Hello.
Someone recommended that I check out this thread, so here I am. Hi! After skimming these pages, I then debated whether to comment, so I consulted the tarot and drew the Ace of Swords. (Really? Ace of Swords. Really?! Tarot and its synchronicities still freak me out at times.) Anyway, while I’m sure we can now debate how I’ve interpreted the Ace of Swords, I personally took it as a sign to reply.
With regard to the fortune-telling and divination distinction, at least from a Chinese perspective, I submitted a piece on that in _Spiral Nature_, so if you are at all interested, please keep an eye out for that.
In short, though, I agree with Teheuti: I didn’t explain that otherwise complex issue of fortune-telling and divination well at all in my book and really should have. I also agree with Lee and others that I belabored the “anti” point. That is entirely my own fault and it was really more of an editing error. In reviewing that ginormous manuscript under tight deadlines, my focus became scattered. I didn’t realize how redundant I came across in the opening chapters until very late into the publisher review phase and by then, I couldn’t do the major overhaul those sections needed. Again, entirely my own fault. In retrospect, I should have been more attentive to the presentation of that opening matter.
As for being rationalistic and psychologically-oriented, yes, though not at the exclusion of supernatural agency (which I don’t see as “supernatural”). There is a very natural metaphysical component to all that is in the physical form and I believe tarot has an uncanny, inexplicable way of tapping into that metaphysical component, which we don’t fully understand today, but is still “psychological” and rational. I say that because I believe in a collective unconscious and how the signs and symbols of tarot form a language that allows information (that may seem supernatural) to cross the bridge between the unconscious to the conscious. All that theoretical mumbo-jumbo is for another book, perhaps.
While fortune-telling and divination were not the main objectives of the book, which is why I used both terms together in some sentences, using the book for divinatory purposes is certainly instructed. Divination is just a part of the whole. Divinatory practice is but one rung on the ladder up to self-actualization, or universe-actualization. However, divination is not the end all be all of tarot study, at least not for me.
My main objective for the book is to convince someone who might otherwise believe that he or she is too rational-based to be interested in something like tarot to get interested in it, because there is great value to learning tarot for self-actualization. I presumed that once a rational skeptic took the step of working with tarot, that aspect of tarot that seems esoteric or occult would be revealed through individual work. That conclusion is one reached by the individual, not one that needs to be plainly stated by my book. I was hoping that my book’s structure, from page one to the end, would be a pathway that leads an individual to draw that personal conclusion and open up the doors of curiosity to the metaphysical.
Another objective is to demonstrate how complex tarot is, that tarot is a subject matter worthy of serious study (I’d be preaching to the choir here, on this thread), that it is just as if not more complex than certain bodies of law, certain academic studies, courses we would teach in a university setting, which is why tarot would require a treatise to be written about it. (Though by no means would I dare call my book fully comprehensive. Achieving full comprehensiveness in a book on tarot is incredibly difficult, as I’ve come to learn.)
Even to that effect I came up short, as I did not include a chapter on tarot and the Kabbalah, an intersection that is so entrenched in tarot studies that not mentioning it is pretty absurd. I also neglected to talk more in-depth about understanding the Major Arcana through the three septenaries, which is actually a substantial part of my personal tarot practice, so I really can’t believe I did not flesh out that topic.
In terms of how I approached writing the book, I jumped into it right after publishing law review articles and academic legal writing, which has a very specific style that I adopted for writing a tarot book, as odd as that may sound. (In fact, the very first draft of the manuscript as submitted to the publisher initially contained citations and end notes in Bluebook format.) A lot of the issues referenced in this thread seem to stem from that particular style of writing I adopted, which may differ from what readers are more accustomed to in the writing styles previously applied to tarot books. That is another point I should have been more sensitive to and cognizant of when writing.
Also, Teheuti, while many of my correspondences are influenced heavily by Golden Dawn sourced attributions, I deviated from those correspondences in particular areas (e.g., The Magician) because the GD attribution did not resonate with me. In the final published version of the book, I explained my Earth attribution over Air, which I don’t think was in the review copy you received. My apologies: I still have to get the final published book in the mail to you. I had agreed with all of your critiques when you first e-mailed me and I made author alterations to the review copy based on your critiques. They appear in the final published copy.
As for tarot history, I hope a reader isn’t coming to my book for tarot history. That would be silly. I devoted I believe less than 5 pages to tarot history and instead, in the footnotes, referred to half a dozen or more books that the tarot history enthusiast should turn to. For all theories and the wild speculations on the origins of tarot, I did try my best to cite all sources, but the actual end note might not be immediately following the sentence containing the speculation. Instead, the citation is probably at the end of the passage, if all the contents of that passage were cited from the same source. Every origins theory or speculation I wrote about came from a specific source, which should appear in the end notes. If not, then it was an unintentional omission on my part.
Overall, I do apologize and feel bad about being annoying in the way I’ve written my views. On the historic accuracy front, all I can say is I tried my best to cite my sources and was clear that my book should never be treated as a primary source for anything history or Golden Dawn related. On the divination vs. fortune-telling front, yes, my fault for not presenting my views there better.
I also should have explained my distinction between predictive tarot and projective tarot. Predictive tarot is not rational-based per se. It is about harnessing specific metaphysical energies that go against the normal physical laws of space-time, which could result in certain karmic repercussions. That’s why I don’t teach predictive tarot. Predictive tarot does not factor in past or present variables, whereas projective tarot is a rational-based analytic exercise (at least in a way), taking into account past and present variables in an attempt to ascertain the most probable future outcome. It’s a projection of a future outcome. It only appears predictive when people behave predictably. Oftentimes a tarot reading is about guiding a seeker to behave unpredictably, so that he or she may change an undesirable probable outcome.
I am grateful that my little book incited passion, in both directions. The balanced critiques have been most helpful and formative in the way I will think about and approach future books. Thank you.
