THE 18TH PATH

   “The 18th path is the key to understanding one of the most basic divisions of the Tree of Life. On the path of ‘The Chariot,’ you are at the end of a cycle related to the higher self and are about to begin a new cycle related to the True Self, the divine core. In one division of the Tree of Life, the four lower spheres--Netzach, Hod, Yesod, and Malkuth--represent the lower, incarnated personality. The three spheres above, Chesed, Geburah, and Tiphareth, represent the higher self, or Individuality, which contains the essence of the experiences of the soul retained from its incarnations.
   “In the first cycle, you purify and dedicate yourself to the Great Work, attaining a heightened awareness of the higher self. In the second cycle, you pass through a veil, experiencing the kind of death and rebirth necessary to live in the higher self. In the third cycle, you experience reintegration of the soul and achieve harmony and balance. In the last cycle, you move through the highest veil, known as the Abyss, to the core of your being, the divine spark around which the individual soul has evolved, a state that is generally beyond brain consciousness and materialistic rationality. In fact, you experience the supernal triad of Kether, Chokmah, and Binah primarily through intuition since you have moved beyond the planes of form.”
   “Moving through the abyss beyond the planes of form sounds pretty scary.”
   “It is perhaps the most daunting challenge of all. When you reach this point, you are moving along the edge of a dark frontier. The path has two different meanings, depending on whether the charioteer is a warrior moving toward Geburah, or a knight on a quest for the holy grail, heading towards Binah. The knight wears armor as if going into battle and appears to be moving away from the enclosure of a fort or a city, but the path contains several oddities. First of all, the animals pulling the chariot are sphinxes, symbols of the combined elements, one white, one black, suggesting the polarity of the two pillars of the Tree of Life, and the sphinxes are resting, not pulling the chariot. The knight is standing in a cube of gray stone, symbolizing physical manifestation. Also, the reins are invisible. The emphasis is again on balance: the knight’s shoulder guards are moons with masks of human faces, one smiling, one grimacing. In the knight’s crown is an eight-pointed star, which represents higher awareness.”
   “This star is at the knight’s crown, suggesting knowledge of the divine spark, right?”
   “Yes, and depending which way the knight is moving on the path, he or she is either carrying that knowledge into manifestation or awakening that knowledge by moving toward greater spiritual awareness in what the Qabalists call the Neshamah.
   "Another way of looking at the Tree of Life also exists. Roughly, the divine Self is divided into three supernal spheres, the conscious self into five spheres, and the physical self into two spheres. Starting at the bottom of the Tree, you have the physical body, the aspect of the individual known in Hebrew as the ‘Guph,’ the shell that contains the self. The second part, known as ‘Nephesh,’ corresponds to the etheric body, the matrix of energy that is the foundation of the physical body. As you rise on the Tree, you find the different aspects of the conscious self known as the Ruach, associated with Hod, Netzach, Tiphareth, Geburah, and Chesed. Beyond that is Daath, which is not technically an Emanation but a bridge to the divine core. Then you find the three Emanations that correspond to the True Self: Binah, known as Neshamah and corresponding to the intuitions of the spirit; Chokmah, known as Chia and corresponding to the divine will; and Kether, known as Yechidah, which is the spiritual essence of the individual unified with ultimate Reality.”
   “So ‘The Chariot’ is a path that connects the conscious mind with the True Self?”
   “Yes, and the 18th path on one level helps you to understand form, especially in its relation to force, as you move to Binah, the abstract principle of form on the Tree of Life. Again, the Hebrew letter, the astrological sign, and the God name bear this out. First of all, the Hebrew letter Cheth, which means ‘fence,’ or ‘enclosure,’ is associated with this path. When ownership of animals was a primary source of wealth, the fence was extremely important in establishing the boundaries of what a person considered valuable in terms of belongings, suggesting the boundaries of the self. Also, of course, an enclosure is associated with a type of form. Cancer, the astrological sign, also relates to form in the sense of a shell encasing a crab, the way that the armor encases the knight. The God name for this path is EL, formed by the Hebrew letters Aleph and Lamed, and is associated, like the sign of Cancer, with the element of Water. Aleph, as you know, means ‘ox,’ and is associated with the great strength and potency of the life force, whereas Lamed means ‘ox-goad,’ and suggests the ability to channel that great power for a particular use.”
   “Is the God name more associated with force than form?”
   “Remember that this path connects Binah, the sphere of the root of form, with Geburah, the sphere of great discipline and limitation, on the Pillar of Severity, revealing how force is focused and channeled through the form, like the combustion within an engine that causes a machine to move. Without the discipline of form, force would remain free-moving and uncontained, its potential unmanifested and unrealized.
   “The 18th path is the connection of the Ruach with the Neshamah and as such channels the spiritual intuition into the conscious mind. Notice again, the association with Cancer, a Water sign, which suggests that each individual, like our friend the knight, is like a crab in a shell in a vast ocean of manifestation, the forms, in another sense, like waves that incessantly rise and fall and rise again. Binah, the great celestial Goddess, is associated with the ocean and the moon with its forever changing phases. You see, our friend the knight is not really moving, but is attentive to the voice of intuition, maintaining spiritual balance in a changing world.”
   “But should you always trust your intuition?”
   “That depends. If a person has not attained the consciousness of Tiphareth, intuition consists mainly of vague images and whisperings. Occasionally, you’ll think of a friend and that person will call you. But once you’ve opened up the higher consciousness, you also eventually open up a channel with the Neshamah, which gives you strong, reliable intuitions.
   “The knight might be moving down the path to Geburah, going to war, which suggests on one level that the conscious self within manifestation might contain conflicts that need to be harmonized for the highest good. Or the knight might be heading up to Binah on a quest for the holy grail, the cup holding extremely high spiritual energies. Either way, the knight on this path is feeling the influence of the True Self and is letting his or her star shine bright through the facets of manifestation.”

Reversed: lack of vision or direction, rash, reckless

CORRESPONDING COLORS
Atziluth: Amber.
Briah: Maroon.
Yetzirah: Rich bright russet.
Assiah: Dark greenish brown.