Numbers are nine distinct vibrations. There is not a thing that exists that does not vibrate. Vibration is measurable, and to measure we must use numbers. Each number is a law unto itself, which never deviates from the principle behind the law that governs it, each one being a symbol for a type of influence or energy.
Pythagoras saw number as universal principle, and each number with a nature all its own. Scientifically this has been proven by modern physics: every manifestation has its own wavelength; a vibrational frequency of electromagnetic energy which is measurable.
God created everything with weight, measure and number.
—Eliphas Levi
This means there is a number that can be applied to everything that has existence, and that number includes its own qualities and characteristics, including its own opposites. So each number is like a balance rod with the positive qualities on one end, the negative on the other end, and the destructive on the reverse side, each number being a complete vibration of a type of energy or influence.
The destructive forces, called the “qliphoth,” are brought into manifestation by the most negative thinking. In order for us to maintain perfect balance in our lives, we must avoid the destructive tendencies, the qliphoth, and walk the middle path. This is where we find harmony in our lives, our health, and even our attitudes, which have a direct bearing on our success.
So this then is the secret that makes numerology work: letters are symbols for sound, sound vibrates and creates form and has its own traits, in order to know those rates of vibration, we need numbers. The letters' numbered place in the alphabet are their rates of vibration when either thought or spoken.
In numerology we always add the digits together until we come to one number, the root, e.g., 25 (full number) is 2 + 5 = 7 (root number), or 25/7.
For deeper kabbalistic interpretation, the full number is important. In the Kabbalah, all words are totaled by their full number. Those that have the same word total have the same numerical rate of vibration and are related. So the Kabbalists substituted words of the same vibration (Gematria) in order to hide spiritual truths from the masses.
Since the full number is the one revered by the Hebrew Kabbalists, and it was used to decipher their holy writings, in English that full number pertains to the Source, the Divine Nature. The full word total reflects our personal level, and the word root number gives the rate of vibration and its basic attributes.
This is confirmed in Henrietta Bernstein's Cabalah Primer:
The beginning digits of the number would be its “face” (The God Self); and the final digits of the numbers would be its “back parts” (the human self). Reverse the one, and you have the other.
For example, for the word ART:
The full word total, 39, comes directly from the Source, the Creative Trinity (3), which created all in universal love with a great breadth of viewpoint (9). The vowel A is 1, originality, the number of the great artist.
Omnia in numeris sita sunt. (Everything lies veiled in numbers.)
On the human level, the word root total is 12. It is following the basic 1, 2, 3 or A, B, C, in order to accomplish the word root number 3, which is artistic expression.
Eliphas Levi calls this method of interpretation “the arithmetic of thought.” He says:
The alphabet and the ten numerical signs are of course the basic elements of all sciences—each sign represents an absolute or essential idea. The form of each cypher and of each letter has its mathematical reason and hieroglyphic significance. Ideas, inseparable from numbers, follow their movement by addition, multiplication, etc., and acquire their exactitude.
The words that are interpreted in this section are figured by their root totals.
Full word numbers are interpreted only in cases where they are especially significant.
