AUTHOR'S NOTE: "Reading style" is a consideration that is always at the forefront of my thinking on the most effective ways to wield the tarot when divining for other people. I was just nudged a little further along the path by my study of traditional Chinese philosophy. I recently finished a thought-provoking book, The Tao … Continue reading The Crane and The Snake: “Hard” and “Soft” Tarot Reading
Tarot Theory
The “Gang of Ten”
AUTHOR'S NOTE: After reading Paul Marteau's peculiar statement that the Fool doesn't necessarily belong at either end of the Major Arcana sequence as 0 or 22, but would more properly be found after any multiple of 7 (e.g. the Chariot or Temperance), I felt I had to drive the notion from my head by tackling … Continue reading The “Gang of Ten”
Islands in the Sea: The “Gateless” Suit of Pentacles
AUTHOR'S NOTE: This is one of the more intriguing and challenging mental tasks I've undertaken in a while: rethinking the numbered cards of Pentacles in line with Barbara Walker's discussion in The Secrets of the Tarot: History, Origins and Symbolism. I've long felt that the quaint, folkloric descriptions that have grown up around the Minor … Continue reading Islands in the Sea: The “Gateless” Suit of Pentacles
National Football League 2022 Season: Buffalo Bills Win-Loss Predictions
AUTHOR'S NOTE: Here is a lengthy experiment applying the "point gap" method I developed to replace the imperfect scoring technique I've used for predicting the outcome of NFL football games over the past few years. Rather than trying to project actual scores, it focuses on the point separation between the two teams at the end … Continue reading National Football League 2022 Season: Buffalo Bills Win-Loss Predictions
A New National Football League Prediction Model
AUTHOR'S NOTE: This is my substantive post for today; I like sports forecasting because it offers immediate and irrefutable proof of the accuracy of one's techniques. For several years now I've been using the tarot to attempt prediction of the winning team in sporting events, particularly National Football League and Major League Baseball games in … Continue reading A New National Football League Prediction Model
Color Me “Plaid”
The more Tarot de Marseille books I read, the more weary I become of the ubiquitous (and usually anal) attempts to parse all of the bits of local color in an image into some kind of coherent meaning; when they don't drive me crazy, these exhaustive permutations soon degenerate into a monochromatic blur in the … Continue reading Color Me “Plaid”
The Turning Away
I've never been content with the conventional wisdom that any card placed in the far left position of a line spread usually refers to past aspects of the matter. Right now I'm reading the English translation of Paul Marteau's 1949 Tarot de Marseille book, in which he suggests that left-facing figures in individual cards denote … Continue reading The Turning Away
Two Steps Forward, One Step Back
AUTHOR'S NOTE: I would not be surprised if this has been done before (and perhaps better), but this is my own spin on it. In a previous essay I floated the idea that a reversed court card might exhibit the qualities of the preceding zodiacal sign more prominently than those of its primary astrological referent … Continue reading Two Steps Forward, One Step Back
The Unevolved Fire Signs: A Study in Vanity
AUTHOR'S NOTE: I struggled to find a polite way to say "arrogance" without actually saying it, but that would be an extreme example of my point. Also, there is an idea here regarding the reversed court cards and their Golden Dawn assignment to the Chaldean zodiac that warrants further exploration in another essay. In astrology … Continue reading The Unevolved Fire Signs: A Study in Vanity
Tarot Symbolism in Divination: Fabulism or Impressionism?
I'll clarify my terms before starting. "Fabulism" denotes the placement of fantastical elements into an everyday setting; "impressionism" refers to allusions based on subjective reactions, often loosely-stated. As an example, this distinction aptly displays the difference between the Waite-Smith 7 of Cups, which could best be described as moodily phantasmagorical, and the same card in … Continue reading Tarot Symbolism in Divination: Fabulism or Impressionism?
Parsifal's Wheel Tarot & Astrology 