10. The Kabalahc

Here follows the religious and kabalistic key of The Tarot, formulated in technical verses after the mode of the ancient lawgivers: 1 א A Conscious, Active Cause in all we see, 2 ב And number proves the living unity. 3 ג No bound hath He who doth the whole contain, 4 ד But, all preceding, fills life's vast domain. 5 ה Sole worthy worship, He, the only Lord, 6 ו Doth His true doctrine to clean hearts accord. 7 ז But since faith's works a single pontiff need, 8 ח One law have we, and at one altar plead; 9 ט Eternal God for aye their base upholds. 10 י Heaven and man's day alike His rule enfolds. 11 כ In mercy rich, in retribution strong, 12 לHis people's King He will upraise ere long. 13 ם The tomb gives entrance to the promised land, Death only ends; life's vistas still expand. These doctrines sacred, pure and steadfast shine; And thus we close our number's scale divine. 14 נ Good angels all things temper and assuage, 15 ס While evil spirits burst with wrath and rage. 16 ע God doth the lightning rule, the flame subdue. 17 פ His word controls both Vesper and her dew. 18 צ He makes the moon our watchman through the night, 19 ק And by His sun renews the world in light. 20 ר When dust to dust returns, His breath can call 20 or } ש Life from the tomb which is the fate of all. 21 21 or } ת His crown illuminates the mercy seat, 22 And glorifies the cherubs at His feet. By the help of this purely dogmatic explanation we shall already understand the kabalistic alphabet of the Tarot. Thus, Figure I, entitled the Juggler, represents the active principle in the economy of divine and human autotelia. Figure II, vulgarly called Pope Joan, represents dogmatic unity based upon numbers, and is the personification of the Kabalah or the Gnosis. Figure III represents Divine Spirituality under the emblem of a winged woman, holding in one hand the apocalyptic eagle, and in the other the world suspended from the end of her sceptre. The other emblems are equally clear, and can be explained as easily as the first. Turning now to the four suits, namely, Clubs, Cups, Swords, and Circles or Pantacles, commonly called Deniers - all these are hieroglyphics of the Tetragram. Thus, the Club is the Egyptian Phallus or Hebrew JOD; the Cup is the cteis or primitive HE; the Sword is the conjunction of both, or the lingam, represented in Hebrew preceding the captivity by Vau while the Circle or Pantacle, image of the world, is the HE final of the Divine Name. Now let us take a Tarot and combine all its emblems one by one into the Wheel or Rota of William Postel; let us group the four aces, the four twos, and so on, together; we shall then have ten packs of cards giving the hieroglyphic interpretation of the triangle of Divine Names on the scale of the denary, as previously tabulated. By referring each number to its corresponding SEPHIRA, we may then read them off as follows: Four signs present the Name of every name. 1 KETHER. The four Aces. Four brilliant beams adorn His crown of flame. 2 CHOKMAH. The four Twos. Four rivers ever from His wisdom flow. 3 BINAH. The four Threes. Four proofs of His intelligence we know. 4 CHESED. The four Fours. Four benefactions from His mercy come.