Subject: Re: (urth) Conjunctions 39
From: Josh Geller 
Date: 25 Jun 2003 16:10:06 -0700

On Wed, 2003-06-25 at 07:19, Michael Andre-Driussi wrote:

> Clute provides one of two essays in the book, and as Nick reported, he
> makes a possible link between the nine worlds in KNIGHT and the sefiroth of
> Kabbalah.  To me the much more immediate association is with the various
> worlds listed in Norse mythology -- that is, the story is a straight riff
> on the Norse cosmos, where elves have their own world, giants have their
> world, etc.  It is true that there might be echoes between the tree
> Yggdrasil (with worlds at roots, middle trunk, and upper branches) and the
> "tree" of Kabbalah, but that is its own weird mystical musing in itself.

Both trees are based on the observed structure of the Sky.

The rabbis tried to generalize the QBLH and associate it more directly
with number than with the physical Sky and its inhabitants, the worship
of which (as good monotheists) they were trying to discourage.

The Norse system is nuch more directly and explicitly astronomical:
Asgard is the Arctic sky, Midgard the band of the Zodiac, Hel's kingdom
the hidden (from the North) Antarctic sky. Various other heims and gards
are other specific celestial topoi. And of course, Odin, Thor, Tir etc 
are explicitly Mercury, Jupiter, Mars rather than the dodge the 
qabalists use of having a Sephira associated with a planet among its
many other associations.

I know Wolfe is aware of a great deal of this stuff, how much he chose
to incorporate in WIZARD/KNIGHT I don't know.


J.




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