Moon crescent under High Priestess foot, why?

Abrac

I think the Empress is also the woman clothed with the sun. From the PKT: "There are also certain aspects in which she has been correctly described as desire and the wings thereof, as the woman clothed with the sun. . ."
 

Gofannon

She is the mother that becomes the bride, the bride being the Empress. She is also Hathor or Mehet-Weret, carrying the sun disc between her horns. She is associated with water and the flooding of the Nile, so that links her with Sirius.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hathor

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mehet-Weret

I would still like to know why the crescent moon is placed at her feet. We know the Moon card is Pisces, and Pisces is the feet, is that the only connection?
 

Michael Sternbach

She is the mother that becomes the bride, the bride being the Empress. She is also Hathor or Mehet-Weret, carrying the sun disc between her horns. She is associated with water and the flooding of the Nile, so that links her with Sirius.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hathor

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mehet-Weret

Nicely said. Actually, in the iconography of the New Kingdom, Hathor was hardly distinguishable from Isis.

I would still like to know why the crescent moon is placed at her feet. We know the Moon card is Pisces, and Pisces is the feet, is that the only connection?

This is a very common feature in images of Mary. It's quite obvious that this is where Waite/Coleman got this idea from. Christian symbolism is one of the prevalent influences in the RWS. And Waite was a Catholic, after all.
 

Barleywine

I never thought too hard about this, nor explored the origins of the symbolism. I always assumed - most likely based on something I read somewhere - it was an allusion to Yesod as the "jumping-off place" for the Lunar energy on the Way of Return (via the Path of the Arrow, joining the Moon of Yesod directly to the Sun of Tiphareth even as the path of the High Priestess joins the Sun (or Son) to Kether, the highest expression of the Father), and just took Crowley at face value on that point:

"The card refers to the Moon. The Moon . . . is universal, and goes from the highest to the lowest. This path is in exact balance in the middle pillar. There is here, therefore, the purest and most exalted conception of the Moon. (At the other end of the scale is Atu xviii, q.v.)"

I always thought it was a neat bit of reinforcing symbolism showing the ultimate purification and exaltation of the lower form of the Lunar force, which she is using as a "stepping-stone" to transcend.
 

Richard

P.F. Case considered it more appropriate for the crescent moon to be under the foot of the Empress rather than the High Priestess. I forget his reasoning.

Anyhow, there are occasional posts from neo pagans who are dismayed by the negativity of Trump XVIII. Apparently they are not taking Trump II into consideration. Of course, a lunar goddess should have destructive as well as creative powers, so it is appropriate for her to have both negative and positive cards.

Isaiah 45:7 King James Version:
I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord do all these things.​
 

Attachments

  • moon.jpg
    moon.jpg
    208.8 KB · Views: 592

Barleywine

P.F. Case considered it more appropriate for the crescent moon to be under the foot of the Empress rather than the High Priestess. I forget his reasoning.

Anyhow, there are occasional posts from neo pagans who are dismayed by the negativity of Trump XVIII. Apparently they are not taking Trump II into consideration. Of course, a lunar goddess should have destructive as well as creative powers, so it is appropriate for her to have both negative and positive cards.

Isaiah 45:7 King James Version:
I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord do all these things.​

I just read Case's discussion on the subject. Under the High Priestess, he says: "In the Rider pack, there is a yellow crescent at the feet of the High Priestess. This is good lunar symbolism but it confuses the symbolic issues. This will be better understood after you have read the explanation of the Empress, in the next chapter."

Regarding the Empress, he considers her to be the seat of subconsciousness (that is, subconsciousness "impregnated by seed-ideas" as distinct from the virginal cosmic subconsciousness of the High Priestess): "Psychologically, the Empress represents subconsciousness as the mother of ideas, the generatrix of mental images." He wraps it up by saying "The particular mental function peculiar to subconsciousness is imagination, based on memory." He makes his point rather convincingly, although he does sacrifice the Middle Pillar symmetry of the original concept.

On the subject of God as the source of all things both good and evil, Monty Python had a few pithy comments on the subject:

http://www.lyricsdepot.com/monty-python/all-things-dull-and-ugly.html
 

foolMoon

Apart from the astrological attributions to the card, I feel the notes from the Hulse's book relevant in this issue.

"the moon on the High Priestess feet, as the energy or message descented from God from Kether (The top pomegranate on the veil), the first Sephira, while the solar cross on the breast of the priestess is the position of Tiphereth, the sixth Sephira. Therefore the path of Gimel spans the crown, head and thorat of the priestess." - pp.362, The Key of It All.

So I used to think the moon here depicts its placement on Malkuth in Tree of Life, the material world, i.e. The energy or secret / sacred message descended from God to the word we live in. The High Priestess is the essential medium for that energy and message.

For the solar energy, we get it direct from the Sun, but for the lunar energy and messages, we get it only via the medium.
 

Laurelle

I understand that the Moon Card is associated with Pisces, but the Moon under the HP's feet associates her with Cancer. She rules cancer and is exalted in Taurus. Cancer rules the Moon.

So I'm not sure why a few posters have tried to relate the HP back to the Moon tarot card, though I can see the connection.....

And Yes, Case changed the moon to the Empress, which does make a little more sense, but both seem sensible choices.
 

Barleywine

So I'm not sure why a few posters have tried to relate the HP back to the Moon tarot card, though I can see the connection.....

In Crowley's case I think he was making the point that the Moon, as a universal archetype, partakes of both the "highest and the lowest." One read through the Book of Thoth Moon essay makes it abundantly clear that he saw the Moon more as Hecate than Diana.