My first IDS post!
I hope this isn't too long or boring. I'm 100 percent certain it recaps much of what has already been said. But to write is to study twice, and that's what I'm up to! So here it goes!
I always want any Lovers card to mean Love, romantic or compassionate. The Choice thing always makes me crazy. But one look at the Thoth Lovers, and you can tell it’s not about love--maybe potential for love. But it’s not about choice, either. Well, not exactly. It’s all about opposites. Most obviously, male and female (including lance and cup, club and flowers). We also have the archetypal black and white, counterchanged in the children. Also the alchemical RED and white, which is also masculine and feminine, and fire and water--Leo lion and Scorpio eagle (and tarot wands and cups!). And gold and silver crowns--Sun and Moon. So far, these all go hand in hand.
But then there’s Eve and Lilith. Obviously not masculine and feminine. Some have suggested virgin and whore (good and evil?), but if we pay attention to the story, I’m thinking more obedient and rebellious. Or even other-motivated and self-motivated.
Why all this duality on the Lovers card? Because it’s also Gemini, the twins. And Zayin, the sword. I see the arch of swords over this alchemical wedding. (On the sides are the fluted columns that Eve and Lilith are standing on.)
Crowley suggests the card could be the Brothers instead of the Lovers, specifically Cain and Abel, who were twins but in every other way opposites. (Wheel and) Whoa! I am just re-reading, and he suggests that the Marseilles Lovers are Cain, fresh from murdering his brother, between Eve (overshadowed by Cain’s father, the serpent!) on one side and Lilith on the other. Just more opposites, I guess.
I never understood the story of Cain and Abel. Why was Cain’s offering not as good as Abel’s in God’s sight? Why did God mark Cain so that he WOULDN’T be murdered in turn? What is the story about??? Snuffin suggests that the children on the card are Cain and Abel, but I think that’s pushing it a bit.
He? also suggests that they are the babies on the Fool grown older, and the children on the Sun grown a bit more and having grown butterfly wings. This makes more sense if you consider the Majors as a progression, which I’m pretty sure is the plan in the Thoth.
Speaking of the progression, at the bottom is the Orphic Egg. I’ve had trouble with understanding this symbol. I could get it mentally, but it just didn’t click for me intuitively, but I think I’ve got it now. It is a symbol of the creation of the universe. The egg is matter and the snake is the life force. Combine matter and life and we have the universe as we know it. And of course it looks like the human (mammalian?) egg and sperm. Ultimately that is what this card is about. You have to have a male and female to create a new life. You have to have opposites to have the union of opposites. This is the first step. The egg still has wings--it’s still in the ethereal, ideal stage. The next time we see the Egg is on the Hermit, where it’s all green and ready to grow. Then Art takes place WITHIN the Egg. Cool, huh? Crowley makes a big deal about the Lovers and Art being twins. Duquette calls them the alchemical trumps. Makes perfect sense to me.
And that brings us to the Hermit. The Hermit is the officiant of the alchemical wedding of the Emperor and Empress. I guess that means he’s the alchemist preparing to join the Red King with the White Queen/gold and silver. And the next time we see the egg, it’s in his care. Maybe he’s like Merlin, who spirited the baby Arthur away until he was ready to make his mark. (I love the wedding imagery in the Alchemical Tarot, but in that deck the Hierophant marries the Emperor and Empress in the form of statues on his throne and the sun and moon through his two windows.)
The mobius strip around the Hermit’s arms is the Word. As in John’s gospel: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.” So we’re back to the creation of the universe, with the Hermit as God and his scroll as the Word.
Cupid is obviously the Love part of the Lovers card. The book says his quiver has Thelema inscribed on it. (I’ll have to take it’s word for it!) That is kind of contradictory. The whole point of Cupid’s arrows (pun intended!) is that they are irresistible, even to the gods. So what does that have to do with Will? More opposites, probably intended . . .
ETA: Wise Thoth studiers in another thread have quoted “Love is the Law, Love under Will.” Oh. The arrows of Cupid are Love, and they are under (inside of, actually) the quiver called Will.
Snuffin says that Cupid’s arrow points out the path from Kether to Chokmah. I don’t know why it would though. Oh, and that the white light behind the Hermit’s head is Kether. Does that mean the king and queen are Chokmah and Binah? But, if so, they are reversed . . .
Snuffin (I think) points out that below the wings of the Egg is a bow similar to the bow of Art as Sagittarius (not to mention Diana’s bow in Priestess). And that the lance of the King is its arrow. Another link to Art.
NOW, as a card of the day: I drew this card on a day when my husband and I were away for a long weekend and everything seemed very nice and relaxed and fun. Then that night we had a fight. I think the card is saying now you know where you are at odds/what separates you (like the swords). Knowing the problem is the beginning of creating a new life/relationship together. Like I said in the beginning, not Love, romantic or otherwise, but the potential for love.
I reserve the right to come back when I find out something about the hydrogen, oxygen, carbon thing!!! (My husband is a chemistry teacher, so he should be able to shed some light on the subject!)
GO GEMINI!