anger, as well as other spirited emotions), realizes the desire for immortality in its desire for “eternal fame and glory”. There is a “beauty” (kalon) in the carrying out of great deeds. We cannot, for example, deny that there is no beauty in the site of the Three Gorges Dam. Public care and concern (“spiritedness”) is linked to self-interest and it is here that we find the motivation of the politicians. The desire for immortality is in the desire for the doing of great deeds which will bring the individual before the public in some manner. Whether through military campaigns, the creation of ‘works’, or sporting achievements, this recognition is another way in which the soul tries to achieve a partial immortality, eternal fame, just as children are a ‘partial immortality’ in the physical realm.

The techne or artisan is the servant of the people: “in another, for another”. His “work” illustrates his mastery of a ‘part’ of knowledge, his own art, his “know how”, that knowledge that the philosopher aspires to for the whole of things. This mastery is driven by the thymoeides part of the soul, that which is driven for the mastery (thymus) of the eidos (the outward appearances of things).

The logistikon is that part of the soul that is the smallest part of the soul, and it is the only part of the soul that is beyond Necessity because it is part of the Good itself. In the illustration provided below, the logistikon is the centre point of the sphere that may be said to be within Time and out of Time, or it is at least the closest one can come to in being out of Time. References to the logistikon are found throughout our literature in myth and fairy tales as the ‘smallest’ of things that grow that have the greatest consequence. The sphere itself is as a great Wheel of Fortune that is in motion. This is Necessity. The only way of escaping the turnings of the Wheel is by being at the centre of it (King Lear Act V sc. iii).

In the A-B section of the Divided Line, the logistikon acts as that which ‘ties things down’, the logos that gathers things together and holds them in place. The ‘knowing’ and ‘making’ of the artisan and the technician (technology) is the interaction between the logistikon and the thymoeides parts of the soul of the artisan and technician. It is the face of the logos that is the principle of reason, of logic, and the language that forms our collective discourse (rhetoric). One of the faces of the Logos is that it is the “form” that makes the “informing” possible.

Section B-C of the Divided Line: Technology as Shadow

Section B-C of the Divided Line corresponds to physical things and to that which can be ‘counted on’ i.e. it represents trust, confidence, belief, faith (pistis). The physical things are those that can be seen or perceived with the senses. It is eros as ‘light’ that provides this capability. They are the things that are at our disposal, the ready-to-hand. In the Divided Line B = C: the physical things and our trust/belief in them is equal to the thoughts that we can think of those things through the representations of our perceptions of those things with our senses i.e. the Forms or Eidos of the things, the “outward appearances of the things”.

We have two definitions of what human beings are that have come down to us historically from the Greeks and the Latins. From the Greeks, human beings are the zoon logon echon, “the living being that dwells and perdures in language”. From the Latins, humans are the animale rationale, the “rational animal”. From the Latin definition arises the principle of reason, and this is what is in operation in section C of the Divided Line and determines one type of thinking and the logos from which it is derived.

A principle contains within itself a ratio, a reason for something else. The principle of reason is the ground/reason for all other principles and that means for what a principle is per se, for what a statement is, for what an utterance is. That about which the principle of reason speaks is the ground of the essence of language, of logos. This ground or essence is what we understand as one of the faces of Eros. Principles are derived from axioms. In Greek, axiom means “to find something worthy”. “Worthiness” is the trust, belief given to us by the “self-shining forth” of the axioms. Given our illustration, the problem is that the principle’s ratio is itself an ‘irrational number’, a contradiction.

The axioms determine the principles that have been derived from them. In Greek axiom is “to let something repose in its countenance and preserve it therein”. It is related to representational thinking and to eidos. Principia
are the sort of things that occupy the first place, that stand first in line.
Principia refers to a ranking and an ordering. They are our objects of sophia.
The ordering realm (Section A-C) is the realm of principles (sophia). We have determined that the sole purpose of axioms is to secure a system that is free of contradictions. The axiomatic character of axioms is to eliminate contradictions. Our concepts, axioms, principles (fundamental principles) serve the axiomatic securing of calculative thinking. What we call science is axiomatic, but for Plato science does not think in the manner that philosophers think.

For the philosopher Leibniz, the principle of reason is the principle of rendering sufficient reasons. To render in Latin is “to give back”. Our “cognition” (ways of knowing), “consciousness” is the rendering back of reasons. In Latin, cognition is representatio: the object, what is encountered, is presented to the cognizing “I”, presented back to and over against it, and thus made present. “Ob-ject” comes from ob-“against” and jacio “that which is thrown”.

Cognition must render to cognition the reason for what is encountered—and that means to give it back to cognition if it is to be a discerning cognition. “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder” because a sufficient reason, a ratio, cannot be given in an account of what is considered to be “beautiful”, although we have the theory of aesthetics which attempts to do so and which itself is based on the principle of reason. Under the principle of reason, eros becomes stifled, exsanguinated.

The principle of reason is reached only when it is understood as the fundamental principle of demonstrations: i.e. the fundamental principle of statements such as those given in our research, experiments, essays, presentations, etc. It is the principle of reason which is the dominant form of the logos in section C of the Divided Line in our modern age. The principle of reason is a Principle for sentences and statements i.e. for what is called “philosophical” and scientific knowledge (methodologies). The principle of reason is necessary for the rendering of reasons in the true statement/sentence. The principle of reason is the fundamental principle of the necessary founding of sentences and principles. This is what makes the principle of reason the essence of what we call Artificial Intelligence and the meta-languages associated with it.

What is empowering about the Principle is that it pervades, guides and supports all cognition (ways of knowing) that express themselves in sentences and propositions. The principle of reason is valid for everything which in any manner is. Cognition, our “ways of knowing “, is a kind of representational thinking. In this “presentation” something we encounter comes to a stand, is brought to a standstill as object. For all modern thinking the manner in which the things “are” is based on the objectness of objects. For representational thinking, the representedness of objects belongs to the objectness of objects. This is what Plato understood as “the shadows” and this is represented by the square in the illustration provided above.

“Ob-ject” comes from the Latin which means “the thrown against”. The “against” of the object must be a founded one: how the object is. Something
is, which means that it can be identified as being a being, only if it satisfies the fundamental principle of reason as the fundamental principle of founding. The principle of reason is the fundamental principle of cognition (ways of knowing) as the Principle for everything that is. It establishes our “under-standing” of what and how things are in the world that is ready-to-hand. It is the reason why “beauty must be in the eye of the beholder”.

We are who we are as human beings only insofar as the rendering of reasons empowers us. This is what makes us the animale rationale. It is from this “empowerment” that we judge what is human and what is not, what is sane and what is not, what is just and what is not, etc. This empowerment, the demand to render reasons, threatens everything of humans’ being-at-home and robs us of the roots of our subsistence i.e. of everything that has made human beings great up till now . It is the nihilism that threatens civilization, the ceasing of concern for what “human excellence” is, for what “virtue” is. There is a connection between the demand to render reasons and the withdrawal of roots, and the subsequent rootlessness of modern humanity.

For the Greeks, ousia or presence was understood as the thing’s way-of-being in the world. The city or society came about because of the body and the needs of the body. The city is a product of the procreation of eros writ large. The city was, thus, the individual writ large. The city represented the individuals which composed it in that its regime would reflect the opinions of those who are predominant in the community, those who hold power. It is because of this power that Plato considers it the Great Beast.

B-C in the Divided Line is the point where we see the two faces of Eros as well as the two faces of the Logos. The wants and the needs of the body for the individual are radically private and at the same time require other human beings for their fulfillment. The city or polis is an artefact brought forth by human beings and it has both the characteristics of being a natural thing and those of an artificial thing. Plato’s Cave in his Allegory is both a natural thing and a product of human invention and production. As the law of necessity controls the realm of nature, so too do laws control the ‘life’ that is shown in the polis. The walls of the Cave reflect the projected shadows of the interpretations of the Cave given through the representational thinking that is the Eikasia or “imagination” of the cave-dwellers. It is here that the essence of technology as “information” or the “form that informs” finds its source.

In the image of the Divided Line, the first thing the dweller inside of the Cave sees are the reflections of the shadows upon the walls of the Cave. These shadows or images form our views of the things that are. These provide us with our “understanding” of things whether they are the things of nature, the artefacts which human beings produce, or the things that are the products of our representations of them such as our sciences or our arts. Our “understanding” is an interpretation of the things, not an under-standing of the things themselves. Eros is not satisfied with these understandings and longs for the things in themselves. This is due primarily to Eros’ chief desire which is the achievement of immortality, that which is beyond change; and the things and our interpretations of them are subject to change.

In the B-C section of the Divided Line, the mind or logistikon part of the soul (the intelligence which became translated as ‘reason’ and so its connection to logos) is aided by the thymoeides or ‘spirited’ part of soul to attain to that object to which the appetitive part of the soul is directed. The appetitive part of the soul is urged by the thing’s “goodness” or perceived goodness, be it in food, drink, sex or whatever, and that this goodness will assist the body to survive and promote the soul’s search for immortality. The soul as a ‘one’, a whole, is directed or attracted by the kalon or beauty of the thing, to possess or ‘consume’ that which it perceives as beautiful. That which is perceived as beautiful is that which is ‘perfect’ or complete. Sexually, this is the individual beautiful human being at the beginning stages of the journey that leads to the perfection that is the Good (or immortality). The individual desires to “consume” the other human being so that the two may become one in a literal sense.

The word beautiful (kalos) is distinct from good (agathon) and it also means ‘fair’, ‘fine’, ‘noble’. Everything outstanding in body, mind or action can be so designated, and the aspiration for these qualities can be related to the thymoeides part of the soul and the eros which drives it. We have designated this quality as “human excellence” among human beings, arete, what we call “virtue”. What is loveable either to sight or mind is beautiful. It is what we designate as “moral” with the distinction that it is beyond obligation or duty, what we cannot expect everyone to perform. It is of a higher rank than the just, which every human being can be expected to perform. The core of a just political order was defined by “virtue” for the ancients, while today “freedom” is believed to be at the core of the just political society. Both of these views may be said to be present in A-C section of the Divided Line. This emphasis was directed by the eros that is the thymoeides part of the soul.

In earlier writings on this blog, it was recognized that the evil or wicked were not alone the individual criminals but those who wished to rule for their own self-assertion. Such people were more destructive of justice than those who ruled simply in terms of the property interests of one class. Because tyrants were the most dangerous for any society, the chief political purpose anywhere was to see that those who ruled had at least some sense of justice which mitigated self-assertion. This was at the core of earlier education systems. The IB, too, has this mitigation of self-assertion at its core. The great danger of the thymoeides part of the soul was its tendency to tyranny. This tendency is also part of Eros.

In Section A-B of the Divided Line, the logos of the logistikon of the soul is concerned with the calculation from which knowledge is derived. This calculus has shaped what we understand by modern science and is at the heart of what we understand as technology. It finds its place or site in that field of mathematics that we call algebra. Money, technology, algebra are analogous as signs of our worship of power.

As Eros is two-faced so, too, is the logos in the realms of the physical and imaginative. The “mathematics” (“that which can be learned and that which can be taught”) of the logos is of two types: the arithmos of the particular things, those things that exist in Time, those things that can be counted and counted on, and the geometria of that which exists in Space, those things that are the works of the Logos. As logos understood as the “calculable” through algebra comes to predominate so, too, does the notion of justice as “calculable” come to predominate (this is the modern view of justice i.e. “the greatest good for the greatest number”).

The thymoeides part of the soul is concerned with “passion”, and it is this passion which unites with the logistikon part of the soul and brings about the urge to attempt to attain immortality through ‘noble’ and ‘fine’ deeds or works. The understanding of what ‘fine’ deeds are is part of the ‘cognition’ or perception of how ‘human excellence’ is understood beforehand. We ‘love’ the beauty of ‘human excellence’ when it is shown to us. It is the passion to possess this beauty that compels us to perform excellent deeds in whatever context those deeds may be performed.

Section C-D of the Divided Line

Many will find the proposition that science does not think the most controversial put forward in this writing. What does it mean for Plato (and Heidegger) to say this? How does this statement cast a light on what we understand as artificial intelligence and on rationality in general?

The Forms or eide (the outward appearance of things) are begotten from the ideai which, in themselves, are begotten from the Good. “Begottenness” is of Eros. The forms give presence to things (ousia) through their outward appearance. The “seeing” of this presence is dependent on “sight” which, in turn, is dependent on the light of the sun. In order for this to occur, the eye must have something “sun-like” in it just as the soul must have something like “the good” in it to be able to “bring forth” the representations of the things that are in the mind or intellect.

There is nothing without thought; there is no thought without things. In the Divided Line, B = C. “Otherness” is a condition of being. Human beings are essential for being to be. Being needs human beings to be. Being is reality. What we call science is the theory of the real, the “seeing” of the real. (“And would you also be willing,” I said, “to say that with respect to the truth, or lack of it, as the opinable is distinguished from the knowable, so the likeness is distinguished from that of which it is the likeness?”) The “images” and “shapes” of things, the eide, such as the city or society is the individual writ large. The polis or city is a city of artisans and technicians, of technites. The “knowing one’s way about or within something” begins in the household and caters to the production of novelty, efficiency. The logos, like Eros itself, is two-faced or of two types. The jumping off point or the leap is the recognition that the Sun in the realm of Becoming (Time), like the idea of the Good in the realm of Being, is responsible for everything that is. The Sun is Time as the moving image of eternity, and all that is in being owes its existence to Time. The Good is eternity, and all that is in Being and Becoming owes its existence to the Idea of the Good.

Dianoia is that thought that unifies into a “one” and determines a thing’s essence. The eidos of a tree, the outward appearance of a tree, is the “treeness”, its essence, the idea in which it participates. We are able to apprehend this outward appearance of the physical thing through the forms or eide in which they participate for these give them their shape. The understanding, the hypo-thesis (dianoia) is the “standing under” of that seeing that is thrown forward, the under-standing, the ground. Thought under-stands the limits and boundaries of things and gives them “measure” through the use of number or language logoi. The giving of measure to the seeing is geometry and geometry deals with ratios; and from it, the hearing of the harmonia of music, the music of the spheres, is recognized and produced. The music of the spheres is the recognition of the whole of which each being is a part, and how that part is related to the whole. Thought comprehends the “measure” of the things that bring about “harmony” and unites the individual being or thing to the whole. The proportionals are arranged about a “mean” which is “hidden” or “irrational”. The principle of stringed instruments and their ratios is applicable to the whole of the universe, both the visible and invisible.

Section D of the Divided Line is the Ideas Ideai which are begotten from the Good and are the source (archai) of the Good’s presence parousia amidst that which is not the Good, both in being and becoming. The Good is seen as “the father” whose seeds (ideai) are given to the receptacle or womb of the mother (Space) to bring about the offspring that is the world of A-E (Time), within the whole of things within Space. The realm of A-E is the realm of the Necessary. (Timaeus 50- 52e). The dialogue of Timaeus occurs the morning after the dialogue that we call Republic. It is the continuation of an ascent from the eikasia of the imagination and opinion of Section A (Republic) to the physical reality of Section B of the Divided Line (Timaeus). Timaeus is a revealing of the Ananke, what the Greeks understood as Necessity. The dialogues of the Sophist, Theatetus and The Statesman illuminate Section C of the Divided Line. Symposium and Phaedrus are dialogues that help to illuminate Section D.

Because the ideas are begotten from the Good, the ideas are the essences of things, their “oneness”, that which they really are. The ideas in turn beget the eidos which bring things to presence in their ready-to-handedness in time for human beings. The things come to a stand through the eidos and give us what we call our “understanding”. The nature of this understanding is pre-determined by the logos within being, by the “frame” or the “form” that is a product of the logos.

Noesis is often translated by “Mind” but “Spirit” might be a better translation. Contemplation, attention, “dialectic” are the activities of noesis. Knowledge (gnosis), intellection, the objects of reason (logoi but not understood as logistics but as noesis, ideai, episteme) is what is understood as “knowledge” in this section of the Divided Line. “Knowledge” is permanent and not subject to change as is “opinion”, whether “true” or “false” opinion. Opinions develop from the pre-determined seeing which is the understanding of the essences of things prevalent at a certain time. Understanding is prior to the interpretation of things and the giving of names to things.

The Idea of the Good (agathon) is what provides “the truth to the things known (i.e. their “unveiling”, their “showing forth”) and gives “the power to the one who knows… and, as the cause of knowledge and truth, you can understand it to be a thing known; but, as fair as the two are – knowledge and truth – if you believe that it is something different from them and still fairer than they, your belief will be right.” (Republic 508e – 509a) The Idea of the Good is the essence of things that come to be whether in the Visible or the Invisible realms. The Good is beyond both Time and Being. When the soul is in direct contact with the Good, gnosis is achieved and the soul is no longer in Time for it becomes part of the One of all that is. The Good is responsible for (aitia ‘the cause of’) the knowledge and truth (aletheia, unconcealment) of all that is. Without it, knowledge and truth could not be attained. Everything would be ‘irrational’. Eros as Love and the Beautiful is this face of the two-faced Eros.

The whole of the Divided Line (A-E) is the Good’s embrasure of both Being and Becoming, that which is both within Time and Space. This embrasure is spherical in shape. The Good itself is beyond this sphere that is Being and Becoming (i.e. space and time) and there is an abyss separating the Necessary (which is both Space and Time) from the Good. Within the Divided Line, that which is “intellected” (C-D) is equal to (or the Same i.e. a One) as that which is illuminated by the light of the sun in the world of vision. (B-C)

Details of the Divided Line

Below is a summary of the points made regarding the Divided Line:

“This, then, you must understand that I meant by the offspring of the good that which the good begot to stand in a proportion with itself: as the good is in the intelligible region with respect to intelligence (DE) and to that which is intellected [CD], so the sun is (light) in the visible world to vision [BC] and what is seen [AB].”

E. The Idea of the Good: Agathon, Gnosis “…what provides the truth to the things known and gives the power to the one who knows, is the idea of the good. And, as the cause of the knowledge and truth, you can understand it to be a thing known; but, as fair as these two are—knowledge and truth—if you believe that it is something different from them and still fairer than they, your belief will be right.” (508e – 509a)
D. Ideas: Begotten from the Good and are the source of the Good’s presence (parousia) in that which is not the Good. The Good is seen as “the father” whose seeds (ἰδέαι) are given to the receptacle or womb of the mother (space) to bring about the offspring that is the world of AE (time). The realm of AE is the realm of the Necessary. (Dialogue Timaeus 50-52 which occurs the following morning after the night of Republic)	D. Intellection (Noesis): Noesis is often translated by “Mind”, but “Spirit” might be a better translation. Knowledge (γνῶσις, νοούμενα) intellection, the objects of “reason” or the logos (Logoi) (νόησις, ἰδέαι, ἐπιστήμην). “Knowledge” is permanent and not subject to change as is “opinion” whether “true” or “false” opinion. Opinions develop from the pre-determined seeing which is the under-standing of the essence of things.
*C. Forms (Eide): Begotten from the Ideas* (ἰδέαι) . They give presence to things through their “outward appearance” (ousia). There is no-thing without thought; there is no thought without things. Human being is essential for Being. Being needs human being. “And would you also be willing,” I said, “to say that with respect to truth or lack of it, as the opinable is distinguished from the knowable, so the likeness is distinguished from that of which it is the likeness?”	*C. Thought (Genus)* Dianoia is that thought that unifies into a “one” and determines a thing’s essence. The eidos of a tree, the outward appearance of a tree, is the “treeness”, its essence, in which it participates. We are able to apprehend this outward appearance of the physical thing through the “forms” or eide in which they participate. Understanding, hypothesis (διανόια). The “hypothesis” is the “standing under” of the seeing that is thrown forward, the under-standing, the ground.
B. The physical things that we see/perceive with our senses (ὁρώμενα, ὁμοιωθὲν)	B. Trust, confidence, belief (πίστις) opinion, “justified true beliefs” (δόξα, νοῦν). Opinion is not stable and subject to change. The changing of the opinions that predominate in a community is what is understood as “revolution” or “paradigm shifts”. “Then in the other segment put that of which this first is the likeness—the animals around us, and everything that grows, and the whole class of artifacts.”
*A. Eikasia* Images Eikones:** Likeness, image, shadow, imitation, our vision (ὄψις, ὁμοιωθὲν). The “icons” or images that we form of the things that are. The statues of Dedalus which are said to run away unless they are tied down (opinion). It is the logoi which ‘ties things down’.	*A. Imagination (Eikasia):* The representational thought which is done in images. Our narratives, myths and that language which forms our collective discourse (rhetoric). Conjectures, images, (εἰκασία). The image of a thing of which the image is an image are things belonging to eikasia. We are “reminded” of the original by the image. “Now, in terms of relative clarity and obscurity, you’ll have one segment in the visible part for images. I mean by images first shadows, then appearances produced in water and in all close-grained, smooth, bright things, and everything of the sort, if you understand.” The Platonic “imagination” is distinguishable from the “transcendental imagination” of Kant. For Kant, the “transcendental imagination” refers to a “blind yet indispensable function of the soul” which is responsible for synthesizing sensory data into coherent experiences (logos) making the objects of experience possible (eros). Human consciousness and self-awareness is both sensibility/sense perception and understanding, and the “transcendental imagination” transforms mere sensations into conscious perceptions. Here, Kant is speaking about the ‘form’ that ‘informs’ i.e. technology. Like Kant, for Plato the imagination is not merely reproductive but is productive in that it makes experience, in general, possible through the coming together of the logos and eros. Unlike Kant, for Plato Eros is not “blind”.

Mathematics and Ethics

Technology as Information

We will be discussing how “mathematics” provides the principles for our actions i.e. how mathematics determines our ethics. We shall examine some considerations of the differences between what is called calculative thinking and what is called contemplative thinking. In this examination we will come to a closer understanding our technological being-in-the-world. Mathematics is understood as “what can be learned and what can be taught”.

What we call mathematics is a theoretical viewing of the world which establishes the surety and certainty of the world through calculation. Calculative thinking determines that the things of the world are disposables and are to be used by human beings in their various dispositions. This commandeering challenging of the world and the beings in it is what we have come to call “knowledge”, and is made possible by what we call “knowledge”. This under-standing (i.e. that which “stands under” or grounds) is that upon which all of our actions are based. This surety or certainty that beings are in the way that we say they are through calculation arises through the viewing and use of algebraic calculation in the modern world. Algebraic calculation is a language of signs and numbers. The results of what is and what has been achieved through this calculative thinking are what we have come to determine what knowledge is in our day and what is best to be known and how it is to be known. What is the relationship between these calculations and what we call “information” and how does information relate to ethics?

Ethics are based on what Aristotle called phronesis: our careful deliberation over what best actions will ultimately bring about the best end result. We call this end result our happiness or what Aristotle called our eudaimonia. But how can happiness be the end result of what is, essentially, a hubristic way of viewing and being in the world? What we choose to be through our doings in the worlds of our projections is that which demonstrates our skills, aptitudes, and fitness to bring forth the “work” that is the “product” or outcome of the activities in those worlds whether those outcomes or “goods” be works, services or ideas. It is eros that urges the soul to “hear” that calling from the logos that sets us upon the journey to self-knowledge that allows us to adapt to the inevitable change that is a re-birth that seeks for that which is fitting to the soul.

A Reading of King Lear

We shall reflect on this question of self-knowledge and how the mathematical impacts self-knowledge by examining the passage below from Shakespeare’s King Lear Act V sc. iii.

CORDELIA
We are not the first
Who, with best meaning, have incurr’d the worst.
For thee, oppressed king, am I cast down;
Myself could else out-frown false fortune’s frown.
Shall we not see these daughters and these
sisters?

KING LEAR
No, no, no, no! Come, let’s away to prison:
We two alone will sing like birds i’ the cage:
When thou dost ask me blessing, I’ll kneel down,
And ask of thee forgiveness: so we’ll live,
And pray, and sing, and tell old tales, and laugh
At gilded butterflies, and hear poor rogues
Talk of court news; and we’ll talk with them too,
Who loses and who wins; who’s in, who’s out;
And take upon’s the mystery of things,
As if we were God’s spies: and we’ll wear out,
In a wall’d prison, packs and sects of great ones,
That ebb and flow by the moon.
EDMUND
Take them away.
KING LEAR
Upon such sacrifices, my Cordelia,
The gods themselves throw incense. Have I caught thee?
He that parts us shall bring a brand from heaven,
And fire us hence like foxes. Wipe thine eyes;
The good-years shall devour them, flesh and fell,
Ere they shall make us weep: we’ll see ’em starve
first. Come.

Explication of the Passage from King Lear

To attempt a summary and explication of the whole of the greatest work in the English language is impertinent. But a brief introduction is necessary to understand the play as it appears in the scene above.

At this point in the play, Lear and Cordelia, supported by French troops, have lost the civil war for Britain to Edmund’s forces. Lear, as King, has been ultimately responsible for this civil war. At the beginning of the play, he has disowned his ‘truthful’ daughter Cordelia and fallen victim to the flattery and machinations of his two eldest daughters, Goneril and Regan. He has divided the kingdom in two giving each sister control of half, the intention being to avert future strife. Lear, at the same time, wishes to retain the appurtenances of a king, the appearances of a king, while retaining none of the responsibility: Lear is satisfied with the appearances rather than the realities of things. It is this satisfaction with the appearance of things that leaves Lear open to the machinations of his two daughters, Goneril and Regan.

Lear’s responsibility is, chiefly, a moral one. Goneril and Regan soon work together to remove from Lear the power and possessions that he once held. Lear becomes an “O”, “a nothing”. In his “nothingness”, Lear becomes mad and rages against the ingratitude shown by his daughters and the injustice that he sees in the nature of things and in the created world as it is.

This scene from Act V above is Lear’s anagnorisis or moment of enlightenment, the moment in tragedies when all tragic heroes recognize the errors of their ways and the consequences of their hubris. These consequences we call nemesis or just desserts.

Lear ends up houseless and homeless and wanders on a heath in the heart of a terrible storm. Lear’s physical, mental and spiritual sufferings soon drive him mad. The storm’s effect is a purification of Lear: Lear removes his clothing to become naked, to reveal human being as a mere ‘bare forked animal’; his ego is destroyed in the madness; he no longer focuses on himself but is able to see the ‘otherness’ of human beings and to feel compassion and pity for them (in the characters of Edgar as Poor Tom and the Fool) because he sees himself and his humanity in them. Edgar, too, has become a ‘nothing’ due to the machinations of his bastard brother Edmund and is a parallel to Lear in the double plot of the play.

Lear has gone from King to nothing and he is ready for re-birth. His ego has blinded him to understanding what his true relationship to his god is: initially he looked upon this god and his power as being something which he, Lear, himself possessed. Lear believed that only he himself possessed this truth. He dismisses the truth-tellers in the play: his Fool and his daughter Cordelia. In Lear’s kingdom, truth is not to be revealed. Only those who flatter are those that are heard.

The play King Lear is a play about the consequences of not knowing who we truly are, as individuals and as a species, as human beings. Lear, focused as he is on his ego, his Self, is willingly duped by machination in the play; he is willingly duped by flattery as this flattery is recognition of his social prestige. His later suffering and madness bring him to a true understanding of his relation to the god and to other human beings, and this relationship is Love expressed through the care and concern that he later shows to Poor Tom and the Fool. Love is, as Plato describes it, “fire catching fire”. It is recognition that in the most important things, all human beings are equal in that all are capable of the capacity for Love. Given the inhumane nature of human action in many cases in the real world, it is not without reason that Love has been described as a homeless, houseless beggar in our mythologies. Our literature sometimes refers to him as Eros.

Many critics suggest that this play is atheistic; Lear has lost his faith in God. The above passage suggests that such is not the case: what Lear has come to understand is his true relationship to his God, the true relationship of all human beings to God. Lear has lost the illusion of what he had once understood as God and what his relationship was to that God. It is this illusion that is the trap cast for those who believe that they are in possession of the truth or that truth is a product of their own creation or doing. Such a belief gives the individual the illusion of power. The God in King Lear is absent: He will not perform some miracle preventing the hangings of Cordelia and the Fool by the Captain later in the play. The essence of human being and of our humanity is to reveal truth. Great catastrophes are the result when we do not do so. In King Lear, the truth is destroyed. Good does not triumph over the evil of human actions in this play and we, too, by our very silence, are made complicit in the deaths of Cordelia and the Fool. In King Lear, human beings are not “beyond good and evil”.

In the play, the god exhibits Himself by His absence. Absence is not non-existence. It is the absence of God in the play that gives reason to those who interpret the play atheistically. One of the many themes of the play is what happens to human beings when they ignore the truth and persecute the truth-tellers. They, too, become subject to machinations and gaslighting. It is the tyrannous element present in all human beings. In their ignorance, they become victims in the struggle for power. When we show our astonishment at the discoveries of the James Webb Space Telescope, we are actually witnessing the withdrawal of the God into hiddenness in order to allow those distant galaxies to be. As Being comes to presence, the God withdraws.

Pythagorean circle — *In relation to King Lear, the above should be viewed as a sphere with each of the triangles being wheels within wheels or spheres within spheres.*

The play King Lear shows that the purpose of suffering is to allow for the de-creation of our selves, the de-struction of ourselves, our “I”s or egos. We today see no purpose in suffering, particularly the suffering of the innocent. One of the purposes of suffering is the destruction of the ego or self through affliction. This same decreation of the self was behind the geometry of the Pythagoreans. For the Pythagoreans, the study of geometry served an identical purpose: the purification of our selves or souls through a contemplative understanding of the things that are. When we stand on the circumference of the sphere above and are subject to its spinning, we suffer the ups and downs of Fate. We are beings in Time. Being at the centre of the sphere allows us to be free of its spinning. The spinning of the wheel or sphere is Time.

There is a Wheel of Fortune motif that runs throughout King Lear: Fortune is personified in the passage through alliteration ‘false fortune’s frown’ to illustrate that it is, in this case, one of human making: even with the best of intentions one can incur the worst: good does not triumph over evil in this sphere but is subject to the same necessity as are rocks and stones. To decreate one’s Self is to have the Self replaced by an assimilation into the divine; it is to become one of ‘God’s spies’, to see all with God’s eyes and to see all for God. God requires human beings “to see” His creation. His creation is Necessity; and there is a great gap separating the Necessary from the Good. Being requires human beings. When a human being sacrifices the Self, the ego, his most treasured possession, for assimilation in God, “the gods themselves throw incense” upon this sacrifice. We believe our Self to be our most precious possession; the renouncing of this possession is the purpose of our lives, and this renunciation is not pleasant: it is done through suffering. Few people are capable of it. I am not sure that one would want to be the parent of a saint. It is a pain-filled event much as ‘the turning’ in Plato’s allegory of the Cave is a pain-filled event.

Simone Weil — “Suffering (affliction), when it is consented to and accepted and loved, is truly a baptism”

The centre of the sphere is both in time and space and out of time and space. The Self as center here is indifferent to the size of the prison, the size of the circle, the size of the sphere. For Lear, imprisonment will be a liberation, not a restriction. “Suffering (affliction), when it is consented to and accepted and loved, is truly a baptism” (Simone Weil, “The Love of God and Affliction”). This is similar to Hamlet’s praise of Horatio (Act III sc. ii) where Hamlet says:

Horatio has what we may call a ‘balanced soul’: each of its parts does what it is supposed to do. Having this balanced soul is what we understand as “self-knowledge”. This self-knowledge allows one to accept the buffets and rewards of fate with equal thanks. Of course, it is easy for us to be thankful for the goods that we receive from fate. It is not so easy to accept the inevitable afflictions that come with being alive with equal thanks.

Baptism is a spiritual re-birth. It is usually associated with the element of water. The purification of the soul is associated with fire, with alchemy. Love is ‘fire catching fire’. On the heath, Lear experiences both the baptism with water and the purification through fire. The spiritual rebirth for Lear is clear from this passage in Act V sc. iii as well as from Act III onwards in the play where he experiences both a physical and spiritual re-birth. In order to do so, he must lose all that has attached him to his world and his ego must be destroyed. He must, in a real sense, ‘die’ and become a ‘nothing’. This is the purpose for Lear’s nakedness and madness in the play.

The attempted suicide of Gloucester in the play due to his suffering is a counterpoint to this: suicide is a sin against the gods because we falsely believe that our self is our own and of our own making. Gloucester’s realization that this is not the case results in his finding Edgar again and having ‘his heart burst smilingly’. His death is the counterpoint to Lear’s death: Lear’s heart will break due to the depth of his affliction at the loss of his Fool and Cordelia. Death is the inevitable end for us all. Contrary to our view, in the world of Shakespeare some kinds of suffering have a purpose and some suffering simply does not, and human beings are not beyond the good and evil that is present in the suffering that has no purpose or meaning. My saying this is in opposition to that statement recently by a Republican congresswoman who said that death is inevitable in order to justify her voting for the cuts that would be made to healthcare for the poor.

Our “personal knowledge” is our ‘sphere of influence’ on our worlds and on the other human beings who inhabit our worlds. The impact of our spheres of influence will be determined by the amount of self-knowledge we possess, and on the skills, aptitudes, fitness (techne) that we possess for the tasks. Those spheres that we inhabit in our lives should be seen as composed of wheels within wheels with our actions the spokes of the wheels. The spokes are our ‘projections’ and provide support for our spheres. The spokes reach out to the circumferences of the wheels: from the diameter, the right angled triangle cannot exceed that circumference. The sphere created by the circumferences may be large or small; most of our lives are spent in our attempts to enlarge this sphere. The spokes that are the radii of the self are the whorls of a gyre initiated by the soul and projected upon the world that we are in in order to create a world. In the whorl that is the motion within our sphere, we are ’empowered’ to carry out our activities, but the prison of ourselves is still a ‘prison’ beginning with our bodies and our egos which are placated by the social prestige which comes from the fulfillment of our urges and desires. At each stage on the whorl, there is a leaping-off possibility that presents itself through the metaxu or relation of the logos.

We become and are satisfied in being the ‘poor rogues’ and ‘gilded butterflies’ that Lear and Cordelia will chat with. The outer edges of the sphere in its spinning indicate the fates of those who are ruled by Fortune: ‘who loses and who wins; who’s in, who’s out’. It is the fate of all of us who are dominated by the wish for social prestige, recognition. This fate and our desire for this fate is part of the ‘mystery of things’, the mystery of being: to see this we must remain at the centre of the sphere where we are not moved by the wheel’s or the sphere’s spinnings, nor are our desires dominated by the wish for social prestige and recognition.

Lear, through his madness and suffering, has been re-born (see other sections of the play particularly Lear’s awakening when he sees Cordelia as an angel, a mediator, and in the play she is, from the beginning, representative of truth). His self, ego, I, has been destroyed. He becomes a “nothing”. In this scene from Act V, Lear demonstrates the friendship that is the love between two unequal yet equal beings. Lear’s ‘kneeling down’ when asked for his blessing in order to ask for forgiveness is his recognition of this equality. It is no longer the view of the Lear who said “I am a man more sinned against than sinning”, a false view of Lear’s at the moment of its occurrence in the play for it is the view of most of us with regard to our own sufferings. We see ourselves as victims.

It is with a great and terrible irony that after these speeches of Lear’s and Cordelia’s, the following occurs:

EDMUND: Come hither, captain; hark.
Take thou this note. (30)
[Giving a paper] Go follow them to prison:
One step I have advanced thee; if thou dost
As this instructs thee, thou dost make thy way
To noble fortunes: know thou this, that men
Are as the time is: to be tender-minded (35)
Does not become a sword: thy great employment
Will not bear question; either say thou’lt do ‘t,
Or thrive by other means.
CAPTAIN: I’ll do ‘t, my lord.

EDMUND: About it; and write “happy” when thou hast done. (40)
Mark, I say, instantly; and carry it so
As I have set it down.
CAPTAIN: I cannot draw a cart, nor eat dried oats;
If it be man’s work, I’ll do ‘t.

The Captain’s final words are a statement for all of us motivated by social prestige. That Edmund should give the Captain a paper or document instructing him is a particularly ironic note. Human crime or neglect is the cause of most suffering. On the orders of superiors we carry out acts that we believe are “man’s work” i.e. they are not the work of Nature but we ascribe the moral necessity for our actions to Nature: “I cannot draw a cart, nor eat dried oats”. We believe that we are compelled to commit immoral actions because we believe Nature imposes its necessities upon us; and, at times, Nature does indeed do so. We believe such actions to be our ‘duty’. But if we live with a thoughtful recognition that there are simply acts which we cannot and must not do, we are capable of staying within these limits imposed by the order of the world upon our actions.

Such words as the Captain’s have been used by human beings to justify to themselves and to others the reasons for their actions from the committing of petty crimes to genocides. They see their crimes as performing a duty, just “following orders”, or as Adolf Eichmann said: “I was just a scheduler of trains; I didn’t kill anybody”, or as Elon Musk in his destruction of USAID does not see himself as responsible for the possible deaths of 15,000,000 human beings. It is indicative of a loss of a sense of ‘otherness’. It is the Ring of Gyges: the invisibility and anonymity we seek in order to dispel any responsibility for our actions. We allow this committing of crimes to ourselves when it is accompanied by an increase in our ‘good fortunes’.

The root of all crimes is, perhaps, the desire for social prestige whether that is achieved through position, money or recognition. The root of all sin is the denial of the light, the denial of truth, the denial of what is the essence of our humanity. This denial results in our becoming increasingly inhumane and cruel. For the Captain, it is Edmund who will determine what ‘happy’ will become for him by his giving to the Captain ‘noble fortunes’; and the Captain believes it. He does not see his act as “inhumane” but calls it “man’s work”. He will achieve his noble fortunes through the committing of an ignoble act, a heinous act.

One would need to look far across the breadth and depth of English literature to find two more contrasting views of humanity in a work than that which is presented here in these two brief scenes from King Lear. Human beings are capable and culpable of both forms of action: we have an infinite capacity for Love and forgiveness as well as a finite capacity for committing the most heinous crimes; only Love is both beyond and within the circle or sphere, and all human action is done within the sphere (or the realm of Necessity). At bottom, all sin is the sin against the light, or truth.

Contemplation and Calculative Thinking: Living in the Technological World

The passages from King Lear give us an entry to understanding a practical alternative way of being-in-the-world to the current conditioning or ‘hard-wiring’ of our way of being under the technological world-view operating as it does within the principle of reason. This alternative way involves contemplative thinking as opposed to calculative thinking. This contemplative thinking is open to all human beings: it is not a special mental activity. It is an attitude toward things as a whole and a general way of being in the world. It is the attitude that Lear proposes for himself and Cordelia on how they will spend their time in prison: while they will still be in the world, they will not be of the world. While they will be involved with the “poor rogues” and “gilded butterflies”, the world of those rogues and butterflies will not be their world.

What does this mean for us? It suggests that we are in the technological world, but not of this technological world; we are here in body but not in spirit. This is not a Ludditian rejection of technology. We are free in our relation to technology. We avail ourselves of technological things but we place our hearts and souls elsewhere. This detachment involves both a “being-in” and a “withdrawal-from”. Like Lear and Cordelia, we let the things of the technological world go by, but we also let them go on. Like Lear and Cordelia, the detachment is both a “no” to the social and its machinations, but it is also a “yes” to it in that it lets that world go on in their entertaining of it.

What is Calculative Thinking?

10 spirals should be seen inside of this cone. The spirals are projected to the circumference of the sphere.

The illustrated gyres on the left are an example of our ‘projections’ of our understanding of our being-in-the-world. These projections are a product of Eros expressed as ‘need’. Being is the essence of technology: Eros as time adapts itself to the Logos as “form” (space) and is thus able to “inform” and to be of use in the meeting of those ‘needs’ that are the projections of Eros.

Calculative thinking is how we plan, research, organize, operate and act within our everyday world. This thinking is interested in results and it views things and people as means to an end. It is a viewing that sees human beings as “human resources” or “human capital”. It is our everyday practical attitude towards things. Contemplative thinking is detached from ordinary practical interests. From where does calculative thinking originate?

Our “spheres of influence” are in a relation to and occupy the spheres of others

Calculative thinking is illustrated by the spirals or gyres illustrated above. From the centre of the sphere that is our site in our being-in-the-world, we send out or ‘project’ what plans, research, activities we are involved in and these create a world that is itself sphere-shaped. These plans and activities are ‘echoed’ back to us. It is the logos as language and enumeration (mathematics) which establishes those spheres that are the worlds of our experience. These spheres are the worlds of the ‘poor rogues’ and ‘gilded butterflies’ whom Lear and Cordelia will entertain. These spheres are sometimes called “bubbles” today, and various types of human beings may occupy and share the same bubble or sphere or part of a bubble or sphere much like in a Venn diagram. We speak of a “sphere of influence” that we attribute to the powers of various individual human beings. This is the projection that they have over and into the spheres that are projected by others. We measure our freedom by how much of our sphere is truly in our possession and not under the influence of powerful people. The amount of this freedom is determined by the self-knowledge that we may have at any given time.

It is language and enumeration that are the metaxu or media that establish our relation to everything that is and to everything that is not. It is language, with the assistance of eros, which entraps us into seeing presence and the things that presence as “data” and this “data” must then be transformed into a “form” so that it may “inform” and thus become a “resource”. This is why our age is called the Information Age.

The piety that is religion establishes what should be looked up to and what should be bowed down to. Aristotle called or implied that human beings are ‘the religious animal’ in his discussions of piety in both his Politics and his Nichomachean Ethics. In other days, this piety was indicated by that object or site which held the highest point and dominated one’s view. In the West, the highest point was dominated by the spire of the cathedral or the minarets of the mosque from which the imam made his call to prayer. These indicated the way of being of the individuals who lived within those communities. In the East, it was the statue or temple of the Buddha, or it was in the prohibition that no human construction was to be higher than the highest coconut tree within the sphere of site of a Balinese person. These are now not the most dominant points. The most dominant points are the communications towers that are the logistics and infrastructure of our Information Age and these are global in influence.

“Information” develops into the setting in order of everything that presences as “data”, and information establishes itself in the “resources” that result, and rules as “resource” itself. This is the essence of artificial intelligence and it is the danger of artificial intelligence. The algorithm rules and determines the understanding and thinking of the spheres of the individuals whose spheres have been created from that algorithm which are made manifest in their projections. While living within the world of technology, human beings are physically, mentally and spiritually changed by that technology.

The danger of the tyranny embedded in technology is obvious: the creators of the algorithm will determine the understanding and thinking as well as the actions of those who are subject to the algorithm. They are the new sophists who use rhetoric as their meta-language. They will pre-determine their spheres and thus their actions. This is the essence of cybernetics, the unlimited mastery of human beings by other human beings. Cybernetics provides a framework, a form which determines the principles of communication (the form that informs and how it informs, similar to the rhetoric of the sophists of ancient days), the control, and the feedback (the algorithm). Cybernetics determines future actions. The term cybernetics originates from the Greek word “kybernētuēs,” meaning “steersman” or “governor”. Cybernetics is political. It deals with the control of the many. One should be reminded of the many analogies Plato makes in his dialogues with regard to ‘the steersman’ or the ‘helmsman’. Cybernetics is the technology of the helmsman or steersman.

What we choose to be in our doings in the worlds of our projections is that which demonstrates our skills, aptitudes, and fitness to bring forth the “work” that is the product or produce of that world be it goods, services or ideas. We feel ‘at home’ in these worlds. This ‘at home-ness’ is what is understood as ‘justice’; our being in those worlds is something we are ‘fitted for’, what is suitable for us. The ‘unbalanced soul’ driven by the desire for power or prestige will seek to occupy all of the space (logos) within the world that the sphere represents. These are those who do not have the skills, aptitude or fitness (the techne) for a world that they have become involved in and so they must use deceit, machinations and lies. Their product will be injustice.

Human beings come to presence as the ‘perfect imperfection’ dominated by Eros as need (Time). In the perduring of their presence, they are the zoon logon echon. Their perdurance is in language (logos): word and enumeration. In their perdurance, human beings adapt and change, but these adaptations and changes are appearances only. They are ‘surface phenomenon’ and are subject to evil, the denial of the good and the denial of the light. The coming to presence of the ‘form’ that ‘informs’ is the algorithm that is the principle of reason. The principle of reason is a principle of Being: it is Eros present as ‘need’ and shows one of his faces.

“Stupidity” is a moral phenomenon, not an intellectual phenomenon. “Intentional ignorance” is the giving over of responsibility for one’s actions, much like the story in the ring of Gyges. There is a parallel between invisibility and anonymity, and this invisibility shows itself in the inability of the individual who believes in the “invisibility” of their anonymity to think or relate to the consequences of their actions. Moral decay and depravity, the lack of self-knowledge that involves the uncertainty of what it means “to be a man”, what is “male excellence”, are all results of the failure to live within the essence of being human by revealing truth. These make the individual less “humane”. These social phenomenon are all connected and rooted in the sin against the light: the failure to bring things to light and the denial of the light.

The essence of technology which presents itself in the appearance of information correspondingly changes the essence of human being by closing down those open regions that are possibilities of freedom for human beings both in thought and action. The various worlds of human beings become closed down because they are limited in possibilities, and reality becomes replaced by fantasy, an empty, unthoughtful wishing that constructs “virtual” worlds. These virtual worlds are essentially nihilistic in nature and mirror the worlds of the rhetoricians and sophists from ancient days. The virtual worlds are the outer reaches of the gyre that has been projected from the central position of the self. The aspirations of those who wish to colonize Mars, for instance, are an example of this nihilism in action. These fantasy worlds are a diminution of the temporal and spatial limitations of necessity or reality, and they accentuate the immediate, the gut reaction. This places the viewer/hearer in the center of the action or the sphere. In the Aristotelian context, pathos or emotion discourages critical analysis fostering an immediacy that endures long enough to inspire one to action (or simply to purchase a product). This is the opposite of Aristotelian phronesis.

The ‘tech bros’ and ‘cybernauts’ are those who have lost all sense of ‘otherness’ and who have come to the conclusion that there are some human beings to whom no justice is due for they are merely ‘resources’ and disposables or they are ‘useless’. That technology as information grounded in the principle of reason is Being itself, then technology will never allow itself to be mastered either positively or negatively by human doing alone. Technology cannot be overcome by human beings for that would mean that human beings have overcome Being i.e. immortality. It is from within the Eros and the Logos that we must look for salvation from the way of being that is technology.

H.L. Mencken-8x6 — “No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American people.”

One type of calculative thinking is that thinking we call ‘machination’. It does not require computers or calculators and it is not necessarily scientific or sophisticated. It would be better understood in the sense of how we call a person “calculating”. When we say this we do not mean that the person is gifted in mathematics. We mean that the person is designing; he uses others to further his own self-interests. Such a person is not sincere: there is an ulterior motive, a self-interested purpose behind all his actions and relations. He is engaged with others only for what he can get out of them. He is an “operator” and his doings are machinations. His being-in-the-world may be said to rest on the saying attributed to H. L. Mencken: “No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American people.” The ‘calculating’ person seeks empowerment or an increase in the influence of his sphere that has intersected the spheres of others.

Calculative thinking is, then, more of a general outlook on things, a disposition, a ‘way of life’. It is an attitude and approach that the things are there for what we can get out of them. People and things are there for us to exploit. This general outlook is determined by the disclosive looking of technology, how it reveals truth, and its impositional attitude towards things. The transforming of the world that is, our reality, into ‘data’ kills both eros and logos and creates a sterile, homogeneous world from which we flee into the realm of ‘virtual worlds’ which, too, are a product of that same limited imagination that constructed the understanding of that reality that is always before one. Calculative thinking inevitably requires moral obtuseness.

There is no lack of calculative thinking in our world today: never has there been so much planning, so much problem-solving, so much research, so many machinations. TOK itself is a branch and flowering of this calculative thinking. Indeed, what is called critical thinking is but another example of the calculative thinking found in other areas of what is called thinking. But in this calculative thought, human beings are in flight from thinking. The thinking that we are in flight from is contemplative thinking, the essence of which is to reveal truth, the very essence of our being human and the way in which we engage in our ‘humanity’. In this flight, we are very much like Oedipus who, after hearing the omen from the oracle at Delphi and its prophecy, rashly flees in the hope that he can escape his destiny. As with Oedipus we, too, are blind and unable to see in our flight from thinking and in our rash attempts to “change the world”.

What is Contemplative Thinking:

Contemplative thinking, on the other hand, is the attention to what is closest to us. It pays attention to the meaning of things, the significance of things, the essence of things. It does not have a practical interest and does not view things as a means to an end but, much like Lear and Cordelia, dwells on the things for the sake of disclosing what makes them be what they are. It is an engagement which is a disengagement.

Contemplative thinking allows us to take upon ourselves “the mystery of things”, to be “God’s spies” in the two-way “theoretical looking” of Being upon us and of ourselves upon Being. To be “God’s spies” we must remove our own seeing and our own looking, that looking and seeing that we have inherited as our “shared knowledge”, our “perspectivism”, and allow Being to look through us. This seeing and looking through is not a redemption that is easily achieved or bought. The pain-filled ascent in the release from the enchainment within the Cave to the freedom outside of the Cave or Lear’s suffering and de-struction on the heath in the storm are indications of the kinds of exertions that are required. King Lear in his anagnorisis has arrived at the truth of what it means to be, as such, and of his place in that Being. Contemplative thinking is a paying attention to what makes beings be beings at all, but contemplative thinking is not a redemption which can be cheaply bought.

The word “con-templation” indicates that activity which is carried out in a “temple”. It is that which is responsible for a communing with the divine. A common word for it is “prayer”. The temple is where those who gather receive messages from the divine. Our ’embodied souls’ are temples. Lear and Cordelia’s prison is, as such, a “temple” to Lear. Within a temple, one receives auguries. An augury is an omen, a being who bears a divine message which must be heard by those to whom it is spoken. In and through this hearing, one is given to see the essence of things and to “give back” those essences to Being.

Contemplation is the observing of beings just as they exist and attending to their essence. It is a reserved, detached mode of disclosing that expresses itself in gratitude, the giving of thanks: we give thanks to Being for being. This attention is available to all human beings who through their love, like Lear and Cordelia, are open to the otherness of beings without viewing those beings as serving any other purpose than their own being. For human beings, it is the highest form of action directed by what the essence of human being is, the revealing of truth through the logos. It is arete or virtue, what we understand as ‘human excellence’. As the highest form of human being itself, it must be available to all since it is our very nature as human beings. It is the height of what the Greeks called arete “virtue”, “human excellence” and signifies the height of being human.

Eros, Logos and the Tripartite Soul

“Spiritedness” and Human Excellence

Eros is the “procreator” of “true virtue”, and true virtue comprises courage, moderation, wise judgement and justice. It was believed that these qualities were the ‘highest’ that a human being could attain and comprised human excellence, the ideal, the model, the paradigm. It was believed that these qualities could be attained through eros as Love. Each of the speakers of the Symposium addresses these four virtues in some way, and in their logoi reveal themselves as individuals as well as the nature of all human beings to some extent.

In Alcibiades’ speech in Symposium, we have his criticism of the love of the philosopher which he asserts is beyond the human. In this, he is in agreement with Aristophanes. Alcibiades’ intense ‘love’ and ‘passion’ for Socrates is contrasted with Socrates’ dispassionate attitude towards him as a result of Socrates being in love with what Socrates calls the Beautiful rather than the ‘beautiful’ Alcibiades himself. The example of Alcibiades is used as a warning by Plato of the disaster that can result if we do not develop our eros in an appropriate way. But from what and where is this ‘appropriate way’ and how is it to be ‘appropriated’? How are we as ordinary human beings going to achieve the state of not “wanting” the things that we have come to desire and of knowing the difference between what is truly desirable and what is not? How do we develop the way of thinking that discerns this?

Since Eros is described as ‘fullness’ and ‘need’, we may look at Socrates through such a lens. As “Need”, Socrates’ outward appearance is ugly and far from beautiful; he is ‘ugly’ like Silenus, the satyr, according to Alcibiades (203 c; 215 a-b). It is ironic that Socrates puts on make up before he goes to Agathon’s symposium, and we must think about this detail in the drama that we are about to read. This is not the only ‘mask’ that he wears in that drama that he is about to participate in; Diotima is also a mask adopted by Socrates. According to Alcibiades, Socrates is “dirty and barefoot…always sleeping on the ground without blankets” (203 d, 220 b 3-5). He is “poor” and disdains material resources. He is unique and unlike any other human being that Alcibiades has encountered. The outer appearance of the ‘mask’ hides the beauty within that is far more lovelier and this is the beauty that Alcibiades is after.

As “Fullness”, Socrates is a “schemer after the beautiful and the good” as he likes to be around beautiful young men, according to Alcibiades. His military actions at Potidaea and Delium suggest that he is “courageous, impetuous and intense”. (203 d) He is “passionate for wisdom and resourceful in looking for it, philosophizing all his life” since he is ceaselessly reflecting. According to Alcibiades, he is “a clever magician, sorcerer and sophist” since he charms all kinds of people with his words (203 d). Is Alcibiades referring to Socrates’ use of rhetoric or his use of dialectic? Socrates is a “daimonion” man, capable of being an intermediary or a metaxu between the divine and the human for other human beings. Socrates is capable of producing or ‘bringing forth’ true virtue and not the image of it, and this is what attracts Alcibiades to him. Socrates tries to encourage Alcibiades to gain self-knowledge and to care for his soul which in Alcibiades’ case means that he must give up his ‘love’ of the hoi polloi which Alcibiades is unable to do for it is the root of his power, and Alcibiades’ first love is power. According to Alcibiades, Socrates is a “babushka doll” with many hidden layers. Inside one Socrates, one will find another. For Socrates, Alcibiades is possibly a great man who has chosen to remain with his love for the surfaces of things.

The “lower eros” or the “pandemian eros”, the eros common to all, moves human beings to seek for a kind of immortality, an image of immortality, while the “true Eros” leads human beings to seek for a “true immortality”. The “lower eros” also leads human beings to seek for images of immortality rather than the true immortality which Socrates believes is to be found in the Good. Alcibiades is the “democratic man” who leads a dissipated life governed by an unrestrained indulgence of the appetites. The consequences of Alcibiades’ immoderation ultimately lead to his impiety and his failure to lead the Sicilian expedition which ultimately leads to Athens’ downfall in the Peloponnesian War. An undisciplined Eros can lead to the complete loss of all that one ‘loves’ and can lead to consequences far beyond one’s self. This principle is as true today as it was in ancient times.

Who and what an individual is is shown by the leading passion of their lives or their eros. For most of us, this is shown in our “love of one’s own” and in the tasks which we choose to do. Some desire “procreation” in beautiful bodies leaving the “produce” behind as offspring. Others feel the desire for immortal fame and honour in the procreative production of “works” or of deeds or of the enactment of laws.

Poets who produce images of the gods but who have no knowledge (gnosis) of the gods provide the horizons for the lives of the many who live in their “opinions” under the laws enacted by those in power. They live in the service of the Great Beast which Plato outlines in Bk VI of his Republic. Others are individuals who are destroyed by their passions giving us the essence of tragedy as will be the case with many of the participants in the drama that is the Symposium. At the time the drama of the Symposium is retold to us through Apollodorus, only Aristophanes and Socrates have survived.

The Tripartite Soul

Plato’s tripartite soul is revealed to us in Bks IV, VIII, and IX of Republic, but its principles operate throughout the whole text. The ‘appetitive’ part of the soul is called the epithymetikon and it is primarily related to the objects that are our physiological needs and these require ‘wealth’ or power or an agency of some type to be appropriated. The ‘spirited’ part of the soul is called the thymoeides, and it is that part of the soul that is primarily concerned with the polemos or strife for victory and honour or just the struggle to be alive which is the primary reason for our focus on ourselves. The thymoeides is primarily concerned with ‘will’ and ‘will to power’. The logistikon is that part of the soul which desires the revealing of truth, and with the truth the genuine Good.

What a person’s soul or character is and how it will manifest itself depends on early experience and education and which desires come to govern our lives. The development or deterioration of the logistikon or ‘noetic’ part of the soul will occur when reason is only used as a calculative tool that determines which ‘appetites’ are stronger or more intense; but this reason in itself is unable to distinguish what is really good on its own. If the appetitive part of the soul predominates, the epithymetikon, it has to calculate according to how best to meet those appetitive aspirations (see Pausanias’ speech in Symposium). When the thymoeides comes to predominate, the technological way-of-being in the world comes forward. The thymoeides part of the soul will primarily be a product of and reflect the regime which rules in our being-with-others in our communities. In all of these cases mentioned, the soul will be unbalanced.

The “philosopher” is the person who achieves the maximum development of the desire for truth and the revealing of the Good and achieves the true essence of what a human being truly is. Human beings desire truth; not to do so is to become inhumane. Where the logistikon fails, the thymoeides part of the soul comes to predominate as a desire for power and as will to power. This will show itself in the desire for wealth and the possession of goods or that which can be “consumed”. The thymoeidic part of the soul acts as an intermediary with the other two parts and is pliable enough to let either of the other two parts come to predominate.

Knowledge of the Good is a condition for knowing what the Good is for the individual as well as the community, and it is a condition of social justice and individual justice which is the self-knowledge arrived at when the individual has the sophrosyne to see the relations of the parts of the soul to the whole i.e. knowledge of the parts to the whole. This knowledge brings about a balance to the soul and allows the individual to be just. Eros (as the cosmic whole of things) is the order (necessity, Time) in which a human being comes-to-be and through his good or evil actions is punished or rewarded accordingly.

Today, we refer to the three parts of the soul as the ‘personality’. Psyche is denigrated through the use of this word. The id, ego, and superego of Freud is a characterization of the lower eros of Plato only. The “blind love” of Freud replaces the love of the Good that is the Platonic Eros, and the Platonic Eros is driven by the “intelligence”, “mind” or “spirit” which he refers to “as fire catching fire”. For Freud, love is a case of contingency and chance. For Plato, Love is that infinitesimal element of the logistikon part of the soul which transcends necessity and chance. For Plato, the human being is like a chimera which has different forms of animals molded into one, such as a sphinx. The desires of the logistikon part of the soul are what reason considers as ‘the right thing to do’ for our actions and it is often at odds with the appetitive part of the soul.

The logistikon of the soul is two-faced: it is both calculative for the appetitive part which it receives from the thymoeidic part of the soul, and it has an impulse all its own which historically has been rendered as “reason”. Its calculative part reveals itself in our algebra which further becomes our way of controlling and commandeering the world we dwell in. The conflict in the soul is the manifestation of the aggressiveness and desire for victory that comes from the thymoeidic part of the soul and which can be used to fight against the appetites forming an alliance with reason or it can seek honours and victory against reason’s advice. This strife occurs in Section C of Plato’s Divided Line described in Bk VI of Republic. The choice involves our desire for immortality through love of one’s own that is the product of one’s own body or through “immortal fame”. The conflict manifests itself in that conflict that we have identified as “critical reason” and its conflict with the appetites.

The erotic “needs” to meet the physical, appetitive part of the soul i.e. drink and thirst, food and hunger and this “need” causes us to focus on ourselves only. These drives are for the objects themselves in order to “consume” them. These objects are “good” in themselves (and we call them “goods” in economics), but some are not good though they may appear to be good. The appetitive part of the soul relates to its ‘physical embodiment’, that which is subject to Necessity. The Necessary never desires the good in itself and in its blindness can choose the bad. The choice belongs only to the logistikon. The logistikon is ‘consciousness’. The “strife” occurs when the logos drives towards the good and the appetites seek objects independent of their goodness. The inability of the appetitive part of the soul to discriminate between what is good and bad is that it cannot establish a “limit” by itself but needs the logistikon with its desire for the good if it is to establish the appropriate limit.

The drive towards what the logos considers good and the appropriation of the goods that are the desires of the appetites is decisive for each human being because it determines what is to be done at a certain moment, which desires will lead our lives, and whether or not we become lovers of truth and whether we are able to get closer to the genuine Good. It is how we participate in justice.

The Soul and the Regime: Republic Bks IV, VIII and IX

Bk IV of Republic discusses the soul’s “physical embodiment”, its attachment to Nature and its significance as a mirror of the political order which surrounds it. In the Symposium, the speaker Phaedrus represents this level of the soul as it relates to eros. Phaedrus’ speech shows his membership in the oligarchic, timocratic social class to which he belongs. He is today’s “literary aesthete.”

Phaedrus’ name is significant in its meaning: it derives from the original Greek word phaino, which was one of the original names of Eros. The Greek word “phainesthai” (φαίνεσθαι) means “to seem”, “to appear”, or “to be brought to light”, thus it is associated with the Greek idea of “truth” (aletheia) but only with the truth’s idea of “seeming” to be true as “presence” (ousia) or appearance. It is the passive form of the verb “phainein” (φαίνω), which means “to show” or “to make appear”. Essentially, “phainesthai” describes something that appears to be or that is revealed but may not be really there.

These namings are significant in their relation to the epithymetikon part of the soul: the individual is led to the “appearance” or the “seeming” of that which, at first, appears to be good or beautiful. The “making” of the technites in the city will be of such a nature that they will use the images and representations given to them by that which is in order to bring into being things that are unnecessary needs for the soul and for the city. This is the underlying idea behind Socrates’ censorship of the poets from his ideal city, for the poets promote freedom as ‘license’ rather than freedom as thoughtful contemplation. Since Plato was a poet himself, we may presume that not all poets are included in this prohibition but only some types of poets. The Imagination as outlined by Plato in the Divided Line may be said to indicate the two-faced nature of the Logos: the imagination as a kind of thinking done by the lesser poets and technicians, and the Divine Imagination as used by the great poets (such as Plato himself) and the philosophers.

For Socrates, the analogy of the city and the individual (435a-b) proceeds from the three analogous parts in the soul with their natural functions (436b). The four virtues of the individual (by which “human excellence” is defined) are also shown in the polis by its organization. By using instances of the polemos or conflict in the soul, he distinguishes the function of the logistikon or thoughtful part from that of the epithymetikon or appetitive part of the soul (439a). Then he distinguishes the function of the thymoeidic or spirited part from the functions of the two other parts (439e-440e). The function of the logistikon part is the two-part thinking understood as rational calculation and as meditative, reflective, thankful consciousness. The spirited part, the thymoeides, is the two-fold experience of emotions driven by rage and anger or the care and concern that is love and the sense of otherness. That of the appetitive part or epithymetikon is the pursuit of material and bodily desires, the pursuit of beauty’s “surface”. Since this pursuit is the root cause for the creation of the city itself, it becomes a question of how this pursuit will be carried out as it is given in the city’s laws.

Socrates explains the virtues of the individual’s soul and how they correspond to the virtues of the city (441c-442d). A well-ruled city reflects the well-ruled souls of the individuals that comprise it. As a corollary, the poorly ruled city will be shown in the nature of the individuals who rule it and who are members of it. Socrates points out that one is just when each of the three parts of the soul performs its function (442d). Justice is the natural balance of the soul’s parts in performing their functions, and injustice is an imbalance of the parts of the soul in the subsequent actions that the individual carries out. (444e). With imbalance in the soul comes a subsequent loss of a sense of otherness. Socrates is now ready to answer the question of whether justice is more profitable than injustice that goes unpunished (444e-445a). To do so he will need to examine the various unjust political regimes and the corresponding unjust individuals in each (445c-e).

Socrates is about to embark on a discussion of the unjust political regimes and the corresponding unjust individuals but is prevented from doing so by Adiemantus and Polemarchus. He will return to this topic in Bk VIII. Instead, Socrates discusses the role of women as guardians and the need for the “ideal city” to sever ties to love of one’s own (which is an indication of the first of the impossibilities of the creation of the lower eros-free state and the possibility of its coming into being). The imposition of Polemarchus and Adiemantus is an indication of our need to compromise with the being of others in our worlds. One needs to also consider the relation between the ideas contained in the numbers 5 and 8 when reflecting on the content that is being discussed in both Bks V and VIII of Republic since the numbers as ideai will illuminate the content being discussed.

An example of the imbalanced soul is given through the story of the Ring of Gyges from Bk II of Republic. The story is related by Glaucon, the very “erotic” older brother of Plato, who is himself an “imbalanced soul” at the time of the dialogue. The purpose of the Republic is to instruct him. The premise of the story of Gyges is that we only act justly because we fear punishment should we not do so. Acting justly is not a good thing in itself. The ring gives one the “gift” of invisibility and anonymity. The ring provides one with the “ability” to dismiss one’s responsibility for one’s actions and thoughts, one’s words and deeds. It creates a gulf in the soul between one’s words and one’s deeds.

This “overlooking” of responsibility may be seen as analogous to what we understand as “intentional ignorance” which appears to be exacerbated by the “anonymity” that some believe the Internet provides today. “Intentional ignorance” can be seen as both a failure of the “imagination” (as outlined by Plato in the Divided Line) due to the lack of self-knowledge and an ironic desire for the “15 minutes of fame” that public recognition provides them. In the modern, 15 minutes is the best we can do, not believing eternal fame or glory are possible.

The belief in the anonymity which some think the Internet provides has given rise to those imbalanced souls being given a voice which allows them to obscure and obfuscate the truth regarding the real world about them, and this imbalance carries over to their being-in-the-world or worlds which they happen to construct and occupy. The avoidance of the recognition by many Christians (or those who wish to call themselves Christians such as J. D. Vance and the MAGA Christians in the USA) of the immorality of their immigration policies is an example of this “intentional ignorance”. This ignorance allows one to retain a belief in their own moral imperfections in spite of the Christian call to perfection (the cruelty, the racism, the inhumaneness of their dehumanization of their fellow human beings). Their evil is the outcome of self-deception and their lack of self-knowledge.

This intentional ignorance opens the door to lawlessness and licentiousness. Human beings who have become ensnared in this way of being-in-the-world behave irrationally and incoherently wherever the social, collective emotions rule. The social prestige that is given to a position of power becomes predominant in one’s desiring. One’s crimes and sins, one’s “stupidity”, are disconnected. “Stupidity” is a moral not an intellectual phenomenon. The metaxu, the eros, is destroyed. The metaxu as justice consists in establishing relations and connections between analogous things identical with those between similar terms, even when the things concern us personally (one’s own) and are an object of attachment for us. This is what the geometry of the “dialectical” purification of the logistikon is all about. It involves an act of will and an act of choosing.

In Bk VIII, the soul’s being with others in communities and its sense of justice is the focus of discussion. The first deviant regime from just kingship will be timocracy, the regime that emphasizes the pursuit of honor rather than wisdom and justice (547d ff.). The aristocratic individual, whose thymoeidic part of the soul is primarily concerned with honour and fame, becomes the oligarchic individual due to the soul’s desire for wealth over honour and fame. Wealth is more easily attained than honour and fame.

The oligarchic soul devolves into the democratic soul when the desires of the appetites come to predominate. The democratic soul then becomes the tyrannical soul. The order of the regimes presented is a descent of the soul of the individual and of the eros of that soul. The timocratic individual will have a strong spirited part in his soul and will pursue honor, power, and success (549a). This city will be militaristic. Socrates explains the process by which an individual becomes timocratic: he listens to his mother complain about his father’s lack of interest in honor and success (549d). The timocratic individual’s soul is at a middle point between the logistikon and the thymoeidic or spirited part of the soul.

Oligarchy arises out of timocracy and it emphasizes wealth rather than honor (550c-e). Socrates discusses how it arises out of timocracy and its characteristics (551c-552e): people will pursue wealth; it will essentially be two cities, a city of wealthy citizens and a city of poor people; the few wealthy will fear the many poor; people will do various jobs simultaneously; the city will allow for poor people without means; it will have a high crime rate. The oligarchic individual comes by seeing his father lose his possessions and feeling insecure he begins to greedily pursue wealth (553a-c). Thus he allows his appetitive part to become the more dominant part of his soul (553c). The oligarchic individual’s soul is at middle point between the spirited and the appetitive part.

Socrates’ discussion of democracy illustrates its relation to the epithymetic part of the soul. Democracy comes about when there is a gap between the rich and poor; the rich become too rich and the poor become too poor (555c-d). Too many unnecessary goods and desires make the oligarchs soft and the poor revolt against them (556c-e). In a democracy most of the political offices are distributed by lot (557a). The primary goal of the democratic regime is freedom understood as license (557b-c). People will come to hold offices without having the necessary knowledge (557e) and everyone is treated as an equal in ability (equals and unequals alike, 558c), and incompetent individuals will feel themselves entitled to offices for which they have no ability or fittedness. The democratic individual comes to pursue all sorts of bodily desires excessively (558d-559d) and allows his appetitive part to rule his soul for he is without limits. He comes about when his bad education allows him to transition from desiring money to desiring bodily and material goods (559d-e). The democratic individual has no shame and no self-discipline (560d).

Tyranny arises out of democracy when the desire for freedom to do what one wants becomes extreme (562b-c). The freedom or license aimed at in the democracy becomes so extreme that any limitations on anyone’s freedom seem unfair. Socrates points out that when freedom is taken to such an extreme it produces its opposite, slavery (563e-564a). The tyrant comes about by presenting himself as a champion of the people against the class of the few people who are wealthy (565d-566a). The tyrant is forced to commit a number of acts to gain and retain power: accuse people falsely, attack his kinsmen, bring people to trial under false pretenses, kill many people, exile many people, and purport to cancel the debts of the poor to gain their support (565e-566a). The tyrant eliminates the rich, brave, and wise people in the city since he perceives them as threats to his power (567c).

Socrates indicates that the tyrant faces the dilemma to either live with worthless people or with good people who may eventually depose him and chooses to live with worthless people (567d). The tyrant ends up using mercenaries as his guards since he cannot trust any of the citizens (567d-e). The tyrant also needs a very large army and will spend the city’s money to obtain it (568d-e), and he will not hesitate to kill members of his own family if they resist his ways (569b-c).

Bk IX discusses the differences between the tyrannical and the philosophic soul. Socrates begins by discussing necessary and unnecessary pleasures and desires (571b-c). Those with balanced souls ruled by the logistikon are able to keep their unnecessary desires from becoming lawless and extreme by imposing limits (571d-572b). The imposition of limits is done through the logistikon. Today, this tyrannical aspect of the soul is manifested in our desire for the “novel”, the “new” and in our creation of unnecessary desires.

In Bk VI of Republic Plato, in his discussion of the Divided Line, shows that the “know how” of the artists (poets) and technicians (scientists) devolves from the production or bringing forth of the products of their expertise to the bringing forth of ‘novelty’ or the ‘new’ with regard to those products in order to satisfy the desires of the appetites of those individuals who have bowed down to their tyrannical natures. The lust for the ‘new’ imposes itself on the eros of the poets and scientists so much so that it becomes a form of enslavement to production itself for its own sake. In the Republic, the search is for a form of thinking that will rise above this enslavement to the calculation of pleasures directed to the satisfaction of the desires and appetites that have been created. The tyrannical individual feels a sense of entitlement to the possessing of these objects of pleasure through wealth or other means.

The tyrannical individual comes out of the democratic individual when the latter’s unnecessary desires and pleasures become extreme; when he becomes full of the lower form of Eros or lust for power (572c-573b). The tyrannical person is mad with lust (573c) and this leads him to seek any means by which to satisfy his desires and to resist anyone who gets in his way (573d-574d). Some tyrannical individuals eventually become actual tyrants in the various worlds in which they happen to be (575b-d). Tyrants associate themselves with flatterers and are incapable of friendship because they are incapable of “dialectic” having lost contact with the logistikon parts of their souls. (575e-576a). The loss of a sense of otherness leads to an imbalance that results in a loss of any sense of justice.

Applying the analogy of the city and the soul in Bk IX, Socrates proceeds to argue that the tyrannical individual is the most unhappy individual (576c ff.). Like the tyrannical city, the tyrannical individual is enslaved (577c-d), least likely to do what he wants (577d-e), poor and unsatisfiable (579e-578a), fearful and full of wailing and lamenting (578a). The individual who becomes an actual tyrant of a city is the unhappiest of all (578b-580a). Socrates concludes this first argument with a ranking of the individuals in terms of happiness: the more just one is the happier (580b-c) for he possesses a sense of otherness.

Socrates distinguishes three types of human beings: one who pursues wisdom (the philosopher, driven by the logistikon part of the soul), another who pursues honor (the individual driven by the thymoeidic part of the soul), and another who pursues profit (those who are driven by the epithymetic part of the soul) (579d-581c). He argues that we should trust the wisdom lover’s judgment in his way of life as the most pleasant, since he is able to consider all three types of life clearly (581c-583a). Those who live the other types of lives are lacking in self-knowledge and do not know who they are. Because they do not know who they are and in their “intentional ignorance”, like Gyges, they have divorced themselves from any responsibility for the acts they do and they commit acts of evil ‘unknowingly’ for they are unable to distinguish the necessary from the good.

In his third argument regarding the happiness or unhappiness of the tyrant, Socrates begins with an analysis of pleasure: relief from pain may seem pleasant (583c) and bodily pleasures are merely a relief from pain but not true pleasure (584b-c). The only truly fulfilling pleasure is that which comes from an understanding that sees the objects which it pursues as permanent, that is, a way of being-in-the-world that moves beyond the images of that which is impermanent to the forms and ideas of that which is permanent (585b-c). Socrates adds that only if the logistikon part rules the soul will each part of the soul find its proper pleasure (586d-587a).

He ironically concludes the argument with a calculation of how many times the best life is more pleasant than the worst: seven-hundred and twenty nine (587a-587e) or 9 to the third power (9 x 9 x 9 or 999). This calculation outlines the difference between the Logos as number as we understand it in arithmetic, and the Logos as number understood as idea. Socrates discusses an imaginary multi-headed beast or chimera to illustrate the consequences of justice and injustice in the soul and to support justice (588c ff.). The physical characteristics of the soul and its desires produce a multi-headed hydra which the soul can vary and produce from out of itself. The bestial urges of the soul are the multiple appetites which constitute it. (See Blake’s illustrations of The Beast from the Sea.) The chimera which is the human soul in Bk IX is akin to, but not the same as, the Great Beast of Bk VI. The Great Beast of Bk VI (his number is 666) is the ‘social’ towards whom the political is directed while the beast of Bk IX is the individual soul of all human beings.

Education and the Training of the Soul

“Spiritedness” (anger, wrath, rage, emotions generally) is aligned with the logistikon in its polemos or strife against the appetites in its decisions on what is “the right thing to do” in order to defeat the urges of the appetites by imposing limits on them. The “spirited” part of the soul predominates when the lower part of the logistikon, that part which calculates, is ruling over the appetites. The calculations deal with the intensities of the pleasures which the appetites can give rise to. Today, what we understand as our technological way of being-in-the- world originates the activities that we pursue from the influence of the thymoeidic part of the soul. What we understand as evil originates in the thymoeides part of the soul, but human excellence also resides there.

Training the appetites is one of the aims of childhood education through the stimulation and weakening of the desires and wants in appropriate ways. The intention is to try to make sure that the individual can overcome the focus on the self in order to gain a sense of otherness and be able to participate in justice. The tyrant has released his lawless appetites not in dreams but in life: he is a “wolf”. The tyrant requires lawlessness in order to better achieve his ends. We are all potential tyrants. Unnecessary appetites can be gotten rid of in most cases. The creation of unnecessary appetites is the eros of the democratic regimes ruled by oligarchic capitalists who engage in these activities in order to increase their power through wealth. These unnecessary appetites show up as the desire for ‘novelty’ or the ‘new’ in the creation of ‘wants’ that are unnecessary for the human being.

The “timocratic man” becomes desirous of wealth and the possession of material things when he has found that the search and struggle for human excellence in itself is too difficult and he is too timid to achieve it in military campaigns. This love of possessions (the lowest form of “love of one’s own”) focuses on the “consumption” of the beauty of those things. The consumption of beauty is driven by the misguided belief that somehow one can find “immortality” through the possessions themselves. The corruption of an aristocratic regime and its descent to an oligarchic regime is due to the admission of the desire for wealth by its rulers: “He (the aristocratic man) secretly runs away from the laws like a child from his father” (549 a-b).

The love of wealth develops from the lack of a “musical education” in childhood, and the lack of a musical education then requires training by “force” and not “persuasion”. “Musical education” is contact with beauty and goodness, the mathemata (what can be learned and what can be taught) or what we understand as “reality”. Without training in “geometry” (“music”), the appetites grow without limits, especially the desire for wealth.

The logistikon part of the soul is trained through music (mathematics, geometry). The child is to receive ‘right stories’ in order to inculcate ‘right beliefs’. In democratic regimes, these stories are directed towards a sense of “entitlement” to the satisfaction of unnecessary appetites. “Democracy” has its evolution in this desire for wealth: the unnecessary appetites, created by the artisans and technicians, come to predominate. Power is the root of all evil and is most manifest in the desire for wealth. All worthy opinions and appetites are destroyed and the tyrant emerges. The philosopher and the tyrant are on opposite poles.

The thymoeides part of the soul, which has “anger” as a chief emotion and aggressiveness to confront the dangers of the world, is where andreia or will is to be found, and the will can be directed by will to power or the love of wisdom. For the Greeks, andreia is an episteme or way of knowing, so animals cannot have it. How is will connected to the logos?

At 588 d in Republic, the soul is depicted as a lion. The lion seeks and desires renown and predominance. “Spiritedness” is the desire for victory. It is “irrational”. It is the desire for competitive success and the esteem from others and oneself that comes with it. The tendency to form an ideal image of oneself in accordance with one’s conception of what is fair and noble requires social recognition to be confirmed. But this image is a false image of “self-knowledge”. This error is the reason so many individuals become involved in cults or movements that erase the hope of attaining a true sense of “self-knowledge” or “consciousness”. The “spirited” nature is incapable of discerning the good and the bad on its own and so attaches itself to the changeable, the physical. It makes the logos hold false opinions and judgements. The “uneducated” spirited nature becomes hard and ruthless instead of brave. At the same time, “artistic education” must be combined with sports so that the person does not become too soft and gentle. The greatest crimes are performed by natures of great eros in the thymoeidic part of the soul, but these natures are corrupted by deficient education which is usually the inability to impose limits on the epithymetikon part of the soul through the logos. The logos as rhetoric (the language of the masses) appeals to the thymoeidic and epithymetic parts of the soul.

The desire for wealth is the root of the appetitive part of the soul when it is “unlimited” by the logos. If knowledge does not confer honour, it is worthless. This gives importance to rhetoric as the logos of the timocratic, oligarchic and democratic man. Flattery and meanness of spirit result from subjecting the “spirited” soul to the “mob-like beast” (590b 3-9). With the desire for money and the constant satisfaction of the beast’s needs, the spirited element gets used to being trampled on so that it turns into a monkey instead of a lion. A sense of “victimization” results.

The two-fold nature of the thymoeidic part of the soul might be captured in the phrase “the call to arms”, for the call can be either the call from another human being whose beauty attracts one, or it can be the call to attain renown and glory in military deeds. Without proper training, the “spirited” part of the soul will behave in a beast-like way i.e. “irrational”. The logos is not merely reason as calculation. This is but one face or aspect of the two-faced Logos which relates to the two-faced Eros. The lack of moderation (sophrosyne) gives the terrible creature, the great beast with many heads, too much freedom (590 b). The individual is a microcosm of the polis of which he is a member and a further microcosm of the universe of which he is a part.

The epithymetikon part of the soul, because it is unlimited and seeks the satisfaction of unnecessary desires and appetites (what we would call “novelty” today) pulls the soul in their direction. Even in the best souls, the best one can do is to contain the appetites through the measuring of the logos and its imposing of limits. The appetites do not help the soul in its attempts to obtain the good.

If the “spirited” part of the soul is aptly trained by participation in “sports” and the logos trained “musically” to perceive the harmony of “right opinion” for what is good and what is not, what is honourable and what is not, what is worth fighting for and what is not, what is to be feared and what is not, “spiritedness” can then help the logistikon to achieve both individual and political goods founded on an understanding of reality (self-knowledge).

Courage is the knowledge of what is to be feared and what is not to be feared. The pull of the appetites towards bodily pleasures is what is to be feared most of all for it can become obsessive. It is destructive of right education which teaches right opinions and is destructive of the logos/logistikon as a whole. The highest courage is required for ‘gnostic’ knowledge of the Good which will give knowledge of political good as well as self-knowledge.

Animals have a kind of ‘rationality’, but it is not the rationality that reflects and calculates. The “aristocratic man” who lacks the right “musical education” and who is highly “spirited” does not have the “consciousness” to distinguish good from bad, true from false, and considers fighting and winning as ends in themselves. He has a distorted understanding of reality as a whole. The logos is in contact with the things that change and this leads to false judgements about what is honourable and what is not. The aristocratic man does not fight against real enemies i.e. the appetites and the enemies of the polis. The logos is poorly developed and the appetites are not trained to stay within ‘limits’. When this occurs, the person becomes wild and savage, a “beast”. The oligarchic, democratic and tyrannical men who have no “musical” training are incapable of restraining the appetites to stay within limits for they are overwhelmed by a need for will to power and do not remain within the limits of the necessary. The person becomes a ‘coward’. The timocratic man becomes psychologically unstable and becomes a lover of wealth. The overdevelopment of the appetites in the timocratic man are not governed by the logos. The environment provides the wrong conception of what is good.

The will that fights for victory and fame without the direction of the logos becomes pure savagery; and its corruption, weakened by the appetites, becomes a lover of wealth. With the proper training, the will becomes an ally of the logos in the search for truth and the Good. Courage is the manifestation of proper training supporting the right beliefs which are to be able to identify what is to be feared and dared. The most fundamental fight is that against the appetites.

The Logos/Logistikon

The logos is that through which we learn, reason and judge. It is most broadly what we understand as word and number. As word it encompasses rhetoric (the speech to many) and dialectic (the speech to a few). As number it encompasses number as calculation (arithmetic, algebra) and as geometry (mathemata that which can be learned and that which can be taught). Its dual aspects allows it to become an ally of the thymoeides in its making judgements regarding what is good or what is bad.

“Dialectical knowledge” (gnosis, Love) is the highest knowledge achievable. The logos is common to all human beings. It manifests itself in the desire for love and friendship. “Knowledge” exists in all of us, as do the appetites and the desire for recognition of our selfhood. What is understood as “reason” is a particular form of desire, a desire that compels the individual into finally achieving contemplation of the form of the Beautiful through to the idea of the Beautiful itself.

In its urging towards an ascent, Eros’ affect is to make us love the light and truth and hate darkness and falsehood. Care and concern for others and our sense of “otherness” develops from Eros’ erotic urge. This is what we understand as justice and is our participation in justice. Justice is experienced in both the thymoeidic and logistikon parts of the soul when these parts are in balance and are effectively carrying out their work. The ascent from the individual ego and its love of the part, experienced in the love of a single, beautiful other, to a knowledge of the whole and the love of the whole of things is a process that the immortal part of the soul (logistikon) undergoes in its journey towards “purification” from the love of the meeting of our own necessities and urges to the love of the Good. The tyrannic and democratic soul wishes to possess and consume all that comes before it. “Depth” arises from the ascent which is toward the centre of the sphere in the illustration provided. The descent brings about our desires for the surfaces of things, which is the lower form of eros. This descent is towards the outer circumference of the sphere. Evil is a “surface phenomenon” and eros is a part of it.

The November 2025 TOK Essay Prescribed Titles

A few notes of warning and guidance before we begin:

The TOK essay provides you with an opportunity to become engaged in thinking and reflection. What are outlined below are strategies and suggestions, questions and possible responses only, for deconstructing the TOK titles as they have been given. They should be used alongside the discussions that you will carry out with your peers and teachers during the process of constructing your essay.

The notes here are intended to guide you towards a thoughtful, personal response to the prescribed titles posed. They are not to be considered as the answer and they should only be used to help provide you with another perspective to the ones given to you in the titles and from your own TOK class discussions and research. You need to remember that most of your examiners have been educated in the logical positivist schools of Anglo-America and this education pre-determines their predilection to view the world as they do and to understand the concepts as they do. The TOK course itself is a product of this logical positivism.

There is no substitute for your own personal thought and reflection, and these notes are not intended as a cut and paste substitute to the hard work that thinking requires. Some of the comments on one title may be useful to you in the approach you are taking in the title that you have personally chosen, so it may be useful to read all the comments and give them some reflection.

My experience has been that candidates whose examples match those to be found on TOK “help” sites (and this is another of those TOK help sites) struggle to demonstrate a mastery of the knowledge claims and knowledge questions contained in the examples. The best essays carry a trace of a struggle that is the journey on the path to thinking. Many examiners state that in the very best essays they read, they can visualize the individual who has thought through them sitting opposite to them. To reflect this struggle in your essay is your goal.

Remember to include sufficient TOK content in your essay. When you have completed your essay, ask yourself if it could have been written by someone who had not participated in the TOK course (such as Chat GPI, for instance). If the answer to that question is “yes”, then you do not have sufficient TOK content in your essay. Personal and shared knowledge, the knowledge framework, the ways of knowing and the areas of knowledge are terms that will be useful to you in your discussions.

Here is a link to a PowerPoint that contains recommendations and a flow chart outlining the steps to writing a TOK essay. Some of you may need to get your network administrator to make a few tweaks in order for you to access it. Comments, observations and discussions are most welcome. Contact me at butler.rick1952@gmail.com or directly through this website.

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B-8nWwYRUyV6bDdXZ01POFFqVlU

A sine qua non: the opinions expressed here are entirely my own and do not represent any organization or collective of any kind. Now to business…

The Titles

For historians and artists, do conventions limit or expand their ability to produce knowledge? Discuss with reference to history and the arts.

The first essay title asks us to define and understand what “conventions”, “limitations” and “expansion”, “the ability to produce”, and what “knowledge” is in the arts and history. Examining these terms closely will help the student to get their bearings within the areas of knowledge of history and the arts and of the perspectives from which the questions unfold from out of those areas of knowledge.

First of all, the title indicates that “knowledge” is something that is able to be “produced”. To “produce” is “to make” or to “bring forth”, to bring into existence something from out of materials or components that are ready-to-hand and already in existence. To “produce” can also mean “to cause or bring about a result”. This “causing” indicates that something is responsible for an end result.

For example, if we look at our word “information”, we will see that its suffix is “-ation” which derives from the Greek aitia meaning “that which is responsible for”. So the word “in-form-ation” may be said to mean “that which is responsible for the “form” so that it has the ability to “inform”. The “form” that was responsible for creating the ability to “inform” was called logos by the Greeks. We translate logos as “reason” or “rationality”, a type of thinking. When Albert Einstein complained to Werner Heisenberg that “God does not play dice”, Einstein’s position was based on his belief that the universe was ‘rational’, a “conventional” belief that he had inherited from Newton’s physics. The conventions of science are expressions of the ‘faith’ based on our belief in the axioms and principles of mathematics and how they relate to Nature.

The ‘forms’ of our thinking are what we understand as the ‘conventional’. The conventional from this thinking is where we get our “knowing”. “Making” and “knowing” is our word “technology”: techne being the craft of the artist, the artist’s “know-how”, the “making”, and logos being the “knowing” itself, that which allows the “making” to be possible. The “knowing” or logos establishes that “open region” that allows for the making of the tools of technology such as computers and handphones. “Information” is a type of knowledge that has been ‘brought forth’, and for many it is the only form of knowledge.

“Conventions” are the “opinions” of the many and they will always be found to be surrounded by politics, particularly in History, but also in the Arts. They provide the horizons, the limits, in which understanding and meaning are given to human beings in their lives. In our being-in-the-world, we are at the same time living in a number of “sub-worlds”. You are an IB student or teacher, but this is only one of a number of worlds that you occupy simultaneously and each of these worlds has a different logos with which you are familiar and within which you are “at home”. Other human beings live in other sub-worlds in which you are not at home because you lack the logos or the ‘expertise’, the “know-how” required to fit comfortably within that world.

For our title, the sub-worlds are the worlds of the arts and history, and each of these worlds has a specialized vocabulary that distinguishes those who live in these sub-worlds. Each of these sub-worlds has a logos which is unique to itself and the purpose of education is to provide the learning so that one may be able to enter into the various ‘sub-worlds’ or areas of knowledge as a ‘specialist’ and to be able to dwell comfortably and be ‘at home’ in that world . “Conventions” are the ways and the contents of the knowing that provide the base of understanding that allows one to enter into a sub-world. They are the sub-world’s “history”. They provide the horizons or limits within which the sub-world operates. When one decides to operate outside of the conventions of the sub-world, one will then use ‘imagination’ or ‘fantasy’ to do so. These two types of ‘thinking’ are not the same.

The AOK of History attempts to deal with a world of “facts”; and from that limited world, the logos or perspective of the historian builds from an understanding, which is given to him/her from “convention”, how those facts are to be interpreted, selectively choosing and shaping the meaning of those ‘facts’ into a ‘rational’ whole or form so that others may come to understand the significance of the events being discussed. History deals with the past, present, and future. Its concern is with Time. The purpose of studying history is to gain knowledge of the actions of others in the past so that we in turn will gain self-knowledge so that we can come to an understanding of our place in history so that we will be able to make ‘informed’ decisions in the future. In order for history to inform us, some ground rules must be followed in its telling. This is what is known as ‘convention’, and ‘convention’ is both limiting and at the same time liberating.

The historian relies on ‘rationality’ as that which brings the ‘facts’ to light to show them in their “truth”. The first historian of the West, the Greek Thucydides, wrote: “I have written my work, not as an essay which is to win the applause of the moment, but as a possession for all time.” History of the Peloponnesian War bk. 1, Ch. 22, sect. 18 (tr. Richard Crawley, 1874) Thucydides is saying that while his work is history, his writing of that history is “trans-historical”. His work rises beyond the rhetoric that is the logos of those who wish to gain fame in the present. He believes that his work will have something to say to those who wish to understand the essence of war and of power and so be able to ‘interpret’ these phenomenon in the future. Such knowledge will possibly prevent future cataclysms. His history outlines the end of that era known as the Periclean or Golden Age of Greek history due to the failure of the Athenians’ war against the Spartans. If Thucydides is right, reading his history should be helpful for us if we wish to understand the essence of, say, the USA at this moment in its politics. Thucydides is a ‘true historian’.

The propagandist, on the other hand, relies on ‘fantasy’, the ‘big lie’, the gaslighting that questions the reality of the facts themselves and is, thus, the ‘false historian’. Since we have ‘facts’ as a reality, we also have ‘interpretations’ of facts. The propagandist limits himself in the interpretation of facts by his lack of imagination or thoughtlessness. The interpretations of facts is the discourse of historians. Thucydides believes he has gotten to the ‘truth’ of the facts in his interpretation that is a product of his understanding. His truth ‘defines’ or places limits on the things which he is speaking of so that they can be understood, brought forth, and be capable of being spoken about. He must convey this truth through language (which is also another meaning of the Greek term logos) providing sufficient reasons for his interpretation of the things he has chosen to speak about.

The propagandist’s view, however, is “unlimited” according to the rules of convention for his view relies on ‘fantasy’, and fantasy is opposed to ‘rationality’ and to the ‘imagination’. The propagandist will not have evidence or sufficient reasons to support his perspectives on the facts that he has chosen. The propagandist is ‘anti-rational’ and abhors thinking in any form for thinking gives light to the lie that he is trying to propose. The propagandist requires thoughtlessness. Defining the propagandist as ‘anti-rational’, one can go so far as to say that the propagandist speaks the ‘insane’, the ‘irrational’ to the insane and irrational. The propagandist requires the ‘unlimited’ and the ‘unconventional’. Truth brings the facts to light. The lie obscures, hides, deceives and does so in an irrational logos. The end purpose of the lie is the achievement of power i.e. it is political, and all writing is finally political for it involves our being-with-others and our speaking to others. This is the reason why propagandists appeal to the ‘anti-rational’ emotions of the many to achieve their ends. The propagandist relies on the emotion of the moment, while the true historian attempts to rely on the timelessness of truth. The propagandist ultimately has no respect for his audience; and since this is the case, there can be no “expansion” of knowledge.

In the USA today, the “unlimited” is shown by those who believe that they are capable of living in the various sub-worlds that have been constructed without having the specialized logos required for true participation in those sub-worlds, for being ‘at home in’ those sub-worlds. They lack the techne, the know-how or skill required. They are like poor cobblers who bring forth nothing but ill-fitting shoes. One may think one has “knowledge” where, in fact, none exists. (See the quotation from Plato’s Laws noted below).

The most famous quote of Thucydides not only applies to geo-politics, it also applies to the actions of individual human beings: “The strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must.” (History of the Peloponnesian War bk. 5, Ch. 89) The philosopher Nietzsche once said “Power makes stupid”, and this “stupidity” rests on the lack of self-knowledge that the “strong” exhibit in their lack of respect for conventions and laws. The propagandist has no ethics or morals and his will to power leaves nothing but wastelands in its wake. Thucydides’ quote applies to both individual human beings and to states.

Where ‘fantasy’ rules and dismantles the role of convention providing the illusion of ‘freedom’ in the ‘unlimited’ worlds of the propagandists, ‘imagination’ is the faculty that rules over the worlds of the arts. Fantasy and the imagination are not the same thing. “Novelty” is the end for “production” in the arts (“that which is responsible for”: -tion aitia; for that which is brought forth: pro forward, ducere to lead). “Novelty” is the bringing forth of the Same even though it may be considered “new”: a shoe is a shoe is a shoe. The ‘true artist’, like the ‘true historian’, attempts to change the way in which we view our human condition, to bring about a new or fresh perspective on the things that are. In our cobbler and shoe analogy, the true artist attempts to change the manner in which we view our feet!

Both fantasy and the imagination relate to our manner of viewing the world in which we live and give us our understanding of that world. How we first see our world will determine what can or will be brought forth from that world. (See Title #2) We cannot have hand phones and computers without first viewing the world “technologically”, and our viewing provides a space for the tools of technology to come into being, to be produced. The cobbler views a shoe differently than those who are not cobblers because he views a shoe from his techne.

The English poet William Blake speaks of the “Divine Imagination” and he contrasts it with “Newton’s sleep”. “Newton’s sleep” was Blake’s view of convention: how the principle of reason (nihil est sine ratione: “nothing is without reason”) dominated our world of understanding and thus of ‘science’ or ‘knowledge’. It was and is the way in which we view the world. Today we might think of it at its apogee, which is Artificial Intelligence.

While we may view AI as ‘unlimited’ in its scope and possibilities, for an artist like Blake this is merely an illusion. Today, ‘imagination’ is a polite way of saying that something is false, and it is a common statement of the gaslighters. For Blake, however, the imagination is the central faculty of both the Divine and of human beings in contrast to ‘rationality’. Whereas the “conventional” seeing of Newton keeps us in a somnambulistic state, the imagination is all-embracing and liberating: “In your own bosom you bear your Heaven and Earth & all you behold; tho’ it appears Without, it is Within, in your Imagination, of which this World of Mortality is but a Shadow” (Jerusalem 71:17) For Blake, the imagination was the basis of all art and in the creative act, it was the completest liberty of the spirit. Many of Blake’s contemporaries thought he was ‘mad’. In Blake, the Daughters of Memory (convention, tradition) are often contrasted with the Daughters of Inspiration. “Imagination has nothing to do with memory.”

2. What is the relationship between knowing and understanding? Discuss with reference to two areas of knowledge.

(Any response to this title should also look at some of the points made in title #1 and title #3.)

For any “relationship” to be established, there must be something in common between the things that will allow that relationship to be possible. What do knowledge and understanding have in common and how are they related to each other? What do knowledge and understanding have in common with the limitations that are given within the horizons of the knowing and understanding of historians and the artists?

For the Greeks, the term metaxu is a word that means “between”, “among”, or “in the midst of”. It can also mean “meanwhile”, “in the meantime”, or “afterwards”. This ‘between’ has something to do with being and time for its meaning is adverbial in nature while also containing elements of the gerund. We could say that it is the ‘relationship’ itself that is ‘between’ knowing and understanding and dwells in the midst of what knowing and understanding are. It is a constant presence between the two and must be present for both to occur.

“Understanding” may be said to be “something in which you have a reason to believe”. It involves “faith” to some degree. Understanding may be said to precede knowledge, for there is no knowledge possible without first understanding. Understanding is “consciousness”, “awareness”. Understanding is our projection of possibilities for our being-in-the-world. Once understanding is established, one then proceeds to knowledge. Understanding is the prosthesis which allows knowledge to come to be.

Understanding is the horizons that are the limitations that are present in what is called knowledge in the areas of knowledge. Understanding is always present or ‘in the midst of’ what we call knowledge, just as knowledge is always present in how we understand some things. Understanding is the axioms or “common sense” from which we proceed to gain knowledge of some other thing. Under-standing is the grounding of our seeing, our vision, or how we view the world or worlds in which we happen to be involved. What is it that “stands under” what we think knowledge to be? How does this standing under provide a prosthesis for our moving forward in the quest for knowledge?

If for example we believe that “beauty is in the eye of the beholder”, our understanding is our belief in what we think ‘beholding’ to be. The understanding is the ‘beholding’ itself. From this, the possibilities for how we understand the Arts proceeds, and our ‘knowledge’ of those Arts will be spoken of in a language which shows what we think that ‘beholding’ to be i.e. it “proceeds” from out of that beholding itself and that ‘beholding’ is a projection of its possibilities.

If we think about the word ‘behold’, we can see that it is a viewing or a looking that creates a ‘grasping’, a ‘holding’ that gives ‘being’ or reality to something: be-hold. “Viewing” or “looking” is what the Greeks understood as theoria, and our word “theatre” “the viewing place” derives from it. The theory is produced from the manner of the “looking”. For the theory to proceed from the looking, the looking must give various possibilities. When this looking provides the being to things, ‘reality’ is given to things and then knowledge of the thing is made possible. This knowledge will then be expressed in a language that arises from out of such “be-holding”, and so we see that it is language or what the Greeks called logos that is the “relationship” between knowing and understanding. We translate logos by “reason”, but it is also language or ‘word’. The manner in which we view things is given justification through the provision of evidence. We know more about the things we have made than about the things we have not made. The evidence which is required for the being or existence of things are the sufficient reasons demonstrated in the results or outcomes that have occurred.

The giving of reality or being to something is to give that thing meaning or significance. The giving of meaning is to provide the thing with “significance” for us. Where ‘significance’ is lacking, meaning is lacking and some things become overlooked or ignored because they are believed to contain no possibilities. This giving of meaning to things provides us with the ‘know how’ that allows us to occupy our worlds securely. This is done through the axiom of the principle of reason (“Nothing is without a reason”). An axiom is a statement or proposition which is regarded as being established, accepted, or self-evidently true. It is based upon “faith”. It is the foundation of the area of knowledge we understand as mathematics. Mathematics is “that which can be learned and that which can be taught” i.e. the projected “possibilities” of reason. The axioms of mathematics are the logoi that derive from the principle of reason, “that which is thrown forward”. “Mathematical projection” is the realization of the possibilities of the things which we encounter in our day-to-day lives.

A principle is much like an axiom. It can be a fundamental truth or rule that serves as a basis for something i.e. a prosthesis, an under-standing, a support. Principles can be used in various contexts including science, ethics, and everyday life; for example, “The principle of relativity” in physics or “The principle of fairness” in ethics. Principles are statements that can be derived from observation, experience, or other principles, unlike axioms which are statements based on the self-evidently true. “Statements” are what we understand as the logoi, which is the relation between what is said about the thing and the thing said. We understand this saying about things as “judgement”.

“-Logy” is a suffix that follows the naming of many of our areas of knowledge e.g. “bio-logy”, “psycho-logy”, etc. That the self-evidently true can be ignored is shown in USA’s Declaration of Independence: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” Such a statement expresses a “faith” that can provide the motive or motion for an action that is an expression of a “belief” if it is taken to be true. If not taken to be true, it can simply be ignored. Self-evident truths are often ignored in our day-to-day lives if they are not convenient for us. This is particularly so in Ethics and Politics.

Through understanding, we disclose the meaning and the significance of the entities (things) and the experiences that we have not by simply knowing facts but by grasping their significance within the context of our being-in-the-world. Language is the fundamental tool for understanding as it allows us to express and share our experiences and interpretations of the world (the whole) and the worlds of which we are a part, the contexts and details that make up the experiences of our lives. In its broadest sense, language can be understood as both word and number. The axioms of mathematics and the rational discourse of the principle of reason are both “relationships” between knowing and understanding that are established by the logos be it word or number.

3. Should knowledge in an area of knowledge be pursued for its own sake rather than its potential application? Discuss with reference to mathematics and one other area of knowledge.

A well-known gangster saying has it that ‘Blood is very expensive and bad for business.’ In the world of academic research for its own sake, “Truth, like blood, is very expensive and bad for business”. The poet John Keats once wrote: “Beauty is truth, truth beauty,—that is all/ Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.”

In mathematics, as well as in many other areas of knowledge, those who are engaged in ‘pure mathematics’ do so because they find that what they do (the pure disinterested use of number) fills them with a sense of the overwhelming beauty of the world. The ‘true’ mathematician and the ‘true’ artist are engaged in what they do because of the beauty of what they encounter through their work. This encounter with beauty fills their lives with joy. In Sanskrit, the word is ananda or “bliss”. We may say that this encounter is the experience of the relationship between knowledge and truth and how truth illumines the reality of the world which the mathematician or artist inhabits (its beauty). The mathematician or artist will always be tempted by the ‘big bucks’ on offer for the ‘practical applications’ of the knowledge that they have. They have the choice to succumb to that temptation or to remain true to their ‘faith’. This choice is not an easy one for the simple reason that one needs to eat.

The propagandist, be they an historian or an artist, abhors the truth for the truth seeks to bring things to light while the propagandist wishes to hide the truth for it is a threat to his real interest, which is power. This power manifests itself most often in public prestige often showing itself in the form of money. Human being, in its nature, reveals truth. When it does not do so, it becomes ‘inhumane’. Corporate interests and their propagandists (their media advertisers) are not interested in truth or education since their end is to produce the mass society of mass consumption, the ‘city of pigs’ as it was designated in Plato. The artist who designs the media campaigns for the large corporations is not a true artist just as the historian who works as a gaslighter for political entities is not a ‘true’ historian since he does not report the truths as they relate to the facts.

Earlier, I spoke of the English poet William Blake’s identification of the thinking of the scientist with what he called “Newton’s sleep”. For Plato (and Blake), science does not think in the way that thinkers think. This is science’s blessing for if it did think in the manner in which thinkers think we would cease to have all of the wonderful discoveries that science’s applications have produced. The thinking required to combat the general “thoughtlessness” of the sciences is not the kind of thinking that is to be found in the sciences. The thinking upon which the sciences are grounded is a form of nihilism since it is the principle of reason, the science itself, that gives being or reality to things. Elon Musk’s thinking, for example, is not the thinking of a thinker. It is the thinking of a technician. What is it that distinguishes the thinking of a technician from the thinking of the philosopher?

In Plato, the ideas give being to the things that are and cause them to come to appearance in their ‘outward form’ (eidos). The ideas are the logoi be they “word” or “number”, and the ideas as number are distinguished from the ones, twos and threes that we usually think of as numbers in our calculations. The ideas as “word” are different from our usual understanding of “words, words, words” as ‘information’. The thinking of the technician or the artist uses the ‘imagination’ or eikasia in order to enable his ‘know how’ or ‘technical skill’, his techne, to construct the product or end that he has in mind and bring that product into being be that product a pair of shoes or a poem. In the Divided Line of Plato from Bk. VI of his Republic, B=C: the ‘material world’ (B) is equal to that world that we understand through rational thought (C). Rational thought (C) is capable of ‘procreating’ an infinity of possibilities within the sempiternal character of created Nature (B). This is what we understand by ‘materialism’. There will always be new Nikes as there will always be new poems, but neither creation will be ‘great’. It will be the procreation or the bringing into being of the Same.

The knowledge that we understand as episteme or ‘theoretical knowledge’ is dependent on, and in a relation to, the higher section of the Divided Line that Plato outlines in Bk. VI of his Republic (D:C). Socrates (534 a 4-5) relates that dialectical noeisis, “the conversation between two or three that runs through the ideas, is to pistis (faith, trust, belief) as natural and technical dianoia is to eikasia (imagination).” Socrates distinguishes the logos of the ‘spirit’ or nous that is used by the ‘dialectician’ from the logos of the imagination which is that used by the technician and the artist. The numbers and words of the ‘spirit’ are distinguished from the numbers and words of the creative artist and technician. For example, Socrates did not write books; Plato wrote books. Jesus Christ did not write books; his followers wrote the books. The Buddha did not write books; his followers wrote the books. These writings of the followers were the products of the “imagination”. They represented a knowledge of the individual (Socrates, Christ, the Buddha) that was a product of a gnosis or ‘direct experience’ of the individual; but in the writing this knowledge becomes ‘true opinion’, an ‘interpretation’.

The ideai are the logos: the ideas give to things their essence, their ‘whatness’, and thus their being, while the eidos (whether of word or number) gives them their “outward appearance”. The ideas are not the products of human beings but something which has been given to human beings. They are much like the axioms which we discussed under title #2. We have come to call these outward appearances of things “beauty”. The “outward appearance” of the thing is merely its ‘shadow’ i.e. it is the thing without its ‘light’, its logos, and it is its light (truth) which illuminates its truth and its ‘true beauty’. (That is why the Sun is a metaphor of the Good in the allegory of the Cave). According to Plato, the thinking which seeks the essences of things is that “noetic thinking” that we have come to call ‘geometry’. Geometry is now what we understand as ‘spacial relations’ between things but Plato understood ‘geometry’ as the possibility of the thing being brought into a relation of ‘harmony’ and friendship.

Over his academy Plato had the statement, “No one enters unless he knows geometry.” By this he meant that no one enters (gains knowledge) unless he knows “friendship” and is capable of friendship, of relationships. This knowledge of friendship is a gnosis or a knowing by direct experience and is a by-product of that self-knowledge which allows one to have the capability of being a friend.

The natural dianoia or ‘gathering together into a one’ which is the product of scientific rationalism (the turning of the thing into an object), is a ‘mirroring’ of that thinking that is dialectical noeisis. The “seeing” for one’s self becomes a ‘hearing’ from others on the ‘method’ or ‘plan’ that is to be used to bring about a desired result. While it is not knowledge as gnosis or direct possession or experience it, nevertheless, is ‘true opinion’. The distinction is shown in the example of the road to Larissa in the dialogue Meno of Plato where one has been given correct instructions on how to get there but has not personally undertaken the journey for themselves: if one follows the directions, one will get to Larissa.

The ‘should’ of the title implies an ethical choice: the humanity of human beings always implies ethical choices; they are what make us ‘humane’. If scientists thought the way that thinkers think, then we would not have the many wonderful discoveries that science has been able to produce through its applications, its techne. If the poet Keats is correct, then these discoveries have some ‘beauty’ in them and, therefore, truth. They are part of our ‘humaneness’.

The writings of a Plato and a Blake are not the usual writings that have been given to us. The ‘creativity’ of a Blake and a Plato, their use of the imagination, is different: their art leads to that thinking and that direct experience of beauty and truth which is not the product of the imagination. But the Blakes and Platos, like the philosophers and saints, are few and rare among us.

4. To what extent do you agree that however the methods of an area of knowledge change, the scope remains the same. Answer with reference to two areas of knowledge.

“Methods” may be said to be a particular form of procedure for accomplishing or approaching something, especially a systematic or established one such as the ‘scientific method’. Historically, the scientific method is said to have been given to us by the English materialist Francis Bacon. “Methods” are among some of the ‘conventions’ spoken of earlier in these essay titles particularly title #1. The “scope” is the “seeing” or “viewing”. A micro-scope means “to see small”; a tele-scope means “to see far”. The “scope” is what produces the theoria, the theory that determines how one is to see in a certain manner. The “scope” is what gets things going in an area of knowledge and determines the theories that arise from within it.

The answer to the question, for example, “why has algebraic calculation become the paradigm of knowledge for our times” (the “mathematical projection” that results in the “to what extent” type of questions that we ask) is not a proposition: it reveals a transformed basic position, a transformation in the “scope”, or a transformation of the initial existing position of human beings towards things, a change of questioning and evaluation, of seeing and deciding, a transformation of what we are as human beings and what we think we are as human beings in the midst of what is. This transformation is a true paradigm shift and it occurred during the transformation of the age known as the Renaissance to that known as the Age of Reason in the West. In the William Blake example used here, it occurs is the ‘cruel materialism’ of the English philosopher John Locke, the science of Isaac Newton, and the method of Francis Bacon.

We cannot use science to tell us what science itself is: we cannot conduct an experiment or use the other methodologies of the sciences to teach us what science itself is. The question concerning our basic relations to nature (including our own ‘human nature’, our own bodies), our knowledge of nature as such, our rule over nature is itself in question in the question of how we stand in relation to all the things that are. This questioning will lead to the ‘abyss’, and our response to our questioning can only come through discussions that will make us mindful of the implicit assumptions which we hold with regard to what we call knowledge.

In connection with the historical development of natural science, things become objects, material, and a point of mass in motion in space and time and the calculation of these various points. When what is is defined as object, as object it becomes the ground and basis of all things, their determinations as to what they are, and the kinds of questioning that determine those determinations. This grounding is the mathematical projection and we may call this grounding a “knowledge framework”. This “knowledge framework” itself is grounded in the principle of reason: nothing is without a cause, or nothing is without reason (reasons).

The determination of things as objects is the “scope” of our projection of things. That which is animate is also here in this determination of object: nothing distinguishes humans from other animals or species (Darwin’s Origin of Species). Even where one permits the animate its own character (as is done in the human sciences), this character is conceived as an additional structure built upon the inanimate. This reign of the object as material thing, as the genuine substructure of all things, reaches into the area that we call the “spiritual”, into the sphere of the meaning and significance of language, of history, of the work of art, and all of the areas of knowledge of TOK. It is what we call our culture. Works of art, poems and tragedies are all perceived as “things”, and the manner of our questioning about them is done through “research”, the calculation that determines why the “things”/the works are as they are. The difficulty from such a position is that while we may learn about the thing that we call history, for instance, we cannot learn from the thing that we call history because we perceive ourselves to be in a superior position to it from the outset.

When the “scope” of what and how we are attempting to gain knowledge changes, then we have what we call a true “paradigm shift” in the study of what we have been historically observing. The German physicist Heisenberg once said: “What we observe is not nature in itself but nature exposed to our method of questioning. Our scientific work in physics consists in asking questions about nature in the language that we possess and trying to get an answer from experiment by the means that are at our disposal.” When quantum physicists study laser light to try to understand its properties, it is not a thing of nature that they are studying. Laser light does not occur naturally. Why is the knowledge arrived at in the Natural Sciences considered to be “knowledge” in its most “robust” form and what is it knowledge of then? Technology is the “scope” of what we have come to call knowledge and it is technology which provides the “space” for the objects and methodologies of technology to come into being.

To characterize what modern technology is, we can say that it is the disclosive looking (the scope) that disposes of the things which it looks at. Technology is the framework that arranges things in a certain way, sees things in a certain way, and assigns things to a certain order: what we call the mathematical projection. The “looking” (the theory) is our way of knowing which corresponds to the self-disclosure of things as belonging to a certain order that is determined from within the framework itself. From this looking, human beings see in things a certain disposition; the things belong to a certain order that is seen as appropriate to the things i.e. our areas of knowledge.

The seeing of things within this frame provides the impetus to investigate the things in a certain manner. That manner is the calculable. Things are revealed as the calculable. Modern technology is the disclosure of things as subject to calculation. Modern technology sets science going; it is not a subsequent application of science and mathematics. “Technology” is the outlook on things that science needs to get started. Modern technology is the viewing/insight into the essence of things as coherently calculable. Science disposes of the things into a certain calculable order (the knowledge framework as based on the principle of reason). Science is the theory of the real, where the truth of the things that are views and reveals those things as disposables.

The “scope” or the idea that nature is a calculable framework of forces stands at the beginning of experiments, or prior to the experiments, and is not the result of experiments. Galileo’s rolling of balls down an inclined plane does not result in a view of nature as calculable forces; Galileo must first see, must first have the “theory” in view in advance of what he believes that things in general are like.

The grounding of this theory, this looking, the “scope” is beautifully encapsulated in the title of Newton’s great work Philosophae Naturalis Principia Mathematica, which we translate The Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy. “Natural Philosophy” is science of nature or what we call knowledge. Modern science must possess this disclosive looking, these mathematical principles or axioms, before it sets to work, before it conducts experiments. In the light of this mathematical view, science devises and conducts experiments in order to discover to what extent and how nature, so conceived, reports itself. Experimentation itself cannot discover what nature is, what the essence of nature is, since a conception of the essence of nature is presupposed for all experimentation. Without the conception of nature in advance, the scientist would not know what sort of experiments to devise.

The rigor of mathematical physical science is exactitude. Science cannot proceed randomly. All events, if they are at all to enter into representation as events of nature, must be defined beforehand as spatio-temporal magnitudes of motion. Such defining is accomplished through measuring, with the help of number and calculation. Mathematical research into nature is not exact because it calculates with precision; it must calculate in this way because its adherence to its object-sphere (the objects which it investigates) has the character of exactitude. In contrast, the Group 3 subjects, the Human Sciences, must be inexact in order to remain rigorous. A living thing can be grasped as a mass in motion, but then it is no longer apprehended as living. The projecting and securing of the object of study in the human sciences is of another kind and is much more difficult to execute than is the achieving of rigor in the “exact sciences” of the Group 4 subjects.

Today’s word for “method” is algorithm. An algorithm is based on the principle of cause and effect and the principle of contradiction, both of which come together under the principle of reason. The grounds of any algorithm are the algebraic calculations projected onto a world conceived as object, including the human beings who occupy that world. A method may be said to be the application of the principle of reason (which is the “scope”, the “seeing” that is the understanding: see Title #2), which provides the form for the orderliness of thought or behavior or the systematic planning that precedes action. This is what is understood here as the logos. We speak of the ‘experimental method’. All of these may be broadly understood as ‘logistics’ for they centre on providing the efficiency and accuracy necessary for our technological way of being-in-the-world. When we think of our word “information”, we see that it is composed of in-form-ation: that which is responsible for the “form” (-ation from the Greek aitia) so that it may “inform”. Without the form, which is the logos, it cannot inform. The “form” is what we call the “mathematical” and this is what the Greeks understood as one aspect of logos as it is used in these writings.

5. In the pursuit of knowledge, is it possible or even desirable to set aside temporarily what we already know? Discuss with reference to the natural sciences and one other area of knowledge.

Should we decide or attempt to ‘set aside’ what we already know for any period of time would indicate that we desire that we are not ‘conscious’ for that period of time i.e. we are without any understanding of our world we live in and thus are ‘machine-like’, motion without consciousness. Such a position is ‘thoughtless’ and as should be clear from the earlier discussions on these titles, it is a position not possible for human beings. There is always an a priori understanding of the world in which we live and this a priori understanding will determine how we will view that world.

In earlier titles I spoke of the English poet William Blake’s notion of “Newton’s sleep” and indicated that it was the kind of thinking that was done in the rational (natural) sciences for it focuses on the material world and fails to take into consideration the ‘spiritual’ or ‘noetic’ realm of the world inhabited by human beings. Blake spoke of the ‘cruel philosophy’ of materialism that had spread from England throughout the world: “I turn my eyes to the Schools & Universities of Europe and there behold the Loom of Locke, whose woof rages dire, wash’d by the Water-wheels of Newton: black the cloth in heavy wreathes folds over every Nation.” (Jerusalem 15:14) In the painting of Newton by Blake, we can see that Newton writes upon a scroll which proceeds or ‘projects’ from the back of his head. He does not do his calculations upon a rock tablet or in a book (which come to establish the conventions spoken about in title #1), and such writing upon a scroll is indicative of “imaginative creation” which is from the realm of eikasia in Plato’s Divided Line from Bk VI of his Republic which was discussed under title #3. The “imaginative creations” of the artists and technicians create the objects that are paraded in front of the fire in Plato’s allegory of the Cave.

In Blake, “Newton’s sleep” is that ‘unconsciousness’ which arises from a materialistic mechanistic conception of the world; and in Blake’s mythology, this materialistic conception is comprised of the triune figures of Newton, Bacon, and the English philosopher John Locke. This trinity of figures of naturalistic rational science, or empirical science, are opposed to the creative figures of John Milton, Shakespeare and Chaucer in Blake’s mythological world. Both the scientific and poetic figures use the logos whether as number or word in order to construct their creations or projections. With Newton, we have the law of gravity for instance, while with Shakespeare we have King Lear.

The understanding, which makes a tabula rasa position impossible in the pursuit of knowledge, is the “projection of possibilities” onto the world in which we live. We call such projections “projects”, so we speak of the “mathematical project”. To pro-ject is “to throw forward”, into the future. The outcome is to be anticipated in the future. In the Blake painting, the “project” is the scroll which is thrown forward and upon which Newton is doing his calculations. Our desire to “overlook” or “skip over” what we already know comes from our urge towards “novelty”, the “new”, in our desire to create. This desire for the new proceeds from the possibilities that are already present in our initial projection. (See response to title #1) The initial projection or understanding ensures that the results from such ‘new’ creations will always be the Same.

In the natural sciences, the theory of relativity of Einstein is not a new “projection” of physics but, rather, stands upon the shoulders of Newton and what are called “classical physics”. The other great discovery of modern physics, the indeterminacy principle of Heisenberg, also stands upon Newton’s shoulders but it is a much more radical rejection of Newton’s findings and calculations. With our new technologies, we are discovering that Heisenberg’s calculations have a greater precision and exactness than the findings of Einstein.

The natural sciences deal with the world as a “surface phenomenon”, their physical presence. As a surface phenomenon, the natural sciences deal with the world in which we live as a ‘power phenomenon’ and that world’s meaning lies in the relations of these manifestations of force. The workings of the artist also deal with the world as a ‘surface phenomenon’ but in doing so attempt to get at the ‘depth’ of the physical object that they are trying to portray. Both the natural scientist and the creative artist use the imagination to make representations of the phenomenon of which they wish to speak in order to convey the ‘essence’ or truth of the phenomenon. Such use of the imagination will be determined by thinking in which the artist or technician is engaged in their manner of seeing and understanding their worlds.

6. Is empathy an attribute that is equally important for a historian and a human scientist? Discuss with reference to history and the human sciences.

The French philosopher Simone Weil once wrote: “Faith is the experience that the intelligence is illuminated by Love.” I have spent a good part of my life trying to understand what she meant by that. Empathy is part of love; we cannot love unless we have empathy for that which we encounter in our everyday being-in-the-world. Empathy is one of the bridges that we have to overcome our experience of the world as separate from ourselves. Empathy is a self-conscious awareness of the feelings, experiences, and emotions of the other human beings around us.

In relation to the other titles discussed here, “empathy” is a part of a state of consciousness that is of a higher order than rationality. It requires a state of some self-consciousness or self-knowledge on the part of the individual involved. Empathy is distinguished from sympathy in that one can be sympathetic towards another’s condition without feeling any empathy for that individual at all. Empathy is an emotion which helps overpower the subject/object distinction that dominates modern technical thinking. Sympathy is an emotion of superiority while empathy is not and we are quite capable of sympathy even though we may be in a position of power.

The difficulty for the historian and the human scientist is that they must cease to be “scientists” if they wish to have “empathy” for that which they are studying or researching because that which they are studying and researching must first be turned into an object; and in both of these specific cases, the objects that are being studied are other human beings. The objects of their study need to be enframed within a statistical matrix so that an answer to the “to what extent” type of questions can be put forward. The “objects” of study must be “dead” in a very real sense.

The researchers, whether in history or the social sciences, must observe the fact/value distinction: the fact-value distinction suggests that facts are objective and values are subjective, and that values cannot be derived solely from facts. The great danger for historians when they do not observe the fact/value distinction is that they can become mere propagandists for their vision is dominated by the empathy they feel towards “one’s own”. As the dictator Josef Stalin said: “Only the victors get to write the history.” Social scientists merely become ‘morally obtuse’ in their political recommendations due to their reluctance to recognize something as ‘good’ or ‘evil’, or good or bad. The historians and social scientists must attempt to rise above that subjectivity that stresses that “one’s own” is the “otherness” that is the world in which we live.

What we believe “science” or “knowledge” to be is founded upon or grounded in the understanding that is the subject/object distinction: that we know more about something by turning the thing into an object and making it “useful” and “disposable” to us and for us in some way. In history and the social sciences, this requires the use of the fact/value distinction since these sciences have always tried to mirror the natural sciences in their methodology. (See title #4)

That which distinguishes philosophers and saints (and makes them so rare and few among us) is their ability to rise beyond our very “common sense” love of our own to the love of the Good. This conflict is very much alive today in all of our encounters within our being-in-the-world and our being-with-others. Our being-in-the-world involves our constant struggle to ‘know ourselves’ and to know what is ‘good’ for ourselves. Our being-with-others involves politics, and politics involves power.

In the USA, Pope Francis made a pointed critique of J. D. Vance’s erroneous exposition on medieval theology regarding the ordo amoris, the ‘ladder of love’ or the ‘steps of love’ which were originally outlined by Diotima the prophetess in Plato’s Symposium. Vance stated: “There is a Christian concept that you love your family; and then you love your neighbor, and then you love your community, and then you love your fellow citizens in your own country. And then after that, you can focus and prioritize the rest of the world.” In the X post, he called his view “basic common sense.” Of course, Vance has left out ‘the love of self’ which is prior to all of the steps that he has outlined. The love of self that lacks ‘self-knowledge’ colours all of the subsequent viewings of family, community, country and world.

The ordo amoris initially outlined by Diotima in Symposium is about the order of love and the justice that is due all human beings which involves caring and concern for all in need. This care and concern arises from an ’empathy’ for all human beings. It involves the distinction between love as eros and love as agape. To quote from the Pope’s letter, “The true ordo amoris that must be promoted is that which we discover by meditating constantly on the parable of the ‘Good Samaritan’ (cf. Lk 10:25-37), that is, by meditating on the love that builds a fraternity open to all, without exception. But worrying about personal, community or national identity, apart from these considerations, easily introduces an ideological criterion that distorts social life and imposes the will of the strongest as the criterion of truth.” The Pope added, “What is built on the basis of force, and not on the truth about the equal dignity of every human being, begins badly and will end badly.” The question which needs to be explored is what is it about human beings that makes justice (“equal dignity”) their due and what are the consequences for human beings when this equal justice is not upheld? How does this relate to love of one’s own and love of the Good?

Plato in his Laws indicates the problem of an overreaching “love of one’s own”: “For the lover is blind to the faults of the beloved, so he is a poor judge of what’s just and good, because he believes he should always honour his own, above the truth. But a man who is to be a great man must cherish, not himself or what belongs to himself, but what’s just, either in his own actions or indeed in the actions of others. From this same fault is born the universal conviction that our own ignorance is wisdom, and so we who, in a sense, know nothing, imagine that we know everything. And since we don’t rely on others to do whatever we ourselves don’t know, we inevitably make mistakes in doing this ourselves. That’s why everyone must flee from this intense self-love, and always keep with someone better than himself, without feeling any shame in doing so.” The Laws (731D-732B)

Human beings are by nature empathetic. When human beings lose their ’empathy’, they become inhumane, bestial. Justice is the recognition of “otherness”, and this sense of otherness begins with empathy. The tyrant is the most unjust of human beings because his/her sense of “otherness” has all but disappeared. Macbeth is the best example of this that we have in our literature, and his “Tomorrow and tomorrow…” speech (Act V sc. v) indicates the nihilism that befalls all those who succumb to the tyranny of their own injustice or lack of a sense of otherness. Macbeth’s speech is by someone who is incapable of learning from history, and so for him, life has come to have no ‘significance’. Life is “a tale/ Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury / Signifying nothing.” This view is that which is held by a person who has violated life’s laws; nevertheless, it is a view held by many today.

Today, Elon Musk’s actions in the USA indicate a similar lack of recognition of otherness and a similar lack of recognition of the thinking that is necessary for justice, what the Greeks understood as phronesis or “good judgement”. “Empathy” is lacking in his actions and his thinking. As the philosopher Nietzsche noted: “Power makes stupid”; and stupidity leads to arrogance and the other hubristic failings that prevent human beings from achieving arete or “human excellence”. Musk, who many consider a ‘great thinker’, a ‘genius’, is incapable of the thinking that is exercised by the philosophers and the great artists and his recent actions have caused the whole of his thinking to become questionable.

Plato’s discussion of the Divided Line which occurs in Bk VI of his Republic distinguishes between the thinking that is done by philosophers and the thinking that is done by technicians and artists . In Bk VI, the emphasis is on the relation between the just and the unjust life and the way-of-being that is “philosophy”. Philo-sophia is the love of the whole for it is the love of wisdom which is knowledge of the whole. The love of the whole and the attempt to gain knowledge of the whole is the call to ‘perfection’ that is given to human beings. Since we are part of the whole, we cannot have knowledge of the whole. This conundrum, however, should not deter us from seeking knowledge of the whole and, indeed, this seeking is urged upon us by our erotic nature. All human beings are capable of engaging in philosophy, but only a few are capable of becoming philosophers. As human beings, we are the ‘perfect imperfection’. While the top of the mountain may be obscured in clouds, we are still able to distinguish a mountain from a molehill and so we are able to reach beyond that thinking or consciousness that is the fact-value distinction.

A Commentary on “The Thirty-two Paths of Wisdom” Chapter Ten

The Emanations to and from Malkhut

Path 10. Scintillating Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel MitNotzetz): It is called this because it elevates itself and sits on the throne of Understanding. It shines with the radiance of all the luminaries and it bestows an influx of increase to the Prince of Face(s).

The Tenth Path is the Resplendent Intelligence, because it is exalted above every head, and sits on the throne of BINAH (the Intelligence spoken of in the Third Path). It illuminates the splendor of all lights, and causes a supply of influence to emanate from the Prince of Countenances.

Alt. Trans. “The tenth path is called the resplendent consciousness because it is exalted above every head and sits on the throne of Binah. It is illuminated with the splendour of all the lights and it causes an influence to flow forth from the Prince of Countenances.”

Wescott trans. The Tenth Path is the Resplendent Intelligence, because it is exalted above every head, and sits on the throne of Binah (the Intelligence spoken of in the Third Path). It illuminates the splendour of all the lights, and causes an influence to emanate from the Prince of Countenances (Metatron, the Intelligence of the First Sephira, and the reputed guide of Moses.)

Case trans. The tenth path (the tenth Sephirah, Malkhut) is called the Resplendent intelligence and is so because it is exalted above every head. and sits on the throne of Binah. It illuminates the splendour of all the lights, and causes the flowing forth of influence from the Prince of Countenances.

Genesis 1.10 And Elohim called the dry land Earth, and the gathering together of the waters called He Seas; and Elohim saw that it was good.

The Tenth and Eleventh paths must be held together and viewed simultaneously for they represent both the presence and absence of the Good that human beings experience in their being. As the Eight path of Hod deals with “artistic consciousness” and the making of things from something else and bringing those things to completion, the Ninth path, Yesod, deals with “scientific consciousness” or “theoretical consciousness”, the principle of reason, the foundation of the design or plan, the “knowing” that allows the things to be brought forth into their truth. The Tenth path deals with the whole of our knowledge and understanding of the created world and combines both the influences of Hod and Yesod with the Sephirot of Malkhut. Malkhut and the tenth path are both an end and a beginning. Malkhut is referred to as ‘Kingdom’.

The “Prince of Countenances”, the Ain Sof, the Sephirot Tiferet (Metatron, an archangel who was reputed to be the guide of Moses in some commentaries) is the “beauty of the world” given to us in its outward appearance, its “countenance”, its “look”, and it is this beauty, this light, “which illuminates all lights” that are present in the “truths” that we discover of our world when we understand the essence of the Sephirot. Truth is One. This brings about the “supply of influence” or Love that emanates from the “Prince of Countenances” which illuminates all things through their beauty. He is Eros. When we refer to the beauty of things, we are not speaking of ‘aesthetics’, for aesthetics refers to objects and the objectification of things and to their viewing as objects. This is a sterile viewing. The experience of the beauty of the world is an erotic experience, for from it we experience the need and the longing for that which we lack which is the perfection with our union with the One.

Malkhut is the root of the central pillar of the Tree of Life and receives the light of Keter through the logos or letter of the Alef as it passes through the Beauty (Tiferet) and Foundation (Yesod) of the created worlds of Beriyah, Yetzirah, and Asiyah. Malkhut is the only Sephirot not directly connected to Tiferet in some way. Nevertheless, it is indirectly connected. This indirect connection is through the ‘reflected light’ of the Moon that derives from the Sun.

Malkhut may be said to stand at or rest upon the boundary or as the boundary between the enumerated worlds of time and space, the throne of Binah (Beriyah, Yetzirah, and Asiyah), and the world prior to, or more primordial than these three, called Atzilut which is composed of Keter, Chalkmah and Binah. Chesed is that world that can be understood through numbers, the sequential world of cause and effect, past, present and future when we are viewing the creation side of the Tree of Life. Chesed and Gevurah represent the two poles that separate the contraries i.e. unity (identity) and difference, absence and presence, deprivation and fulfillment, in fact all ten of the contraries that the Pythagoreans are said to uphold as the nature of the things that are.

The Unity that is present in and is the essence of all things can be understood as the ‘friendship’ between God and His creation. This ‘friendship’ is experienced in the Now of Time, in every waking moment of one’s life. The distance separating God from His creation can be understood as cases of deprivation. They are indicative of the concealment of Truth. There are no true opposites, only cases of deprivation (time) and distance (space). In God’s withdrawal from Creation allowing it to be, the process of creation appears as an “expansion” of ever-widening gyres, and ever-widening expansion of space allowing the place for physical things to come into being. This illusion of “expansion” is mirrored in the narrowing of the gyres in the decreation that brings one closer to the Divine and whose journey is upward on the Tree of Life. Both of these processes occur simultaneously in the NOW.

The decreation of the self, which is a journey of de-gyring down to essence of the Divine, is shown in the principle of self-effacement or humility. It is done through the purification of the fire of Shin. God gives being to us in order that we should give it back to Him. If we compare it to fairy tales, it is like those points in the stories where the characters are tested, initiated, and baptized (Path #25 The Intelligence of Trials) where the acceptance of the gift given is bad or fatal. The character must experience a “death” of some kind and be reborn into a new self. These are referred to as “conversion” and “baptism”. (“Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. ²This man came to Jesus by night and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him.” ³Jesus answered him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.” ⁴Nicodemus said to him, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?” ⁵Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. ⁶That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. ⁷Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ ⁸The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.” John 3: 1-8)

The virtue of humility is present in our refusal to accept the gift offered (see the George Herbert poem “Love” spoken about in Chapter Nine). It is captured in the Spanish proverb or saying: “Take what you want (the gift) said God; take it and pay for it”. God allows us to exist outside of Himself and it is for us to make the decision not to do so. This is part of the reason why The Fool #0 is represented along with The Wheel of Fortune #10. The Fool is an indicator of the journey both upward and downward. Humility is the refusal to exist outside of God, and this is why it is among the highest of the virtues. Humility is represented in those letters which can be reshaped into something else; Love can only penetrate where it is ‘soft’ as our myths and fairy tales tell us (Apollodorus in Symposium is described as a ‘softy’). The Fool’s choice is to become The Magician #1 (Will) or the Strength #11 (Love). In choosing to become The Magician #1, the Fool #0 chooses will to power; in choosing to become Strength #11, The Fool chooses mercy and kindness. Both are possible responses to the world.

“The throne of Binah” is the root or foundation of the “sanctifying intelligence” which is the foundation of faith. From this we may understand Simone Weil’s remark: “Faith is the experience that the intelligence is illuminated by Love.” Since science is not able to “measure and weigh” beauty with any precision or exactitude, it removes any concept of beauty or love from its understanding of things and turns things into “objects”. The ‘measuring and weighing’ of things is at the heart of the principle of reason, and the principle of reason is at the heart of power and of will to power.

It is not possible to love an object. When we turn things into objects, Beauty then becomes “in the eye of the beholder”, something subjective; love becomes “blind”, not what it is in fact in its truth: a way of being and of seeing in the world. The removal of our response to the beauty of the outward countenance of things, or rather, the making of this response “subjective”, has resulted in the oblivion of eternity, the loss of the “holy” or sacred, the death of God, and the resulting loss of faith for many human beings. In the justice of our desire for mass learning, mass meaninglessness has been the result. What we have in its place is the sterility of the sciences, the nihilism of the will to will for its own sake (what we call “novelty”), and the devastation that is the wasteland that continues to grow and expand. But for all this, it remains a matter of choice in how one views the world as it is given to us. Beauty is not the enemy of rationality as that rationality is conceived to be in the modern, but is the foundation of that rationality that is our understanding and knowledge of the things that are. That foundation is the Law of Necessity from whence the principle of reason arises. This paradoxical relationship of Necessity and Beauty is the great mystery of Life.

Another name for Malkhut #10 is “The Bride”. This is to indicate that Malkhut includes the human body through the influence of Yesod. Christ says: “I am the Bridegroom and you are the Bride”, and the Bible speaks of “the bride of the Lamb”. Individual religious sects have interpreted this to refer to themselves exclusively i.e., that they are the “chosen ones”, they themselves and only themselves are “the bride of the Lamb” who will be united with the Redeemer and fulfil His covenant. In the Sefer Yetzirah, it is the whole of creation that is the Bride of Christ, including Jerusalem and Israel (although, of course, the Sefer Yetzirah does not refer to the Messiah or Christ directly since it was written before the birth of Christ). The original Sefer Yetzirah as well as the geometry of the Pythagoreans were intimations of Christianity prior to the birth of Christ historically. Christ’s historical birth is but one of many Incarnations of the Divine in history since the Divine is the parousia in the NOW. How these Incarnations have been ‘clothed’ is that which calls for understanding from all human beings.

The other face of Malkhut is Leviathan or the beast dwelling in the depths of the seas. As an “embodied soul”, human beings dwell within “the belly of the beast”, and it is through our understanding and knowledge (Binah) that we can extricate ourselves from the beast. But whether or not this extrication occurs is up to the grace of God. The Renaissance English philosopher Thomas Hobbes’ book Leviathan is appropriately titled since it deals with the materiality of the Kingdom of Malkhut; and Hobbes, being an atheist, relies on “laws with teeth in them” (the offspring of Shin) to deal with what he perceives to be the reality of the human condition, that human life is “nasty, brutish and short”.

It is appropriate that the path from Hod to Malkhut, and Malkhut to Hod should have “teeth” as its symbol and The Fool #0 and The Magician #1 as its Tarot cards. The letter Shin means “teeth”, and it is the grinding of teeth that is symbolic of the decreation of the material world necessary to making progress on the upward path of the Tree of Life. Shin is also the goad or prod that urges human beings on their journey to seek their perfection which is their completion. The deprivation of this perfection is the letter Qof which indicates a submission to the bestiality of our human being and the need to choose that which is higher in us.

There are a number of similarities between the Wheel of Fortune card and The World card #21 in the Tarot. The World is signified by the letter Tav ת which means ‘good’; some commentaries have ‘torah’ as its meaning since they understand the Torah as the good. Tav is the last letter of the alphabet and is its completion. The whole is indicated as ‘good’. In The World card, The Wheel has been replaced by a wreath of laurel (?) leaves which signifies victory. The leaves are bound together by three ouroboros. There is a singular ouroboros at the top and two at the bottom. The single ouroboros is the boundary of the realm of Atzilut while the double represent the boundaries of Beriyah and Yetzirah.

The female figure in the centre holds two wands in her hands indicating that she holds both the directions of the life-force in balance, the creative and decreative aspects, the ‘buffets’ and ‘rewards’ of Fortune spoken of earlier, the movements upwards and downwards on the Tree of Life. She has a banner of purple, representing ‘majesty’ or ‘kingship’, moving in the TARO direction (from The Wheel of Fortune) indicating that she has mastery over the influences of the heart, body, mind and soul. The illustrator of the cards has chosen to include the four evangelists in this card as they are presented in The Wheel of Fortune. These are not necessary for the figure herself has achieved the position of being both in Time and out of Time simultaneously and she is capable of the gift of prophecy herself. It is interesting to note that the last letter of torah is Heh meaning ‘jubilation’, while the last letter of tarot is Tav meaning ‘good’. Both indicate a joy in the completion of the journey and both are possible ways of completing the journey.

The Letter Tav and the 30th Path: The General Universal Collective Intelligence

Path 30: Yesod to Malkhut/ Malkhut to Yesod

The Thirtieth Path is the Collecting Intelligence, and is so called because Astrologers deduce from it the judgment of the Stars, and of the celestial signs, and the perfections of their science, according to the rules of their revolutions.

(Alt. Trans.) “The thirtieth path is called the universal consciousness because through it, masters of the heavens derive their judgments of the stars and constellations, and perfect their knowledge of the celestial cycles.”

Path 30. General Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Kelali): It is called this because it is the means by which the astrologers collect their rules regarding the stars and the constellations, forming the theory that comprises their knowledge of the Ophan-wheels of the spheres.

The Law of Necessity rules the realms of Time and Space, and the principle of reason is a result of the Law of Necessity. The path of General Intelligence deals with Space and Time as pre-requisites for the possibility of the things that are. The things that are do not exist outside of these realms, and so Space and Time are the “foundation” (Yesod) for the things that are. Yesod represents Path #9, Pure Intelligence which we have equated with the theoretical viewing of the sciences based as it is on the principle of reason. The Sephirot of The Hermit deals with calculations and reckonings of the movement of the spheres; and from these, predictions can be made, ‘prophesies’ if you like. In the calculation and reckoning, the astrologers, “the masters of the heavens”, are capable of having foreknowledge of the outcomes of things, both in the world at large and within the individual. The Hermit dwells within a dark, sterile world and his knowledge places him “on top” of that world for he can commandeer and manipulate the contents of that world. It corresponds to the study of Physics.

The Law of Necessity is the harsh Justice of the left-hand side of the Tree of Life; it is a Justice without Mercy, and knowledge of it is knowledge without Love or Beauty. Thus, we have the darkness, solitude and coldness represented by The Hermit #9 card. It is apt that the “new human being” created from such knowledge is a golem or “zombie”, for this it the ultimate result of this knowledge when it is not accompanied by the spiritual elements that are love and beauty.

Malkhut deals with the physical, material universe, Asiyah. Here, the world is conceived of as a combination of elemental forces capable of being grasped through calculation. It is the world of objectness and of cause and effect. It is world as text prior to the word, a world of numerical calculations. As Case points out, it is ruled by both Mercury and the Moon, calculation and illusion.

The 30^th path deals with astrological knowledge or knowledge of space and time, cause and effect, what we today would call physics. The astrologers or Magi, through their calculations based on the geometry that supplies the division of the sphere into 12 “houses” and the movements of the seven visible planets through those houses, derive pre-dictive knowledge of human beings and beings. Their knowledge is inductive: moving from the particular to the universal. As predictive knowledge, it is the forerunner of what is now called science. Their knowledge is based on a ‘cosmic theology’ through their understanding of the divine circular motions of the luminaries of the heavens.

The mind is perceived as a “secondary organ”, not the ego cogito of Descartes, the supreme subjectum, but the combination of Fire, Water, Air to bring about Earth; the combination of mind and spirit embodied. Fire and Air embodied in Water produces Earth. The “dust” of the Earth was originally conceived as snow in the Sefer Yetzirah. Humas, the root of “humanity”, “human being”, relates to the creation of human beings. Historically, the search for the formula to invent a golem was founded in the various letters and incantations that were made by those who wished to do so. The golem is a being deprived of a soul and also deprived of language. Is the forgetfulness of language a foretelling of how human beings will become golems in a possible future?

Tav derives from “and Elohim saw every thing that He had made, and, behold, it was very good.” 1:31

ת Tav is the last letter of the Hebrew Alphabet. Meaning “mark”, “sign”, “omen”, or “seal”, it is the symbol of truth, perfection, and completion. It represents the restoration Tikkun תיקון of all of existence. It is a return to the essence and purpose of one’s life. It represents completion, before beginning again with the original Oneness of the Aleph. Few human beings achieve this goal.

The Tav shows us that the end was set from the beginning, as Tav is the final letter of בראשית Beresheet, “In the Beginning”, the first word of the Torah/Bible. It is the idea that the Creator set in motion all of existence in order to reach a final state of perfection, the fulfillment of all of creation. It is also the completion of Truth אמת Emet.

However, as soon as the Tav is reached, we begin again immediately by going back to the Aleph, the one source of everything. Or in the Tarot, we move from The World #21 to The Fool #0. The end is never really the end, but the beginning of something new.

Tav represents the restoration Tikkun תיקון of all of existence and that is why it is associated with the path of Continuous Intelligence #31 and signifies both an end and a beginning. In the journey up the Tree of Life, it is a return to the essence and purpose of one’s life which is the restoration of the soul to the Divine. The Tav represents completion of the Creation cycle, before beginning again with the original Oneness of the Aleph and beginning the process of Decreation which is primarily the work of Shin. The design of Tav contains both Dalet and Nun, both suggesting endings, beginnings, and transformations. Dalet means either ‘riches’ or ‘poverty’, while Nun relates to ‘deceit’, death, transformation.

The idea that the Creator set in motion all of existence in order that it reach a final state of perfection, the fulfillment of all of creation which will be its cessation brings about the great contradiction of the Sefer Yetzirah. The Tav as the completion of Truth אמת Emet, or the Truth revealed is something to be experienced in the NOW. The Creation is viewed as an evolutionary progress towards perfection rather than being the image of that perfection itself i.e., the ‘moving image of eternity’.

The 32^nd path, along with the 30th and 31st paths are the outline or nexus of the realm of Necessity. All created things must “serve” the law of Necessity whether it be seen as the force of gravity or those forces which operate within the realm of social interactions. The Law of Necessity is the Divine Will. The 32^nd path is also a warning to those who are unable to distinguish between the Necessary and the Good because those who are unable to do so usually worship power.

The Letter Qof and the 31st Path: The Continuous Perpetual Intelligence

Path 31: Netzach to Malkhut

The Thirty-first Path is the Perpetual Intelligence; and why is it so called? Because it regulates the motions of the Sun and Moon in their proper order, each in an orbit convenient for it.

Alt. Trans. “The thirty-first path is called the perpetual consciousness. Why is it called this? Because it directs the movements of the sun and moon according to their natural order, each in its proper orbit.”

31. Continuous Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Timidi): Why is it called this? Because it directs the path of the sun and moon according to their laws of nature, each one in its proper orbit.

The Thirty-first Path of Wisdom is represented by the letter Qof and connects Malkhut to Netzach, Kingdom to Victory, or Victory to Kingdom. It emphasizes the animality or the embodiment of the human spirit or soul. The Law of Necessity is that which is permanent or “perpetual” in the laws of Nature amidst the metabole or change that is apparent in the growth and movement of created beings. It is one of the key types of knowledge in the universe of Asiyah. Along with the “serving knowledge” of the 32^nd path and the calculative thought and knowledge of the numbers of the principle of reason in the 30^th path, it illustrates the manner in which the realm of Necessity is to be understood. In the Hebrew, it refers to “perpetual time”, and we are reminded of Plato’s statement that “Time is the moving image of eternity”. It also seems to indicate the sempiternal world of created things in the manner understood by Aristotle.

It is Time which directs the movements of sun and moon and gives to us our solar and lunar calendars. Time and Space are the ‘plan’ and components of Necessity and these determine the movements of the planets, the sun, and the moon. From this we may understand what Plato means when he says that “Time is the moving image of eternity”. As a ‘moving image’, Time is subject to change and this relates to its relationship with illusion and shadows. The Sun is the planet of Tiferet; the Moon is the heavenly body associated with Yesod. Here, the Justice of Necessity is seen through the Sun’s light i.e., the Beauty of the world. Qof translates as the ‘back of the head’, that which is hidden: in the Western tree, it connects Netzach to Malkhut. In the Hebrew tree, Qof is that world dominated by the reflected light of the moon and implies a will to power to transform the world in which human beings live. To see what is behind the back of the head requires a mirror.

ק The letter Khof (also spelled Kuf, or Qof) originally meant the back of the head, or the eye of a needle. Khof also means “monkey”. It is the symbol of both the sacred Kedushah קדושה, and the profane – the Klipah קליפה, the peel, cover, or husk which represents the negativities in the world. Khof has to do with the requirement of removing the husk of the superficial to reveal the holiness within. The human body is a “husk” that encircles the part of the divine that is the soul within.

In Hebrew, Khof means monkey, a creature which resembles a human but is purely animalistic, with none of the higher capacities of a human. This indicates the requirement for human beings to overcome their purely animalistic nature and to emulate the image of the Creator, to realize their true spiritual nature beyond just the physical. The Khof is the only letter which extends below the line of the other letters, indicating descent into the lower world, but also the ability to ascend from there. The human body is the ‘cross’ that we all must bear.

Kuf is also הקפה – “circle”, “go around”; and I believe it indicates the beginning of the gyring motion that is necessary for movement within the Tree of Life itself. Khof represents all the cycles of nature, changing seasons, monthly and yearly cycles. It is the constant movement, circulation, and change of life. It could also represent that through the cycles of life that we see – evolution, growth, change, suffering, happiness, life experience – we are constantly worked on in order to evolve and realize our true spiritual nature.

The letter Khof (also spelled Kaf, Kuf, or Qof) originally meant “the back of the head”, or “the eye of a needle”. (“Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.” Matthew 19: 24) Khof also means “monkey”. It is said to represent “unholiness”. It is the symbol of both the sacred Kedushah קדושה, and the profane – the Klipah קליפה, the peel, cover, or husk which represents the outward presence of the things that emerge from the khôra, the ‘countenances’ of the outward appearances of things. Khof has to do with the requirement of removing the husk which hides the truth of that which lies within. The outward appearance is this husk.

In Hebrew, Khof means “monkey”, a creature which resembles a human but is purely animalistic, with none of the higher capacities of a human which are related to the logos i.e., language and number. In the Kabballah, this indicates the requirement for a human being to overcome their purely animalistic nature and to emulate the image of the Creator (the Logos) that is their true nature, to realize the true spiritual nature of their being an ‘embodied soul’. It is the essential strife of life. The Khof is the only letter which extends below the line of the other letters, indicating descent into the lower world, but also the ability to ascend from there. As such, it is related to the Sephirot Yesod (Foundation) and to the material world of Malkhut (Kingdom). The revealing of the true essence of what human beings are is in their wresting of truth from the husks of the world that hide it. When human beings cease to reveal truth, they succumb to their bestial, animal natures.

The design of the Kuf is similar to that of the Hei, the fifth letter of the Hebrew alphabet, but while the Hei is said to represent holiness and jubilation, the Kuf represents Klipah, or unholiness and despair. Both letters have three lines, two vertical and one horizontal. These three lines, depicting thought, speech, and action in the Hei, are also represented in the letter Kuf, but its three lines represent unholy thoughts, profane speech and evil actions. These negative qualities are illustrated within the actual form of the Kuf. Its long left leg plunges beneath the letter’s baseline. It represents one who ventures below the acceptable, an individual who violates the circumscribed boundaries of the laws of Necessity (primarily with regard to the social) and, thus, commits hubris for which an eventual nemesis must be paid.

It is also significant that the head of the Kuf is a Reish (in contrast with the Dalet that comprises the Hei). The difference between the Dalet and the Reish is the Yud in the right-hand corner of the Dalet, representing the individual while the Reish represents the collective . The Zohar, one of the principle sources for the medieval interpretations of the Sefer Yetzirah, calls the Kuf and the Reish the letters of falsehood and impurity. This associates the letter with The Moon #18 card of the Tarot. If the Reish represents the choice which has to be made regarding spiritual matters, then the Qof represents a false choice.

When Christ said that “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God” (Mark: 10:25), He is referring to the difficulty that arises when one forgets to remember that “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also”, and this is dependent on how one sees the world which, in turn, determines how one will be in the world. Christ follows his statement on the heart with “The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are good, your whole body will be full of light” (Matthew 6: 21-22). This would suggest a connection between Kuf and Ayin.

Kuf is also הקפה – circle, go around, cycle. Khof represents all the cycles of nature, changing seasons, monthly and yearly cycles. It is in the realm of Time. It is the constant movement, circulation, and change of life. Kuf represents the ‘buffets and rewards of Fortune’ which are to be received with equal thanks (as Hamlet says of Horatio in the play, and this represents Horatio’s ability to be ‘just’ and in so doing, his capability of being a ‘friend’). The Kuf could also represent that through the cycles of life that we see – evolution, growth, change, suffering, happiness, life experience – we are constantly worked on in order to evolve and realize our true spiritual nature, the grinding of the teeth that are represented by the letter Shin which decreates that which we are and the suffering that we undergo. The gematria of Kuf is 100 and this aligns it with The Fool, The Wheel of Fortune, and The Magician cards of the Tarot. Because Kuf is associated with beginnings and endings, it is also associated with the Death card. This death can be both spiritual and physical and is significant of the need for conversion, baptism and rebirth.

To see ‘the back of the head’ one requires a mirror, and with a mirror all things are seen in reverse. As discussed earlier, the symbol of Venus is a mirror and the danger of mirrors is that they can lead to narcissism. The point of the Shin is the destruction of this narcissism through the purification brought about by fire. Suffering and affliction are symbolized by fire, and the eschatological destruction of the world through fire is symbolic of this. The ‘world’ is the narcissistic ego of the Self that is the barrier to the unification with the Divine One. This may signify that viewing the material world only is a reversal of the true state of affairs i.e., there are realms beyond the material or the world of Asiyah.

The Letter Tzaddi and the 32nd Path: The Administrative, Worshipped, Serving Intelligence

Path 32: Malkhut to Hod

The Thirty-second Path is the Administrative Intelligence, and it is so called because it directs and associates, in all their operations, the seven planets, even all of them in their own due courses.

Alt. Trans. “The thirty-second path is called the serving consciousness because it directs the motion of the seven planets, each in its own proper course.”

The Thirty-Second Path is the Worshipped Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Ne’evad): It is called this because it is prepared so as to destroy all who engage in the worship of the seven planets.

The Thirty-Second path indicates the difficulties that are present in trying to determine what is the original text of “The Thirty-two Paths of Wisdom”. The first two translations above seem to indicate an awareness of, or consciousness of, the Law of Necessity, but the next translations indicate that this is what is ‘worshipped’ by those who are unable to distinguish the Necessary from the Good.

This is the path proceeding from Malkhut to Hod, from Kingdom to Splendour. Here the Splendour referred to is that which is bestowed by social recognition and prestige, and we would like to consider this ‘justice’, that this prestige and recognition are somehow ‘apt’ or ‘fitting’ and that we are deserving of it. The Tower #15 card illustrated on the left shows the crown of the Kingdom blasted by the thunderbolt of Zeus, and with it the twelve Yods (perhaps representing the 12 houses of the Zodiac or the twelve houses of Israel) and the ten Sephirot of the Tree of Life. The illustrator has chosen the letter Peh to signify this card. In the interpretation offered here, the letter Peh refers to language as rhetoric, the language of assemblies. The lightning bolt is the nemesis which is the judgement of the Divine which is true Justice, and it proceeds from the Sun in the shape of a ladder that indicates the traditional interpretations of the movement along the Tree of Life.

The 32^nd path is the outline of the realm of Necessity. All created things must “serve” the law of Necessity whether it be seen as the force of gravity or those forces which operate within the realm of social interactions and institutions. The Law of Necessity is the Divine Will. The 32^nd path is also a warning to those who are unable to distinguish between the Necessary and the Good because those who do so usually worship power.

Tzaddi is the 18^th letter of the Hebrew alphabet and corresponds to the 32^nd path of Wisdom or the Administrative Intelligence. It signifies both “righteousness” and the “hunt”. Its literal meaning is “fish hook” and it is with the hook that one hunts and catches the “fish”, signified by the letter Nun. In Greek mythology, the goddess of the hunt is Artemis. She is also the goddess of the moon. The shape of the Tzaddi is a Nun with a Yod riding on top it. The gematria of Tzaddi is 90 suggesting a connection with Yesod and The Hermit card #9: 9 X 2 is 18, the number of The Moon. The contrary to The Moon is Justice (‘righteousness’) which is card #8 in Tarot. This seems to suggest that the ‘righteous’, the just, can be deceived by the ‘false speech’ and become hooked as a fish is deceived by the bait on the fish hook. There seems to be an alignment between the ‘false knowledge’ that belongs to The Hermit card of the Tarot and the ‘reflected light’ that is The Moon’s as opposed to the direct light of the Sun. The deception, the deceit and fraud, is also related to the ‘hiddenness’ that is an element of Tzaddi and of The Moon.

Tzaddi as ‘fish hook’ indicates the way in which we can become ‘hooked on’ or entrapped by the materialism of created things. ‘Fish’ is a sign of nourishment and fertility. Is Corporeal Intelligence (materialism) the first temptation of Christ : the turning of stones into bread? Is this the reality of what has been understood as ‘materialism’ in the West? This is, metaphorically, the belief at the bottom of the technological worldview.

Path	Letter	Meaning	Symbol
Path 10. Scintillating Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel MitNotzetz): It is called this because it elevates itself and sits on the throne of Understanding (Binah). It shines with the radiance of all the luminaries and it bestows an influx of increase to the Prince of Face(s).		Kingdom. The understanding determines the General Intelligence, the Corporeal Intelligence, the Palpable Intelligence, and the Continuous Intelligence. The world of materialism.	The wheel. Movement of time within space.
Yesod to Malkhut Path 30. General Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Kelali): It is called this because it is the means by which the astrologers collect their rules regarding the stars and the constellations, forming the theory that comprises their knowledge of the Ophan-wheels of the spheres.	Tav ת	The beginning in the end and the end in the beginning.	The figure holds two wands in the shape of coils indicating she is able to draw energy from both sides of the turning sphere. She is a ‘prophet’. She is the opposite of The Hanged Man who is suspended from Chet. It is the Good which directs the paths of the sun and moon in their orbits according to the Law of Necessity.
Path 31: Continuous Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Timidi): Why is it called this? Because it directs the path of the sun and moon according to their laws of nature, each one in its proper orbit.	Qof ק	“Monkey”, the back of the head, the eye of the needle.	18 Yods, the collective, society. The camel (Gimel) has an easier time passing through the eye of the needle than a rich person.
Path 32. Worshipped Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Ne’evad): It is called this because it is prepared so as to destroy all who engage in the worship of the seven planets.	Tzaddi צ		The magi or ‘wise men’ form their theories from the principle of reason which is based on, or finds its foundation in, the Law of Necessity. From the principle of reason, the ‘rules’ i.e., the laws, axioms, etc. of the universe are created according to human beings. From these rules, the “Apparative Intelligence” Path 24 can operate.

A Commentary on “The 32 Paths of Wisdom” Chapter Nine

The Paths Emanating From Yesod

9. Pure Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Tahor): It is called this because it purifies the Sephirot. It tests the degree of their structure and the inner essence of their unity, making it glow. They are then unified, without any cutoff or separation.

The Ninth Path is the Pure Intelligence so called because it purifies the Numerations, it proves and corrects the designing of their representation, and disposes their unity with which they are combined without diminution or division.

Alt. Trans. “The ninth path is called the pure consciousness because it purifies the essence of the Sephirot. It provides and adapts the design of their patterns and establishes their unity. They remain united, without diminution or division.”

Wescott trans. The Ninth Path is the Pure Intelligence, so called because it purifies the Numerations, it proves and corrects the designing of their representation, and disposes their unity with which they are combined without diminution or division.

Case trans. The ninth path (Yesod the ninth Sephirah) is called the Pure intelligence and is so called because it purifies the essence of the Sephiroth. It proves and preserves their images and prevents them from loss by their union with itself.

The Letter Yod and the 9th Path: The Pure Intelligence (Consciousness)

The Ninth Path of Yesod is called the “pure intelligence” and it is represented by the Hebrew letter Yod in some commentaries. It is also called “Foundation” because it deals primarily with the material world and the “mathematical” in the sense that, similar to the purification that occurs in the alchemical processes, the extraneous elements are separated from the essential element as the “waters” are separated from the “earth”. The activity of the intelligence in the mathematical “measures and weighs” the numbers to assure their “correctness”, and combines the rationality of their relations with the images or representations given in the eidetic forms or the appearance of things. It is Plato’s “correctness of the glance” and references the relation between the outward appearance of things, the Ideas of the things, and the essences of the things which, in the Sefer Yetzirah, are the Sephirot themselves. The text of “The Thirty-two Paths of Wisdom” is contemporaneous with Immanuel Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason, and the ideas of the “pure intelligence” and Kant’s “pure reason” are very similar in nature.

To “purify” is to reduce something to its essence. The essence of the multivarious things which make their appearance in Creation is the unified One that is the manifestation of the Sephirot themselves. This purifying process is decreation. In this purification, the revealing of the truth that is the essence of the Sephirot is accomplished. It has characteristics in common with inductive reasoning, but it is more than this. The “correcting” and “proving” of the design of their representations is what we have called the “mathematical projection” of our world here. But this is only one way of viewing the world and its roots are in the world of Yetzirah. The mathematical projections are preserved from loss through Memory, and from having been written down. The memory element is derived from the path of the crossover of Mem from Netzach to Hod where it meets the fire of Shin emanating from Hod. This crossover is the mediating point of Alef which is received through Tiferet to Yesod. This mediating point is crucial to the understanding of the whole of the Sefer Yetzirah and “The 32 Paths of Wisdom”.

The “numerations” are the numbers assigned to the Sephirot, their representations in geometry, and the combination of their various individual representations into a unity when applied to the things of the world of the senses. It is the diaretic (separation) and dianoic (unification) types of thought which were spoken of earlier. It is the thinking conducted by the sciences and it is concerned with the universe of Asiyah, the physical universe, as well as the world of formation that is the realm of Yetzirah. The foundation of the thinking found in the mathematical projection of the world is itself grounded in the principle of reason which embraces the principles of contradiction and the principle of causality in itself. It is the thinking of the sciences and the predominant thinking of our world today. The principle of reason is a principle of Being. The algorithms that have emerged out of the principle of reason have given us our artificial intelligence which I have said is a ‘second Cave’ of Plato and a further remove from the truth of the things of the world and of the things that are.

In another translation of “The 32 Paths of Wisdom”, the translation states that the “pure consciousness” purifies the Sephirot by testing the structure and essence of their unity, “making it glow”. The “glowing” is the light that is the inner essence of the things, a metaphor for the physical materials that glow in the alchemist’s crucible as he attempts to ‘purify’ them. The thinking that purifies is the thinking that moves beyond the “mere shadows” or “apparitions” given of things by the reflected light of Malkhut that is the representational thinking of our sense organs and apprehends the things as they shine in the light of the sun. This thinking of our senses is called “representational thinking” for it relies on images or representations in order to make visible the abstract content of the thought being carried out. This is why the thought is expressed in metaphors and the like either through words or numbers. The “pure intelligence” of Yesod is a “know of” knowledge or a “knowledge by acquaintance” acquired through the experience of the senses. The Perfect Intelligence of Hod is a “know how” knowledge which is acquired through action or The Apparative Intelligence of Path 24 (which is sometimes referred to as The Imaginative Intelligence).

Yesod is related to the sexual organs of human beings and it is in this connection that we have the “two-faced” nature of the appearance of things. We in the modern world have become satisfied with the outward appearances of things, the beauty of their uses, including other human beings, and so we turn all beings into “objects” that can be controlled or manipulated either through our sciences and their results or through our machinations in our relations with others either politically or within our other social relationships.

The god Eros is said to be “two-faced” or “Janus-faced”. We have become satisfied with the “reflected light” of things rather than the true light of their essence. Within this satisfaction we “descend” to the physical world of Malkhut rather than “ascending” to the higher levels of spirituality that are our true nature. This is the relation of the Sephirot Yesod to the Sephirot Tiferet. They are connected by the letter Alef and the middle path of the Tree of Life from Keter; and these in turn are indicated in the path of “trials” or tests, represented by Reish. It is at this point that we make our choice of where we place our “treasure”, what we will come to “value”.

Besides the direct path from Tiferet, three other paths lead to the Sephirot Yesod. They are represented by the letters Yod, Nun, and Resh. The “pure intelligence”, through its “measuring and weighing”, discerns and distils the influences from these three paths and “purifies” them (relation of the emanations to water) and brings them into a relation so that they can become a “one” even though the number assigned to them is other than one. The “pure intelligence” of Yesod determines how the “eye” of Ayin will see the world (as “object”?) and how the individual personality will conduct itself in its day-to-day affairs. The “trials” of the path of Resh are the strife that life is made of, but it is the “pure intelligence” founded upon the principle of reason that determines other aspects of the individual and the community in which the individual dwells.

From Yesod to Malkhut is a single path only and this is related to the letter Tau/Tav. Yesod is the Foundation and Malkhut is Kingdom. The letter Tau is the seventh double as outlined in the Sefer Yetzirah. It can be represented by the two Tarot cards: The World #21 and the Fool #0 for it is both an end and a beginning, and it indicates the circular or spherical nature of the Tree of Life itself. It can be both the beginning of the journey (The Fool #0) or the end of the journey (The World #21). The letter Tav itself means “good”. When it is related to The Fool, it is the beginning of the journey of decreation up the Tree of Life. When it is related to The World, it signifies the knowledge and understanding that is related to “prophecy” and to the knowledge of the whole of things contained within the realms of Time and Space which is the Creation itself. This knowledge confers the gift of prophecy. This is what is meant by self-knowledge. The figure of The World has a banner of purple (the royal colour) in the shape of a Beth across her signifying her knowledge of the whole of things.

Yesod means “foundation”: it is the instinctual animality of human beings, but it is also the foundation of human being in Time, the principle of reason as a principle of Being as we now understand it. The interpretations of the images of the Sephirot are written down, literally “written in stone”, so that they are preserved and are unified with the “physical” itself (materialism). How the outer world appears is determined by these interpretations. This is why this realm is called “the sphere of the Moon”, the sphere of “reflected light”. This is the realm of what we call the “historical”, and the things come to be and pass away giving the illusion of “historical relativism”. Is this what we have come to understand as Hell? The focus on the Ego? When Sartre says that “Hell is other people”, his statement indicates this egoistic hell itself, the choice that separates Love from Intelligence.

The starkness of The Hermit #9 card aptly depicts this region. The letter Yod associated with The Hermit is the letter “I” in English and iota in Greek. In The Moon card, there are eighteen Yods surrounding the face of the Moon indicating the social, the collective. (Mathematically: 9 + 9 = 18 / 2 = 9; or 9 x 2 (the High Priestess) = 18 / 2 = 9.) Our bodies are the “cross of Christ” and He says: ““If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.” Matthew 16:24. It is through our bodies that we experience existence and the body is our infallible judge through this experience.

The 10th Hebrew letter Yod is a dot or point. There are a number of contradictory interpretations for the letter Yod, and these contradictions rest in how different interpretations of the nature of the Divine and the nature of human beings have come about. For some, the Yod represents the Creator, the single point from which all of creation emerges, the Unity within the multiplicity of things. But is this not a duplication of the understanding of the letter Alef? The letter Alef is composed of two Yods and a Vav suggesting a Trinity. A singular Yod would place God at an infinite distance from His creation, or conversely, place God within His creation in such a way that He is mistaken for the Necessary and all that occurs within Necessity. The Yod itself is considered the foundation of all foundations, and this is why it is associated with the Sephirot Yesod. Is the key to understanding the significance of the Yod is that it is the 10^th letter of the Hebrew alphabet and thus a new beginning of some kind?

Yod is a symbol of the Holy One, the Creator, since the holy name starts with Yod (YodHehVavHeh). Small in form, the meaning of the Yod is great. According to Kabbalistic tradition, all of creation came forth from a single point – a point which represents God’s infinite presence inside of the finite world. This interpretation seems to be fine if it is remembered that this single point is infinitely small in relation to the macrocosm about it.

Yod also represents the idea of Unity within Multiplicity, of one whole that is comprised of parts. Yod, as we see, is a single point, but its value is 10. It shows us that many grains of sand are used to make one pot, many pages make up one book, many drops of water make up the ocean. There are many parts that comprise the individual human being and all of these parts belong to Necessity, but at centre of the human being is an infinite point that does not belong to Necessity. It belongs to God because it is part of Him.

There are many occurrences and experiences in the world, but they all stem from One God, perfect and indivisible. But if this is the case, how can events and experiences which are clearly deprivals of the Good be attributed to God? One cannot so easily dismiss the Book of Job. The Yod also is said to represent the ten Sefirot (but if this is the case, what is the significance of the Alef and what is the relation between the two? The letter Alef is composed of two Yods and a Vav. It is a ‘trinity’. The Yod that contains the ten Sefirot is beyond comprehension). In Yod, the multiplicity returns to unity.

In the Sephirot Yesod, it can be said that Being is the foundation, the ground/reason. The principle of reason speaks to us as a principle of being from within the Yesod and the Yod itself can be mistakenly understood as this principle of reason only. The Fool stands before the abyss of Being, the world of Asiyah; he/she makes a leap into that abyss. The result becomes The Magician: the techne, the “showman” and the resultant theatre that is the world of Yetzirah. Shakespeare understood this when he said: “All the world’s a stage and all the men and women merely players”.

The soul is that hidden dot beyond the imagination – formless, the source of all thought, beyond all thoughts, beyond time and space, beyond the representational thinking that is our modern understanding of what knowledge and sensibility are. It is the secret hidden principle of the universe that we cannot perceive, and because of this hiddenness is mistakenly taken for will to power through the principle of reason.

So why then is it related to the Palpable Intelligence here? It is related to the Palpable Intelligence “because the intelligence of things is created (is “made”) under the entire upper sphere, as well as their sensations, were created through it.” Here one can see the connection of the Yod to the Logos understood as Word, as well as the connection of the Yod to the principle of reason as a principle of Being and as will to power. The Palpable Intelligence is also translated as the “Exciting Intelligence” and this demonstrates a connection to eros and to the recognition of need and to the condition of deprival.

The Yod represents both the Creator and the individual soul, the single point from which all of creation emerges, and that Unity within multiplicity that makes up the Divine and humanity. It is the foundation of all foundations, the hidden Divine spark which causes everything to be whether it be from natural or human production. It can represent the power of the will to govern, commandeer and guide the matter whether that matter be physical or spiritual. It is associated with the “ego” or the human being when viewing themselves as individuals. As shown in the letter Alef, two Yods are separated by a Vav, and this Vav is Necessity itself.

Yod is a symbol of the Holy One, the Creator, since the holy name starts with Yod. The significance of the shape of yod is that it is small in form, but the meaning of the Yod is great. This is in conformity to a number of fairy tales, myths, and parables where the smallest item is the most important. According to Kabbalistic tradition, all of creation came forth from a single point – a point which represents God’s infinite presence inside of the finite world. Between this infinite presence and the individual human being’s presence is an abyss, the abyss of the whole of Creation itself.

The Yod is an infinite dot, the essence of all life. As the foundation of all foundations, we can say it is the image of the Good. As was discussed in the structure of the letter Alef, everything comes from it and returns to it. It is a hidden dot beyond imagination, the vanishing point – formless, the source of all thought, beyond all thoughts, beyond time and space. It is the secret hidden principle of the universe that we experience in our ‘perfect imperfection’, and are unable to perceive. It is the Light that the Darkness cannot comprehend. It is the Divine spark of life that is in every single being. It cannot be grasped, but is in every cell of our bodies, causing us to be. It has no mass or density, time or space. In it is the spirit to govern and guide the matter of the material world and yet it is beyond the world. It is, thus, the Law of Necessity. When we have a false view of it, we see it as Will to Power.

The appearance of the Yod is as a flame suggesting the fire of Shin and the purification process of alchemy. Shin itself is composed of three Yods, the three-personed God. Its movement is upward. This aligns it with Path #9 The Purifying Intelligence. This suggests that the movement on the Tree of Life is clockwise with the downward movement of Mem as water, meeting with Alef as air and Shin as fire producing the earth that is the Foundation and Kingdom, the bottom two Sephirot of Yesod and Malkhut. Most commentators see this movement of water in the shape of a lightning bolt zigzagging downwards, and as a ladder of fire moving upwards. I have presented it as ever-widening gyres in its movement downwards, and in narrowing gyres in its movements upwards. In the movement downwards, the movement that is upwards is seen in a mirror image, just as the movement upwards sees the movement downwards in a mirror image.

The human soul may be seen in the symbol of the eagle or falcon which, in its flight, widens its gyres to ascend upward and then narrows its gyres upon its return. It is in its upward movement that we may understand Plato’s statement that Love is “fire catching fire”. Also, as the smallest letter of the alphabet, the Yod indicates the principle of the various stories of fairy tales, parables, and myths where the least is most important. The princess and the pea; “The Kingdom of Heaven is like a grain of mustard seed which a man took, and sowed in his field, which indeed is smaller than all seeds. But when it is grown, it is greater than the herbs and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and lodge in its branches.” Matthew 13: 31-32; “Even the smallest person can change the course of the future” The Lord of the Rings.

The Letter Nun and the 28th Path: The Natural Intelligence

Genesis 1. 9 And Elohim said: ‘Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear.’ And it was so. (The Pure Intelligence) Nun – And Elohim “blessed them [male and female].” 1:28 (The Natural Intelligence)

Path 28. Natural Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Mutba): It is called this because the nature of all that exists under the sphere of the sun was completed through it.

The Twenty-eighth Path is the Natural Intelligence, and is so called because through it is consummated and perfected the nature of every existent being under the orb of the Sun, in perfection.

Alt. Trans. “The twenty-eighth path is called the natural consciousness. Through it is completed the nature of all that exists beneath the sphere of the sun.”

Case trans. The twenty-eighth path (Tzaddi, joining Netzach to Yesod) is called the Natural Intelligence, because by it is perfected the nature of all things under the orb of the sun.

The 28^th path appears to be related to technology, to human “knowing” and “making”, which completes the “purpose” or end, the telos of the “created things”, through a process of making them “pure”, or through what we believe is a dis-covery or uncovering of their essence, their truth. This is the principle of reason as a principle of Being. This is a difficult concept for it involves what has become known as the history of Western metaphysics. This history may be summed up by our inability to separate the Necessary from the Good because, paradoxically, by establishing the duality of subject/object and the ‘objectification’ of all beings, we have dispensed with the Good as ‘values’, something we create in our willing. We cannot love an object. My understanding here is that it is contained in Shakespeare’s idea that “The art itself is Nature” i.e. that the art is a principle of being as is the principle of reason.

The 28^th path has many similarities to how Aristotle understood dynamis. In the Sefer Yetzirah, the good may be seen as the light which enables both the being of created things and that which enables human beings to see what their ends or purposes are for. For both Plato and Aristotle, the proper direction for human beings is the directedness of their vision toward the divine, toward the whole. This directedness of vision was contemplation, reflective thought. On the other hand, the 28^th path may refer to how dynamis, potentiality, becomes energeia or the completed product or work. This would seem to suggest that the universe is ”rational” and its rationality is akin to our own rationality. This is the ground of the principle of reason, and the principle of reason is a principle of being.

There appears to be a connection between the Bible’s giving human beings a central role, as an acme, as the point or purpose of creation (as is shown in the Sephirot Yesod), and the giving of power to human beings over all created beings so that they may be “completed” in their nature through the power of human beings’ making. (1.28 And God blessed them; and God said unto them: ‘Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that creepeth upon the earth.‘) The power that is given to human beings is realized in their “knowing” and “making” that has become the stand and directedness of human beings’ being-in-the-world. The question is whether or not this dominion over the earth is one of the shepherd filled with care and concern or one of the tyrant filled with commandeering and domineering.

There is here present the view that the created things themselves are not complete in some way. This view of human beings and their role in creation later becomes the “humanism” of Western philosophy, and the consequences of humanism have become far-reaching. The question must be asked: is this view of human being, a product of the Renaissance, a correct understanding of what is said in the Sefer Yetzirah, and is it a correct understanding of what human beings are in their essence? The absence of God, experienced as the God’s silence through which human beings realize their “imperfection” in their affliction and need, devolves into the oblivion of eternity and into the view that the essence of human being is human existence itself and human will (freedom), that human beings will themselves to seek to realize human perfection and determine what Justice is and what Justice will be. Are we as human beings ‘our own’? In the completion of creation, there is no need for a God. The transformation that is spoken about by some commentators regarding Path #28 does not occur within the individual human personality only, but in the way in which human beings are in their worlds. It involves the whole human being, including their bodies. (That is why the conversion in Plato’s allegory of the Cave involves the turning of the whole body.)

But Path #28 suggests another kind of way of looking also. If one looks at this “ascent of man” in the history of Western thought through the lens of the Sefer Yetzirah and “The Paths”, one can see that it involves the yoking together of the worlds of Asiyah, or Sensation, and the world of Yetzirah or “Formation/ Creation”. This yoking may be done through the “reflected light” of Malkhut, the light from those objects that are present in the created world, or it may involve the light that descends from Keter, through the beauty that is Tiferet, to the foundation that is Yesod. This yoking requires the presence of Shin, one of the three Mother letters of the alphabet as outlined in the Sefer Yetzirah. The yoking is one of “unity”, not identity. There is a possibility of ascent as well as descent within it. The universe beneath the “sphere of the sun” involves the Sephirot Netzach, Hod, Yesod and Malkhut, and the links between them may involve either Tiferet or Netzach, the Divine or the human.

Our being-in-the-world is the primordial “foundation” (Yesod) which, through the reflected light of Malkhut, is how we view or how the world will be disclosed or “opened up” to us. Our disclosure or opening up to this world can be either true or untrue, and this disclosure or opening up is exclusive to human beings as that which has been gifted to them from God. The truth or falsehood of the disclosure or opening up of the world is dependent upon this primordial viewing of the world in which human beings find themselves placed. Human beings disclose or open up themselves to themselves by the manner in which they disclose or open up their worlds. This “opening up” is what we understand as “freedom” in which we are able to view our possibilities and potentialities. The world in which we find ourselves is already opened up to us; how we view this opening and our own openedness determines what we will conceive ourselves to be in our essence. This determination arises from what we conceive the truth to be i.e. openedness itself.

In commentaries on the Sefer Yetzirah and “The 32 Paths of Wisdom”, the word “initiate” and “initiation” are often used to describe the journey through life through the Tree of Life and its paths. This word can be seen as a simile or metaphor for our word “education” which comes from the Latin educare, “to lead out”, and “that which is responsible for the leading out”. The “initiate” and his or her “initiation” is a “leading out”. The initiate is not capable of this action alone; a guide is necessary. The images of paths and guides are apt here. We are concerned with what is authentic thinking here and how it may be achieved. Every “leading out” begins with an “opening up”. In this open region, both truth and untruth are possibilities. Untruth is the deprivation of truth, not the opposite of truth; just as evil is the deprivation of good, not the opposite of good. How one views the world is a choice to be made. Because we are beings in bodies, we become preoccupied with the things that are and how those things may be able to fulfil our needs, whether those needs are hunger and thirst or empowerment.

Shakespeare himself says: “The Art itself is nature”, and one is very hesitant to disagree with the wisdom of the Bard. “Human nature” is completed through “natural intelligence”, through the ‘light of the Sun’, i.e., through Tiferet, not through the ‘reflected light’ of the Moon that dominates the world of Asiyah, (Malkhut/Yesod) and the world of Yetzirah or Formation (Hod/Yesod/ Malkhut/Netzach). This is a key point in the Tree of Life for at this juncture, human beings make the choice of becoming more fully human/humane or simply residing on the “bestial”, appetitive level of existence. It is here that one fully experiences the “severity” of Hod and how and what we think shapes our perceptions of the world about us.

When rationality or the principle of reason dominates our view of the world and becomes our principle of being-in-the-world, we are less than fully human; and this foreshadows the coming into being of the technological worldview which dominates the world of Yetzirah, the world dominated by the Gestell, the “system”, the “plan” which brings about one’s attempts to bring justice to the world through our commandeering of nature. This is why technology may be viewed as ‘black magic’.

The letter Nun has a number of contradictory meanings just as the Death card of the Tarot contains a number of contradictory meanings. It can mean “deceit”, “kingship”, “fish”, “miscarriage”, and “miracle”, and at the same time be the symbol of faithfulness (ne’eman נאמן), soul (Neshama נשמה), and emergence. The gematria of the nun is 50.

The “fish” is the being that makes its “home” in the “house” that is the water of Mem and in the waters of Chakmah. Mem is associated with the Moon, and the Moon is associated with deception. (Notice the moon on the crown of the High Priestess card). It can be thought of as the fish that swims in the dark waters of the created world, represented by Mem מ. The fish may be caught with the ‘fish hook’, (the letter Tzaddi צ) or ensnared in a net (the letter Chet ח.) The greatest error that we human beings can make is to mistake the Necessary for the Good for this is how we are hooked or ensnared, and this is the point of Path #25, The Intelligence of Trials. We, too, may feel at home in our world where we have plenty of our needs met by the good things of the world. Those who do not do not feel in this way. This situation is entirely due to circumstances and Chance. This may be said to be analogous to the beautiful woman who looks in the mirror and believes that that is all that she is for she has been chanced with physical beauty, while the ugly woman who looks in the same mirror knows that she is more than that image which she sees. We can become forgetful of where our true being lies; and when we do so, we become less humane. This is the temptation and trial of looking into the mirror and how one is to look into the mirror.

Nun’s related meaning to “miscarriage” can be understood as “injustice”, since all miscarriages are connected to processes that are not brought to their true completion. We all feel that our own death is an injustice. Nun is also connected to fertility, continuity, and the ability to increase and multiply. Its contradictory nature can be represented by its association with Binah (the Empress #3), for it shows that Life must have its completion in Death and yet this Death is a “miscarriage”. Nun is also said to stand for the 50 Gates of Wisdom of Binah, which would again show its connections to Mem and to Chakmah.

Nun indicates constant presence, the being of the world experienced as presence. The Nun shows that we are bound to the Creator’s will (the Law of Necessity), even though we may become bound in our own personal egoistic way. This is a difficult situation to overcome. Life requires us to focus on ourselves in order to survive, and yet its great teaching is the overcoming of ourselves. The philosophers, in general, agree that life is the preparation for death. Nun shows the relationship between the body, which is impermanent, and the soul, which is eternal. This is its association with “miracle”, for it is a matter of faith that the soul will be reborn in its unification with the One.

Nun can also teach us about the nature of time and space since it is associated with the Time that is Binah and the Space that is Chakmah. Time and Space are the containers of the Law of Necessity. Nun also represents flow, and is thus associated with water. Its movement is downward and suggests both creation and humility.

The Letter Reish and the 25th Path: The Intelligence of Trials/Strife

Yesod to Tiferet: Path 25. Testing Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Nisyoni): It is called this because it is the original temptation by which God tests all of His saints.

The Twenty-fifth Path is the Intelligence of Probation, or is Tentative, and is so called because it is the primary temptation, by which the Creator (blessed be He) trieth all righteous persons.

Alt. Trans. ” The twenty-fifth path is called the consciousness of trial because it is the primary test by which the creator proves the compassionate (Khasidim).”

Reish “and Elohim saw that it was good” (the beasts of the earth) 1:25

The Reish, the 20^th Hebrew letter, means “head”, “leader”, and “beginning” and appears to have some loose connections to the letter Tzaddi. The leader or head is that of the collective, so in the paths of wisdom, Reish is the symbol of choosing between whether one is to complete one’s journey individually and achieve greatness of soul, or whether one will succumb to the second temptation and become degraded by the power of social prestige and the trappings of material things.

Reish is the word for “poor” רש Rash, but this poverty is the deprivation of spirit not the poverty of being without the goods of this world. When Christ says that the rich “have their reward”, He is referring to that point where the choice is made to be satisfied with the material comforts and pleasures that such a choice brings.

Reish is similar to the letter Dalet; but whereas Dalet contains a Yod, the Reish does not. This may signify the individual who loses themselves in the collective so that the “I” ceases to exist. Such a loss of the “I” is a false choice as one can choose (or may not have a choice) to lose their “I” through decreation or one may choose to lose their “I” in a collective. This choice is representative in Reish being one of the double letters and its meaning as being “the head”. The head can represent a leader or that place or site where the choice has to be made.

Reish is a container, just as Beth (2) and Khaf (20) are containers, but while Khaf represents forms such as a cup or house, Reish(200) represents the containment of the infinite, the life-force, the ‘embodied soul’ or spirit. Reish represents the strife of the constant transition, the flow and change of life and is, thus, related to Time. It is like a constant flow of energy, breaking through, breaking down into pieces, and building anew. This is its kinship with Shin. Reish is also associated with the will to power as that which is ever-present to stop the process of decreation.

The Reish also relates to the “head”. It contains the secrets of Beresheet בראשית, the beginning and is, thus, associated with The Fool #0 card where choice is strongly indicated. As the word ראש Rosh Head, it also refers to the secrets of the Crown Keter כתר, the highest of the Sephirot but also to the Kingdom Malkhut, the lowest of the Sephirot.

The Twenty-fifth path is related to the letter Resh, ר meaning “head”, and is the sixth ‘double’. The path intersects the path established by the letter Mem. The Sefer Yetzirah seems to indicate that the created world is already ‘a garden of Eden’ since in the eyes of God (Elohim) all created things are good. The “primary temptation” is to view the world as not good but incomplete and it is conceived as incomplete because it does not conform to our wishes or desires.

The Tree of Knowledge in the garden has always been viewed as “knowledge of good and evil”, and the great temptation for human beings is to view themselves as the ‘creators’ of good and of justice, to see good and evil as constructs of their own viewing and valuing, and thus tempts them to ‘turn stones into bread’. The ‘righteous’ or the ‘just’ are those who are able to obey the will of God and able to avoid the temptation of seeing themselves as the creators of good, and the only creators of good. Clearly those who are just, show compassion to all that is and are mindful of the affliction that is part of the root of existence.

The path of Resh is the test or trial i.e., the polemos or confrontation that the individual must face with regard to “egoism” and the recognition of Otherness, the choice between power or compassion, between severity or loving kindness. The choice results in these opposing forces being brought into equilibrium, where love and will, the ego and the Other meet in harmony and friendship and become a unity.

The path of Resh links Tiferet to Yesod, the Beauty of the world to the Foundation of the physical world. It intersects the path of Mem, the horizontal mother letter, and forms a “cross” (“Pick up your cross and follow Me” Matthew 16: 24-26; “What God has joined together let no man put asunder” Matthew 19:6). The “putting asunder” of what God has joined into a unity through his mediatory powers is “the sin against the light”, that sin which is the root of all sin, the sin against the Truth. All denial of what one knows to be true is a sin against the Light. As Socrates said, “No one knowingly does evil”. This is the darkness that is current in America at the moment, and it accounts for its rampant corruption, immorality and injustice in the public sphere.

The equilibrium between the self and others, the unity between the “inner” and “outer” worlds is given by the light of Tiferet. (This is the unity which Socrates prays for at the closing of the dialogue Phaedrus and it mirrors the passage of Matthew 16: 24-26). The balance conferred by Love illuminates both Netzach and Hod, ethical action and justice, with the command to be compassionate.

The ”severity” of institutionalized religions (Judaism, Christianity, Islam in the West) arises from their desire for power, from their being in possession of the “revealed texts” understood as Law and from their belief that they are in possession of the truth. The Divine Revelation becomes ossified in stone, literally, and ceases to be a “living God”. Their God becomes a “jealous God” who seeks retribution for sin. However, “the god who sometimes does and sometimes does not wish to go by the name of Zeus” demands payment in blood for the worship of false gods as is seen in the histories of these religions. (This is the tarot card The Tower #15 or #16, the card of revolution, the lightning bolt of Zeus).

The point of equilibrium is Tiferet which brings into a relation the Sephirot Yesod, Netzach, and Hod simultaneously. This equilibrium is not something permanent but must be wrested from the darkness that attempts to hide it. The wresting of truth is the constant strife of life and is the trial for the ‘righteous’.

The Letter Tav and the 30th Path: The General Universal Collecting Intelligence

30. General Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Kelali): It is called this because it is the means by which the astrologers collect their rules regarding the stars and the constellations, forming the theory that comprises their knowledge of the Ophan-wheels of the spheres.

The Thirtieth Path is associated with the letter Resh in the Western Tree of Case, and the Sephirot Malkhut #10 in the Hebrew Tree. In the W.T., it joins the Sephirot Hod to Yesod, or that which links the Tarot of Justice #8 (historical study) to that of The Hermit #9. The Law of Necessity rules the realms of Time and Space. The path deals with Space and Time as pre-requisites for the possibility of the things that are. The things that are do not exist outside of these realms, and so Space and Time are the “foundation” (Yesod) for the things that are.

The Sephirot of The Hermit Yesod deals with calculations and reckonings of the movement of the spheres; and from these, predictions can be made. In the calculation and reckoning, the astrologers or magi, “the masters of the heavens”, are capable of having foreknowledge of the outcomes of things, both in the world at large and within the individual. The Hermit dwells within a dark, sterile world and his knowledge places him “on top” of that world for he can commandeer and manipulate the contents of that world. But that world is very dark, as is depicted in the Tarot card used in the illustrations here.

The Pure Intelligence of Yesod gathers together or “collects” the particular data of the movement of the stars and planets to arrive at the General or Universal Intelligence from which is derived the theoretical intelligence or knowledge and from which principles can then be determined. Knowledge of the movements of the stars and planets is knowledge of Time and Space. Knowledge of Time and Space is knowledge of Necessity. The Law of Necessity is the harsh Justice of the right-hand side of the Tree of Life; it is a Justice without Mercy, and knowledge of it is knowledge without Love or Beauty. Thus, we have the darkness, solitude and coldness represented by The Hermit card. It is apt that the “new human being” created from such knowledge is a golem or “zombie”, for this is the ultimate result of this knowledge when it is not accompanied by the spiritual elements that are love and beauty. The spiritual elements are represented by the Tav and The World #21 card.

The 30^th path deals with astrological knowledge or knowledge of space and time, cause and effect. As has been stated, this knowledge is what is determined through the principle of reason, and the principle of reason is a principle of being or way of being in the world. The astrologers or Magi, through their calculations based on the geometry that supplies the division of the sphere into 12 “houses” and the movements of the seven visible planets through those houses, derive pre-dictive knowledge of human beings and beings. Their knowledge is inductive: moving from the particular to the universal. As predictive knowledge, it is the forerunner of what is now called science.

The mind is perceived as a “secondary organ”, not the ego cogito of Descartes but the combination of Fire, Water, Air to bring about Earth; the combination of mind and spirit embodied. Fire and Air embodied in Water produces Earth. The “dust” of the Earth was originally conceived as snow in the Sefer Yetzirah. Humas, the root of “humanity”, “human being”, relates to the creation of human beings. Historically, the search for the formula to invent a golem was founded in the various letters and incantations that were made by those who wished to do so. Through the principle of reason as a principle of being, it will now be possible to do so.

Path	Letter	Meaning	Symbol
Path 9. Pure Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Tahor): It is called this because it purifies the Sephirot. It tests the degree of their structure and the inner essence of their unity, making it glow. They are then unified, without any cutoff or separation.		The “pure reason” of Kant? The alchemical processes of purifying through fire and the beginning of the decreation of the human ego so that it may be unified with the Divine.	In the illustration here, the lamp of the Hermit is a modest light given as a reflection of the Moon behind it. The world depicted is a sterile one.
Path 25. Testing Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Nisyoni): It is called this because it is the original temptation by which God tests all of His saints.	Reish ר	An indication that the three temptations: turning stones into bread, the desire for the power of social prestige, and the temptation to suicide are really one original temptation.	The site where the choice has to be made. The possibility of conversion, baptism, and re-birth.
Path 28. Natural Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Mutba): It is called this because the nature of all that exists under the sphere of the sun was completed through it.	Nun נ	The completion of all that is created or made is its passing away.	The Hermit is the realm of completion by the light of the Moon, while Death is the completion of all that is made under the Sun. Is it a rising Sun or a setting Sun?
Yesod to Hod Path 27. Palpable Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Murgash): It is called this because the intelligence of things created under the entire upper sphere, as well as their sensations, were created through it.	Yod י	In The Palpable Intelligence we are looking at the Mind as that which determines the appearance and the sensation of things. This brings about the ‘completion’ of things for those who view the world materialistically.	The thinking that is derived from the light of the Moon.
Path 30. General Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Kelali): It is called this because it is the means by which the astrologers collect their rules regarding the stars and the constellations, forming the theory that comprises their knowledge of the Ophan-wheels of the spheres.	Tav ת	Tav as one of the double letters indicates either descent or ascent, an ending or a beginning. The letter itself means ‘good’, but it can also mean ‘torah’. The ways can be either TORA or TARO.	Prophecy (represented by the four evangelists). The ways represented by the wands which appear as coils or gyres. The royal purple Kaf representing dominance in the realms of Yetzirah and Asiyah.

A Commentary on “The Thirty-two Paths of Wisdom”: Chapter Eight

The Emanations to and from Hod

Hod and the 8^th Path: The Perfect Intelligence

Path 8. Perfect Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Shalem): It is called this because it is the Original Arrangement. There is no root through which it can be pondered, except through the Chambers of Greatness, which emanate from the essence of its permanence.

The Eighth Path is called Absolute or Perfect, because it is the means of the primordial, which has no root by which it can cleave, nor rest, except in the hidden places Of GEDULAH. Magnificence, which emanate from its own proper essence.

Alt. Trans. ” The eighth path is called the perfect consciousness because it is the plan of the primordial. It has no root where it can abide except in the hidden chambers of majesty (Gedulah) from which its own secret essence emanates.”

Wescott trans. The Eighth Path is called the Absolute or Perfect Intelligence, because it is the means of the primordial, which has no root by which it can cleave, nor rest, except in the hidden places of Gedulah , Magnificence, from which emanates its own proper essence.

Case trans. The eighth path (Hod the eighth Sephirah) is called the Perfect intelligence and it is so called because it is the dwelling-place of the Primordial. It has no root in which it may abide. other than the recesses of Gedulah, whence its essence emanates.

Hod is the Sephirot representing “the perfect intelligence”. As we have previously discussed, “perfect” means “complete”, “finished”, not requiring anything else nor any further action. Hod is represented in the Tarot by the Justice #8 card. Justice is the Law of Necessity or Natural Law as it was understood by the ancients, and this understanding is demonstrated in Path #22 The Faithful Intelligence and its influence on the Hod. The Primordial resides in the Law of Necessity; it was established prior to the Creation itself and determines what Creation would/will become. It is the justice of God’s withdrawal, allowing something to be other than Himself. This is why that which is completed is the ‘dwelling place’ of the Primordial, and its roots are in the Law of Necessity whose essence emanates from Sephirot Chesed.

While Justice is the law of Necessity and is the dwelling-place of the “primordial”, it is also representative of the human making of those things which we find ready-to-hand to us, those things that are ‘apt’ or ‘fitting’ for our uses and needs. The cycle of life found in the things of nature represents its teleology or purpose. The rose in bloom and its casting off of its seed is its natural end, its purpose. For human beings, to seek for the Good and to live well in communities is our “natural end”; it is our essence as human beings. When we fulfil our natural ends, we are ‘just’ and this implies that we are moral and ethical because the whole of Creation itself is moral and ethical.

In crossing over from the Divine to the created world (Gedulah or Chesed), the Divine must cross that abyss that separates the Good from the Necessary. How the Divine does so is one of the mysteries of Faith. The Law of Necessity is itself complete. Its essence rests in the physical world itself and it manifests itself from within the physical world. We find its clearest expression in the law of gravity and in causation itself, what we have interpreted as the principle of reason here, the principle of reason as a principle of being.

What we call “knowledge” in the arts and the sciences is the result of Necessity and our perspectives and understanding of what we call Necessity. Some Kabbalists ascribe The Library of Hermes to the Sephirot Hod, and this is appropriate as it is the Necessary which gives to us all that we can know about the Divine. The Divine itself conceals itself from us. The Library of Hermes is the container of the seven pillars of wisdom. Hermes is the mediator who conveys the logoi or messages of the gods. These messages are contained within his library.

The eight path captures what Plato means when he says: “Time is the moving image of eternity”. In Genesis, this passage is the first mention of God “making”, and “making” belongs to the universe of Yetzirah, which is the universe of making something from some thing. Beriyah is the universe of making something from no thing. Here the making appears to be the formation of space.

The “absolute” or “perfect” intelligence is that intelligence directed towards making or the end or “purpose” of making, to “pro-duce” or “bring forth” that which is apt or fitting or suitable for the desired purpose or end (justice). This production refers to human production, not with natural production since the ends of natural production are pre-determined through the Laws of Necessity.

Human production comes from our understanding of the Laws of Necessity. This human production is one aspect of “justice” as the Greeks understood it. Its highest achievement would be the enacting of just laws, and laws are the actions of human communities or societies (Gevurah). The most perfect law is the Law of Necessity, Natural Law: “Be perfect as your Heavenly Father is perfect, for He causes the rain to fall in equal amounts upon the just and the unjust” Matthew 5:8. This passage describes what we mean by the ‘blindness of justice’. The Law of Necessity is the Divine Will. The Perfect Intelligence is our understanding of the Divine Will, but this is an impossible task and comprises the essence of our journey in Life.

The hidden places “of Gedulah” (Chesed) are those of the physical world. Nature does not ‘lie’; it ‘hides’. The makers take those things which are ready-to-hand, use their knowledge to determine their “hidden” potentialities or possible forms, see a use for which they may be put, and then, through the use of tools, work to bring the “perfect” product into being that they originally had in mind. The end product is “perfect” because it is complete and requires no further work or action. If the end product is complete and serves its purpose, it is “just”, suitable; it is apt for its purpose. The hidden potentialities within things is the dynamis within them, the dynamis of the philosopher Aristotle. The wood of the tree has the potentiality to become a table. In Aristotle’s four causes, all these possibilities must be present for the potential thing to be made. Should one be lacking, then some other end is brought about.

The eighth path is placed within the universe of Yetzirah or Formation among the four universes of the Sepher Yetzirah: Atzilut is the Spiritual universe which is focused on parousia or ‘presence alongside’ or ‘between’ and is the source of the emanations or influences/influx of the Divine through the Sephirot. It is the source of “the primordial plan” that is present in the Beriyah which is focused on the creation of something from no-thing (the created world of Time and Space contained within the boundaries and limits of the Laws of Necessity, what we might see as our ‘theoretical world’); Yetzirah is the formation of something from some thing, human making, what we call technology, the use of our ‘knowing’ that is theoretical (logos) and our ‘making’ of something from some thing through our use of tools; and Asiyah is the shadows of the physical, where things are seen in the reflected light of Malkhut. Our current viewing of the world is dominated by the reflected light of Keter that views the world through the ‘gloom’ of Chokmah which is symbolized by the Moon and represented by the letter Mem. Put another way, everything which is grasped by our natural faculties is hypothetical and is in the realm of opinion.

The eighth Path is the focus of four Sephirot: Gevurah, Tiferet, and Hod; but there is another path involved and that is Malkhut, the path of will to power through the Laws of Necessity. Human beings, through their will to power, try to gain dominance over the Laws of Necessity and the nature that is subjugated to it. This domination increases their freedom. Through the predictive powers of the sciences (which is our understanding of the Laws of Necessity), nature’s spontaneity is controlled and dominated by the technology that is human knowing and making so that human spontaneity or “freedom” may be increased. This power contains the potential for great good or great evil. The greatest danger or evil is the loss of our humanity as “human beings” when the presence of Tiferet is ignored or bypassed. Malkhut is the only Sephirot not touched directly by Tiferet. Does Tiferet’s contrary come to dominate and we become lost in the darkness that is The Devil #16, and we become lost in our simple desire to will to will when we forget the call to kindness and mercy that is part of the essence of Tiferet?

The philosopher Nietzsche says: “Power makes stupid”. Stupidity is not related to the intellect or intelligence. Stupidity relates to the social or the collective sphere where the responsibility of thinking and contemplation, the revealing of truth, is given over to others; and in doing so, no truth can be revealed. With this loss of the revealing of truth comes a subsequent loss in our humanity. We become more bestial, violent, mad. The individual mind is capable of making 1 + 1 into a 2, but the collective mind cannot. “One mind is enough for a thousand hands”, as the German philosopher/poet Goethe said.

The human intellect and its products are entirely moral. One could go further and say that human existence is entirely moral. Social media will produce greater stupidity for it is subject to the same laws of Necessity that rocks and stones are. With this increase in stupidity will come a subsequent loss of language, that language that allows us to become co-creators with God. The Devil or the Great Beast is the realm of the social, the realm of power. Power in the social realm can only come into effect with the existence of others. The collective is like a physical mass or weight, and like all mass is subject to the laws of gravity and Necessity.

Paul Foster Case sees the letter Mem as the link between Gevurah and Hod, but the letter Shin in combination with the double letter Kaf would appear to be more appropriate. It would also require its combining with one of the double letters which are the seven vertical paths of the Tree of Life and which represent both ascent and descent. Mem, one of the three mothers, links East to West, from Netzach to Hod, and may link South to North from Chesed to Netzach, as Mem is the mother letter of the right side of the Tree of Life. Mem signifies water’s movement downwards; Shin signifies fire’s movement upwards. This corresponds to the downward movement of creation and the upward movement of decreation. Decreation is to make something created pass into the uncreated, the purifying fire, unlike destruction which is to make something created pass into nothingness. Nihilists and nihilism are the symptoms of the substitution of destruction for decreation, the anti- Logos for the Logos.

The linking letter from Tiferet to Hod is Lamed meaning “study”. The “perfect intelligence” of the maker in the universe of Yetzirah or Formation is that knowledge which can bring things to completion, the “know how” of the techne, the technician or artisan. “The eye” of Ayin refers to the thinking that is “theoretical”. The techne or artist or craftsperson is knowledgeable of the materials, their potentialities and possibilities for formation, their giving and their resistance to formation. He has “know how”. He is knowledgeable of the eidos or the outward appearance of the thing which he intends to make and the use it will be put to. His dynamis is his knowledge of these things. The work is in another and for another. The architect, for example, must have knowledge of the materials that will be used to build the structure he intends, the form or outward appearance of the structure once it will be finished, and the use to which the structure is finally intended. He himself will not do the work; that will be done by another. The structure is intended for use by another (although the architect could make use of the structure himself.) This kind of knowing and making is the essence of what we call technology.

We need to remember that what is brought into being through technology is not “new”; and while it may be “novel”, it does not come to be out of nothing but comes to be from what was always already there in its essence through what we call the essence of our understanding and knowledge, language, and number, what is called the Ain Sof in the Sefer Yetzirah. The realm of the “perfect consciousness” is the realm of the artist and the craftsperson, the technites of the Greeks. The realm of “pure intelligence” is the realm of the scientist; but both knowing and making, the arts and the sciences, are held together in the unity that we call technology (techne + logos).

The Letter Lamed and the 22nd Path: The Faithful Intelligence

Lamed – and Elohim “created the sea-monsters, creatures that creep, and fowl.” 1:21

Alt. Trans. “The twenty-second path is called the faithful consciousness because, through it, the spiritual powers are increased. All dwellers on earth ‘abide in its shadow.'”

Path 22. Faithful Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Ne’eman): It is called this because spiritual powers are increased through it, so that they can be close to all those ‘who dwell in their shadow’.

Lamed, the 12th letter of the Hebrew Alphabet, is the symbol of learning and teaching and, thus, expresses what the Greeks called the mathematical. It is translated literally as the word for “learning” or “study” and also for “staff” or “goad”. The shape of Lamed is the ‘uncoiled serpent’, and the serpent is associated with knowledge. Lamed is located at the centre of the Aleph-Beth and represents the heart Lev לב. This is why it is associated with Tiferet, the Heart. In Kabbalah, learning is mostly done with the heart and soul, not just the mind as the mind is a secondary organ. This learning and teaching is illustrated in the statement of Simone Weil: “Faith is the experience that the intelligence is illuminated by Love.” This is why I have associated Lamed with the path of the Faithful Intelligence, the path going from Tiferet to Hod.

Lamed indicates that all learning is the heart of human existence, both spiritual and physical, and that the revealing of truth is part of human nature. When human beings cease to reveal truth, they become more inhumane, bestial, violent, mad. Human being’s course in life is to learn and express i.e., to use those faculties which distinguish human beings from all other animals and beings. Those faculties are our participation in the Logos, the use of language and number. Through the use of language and number we reveal truth and complete our human nature. But this use of language and number is “two-faced”: it can both reveal and conceal at the same time. When the use of the logos becomes centred in the Yod or individual (the Palpable Intelligence of the 27^th path), it then becomes will to power or “self-centred”. Does a choice remain for human beings not to live out their being with this view of the logos i.e., is their past viewing of the logos now become their Fate? How does one extricate oneself from this?

Lamed reaches higher than any of the other Hebrew letters, like a lighthouse or tower high in the air. It may thus signify a warning of the hubris that comes to human beings when their pride in their learning causes them to place themselves at the centre of the universe at the expense of all other beings. It is the nemesis that results from such pride. The lightning bolt emanates from the Sun (a symbol of truth and associated with the Sephirot Tiferet) and blasts the crown or symbol of the “kingdom” (Malkhut) that human beings construct from their false use of language and number.

The shape of the Lamed is an undulating movement, (the serpent uncoiled, the Draconis spread across the sky) and the Lamed represents constant organic movement, constant change, the Draconis or Time. It may be said to be the learning that results in revolution, the hard learning of life. But this learning can also be the opportunity for conversion and change in the Self. Lamed is the lightning strike of energy or the lightning bolt of Zeus descending down the two sides of the Tree of Life. The Tower card (which I would suggest is #15 rather than #16) shows ten yods in the form of the Tree of Life on the female side of the tower and twelve yods indicating the twelve houses of the Zodiac, the twelve tribes of the Houses of Israel (again Israel being all creation and the twelve tribes being all the races of human beings) on the male side of the tower. The element of fire predominates in the card and this would suggest its association with the mother letter Shin. The illustrator of the card has chosen to associate the card with Peh, which signifies ‘mouth’, and Peh is one of the seven double letters. Does this signify the potential of speaking truly or falsely regarding things? We can gain some insight into this from Macbeth’s speech:

“Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, / Creeps in this petty pace from day to day, / To the last syllable of recorded time; / And all our yesterdays have lighted fools / The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle! / Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player, / That struts and frets his hour upon the stage, / And then is heard no more. It is a tale / Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, / Signifying nothing.“

Here we see the false speech of a man who views life from the perspective of having violated life’s principles: he has committed numerous murders in order to satisfy the desires of his own ego. For such a man, learning (especially from history and its ‘lighting’ of human experience in time) makes a human being ‘a walking shadow’ who cannot learn from his suffering and so becomes a nihilist, a destroyer. (Much, much more can be said of this particular speech.)

Lamed teaches us to learn from everything in life so that we may understand what can be learned and what can be taught. The significance of the Yods on The Tower #15 card indicate a learning and teaching that is focused on the ego, and this learning will lead to our downfall, as it does with Macbeth. While we cannot know the will of God in detail, we can learn that the purpose of suffering is the decreation or destruction of the ego. (Shakespeare’s King Lear is the best example of this in English literature). It is through this destruction or decreation that one becomes united with the Divine. After one has governed their bestial tendencies in Khaf and no longer has the blockages of the ego interfering with their vision of the world, they can begin to learn the truth of the true nature and purpose of human learning.

The Letter Mem and the 29th Path: The Corporeal Intelligence

Genesis 1.7 And Elohim made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament; and it was so. 8 And Elohim called the firmament Heaven. And there was evening and there was morning, a second day.

The Twenty-ninth Path is the Corporeal Intelligence, so called because it forms every body which is formed beneath the whole set of worlds and the increment of them.

Alt. Trans. ” The twenty-ninth path is called the corporeal consciousness because it marks out the forms and reproduction of all bodies which are incorporated under every cycle of the heavens.”

Path 29. Physical Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Mugsham): It is called this because it depicts the growth of all that becomes physical under the system of all the spheres.

“To mark out” is to assign limits and boundaries to things, to give them a form (eidos) so that they may be understood within the web of Necessity. This is the mental process of the principle of reason and so has been assigned to the letter Shin. This influence of Shin is the realm of Yetzirah or Formation; and as we have stated, it is ruled by the principle of reason. The 29^th path seems to indicate Aristotle’s teleology: the telos or end in which things achieve their completion or perfection (Hod). In the Tarot, The Star #17 is another card of completion i.e., Fate, what one is destined to be. What one is destined to be is determined by the choices one makes. The 29^th path is the crossover from Netzach to Hod and it indicates a change from the realm of Asiyah, the material realm, to that of Yetzirah or the realm of Formation. The Judgement #20 of the test of Reish has already been determined and the Fate has already been decided.

The paths and the Sefer Yetzirah cannot be viewed from an individual perspective only. The individual is not the whole human being. The human being is an ‘embodied soul’ within a community of embodied souls. In the journey that is life, one can be ‘hooked’ into viewing the world as material only, as the fact-based reality we encounter and confront every day in our day-to-day lives. In the confrontation or strife that is Netzach, one makes the choice of becoming a full human being and going onward, or of being satisfied with materialism and power and of potentially becoming a golem, a ‘soulless’ animated thing. One chooses the darkness, or one chooses the light.

The letter Mem is water mayim מים, the waters of wisdom, knowledge, the Torah as it is referred to by some Hebrew commentators. Representing both waters and manifestation, it is the ability to dive deep into the wisdom, into the depths of Creation. It is said that in every person is the thirst for the words of the Creator which are the waters of life, and this corresponds to Aristotle’s words that “All human beings by nature desire to see”. The open Mem refers to the revealed aspects of God’s will that we understand as Necessity and that are given to us in our study and learning, while the closed Mem refers to the concealed part of the celestial rule that nonetheless guides us and all of existence i.e., the Divine Will. Mem also represents the time necessary for ripening and indicates to us the importance of balanced emotions and of humility, in particular, while we are waiting on God.

Mem corresponds to the number 40 and represents the time necessary for the ripening process that leads to fruition. (40 days for the development of the embryo, 40 years in the desert before reaching the holy land, 40 years development before Moses was prepared to be the leader of Israel, Jesus’ fasting for 40 days before he is tempted by Satan).

The Mem also teaches us about balanced emotions – balancing the watery motions of our feelings and this is how it influences Netzach. And it is about humility – water is the substance that always runs downhill to the lowest place. Fire, on the other hand, always rises.

The Twenty-ninth Path once again illustrates that which has been called the “mathematical” in this writing i.e., that which can be learned and that which can be taught. It is the knowledge or awareness of the physical material of the universe and the forms that are possible for this physical material to take its shape. In the path, this movement is associated with Time.

The “mathematical” would be indicated by the letter Lamed ל or “study”, “the serpent uncoiled” and how this emanates from the Sephirot Tiferet or The Sun. In order for some thing to be learned, it must first be brought to a “stand” or bounded within a horizon so that it may be “de-fined” and a name given to it so that it may be spoken about. The “numerations” weigh and measure things so that they are brought out of their natural state of metabole or change into something that can be known i.e., they are given a “permanence” of some kind, a “stability” of some kind. Numbers are only one example of the “mathematical”. The manner of seeing that results from the “consistency” or reliability of the use of numbers is but one manner of encountering and accounting for the laws of Necessity and the relation of created things to the domains of time and space.

The Twenty-ninth Path also indicates the limits of human reason and intelligence and so is influenced by The High Priestess #2. The ‘stability’ that arises from the collective or social manner of viewing the world comes about as a result of the consistency of the results of calculations or ‘numerations’ that are carried out. The ‘numerations’ are the logoi or speech that is shared among the members of the community. These logoi are grounded in the principle of reason. The Sefir Yetzirah states that Mem, as one of the three Mothers, moves in a horizontal, not a vertical direction. The movement on the paths is a later, Renaissance, addition. Because Alef is the source of all the letters, it is capable of both vertical and horizontal movement. The direction of Mem is back and forth not up and down, unless one considers the three Mothers as both horizontal and vertical and that the three Mothers are the three pillars of the Tree of Life (which is what is considered here). The three Mothers act as vowels in the formation of words and thus must be capable of both horizontal and vertical movements as well as diagonal movements.

There is no “human progress” that occurs on the spiritual level along with the progress achieved on the material level. Morally and ethically human beings, as a whole, have not made any significant progress from their ancestors. This is because the moral and ethical presence of what human beings truly are as human beings has always been present for them to reach out to and grasp. Because human beings lose sight of the chasm which separates the Necessary from the Good, they fail in making true progress. They come to worship power and all of its false idols. This ultimately results in the oblivion of eternity for human beings.

Hod is the terminus of the Pillar of Severity or Form (necessity); Netzach is the terminus of the Pillar of Mercy, the “splendour” of which is the recognition of the Beauty of the world and the beauty of human actions within that world. The middle pillar is the fulcrum providing the “balance”, the “harmony”, the “equilibrium”, the “friendship”, the “covenant” between the Divine and human beings. It is referred to as the Ain Sof by the Kabbalists

The Letter Kaf and the 24th Path: The Imaginative/Apparative Intelligence

The Twenty-fourth Path is the Imaginative Intelligence, and it is so called because it gives a likeness to all the similitudes, which are created in like manner similar to its harmonious
elegancies.

Path 24. Apparative (Tools) Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel
Dimyoni) (Sometimes called The Imaginative Intelligence): It is called this
because it provides an appearance for all created apparitions, in a form
fitting their stature.

Khaf, the 11th letter of the Hebrew Alphabet, means literally the cupped palm of the hand. It is like a cupped, outstretched palm, ready to receive. The shape of all containers – a bowl, a cup, a jar, is based on that basic curved shape, and Khaf represents the idea of a container. It represents form, the outward appearance of a thing. A house is a form that contains the goings on of the people inside it; a body is a form which contains the life and energy of the person. The forms of the physical world are where the spiritual essence of life is contained and is able to manifest itself. The Khaf also teaches us to shape ourselves- to bend the ego and shape our character. This flexible character aligns it with Path #9, The Purifying Intelligence of Yesod. (The Kaf may also be said to refer to the Holy Grail, the container that holds life itself.)

The Khaf is what gives form to the matter, and because of this power is placed on the left side of the Tree of Life. It is also one of the seven double letters and implies movement both up and down on the Tree of Life. It contains all the possibilities of containing, building, and forming all existence, and this relates it to the eidos or the outward appearance of some thing. It is the letter of formation, bending the straight line into a curved shape. It also symbolizes the crown of the Torah – Keter כתר (I think this would be better understood as the Kingdom of Malkhut?) The Khaf could also be understood as an arc which composes the sphere that encompasses or contains the physical world and thus is part of the gyre that crosses the world of Asiyah to the world of Yetzirah. Since the Khaf gives form to some thing and completes that thing, it is appropriate that it is associated with the path from Hod to Gevurah and is related to the Justice card #8 of the Tarot which is related to the “know how” that brings about the completion of some thing made from some thing else.

The Imaginative or Apparative Intelligence that is path 24 relates to that “know how” that is the technological. Technology is the unique coming together of ‘knowing’ and ‘making’, techne and logos, that is founded upon the viewing of the world as ready-to-hand, something disposable. This viewing first requires a ‘system’ or ‘grid’ in which the things are placed as objects; and as we have previously discussed, this viewing is determined by the theoretical understanding established in the Beriyah world under the influence of Binah, the third sephirot. When the things are brought to a stand within the system, it is through the use of tools and equipment that change in the outward appearances of things is brought about, and their shapes are bent so that they will be made useful to meet human ends or purposes. This is why we commonly misconstrue technology as the equipment and tools of technology rather than the viewing which first determines those tools and equipment and the uses of those tools and equipment. This may be said to be the reason why Binah is associated with the pillar of Boaz and with the adjectives of ‘severity’ and ‘contraction’.

In examining the triangles of the paths, the Kaf of Path #24 (The Imaginative/Apparative Intelligence) combines with the Shin of Path #29 (The Corporeal Intelligence) as well as the Ayin of Path #20 (The Intelligence of the Will) and the Lamed of Path #22 (The Faithful Intelligence) to produce what is called the technological viewing of the world. This is also affected by the Vav of Path #17 (The Intelligence of the Senses) and the paths of Peh (The Unity Directing Intelligence) and Kaf (The Imaginative Intelligence) which results from the influence of the path of Lamed from Tiferet to Hod.

The Letter Yod and the 27th Path: The Exciting Palpable Intelligence

The Twenty-seventh Path is the Exciting Intelligence, and it is so called because by it is created the Intellect of all created beings under the highest heaven, and the excitement or motion of them.

Alt. Trans. “The twenty-seventh path is called the exciting consciousness because, through it, is created the life-breath of every created being under the supreme orb, as well as the motion of them all.”

Path 27. Palpable Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Murgash): It is called this because the intelligence of things created under the entire upper sphere, as well as their sensations, were created through it.

The Twenty-seventh path relates to the creation of human beings, their “ensoulment” and their motion. Here we can see that “soul” is related to “intellect” or “reason” in one translation; it is called the “life-breath” of human beings in another translation, and it is here that a great transformation takes place in the being of human beings. We can relate this “intellect” to the Greek logos or perhaps the Greek nous, but it more closely relates to the Latin understanding and translation of logos as rationale or “reason” rather than the broad Greek understanding of the term.

If we relate this to our understanding of eros, the “exciting consciousness” is the awareness of “need”, and it is this need which compels us to “motion” or action. This awareness of our needs requires us to apply reason to them in order to fulfil them. The use of the word “palpable” in some translations suggests that the sensations spoken of here go beyond the mere ‘seeing’ with the eye only but also include the other senses. We feel the needs of eros ‘palpably’. While sight is given priority in the senses, it is not the only sense of human beings. Equally important, perhaps, is the sensation of hearing.

Motion is related to Time, and here it is related to the concepts of Being and Time. From Netzach to Yesod is experienced the “life-force” of sexuality/propagation, and Time is the coming into being of all beings. With the “exciting intelligence” is experienced the erotic need of the recognition of our incompleteness. The words of this path suggest that the world as a whole is a ‘living being’ and that all created beings have the ‘life-breath’ within them. The purpose of the journey is to get in touch with this life-force. Again, whether this will be experienced as will to power or Love is the choice that the human beings must make, and this choice comes at path 25 The Intelligence of Trials.

(Our desire for children is the desire for the Incarnation which came into being through Tiferet. The “supreme orb” is the sphere encircling all created things, but there is also an indication that it is the Sun. The tarot card corresponding to this path is The Devil #16 and the letter Ayin ע meaning ‘eye’ is associated with the card. This card stands in contrast to The Lovers card #6. Is the beauty of individual human beings and our desire to possess and consume that beauty (the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge) the trap that is set for us? the “original sin” and its temptation is the desire to consume, to eat that which is beautiful? This cannot be so, but it is so difficult to think around this. Our sexuality is a mirroring of the creative act of the Divine, a widening of the gyres. Is this the reason behind the calling of sexuality ‘sinful’ in so many of the traditional religions? Or is it the very disruptive nature of eros to social order that is the ground of the various taboos against sexuality as it appears in its various forms?)

The 10th Hebrew letter Yod is a dot or point. There are a number of contradictory interpretations for the letter Yod, and these contradictions rest in how different interpretations of the nature of the Divine and the nature of human beings have come about. For some, the Yod represents the Creator, the single point from which all of creation emerges, the Unity within multiplicity, but is this not a duplication of the understanding of the letter Alef? The letter Alef is composed of two Yods and a Vav suggesting a Trinity. A singular Yod would place God at an infinite distance from His creation, or conversely, place God within His creation in such a way that He is mistaken for the Necessary and all that occurs within Necessity. The Yod itself is considered the foundation of all foundations, and this is why it is associated with the Sephirot Yesod. But is not this foundation what is being referred to as Necessity here? Is the key to understanding the significance of the Yod that it is the 10^th letter of the Hebrew alphabet and thus a new beginning of some kind?

Yod is a symbol of the Holy One, the Creator, since the holy name starts with Yod (YodHehVavHeh). Small in form, the meaning of the Yod is great. According to kabbalistic tradition, all creation came forth from a single point– a point which represents God’s infinite presence inside of the finite world. This interpretation seems to be fine if it is remembered that this single point is infinitely small in relation to the macrocosm about it and that it mirrors the soul in the body in that the soul is an infinitely small point in the microcosm that is the human body.

Yod also represents the idea of Unity within Multiplicity, of one whole that is comprised of parts. Yod as we see is a single point, but its value is 10. It shows us that many grains of sand are used to make one pot, many pages make up one book, many drops of water make up the ocean. There are many parts that comprise the individual human being and all of these parts belong to Necessity, but at centre of the human being is an infinite point that does not belong to Necessity. It belongs to God because it is part of Him. There are many occurrences and experiences in the world, but they all stem from One God, perfect and indivisible.

But if this is the case, how can events and experiences which are clearly deprivals of the Good be attributed to God? One cannot so easily dismiss the Book of Job. The Yod also is said to represent the ten Sefirot (but if this is the case, what is the significance of the Alef and what is the relation between the two? The letter Alef is composed of two Yods and a Vav. It is a ‘trinity’.). In Yod, the multiplicity returns to unity. In the Sephirot Yesod, it can be said that Being is the foundation, the ground/reason. The principle of reason speaks to us as a principle of being from within the Yesod and the Yod itself can be mistakenly understood as this principle of reason only. The Fool #0 stands before the abyss of Being, the world of Asiyah; he/she makes a leap into that abyss. The result becomes The Magician #1: the techne, the “showman” and the resultant theatre that is the world of Yetzirah. Shakespeare understood this when he said: “All the world’s a stage and all the men and women merely players”.

The Yod is an infinite dot, the essence of all life, when it is understood as the ‘soul’ of the individual. As such, it is the foundation of all foundations since it is related to, and brought into a relation to, the Logos, the Word. In it is the power of the spirit to govern and guide the matter of the material world and this is why it is mistaken for empowerment. Everything comes from it and returns to it. The soul is that hidden dot beyond the imagination – formless, the source of all thought, beyond all thoughts, beyond time and space, beyond the representational thinking that is our modern understanding of what knowledge and sensibility are. It is the secret hidden principle of the universe that we cannot perceive, and because of this hiddenness is mistakenly taken for will to power through the principle of reason.

So why then is it related to the Palpable Intelligence or Consciousness here? It is related to the Palpable Intelligence or Consciousness “because the intelligence (consciousness) of things is created (is “made”) under the entire upper sphere, as well as their sensations, were created through it.” Here one can see the connection of the Yod to the Logos understood as Word, as well as the connection of the Yod to the principle of reason as a principle of Being and as will to power. The Palpable Intelligence is also translated as the “Exciting Intelligence” and this demonstrates a connection to eros and to the recognition of need and to the condition of deprival.

If we understand the Logos as Love, we can see how widely variant ways of looking at the world are possible. In literature, psychoanalysts have a field day interpreting the poem “Love” by George Herbert, but their analyses indicate what has become of our understanding of eros and love under the technological. Freud gave to love a cup of poison to drink.

Love

LOVE bade me welcome; yet my soul drew back,
            Guilty of dust and sin.
But quick-eyed Love, observing me grow slack
    From my first entrance in,
Drew nearer to me, sweetly questioning
            If I lack’d anything.

‘A guest,’ I answer’d, ‘worthy to be here:’
            Love said, ‘You shall be he.’
‘I, the unkind, ungrateful? Ah, my dear,
            I cannot look on Thee.’
Love took my hand and smiling did reply,
            ‘Who made the eyes but I?’

‘Truth, Lord; but I have marr’d them: let my shame
            Go where it doth deserve.’
‘And know you not,’ says Love, ‘Who bore the blame?’
            ‘My dear, then I will serve.’
‘You must sit down,’ says Love, ‘and taste my meat.’
            So I did sit and eat.

From what is being written here in this analysis of “The Thirty-two Paths of Wisdom” about the two-faced nature of Logos and Eros, one can get a vastly different understanding of this poem and the encounter with Love. This difference is the essence of the thinking that occurs within the realms of Beriyah and Yetzirah and how they diverge. A psychoanalytic reading of this poem will achieve the same effect as the viewing of Van Gogh’s “Sunflowers” with knowledge of the chemical composition of his yellow paint. It will be interesting but yet will tell you nothing of the reality of the truth that is present in the object before one.

The Letter Tzaddi and the 32nd Path: The Administrative Serving Intelligence

Alt. Trans. “The thirty-second path is called the serving consciousness because it directs the motion of the seven planets, each in its own proper course.”

The 32^nd path has a variety of translations each of which offers possible insights into its contents and meanings. That which directs the seven planets is the Law of Necessity, and through its direction, we are given Time. The students of the movements of the planets are the Magi or astrologers, and The Magician #1 derives his name from them. The danger, of course, is that through the predictions of the Magi, Necessity itself will become “worshipped” and the followers cease to distinguish the gulf that exists between the Necessary and the Good. There could also be an allusion here to the Roman religion which worshipped the planets as gods and because of this worship, the one God of the Hebrews would eventually ‘destroy’ them (which is what ultimately occurred).

What the 32^nd path indicates is that in the kingdom of Malkhut, it is the law of Necessity which rules; and when The Fool makes his/her leap into the abyss of being, he or she is immediately faced with a choice of being a follower of others or someone who sets out on their own path. It appears that this choice is represented by the choosing of the path of the Tzadik, the 32^nd path, or the path of the Tav to Yesod, the 30^th path.

As the element of water represented by Mem is present throughout the downward movement on the Tree of Life, the element of fire represented by Shin is present throughout the upward movement. The element of fire refines and purifies things and is called alchemy in the course of history. The purification is the search for the ‘philosopher’s stone’ which is a metaphor for the ‘soul’. The alchemical process is the baptism that follows the ‘conversion’ of the initiate, and this conversion occurs immediately when confronted by the paths of Tzaddi and of Tav. This is why there is the connection within the Sephirot Malkhut between The Fool #0, The Wheel of Fortune #10, and Judgement #20 cards of the Tarot. The choice facing The Fool is path 25 The Intelligence of Trials, and the result is either a conversion and baptism or being caught like a fish in the ‘fish hook’ that is the meaning of the letter Tzaddi.

Tzaddi is the 18^th letter of the Hebrew alphabet. It signifies both “righteousness” and the “hunt”. Its literal meaning is “fish hook” and it is with the hook that one catches the “fish”, signified by the letter Nun. Fishing is a hunting activity, and is here a metaphor for religious proselytizing.

In Greek mythology, the goddess of the hunt is Artemis. She is also the goddess of the moon. The shape of the Tzaddi is a Nun with a Yod riding on top of it, indicating the individual as a ‘fish’ or as a distinct person. The gematria of Tzaddi is 90 suggesting a connection with The Hermit card #9 of the Tarot: 9 X 2 is 18, The Moon. The contrary to the Moon is Justice (‘righteousness’) which is card #8 in Tarot. This seems to suggest that the righteous can be deceived by the ‘false speech’ and become ‘hooked’, as a fish is deceived by the fish hook. “Righteous” means “just”, but here it seems to indicate the justice that is the product of the society or culture that produces it. There seems to be an alignment between the ‘false knowledge’ that belongs to The Hermit card of the Tarot and the ‘reflected light’ that is The Moon’s as opposed to the direct light of the Sun. The deception, the deceit and fraud, is also related to the ‘hiddenness’ that is an element of Tzaddi.

The Tzaddi represents the Tsaddik, the person who is just; but this justice is bereft of mercy, it appears. They may be the leaders of their generation be they politicians, teachers, priests or other religious figures. They are the ‘hooks’ that hook the ‘fish’, their followers. Tzaddi belongs to the left side of the Tree of Life for it deals with societies and leaders. The true Tzaddik strives to reveal truth, loving justice and mercy, able to recognize their weaknesses and strengths, and thus have self-knowledge. This self-knowledge can only come in choosing the paths of the Tav and the Reish.

The shape of Tzaddi appears to be a combination of the letters Lamed, Yod and Zayin. One can understand the significance of this combination if one considers that Lamed is ‘study’, Yod is the individual, and Zayin is either the ‘sword’ or the ‘manacle’. The Zayin can be either a sword of liberation or a manacle of entrapment or enslavement. The individual is faced with a choice once they have made the leap into being.

Path	Letter	Meaning	Symbol
Path 8: Perfect Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Shalem): It is called this because it is the Original Arrangement. There is no root through which it can be pondered, except through the Chambers of Greatness, which emanate from the essence of its permanence.		The knowing and making that brings about the completion of some thing. “Know how…” This thing may be corporeal or it may be some ‘value’ that human beings ‘create’ at this stage. Original arrangement: Necessity. The Chambers of Greatness: Malkhut.	The scales
Hod to Gevurah Path 24. Apparative (Tools) Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Dimyoni) (Sometimes called The Imaginative Intelligence): It is called this because it provides an appearance for all created apparitions, in a form fitting their stature.	Khaf כ	Hand; taking possession of something. The viewing of the world as ready-to-hand turns the world into objects and those objects are ‘disposable’ according to the human will.	The form of the outward appearance of things is a ‘shadow’ or an ‘apparition’ of the thing. It is not the essence of the thing. The divine essence shows forth and hides simultaneously. We can become lost in the outward appearance of things.
Hod to Tiferet Path 22. Faithful Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Ne’eman): It is called this because spiritual powers are increased through it, so that they can be close to all those ‘who dwell in their shadow’.	Lamed ל “study”, “learning” The Library of Hermes	The Library of Hermes is composed of the texts of the world. The texts of the world are composed of that which is understood regarding the Laws of Necessity. It is what we call ‘education’; ‘historical knowledge’.	The Tower of Babel. The writings of all nations regarding their interpretations of the Laws of Necessity and the Divine Will. Lamed as the ‘uncoiled serpent’, what we call knowledge and ‘study’.
Hod to Yesod 27. Palpable Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Murgash): It is called this because the intelligence of things created under the entire upper sphere, as well as their sensations, were created through it.	Yod י	That ‘seeing’ that brings the things of the world into appearance in a manner in which they may be understood and spoken about. Crucial distinction between the principle of reason as being or Logos not understood as ratio, rationale.	Arm. The extension that grasps. The ego. The physical body as a vehicle by means of which the soul extends itself beyond the limitations of the body to the created world that is ready-to-hand.
Hod/Netzach Path 29. Physical Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Mugsham): It is called this because it depicts the growth of all that becomes physical under the system of all the spheres.	Shin/Mem/Alef מ/א/ש	The Physical intelligence dominated by Mem in the crossover from Hod to Netzach or Netzach to Hod. It is shaped by how the Palpable Intelligence has come to be interpreted.	Fate, destiny, how one’s being in the world is determined. “Matter is our infallible judge.” The fate of the end of being a full human being or something less than that.
Hod to Malkhut Path 32. Worshipped Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Ne’evad): It is called this because it is prepared so as to destroy all who engage in the worship of the seven planets.	Tzaddi צ	Fish hook. The Fool is the ‘fish’ and it is The Magician who is trying to ‘hook’ him. The Magician is a proselytizer of any collective looking for adherents or followers.	The Tzadik receives his view of justice from the society or world of which he/she is a part. Here it is a descent from Hod to Malkhut and is part of the world of Asiyah. The Magician is the possessor of the knowledge that is believed to be the truth and The Fool may become a follower of this ‘truth’.

Understanding the Paths Emanating from Netzach: The Spiritual Inward Journey

The Paths Emanating to and from Netzach

The 7th Path: The Hidden Occult Intelligence

7. Hidden Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Nistar): It is called this because it is the radiance that illuminates the transcendental powers that are seen with the mind’s eye and with the reverie of Faith.

The Seventh Path is the Occult Intelligence because it is the Refulgent Splendour of all the Intellectual virtues which are perceived by the eyes of intellect, and by the contemplation of faith.

Alt. Trans. “The seventh path is the hidden consciousness because it is the radiance that illuminates all the powers of the mind which are seen with the eye of the intellect and through the contemplation of truth.”

Wescott trans. The Seventh Path is the Occult Intelligence, because it is the Refulgent Splendour of all the Intellectual virtues which are perceived by the eyes of intellect, and by the contemplation of faith.

Case trans. The seventh path (Netzach. The seventh Sephirah) is called the Occult or Hidden Intelligence, and it is so called because it is the brilliant splendour of all the intellectual powers which are ‘beheld by the eye of understanding and by the thought of faith.

Genesis 1:6 — “And Elohim said: ‘Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.’ “

The paths emanating from Netzach are those that illustrate the individual’s experience of the day-to-day world. The Hidden Intelligence or The Occult Intelligence is the knowledge of the unseen theoretical world “which illuminates all the powers of the mind” i.e., the awareness of the principles, laws, and axioms of the rational mind which determine the understanding of the things that are, as well as a knowledge of the unconscious or the sub-conscious. It is a part of what we understand by self-knowledge. Faith is not a thought but a way of being in the world: “Faith is the experience that the intelligence is illuminated by Love.” It is a way of thinking, and as such is a way of being-in-the-world.

The Greek philosopher Aristotle begins his Metaphysics with: “All men by their nature desire to see”. The translation of “see” into English usually becomes “to know”. The “brilliant splendour” or “glory”, the beauty of the world, that is given to the human intellect is enlightened by Love, and such viewing results in faith. The Hidden Intelligence, Path #7, combines with Path #29, the Corporeal Intelligence, the Palpable Intelligence #27 (Yod), and the Natural Intelligence Path #28, to produce the individual perspective on the presence-at-hand and ready-to-hand world of Yetzirah. This is crucial to how the world is to be apprehended by the human psyche, and the psyche is wed to eros.

The individual perspective becomes what it is because it is influenced by the Memory of Mem given from Chakmah (Dalet) which shows its concrete manifestation in what are called the 7 Pillars of Wisdom (our “historical knowledge”) which combines with the Alef of the Logos or Ain Sof (given in the symbols of “tongues of fire” from Tiferet and which gives Intelligence of the Secrets of All Spiritual Activities Path #19) to “clothe” the individual in the images of Path #24, The Intelligence of the “Imagination” or The Apparative Intelligence, and this is the foundation of Beauty. This Beauty is accompanied by the Intelligence of Trials, Path #25, and it represents the “strife” that occurs between Love and Will which is ever-present in the individual human being.

In the Hebrew Tree, the Seventh Path is represented by the Sephirot Binah. In the Western Tree of Case, the Seventh Path is the Sephirot Netzach represented in Tarot by The Chariot #7 card. With the letter Alef, Elohim “made” the firmament, but with Binah Elohim says “let there be a firmament”.

Binah is the potential or possibility of making i.e., it is the dynamis as understood by the Greek philosopher Aristotle. With the Alef present in Tiferet, this possibility becomes energeia, the realization of the work, the work brought to its completion. Binah stands on the contrary pole of the Tree of Life from Chesed. While Chesed is on the pole of Jakim, Binah is on the pole of Boaz. This may account for the assigning of Binah to path Seven as 3 + 4 = 7. This, however, would be contrary to the Pythagorean use or understanding of number. Binah ascribes the limits (potentialities and possibilities) to that which is unlimited. In the Tarot, The High Priestess #2 is rightly referred to as the “dark, sterile Mother”, while The Empress #3 is the “bright fruitful Mother”. Brightness and fruitfulness arise from the imposing of limits.

The Emperor card #4 shows the figure seated within a sterile landscape in the Tarot deck illustrated here. Is this a representation of the power of Nature? This would seem to suggest that there is something missing within the sphere represented by The Emperor. The Emperor card is associated with Aries in the Zodiac. Is this an aspect of the “Lamb slain from the foundation of the world” and its association with the creation of Time? Does one need to view the Tree of Life in a mirror i.e., to transpose all statements into their contraries? Or does it mean that one must sustain the contraries in a synthesis? This needs to be explored further.

Netzach is the centre of the strife that is being a human being. It is the embodied soul illustrative of the strife that is within eros itself. The human body is “the chariot of fire”; and the fire which it carries is the human soul. The symbols of Venus are prominent in the martial aspect of this card because it is through Ares and Aphrodite and their son Eros that we experience the needs and their fulfillment in our lives. The fire here is the “shadow fire”, the human urges that drive us in each waking moment of our lives, that which is hidden and emerges from the sub-conscious. The “victories” that we may experience take many different forms. Netzach is linked to the letter Dalet and to the path linked to Chesed. This is combined with the influence from Tiferet through the letter Samekh. The illustrator here has chosen to link Netzach with the letter Chet; and since Chet means “enclosure”, it is apt to represent the human body as that which “encloses” the soul.

The word “occult” here means hidden or concealed. We might go back to the quote with which I began this writing: “Faith is the experience that the intelligence is illuminated by Love”. What Weil means by “experience” here is what we perceive with the eyes, what we become acquainted with in our day-to-day experience. Our knowing of these things is “illuminated”, is made clearer, is brought to light, through loving them as gifts. Because of this illumination of the things about us through Love (Tiferet), we may have faith in the experience of God even in His absence as we re-collect His Covenant with us through this Love. Our desires for various goods are a reminder of the Good that awaits us in the fulfillment of our absence, our imperfection. Our absence is experienced as the need for the Good. As Christ said: “Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also” Matthew 6: 21. Temptation rests in our desire to place our “treasure” in false goods and not the Good.

Nature does not lie; it hides. The “occult” or “hidden” aspect of this intelligence or knowledge also refers to the nature of the essence of things: each thing hides within it its contrary. This includes human beings. The goods of the world that we see about us can create obsessions and thus become evils. Illness is part of the nature of things, but within it hides health, that which is natural. In the affliction of despair, hope is hidden. In the darkness that is the false fire and false light of The Devil, there is also the hope for the genuine light and the genuine fire that is the Good.

In the Sefer Yetzirah, all of creation is seen as ‘holy’ and, therefore, we must say that all of creation is seen as moral. “Creation” is perpetual action or movement. This is extremely important in discerning what we think “knowledge” is today. Socrates once said that “the opposite of knowledge is not ignorance, but madness”. We can understand what he is saying when we consider the phenomenon of “stupidity” as a form of madness. Stupidity is a social phenomenon and therefore a moral phenomenon. The German philosopher Nietzsche once said: “Power makes stupid”. “Stupidity” as a collective, social phenomenon is the great danger to the Good. What we call “intelligence”, the mathematical intelligence most admired by society, (that mathematical intelligence and projection exhibited by the AI Chat GPT, for instance) is so because it is an expression of power. Nietzsche also wrote: “In individuals insanity is rare; but in groups, parties, nations and epochs, it is the rule.”

There are many “intelligent” people whose actions are quite evil i.e., Jeff Bezos, Donald Trump, and Elon Musk as examples; and there are many people who are considered not very “intelligent” yet who appear to be in touch with the very purpose of life itself. These men, Bezos, Trump and Musk, have a number of characteristics which they share, not the least of which is that their “accomplishments” are the by-products of the wealth of others. Their desire for further power is expressed in their “creating” their own social media platforms i.e., Musk > Twitter, Trump > Truth Social where their rhetoric will dominate the discourse of the people who follow them, or in paying a billion dollars to acquire rights to popular cultural events (Bezos’ Rings of Power). They are, of course, not interested in “truth” but in making people “stupid”. They show contempt for the laws of their society and this is telling in itself. (The analogy in literature is to Saruman of Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings. He aspires to overthrow Sauron; but in his overthrow, he will merely replace him. His knowledge of the making of rings comes from Sauron himself.)

Liberation, not instruction, is the only way to overcome stupidity. But of what does this liberation consist? In Plato’s Republic, the prisoner in the cave must be released from his chains first before the paideia, the education, the “leading out”, can take place. In The Lord of the Rings, Frodo must believe that Gollum (notice the similarity to the Hebrew word golem) can be saved, that he can return to becoming a full human being. We, too, must believe that human beings dwelling in the madness of stupidity can be saved either through the grace of God (first) and then secondarily through education. Frodo treats Gollum with mercy and kindness, and he provides an example for us in dealing with those who have succumbed to “stupidity”. Even the great Martin Heidegger succumbed to stupidity during the Nazi regime in 1930s Germany; and it must be remembered that even a character as noble as Frodo fails in his quest to destroy the Ring of Power, the final destruction of which is merely a matter of Chance.

“Stupidity” is not an intellectual defect, but a moral one: there are many intellectually agile people who are stupid, and there are others who appear intellectually dull but who are anything but stupid. People can be made stupid or they can allow stupidity to happen to them i.e., they can choose it. Evil needs the stupidity of others to hide the truth just as the Good needs human beings to reveal the Truth of God’s Creation.

The Letter Dalet and the 26th Path: The Renewing Intelligence

The Twenty-sixth Path is called the Renovating Intelligence, because the Holy God (blessed be He) renews by it, all the changing things which are renewed by the creation of the world.

Alt. Trans. “The twenty-sixth path is called the renewing consciousness because through it God, blessed be He, renews all things which are newly begun in the creation of the world.”

Path 26. Renewing Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel MeChudash): It is called this because it is the means through which the Blessed Holy One brings about all new things which are brought into being in His Creation.

The Renewing Intelligence path (#26) is said to be indicated by the letter Dalet, (the Hermit #9 card has the letter Yod), and relates to the dynamis of procreation, both in nature and in human beings. This renewal is but one aspect of the lower form of eros. Because of the inherent power of sexuality and procreation, many taboos have been instituted against it. Many commentaries on the Kabbalah have attributed this path to Venus, but it does not take much reading to see that Venus is not a particularly pro-creative goddess in and of herself although she does exhibit the isolation of The Hermit. The appropriate goddess is Demeter, or Ceres (The Empress #3 card of the Tarot), the goddess of fertility and grains whose daughter, Persephone, is the husband of Hades, the King of the Underworld, represented by Death #13. Here we see the circle complete. Eros is the off-spring of Aphrodite/Venus, not the goddess herself. Beauty initiates the urge present in eros and leads, ultimately, to procreation and to the bringing forth of beings. The world of The Hermit, on the other hand, is a particularly sterile world.

“Holy” means “perfect, pure”, “set apart from defilement.” The Hebrew word means “separate”, and this designates the chasm separating the Divine from creation. The “speaking silence” is much like the word Aum or Om: it begins in “openness”, goes into “hiddenness”, begins with an “in-spiring of breath” and ends in silence. Music is analogous to it. Chashmal is “brilliant flame” (fire) which, combined with air and water produces earth. From this, or prior to this, is the Law of Necessity which determines the form of everything, be it “potential” (dynamis) or actual (energeia). All of what we call knowledge is grounded in our understanding of the Law of Necessity. The Kabbalistic speech (logos) employs the Law of Necessity; all our actions reflect the laws of Necessity. The danger present is that this knowledge can become “mechanistic”, sterile. The ultimate outcome of a world based solely upon the principle of reason is a world of nihilistic sterility.

The letter Dalet is one of the seven double letters indicating that movement along it can be either up or down. If The Emperor is said to represent Chesed and he is a very sterile figure, then the Dalet represents a fruitful, procreative figure.

Dalet דלת is the word for door, gate and indicates resistance, a barrier, and the state of selflessness and humility needed to pass through it. Dalet is also said to indicate a ‘poor’ person, and this may metaphorically be said to represent the ‘perfect imperfection’ of human beings. The letter also suggests how to pass through the gates to know one’s own mystery of being (self-knowledge) and return to the power of the Aleph – the One source of all creation and being which is the goal of the teaching of the Sefer Yetzirah.

The Dalet is in the shape of a bent over human being, signifying humility and receptiveness. It represents Bitul, the self-nullification, or nullification of the ego, necessary to realize one’s inherent connection to the Creator. This self-nullification or decreation is not an easy task. In the common visions of the after-life, heaven is seen as a ‘land of milk and honey’, the goods and nourishment of this world, where we will be united with those whom we have loved in the present life. This appears to be a placing of the self before the Divine One who is All Good, and such a temptation is ever-present for all human beings. It is a denial of the First Commandment. In the journey on the Tree of Life, Dalet is the structure, form and the diligence required to receive the grace that the Divine is perpetually offering.

Dalet is also Dalit דלית, the “poor man”, the one who receives from benevolence or grace of the Creator through the Holy Spirit represented by Gimel. It is the realization that as humans “we are not our own” and that we have nothing of our own, but are entirely dependent on the creator and that every breath and movement is given to us from Him. It is the recognition of Otherness and the complete denial of the individual ego.

The Dalet also represents structure or gestell, the German word that Heidegger associates with technology and its enframing, but with Dalet it is not a completed frame. Its form of a horizontal and vertical line represents a grid, giving structure to the form. It is shaped like a stair-step, the metaphorical structure required to be ‘lifted up’, or to ‘go up’, thus overcoming the resistance given by gravity and the law of Necessity. This would also indicate that Dalet is a means of ‘going down’, descending the Tree of Life. This would seem to suggest that the creation is a ‘door’, a barrier but also a way through. This might associate the letter and its path to the belief of human beings’ giving ‘perfection’ to the created things and somehow completing them, for the creation and its beings are not wholly themselves.

On the individual level, it shows the structure and stability required to receive. This might suggest that the path suggested by Dalet is from Chesed to Netzach, and that the structure spoken of is the human body, the human form. This would be on the side of “Mercy” on the Tree of Life. The path from Binah to Gevurah would suggest the side of “Severity”. (One might look at the path from Chakmah to Chesed as also a possibility, but I am unable to connect how this can be associated with the Emperor #4 of the Tarot unless the Emperor is viewed as a ‘benevolent king’).

The fourth path or Chesed indicates the physical manifestations of all those things which we call “good” but which are not the Good itself. They are “shadows” of the Good. With it is the arrival of numbers and of the physical forms that can be measured with them; with language and numbers we can measure the benevolence of God or become aware of the benevolence which is “glaring” or obvious (?). Through number we measure, bring into a cohesion, and provide the boundaries which form the “receptacles” or “husks” of physical beings, the eidos or outward appearances of the things. From these boundaries we can then “define” the things, separate and enclose the things, and distinguish them one from another.

The German philosopher Heidegger once said: “Language is the house of Being; in its home humans dwell”. We may further extrapolate on Heidegger’s words by saying, “Logos is the house of being” for logos includes both language and number and it has been translated as “reason” into English. One may go further and say that the human body is the logos or the “home” of the embodied soul. The letter Bet is the first of the ‘double’ letters and is attributed to the path that crosses the mothers of Shin and Alef. My understanding is that Alef is the source of all the following letters and that it is Alef as Air, in combination with Mem as Water and Shin as Fire that creates the Bet which is Earth. Alef yokes together the worlds of Tiferet and of Yesod to the light of Keter, and Bet is the emanation of the goodness that is the reflected light of Keter. In the Hebrew Tree, Bet is said to cross the veil of separation between Chakmah and Binah as well as that between Chesed and Gevurah. Bet would then be associated with the Moon, with the “reflected light”.

This has a number of similarities to the characteristics of The Chariot #7 just discussed and to The Sanctifying Intelligence, Path #3. The “holy powers”, again, are the naming of things, that which distinguishes human beings from other created beings, our ability to use language and to name. From this path we can discern that the Gnostics were incorrect in attributing evil to the demiourgos and that the created world is one of evil. It is more appropriate to say that the created world is one of deprivation and need and this deprivation and need are present from the beginning of the creation. The created world is a ‘house’ that human beings make a ‘home’ through their use of language and number.

Paul Foster Case’s interpretations of the paths run into some contradictions here (or so it seems to me) because he confuses the Necessary with the Good. The Good is beyond Being. The Light that is Keter might be understood as the Highest Crown (since the crowns are associated with the letters), but they are not the “primordial emanation”. If The Fool #0 is represented by the letter Alef and is the channel to Chakmah or Wisdom, how is “wisdom” being defined here? Wisdom is “knowledge of the whole” which The Fool clearly does not have unless we are considering reincarnation here (which is entirely possible.) In this life, it is not given to human beings to have knowledge of the whole of which they are a part.

With the creation of numbers, Time also comes into being. With Time comes Memory. It is our Memory of the original Good that creates the absence/presence of human existence and the longing for completion in the Good. The Beauty of the created world acts as a souvenir, a photograph or image that gives us the Memory of that which is our end or perfection, our completion. Thus, Plato can say: “Time is the moving image of eternity”, but it must be remembered that these images of which Time is composed are merely shadows. Our collective knowledge, which is our collective Memory, derives from our understanding of the Laws of Necessity. Necessity is the will of God i.e., Justice.

The 23rd Path: The Letter Samekh and The Stable Sustaining Intelligence

Samekh: Tiferet to Netzach: Netzach to Tiferet

Path 23: Sustaining Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Kayam): It is called this because it is the sustaining (enduring) power for all the Sephirot.

The Twenty-third Path is the Stable Intelligence, and it is so called because it has the virtue of consistency among all numerations.

Alt. Trans. “The twenty-third path is called the stable consciousness because it is the power of sustenance among all the Sephirot.”

Case trans. The twenty-third path (Mem joining Gevurah to Hod) is called the Stable Intelligence because it is the power of permanence in all the Sephiroth.

Samekh is the symbol of support, protection, and memory. It means to “lean upon“, “support”, “uphold”. In gematria its number is 60. The perimeter of Samekh denotes the Creator and its interior denotes His creation, which He constantly supports and upholds and protects. It represents the Orr Makif, the Surrounding Light of the Kabbalah, indicating the general providence of the Creator, surrounding and sustaining all of existence, even as we perceive ourselves as separate and distinct from that Creation. The Samekh is the container of all forms and is, therefore, related to the other container letters including the letter Khaf.

The Sun card is the microcosm of this overall cosmic relationship. Friendship is shown through the love, protection, and keeping in mind through one’s care and concern the interests of the other. Its common symbol is the wedding band which indicates the bond of the relationship. When two people are joined by Love through the mediation of the Divine, they enact a covenant with each other which cannot be broken. (“What God has joined together, let no one put asunder”. Matthew 10:9) Human beings are not always brought together by or through God, however. Other forces are at work here.

In literature, we see the opposite of this bond in The One Ring of Sauron in The Lord of the Rings. Here the bond is not one of friendship or relationship but one of oppression and dominion. The relationship of Sauron to his followers is contrasted by the relationship of the hobbits in the story, especially that of Frodo and Sam. The figure of Sauron is well-illustrated by The Devil #16 card of the Tarot which is the contrary of The Lovers #6 card and can be said to be contrary to The Sun #19 which is contrary to The Hermit #9 card.

The letter Samekh teaches us that thinking in its rational form is circular. There are no grounds for the principle of reason, although traditionally it has been grounded in and on the Divine Reason itself (the Uncaused Cause) understood in its Latin translation of the Logos as ratio. Samekh tells us to think for the good of the other, to take care and be concerned with the other, and not just one’s self. This means to be inclusive of everything and everyone as these are part of the One. It is the principle that the wisdom is not contained in just one vessel, in just one person, but is distributed in all beings. This could be why those who believe they are in possession of the truth are, so often, intolerant. Their illusion is their foundation which, of course, is not a solid foundation for it is merely the ‘garments’ that the truth shows itself in its appearance/hiddenness to us. The Samekh teaches us that in order to know our Creator, we have to get out of our limited selves, out of what we think we know and the limitations of the physical, so we can get in touch with our essential inner self. It is the meaning of Christ’s saying that “Unless you become as little children, you cannot enter the kingdom of heaven.“ Matthew 18: 3 It implies a re-birth, and this re-birth is a going in the opposite direction from that suggested by linear time. It is the decreation process that I am speaking about here.

The danger of the Samekh is that we can become totally absorbed with ourselves and not be concerned or care for the other. We must empty ourselves in order to be filled; this “decreation” is much more easily said than done. The first step in the recognition of otherness is given to us by the beauty of the world, and this recognition pierces us (Zayin) and inspires us to love the other. The outer covering or ‘husk’ of Samekh needs to be pierced by the ‘arrow’ or ‘sword’ of Zayin in order for the divine influence to flow into it. (This is the meaning of Jesus’ saying that ³⁴“Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. ³⁵For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. ³⁶And a person’s enemies will be those of his own household.” Matthew 10 34-36 This suggests the polemos or strife that is at the heart of Life and at the heart of what we conceive to be ‘our own’.)

The combination of Nun (Path #28 The Natural Intelligence) and Samekh נס Nes (Path #23 The Enduring Intelligence) means “miracle”. This miracle is what is called Love here. Once we have learned the lessons of these two letters, we can discover what the miracle really is. It is the ‘friendship’ of the Divine which sustains all the Sephirot, and we as human beings are called upon to mirror that ‘friendship’ in order to sustain that which makes us truly human, to continue to reveal the truth of God’s creation. Frodo’s friend and companion in The Lord of the Rings is appropriately named Samwise and their ‘friendship’ is a manifestation of that miracle. This miracle is “the friendship of Justice” or “the Justice of friendship”, the bringing of two unequal parts or partners into a relationship that makes them “equal” (but not the “equality” that we perceive as the Same). The possibility of friendship is a miracle.

If we look at the combination of Path #6 The Transcendental Influx Intelligence and Path #23 The Sustaining Intelligence, we can see that the combination of the Light of the letter Alef and the “house” of the letter Beth influences how we come to interpret the Sephirot Chesed. It is from Tiferet that Chesed receives the qualities of Mercy and Kindness, and when Chesed is looked upon without the influence of Tiferet, then we have the influence of will to power which is a relationship of commandeering and domination.

The Letter Qof and the 31st Path: The Continuous Intelligence

Qof: Path 31 The Continuous Intelligence: Netzach to Malkhut

Qooph – Elohim “said: I have given you all . . .” 1:29

Khof is the nineteenth letter of the Hebrew alphabet. The letter Khof (also spelled Kaf, Kuf, or Qof) originally meant “the back of the head”, or “the eye of a needle”. Khof also means “monkey”. It is said to represent “unholiness”. It is the symbol of both the sacred Kedushah קדושה, the prayer for holiness, and the profane – the Klipah קליפה, the peel, cover, or husk which represents the outward presence of the things that emerge from the khôra. Khof has to do with the requirement of removing the husk which hides the truth of that which lies within. The Khof is that which hides the Divine Unity of the One and illustrates itself as the deception of the outward appearance of the Many. The Qof is at the greatest depth or the furthest away from the primordial Light of the Divine as it descends towards the sephirot of Malkhut.

In Hebrew, Khof means “monkey”, a creature which resembles a human being but is purely animalistic, with none of the higher capacities of a human being which are related to the logos i.e., language and number. In the Kabballah, this indicates the requirement for a human being to overcome their purely animalistic nature and to emulate the image of the Creator (the Logos) that is their true nature to realize the true spiritual nature of their being an ‘embodied soul’. It is the essential strife of life.

The Khof is the only letter which extends below the line of the other letters, indicating descent into the lower world, but also the ability to ascend from there. This extension also suggests “exceeding the boundaries” or the limits placed upon human actions. The elements of hubris and nemesis come into play here, and these are revealed in Path #32 The Administrative Intelligence of Malkhut to Hod. As such, the Qof is related to the Sephirot Yesod (Foundation) and to the material world of Malkhut (Kingdom). The revealing of the true essence of what human beings are is in their wresting of truth from the husks of the world that hide it. When human beings cease to reveal truth, they succumb to their bestial, animal natures. This is the succumbing to stupidity, which again, is a moral not an intellectual phenomenon.

The design of the Kuf is similar to that of the Hei, the fifth letter of the Hebrew alphabet and representative of Path #16 The Enduring Intelligence, but while the Hei is said to represent holiness, the Kuf represents Klipah, or unholiness. Both have three lines, two vertical and one horizontal. These three lines, depicting thought, speech, and action in the Hei, are also represented in the letter Kuf, but its three lines represent unholy thoughts, profane speech and evil actions.

These negative qualities are illustrated within the actual form of the Kuf. Its long left leg plunges beneath the letter’s baseline. It represents one who ventures below the acceptable, an individual who violates the circumscribed boundaries of the laws of Necessity and, thus, commits hubris for which an eventual nemesis must be paid. This nemesis is shown in the Tarot card The Tower #15. As a contrast with the letter Heh, the Paradise of the saints represented in the 16^th path is shown as the hell of the 31^st and 32^nd paths.

It is also significant that the head of the Kuf is a Reish (in contrast with the Dalet that comprises the Hei). The difference between the Dalet and the Reish is the Yod in the right-hand corner of the Dalet, representing the individual while the Reish represents the collective. While the individual Yod may be capable of passing through the door or gateway (“the eye of the needle”), the collective is not able to do so. The Zohar, one of the principle sources for the medieval interpretations of the Sefer Yetzirah, calls the Kuf and the Reish the letters of falsehood and impurity. This associates the letter with both The Devil #16 and The Moon #18 cards of the Tarot.

When Christ said that “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God” (Mark: 10:25), He is referring to the difficulty that arises when one forgets to remember that “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also”, and this is dependent on how one sees the world. Christ follows his statement on the heart with: “The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are good, your whole body will be full of light” (Matthew 6: 21-22). One must see with one’s own eyes, not with the eyes of the collective.

Christ’s statement may also refer to the path of the letter Gimel which means ‘camel’ as well as ‘wealth and abundance’ (the path from Chokmah to Chesed) and the need to discard the illusion of conceiving or the manner of seeing where it is believed that the Good rests in material things in order to enter the kingdom of heaven. This erroneous seeing has been a foundation for a number of different Christian sects throughout history and the disburdening of this error is not an easy task. There are also some references to the ‘eye of the needle’ as being the entrance to the fortified city of Jerusalem where all mercantile traffic must pass. For Christ to say that “It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of the needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven” would be a good joke.

Kuf is also הקפה – to circle, to go around. Since the letter rests at the bottom of the created world, the next step is rise up to the beginning. It thus signifies a new beginning. Shin is the power to rise; Mem is the power to move down to the depths. Khof represents all the cycles of nature, changing seasons, monthly and yearly cycles. It is in the realm of Time, and this would associate it with The Devil #16 card as well as with the realm of Necessity. It is the constant movement, circulation, and change of life. It is one aspect of the lower form of eros. It also represents that through the cycles of life that we see – evolution, growth, change, suffering, happiness, life experience – we are constantly worked on in order to be purified (the process of Shin, the fire) and to realize our true spiritual nature. The gematria of Kuf is 100 and this aligns it with The Fool #0, The Wheel of Fortune #10, and the Judgement #20 cards of the Tarot. Because Kuf is associated with beginnings and endings, it is also associated with the Death #13 card. This death can be either or both spiritual and physical.

It should be noted that I am placing the 31st and 32nd paths on the Tree of Life as proceeding from Netzach to Malkhut and from Malkhut to Hod. There are no paths from Keter to Chakmah or from Keter to Binah. The paths of “The Thirty-two Paths of Wisdom” are “personal” paths and the realm of Atzilut is unknowable on the “personal” level. There are no paths there so they must be accounted for in some other way.

The Letter Nun and the 28th Path: The Natural Intelligence

28. Natural Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Mutba): It is called this because the nature of all that exists under the sphere of the sun was completed through it.

The Twenty-eighth Path is the Natural Intelligence, and is so called because through it is consummated and perfected the nature of every existent being under the orb of the Sun, in perfection.

Alt. Trans. “The twenty-eighth path is called the natural consciousness. Through it is completed the nature of all that exists beneath the sphere of the sun.”

Case trans. The twenty-eighth path (Tzaddi, joining Netzach to Yesod) is called the Natural Intelligence, because by it is perfected the nature of all things under the orb of the sun.

The 28^th path appears to be related to technology, to human “knowing” and “making”, which completes the “purpose” or end, the telos of the “created things”, through a process of making them “pure”, or through what we believe is a dis-covery of their essence, their truth. This is a difficult concept for it involves what has become known as the history of Western metaphysics. This history may be summed up by our inability to separate the Necessary from the Good because, paradoxically, by establishing the duality of subject/object and the ‘objectification’ of all beings, we have dispensed with the Good as ‘values’, something we create in our willing. We cannot love an object, and it is through our objectification of the Other that we have created the gap that exists between Love and the Intelligence.

Initially, the good as action was seen as that which enabled some one or some thing to be capable of carrying out an action to bring an end about. It is good for animals to breathe, for instance; it is not good if they do not do so. The 28^th path has many similarities to how Aristotle understood dynamis. In the Sefer Yetzirah, the good may be seen as the light which enables both the being of created things and that which enables human beings to see what their ends or purposes are for. For both Plato and Aristotle, the proper direction for human beings is the directedness of their vision toward the divine. This directedness of vision was contemplation, reflective thought. On the other hand, the 28^th path may refer to how dynamis, potentiality, becomes energeia or the completed product or work. This would seem to suggest that the universe is ”rational” and its rationality is akin to our own rationality. This is the ground of the principle of reason, and the principle of reason is a principle of being. This principle of poiesis is a principle of “bringing forth”, but it is a distinctive “bringing forth” from that which is found in poetry and the techne of the arts.

There appears to be a connection between the Bible’s giving human beings a central role, as an acme, as the point or purpose of creation (as is shown in the Sephirot Yesod), and the giving of power to human beings over all created beings so that they may be “completed” in their nature through the power of human beings’ making. (1.28 And God blessed them; and God said unto them: ‘Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that creepeth upon the earth.‘) The power that is given to human beings is realized in their “knowing” and “making” that has become the stand and directedness of human beings’ being-in-the-world. The question is whether or not this dominion over the earth is one of a shepherd filled with care and concern or one of a tyrant filled with commandeering and domineering.

But Path #28 suggests another kind of way of looking also. If one looks at this “ascent of man” in the history of Western thought through the lens of the Sefer Yetzirah and “The Paths”, one can see that it involves the yoking together of the worlds of Asiyah, or Sensation, and the world of Yetzirah or “Formation/Creation”. This yoking may be done through the “reflected light” of Malkhut, the light from those objects that are present in the created world, or it may involve the light that descends from Keter, through the beauty that is Tiferet, to the foundation that is Yesod. This yoking requires the presence of Shin, one of the three Mother letters of the alphabet as outlined in the Sefer Yetzirah. The yoking is one of “unity”, not identity. There is a possibility of ascent as well as descent within it. The universe beneath the “sphere of the sun” involves the Sephirot Netzach, Hod, Yesod and Malkhut, and the links between them may involve either Tiferet or Netzach, the Divine or the human.

Our being-in-the-world is the primordial “foundation” (Yesod) which, through the reflected light of Malkhut, is how we view how the world will be disclosed or “opened up” to us. Our disclosure or opening up to this world can be either true or untrue, and this disclosure or opening up is exclusive to human beings as that which has been gifted to them from God. The truth or falsehood of the disclosure or opening up of the world is dependent upon this primordial viewing of the world in which human beings find themselves placed. Human beings disclose or open up themselves to themselves by the manner in which they disclose or open up their worlds. This “opening up” is what we understand as “freedom” in which we are able to view our possibilities and potentialities. The world in which we find ourselves is already opened up to us; how we view this opening determines what we will conceive ourselves to be in our essence. This determination arises from what we conceive the truth to be.

In commentaries on the Sefer Yetzirah and “The 32 Paths of Wisdom”, the word “initiate” and “initiation” are often used to describe the journey through life through the Tree of Life and its paths. This word can be seen as a simile or metaphor for our word “education” which comes from the Latin educare, “to lead out”, and “that which is responsible for the leading out”. The “initiate” and his or her “initiation” is a “leading out”. The images of paths and guides are apt here. We are concerned with what is authentic thinking here and how it may be achieved. Every “leading out” begins with an “opening up”, a liberation. In this open region, both truth and untruth are possibilities. Untruth is the deprivation of truth, not the opposite of truth; just as evil is the deprivation of good, not the opposite of good. How one views the world is a choice to be made. Because we are beings in bodies, we become preoccupied with the things that are and how those things may be able to fulfil our needs, whether those needs are hunger and thirst or empowerment.

Shakespeare himself says: “The Art itself is nature”, and one is very hesitant to disagree with the wisdom of the Bard. “Human nature” is completed through “natural intelligence”, through the ‘light of the Sun’, i.e., through Tiferet, not through the ‘reflected light’ of the Moon that dominates the world of Asiyah, (Malkhut/Yesod) and the world of Yetzirah or Formation (Hod/Yesod/ Malkhut/Netzach). This is a key point in the Tree of Life for at this juncture, human beings make the choice of becoming more fully human/humane or simply residing on the “bestial” level of existence. It is here that one fully experiences the “severity” of Hod and how and what we think shapes our perceptions of the world about us.

The Letter Mem and the 29th Path: The Corporeal Intelligence

The Twenty-ninth Path is the Corporeal Intelligence, so called because it forms every body which is formed beneath the whole set of worlds and the increment of them.

Path 29. Physical Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Mugsham): It is called this because it depicts the growth of all that becomes physical under the system of all the spheres.

“To mark out” is to assign limits and boundaries to things, to give them a form (eidos) so that they may be understood within the web of Necessity. This is the mental process of the principle of reason and so has been assigned to the letter Shin. This influence of Shin is the realm of Yetzirah or Formation; and as we have stated, it is ruled by the principle of reason. The 29^th path seems to indicate Aristotle’s teleology: the telos or end in which things achieve their completion or perfection (Hod). In the Tarot, The Star #17 is the card of completion i.e., Fate, what one is destined to be. What one is destined to be is determined by the choices one makes. The 29^th path is the crossover from Netzach to Hod and it indicates a change from the realm of Asiyah, the material realm, to that of Yetzirah or the realm of Formation. The Judgement #20 of the test of Reish has already been determined and the Fate has already been decided.

The Sefir Yetzirah states that Mem, as one of the three Mothers, moves in a horizontal, not a vertical direction. The movement on the paths is a later, Renaissance, addition. Because Alef is the source of all the letters, it is capable of both vertical and horizontal movement. The direction of Mem is back and forth not up and down, unless one considers the three Mothers as both horizontal and vertical and that the three Mothers are the three pillars of the Tree of Life (which is what is considered here). The three Mothers act as vowels in the formation of words and thus must be capable of both horizontal and vertical movements as well as diagonal movements.

Hod is the terminus of the Pillar of Severity or Form (necessity); Netzach is the terminus of the Pillar of Mercy, the “splendour” of which is the recognition of the Beauty of the world and the potentiality for the beauty of human actions within that world. The middle pillar is the fulcrum providing the “balance”, the “harmony”, the “equilibrium”, the “friendship”, the “covenant” between the Divine and human beings.

The following chart provides a summary of the paths emanating from Netzach.

Path	Letter	Meaning	Symbol
Netzach Path 7. Hidden Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Nistar): It is called this because it is the radiance that illuminates the transcendental powers that are seen with the mind’s eye and with the reverie of Faith.		The embodied soul and its strife in everyday life. Our revealing of things is at the same time a concealing of them. The transcendental powers seen with the ‘mind’s eye’ are Love and Will. These two powers are in constant strife as is truth itself in its hiddenness as it is revealed simultaneously.	The tarot card of The Chariot #7 is extremely rich in symbolism. It embodies many of the themes expressed in the Sefer Yetzirah and in “The 32 Paths of Wisdom”. The Sphinxes represent Love and Will and their strife. The cubic shape of the chariot illustrates limitations. The wheels represent the two manners in which one may travel the Tree of Life, etc.
Netzach to Chesed Path 26. Renewing Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel MeChudash): It is called this because it is the means through which the Blessed Holy One brings about all new things which are brought into being in His Creation.	Dalet ד	Door, gateway. A revolving door. The revealing/hiddenness of the appearance of truth in being.	Indicates the truth of the saying that ‘nature does not lie, it hides’. The truth must be wrested from nature since it hides itself.
Netzach (Victory)/ Malkhut (Kingdom) Path 31 Continuous Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Timidi): Why is it called this? Because it directs the path of the sun and moon according to their laws of nature, each one in its proper orbit:	Qof ק	Back of the head, monkey, the eye of the needle. Does the “monkey” refer to the bestial qualities of human being and thus relates it to the figures in The Devil card? “And again I say to you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of the needle, than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.” The light of the Sun as opposed to the light of the Moon.	Hidden, behind. Deception, deceit. The past as hidden from us until it is brought forth into the light? What is behind is unseen. The past deceives (?) us as a shadow At the same time, the outer husk that conceals the fruit contained within. The simultaneous appearance and disappearance of truth, its revealing and concealing.
Netzach (Victory)/ Yesod (Foundation) Path 28. Natural Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Mutba): It is called this because the nature of all that exists under the sphere of the sun was completed through it.	Nun נ	Fish	Honesty, harvest (reap what is sown, Fate) The elements of hubris and nemesis are present here.
Netzach to Tiferet Path 23. Sustaining Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Kayam): It is called this because it is the sustaining power for all the Sephirot.	Samekh ס	Support, prop	Indicates that Mercy and Kindness, Love, sustains the Sephirot. Without human beings, there are no Sephirot. The ring and eye of the Divine in contrast to the Ayin of The Devil.
Netzach to Hod Path 29. Physical Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Mugsham): It is called this because it depicts the growth of all that becomes physical under the system of all the spheres.	Shin/Mem/Alef מ/ש/א	Fate, Choice	How nature is understood is through a “system”, a grid that depicts the ‘growth’ of all that becomes physical in Time. Being and Time. The depictions are representational thought; they occur in metaphors. These depictions become a ‘fate’ chosen by human beings.

A Commentary on “The Thirty-two Paths of Wisdom”: Chapter Six (Part Two)

The Paths to and from Tiferet (Part Two)

“To those who are superficial and in a hurry, no less than to those who are deliberate and reflective, it must look as though there were no mystery anywhere.” MARTIN HEIDEGGER, “A DIALOGUE ON LANGUAGE”

“If the bleak days scare away all shining radiance, and if all breadth shrivels into the paltriness of narrow conventionality, then the heart must remain the source of what is light and spacious. And the most solitary heart makes the broadest leap into the middle of beyng, if on all sides the semblance of nonbeings stops its noise.” MARTIN HEIDEGGER, PONDERINGS V

In Part Two of our discussion of the paths emanating to and from Tiferet, we will be examining Path #21 The Desired and Sought Intelligence (Zayin), Path #22 The Faithful Intelligence (Lamed), Path #23 The Sustaining Intelligence (Samekh), and Path #25 The Intelligence of Trials (Temptations) (Resh).

The Letter Zayin and the 21st Path: The Desired and Sought Intelligence

Zayin: Tiferet to Chesed: Path21. Desired and Sought Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel HaChafutz VeHaMevukash): It is called this because it receives the divine Influx so as to bestow its blessing to all things that exist.

The Twenty-first Path is the Intelligence of Conciliation, and is so called because it receives the divine influence which flows into it from its benediction upon all and each existence.

Alt. Trans. “The twenty-first path is called the consciousness of the desired-which-fulfills because it receives the divine influence which flows into it as a result of the blessing it confers upon all that exists.”

We have spoken a number of times regarding the gap that currently exists between Love and intelligence or between Logos and Eros. On the 21st path, the intelligence or “consciousness” receives “the divine influence” or Love, which is “the desire which fulfills”, and through this coming to en-own confers this love on all that exists or on the Other. This is ‘conciliation’. The Divine is in need of human beings’ complicity in order to reveal Its truth. “Faith is the experience that the intelligence is illuminated by love”, as Simone Weil said. This experience is called “conciliation” (what we have been calling dialectic here), and this conciliation overcomes the strife that exists between the intelligence and its desire to know and the fulfillment of this desire to know.

The letter Zayin is shaped like a sword and is the symbol of “spiritedness”, “sustenance” (endurance, courage), and strife. It is the arrow of Eros, that which pierces through the husks and containers of the enclosures represented by the letters Chet and Tet and allows the inner light or true essence of things to be seen. It is the key to the door of Dalet and the opening of that door or gateway to the realm beyond. It represents the 7th day of Shabbat (Sabbath), the day of rest and spirituality (or the “letting be” of passivity), which completes the process of the 6 days of creation. It is the sword that Christ refers to when He says He comes not to bring peace, but with a sword. (Matthew 10: 34-36)

The Zayin signifies Space and includes the six days and six directions of physical reality, but also stands as a unique 7th principle or energy, the “spirit” which activates the physical. We usually designate this as “energy” or the life-force, but it seems that we need to somehow see how this principle is one of Love and not of Will. The Zayin is also associated with the word ‘manacle’ and this could indicate that its relation to rest is one of imprisonment. The contradictory forces of ‘liberation’ and ‘oppression’ seem to be implied in its nature. The Zayin is the source of all movement which would indicate a relation to Time. Like the letter Vav, it is an impregnating principle, which activates the creation. The contraries of rest and movement are symbolized in the letter.

Zayin is drawn with a Vav with a crown on top of it. The Vav is related to the Ohr Yashar, the direct light of the Creator coming down into the created world. The Zayin also relates to the Ohr Hozer, the returning light, which follows the path of the Vav to return and then spreads out when it reaches the crown. The Zayin impregnates all of life and allows the Vav to spread, opening the field of every possibility.

Shaped like a sword, the Zayin represents all movement and all movement is related to Time, which is associated with Binah. The Zayin represents the strife between contraries, the struggle for existence to overcome need, the struggle for sustenance (מזון). It is the struggle between Yaakov Jacob and the angel. Is it a good thing that Jacob is victorious over the angel in his struggling? What are the implications of this? The Zayin is said to be the power within a person that causes them to speak, initiate, live i.e., what it is about human beings that makes them human. It is the Eros of the human soul, Psyche. Interestingly, Zayin is also the source of rest. It teaches us to harmonize between the spirit and perfection related to the 7th day of rest, and the matter of the 6 days of work.

Genesis 1.14 And Elohim said: ‘Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days and years; 15 and let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth.’ And it was so.

The Letter Lamed and the 22nd Path: The Faithful Intelligence

The Twenty-second Path is the Faithful Intelligence, and is so called because by it, spiritual virtues are increased, and all dwellers on earth are nearly under its shadow.

Alt. Trans. “The twenty-second path is called the faithful consciousness because, through it, the spiritual powers are increased. All dwellers on earth ‘abide in its shadow.'”

Case trans. The twenty-second path (Lamed, joining Gevurah to Tiphareth) is called the Faithful Intelligence, because by it spiritual powers are increased. All dwellers on earth are under its shadow.

Lamed, the 12th letter of the Hebrew Alphabet, is the symbol of learning and can be seen as either a step or as a snake uncoiled. It is translated literally as the word for learning and also as a staff or goad. It is located at the centre of the Aleph-Beth and represents the heart Lev לב; in Kabbalah, learning is mostly done with the heart and soul, not just the mind i.e., the intelligence is illuminated by Love. The mind is a secondary organ. The Lamed indicates that “spiritual learning” is the heart of human existence. The course in life for every human being is to learn and express spiritual experiences and to practice what has been learned with every breath of life. This manner of being-in-the-world comes into conflict with the ideologies and narratives which predominate in the societies of which we are members.

Lamed reaches higher than any of the other Hebrew letters, like a lightning flash high in the air. This ‘higher reaching’ may be an indication of hubris. The shape of the Lamed is an undulating movement, and the Lamed represents the constant organic movement, the constant change that occurs within the limits of Necessity. Lamed is the lightning strike of Zeus or of God descending down the two sides of the Tree of Life. This would indicate that it is a warning sign against pride in one’s own learning or in the learning of the shared knowledge of the community of which one happens to be a member. Lamed teaches us to learn from everything in life, that no one and no institution are solely in possession of the truth. After one has governed their possessive, grasping tendencies in Khof and no longer has the blockages of the ego interfering, they can begin to learn the spiritual perfection of their own self, and to learn the laws, will, and ways of the Creator from the torah side of the Tree of Life. This is the process of learning to align with the will of the Creator and the acceptance of that will.

As a snake uncoiled, Lamed may be the ‘flying serpent’ or dragon, the Draconis Tali of the Sefer Yetzirah, which extends throughout the firmament of heaven and indicates both Space and Time. The ‘pattern of all that is formed’ is the web of Necessity. The web of Necessity is the limits and boundaries placed upon created things as well as the actions of human beings. Human action, including its desire and will, is subservient to the same Necessity that is evident in the laws of gravity. It is the Greek understanding of phronesis whose goal is sophrosyne, the balance and equilibrium or moderation that is the wisdom of actions, the wisdom that sees actions as subject to the same limits and boundaries as are all created beings.

The tarot card Temperance #14 is appropriate here. The knowledge of ‘the pattern of all that is formed’ is within the universe of Yetzirah and yet bridges to the universe of Beriyah. Tiferet is the Pythagorean mean which brings into a relation, a ‘conciliation’, and balances (hence Lamed is associated with Libra) the individual will of Netzach with the limits and boundaries of creation which is the will of God. The will of God is, ultimately, inscrutable but the balance of the mean properly determines ethical actions i.e., the individual’s being-in-the-world and the individual’s being-with-others. It is the knowledge of Necessity which allows one to distinguish between that which is Necessary and that which is Good, to distinguish between the things that are Caesar’s and the things that are God’s.

The Sephirot Hod is said to represent The Library of Hermes and this is the site of the study that Lamed represents. There is a warning in the letter with regard to the pride that can mistakenly occur through one’s pride in one’s own knowledge. This is a warning against the danger of hubris.

What we think virtue or human excellence to be is given to us from the societies of which we are members. This knowledge is associated with time and history. Since the path is restricted to time and history, the realization of its knowledge is to increase the will to power of its possessors. This may account for the Martial and sexual connections that Case associates with this path, and also to the conventional notions of Justice to which it is related. This would suggest a Hod, Yesod, Netzach connection to the paths and I have chosen to relate Lamed to the path from Tiferet to Hod and will discuss it later under the paths emanating from Hod. What Case’s interpretation appears to reveal is the thinking of a man who is trying to establish a sect himself and to give power to the teachings of that sect. Placing the Justice card as #11 is indicative of the completed work of the Magician #1, which is clearly a product of the will to power. While this is indeed a form of “justice”, it is not the true form, the true completion, perfection. Justice itself is not a product of human wills but rather determines them.

What is quite clear in the Sefir Yetzirah is that redemption and salvation is an individual journey, and the search or quest for the Light is not to be derived from traditional teachings only because the search, and its goal, is not something that can be passed on through the genes or the inheritance that one gets from one’s parents or from one’s society. The quest must be undertaken by the individual themselves. Contrary to how Americans sometimes view their history, the collective itself cannot engage in a ‘spiritual journey’. The collective engages in the search for the will to power. (This may be one of the reasons why the Americans and the technological are so compatible with each other.) The spiritual, when not understood as will to power, is not a product of Time. The translations of the Sefer Yetzirah and “The 32 Paths of Wisdom” create a great deal of confusion in not distinguishing between the spirit as will and the spiritual as will to power i.e., spiritedness.

In examining the paths, the four universes of the Sefir Yetzirah must be kept in mind as well as the directions in which the paths are leading. Because the created world is spherical in shape, and because the created things themselves are square or cubic in form (since physical things begin at the number 4), the attempt here is literally “to square the circle” which is irrational in itself. That which is beyond the physical requires the intervention of a mediary i.e., a radius that will be the circumference of the circle. (?) The universes of Asiyah, Yetzirah, and Beriyah are all capable of accessibility, but the realm of Atzilut is beyond human beings without some kind of Divine intervention through grace. (The universes of the Sefer Yetzirah parallel the universes of Buddhism: Asiyah > Kamadhattu: the world of desire; Yetzirah > Rupadhattu: the world of forms; Beriyah: Arupadhattu: the world of formlessness; Atzilut > Nirvana: the world of the unnamable, the unspeakable. These universes can be seen and explored in the temple of Borobudur on the island of Java in Indonesia).

The Letter Samekh and the 23rd Path: The Sustaining Intelligence

Samekh: Tiferet to Netzach Path 23: The Stable/Sustaining Intelligence: The Twenty-third Path is the Stable Intelligence, and it is so called because it has the virtue of consistency among all numerations.

Alt. Trans. “The twenty-third path is called the stable consciousness because it is the power of sustenance among all the Sephirot.”

Sustaining Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Kayam): It is called this because it is the sustaining power for all the Sephirot.

The Twenty-third Path once again illustrates that which has been called the “mathematical” in this writing i.e., that which can be learned and that which can be taught, and how this understanding of the mathematical is in strife with the Love and friendship that is at the heart of the purpose of Creation, the Ain Sof. The “mathematical” would be indicated by the letter Lamed ל or “study”, “the serpent uncoiled”, and I have indicated that this is Path 22 The Faithful Intelligence where ‘spiritual powers are increased through it, so that they can be close to all those ‘who dwell in their shadow’ i.e., those who live in the world of the mathematical dwell in the shadows of the spiritual powers. The ‘shadows’ are the outer appearances of things.

In order for some thing to be learned, it must first be brought to a “stand” or bounded within a horizon so that it may be “de-fined” and a name given to it so that it may be spoken about. The shape of the letter Samekh ס indicates this bringing to a stand and this binding. The “numerations” weigh and measure things so that they are brought out of their natural state of metabole or change into something that can be known i.e., they are given a “permanence” of some kind, a “stability” of some kind. Numbers are only one example of the “mathematical” but they are the most common. The manner of seeing that results from the “consistency” or reliability of the use of numbers is but one manner of accounting for the laws of Necessity and the relation of created things to the domains of time and space, that which is studied in Path 22 The Faithful Intelligence.

The Twenty-third Path also indicates the limits of human reason and intelligence. The Sustaining/ Stable Intelligence is that knowledge which can be relied upon. In English, we have come to understand logos as “reason” because the origins of philosophical English are Latin, ratio, rationale. We rely upon principles, laws and axioms to “illuminate”, “sustain”, “stabilize”, and “endure” in our projections upon the things of the world. These projections determine how we view the things of the world. The letter Tet ט, meaning ‘snake’, which we have discussed as the path from Binah to Chesed, has a clear connection to the letter Lamed and this also suggests the limits that are placed on human knowledge. That which provides the stability to the Sephirot is the Good, and this Good shows itself in the friendship of the Divine Trinity and the Love that sustains Creation. The ‘stability’ that arises from the collective or social manner of viewing the world comes about as a result of the consistency of the results of calculations or ‘numerations’ that are carried out regarding Necessity. The ‘numerations’ are the logoi or speech that are shared among the members of the community.

The letter Mem is attributed to the 23^rd path by Case. The movement on the paths of the mother letters is vertical, horizontal or diagonal and their movement influences the character of the path that is being experienced. Because Alef is the source of all the letters, it is capable of both vertical and horizontal movement, but it can also influence the diagonal paths existing between the various Sephirot. In making a visual illustration of the paths, they are shown as straight lines; but in reality, they are arcs on the circumferences of the gyring movements either up or down the Tree of Life.

Case in his study of the 32 paths sees the Twenty-third Path as that path which will lead the human community to a better universal, homogeneous State i.e., through the principle of reason realized in the technological. The Illuminati of the Twenty-third path are those who believe themselves to be the new Uber mensch, the Nietzschean “overman”, the next step in the human evolutionary chain. But they are nothing more than the “helmsmen” whose use of cybernetics realized in the making of artificial intelligence is the core of their power. Such progressive hopes of Case ignore the lessons of the Sefer Yetzirah regarding the nature of force and power. When the logos is understood as the principle of reason (the Cause of Causes), the logos comes to be understood as will to power realized through the use of the principle of reason. As Nietzsche said, technology is the highest form of will to power.

There is no “human progress” that occurs on the “spiritual level” along with the progress achieved on the material level. The “spiritual level” is not subject to Time as are the created things of the world. Morally and ethically human beings, as a whole, have not made any significant progress from their ancestors. This is because the moral and ethical presence of what human beings truly are as human beings has always been present for them to reach out to and grasp. Because human beings lose sight of the chasm which separates the Necessary from the Good, they fail in making true spiritual progress. This is demonstrated in what is called today the ‘woke culture’. Whether one is ‘woke’ or not (after all, ‘woke’ is a synonym for ‘consciousness’), it is the product of the worship of power and all of its false idols. This ultimately results in the oblivion of eternity for human beings with the consequence of human beings becoming more bestial.

The 23^rd path derives from Genesis: 1:24 — “And Elohim said: ‘Let the earth bring forth the living creature after its kind, cattle and creeping things, and beast of the earth after its kind.’ And it was so.” Here, creation ex nihilo, “out of nothing”, the world of Beriyah, is distinguished from the growing and “bringing forth”, the poiesis, that is the production of nature and of human beings. This is a distinction of the universe of Asiyah from those of Yetzirah and Beriyah. Nature supplies the content of the Sephirot and it does so from out of itself. This is the significance of the sephirot Malkhut. Human beings share in this through procreation, so there is a connection here with the Sephirot Yesod.

The 23rd path extends from Tiferet to Netzach and is represented by the letter Samekh. ‘The power of sustenance among all the Sephirot’ is the ‘friendship’ or Love which is initiated by the Divine Trinity. This seems to indicate that, for human beings, the Sephirot and their existence can be lost or “forgotten”, “hidden”, and the ‘revealing’ of their truth may cease among human beings when love and friendship, mercy and kindness, is forgotten. This ‘forgetfulness’ puts human beings out of a proper relationship to Yesod, #9 The Pure Intelligence, and to our relationship with all that comes to be in our lives. #7 The Hidden Intelligence of Netzach, in combination with #8 The Perfect Intelligence of Hod and #9 The Pure Intelligence of Yesod, can combine in such a way that “the material intelligence of corporeality” (Path 29), “the palpable intelligence of the senses” (Path 27), and “the natural intelligence” of human being-in-the-world (Path 28) can cause us to be forgetful of the Transcendental Influx Intelligence of Tiferet (Path 6).

Hod #8 is indicated by the Justice card in Tarot and represents The Perfect Intelligence. “Perfection” is the completion of things; the things require nothing further, and it is the height of world of Yetzirah or Formation. The Chariot #7 is the embodied soul of human being, and the martial aspects of the card indicate the strife of living, how the truth must be wrested from hiddenness. The recognition of the justice of this strife or polemos (war) is what provides the “stability” to the intelligence (this is not “rationality”) and the ability to “reveal” the presence and influence of all the other Sephirot. This revealing of truth is what makes us truly and fully human; it is how we participate in Being together with Being. The difficulty is that this revealing of truth is also at the core of the principle of reason and technology, the ‘know how’ that brings things to a completion. This ‘know how’ must be seen as secondary to the primary knowledge of how things are illuminated by Love and given sustenance and stability through ‘friendship’. This is the core of this stage of that choice which must be made along the journey of life.

Hod is the terminus of the Pillar of Severity or Form (necessity); Netzach is the terminus of the Pillar of Mercy, the “splendour” of which is the recognition of the Beauty of the world, the covenant of God. The middle pillar is the fulcrum providing the “balance”, the “harmony”, the “equilibrium”, the “friendship”, the “covenant” between the Divine and human beings, and this fulcrum is the Corporeality of the physical universe, what is called the Ain Sof.

Samekh: Tiferet to Netzach: Path 23: Sustaining Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Kayam): It is called this because it is the sustaining (enduring) power for all the Sephirot.

The letter Samekh is the symbol of support, protection, and memory. It means to “lean upon“, “support”, “uphold”. In gematria its number is 60. The perimeter of Samekh denotes the Creator and its interior denotes His creation, which He constantly supports and upholds and protects. It represents the Orr Makif, the Surrounding Light of the Kabbalah, indicating the general providence of the Creator, surrounding and sustaining all of existence, even as we perceive ourselves as separate. The Samekh is the container of all forms and is, therefore, related to the other container letters including the letter Khaf.

The Sun #19 card of Tarot is the microcosm of this overall cosmic relationship. Friendship is shown through the love, protection, and keeping in mind through one’s care and concern the interests of the other. Its common symbol is the wedding band which indicates the bond of the relationship. When two people are joined by Love through the mediation of the Divine, they enact a covenant with each other which cannot be broken. (“What God has joined together, let no one put asunder”. Human beings are not always brought together by or through God, however. Other forces are at work here.) In literature, we see the opposite of this bond in The One Ring of Sauron in The Lord of the Rings. Here the bond is not one of friendship or relationship but one of oppression and dominion. The figure of Sauron is well-illustrated by The Devil card of the Tarot which is the contrary of The Lovers card.

The letter Samekh teaches us that thinking in its rational form is circular. There are no grounds for the principle of reason, although traditionally these grounds have been attributed to God. Samekh tells us to think for the good of the other, to take care and be concerned with the other, and not just one’s self. This means to be inclusive of everything and everyone as these are part of the One. It is the principle that the wisdom is not contained in just one vessel, in just one person, but is distributed in all beings. This could be why those who believe they are in possession of the truth are, so often, intolerant. The Samekh teaches us that in order to know our Creator, we have to get out of our limited selves, out of what we think we know and the limitations of the physical, so we can get in touch with our essential inner self. It is the meaning of Christ’s saying that “Unless you become as little children, you cannot enter the kingdom of heaven.“ It implies a re-birth.

The danger of the Samekh, being enclosed as it is, is that we can become totally absorbed with ourselves and not be concerned or care for the other, both on an individual and/or communal level. The grave danger is that we believe we are in sole possession of the truth and all others must bow down to this truth. This self-possession becomes obsession and leads to intolerance.

We must empty ourselves in order to be filled; this “decreation” is much more easily said than done. The first step in the recognition of otherness is given to us by the beauty of the world, and this recognition pierces us (Zayin) and inspires us to love the other. The outer covering or ‘husk’ of Samekh needs to be pierced by the ‘arrow’ or ‘sword’ of Zayin in order for the divine influence to flow into it. (This is the meaning of Jesus’ saying that “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a person’s enemies will be those of his own household.” Matthew 10 34-36)

The combination of Nun (Path 28 The Natural Intelligence) and Samekh נס Nes (Path 23 The Enduring Intelligence) means “miracle”. Once we have learned the lessons of these two letters, we can discover what the miracle really is. It is the ‘friendship’ of the Divine which sustains all the Sephirot, and we as human beings are called upon to mirror that ‘friendship’ in order to continue to reveal the truth of God’s creation. Frodo’s friend and companion in The Lord of the Rings is appropriately named Samwise and their ‘friendship’ is a manifestation of that miracle. This miracle is “the friendship of Justice” or “the Justice of friendship”, the bringing of two unequal parts or partners into a relationship that makes them “equal” (but not the “equality” that we perceive as the Same). The possibility of friendship is a miracle and it is this miracle which is the hope for human communities. Hope is the great antagonist against tyranny.

If we look at the combination of the Path #6 Transcendental Influx Intelligence and Path #23 The Sustaining Intelligence, we can see how the combination of the Light of the letter Alef and the “house” of the letter Beth influence how we come to interpret the Sephirot Chesed. It is from Tiferet that Chesed receives the qualities of Mercy and Kindness, and when Chesed is looked upon without the influence of Tiferet, then we have the influence of will to power which is a relationship of commandeering and domination, the world without the influence of the Ain Sof.

The Letter Resh and the 25th Path: The Intelligence of Trials (Temptations)

Tiferet to Yesod: Path 25 Intelligence of Trials (Temptations)

Alt. Trans. ” The twenty-fifth path is called the consciousness of trial because it is the primary test by which the creator proves the compassionate (Khasidim).”

Path 25. Testing Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Nisyoni): It is called this because it is the original temptation by which God tests all of His saints.

Resh: Tiferet to Yesod

The Reish, the 20^th Hebrew letter, means ‘head’, ‘leader’ and ‘beginning’. It is the symbol of choosing between greatness and degradation. In it is the word for poor רש Rash, (Need) but when it is filled with the power of the Aleph it becomes Rosh ראש, head or first (Fulness). As it is, it is composed of Shin and a Mem and the mother Alef is missing. Reish is the sixth of the seven double letters of the Hebrew alphabet.

Reish is a container, just as Beth (2) and Khof (20) are containers. But while Khof represents forms such as a cup or house, Reish (200) represents the containing of the infinite, exponential growth which is the illusion that will to power gives; the container is the law of Necessity, and the ultimate container of life is death. Containers relate to limits and to the thinking that imposes limits. The Reish also represents the constant transition, flow and change of life and so is associated with Time. It is like a constant flow of energy, breaking through, breaking down into pieces, and building anew. Shin has a powerful influence over Reish and the illustrator of the Tarot illustrated here has associated it with the Judgement #20 card of Tarot. The Judgement card itself suggests a conversion and a rebirth here, a new beginning, and this relates it to the 25^th path of wisdom.

Genesis 1.25 And Elohim made the beast of the earth after its kind, and the cattle after their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the ground after its kind; and Elohim saw that it was good.

The Twenty-fifth path is related to the letter Resh, ר meaning “head”, and is the sixth ‘double’. The path intersects the crossover path established by the letter Mem/Alef. The Sefer Yetzirah seems to indicate that the created world is already ‘a garden of Eden’ since in the eyes of God (Elohim) all created things are good. The “primary temptation” is to view the world as not good but incomplete, and it is conceived as incomplete because it does not conform to our wishes or desires. The Tree of Knowledge in the garden has always been viewed as “knowledge of good and evil”, and the great temptation for human beings is to view themselves as the ‘creators’ of good and of justice, and thus tempts them to ‘turn stones into bread’. The ‘righteous’ or the ‘just’ are those who are able to obey the will of God and able to avoid the temptation of seeing themselves as the creators of good, and the only creators of good. Clearly, those who are just show compassion to all that is and are mindful of the affliction that is part of the root of existence.

The path of Resh is the test or trial i.e., the polemos or confrontation that the individual must face with regard to “egoism” and the recognition of Otherness, the choice between power or compassion, between severity or loving kindness. The choice results in these opposing forces being brought into an equilibrium, where love and will, the ego and the Other meet in harmony and friendship and become a unity. Historically, the focus of traditional religions has been on the taboos against sexuality i.e., Yesod, while greed and cruelty were emancipated in the name of empowerment.

The path of Resh links Tiferet to Yesod, the Beauty of the world to the Foundation of the physical world. It intersects the path of Mem/Alef, the horizontal mother letters, and forms a “cross” (“Pick up your cross and follow Me” Matthew 16: 24-26; “What God has joined together let no man put asunder” Matthew 19:6. The cross here is the individual human body). The “putting asunder” of what God has joined into a unity through His mediatory powers is “the sin against the light”, against the Truth. All denial of what one knows to be true is a sin against the Light. As Socrates once said, “No one knowingly does evil.” Evil is the product of ignorance and stupidity. They may think that doing evil will benefit them at first, but in the final outcome it does not. This is the darkness or stupidity that is current in America at the moment, and it accounts for its rampant corruption, immorality, and injustice in the public sphere. These injustices are not only visible in America, however.

The ”severity” of institutionalized religions (Judaism, Christianity, Islam in the West) arises from their desire for power, from their being in possession of the “revealed texts” understood as Law. The Divine Revelation of these texts becomes ossified in stone, literally, and ceases to be a “living God”. Their God becomes a “jealous God” who seeks retribution for sin. However, “the god who sometimes does and sometimes does not wish to go by the name of Zeus” demands payment in blood for the worship of false gods as is seen in the histories of these religions. (This is the tarot card The Tower #15, the card of revolution, the lightning bolt of Zeus).

Path	Letter	Meaning	Symbol
Path 1. Mystical Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Mufla): This is the Light that was originally conceived, and it is the First Glory (“Let there be light”). No creature can attain its excellence. Path 11. Glaring Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel MeTzuchtzach): It is called this because it is the essence of the veil which is ordered in the arrangement of the system. It indicates the arrangement of the paths (netivot) whereby one can stand before the Cause of causes.	Alef/Beth א/ב	The manifestation of the physical universe through the Logos/Word, what is known as the Ain Sof. The association of the Divine Will (Necessity) with the Cause of causes and the principle of reason. The initiation point of the dualities of the universe. The manifestation of the Divine covenant through the Beauty of the World. Glaring means 1. shining with or reflecting a harshly bright or brilliant light ; 2. very conspicuous or obvious; flagrant. This may suggest that what we call “common sense” is meant here? Notice the “order…in the arrangement of the system” and “the arrangement of the paths” and these suggest the principle of reason in operation.	Beth is “house”; the ‘container’ of the physical universe. The ‘veil’ is the hiddenness of the things that are i.e., the covenant of the beauty of the world behind the Laws of Necessity.
Tiferet (Beauty) to Chokmah (Wisdom) Path 16. Enduring Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Nitzchi): It is called this because it is the Delight of the Glory (Eden). As it is, there is no Glory lower than it. It is called the Garden of Eden, which is prepared for the (reward of) the saints.	Heh ה	Jubilation. The Garden of Eden is here present in the NOW, not something that will come as a reward after death. It is the reward for the being-in-the-world of the saints, the reward for being ‘saintly’.	The liberation from the enclosure that is Chet and the re-birth that results. The end of the paths of TORA and TARO in the Tree of Life.
Tiferet (Beauty) to Binah (Understanding) Path 17. Intelligence of the Senses (Consciousness) (Sekhel HaHergesh): This is prepared for the Faithful saints so that they may be able to clothe themselves in the spirit of holiness. In the arrangement of the supernal entities, it is called the Foundation of Beauty (Yesod HaTiferet).	Vav ו	The senses acting as a “hook”, peg. How we come to determine the nature of things. The viewing of things bounded by the ‘sanctifying’ thinking of separation. The influence of the ‘rooted intelligence’ and the ‘transcendental influx’ on how we come to interpret the world.	Contrary symbols of the moon and the heart in the Tarot card The Empress. The throne of Binah is a rectangle, an altar, not the cubes shown in the other Tarot cards.
Tiferet (Beauty) to Gevurah (Severity) Path 20. Intelligence of Will (Consciousness) (Sekhel HaRatzon): It is called this because it is the structure of all that is formed. Through this state of intelligence (consciousness) one can know the essence of Original Wisdom.	Ayin ע “eye”	Eyes How the eye sees and how the ear hears determine how we are going to be in the world of creation. It signifies that here a choice has to be made, a decision taken.	Experience, knowledge. The structure of all that is formed is the Law of Necessity. Knowing the Law of Necessity is Wisdom, for through this one is able to distinguish the Necessary from the Good.
Tiferet (Beauty) to Chesed (Kindness, Mercy) Path 21. Desired and Sought Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel HaChafutz VeHaMevukash): It is called this because it receives the divine Influx so as to bestow its blessing to all things that exist.	Zayin ז	“Sword”, that which pierces. “Manacle”, that which binds. The arrows of Eros as sword; the covenant of God as that which binds.It is the contrary of the Ayin. The Ayin is the root of the will to power over the physical while the desire and seeking of the Zayin is for the Good. Through the reception of Grace, the ‘divine influx’, it bestows the care and concern on all that exists and allows God to ‘see’ His creation, whereas the Ayin is dominated by the seeing of the ego of the individual Self.	The sword pierces the ‘husk’ that is the container of Samekh and allows the influx of the beauty of the world to establish that path or channel that allows grace to flow into the world.
Tiferet (Beauty) to Hod (Splendour) “the outward appearance of the things” Path 22. Faithful Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Ne’eman): It is called this because spiritual powers are increased through it, so that they can be close to all those ‘who dwell in their shadow’.	Lamed ל “study” The Library of Hermes	The Library of Hermes is composed of the texts of the world. The texts of the world are composed of that which is understood regarding the Laws of Necessity. It is what we call ‘education’; ‘historical knowledge’.	The Tower of Babel. The writings of all nations regarding their interpretations of the Laws of Necessity and the Divine Will. Lamed as the ‘uncoiled serpent’. It indicates revolution and change.
Tiferet (Beauty) to Netzach (Splendour) Path 23. Sustaining Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Kayam): It is called this because it is the sustaining power for all the Sephirot.	Samekh ס	Love and friendship as the sustaining power of all the Sefirot. “Unless you become as little children, you cannot enter the kingdom of Heaven.” 12 Yods in the Tarot card: all encompassed under the Sun, the whole of humanity. The salvation or redemption as the destiny of human beings or for human beings.	“Prop”, “support”. The friendship of care and concern that sustains all the Sephirot (creation) and the direct light within human beings. Lamed indicates dwelling in the shadow of this direct light.
Tiferet to Yesod Path 25. Testing Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Nisyoni): It is called this because it is the original temptation by which God tests all of His saints.	Reish ר	Head, leader, beginning. The choice between social recognition and one’s true self. Choice between the head and the heart. (“Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.”) The new beginning that follows the conversion and baptism; a re-birth.	The site of the choice and the possible conversion, baptism and re-birth.

Understanding the Paths emanating from Tiferet in Kabbalistic Philosophy

The Paths to and from Tiferet (Part One)

In the first part of our discussion of the paths emanating to and from Tiferet, we shall look at Path #6 Intelligence of the Separative/Mediating Influence, Path #16 The Triumphal or Eternal Intelligence, Path #17 Intelligence of the Senses, and Path #20 The Intelligence of the Will. These paths are, I believe, central to understanding the whole of “The Thirty-two Paths of Wisdom” and to understanding the Tree of Life and Kabbalistic philosophy as a whole. They are central to the text and to the journeys outlined in the text through the various paths.

Path Six: Intelligence of the Separative/Mediating Influence

6. Transcendental Influx Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Shifa Nivdal): It is called this because through it the influx of Emanation (Atziluth) increases itself. It bestows this influx on all blessings, which unify themselves in its essence.

The Sixth Path is called the Intelligence of the Mediating Influence, because in it are multiplied the influxes of the emanations; for it causes that affluence to flow into all the reservoirs of the Blessings, with which these themselves are united.

Alt. Trans. “The sixth path is called the mediating consciousness because through it the emanation of atziluthic influence is increased. It causes that influence to flow unto all those so blessed as to be united to its essence.”

Wescott trans. The Sixth Path is called the Mediating Intelligence, because in it are multiplied the influxes of the emanations, for it causes that influence to flow into all the reservoirs of the Blessings, with which these themselves are united.

Case trans. The sixth path (Tiphareth, the sixth Sephirah) is called the Intelligence of Separative Influence, and it is so called because it gathers together the emanations of the archetypal influence, and communicates them to all those blessed ones who are united to its essence.

Since all the Sephirot are linked to Tiferet (with the exception of Malkhut), we shall use this section to summarize what has been discovered up to now. Tiferet in Hebrew means Beauty. Tiferet derives its beauty from the Light of Keter and, thus, from the light of the Sun. Its mediating influence can be an atziluthic influence, and it is this influence which is part of the deep mystery of life itself, the erotic that is life, the need that is life. It unites the souls of human beings to the Divine One. Just as the letters Alef, Mem and Shin are united into a one and are present and operating at all times in all the paths of wisdom, Tiferet reflects the ‘friendship’ of this Holy Trinity (the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit or the Ain, Ain Sof, and Ain Sof Ur) in the physical manifestation of the Creation. Tiferet is the daimonic realm, the realm of mediation and “messaging”.

One aspect of this mediation is the “friendship” manifested in the letter Samekh which is the path from Netzach to Tiferet. Tiferet is the manifestation of God’s covenant with human beings that is shown in the Beauty of the World. This covenant or bond is mirrored in “the miracle of friendship” between human beings and in the miracle of friendship between God and human beings. The light of the Sun is the metaphor for this mediation of “friendship” or Love, and this light “illuminates” the “intelligence” in its discernment of those things which are “goods” and those which are not. This is the site of the ethical or moral in our human being-in-the-world. The ethical and the intelligible are indiscernible and inseparable in our being-in-the-world.

Tiferet is at that point in the Tree of Life where the Tree of Life manifests itself in two branches. These two branches are the two faces of Eros and of the Logos. The two faces of Eros and Logos provide the various ways and means in which human being can relate to the Otherness that is being-in-the-world. It is that site where, potentially, there is no gap between “intelligence” and Love in the complete human being. There is no gap because of the presence of beauty. Love and beauty are one and the Same.

Other aspects of the mediation through Tiferet are between the Self and the Other, or the subject/ object dualism of modern Western metaphysics where Mind (thinking) understood as rationality (the Latinate interpretation of our understanding of logos) overcomes or rises above, ‘leaps’ ahead of the other through either Love or Will and commandeers and “projects” that other in order to determine what ends that other will serve. This is the Mind’s connection with the lower form of eros. This is “intelligence” understood as techne or “know how”.

The second is that mediation that brings into a unity the individual soul and the Divine One. After the Great Flood detailed in the story of Noah (Genesis 6-9), God’s covenant with human beings was a rainbow. The rainbow is a singular or particular manifestation of the beauty of world which is constantly present and which is the covenant of God. This covenant is the paradoxical conjunction of being and no-thingness and of no-thingness and being.

In the Christian Bible, Jesus said that God’s actual heavenly presence was arriving on Earth through Him (and not merely present as the Beauty of the World which acts much like a photograph of a loved one) and He often likened this to a huge tree, growing and spreading: (He told them another parable: “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field. Though it is the smallest of all seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds come and perch in its branches.” Matthew 13:31-32). Jesus claims to be a tree of life, the whole, a vine that offers God’s life to the world (“I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. John 15:5). The presence/absence of God in His creation is the why I have used the metaphor of the beauty of the world as being an image or photograph of God i.e., it demonstrates the paradox of being/no-thingness that is the creation.

The figures in The Lovers card of the Tarot stand before two trees: The Tree of Life and The Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil; and these two trees have been placed in the Garden of Eden which is understood here as the whole of Creation itself, and this garden is capable of being experienced in the NOW. Both Life and Good and Evil are the primordial elements of human existence. The Garden of Eden is here in the ever-present NOW. It is worth repeating the words of William Blake from “Auguries of Innocence” to illustrate the point: “God appears and God is Light/ To those poor souls that dwell in night/ But does a human form display/ To those who dwell in realms of day.” The two trees show that the intelligence and Love are inseparable, although in the human condition they have become separated.

In the Sefer Yetzirah and “The Thirty-two Paths of Wisdom”, the human form or body is a microcosm of the macrocosm of the whole of Creation. The human body is “the cross of Christ” and this is the meaning of Christ’s words: “Take up your cross and follow me”, for we experience the afflictions and sorrows of being alive as well as the pleasures, joys and triumphs through the mediation of the human body.

Tiferet is the path that allows one to look inward towards themselves and outward towards other human beings and to recognize and experience the sense of Otherness in their being-in-the-world. From it, the “loving kindness” of Chesed is realized through an awareness of the “friendship” that exists between the Divine Trinity and the created things shown in the Beauty of the world. It is through this loving kindness that is the emanation of the Divine in created things shown in their Beauty that one is able to know the “essence” of things, including one’s own self as part of that Divine creation and part of that which is Divine. From this knowledge and experience, one can have faith. “Faith is the experience that the intelligence is illuminated by love”, as Simone Weil says. The “intelligence” or “consciousness” of the whole of the 32 paths is illuminated by Love. This experience of faith is not brought about through reason and its applications, but through a consciousness of, an awareness of, the Love of God as present in His Creation. This awareness is given to one by Grace, the Divine Mediation, and is traditionally said to be given to one through the angels or daimons as His messengers. It is a product of the heart as well as the mind.

All of the Sephirot, with the exception of Malkhut, are influenced by the emanations that flow from Tiferet. How these influences come to be interpreted and understood is the essence of the teaching of the Kabbalah. The Atziluthic influence spoken of in this path is The Good which manifests itself in those things we call “good” in our lives, and it shows that that which we call ‘good’ has, as its essence, that which is The Good. To be able to perceive this good is due to the influx of the mediative forces of the spiritual. There are many passages in the New Testament in which Christ speaks of Himself as this Mediative influence, the parable of the vine and the branches already mentioned being one of them. Through this mediative influence, “the blessed ones” become united to its essence (the One), which is the Good.

The Constituting Intelligence belongs to Chakmah #2 which is the primordial life-force ‘swaddled in darkness’. This primordial life-force is the Will to Power. The ‘hiddenness’, the mystery of the life-force, is that Chaos that is the receptacle or enclosure of all things that are and that will come to be. We have spoken of these enclosures as manifested in the paths of Chet and Tet.

Tiferet belongs to the Sun, not to the darkness. The High Priestess card #2 cannot be placed here i.e., Tiferet, as Case proposes. The Lovers card #6 is properly placed here. As “that which constitutes the essence of creation in pure darkness”, it could be “the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world”, and the darkness is that darkness which is unable to comprehend the Word or the Light which descends into it. This darkness is present in both the realms of Beriyah and of Yetzirah. Creation is both the Beauty of the World and the Cross of Christ and both represent the presence of the Divine in His Creation even though they are contraries. Beauty is the height and the Cross is the depth of that Creation.

Tiferet is “beauty” in Hebrew and this “beauty” and its “light” is the covenant of God. Response to this covenant is Love and Faith, which give hope. From and within this perspective, one is able to recognize that other human beings are those to whom justice is due, and it is here that ethical actions, “right and wrong”, find their root. It is a paradox in that at this stage where one realizes oneself as a complete human being, one feels one’s self as most “individual” and yet, at the same time, as one individual among many others. It is the experience of ‘freedom’ in being most bound. It is the opposite of the “egotism” which relies on the calculations and machinations of the “personality” to achieve its own particular selfish ends. The true individual is the free individual, and this freedom has nothing to do with the exercise of the will or the ‘freedom’ to exercise that will that results in the ‘empowerment’ of the individual ego.

From this position, one can understand the vision of the saints who see “downward” upon the crucified Christ i.e., the paradoxical covenant of God: the beauty of the world as its height, and the crucified Christ as its depths; the light of God amidst the darkness of creation that is the crucified Christ. Most depictions of the crucified Christ are a ‘looking up’ at Him.

Tiferet is the only Sephirot below the primordial Trinity which receives the light of Keter directly through the channels of the letters Alef and Beth (Alef is the light of the Sun in a descent; Beth is the light of the Moon in an ascent?). The light of Beth is that light within the world of Yetzirah. The letter Beth is that from which all of the other letters are pro-duced or ‘brought forth’. The individual self is not the “personal ego” that is dominated by the “social” and its goal of “recognition” and “social prestige”, the world of power and money. Access to knowledge of “past incarnations” is that knowledge that is available from one’s culture, from history, since all humanity was, is, and will be One. The individual is not the re-incarnation of Helen of Troy or the village idiot from 15^th century Leicester but all of these and more. As individuals, we are re-incarnations of all who have come before us since the individual becomes part of the One upon their death and their goal is to become themselves when they come to be.

The first letter assigned by Case to Tiferet is Gimel, but this might be an error. Tiferet is linked directly to Keter through the letters Aleph and Beth. This is why the reference to Tiferet is “the son”, directly linked to the Father. Since the Father is the whole and has created the whole through a withdrawal, not an expansion, the Son is the link between the Father and His creation. The Son is “the Lamb slain from the foundation of the earth”, and from this one can come to understand the Sefir Yetzirah’s references to the parts of the sacrificial animal and to the human body and its form as microcosms of the Creation itself.

The Sephirot Tiferet is the mediation of all of the other emanations or influences that come from the other Sephirot. It is this mediation which has the ability to bring two things which are incommensurate with each other into a relation of harmony or friendship. The Sephirot are all One, and they are ones individually, linked together by the letter Alef (the light of Keter, the element of Air) and by the “mediating influence” of Tiferet or Beauty. “The reservoirs of the Blessings” are those things which we call “good” in the world and they are “containers”, receptacles, or storage places for the blessings which are all united and share in the One Good. They are referred to as ‘husks’ in the Sefer Yetzirah. The husks are the containers which must be pierced so that their inner essence will come to light.

The 16th Path: The Triumphal or Eternal Intelligence: The Letter Heh

The Sixteenth Path is the Triumphal or Eternal Intelligence, so called because it is the pleasure of the Glory, beyond which is no other Glory like to it, and it is called also the Paradise prepared for the Righteous.

Alt. Trans. ” The sixteenth path is called the eternal consciousness because it is the pleasure of that glory beyond which is no glory like unto it. It is also called the garden of pleasure (Eden), which is prepared for the compassionate (Khasidim).”

Wescott trans. The Sixteenth Path is the Triumphal or Eternal Intelligence, so called because it is the pleasure of the Glory, beyond which is no other Glory like to it, and it is called also the Paradise prepared for the Righteous.

Path 16. Enduring Intelligence (Consciousness) (Sekhel Nitzchi): It is called this because it is the Delight of the Glory (Eden). As it is, there is no Glory lower than it. It is called the Garden of Eden, which is prepared for the (reward of) the saints.

Heh: Tiferet to Chakmah: Path 16: The Eternal Intelligence The second path linked to Tiferet is the letter Heh (but then how does one assign Gimel to its path since the letter is called “king over wealth”? Surely this must be associated with Chesed or Binah which is the physical world and The Emperor #4 card of the Tarot which is associated with wealth and fire, unless one considers the word “wealth” to mean “abundance” in the sense of one’s “cup running over”, the “reservoir” or container of those blessings that are given by God in friendship? This might suggest an association with Binah. The true “abundance” of the world is its Beauty; the true “need” of the world is the Light; and God is perpetually offering His love and friendship in abundance through the Beauty of the World and all those things in the world which we consider ‘beautiful’ and ‘good’. This is how Eros is to be understood.) It is through the Beauty of the World that the “emanations” of the “atziluthic influences” are increased, and “blessed are those” who are united to the cause of the Beauty of the World, the Divine Creator, the Good. The word ‘glory’ and the word ‘beauty’ are synonymous in “The 32 Paths of Wisdom”.

The several paths converging in Tiferet do not influence Tiferet but are influenced by and through Tiferet. Just as the light of Keter is not influenced by the other Sephirot but gives to those Sephirot their presence and ability to be Tiferet, too, determines the nature or the essence of things in their being. Tiferet influences Justice (Necessity) so that its severity and power is balanced and tempered with Mercy and Kindness. The canonical law that is the knowledge and understanding of Gevurah is brought into balance and tempered through the Being in the world of the parousia that is the Son. Our experience of our “need” as human beings urges and prods us to seek for that which will fulfil the absence of that perfection, the completion that we seek.

For human beings, our love of the beauty of the world begins with our love for the beauty of each other through the mediating influence of the light cast upon things which allows us to see them in their outward appearance. We feel the urge of sexual desire, the erotic, through the foundation that is Yesod, the foundation of the physical. We become “friends” through speech, and it is through this speech that we can attempt to become one with the other. While the word of God is perfect speech, our own speech is incomplete and imperfect. When God joins the two together, they then become one.

The Tarot cards associated with Tiferet illustrate the contraries (with the exception of Temperance) to those blessings associated with Tiferet. The speech between “two or three” friends (dialectic) becomes the speech that is to two or three hundred, the rhetoric of those who seek power over others. The experience of love becomes the “hard experience” of The Tower #15 and the knowledge derived from such experience. The cards of The Tower #15 and The Devil #16 are cards without light.

That which endures is Nature. Nature is sempiternal. Consciousness of this is the “Enduring Intelligence”. “Time is the moving image of eternity”, as Plato said. That which endures is Nature; that which passes away is also Nature. In its passing it moves, but in its moving it is ever the Same in its place. The Creation that is is the Garden of Eden which is experienced in the NOW, not at some future point in time. The saints enjoy life as the creation enduring in the NOW. They experience the world of the here and now as Eden.

The Letter Vav and the 17th Path: Intelligence of the Senses

Path 17. Intelligence of the Senses (Consciousness) (Sekhel HaHergesh): This is prepared for the Faithful saints so that they may be able to clothe themselves in the spirit of holiness. In the arrangement of the supernal entities, it is called the Foundation of Beauty (Yesod HaTiferet).

The Seventeenth Path is the Disposing Intelligence, which provides Faith to the Righteous, and they are clothed with the Holy Spirit by it, and it is called the Foundation of Excellence in the state of higher things.

Alt. Trans. “The seventeenth path is called the consciousness of disposition. It provides faith to the compassionate (Khasidim) and clothes them with the Holy Spirit (Ruach Elohim). Within the Supernals, it is called the foundation of beauty (Tiphareth).”

Wescott trans. The Seventeenth Path is the Disposing Intelligence, which provides Faith to the Righteous, and they are clothed with the Holy Spirit by it, and it is called the Foundation of Excellence in the state of higher things.

The Vav is said to represent the Kav, the vertical line extension of the Creator’s perfection into the created world in order to constantly direct it, guiding the cycle of existence step by step, until eventually the perfect Oneness of the Creator which underlies all of creation is revealed. Vav thus relates to the Law of Necessity, the Divine Will, ‘the structure of all that is formed’. The Vav could thus be seen as a barrier but also a way through.

Vav is related to the Orr Yashar, the direct light of the Creator, entering the world; but in the strife of this world, it appears to act as a barrier to the true Light. This would relate it to Christ, the Ain Sof, who is the direct light of the Divine and would thus associate Vav with Tiferet, the sixth Sephirot which is the Beauty of the World. But Vav, being an elemental letter, is capable of only one direction of movement. Is this movement up or down? Is it on the left side or the right side of the Tree of Life? The two sides of the Tree of Life should be viewed as the two faces of Eros, the front (right) and back (left), the two faces of the Ain Sof, or the mirror of the right and the left sides.

As a connector, Vav contains the mediatory power to connect heaven (mind, reason) and earth. It can be considered a channel or canal, which connects and bestows all the energy of the shefa שפע abundance from above down to the created beings. This suggests that its movement is downwards, and appears to imply that all creation is a movement downwards. A more proper direction might be said to an “away from”. The Vav is said to represent the ladder of Jacob Yaakov – rooted in earth, with its head in the heavens, what is known as Jacob’s ladder. But if this is the case, then it is upside down (as is suggested by the tarot The Hanged Man#12). The Vav is the extension of the essential dot Yod י, but this extension is an expansion indicating its relation to the will to power and its relation to the physical body. God’s withdrawal is that from which all of creation comes forth and it is contained in Alef. It is the contrary of will to power; it is a denial of power and an expression of Love.

Vav represents the number 6, 1 + 2 + 3, and represents the six days of the creation of the world, as well as the six physical dimensions (right and left, front and back, up and down) of Space. The first day of creation is related to Chesed and is attributed to “kindness”. God’s withdrawal allows creation to be, but the Mercy and Kindness of God are present prior to their manifestation in the physical world of creation and the act of ‘giving’ that is the Creation. The Light of God is two-fold: one Light is beyond Being (the Good) and then there is the light within creation itself from the sun, moon, and heavens. Creation begins at the number 4, Chesed.

The second day of creation has the attributes of “severity”, “contraction”, and “judgement” associated with it, the binding of things in enclosures; it is the Law of Necessity. It relates to the Sephirot Binah, as well as to Gevurah and Hod. The deprivation and need of the original creation is experienced here and its metaphorical significance is the separation of the waters. It is associated with the Flood and with the Tower of Babel i.e., The Tower #15 card of tarot.

The third day of creation is associated with Tiferet and is associated with beauty, mercy and the balance between the positive and negative elements of creation (although, as is suggested here, these elements are prior to the Creation itself). The fourth day of creation is associated with Netzach, with splendour and the victory that comes from “endurance” (but why is this prior to the creation of human beings? One plausible answer is that the heavens and the earth are sempiternal and that one of the chief virtues for human beings is “endurance”). It is also associated with the creation of the sun and moon. The fifth day of creation is associated with Hod and has the attribute of acknowledgement but also of devastation. The sixth day of creation is associated with Yesod and with the creation of human beings. It is associated with Adam whose name contains the letters Alef, Dalet and Mem. Adam is the human being who is perfect in his thought, speech and action i.e., he is the “complete” human being: the first human being is the complete human being and he is referred to as the Adam Caedmon. That he is brought into being on the sixth day shows the association of human beings with Tiferet. But how is it that human beings other than Adam come to be the “perfect imperfection”?

The Vav is also representative of the male phallus, the fertilizing agent, bringing life, abundance, continuity, and addition and represents the extension below Tiferet to Yesod. This is our first experience of eros.

The Intelligence or Consciousness of the Senses is that manner of seeing which allows the saint to become a saint and allows them to view the world as it is, that is, as a Garden of Eden. This viewing is the reward for their saintliness. In doing so, they are ‘clothed’ in the ‘excellence’ that is what we understand by virtue. They achieve what the Greeks called arete. This is the highest form of human being. The ‘courage’ shown by human beings is in their ‘endurance’ of the experience of creation. It is the denial of the third temptation of Christ.

The highest form of human being is shown through their actions. The saint (or philosopher) shows, through their example, what human excellence is. There is no need for proselytizing. “To make disciples of all nations” (Matthew 28: 19-20) is to show by example what the purpose of the journey is. To those whose god is a dispenser of power and fear, they will also be dispensers of power and fear in their spreading of what they conceive the truth to be. The greatest sins are committed by those who believe they are in possession of the truth. ‘Christian nationalism’ and other “-isms” that purport to be the ‘word of God’ are, at best, mistaken in their understanding of Christ’s message, and at worst, blasphemers. One is reminded of the line from W.B. Yeats’ poem “The Second Coming”: “The best lack all conviction/ While the worst are filled with passionate intensity”.

The letter Vav in Hebrew serves as both a conjunction and a verb modifier from present, past and future tenses. It is thus associated with Time. Binah is the Sephirot associated with Time. The mediation of Vav is thus associated with Time and is the influence of Will upon the ready-to-hand of the world. This is why I have associated Vav with the path that extends from Tiferet to Binah.

Because science no longer deals with what was once understood traditionally as Nature (and, thus, reality), the human will prepares each thing of Nature for that completion or perfection that will come from the ends or purposes that human beings determine or devise that are best for themselves. This is what we call “freedom”, the devising of ends which we think are best for ourselves. We believe in this freedom because we believe that, ultimately, we are ‘our own’ as individuals. Freedom is the commandeering and dominating knowing and making that we understand as technology. This dominating knowing and making includes our own bodies. It is also what we understand as ‘artificial intelligence’. What is clear from the Sefer Yetzirah and the traditional religions of the world both West and East is that we are not our own but are called to a higher destiny beyond ourselves.

In the world of the will and of will to power, there are some cases where there are created beings that serve no purpose or ends for the will to power of some human beings; that is, they have no “purpose” or future “use” and cannot be brought into being as part of a “standing reserve” of resources, and to these beings no “justice” nor perfection is due, and that includes some other human beings. This is what has made, and will make in the future, the possibility of genocides and these genocides will be much greater than those that have occurred in the past.

The Letter Ayin and the 20th Path: Intelligence of the Will

Ayin– and Elohim “divided the light from the darkness.” 1:4

Path 20: Tiferet to Gevurah: Intelligence of Will (Consciousness) (Sekhel HaRatzon): It is called this because it is the structure of all that is formed. Through this state of intelligence (consciousness) one can know the essence of Original Wisdom.

The Twentieth Path is the Intelligence of Will, and is so called because it is the means of preparation of all and each created being, and by this intelligence the existence of the Primordial Wisdom becomes known.

Alt. Trans. “The twentieth path is called the consciousness of will because it is the pattern of all that is formed. By this mode of consciousness, one may know the actuality of the primordial wisdom.”

The Twentieth Path, the Intelligence of the Will, is the understanding of the “preparation of all and each created being”, “the pattern of all that is formed”, and may be best understood in the German word gestell as it is used by the German philosopher Martin Heidegger. A Gestell is a framework or “method of organization” which allows created things to be and to come to presence for us. It is the primordial algorithm and taxonomy. Heidegger calls it the essence of technology. It is a manner or disposition of human being-in-the-world (among other possibilities of human being, although it is by far the dominant one) and it determines how the created beings are to be viewed. It is a ‘destiny’, a ‘fate’ of Being that has been given to human beings. While in German Gestell is a noun, Heidegger uses the word in a way that is uncommon by giving Gestell an active role, by viewing gestell as a product of the human will and a product of human action, a human “projection”, “a throwing forth”.

In defining the essence of technology as Gestell, Heidegger indicates that all that has come to presence in the world has been “enframed”. Such enframing or the placing within ‘enclosures’ relates to the manner reality appears or unveils itself in the period of modern technology (by “modern” here is meant post-Renaissance) and people born into this “mode of ordering” are always embedded into the Gestell (enframing) themselves. (As the Canadian philosopher, George Grant said, “What we have done to Nature, we first had to do to our own bodies”.) Thus, what is revealed in the world, what has shown itself as itself (the truth of itself) requires first an Enframing, literally a way to exist or to be in the world, to be able to be seen and understood. Path #20 indicates this knowledge when viewed from one possible perspective.

In ordinary usage the word gestell would signify simply a display apparatus of some sort, like a book rack, or picture frame; but for Heidegger, Gestell is literally the challenging forth, or performative (dynamis) “gathering together”, for the purpose of revealing or presentation i.e., the human will as central to how the world will be unveiled. If applied to science and modern technology, “standing reserve” is active in the case of a river once it generates electricity or the earth if revealed as a coal-mining district, the soil as a mineral deposit, or scenic sites as part of the tourism industry. It is this challenging forth that connects gestell to the human will. It is ‘the hook’ or ‘peg’ that is part of the meaning of the letter Vav.

We can see here again the connection between the passages from Genesis related to the coming-to-be of human beings and the coming-to-be of technology in our modern age. Human beings are given the central role in creation; and all that has been created or will be created is given over to them for their disposal. The world itself, created beings themselves, do not reveal themselves in their essence without the aid of human willing. The act of revealing is, literally, a one-way path or a one-way street from this particular viewpoint. This is the way of viewing the world when the Strength card is seen as #8 and that it is connected to Gevurah and Chesed by the paths and when one assigns the letter Tet ט to it.

Path #17 The Intelligence of the Senses and Path #20 The Intelligence of the Will indicate that point where The Tree of Life branches off or becomes two-limbed. This branching occurs when the manner of perceiving the world is determined. It may be determined either through Will or through Love. Will and Love determine the two faces of Eros and of the Logos: the lower eros and the higher Eros on the one hand, and rhetoric and dialectic in language. This determination occurs within the world of Beriyah and it can be distinguished by that thinking which is done by the artisans and technicians and that thinking which is done by the saints and the philosophers. This bifurcation determines the world as ‘standing reserve’ and disposable, or it can view the world as a Garden of Eden.

Another way of viewing the 20^th path is to see it as “prudence” or the Strength card as #11 of the Tarot. The essence of technology as outlined by Heidegger devolves into the nihilism of the pure “will to will”, the need to will anything since one has no other alternative given the oblivion of eternity and replaced that eternity with the eternal recurrence of the Same. The technological way of being-in-the-world is a mirror or mimicking of the “primordial wisdom” that is in the realm of the world of Atzilut since it bestows the ‘values’ on things and these ‘values’ are related to their potential uses. This may be seen in the manner of questioning of the thing and how that question will be answered.

“The structure of all that is formed” is the Law of Necessity and it is through the understanding of the Law of Necessity that one is able to know “the essence of Original Wisdom” or the Sephirot Chakmah. Our attempts to understand ‘all that is formed’ comprise our ‘theories of the real’, what we call our sciences, how we attempt to view our world. Our sciences are products of reason and the will. As was said earlier, Artificial Intelligence is a shadow of the shadows of the things of Necessity. In Plato’s allegory of the Cave, artificial intelligence would be a second cave and a further distance, at a greater depth, from the light of the Sun, the Good. Its greatest danger is that it is self-contained and represents the greatest enclosure.

The letter Ayin is erroneously said to have the power to unite everything that is separated in creation and this is why it is confused with the structure of the letter Alef which consists of two Yods separated by a Vav. The letter Ayin as the 20^th path is related to the letter Peh and path 13 The Unity Directing Intelligence and the letter Vav Path 17 The Intelligence of the Senses. But is Vav really a true unifier or a barrier, a separator? Literally Vav means “hook” or “peg” and the Hebrew letter is a vertical line ו. The Vav would appear to be a metaphor of the mediation that exists between reason, the logos understood as an extension of the will to power, and the ready-to-hand world about us.

The world is seen as the second Cave of the Internet containing the whole and the Vav is that reasoning that unites the things in that Cave to the algorithm based on the principle of reason. This reasoning is tied together with The Sanctifying Intelligence, the intelligence that separates (diaresis), and The Unity Directing Intelligence (dianoia) the intelligence that brings into a unity, that emanates from the Sephirot Binah. Are these manifestations of the Logos or the Anti-Logos?

The Hebrew letter Ayin means “eye” and correspondingly, the Ayin has to do with vision and bringing forth the light that is hidden, the unveiling or revealing of truth. The Greek philosopher Aristotle begins his Metaphysics with the words: “All men by nature desire to see” for it is through “seeing” that we come to experience the things of the world and to gain knowledge of them. The letter Ayin in Hebrew relates to time and is related to the planet Saturn. It is the 16^th letter of the Hebrew alphabet and thus is central to the whole of the 32 paths of wisdom: 16 X 2. Since time begins with Binah in the Beriyah world of the Sephirot (the third stage in the moment of creation), we can therefore relate Ayin to the left side of the Tree of Life. The strong relationship of the letter with time suggests its relationship to The Tower #16 card of the Tarot (change, revolution) and also with the letter Peh (mouth), and this suggests the interchangeability between The Devil #15 and The Tower #16 (which I have suggested). Ayin is included in a great number of words associated with time in Hebrew (עת – time, שעה – hours, עתיד – future, עבר – past, רגע – moment, עוד – until, עד – eternity) and vision. It indicates the inextricable link between Being and Time and our inextricable link to Being and Time through seeing and hearing.

The structure of the letter Ayin appears to suggest that it is composed of three other letters: Zayin (manacle or sword), Lamed (the study of that which presences), and Yod (the ego, the self, the point). One can perceive that the letter is suggestive of the anti-Logos. The Yod is a time indicator in the Hebrew language; the Lamed is associated with study as memory, the study of that which has been written down and become ‘historical memory’; and Zayin as being manacled or enchained by the manner of seeing and to Time itself (although this could also be seen as the ‘liberating’ sword from the oppression of the ‘manacle’). This would suggest that what we call ‘historical knowledge’ is not a liberating knowledge, although it can be a ‘leading out’ (and we perceive it as such) but it is also a knowledge that manacles and enfolds those who see it as All within itself. As we have already stated, the principle of reason is founded upon will to power, and the current temptations to artificial intelligence are grounded here. The Intelligence of the Will or path #20 is the intelligence of the principle of reason and its relation to will to power.

If prophecy is the ‘highest speech’ of the visionary who is able to see the past, present, and pre-dict the future, then the vision suggested by Ayin could be said to be the ‘false vision’ which gives voice to the ‘false discourse’ and the ‘false prophecy’. This false discourse and vision is best captured in #15 The Tower and #16 The Devil cards of the Tarot, and is revealed in the letter Peh of the Hebrew language. The Devil card itself is among the darkest of the Tarot, if not the darkest of the Tarot. The only light present is from the torch in the Beast’s left hand which ignites the tail of the male figure in the illustration; the torch is the passions that ignite the desire and the will. That this torch only touches the male figure suggests the patriarchal nature of what we call ‘historical knowledge’, the patriarchal narrative. The torch of The Devil is reminiscent of the fire in Plato’s allegory of the cave which occurs in Bk VII of that dialogue. The Great Beast that is the concrete manifestation of the social occurs in Bk. VI, and I would suggest that these are the Same as what is being shown here on The Tree of Life.

The suggestion is that the figures in the illustration, contrary to the figures in #6 The Lovers illustration, are manacled by their bestiality and by the darkness in which they dwell. They are shown with cloven feet; they have become bestial. The Beast itself stands upon a black cube. This cube is different from the cubes that The High Priestess, The Charioteer, and The Emperor sit upon, and these figures are on the right-hand side of the Tree of Life. On the Beast’s lower abdomen are symbols suggesting that it is the anti-Christ. On its beard is the letter Zayin suggesting its enchainment to Time and to the pleasures and goods that are the products of Time. It can be said to be the overpowering of the influence of Zayin, the influence that shackles or manacles.

Some Hebrew commentators suggest that the pronunciation of the Ayin is also very significant – it is often mispronounced as a silent letter similar to the Aleph; however, Ayin’s correct sound is a guttural throat sound which stimulates the thyroid gland. This mispronunciation also suggests the ‘false discourse’ which gives Ayin the sense of being Aleph, but to think that Ayin is Alef is an error. They are two contrary forces.

Ayin implores us to open our eyes, to see beyond the physical, but in order to do this we require grace. The Ayin requires an other to take us from the dark to the light. The Ayin is ‘the dark boar of the forest’ and the ‘snake’ that hides there from the centre of the Psalms, similar to the beast that dwells at the centre of the labyrinth that is symbolic of the sub-conscious self (Path #7 The Hidden Intelligence). Part of Ayin is the letter Lamed which is the serpent uncoiled and this serpent is the knowledge of which Ayin is composed. The gematria of Ayin is 70 suggesting that the strife associated with the attempt to see properly is associated with Netzach and with The Chariot #7 card of the Tarot. This will be discussed later.

The Division Between Love (Eros) and Thinking (Logos)

Details of the Divided Line: Section A-B

Section B-C of the Divided Line: Technology as Shadow

Section C-D of the Divided Line

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Technology as Information

A Reading of King Lear

Contemplation and Calculative Thinking: Living in the Technological World

What is Calculative Thinking?

What is Contemplative Thinking:

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The Tripartite Soul

The Soul and the Regime: Republic Bks IV, VIII and IX

Education and the Training of the Soul

The Logos/Logistikon

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The Titles

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The Emanations to and from Malkhut

The Letter Tav and the 30th Path: The General Universal Collective Intelligence

The Letter Qof and the 31st Path: The Continuous Perpetual Intelligence

The Letter Tzaddi and the 32nd Path: The Administrative, Worshipped, Serving Intelligence

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The Paths Emanating From Yesod

The Letter Yod and the 9th Path: The Pure Intelligence (Consciousness)

The Letter Nun and the 28th Path: The Natural Intelligence

The Letter Reish and the 25th Path: The Intelligence of Trials/Strife

The Letter Tav and the 30th Path: The General Universal Collecting Intelligence

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The Emanations to and from Hod

Hod and the 8th Path: The Perfect Intelligence

The Letter Lamed and the 22nd Path: The Faithful Intelligence

The Letter Mem and the 29th Path: The Corporeal Intelligence

The Letter Kaf and the 24th Path: The Imaginative/Apparative Intelligence

The Letter Yod and the 27th Path: The Exciting Palpable Intelligence

Love

The Letter Tzaddi and the 32nd Path: The Administrative Serving Intelligence

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The Paths Emanating to and from Netzach

The Letter Dalet and the 26th Path: The Renewing Intelligence

The 23rd Path: The Letter Samekh and The Stable Sustaining Intelligence

The Letter Qof and the 31st Path: The Continuous Intelligence

The Letter Nun and the 28th Path: The Natural Intelligence

The Letter Mem and the 29th Path: The Corporeal Intelligence

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The Paths to and from Tiferet (Part Two)

The Letter Zayin and the 21st Path: The Desired and Sought Intelligence

The Letter Lamed and the 22nd Path: The Faithful Intelligence

The Letter Samekh and the 23rd Path: The Sustaining Intelligence

The Letter Resh and the 25th Path: The Intelligence of Trials (Temptations)

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The Paths to and from Tiferet (Part One)

Path Six: Intelligence of the Separative/Mediating Influence

The 16th Path: The Triumphal or Eternal Intelligence: The Letter Heh

The Letter Vav and the 17th Path: Intelligence of the Senses

The Letter Ayin and the 20th Path: Intelligence of the Will

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Hod and the 8^th Path: The Perfect Intelligence