Who are the Sefirot?

(Excerpt from Colt's Guide to the World of Dragon Metal)

Name origin: The Sefirot is the name of the Tree of Life in the Kabbalah.

Summary: Arguably the oldest of the Three Great Schools of Magic, the Sefirot believe they are magic’s chosen practitioners. They have no central leadership organization, and instead, are divided into different Houses. Each House has a leader called a Sage and a spiritual advisor called a Tzadik. A single House, the Kedushah, serves as the militant arm of all the Sefirot.

Beliefs: The Sefirot believe magic is channeled into our world through the Ten Emanations (also called the Tree of Life, the blueprint of creation). These emanations form the core construct of our reality, as well as the core construct of the human soul. Magic is continually flowing into our world, creating it, moment by moment, as the energy within our souls returns that flow. This belief is problematic now that the mortal world is cut off from the Magical Source (the “Veiling”). The flow to and from the Ten Emanations is blocked and/or severed. Broken. 

Primary Magic Type: 

• Before the Veiling, most Sefirot practitioners used alchemical magic. To understand the flow of magic was to understand the flow of the universe, which opened the door to alchemy, the art of manipulating, altering, deconstructing, and/or reconstructing matter. Alchemy allowed the Sefirot to work toward gaining a greater understanding of magic and its relationship with the mortal world.

• With the Ten Emanations broken, magic can’t flow into this world, and the Sefirot cannot practice true alchemy. Instead, they practice crude forms of alchemy using blood rituals, experiments, and Relics that weave alchemical spells.

Vibes: Outwardly, Sefirot members pose as Kabbalistic study circles, private libraries, philanthropic heritage societies, and fancy country club organizations. In truth, their inner halls are filled with vats, furnaces, chains, and laboratories of Relics and blood.

Symbols: The symbol of the Sefirot is a ten-point-star polygon, representing the Ten Emanations, typically gold against a field of purple. Sefirot imagery also includes the Kabbalah Tree of Life, alchemy symbols, and the Seal of Solomon.

Sefirot Houses

The Sefirot is divided into Houses, some more powerful than others. The Great Houses are the most influential, once seen as the Pillars of the Sefirot. Each is aligned with one of the Ten Emanations, but most have become twisted reflections of the Tree of Life.

1. House Keter (“Crown”): 

• Alternate name: The Maggid’s Throne

• Symbol: A blinding white circle behind a crown of ash. 

• Vibes: The most fervent believers of the Sefirot’s divine authority and absolute vision. A despotic theocracy; claim to see and understand the hidden paths of creation.  

• Function: No single House leads the entirety of the Sefirot. But House Keter tries. They issue decrees and attempt to “mediate” disputes between other Houses. 

2. House Chokhmah (“Wisdom”): 

• Alternate name: The Forge of Sparks

• Symbol: A single burning spark. 

• Vibes: Raw, chaotic insight, like fire. 

• Function: Weapons labs, obsessed with unstable Relic experimentation and explosive alchemy.

3. House Binah (“Understanding”): 

• Alternate name: Black Scripts

• Symbol: An open black book with white letters, bleeding. 

• Vibes: Structure, order, and containment. Often work in labs that resemble slaughterhouses, but for tomes instead of animals--ink mixed with blood, parchment made of skin.  

• Function: Writing grimoires and war doctrine; restructuring mystical knowledge into strategies for control. 

4. House Chesed (“Mercy”): 

• Alternate name: The Flesh Vats

• Symbol: A chalice overflowing with red liquid.

• Vibes: Once believed in mercy, love and generosity. Now, they believe that “mercy” means removing weakness. 

• Function: Flesh alchemy labs. Grafting flesh and bone to clay golems, perfecting grotesque extensions of life, and experimenting with flesh donors.

5. House Gevurah (“Strength”): 

• Alternate name: The Iron Tribunal

• Symbol: A bloodied sword balanced on scales.

• Vibes: Discipline, judgement, and strength. 

• Function: Policing the enemies of the Sefirot, as well as enemies within the other Sefirot Houses. They re-forge failed golems and torture traitors as part of ritualistic purges. 

6. House Tiferet (“Beauty”): 

• Alternate name: The Living Icons

• Symbol: A radiant starburst, cracked. 

• Vibes: Harmony and beauty…twisted into idolatry. 

• Function: Manufacturing perfect/beautiful golems meant to inspire awe, draped in ritual garments, treated like holy statues. But inside, they are unstable, monstrous idols.

7. House Netzach (“Victory”): 

• Alternate name: The Breeding Pits

• Symbol: A vertical ladder made of bone rungs.

• Vibes: Endurance, strength above all.

• Function: Running breeding programs, dark barracks where children are raised like livestock, refined, generation after generation, trained as soldiers. 

8. House Hod (“Glory”): 

• Alternate name: The Mask-Bearers

• Symbol: A hollow mask of gold.

• Vibes: Splendor and deception. Elite assassins, operatives, and manipulators. 

• Function: Fusing masks--Relics with various powers and abilities--to their members' faces, giving them unnatural powers.

9. House Yesod (“Foundation”): 

• Alternate name: The Crucible

• Symbol: A black circle with white veins.

• Vibes: Engineers of life.

• Function: Binding Relics to golems in unique ways, to create the most powerful golems in all the Sefirot.  

10. House Malkhut (“Kingdom”): 

• Alternate name: The Veil Bearers

• Symbol: A cracked mask, half in shadow, half in light.

• Vibes: Illusionists, reality weavers, mirrors.

• Function: Controlling perception--rewriting events, erasing memories, cloaking slaughter in glamour.  

The Kedushah: Not one of the Ten Great Houses, but the most feared, the military arm of the Sefirot. 

• Symbol: a circle around two interlocking triangles that form a six-pointed star, a variant of the Seal of Solomon. Before the earth was cut off from the Magical Source, the center of each star had a different symbol to denote the type of magic used by its wearer. Now that no one can channel magic directly anymore, the center of each emblem is left empty.

• Vibes: Cloaked in secrecy and zealotry. War is holy. Respected but resented; the other Houses depend on the Kedushah but fear its zeal. To the Kedushah, battle is sacrament--armies are choirs, golems are vessels of psalm, and slaughter is prayer.

• Function: The Ten Great Houses lend various levels of support to the Kedushah, and in return, the Kedushah use golems, Relics and assassins to wage war. Some Houses pay in favors to win Kedushah sanction; others keep their distance, fearing the day the Kedushah declares a crusade against them.

• Organization: No Sage or Tzadik. Led by Sar Qadosh, the Holy Commander. A Maskil, the Enlightner, serves the Sar Qadosh as an adviser. 

• Greatest support from the Ten Great Houses: 

  • House Chokhmah provides specialty weapons and Relics.

  • House Binah provides grimoires and war doctrine.

  • House Chesed provides flesh golems.

  • House Hod provides assassins.

  • House Netzach provides soldiers.

  • House Yesod provides specialized golems.

End Entry