(19) 4. Ten are the numbers (of the Sephiroth) out of Nothing, ten--not nine; ten--not eleven. Comprehend this great, wisdom, understand this knowledge and be wise. Inquire into the mystery and ponder it. Examine all things by means of the ten Sephiroth. Restore the Word to Its Creator and lead the Creator back to His throne again. He is the only Formator and beside Him there is no other. His attributes are ten and are without limit.

(23) Each of these worlds has ten powers, or spheres--a parent globe and nine others which conic out of it as emanations, each globe born out of the one preceding. On the plane of Atziluth (A 1 to A 10), the highest and most divine of all the created worlds, the unmanifested AIN SOPH established His first point or dot in the Divine Sea--the three spheres of X. This dot--A 1--contains all creation within it, but in this first divine and uncontaminated state the dot, or first manifested. God, was not considered as a personality by the Qabbalists but rather as a divine establishment or foundation. It was called the First Crown and from it issued the other circles of the Atziluthic World: A 2, A 3, A 4, A 5, A 6, A 7, A 8, A 9, and A 10. In the three lower worlds these circles are intelligences, planers, and elements, but in this first divine world they are called the Rings of the Sacred Names.

(18) 3. The ten numbers (Sephiroth) out of Nothing are analogous to the ten fingers and the ten toes: five over against five. In the center between them is the covenant with the Only One God. In the spiritual world it is the covenant of the voice (the Word), and in the corporeal world the circumcision of the flesh (the rite of Abraham).

(4) And from thence came the Names of the Thrones and Principalities, all according to the Essences of the first and great God goes forth again into many thousand Thousands, yet there is a certain Number [of them,] and in the Center of God none, [or no Number but Infinity;] and thus out of the Fountain of every Essence are gone forth, first the Thrones, and in the Throne many thousand Thousands.

(14) The Ten Commandments are the ten shining gems placed by the Holy One in the sapphire sea of Being, and in the depths of matter the reflections of these jewels are seen as the laws governing the sublunary spheres. They are the sacred ten by which the Supreme Deity has stamped His will upon the face of Nature. This same decad was celebrated by the Pythagoreans under the form of the tetractys--that triangle of spermatic points which reveals to the initiated the whole working of the cosmic scheme; for ten is the number of perfection, the key to creation, and the proper symbol of God, man, and the universe.

(33) TABLE XIII, Figures 1-4. Figure 1 is Ain Soph, the Incomprehensible Abyss of Divine Majesty, an endless welling up, limitless in time and space. Figure 2 symbolizes the three Divine Principles--Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Around the triangle is written: I Shall Be That I Shall Be. At the apex of the triangle is the word Crown; in the left point, Wisdom; in the right point, Understanding. Figure 3 represents the Trinity with its outflow. The words above the upper sphere are Revelation of the Divine Majesty in Jehovah Elohim. The lower circles contain the names of the Hierarchies controlling the lower worlds. The words within the circle of stars read: Lucifer the Son of the Aurora of the morning. The letter C represents the Universal Mercury. The words within the circle read: The first beginning of all creatures. Figure 4 represents the abode of Lucifer and his angels, the Chaos spoken of in Genesis.

(11) It is infinite also by right of being a pure unity with nothing towards which to direct any partial content. Absolutely One, it has never known measure and stands outside of number, and so is under no limit either in regard to any extern or within itself; for any such determination would bring something of the dual into it. And having no constituent parts it accepts no pattern, forms no shape.

Reason recognising it as such a nature, you may not hope to see it with mortal eyes, nor in any way that would be imagined by those who make sense the test of reality and so annul the supremely real. For what passes for the most truly existent is most truly non-existent- the thing of extension least real of all- while this unseen First is the source and principle of Being and sovereign over Reality.

You must turn appearances about or you will be left void of God. You will be like those at the festivals who in their gluttony cram themselves with things which none going to the gods may touch; they hold these goods to be more real than the vision of the God who is to be honoured and they go away having had no share in the sanctities of the shrine.

In these celebrations of which we speak, the unseen god leaves those in doubt of his existence who think nothing patent but what may be known to the flesh: it happens as if a man slept a life through and took the dream world in perfect trust; wake him, and he would refuse belief to the report of his open eyes and settle down to sleep again.

(2) What, then, of the "Number of the Infinite"?

To begin with, how is Number consistent with infinity?

Objects of sense are not unlimited and therefore the Number applying to them cannot be so. Nor is an enumerator able to number to infinity; though we double, multiply over and over again, we still end with a finite number; though we range over past and future, and consider them, even, as a totality, we still end with the finite.

Are we then to dismiss absolute limitlessness and think merely that there is always something beyond?

No; that more is not in the reckoner's power to produce; the total stands already defined.

In the Intellectual the Beings are determined and with them Number, the number corresponding to their total; in this sphere of our own- as we make a man a multiple by counting up his various characteristics, his beauty and the rest- we take each image of Being and form a corresponding image of number; we multiply a non-existent in and so produce multiple numbers; if we number years we draw on the numbers in our own minds and apply them to the years; these numbers are still our possession.

(27) 6. The appearance of the ten spheres (Sephiroth) out of Nothing is as a flash of lightning or a sparkling flame, and they are without beginning or end. The Word of God is in them when they go forth and when they return. They run by His order like a whirlwind and prostrate themselves before His throne.

(78) Each ring includes with in its own nature all the rings within itself and is included within the natures of all the rings outside of itself. Thus, A 1--the primitive dot--controls and contains the thirty-nine rings which it encloses, all of these partaking of its nature in varying degrees according to their respective dignities. Consequently, the entire area from A 1 to D 10 inclusive is the original dot, and the rings symbolize the divisions which took place with in it and the emanations which poured out from it after its establishment in the midst of the abstract nature of AIN SOPH. The powers of the rings decrease towards the center of the diagram, for Power is measured by the number of things controlled, and each ring controls the rings within it and is controlled by the rings outside of it. Thus, while A 1 controls thirty-nine rings besides itself, B 1 controls only twenty-nine rings besides its own. Therefore, A 1 is more powerful than B 1. As the greatest spiritual solidity, or permanence, is at the circumference and the greatest material density, or impermanence, is at the center of the diagram, the rings as they decrease in Power become more material and substantial until the center sphere, D 10, symbolizes the actual chemical elements of the earth. The rates of vibration are also lower as the rings approach the center. Thus, the vibration of A 2 is lower than A 1 but higher than A 3, and so on in decreasing scale towards the center, A 1 being the highest and D 10 the lowest sphere of creation. While A 1, the ruler of creation, controls the circles marked A, B, C, and D, it is less than the three rings of AIN SOPH--X 1, X2, and X3--and therefore bows before the throne of the ineffable Creator from whose substances it was individualized.

(5) For all the seven are equally eternal, and none of them has either beginning or end; and therefore, in that the seven qualities are continally generating one another, and that none is without the other, it followeth that there is ONE Only Eternal Almighty GOD.

(136) The decad--10--according to the Pythagoreans, is the greatest of numbers, not only because it is the tetractys (the 10 dots) but because it comprehends all arithmetic and harmonic proportions. Pythagoras said that 10 is the nature of number, because all nations reckon to it and when they arrive at it they return to the monad. The decad was called both heaven and the world, because the former includes the latter. Being a perfect number, the decad was applied by the Pythagoreans to those things relating to age, power, faith, necessity, and the power of memory. It was also called unwearied, because, like God, it was tireless. The Pythagoreans divided the heavenly bodies into ten orders. They also stated that the decad perfected all numbers and comprehended within itself the nature of odd and even, moved and unmoved, good and ill. They associated its power with the following deities: Atlas (for it carried the numbers on its shoulders), Urania, Mnemosyne, the Sun, Phanes, and the One God.

(29) 8. Concerning the number (10) of the spheres of existence (Sephiroth) out of Nothing, seal up your lips and guard your heart as you consider them, and if your month opens for utterance and your heart turns towards thought, control them, returning to silence. So it is written: "And the living creatures ran and returned." (Ezekiel i. 14.) And on this wise was the covenant made with us,

(1) BUT since whatever we have to say on these matters has reached, in my opinion, a fitting conclusion, we must sing Him of endless names, both as Holy of Holies and King of Kings; and as ruling eternity and for ever and beyond, and as Lord of Lords, and God of Gods. And first we must say, what we think Holiness Itself is; and what Kingdom, and what Lordship, and what Divinity, and what the Oracles wish to denote by the duplication of the names.

(3) That ten is a sacred number, it is superfluous to say now. And if the tables that were written were the work of God, they will be found to exhibit physical creation. For by the "finger of God" is understood the power of God, by which the creation of heaven and earth is accomplished; of both of which the tables will be understood to be symbols. For the writing and handiwork of God put on the table is the creation of the world.

(74) The seven spirits of God, in their circumference and space, contain or comprehend heaven and this world; also the wide breadth and depth without and beyond the heavens, even above and beneath the world, and in the world, yea the whole Father, who has neither beginning nor end.

(42) And their State, [Condition, Jurisdiction, or Authority,] is founded in the Originality of the Essence of all Essences, where God in the Beginning created the Thrones, according to his eternal Wisdom; where then (both in Heaven and also in Hell) there are according to the seven Spirits of the eternal Nature, of which here much ought not to be said, for the World holds it impossible to know such Things; whereas yet a Spirit born in God searches into the Kingdom of Heaven.

(42) In the middle region of the Table appears the all-form-containing personified Spiritual Essence--the source and substance of all things. From this proceed the lower worlds as nine emanations in groups of three (the Ophionic, Ibimorphous, and Nephtæan Triads). Consider in this connection the analogy of the Qabbalistic Sephiroth, or the nine spheres issuing from Kether, the Crown. The twelve Governors of the Universe (the Mendesian, Ammonian, Momphtæan, and Omphtæan Triads)--vehicles for the distribution of the creative influences, and shown in the upper region of the Table-are directed in their activities by the Divine Mind patterns existing in the archetypal sphere, The archetypes are abstract patterns formulated in the Divine Mind and by them all the inferior activities are controlled.

(16) 1. YAH, the Lord of Hosts, the living Elohim, King of the Universe, Omnipotent, the Merciful and Gracious God, Supreme and Extolled, Dweller in the Height whose habitation is Eternity, who is Sublime and Most-Holy, engraved His name and ordained (formed) and created the Universe in thirty-two mysterious paths (stages) of wisdom (science), by three Sepharim, namely, Numbers, Letters, and Sounds, which are in Him one and the same.

Now, from the light, which is the anointed, and from incorruptibility, by the grace of the spirit, the four luminaries that derive from the self-conceived god gazed out in order to stand before it. The three beings are: will, thought, life. The four powers are: understanding, grace, perception, thoughtfulness. Grace dwells in the eternal realm of the luminary Harmozel, who is the first angel. There are three other realms with this eternal realm: grace, truth, form. The second luminary is Oroiael, who has been appointed over the second eternal realm. There are three other realms with it: afterthought, perception, memory. The third luminary is Daveithai, who has been appointed over the third eternal realm. There are three other realms with it: understanding, love, idea. The fourth eternal realm has been set up for the fourth luminary, Eleleth. There are three other realms with it: perfection, peace, Sophia. These are the four luminaries that stand before the self-conceived god; these are the twelve eternal realms that stand before the child of the great self-conceived, the anointed, by the will and grace of the invisible spirit. The twelve realms belong to the child of the self-conceived one, and everything was established by the will of the holy spirit through the self-conceived one.