Direction of the swords

wizzle

I remember reading that there is significance to the direction in which the swords point, i.e. up, down, sideways, etc.

Can you refresh my memory about the various meanings of the directions?
 

wizzle

Book T

Book T has this to say about the direction of the swords...

"Raised upward, it invokes the Divine crown of Spiritual Brightness, but reversed it is the Invocation of Demonic Force; and becomes a fearfully evil symbol. It represents, therefore, very great power for good or evil, but invoked; and it also represents whirling Force, and strength through trouble. It is the affirmation of Justice upholding Divine Authority; and it may become the Sword of Wrath, Punishment, and Affliction."

I knew I'd seen something somewhere.

p.s. You know you are getting obsessed with RWS when you answer your own questions.
 

Grigori

hehehe It just means you are very clever wizzle :D

Also the vertical sword would be balanced, where if it leans to the right it is in favor of action, or if it leans to the left it is in favor of inaction. (No you just need to decide whose right, yours or the character in the card :D )
 

Fulgour

Feel the Energies

wizzle said:
Book T has this to say about the direction of the swords...
Remember that "Book T" was written about a Golden Dawn deck,
and the Pamela Colman Smith Tarot of 1909 is not one of those.
 

RChMI

Fulgour said:
Remember that "Book T" was written about a Golden Dawn deck,
and the Pamela Colman Smith Tarot of 1909 is not one of those.
Members of the G .¨. D .¨. were encouraged and expected to created their own personal Tarot decks based on the instructions of Book T and the copied imagery of Mathers' orginal Tarot Deck. Although later, many members were making copies of other member"s decks. Both Waite and Smith, being G .¨. D .¨. members would and did incorporate aspect of Book T throughout their deck. The personalization of the Minor cards is were they made their radical depature from those of Mathers.


As such, the RWS deck "can" be considered as a Golden Dawn Deck.
 

Fulgour

Name Game

RChMI said:
Members of the G .¨. D .¨. were encouraged and...
It would be interesting if you could define for us
the Golden Dawn at all... it seems to be a myth.
 

RChMI

Fulgour said:
It would be interesting if you could define for us the Golden Dawn at all... it seems to be a myth.
A quite "real" organization, that has grown to "mythic" proportions....

The overall structure of the organization could be viewed as Masonic, with incoprorations of ideals of Gnostic, Hermetic, Rosicurcian, and Yogic thoughts and influences permeating throughout. The overall goal and purpose of the G .¨. D .¨. was to found an integrated initiatory system that could bring Eastern thought into harmonius balance with Western idealism... Ergo, Spiritual Enlightenment of the Ancients, enraptured and enfolded within the auspices of the Modern World for a new Synthesis of Integrated Unity within the Duality (Unified Understanding within Linear Duality.)

The aspects that relate to the Tarot have been misinterpreted as relating to base divination, or "fortune telling." The actuality of the aspects relating to the Tarot were a Hermetic, or "Westernized" re-working of the Hebraic tradition of the "Discipline of the Chariot" (Maaseh Meravah.) Of which a "side effect" is that of prophecy. The Prophets of the OLd Testament were said to have utilized this particular meditative discipline, and were therefore regarded as "Prophets." The Tarot can be seen to be a visual Mnemotechnic for such a process, and was intended to be used as such within the Order.
 

Fulgour

Direction of Swords

RChMI said:
The actuality of the aspects relating to the Tarot were a Hermetic, or "Westernized" re-working of the Hebraic tradition of the "Discipline of the Chariot" (Maaseh Meravah.)
Which means, the "Tarot" is still just the "Tarot"
and all that other stuff is about ritual magic goo.

Ergo viz ibid hence: The direction of the Swords
is what the artist felt best expressed her images
intuitive meanings: and we 'decide' for ourselves.
 

RChMI

Fulgour said:
................

Ergo viz ibid hence: The direction of the Swords
is what the artist felt best expressed her images
intuitive meanings: and we 'decide' for ourselves.
Not necessarily. There would have been more of a collaboration between Waite and Smith under Mathers' previously written instructions and by use of his papers (comments, treatise, etc...)

For example....

Wheel of Fortune - Sphinx holds sword leaning to the right side of the card indicating Chesed, reinforcing the card's attribution of Jupiter (Sphinx=Leo=VIII Strength=19th Path - connecting Chesed and Geburah, Chesed=Jupiter to the right of the path.)

Justice - Sword is in right hand, forming the letter Lamed in conjunction with the scales.

2 S - Swords imitate the paths from Yesod to Hod and Netzach, Reinforces significance of Moon in Libra.

4 S - Swords point to three Chakras (Head, Throat, Heart.) Masonically, the three places struck about on Hiram Abif

6 S - The two swords separated on the left form two crosses , which numerically total eight, and reinforces the attribution of Mercury (Hod=8=Mercury) in the signicance of Mercury in Aquarius.
 

wizzle

I like it

Very nice post RChMI. Is that your analysis or drawn from Mather's or other GD writing? I never thought to connect the swords to the tree of life but it seems to work well.

Thanks for the insight. I'll need to study the cards you cited.