The Tree of Life - Saadia, The Three Elements and Cellular Consciousness

The structure of our body can be divided into 3 sections - the blood which supplies the cellular tissue, the cytoplasm of those cells and finally the DNA which is housed inside the nucleus of each. This threefold division can be associated with our 3 elements as follows - Air with the Blood, Water with the Cytoplasm and Fire with the DNA.

AIR (ALEF)

Our cells are supplied with nutrition and oxygen via the blood but since the blood is predominately made up of red blood cells* I have associated this with Air.  However Air (Blood) is ''Mother of the Mothers'', in that all components of respiration are dissolved into it.

The formula for respiration is:

Oxygen (air) + Sugar (energy/fire) = Water (water) + carbon dioxide (earth*)

• Air - Oxygen
• Water - Water
• Fire - Sugar

Looking at our Tree of Life diagram at the top of the page - the path of Air mediates between the depths of Good and Evil - like we have the notion of faire winds and foul, evil winds, so our blood brings to our cells a payload of merit and liability, or mercy and severity.

Good and Evil are strong terms and it may behoove us to simplify this to the notion of Advantage and Disadvantage, or nutrition and poison to describe the axis of the observer.  The blood brings us the vital ingredients of our life, essential proteins we cannot synthesize, sugar, oxygen, hormones, etc but it also brings us a cargo of death and disease in the form of toxins, pathogenic microbes, etc.

WATER (MEM)

THE CYTOPLASM AND ITS ''PLANETS''

Our second element Water rules over the cytoplasm, the bubble of mostly water that makes up the prime constituent of every cell.  This cytoplasm has various ''organelles'' within it that look like little globes, or planets.  These organelles can be grouped into 7 functions that match with the 7 planets.  Water then is said to be Mother of the Doubles, or Mother of the Planets.

• Saturn - cell membrane, cytoskeleton (the structural integrity)
• Jupiter - endosomes (the transport/trade system)
• Mars - lysosomes (the defence system)
• Sol - mitochondria (the powerplants)
• Venus - golgi apparatus (the ''lips and mouth'' of the nucleus)**
• Mercury - endoplasmic reticuluum (the face around the nucleus)
• Luna - nucleolus (contains the ''mark'' or ''destiny'' of DNA) 

Water as an element mediates between the depths of north and south, cold and hot or expansion and contraction respectively.  Simplistically we can think of the cell swelling and shrinking with supplies of nutrition, the membrane ''pulsing'' if you like.

From a more advanced perspective we can also see the positions of Mars and Jupiter on vertical paths leading from the horizontal of air, to the horizontal of water - here our astrology tells us about contraction and expansion with the planets.  Mars and Jupiter as lysosomes and endosomes form the defence/surveillance system of the cell and its internal transport and external trade system.  These paths then form the link between what passes through the membrane and survives in the interior of the cell and also what is exported back to the body as a whole.

Our Saturnian path leads straight from the membrane to the mitochondria, and shows how nutrients diffuse from the blood into the cell and reach the mitochondria where they allow us to complete our metabolism without which we would die.  Our Luna path, associated with the nucleus, leads us from the depths of the past (our birth, and our cell-line stretching back to the origin of the first cell on Earth) to the depths of the west (the passing of a given day) and reminds us of the cell cycle whereby our cells split and divide into two ''daughter'' cells.

FIRE (SHIN)

THE THREE TONGUES OF SHIN - DNA + RNA

Our third element Fire rules over the DNA itself which operates according to 12 basic genetic rhythms and is therefore Mother of the 12 simples/zodiac signs.  As we see from our Tree of Life, the path of Fire, mediates between the paths of up and down or as I prefer in and out.  The nucleus of the cell, which contains our genetic material is the very core of our being - as such there is an information flow ''out'' from the nucleus and ''into'' the nucleus.

This material is very advanced from a genetic perspective but think about it like this - our Mercurial path ''down/in'' represents the path of information flowing down to the nucleus and being *interpreted by the DNA*.  This ''path'' of interpretation is very Mercurial as it seeks to break things down into parts in order to understand them so it can produce the correct answer/response.  Our Venutian path which mediates between ''out/up/rise'' and ''south/expand'' represents the way in which the nucleus ''replies'' to the questions posed by the Mercurial path - if our Mercury ''in'' path is questions our Venutian ''out'' path are the answers.  Science (Mercury) breaks things down in order to understand, Art (Venus) builds things up and offers them back out.

Even more challenging is to fully understand the link between the 12 basic genetic rhythms and the 12 zodiacal signs.  These genetic rhythms/operations can be very clearly visually associated with the 12 zodiacal signs. I will provide a few examples of these in the notes and leave a full exposition until later on in the Blogos.  

• Aries - DNA replication fork***
• Taurus - DNA polymerase
• Gemini - DNA topoisomerase****
• Cancer - DNA topoisomerase II
• Leo - histone bodies
• Virgo - chromosomes
• Libra - mRNA splicing*****
• Scorpio - mRNA
• Sagitarius - tRNA - ribosome complex
• Capricorn - post-translational folding
• Aquarius - DNA repair
• Pisces - DNA recombination

THOTH SPLICING ANKHS

EARTH (LAND/SOIL)

Whilst water is used in the body, carbon dioxide is exported via the blood and ultimately breathing out.  Carbon dioxide is subsequently used by plants to grow thus the association of this with Earth/land/soil.  Therefore Earth is not one of the three elements in this sense.  Earth does not appear in the Sefer Yetzirah as an element.  It is not one of the Mother Letters.  Earth (Aretz - land) is said to derive from Water, one assumes that as water retreats, floods, sea level decrease land is left. To me Earth in the idea of both planet and ''element'' is the concertation of all 22 celestial forces, a compound - as land on the one hand and as soil on the other - it is the central focus of the 231 gates- the ''one name'' that the 22 letters form.

SPIRIT (MIND)

All of these associations can be used with the Cellular Consciousness model discussed throughout the Blogos - if you are the animated Helix in the centre of the nucleus (your physical reach) the room surrounding you is your ''cell'' (your perceptual reach, typically delineated by the walls). Structures within the room maintain its integrity, the walls etc, various tools allow it to fulfill its function, doors, windows allow access, normally some sort of heating/lighting is provided by a room's ''mitochondria'' etc.  The buildings with these rooms containing them are like tissue lining capillaries, veins, arteries etc - the streets, roads along which these tissues emerge - etc.

Deeper than this we see that we are always in the ''room of our Mind'', which never moves... our Cellular Consciousness.  Therefore the '''walls'''of the ''room'' of our mind, once penetrated lead into the bloodstream of time... Enjoy your free-scaling...

*Alef is said to contain the mystery of YHVH in its structure.  If you break down Alef you get one Vav and two Yods.  This has a total value  of 26 which is the same value as YHVH.  26 is the proton number of Iron.  Iron is the essential element in the construction of haemoglobin which allows the blood to carry oxygen.  ADM means Adam, but DM means ''red earth'' (i.e. rich in iron oxide) and A means Air.  Thus ADM can be read as oyxgenated blood.

**

Associated with Venus via Hebrew letter Pe (mouth).

*** Compare and contrast

****Compare and contrast

*****Compare and contrast.

The Saadia Tree of Life

Ten Sefirot out of Nothing, according to the number of the ten digits, which are five against five and a single convenant to be determined in the centre.  In word and tongue and mouth, they are ten extending beyond limit: depth of Beginning, depth of End, depth of Good, depth of Evil, depth Above and depth Below, depth of East, and depth of West, depth of North and depth of South, and the Sole Master and Lofty King faithfully governs them all from his Holy Dwelling in Eternity, Forever.

Sefer Yetzirah, Ch.1 v. 2, Saadia Version 

THE SAADIA TREE OF LIFE

The 10 sefirot are occupied by the 10 depths - (good-evil, future-past, north-south*, west-east, up-down**) - these ten depths are the axial endpoints of the 5D hypercontinuum that we exist ''within''.  The diagram is 2D what it represents is 5D.  Remember this always.

The 3 horizontal paths are occupied by the 3 elements.  The elements are arranged in their rational order - Air, Water, Fire - the order of creation of these elements in the Sefer Yetzirah***.

The 7 vertical paths are occupied by the 7 planets.  These planets are arranged in the Chaldean order - Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Sol, Venus, Mercury and Luna - descending the Vertical paths, with the topmost middle path being ''first'', the topmost right hand pillar path being second, the topmost left hand pillar post being third and so on down the Tree.

The 12 diagonal paths are occupied by the 12 zodiac signs.  These are arranged from Aries to Pisces in the traditional order of the Zodiac from the top to the bottom.

The purpose of this diagram is to *educate* the WMT on the absurdity of the erroneous Kircher Tree which violates this basic rule of construction.  I have taken every step possible to show the rule of 3, 7 and 12 - the paths are colour coded, the depths are colour coded, etc.

I do accept the possibility of manipulating the position of the letters (permuting them) within the rule of 3, 7 and 12.  For example, from the source text (the Sefer Yetzirah) you can make arguments for positioning Fire in the topmost horizontal (as does the Ari) or making ''Keter and Malkuth'' the depths of Good and Evil, and Hokmah and Binah the depths of Future and Past and several other variations.

I discovered this structure after pathwalking all letters and their Kingships for five years with a dedicated Sefer Yetzirah study group after which a gateway opportunity opened that took me to Prague (literally ''the threshold''). I continued working with this system and Cellular Consciousness for five more years in this celebrated city before another series of pathwalkings (theatrical and otherwise) found me living for a year in the residence of Sir Edward Kelley (during his time in Prague) at the infamous Donkey in the Cradle house.  During this time I began to work with the 231 Gates.  A great deal of this lifelong project and exploration has emerged from work with my magickal memory, and substantial research guided by maggidim such as Saadia, the Maharal, and the Archangel Raziel.

However, I have not placed the Hebrew letters on this Tree or used the traditional Kabbalistic titles. This is not because I don't believe in the value of traditional Kabbalistic analysis of the letters of the Alefbeit, or letter meditations. Throughout my Blogos you will see reference to Tzeruf, Gematria and various other traditional kabbalistic approaches. I asked my artist to make this diagram to educate people involved in the WMT on how important the rule of 3, 7 and 12 is in maintaining the integrity of the Tree of Life and the severe lack of knowledge of Hebrew and the Sefer Yetzirah (*the* core Kabbalistic text) in our community only impedes this understanding.   So in the spirit of transmitting this rule I have excluded the Alefbeit for the moment as I feel the general understanding of astrology in the community outweighs it.  I will produce a sequence of diagrams as above with all relevant information including both Kabbalah *and* Genetics.

The Saadia Tree does not conflate the Sefirot with planets, etc****.  Conflation of this kind within the Kircher related systems (777) leads to a very messy mangling of the core principles, you end up with things like 32=34, people get confused and the Tree begins to lose its sense.  It is also unnecessary. WMT adherents would argue that ''Yesod'' is associated with the Moon but you will see in the diagram that the ''path of the Moon'' leads to Yesod (which is the Depth of the West, or the passing of the day).

Anyone with a basic grasp of the WMT will see very interesting patterns within this rendering of the Tree of Life.  For example our middle pillar now becomes a ''temporal axis'' with Future and Past as the ''macrocosmic'' ends (Death and Birth) and with East and West (mediated by the ''path of the Sun'') as the ''microcosmic ends''.  Time passes within the limits of our birth (associated with the path of the Moon) and death (associated with the path of Saturn) and with the rising and setting of the Sun in the East and West.

One could also compare and contrast the positions of Mars and Jupiter.  The path of Jupiter mediates between the Depths of Good and South (Warmth/Expansion), the path of Mars between the Depths of Evil and North (Cold/Contraction).  These associations should resonate for anyone with an ounce of astrological knowledge.  The zodiac signs in their proper places now simulate the Zodiac Man***** in our ''aura'' while staying within the rule of 3, 7 and 12.

I will provide more detailed exegesis of this system as time passes (and answer any questions) but I want you to note that I am not saying that this is the ''one way'', I accept the rule of 3, 7 and 12 has some useful variants, but I do think this is the most rational way and that Kircher in its deviation from this is a severe error.  I also agree that whilst we should accept that ours is an individual and private path that selfsame individualism occurs within the space-time-observer continuum which is what our Tree of Life is intended to show.  I am not trying to ''fence you in'', or limit your possibilities just demonstrate the field within which those possibilities can happen. I am trying to show you the basic principles of the Tree of Life which the WMT has misinterpreted for an embarassing length of time.

Remember that when other writers mock such maps they generally have been working with the wrong one for their entire occult career (or at least during that part of their career that they were exploring ''Qabalah'').  Most of them never properly studied the Jewish Kabbalah  but only Golden Dawn, Crowley, et al, ad nauseaum, derived commentaries on the Kircher Tree. They were right to mock and abandon the Kircher Tree but the Kircher Tree never was the Tree of Life and its barely a Tree at all. Its really embarassing because the rule of 3, 7 and 12 is so obvious as to be glaring at us, as I hope the diagram shows, and we, collectively were really very stupid to miss it.  That goes to show what dogma can do.  I understand the colossal implications of accepting this error but the truth will out.  With sources such as we have today maintaining this ignorance is utterly idiotic.

If you don't already own a copy of Sefer Yetzirah in Theory and Practice by Aryeh Kaplan and you are serious about understanding the WMT then purchase one now.  This is definitely not your ''101'' spellbook, this is your access to ''the mystical experience par excellence'' and will teach you, as Kaplan suggests, ''a special form of telekinesis''.




*North-south could also be understood as the axis of cold/warm and contract/expand.
**Up-down are fairly relative on an Earth spinning in space.  I would prefer in/out or rise/fall.
***The order in which they appear in the *storm*, our lightning flash.
****One of the reasons such conflation occured is because people identified ''Sefirot'' with Spheres.  The word Sefirot is not related to Spheres but means counting, text, etc.  It could be related to cypher and sapphire (sappirot).  As such the Sefirot are best represnted by points, and the paths as the lines on the cut stone, Sefirot being the point where those lines meet.  Sefirot in this sense are better understood as confluxes.  I am not saying spheres aren't useful in meditation, they are, but lets remember that they are 3D and we are discussing a system in 5D.
*****

The Magickal Memory

The purpose of building your ''magickal memory'' is not for the purpose of remembering past lives. You know how many lives you have had???  *Lots*.  The purpose of the magickal memory is not to open some vast attic containing endless piles of dusty photo albums so you can get all nostalgic about that time you got murdered by being clubbed over the back of the head and chucked down a well*, or that time you died of dysentry.  What would be the point of that?  I know many people spend endless hours reviewing their memories in this life and struggling to let go of them (or indeed dealing with the reality of their own mortality/immortality which is the real cause of the reviewing) lets not extend that problem to all those other lives as well!

When you practice the development of the magickal memory you may indeed receive random ''flashbacks'' to things that never happened in this life, you may get bizarre feelings of dejavu around certain places you've never been because you have been and these are indeed ''results'' and show the efficacy of whatever technique you're employing but they are baubles in the end.

The point of developing the magickal memory is the same as developing the ''physical'' memory - memory is a storehouse of information that you can access in order to improve your ability to deal with the present moment.  When the magickal memory is developed you will recieve information from the memory of past lives that will allow you to deal with situations in this life.

Opening this memory channel, unblocking the magickal memory of the trauma of its last death, so that these memories may flow more easily is *early work* in a magician's career.  Once these memories are flowing, and you'll know it because you'll be experiencing the effects, the next stage is to organise the mind for ''referencing'' - this is why we *study the Qabalah*.

Magickal Memory, like awareness of and an ability to explore the Astral Plane were said to be the work of the ''Zelator'' which corresponds to Yesod and in our Metabolism of Time diagram we see that this is associated with the ''Altered Past''.  Studying the QBL is the work of the ''Practicus'', this ''referencing'' ability I discussed is enriched by such study.  After all a magickal memory is useless if you don't know what it is you are supposed to remember...

*True story.  I was a Cathar when it happened.  Bastards took me unawares.

The Tree of Life - Response to Qabalah is the New Black

Io at the ViaGnostica blog has recently gotten into the Saadia Tree detailed here.  This is an arrangement of the ToL that obeys the rule of 3, 7 and 12 which can be very simply understood as the 3 horizontal paths are associated with the 3 mother letters, the 7 vertical paths with the 7 double letters and the 12 diagonal paths with the 12 simple letters.

I urge you to read the posts as they are a great example of someone grasping the simplicity of this arrangement and also its depth/potential as opposed to the corrupt and unbalanced Kircher Tree which forms the illogical basis of much of the writings of the Western Mystery Tradition and which many occultists end up rejecting.  The Saadia Tree is logically consistent, authentic and more effective...

Links to his excellent analysis and exploration is so far:

http://viagnostica.com/2015/03/04/psa-how-not-to-write-about-the-kabbalah/
http://viagnostica.com/2015/03/05/straightening-the-ol-spine-more-kabbalah-talk/
http://viagnostica.com/2015/03/07/wading-into-the-depths/
http://viagnostica.com/2015/03/08/the-rule-of-three/
http://viagnostica.com/2015/03/09/three-take-two/

I have commisioned a better version of the Saadia Tree (above) and hopefully I will have it by next week.

Astral Projection - The Astral Plane

How do I get into/onto the Astral Plane*?

All your experience happens in your consciousness.  You never percieve the world directly but only through your senses.  You only ever interact with your ''mental impression'' of things.  When you are in the darkness at night you will see that the darkness is not actually ''black'' persay but made up of coloured pixels that are flickering.  These are retinal flares from the cells on the back of your eye, a place that you look at represented on your visual cortex from somewhere else inside your mind. You are going to use that ''consciousness of perception'' to shift your perception.

• Assume death-pose yoga
• Hold your closed eyes forward (lying on your back you should be looking directly at the ceiling)
• Breathe in for 4, hold for 2, breathe out in 1 (repeat)
• Stare at dots for as long as it takes but it should be between 1 and 10 mins
• Blobs (multicoloured) will appear against backdrop of dots
• Stare at blobs, as they drip across your eye, watch them and then focus on the next one as it appears
• Attempt to ''go into'' the blobs, try and ''pull'' them towards you - ''pull'' yourself ''up'' as opposed to push
• Ignore ''astral larvae'' - these very protoplasmic hallucinations are an early part of the defence mechanism** to keep you off the astral.  Snakes, worms, etc will attempt to frighten you and break your concentration.
• During this you may experience colour fields where your whole perception turns to one intense colour, fractals and/or tesselating patterns, what appears to be actual physical light sometimes as if through a skylight, and/or noises (the sounds of parents, friends, lovers, etc)

What does the Astral Plane look like?

Sometime during the above process you will actually ''enter the light'' and on the other side will be a plane full of bizarre landscapes and strange creatures.  One/some of these creatures will often investigate you and ''ask you for your papers'' it is at this point that you must give passwords that indicate that you should be allowed to be there (God-names, etc).  If you cannot provide the password they will ''kick you off'' the Astral.

How do I distinguish the Astral Plane from just my vivid imagination?

The reason people see faces in clouds and rocks is because the human brain is exremely good at recognising these things.  The same thing happens when you are observing the dots and blobs and they transform into snakes, etc - our brain is attempting to resolve these ''shapes'' into recognisable things.  So how do you know that the things one sees are astral and not simply imagined?

Its a difficult question because all things must by necessity be experienced in your mind - how for instance do you know the physical is real, really?  My own personal distinction is when the experience is extremely vivid (often more vivid than ''waking'' perception), contains entities that have ''their own voice'' and also when you are given information that you otherwise couldn't possibly know.   Is this experience all in your mind and the creatures that you experience are created from your subconscious?  It certainly doesn't appear this way although I understand the question I would urge you to seek results and then discuss - after all the whole universe could be contained in a Mind which your Mind is a part of.

I wouldn't let this concern about ''imagination'' slow your exploration of this realm.  You are using your mind and imagination as the interface between you and the astral world, in *exactly* the same way your mind and imagination act as the interface between you and the physical world.

Why am I going there?

As a magician you should be developing an astral body - that is a means in which you can move around on the astral plane.  Only by experiencing it and by attempting travel will this body develop. You are going there primarily to exercise this nascent musculature.  Once developed this Astral Body can be used for lots of terrestrial work as well.

There are also specific places on the Astral Plane, for instance the elemental realms.  By accessing these realms (through tattwas, etc) you can entreat the residing entities to boost your efficacy when working with that element.  There has been a lot of work and discussion regarding how to treat spirits when you summon them to your home, think of this as making a house-call to them.

The Astral Plane is split into different subplanes according to the planets, thus Yetzirah consists of a series of planes with the ultimate plane being Saturnian .  Each one of these planetary planes is guarded by progressively more powerful entities.  The plane described in the above post is mainly the upper Earth atmosphere to the Lunar Plane.  If you are experiencing blinding light you have probably astrally projected to Sol.

Why am I writing this?

I am deeply troubled by the lack of knowledge and/or interest in this topic.  In a recent discussion regarding education and magic very few of the people who responded claimed any more than the status of ''dabbler'' and by all accounts minor dabblers at that.  Whether or not other figures in the community share my opinion as far as I can tell the WMT is running on fumes (at least visibly).  The focus in topics in my immediate vicinity seem to be the socio-cultural anthropology of magic, geopolitical speculations, various titbits of hedge magic, assorted dogma about sash design in out-dated orders, empty ''go girl!'' rhetoric and 101 style terrestrial magic (summoning Earthly rewards primarily).  Well-respected figures of ''the community'' are apparently just learning to meditate which I find more than a little shocking and it necessarily leads me to wonder about other figures.

Alongside this people I thought were my peers have not developed an Astral body or their magickal memory.  They have not properly studied the QBL (yet often dismiss it).  They have not explored their consciousness and how it works.  They have not completed devotion rituals but treat God-spirits like buttons they can press for candy.  I had mistakenly believed that these skills were core disciplines in the WMT and it makes me wonder when you strip them away what *are* you left with? A tradition perhaps, but very short on magic and/or mystery.



*Yetzirah.
**What defense mechanism - depending on your P.O.V. you could consider it a way in which your higher mind stops your lower mind from accessing all your powers (as your lower mind cannot be trusted) you can see it as part of the ''psychic interdict'' maintained on the Earth by other worldy creatures or as both...