AUTHOR'S NOTE: The more I read The Tarot of the Bohemians by Gerard Encausse ("Papus"), the more respect I have for his wisdom (at least until he wanders off into Theosophy and loses me). When - in his discussion of science - he says that "observation and experience are only instruments" of intuition (the cognitive … Continue reading “Who’s Zoomin’ Who?”
Tarot Theory
The Third Principle
AUTHOR'S NOTE: In The Tarot of the Bohemians, Papus covered a minor point that I've explored in much greater detail in my own work over the last few years, although at the time I had no idea I was echoing a nearly 150-year-old numerological concept. He proposed treating the second of two cards in a non-adjacent … Continue reading The Third Principle
Cut the Cord! – Folk Magic and the 3 of Swords
AUTHOR'S NOTE: I've written in the past about the opportunity presented by the Waite-Smith (RWS) 3 of Swords to resist wallowing in the apparent misery it depicts and instead actively seek a way to remove the swords from the heart and let it heal. (This is the symbolic function of the nimble and resilient number … Continue reading Cut the Cord! – Folk Magic and the 3 of Swords
The Tarot Cosmology of Papus
AUTHOR'S NOTE: A couple of weeks ago I posted an essay in which I took issue with the Golden Dawn's arrangement of the Kings, Queens and Knights on the Chaldean wheel of the zodiac. Rather than the Queens being Cardinal (a dynamic and enterprising mode), I've always felt that they should be Fixed due to … Continue reading The Tarot Cosmology of Papus
“Ankle-Biters” – A Brief Meditation on Reversal
AUTHOR'S NOTE: While writing my essay on the occurrence of reversals in the Celtic Cross spread, I hit upon the idea that a reversed card (in its emulation of the Hanged Man's inverted perspective) enters the situation at "ankle height" rather than at shoulder level where we can handle it directly in the way we're … Continue reading “Ankle-Biters” – A Brief Meditation on Reversal
The Virtue of Extemporizing
AUTHOR'S NOTE: In a recent r/tarot thread, someone advised beginners - once they've diligently jotted down their initial thoughts about each card - to "put this notebook away and don't look at it again. You've done the basic work of learning the meanings, and even if you think you don't remember, that knowledge is now … Continue reading The Virtue of Extemporizing
Papus and the Trump-Card Septenaries
AUTHOR'S NOTE: With the numbers One through Ten, Papus (Gerard Encausse) found major inspiration in the quaternary paradigm, by which he managed to turn ten "pips" into a triad of four-card arrays. (See my previous essay.) With the trump cards he adopted a septenary model instead, and strove to bring the two onto the same … Continue reading Papus and the Trump-Card Septenaries
Schrodinger and the “Fabric of Reality”
AUTHOR'S NOTE: I haven't touched on this subject recently, but my involvement in the Reddit sub r/seculartarot brought it back around. I once described divination in fanciful terms as "running my mental fingers through the warp-and-woof of the fabric of reality, trying to tease out threads of truth." More recently I encountered the ideas of … Continue reading Schrodinger and the “Fabric of Reality”
Papus and the “Formula of Tetragrammaton”
AUTHOR'S NOTE: In The Tarot of the Bohemians, Gerard Encausse (aka "Papus") spends the first 20% of the book playing with the numerology of the cards and relating them to the four Hebrew letters of the "ineffable Name of God" (euphemized as "Tetragrammaton"). Papus stacked up the trump cards in "quaternaries" (four-card sets) following the … Continue reading Papus and the “Formula of Tetragrammaton”
A “Tendency to Exist”
AUTHOR'S NOTE: I recently read a fascinating passage at the end of Sallie Nichols' discussion of the World card in Tarot and the Archtypal Journey that compares and contrasts the views of reality held by physicist Erwin Schrodinger and psychologist Carl Gustav Jung. Nichols begins by examining the nature of subatomic particles (circa 1980), noting … Continue reading A “Tendency to Exist”
