La Maison Dieu - how may it be read?

Fire

Noblet version of this card is very inspiring. It is possible it depicts very common thing in medieval times - fire of a building. I like connecting it with L'Amoreaux - fire of love definitely releases every doubt and stretch its' hands to the Sun (the best symbol of fire of love itself). I like this idea when whole activity depends on structure, not the Sun and lightning (as a punishment). I see this card as absolute YES without doubt, just a little reckless maybe.

One philosopher from my country noticed very interesting thing - I am not sure if it's right. He says La Maison Diev is not exactly House OF God but rather House-God in French. I like imagine this detail as a revealing of true essence of whole personality and body as a Gods' acting tool (something similar as when in Zen adept reveals his body lives without his attention - with fully understanding, not as a superficial idea...). Isn't it said in Bible too (I will build it in three days again...)?

Fudugazi said:

I often see the Maison-Dieu as orgasm, which is a moment of complete surrender, of joining of the physical and the spiritual through the bonding in explosion of two bodies. So we might also say that we may also enjoy the pleasure of being born in this material plane .

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Love this thread.

And....depending upon how many moments of surrender we experience, how many "rebirths" are possible in this plane. Is that bonding and release in sex a reminder of the possibilities of letting go and trusting completey, going with the moment of surrender??

Without this great pleasure, too, would we even think of ...getting married, continuing relationships, which tend to become complicated and messy as they go on??

terri

tmgrl2 said:

And....depending upon how many moments of surrender we experience, how many "rebirths" are possible in this plane. Is that bonding and release in sex a reminder of the possibilities of letting go and trusting completey, going with the moment of surrender??

Without this great pleasure, too, would we even think of ...getting married, continuing relationships, which tend to become complicated and messy as they go on??

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That's exactly what the Maison-Dieu periodically brings - something to rearrange the mess, and bring down the complex structures we build around relationships - it's a simplifier.



content edited by me - no longer relevant

PIRUCHO said:

Hello Kwaw:
Is it not a hospital at the end ?

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A hospital attached to a monastery was called a Maison-Dieu or Hôtel-Dieu - it treated sick pilgrims and locals. From the the 17th Century, only Hôtel-Dieu was in use.

If La Maison-Dieu is related to these monastic hospitals (and why not, as it's the same word!), then this card might be read as a place where we meet our fate through some sort of outside intervention - like a sickness. In reality, illness - ours and those of our loved ones - remains one of the major "tower" events of our lives, as it always has been. By extension, anything that comes down on us and changes the course of our lives like a serious illness. How we negotiate that event, how we allow it to change us (for the better, for the worse) would be the subject of further readings. What we know, when we draw this card in a spread is: nothing is going to be the same, ever again.

In relation to initiation (which I mentioned in my first post) - in all cultures around the world, serious illness (physical and/or mental) is viewed as an initiatory event. I would therefore link the theme of sudden and life-changing illness (or similar) to that of initiation - it certainly makes complete sense when reading that card and relating it to our lives!

Moderator Note

Please note that some posts have been merged with the thread X V I - La Maison ? Diev

Thank you

Moonbow*

kwaw said:

In England a Maison-dieu (alternative terms include a Maise, Meis, Mies, Maysondieu or meson dieu) was generally a hospital, pilgrim's rest, poor-house or almshourse, often endowed by a benefactor for this use with the stipulation for prayers to be made for the souls of the benefactor and / or others; we may view it then as a place dedicated therefore not only to the purgation of the sick in body but of the soul in purgatory.

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In medieval medicine sickness was linked with punishment, confession therefore was an essential element in the purging of sickness, purgation of sickness being effected through the purgation of sin; it was also considered to be affected through the imbalance of humors, and the purgation of the offending humor was also a primary treatment. The concept of confession or coming clean we may relate the biblical comment that judgement must begin at the house of God, it is not our place make self-righteous proclamations upon others, but to look at ourselves (people in glass houses, he who is without sin etc.,); and this leads us not into judgement and condemnation, but compassion for others, thus the obligation upon members of the Maison Dieu to contemplate and pray for the souls in purgatory; as great as our sufferings can be, they can never match the suffering of those in the purifying fires of purgatory. So we may be led from consideration of our own minor ailments to compassion for greater suffering of others.

In reading we could think health issues and hospitals perhaps, or health farm and anti-toxin purification regimes, to ideas of rejection and expulsion, the rejection of false idols, false or bad things or habits we hold dear to above the just and the good, of a need to 'come clean' about something (to ourselves as much as others); from contemplation of our own suffering, to compassion for the suffering of others; of lessons leading us from self-righteousness judgments of others to self-knowledge and understanding.


For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God: and if it first begin at us, what shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God? I Peter 4:17

The Fall - the beginning of judgment --- the last judgment - The Restoration

kwaw said:

The Fall - the beginning of judgment ...

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Or binge and purge:



In terms of reading perhaps...

...pizza delivery?

...in need of a good clear out?

LOL, Kwaw

Although purge - or bloodletting or any of these types of medical interventions - wasn't only seen as a punishment. Hildergard von Bingen's famous medical treatise mentions balancing the humours, and generally keeping the body in balance. The methods are the same, however - only the intent changes. Does that make a difference?


In Ayurvedic medicine to this day, induced vomitting is a common cure. The aim there is also to balance.


I'd love to see a querent's face, though, if we said: "you've been having a bit too much pizza, time for a purge! The cards are saying you need a good vomit, and all will be well again."


We can say then, that la Maison-Dieu can also be read as a rebalancing - possibly through purge or bloodletting (literal or metaphorical) leading to the harmonious state we see in L'Etoile?


I think I prefer orgasm, all things told

Fudugazi said:

I'd love to see a querent's face, though, if we said: "you've been having a bit too much pizza, time for a purge! The cards are saying you need a good vomit, and all will be well again."

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Don't see the problem ~ woman's magazines are full of 'detox' and even 'colonic irrigation'! Open euphenisms are a safer bet of course, the client can then apply the abstract / general sense to one of specific relevance to them improving the odds of reader 'accuracy'. Who can argue with the need to 'rebalance' after all, it could mean anything

Fudugazi said:

I think I prefer orgasm, all things told

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Another form of expulsion or throwing forth or cumming clean?

and a good clean out doesn't to be a reference to medicine, but ... housework, a spring clean, a de-cluttering....

In numerous contexts.

Hello Fudugazi:
You said "In relation to initiation (which I mentioned in my first post) - in all cultures around the world, serious illness (physical and/or mental) is viewed as an initiatory event. I would therefore link the theme of sudden and life-changing illness (or similar) to that of initiation - it certainly makes complete sense when reading that card and relating it to our lives! "

What can I say or best to say add to this your words ?

And also agree with Kwaw of course because I think that all is tied.
In my opinion is as follows:

XV : The card that shows the degree of weight of ours Souls.
So how much we are tied to matter and where ours Souls are waiting for us work to return to XXI,the Anima Mundi.
Of course does not exists your Soul or my Soul,only the Soul.
Best said is the point where we tied ours Souls to matter and the degree of this.
XVI: The Allchemicum Furnace,best see at Noblet as Kwaw showed or at Jean Dodal for one example between others.(And then lost as one can see on decks where the fire hit the tower with fire coming from the Sun),and worst lost with the door seen at Tdb pattern )
With the sacred fire returning to its origin after burned all the (ours) dregs or best slags

-XVII: The matter,ours matter purified is return to the earth by a woman not an Angel.
I mean as we see at XIIII after XIII work.

-XVIII:Ours turn to meet ours Beast,that suppose ours responsability to broke this SUN ECLIPSE of life as one cans see at Noblet or Dodal.
Is the part of darkness we done to the planet Soul,of course not to her but we clearly without want it,darkened "Her face" to others as us.
I know that is a Sun Eclipse,and just for me.
But ours Souls is the link with ours Spirit,best said the One Spirit.

-XVIIII : After cleansed ours dark side here we are recieved by a Brother.
Anyone who did it first.
Because all of Us are part of the whole chain.
The whole planet is involved in this process of Return.
Corpus Hermeticum btw said.
Here ours see us somewhat astonished as the card show it.
Well,we done a huge work,and will takes many lives ahead.

XX:Resurrection from the matter.
Here we live the tomb,the alchemical tomb of the matter,we are no man,no woman,and this is why there is a woman and a man outside of the tomb praying.

XXI: We returned to the Soul,the great one the Anima Mundi.

Well I regret not have more vocabulary as yours to express mi opinion.

My best to both !