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[DRAFT COPY ONLY]

On The Symbology of the NUR Calligram
by Hieronymus Vivant

The Symbolique of Calligraphic Forms


In every word shine many lights Zohar, III, 202a

The following exposition is a hermeneutic of a symbol brought to the attention of the NUR group
through shear revelation upon one of its members
1
. To understand this calligram we must fathom the
ultimate raison dtre of the iconography. This sigil is not an sthetic but rather a supernatural
influence. It represents, not only the mechanisms of our groups aspirations but also the structure of
the universe as emanated from above to below. Since the symbol is constructed of letters of the
Arabic alphabet we will be dealing with an alphabetic science known to the Muslim esotercists as ilm
al-harf (science of the letters) and we shall also be drawing quite heavily upon the two other
Abrahamic traditions, Namely the gematria of the Kabbalists and the Logocentrism of Christianity,
whereby the world, as created by the Word, resolves itself in text.

Letter mysticism proposes a hierophanic alphabet as a mediating principle between both extremes of
the emanationist spectrum. As mental compositions, letters represent an acoustic phenomena and so
they participate in the structure of our world. The Greek term stoicheia refers to letters and elements
as a single atom whereby permutations of letter combinations are reflected as indefinite aspects of
universal configurations. The Pythagoreans believed that a musica universalis was responsible for the
creation and maintenance of the cosmos. Each of the planetary spheres is ascribed a unique pitch
with which, together, they orchestrate a harmonious symphony that resonates throughout space and
time influencing everything from biology and seasons to the human soul.

The 16
th
Century Kabbalist Moses Cordovero states that, in its innermost essence, the Torah is
composed of Divine letters, which are configurations of Divine light and that only in a process of
materialization do these letters combine in various ways. This diminution of light into script is

Incomplete @ NOV 2007

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This revelation was given shortly after partaking in an entheogenic operation using a South American sacrament known as
Ayahuasca. Since then, this calligram has never stopped bearing revelation.
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known to the Kabbalists as the 'Language of the Branches', which is a complex system whereby
corporeal branches stem from spiritual roots. In order to explain the structure of the spiritual root,
Kabbalists use physical names, appellations and predicates in order to elevate their meanings from
literal (peshat) and allegorical (remez) to anagogia so the outer fact (maaseh) reveals a hidden meaning
(sod).

The creative power of the Deus absconditus unfolds through Divine emanations known as the sephiroth
and as it does, it is revealed as attributes known under the aspects of Divine Names. These Names
are the essential signatures of God, and carried with them His power (0) and operation
(rr). Through these Names comes the possibility of deification (r) by means of
communicated energies and condescending theophanies. The Divine Names are innumerable, so the
nature which they reveal remains nameless and unknowable, yet it is by unions (r) and
distinctions (ol) that we come to know our God. Though remaining inaccessible in His
essence, God is self-revealed in the Divine Names.

With this in mind it becomes apparent that words are not stagnant at all, but filled with potential life.
Words of God are those ideas that can be expressed by art and this is the case in art forms such as
calligraphy. Form determines shape and in this way art is not merely the vagaries of human reverie,
but an imitation of eternal realities. The role of the artist is to grasps the primordial truth, to make the
ineffable audible, to enunciate the primordial Word. Holy images express things in themselves
invisible, and render them present, visible and active. An Icon does not simply exist to direct our
imagination during our prayers. It is a material centre in which there reposes an energy, a Divine
force which unites itself to human art. Having done this, we can transmute the graphically inanimate
into a liturgical symbol.

The lettering of calligraphic script form an intimate relationship through points, lines, angles, curves
and planes amalgamated into shapes, positions, directions and intervals that eventually articulate
consonants, vowels and finally words. Calligraphy should rouse a sense of movement in the same
manner rhythm articulates music for both arts share a dynamic which separates logic from its
rationality and its rhetoric. Islamic calligrams have been popular in Turkey, Persia and India from the
17
th
century onward and they are created by the interweaving of written words into
anthropomorphic figures, zoomorphisms and other stationary representations using either a Quranic
verse or one of the Divine Names.
By virtue, the NUR calligram is a Tughra (insignia), in that it discloses regal authority. Geometrically
our sigil is more akin to a Muthanna emblem. A Tughra is a unique calligraphic seal favoured by
Ottoman royalty whereas the Muthanna (Arabic for 'doubled') is the technique of mirroring a
pictorial design in which the composition on the left reflects the composition on the right. As will be
seen, our logo is a balance of temporal authority and spiritual influence.
Geometric principles play an essential role in Arabic calligraphy. The legibility of a text and the
beauty of its line require rules of proportion. According to Arab calligraphers, the proportions of the
characters always remain in a constant relationship: they all refer back to the size of alif, the first letter
of the Arabic alphabet. Alif is taken as the module of every Arabic calligraphic system; this choice
and method are due to religious and mystical concepts, to which we will return.




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In Arabic the rhombic impression formed by the pressing of the tip of the pen to paper forms the
universal unit of proportion, the point or dot (nuqta). The length of the alif varies according to a dot-
matrix arrangement which measures out the vertical stroke by a series of ink-blotches.
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The
calligrapher then establishes the dimensions that compose the characters and proportions them with
consistent graphic symmetry according to these three elements; the width of the dot, the height of the
alif, and the diameter of the circle. Thus, the alif is used to measure the diameter of an invisible circle
within which all Arabic letters can be written. In all the Divine Names, and hence in all elements of
language, the alif remains the innermost principle as the 'balancing index of the scales'.
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Once the stage is set by the initial alif, the other characters come into play. Every letter of the Arabic
alphabet is said to be a contorted variant of the straight line of alif, and each of these mutated figures
has a crown, mid-rift and tail. This is paralleled in Kabbalah, where the letters are also comprised of a
head (rosh), inside (toch) and end (sof). With these three distinctions of each letter are three types of
dots (nekudot).
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Each letter acts as a vessel (kli), while the nekudah is the light (ohr) that fills them. If the
nekudah is above a letter, it symbolizes a light in potentia of entering a vessel. If the nekudah is within
the letter, then it is light which has entered the vessel, whilst a nekudah that is below the letter is a
light that has exited the vessel. This is a vital factor in the understanding our NUR calligram, because
the placement of the nekudot speaks only of a spiritual quality of the letters personality (partzuf).
Each character of the alphabet carries a tremendous amount of information in its shape. This
information is indicative of the motion of spiritual events. When a Kabbalist operates with letters, it
does not mean he plays arbitrary puzzles or word games, it means he executes spiritual actions.
When he pronounces a word, he expresses his feelings in each letter; they register in his mystical
intentions (kavvanah) and verbalize the spiritual level of his own partzuf. Those who have an ear; let
them hear. Fiat Lux!


An example of a how letters (otiot) represent vessels (kelim) and their vowel-points as light. The
taamim is the savor of the light as it pervades from head (rosh) to the belly (tabur) and forms the
vessel. The nekudot are the lights that animate the vessel and transmutate the parztufim. The glowing
nostalgia (reshimot) remaining in the body (guf) after the expulsion of the light is called tagin.


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The width of an alif is equivalent to one dot whilst its height varies from three to twelve dots depending on the author and the style
of the script. The importance of establishing the height for each text is critical. Once the calligrapher had chosen his alif module, he
would apply it consistently throughout text. For example, in naskhi script the alif is five dots high, whilst the letter b is seven dots
wide and two dots for each of its serifs. In thuluth script, the alif measures nine dots and the top of the character has a crochet of three
dots, whilst the length of the b is either fifteen or eleven dots according to the two ways in which it can be written. When a letter is
partly curved, it must be based on the arc of a circle of a given dimension, which is predetermined by the diameter of the alif standard.
The Splendor of Islamic Calligraphy, Abdelkebir Khatibi & Mohammed Sijelmassi, p.???
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Sepher Yetzirah 2:1
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The nekudot positioned above the head of a Hebrew letter is called Holam. The middle nekudot within the letter is Named shuruk
and the lower nekudot place under the letter is called Hirik. The Science Of Kabbalah, Rav Yechuda Ashlag, p.315
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- Nuqta -

The inwardness of the letters lay in the inks mystery. - Dwn al-Haq q, Abd al-Ghani an-Nbulus

Now that we have outlined our approach to the Divine language in calligraphic forms, I would like
to open up the kernel and reveal an arcane seed planted within. The primal Point (nuqta-i-l) in
occultation before the manifestation of itself as alif. Its secret lies in the dramaturgy of the Deus
absconditus;

[INSERT ARABIC SCRIPT AND RELEVANT SURAT #]
I was a hidden Treasure and I yearned to be known.
Then I created creatures in order to be known by them.

The Point and the ink are interchangeable as symbols, in that writing is made up of a series of points
of ink, as we have outlined. To the Kabbalists it is 'the first head that cannot be perceived' (reshah de lo
is yada) which is not subject to the limitation of being defined. To the Sufis, the nuqta is the secret of
the essence, which is the 'Oneness of Perception' (Wahdat ash-Shuhd). Although the letters are its
qualities; the quality does not encompass the essence. It is the state of utterly impenetrable mystery,
where there is neither separation nor union and yet the Point is the symbol of Unity in which is
produced the concentration whence light emanates. It is the principle of the spatial extent that exists
only by its radiation. In its state of 'void', it is nothing but pure virtuality which can only develop by
first duplicating itself. From this unoriginated primordial principal that there proceed the lights of
the flames that then become separated from their origin and, in their differentiation increasingly
removed from it to form the alif in Arabic.

- Alif -

There is nothing on the table of my heart but my loves tall alif. What can I do? My master taught no other letter. - Hafiz

Alif is the First Manifestation, the 'One Who Alone Is' (Whid al-Wujd). Its upper-point is the secret
of secrets (sirr al-asrr) because it is the angle of angles (rukn al-arkn) and at its summit the clef de
vote of our mystery. Since the Point is without extension, the alif is what is called 'firstness'. The
appearance of the alif from the Point was not caused, but rather, the Point overflowed with it as an
outward urge of the Points hidden treasure-hood. The alif is none other than the Point itself which is
an eye
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that wept the sadness of its vertigo in solitude (ahdya) as a drop gushing forth. From its
downpour it was Named alif.
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5
In many manuscripts of the Quran the hamzah on an initial alif is indicated by a large dot. A hamza is orthographically
and phonetically related to the ayn and the letter ayn is also the term for 'eye', in both Arabic and Hebrew. In Aramaic,
having the same meaning, it is actually the shaped as a circle: O

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The alif can also be likened to la lance qui saigne (the bleeding lance) dripping the blood of redemption into the chalice of
the Eucharist. This is the same spear that was used to pierce Christs side and open up the nekudot she ba lev (point in the
heart). This wound often takes the shape of the yd and the significance of the Point penetrated is found in the parables of
the mustard seed.


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The Point is without extension; yet for spatial extension to exist, there must be two points. If spatial
manifestation disappears, all points situated in space are resorbed into the single principle point,
since there is no longer any distance between them. It is this distance between them that constitutes a
third element which expresses the relationship between the two points, by at once joining and
separating them. Though only one degree distant from the Point together they form the alif :



Alif is a silent consonant and to the Kabbalists, aleph represents a breath of air. As the Point seeks
companionship it breathes a 'Sigh of Compassion' (Nafas Rahmn). In His silent emptiness above-
Being, the God who is not (0 c ) seeks to possess a positive foundation in Attributes, and so
his moving exhale establishes the first letter of the alphabet, by which other letters are formed
eventually to express His qualities in Divine Names (asm ilhya). We know the Divine Names only
as Attributes and it is through them that we recieve knowledge of ourselves as God describes himself
to us through ourselves. The term Ilh (Hebrew Eloha) is from the root wlh connoting to be sad, to be
overwhelmed with grief, to sigh towards, to flee fearfully towards. Wilh, is the Divine Name
meaning sadness. He is a pathetic God, a suffering and passionate God. The Nafas Rahmn is the
release of the Wilh sympathizing with the Divine Attributes and the nostalgia of the Names is the
anguish of the Theos agnostos crying his tears from occultation.

The alif is the herald of the alphabet, which in turn is the announcer of the Divine Names through
which is born a relationship between man and God in o (sym-pathesis). This fundamental
basis is why and how God is affected by human events and feelings and reacts to them in a very
personal way. Both man and God are 'with suffering' and so their pathos spontaneously gives rise to
their tropos. God turns towards man in an act of anthropotropism and man ultimately turns towards
God and inaugurates a constant reciprocity between Divine anthropopathy and human theopathy. If
we know sadness, he cried it first. If we know laugher he laughed it first. This relationship is only
possible through the pure act of Intelligence as the First Consequent, the First Caused (al-malt al-
awwal), the Primordial Originated (al-Mubda al-awwal).

The intellection (taaqqul) that the First Principle has of itself is the Intelligence (Aql, Nos), which is
the intellection that the First Being intelligizes of itself as it is also a procession out of itself. Thus; the
First Intelligence intelligizes its own Principle of which it is itself the intellection, the thought, and
thus it intelligizes itself as thought, by the First Being.
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Its own intelligization from primal Point
(nuqta-i-l) to secondary point (nuqta thn) forms a ternary rhythm from beginning to end, whereby
the intelligization of itself is the third factor and also the relationship between the two points, as we
have already mentioned above.







7
Avicenna and the Visionary Recital, Henry Corbin, p.61
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In review, the monad is set in motion in virtue of its richness; the dyad is surpassed (for the deity is
above matter and form) and the triad contains itself in perfection, for it is the first to surpass the
composition of the dyad. In other words; 'two' is the number that separates and 'three' is the number
which transcends all separation.
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This ternary rhythm is a process that continues from intellection to
intellection unceasingly.
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From the first threefold theophany of itself proceeds a second ternary of
intellection resembling the first. The second o becomes the first Animae Coelestes of the Angelic
hierarchy.

Each Intelligence holds the same relation to the Intelligence from which it proceeds as is held to it by
the Intelligence that in turn proceeds from it, and the relation is repeated from degree to degree; each
level being both a median and a mediating position and exemplifies a twofold relation to the degree
that precedes and the degree that follows it. Each Soul is at once turned towards their Angel and is
occupied with drawing its heaven into the motion of its desire. Each Angel-soul stands to the Active-
Intelligence in the relation described, which is repeated and exemplified with each dyad. That is,
every precedent (sbiq) stands to his successor (tl) in the same relation as the Nos to the psyche
(soul). Each is the sbiq of his tl. These are the souls two intellective powers (intellectus
contempaltivus and intellectus practicus) and their syzygy will be dealt with later when we talk about
the dual function of the b.
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- B -
I see nothing without the b written into it - ???

In Hebrew the letter bt (=2) indicates two things joined together Namely two points, one shrouded
in mystery, one capable of being revealed.
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And this is exactly where alif communcicates itself to b.
As we have seen, the first emanation from God is the Universal Intellect as alif. The second is the
Universal Soul as b. They are bound by the Universal Spirit. Where alif ends, b begins. The b is the
'Ultimate Manifestation', after which comes the rest of the letters. This 'Supreme Spirit of Being' is
none other than the 'Universal Man' who contains the whole Universe.
12
The letter b comes at the
origin of being, and its esoteric secret makes it a symbol of the First Existence designated as the
Reality of Realities (Haqqat al-Haqiq).










From alif to b there is a transition from active to passive: the masculine I knocked down as feminine
_. The alif who once stood upright now undergoes a 'Fall' by taking on the form of b. For example, if

8
However, in the spiritual dimension our threefold number which serves for calculation here is not subject to
quantitative increase and so the formula (3 = 1) is applicable in the same way the Christian Trinity operates.
9
Avicenna and the Visionary Recital, Henry Corbin, p.61
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The second and third sephiroth, Hochmah and Binah are conceived as forming a unity with the first, Keter which is
symbolized by the aleph which contains the bt as one of its legs. The twofold ternary created by alif and b are united in a
single ternary and this is why together they have the gematria of 3 and spell the word Ab (Father), together they are
contained in the 'dot beneath the b'. These things will be treated shortly.
11
Zohar p.32
12
A Moslem Saint of the 20
th
Century by Martin Lings
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one lay the alif down and curved up its two ends, it would gain the boat-like shape of the b; which
acts as a receptive matrix whose impregnation results in the nn
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As the alif is comprised of two points and a mediating principle in the vertical, so the same can be
said for b in the horizontal. Between them they form two ternaries and yet together they form one
ternary. This conundrum is to be found in a coincidentia oppositorum between alif and b where they
share a sympathetic mirror that allows mediation between their principles. This paradox is made clearer
when the tail of alif is placed at the head of b to reveal a configuration that resembles the Arabic lm. Lm is
the letter most associated by term L, meaning 'Not'. The union of alif & b hold the key to the interaction
between being & non-being.
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As can be seen in this diagram, the trinity is made manifest from three points: The head of alif, the tail
of b and their meeting point at the tail of alif and the head of b and each individual letter is also
composed of a threefold division (head, body, tail). But where the nuqta is placed above alif it falls
beneath the b, since the things of the lower worlds are manifestations of the Point. Now that his is
clear, it must once again be pointed out that the word Ab in both Arabic and Hebrew is the Divine
Name meaning 'Father'
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who can be geometrically represented in Holy Trinity by forming a triangle
using alif and b:


BIBLIOGRAPHY:

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Both these characters are related by the passivity of their shape, only differing in the placement of the nuqta whose principle of
virility rises anew by yet another mediating 'third phase' in the form of pure and transcendent activity capable of inducing a rebirth;
which is a return to verticality after the seed is sown in the womb.
14
In Kabbalah the negatively existent Absolute Being is also called the 'Not' and is represented by the Hebrew Ayin,
whose character is virtually identical to the to the Arabic L, .
15
A Moslem Saint of the 20
th
Century, Martin Lings, p. ???
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- BIBLIOGRAPHY
incomplete


The Splendour Of Islamic Calligraphy

by Abdelkebir Khatibi & Mohammed Sijelmassi

Thames and Hudson Ltd
London, UK
1995

A Moslem Saint of The 20
th
Century

by Martin Lings

George Allen & Unwin Ltd.
London, UK
1961


Al-Kimia: The Mystical Islamic Essence of the Sacred Art of Alchemy

by John Eberly

Sophia Perennis
New York, US
2005

Fundamental Symbols: The Universal Language of Sacred Science

by Ren Gunon

Quinta Essentia
Cambridge, UK
1995


Temple and Contemplation

by Henry Corbin

Kegan Paul
??????
9

The Hermetic Tradition: Symbols & Teachings of the Royal Art

by Julius Evola

Inner Traditions International
Vermont, US
1995

A Dictionary of Angels: Including the Fallen Angels

by Gustav Davidson

Free Press
?????
1994
The Original Tetragrammaton

by ?????

Free Press
?????
1994
On the Kabbalah and its Symbolism

by Gershom Scholem

Schocken Books Inc.
New York, US
1996












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APPENDIX


The Emanation of Alif to B via ternary movement




The birth of al-nuqta from B via ternary movement
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The geometrical relationship of alif & b (Ab) to Lm & Nn




The emanation of al-nuqta through alif & b to nn related to the Tetragrammaton



The schema of ABN to the dualing of Platonic Solids; with the Kabah (Cube) & Lapis (Octahedron)
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16
The dot at the centre of the dualing Platonic solids is al-nuqta and in the Kabbalistic Tree scheme it holds the position of
Daat. According to Chabad tradition Daat (Knowledge) is the union of Hochmah (Wisdom) and Binah (Understanding). In
this schema, Keter (Crown) holds the position at the head of alif, Hochmah on the head of b, Binah on the tail of b and
Daat is the dot beneath the b. This dot, then, is the union of all three of the upper sephiroth and so the centre of the six
directions of space contains the YHV (cube as Abba) and the AMSh (occtahedron as Imma). The interiortity of Daat
undergoes a 'Fall' to become Malchut, who is its exterior aspect. More on this to come!