"Man Overboard" on the Steamship Archetype

This sentence of jmd's from the "Beyond the World/Extra Majors" thread plum reached out and smacked me across the face. Since this is pretty off topic, let's take it up here:

<<For myself, I do not think it correct to view the Atouts (or Majors) as 'archetypal' (in the jungian sense). Rather, they reflect in quite an astounding manner an internal tension in their dynamic sequence.>> (--jmd)

I've been looking for a while for a way around this "archetype" word. I'm not a Jungian/Campbellian, but certain trains of thought are hard to ride without the concept 'archetype' -- it works as a tool, but it feels like kind of a crutch. So every now and again I play a round of think-it-through, but haven't found a preferable term. Archetype's only been used Jung-style since 1919, and previously:

<<An ideal example of a type; prototype, quintessence.
"original pattern from which copies are made," 1545, from L. archetypum, from Gk. arkhetypon "pattern, model," neut. of adj. arkhetypos "first-moulded," (dictionary.com)>>

Are the Trumps prototypes? Static and captured quintessence? (side query: is this meant to be Platonic Ideal-style, this prototype?)

"...an internal tension in their dynamic sequence."

Dynamic sequence means there is no static quintessence in a card. It means the meaning, The Meaning, is a function of the trumps' constant interplay and unfurling -- they only exist in relation to each other, the structure that inner tension maintains. I like Trump as Tension because it clearly presents that give-and-take, it contains the ongoing relationship in its many possible states of im/balance. The whole, the deck, is the quintessence.

The "collective unconscious" idea retained some minimal appeal for me because it allows for the fact of dynamic existence on some level. But again, this "dynamic sequence" idea joints nicely. The card isn't implicit in human/nature, it's the *sequence itself.*

Or maybe that's just how I'm thinking now that I've left port and come upon the open waters of qabbala/fibinnacci studies. And lord knows, "an internal tension in their dynamic sequence" doesn't have the wholesome snap of "Archetype" in the heat (/icefloe?) of debate.

So what other terms have folks used, besides "archetype," to get around in Trumpville?

(and a dramatic tip of the hat to jmd for the lovely and useful phrasing...)

I've used the term Form (as in, platonic)... because it's a dynamic interaction that can only manifest imperfectly and partially at any given moment, yet every manifestation reflects the whole. Like fragments of a holograph containing the complete original image.

Thanks for the thoughts, Scion.

Hmm. So is the idea then (forgive my rusty Plato) that the Form is the unmanifestable whole, and the card (manifestation) is a facet of the hologram? For instance, there is The Empress as a Form, and there are the numerous physical Empress cards by which we meet her? If that's it, then does it follow that the Form of the Empress is static, but we only interact with her through ever-changing/imperfect manifestations?

You say the fragments are of a "complete original image." So the Form exists independently of/prior to our experience of it?

I detest the term ‘Archetype’.

Let’s switch channels for a second.

Let’s look at the defunct TV series “Firefly”. Firefly worked well because it had clearly defined characters. We had the complex Captain who led, and had occasional moral issues he had to deal with. Mal was ‘enigmatic’. Then there was his army buddy, Zoe.

So we had army buddies, leaders…(army buddies (and other shared difficulty experiential background) is a common ‘archetypal situation’ that spans all epic stories).

What about Jayne Cobb? His character was clearly archetypal – the mercenary, the muscle…(with no conscience)...

River Tam – genius, psychic, way messed up. And her brother Simon (the Doctor). So here we have a filial relationship that opposes the ‘army buddy’ relationship.

Inara could be the High Priestess of course…but what about Kaylee? What card is she?

Where are these relationships in the Tarot? What card represents Jayne Cobb?

If the Tarot majors truly represented Archetypes, we would not need a gazillion books explaining them. They’d be self explanatory.

That said, the majors CAN display some (but not all) ‘archetypal concepts’ – which is quite different than ‘archetypes’.

I find that some cards can be archetypes, the way I understand the word.
Some more than others, some more often than other.

I don't know what's wrong with the word.

It's just a word.....

<<Where are these relationships in the Tarot? What card represents Jayne Cobb?>>

Here here (hear hear?). Archetypal situations, archetypal relationships can be illustrated in the cards -- but the cards don't represent "the archetypes" themselves, or even completely disparate entities. Again, my trouble comes with trying to envision the static "whole." If it has to be relational to make sense, why rely on a word that connotes a solitary entity?

<<I don't know what's wrong with the word.

It's just a word...>>

It's not that it's wrong so much as just...not right. For me, at least. I'm striving right now for clarity of language. Clarity of language leading to more clarity of thought. Words are like tools, or maybe hinges: they work differently, they open different doors, according to even the smallest of precision-tweaks. I don't know about you, Umbrae, but I "detest" the word because even when I use it with the best intent, I still don't know what I'm really talking about, never mind how the message comes across.

I understand archetypes to be spiritual principles or types. They are patterns in the non-material plane from which copies in the material plane are made. In this sense, the Tarot cards are not technically archetypes but are symbols which represent archetypes.

The way I see it is that people that don't talk good, but wanna sound edjumaketed say things like, "The Tarot trumps are archetypes..."

But for those of us that speak well, such statements are like fingernails dragged across a chalkboard.

brujaja said:

Thanks for the thoughts, Scion.

Hmm. So is the idea then (forgive my rusty Plato) that the Form is the unmanifestable whole, and the card (manifestation) is a facet of the hologram? For instance, there is The Empress as a Form, and there are the numerous physical Empress cards by which we meet her? If that's it, then does it follow that the Form of the Empress is static, but we only interact with her through ever-changing/imperfect manifestations?

You say the fragments are of a "complete original image." So the Form exists independently of/prior to our experience of it?

Click to expand...

Plato's Forms are a massive topic, but most simply... the Form is the unknowable perfect image/essence/concept/idea/model/possibility that we understand in its imperfect, limited, concrete manifestations in the "real" world. So that the world we think of as real is a shadow of the gleaming perfection of the world of Forms. As we move towards enlightenment, we realize that all the things we think of as permanent or true or perfect are limited by the fact that we (as limited beings) cannot comprehend something eternal.

In Tarot terms, the Empress is one Form that is expressed variously in different decks that each approximate the FORM of the Empress imperfectly. BY extrapolating from all of these Emress cards, we can arrive att a sense of what the Empress form represents and delineates. Furthermore, the Empress as a card in a reading contains several modes/patterns/features which are manifest (imperfectly and temporarily) in the concrete day-to-day world. So the "Empress" is a form which in turn expresses itself as the "Empress card" form which in turn manifests as different cards in decks which in turn manifest as different forces in readings which in turn manifest in people's lives. And for Plato, Forms are both eternal and eternally manifesting: shadows of shadows of shadows.

So Form is extremely useful as a term because it expresses the concept not only more accurately but with a clearer sense of the complexity and interpenetration of the ideas across different levels.

Useful?

Scion

<<Plato's Forms are a massive topic>>
Yeah, I realize the silliness of my question, considering the centuries of debate, but I very much appreciate the walkthrough of how you think it out -- and for the record, you've hit in a few succint paragraphs what it took a certain lit-crit professor a week to pinball through...

<<In Tarot terms, the Empress is one Form that is expressed variously in different decks that each approximate the FORM of the Empress imperfectly.>>
Here, for instance. "Approximate" is loud and clear.

<<it expresses the concept not only more accurately but with a clearer sense of the complexity and interpenetration of the ideas across different levels.>>
Agreed -- I do like it for this aspect, its vertical reach, I guess, through those levels. I still miss the horizontal reach, though. The fact that the Empress is a Form, but also proceeds from and to certain other Forms, is known at all by relating to those other Forms, is read in a reading not only according to her own internal variations but against the other Forms and variations on the scene. The fact that She and these other Forms comprise a set. "Tension" has this horizontal reach for me.

Maybe a combination is called for. Trump as "Formal tension." eh?

<<Useful?>>
Always. Muchas gracias.