Trigrams related to the Tree of Life and Tarot

[ernobe]

This diagram assigns the trigrams to the sephiroph on the Tree of Life. A Tarot trump may be assigned to each trigram as follows:

• 111 = The Chariot
• 000 = Death
• 011 = The World
• 100 = The Hermit
• 010 = The Star
• 101 = Strength
• 001 = The Sun
• 110 = The Devil

 

[Freedda]

This diagram assigns the trigrams to the sephiroph on the Tree of Life. A Tarot trump may be assigned to each trigram as follows:

• 111 = The Chariot; 000 = Death; 011 = The World; 100 = The Hermit; 010 = The Star; 101 = Strength; 001 = The Sun; 110 = The Devil

But in the Kabbalah aren't there ten sephiroth, each one being an attribute through which God can project himself to the universe and man? So, what happened to the other two?

And which are the the actual trigrams associated with these? You only listed the binary 'code' but not the names/titles of the trigrams.

And what might be some other common names for these cards. For example, I've seen where someone associated the trigram Xun, Wood/Wind with the Magician, and the trigram Kan, Water, Exposure with the High Priestess, but these are neither correspondence or terms you are using above?

And finally, what is your source material here? I don't really know if this has any validity, or reasoning, or rationale behind it, or is just something someone made up!

Best, D.

 

[ernobe]

Why don't we actually apply the trigrams and their meanings to understanding the meaning of the I-Ching hexagrams? Then if the Wood/Wind meaning of Xun can be better conveyed by The World than The Magician, we can discard the latter and adopt the former. And if it works, who cares what its source is? But since you asked for the source, I can direct you to my website.

 

[Freedda]

.... if the Wood/Wind meaning of Xun can be better conveyed by The World than The Magician, we can discard the latter and adopt the former. And if it works, who cares what its source is? But since you asked for the source, I can direct you to my website.

Okay, I went to your website but did not find anything about what your talking about above???

I gather that one thing you're saying is that yours are different tarot associations than the ones I mentioned, not different names for the same cards. I can see that now.

I don't think there's anything wrong with wanting to know sources / references. People make sh_t up all the time - especially on the internet (and that includes about the I Ching and the Tarot) - and therefore, I do care what the sources are. And it's fine if this is of your own making/design, it would just be good to know.

And I still have the other questions, above:

In the Kabbalah aren't there ten sephiroth, each one being an attribute through which God can project himself to the universe and man? So, what happened to the other two? AND why did you pick just these particular eight?

And which are the the actual trigrams associated with these? You only listed the binary 'code' but not the names/titles of the trigrams. I'm hoping you can give us the trigram names/titles to go along with the binaries.

D.

 

[ernobe]

I'm hoping you can understand which trigrams are being referred to by the binaries. The first number corresponds to the bottom line, the next number to the middle line, and the final number to the top line. "1" is an unbroken line, and "0" is a broken line. Since I'm correlating the trigrams and the Tarot trumps with the Tree of Life, some of the sephiroph will correlate with Tarot trumps, while others will correlate with trigrams. It's not something I'm just making up. All I'm doing is correlating two different systems, in order to see their similarities. I'm not belittling any of the two. In other words, I'm not saying that The World means something other than what you take it to mean, neither am I saying that the Xun trigram means something else. I'm seeing their similarities, and pointing these out, so people will gain a better appreciation of both of them. Now if for you The World and Wood or Wind mean something other than their evident meaning, then it is you, not me, who is making things up. Do you see my point? If you notice that similarities I'm pointing out are not true, you can point this out, with the proper references. I can provide the proper references on which I base my correlations, but since these have been discovered by me, you won't find them already referenced.

 

[Freedda]

I don't understand what you mean by making things up ....

Ernobe, either I'm not being very clear, or you're not really reading what I'm saying. So, I'll try a third time:

1. Can you provide the names of the trigrams, along with the binary code? The names Lake, Thunder, or Dui and Zhen all mean something to me. 000, 010, etc. do not.

2. I never said you are making stuff up. I said people often do - especially on the internet - and that's why I like to see sources and references, or at least to get a sense of their thinking. You referred us to your web site, but I DID NOT FIND anything there about the Yi or about Tarot or about the chart you shared!

3. And even if you don't have those references that fine. I can - if I have the trigram names and if I'm even interested after all this - look up the tarot-trigram associations myself using other sources.

But as it is, what you have shared - it's sort of like me saying: "Trigram 6MP is assocated with Mars in Pluto, and Trigram 66P is associated with Venus going retrograde ..." but if I don't tell you what 66P means and I don't give you a way to know what Venus retrograde means ... I'm not leaving you with a whole hell of a lot, am I?

Best, D.

 

[ernobe]

It looks like you posted after I had already edited my previous post. There you will find out how to make the conversion from binary number to trigram.

 

[Freedda]

So,
001 = Mountain/Gen = The Sun
110 = Lake/Dui =The Devil
.... and so on?

And now that I have these, is the next step that I should go find/look up/research what each of these tarot cards means to see if I think they correspond at all to the Trigrams?

(And is there any reason you can't just write those trigram names out in your original list?)

 

[bradford]

No. Just no. You have a lot of rethinking to do here. Maybe years or decades of it, and starting from scratch a few times. You have learned both the Trigrams and the Kabbalah badly.

 

[Gmulii]

This diagram assigns the trigrams to the sephiroph on the Tree of Life. A Tarot trump may be assigned to each trigram as follows:

• 111 = The Chariot
• 000 = Death
• 011 = The World
• 100 = The Hermit
• 010 = The Star
• 101 = Strength
• 001 = The Sun
• 110 = The Devil

View attachment 2368

Interesting. : )
But to have a practical value that have to have some way to be used where we can test if its accurate or not.
The Images in Chinese Metaphysics are very specific, so its easy to test if something works or not.
Xun = Liver, likely female younger then 18 etc. Qian = Large Intestine + male age 55+ etc.

Logically, someone would say that Zhen should be Kether, as Zhen is related to Jia and Jia has images of Sky and Head.
All can be valid as long as it works in practice. Yet if we study the Palaces it seems Kether is just line 6 in each hexagram, that is related to Jia, but the Images that come with the line are more connected to it then the Stem would be.

There are many images, of course, so figuring out if Qian will show "big busy and lively city", vehicle or large intestine would depend on the question.
But in this case all is much simpler, as we are just wondering if it works, not divining with it.

So that part should be easy, if we have a very clear tarot reading we can convert that to Trigrams and see how much of the Images will show up. If they aren't accurate to the actual situation then the arrangment we did may be very interesting or logical, but it isn't very useful in practice.

In that sense if you have a tarot reading, some plans how to convert the rest of the major arcana to trigrams and you know the situation very well we can give it a try. But while I get some of the logic I don't think it will work, as this type of transitions usually aren't logical at first glance, need to work with them for some times to start to get the logic in it. Also they are usually made from practice, making them by logic rarely works very well.

But anyway, if you have some question and the cards on it, you know how the situation developed and you have a way to convert all major arcana to that lets give it a try. : )
If it doesn't work I'm open to post some info on how its more likely to work.

 

[ernobe]

If it doesn't work I'm open to post some info on how its more likely to work.

There are 22 trumps and 8 trigrams, so we should be able to get at least 2 trumps per trigram accurately. The numbers on the paths that circle the image correspond with the Tarot trumps already assigned. The paths that go from each trigram to the center have a number that follows the ones already assigned. Therefore in addition to the previous correlations we have the following:

• 111 = Justice
• 000 = Temperance
• 011 = The Fool
• 100 = The Wheel of Fortune
• 010 = The Moon
• 101 = The Hanged Man
• 001 = Judgement
• 110 = The Tower

Most of all these are self explanatory, with the exception of The Tower, which is actually a tower being struck by lightning. The remaining six trumps obviously have some connection, but we can't say for sure how the six map out to eight, at least not with the information provided. All we can say for sure is that their meanings provide a better understanding of the connections between the trigrams.

 

[Gmulii]

It is interesting and it is logical, but if we want to use it practically the important part would be to see if the Images fit.
At first glance, doesn't seem so, Li is fire, easy to see and guiding light from the heart, while Hanged Man is postponement, obstacles and sacrifice. Li can be connected to sacrifice, yet its a very distant image.

In Shuo Kua we have this for Li, most of the stuff from there we use practically in Divination(with exception of colors, as there were changes there).

The Clinging is fire, the sun, lightning, and the middle daughter.
It means coats of mail and helmets; it means lances and weapons.
Among men it means the big-bellied.
It is the sign of dryness. It means the tortoise, the crab,
the snail, the mussell, and the hawksbill tortoise.
Among trees it means those which dry out in the upper part of the trunk.
...
The Clinging is the brightness in which all creatures perceive one another. It is the Trigram of
the south. That the holy sages turned their faces to the south while they gave ear to the
meaning of the universe means that in ruling they turned toward what is light. This they
evidently took from this Trigram.

So we basically have Fire in the way its understood in the Five Arts. That is something that burns while consuming a source(usually wood). The key idea for Fire is that its "taking attention", so Images of fashion for example, or weapons or anything that "grabs" attention would be here.

It seems the Li would be very connected to Images related to Tipharet alone, Fire in Chinese Metaphysics is considered related to shen神 and xin心(the Heart) that is suppose to by controlling and governing the spirits of the other organs. Suggesting we should have Image of Fire(shen神) in the middle, controlling 4 more aspects in the Sephirot around.
Should be easy to find relation from Li to Tipharet, not just that its more or less in the center of our chest and is bringing blood to all the body with Images of the Heart心, but also it seems to be governing 4 sephirot on the sites, one below while connected with more up.

While we can also assign the idea that the Earth should be in the center, as in the Lo Shu its usually the way it works, but if we look at the Images of the spirit of the Earth(yi意) its very easy to see practically that they are almost exactly what Hod represents. And not very connected to Tipharet, as Tipharet can never be contracting in the way the "Yellow 5" often is. Of course, some practitioners can say that Yellow 5 is contracting only if the Lo Shu is out of balance, so 5 is not in the center, but that would bring the question is it possible for Tipharet to be out of it...
In any case, the Images of Hod does set earth lower, same way as the stomach and spleen are lower and to the site of the Heart.

Giving the idea if we want something governing 4 more aspects, that is probably Tipharet. Making the whole Tree close to exact map of our body from the Heart down.

Assigning the others following the Images should be very easy as the Images are almost identical to the Sephirot around Tipharet and the 5 shens神. And if we are unsure of something we can just look at the organ related to it and its position to the Heart.

Giovannis TCM material is very good source for basic Images of the spirits(lectures in youtube summarize it)
It gets much more complicated after that, as the nature of Binah, Chokmah and Kether suggest that any assignment of Images will change depending on their role and what we interact with.

If we go to the actual tree I have to clarify that I'm only using Grays arrangement on the paths.

In there the Hanged Man is the sacrificed needed to get from Tiphareth to Binah. Then from Binah can take the path of the Hermit to Kether.

All that being said, I think everyone is free ot make relation of the 2 systems in any way they feel meaningful. So I'm not saying its not good, I'm just saying I would do it differently, as I would aim to preserve as much Images as possible, of what is related to the organs/elements in TCM.

But of course, other arrangements are also possible, as we know.There are just different ways that preserve different amount of shared "Images" and the way above, in my view, will preserve as many as possible, of the Images related to the 5 shens神, that would always be priority for me.

Yet if we want ot preserve the movement in the Lo Shu for example, then Kether will be Fire, Yesod will be Water, Gevurah will be Wood and Chesed will be Metal(although metal and wood can be switched as well, as sometimes we do use the Tree turned around). Then Tipharet will be Earth of course. In that case the 3 treasures would be Yesod > Tipharet and Kether and that does bring a lot of sense in it. The whole arrangment in my view is also valid, just less Images fit for practical use and relation to the body.

Considering how the Five Arts work, usually all this stuff is valid, the science of it would be to know when to apply what. In this case when working with Later Heaven events would probably be interesting to check the Lo Shu to Tree way, while when working with TCM with exception of the 3 treasures, working with the 5 shens神.