The name for each number group is derived from the Greek word for that number: Monad, Duad, Triad, Tetrad, Pentad, Hexad, Heptad, Ogdoad, Ennead, and Decad. Each group held the underlying deeper meanings of the number to the Kabbalists.
There is a difference between 1 (one) and the Monad. The 1 is applied to each of the essential parts in any group, so the 1 is simpler than the Monad, which is the part considered as a unit.
Pythagoras did not even see 1 as a number. To him it was the Monad, the Father, and the symbol of wisdom; the principle underlying all numbers and from which all numbers come forth.
This is easier to understand if we see it as he did—a circle with a dot in the center. It was one in the midst of all. Ain Soph Aur. Infinite. So the Monad was considered as a unit just as a man, like the Universe, is a unit composed of many individual parts. According to Cato:
God makes himself known to all the world; He fills up the whole circle of the universe, but makes His particular abode in the center, which is the soul of the just.
—George Oliver, The Pythagorean Triangle
The beginning of all things lies motionless in Ain Soph Aur, the Monad, in the form of ideas that have yet to become real. Since the Monad is this original mind, it is the origin of all thoughts and contains all wisdom, for all numbers proceed from and are hidden in the Monad.
Pythagoras's description of God was that He is everywhere present in the Universe as Supreme Mind, Who is the original cause of all things that exist and have being; the source of every Divine good; that His motion is circular, His nature is truth, and His body is light.
In the Pythagorean triangle, the Tetractys, the Monad is the top and first point.
In the Tree of the Sephiroth the Monad is Kether, the Crown whose attribute is Will and whose essence is Divine Love. It contains within itself all the other Sephira. All ideas that are, were, or ever will be are contained within that point of light.
In the Grand Man of the Universe, the Adam Kadmon, the Monad is the crown above the head that is the genesis of all creation. The vibration of the Monad corresponds with the C below middle C: 128 vibrations per second. This is the seventh octave above the fundamental tones of the Cosmos.
Kether is a symbol of unity as it is indivisible. Divide 1 into 1 and you still have 1. Multiply 1 by itself and the 1 remains, so it represents the unity of all life. Every number is made up of 1's. The 1 is the self that performs, learns, and grows in each lesson.
The Monad was depicted as a point in a circle. In order for it to reach out and take form it had to cast its own reflection. By so doing, it created a positive and negative pole: unity separating itself. The original Monad is the positive male principle, electricity, and the opposing end is the negative principle, magnetic attraction. Both are necessary for creation since it is spirit's descent into matter.
Thus the Duad is the dividing line between spirit and matter. It represents all duality, all opposites, all diversity. The hieratic secret of the Duad is the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, the fruits of which can be beneficial or deadly.
These fruits are the five senses, which can be used or abused. For example, the sense of taste is a blessing, which helps us enjoy wholesome food for our nourishment. But it becomes perverted through overindulgence and gluttony.
The serpent on the tree has several meanings. Some say it is the serpent of wisdom. Others say it is the devil who entices. The least-known aspect is that it symbolizes electricity, the male positive force in nature. Because electricity moves in a serpentine motion when it passes between the poles of a spark gap, it was called “The Great Snake,” symbolized by the serpent. Since electricity is a universal force that can be used for either constructive or destructive purposes, the serpent was an emblem of both good and evil. The apple represents the knowledge of the procreative process. An apple cut in half crosswise reveals a perfect five-pointed star, one point for each of the five physical senses and the star itself representing man and his extremities.
It is through misuse of the wholesome fruits of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil that all ills befall the world. God does not cause illness, disease, and destruction. We do that ourselves when we partake of the evil side of the fruit.
So the Duad represents the beginning of the knowledge of good and evil, error and truth, and all contrasts of nature: night and day, cold and heat, wet and dry, as well as male and female. Pythagoras taught that every man was placed between vice and virtue and would eventually have to choose between the two.
The number 2 consists of the straight base line which is good, and the twisted line which is evil. If man follows the twisted path and is burdened by his evil doings, at death he must face the misery he created in one of two mansions of the lower realms: Tartarus, where he suffers for eternity, or Elysium, where amends can be made for an eventual return to Heaven.
In the Pythagorean Tetractys, the Duad is the first of the second two points near the top.
In the Tree of the Sephiroth it is Chochma, the Father whose attribute is Wisdom. Chochma could come from the original Monad, Kether, only by reflection. It is the Divine Intellectual power to generate thought. Wisdom contains the entire zodiac, each sign being dual.
Chochma is above and to the left of Adam Kadmon's left shoulder. Whereas the original Monad is androgynous, Chochma is the potency of positive, vital, outpouring energy.
The Triad was highly revered by the ancients. One or two lines could not represent a figure, but three lines form the triangle, the first figure. And since it is first and is perfect, it represents God.
It is the first three Sephiroth, the Godhead: the Creative Principle. It is the supreme expression of love; two who seek each other only to become three. But also two who seek each other that they may become one. To Pythagoras, the union of the Monad and Duad produced the Triad. To him, the right-angled triangle represented this world.
The tripod is the first structure that can give support to a physical thing. 1 lacks base, 2 lacks steadiness, 3 gives support (and 4 gives solidarity).
According to the Kabbalah, 3 is associated with triangles, tripods, bodies with three divisions, and bodies that can expand and contract because the triangle is the primal or first shape. Salt in a solution will form triangular shapes as the molecules begin to cluster.
The triangle is the shape of the pyramid, and the pyramid is said to hold the secret to Fire. So words referring to Fire begin with “pyro.” Particles of fire are pyramidal in form.
Pythagoras taught that everything in nature is divisible into three parts, and that all things consist of three, including our problems. The problem itself is one side. When we see the other point of view, that establishes the second side. Then it is easier to supply the base, which is the answer. “Establish the triangle and a problem is two-thirds solved.” (Pythagoras)
The third Sephira on the Tree of the Sephiroth is Binah, or Understanding and Intelligence. Binah is the female energy from which all life becomes manifest. As the female potency it is the negative, passive energy, not sexuality.
In Adam Kadmon, Binah is above and to the right of the Grand Man's shoulder, directly across from Chochma (Wisdom), the male energy. Here we see male and female absolutely equal. It was not until the church came into power that woman was put below man. According to the Kabbalah, they are equal before God.
When Understanding joins Will and Wisdom in the form of Divine Love, it completes the creative triad, forming a triangle of power: the Holy Trinity. Only through Understanding are we able to manifest the power of Wisdom and Divine Love in our lives.
The four-sided figure was considered sacred because it represented the beginning of form. The sacred Trinity spoke the Word which set up a vibration that sent the molecules whirling into visibility clothed in form.
Everything that exists has to start with 1 and go through three successive stages to reach form in 4:
1 —Idea.
2 —Seed planted.
3 —Growth.
4 —Mature product; matter brought into being by the Holy Trinity.
So 4 represents the generative power from which all combinations are derived, the root of everything that can be named. The Pythagoreans concluded from this that there is a connection between God and numbers.
In his law of opposites, Pythagoras called the 4 “Right and Left” for when you are standing, the Earth spreads out from your left and from your right. It is the physical plane, the Four Corners of the Earth, the four directions: North, South, East, and West; the four Elements: Fire, Water, Air, and Earth; and the four geometrical forms: point, line, plane, and solid. This is why the ancient Greeks considered the Tetrad to be the root of all things.
They also noted that there are four liberal arts: geometry, astronomy, music, and arithmetic, all of which are important in understanding the other sciences.
4 doubled is 8, or the cube, which was the symbol of truth, because no matter how you look at it, it is always the same. It also had significant reference to justice because the cube could be divided equally.
Many ancient peoples gave God a name containing four letters: Amun (Egyptian); Sura (Persian); Deus (Latin); Odin (Scandinavian); 
(Hebrew); Gott (German); Dieu (French); etc.
The Hebrews and “Tetractys” called the four-letter name “Tetragrammaton” by the Gentiles.
Pythagoras claimed that man's soul has four powers: mind, science, opinion, and sense, making it a Tetrad. Since the Tetrad is the first solid figure, it represents immortality. The universal symbol for immortality is the pyramid because of its four-cornered base.
Geometrically, 4 is related to horizontal lines, squares, crosses, and rectangles.
The fourth Sephirah is called Chesed, or Mercy. This is the first Sephira following the trinity of Kether (0), Chochma (Wisdom), and Binah (Understanding): the Holy Trinity that makes up the Creator, also known as Macroprosopus. Chesed is the next Sephira, the first of the six Sephiroth below which illustrate the law “As Above, So Below.” Its place as the Grand Man of the Universe is the left shoulder, and is directly opposite the fifth Sephira, Geburah (Strength), which is the right shoulder. So our bodies are related in this Tree of Life. Chesed is the beginning of manifestation, just as the number 4 shows the beginning of solid form. Particles of earth are cubical in shape. Chesed establishes the basic structure on which matter is built.
Paul Case tells us in his Book of Tokens that the riches of the kingdom are hidden in Chesed. “Kingdom” is the 10th Sephirah. If you add the numbers 1 through 4, which is Chesed, 1 + 2 + 3 + 4 = 10. And, since Chesed is the fourth Sephira, it suggests that 1, 2, and 3 already have existence. So you can see how the riches are hidden in Chesed: the richest of all 10 Sephiroth.
The 5 represented equilibrium. In numbers 1 through 10, 5 is the exact middle. The Decad (10) is Divinity, and the five (5) is the Demi- Goddess because it is half of 10. It is the number of the Sage (14/5): one who has limited knowledge of that which is higher than itself.
The ancients said the row of numbers 1–9 in sequence, formed a beam of balance, and man is perfectly balanced in the center. 1, 2, 3, and 4 add up to 10 and are the animal forces below; 6, 7, 8, and 9 add up to 30 and are the spiritual forces above. The Pentad was often called “Justice” and sometimes “Nemesis” for it was the instrument keeping the balance between the celestial and the bestial. Pentad refers to the number 5. The pentagram is an emblem, the five-pointed star representing the Pentad. It became the symbol of safety, that middle ground of balance that is necessary because of the dual influence of the 5.
It is also the number of man because man has five senses and five distinct extremities: two arms, two legs, and a head that directs the other four.
The pentagram is actually a figure of the microcosm, man, and represents the soul (1) rising above the animal nature.
Sometimes the body of man is drawn on the five-pointed star, the head at the single point at the top, the arms outstretched on the two points at the upper middle, and the legs on the two lower points. Drawn this way it locates the five mysterious centers of force, which have great meaning to the mystics, the study of which leads to remarkable understanding. Man is the pentacle.
But inverted, the pentagram represents a perverted power, for it takes man off balance by standing him on his head. Black magicians distort it by breaking a line somewhere or by using it upside down so that the two star points are at the top resembling a goat's horns. The ancients considered the Pentad as a symbol for marriage because it contains the first female number, 2, and the first male number, 3. (The 1 was not considered the first male number because it is found in every number and its addition makes odd numbers even.) Five candles are lighted at the wedding ceremony.
The minister performing the rites holds one hand, five fingers spread, above the bride and groom while declaring them to be husband and wife.
The Pythagoreans noticed that the five points resembled five capital A's interlocked, so they called this symbol “Pentalpha.” Alpha represents the Element of Air and is everywhere present in, through, and around all creation.
The 5 is the number of nature because above the four Elements of Earth, Fire, Air, and Water is the fifth and celestial Element of Ether. Pythagoreans called it “quintessence,” which means “the purest and most essential part of anything.” The number 5, by its shape, symbolizes this quintessence because it has a serpentine form showing pictorially the animating spirit or vital essence that flows through all of nature.
Most flowering plants have petals or leaves in clusters of four or five. Like nature, 5 reproduces itself by its own seed, because when it is multiplied by itself it returns to itself by producing its own number, showing up as part of the total, for example, 5 × 5 = 25, 5 × 15 = 75, 5 × 25 = 125, etc.
The 5 is related in form to sharp shapes, forms that lack order or coherence, and to jointed and disjointed bodies. The fifth Sephira is called Geburah, or Severity. It means strength. It is opposite of Chesed (Mercy) on the Tree, and where Chesed is the builder, Geburah is the destroyer, both necessary to ongoing creation.
Being the destroyer means eliminating that which is no longer useful. It also demands payment where it is due, and fulfills karma. “Chesed giveth, Geburah taketh away.” So it is called “The Sphere of Fear,” but it means to be in awe of God, for that is the beginning of wisdom.
In the Grand Man of the Universe, Geburah is the right shoulder, being Chesed's perfect balance.
In the law of opposites, the 5 is masculine and feminine, and for us to be well balanced, we must all have a small amount of the opposite force. Man must have some receptivity to soften his nature, and woman must have some positive force to give her strength.
The Hexad was considered a sacred number because the world was created in six days, and on the sixth day man was created. According to Thomas Taylor's The Theoretic Arithmetic of the Pythagoreans, Pythagoras called the Hexad the “form of forms, the articulation of the universe and the maker of the soul.” His followers called it “the perfection of parts” and “Venus, herself.” The Hexad was the source of harmony, and Venus is the “Mother of Harmony.”
The Hexad was the perfection of parts because it is the only number from one to 10 that is completely equal in its divisions, and it produces a hexagon when six lines are circularly drawn and adjoined, like individual pockets in a honeycomb.
Its consistence of form in the honeycomb, or in a double triangle, also signifies good health, for health is perfect form. It was also noted that nature is partial to six-cornered formation of crystals. The relation of the 6 to body and form is also seen in the fact that the world consists of six sides: north, south, east, west, height, and depth. There is no existing body that does not have six sides.
The very vowels of World (O = 6) and Earth (E = 5, A = 1, and 5 + 1 = 6), add up to a 6 soul urge, the urge to propagate the species and to nurture.
The 6 was an ancient symbol of marriage because the male (3) times the female (2) equals 6, the two becoming one body. And because it is a number equal to its parts, it produces children resembling their parents.
So 6 is associated with symmetrical and well-formed bodies, graceful curves and rounded figures where symmetry and balance are evident.
In the law of opposites it was “rest and motion,” the necessary ingredients for bodies to remain in health.
The sixth Sephira is called Tiphereth, which is Beauty and Mildness. It is in the exact center of the Tree. In the Grand Man, the Adam Kadmon, it is the solar plexus or sun center in man, the exact center of man, and is like a sun shining from within.
It is from this center that we first feel great joy or great sorrow. If something goes against our higher nature, we feel as if our breath has been whacked out of us from that area. Elation brings a feeling of lightness there. So this is a very important spiritual center that we can learn to trust.
It is the power of nature and of the Christ Force within working toward perfect expression, so that God's attributes can be reflected in man's life.
The 6 is a symbol of creation and no creation would have taken place without the Word of God which is the Christ Force. The Hexad is a double trinity: the first being God and the second, His reflection. God's brow and eyes form a triangle in the heavens, say the Kabbalists, and its reflection in the waters formed a second triangle, which was the beginning of creation. A double triangle has six sides. Six equates with sex to bring about creation that can continually renew itself through its 6-Force.
The Sixth Commandment is “Thou shalt not kill.” That takes away the Christ Force from another. This in turn brings destruction back to the slayer. We cannot set into motion any word, act, or deed that does not return to us, for we are dealing with the law of the circle. Everything from the paths of the planets to the circulatory system, to people lost in the woods, to words and deeds, ad finitum, all are subject to this law.
Throughout the ages in every religion the 7 was a symbol of the ensouled, living man. The Pythagoreans called this number “the vehicle of life” since it contained body and soul: 6 applies to the physical dimensions of height and depth, front and back, right and left sides, and is animated by the seventh dimension, the living, vital essence within which is the immortal spirit.
Spiritual man is known to have seven senses, the five physical, including sight, touch, smell, taste, and hearing, plus the sixth of mental perception and the seventh of spiritual understanding.
The 7 was sacred because it contained 3 and 4: 4 being matter and 3 being the spirit that activates it. The Kabbalah shows the cube representing matter when it is unfolded and becomes the cross of four squares down and three across. This is the Tau form that symbolizes the Element of life.
Sometimes it is shown as a triangle above the square. The triangle is the threefold spiritual body of spirit, mind, and soul descending into the physical form (the square) on Earth. After death they disconnect, the lower quarternary turning to dust and the spiritual body continuing. “Then the dust shall return to the earth as it was; and the spirit shall return to God who gave it” (Ecclesiastes 12:7).
The 7 was sacred to life because babies who are born in the seventh month generally live, while those born in the eighth month perish. Pythagoras said this was because 7 is composed of 3 and 4, masculine and feminine forces. But 8 is composed of 4 and 4 which is a purely feminine number or force and unable to supply the strength needed to survive.
The Heptad was called “Minerva,” the unmarried virgin goddess who was said to have sprung from the forehead of Zeus, or Jove. This was the same as if she had come directly from the Father of All, the Monad.
The figure 7 is like the Monad (1) but with a line extending from the head, thus: 7, to depict the event. It also portrays the helmet that Minerva wore. So 7 is representative of helmet shapes, horned shapes, crescent forms, and shapes with curves on the right side. In the law of opposites, 7 is “crooked and straight.”
There are seven creative double letters in the Sepher Yetzirah and there are seven Elohim who make up the manifested aspects of the Godhead. These are the same seven. In Christian scripture they are referred to as “the sons of God” and are the ones who say, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. . . .” (Genesis 2:26).
Every culture has reference to these seven primordial powers, which are the Elohim, nature powers, or planetary gods, the creative hierarchies. Their tools are the seven primary colors and the seven tones of music that supply the keynote of vibration to every living thing.
Pythagoras calculated the tones of the planets according to their distance from each other, reasoning that their movement creates a vibration, which in turn creates a musical sound.
He was led to this enlightenment by observing that the effect of a sound emanating from a vibrating string was controlled by mathematical proportions or by the length of the string when plucked.
There were seven tones in all and each tone emitted was a step of the musical scale of seven tones. The whole Cosmos is in a state of vibration, the overtones emanating from the fundamental tone of the original Monad, or Creative Deity. These tones compose the “Music of the Spheres” and the “Voices of Nature.”
There were also seven vowels in the Greek alphabet, seven basic colors, and seven metals, and Pythagoras assigned one of each to the seven known planets:
Each planet corresponds to one of seven basic wavelengths. Like music, they have their octaves depending upon their rate of vibration: the slowest is the color red, the musical note C, the planet Mars, the vowel O, and the metal iron. The lower the rate is more physical, and the higher the rate is more spiritual.
Pythagoras was known to have taken children with a 7 Birth Path into his schools of mystery without first testing them, for the 7 meant they were born to pursue this course.
The seventh Sephira is called Netzach, “Firmness and Victory,” for this is where perfection is reached. Through the first six Sephiroth a man can evolve intellectually, but until he responds to his center of spirituality, which is the light of illumination within, he cannot achieve Victory.
The body has six sides. Netzach, 7, is the spiritual center that represents the spark of the Deity within every man. It is also the first Sephira that makes up the personality. It has to do with expressing the arts, music, poetry, and all that takes creative imagination. In creating things of beauty through the use of imagination, the person develops his ability as a creator and that is his likeness of God.
Netzach is the right leg of the Adam Kadmon and stands for the instincts and emotions; while its opposite and balance called Hod (8) is the left leg and stands for the intellect. A proper balance is needed between the two because intellect alone is cold and calculating.
Here is the difference between material and spiritual man. Material man is able to gain much through intellect, but until there is that inner illumination of the spiritual self, he cannot grow into his full perfection.
Any group or set of 8 is called an Ogdoad. The Gnostics of old portrayed this by eight stars for it was sacred to them. To philosophers, the Ogdoad is the first cube of energy having eight angles. The number 8 was considered the only “evenly even” number between 1 and 10, meaning it could be divided by any other lower number and not leave a remainder.
This was also true of 4 except that 4, unlike 8, could not make a three-dimensional figure. And so 8 proved to them that idea produces form: God “geometrizes.”
The Ogdoad is like a double mirror that sees (understands) both worlds, so it represents good judgment. It stood for justice because it could be divided into equal parts. 8 on its side represented the scales: ∞, a symbol that has always stood for man being equal under the law. “False scales are an abomination to the Lord but just weights are his delight” (Proverbs 11:1).
The ∞ was also a pictorial symbol of the orbital movement of planets and their regular and constant serpentine paths in the Universe.
Because they were always perfect, it came to mean perfection.
The 8 also referred to time because it depicts the hourglass, which the ancients used to measure time.
Because the 8, like the O, can be written over and over without lifting the pen from the page, it symbolizes divine power and material power; the higher “As Above” flowing serpentine into the lower “So Below.” So 8 is the symbol of all coiled, intertwining serpentine and scroll forms.
There is a discovery known as “The Law of Octaves” in modern chemistry. John A. Newlands was making a list of the elements according to their atomic weights and found that every eighth element had a definite repetition of characteristics.
This is also true of colors and of sound; when one octave of music ends and another begins, there are twice as many vibrations as there were in the first octave and three times as many in the third. There are seven notes in the scale, the eighth making the octave that vibrates at twice the rate of the first and in distinct unity of pitch on a higher level.
Likewise, as C is the bottom of the musical scale, consisting of the coarsest waves of air, red is at the bottom of the color spectrum, consisting of the coarsest waves of luminous ether. Together they traverse the scale: sound and color, side by side through the octaves of vibration, each octave showing a repetition on a finer scale.
Sights and sounds that are out of our range of seeing and hearing continue on in another realm invisible to us, but existent nevertheless in the fourth dimension.
8 symbolized friendship and love because they were considered to be in perfect harmony, love being an octave above friendship in vibration.
The eighth Sephira is called Hod and represents Glory, or Splendor. Where 7 (Netzach), its opposite and balance represents the arts, feelings, and instincts; Hod stands for the sciences, literature, and all that is part of the intellect, or the concrete mind.
In the body of the Grand Man of the Universe, Adam Kadmon, Hod is the left leg. Instincts and intellect: two legs that give balance to the mind of man. Here ideas take form and can be put into words so there is a deeper understanding.
The Pythagoreans called 9 “the Ocean and the Horizon” because it had all numbers within it and none beyond it, as the ocean contained all the Water and all that is within the Water and continued to the horizon as far as man could see. For after 9 is 10. And all numbers following, when added together to the last digit, cannot produce a number higher than 9 as its root. So it returns to itself as water to the ocean.
The 9 is called the number of Initiation for the same reason. No matter how much we learn, we must return to our source in 10, forming the never-ending circle of existence which, at each graduation, begins at the same point on a higher level, ever spiraling upward, 1 through 9 on higher levels. Each 9 we come to is an initiation to a new cycle.
Often we experience an initiation in a dream, which is in fact a true experience in the higher realms of the astral world. It may be forgotten, but its equivalent will come about in our physical world. The way we handle the situation constitutes our understanding of the lessons we should have learned first inwardly. Those who pass the test start anew at 10 on the next level and work toward the next initiation. The reason we experience our tests first on the higher inner level is because it is in accordance with the law of all material manifestation: all that manifests is first an idea. Then comes the Will to create, followed by the Wisdom or Intellectual power to plan, the activity to produce, and finally comes the production, or manifestation. This is the same procedure as that of the creation of the world, and it is the power that we, as minor creators, follow.
Sometimes a person fails to follow his inner promptings, and delays the graduation even to another incarnation. But those who do pass realize a new strength surging through them and a feeling of a “job well done.”
Matter was represented by the number 9, or 3 × 3. It was noted that all material was composed of three Elements: Water, Earth, and Fire, and that those three elements each contained a little of each other. Therefore, 3 x 3 became a symbol of all body formations of matter.
The 9 has come to be known as “The Great Lover.” This stems from the story told about the brother-in-law of Alexander named Caleron, who was able to become invisible by carrying a piece of silver with the number 9 engraved upon it. He would make love to his brother's concubines and never be caught.
The 9 was the finishing number, a bringing to an end, because it takes nine months for a baby to be formed, and when it is completed there is birth. Hence 9 is perfecting and finishing for the new birth which is in 10.
Still, there were many ancients who feared 9 because it signified the end of something and unknown changes to take place.
The number 9 looks like a spermatozoon, so it is associated with germinal life. And because there are nine months of embryonic life, the 9 came to be known as the number of humanity.
The Kabbalists saw the 9 as the generative egg, the stem being the spirit of life flowing into it. The circular part also represented the planet that is animated by the spirit of life.
In the Law of Opposites, 9 is “Good and Evil:” good because 9's are known to be filled with brotherly love and seldom focus on the evil in things, and evil because it is an inverted 6. By inverting numbers, the destructive aspects become prominent.
The 9 is associated with shapes that are sharp and pointed, especially if made of steel or iron: spears, knives, swords, and scalpels.
The ninth Sephira is called Jesod, or Foundation. It is the stability and foundation because it causes continuity of life, and is situated in the generative (sexual) area of the Adam Kadmon. And 9 is the sperm-shaped glyph that is the visual representation of that germ of life.
It is in this area, at the base of the spine, that the Kundalini force (the Serpent of Wisdom encountered in the Garden of Eden) lies coiled. It can be awakened to the strictly physical sex force and orgasm or, in the spiritually awakened man, will undulate upward through the 33 segments of the spine, opening each chakra on its way. When this occurs, a tingling sensation is felt all over the body. When this force reaches the pineal gland (the Eye of Horus) the spiritual eye is opened and the Initiate is ready for wisdoms to be revealed. From then on the still small voice becomes very clear, for these seven centers (chakras) are the seven seals spoken of in the Bible that cannot be opened until the individual evolves spiritually. They are the means through which man comes into conscious communion with the higher realms.
It is very hard for material man to understand the spiritual man. Material man always has been and always will be blind to spiritual truths. “For the material man rejects spiritual things; they are foolishness to him; neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned” (1 Corinthians 3:1).
Decad comes from the root word dechomai, meaning, “to receive.” It represents Heaven, the origin of number, the container of all things, the attributes of all Ten Sephiroth.
To the Pythagoreans, 10 was “the great number” symbolizing perfection: 1 being the spirit, embodied in nature which is 0. The 10 Yods in their sacred Tetractys explained the nature of God and the Universe and all its elements, and even included the unspeakable name of God.
The number 10 represented concord, love, and peace to the sages, and when their 10 fingers would clasp hands, that was called “the Master's grip,” a sign of union and good faith.
Pythagoras too, used the clasped hands as a symbol, for 10 was the number of Yods in the Tetractys. The 10 was the number in which all the preceding numbers were contained.
In the law of opposites, 10 is limited and unlimited, like 1. The 1 is found in every number, and every number has proceeded from the 0 and is contained within it.
The Kabbalists often wrote 10 this way: unity in the middle of zero and representing God, man, and the Universe. It was not just a 1 and a 0, but a pillar and a circle; the Monad, or First Cause, creating and expressing through the circle of no beginning and no end and infinite in boundless space. It was completeness: the 1 being the masculine creative force and the 0 being the feminine uniting to form the Yod of creation. Later on the Yod became a phallic symbol of the Father, and the moon of the Mother aspects of the Godhead. In the Argian dialect, the 10 means “the moon.”
And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good.
—Genesis 2:31
The moon is related to mother and creation because woman's reproductive system is on a monthly 28-day lunar cycle. If we turn the “n” upside down in “month,” it becomes “mouth.” As you remember from the three views of creation, it is the Mouth of God that spake all of creation into existence. So the mouth is, in a sense, a womb. It is from “womb” that we get the word “woman,” and it is from the Holy Creative Mouth that we get the word “mother.”
The 10th Sephira is the womb out of which all creation is born on Earth. It is called Malkuth, or Kingdom, and refers to Earth. The bounty of food, the beauty of nature, all come from the womb of Mother Earth for the benefit of her living beings.
