[Don't know if this is the correct thread for this as you have so many on the go (more threads than a frayed cuff)].
Here's a simplified account of Number according to the Sage of Samos, via Schwaller and West:
1. One, the Absolute or unity, created multiplicity out of itself. One became Two.
This Schwaller de Lubicz calls the 'Primordial Scission' (Division, Separation). It is forever unfathomable and incomprehensible to human faculties (although language allows us to express what we cannot comprehend).
The creation of the universe is a mystery. But in Egypt this was regarded as the only ineluctable mystery —beyond the Primordial Scission, all is in principle comprehensible. And if it is objected that a philosophy founded upon a mystery is unsatisfactory, it must be remembered that modern science is rife not only with mysteries, but with abstractions corresponding to no possible experience in reality: the zero, which is a negation; infinity, which is an abstraction; and the square root of minus one, which is both a negation and an abstraction.Egypt carefully avoided the abstract.
Turn (transcendent cause), in regarding himself, created Atum out of Nun, the primeval waters.
In our terms unity, the Absolute or unpolarised energy, in becoming conscious of itself, creates polarised energy. One becomes simultaneously Two and Three.
Two, regarded by itself, is divisive by nature. Two represents the principle of multiplicity; Two, unchecked, is the call to chaos. Two is the Fall.
But Two is reconciled to unity, included within unity, by the simultaneous creation of Three. Three represents the principle of reconciliation, of relationship. (This threeinone is of
course the Christian trinity, the same trinity that is described in innumerable mythologies throughout the world.)
Numbers are neither abstractions nor entities in themselves.
Numbers are names applied to the functions and principles upon which the universe is created and maintained.
2. The Absolute, unity, in becoming conscious of itself creates multiplicity, or polarity. One becomes Two.
Two is not One plus One. Metaphysically, Two can never be the sum of One plus One since, metaphysically, there is only one One, which is All.
Two expresses fundamental opposition, fundamental contrariety of nature: polarisation. And polarity is fundamental to all phenomena without exception. In Egyptian myth, this fundamental opposition is vividly depicted in the interminable conflict between Seth and Horus (ultimately reconciled after the death of the king).
Polarity is fundamental to all phenomena without exception, but it changes in aspect according to the situation. This fact is taken into account in common language. We apply different names according to the situation or category of phenomena. Negative, positive; active, passive; male, female; initiating, resisting; affirming, denying; yes, no; true, false — each pair represents a different aspect of the same, fundamental principle of polarity.
Two, regarded in itself, represents a state of primordial or principial tension. It is a hypothetical condition of eternally unreconciled opposites. (In nature, such a state does not exist.) Two is static. In the world of Two, nothing can happen.
3. A relationship must be established between opposing forces. The establishment of relationship is, in itself, that third force. One, in becoming Two, becomes Three simultaneously. The 'becoming' is the third force, automatically providing the innate and necessary (and mysterious) reconciling principle.
Here we come to an insoluble problem in both language and logic. The logical mind is polar by nature and cannot accept or comprehend the principle of relationship. Throughout history, scholars, theologians and mystics have been faced with the problem of explaining the trinity in discursive language.
(Plato wrestled manfully with it in his description of the 'world soul'; to all but Pythagoreans it seems gibberish.) Yet the principle of Three is easily applied to daily life where, again according to the nature of the situation, we apply a different name.
Male/female is not a relationship. For there to be relationship there must be 'love' or at least 'desire'. A sculptor and a block of wood will not produce a statue. The sculptor must have 'inspiration'. Sodium/chlorine is not in itself enough to produce a chemical reaction; there must be 'affinity'. Even the rationalist, the determinist, pays unwitting homage to the principle: unable to account for the physical world through genetics and environment, he calls in 'interaction', which is a label applied to a mystery.
Logic and reason are faculties for discerning, distinguishing, discriminating (note the Greek prefix di-, meaning two). But logic and reason will not account for everyday experience: even logicians fall in love.
So, while we cannot measure or know Three directly, we experience it everywhere. From common everyday experience, we can project and recognise the metaphysical role of Three; we can see why trinities are universal to the mythologies of the world. Three is the 'Word', the 'Holy Ghost', the Absolute conscious of itself. Man does not directly experience the Absolute or unity or the Primordial Scission. But the famous mystical experience, union with God, is, I believe, the direct experience of that aspect of the Absolute that is consciousness.
4. Material, substance, things; the physical world is the matrix of all sensuous experience. But material or substance cannot be accounted for in two terms or in three. Two is an abstract or 'spiritual' tension. Three is an abstract or 'spiritual' relationship. Two and three are insufficient to account for the idea of 'substance', and we can illustrate this by analogy. Lover / beloved / desire is not yet a 'household' or even an affair. Sculptor / block / inspiration is not yet a statue. Sodium / chlorine / affinity is not yet salt. To account for matter in principle requires four terms: sculptor / block / inspiration / statue; lover / beloved / desire / affair; sodium / chlorine / affinity / salt.
Thus matter is a principle over and above polarity and relationship. It includes, of necessity, both Two and Three, yet is something beyond the sum of its constituents, as every sculptor and lover knows full well. Matter or substance is both a composite and a new unity; it is an analogue of the absolute unity, with its triune nature.
The four terms needed to account for matter are the famous four elements — which are not, as modern science believes, a primitive attempt to account for the mysteries of the material universe, but rather a precise and sophisticated means of describing the inherent nature of matter. The ancients did not think that matter was actually made up of the physical realities fire, earth, air and water. They used these four commonplace phenomena to describe the functional roles of the four terms necessary to matter — or, rather, to the principle of substantiality. (At Four we have not arrived yet at the actual physical stuff we stub our toes against.) Fire is the active, coagulating principle; earth is the receptive, formative principle; air is the subtle, mediating principle, that which effects the interchange of forces; water is the composite principle, product of fire, earth and air — and yet a 'substance' over and above them.
Fire, air, earth, water. The ancients chose with care. To say the same thing in modern terms requires more words, and none stick in the memory. Active principle, receptive principle, mediating principle, material principle — why bother with such abstractions when fire, earth, air and water say the same and say it better?
In Egypt, the intimate connection between Four and the material or substantial world was applied in symbolism. We find the four orientations, the four regions of the sky, the four pillars of the sky (material support of the realm of the spirit), the four sons of Horus, the four organs, the four canopic jars into which the four organs were placed after death, the four children of Geb, the earth.
Unity is perfect, eternal, undifferentiated consciousness. Unity becoming conscious of itself creates differentiation, which is polarity. Polarity, or duality, is a dual expression of unity. Thus each aspect partakes of the nature of unity and of the nature of duality — of the 'One' and of the 'Other', as Plato put it.
Thus each aspect of primordial, spiritual duality is itself dual. The primordial Scission creates a twofold antagonism, which is reconciled by consciousness. This double reaction, or double inversion, is the basis of the material world. If we understand nothing of this fourfold process, we understand little of the world of phenomena — which is our world. Symbols, studied in the correct manner, make these processes clearer than words. The square inscribed in a circle represents passive, potential matter contained within unity.
It is this same principle of double inversion and reconciliation that lies behind all religious Egyptian art and architecture. The crossed arms of the mummified pharaoh — who (whatever his personal traits may have been) represents successive stages of the cosmic man — holds the crossed scepter and flail of his authority. Schematically, the point where the two arms of the Christian cross intersect represents the act of reconciliation, the mystical point of creation, the 'seed'. Upon a similar scheme, the exalted, mummified pharaoh represents the same abstract point.
The cross and the mummified pharaoh thus symbolise both Four and Five.
5. To the Pythagoreans, Five was the number of 'love' because it represented the union of the first male number, Three, and the first female number, Two.
Five may also be called the first 'universal' number. One, that is unity, containing as it does all and everything, is strictly speaking incomprehensible. Five, incorporating the principles of polarity and reconciliation, is the key to the understanding of the manifested universe. For the universe, and all phenomena without exception, are polar in nature, treble in principle.
From the roots of Two, Three and Five all harmonic proportions and relationships can be derived. The interplay of these proportions and relations commands the forms of all matter, organic and inorganic, and all processes and sequences of growth. It may be that in the not too distant future, with the aid of computers, science may come to a precise knowledge of these complex interactions. But it will not succeed in doing so until it accepts the underlying principles which the ancients knew.
So Five, to the Pythagoreans, was the number of love, but given the innumerable connotations of that much abused word, it is perhaps preferable to call Five the number of life.
Four terms are necessary to account for the idea of matter, or substance. But these four terms are insufficient to account for its creation. It is Five — the union of male and female — that enables it to 'happen'. And it is an understanding of Five in this sense that is responsible for the peculiar reverence in which Five has been held in so many cultures; this is why pentagram and pentagon have been sacred symbols in esoteric organisations (and why it is so ironic to see it currently used as the basis of the plan of the world's largest military headquarters). In ancient Egypt, the symbol for a star was drawn with five points. The ideal of the realised man was to become a star, and to 'become one of the company of Ra'.
The number of 'love', the number sacred to Pythagoras, the number symbolised by pentagon and pentagram, which commanded the proportions of the Gothic cathedrals, played a crucial but subtler role in Egypt. Apart from the hieroglyph of the fivepointed star, we find no overt instances of fivesided figures.
Instead Schwaller de Lubicz found the square root of Five commanding the proportions of the 'Holy of Holies', the inner sanctuary of the Temple of Luxor. In other instances he found the proportions of certain chambers dictated by the hexagon generated from the pentagon. In others, crossed 8x11 rectangles, the foursided generators of the pentagon from the square, commanded the proportions of wall murals symbolically related to those functions represented by Five.
Egypt also made extensive use of the Golden Section which, from the Primordial Scission, commands the flow of numbers up to Five. The pentagram, made up of Golden Section segments, is the symbol of unremitting activity; Five is the key to the vitality of the universe, its creative nature. In mundane terms, Four accounts for the fact of the sculptor's statue, but does not account for the 'doing' of it. Five terms are required to account for the principle of 'creation'; Five is accordingly the number of 'potentiality'. Potentiality exists outside time. Five is therefore the number of eternity and of the principle of eternal creation, union of male and female — and it is for this reason, and along these lines of thought, that the ancients came to hold Five in what looks to us like a peculiar reverence.
6. Four terms are needed to account for the principle or idea of 'substance'. Five terms are needed to account for 'creation', for the act of becoming, the event. But five terms are insufficient to describe the framework in which the event takes place; the actualisation of potentiality. That framework is time and space.
We may call Six the number of the world, in this sense. Five,in becoming Six, engenders or creates time and space.
The functions, processes and principles relating to One, Two, Three, Four and Five may be called spiritual or metaphysical. In any case, they are invisible. We cannot actually see or even visualise a polarity, a relationship, principial substance or the act of creation. But we live in the world of time and space and, unfortunately for us, it is this overpowering sensory interpretation of time and space that conditions what we call 'reality', a reality that is but one aspect of the truth. Our language, with its tenses of past, present and future (not all languages have these tenses) reinforces the illusory picture drawn by the senses. From time immemorial, scholars, philosophers and thinkers have stubbed their brains against the problem of time and space, seldom realising that the language in which they hoped to solve the problem was itself ordered in such a way as to support the evidence of the senses.
In ancient times, the problem was probably less acute than it is today. Language is the principal instrument of expression of the intellectual faculty. When men were less dependent upon their intellects, and in all likelihood had more highly developed intuitional and emotional faculties, they were more susceptible to experiences that transcend time and space, and were able to accept the provisional evidence of the senses at its true value.
But the study of the symbolism of numbers and of the functions and principles numbers describe, allows us to grapple with it on a sound intellectual basis. It is no substitute for the mystical experience, which alone carries with it the unalterable emotional certainty that is 'faith'. But at least it enables us to see simultaneously both the 'real' nature of time and space and the conditional aspect of it returned by our sensory apparatus. It also allows us to reconcile the apparently irreconcilabe standpoints of Eastern mysticism, which holds that the world of the senses (and with it time and space) is illusion, and wholly a mental construct, and Western empiricism, which takes sensory data at face value despite the insoluble philosophical and scientific problems that this raises.
Both views are correct, depending upon the standpoint taken. In terms of the material world, time is real. Time is real as far as our bodies are concerned. We live and die. In terms of the spiritual world, time is not 'illusion' in the sense of falsely perceived reality. Rather, time does not exist. To the Absolute, to transcendent unity, there is no time. And all initiatic religions teach that the goal of man is reunion with the Absolute, with God, with the realm of 'spirit'. Therefore, an important aspect of all these teachings is the insistence upon the necessity to transcend time; for it is time which holds us in bondage to the material world.
The framework in which creation takes place is time and space, which requires six terms to define them. Creation does not take place within time; rather, time is an effect of creation.
Things do not exist within space; things are space. There is no time except that which is defined by creation; there is no space except that which is defined by volume. The material universe is an interpenetrating hierarchy of energies at different levels or orders of density, to which our senses have but limited access.
A science that attempts to explain the universal order in terms of human sensory experience, or through machines which are but quantitative extensions of human senses, is bound to travel further and further from a comprehensive understanding. This situation we see today, as specialities proliferate, and though lip service is paid to the undeniable interaction among the various fields, the specialists involved have no clue as to how or why these interactions take place. The interminable wrangle over whether the universe is ultimately material or ultimately spiritual goes on.
In Egypt and other ancient civilisations the situation was the opposite. In the vitalist philosophy there could be no distinction between mind and matter: both were understood as aspects of a single scheme. Only the Primordial Scission was unknowable; all else devolved from this event in terms of functions, principles and processes, and these were comprehensible in terms of number and communicable (in Egypt) in terms of the Neters (the socalled 'gods') whose attributes, gestures, size and position altered according to the role played within any given situation. (We do the same in less systematic fashion in modern language. We know — though we might not be able to 'prove' it — that the role of the 'man' in a polarity is not the same as the 'lover' in a relationship.) Six, the number of the material world and therefore of time and space, is the number chosen by the Egyptians to symbolise
temporal and spatial phenomena. Six served the Egyptians, as it does us, for the basic temporal divisions: twenty four hours in a day (twelve of day, twelve of night), twelve months of thirty days each in the year, plus five days in which 'the Neters were born'. This is neither accident nor coincidence, but a natural corollary of the functional role of Six. (In celestial mechanics, discussions of motion employ a sixdimensional space — three for the position and three for the velocity of each particle or planet.)
Volume requires six directions of extension to define it: up and down, backwards and forwards, left and right. So in Egypt the cube, the perfect sixsided figure, was used as the symbol for actualisation in space; the cube is the symbol for volume.
Pharaoh sits squarely upon his throne, which is a cube (sometimes he is sculpted emerging from a cube). Man is placed unmistakably in material existence. Nothing could be clearer than this instance of conscious recognition of the role and function of Six. But to recognise it ourselves, we must be able to think as the Pythagoreans did.
Six is also symbolised by the hexagon, by the Seal of Solomon and by the double trigrams of the Chinese I Ching, each of which represents a different approach to Six and illustrates a different aspect, although these aspects are ultimately complementary. (The cube is the result of Six; the Seal of Solomon and double trigrams are Six in action.)
In Egypt, Schwaller de Lubicz found that the dimensions of certain specific halls of the Temple of Luxor were determined by the geometric generation of the hexagon from the pentagon. This is a symbolic expression of the materialisation of matter from the spiritual creative act. At the same time it is an actual expression of materialisation. The temple both symbolises and is time and space, in strict conformity to the relevant laws.
7. Five terms are required to account for the principle of life, for the creative act, the 'event'. Six terms describe the framework within which the event takes place. But six terms are insufficient to account for the process of comingintobeing, of becoming.
In the material world, we generally experience this process in terms of growth. But when we come to relate the functional significance of Seven to everyday experience, we begin to run out of analogical steam. At Five, the correspondence between the sculptor and the cosmic 'act' was precise. At Six we hover on the edge of metaphor. Our sculptor, at Six, was not creating time and space. He was himself already in time and space, and was creatively sculpting. The 'volume' of his statue was preexistent in the block of wood (though we might say, from the point of view of the statue, that the sculptor was reenacting the role of God and creating time and space since the statue qua statue did not exist before).
At Seven, however, our analogy becomes pure metaphor. In no material or biological sense does the sculptor's statue 'grow'. We grow. An apple grows. But the 'growth' of the statue is purely metaphorical. (It may not seem entirely metaphorical to the sculptor who, by carefully observing the progress of his creation from idea or 'germ' to completion, may gain an insight into the principle of 'growth'.)
Seven terms are needed to account for the phenomenon of growth. Growth is a universal principle observable (and measurable) in all realms of the physical world, excepting the most microcosmic — we cannot observe or measure the growth of an atom or molecule.
Like all the principles and functions described up to now, all of which contribute to our experience of the world as it is, 'growth' cannot be accounted for scientifically. There is nothing in the behaviour of the hydrogen atom that makes predictable the growth of a kitten into a cat. But, as with all functions and processes, scientific ignorance is masked under jargon. Things grow because 'mechanisms' fortuitously initiated over the course of 'evolution' have proven 'growth' to be a factor conducive to 'survival'. This fatuous circumlocution is called 'rational thinking'.
It is interesting to remark that, up to this point, in relating number to function, we have been able to show why the numbers Two, Three, Four, etc. and not others, apply to polarity, relationship and substantiality, but we could not easily find concrete physical examples to substantiate the correlations: we can find no physical proof that a lump of salt, as material, is predicated by the meaning of Four. A skeptic might call the universal application of Six to time and space measuring systems arbitrary.
When we come to Seven, however, we can no longer relate it directly to our experience — we cannot of ourselves initiate 'growth'. But in the physical world we find a multitude of instances in which Seven manifests itself in growing or active systems.
Growth is not a continuous process. It takes place in discrete steps, in quantum jumps. Children seem suddenly to 'shoot up'. And so they do. Bones do not grow continuously; they grow in length for a period, and then in breadth. At certain (numerically determined) periods growth proceeds a pace. In between there is little growth.
Seven terms are needed to account for the principle of growth, and it is remarkable how often seven or multiples of seven command the actual steps or stages and sequences of growth — even more remarkable in view of the fact that science dismisses Pythagorean thinking and does not look for such correspondences. The data accumulate anyhow.
Seven terms are needed to account for the principle of growth, and it is remarkable how often seven or multiples of seven command the actual steps or stages and sequences of growth — even more remarkable in view of the fact that science dismisses Pythagorean thinking and does not look for such correspondences. The data accumulate anyhow.
Phenomena tend to completion in seven stages, or are complete within their specific stage. There are seven tones in the harmonic scale. It is the harmonic scale, and the human function of hearing, that give us direct access into the process of growth, of creativity manifesting itself. It is for this reason — not chance or superstition — that led the Pythagoreans explicitly, and the Egyptians implicitly, to employ the harmonic scale as the perfect instrument for teaching and demonstrating the workings of the cosmos.
Consider a string of a given length as unity. Set it vibrating; it produces a sound. Stop the string at its midpoint and set it vibrating. It produces a sound one octave higher. Division in two results in an analogue of the original unity. (God created Adam in his image, and it took Him seven days, or discrete stages, to carry out His work.) Drawn schematically, the divided vibrating string illustrates the principle of double inversion that pervades all of Egyptian symbolism — and that just now is being investigated by subatomic physicists as a fundamental characteristic of matter.
Between the original note and its octave there are seven intervals, seven unequal stages which, despite their inequality, the ear interprets as 'harmonious'.
We cannot describe or define harmony in rational or logical terms. But we react to it — and to its absence — instinctively. This reaction is characterised by an unmistakable sense of 'equilibrium'.
An atom is a moment of equilibrium. So is a cat. Equilibrium is a state in which positive and negative forces are balanced. Modern science, with its doctrine of entropy and negative entropy,* expresses the principle without recognising its functional significance. The Western astrological zodiac (product of the primitive imagination!) expresses the principle both precisely and completely. Libra, the Balance, is the seventh sign.
Seven signifies the union of spirit and matter, of Three and Four. One of the forms that traditionally expresses the meaning of Seven is the pyramid, so characteristic of Egyptian architecture — a combination of the square base symbolising the four elements and the triangular sides symbolising the three modes of spirit. The different pyramids are constructed in such a way as to express different functions of the Golden Section.
8. Before discussing the functions and principles inherent in Eight, it is worth interjecting a word of caution regarding number symbolism. As we progress from one number to another, each number not only symbolises and defines the specific function allotted to it, but incorporates all combinations of functions leading to it. For example, polarity, the tension between opposites, is simple and straightforward. But Five not only represents the act of creation; it incorporates Two and Three, the male and female principles, and two sets of opposites — the principle of double inversion — united by the invisible point of intersection. Five is also One, or unity, acting upon Four, or principial material, hence creation.
When we come to Seven, matters become even more complex. Each aspect or combination manifests itself differently.
Seven is Four and Three — the union of matter and spirit. It is Five and Two — fundamental opposition united by the act, by 'love'. It is Six and One — the fundamental note, 'do', actualised by Six. That is to say, in time and space it produces its octave tone, which is a new unity.
This new unity is not identical, but analagous, to the first unity. It is a renewal or selfreplication. And to account for the principle of selfreplication, eight terms are necessary. The old unity is no longer, a new unity has taken its place: the king is dead, long live the king.
In the zodiac, it is the eight sign, Scorpio, that traditionally symbolises death, sex and renewal.
In Egypt, the wellknown text declares: 'I am One, who becomes Two, who becomes Four, who becomes Eight, and then I am One again'.
It is Thoth (Hermes to the Greeks, Mercury to the Romans) who is 'Master of the City of Eight'. Thoth, the messenger of the gods, is the Neter of writing, of language, of knowledge, of magic; Thoth gives man access to the mysteries of the manifested world, which is symbolised by Eight.
Number symbolism, related thus to function, provides the framework that makes the world of our experience comprehensible.
Eight, then, corresponds to the physical world as we experience it. But the physical world as we comprehend it is still more complex. The interacting functions up to Eight do not permit of pattern or plan — of the ordering of phenomena. Nor will an eightterm system account for the source of order or pattern — for the patternmaker, as it were. It will not account for necessity (the principle that reconciles order and disorder). In order for there to be 'creation' it must first be necessary. Finally, there is the matrix within which all these functions operate simultaneously, which we might call the world of possibilities.These higher numerical functions correspond to Nine, Ten, Eleven and Twelve. The functions corresponding to these numbers are not a part of our direct experience, but philosophically we can recognise their necessity. Admittedly, these concepts are difficult to grasp — particularly since our education trains us to analyse, never to synthesise. Nevertheless, these functions are not abstractions — not in the sense that the square root of minus one is an abstraction — for they are essen
tial to complete the framework of our experience, even if we cannot experience them directly.
In the zodiac each sign partakes of duality, triplicity and quadruplicity. Naturally, in the newspaper astrology (which scientists and scholars assume to be the only astrology there is) this fundamental aspect of the zodiac goes unnoticed. Unfortunately, most serious modern astrologers, while making intuitive use of the zodiacal signs, scarcely recognise the number symbolism upon which they are founded.
The physical universe is complete in principle in four terms: unity, polarity, relationship and substantiality. But the full actualisation of all possibilities requires the working out of all combinations of Two, Three and Four. This is accomplished in the twelve signs of the zodiac. The zodiac is divided into six sets of polarities, four sets of triplicities (the modes) and three sets of quadruplicities (the elements). Each sign is simultaneously polar (active or passive), modal (cardinal is that which initiates; fixed or fixing is that which is acted upon; mutable is that which mediates or effects the interchange of force) and elemental (fire, earth, air, water). Polarity is realised in time and space (six times two), spirit materialised (three times four) and matter spiritualised (four times three). Thus, four terms gives the world in principle. Eight terms gives the world actualised in time and space. Twelve terms gives the world of potentialities and possibilities.
9. Egypt evoked, but never explained. As we have seen, the correlations made between number and function are not arbitrary, and in each case it has been possible to show these correlations employed in the symbols and myths of Egypt. As a general rule, however, we have had to go looking for them, and it is necessary that we first understand the functional significance of number before we know how or where to look. Even the triads of Neters (and trinities throughout the mythologies of other civilisations) are not overt declarations of concern with number, or of an understanding of Three as the principle of relationship. The skeptic could easily argue that the phenomenon of male and female engendering new life is so selfevident that it might easily serve as a symbol without knowledge of its philosophical or Pythagorean connotations.
But a choice of Nine is not at all selfevident, and there can be no mistaking the importance attached to the number Nine by Egypt.
Nine is extremely complex, and practically insusceptible of precise verbal expression. The Grand Ennead (an ennead is a group of nine) is not a sequence, but the nine aspects of Turn — interpenetrating, interacting, interlocked. Diagrammatically, the Grand Ennead can be illustrated by that most intriguing of symbols, the tetractys, which was regarded as sacred by the Pythagorean brotherhood.
The Grand Ennead emanates from the Absolute, or 'central fire' (in the terminology of Pythagoras). The nine Neters (Principles) circumscribed about One (The Absolute) becomes both One and Ten. This is the symbolic analog of the original Unity; it is repetition, the return to the source. In Egyptian mythology the process is symbolised by Horus, the Divine Son who avenges the murder and dismemberment (by Set) of his father, Osiris.
The tetractys is a rich, manylayered symbol which repays meditation with an almost inexhaustible flow of meanings, relationships and correspondences. It is an expression of metaphysical reality, the 'ideal world' of Plato. Its numerical relationships express the basics of harmony: 1:2 (octave); 2:3 (fifth); 3:4 (fourth); 1:4 (double octave); 1:8 (tone).
Cursory as this essay into Pythagoreanism has been, it should be enough to suggest both the extreme complexity and extreme importance of Nine. And given its importance in the metaphysics of structure and pattern, it comes as no surprise to find it made manifest in the structure of the living cell, whose mitosis, it is held by some biologists, begins in the centriole, made up of nine little tubules.
The form of the double helix and the sequences of amino acids and proteins in basic cell structures and enzymes all follow clearly defined and precise patterns whose proportions and numerical relationships must conceal the reason why these things are as they are.
For example, water (H20) displays two basic harmonic attributes. Two hydrogens to one oxygen gives the octave; by volume, eight oxygen to one hydrogen gives 8:9, the tone.
Is this 'coincidence? No one can 'prove' that it is not. And yet these basic harmonic attributes do seem too neatly Pythagorean to dismiss. Remember that in the ancient system 'water' is the fourth element, the primal, principial 'substance' and analog of one, as the octave is the analog of the fundamental.
In the physical world water is the support of life. In the metaphysical world of Egypt, Turn creates himself out of Nun, the primeval waters. Creation proceeds harmonically, the octave is the instrument of process, of 'life', and the first note of the octave is the tone. To produce the perfect tone, the string must be proportioned 8:1 — just the ratio of oxygen to hydrogen atoms by volume. And creation is volume, which is space.
Taken from 'Serpent In The Sky' by John Anthony West.
Sorry about the formating but the text appears to have developed a mind of its own
and has refused to do what I want.
and has refused to do what I want. 
