So you'd like to know the history of tarot

kapoore

A. E. Waite

Hi Mary and all,
I have an origin theory for A. E. Waite's "Secret Doctrine." I think Waite guessed the true origin, at least in part. The pictorial key is based on (Pseudo) Dionysius. He wrote, "I feel that the time has come to say what it is possible to say, so that the effect of current charlatanism and unintelligence may be reduced to a minimum." Here is the clue. As regards the VERBAL MEANINGS. The clues to the origin are in the verbal descriptions. Let me give an example of the Fool. Waite: "With light step, as if earth and its trammels had little power to restrain him, a young man in gorgeous vestments pauses at the brink of a precipice among the great heights of the world." Dionysius: "Then, freely and untrammeled by anything beneath him, he returns to his own starting point without having any loss. In his mind he journeys toward the One." The key Dionysius's words implanted in the paragraph are "trammeled and the concept of the abyss or in Dionysius words "anything beneath him." It's not easy reading the Dionysius Corpus and shifting through every word, but I am convinced that not only is this the secret doctrine of Waite but a major clue to the source of imagery of the the Trumps.

Let's look at some of the descriptions of symbols in Dionysius and connect this to Waite. Dionysius: "The spears and the axes represent discriminating skills amid the unlikeness of things, the sharp clarity and efficacy of powers of discernment." Perhaps the suit of swords.
Dionysuis: "The bare feet and body signify detachment, freedom independence, the fact of being untarnished by anything external, the greatest possible conforminty to the divne simplicity" Think Waite's Temperance and Star.
Dionysius: They are also named "winds" as a sign of the virutally instant speed with which they operate everywhere, their coming and going from above to below and again from below to above as they raise up their subordinates to the highest peak and as they prevail upon their own usperiors to proceed down into fellowship with the concern for those beneath." Wands
What does being "seated." Dionysius: What, then, are we to say regarding the divine attributes of "resting and sitting" ...the unstirring god moves and goes out into everything." ETc.

Here is what Waite had to say about Dionysius: "I shall make a beginning with Dionysius, because he is the spring and the fountain both of doctorine and procedure, and at least in one respect the root of the whole subject." (The Way of Divine Union: chapter 111)

I do understand there is a major cultural conflict between Christian Platonism of the 5th Century and modern Tarot as an interactive art form. One could barely understand the other. Still, if we can suspend judgement and recognize that one does not necessarily have to limit the other; and yet there is a tangential relationship. Perhaps there is a way out of the morass of ignorance. Few may choose to take the journey as Dionysius says,"We have therefore to run counter to mass prejudice and we must make the holy journey to the heart of the sacred symbols. and we must certainly not disdain them, for they are the descendants and bear the mark of the divine stamps. They are the manifest images of unspeakble and marvelous sights."

This is the not the entire origin story, but my guess it is a good start...
 

Greg Stanton

kapoore said:
I do understand there is a major cultural conflict between Christian Platonism of the 5th Century and modern Tarot as an interactive art form.
Actually, an excellent book has been written about the connection of Tarot and Christian Neo-Platonism, called "The Tarot: History, Symbolism and Divination" by Robert Place. This book, along with Huson's "Mystical Origins of the Tarot" really do lay to rest the old myths of Egyptian origin, and quite conclusively explain how the Major Arcana was derived from street parades called "Triumphs" -- within a Neo-Platonic framework.
 

kapoore

Place's book

Thanks for the response. I have read that book, but I haven't read it since I have been matching up the Waite deck imagery with the writings of Pseudo-Dionysius. And I didn't remember his (Place)writing that the verbal clues to Waite's imagery lead to passages within Dionysius. (And 'darn' I can't now find the book) Let me explain, though, my theory of Tarot origin search. I move forward with an hypothesis until I encounter a contradiction. This is not perfect obviously because a lot is unknown. However, I think that Robert O'Neill has brought up a contradiction with the Triumphal Parade theory in that not all the Trumps fit into the sequence. I am sure you are aware of his excellent website on the imagery of Tarot and the various traditions.

In terms of Waite and Dionysius, I feel 'quite sure' that this is the source of Waite's imagery since the verbal passages match, although I haven't covered every single Trump card; I have a lot of them. Waite drank in his Dionysius unfiltered. The inventor of the Renaissance game Triumphs did not. The original Tarot is heavily Pythagorized as was the Latin tradition. Waite didn't pick up on this. However, I do think that our mystery inventor was working within the system of Dionysius as well. Any obvious contradictions???
 

Teheuti

kapoore said:
Hi Mary and all,
I have an origin theory for A. E. Waite's "Secret Doctrine." I think Waite guessed the true origin, at least in part. The pictorial key is based on (Pseudo) Dionysius.
kapoore-
I think you're really onto something here. It's important to understand that Waite was a synchretist - he drew from many sources, so I'm not sure that "true origin" is the point. Rather, I think you can make an excellent point for Pseudo Dionysius being one of his sources. The Fool example is excellent. The connection you make between wands and wind is problematic in that Waite equated wind/air with swords. Some of the more general symbolic material was not original to Pseudo Dionysius, but part of a wider symbolic lexicon - like the idea of sitting and power (royalty), and other ideas that are more broadly neoplatonic. Also, some of the connections you see to Waite, actually go back further to concepts Waite took from the Golden Dawn, which may very well have influenced other GD members.

What source do you use for Pseudo-Dionysius?

I hope you will share more of your discoveries.

Mary
 

kapoore

Pseudo-dionysius

Hi and Thank you for your response;
I am using Pseudo-Dionysius: The Complete Works translated by Paul Rorem.

I agree that in some Trumps, such as the Lovers, Waite is using the Kabbalah. (And I was probably wrong about the winds image) I do think, though, that Waite is placing Dionysius's actual words in his Trump descriptions as clues. For example, he writes that the "Mysteries may be made public with a flourish of trumpets." In a passage I think Waite related to the Judgement card, Dionysius writes "..he hears the many voiced trumpets..." Waite writes, "What is that within us which does sound a trumpet." Nudity in Dionysius symbolizes the immaterial, and out of the body experience or an ecstacy is related to this passage of the trumpets... "Here renouncing all that the mind may conceive, wrapped entirely in the intangible and the invisible, he belongs completely to him who is beyond everything. Here, being neither oneself nor someone else, one is supremely united to the completely unknown by an inactivity of all knowledge, and knows beyond the mind by knowing nothing." Waite writes. "It should be noted that the figures are as one in the wonder, adoration and ecstacy. It is the card which registers the accomplisment of the great work of transformation in answer to the summons of the supernal."

Waite admits that he is following standard fortune telling in the Minors, although in several cases I think he did take images out of Dionysius. For example, I found a passage that does resemble his 5 of Wands. And I do think the clouds, colors, mountain peaks, sun imagery, and even the horses are right out of Dionysius. For example, Dionysius writes "Horses mean obedience and docility. Their whiteness is the gleam of their kinship with the light of God; their blue color is the sign of hiddenness, the red is the power and sweep of fire, the piebald is the alliance of opposite extremes, and the capacity to move from one to the other, that adaptability of superior to inferior and of inferior to superior which comes of return and providence."

In Waite's Chariot card the lions are piebald. The horse in the death card is white. I think it worth interpreting the background colors according to the Dionysius scheme. Blue is hiddenenss, etc.

I guess what I am saying is that I do believe that Dionysius is Waite's "Secret Doctrine." I could give many more examples. I believe that he is referring to Dionysius when he writes, "...yet these cards belong in themselves to another region, for they contain a very high symbolism, which is interpreted according to the Laws of Grace..."

Also, Waite tapped into a genuine tradition in the actual Renaissance origin since there are linkages in terms of imagery even in the antique cards.

I appreciate your giving these thoughts attention. Warmly...
 

Scion

Teheuti said:
This is a good (though extreme) example of what happens when 'intuition' has completely free rein to pose as historical fact.

Is there something we can do about this. I haven't found a place yet on amazon where this article can be protested - but perhaps we could create a "Know the Real History of Tarot" guide?
Mary, I wrote a review of Wagner's execrable "Thoth" book a while back, a book which is even worse in the hand that is in in theory, if that's possible... I hadn't noticed her BS leakage over on amazon. Thanks for the heads up.

S
 

Teheuti

kapoore said:
I guess what I am saying is that I do believe that Dionysius is Waite's "Secret Doctrine." I could give many more examples.
As can be seen from Waite's multitudinous works, he had many inspirations of which Dionysius was one. His most thorough discussion of the works of pseudo-Dionysius that I've found is in Lamps of Western Mysticism.

It's in The Secret Tradition in Alchemy that Waite makes most clear what it is that he attributes to Dionysius:

Regarding the Tract on Mystical Theology by pseudo-Dionysius, Waite says, "That Tract is the fountain-head of all Christian Mysticism in the West and—on the faith of scholarship—this is how it began." p. 357

Elsewhere he makes clear that the Secret Doctrine goes back to the myths before Christianity, and that pseudo-Dionysius was simply the origin of it in Christianity. Also, that pseudo-Dionysius, although he teaches knowledge of the Unknown in the Mind, never mentions Love. Whereas for Waite, Divine Union with the Shekinah in the temple of the heart is the ultimate attainment.

Pseudo-Dionysius is certainly an important figure in Waite's mysticism, and, to Waite's mind, the font or root of Christian Mysticism, but he is not THE Secret Doctrine - only an exemplar of one form of it.

The parallels between this work and Waite's tarot material are an important find. I suggest, though, that the symbols and colors have multiple referents - for instance, the qualities of a white horse are discussed by Plato in Phaedrus.
 

kapoore

Waite's Secret Doctrine the guidebook

Hi Tehueti,
How appropriate to be debating Waite in the 100th year since the publication of the Waite/Smith deck!!

Waite gives a considerable attention to Dionysius in his book, The Way of Divine Union where he discusses Dionysius and his influence for 50 or so pages. In your reference to the quote in his book on alchemy, he simply seems to be saying that Pseudo-Dionysius was Pseudo and yet the inspiration for the Western tradition. While in Divine Union he goes into detail about the negative method.

I realize that Waite along with everyone else at that time was very influenced by James Frazer's thesis as outlined in the Golden Bough. Do you think that Waite was specifically referring to this thesis when he wrote, "As regards the sequence of greater sybmols, their ultimate and highest meaning lies deeper than the common language of picture...This will be understood by those you have received some part of the Secret Tradition?"

I restate my opinion, that this introductory essay is referring not to something in general--as in his multiple influences--but something in particular, that is the Secret Tradition specifically in the Tarot Trumps, such as the "journey to the heart of the sacred symbols." It is a 'secret' because not everyone can read symbolism. As Waite writes in his passage on the Hermit card, "..like the card itself--to the truth that the Divine Mysteries secure their own protection from those who are unprepared." As Dionysius says, "...have no eye for imagery."

I do understand, though, that most Tarot historians don't take Waite's tradition seriously, and you do seem to be saying that there was in fact no real 'secret doctrine' but a multiple of influences--alchemy, Rosicrucians, Golden Dawn, James Frazer, and so forth. Or maybe Waite was in pursuit of something that he could never find.
However, I will continue to identify Waite's paraphrasing of Dionysius, and perhaps in a month or so we can discuss it again. Warmly..
 

mac22

kapoore said:
Hi Tehueti,
How appropriate to be debating Waite in the 100th year since the publication of the Waite/Smith deck!!

Waite gives a considerable attention to Dionysius in his book, The Way of Divine Union where he discusses Dionysius and his influence for 50 or so pages. In your reference to the quote in his book on alchemy, he simply seems to be saying that Pseudo-Dionysius was Pseudo and yet the inspiration for the Western tradition. While in Divine Union he goes into detail about the negative method.

I realize that Waite along with everyone else at that time was very influenced by James Frazer's thesis as outlined in the Golden Bough. Do you think that Waite was specifically referring to this thesis when he wrote, "As regards the sequence of greater sybmols, their ultimate and highest meaning lies deeper than the common language of picture...This will be understood by those you have received some part of the Secret Tradition?"

I restate my opinion, that this introductory essay is referring not to something in general--as in his multiple influences--but something in particular, that is the Secret Tradition specifically in the Tarot Trumps, such as the "journey to the heart of the sacred symbols." It is a 'secret' because not everyone can read symbolism. As Waite writes in his passage on the Hermit card, "..like the card itself--to the truth that the Divine Mysteries secure their own protection from those who are unprepared." As Dionysius says, "...have no eye for imagery."

I do understand, though, that most Tarot historians don't take Waite's tradition seriously, and you do seem to be saying that there was in fact no real 'secret doctrine' but a multiple of influences--alchemy, Rosicrucians, Golden Dawn, James Frazer, and so forth. Or maybe Waite was in pursuit of something that he could never find.
However, I will continue to identify Waite's paraphrasing of Dionysius, and perhaps in a month or so we can discuss it again. Warmly..

It's clear to me that Waite knew a great deal... the problem [for me as a newbie] was Waite's style.... Now 40 yrs later Waite makes a good deal more sense, in part because i'm far more knowledgeable now.

Mac22
 

Teheuti

kapoore said:
you do seem to be saying that there was in fact no real 'secret doctrine' but a multiple of influences--alchemy, Rosicrucians, Golden Dawn, James Frazer, and so forth.
Waite wrote several books called The Secret Tradition in . . . Freemasonry, Alchemy, Israel, etc. He writes extensively about how it manifested in many different places and times. I don't remember any references in Waite to James Frazer so I can't speak to those.

Waite later created a second Major Arcana deck (now called the Trinick deck after the artist) that I believe adheres much more closely to ideas that focus on the Christian Mysticism found in Pseudo-Dionysius and others.