The Moon is Associated with Air, Not Water

 

This post makes a technical point about the qabala. You may find it irrelevant, if you are not a qabalist. Or, you may find the glimpse into my mentally interesting, amusing or frightening. Who knows?

Each path and sephira of the tree of life is associated with an element. Air makes up the middle pillar. Fire and water alternate upon the pillars of mercy and severity. The image shows the pattern with red representing fire with yellow and blue showing air and water respectively. This arrangement looks neat and tidy. The image is completely balanced in an intellectually satisfying way.

There are those that say when things fit this neatly they are not natural. Others have pointed out beautiful symmetries in the glyph and qabalistic thought and see therein divine inspiration. In my opinion, these statements are both correct. When something is forced into a pattern it isn’t likely to be representative of a deep truth. Of course, neither is a complete mess. Nature does have its order.

On the tree of life, the 9^th sephira, Yesod, is associated with air and the moon. In my internet travels, I came across the statement that this is obviously false. The moon is water*. In looking to the natural world, this would seem confirmed. The moon effects the tides and is associated with the cool night. From this point of view the system is too neat and just may be forced into place.  

In this case, the perspective is incorrect, not the tree. Nothing is being forced. The tree of life is not meant to reflect the natural world in that way. The pattern shown is a fractal or repeating pattern of creation and a path to return to the godhead. The combination of Luna and the element of air creates something called the pure and clear intelligence. This is the mindset of the sephira.

The moon is ever changing but locked in a fixed pattern. The self-observant may recognize this as reflective of their own minds. Whatever the full scope of one’s thoughts, topics repeat and often associated thoughts simply regurgitate one’s own perspective and opinions. Air is associated with thoughts, not cycles. Combining the cyclical but mutable nature of the moon with an influx of new thought creates a mindset close to the pure and clear intelligence when new enter the picture.

The final step is the to multiply one’s thoughts by negative one.

Thoughts are things. Buckminster Fuller laid out these ideas beautifully. If you want a fun fictional read on this topic try the book, Poker Without Cards.

Thoughts being things gives them certain properties. Namely, that one thought is capable of hitching to another and that to another etcetera.  For example, my late father once said of Michael Jackson, “How good can he be if he has to dress up like a doorman to get attention?” That thought-memory is always attached to Michael Jackson in my mind. It also attaches to any flashy-dressed performer. Along with it comes the thought that I disagree with my father’s statement. Jackson was quite talented. Attached to that is the thought of how my father’s political views were always well-thought out and interesting before he started to listen to Rush Limbaugh. After that, he just repeated absurdities with little of his trademark thoughtfulness. This is literally my train of thought, one thought hitched to another. Each of those thoughts makes a living by linking up with the previous thought like a little energetic parasite. You can see how this limits my thinking on Michael Jackson. When I hear his name, I do thing of him at all, but instead, thoughts of my father fire off in my consciousness.

In Yesod, one must be in the state of mind or ‘the intelligence’ of the pure and clear. This state allows you to multiply each thought by -1. All thought associations disappear. All that is left is the idea of Michael Jackson. I can even burn away the pedophilia accusations and the fact that he was singer. I am left with nothing but the visual image of the man.

This same process works for all our inner self-perceptions, emotional ties and the like. By going through this process I have become a much more gentle communicator. Why? Because I have burned of a thought that change that led almost all communication to led to anger.

So, sometime the obvious associations, such as the moon is linked to water, are incorrect trains of thoughts. Sometimes, you have to burn these associations off in order to heal, learn or grow. This is one part of The Great Work.

Parenthetical Note: The sephiroth are more than their associations. I am more than willing to entertain the idea that the sephira Yesod is airy and a water associated moon exists within that sphere.

Another Parenthetical Note: This post is about Qabala and makes no reference to other world views outside of Qabala. It is entirely possible that the moon is totally water using another philosophical map of reality.

*I came across this statement just before I started blogging but I have not been able to find that quote again. Trust me, those words are out there somewhere.

Image: The base image has full public use rites. The color modifications are my own.