Plato and Tarot

beanu

Lets move the Fool specific stuff to the Joker vs Trickster thread,
shall we? I'll do a summary there.
But please keep going here with the rest of the Platonic stuff.
 

beanu

Comparing the Fool to the Magician, I see the fool as the start of the new-platonic "descent" and the Magician as the mastery that lies at the end of the "ascent" of those who work to climb back up.

I see the Devil as Lucifer, representing the Fall ( the descent) and the Tower as the climb back up (the ascent)

The Lovers shows the Fool/Hermes uniting male and female polarities,
knowing that their union will result in their Death(card), and subsequent rebirth (Judgement card).

This reminds me of the philosphy that we are born with a half-soul each, and the search for our true love is the need to to re-unite with our other half,
as expressed in the mediocre movie "The Butchers Wife".
Someone told me where this came from originally, but I have forgotten.
One of my errant neurones indicate that this is also from Plato.
Can anyone help with this?
 

blue_fusion

Some more Plato-related stuff to toy with. Plato's belief that the souls is not tabula rasa. He believed that living is a process of remembering, and we were born with innate memories. I wonder how this relates to the Fool's journey? That perhaps his journey is already a part of him?

The "other half" thing may also relate to the World's Hermaphrodity?

And, what of the Fool in the Socratic tradition (given that most of Socrates' works are "recollections" of his student Plato)? The knowing fool, who knows that none is wiser than him because he knows everyone hasn't attained wisdom. Or as the gadfly, always irritating people by reminding them what they are doing wrong.

Sorry if I'm messing with the flow of the discussion. This is a sort of interest of mine as well...
 

beanu

Out on a Limb

Hi all,

I have my own system, which results in pairs of cards being attributed to spheres on the tree of life.

Derivation is quite complex, but the result can be seen here.
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(and yes, I? know the lightning strike is reversed left to right. Thats the sequence the Tarot gives. Perhaps it was done that way as a deliberate obfuscation.)

sorry about the size.

Its my current speculation that, of each pair, one card represents the descent, and the other card represents the ascent, according to the meaning of the sphere they are in.
In other words, half the cards represent the descent, and half represent the ascent.

I propose to work through the pairs, trying to identify which card is ascent and which is descent, and explaining the meaning of the spheres, ascent and descent along the way. I will do one pair/sphere per posting.

I don't intend to spend too much time explaining the why of the system in this thread. It is well explained on the website and in the book. I can answer questions as required, but perhaps on my site, or in another thread, or PM, so as to avoid cluttering this thread.

I will be trying to focus on neo-platonic concepts with your help, as it is not my specialty.

Shall we dance?
 

beanu

Fool and Magician

KETHER - the top-most sphere on the tree - closest to God.

DESCENT = Magician

The Magician is Plato's Artificer, who draws the power of divinity down to create the material world, through stages (10 spheres, 7 levels, etc.)

ASCENT = Fool

The perfected man is able to understand the will of God. He communes with God, as does Hermes/Mercury. He is in a state of ecstatic intoxication. He has no concern for the more mundane matters of life, and so is considered a Fool by normal standards of behavior. However, he is sometimes capable of uttering deep insights, and of performing miracles. He is "touched by God".
 

kwaw

Doesn't this belong in advertising forum rather than history?
 

kapoore

Hi Beanu,
Let me comment on the process rather than the specific, and show how this fits in with the history of the Tarot.

l. A Memory System: I believe that the Tarot is connected to the Art of Memory. You have systematically organized the Trump cards in such a way that you see them all at once as a pattern rather than card by card. I am sure when you picture the Trumps you see this pattern in your mind. This is how the art of memory worked--to see all at once. (here paraphrasing the Art of Memory by Francis Yates)

2. A Hierachical System: The hierarchy with the divine light descending and the seeker rising up to it. This is the classic Neo-Platonic schema. At the highest level there is the unknowable deity. However, the freedom of will is maintained through contingency. This deity is one that emmanates but does not dictate because in some sense this deity exists in divine simplicity and ignorance. The process of knowing becomes a general cosmic awakening. The act of naming is the creative act and I can see you are working dialectically with the opposites as a form of rising in the spheres. As you can see this is a highly subjective vision. But it is not entirely subjective because the archtypes are visible mirrors of invisible and ineffable forces (angels, etc.). Humans cannot know directly (except in ignorance), but they know through the medium of the archtype. (Or the Book of Nature) However the intimate relationship between the higher and the lower is not broken because, "the same light, that is God himself, which is directly present in the appropriate way at every level...the activity of the creature, by participation, truly is that of God." The key idea here is participation. You have reached into the depths of the archetypes and are actively working with them--that is participation.

3. Nominalism? Am I just saying words or do I have tangible evidence to back up my claim of Tarot and Neo-Platonism? I think this is a important question because every verbal or symbolic system can degenerate into nominalism--just words, words, words. However, I think there is at least one or two key remnents on the cards that make me think this is a Neo-Platonic system. I mentioned the World card of the Marseille deck. Also, I think the Pope card is in my mind taken from Ps Dionysius "The Ecclesiactic Hierarchy" (Neo-Platonism in the Latin West). This figure is really called the "hierarch." The "arrangement of all sacred realities" are perfected and known in him. He contains the pattern which he transmits to the two initiates that come before him. One initiate is involved in the "active path" and the other in the "inward path." Waite divides these between red for active and blue for inward. The two initiates stand before him, he makes sign of cross, ...etc. This encounter between the initiates and the hierarch is detailed on the Marseille pattern of the Pope card.

Hope this isn't too much...or too little. I think by focusing on the process you can meet the historical forum.
 

Moonbow

Beanu

Its fine to post your theories here as long as no link is included in the body of your post.
 

beanu

Hi Kapoore,

The Tree of Life is also commonly recommended as a memory system, and so my mapping of tarot cards onto it will therefore form a memory system.

Thanks for the info about the Hierarch. Having two different types of disciple certainly adds a new level of meaning to it.

Nominalism. Certainly a problem. I freely admit an almost complete lack of hard evidence. any assessment of my ideas has to be based on the indivudal student's assessment of "goodness of fit".

I am coming to see my work as tending towards the concepts of semiotics - the study of human interpretation and interaction with symbols. Umberto Eco (author of Foccoult's Pendulum) has been identified to me as the world leader in semiotics, although I have no real understanding of the details of discipline. I imagine that like most soft sciences, it must rely heavily on statistics.
However, it does to some extend legitimize the exploration of the meaning of symbols in the Tarot. It says that we can trace the development and evolution of the concepts behind the symbols, even if they cross out of the Tarot domain and into related fields.
 

beanu

Empress and High Priestess

BINAH

Contains the Empress and the High Priestess.

DESCENT
In the descent, the unity of the creation is divided into opposing polarities - in particular the male and female polarities. The Empress represents the Female principle, and may also be attributed to "Wet" in elemental terms.
This is in comparison to the Male "Hot" of the Emperor.
Wet and Hot are the basic building blocks of the four elements, as we shall see later.

ASCENT
The student becomes the High Priestess - one who understands the secrets of the female principle. Also, one who devotes herself to the Goddess - the ultimate female archetype.

Does anyone have anything to offer on neo-Platonic views of the female?
There is evidence that Plato himself was a bit of a woman-hater on the personal level, but does this carry through into his philosophy, and is it moderated in neo-platonism?

The choice of male/female as the first and most fundamental split is interesting. In the world of science there are many possible polarities, but the male female split is generally limited to Life, and not even to all types of life.
It is however recognised in science that the evolution from asexual organisms to male/female species triggered a rapid increase in the evolution of lifeforms, as shown by the variety of species found in fossil records at that time. It appears that the male/female polarity strongly promotes evolution.
It is also very significant to humans, of course.

I wonder if Plato or neo-platonism focusses on this because of humankiunds "nearness to God", and extrapolates to all of creation, or do they project male/female onto all of creation, living or not?