Aleister Crowley's Thoth - should i or shouldn't i ? Any advice would be welcome!

[Lillie]

Are you always this funny!

Well, being new to the Tarot and not owning a Thoth but being somewhat interested by it, I thought I would add some n00b comments.

I have absolutely no problem with the Thoth deck, I even find its images somewhat compelling. However, I do have a problem with Crowley. I think he was a little... off.

I read somewhere that Crowley gave up Chess because he said he realized that he didn't want his life to end up like all the other people, the masters that made Chess their life. Well, I don't want my life to look anything like Crowley's. So although I have no problem with the deck itself, it may be a valid contribution to the Tarot in its own right, I do have a big problem with reading anything that came out of Crowley's mouth, especially because I question his sanity.

And since, as has been stated in this thread, it may not be possible or wise to excise Crowley from the Thoth deck... I remain undecided (although slightly negatively inclined) as to whether I will ever get this deck...

Are there any books that discard Crowley and make effective use of the Thoth? Or is the consensus that the Thoth and Crowley are inexplicably intertwined?

Funny?
I am never funny...
I just don't understand why people laugh at me so much...

OK.

Crowley.
Weird guy, wasn't he?
Interesting too.

And reputed to be a very good chess player.
Maybe like Paul Morphy who also gave it up...

Anyway, it's up to you whether you like Crowley or not.
I love him, I think he was as funny as hell.
From what I can tell he had a real weird sense of humour to go with his big ego and bad habits.
But of course your opinion is your own, though I have to say that you win the prize for the first person I have ever spoken to who disliked Crowley because of his comments on Chess (wonderful game though it is).

As for reading his stuff. It's not easy. He was one of that generation who used far too many big words.
But his sanity?
The world is full of insane people and you don't catch insanity from reading their stuff. He was also very clever, very knowledgeable on all occult matters. It is worth giving him a look at, really it is, whatever you think of his lifestyle or his opinions on chess or anything else.

I mean, Thomas Jefferson, Kept slaves, didn't he? That is pretty nasty, but it don't stop him being classed as a great man.
Bobby Fischer. He was a right fruit cake, wasn't he? Still, interesting guy and I bet you'd read anything he wrote...
And so on.

And what about the unknown guy that first drew the Marseilles?
For all we know he was as mad as a hatter and had the bodies of his five ex wives buried under the garden shed with knives in their backs... Does our not knowing make it OK to like that deck in a way that our knowing makes it OK not to like Crowley?

But whatever.
Your opinions are yours, and more power to you for holding them.

There are books that deal with the Thoth without going into the whole Crowley thing. I believe the Arrien book is one.
However from what I know she just does the 'say what you see' method, which although valid in itself as a way of reading tarot is essentially pointless, because by following that method you would look at the deck and say what you saw rather than what she did.

Whatever you do, whether you get the Thoth or not, more power to you.

 

[gregory]

Arrien was one of the ones I was politely not mentioning on account of how I think it isn't even fit for dead dogs....

 

[Lillie]

I've never read her, but she is the only one whose name I can recall...

It should be noted that there are many threads on Arrien.
None are complimentary.

 

[JSNYC]

She can always be if she chooses. But she's right.

Of course she is right! I was actually referring to another post where something she said struck me as funny (while being directly to the point).

Funny?
I am never funny...
I just don't understand why people laugh at me so much...

I hope you don't misunderstand me Lillie. I love your forthright style. It is so very refreshing. And maybe you do it with a humor that you don't realize, or maybe one that only I get.

(Pawn to Queen's Bishop 4 )

And I wasn't saying that I didn't like the Thoth due to Crowley's involvement in Chess, or anything like that. I was saying that I agreed with Crowley's analogy, and I was essentially using his own words against him.

And I want to clarify something, my opinions of Crowley refer only to Crowley, not his deck, and especially not to anyone who uses the Thoth for any reason.

As a matter of fact, if learn the Thoth I would probably learn it like Lillie, which is to make it my own and not rely on a foundation set by Crowley. I just wanted to make it clear, that I was not disparaging the Thoth deck, I am still considering getting it; I was only disparaging Crowley.

I just thought I would post (one of the primary) reasons why I haven't decided to buy it.

Ummm... I think we are revisiting an old topic, gregory! Going back to the source!

 

[gregory]

Ummm... I think we are revisiting an old topic, gregory! Going back to the source!

We feely thinkers have to do that a lot

 

[Probie]

I have to say I knew nothing, but that didn't stop me and over the years I learned stuff, and it's like the Thoth was always there for me, and I learned along side it, I learned as I went along.
And there was no time when I thought that the deck needed too much study, or that I didn't know enough.
It was always like it met me wherever I was at the time.
And as well, it has never been like I finished learning with it, like I knew all there is to know. There is always more.

Lillie, your whole post was such a profound read, but this bit in particular (emphasis mine) really struck me. Yes, I had learnt a little bit about Hermetics/astrology/qabalah/etc prior to picking it up, but the thing that really got me going on the Thoth was the deck itself, in tandem with the Book of Thoth. Coz the two of them send you in a myriad directions of enquiry and you keep coming back full circle, only it's like one of those carparks where you're just circling over the same bit of ground and going up in spirals - up in knowledge and understanding. It's the most amazing journey I've ever been on, and it won't ever end.

\m/ Kat

Wow...this explains it all...and I bet there was an HGA or three involved in all of this too! Seriously though, it's like I swing out to do something and then come back to this tradition like it's some tether. It does take a lot to get up & running in it, but it's not like you can't do anything till you've got it all down.

I just finished DuQuette (2003) Understanding Aleister Crowley’s Thoth Tarot and also Hazel (2004) Tarot Decoded: Understanding and Using Dignitaries and Correspondences - can we say dignitaries anybody? And that brought about now getting into Woolfolk (2008) The Only Astrology Book You’ll Ever Need - yeah, right, sure, whatever you say...all the Crowley books come next week, the Qabalah books came this week [including the posthumous publication of Rabbi Lamed Ben Clifford's work ]...and it never ends...

...but if it did, would it be worth it?

 

[Maskelyne]

[...] I do have a big problem with reading anything that came out of Crowley's mouth, especially because I question his sanity.
[...]
Are there any books that discard Crowley and make effective use of the Thoth? Or is the consensus that the Thoth and Crowley are inexplicably intertwined?

From what little I have read of Crowley, I think he would want you to question his sanity - and your own, too. While I argued earlier in this thread that the deck works fine as a strictly visual document, I don't see much point in reading books about the Thoth deck that don't take advantage of Crowley's Book of Thoth, as Crowley has provided a detailed explanation of the symbolism and associations in the deck. I do have Ziegler's Tarot - Mirror of the Soul, (couldn't help it - came with the cards) which gives simple divinatory meanings for the cards. I don't think Ziegler consulted the Crowley book, since he manages to misidentify what he's seeing in some cases.

Whatever you might think of Crowley's philosophy or lifestyle, his knowledge of occult symbolism is solid. And I'm pretty sure you can read The Book of Thoth without getting sucked into sexual magick, hashishism, multi-level-marketing, or other forms of debauchery.

 

[gregory]

Oh god - Ziegler..... There's a book that seems to take no account of Crowley, if you are looking for one.....

 

[Probie]

There's another too:

• Wagner, S. (2004). Integral Tarot: Decoding the Essence: Myths, Magic, & Metaphor. Salt Lake City: UT: Strong Winds.

• Wagner, S. (2005). Integral Tarot: CD Treasure Chest: Decoding the Essence: Myths, Magic, & Metaphor [CD]. Salt Lake City, UT: Strong Winds.

The CD was $50, full of unusual claims, and questionable history. Wagner uses the Thoth Tarot with an integration of the Intuitive School and a more standard Rider-Waite-Smith/Traditional School for her approach, complete with reversals and sees the two extra 1/Magus cards as essential. There's nothing about Crowley or Thelema in there at all. Wagner claims to be completelely self-taught by angels.

Book could be helpful (minus the history and take the extra cards with a grain of salt), skip the CD. But then again, it's not high on my "to read" list and I skip the TV for the reading...

 

[Emily]

Arrien was one of the ones I was politely not mentioning on account of how I think it isn't even fit for dead dogs....

But it makes a good doorstop.