Chesed

Mercy (also Gedulah, Greatness or Magnificence)

The Fourth Path is called the Measuring, Cohesive or Receptacular Intelligence; and is so called because it contains all the Holy Powers, and from it emanate all the spiritual virtues with the most exalted essences: they emanate one from another by the power of the Primordial Emanation, the Highest Crown, Kether.
The 4th Path, the Measuring, Cohesive or Receptacular Intelligence: The 32 Paths of Wisdom, trans. Westcott

Correspondences

Number: 4 of the ten
Meaning: Mercy (also Gedulah, Greatness or Magnificence)
Pillar: Pillar of Mercy
Triad: Ethical Triad
World: Briah/Yetzirah: the first sephirah below the Abyss
Divine name (Atziluth): El אל
God, the Mighty One
Archangel (Briah): Tzadkiel צדקיאל
the Righteousness of God
Angelic choir (Yetzirah): Chashmalim חשמלים
the Brilliant or Shining Ones, from the chashmal, the ‘amber’ glow of Ezekiel 1:4
Mundane chakra (Assiah): Tzedeq צדק
Jupiter, Righteousness
Colours: King: Deep violet · Queen: Blue · Prince: Deep purple · Princess: Deep azure, flecked yellow
Magical image: A mighty king, crowned and throned
Spiritual experience: The Vision of Love
Virtue: Obedience
Vice: Bigotry; hypocrisy; gluttony; tyranny
Titles: Gedulah (Greatness, Magnificence); Love; Majesty; the Receptacular Intelligence
Symbols: The solid figure; the tetrahedron; the pyramid; the equal-armed cross; the orb; the wand, sceptre and crook
Tarot: The four Fours
In the body: The left arm (777; the Zohar gives Chesed the right arm)
Part of the soul: Ruach (with the four sephiroth below it, down to Yesod)
Grade: Adeptus Exemptus 7°=4□
Qliphoth: Gha’agsheblah (Gamchicoth), the smiters, who devour substance; arch-demon(s): Astaroth
Gods (777): Egyptian: Amoun · Greek: Poseidon, Zeus · Roman: Jupiter · Hindu: Indra, Brahma
Precious stone: Amethyst; sapphire
Plant: Olive; shamrock
Animal: Unicorn
Perfume: Cedar
Magical weapon: The wand, sceptre or crook

In Jewish Kabbalah

Chesed is loving-kindness, overflowing grace without limit. It is the first of the seven lower sephiroth, the first day of creation (“Let there be light”), and is identified with Abraham, who ran to welcome strangers into his tent (Genesis 18). In the Zohar’s image of the divine body it is the right arm. Unbalanced by Gevurah, unlimited kindness would drown the world; the Kabbalists say that God first tried to create the world with Chesed alone and then joined it to Din (judgment).

In the Golden Dawn and Thelema

Chesed is the sphere of Jupiter and the throne of the Masters: in Golden Dawn lore the Inner Order’s Third Order grades begin here, and the Secret Chiefs are said to dwell in Chesed. It is the highest point the Adept may reach while still holding to an individual self. In Crowley’s Thoth deck the Fours (Completion, Luxury, Truce, Power) show order, law and established rule, each one stable but liable to stagnate.

Dion Fortune

Fortune describes Chesed as the “organiser”: the benevolent king who builds and protects, the sphere of the Masters of compassion. Its symbol, the solid figure, is the first figure that takes up space, the abstract idea made concrete. Its virtue is obedience because the true king obeys the law he administers; its vices, tyranny and bigotry, are what happens when mercy is not held in check by justice.

Chesed and Geburah

Chesed and Geburah, Mercy and Severity, are the two arms of the Ethical Triad. Every school insists that they must balance in Tiphareth: Mercy without Severity becomes weakness and indulgence; Severity without Mercy becomes cruelty. Knight points out that Chesed builds up and Geburah breaks down, and the soul needs both.

In the Tarot

Each sephirah rules the four small cards of its number. From two to ten, each card is also one of the 36 decans of the zodiac, ruled by a planet in a sign, following the Golden Dawn’s Book T.

Card	Thoth title	Book T title	Decan
4 of Wands	Completion	Lord of Perfected Work	Venus in Aries
4 of Cups	Luxury	Lord of Blended Pleasure	Moon in Cancer
4 of Swords	Truce	Lord of Rest from Strife	Jupiter in Libra
4 of Disks	Power	Lord of Earthly Power	Sun in Capricorn

Paths from Chesed

Read further

Chesed on Wikipediaoverview of the Jewish and Hermetic sources
Sepher Yetzirah and the 32 Paths of WisdomW. Wynn Westcott, trans., 1887
The Kabbalah UnveiledS. L. MacGregor Mathers, from Knorr von Rosenroth’s Kabbala Denudata, 1887
Liber 777 RevisedAleister Crowley, 1909/1955
The Book of ThothAleister Crowley, 1944
The Golden DawnIsrael Regardie, ed., 1937–40
A Garden of PomegranatesIsrael Regardie, 1932
The Mystical QabalahDion Fortune, 1935
The Pictorial Key to the TarotA. E. Waite, 1910
The Tarot: A Key to the Wisdom of the AgesPaul Foster Case, 1947
A Practical Guide to Qabalistic SymbolismGareth Knight, 1965

Also in the background throughout: Gershom Scholem, Kabbalah (1974) and Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism (1941), for the Jewish tradition as historians understand it; Aryeh Kaplan, Sefer Yetzirah (1990); Kenneth Grant, Nightside of Eden (1977), for the Qliphoth; Robert Wang, The Qabalistic Tarot (1983).