Does too much history shred the mystery?

1. Does too much detail and information strip the mystery and joy of your tarot studies? Or perhaps it replaces false romance with additional riches?

For instance, I have a positive joy in most of the tarot designs and what I read...but have been thinking a bit...if one analyzes too closely about the designs and history, does it strip the joy of the discovery of certain tarots or the romantic thoughts of tarot from you?

2. I've marvelled at modern designers of tarots...and the cross-currents and I do believe over time, it's given me a gentle understanding. If I were strict in terms of analysis, there's a brief dismay...and a sigh, as others have said...we may be borrowing something already known, there might not be anything new under the sun...here's an East-West research 'cross-current' rediscovery for me, one example:

For instance, the use of a mandala-style meditative approach or designing a chakra layout and tarot designs were in my Italian-language books issued in 1995...and RT Mann did an Astrological Tarot in 1972, (republished in 1986), which has round symbols, East-West cross currents and related information...but if I hadn't been so curious and researched threads on this board and otherwise..., I would have only thought East-West tarot cross-currents might have started in the 1980's...a romantic notion.

I think 'tarot' in general keeps me learning and thinking...

http://www.atmann.net/atm1.htm

Anyway, it's a smile of ruefulness as I look at the beautiful Roots of Asia, which has tributes to Julia Turk, Rosemary Guiley (and indirectly, Robert Place) and others...I think as a one set combining smallness and beauty, the Roots of Asia is a great essential and easiest way to tuck in my East-West toolbox of tarot...the others that I enjoy, such as the Ukiyoe, Feng Shui, Buddha and anime tarots, are interest specific..

3. As much as I have enjoyed the 1998 Minchiate Tarot book by Brian Williams, the plastic cards just never worked for me. I use the older, used Solleone Tarot of the 1970's vintage printing with the English booklet by Kaplan or the smaller paper Minchiate Etruria from 1997 if I play with the Minchiate.

It took awhile...for I thought when I first researched the Minchiate, that the Lo Scarabeo deck and Brian William's decks were the only ones. Kind of sweet mystery of romantic belief...through aeclectic.net and other sites, of course, I discovered the Constantini, the Il Meneghello version of the Minchiate, etc...

Long-winded thoughts. Trying to frame what I was feeling in a more positive thought form...or reflecting...hope some of these ideas yield responses!

Cerulean

**1. Does too much detail and information strip the mystery and joy of your tarot studies? Or perhaps it replaces false romance with additional riches?

For instance, I have a positive joy in most of the tarot designs and what I read...but have been thinking a bit...if one analyzes too closely about the designs and history, does it strip the joy of the discovery of certain tarots or the romantic thoughts of tarot from you?**

I'll just answer this part of your question because I've been thinking about this for myself. What works for me is that I just read the cards. I've been reading "about" the cards and studying the history and symbolism (I say trying to because that's real dry stuff for me) for several years, and for me there came a point where it was just time to read cards. I can only absorb so much. My goal when I came to tarot was to be able to read the cards, but I got so wrapped up in trying to do it "right" by studying so deeply that I almost left it in frustration.

So now, I read cards. I know that what I managed to fathom of the technical, historical, and infinitesimal that I read here and in books and all the passionate collecting of decks that never clicked with me because they were rare or the latest thing or whatever----all that went into my ability to read the cards somehow. But it almost derailed me from tarot altogether. Now I don't pick it apart and try to get a tarot PhD because I know everything there is to know about tarot and its history or own a buzzilion decks. I just read the cards. That's right for me and I guess it's best I just leave it at that. If I read the cards well and can use that skill to be of help to others, that's what I meant to do in the first place. And believe me, I'm happy with it. I may be a tarot dishwasher instead of a tarot professor, but maybe the world needs more good dishwashers, ya know?

I'm neither tarot janitor, nor tarot professor. I just love the history, the art
and symbolism ... the exploration. Does it ruin tarot for me? Not a chance, but then I'm not really interested in the reading side of tarot. Besides, I find that when I am actually reading, none of that side of my tarot studies consciously pops up ... because I slide out of analytical, research, study head, into intuitive, slightly altered state of consciousness, connect with the sitter head.

No doubt at one level or another, both inform each other ... but I see them, nonetheless as separate interest areas which somehow create a mandorla experience of over-lapping wholeness ... if that makes any sense.

mythos

I dunno- I have had struggles with this question, not in relation to tarot, but in relation to science. Does knowing too much about how a plant grows ruin the magic that happens when a healthy plant rises out of a barren patch of sand? Does knowing too much about the lifetime of a star ruin the night sky? Does it ruin whalesong to hear new theories about exactly why they sing?

I am not far enough along in my studies of tarot to truly know if these are good analogies.....

Is tarot as limitless as the night sky?

Is there a life force within the interaction of the cards that compares to a sprig of green squeezing life out of parched land?

Is the song that the cards make when shuffled and spread out compare to the music of the whales?

I just don't know these answers- But I do know that no matter how much I found out about the science behind things, it never really ruined the magic of those things for me- if anything, it made the magic all the more amazing. I'm hoping that tarot proves to be as worthy as nature, and that it can withstand the scruitiny of sustained studies.

-tb

It does not spoil things for me - I love History.All that has gone before has made Tarot what it is today for me. But more than that I loved thinbuddha's post- that was music with lyrics ~Rosanne

When I read the opening post, I thought immediately of science too - thinbuddha has said exactly what my feelings are on that subject.

I know a bit more about tarot than about science, however (not a lot, but a bit more!), and I can't say the study of its history, symbology, myth, etc. has in any way marred my enjoyment of tarot, quite the opposite. Obviously I have to be careful in readings not to go off on tangeants like: "they found a Cernunnos torque just like this one in...and it showed that the tribes living there were..." which is fascinating to me but less than useful for a querent who wants to know how to change professional orientation (unless she wants to be an archeologist!).

Tarot will always be mysterious to me. First of all because divination is by its very nature mysterious. Why does that card turn up at that time for that person? That is the essential mystery, the joy of tarot - these surprises of synchronicity - and not all the history in the world will take that away.

But even when not reading, the cards retain their mystery, their wonder. It doesn't matter if I know the name of the first guy who painted the real first trionfi cards, and that it wasn't Thoth; it doesn't matter that I know that there are some literary, gothic, romanesque, alchemical or whatever influences in the cards. Beauty & mystery are only enhanced by knowledge - as long as the knowledge (or the beauty, for that matter), is part of the whole & not pursued for its own sake.

When I met my beloved, I already knew what happened to the brain when you fall in love. And I fell in love...did it take away an ounce of the mystery of that love to know the chemical reactions going on in my brain? What do you think?

What an interesting chain of thoughts.

I agree fully with the science thought and would take it a step further. Because I know some astronomy, I find the night deeper and more full of wonder than when I didn't. Because I know a lot of meterology I find weather more fascinating and awe-inspiring rather than less.

I find the discussions about art and history very interesting, but it seems to mostly just slide away when I sit down to read. Most likely it provides unconscious background, in fact I am sure it does. Intellectually, I find that kind of information fascinating; reading seems to come from a different brain area but it feeds back on the knowledge.

For me, the readings are where I deeply appreciate the tarot. I am aware that for others this appreciation can come from the varied interpretative art or the minute details of the history meanders that it too.

C.S. Lewis said somewhere in his books about the mythical land of Perelandra that if you don't understand something, it might as well be invisible. More knowledge increases the beauty, in my view. I do not think that I would enjoy the reading so much without the understanding. In fact without that, tarot would be 'invisible' to me.

I find myself going back and forth in my Tarot journey.

At times I need to know why this color, why this form etc....and I will try and find out everything I can.
And apply it to the deck/decks and Tarot knowlege.
Then I am full for a while.
And I dont want anymore theories. Anyone elses outside ideas.
I just want to read and see what comes and how the deck moves between myself and the querent and get those "real life" lessons that come from using decks rather than studying them.
Then I start getting to familiar with Tarot. Dont want to read for anyone. Find myself annoyed by the ever-present " does he/she love me" question.
And so I take a break, usually without realizing I am doing it.
I put most of the decks in the boxes;maybe I leaving a current favorite nearby on the bedstand. It just sits there.

Then one morning I wake up and get dressed and ready to face the day; but something is missing, I check my purse and find my keys....count the children , yes they are present and ready for school. My checkbook is squared and I have brushed my teeth.
But I have a nagging feeling I am forgetting something.
By nighttime I get it~ Tarot has not been in my life!!!
Go online and start studying, or to my library and pull out a book and re read something that didnt make sense last time.
Its started again.

This comes from one who is no Tarot scholar.
I'm a wannabe. I'd love to be a Tarot scholar, but right now I dabble.
And as a dabbler, and perhaps someone will give me a proper dressing down over this, but as I read so-called histories of Tarot I really do consider the history as a bit of a fiction.

Because there is so much supposition in the history of Tarot as to make it fictional. No one really knows.

It seems to me that everyone is supplying some very good educated guesses about what the symbols and history and original uses of cards might have been, but ultimately, the history we are dissecting, or wishing we could dissect, is imaginative fabrication, isn't it?

So, in that light, no I don't think the history shreds the mystery.
In fact, even the RWS if taken as a seperate entity in Tarot, is shrouded in mystery.

I have the first two volumes of Kaplan's encyclopedias and I have the Place book as well. When I've made my way thru them I'll weigh in again, but for now, I really love Tarot, love the mystery, and love finding my way to the older decks, the historical decks.

I think that the journey, the personal journey each of us embarks upon as we discover the older decks is the most important journey...the history in the making with the deck showing the way, not the pennings of Tarot scholars...

Tolkien wrote once, before the publication of the Silmarillion, that he was unsure of whether to publish it at all since, as he saw it, The Lord of the Rings was so full of depth of unseen vistas of history, that "to go there is to destroy the mystery." Nevertheless, the Silmarillion was indeed published posthumously, by his heir. And yet, reading the Silmarillion does not detract from the enjoyment we derive from LOTR, rather, it enhances it, we see things in a new light.

And so it is for me, with Tarot. Learning about the History of the designs, the cards, their uses and all the rest only makes Tarot into a far richer experience. It is one thing to read Tarot, but as a student, learning Tarot is a joy that never ends. Even after you have exhausted their entire history, there is always something more. When I look at my deck, the Thoth, I see not only the beauty of the cards, their symbolism and their divinatory uses, but also the years that took in their making. Five years, and it all shows.

And in any case, Cerulean, your posts are a joy! There is never one that is not an eye-opener for me. Suppose I would tell you to stop studying and exploring, would you? Can you? People are learning animals, and it is not possible for me to devour anything with the slightest connection to Tarot