Jung and the qualities of the "II" card

full deck

Carl G. Jung's last book, Memories, Dreams, Reflections contains some very striking parts which are very relevant to certain Tarot symbolism, but also, describes his own personal experience with gnosis or knowing without the use of rational processes:

Page 50-51
There was an enormous difference between my mother's tow personalities. That was why, as a child, I often had anxiety dreams about her. By day, she was a loving mother, but, at night, she seemed uncanny. Then she was like one of those seers who is at the same time a strange animal, like a priestess in a bear's cave. Archaic and ruthless; ruthless as truth and nature. At such moments, she was the embodiment of what I have called the "natural mind".

I too have the archaic nature, and, in me, it is lined with the gift — not always pleasant — of seeing people and things as they are. I can let myself be deceived from here to Tiperary when I don't want to recognize something, and yet, at bottom, I know quite well how matters really stand. In this, I am like a dog — he can be tricked, but he always smells it out in the end. This "insight" is based on instinct, or on a "participation mystique" with others. It is as if the "eyes of the background" do the seeing in an impersonal act of perception.

This was something I did not realize until much later, when some very strange things happened to me. For instance, there was the time when I recounted the life story of a man without knowing him. . . . In the course of my life, it has often happened to me that I suddenly knew something which I really could not know at all. The knowledge came to me as though it were my own idea. It was the same with my mother. ..."

It is interesting that he alludes to the symbol of the priestess so well but rather also points to the means by which the priestess gains insight. One important point he lightly touches on is this "eyes of the background" which I roughly interpret as a description of the perceived background (context) of what one would call reality. For me, he seems to suggest that the very fabric of reality is possessed of an intelligence that is cabable of knowing and communicating with one who is predisposed to hear such. This is an fair description of what a shaman does.

It occurs to me that this could be one description of how Tarot "communicates "to the reader in that it provides a "background" through which knowing can happen in conjunction with and independent to the inherent symbolism of the Tarot.

Comments?

being_chrysalis

Always interested in discussions of Jung, archetypes, and tarot...

This view of the High Priestess more closely fits my view of her as well - much closer to nature (less isolated/cold) but at the same time, just a little bit.. chilling, in her ability to get to the heart of the matter. I also like the connection with the night time... something I'm going to have to think through a little bit more.

I am interested in hearing what others have to say about this as well.

Sophie

Well, the Papess is the mother of the Tarot - or the mother-in-waiting rather (as opposed to any earth mother ideas of motherhood); and also the mother-as-knower. She gestates - therefore is maternal, receptive & natural - but detached. She also knows in a way that is uncanny (to borrow Jung's term). She is both real mother - and the mother in us who knows things about us in lucid & detached ways, nonetheless loving.

In her Priestess reinvention, she is Isis, who is the archetypal mother and mysterious knower/sorceress.

Jung and the qualities of the "II" card

full deck

being_chrysalis

Sophie