The 22 Paths
The 22 Paths connect the
Sephiroth of the Tree of Life. There are various arrangements of these Paths
and many different methods of attributing certain qualities to them.
The arrangement used by Mirach comes from traditional Jewish sources
and has as its primary attributions the Hebrew letters. The kabbalah places great importance on the letters of the Hebrew
alphabet. Each letter is associated with a sound, a numerical value, a word
(the name of each letter is a word in its own right ) and an esoteric meaning.
Beyond this, the letters are seen as being the basic building blocks of
creation. The classical text The Sepher
Yetzirah outlines how God used the 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet to
create the universe. The Sepher
Yetzirah divides the 22 letters in to three groupings: Mothers, Doubles, and
Singles. The three Mother letters (aleph, mem, shin) are
attributed to the three horizontal Paths that connect the two outer columns of
the Tree. The seven Double letters (beth, gimel, daleth, kaph, pe,
resh, tau) are attributed to the seven vertical Paths. The twelve
Single letters (hey, vau, zayin, cheth, teth, yod, lamed, nun, samekh, ayin,
tzaddi, qof) belong to the twelve diagonals.
The Torah also reinforces the
idea of the letters as creative tools. In Genesis, Adam is asked by God to
"name" all the animals. This naming, this combining of letters to form a
meaningful word, moved animals from a potential state in to a physical,
material state.
Later in the Torah (Exodus
31:3) the task of building the Ark of the Covenant and its attendant equipment
was given to Bezalel. He is described as being "filled with the Spirit of God".
Some commentators have taken this to mean that he knew how to use the Hebrew
letters creatively.
In more modern times the Hebrew
letters are supposed to have been used in the creation of golems.
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