osho zen help

Thread originally posted on the Aeclectic Tarot Forum on 21 Nov 2001, and now archived in the Forum Library.

glamourbug	21 Nov 2001
Hello everyone, A friend of my hubby’s has visited tonight and he has given me a set of osho zen tarot cards. I have had a quick look through them but haven’t had a chance to look at the accompanying book or anything. However I am confused by the card names, is there a structure suit wise anywhere in this deck or are they just single cards like one long set of majors? It would be a shame if I couldn’t get on with these cards so I will try my hardest but I am very traditional and like sticking to the four suits and majors so that in newer decks I can refer back to the traditional card in my mind if necessary. (Does that make sense to anyone else? Lol) Waiting for some quiet time now so that I can play!! Lisa

EveAnna	21 Nov 2001
Hi Lisa, This is slightly off topic but I noticed you were after The Ancestral Path Tarot - R Somerville http://www.playing-cards.demon.co.uk stocks this deck at £12.50 + pp ( couple of £'s). You can pay by cheque or card. I'm in the UK too and have dealt with this company before and have always been pleased with their service. Hope this is of help :)

lalaurie	21 Nov 2001
Hello glamourbug, The Osho Zen deck was the first to really hit me, and I've discovered that I meshed with it so well largely because I was NOT trying to work with it in a standard suit system (because I wasn't yet versed in a system). In looking at the deck now I'm sure I would react to it differently, but I'm glad I had that unstructured introduction to it because it really is a beautiful deck with a lot of potential. My connection to it is probably based mainly on two of the most important things to me: enlightenment philosophy (Zen, Tao, etc) and color. Almost every single card jumps out at me, and when I do readings with this deck I'm almost always doing a lot "hmmhmming" and "ohing" (and sometimes some "yeah, I know"-ing!). From this deck I've gotten the most reconfirming and gentle nudging than any other. I hope you find a way to enjoy it too! :-) Take care, lalaurie.

Kaz	22 Nov 2001
The book which should be in the box with cards explains the suits and the little triangular symbols. I would say not to look at this deck in a traditional way, meaning it's really different than RW and clones. The post above here could have been written by me, it's what I also think about the deck. Enjoy it, it's a fantastic deck ! Kaz

cj	22 Nov 2001
hi all, I purchased the deck because it was soooo beautiful and find myself using it for self exploration. I have to read the book for each card still because it is so different (I can't seem to connect traditional suites to these cards). But evenutally, I'll have them down. Good luck and try to go with the flow..it not a usual Tarot deck. cj

raistlynne	25 Nov 2001
I can't tell you how much I love this deck! This has been the first deck that I've felt completely comfortable with, and the first to actually "speak" to me. I forced myself to read most of the book, but I find that I can pick up the meanings from just looking at the cards, so out went the book. If you give it a chance, it's a great deck for self-exploration, but it can be so much more. Enjoy!

Marion	01 Dec 2001
Well, I think Clouds are meant to be Swords, Rainbows are Pentacles, Water is Cups and Fire is Wands. After you work with it for a while you start to see that a significant number of the cards are RW-based. The biggest variation is in the majors, but even there you can often see the RW origin through the Zen 'take'. I too love this deck for personal development work. Doesn't seem to work as well for more pedestrian questions, to me anyway.

Marion	01 Dec 2001
Sorry, I hit Post when I meant Review. The Clouds in Osho Zen represent The Mind or your thoughts. Like swords which often represent thinking and thoughts. But, the big difference is that in Osho's system, thoughts are 'bad' and just confuse you. For him and for a lot of Buddhism I think, 'not-knowing' is actually the desirable state, and thoughts just confuse you. Hence, Clouds. Rainbows equate to pentacles, as the respesentation of the physical, the 'real'. It is the glory of heaven created by the earthly reality. Fire and water are fairly conventional symbology. One thing that tends to throw you off a bit is the rather amazing variation in the style of the different cards. To take an extreme, looks at the three of cups and the major I Existence. There really are majors and minors. The majors have a deep purple diamond and the numbers are in Roman numerals. Clouds is a gray diamond,Fire is red, water is blue and Rainbows is, guess what, rainbow coloured.

glamourbug	02 Dec 2001
Thank you everyone, I still havent studied the deck as much as i would like but i am beginning to see the suits and the relation to most RW definitions. I think i am going to enjoy this deck but it is definitely going to take a bit of getting used to. Lisa

Jewel	03 Dec 2001
Marion's first post is right on about what each suit is. I also agree that one can often times look at this deck and see the "Buddhist" take on the images. By that I mean that they sometimes have the same meaning as the RW cards but from a Buddhist perspective and outlook. As for the clouds meaning that thoughts are "bad" I would have to disagree with this. Buddhism emphasizes the here and now and state of being. I am having a hard time explaining this but what I think I am trying to say here is that unlike our daily lives which seem to be more focused on the future or on the past Osho was looking at the here and now and acceptance/enjoyment/love of the moment. Thoughts are not bad, it is our temporal relationships that can make them skip over what you have today. Great deck ... I can't believe I waited so long to get it! Love & Light,

Marion	04 Dec 2001
Hi Jewel, I partly agree with your comments, and like you am concerned I cannot explain what I think properly. I didn't really mean 'bad', but that thoughts are sort of like noise, and sometimes pretty mean-spirited noise at that. They can 'cloud' your spirit. Take the osho 8 of clouds Guilt: guilt is an example of a thought taking over your mind and dominating all other processes. Or 6 The Burden: once again, a warning about compulsive thoughts driving you. And osho 3 of clouds: Ice-olation. I relate well to the Clouds/swords suits because I am such a mental person. And understand both the power and the peril of thoughts. Like Fire, good servants but a bad masters. That is why 'not-knowing' is an ideal. It is not "not-thinking', but not allowing thoughts to overrun/drive your spirit. The Osho deck seems to take to different places than the other decks, but then some of the other decks seem to take you places osho doesn't. Take care.

Kaz	05 Dec 2001
In a black/white way of saying what clouds stand for: Clouds: We all have these ego's within us that make us think and feel and act. These can be contrary to to what we should if we think/feel/act from true spirit. We have all those desires, impulses,reactions, etc, that characterise our behaviour in everyday life. These ego's manipulate us, just as a computers responds to its software. Our thoughts are in an ongoing endless flow, so you live your life in a daydream. In your thoughts you are always right, yet other people seem to think they are right as well. Thoughts are self-centered. The Osho deck points this out, and not to go along with all that, be aware of your ego's so you can eliminate them. Kaz

The osho zen help thread was originally posted on 21 Nov 2001 in the Tarot Decks board, and is now archived in the Forum Library. Read the active threads in Tarot Decks, or read more archived threads.