The snooty elitism of wine snobs is well-known. Much of their recondite vocabulary speaks of properties that apply to anything but fermented grapes. To be fair, I have come to the conclusion that some red wines do present the fanciful and not-entirely-agreeable sensory impression of "raisins" or the slightly more desirable "black currants" in both … Continue reading Cartomantic Snobbery?
Tarot Opinion
A Star to Steer By
Old wine in new bottles . . . Those of you who have been reading this blog for a while will no doubt have noticed that I tend to recycle certain ideas that have become almost axiomatic for me, and I trot them out whenever the occasion warrants it. There are a couple here but … Continue reading A Star to Steer By
“It Is Known”
C.S. Lewis observed that history books written during the Middle Ages differed far less from the historical fiction of that time than modern histories differ from present-day historical novels (or, even more so, screenplays). He pointed out that the proper role of the Medieval historian was to accurately perpetuate the "knowledge" received from earlier authorities … Continue reading “It Is Known”
Transitional Cards
I use two different numerical models in my work with the minor (or "pip") cards of the tarot: the Pythagorean sequence that exhibits an increasingly complex geometric progression, and the Qabalistic numeration based on the descent of the sephiroth on the Tree of Life. Both explain the emergence of formless "archetypal energy" from a primal … Continue reading Transitional Cards
Like Night and Day
It's probably evident that I'm getting a lot of intellectual stimulation and pleasure (not to mention expository mileage) out of reading The Discarded Image by C.S. Lewis, a thoughtful, scholarly study of Medieval cosmology that has intriguing implications for the Renaissance tarot. Here is another instance. At one point Lewis mentions that "night" in our … Continue reading Like Night and Day
The Grand Illusion
My understanding from numerous on-line conversations with European tarot enthusiasts is that many of them use only the 22 trump cards in divination. I've tried this approach but it seems a bit too much like reading a text message that is all capital letters and exclamation marks (like a Donald Trump tweet). There can be … Continue reading The Grand Illusion
“Celestial Seeping”
As I work my way through The Discarded Image, an examination of Medieval cosmology by C.S. Lewis, I encountered an observation that seems to support my long-standing assumption - not my own idea but one I read somewhere - that the Hermetic Qabalah is to a large extent grounded in the Neo-Platonism that was grafted … Continue reading “Celestial Seeping”
To Inform or Inspire?
Ever since the day last year when I was chided (gently) for my "fancy writing," I've striven to sharpen, refine and carefully prune my overly verbose descriptive style (of course, I'm not always successful because, as you can plainly see, I adore adjectives, semicolons and parentheses). In doing so, I sometimes find myself skewered by … Continue reading To Inform or Inspire?
A Baleful Thing?
Upon the recommendation of a fellow on-line "Tarot History" member, I've begun reading The Discarded Image by C.S. Lewis, a study of Medieval literature and its iconography. At the very beginning of the Introduction I encountered a passage that stopped me in my tracks. He was talking about how, when we come upon "hard places" … Continue reading A Baleful Thing?
A Step Beyond
In the last few months I've read three tarot books that have caused me to move beyond my aversion to drawing additional "clarifier" cards during my readings, although in a very specific and limited way. This situation arises due to the facing (also known as "gaze," "regard," "gesture" or "posture") of the figures on the … Continue reading A Step Beyond
Parsifal's Wheel Tarot & Astrology 