View Full Version : The Lovers
MystiqueMoonlight
01-04-2003, 02:58
"The Oracle of the Gods is the Child-Voice of love in Thine own Soul: hear thou it. Heed not the Siren-Voice of sense or the Phantom voice of reason: rest in simplicity, and listen to the silence" Aleister Crowley
Correspondence:-
Colour- yellow
Astrology-Gemini
Herb-Sandalwood
Rune- Kenaz: analysis, creativity, shaping things, creative fire. Art, craft, transformation of current situation. Rest and relaxation are necessary. Power to create your own reality. Reflect and understand before you make a decision.
AND
Wunjo: Harmony, courage, good cheer. Maintain joy in the face of adversity. Keep ideals in mind. Friends and family are important. New relationships, business success, the wind is blowing in your favour.
Hebrew- Zayin: is the completed fertilising act. Every object leading to an end. A symbol of luminous refraction.
Wow...am I the first to respond here? Cool.
Anyway, yeah...The Lovers...I think a lot of the symbolism that Crowley added doesn't really make much sense except when considered with Art, and even then, I really don't "get" this card completely...Has anyone read "The Chymical Wedding of Christian Rosenkruetz"? I'm guessing that might explain some of it...
A couple things I think are worth noting:
1) The crowns worn by the couple are the same as worn by the Empress and Emperor.
2) The swords in the background. Zayin means "sword."
3) The wedding is beig performed by the Hermit. I have no idea why...Also the Orphic egg here will later show up on his card.
I think this is one of the central cards in the Thoth deck, if for no other reason than it contains references and echoes of at least four other trumps.
Melissa`
01-04-2003, 03:32
Interesting things you pointed out Richard. Soon as I saw your reply and read it, I pulled out my deck to look. I haven't read the book that you mentioned..
but what I am curious about..the woman.. what is the print of on her robe? To me and my tired eyes right now it looks like incects? .. help me here! .. I know on the mans robe the print is of coiled snake? or so it looks to me..
Amaya
coldsuns
01-04-2003, 04:25
I think is flowers on her robe..
Whats Wunjo, Kenaz, Zayin? Is it on the picture? You might have said but i still dont understand..
Why there is lion of the left and eagle on right? The children on left is with white roses and on right is with a wand? The male(Fool) is taking spear and the female is taking cup?
The insects look like bees, which are also found on the Art card's robes... In the Art card are also found the Eagle and Lion as in the Lovers card, but they have switched colours.
Tree of Life stuff: This card takes us from Tiphareth to Binah, from Beauty (I think?) to the female part of God. (I'm not good with Qabalah) Or is it going from Binah to Tiphareth?
Coiled snakes on the man's robes: Kundalini? Sexuality?
Bees on woman's robes: Fertility?
This card reminds me of the Heiros Gamos (Sacred marriage)
And hey, is that the Golden Snitch down at the bottom of the card? ;)
Kiama
I`ve just started working with this deck, I love all your observations, I must admit that I hadn`t noticed the insects and snakes on the gowns. Had noticed that the crowns are those of the Empress and Emperor.
The cherrubs at the bottom are holding roses and a club as well as the spear and cup - are these to represent the suits?
Are they standing on anopen book?
Kiama,what is a golden snitch?
I really must buy a book to go with this deck.
Crystalmynx xx
Melissa`
01-04-2003, 08:37
Originally posted by crystalmynx
Are they standing on anopen book?
Hey crystalmynx,
I too first thought they were standing on an open book when I first glanced at the card. Its a set of red wings that the cherubs are on. the animals seem to be perched on a bar(correct me if I'm wrong) ..
I wonder if this was meant to look like an open book perhaps?
Also with the man and the woman.. her skin and hair are golden while the crown is blackish/silverish.. the man is complete opposite , golden crown with blackish colored skin. Is this supposed to represent something along the lines of the concept o ying an yang?
*mutters*... books on symbolism would be great right now :D
Ah! looking at the card and looking at the robes in the center where they come together he color of the two mingle together and the incect and snake pattern together.. as if one material..
ok. enough rambling.. :)
Amaya
There are quite a few references to opposites in this card...
Dark man, gold crown, light woman, silver crown.
Red Eagle, White Lion (Fire and Air elements)
The spear and chalice, which seem to represent the 'Sacred Marriage' (The spear is phallic, and when placed in the vagina-like chalice, the sexual union is symbolically taking place).
Man on on side, woman on the other... Yet the figure above them, whilst he has his two hands apart, one on one side of the picture (Female side) the other on the left hand side (Male side), his two hands are joined loosely by what looks like material... Dos this refer to the Catholic practice of placing a cloth over the marrying couple's hands for the wedding service?
Crstalmynx: The Golden Snitch is the winged ball from Harry Potter. The orphic egg at the bottom of the Lovers card looks like it.
Apparantly, according to the Book of Thoth, the Orphic Egg represents the marriage in a more primitive form.
Kiama
MystiqueMoonlight
01-04-2003, 15:04
Aahh, so that was a good idea. Gee I certainly invoked some thoughts on that one.
Basically you have all hit upon some good points. There's really no right or wrong when it comes to card interpretation.
Just a few more ideas to really get your intuitive juices flowing:-
1. Orphic Egg: contains the secret of life. The dark child upon it & carrying the spear indicates the male instinct to procreate and like the red lion is the is that of creative will. The white child is a Moon symbol such ass that of the white eagle. It unites us with our inner most femininity.
2. The number 6 is that of the union of opposites.
3. According to Crowley the connection between Binah & Tiphareth "From this point of view, he is a symbol of inspiration (Binaah), descending upon the hooded figure (Tiphareth), who is he, in this instance, a prophet operating the conjunction of the King & Queen"
4. Further of Zayin (the Hebrew letter). The hermaphrodite which holds itself in it's own embrace and is cut in two by the sword. Since then the two parts have been searching for each other.
Crowley also points out an association with Cain and Abel (the children), as well as Eve and Lilith (in the upper corners), but I must confess that I didn't really get a lot of it. He also says that the real title of this card should be "The Brothers."
I'm just wondering though...where is cupid pointing that arrow? I know he's blindfolded, but his aim shouldn't be THAT off...
I'm also wondering about the Spear/chalice vs. the club/flowers...could the latter two be considered more "natural" versions to the first two?
Also, I love the story of the Orphic Egg, but from what mythology does it come? I think it said in the Banzhof/Akron book that it was "Pelagasian" (or something like that...I'm too lazy to run back and check), but I have no idea what culture that would be.
Coldsuns: Why do you think the man is the Fool? I notice that the Hermit here has a cone of light behind his head that's like the Fool's, but that's the only connection here I can find...
Hi!
I think Kiama may have gotten the essence of this card with her post about all the opposites in the card.
According to Crowley:
The Hebrew letter corresponding to this card is Zain, which means a Sword. The Sword is primarily an engine of division. However, in the intellectual world-which is the world of the Sword suit-it represents analysis. The sword cuts, divides, and separates the whole into individual distinct forms-and distributes polarity through the universe. (symbolized by all those opposites on the card) It separates female from male, black from white, negative from positive, etc. But besides being the instrument that separates and divides, it symbolizes the mental ability to recognize those differences.
One meaning of the Lovers card is the need for individuals not only to unite with each other but to unify and reconcile the opposites within themselves.
Crowley pairs the Lovers card with the Temperance Card. The subject of the Lovers + Temperance is Analysis, followed by Synthesis. He states: The first question asked by science is: "Of what are things composed?" This having been answered, the next question is: "How shall we recombine them to our greater advantage?"
According to Crowley the framework of this card is an Arch of Swords (behind the Hermit), beneath which the Royal Marriage takes place. The Arch of Swords represents division and analysis. The royal or exalted marriage (?synthesis?) is the marriage of ying and yang, Earth mother and Earth father. Their love conveys the balance of equally-weighted opposites. I guess he is saying that we need intellectual understanding and knowledge to achieve union.
The Hermit is presiding over this marriage. (Kiama, Crowley says that the cloth around his arms is a scroll, ?a message?) Does he represent a guide-who leads us to wholeness? Does he stand as a reminder that each one of us is an individual-that even if we join with someone else we are still separate and need personal space? Does he stand as a symbol that we must sacrifice some of our separateness in order to be with others? Why is he hooded? Any thoughts on this?
Some others things of interest, quoted directly from Arrien's The Tarot Handbook:
"In the background of the card are iron gates, symbolizing the Lovers' need not to be limited."
"All relationships are a transformative experience, represented by the Orphic Egg, the egg wrapped with the snake, so that physically in relationships, we change like the egg, and spiritually, we transform and let go of old identities, like the snake shedding an old skin. Each relationship has an internal or spiritual connection, which is represented by the wings that are attached to the egg."
Rose
Good post, Rose...it occurs to me that even the Hermit isn't exempt from the dualities in this card. I just thought of this right now, so it may be completely wrong, but could he be paired with Cupid? Since the two of them are the only images in the card that don't have some kind of analogy (I'm looking at the snake and the egg as being two images, rather than one).
Hmm. Now that I've thought of that, I'm at a loss on how to elaborate...the Hermit is solitude, Cupid is the god of love...both have a blindfold or sorts...
I dunno. Am I way off base here...?
Richard, I didn't quite get the Cain and Abel thing either. I wonder if historically some deck used the story. Maybe Crowley would have preferred calling the card "The Brothers"-as a reference to relationships in general. I don't think he was particularly fond of women. The Cain and Abel story in the context of this card is interesting though--look what happens when we forget our connection to each other--jealousy, hate, murder.
The book I have by Arrien equates the spear/sword, chalice/cup, club/wand, and flower/earth with the four elements. The flower/earth thing seems weak to me.
And yes I'm also wondering where the heck that arrow is going to land.
Rose
Rose, I'm kind of wondering (throwing in some completely gratuitous Crowley-bashing here) if he thought a Lovers card would be superfluous, since there's a Lust card...just a speculation.
At any rate, I'm glad that it is the Lovers rather than the Brothers. Although I love this deck to pieces, a lot of the Thelemic attributes do bug me, and eliminating the Lovers would just be going too far...
I've been discussing the Lovers card and its relationship to the Temperence card with a Thelemite (Crowley was the forefather of Thelema). According to him and Thelema...
The Art card is the start of the process of initiation, which in Thelema occurs when you achieve knowledge and conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel. (This Holy Guardian Angel thing is looked at in The Sacred Magic of Abra Melin the Mage and is a key element of Thelema) The Lovers card is the end of this process, the Heiros Gamos, and the cards after that, (Heirophant, Emperor, Empress, Priestess, Magician, Fool) are the susequent further stages of intitiation which occur to bring the initiate to the level of Adept. (nb- Thelemites do the Fool's journey 'backwards', from the World to the Fool.)
All the cards in between in Art and Lovers cards are the transitory stages of initiation.
I thought this was very interesting, so had to share it with you all.
Kiama
MystiqueMoonlight
02-04-2003, 02:37
OK I'm just gonna throw this one in and see how it lands for you all......
Why the comparison of pairs in this card? Perhaps we can apply it as one singular person who has the quality of both halfs.
Take the Cain and Abel analogy for instance. Does that necessarily apply to 2 people or can we say that it is 1? How does the Fool/Magus/Hierophant progression to this point within our deck effect this card.
Try not to just analyse each card of it's own merit, but more over as the next progession from the previous cards in the deck.
Kiama - Thank you for blowing my mind. I'm trying to get my head around a backwards progression now...so the Major Arcana is not the jounrey TO the new Aeon, but what happens IN the new Aeon? Wow...let me get my thoughts together, and maybe I'll have enough to post a new thread...(I know a Thelemic witch; I might ask her and see what she says).
MystiqueMoonlight - I'm not sure what you're getting at here...but if we look at the Lovers as being a single person, perhaps the Hierophant feels the stirring of the child inside his chest; that child throws off and contradicts all the doctrines the Hierophant thought to be true, and has revealed his entire life to be nothing but an empty husk. In the Lovers, the two opposite and contradictory views are merged, at least superficially, which brings us to the Chariot. Actually believing the new doctrines and overthrowing the old takes a bit more time and soul-searching (as well as examination of ideas of justice, spiritual enlightenment, fate and chance, strength, sacrifice, and life and death), but is finally acheived in Art.
Does that make sense?
MystiqueMoonlight
02-04-2003, 03:30
It does to me...does it to you? :)
More or less...I always took Rachel Pollack's view that the Fool simply encountered cards I - V, and didn't really participate until VI. Seeing the Fool as the Hierophant (and thus, potentially as everyone in the deck) is a new concept to me...and almost a revelationary as trying to figure out what the Majors' "story" is if told backwards...
Some general-not deck specific thoughts on the lovers.
As part of the Spiritual Journey of the Fool:
As the Fool goes through the first five cards of the Major Arcana he internalizes the experiences he has and in that sense becomes the card or the people in them. By the time the Fool gets to the "Lovers card" stage of life, he has formed a value system. However, for the first time the Fool fully realizes that he is a separate individual. He starts breaking away from his parents, he makes his own decisions-for better or for worse. He begins to question things; things are no longer black and white in his world. He realizes that some of his beliefs and feelings conflict with each other. Feeling independent and separate can be scary and lonely, so at the same time that he is trying to separate, he goes looking for ways to re-connect (both externally and internally) and become whole.
The pairs on this card are not only symbols of human relationships, but also of the opposing traits within ourselves that need to be reconciled-our own dual nature.
The Lovers as an allegory of choice and decision is a good one, because who you choose as a mate or a friend reflects a lot of things about you, such as self esteem, values, who you hope to become, etc.
Rose
isthmus nekoi
04-04-2003, 13:25
Haven't read all the posts yet, so forgive me if I repeat something...
I'm so glad to read about the cain/abel thing, Richard b/c just the other day, I got the Lovers in Vertigo, and that was immediately what I thought - they're c/a, and suddenly it all made sense.
c/a is the oldest *human* story - it is the first story of human autonomy. The creation myth is the oldest *god* story in which god/satan call all the shots and we find the birth of consciousness. c/a is the story where Cain (Satan prototype) **utilizes** his own consciousness by negating the Other (Abel/Christ prototype).
You have to read the story carefully, interpret it on your own. So many ppl interpret the murder as: oh, Cain got all pissy and jealous that God liked Abel's sacrifices better, humans are all pissy and jealous and vengeful, let this be a lesson to us all. OK, fair enough, but it's more complex than that (if not the earlier interpretation being totally off the mark :P)
c/a represents the human opposites, which is why they are both brothers (both in the conscious mind). This is *different* from the original opposite that stems from the split b/w man and God which is represented by the expulsion from Eden.
Consider the following binary:
Cain------------------------------------Abel
Satan----------------------------------Christ
active----------------------------------passive
A type----------------------------------B type
top (in the BDSM sense)-----------bottom
evil (in the not 'bad' sense)-------good
farmer/agricultural economy------shepherd/hunter gatherer econ
rich (agricultural surplus)----------poor
civilizations/empires----------------pre-civilization
colonizer------------------------------colonized
ego-------------------------------------Other
Back to the Lovers/Brothers. What we have here is only the first level in reconcilling division b/w opposites - the foundation of the conscious mind. (I just learned that in Japanese, the character for understanding - wakaru - is the same one used for dividing - hanbun.) This however, is important b/c it's not reconciling the foundational difference b/w man and God. Only man and man.
From Jung/Answer to Job: "By engendering insoluable conflicts and consequently 'afflicto animae', it brings man nearer to a knowledge of God. All opposites are of God, therefore man must bend to this burden; and in so doing he finds God, in his 'oppositeness,' has taken posession of him, incarnated himself in him. He becomes a vessel for Divine conflict ..."
This is the first step - recognizing differences, marrying them (*not* uniting/dissolving into one). It's the precussor to dealing w/the split b/w man/Divine.
Sorry if that's incoherent. If you have any qs, just shoot. Will be back later to examine similarities b/w this card and Jung and alchemy. One text in particular, forgot the title. It's got a king and queen holding flowers, if you can remember it, pls post, I'd be greatful.
It's not incoherent. Your post makes a lot of sense. Thank you. I like your interpretation of the Vertigo Tarot's Lovers as Cain and Abel from Sandman better than Rachel Pollack's and Dave McKean's choice of Chantelle and Tani (an angel and demon from the Comic series Hellblazer).
Rose
isthmus neki - Wow...you rock! And you're not being incoherent at all. I always read Cain and Abel as a story of sacrifice, animal and human, but the dualism is definitely there as well. I wonder what it means that Cain was the alpha male/murderer, yet Abel was the hunter?
Another binary here that's important is Lilith - Eve. The mother of demons and the mother of the human race...
And I think you've not only hit the nail on the head with this card, but drove the nail firmly into the wood with one deft tap. The Lovers is a recognition and marriage of opposites that doesn't quite reach the level of "coagula" yet (makes me wonder, which card is "solve"? Does it begin with the Fool?).
I know next to nothing about alchemy besides the fact that Nicholas Flamel was a real person and that playing with mercury is a bad idea. I likwise know little about Jung, so I'm not sure what book you're referring to.
But...wow. Good post. I'll try to come back with something when I've woken up a little more...
(Oh, by the way...I also like your idea for the Vertigo Lovers card. However, I LOVE that picture! I know next to nothing about Garth Ennis's take on Hellblazer, but that card is so intense...)
Do what thou Wilt shall be the whole of the Law.
Originally posted by Richard
Crowley also points out an association with Cain and Abel (the children), as well as Eve and Lilith (in the upper corners), but I must confess that I didn't really get a lot of it. He also says that the real title of this card should be "The Brothers."
Crowley thought that the card referred to the establishment of a political order. In many myths, the establishment of the political order is tied to a slaughter of brother by brother. For instance, Cain and Abel or Romulus and Remus.
$20,000 Question: How does this tie into the "Oracle of the Mighty Gods?"
Also, I love the story of the Orphic Egg, but from what mythology does it come? I think it said in the Banzhof/Akron book that it was "Pelagasian" (or something like that...I'm too lazy to run back and check), but I have no idea what culture that would be.
If Banshaf and Akron say it's Pelasgian, that only confirms my suspicion that they don't know what they're talking about.
The Orphic Egg comes from the Orphic poems (naturally). These were a literature that existed on the margins of Greek culture, which told stories about the gods, the birth of man, and how men might return to their divine origin by means of rites and not killing one another. They were attributed to the mythical singer Orpheus. At the beginning of their stories about the gods was very often a cosmic egg hatched by some primordial being.
None of the Orphic poems survive whole. But we have some quotations of them by later ancient authors, and some pseudo-Orphic literature from very late antiquity. Modern scholars, of course, have had a field day trying to reconstruct Orphic beliefs and practices. If your public library has a decent inter-library loan program, you might try to get a hold of M.L. West's _The Orphic Poems_ for a good introduction.
Coldsuns: Why do you think the man is the Fool? I notice that the Hermit here has a cone of light behind his head that's like the Fool's, but that's the only connection here I can find...
Crowley alludes in a couple of other places to the secret marriage of the Empress and the Hierophant. Maybe they're the couple?
Love is the Law, Love under Will.
Originally posted by Rose
Richard, I didn't quite get the Cain and Abel thing either. I wonder if historically some deck used the story.
This refers to one of his Visions recounted in _The Vision and the Voice_, where the "true" nature of the card was revealed to him. I am fairly certain that it appears in no previous tarot deck.
Originally posted by Minos
If Banshaf and Akron say it's Pelasgian, that only confirms my suspicion that they don't know what they're talking about.
It's funny you should say that...after finishing The Book of Thoth, I went back and read the Banzhof/Akron book, and...I hated it. FACTUALLY I think it's usually fine, but as far as INTERPRETATION goes, I think it's confused, sometimes sexist, and often out and out wrong (especially in their section on the Hanged Man, which seems to ignore Crowley's changes, and relies on an interpretation that fits nearly every deck BUT Crowley's).
And I wondered if the Orphic Egg story was Greek...since the words Orphic and (especially) Eurynome certainly sound Greek...thanks for clearing that up, Minos.
By the way, you don't happen to know anything about the backwards order of the Major Arcana, do you? Just curious...
(Can you that tell this idea really struck me?):)
isthmus nekoi
06-04-2003, 22:57
wow, thanks!! I'm glad you guys liked the post :) And more Vertigo fans woo hoo!
Anyways, I went back and read over the earlier posts... great stuff! The "backwards" journey is interesting, I remember someone telling me the Tibetan Book of the Dead was similarily "backwards". One wonders if this is representative to the two simultaneous approaches needed - forwards representing movement towards the development of consciousness, backwards representing movement towards the unconscious. Ya gotta have both in order for things to work.
---
Yes, there is definetely a theme of sacrifice in c/a - firstly Abel's death foreshadowing Christ's... except Christ's blood is there to redeem the burden of consciousness/offer eternal life while Abel's blood soaks the ground and Cain (ie father of humanity) will have to toil for the rest of our conscious days... another thing is the sacrifice that's needed to *exist*; sacrificing Eden for knowledge, sacrificing slaves to build/maintain empires, sacrificing the feminine prinicpal to build up a patriarchy, sacrificing mom to grow up (if you want to be Freudian ^_~), basically sacrificing the totality of the Self to build limitations/boundaries of the ego etc etc.
>Abel was the hunter
Yes, it's funny. Abel's technically a shepherd which connotates the nomadism and egalitarianism (ie. no wealth accumulation) of a hunter gatherer society. Of course, Abels have been known to top from the bottom sometimes ;) But it's always the Cains, the brother killers, that build great empires if you want to go the political route. Cain makes a great capitalist ^_~
Right, Lilith/Eve.... Brothers could very well be Sisters, or Twins (Gemini). Or Lovers, although this can get confusing b/c Western discource will often gender the unconscious/Divine w/female and conscious/ego (rational) w/male. In this context, I don't think Lovers was created w/this female=uncon male=con gendering in mind b/c this isn't a merging of ego into Self. Lilith/Eve like c/a are similarily reinstated w/the 2 Marys expressing the virgin/whore binary. And wouldn't it be nice if we could marry those Marys! The interesting thing to note about l/e is that unlike c/a, they are both sinners and related to Satan. Note also how the Marys also don't give us a c/a binary as they are both 'good'. Mary 1 is the holy mother, Mary 2 is the repentant/redeemed whore. In both cases, the *mothering* figure is more 'good' than the single woman. Little more problematic than brothers in this context, I find.
I forgot to mention related myths: Inanna/Dumuzi (sp) of Sumeria, as well as Isis/Osiris/Seth of Egypt. Note how these myths feature a third (transcendent function if you're going Jungian) element, the sister/lover. Something funny happened to this character in Christian myth, she's sort of displaced.
-------
Orpheus....... very strongly tied in w/the figure of Persephone who in turn shares many qualities w/Eve. There are some mythical characters that had secret religious rituals built up around them, before Christianity took over. Orpheus is one, Persephone is another, Dionysus is also a good place to look, we've discussed him before I believe. Mithras is also a very hot one, although his story is not so popular.
-------
Oh man, I really gotta brush up on my Jung and alchemy now!! ^_^ I think the nice thing though about alchemy is that like tarot, it's really based on pictures (as opposed to text) which are soooo heavy in symbolism. It might take me awhile though... basically, if I can't find the particular text I had in mind, there's still much to talk about in terms of the alchemical king/queen.
Originally posted by isthmus nekoi
Orpheus....... very strongly tied in w/the figure of Persephone who in turn shares many qualities w/Eve. There are some mythical characters that had secret religious rituals built up around them, before Christianity took over. Orpheus is one, Persephone is another, Dionysus is also a good place to look, we've discussed him before I believe.
The fragments we have of the Orphic poems seem to portray a scheme in which Dionysus and Persephone are set over the salvation of humanity.
Orpheus was supposed to have been torn to pieces by maenads (crazed female worshippers of Dionysus) when he neglected the worship of Dionysus, and instead worshipped the Sun under the name Apollo as the sole god.
Logically, Orpheus was then closely associated with Dionysus in cultic practice, and became the premiere pseudonym under which poems praising Dionysus as the chief liberator of the human race were written. Furthermore, shrines of Apollo were invariably hostile to those of Orpheus.
This kind of clear and inescapable logic is often seen in Greek religion. Hyacinthus was slain by Apollo, and of course became a sort of double of Apollo, given joint sacrifices with his murderer. Erectheus was slain by Poseidon for favoring Athena over Poseidon, and after his death was worshipped as Poseidon Erechtheus.
Heracles was tormented throughout his whole life by a jealous Hera, finally being driven mad by her, slaying his children and committing suicide. His name, naturally, means "the glory of Hera."
This sort of logic is no doubt behind Crowley's idea of Atu VI as "the Brothers."
Mithras is also a very hot one, although his story is not so popular.
Mithras's story is very tough to figure out. All we have are some very scanty literary references, some tantalizing but unclear relief-carvings in Mithraic places of worship, and some even more tentative hypotheses by modern scholars.
Wow...a lot to chew on here, much of it not *quite* on topic...I don't know why I didn't put this together before, but Orpheus getting torn to pieces...do you think that would imply an association with Osiris?
And Isthmus Nekoi (Sorry for misspelling your name by the way...I noticed the mistake just now...), good points about Lilith and Eve/Mary and Mary. As for the Sumerian goddesses, I've only read the Mesopotamian versions; I'm guessing Dumuzi is the same as Erishkagul?
And what would you recommend as a good alchemical primer? I found The Chymical Wedding of Christian Rosenkreutz on-line at the Hermetic Golden Dawn's website, but I haven't gotten around to reading it yet...I'm too engrossed in trying to puzzle out the Sepher Yetzirah right now...
And it's funny that you mention the male and consciousness and the female as the unconscious...I'm working on the B.O.T.A. deck right now, and Case definitely views it that way. But yeah...I don't think that distinction is at play in the Thoth.
firemaiden
07-04-2003, 03:49
Originally posted by Minos
If Banshaf and Akron say it's Pelasgian, that only confirms my suspicion that they don't know what they're talking about.
The Orphic Egg comes from the Orphic poems (naturally). These were a literature that existed on the margins of Greek culture, which told stories about the gods, the birth of man, and how men might return to their divine origin by means of rites and not killing one another. They were attributed to the mythical singer Orpheus. At the beginning of their stories about the gods was very often a cosmic egg hatched by some primordial being.
It seems the source of the word "Pelasgian" for Banzhof is Robert Graves. This "Pelasgian Creation Myth" is scattered all over the interenet, but the only source listed is Robert Graves 1959 Creation Myths. It seems the original source is in doubt, I understand in recent years Graves has been much discredited.
Be that as it may Banzhof was undoubtedly just repeating what he read.
Here is one site with his "reconstruction" of the myth:
http://www.ferrum.edu/philosophy/pelasgiancreation.htm
I was quite taken with this creation myth, as are many because it fits perfectly with the big bang theory of creation. You have a the Goddess of the Ocean, Eurynome, born of Chaos, dancing with the Serpent Ophion. Ophion gets her with child... She turns into a dove, lays an egg, which Ophion then coils himself around to hatch.
Out of this egg fly all things in creation.
Originally posted by firemaiden
It seems the source of the word "Pelasgian" for Banzhof is Robert Graves. This "Pelasgian Creation Myth" is scattered all over the interenet, but the only source listed is Robert Graves 1959 Creation Myths. It seems the original source is in doubt, I understand in recent years Graves has been much discredited.
Be that as it may Banzhof was undoubtedly just repeating what he read.
Ah, okay, I see it now. Graves's ideas were...idiosyncratic, even for the time he was writing.
I was quite taken with this creation myth, as are many because it fits perfectly with the big bang theory of creation.
Yes! Whatever its status as history, it does work quite nicely as myth.
Do what thou Wilt shall be the whole of the Law.
Originally posted by Richard
Wow...a lot to chew on here, much of it not *quite* on topic...
Sort of. But I do think the idea of a god having a mortal double whom he torments and kills, and who then receives immortal glory thereby, ties in with the Cain and Abel/Romulus and Remus myths.
Both of these complexes point to a synthesizing of two elements that works somewhat differenly than the normal harmony-of-male-and-female implied in most Lovers cards.
Rather than opposite things combining, similar things conflict. A new state is still produced, but in a quite different (perhaps more powerful?) way.
Instead of just love, we have love and strife, which is both a more realistic picture of the way lovers act and a more effective formula for transformation.
I don't know why I didn't put this together before, but Orpheus getting torn to pieces...do you think that would imply an association with Osiris?
Yes. Almost anywhere Dionysus shows up, dismemberments start happening, which suggests a common Near Eastern heritage with Osiris, filtered through a Greek lens.
Orpheus is torn to pieces by maenads; only his head is preserved, which continues to sing and prophesy. Lycurgus is driven mad and hacks his daughters to death with an ax, thinking they are grape-vines. Pentheus is rent by his mother, who thinks he is a lion cub.
In the Orphic fragments, Dionysus himself - not the second Dionysus born to Semele, but the first Dionysus, the child-ruler of the universe born to Persephone - is cut to pieces by the Titans after they paint their faces white, dance around him, and dazzle him with toys and a mirror. They then boil, roast and eat his limbs, with only the heart being preserved by Athena.
Zeus strikes the Titans dead with lightning and the smoke from their ashes gives birth to humanity, who are part Titan and part god. A new Dionysus is made from the heart, and is set with Persephone over the process of freeing the divine in man from the Titanic nature.
To bring this back to the thrust of our discussion, we might say that the Thoth Art card represents the process by which the divine is extracted from the Titan in us (Persephone, like Art, was supposed to have had two faces and four eyes; the cauldron recalls both the alchemical process by which the purification might happen and the cauldron in which Dionysus was cooked).
The fratricide of the Lovers/Brothers ("The Children of the Voice"), which in the cases of Cain/Abel, Romulus/Remus, and Dionysus/Orpheus marks the beginning of laws and oracles, would represent the revelation, institution, and commencement of this purification-process - "the Oracle of the Mighty Gods."
Just my prelimary musings, anyways.
Love is the Law, Love under Will.
isthmus nekoi
08-04-2003, 21:24
Oh yes, thanks for the clarification, Minos. It's been a long time since I read about Orpheus and co, but the topic has always been fascinating to me.
There were some interesting texts written about Mithras, but yes, a lot of it is speculation. If I can find the titles for those interested, I'll post them here. Personally, I saw a lot of strong visual links from Mithras to Rider Waite's tarot, haven't really looked for them in Thoth yet.
Apollo, was he a twin w/Diana?
------
Oh, I don't mind my name being spelt wrong, Richard, I'll admit it's quite a mouthful. And yes, torn to pieces.... Osiris must die in order that he can be reborn into his new form. I'll have to reread the myths (Orpheus/Osiris) more in depth to link them up to a more satisfactory nature. This is vaguely reminiscent of Christ/Abel and Dumuzi/Tammuz who also die first as humans and then take on a more godlike role. Dumuzi (shepherd) is the chosen lover of Inanna (who almost chose the farmer). Tammuz is the Babylonian counterpart, Inanna becoming Ishtar.
Right, I like the Inanna/Erishikagal (sp!) binary better than Lilith/Eve b/c here we have a more similar c/a dynamic of "good" and "evil" for lack of better terms.
Good alchemical primer. So many alchemical texts I've read (all except one!) are derived from Jung's writings that I would like to seriously branch out. If you don't mind the bias, to begin w/, I'd suggest Edward Edinger as a good interpretor of Jung and I think maybe Marie-Louise von Franz has also written good intros to Jung's take. If you don't mind reading Jung himself, his Mysterium Conionctio or however it's spelt is where it's at, although probably not a good place to begin unless you resonate w/the ideas, and have a solid grounding in Jungian theory.
Hmmm...Apollo and Diana...yet another set of twins to think about...
And thanks for the alchemy suggestions, Isthmus! I tend to like reading original sources first and commentary afterwards (which made reading Finnegans Wake a mess, as I'm sure you can imagine...), so I'll check out Jung next time I hit the library.
I have to say that my reading list these days would certainly have surprised me even a year ago...
And drunkenness and dismemberment...THAT's something to look into...
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.
Originally posted by Richard
And drunkenness and dismemberment...THAT's something to look into...
Oh yeah! Dismemberment is a common mythic theme in shamanic cultures. (Just as drunkenness is an important metaphor in trance-possession cults like Voodoo). The feeling of the soul leaving the body leads pretty naturally to the image of the body being pulled apart, and the really essential thing (like Dionysus-Zagreus's heart or Orpheus's head) emerging on its own.
One of the theories that's been kicking around classical scholarship for a while is the idea that Greece absorbed influence from a shamanic culture to the north (the home of shamanism is Northern Eurasia) at some point during the sixth/seventh centuries BC.
Orpheus was from Thrace, the semi-barbarian land to the North of Greece. Apollo, who inspired oracles, was supposed to winter in the far-off Northern land of the Hyperboreans. Artemis had an important cult-center at Tauris on the North coast of the Black Sea (allegedly invovling human sacrifice). Ares, another god with trance-possession powers, had important connections with Thrace and Scythia, which is now part of Southern Russia. Dionysus was the "god of Nysa", a mountain in Thrace (or Libya, or India, or Ethiopia, depending on who you ask.)
The shaman-hypothesis is the kind of 19th-century-seat-of-the-pants-derring-do semi-groundless speculation that small-minded modern scholars love to refute. But they've so far have been loath to do it in this case, mostly because it would require the unpleasant conclusion that the Greeks invented the shamanic/voodoo practices of Orphic and Bacchic cult all on their own.
Love is the Law, Love under Will.
firemaiden
09-04-2003, 04:52
Originally posted by Minos
The shaman-hypothesis is the kind of 19th-century-seat-of-the-pants-derring-do semi-groundless speculation that small-minded modern scholars love to refute.
hahahahahah - this is adorable Minos! I can hear a phd thesis writing itself in no time!
firemaiden
09-04-2003, 05:07
Originally posted by Minos
But I do think the idea of a god having a mortal double whom he torments and kills, and who then receives immortal glory thereby, ties in with the Cain and Abel/Romulus and Remus myths.
Gosh! it sure does! now I understand how we can see the Cain and Abel thing as a creation myth -- the mortal double! it never occured to me before. So that would be like the sacrifice of christ - the mortal double of the Father. I never understood the Cain and Abel story before. At all.
Can you say more about Romulus and Remus then?
firemaiden
09-04-2003, 05:30
Originally posted by Minos
Both of these complexes point to a synthesizing of two elements that works somewhat differenly than the normal harmony-of-male-and-female implied in most Lovers cards.
Rather than opposite things combining, similar things conflict. A new state is still produced, but in a quite different (perhaps more powerful?) way.
Instead of just love, we have love and strife, which is both a more realistic picture of the way lovers act and a more effective formula for transformation.
.
Minos I am in awe and terror of your en-cyclops-pedic, powerful and focussed mind!
Please can you elaborate, or clarify and develop you ideas above in relation to this from the Book of Thoth: "This card and Atu XIV together compose the comprehensive alchemical maxim: Solve et coagula."
Originally posted by firemaiden
Can you say more about Romulus and Remus then?
Romulus and Remus are doubles - even down to their names. Both variations on a masculinized form of 'Roma'.
In 'Romulus', you've got the diminutive '-ulus' ending tacked onto it; in 'Remus' the vowel of the stem gets switched around - something that doesn't happen in classical Latin but is a remnant of an older layer of Indo-European, which you can see in English verbs like write/wrote.
Romulus and Remus, being suckled by the she-wolf, are both iterations of an old wolf-man/shepherd-king motif that shows up in Greece in figures like Lycaon (lit. 'wolf-man', the cannibalistic king of Arcadia and son of Robert Graves's pal Pelasgus.) I'm sure there are parallels in Celtic or Germanic myth as well.
Anyways, this figure is always associated with a similar wolf-shepherd-agricultural god: in Lycaon's case, Zeus Lycaeus ('wolfish Zeus'), in Romulus's case, Mars/Quirinus, with whom he is often associated/confused in cult.
Thing about wolves is, they're both the most social of animals, in that they hunt intelligently in packs, and the most asocial of animals, in that they prey upon man and his flocks - the wolf was a favorite metaphor for the tyrant in Greek philosophy.
So the wolf is both a good way to talk about founding society, and also something you have to distance yourself from.
In Lycaon's case, this was accomplished relatively simply. Lycaon invents culture, but then offers up a human sacrifice to the gods and is punished, an event commemorated in a secret ritual in Arcadia down to Plato's day.
In Romulus's case, it's more complicated, since the story is bound up with the old practice of leaving a human sacrifice in the foundation of a building or city wall, like the mythical 'fair lady' walled up in London bridge.
So Romulus offers the most potent sacrifice possible, a double of himself, on the new walls of Rome, and then goes on to found the city. (Crowley said the most potent sacrifice was 'a male child of perfect innocence and high intelligence.')
But then he becomes a tyrant and the Senate decides to kill him, except he's assumed up into heaven as the god Quirinus before they get the chance.
Originally posted by firemaiden
Please can you elaborate, or clarify and develop you ideas above in relation to this from the Book of Thoth: "This card and Atu XIV together compose the comprehensive alchemical maxim: Solve et coagula."
Aw man, do I hafta be cute and brilliant every day?
The Tower is not destroyed by lightning merely by chance. It has to be destroyed by lightning because there is something inside that is a blasphemy to gods and men, something so unspeakable that the universe cannot tolerate it being for another second.
You see this kind of thing in some of Lovecraft's and Borges's stories.
So whereas in the Lovers you have creation through the conflict of similars, in the Tower you have destruction because of the unbearable collusion of dissimilars, of the familiar with the Other - the dove with the terrible lion-serpent, who should never be together but always strive to secretly collaborate in ways that should not be.
firemaiden
09-04-2003, 10:29
Yes Minos!! Everyday, every minute! :D
WOW WOW mouth agape
Firemaiden is speechless...
ahhh
so would the lovers card be the coagulating and the tower the dissolving?
Originally posted by firemaiden
so would the lovers card be the coagulating and the tower the dissolving?
Yep. ;)
Wait a sec...I thought that the Lovers was solve and Art was Coagula...or at least that Art was the fulfillment of the work begun in the Lovers.
Although I can see the Tower as being both a sundering (the building) and a fusing (the people burning into carbon), it seems to me that the really strong connection is between VI and XIV...
firemaiden
09-04-2003, 15:47
But Richard, why would a card which is about joining illustrate "solve".
Or maybe it is that both cards illustrate both, and the maxim is only complete when they both come together...
Would someone like to elaborate on the importance of this phrase in alchemy? and what it means?
I understand it to be - that the two basic processes of creation are separating and combing, combining and separating:combine the egg and the sperm, then the fertilized egg sets about separating, etc... Or: the universe was created from combining matter and anti matter, in a big bang, which set in motion the expansion of the universe --- which is still going on, and amounts to one big slow process of separation...
Combining, mixing, fertilizing, like art, mixing paint, or combining different metals, or separating -- purifying the colors, or the metals.
The combining and separating are also important processes of analytical thought:
==>bring thoughts together = compare, find similarities and analogies between ideas/myths/ images, etc. --
==>separate thoughts = to make distinctions and classifications.
We brought up dismemberment -- lol, that is separation...
and love - combining
choosing = separating...
etc.
So perhaps Art and the Lovers card both illustrate both parts of the maxim?
Good post, Firemaiden!
Yeah, I think the Lovers is the beginning of the coagula process and Art is the result.
Or else, in some way, the Lovers represents the elements before they are joined (admittedly JUST before they are joined) and thus would be the solve part of the equation.
If the first is true, I'm not sure which card(s) represents the separation, though...perhaps the Empress (salt) and the Emperor (sulphur)?
I freely admit that I know very little about alchemy, though...and Kiama's post about Art being the beginning of the process and the Lovers being the result has me wondering about the validity of ANY of this...
(That whole backwards thing is like a piece of gristle that I can't bring myself either to swallow or spit out...I've come up with a generally workable theory of it; the main thought behind it being "Oh, brave new world that hath such people in't!")
Originally posted by Richard
Wait a sec...I thought that the Lovers was solve and Art was Coagula...or at least that Art was the fulfillment of the work begun in the Lovers.
Although I can see the Tower as being both a sundering (the building) and a fusing (the people burning into carbon), it seems to me that the really strong connection is between VI and XIV...
You're right! I read XIV dyslexically as XVI.
In the conflict of two like elements that produces a new state, I looked at the new state as a kind of coagulation.
Of course, the conflict would be more like dissolution.
Sometimes the glass is half full, sometimes it's half empty...
paradoxx
18-04-2003, 02:34
The shaman is present because he is virgo, also rulled by mercury as well as gemini. The eagle and lion are symbols of America and the UK (Crowleys connection tith the OGD verfies this), just as a two headed eagle of Eastern Europe/Russia is present on the Emperess Card.
Being a solar gemini and a rising virgo with a retro mercury i was compelled to make this connection.
isthmus nekoi
22-04-2003, 12:00
Merc in Gemini certainly works w/the swords b/c it's an air sign. Yes, I haven't forgotten this thread, however 'tis exam season and time to research wears thin..... nevermind the fact that my darn school library sys keeps all the Jungian material in the humanities library and all the alchemical material in the engineering library blocks away!! T_T
And yes, Minos! You must always be cute and brilliant :D
isthmus nekoi
02-06-2003, 16:12
so someone reign me in if I'm wrong here...
To simplfy here, there are 3 stages to the opus, and 3 stages in the alchemical process: nigredo (black/green), albido (white/yellow) and rubedo (red/gold), each stage goes through a process of coagulatio (there's also calcintio, solutio, sublimatio, mortificatio, separatio, and coniunctio/conjunctio).
Rubedo is the final stage and the coag represents a marriage (king/queen), which is tied into the Philosopher's Stone. It's the coming of consciousness, in other words, which may be why Waite's Lovers depicts Adam and Eve, whose expulsion from Eden may be read as a metaphor of consciousness. I'm not sure we're looking at rubedo though.... But note the alchemical colours representing the 3 stages are emphasized through the royal couple.
Anyways, I guess that was a bit of a tease. Gotta wait for the library to transfer Jung's coniunction book. I only have Campbell's Portable Jung for 1st hand reference and it doesn't have much alchemy stuff.
i completely forgot to add the card right at the beginning of the thread.