Carlo Suares: The Sepher Yetsira: Some Important Explanations of the Text and of Astrology

IN ORDER to write this book in its original version, in French, needed the help of a [cw friends whom I acknowledge here with thanks for their contributions. Firstly, Mr. Edrei, who gave me some most valuable information which enabled me to determine the spatial cube and the Menorah. However, he declined to collaborate with me on the astrological section as he was trained in a different tradition. Secondly, Mr. and Mrs. Lance, and Mrs. de Ponthiere who were in accord with my views. Mr. Lance drew some excellent charts under my direction. As astrologers they largely confirmed what I had more or less understood. The French edition (Editions du Mont-Blanc, Geneva, 1968) was well received by the public, but the chapters on astrology were said to be inadequate for students of the subject. I was well aware of this, and for the last six years I have been consulting all the astrologers I know in an attempt to enlarge my understanding. Fragments of knowledge, from many different schools of traditional astrology failed to fill the gap between my correct reading of the Autiot and their interpretations. Meanwhile, I became more and more convinced that the so-called knowledge of astrology was merely a tradition and that it lacked any real basis for the origin of the keywords of the Planetary and Zodiacal signs. The modern approach, with all its complex calculations, could not possibly discover the very intimate nature and character of the planets considcrcd as iivng bodies. such as I know them to be. If we fail to understand that consciousness is everywhere and in everything and that everything is related, wc will soon belong to paet history. Yet scientific research, all over the world. is already far advanccd in the study of consciousness as and energy as consciousness. 1 implicitly trust qualified astrologers to cast scientific horoscopes based on correct ephemeris. Precious information conccerning cvcnts can be obtained from them -- whether or not thc business one is starting will be successful, which is the best date to begin it, whether I will have an accident, an illness, and so on and so forth. However, a successful business can be psychologically disastrous, and vice versa. Is it the real self that has these experiences? The astrologers answer: You are the Taurus, Gemini, Scorpio type. Yet however these supposed "types" are read, it is irrelevant and extraneous to the inner lives, the souls, of the persons concerned. There is no such thing as a "Zodiacal sign" type. Those signs describe only containers, or "dwelling houses" and are not, by any means, the persons who happen to fit some calendar at the moment of birth. Moreover, the names of animals, or of Roman deities -- Mars, Jupiter, etc. -- are misleading. Not only as words do they have nothing in common with what they designate, but they are misleading because, when using them, one is prone to attribute to the Planets the qualities of the mythological personages, or animals, attached to them. Such views are only mental projections, without any reality. You will never find the letters M A R S when seeking to know the inner quality of the Planet, whereas Meadim, in code, reveals it clearly. Gradually I became convinced that the astrology Of The Sepher Yetsira is an inner exploration of the individual. Whether it also deals with outer events I do not know. Before coming to any conclusion on that matter one will have to learn what there is to learn from The Sepher Yetsira. So wc will not deal with learning astrology, but with learning how to read The Sepher Yelsira. By this I mean, how to read every Aut, every equation, every inter-relationship, the Autiotic formation the Planets, the names of the Planets, the formative Autiot of thc Zodiacal signs, the names of those signs and, finally, the names of the qualities of the Planets in their own dwellings. This amounts to formulating and solving a cornplex series of equations with, sometimes, twelve or sixteen variables. It is not as difficult as it sounds. A trained doctor of medicine, for instance, can, intuitively, immediately diagnose a patient's illness. This same diagnosis, when made analytically, is the resultant of twelve or sixteen data, which include a description of the patient and his symptoms. A cabalist who has a deep cognition of the Autiot can read a horoscope at first sight. I mean that he has an immediate insight into a person's psychology and its orientation. This last point is important and I hope to explain it when studying the seven double Autiot. We are not static focusses Of energy; we are moving focusses, going in one of the two opposite directions of the dual One energy. And the essential thing for every one of us to know is whether we are oriented in the right or wrong direction, with respect to our innermost and strongest natural impulses. I was experimenting on this during the years that Shambhala Publications was asking for my interpretation of The Sepher Yetsira. I said that I was not ready. Tentatively I drew different Zodiacs, hesitating as to the best way to establish where their reading point began, and on many other factors, such as how to write the names of the Planets and of the ZodiacaJ signs: if they should be written facing the circumference, or, if the author were to envisage hilnself in the centre, the letters should be in opposite positions. I had a feeling that their places in the Zodiac were important. Having decided on different Zodiacs I asked some friends to cast a few on transparent paper, stipulating that they should be anonymous and very simple: just location of the seven Planets and of thcir ascendents at birth. I superimposed them my Zodiacs and concentrated my attention on them, allowing tuysclf to be guided by a few suppositions on the general reading of thc Zodiac which I had been led to formulate. The results were more positive than I had hoped they would be: they gave a vivid picture of the inner drives the inner drives of the persons concerned, and of what was to be expected from them. Half a dozen, or so, of these experiences convinced me that a door to astrology can be opened if some astrologers are willing to enter through the obligatory ante-chamber of the Autiot. So far the response has been practically nil, and I am not prepared to go any further along that line, or any other diverging from the centre of the Qabala, where my place is. Many more lines are being explored today, in physics, biology, in the most recent developments of para-psychology, psychokinetics, and so on. All tend towards the study of consciousness as energy. On this question the ancient, original Qabala has much to say, if we were to know how to put it in modern, scientific terms. In the following pages I will try to deal as clearly as possible, in the proper sequence, with the data in The Sepher Yetsira. The three "Mother Letters" come first; then the seven "Doubles," and lastly the twelve "Simples." Afterwards I will construct the Zodiac and suggest four different ways of beginning to read it. The Three Mother-Letters lf they are prinnary elements there are three of them, and not four (as I noted above). After much consideration it seexns to me that the introduction of "four elements" (fire, air; water earth) to astrology, and in the study of huanan types, is only a survival of an ancient classification which is mistaken and irrelevant. After making lengthy experiment with all the Autiot, I have come to the conclusion that Aleph, Mem and Sheen are correctly called "Mothers," although they are no more than symbols. In plain language. Aleph is maximum energy, Mem is minimum energy and Sheen is the action of Aleph upon Mem. In III,2 they are said to be the origin of the Fire and the Waters. both male and female "out of which are born the Fathers, creators of all that is." In 111,3 the process is in the reverse order: Aleph forms the atmosphere (Avir), Mem thc the Wates, ( Maim), and Sheen the Fire (Esch) . In 111,4 the text becomes more complex. However, the general idea is simplc: when a maximum energy is postulated as acting upon a minimum we are speaking in the abstract. In manitested existence there is no fire without air and the result of the dual action of the 3 Elements upon each other is: Schamaim (wrongly translated as skies) and Eretz (meaning, in a limited sense, earth). Schamaim and Eretz express One energy flowing in two opposite directions. I developed this point in previous writings. Here my purpose is to eliminate the four and the three Elements from the Zodiac, and from astrology as a whole.