Waite reversal/Astrological & Qabbalistical Correspondences

Hi All

I am new here and thought i would kick off one on what seems to be the most controversial issue in Tarot.. to Waite or not to Waite!!!

If this topic has already got its own thread i do apologise and ask that you please refer it to me. I searched for "Waite" and got 100s of hits!

The Rider-Waite is now the most famous deck and many modern decks are its derivatives. So great is its influence that in fact now many Tarot-readers don't even recognise what the traditional Tarot is since US Games Systems has appropriated the label "Traditional" for the Waite deck! A grand "transformation"!

The whole basis of his reversing number position of Strength and Justice he refused to divulge to his readers but it has been argued to be from Astrological & Qabbalistical Correspondence.

Some would consider that card meanings are critically dependent on number positions making any movement of number assignations a matter of great importance. Others feel the meanings derive from the symbolism of the Majors and some feel also of the Minor card pictorials created by Pamela Colman Smith for Waite, believing the numbers to be arbitrary! Yes, many people actually illogically 'think' Waite 'discovered' the 'real' Tarot, apparently deriving the Minor card pictures and meanings from the Aethers by Divine Providence! Obviously by his own admission he did no such thing, merely "correcting" the Tarot.

This thread is for all who wish to argue for or against or otherwise comment on this tendentious issue of whether the Tarot and the Royal Art of Astrology and the "Divine" Revelation of QBL/KaBaLa/etc. are correspondable and to what degree, such as on the typical one to one basis.

THIS IS A BIGGIE, folks! Have at it!

The numbering of the RWS Majors as well as the scenes depicted on the Minors are based on Book T, a document which did not originate with A. E. Waite. (The author was probably S. L. MacGregor Mathers.) The information is readily available in the Rider-Waite-Smith forum, or one can go to the original source material and work it out for oneself (which, believe it or not, requires far less effort than learning the differential and integral calculus in order to understand Newton's mathematical proof of Kepler's Laws of Planetary Motion). Why was Waite not more candid about his sources? (Why will a Freemason not reveal the secret hand grips?)

It is true that Waite was not forthright in the information he divulged in the PKT, but that was written for the general audience, not for initiates who would no doubt conduct their own studies of the deck. It is doubtful if his artifice still holds, as the Golden Dawn documents have been made public, and although the Coleman pictures deviate from the prescribed symbolism, a perusal of Book T does reveal much of the meaning behind the images.

Now, although others have also made correspondences between Tarot, Kabbalah and Astrology, none did it so well, or at least so codified as the GD, so while I don't think it the right way to do things, I do think it is the "rightest," and I see the logic in the Strength/Justice swap to correspond to Libra/Leo. Important to keep in mind is that Waite didn't make the switch; Mathers probably did. Much more challenging to me is Crowley's Star/Emperor switch. All in all the RWS is closer to the GD "spirit" (including its Christian influences) than, for example, the Thoth, even though the RWS images are radically different.

I think the meanings of the cards are not arbitrary, but a direct result of the Golden Dawn attributions. It is perfectly fine not to study why they are what they are but only the divinatory meanings but strictly speaking so-called "traditional" meanings, at least for the minors, don't actually exist independently of the GD. Do I believe Mathers was in contact with the Secret Chiefs who gave him the information and that the Cypher Manuscripts were genuine? No, on both counts. However, that does not mean the actual attributions don't "work" and make sense.

The only thing which I hope does not arise in a thread such as this is for someone to start berating the Golden Dawn or A. E. Waite simply because they did not do things the way one might wish. The popularity of the Waite deck is due to the fact that many people like it, not because it was forced upon them. If anyone does not approve of the esoteric origins of the RWS, that's perfectly alright, but it does not change the facts, however much one may wish that it did.

ETA. The strange origins claimed by the Golden Dawn are not at issue here, but they are extremely murky and suspect, to say the least. On the other hand, as closrapexa noted, this does not imply that all of their subsequent documents must thereby be spurious or totally fallacious. Likewise, A. E. Waite had human faults as does everyone, but this in no way compromises the legitimacy of the voluminous reseach he did on esotericism and the occult.

Good points, LRichard, although I never did see anyone berating them for doings things "wrong" but rather negation for doing anything at all. Widely touted as a beginner's deck, many people seem content with learning "traditional" meanings and using "intuition" as a means of reading. This seems to be a variant of the Angeles Arrien syndrome so widely picked apart in the Thoth forum.

On one hand people seem to accept the LWB-style divinatory meanings in the PKT, going so far as to call them traditional and then proceed to berate Waite for being obtuse and wave away the Golden Dawn as bored pedants. It actually seems people are willing to accept the RWS but would rather get rid of that pesky "secret magickal society" GD nonsense.

Instead of actual growth, we see many Tarot books expanding the, again, "traditional" meanings, doing away with any challenge understanding vital concepts of life itself, and the nitty gritty of how the deck works is washed away by pseudo psychological New Age affirmations and chewing gum. Point of fact, I have seen actual vehemence at the suggestion the RWS held anything more than exoteric experience, or that esoteric knowledge was useful in exoteric thought processes.

closrapexa said:

" It is perfectly fine not to study why they are what they are"

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While I am sure it is perfectly fine to not understand what one is doing I do think it best to. Otherwise mistakes are bound to occur. Are you really arguing for rote-learning of meanings with no comprehension of the fundamentals as a viable way of reading the Tarot?

closrapexa said:

"but only the divinatory meanings but strictly speaking so-called "traditional" meanings, at least for the minors, don't actually exist independently of the GD."

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Your meaning here is not clear to me. Perhaps my English is inadequate. Are you saying that "traditional" meanings of the pre-GD Tarot are derived from the GD? I didn't think the GD had that kind of time-travelling magic so i guess you meant something else. Please elucidate.

LRichard said:

"If anyone does not approve of the esoteric origins of the RWS, that's perfectly alright, but it does not change the facts, however much one may wish that it did."

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What interests me is not what people claim their inspirations are but rather the mettle of their cold argument for their position, fully referencing verifiable facts. Waite adopted Mathers' change to the Tarot and did not provide one drop of argument for it.. and though many have subsequently argued for correspondences with the other systems I would like to see the debate fully explored on this forum, in this thread.

"The popularity of the Waite deck is due to the fact that many people like it, not because it was forced upon them."

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While the deck is popular with some in part because of it's aesthetics, though I and many others dislike its dull hues, in fact that statement was entirely incorrect.

People learn Tarot from a severely restricted pool of commercially available knowledge with modern decks and books being mostly based on RWS. Most people interested in Tarot don't even know that Tarot was different before the RWS deck! New books have a hard time getting published if they don't tow the Golden Dawn [Elitist] line. Do readers realise US Games Systems, who have dominated Tarot publishing for decades, for at least the 1980's refused to publish any new decks that were not RWS-based?

Now come on, folks, let us see some debate! If you can't be bothered to type much that is fine but at least provide some links to your favourite source materiel.

Happy Holidays, Beacon!

People enjoy sharing certain ideas about Tarot that have brought them personal pleasure and fulfillment, in the hope that this also may be edifying to others. There is no need to waste energy debating such things unless one enjoys debate merely for the sake of debate.

Do please have a Merry Yule, one and all!

Debate, properly conducted, clarifies and can resolve contradictions by revealing errors. That is why i love it so.

Anybody else have some info, links, opinion, preferably backed by reasoning, on this issue?

Beacon said:

While I am sure it is perfectly fine to not understand what one is doing I do think it best to. Otherwise mistakes are bound to occur. Are you really arguing for rote-learning of meanings with no comprehension of the fundamentals as a viable way of reading the Tarot?

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No, that wasn't my intention at all. I dislike the concept of learning by rote without understanding, but the type of reader one is and will be is a personal choice. Not everyone wants to study the occult and that's their right.

Beacon said:

Your meaning here is not clear to me. Perhaps my English is inadequate. Are you saying that "traditional" meanings of the pre-GD Tarot are derived from the GD? I didn't think the GD had that kind of time-travelling magic so i guess you meant something else. Please elucidate.

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Again, my meaning was that the mainstream traditional meanings aren't traditional at all, but originated with the Golden Dawn. While the Majors kept their major traditional association, the meanings of the pips are radically different in the move from mainly pips to GD pips with esoteric detail, much less the pictorial pips of the RWS.

Beacon said:

What interests me is not what people claim their inspirations are but rather the mettle of their cold argument for their position, fully referencing verifiable facts. Waite adopted Mathers' change to the Tarot and did not provide one drop of argument for it.. and though many have subsequently argued for correspondences with the other systems I would like to see the debate fully explored on this forum, in this thread.

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He didn't for several reasons. Firstly, his vows of secrecy to his order kept him from revealing many things of import, that specific switch being but one of many. Secondly, neither the PKT nor the RWS were intended with initiates in mind, but the general public. If anyone were to know of the switch in the first place then they would not need it reiterated to them and whoever didn't, didn't have to know, according to Waite.

Beacon said:

While the deck is popular with some in part because of it's aesthetics, though I and many others dislike its dull hues, in fact that statement was entirely incorrect.

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I fail to see how his statement was wrong. Each "likes" something for different reasons, and although you (and many others) dislike the deck, it is still the world's best selling deck by a huge margin, so apparently people, on some level and for a myriad of reasons, like it.

Beacon said:

New books have a hard time getting published if they don't tow the Golden Dawn [Elitist] line. Do readers realise US Games Systems, who have dominated Tarot publishing for decades, for at least the 1980's refused to publish any new decks that were not RWS-based?

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I actually did not know that, and it is interesting information, although I fail to how it relates to your topic of debate. In addition, I don't understand why you would call the Golden Dawn "elitist." It did present a complete and unified theory of divination, what makes that elitist? Publishers publish that which sells the most, not because of any philosophy. But if anyone else is willing to do the work they did, anyone is welcome to. I don't see where you're getting at.

Beacon said:

Now come on, folks, let us see some debate! If you can't be bothered to type much that is fine but at least provide some links to your favourite source materiel.

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I don't understand, a debate about what? Why the switch was made? When proposing a debate, it is useful that the proposer offer a position, hypothesis, anything to get it started. Let's try again.

I have a bone to pick about the use of the term "elitist" as applied to the GD, which, at least in the US, carries the connotation of snobby superiority. Actually, the fin de siecle GD, despite all of its faults, is rather the opposite. However, I shall await Beacon's response before posting.