PLANETS TO TATTVAS — A SUPPLEMENT TO XII

By G. H. Frater D.D.C.F. (S.L. MacGregor Mathers)

In Flying Roll XII there appears Venus (Daleth) as Water of Earth.

The Planets are not Tattvas but have a sympathy with them. The Planets are not Elements but have a great sympathy with them.

Planets represent, for the most part, the compound action of the Elements with the Spirit. For the Spirit enters into their composition from their attributions not only to the Paths, but also to the Sephiroth. Here follows a Table of Attributions and correlations between Planets, Elements and Tattvas. The Elements may be in any proportion, but chiefly and better with the Element first mentioned preponderating in each case. Save in the case of Luna, the Akasha Tattvic symbol is not to be expressed, but Akasha represents the darkening aspect of the Spirit, that is, in a too neutral and negative sense.

Saturn	Spirit	Air	Earth	Earth of Air
Jupiter	Spirit	Fire	Water	Water of Fire
Mars	Spirit	Fire	Earth	Earth of Fire
Sun	Spirit	Fire	Air	Air of Fire
Venus	Spirit	Earth	Water	Water of Earth
Mercury	Spirit	Air	Water	Water of Air
Luna	Spirit	Water	Earth & Alchemical Mercury	Earth of Water

The Tattvas however, are not exactly the Aspects of the Spirits with the Four Elements, as we treat them. They almost coincide with these five forces in our Hermetic and Rosicrucian Scale of the Queen-the complete understanding of which comes later. They are powerful as representing the Natural Passive condition of the Forces and are, in a sense, dangerous; because, if ill understood and directed, their operation induces too passive a condition and one too subject to fatality.

Their roots are in the material reflections of the five forces in the Scale of the Queen in the Earth’s atmosphere; and they are more nearly material in their nature than those of the more active Scale of the King. Wherefore their forces are more easily perceivable materially, though less powerful in reality, than ours in the Scale of the King; because there is a certain mode of combination wanting in them which is present in our Scale of the King.

Used with the full knowledge of a Zelator Adeptus Minor, they are perfectly safe, because his knowledge supplies what is wanting in their teaching. Used by the uninitiated, they are dangerous, as quickly leading to a dangerously passive condition.