Rohrig Study - Twos

darwinia

Ha, I see Littlewing is incorporating Belladonna's idea (from the Wheel of Change thread) for studying the pips with all four suits at once for the Buckland Romani deck! Makes so much More sense to me too since I never seem to get to the minors in decks when groups start.

I'm setting the twos up for this one day early since Yab seems slightly impatient. We like a guy who wants to study though. I just finished a job I had to get out but will post shortly.
 

divinerguy

The twos are a bit harder. The keywords are love, peace, change and dominion. If you study the words on the note paper, they are slightly different.

Based upon the qualities underlying the keywords, I see the theme of the twos as balance.

Peace requires compromise and tolerance.
Love requires a giving of oneself, and the receipt of love.
Change includes Yin and Yang (see the card notes), which is the essence of balance and harmony.

The 2 of Wands, dominion is more difficult, but not unduly so. Dominion, or control, if it is to be longstanding, requires fairness or balance in its administration. An examination of the card reveals a gleaming city on a hill. For a city to prosper, it must have an egalitarian foundation. Balance and fairness.

When examined on their own, however, the cards have meanings which are entirely distinct.

I see the 2 of swords as tranquility, the cups as lust, the coins as harmony, and the wands as benevolent control.
 

darwinia

2 of Swords

There's a sense of that classic R-W imagery of guardedness here, the swords balanced and watchful over the kingdom of peace. Also a sense of a stage setting within the larger universe--clouds floating out to stars and the sky a mere curtain of Universe. And that's the hook that got me with this card. That's a particular definition of peace of mind--we shut out the universe and keep to our own world in our mind so we aren't overwhelmed by infinity. In a negative aspect, some people find peace in their own narrow world and definitions and forget or disregard the larger Universe that surrounds them.

2 of Cups

This seems a very gently, loving card. Two people in each other, melting into each other. Behind them the lacy tracery of a leaf showing the structure that enables it to hold its shape, and the branching arteries (like the arms and fingers of the two figures) sending nutrients and support throughout the leaf. Life, growth support, interconnectedness.

Also the shape of spirals in her hair, the classic symbol of gnomonic expansion from Sacred Geometry. Generation, additive number progressions, growth outward. Leaves and plants also exhibit the Fibonacci Series of math and Sacred Geometry in their branching patterns. See her dreamy expression--bedroom eyes, lust, but also the transference of the individual, the dreamy escape into the other, branching out, embracing.

2 of Disks

Change, transformation, harmony, energy twisting symmetrically, balanced, equidistant, yin and yang, masculine and feminine with constant movement between. I like his grounded earth with energy rising from the changing landscape and different elements of water, earth and air. These elements reflected in the orbs, like change retained in your mind's eye, the focus changing but the eyes open and always the acceptance of movement without blinking.

Sometimes it might restful to blink, to soothe the eye, to still the change.

2 of Wands

Two roads diverging, yet coming together at the pinnacle to attain the same goal. The pillars rooted yet transparent, on guard, but allowing vision forward and backward. The celestial city, the peak, aglow with righteous light.

And yet in stasis, solid, respectable, balanced, but suffering from its perfection, almost too symmetrical. If you are under dominion, you are ruled by someone else, perhaps too restricted, too rigidly defined? "Dominion" means property, right of ownership, lordship, which taken to extreme can become obsessive control and calcification of solidity.

I see Divinerguy and I both had a bit of trouble with that word "dominion" since it has such negative connotations. I still have trouble with even benevolent control not equalling stasis. Rohrig seems to be more vigorous in the negativity of this particular card in the twos, but perhaps to highlight the balance required?
 

Little Baron

Hi FreesiaSkye and Divinerguy
(and anybody else passing through)

I always looked past some of the elements of the 2 of Cups. I read a thread on the boards recently, which compared it with the Lovers card to see whether people saw its energy as that of sexual love or plutonic love. In a lot of decks, I do not see the love as a sexual love, even though, in this instance, since they couple are unclothed, it could be percieved as that way.

I never noticed the leaf before. I might interpret this as being the end (like a death card reference) of a certain kind of love. In a way, this image reminds me of that 'goodbye' you can have when you finish a love affair; that last amicable embrace before you part. Maybe it could signify the end of a friendship that is becoming more than that, or a sexual relationship that is becoming more like a friendship.

The reasons I also feel that this could be a plutonic love card or a union card, or support card, or a parental or friends love is the amount of hands the woman has around her - three. I also did not notice this before; just took it for granted that her 'lover' had two arms and not three. The three arms are cradling her in a non sexual way and comforting her. I find it interesting that we cannot see the other person/persons. Is this card illustrating a need for companionship, rather than describing one that already exists? Because of this new awareness, I am liking this card a whole lot more. I am very interested, if it comes into a reading, with other cards around it, which of the ideas I have come up with will fight to come to the surface.

My first impression of this card feels possitive but as I look at the two winding roads and the offer of choice as to which to take, it starts to look a little more complicated. Both roads seem to end up in the same place. The light from inside the castle/city looks possitive. I can see the negative aspects that you both pull from this card. It is difficult, however, because the cards energy via the image is one of great possitivity. Balance seems to be the 'keyword' for me - keeping the balance of the two illuminated wands, whatever pathway you take, will end up in the city.

Things are definitely on the move in the 2 of Disks card. They almost seem to be moving from the water and through the discs, into the air, sending the disks (or balls, as they look to me) spinning. I like the thought of the spinning balls for this card and the fact that the landscape is reflected within them. As the balls are spinning, the landscape is for ever changing in the reflection. It's a very powerful image.

The 2 of swords, reminds me of how far you can see on a clear day. The baloons make me think of friends coming to visit. When we had friends over when I was a kid, I would always stand on the bed in my parents room and wait until I could see the car in the distance. Somehow, it reminds me of that. They seem to glide through the air effortlessly and the swords, against each other, rule above them. I see the swords as a contrast. They seem to suggest a confrontation to the peace; like something is waiting that will disturb it.

Hope this is of some relevance. Look forward to your responses.

Yaboot
 

darwinia

Double or Nothing

Ya Boot Ya
Ya Ya Boot Ya Ya
Boot Ya Ya Ya Ya Ya

Just noticed how binary this looks. Could be either:

1 0 1
1 1 0 1 1
0 1 1 1 1 1

OR

0 1 0
0 0 1 0 0
1 0 0 0 0 0

I pick pattern number two Uncle Yab. OMG does it mean an alien attack is imminent?? You've been sending out these intermittent signals and they've heard you!! Oh yeah, and I believed you when you said you were a fashion designer. Good cover guy, no one would have suspected were it not for the secret code.
 

darwinia

Illusion of Cups and Polarity Becomes Clarity

When I looked at the three hands, it reminded me of the illusion that comedians (or kids) sometimes do where they wrap their own arms around themselves and from the back it looks like someone is embracing them. The smaller, paler arm looks like her own arm wrapped around. Either that or there are some mutant models over in Germany that need our help. ;-)
So maybe it's the old you have to love yourself first thing? Which would tie-in with your idea of freindship too, I like this milder spin on love, a more diffusive, encompassing love. I might agree with you on the various types of love and change.

The 2 of Wands I actually looked up in my Tarot of the Spirit deck which is also Thoth influenced. I don't have the Thoth deck for comparison but the TOS book/card has the keyword "Convergence" which I think is the more positive aspect of this card that we were meant to see in the Rohrig deck. Pamela Eakins mentions the necessity of connection and profound convergence and refining your energies in a focused direction. She says "Two points polarize and become clear" and that your focal point is the direction you must travel. Contrast, duality, and maintaining balance and directing energy. Very much in tune with this card of Rohrig's.

So I'm quite happy with the clarification you post. Hey, I'm from Canada, we used to be The Dominion of Canada when I was young and that word does tend to rankle with negative meaning.

I love keywords, I've got them in the Tarot of the Spirit, Rohrig, Gill, Osho Zen, and let's face it, the titles of the Majors could be construed as keywords too if you are so inclined, so they never bother me until I get a card like this and hone in on the skewed meaning, and have it sit like a lump in my brain to the exclusion of other ideas. I might be less likely to do that in a reading because of the influence of surrounding cards. I don't know, I think it a satisfying thing to discuss such issues.
 

galadrial

Two of Cups

The Two of Cups makes me think of the different kinds of love I need to give out simultaneously, and the changes in that love brought about by the passage of time. I'm mostly divided between my husband, my son and my mom, so three hands is particularly significant to me. I think of keeping love flexible; of bending to it's changing needs as she is bending forward. As my son grows up, my mother shows signs of old age, and my husband and I adjust to middle age changes, I have to fine tune the expressions of my love. The leaf makes me think of time, as well. The need to love and be loved in all the seasons of our lives, not just the spring and summer.

Two of Wands

The city on the hill seems like a state of perfection to me. An image of wholeness and well being. I see "dominion" as having dominion over desires and ambitions that would take me down those roads and away from the city. The wands are demarcation points; a gate that signals clearly that "past here you are off the spiritual path and on your own", but that once past the gates and in spiritual territory, as long as I set my sights on the city, all roads will lead there.