Chokmah

Wisdom

The Second Path is that of the Illuminating Intelligence: it is the Crown of Creation, the Splendour of the Unity, equalling it. It is exalted above every head, and named by Kabbalists, the Second Glory.
The 2nd Path, the Illuminating Intelligence: The 32 Paths of Wisdom, trans. Westcott

Correspondences

Number: 2 of the ten
Meaning: Wisdom
Pillar: Pillar of Mercy (the white, active pillar, Jachin)
Triad: Supernal Triad
World: Briah, the Creative World (the Supernal Father)
Divine name (Atziluth): Yah יה
the first two letters of the Tetragrammaton, as in Hallelu-yah
Archangel (Briah): Ratziel רזיאל
Herald of the Deity, the angel of secrets, said to have given Adam the Book of Raziel
Angelic choir (Yetzirah): Auphanim אופנים
the Wheels of Ezekiel’s chariot, ‘full of eyes round about’
Mundane chakra (Assiah): Masloth מזלות
the sphere of the zodiac and the fixed stars; moderns sometimes add Uranus or Neptune
Colours: King: Pure soft blue · Queen: Grey · Prince: Pearl grey, iridescent · Princess: White, flecked red, blue and yellow
Magical image: A bearded male figure
Spiritual experience: The Vision of God face to face
Virtue: Devotion
Vice: None
Titles: Power of Yetzirah; Ab (the Father); Abba, the Supernal Father; Tetragrammaton’s Yod; the Beginning (Reshith)
Symbols: The lingam; the phallus; the standing stone; the tower; the uplifted rod of power; the straight line; the inner robe of glory
Tarot: The four Twos, and the four Knights (called Kings in the Golden Dawn’s Book T; Knights in both the Thoth and Waite decks)
In the body: The left side of the face (777); in the Zohar the brain’s right hemisphere, the source of the flash of insight
Part of the soul: Chiah, the life force and true will
Grade: Magus 9°=2□
Qliphoth: Ghagiel (Chaigidel), the hinderers, who cleave to outward appearance; arch-demon(s): Beelzebub
Gods (777): Egyptian: Amoun, Thoth, Nuit · Greek: Athena, Uranus · Roman: Janus · Hindu: Shiva, Vishnu (as Buddha-avatar), Akasha
Precious stone: Star ruby; turquoise
Plant: Amaranth
Animal: Man
Perfume: Musk
Magical weapon: The lingam; the inner robe of glory

In Jewish Kabbalah

Chokhmah is the first emanation that can be named. The Zohar reads the first word of Genesis, Bereshit, “in the beginning”, as “with Chokhmah”, since Proverbs 3:19 says “YHVH by wisdom founded the earth.” It is Abba, the Father, the partzuf (face) that in Luria’s system couples with Imma, the Mother, in Binah. Hasidic writers split the word into koach mah, “the potential of what is”: the flash of insight before any idea has taken form. With Binah and Da’at it forms the ChaBaD intellect of the Lubavitch school.

In the Golden Dawn and Thelema

The Golden Dawn calls Chokmah the Sphere of the Zodiac and places on it the Yod of the divine name: the first spark of force, still undirected. It heads the Pillar of Mercy. In 777 Crowley assigns it the Knights of the Tarot and the Twos, which he calls “the first manifestation of the Element in its essential force” (Two of Wands, Dominion). For Crowley Chokmah is the Logos, the Word, the masculine creative principle which in Thelema is the true will; the grade of Magus is the one who utters a Word that becomes the formula of an age, as Crowley believed he had with “Thelema.”

Dion Fortune

Fortune calls Chokmah “the great stimulator of the universe”, pure dynamic force which would dissipate into nothing if Binah did not receive and give it form. She stresses that the Supernal Father and Mother must be understood together; neither has meaning alone. Its virtue, devotion, is the outpouring of self towards its source, and since it is above the Abyss it has no vice.

Meditation

Knight’s Practical Guide suggests contemplating the zodiac as a whole, the rod or standing stone, and the grey of the Queen scale: the colour in which white and black, Kether and Binah, are mixed. The Vision of God face to face recalls Exodus 33, where Moses is told that no one may see the face of God and live, and Jacob at Peniel: “I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved.”

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
2 of Wands	Dominion	Lord of Dominion	Mars in Aries
2 of Cups	Love	Lord of Love	Venus in Cancer
2 of Swords	Peace	Lord of Peace Restored	Moon in Libra
2 of Disks	Change	Lord of Harmonious Change	Jupiter in Capricorn

The four Knights also belong here: the fiery, swift part of each element (Book T’s Kings). In the Waite deck: Knight of Wands, Knight of Cups, Knight of Swords, Knight of Pentacles.

Paths from Chokmah

Read further

Chokmah 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).