Fudugazi said:
It's anachronic, as is your appreciation (or lack thereof) of Court de Gébelin. He was writing a "grand theory of all cultures" and trying to see some common thread that ran through them. He lived in an era where universalism was not only an ideal - it was about to burst into flower in the French Revolution. He also lived smack bang in the middle of a time when Freemasonry and other secret societies were all the rage and the Gothic novel was at its most popular. Abracadabrantesque? So were they all! Gébelin claiming the tarot as Egyptian was no more far-fetched from the Freemasons claiming a descent from King Solomon. It may sound ludicrous to us now, but we have to judge it according to the culture, desires and priorities of the era: which was idealistic and universalist in nature. Myths create culture far more than facts ever have.
That's why a game couldn't just be a game: it had to stand for something else, something bigger, nobler and more universal.
I think his aims generous, even if he was wrong. And his glorious mistake changed the course of divination history in the West. Hell - it gave the modern occult movement a divination and meditation tool that the West could be proud of. The Tarot is our I-Ching, our Ifa verses. It has proved to be a versatile invention, a card game that is at the same time the projection of every generation's preoccupations since Court de Gébelin. His generation cared about overcoming tragic divisions of fortune, class and culture through finding a common origin to every human culture; they did it with a great deal of purple prose and a love for ritual (perhaps because the Church had become so unpopular!). Egypt was as good a starting-point as any.
Of course your answer makes sense in some ways.
But to, me trying to understand the historical context really does not implicate that I should have sympathy for the expressed ideas!
The spirit of time or "Zeitgeist" as they say in Germany, is a strange thing!
There are a lot of things which are "all the rage" today and I really really do not like them at all and I have absolutely no comprehension for them!
Also I am also not sure in this case what should be considered as anachronic, my critic or Gébelin's theory?
Especially as it is very often tried to declare Tarot as as a tool which independant of time (well Gébelin did this too)
I make another assumption, I am am quite sure (well I hope so) that if I had lived in 1786, I would have found what Gébelin wrote abracadabrantesque too.
There are quite a lot of books as old or even older than Gébelin Monde Primitif that I can read today with much joy.
Yes of course, he was probably the one who gave a significant impulse for divination Tarot, but I absolutely do not like his impulse and the way the things went after him and Etteilla (who has really a lot to do with this, and in my comprehension a lot more than Gébelin).
I do love Tarot and I do use Tarot to read sometimes.
But it took me some times to understand that I had to throw away all this heavy baggage that comes just from this time: Gébelin, Etteilla ... and later from Waite ... Crowley ...
Also seing how it still influences new Tarot authors or artists, I really wish sometimes the impulse from Gébelin and from a lot of follower would have not been so abracadabrantesque.
Of course I am aware that what is abracadabrantesque is a very subjetive thing
BTW I used during a long time the Yi King and I never had any problem my with any interpretation as I have with a lot of Tarot interpretations.
If I recall well you are native french speaker?
Do you like the style of Gébelin?
Best regards