AUTHOR'S NOTE: I avoided discussing this technique in my previous post on reconstituting the trump cards, but I've been mulling over ways to make it work. Once again, I will use the Tower as my main example and also provide a couple of others. (If you're unfamiliar with isomorphs, I linked my "primer" on the … Continue reading Trump Cards and Isomorphs
Trumps
Boundaries, Fences and Neighbors: Drawing a Line in the Sand
AUTHOR'S NOTE: In his poem Mending Wall, Robert Frost gives the impression that he is rudely baiting the neighbor who keeps telling him earnestly "Good fences make good neighbors" as they work on repairing their shared stone wall. ("Something there is that doesn't love a wall." Hmm. Why do I feel that Frost would have … Continue reading Boundaries, Fences and Neighbors: Drawing a Line in the Sand
“Dividing the Chaos” – Reconstituting the Trump Cards
AUTHOR'S NOTE: Here is another oddball experiment (I have a few of them queued up) in which pairs of trump cards are collated numerologically (similar to the "quintessence" calculation but with pre-selected components) to intentionally yield the numerical value of a third trump. The goal is to create a three-part dynamic with two "modifying" cards … Continue reading “Dividing the Chaos” – Reconstituting the Trump Cards
“Just Desserts” vs “Justice Served” – The Two Faces of Justice
AUTHOR'S NOTE: Whenever the Justice card appears in a client's reading, I usually talk about "receiving one's just desserts" according to the propriety of one's actions. I like to tell them that "the trick is to be found worthy and not wanting when the verdict is handed down." But there is another, potentially more sinister, … Continue reading “Just Desserts” vs “Justice Served” – The Two Faces of Justice
Inspirational and Cautionary “Catch-Phrases” for the Major Arcana
AUTHOR'S NOTE: There are several ways to split the 22 Major Arcana into rows; one of the most popular is the 7x3 layout of 21 cards with the Fool standing apart, an array I first encountered in Rachel Pollock's 78 Degrees of Wisdom (although it is much older). Here I'm organizing the rows into "duets" … Continue reading Inspirational and Cautionary “Catch-Phrases” for the Major Arcana
Deep, Distant, Dire or Ditched? – Competing Views on the Major Arcana
AUTHOR'S NOTE: Every time I encounter a new observation about the significance of the Major Arcana I feel compelled to revisit the subject in order to re-examine my own position. When I was learning to read the tarot cards back in the early '70s the consensus was that the 22 Major Arcana were a "big … Continue reading Deep, Distant, Dire or Ditched? – Competing Views on the Major Arcana
The Polysemous Tarot: A Symphony of Meanings
AUTHOR'S NOTE: Although I may regret it from the standpoint of intellectual overload (and so might my readers), I've just begun digesting (you don't idly graze these things) Ronald Decker's scholarly study of occult tarot history, The Esoteric Tarot: Ancient Sources Rediscovered in Hermeticism and Cabalah, in the introduction to which he acknowledges that he … Continue reading The Polysemous Tarot: A Symphony of Meanings
Personalizing the Princesses
AUTHOR'S NOTE: In my previous essay on assigning tarot court cards to the Sun, Moon and Ascendant degrees of the natal horoscope, I promised to address how the multi-sign Princesses of the Golden Dawn and Aleister Crowley can brought into the same model. Here goes! It is a traditional assumption that each King has mastered … Continue reading Personalizing the Princesses
The Ideal Consort: The Devil and the Queen of Disks
"Please allow me to introduce myself, I'm a man of wealth and taste" (Jagger/Richards) AUTHOR'S NOTE: In his book The Thoth Companion, Michael Snuffin expounds upon the "goat" symbolism on the Queen of Disks card by noting that "A goat stands on a second golden orb in the foreground, which represents the Sun in Capricorn, … Continue reading The Ideal Consort: The Devil and the Queen of Disks
A Loony on the Paths
AUTHOR'S NOTE: After re-reading the Sepher Yetzirah and some of its modern commentary for the first time in several decades, I decided to rework the correspondences for the trump cards on the paths of the Qabalistic Tree of Life to align them with my renewed (some will say "skewed") awareness. During a discussion on one … Continue reading A Loony on the Paths
Parsifal's Wheel Tarot & Astrology 