„All is number.“
Pythagoras
„All is number.“
Pythagoras
The Principle of Numbers: A Short Guide to Number Symbolism
If every number is more than just a digit, if it also symbolically represents a philosophy of numbers, then the real question becomes: what message does each individual number express? That knowledge has nearly been lost today, and survives, at best, on the fringes of esotericism and numerology. But the principle behind numbers was self-evident to many of history’s great thinkers. Most of the scholars of the past we still admire today, the ones so many of our modern achievements are built on, understood the qualitative side of numbers. Not just Pythagoras, but Plato, Augustine, da Vinci, Goethe, Mozart, the Brothers Grimm, and even many directors of modern blockbusters, have all been believers in number symbolism.
Before diving deeper into this lost knowledge, here’s something important to know: numbers build on each other logically. Every number develops further from the one before it. It’s hard, for instance, to understand the number 5 without knowing what quality the number 4 carries. So it makes sense to work through these principles in order. The descriptions below are deliberately brief, meant to give you a first sense and a quick overview. If you want to understand more deeply how the principle of numbers shows up in the natural sciences, the humanities, and culture, take a look at the book Verlorene Weisheit.
Here’s where you can explore each individual number principle:
