In the Sepher Yetzirah, the Alef is referred to as a breath of air which reconciles water and fire.
Yes, as I said, that is a system of 3 elements ... the same as is in the Tarot Trumps ... where there is no obvious Earth element ( that isnt a card doing 'double-duty')
“Now air is considered a reconciler between water and fire, which is why the Pillar of Mildness is attributed to air. Then Malkuth, which holds a sort of special status on the tree as being the receptacle of all the energies of those that came before, is attributed to earth, and earth is also the receptacle of the three other elements.”
And I dont say the above because of just what it says here ... there are many other examples from many traditions and examples in nature. I think that is a restrictive or 'only one way' of explaining it. When the three are set up (in the triangle) the triangle itself becomes Earth. Or, as sometimes depicted earth is a 'pendant' to it, or 'generated' from it (as in alchemical symbol for sulphur ). The other principle of three that is within it is that it generated from 1 in the first place so it still contains that ; 'Centrum in centri trigono ' - the eye in the triangle; “The World deluded by these Three Gunas does not know Me: Who is beyond these Gunas and imperishable.”
Its probably too obvious to mention but ... the top of the ToL has this symbol, it is then reflected upside down, then again to make a triple triplicity and Malkuth hangs like a pendant from the last triangle.
It looks like the arrangement in question
The four is something different again and here fire comes first , one set of 'workings' acts by the tarot arrangement : Fire water air earth ... but another (in the old Hermetic concept of Spheres and {in some respects} the modern one of 'specific gravity' - which are basically the same except the ancients saw the Earth as the centre {of everything and hence attraction} but nowadays we realise everything has a centre of attraction) arrangement is fire air water earth.
Four is as in this .... and ... seasonal attributions could relate to this (if not locality)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Four_elements_representation.svg
IMO the SENSIBLE ordering of the elements in different ways relate to different processes ... a bit like the variation in Egyptian God forms due to, not just time and locality but to describe variation of function (even though they are are all talking about the same thing) ... not that one is right or the other wrong eg; The Hermopolitan Ogdoad (manifesting in four pairs generated by duality) and the 'Solar Triad' (Sopdet, Ra, Khepri - in a downward triangle - a pair generates a unity) both seem to be an expression of the World of Manu and respectively describing Formation and Fluctuation. In the world of Aakhut the Memphite and Esna Triads ( both down triangles) : articulation and construction. Yet, following the model in the world of Rostau, the Heliopolitan Ennead (9) starts with 1 (Augmentation) and the Funerary Quarternary is (of course) 4 square and represents sublimation. Describing principles within the concepts of the World of Ament all are triangular relationships (upward pointing - generated from 1 , not a pair) ; Theban Triad - Differentiation, Initiatory Triad - Domination, Cyclic Triad - Separation . It's not as if one is wrong because it says Atum is the creator while in another part and time of Egypt it was Neit and Khnum.
I know the Australian Aboriginals have a similar system ... if one says Biame is the creator and another says it is Wallengie ( and both had totally different stories - ie. its not just a name variation) they dont say each is right or wrong ... many non-aboriginals dont get this ... we tend to see in black and white: right and wrong.
Anyway ... rave, rave ... perhaps in this case this was what the arrangement signified, assuming it was made with knowledge ( I think the aboriginals and Egyptians knew more about this (elemental ordering concepts) than us or even the Medieval Hermeticists.