Why is High Priestess Moon? - Westcott and Mathers Blasting off Again

28 Mar, 2026

The British Disaster - Westcott and Mathers Blasting off Again

Westcott’s Sefer Yetzirah and the Attribution mishap

We dealt with the French demons and now we have to exorcise the ones in Britain. Westcott released a translation of Sepher Yetzirah and The Thirty−two Paths Of Wisdom, which directly connect us to Athanasiusi Kircher’s Oedipi Aegyptiaci, one of the first works to assign letters to the paths between the Sefirot! Yea this is why I put up his Tree of Life as an example. Westcott was Mather’s buddy. He definitely influenced his view on Tarot. And my dear friend actually keeps directly to the SY GRA assignment version in the already mentioned Isiac table of Bembo. He assigns the majors as Levi did, other than switching The World and The Fool to shin and tau respectively (so basically pushing the Fool the the end). His version perfectly corresponds to GRA and he even shouts out Sefer Yetzirah.

I can strongly recommend a study of the Sepher Yetzirah, or Book of Formation, as one of the most ancient philosophic schemes of Theosophy known to us. It is far older than the Kabbalistic Zohar. (The Isiac Tablet Of Cardinal Bembo.)

His translation was first released in 1887, around the same time as the Isiac Tablet. Did this version have anything that looks even close to final Golden Dawn attributions?

I wanted to track Westcott honestly on this - why is he saying what he is, what are the attributions he gives and why. Whence did his info come from?

But… one problem about the GRA version. It was only out in Hebrew for much of the 19th century. The first printed version was in Belarus, 1806 and Aryeh Kaplan is considered the first proper English translation. Before him, this recension was not even seen as a distinct category. And neither of these people, as fluent as they were at stealing from Jewish ideas, used actual Hebrew texts in their own translations at first. Again, I made a crucial mistake in assuming any of the people would actually read Jewish tracts! I trusted Christine Payne-Towler with my life on this!

His first version, the one actually released in 1887, around the creation of the Golden Dawn, only used Latin authors as source.

The Preface to the Fourth edition to Westcott’s translation puts it like this:

Westcott’s translation of the Sepher Yetzirah has been criticised as being “in reality a paraphrase and fulfils few of the conditions required by scholarship.” 2 Most commentaries of the Sepher Yetzirah tend to reveal more about the author’s own system than they do of the Sepher Yetzirah. As Westcott had stated in his Introduction his translation was prepared for members of the Theosophy Society, the Hermetic G.D. and the Rosicrucian Society of England.

Westcott offered his edition in 1887 which was translated into English from the Latin versions of Pistorius and Postellus. His second edition (1893) and third edition (1911) were translated from the Hebrew and collated with the Latin versions of Rittangelius, Pistorius and Postellus. (Darcy Kuntz’ Preface to the Sepher Yetzirah)

(Yea the guy who said that quote at the beginning is Waite. He couldn’t stop beefing with any of these people. He was usually right too.)

When Westcott released a later edition in 1893 he humbly says that his work depended too much on Latin authors, that some versions don’t even have planetary assignment, and he mentioned the same Jewish scholar that Papus did in his version. This version also has Supplement to Chapter IV, which has the attribution verses from the translation by Isidor Kalisch.

Mayer Lambert gives:−−Beth to Saturn and the Hebrew Sabbath−−that is Saturday; Gimel to Jupiter and Sunday; Daleth to Mars and Monday; Kaph to the Sun and Tuesday; Peh to Venus and Wednesday; Resh to Mercury and Thursday; and Tau to the Moon and Friday (Westcott’s Sepher Yetzirah, Supplement to Chapter IV - this quote is missing in edition 2 so likely added with third release)

Mayer-Lambert published his Commentaire sur le Séfer Yesira, ou livre de la Création par Saadiah in 1891. His attributions are found, accordingly, in majorities of Hebrew fragments (crosschecked with Kaplan’s book), as we mentioned in the Papus section. So he is out as the main source.

Westcott also smugly says this in the notes:

In each planet the learned Jesuit Kircher allots Beth to the Sun, Gimel to Venus, Daleth to Mercury, Kaph to Luna, Peh to Saturn, Resh to Jupiter, and Tau to Mars. Kalisch in the supplementary paragraphs gives a different attribution; both are wrong, as an adept cultured clairvoyant could prove. Consult the Tarot symbolism given by Court de Gebelin, Eliphaz Levi, and my notes in the "Isiac Tablet of Bembo." The true attribution is however, not anywhere printed. The planet names here given are Chaldee words.

*The Seven Heavens and the Seven Earths are printed with errors, and I believe intentional mistakes, in many occult ancient books. Private Hermetic MSS have the correct names and spelling. (Westcott’s Sepher Yetzirah, Notes on Chapter IV**)***

So. Let's try to trace the origins of Westcott's attributions in the Isiac Table. In versions, which do not have assignments related to verses, I just take that order. At this point I was desperate.

* No SY text, Kircher just showed me a table with attributions.
** Johann Friedrich Meyer should not be confused with Mayer Lambert mentioned earlier.

So…All Westcott Latin sources were versions without specific letter-planet attributions - just the one verse that lists out planets. The Isiac Table attribution is however identical to Kalisch’s and Kalisch did have the specific one by one planet attribution verses.

Did he simply take a convenient edition that was already there (Isidor Kalisch)? He does mention him, as early as second edition:

Quite recently, and since the completion of my translation, my attention has been drawn to a version by Isidor Kalisch, in which he has reproduced many of the valuable annotations of Meyer.

7. He produced Lamed, predominant in Sexual desire, crowned it, combined and formed with it Libra in the Universe, Tishri in the Year, and the private parts of Man. (Kalisch gives "gall.") (Westcott’s Sepher Yetzirah, Supplement to Chapter V.)

Aside - Kalisch didn’t just reproduce annotations of Meyer. His work is the first English translation specifically for the American Jewish community. Acting like he is just a valuable transmission of Meyer is fucking condescending.

In second edition he also notes the following Hebrew translations that he examined:

Version by Saadiah, ab. ben David, and three others — Mantua, 1562 Version with commentary of Rabbi Abraham F. Dior — Amsterdam, 1642 Version with preface by M. ben J. Chagiz — Amsterdam, 1713 Version — Constantinople, 1719 Version — Zolkiew, 1745 Version by Moses ben Jacob, Zozec — 1779 Version — Grodno, 1806 Version — Dyhernfurth, 1812 Version — Salonica, 1831 MSS. copy dated 1719 — British Museum (Westcott’s Sepher Yetzirah, Introduction)

So, he later HAD access to the GRA version. But I can’t prove that he took from it - there are many editions here. Nor can I prove it was his primary source for the attributions in Isaiac Table.

The biggest problem is that I can’t access the first edition to see if the “lol everyone is wrong” note existed there. It exists in some museums but it’s one of those things you have to go see in person. As such, I don’t know what was in there and what was floating in his head in 1887. Most of the available info is from the second edition onward, way after the Golden Dawn attributions were codified, where he has space to be going “Oh yea btw those are all wrong, the truth is hidden in a book I know about tee hee.”

To explain the mystery of the Isiac Tablet attributions, the simplest answer is that back in 1887 he simply went fuck it and took from Kalisch. Kalisch worked with many Hebrew manuscripts and even notes in one section that he chose Luria’s wording over one that was more common. So we know he had access to the version that GRA was reacting to, which might share these verses. In 1893 Westcott had access to GRA manuscript, but that is irrelevant to the fact that in 1887 he only gave a fuck about Latin translations, which means Postellus, Pistorius and Rittangel. It’s DEEPLY problematic to dismiss a man like that, while using his work without credit.

Beyond all this posturing and tangle of info, it shows that Westcott knew these planetary attributions were variable.

The true attributions… What does our dear friend Westcott who would never lie to us mean?

Westcott, Eliphas Levi and Sanctum Regnum,

The magical ritual of the sanctum regnum is a super short tract, supposedly found in Trithemius' book, notes scribbled on the margins. Westcott collated them and added his commentary and released it in 1896. It seems to be just shortened notes from Dogma and Rituel together with some rituals. The Levi part is almost worthless, it’s all a repeat of stuff in short chapters. Thank God, I am so fucking tired of reading him.

Westcott seems to barely engage with actual content of the chapters, instead putting together basic meanings of the Tarot cards and the notes.

Of relevance are the following quotes:

The First Tarot Trump is named Le Bateleur, and in English is spoken of as the Magician. Levi remarks in one of his works that the arms and body of the figure bear a resemblance to the first letter, Aleph, of the Hebrew alphabet, in some packs of the oldest designs; but the student will do wisely to consult his intuition, if he have no adept instructor, as to the true attribution of this or either of the other trumps of the Tarot.

—--

The Twelfth Tarot Trump, named the Hanged Man, is the most closely veiled of all Tarot hieroglyphics. Its real meaning is now known to but very few; there is the gravest doubt whether Levi knew it himself. Papus, who has produced a work on the Tarot, gives a clearly faulty explanation. Neither Etteilla nor Court de Gebelin grasped the hidden meaning. But its significance has in some cases been found by clairvoyant visions, and in a few by intuition. The key is held by such as know rightly to which Hebrew letter it belongs and the correspondences of that letter. (The magical ritual of the sanctum regnum, 1st and 12th chapter respectively)

So I think this is an implication that Westcott is hinting at the “true” (Golden Dawn) correspondence. That Mem = HUNG Man and that Aleph belonged to Fool. Again with the ARG tactics - he was part of the organisation that had been using them by now.

And… this is merely an aside. Confirmations of what we suspected. But… Isn’t this…convenient? That we can’t find the original? Oh well, let’s not worry about that right now.

So about that Cipher Manuscript

But this explains nothing about what was changed between Westcott and what was actually assigned to the Golden Dawn system. Because even these correspondences that he put forward in 1887 are NOT in the final and approved curriculum. And I don’t know why Westcott suddenly changed his attributions around 1887 and 1888. Is he saying he and his group discovered the real esoteric order hidden in the Tarot ? Are the attributions in the Isaiac Tablet a cover? That’s just a classic isn’t it. After all, Mathers also invoked Levi’s attributions uncritically while playing cute in 1888 about the esoteric undercurrent. It seems to be the same tactic - no wonder they were buddies.

To look at the origin of Golden Dawn attributes, we need to look at the Cipher Manuscript they obtained. It’s a small stack of folios written in English cipher (based on Polygraphiae of the Abbot Johann Trithemius ). It contains grades, rituals, curriculum, and very notably some sketches of Tarot trumps and the tables of attributions. It’s been deciphered by now and is available online: Hermetic.com, Golden Dawn Library

As a reminder, this is the document they’ve found that justified their new Order. Or so they claim. By now we have a solid evidence that the letters from the German Rosicruzian Anna Sprengel were a fucking fraud, a smoke screen, a justification, a providence giving blessing to open new order, which just keeps fucking happening doesn’t it. It has been watermarked as being from 1809, which doesn’t check out with it containing some details, such as proper Egyptian translations, which wouldn’t have been possible until the 1820 Rosetta Stone breakthrough. Ellic Howe (The Magicians Of The Golden Dawn) and Dummett&Decker (A History of the Occult Tarot) are the major critical examiners of this fraud. I only touch on some interesting bits because this essay is long enough and I recommend these books on the topic.

Hell, the fakeness of these documents was one of the parts that caused the Order to implode as its own members (of course it was Waite at first) noticed the fakeness.

Our two boys got it from a bloke called Woodford, who passed the documents to his mate Westcott before he died. There is even one note on it that deciphers to French, to perhaps suggest Eliphas Levi (Folio 46). Hey, remember how Crowley claimed that Levi had a proper attribution table in a private manuscript?

The Cypher translates into English, yet they came to me from a correspondent in France with a history that they had passed through Levi s hands and indeed a loose page among them has a note signed A.L.C. (Westcott’s note on the contact with Woodford on how he got these Manuscripts, *The Magicians Of The Golden Dawn, Suspect Documents)

So… we don’t even really know if he actually talked with the guy about it and both A History of the Occult Tarot and The Magicians of The Golden Dawn suggest that he very likely faked this correspondence as well.

On this copy Westcott wrote: ‘Mathers has original in the Box at the office.’

It is necessary to question even this apparently innocent statement, because in the absence of the original letter there is the possibility that the document might have been fabricated. (The Magicians Of The Golden Dawn, Suspect Documents).

Translator and Masonist Mackenzie was suggested as a source for these documents, the story goes, but I can’t find anything from him that would suggest anything about planets. He met Levi once, might have seen his original Tarot, showed interest in writing a book about Tarot which never came to be, but his Cyclopedia is genuinely a piece of sober writing. It openly says there is no connection between Kabbalah and Masonry for example. He might have had a different opinion on the Tarot, which is not really Masonic, but I can’t prove that. The Cyclopedia contains many Orders and their Grades and there is proof Westcott and Mathers yoinked that from him and his description of a certain Rosencruzian Order and used them for their Golden Dawn.

A History of the Occult Tarot shows proof that his manuscript on Tarot was abandoned and notes given to Mathers.

By December 1885 he had abandoned all intention to write a book on the Tarot, telling Westcott in a letter, ‘I am not at present writing about the Tarot. It was a projected work some years ago and fell through. I may perhaps resume it some day ... The subject is terribly intricate and I have not the same means of literary command I formerly possessed’. He added that he had given ‘Bro. Mathers’ (S.L. Mathers) a prospectus of the book. An important effect of Mackenzie's interest in the Tarot was to arouse that of Westcott in the subject. (A History of the Occult Tarot)

Prospectus is, however, a small description of the book, usually for the purpose of advertising, not enough to be 60 folios that are written in a weird cipher. You’re not sending that to your fucking publisher.

Howe ends his own description of the manuscript on a rather depressing note, which I see no reason to distrust:

It is impossible to deduce from the manuscript who made the summary notes of Ceremonies’ and this mystery may never be solved. (The Magicians Of The Golden Dawn, Suspect Documents)

So this is a document which, no one knows what to make something out of, with even every explanation being possible. Wikipedia has a nice list of all of them. Was it just the invention of Mathers and Westcott? Is it some form of Mackenzie’s notes? Is this material from the alchemy focused secret society - Society of Eight - and that’s where MacKenzie got it? What if its legitimate notes were found from some German Rosencruzians group? Theories, theories theories, which all give possibilities but don’t show me a clear way to discover what these men were thinking and who were they taking this from. Lost in the labyrinth of lies of generations of esotericists, I cry out to the sun streaking above as the Minotaur devours me like Kronos devoured his child.

The Foundation of Modern English Attributions

While tracking the influence behind Cipher Manuscript is a genuine hard wall for me, because these people don’t believe in citations, they believed in vibes, and knowing it was most likely falsified (Westcott and Mathers could claim they have a mother but I wouldn’t fucking believe them), it’s still the foundation of their rituals. This is the destination we have been waiting for, so let’s see what it says about Tarot cards.

On folio 32 we can see not only the first indication of the Fool as the first Card (0=1) we can also see the indication for another curious part of GD which is switching the Strength and Justice cards. Their new order produced…something. The switch clearly arises from the fact that there’s now a somewhat defendable visual zodiac sequence, however Strength and Justice clearly belong to the opposite zodiac sign as opposed to one they ended up with(having Lion and Scale you know). As such, this switch of cards was egalitarian, and also gave the narrative of restoring the original order from the veiled assignments.

From Page 51 onward we have a whole lecture on Tarot. There’s the classic explanation on the Qabbalah elements, the 3 elements, 7 planets and 12 signs. And in the following folio we can see all proper attributions now and the Strength and Justice not switched yet!

What follows in this lecture is exposition on how and why is the true order the opposite from what was intended. But even this is framed almost as a discussion and working through the problem, rather than ancient truth.

First cometh the numbered. The of the heavens = negative, then 1 = the opened out into a right light - the positive.

This is Zohar based justification for the order of the Majors being changed - it’s Kabbalistic cosmology. Fool comes first, because the Sefirot came from the Nothingness (extremely simplified).

These two numbers have corrupted Egyptian titles to the Mat. To the 1 patan these are maut - mother goddess, and Pekht = extension Maut of all extended through the universe extended and about the shoulders of that great goddess is nature in her exalted

I have no idea what 1 patan is. I saw another transcript of this that says a word closer to pagat, which is the Italian title for the Juggler. And this is possibly meant to say “0 to the Mat”, which is Italian Fool (there is a shape that looks like 0 there, if you look at the folio itself). The rest seems concentrated on the idea that Maut (Mat the goddess of justice) and Pekht (Pakhet, the lion goddess of hunt) have been transposed as a result of this reassignment. And how this is possibly justified because the Last card is just Maat again, but like the Universe in her extended aspect. (Shouldn't it be Nut?) It feels like defense of the Fool as aleph , like hey we didn’t fuck it up completely. Then -

Causeth a transposition, for these are cognate symbols, but at one time the sword of Justice was the Egyptian knife symbol of the sickle of Leo, while the scales meant the [Sun] having quitted the balance point of highest declination. To the female and the lion gave the idea of [Venus], Lady of [Libra] repressing the fire of Vulcan ([Saturn] in [Libra] exalted). But earliest was the lion goddess to [Leo] and Ma to [Libra] with her scales. And this is better. Also [Libra] was given to [Venus] and her is at one time."

Even if the Fool at the front causes a problem, there is an attempt to explain it away with some vague pointing towards equinox and astrology. This is interesting - it follows discussion on how to arrange the Tarot and comes towards resolution for rearrangement, after making a case for the original order. Almost as if the whole system is more flexible than it appears. Mathers knew of historical tarots, he mentions Grigoneur in his 1888 pamphlet, so he would know that they too changed orders between cards, as these cards moved regions. I suspect this would be his justification if push came to shove and he had to explain with the gun to the head.

But it’s the last few pages which have the real interesting bits:

The Fool is given air moveable and never permanent. The Juggler is the natural symbol of Mercury the god of tricksters and also the deeper knowledge. The High Priestess finds her nature in the [Moon]. Venus - Empress. [Aries] = Emperor. For in that sign is the Sun exalted and so on with the others in each shalt thou find its natural attribution

She finds her nature in the moon. I expected rigorous proof for every card. Something. Sefer Yetzirah callout at least. But this is just… using visuals to approve and prove the cards. Fucking CHRIST.

The Emperor gets a proof - Aries is a place in zodiac where the Sun is exalted (basically it really fucking loves being there and its impact is stronger). It’s a weird fucking proof that in my opinion vaguely points to the Cards as related to the paths on Tree of Life that they represent. Golden Dawn also assigned planets to Sefirot themselves. I suppose the Emperor's path is between Tifaret (Solar) and Chokmah. But then you have to wonder… if that’s the case. Why is High Priestess who corresponds to the path between Tifaret and Kether, fucking Moon? We know Mathers and Westcott more or less invented this new planetary order, the only thing that needed to be tinkered with.

There is a strong case to be made that their fundamental guiding force was the least amount of friction based on images. The proof is that Strength and Justice were switched on the account of the image alone.

The reason why I painstakingly traced the origins of Westcott’s attribution in his own Sefer Yetzirah, all exploded in this. I wanted reasoning - he showed he doesn’t give a fuck about it as a source. These assignments were simply shifted based on their needs and their proclaimed ancient order. There is likely nothing less and nothing more to it. But it’s worth it to say that Eliphas Levi, as I’ve painstakingly shown, did it too. The student has become the master.

It’s all fucking patchwork. There is no logic. Engage in Bacchanalia of chaos and orgies of wine.

My Capitulation

And now we have to go through the biggest problem of this whole section. We have limited knowledge of Golden Dawn’s Inner Circle. Or at least I don’t. Maybe someone out there got some documents, or something. Israel Regardie leaked a lot of documents on rituals and the books circulated in the Golden Dawn’s teaching in 1936. However, he was actually not even involved with the original Order, but in one of its spiritual descendants created by an original member. So, how far away are his notes from the original intent? Felkin, the man who created this organization after Golden Dawn imploded WAS in the so called Inner Order (remember he co-wrote Book T with Mathers), but we can’t tell how much he edited when he changed ships.

Not even Crowley got into the Inner Order properly, he got into right before it collapsed. Most of his attributions and Thelemic basis were based on his own work on correspondences and his own esoteric backing. Sure, something comes from the Order info he leaked more than once, but again, that’s not Inner Order material. So Thoth Tarot is out as a decent source!

What about Waite? He was in the Inner Order, but he was also primarily a Christian mysticism fan, who even briefly took over remnants of GD and removed everything that wasn’t meditation focused on that aspect. He then made his own group. His tarot, the damned fucking thing we see everywhere, is also pretty covert and contains a lot of shout-outs to the Golden Dawn teachings, such as the Strength-Justice switch, but not much else. His Pictorial Key is short on the details of the cards. So, we never really got much out of him.

It’s genuinely baffling to me that I can see Levi more clearly than one of the biggest sources of esoteric groups and thinking in the 20th century. Golden Dawn truly compressed the idea of taking it from your teacher, debunking it, taking it over as an esoteric tradition and made it into a factory of mass produced dickheads. And here is a problem - beyond that the lines get so confused and crossed between many people who wrote about, that I can’t keep up anymore. As such, I cut off my findings and research here. Perhaps unfairly. However, this reaches my limit. My research stops with Cipher Manuscript because to me that’s where the correspondences of Golden Dawn crystallized.

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