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9. There are twenty-two letters by which the I AM (YAH), the Lord of Hosts, Almighty
and Eternal, designed and created by three Sepharim (Numbers, Letters, and Sounds) His
universe, and formed by them all creatures and all those things that are yet to come.

10. When the Patriarch Abraham had comprehended the great truths, meditated upon
them, and understood them perfectly, the Lord of the Universe (the Tetragrammaton)
appeared to him, called him His friend, kissed him upon the head, and made with him a
covenant. First, the covenant was between the ten fingers of his hands, which is the
covenant of the tongue (spiritual); second, the covenant was between the ten toes of his
feet, which is the covenant of circumcision (material); and God said of him, "Before
Abraham bound the spirit of the twenty-two letters (the Thora) upon his tongue and God
disclosed to him their secrets. God permitted the letters to be immersed in water, He
burned them in the fire and imprinted them upon the winds. He distributed them among
the seven planets and gave them to the twelve zodiacal signs.

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Fundamentals of Qabbalistic Cosmogony

THE Qabbalists conceive of the Supreme Deity as an Incomprehensible Principle to be
discovered only through the process of eliminating, in order, all its cognizable attributes.
That which remains--when every knowable thing has been removed--is AIN SOPH, the
eternal state of Being. Although indefinable, the Absolute permeates all space. Abstract
to the degree of inconceivability, AIN SOPH is the unconditioned state of all things.
Substances, essences, and intelligences are manifested out of the inscrutability of AIN
SOPH, but the Absolute itself is without substance, essence, or intelligence. AIN SOPH
may be likened to a great field of rich earth out of which rises a myriad of plants, each
different in color, formation, and fragrance, yet each with its roots in the same dark loam-
-which, however, is unlike any of the forms nurtured by it. The "plants" are universes,
gods, and man, all nourished by AIN SOPH and all with their source in one definitionless
essence; all with their spirits, souls, and bodies fashioned from this essence, and doomed,
like the plant, to return to the black ground--AIN SOPH, the only Immortal--whence they
came.

AIN SOPH was referred to by the Qabbalists as The Most Ancient of all the Ancients. It
was always considered as sexless. Its symbol was a closed eye. While it may be truly said
of AIN SOPH that to define It is to defile It, the Rabbis postulated certain theories
regarding the manner in which AIN SOPH projected creations out of Itself, and they also
assigned to this Absolute Not-Being certain symbols as being descriptive, in part at least,
of Its powers. The nature of AIN SOPH they symbolize by a circle, itself emblematic of
eternity. This hypothetical circle encloses a dimensionless area of incomprehensible life,
and the circular boundary of this life is abstract and measureless infinity.

According to this concept, God is not only a Center but also Area. Centralization is the
first step towards limitation. Therefore, centers which form in the substances of AIN
SOPH are finite because they are predestined to dissolution back into the Cause of