Thoth - The Priestess

Richard1

Isthmus Nekoi, I think pincones are a symbol of growth and fertility...but I'm not sure. Anyway, the Queen of Wands also has one...
I find this card fascinating...even where the veil is dropped, you can't really see her; the prism-like swirling lights obscure her upper body, an infinity symbol covers her eyes, and the light from the moon covers her head. The sense of depth, mystery, and silence is almost overwhelming. The whiteness of her skin and hair make her look literally statuesque...
 

coldsuns

Questions!

On her head,there is a "moon" with a "circle" on it. What does it mean? And on the floor there are "diamonds"? I dont understand..^_^
 

firemaiden

Richard said:
...even where the veil is dropped, you can't really see her; the prism-like swirling lights obscure her upper body, an infinity symbol covers her eyes, and the light from the moon covers her head. The sense of depth, mystery, and silence is almost overwhelming. The whiteness of her skin and hair make her look literally statuesque...


Obscured by light
An important concept
Why are we not studying these cards in function with the book of Thoth?

Crowley writes: "She is clothed only in the luminous veil of light. It is important for high initiation to regard Light not as the perfect manifestation of the Eternal Spirit, but rather as the veil which hides that Spirit It does so all the more effectively because of its incomparably dazzling brilliance. [The tradition of the best schools of Hindu mysticism has a precise parallelism. The final obstacle to full Enlightenment is exactly this Vision of Formless Effulgence]. Thus she is light and the body of light. She is the truth behind the veil of light. She is the soul of light."

http://www.angelfire.com/celeb/Crowley/thoth/majors.html
 

jmd

I agree that one should also look at what Crowley also said of this (and other) cards in his The Book of Thoth - but it is also worth considering how the images Frieda (I nearly wrote Fire-da...) Harris gifted us from possible early discussions with Crowley, and then her work with either George Adams and/or Olive Whicher on projective geometry. It is the combination of these which resulted in her creation of these wonderful cards she gifted the world.

In writing his Book of Thoth, then, Crowley may himself have been influenced by the manifestation (perhaps at times surprising yet truthful to his guiding instructions) of Harris's cards.

On this card, not only the Light-mesh, as a net which veils, but its very shape hint at the sanctity of its hidden dimensions.

Crowley would have been quite aware of the significance of the 'diamonds' in the lower portions. Three are clearly regular polyhedra (oft called 'Platonic Solids'): the Tetrahedron, Dodecahedron, and Octahedron. The bottom left-hand one appears to combine somewhat what may be expected to be either a Hexahedron (ie, cube) and Icosahedron - a strange mixture, really... The other depictions (such as the sunflower-like plant on the right, the pine-cone, and the other flora-like depictions) each exhibit clear golden proportions through their implicit Fibonacci numbers.

Here, then, what seems to also be revealed is that nature will manifest through not only geometrical veils of Light, but that its descent will manifest through harmonious and law-abiding structures.

When considering also the card's location upon the Tree (as Crowley and the Golden Dawn would have it), it is placed upon the path which not only crosses the Abyss upon which Knowledge (Da'at) will be required for its re-entry, but links the central Solar Sephiroth with its ultimate Crowning-Achad (unity) of origin.

Here, certainly Gimel may easily be understood to make sense (even if this tradition is not universally accepted). The Camel, as the ship of the desert (in ancient Egyptian: Deshert = Red earth = the place of danger and death), assists in making such long journeys in the fiery desert in which water is sparce... One's own knowledge (Da'at) of placements (the various oasis and wells) is required for the drinking deeply of the quenching.

As Artemis, who, as Crowley describes her, hunts with the musical bow by enchantment, depicts the High Priestess, a question may truely be asked as to whom her prey becomes!

In the same book previously mentioned, Crowley also says of this card: 'Pure, exalted and gracious influence enters matter. Hence, change, alternation, increase and decrease, fluctuation. There is, however, a liability to be led away by enthusiasm; one may become "moon-struck" unless careful balance is maintained.' (p 255)

The unveiling of Isis (or as Plutarch wrote her name: Iside, reminiscent of another name Isilde) becomes but the blinding Light and its darkness made visible through initiation of, as a first step, one's Holy Guardian Angel...
 

Richard1

Wow...that's what I love about this place...I think I've got a handle on the various meanings of each card, and then someone comes along and kicks my intellectual butt.
I really like the idea that, rather than try to rend the veil or look beyond it, we should in reality be grateful it's there. I might have more to say when I'm more awake...
 

skytwig

From Angeles Arrien:

This is an adrogynous figure who archetypally represents blalnce. From the naval up, the figure is all curved lines, soft, magnetic, ying, and receptive. From the navel down, this figure is all straight lines, strong, dynamic, yang, and assertive. .... the High Priestess with her sun/moon crown represents each person's commitment to have equal balance in strength and softness.

The crystals represent the multifaceted aspects of intuition that are present at each level of consciousness: mental intuition (the triangular crystal); emotional intuition (the round crystal); spiritual insight (the diamond crystal); and physically registered information (the octagonal crystal)....

Mythically, this archetype also represents the journey homeward or the return to oneself. the camel within the oasis symbolizes the return to the inner oasis or garden within.....


I, too, find the mathematical presence to be significant, as the Gridwork healers learn of; the invisible, yet powerfilled realm of reality that gives us the 'variable' order, the ordered chaos, if you will, of this grand Universe.
 

isthmus nekoi

Thanks for the suggestion, Richard. Maybe there is something about pinecones that is suggestive of mathmatical proportions and what not....

Also, this is a much more personal observation but... I once wrote a story where a woman dreams of a thousand white crows flying into the sun.... something along the lines of... she could not forget that image of light covering light. Later, she's burying a dead mare (primordial feminine symbol) and she sees a thousand white crows fly into the sun. She takes ill and dies later on in the story (in order to make room for the new feminine priciple).