☽ is the alchemical and astrological symbol for the Moon, representing silver, the metal of reflection, and the feminine, receptive principle. In Latin, Luna; in Greek, Selene; in Hebrew, Levanah. Its glyph is a crescent, depicting the moon in its waxing or waning phase, a symbol of cyclic change, intuition, and the subconscious.

Position on the Tree of Life

On the Tree of Life, the Moon corresponds to Yesod (Foundation), the ninth Sephirah, which lies at the base of the Pillar of Equilibrium. Yesod is the sphere of the astral plane, the receiver and transmitter of formative energies from the higher Sephiroth to Malkuth (the Kingdom). As the final station before the material world, the Moon governs reflection, illusion, and the hidden emotional currents that shape physical reality. The path connecting Yesod to Malkuth is associated with the letter Tau and the Moon (often called the "Earth of Yetzirah," the formative world).

Astrological and Planetary Correspondence

Astrologically, the Moon rules the zodiac sign Cancer, is exalted in Taurus, and is in its fall in Scorpio. It governs the night, the tides, the female menstrual cycle, and all matters of growth and decay. In natal charts, the Moon represents the personal unconscious, memory, habit, and the mother or nurturing figure. Unlike the Sun (which is individual will), the Moon is the collective emotional body, responsive and mutable. In alchemy, Luna is the fixed feminine counterpart to Sol (the Sun); together they produce the Philosophical Child. The metal silver is associated with the Moon’s reflective and receptive nature.

Historical Context

The Moon has been venerated since prehistory as a primary deity and timekeeper. In Mesopotamian tradition, Nanna (Sin) was the moon god, whose three phases (waxing, full, waning) corresponded to the divine triad of heaven, earth, and the underworld. In Egyptian mythology, Thoth (initially a lunar deity) regulated the calendar and restored the Eye of Horus (the moon) after its dismemberment by Set—a myth encoding the moon’s phases. For the Greeks, Selene drove her chariot across the night sky, later syncretized with Artemis (the huntress, virgin goddess) and Hecate (the dark moon, sorcery). Roman Luna presided over childbirth and the lunar month; her temple on the Aventine Hill dated to the 6th century BCE.

In Hermetic and Neoplatonic thought, the moon was the sphere of generation and corruption, a boundary between the immutable celestial realms and the mutable sublunary world. The soul was said to descend through the planetary spheres, receiving faculties; at the lunar sphere, it acquired the capacity for growth and bodily form. Medieval grimoires (e.g., the Key of Solomon, Picatrix) prescribed lunar hours for rituals involving emotions, dreams, travel over water, and the acquisition of treasure. The Emerald Tablet’s dictum “Its father is the Sun, its mother the Moon” identifies the Moon as the passive material substrate in the Great Work—silver, the matrix that receives the solar seed.

In modern Thelema and ceremonial magic, the Moon is the gateway to the astral light, the seat of the image-making faculty that must be purified before crossing the Abyss. Crowley’s Liber 777 places Yesod (the Moon) at step 18, a path that unites the foundation with the material world. The practitioners of the Golden Dawn invoked the Moon to enhance clairvoyance, to harness the tides of emotion, and to contact the elemental spirits of water.

In Liber 777 (Step 18)

At step 18 (Path 18, Tau), the table of Planets ruling Column CXXXVII gives the Moon (☽) as the governing influence. This placement aligns the number 18 (Chai, “life” in Hebrew) with the lunar sphere, emphasizing the transformative power of the receptive, formative force that underlies all manifest existence. The Moon at this step rules the path that connects the astral foundation to the physical world, making it a key node in the network of correspondences that binds the macrocosm to the microcosm.