{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/3743", "note": "Exported from an unofficial mirror of a public mailing list. Copyright in each message remains with the person who wrote it. Email addresses are obscured as `user at host`, the form the original archive published. This file was rebuilt from parsed fields rather than retained headers, so it is faithful in content but not byte-exact.", "addresses": "obscured as 'user at host'" }, "archive": "urth", "thread": { "id": 3743, "subject": "Qabbalah", "messages": 1, "voices": 1, "first": "2003-01-05T00:28:26+00:00", "last": "2003-01-05T00:28:26+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "James Jordan", "address": "jbjordan4 at cox.net" }, "date": "2003-01-05T00:28:26+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Qabbalah", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Chris,\n I once tried to run up speculations about the series of worlds in \nthe Qabbalah, since Wolfe refers to Yesod and Briah. But I asked him \ndirectly about this in my interview, and he said that he had just plucked \nthese names from the Q without intending anything further, without \nintending a larger spin on the Q universe. I concluded that trying to find \nthe sephiroth in these books was, well if you'll pardon me, barking up the \nwrong tree.\n Which is not to dismiss ALL your mooted analogies.\n FWIW.\n\nNutria" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "At 01:24 PM 12/31/2002, you wrote:\nSpeaking of myth, I have been toying with an idea which I am hoping \nsomeone can put me on the right track with (or off the wrong one). The \nLearned Ones of this list have certainly seen a lot, and I would be \nsurprised if someone hadn't already pursued this in more detail.\n\nI am thinking that *one* way to describe what's going on is that the \nnature of Yesod is that it is a world of *myths*, and not just a world \nwith myths, but essentially it is the mythical realm and follows mythical \nrules. It is also one of four distinct stages of creation, of which our \nphysical world is also one. If one traces from the Creator to Creation, \njust one step short of the physical world is Yetzirah; an \"Ur-Earth\". \nQabbalistically, there are four worlds of creation, starting from Atzilut \n(which is Nothingness), closest to the creator. The next rung down is \n*Briah*, whose focus is bringing Something from Nothingness, and whose \nassociated archangel does happen to be Tzadkiel (also associated with \nChesed, the sefirot of \"Mercy\" or giving, which is appropriate). Next down \nis the world of Yetzirah, the world of Forms (Something from Something) - \nthis is where one might say the myths go to play. I believe this is the \nstage where the New Sun series takes place; perhaps you could say it is an \nalternate way of telling the same story that is our universe... The use of \nthe term Yesod (which is the sefirot of \"Foundation\") could refer to the \nfact that Yetzirah can be said to correspond to 6 of the lower sefirot \ntaken together, the lowest of which (low being in the direction of \ncreation, away from creator) is Yesod. The world as we know it in our \nphysical sense is Assiah (Completion) and is associated with Malkhut, the \n\"lowest\" Sefirot of all (this is a vast oversimplification).\n\nThere are numerous things that would seem to go along with an \ninterpretation like this. Talos' play may be a very big hint toward how to \nlook at the overall story.\n\nAnother thing which I may pursue in an unrelated (or related way) is the \nassociation of Severian with Sammael - the angel often associated with \nGeburah (\"Severity\") and I guess you would say the counter-part or \ncounter-balance to Tzadkiel. While these two angels are in opposing \nspheres, it's important not to read any antagonism into the relationship: \nthe two form a thesis/antithesis pair that is necessary for the process of \nsynthesis. A point of note is that in qabbalah each persistent, named \nangel is associated with a star - exactly *one* star per angel. The terms \nin which this was described to me reminded me very heavily of the \nassociation of the Conciliator with his New Sun.\n\nIf I use this framework, I am as yet uncertain whether to say the Long Sun \nbooks take place in Yetzirah or Assiah. Either seems possible. It's \nmaintained by mystics that it's possible for a person in this world to \ntemporarily translate his consciousness to the world of Yetzirah (though \nno higher than that? not sure about that), which would make it possible \nfor Silk to talk to Severian even from a different realm. An interesting \nside effect of this is that if that's how the communication takes place, \nthen the difference in time and distance between Silk and Severian becomes \ncompletely irrelevant.\n\nI have far more to learn on both of these subjects before I can really do \nmuch useful with it - that is, if I'm not running down a blind alley.\n\nChris" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Roy claims that Typhon knows very little about the conciliator or about\nflooding. However, he hints at several things in his appearance in Sword of\nthe Lictor. He claims that water brings new life and rebirth. He \nunderstands\nthe role of the conciliator and his idenitity, promising Severian that if he\nkneels before him, the Conciliator come again will also kneel before him.\nAnd\nwhat does Severian see when he looks out the eyes of Typhon? A vast plain of\nwater. This is what Typhon sees from his mountain, with his false eyes.\nAs for the idea of the Conciliator was not unknown in Typhon's time - the\nconciliator was a rewriting of christology - an echo of the promise of a\nsavior that MUST have been extent if Buzz Aldron was extent in that distant\nfuture. The conciliator became meshed with Christ in myth- and of course\nTyphon knew about that, since he is an allegory of Satan. He is re-enacting\nthe temptation scene - he knows everything about the conciliator and his\nmission. Even if there was no need for a sun before the age of Typhon, there\nwas still need of a spiritual salvation with which the conciliator became\nassociated. Come now. How can the memory of Buzz Aldron outlive the memory\nof Christ? You really believe that Typhon, the satan figure of the text of\nNew Sun, is ignorant of the role of the savior figure? He might, after all,\nhave had access to the book of Canog that Dr. Talos must have perused to \nwrite\nEschatology and Genesis. And the whole secret of the future is of course in\nthat text, composed from notes Severian revealed at the time when he meets\nTyphon in the past and is incarcerated. If Typhon lived even another year or\ntwo, he might have seen that text, with its gnostic eschatology and genesis\nripe for his analysis. He might have even tried to use it when he took \nall the\nother writings of ready-made religions and made his whorl. (if the whorl was\nalready sent, then he still had an immense storehouse of myths that would\nbecome inseparable from the story of the Conciliator, who, before the\npublication of Urth of the New Sun, seemed to be homologous with Jesus \nChrist.\n Could Sappho and Aurelius outlive the documents of Christ in someplace like\nBuenos Aires?).\n\nMarc Aramini\n\n\n\n--" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "_________________________________________________________________\nSTOP MORE SPAM with the new MSN 8 and get 3 months FREE*. \nhttp://join.msn.com/?pageþatures/junkmail&xAPIDB&PSG575&PIs24&DIt74&SU= \nhttp://www.hotmail.msn.com/cgi-bin/getmsg&HL\u001216hotmailtaglines_stopmorespam_3mf\n\n\n--" } ] } ] }