I happen to be on vacation this week, thus time for this admittedly long reply:
Thanks for the warmth. Also, I appreciate the international milieu here. Very nice.
To answer Lee's and others' curiosities about my comprehensive system...well, it's quite synthetic. I beg, borrow, and steal from all kinds of sources. I can be a devotee of tradition or an iconoclast. Perhaps I can share more details as topics arise. But, here's a snapshot of its nature.
1. Basically, I see the Tarot as a kind of Hegelian Dialectic, a very energetic system of thesis/antithesis/synthesis. The red, blue, and yellows play out this battle. That's why I like the TdM, it most plainly shows this dialectic; I believe other tarots distorted this in their quest for enhancement of presumably
primitive images.
2.
My Major Arcana system:
- is informed by many Medieval cosmological models. No room here to expand on that right now.
- One of the ways I line up the Major Arcana for comparison is:
{row one} 1 {Le Bateleur} to 10 {Le Roue}
{row two} 11 {Le Force} to 20 {Le Jugement}
- Le Mat and Le Monde are paired outside.
- This arrangement produces many interesting dialectics. For example, Le Bateleur and Le Force are two types of power; Le Roue and Le Jugement are two types of movement.
- I assigned my own astrological/planetary combos to the Major Arcana. They represent Planetary Rulerships (10) + Planetary Exaltations (10) + Two of the Planets rule two extra signs, i.e. Mercury & Venus (2) = 22. This gives you 10 planets and 12 signs.
3.
My Minor Arcana system is complex.
- I basically use a Vedic Numerological/Astrological system based on 1-9. What about the left-out 10? Indeed, it's position outside 1-9 contributes to its meaning as a transitional number with no real substance in the sequencing. This matches the Major Arcana La Roue and Le Jugement, which represent transitional states.
- The Minor Arcana take on spontaneous meanings that are generated in-the-moment from combining number + suit. Suits represent different social states or areas of mundane life. Papus adds a layer here as well:
- I borrowed from Papus and his numerological ideas of Thesis/Antithesis/Synthesis and Commencement/Opposition/Equilibrium.
- This easily lead me to borrow from Vedic sources and ideas of Brahma (creator), Siva (destroyer), and Vishnu (preserver) who serve beautifully as an overlay on the 1-9's and match Papus' system. The 10's are Trimurti - i.e. Brahma/Siva/Vishnu united.
- Why did I get into Vedic stuff? Because I've always loved the gypsy mystique of the cards, despite its mythological nature, and how the Vedic sources speak to the gypsy background.
- Then, I add in a layer of Decanates on the Minor Arcana, but not the GD's system. Moreover, my decanates begin with the Ace, not the Two. This preserves the 10 as outside of the number-system.
- For the Minor Arcana, then, I learn the skeletal system, rather than memorize meanings. The "meat on the skeleton" is in-the-moment.
Whew! Would you believe that the layers all match up-- i.e. have congruency...well, at least for me. So, those are some of the layers in this rather tall wedding cake system of mine. There's more, but this email is waaaay too rambling. I'll get a reputation with only my third post!
Yet, despite all of this layering, I have taught others that when the cards hit the table, they must first be read through the eyes of a child, which means all knowledge is forgotten, and a Beginner's Mind is maintained. In practice, this means that any idiosyncratic TdM imagery (whether perhaps a flower, a color, or how the courts are looking at each other) will suggest spontaneous, intuitive meanings that cannot be systematized into a
bible of meanings.
Thanks for tolerating the brain-dump.
