Light and Darkness

Thread originally posted on the Aeclectic Tarot Forum on 11 Mar 2005, and now archived in the Forum Library.

WalesWoman	11 Mar 2005
There were so many threads this could apply to I couldn't decide what to post to. It seems like the world is becoming so off balanced, every day something happens to shock us out of our complacency, be it a natural disaster to increasing deteroration of common decency, to wonder what goes on in the minds of humankind and where the future will take us. So what got me thinking was that perhaps it's like the Sun. The more illuminated one becomes the darker and distinct the shadows become, maybe you just notice the abberations more or what I really thought was with the growth of enlightenment in the past 40 odd years, that this is also a form of balance. Only it's like a homeostatic way of doing it, our bodies will add some extra of one thing to counterbalance something else going on, but it the problem isn't taken care of, the process overcompensates, too much of a good thing that then becomes a threat, so it releases something to counteract that and the balance becomes completely lost and unstable. That's about where we are now I think. Think about it...how many members are here in this little microcosim? And this represents just a small fraction of people who are consciously trying to get in touch with their inner workings and become more enlightened, loving beings spreading the light around them. So it just stands to reason that the opposite also holds true, that more and more are being pulled from the complacent center to the poles...no matter what the issue or situation. So it creates a wobble effect, the whole out of balance turbulence and unrest and strange goings on...until things spin out or something happens to force everything back into the center again... I just had an image of a potter's wheel for that and that whomp, whomp of struggling to get things to spin concentricly when things get a bit off center. Big enough lump of clay can just about make you lose your own balance, or just stop the wheel and start all over again. That is what I am now seeing that the Sun can represent...not just Oh Joy! But the realization that with the light comes the realization of what creates the shadows and gives them form, seeing things for what they are and how those things overshadow and affect what they touch So I guess it's a bit of Sun and Wheel, the rise and fall of civilizations via the loss of civility and civic responsibility and the denial of citizenship as well. How can we ever get it together to survive in this world if we have the have's and have not's? I figure the whomp of the out of balance cycle, flings the radical elements off both ends, unfortunately the good often goes out with the bad... I don't have answers, simply some off the wall observations.

TheoMo	11 Mar 2005
WalesWoman, I've been thinking about the issues you brought up too as well. I see things reverse tho -- I don't see the Sun as making the shadows darker. If there is growing darkness, I see it as necessary to drive people to discover the source of those shadows (and eventually the Sun) as opposed to it being caused by Sun. I can't speak for anyone else, but it was a lot of the darkness that I see that started me down a path as to why things exist the way they do, and that path brought me to tarot. I am beginning to see things more and more in terms of balance, yin/yang and what not, but just in terms of normal everyday life you see that love affects others positively, and even where it doesn't no harm is produced. On the other hand, hate does beget hate. In that sense, the Moon might represent the darkness -- it's the dead of night, there's the illusion of the moon, the challenge of making it through. But the Moon is necessary to reach the stage of illumination promised by the Sun. Perhaps we as a species are in the Moon phase of our existence. Just my thoughts tho, it's a pretty deep topic you've brought up ;) theo

SunChariot	11 Mar 2005
This is probably off the topic of Tarot although it is something I came up with during a Tarot reading. For some reason your post reminded me of this. About humankind's relationship to the planet....Tell me what you think if this. If you look at it, you can see civilization maturing over time. In the beginning, when people all lived off the land, way before technology, we were like children who were totally dependant on our mother (Mother Earth). And as children, your parent seems all powerful. Then technology came and we rebelled against our parent, thinking we needed her less and less (adolescence). Now, I think we are getting ready to be adults. With Ecology and all people are realizing more and more how much we need Mother Earth and to respect her...Which I think is like a person reaching adulthood and rebonding with their parents again. Anyone see it this way too? Bar

Skydancer	11 Mar 2005
Bar - I think you are right on. I look at the sun as causing shadows - not making them darker, but causing them to exist. Here's what just now came to me ... when a room is in total darkness it is balanced; no one area is more pronounced than another. But - light one candle ... well, it does dispell darkness, but it also throws it off balance, in that now some areas are more illumined (is that a word?) than others, making one think that some areas are more important than others, better, more visible, less dark, etc. Funny - I hadn't thought of it like that before. As for swinging from pole to pole - that is what always happens. We go from one extreme to the other. Human nature? I wish it wasn't. Hope it's not. But it is what happens, time and time again. One ridiculous knee-jerk over-reaction to the next. my 2˘ Ann S:OS

SunChariot	11 Mar 2005
Skydancer wrote: Bar - I think you are right on. I look at the sun as causing shadows - not making them darker, but causing them to exist. Here's what just now came to me ... when a room is in total darkness it is balanced; no one area is more pronounced than another. But - light one candle ... well, it does dispell darkness, but it also throws it off balance, in that now some areas are more illumined (is that a word?) than others, making one think that some areas are more important than others, better, more visible, less dark, etc. Funny - I hadn't thought of it like that before. That's true, without the Sun (or light) there would be no shadow. Or something I read somewhere: " What makes you read the words on the screen? What makes you see the words? It is the white space behind the words. The space and the words make this page a whole. Without any one of them, the page does not exist." We live in a world of duality. I don't think that is out of whack. It is the way it is supposed to be. Life is supposed to contain negative forces for us to struggle with, how else could we strenghthen our spiritual muscles. Just as physical resistance strengthens our body's muscles. We have free will and people are free to chose their own paths. That also is part of life. We can chose a spiritual path or not. But it is a duality universe. Without light, there are no shadows. Without some "evil" in the world how would we recognize true good? If everyone were perfect, and perfectly enlightened all the time we could have no concepts of right and wrong. We can only truly recognize a right path in comparing it to its opposite. I say that the universe is not off balance. It is meant to be what it is. It could well be true though that the brighter the Sun shines the darker the shadows appear. I would think that may be true that the more enlightened you become the more "different" unenlighted people seem, and the more you may be aware of the differences. But I still say the universe is what it was meant to be. Bar

Kiama	12 Mar 2005
I've never been a great lover of Plato (a Platophiler?) but there is one thing he said which is incredibly pertinent, and for which I think he was bang on the mark... He told a story of a Cave. *Kiama hears the people familiar with this concept groan and sigh. Hey, bear with me.* He said that in this Cave were a bunch of prisoners, chained to a rock so that their heads and bodies can't move even a little. They have always been in this cave - they have never been outside into the 'real world'. Behind them, meanwhile, is another bunch of guys with a fire, and they are casting shadows on a blank wall in front of the prisoners by playing Shadow Puppets with their hands. Now, all these prisoners can see are these shadows, and so they happily think that this is the 'real world'. But one day, one of the prisoners (let's call him Jeff) manages to escape. Dunno how, he just does (as always happens in these stories.) And he stumbles his way out of the cave into the outside world, where he is immediately blinded by the light of the Sun. He cries out in agony, as his eyes take hours to accustom to this alien light, but eventually he begins to be able to see, and he looks around him at the world - at people going about their daily business; at a lake where he sees his reflection; at the sky above him. And he quickly puts two and two together. He rushes back to the Cave to tell his fellow prisoners that they have been deceived! Duped! What they see is not the real world - it is a fantasy of shadows and ill-formed things... He releases them from their chains, and urges them to follow him out of the Cave... And they kill him. (Can you tell Plato was Greek?) Okay, so it's not the happiest of stories, but to me this is the story that epitomizes the Moon and Sun cards... The Cave, and the shadows on the wall, is the Moon, and the 'enlightenment' of the escaped prisoner is the Sun - and of course, the truth hurts him at first (when he is blinded), and he suffers the fate of many a messenger of the Light in the end. But just as Buddha did not gain enlightenment through everything being nice, and just as Jesus did not save mankind through dying an old, fulfilled, and happy man in his sleep, without the Moon and the darkness I doubt we'd even have a spiritual journey at all. A journey implies a beginning and an end - without the Moon and shadow we have no beginning. If we eternally lived in the light, we'd have no desire to grow spiritually. So to me, this is what the pairing of the Moon and Sun cards tell us, and for once Plato was right. Kiama

Skydancer	12 Mar 2005
" ... and for once Plato was right." :) I loved my philosophy class of a couple of years back. And I've heard of the cave story of course. Gave me goose bumps the first time I encountered it. Are we back to "human nature" again ... ? Duality. Pros and cons. Light and dark. Who is to say which is which? Why do we tend to kill the messenger? Why do we kick and scream against change that forces us from complacency? Why do babies cry at birth? Enlightenment, or deep thinking, does put into sharp contrast the differences between people. Their views and whether or not they are true to them. But who is to really say. Everything being just and peaceful is not how things get done, not how the world changes for the better. And again, who is to really say. It's like passing a silent judgement on how someone else lives their life. Gosh it's too early in the morning for this! I came up here because I thought there was something I was supposed to say here ... maybe this was it. I drew the 3 of Wands during my morning coffee - I think I'm starting to get a feel for how my day is going to go! Peace and Good Will ~ Ann S:OS

WalesWoman	14 Mar 2005
I think what I meant by the shadows becoming darker, is that the light gives them form...we can see what it is that causes them. When it's a gray day, the shadows are indistinct and blend into the grayness. When there isn't light, all there is, is the shapeless, formless sameness, similar to the Moon I suppose, but the Dark of the Moon. Last night I stood around a huge bonfire...sparks trailing forever into the night sky and thought about this whole thing of light and shadow. That even with light, you can only see the one side of it, that faces the light and the further something is from the light, the darker it becomes until it blends into blackness. Full Daylight is more illuminating, it does make things more clearer, banishing the fears and uncertinty of the things we can't see or understand or fear...they don't go away, they simply can be seen for what they really are. The main point I think I was trying to make was this, a long time ago a freind of mine was very into transcendental meditation...I couldn't shut my mind off to do it, tho I tried very hard. She told me the belief was if 20% of the world's population meditated about the same thing, some positive thing that would make the world more peaceful, then it would have a very profound effect...that it would be enought to tip the balance and make the world a better place. This was almost 30 years ago that she told me this, and since then I have seen there are more and more people who think similarly, maybe not like her view, but with that loving intent. So my theory is that as more people do become more open, tolerant and loving, that the reverse is also that there is a growing number of those who need to hate, discredit and destroy the beauty around them. And that is why there is so much unrest, violence and wierd goings on and that it will increase until one has to make some sort of stand, that it would be impossible to remain in a neutral state, sort of good vs evil. That is, the balance that is out of whack right now, shifting from one side to the other, so is it possible for the universe to remain intact if one overcomes the other or do we need both to survive?

WalesWoman	14 Mar 2005
SunChariot wrote: About humankind's relationship to the planet....Tell me what you think if this. If you look at it, you can see civilization maturing over time. In the beginning, when people all lived off the land, way before technology, we were like children who were totally dependant on our mother (Mother Earth). And as children, your parent seems all powerful. Then technology came and we rebelled against our parent, thinking we needed her less and less (adolescence). Now, I think we are getting ready to be adults. With Ecology and all people are realizing more and more how much we need Mother Earth and to respect her...Which I think is like a person reaching adulthood and rebonding with their parents again. Anyone see it this way too? Bar I hope!!! I love the way you expressed this.

SunChariot	14 Mar 2005
WalesWoman wrote: I hope!!! I love the way you expressed this. Hope so too, and thanks. It was just an idea that came to me in a Tarot reading once. Makes sense to me though.:-) Bar

NightWing	19 Mar 2005
Interesting thread. But I think there is a danger in getting too caught up in metaphors of light and darkness. Even a "bright, sunlit day" is mostly illusion caused by our earth's atmosphere, after all. The unbelievably vast emptiness of the universe out beyond our fragile planet's atmosphere is mostly unending, everlasting darkness. Start taking THAT as serious symbolism, and a person could go completely insane. In Tarot terms, I think we need to learn to accept the Moon as well as the Sun. Remember that the Moon image includes a pathway through and beyond; there can be both comfort and promise there, as well as much (self-)discovery. It really is in exploring our shadows that we achieve balance in this life. Should we not go forth, like the image of the Hermit, resolutely carrying our spark of light out into the darkness, and even embrace it?

SunChariot	19 Mar 2005
NightWing wrote: Interesting thread. It really is in exploring our shadows that we achieve balance in this life. Should we not go forth, like the image of the Hermit, resolutely carrying our spark of light out into the darkness, and even embrace it? I found this thread so interesting too. :-) Funny you should say that, that it is only in exploring our shadows that we achieve balance in this life. I have been getting ready to do some Tarot shadow work for a while, but hesitating out of a bit of fear on my part. Underneath I know it may not be easy, but that it will be worthwhile. :-) I have the book :Tarot Shadow Work, Using the Dark Symbols to Heal, by Christine Jette, which I want to work with. Saving my Thoth deck for that... Anyway, now after your note, I feel better about it and I know you are right, and I will get on to that soon, Thanks! Bar

The Light and Darkness thread was originally posted on 11 Mar 2005 in the Talking Tarot board, and is now archived in the Forum Library. Read the active threads in Talking Tarot, or read more archived threads.