similia said:
Despite it being clearly written in the BoT, I just realized that this card is a direct snub at the Golden Dawn. The cross above the triangle is the Golden Dawn symbol, and represents the old aeon formula of sacrifice. Crowley has changed the shape of the Hanged Man to match the GD's symbol, to the GD meaning the descent of spiritual light into matter via Christ like sacrifice.
But the original Golden Dawn design incorporates the same cross and triangle motiff. The only real difference that I can see is that the Hanged Man is a corpse. Either that or he's not been out in the sun for a while.
I agree with ravenest that the Thoth is an evolution of the Golden Dawn Tarot. The changes Crowley made within the Thoth don't break the rules of Golden Dawn symbolism. They kind of move it forward while using the same symbolic language.
The Golden Dawn saw the Hanged Man as the descent of the divine light in order to redeem the darkness. That's almost the Gnostic view of earth being the prison of spirit. That fits perfectly with the formula of Osiris and it's dualistic notion of Good Spirit versus Evil Matter (read Isis
). But the the formula of the New Aeon tells us that Spirit and Matter are two sides of the same coin. Osiris and Isis are both needed to create their son, Horus. The fomula of IAO changes. Instead of Isis being ruined by Apophis and resurrected in Osiris, now Horus is identified with Apophis and unites the seperated lovers. (A link to the Tower?)
With the realisation that Spirit = Matter, the question of redemption becomes an absurdity. Instead the function of the Hanged Man revolves around the nature of Illusion and incarnation. The letter Mem (Mem Yod Mem = 90) alludes to the secret (Yod -Will) hidden between the Waters (Mem). Once the secret is found the formula is reversed so that the submerged Hanged Man becomes the Emperor (90 - Tzaddi - Sulphur), the Kings mentioned in Liber AL, and sits on top of the Cubic Stone. But in order for that to happen you've got to do a bit of fishing.