Death's Armor

BodhiSeed

Does anyone have any ideas about why the skeleton is wearing a suit of armor in the Death card? All I can think of is a play on words: "A Night in Shining Armor." :D

Bodhran
 

patrickjutte

death's armor

hi bodhran,

I think that the Death card is linked with the Moon card. (Look at the two towers on both cards). There is also a little cave hidden on the trump XIII (a few weeks ago, there was a thread about the hidden cave on aeclectic). With the Deathcard the seeker/the hero/the fool enters the underworld (the cave) and comes into the Mooncard out of the underworld( crab comes out of the water, wich is a symbol of the underworld). The crab on the Mooncard symbolises the coming to the " surface" again. The crab is a animal/symbol of the underworld (in the water) and so does the cave.
So, the seeker enters the underworld by the deathcard and comes out of the underworld by the Mooncard.

The crab has a pantser, so has the skeleton of the Deathcard.

I think Waite/Smith wanted to show us that this two cards were linked (there not the only cards wich are linked, but that is another subject) with each other by the armor/pantser connection.

greetings patrick.
 

BodhiSeed

Thanks for all the information patrickjutte!
Forgive me for my ignorance, but is a pantser like armor? If so, then the comparison between the Moon and the Death cards make a lot of sense. Its almost like the shamanic journey begins on the Death card, then he emerges on the Moon card by the same towers you can see in the distance on the Death card. Great connection patrickjutte!

Bodhran
 

Abrac

In The Pictorial Key, Waite writes, "The veil or mask of life is perpetuated in change, transformation and passage from lower to higher, and this is more fitly represented in the rectified Tarot (i.e., his Tarot) by one of the apocalyptic visions than by the crude notion of the reaping skeleton."

Since Waite doesn't say specifically what he means by "one of the apocalyptic visions," I will assume he is referring to St. John's vision of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse - Revelation, Chapter 6. Their appearance in the narrative ushers in a time of great hardship and death upon the Earth, followed by a state of higher awareness and peace. But none of the Horsemen wear armor, though a couple of them are portrayed as warriors. Waite may have wanted to portray his skeleton as a Knight, thus, the horse and armor. Knights brought death and destruction, but they always had a higher, more noble purpose as their objective.
 

job

Uh, oh

Hi Abrac

Thanks. You've been a great help.

I don't want to take this thread off course (we're still talking about Death) but I have to ask what you* think this passage in the PKT is talking about...

"...but the exotic and almost unknown entrance, while still in this life, into the state of mystical death is a change in the form of consciousness and the passage into a state to which ordinary death is neither the path nor gate."

Thanks again.

*EDIT: Or anyone else
 

BodhiSeed

Abrac said:
Waite may have wanted to portray his skeleton as a Knight, thus, the horse and armor. Knights brought death and destruction, but they always had a higher, more noble purpose as their objective.

Abrac,
This does make sense. I can see Waite wanting Death to appear as chivalrous - even though it is the end, it also offers a new beginning.

job said:
...but the exotic and almost unknown entrance, while still in this life, into the state of mystical death is a change in the form of consciousness and the passage into a state to which ordinary death is neither the path nor gate.

I wonder if this "entrance" to a change in consciousness has anything to do with that hard-to-see cave on the card... Hmmm...

Bodhran
 

HudsonGray

That's what it sure sounds like. There's a thing with shamanism where they go through a 'death' usually underground, and get stripped down to just bones and reassembled again. It's a rite of initiation and is one of the things that needs to be done before they can move on with their learning. I wonder if they borrowed from that as part of the meaning.
 

Peredur

Perhaps there is a reference here to Longfellow's poem, The Skeleton In Armor. The Viking ship would support this theme.
 

BodhiSeed

In "An Illustrated Encyclopedia of Traditional Symbols" by Cooper says the knight's quest represents the journey of the soul through the world. Alchemically, black (color of the armor) is "nigredo", the decay that precedes renewal.

Bodhran
 

Rainbow Aurora

I've sometimes noticed a similarity ;) between these two:
 

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