PKT:Secret Trad#1 - Study Group

Abrac said:

Hey INIVEA. I thought this part is interesting: "Scholars have always seen a striking connection between the concept of the Shekinah and the idea of Logos "The Word" which Philo introduced into Jewish philosophical thinking."; and also the quote from John 1.

From what I've read of Waite up to this point, he equates the "Word" with the Son, or the Christ. In his description of the High Priestess, he says, "The scroll in her hands is inscribed with the word Tora, signifying the Greater Law, the Secret Law and the second sense of the Word." It appears therefore, the Son represents the outer sense of the Word and the High Priestess as Shekinah represents a Greater Law, that is, the hidden sense of the Law. At least that's what I'm taking away from it at this point.

What are your thoughts?

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okay so for warning you, I am not well versed with Waite, so I'll just run some of my thoughts off the top of my head.

What is running around in my brain, is the cross is over her breast (chest) covers the heart. the Word, or logos, spoken in the beginning by god (creation of the earth etc.) to me is a language, but this language has been forgotten, man doesn't know the language, therefore can't speak it, hidden, now with that phrase :inscribed with the word Tora, is a clue, word then Tora = Gods hidden language; Which would be unknown /secret to humans. however there is this intuition, but is it intuition, maybe it is something else that speaks the gods hidden language. Christ and God, hmm maybe moses, or pharohs , summarian kings knew of this language, thinking Templars (Ark of the covenant), like mana being the atomic gold. sorry my thoughts are scattered, hope you can make some sense of it. it's like this language is some source of energy.

First, my perspective is that all this God stuff is mythological, not objective reality. Like the pantheon in Gnosticism, it refers to subjective phenomena. As Waite observed in his earlier book Azoth or the Star in the East, God is accessible only by looking inward, not outward. This is similar to William Blake's contention that God can only be known by its manifestation in human beings. My personal view is more Jungian. I do not believe there necessarily is a God "out there" somewhere (as is required by the "pie in the sky" mentality).

I have simplified the Trinity concept to 1) God the Father, 2) God the Mother (Ruach/Shekina/Sophia, which is feminine, at least until it was masculinized as Spiritus Sanctus by the paternalistic Latin Church), 3) God the Son (the Logos, or Cosmic Christ, which incarnated as Jesus of Nazareth in Christian mythology).

I also identify Mary (mother of Jesus, called Mother of God by the Latin Church) as a manifestation of the second person of the Trinity. Another manifestation is as a dove (which is so represented in the Ace of Cups).

Of course, the Bible (a collection of diverse writings by various individuals) is inconsistent regarding the God stuff; therefore it cannot be cited as absolute proof of anything at all. (How could it be otherwise?)

LRichard said:

First, my perspective is that all this God stuff is mythological, not objective reality. Like the pantheon in Gnosticism, it refers to subjective phenomena. As Waite observed in his earlier book Azoth or the Star in the East, God is accessible only by looking inward, not outward. This is similar to William Bake's contention that God can only be known by its manifestation in human beings. My personal view is more Jungian. I do not believe there necessarily is a God "out there" somewhere (as is required by the "pie in the sky" mentality).

I have simplified the Trinity concept to 1) God the Father, 2) God the Mother (Ruach/Shekina/Sophia, which is feminine, at least until it was masculinized as Spiritus Sanctus by the paternalistic Latin Church), 3) God the Son (the Logos, or Cosmic Christ, which incarnated as Jesus of Nazareth in Christian mythology).

I also identify Mary (mother of Jesus, called Mother of God by the Latin Church) as a manifestation of the second person of the Trinity. Another manifestation is as a dove (which is so represented in the Ace of Cups).

Of course, the Bible (a collection of diverse writings by various individuals) is inconsistent regarding the God stuff; therefore it cannot be cited as absolute proof of anything at all. (How could it be otherwise?)

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but what do you think if "Word / Logos" could be some sort of energetic language, that is a hidden energy of some sorte, that we don't know, but at one time was known, and then forgotten or we haven't learned it yet.

INIVEA said:

but what do you think if "Word / Logos" could be some sort of energetic language, that is a hidden energy of some sorte, that we don't know, but at one time was known, and then forgotten or we haven't learned it yet.

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Of course it could be something like that, only it would still be metaphysical speculation. For example, there do seem to exist mysterious phenomena, such as life force and consciousness. The universe is a marvelous thing, after all. There is so much that we don't understand and perhaps never will. Everything is "awesome" in the true sense of the word, and as Einstein stated, anyone who does not regard it with awe and wonder is as good as dead. Even the atheist Richard Dawkins has admitted the existence of the numinous, as do I.

INIVEA said:

but what do you think if "Word / Logos" could be some sort of energetic language, that is a hidden energy of some sorte, that we don't know, but at one time was known, and then forgotten or we haven't learned it yet.

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That could refer to the Fall, the separation of Man from God, exemplified in the biblical story of the fruit. As long as Adam and Eve walked in the garden, their will was the same as that of God, there was unity. It was only when they set out to become "as gods," thus receiving the power of creation, that the direct connection to God was broken.

Actually, the Logos is identified with God: ΚΑΙ ΘΕΟΣ ΗΝ Ο ΛΟΓΟΣ. However, it could be taken as God-consciousness, I suppose. "in him (God/Logos) was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness comprehended it not." This may be an oblique reference to a mythical, blissful golden age, characterized by God-consciousness, which at some point was lost, the story of the Fall being an attempt at an explanation. Interpretations of the Fall are all over the map.

LRichard said:

Actually, the Logos is identified with God: ΚΑΙ ΘΕΟΣ ΗΝ Ο ΛΟΓΟΣ. However, it could be taken as God-consciousness, I suppose. "in him (God/Logos) was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness comprehended it not." This may be an oblique reference to a mythical, blissful golden age, characterized by God-consciousness, which at some point was lost, the story of the Fall being an attempt at an explanation. Interpretations of the Fall are all over the map.

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Well, If you took the bible and read each story as pertaining the human body and it's functions, you could come up with something like this.

"in him (God/Logos) was life (heart = pump = energy), and the life was the light of men(blood flow= energy flow). And the light shineth in darkness (brain = neurons), and the darkness comprehended it not (Brain = neuron, energy translation)."

The heart should it stop, life ends as you know it. the blood feeds the body, if the blood flow stops, so does the body, the brain controls all these things, should it stop so does everything else. The Brain is the last organ to die and yet while the body and the organs have stopped the brains neurons (energy) still continues to fire (energy) creating all sorts of phenomena. What controls the brain, Energy, what do we really see, energy, that the brain translates into a 3D picture, yet this 3D picture is viewed differently by everyone, brain disorders, the energy fired by the neurons gets displaced / fires wrong information or is it.

So the questions is, are you looking inward?

The heart has one piece of energy, that animals may not have, that is feelings (emotions) which separates us humans from them. And it's emotions that trigger the neurons, to translate thoughts, and the neurons that trigger thoughts, that trigger emotions. The emotions are in the heart, which is huge pump of energy, and can produce a lot of it, more than the brain. Therefore we are made up of energy, energy is also sound and sound vibrates at different frequencies, so we have language, which is a form of energy language, just what frequency is our language. Gods (word/logos) language may be running at a higher or lower frequency than our own, and we may not hear it at all, which maybe why it is hidden/secret. or as I said above maybe we haven't learned it yet. or because it was lost and forgotten.

Our ear Drums, takes in the sound energy and sound frequency and it's our brain ( neurons) that translates the Sound energy and Sound frequencies.

Which I feel would represent the High priestess well. but then again, I could just very well be wrong too

I don't believe it's a matter of right or wrong, it's just the way you perceive things at this point in time, though someone else might see it differently. I think we can all learn from each other.

I find Waite's comment in line 17 fairly interesting,

"It is also the most catholic, because it is not, by attribution or otherwise, a derivative of any one school or literature of occultism; it is not of Alchemy or Kabalism or Astrology or Ceremonial Magic; but, as I have said, it is the presentation of universal ideas by means of universal types, and it is in the combination of these types —if anywhere—that it presents Secret Doctrine."

It doesn't sound like he's saying Secret Doctrine can't be found in Alchemy, Astrology, Kabalism, etc.; but that it's not limited to just one branch. The Secret Doctrine is universal and transcends all systems. It does sound like he's saying the tarot is the most "pure" symbolism as it is itself universal in nature.

The "combinations" idea he may have picked up from Eliphas Levi or Kenneth Mackenzie or both. Mackenzie relates the following in his account of his first visit with Levi in Paris, 1861:


Thanks to Ross Caldwell and the Book of Thoth study group for this little tidbit.

Abrac said:

I don't believe it's a matter of right or wrong, it's just the way you perceive things at this point in time, though someone else might see it differently. I think we can all learn from each other. .

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Thanks, I also feel we can learn so much from each other, I am currently learning a ton from everyone here so far

Abrac said:

I find Waite's comment in line 17 fairly interesting,

"It is also the most catholic, because it is not, by attribution or otherwise, a derivative of any one school or literature of occultism; it is not of Alchemy or Kabalism or Astrology or Ceremonial Magic; but, as I have said, it is the presentation of universal ideas by means of universal types, and it is in the combination of these types —if anywhere—that it presents Secret Doctrine."

It doesn't sound like he's saying Secret Doctrine can't be found in Alchemy, Astrology, Kabalism, etc.; but that it's not limited to just one branch. The Secret Doctrine is universal and transcends all systems. It does sound like he's saying the tarot is the most "pure" symbolism as it is itself universal in nature.

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ok, I don't have a bible, so I don't where to look for this, but I do recall in Babylonian time, God punished ? man, by taking (Gods language) from man, so he can nolonger speak it, and made every man speak in different languages, so that they could not understand each other.

any one here who is versed or some what versed in the bible post the bible Verse here please.

This could very well be the point of the Tarot, so that no matter what language we speak, we have a universal language with the Tarot deck.

What do you think?

Abrac said:

The "combinations" idea he may have picked up from Eliphas Levi or Kenneth Mackenzie or both. Mackenzie relates the following in his account of his first visit with Levi in Paris, 1861:

“Eliphas Levi informed me that if there were any truths to be discovered in his books – as he believed there were – they were not to be attributed to his own wisdom, but that he had arrived at the various inductions there published by means of the combinations presented by the twenty-two cards of the Tarot.”​

Thanks to Ross Cadwell and the Book of Thoth study group for this little tidbit.

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sorry this went right over my head, could you please explain a little more in easier terms please.