Yael R.

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Qaballah and Tarot: A Basic Course in Nine

Lessons
Lesson III: The 22 Paths of the Tree of Life and the
Greater Arcana of the Tarot

A. Introduction: What Are the Paths?

In the Sepher Yetzirah (The Book of Formation), all the aspects of the Tree of Life are called “Paths,”
but this term normally refers to the connections or relations between pairs of Sephiroth, and that is how the
term is used here. Traditionally there are 22 of these, corresponding to the number of letters in the Hebrew
alphabet. However, as they represent relations between Sephiroth, and as 55 possible such two-way
relations exist, including Identity relations,* there are thus potentially 55 Paths for a Tree of Life
comprising 10 Sephiroth.

*For detailed discussion of the Identity relationship and other mathematical concepts relevant to Qaballah
and Tarot, see Lesson V of this course, “The Mathematics of the Atua.

While a Sephirah primarily represents an objective state of being or existential truth, a Path is the
subjective experience which one undergoes in transferring consciousness from one Sephirah or state to
another. Thus, e.g., the 22nd Path, Tav, connecting Sephirah 10, Malkuth, and Sephirah 9, Yesod,
represents what it is like, emotionally, mentally, spiritually, and sensually, to transfer one’s consciousness
between the physical world (Malkuth) and the psychic, psychoanalytic, Magickal realm of the Lower
Astral, the “field”1 realm of Yesod. This journey in consciousness can be carried out in either of two
directions: from Malkuth to Yesod or vice-versa; in general, the Path linking any other pair of Sephiroth is
likewise a two-way street.
Each Path basically represents three things. First, it represents a letter of the Hebrew alphabet, which
Qaballists believe expresses the pure essence of the Path. The order in which the Hebrew letters are
assigned to the 22 Paths of the traditional Qaballah is revealed in the glyph of the Serpent of Wisdom upon
the Tree of Life (see, e.g., Col. IX of Crowley’s Liber 777; Gareth Knight, passim; Dion Fortune, passim;
et al., op. cit.). This serpent trails its way from Malkuth to Kether, on its way touching or passing over
every Path. The order in which it does so reveals the order of numbering of the Paths, and the Hebrew
letters follow that numbering in order, i.e., Aleph corresponding to the first Path it touches, Beth to the
second, and so on down to Tav, the last Path which the Serpent of Wisdom visits on its Journey down the
Tree.
 Second, there is either an astrological Sign, a Planet, the Sun, the Moon, or one of the four Elements of
Pythagorean mysticism associated with each Path.
Third, a Tarot Trump is assigned to each Path.
Now, written Hebrew doesn’t have a set of numerals or digits separate from the letters of its alphabet.
Rather, each letter in its alphabet is associated with a number out of the set A = {1, 2 ,. . ., 9, 10, 20, . . . ,
90, 100, 200, . . ., 900} (the values {500, 600, 700, 800, 900} correspond respectively to final forms -- that
is, when they are the last letters in a word, taking different forms than when they are elsewhere within a
word -- of the letters Kaph, Mem, Nun, Peh, and Tzaddi). Additionally, when a letter has a bar written over
it, its value is multiplied by 100, while a letter written much larger than others has its value multiplied by
1,000. So every Hebrew letter thus has a multiple value: First, it has that of its individual position or order
in the Hebrew alphabet, its ordinal value, e.g., first, second, third, etc. Second, it has a numerical or
cardinal value, one of the counting numbers assigned to it out of the set A given above. Third, it is
associated with one of the 32 Keys (the 10 Sephiroth plus the 22 Paths) of the Tree of Life. Fourth, it has
assigned to it a Tarot card, which has a number of its own, as well. Finally, when the name of a letter of
the Hebrew alphabet is spelled out in full in Hebrew, each of the letters with which it is spelled has a
numerical value of its own, and when the values of those letters are summed, that sum is yet another
number associated with the letter, one with its own Qaballistic meaning. Thus written Hebrew is freighted
with a treasure of symbolic and allegorical meaning far beyond its literal content.
To a lesser extent, this is also true of such languages as Arabic and Greek. It is no wonder that the
written word has been considered to be at least as Magickal and potent as the spoken one, to which ancient
peoples already assigned the powers of Gods, above and beyond the convenience and efficiency for
communication of information both near and far.* It is this marvelous psychic, Magickal, and spiritual
richness and meaning of both spoken and written language, including its musical and incantatory
expressions, that the Tarot and similar symbol-sets were created to represent. The designs of Tarot and its
mantic cousins, e.g., astrology, palmistry, I Ching, etc., represent the links among our internal, spiritual
powers and potentialities and the manner in which we are able to actualize these in our being and in their
manifestations in the concrete, “here and now,” physical waking world. They were created the facilitate the
acquisition and spread of spiritual and psychological literacy, as reading primers are designed to facilitate
intellectual literacy, and musical exercises are used to enable the practitioner to become musically literate.
Language, oral and written, has enormous power on the emotional and spiritual planes, far beyond anything
that intellectual understanding alone can accompoish,2 and it was to harness that power as well as to help
the seeker or sufferer to achieve inner healing and harmony that such systems as Tarot were invented.

*For example, see Genesis I:1-3 of the Old Testament, in Greek translation as well as in the original
Hebrew, which translates into English literally as “the word was a God,” i.e., the Logos.

Two good texts on this subject are Israel Regardie’s A Garden of Pomegranates,3 Chapter IV, and
Gareth Knight’s A Practical Guide to Qabalistic Symbolism,4 Volume II. Aleister Crowley’s Magick in
Theory and Practice,5 Chapters 0-XXI, is also helpful for the advanced student.