"Life Is A Dream"

Rosanne: Back to the Hermit- so he walks in two worlds- that of Man and that of Soul- so he might be shown with a split personality eh? How might that be shown?
Any Ideas? This according to me would be the only schizophrenic personality in the whole deck

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Not clear about this (not unsurprising ) Is the world of the Soul the same as the world of the Spirit?

I have thought that the Soul was supposed to be unique to every person. In effect that would mean everyone walks with it. Clarification needed.


Bee

Really interesting. I'm most intrigued about the diagrams you have scanned Rosanne. I'm going to save them to my PC and see if I can enlarge them a little without losing too much detail and see what I can make out. Is the book one worth obtaining? Normally when I discover such interesting books (or decks) they are either out of print or very hard to find. I expect this will be the case with this book too. Anyway, will go and see what I can make out from the diagrams.


ETA....actually, just realised the time and need to go and cook dinner for my girls. Will try and get to this later.

...so he walks in two worlds- that of Man and that of Soul.

If those are the words he (J.S) used I wonder if it is a 'saying', meant to convey that the Hermit has one foot here in this world and one foot in the 'next' world. i.e: Due to age (Saturn; Time, old age, proximity to death)?


Bee

Well....
The first set on the graph you cannot see is the Realm of Man and is Lunar consciousness = everyday stuff- human activity and personality and is like the Ranks of Man in the Mantegna.

It goes backwards astrologically from Cancer to Aquarius.
For Man everything swings from the hipbone of The Lovers who is considered the Solar angel because it is through Love that the life force comes to us via the Sun.
So it looks like this.....
...........................................Love[ers]..............................................
Moon........Mercury.......Venus..........Mars..........Jupiter.............Saturn
Magician....Popess........Empress......Emperor.....Pope...............Hermit
Cancer......Gemini.........Taurus.........Aries..........Pisces..............Aquarius

The top line is the Planetary Ruler- their Dignities. It is not saying that The Emperor is an Arieian but he is ruled by Mars; He is personified when Mars goes through Aries. So Mars is the God of Force and action and Aries is cardinal and fiery - so the Emperor is a raider and an invader- whilst he has courage he also has aggression. He is action both good and bad.

See how it goes?
I have a problem with the so called double nature of the Hermit.

Then you have the second set which is the Solar half of the Zodiac from Leo forward to Capricorn. This is the Realm of the Soul- life, death,virtues and moralities. The Lunar angel is Temperance and is called Chronico- I am guessing that mean what is our penalty for life. She is the controller of the cycle of regeneration- solution and dissolution- Life and Death.
So we have the Chariot, Justice, Hermit W.O.F, Fortitude, The H.Man and Death.

It is oh so neat and tidy and perfectly understandable as a Cosmos in Miniature (which is the books name) and yes it is still able to be purchased.
Except I do not get the Hermit bit, especially a Judaic Hermit..........He leads a double life as a Hermit and as Prudence in this scheme.The Visconti Hermit does not look like a Hermit.

~Rosanne

Baldly speaking: Saturn = Formative principle. Functioning through Aquarius as detached & unconventional (non-15th cen).

Sounds like Mel
Going back to my earlier post, how was Aquarius understood back then? I can't think of anything that's dualistic about it.

Bee

Bernice said:

Baldly speaking: Saturn = Formative principle. Functioning through Aquarius as detached & unconventional (non-15th cen).

Sounds like Mel
Going back to my earlier post, how was Aquarius understood back then? I can't think of anything that's dualistic about it.

Bee

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The Zodiac signs didn't have 'personalities' as they do now. They were seen as places where the planet dwell, so Saturn would be dignified in his own house, and the focus would not be on Aquarius, but on the positive aspects of the planet Saturn.

Everyone interested in the 15th century worldview MUST have a copy of Calendar and Compost of Shepherd from Kessinger Publishing.

This book was hugely popular and remained in print in one edition or another from 1493 to 1656. It gives a clear picture of the worldview of the average European in the 15th to 17th centuries. It covers the Virtues and Vices, basic Church doctrine, Astrology, and basic Humour based medicine.

The book makes no mention of the character of the Zodiac signs, but has lengthy explanation of the 12 Houses and the characteristics of the seven planets, with nice woodcuts of the Children of the Planets.

The Zodiac signs didn't have 'personalities' as they do now. They were seen as places where the planet dwell, so Saturn would be dignified in his own house, and the focus would not be on Aquarius, but on the positive aspects of the planet Saturn.

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I agree. Better described as an 'astmosphere'.

A lengthy describtion of the Houses , that's where todays' ideas of the signs come from.


Bee

I think I get it now.
It could be.......
The accursed day- the ignoble. Saturday. Saturn is seen as the enemy of the Sun. From a Christian point of view The Sun is Christ- and what the ancients called Shamah= Saturn is the second Sun, the Helium Sun- the bad Dude.

Evidence, also cited by Ben-Yehuda, comes from Tacitus, a Roman historian. Writing in the late first or early second century C.E., Tacitus tells us that the Jews rest every seventh day, and let the earth lie fallow every seventh year, in honor of Saturn, the seventh and highest of the heavenly bodies. Although he does not say that the Jews worship Saturn, Tacitus does state that it is considered by them to be the planet with the most powerful influence on human life.

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Neh says a Christian- Sunday is the Lord's Day.
So really it now makes sense to me why this fellow we call the Hermit (in the Visconti) is maybe Jewish. Shabtai/Shamah/Saturn. There is an old saying about Jewish people and a pun on the word Dies Sacrum or Holy Day
Auri sacra fames=The cursed hunger for gold. I am sad now. There I was thinking that maybe the Visconti was in praise of their discreet(Aquarian trait) friends The Jewish Pawnbroker instead it was once again about "my God is bigger than your God" which is of course a Renaissance Cosmology.


But the book is very interesting......I feel it has given me an understanding of Tarot that I did not quite have before.

~Rosanne
Edited to add from Medieval Astrology: Saturn is reputed hurtfull, and the most obnoxious and malevolent of all the Planets, by reason he thus opposeth the Luminaries that are the Lamps of light, life and nutrition.