brightcrazystar
Grigori said:
I use Tarot cards like the Japanese paper talisman sets, in the art known as Ofuda. Basically, it is taking the name of a spirit and binding it to a paper that you post, burn, or otherwise use to compel the spirit to do your bidding. Each card has a veritable arsenal of spirits bound to it, and if you combine images, you get even more. Combine the images of The Sun, The Tower, The Fool, and Adjustment for Raphael, for example. The image could be an illustration of a Young Child on the eve of his manhood holding a sword in earnest. A tower is split asunder on either side of him as though he cleaved directly through the top and directly through the entire middle of it, one side entirely blasted by the lightning of his sword, and the other illuminated by the flash. His eyes are masked with a violet mask, striking against his vibrant golden locks. He wears a white robe and golden mantle with a silver gilt cresent with a bright bue circle in it (Apas Vayum or Water of Air Tattva). Above his head, and in the far background a giant red eye watches all that occurs.
The first Tarot Society of the Golden Dawn Inner Order did not use cards for just Divination. They did divination (and played a game somewhat like Bridge) with the Marseilles Deck, and learned the proper symbols from drawings they copied in their own hand. Later they used Rider Waite instead of MArseilles, which is still an awesome deck. These original images (of which few survive and all in private collections so we don't even know if there is a complete set still) were meant to be drawn to actually MAKE THINGS HAPPEN, not simply divine them.
In my magick, I use the bell book and candle model prominently, and my book is often my Tarot.
