I have made one correction to my previous post, changing my claim that my hypothesis, that the SY has 2 pictures, is "simpler and explains more", to "explains ". I don't actually accept "simpler and explains more" as a valid reason for accepting a hypothesis in this line of research, and I can't believe I actually said it. I didn't have a lot of time to re-read and evaluate what I wrote before posting.
I also didn't have time to finish commenting on Huck's and Steve's recent posts, which came fast and furious while I was sleeping.
Wiki states ...
Gikatilla at times criticizes the Sefer Yeẓirah and the Pirḳe Hekalot. The seven heavens (Ḥag. 12a) are identified by him with the seven planets. He holds Maimonides in great esteem even when he opposes him, and quotes him very often. Other authorities quoted by him are Ibn Gabirol, Samuel ibn Naghrela, and Abraham ibn Ezra. Isaac ben Samuel of Acre in his Me'irat 'Enayyim severely criticizes Gikatilla for too free usage of the Holy Name.
Is the attribution of the 7 planets really invented by him? Or were there somebody earlier with it?
In
Gates of Light Gikatilla does indeed talk about planets. He says there are 12 of them, 3 for each of the 4 seasons, named the lamb, the bull, the twins, the crab, the lion, the virgin, the scales, the scorpion, the archer, the goat, the bucket, and the fish. Otherwise I can find no mention of planets, or of the particular planets by name, in Gates of Light (Sha'are Orah).
SteveM wrote,
It's a pretty standard representation, nothing you can't find in English -- try a search on 'zodiac globe' or 'astrological globe'
Thanks. I hadn't thought of those keywords as pairs. Looking in Google images for "zodiac globe" I found 3 pictures, all quite different in the aspects of relevance. One had Capricorn at the equator and no indication of directions (but I could guess), one had what I think is Gemini at the Tropic of Cancer (directions unclear, except that the up-down axis seems to be north), and one had all the signs on the same level, with no indications of directions. The last obviously is not like the Hebrew one. None had any text to go with the picture: they were merchandisers. I would have guessed that the one with Gemini at the Tropic of Cancer and the marginally clearer directions is the closest, but that it really should be Gemini on one side and Cancer on the other side of the Tropic of Cancer.
Is that right, with my modification? If so, I can proceed. But I won't until I hear from somebody.[/quote]
Later you write:
Aries is the east sign, and those that follow it '(taursu.Gemini) easterly'. The wheel of the zodiac can appear odd to those unfamiliar with astrology/astronomy. On a zodiacal wheel Aries the east sign is on the left opposite libra )(west) on the right. Cancer (North) at the bottom opposite Capricorn (South) at the top...
I couldn't find that one at all. Cancer at the bottom? Libra at the west? By "west" you have to mean the middle,either facing us or away from us, because the picture has Capricorn and Cancer at the top left and bottom right (whichever is which). I can accept that Cancer is sort of north (along with Gemini) and Capricorn sort of south (Along with Sagittarius), as I think you are close to saying, and the above picture sort of confirms, in an upside down way. But I can't find any picture such as you describe; I don't even see how would one be possible.
SteveM wrote,
The SY clearly identifies its sefiroth -- what do you think the path of Heh = UPPER EAST diagonal boundary most likely connects to? Beginning and Evil? Or ABOVE and EAST?
Good question. In Ch. 1, the sefiroth are not described as connecting to anything. In Ch. 5, there is no mention of sefiroth, so we have to make inferences. First, the sefiroth aren't called "Above" and East". They are called "depth of Above" and "depth of East". I would guess that the combination of those two produced "upper east", On the schematic diagram of ch. 5 (first version, for the Short, at
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-k0UiLX-LojY/V ... quare9.JPG), there are 4 possible places for "depth of East", 4 for "depth of Above", and so on. There are also four others, which have to fit into places where "breath of God"/beginning and "breath of breath"/end are opposite and "water of breath"/good" and "fire of water"/evil are opposite. I don't know how many possible combinations fit all these conditions. Maybe more than one. If so, any will do. If none, then those names won't work any more, and others have to be invented. But not names that would imply that only the lower 6 sefirot had zodical constellations produced by them. Perhaps they would be named "1", "2", "3", etc.
In later allegorical writings they didn't bother seeing if the old names would work in the new diagram. The sefirot got renamed in an allegorical way. But the Gra version, at least if Kaplan has correctly pictured it, retained the tradition of giving the mother letters to the horizontals, the doubles to the verticals, and the singles to the diagonals:
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-KHR6l9reXYM/V ... age-39.JPG, although the diagonals aren't assigned letters the way they would be in mine. If these letters, in the context of the SY, don't stand for astrological entities among other things (units of time, body parts, etc), what do they stand for?
Huck wrote, about Gikatilla's "tree":
Do you have the passage? Or the link? Is it in this "Gate of lights?
And I replied:
I would have to get 22 passages, as the paths for each one appear in each of the 10 chapters of the book. And these 22 might not make sense out of context, given the visionary language, I don't know.
Actually, I only have to deal with the 5 that are missing from the Portae Lucis frontispiece. First, it has no line between Hod and Netzach. Here is a passage about their connection:
...these two names are defined in the light of each other. For when one is defined the other has to be brought in; thus they end up being defined as one, for they are united together as one.
And here is one about Chesed and Din (5) (p. 254)
The attribute Chesed, with the merit of Creation, is continually reversing harsh judgments when they stand before Elohim in judgment.
Here is one about Binah and Chesed (and also Netzach and Hod) to explain the connection of Binah to Yesod (p. 285):
For the essence of the connection of the nine upper Spheres begins when we count from the Sphere Binah: Binah, Gedullah, Gevurah, Tiferet, Netzach, Hod, Yesod.
For Keter to Tiferet, he says of Tiferet (which he calls YHVH) (p. 147):
This is the name which is likened to the trunk of a tree and all the other Holy Names are like its branches; all are attached to each other from above, below, and all sides.
And (p. 231):
..Jacob, who is in the middle, ascends alone to Keter...
I am still looking for an example between Hochma to Din. But surely if Love (Chesed) can cancel harsh judgments, Wisdom can, too. Who would stop at 21?
Admittedly these connections, except the one from Chesed to Din, are not emphasized as much as the others.
Steve M wrote
Does a cube model give you diagonal boundaries? I know the octohedron does... but when I imagine myself in a cube I don't see diagonal boundaries -- say for example facing east I see a square and I see horizontal top and bottom {EU EB}, vertical side pillars -- maybe it's a lack of imagination.visualization skills, though while I can see it with the octohedron easily I can't with the cube...?
It's not hard; all you have to do is tilt the cube a bit. The Creator's "up" does not have to be the same as ours. In fact, everyone knew that the earth was a sphere; in that case anyone looking "up" would actually be tilted on a slant, most of the time. Only the creator knows which way is "up". The cube tilts between ch. 1 and ch. 3. In ch. 3, we've entered the cosmos as we know it.
By ch. 5 we have a schematic representation of a cube, also tilted, as in
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-k0UiLX-LojY/V ... quare9.JPG.
The octohedron needs to be tilted, too. Otherwise only 8 of its edges are diagonal. The others are vertical or horizontal. When the 12 lines are arranged in a circular pattern, only 8 are diagonal, too. The top one is horizontal, and so is the bottom one. The ones on the left and right are vertical. Maybe in your version, in the "diamond", they are all diagonal, I don't know. That was a few pages back.
Huck wrote,
..
... the sephiroth are also corners
.
I see three spheres in the picture, outside the fixed stars. Two aren't in the corner. Anyway, just because an artist ends a painting with a right and top edge, that doesn't mean that reality stops there; a landscape painter, for example, doesn't mean to be showing the sky ending in a corner just because he ends the painting there. Also, this artist is trying to depict what one sees when one goes outside space, which ends at the fixed stars. Naturally it isan analogical painting, not anything drawn to scale.
Steve's last post seems to me to ignore an important part of what I said, namely, my stipulation that there are two pictures, one for chapter 1 and one for 3 on. If that is denied, then I admit I don't have much of a case, at least for the Sefer Yetzirah. I see no a priori reason to reject it. If by some chance there is, I simply make the cube, etc., the transition to the other trees. Surely it isn't just coincidence that all the "trees" have 3 horizontals, 7 verticals, and 12 diagonals. And there is also the Gra version's diagram, which clearly has the zodiac constellations in order on all the diagonal lines (
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-rv8bExRR1rc/V ... ge-39a.jpg), the planets in order on the verticals, and the three elements in just the way the SY has them (air in the middle) in chapter 3.