Mel's Old Fashioned Pips & Courts and Homemade Baked Goods

Melanchollic

Bernice said:
EDIT: In one of your posts you mention that the Devil ranks the worst (in this approach). Looking at the 'three pillar' diagram for the Trump Ranking, does this mean that the strongest/most intense cards are along the top row?


Yes. The Celestial tier (15 ~ 21) trumps the Cycle of Life tier (6 ~ 13) which trumps the Orders of Man tier (F ~ 5). One might also use the horizontal lines to determine how good or bad a card is - the Fool being worst than the Juggler, or the Pope being better than the Emperor, etc. I just sort of see them as different kinds of bad or good - the Emperor is one kind of good, the Pope another.
 

Bernice

'lo Mel,

Purely on a ranking basis for the Trumps, have I got this right:

Death (-)........................Trumps......The Emperor (+)
Temperance (Neutral).......Trumps......The Chariot (+)
Moon (-).........................Trumps......Temperance (neutral)
Star (+)..........................Trumps......The Pope (+)
Devil (-)..........................Trumps......Justice (Neutral)
World (+)........................Trumps......The Devil (-)

etc......

I'm assuming that this last one above, World trumping the Devil, would indicate a 'battle royal' with the Devil spitting fire and the World drawing from all 4 elements (quintessence). But the World would triumph. (yes?)

These are the best & worst cards in the deck, both are both Active and in the Celestial Tier.

Bee :)
 

Bernice

Opps, are the World & the Juggler still to be considered as Quintessence?

Also, could it be said that the Moon draws/receives from the Star & the Sun (As presented in this 'default-layout') ?

Which might also mean that Strength has access to the energies/influences of all three Celestial cards above it - Star-Moon-Sun, ............. ?

Bee :)
 

Melanchollic

Bernice said:
'lo Mel,

Purely on a ranking basis for the Trumps, have I got this right:

Death (-)........................Trumps......The Emperor (+)
Temperance (Neutral).......Trumps......The Chariot (+)
Moon (-).........................Trumps......Temperance (neutral)
Star (+)..........................Trumps......The Pope (+)
Devil (-)..........................Trumps......Justice (Neutral)
World (+)........................Trumps......The Devil (-)

etc......

I'm assuming that this last one above, World trumping the Devil, would indicate a 'battle royal' with the Devil spitting fire and the World drawing from all 4 elements (quintessence). But the World would triumph. (yes?)

These are the best & worst cards in the deck, both are both Active and in the Celestial Tier.

Bee :)



Which card specifically Trumps which card is simply the Tarot order itself - The Juggler trumps the Fool, The Papesse trumps the Juggler, and on down the line. So Fortune not only trumps Father Time, but every card before it, in the Marseille ordering any way. But yes. I see the Devil as the worst, and The World as the best. They represent of course Hell and Heaven.

The device of using the Juggler and The World as 'quintessence' was based on the CRVX CVBIS model, and doesn't really apply to the THREE COLUMN model. Though the World could still work as such..

Here is another diagram of the Three Column Model, the "temple", as I call it -



templeoftarot.jpg



The dexter column is GOOD. The sinister column is BAD. The center column is NEUTRAL - it basically represents the fluctuating realm caught in a 'tug-o-war' between GOOD and EVIL - the constantly moving celestial orbs (Star, Moon, Sun) which travel through the zodiac affecting the fate of all - Time and Fortune the fickle forces governing our worldly life - the Church and State as symbolic of the Holy Roman Empire, and empires too do rise and fall.

Each pillar holds a virtue.


  • To the left - Is it not lust and cravings that we need to 'temper'? It is sin and temptation that gives rise to the virtue of Temperance.

  • In the center - Is it not the constant change, impermanence, and fluctuation of the world that requires us to be strong and have courage. In the ideal world of the Garden of Eden, a state of innocents beyond good or evil, Fortitude would have not been necessary.

  • To the right - Is it not goodness that give us the means to be fair? Justice is born from the desire to do good.


I find the position of the Virtues particularly profound.

Following the sinister column, from top to bottom - The Devil gives rise for Temperance, then Temperance rules over the lesser creations of the Devil; folly, deception, dishonor, and death.

On the center column - The movements of the planets give rise for Fortitude, then Fortitude rules over the lesser creations of these astrological forces; time, fate, fortune, etc.

On the dexter column - Heaven gives rise to Justice, and being just brings us love, honors, and high position.
 

Bernice

Masterly depiction of the Trumps.

I had been toying with the Virtues as being 'mediators' between the higher & lower realms - your explanation is more indepth. Beautifully phrased.

I strongly suspect there is much more to be gleaned from this particular layout. The balance of the Active & Passive cards also seem to have a meaningful symetricy (excuse spelling) - still studying it.

Bee :)

P.S> Many thanks for the Temple pic :)
 

Bernice

Had a thought.

Have you formulated different 'elemental' assignments for this particular model/layout? Perhaps each card should contain 2 elements, with one more prominent depending on the combination they make in a spread and the query?
Just a thought.

Bee :) :) Love this Model.

Sinister and dexter, echos of Heraldry. Love it.
 

Melanchollic

Bernice said:
Have you formulated different 'elemental' assignments for this particular model/layout?


I've never really thought about elements for this system. Elements are useful for the pips and courts, since they are basically empty tokens of play without clear meanings. Assigning elements to them empowers us to give them meaning.

The trumps however are all fairly common allegories. The meaning is already there - Love, Death, Justice, Fortune, etc. Much of the confusion of we moderns have in understanding some of the trump images, is that the allegories are 15th century, and not currently in use. In the 15th century Italian states, these allegories would have been known to all. There was nothing esoteric or occult to it. Athough the sequence as a whole, I believe, holds a larger allegory, as I speculate in post #64, which may not have been immediately obvious to your common Italian.

Based around this larger allegory, I drew the positive, negative, passive, active, or neutral correlations. The Chariot is positive because of its basic allegory and this is supported by its position before Time and Fortune, and it is passive because it is subjected to the power of Father Time and Dame Fortuna.

Since we can speculatively deduce the 'goodness' of each card, and whether or not it is active or passive based on the actual allegory, assigning elements, whose main purpose is to determine the 'goodness' of each card and whether or not it is active or passive, would be redundant.

If we have a way to determine:


  1. Dignity - Whether the card is good or bad.

  2. Activity - Whether a card is passive or active.


Then we can judge both an answer to a question, and even elaborate.


Short Example Reading

The Querent asks: "Will Sally go out with me?"

Card #1 (The Querent) = Pope
Card #2 (The Quesited) = Empress
Card #3 (How they interact) = Love

Judgement: We can deduce from the general positive nature of the cards that this is a 'Yes'. From the activity we can see that the Empress is passive. The Pope is active, so he must make the first move, or nothing will happen. I really don't know what the Emperor is going to think about this though! :eek:
 

Bernice

...Elements are useful for the pips and courts, since they are basically empty tokens of play without clear meanings. Assigning elements to them empowers us to give them meaning.

The trumps however are all fairly common allegories. The meaning is already there - Love, Death, Justice, Fortune, etc. .....

Point taken. And a good one at that.

I'm afaid that I've been tainted with the 20th century idea that all possible esoteric odds & ends may be correlated with the tarot cards! And of course, these esoteric elements were not a part of the 'original' cards, save that some may have been assigned some planetry influence.
Rather like the blank rune that was latterly added to the Elder Furthark - not an original stave of the Furthark.

Apologies for a dumb question......

Bee :)
 

Melanchollic

Bernice said:
Apologies for a dumb question......


On the contrary, it was a great question!
 

Bernice

Been thinking.... This model relates to the relative world/experiences. What if the Virtues were Quintessence, or a fusion of the 4 elements? i.e: The nature of the Trump (allegory) plus four 'avenues' of expression.

Still thinking...

Bee :)