Zmagus64
Love this forum.
I just took Barleywine's advise on a couple of books, and am glad I did. John Maxwell's "The Tarot" gives a great historical perspective on Tarot, which I love. It also goes into the details of numerology and the pips. The interpretation of Temperance was very interesting, I see not only the transformation of "will and desire" into creative energy, but I feel that she represents the Universal Soul, or Universal Energy from which we all come, ie god. In the Tarot De Marseille, Temperance is of Heaven (with angel wings) and of Earth (both feet on the ground). Because the lower cup is the blue side of desire and the higher cup is the red side of creation, I believe the pouring is moving from the lower cup to the higher, indicating a power that is not earthly -I've tried and my wife is getting pretty angry with the mess. I'm also interested that the image of Temperance is larger than most of the other representations in the deck, she actually touches three borders of the card and the right border is very close.
I'd love to hear your thoughts on the placement of Temperance also. Placed after Death and before The Devil seems at first glance a strange place for such an even keeled character.
I guess it could be viewed as the time we spend right before birth (after Death), deciding how we'll fit in, where our true value will be, and getting a sense of the rest of the world we're about to enter. Maybe the placement in front of the Devil is a reminder that once we are earth bound it is very likely that we will have to come to grips with our own ego and forces inside that temp us to cross over the lines of morality, to give into the temptation so inherent in being human?
By the way, I swear I don't talk like this in person, Tarot brings out the philosopher in all of us I guess.
I just took Barleywine's advise on a couple of books, and am glad I did. John Maxwell's "The Tarot" gives a great historical perspective on Tarot, which I love. It also goes into the details of numerology and the pips. The interpretation of Temperance was very interesting, I see not only the transformation of "will and desire" into creative energy, but I feel that she represents the Universal Soul, or Universal Energy from which we all come, ie god. In the Tarot De Marseille, Temperance is of Heaven (with angel wings) and of Earth (both feet on the ground). Because the lower cup is the blue side of desire and the higher cup is the red side of creation, I believe the pouring is moving from the lower cup to the higher, indicating a power that is not earthly -I've tried and my wife is getting pretty angry with the mess. I'm also interested that the image of Temperance is larger than most of the other representations in the deck, she actually touches three borders of the card and the right border is very close.
I'd love to hear your thoughts on the placement of Temperance also. Placed after Death and before The Devil seems at first glance a strange place for such an even keeled character.
I guess it could be viewed as the time we spend right before birth (after Death), deciding how we'll fit in, where our true value will be, and getting a sense of the rest of the world we're about to enter. Maybe the placement in front of the Devil is a reminder that once we are earth bound it is very likely that we will have to come to grips with our own ego and forces inside that temp us to cross over the lines of morality, to give into the temptation so inherent in being human?
By the way, I swear I don't talk like this in person, Tarot brings out the philosopher in all of us I guess.