The Exaltation Tarot

venicebard

(The words just pour forth, sorry)

Fulgour said:
After reading, and re-reading, pondering the many possibilities,
the true "sense" of this arrangement remains elusive to me still.
Moi aussi, which is why I study it (once a mystery is solved, I move on)

Perhaps this is because I cannot "visualize" the shifting patterns
and relate to them as thousands of years pre-Jewish mysticism?

Babylon was the birthplace of more than astrology. Mathematics
owes much to these ancients, all simply "borrowed" by Kabbalah.

So if this does work as you describe it, would not an even older
model precede their adoption by those who arrived much later?
Don’t know what of Qabbalah was “borrowed” from Babylon. Phoenicians were sailors, hence undoubtedly astronomers, and Keltic druids had a reputation world-wide for their astronomy and astrology (oral, not written). Indeed I have read that Sefer Yetzirah resulted from Greek influence, though I am doubtful... of course I suppose it is usual to trace Greek astrology back to Babylon, to which I have no well-informed response.

The zodiac, though, is a universal symbol: anyone with compass and straight-edge can construct one, and it is the basis of reality, not an invention of Babylon. (I am suspicious of astrology that places more emphasis on constellations than signs, though coincidence of north and south nodes with crossing of ecliptic and milky way may well lead to deeper truths.) But I take it the exaltations themselves are Babylon-related? (I’m asking)

Some background on my ‘method’. I take as a given that science over the last ten-or-so thousand years has declined precipitously (via catastrophe). The fact that we have made some advances over the past few hundred does not get us back to the plateau, only to a point where some of us can see there WAS a plateau. The fact is, science in modern times has even discarded the four elements, which I consider a prerequisite to science proper, hence I do not consider modern science very scientific. However, it contains some empirical currents – particle physics (which confirms the four elements, by the way, then tries to wriggle out of it), much of chemistry, the technical (as opposed to theoretical) aspects of astronomy, etc. – all helpful in reconstructing a portion of the original pristine science handed us by the previous civilization and imperfectly preserved in ancient tradition. This is what Newton explicitly sought (through alchemy), and his part in reconstructing it was the inverse-square law defining force (trump XI?).

Elements’ relation to the zodiac is neither defined by nor limited to the astrological. The primordial or logical application of elements to it – confirmed (transferred to earth's cardinal directions) by the Zohar – is fire or flame pointing up (to aries), water (to which Torah is likened) down (to libra), the air in our face pointing back (to capricorn), and the earthly body forward (to cancer). Defining in towards one (straight back) as condensation and out from one (straight ahead) as evaporation, and noting that heat rises, this arrangement is the one that yields the doctrine fire = hot and dry, and so on: fire is hot (up) and drying (progressing outward, evaporating), air moist (in) and warm (rising), and so on. This explains and defines the elements’ cyclic nature.

Between this arrangement and the astrological (which you know) is yet a third method, based on the diurnal cycle. We take aries or up to be north, where the direction up is on average, and since ‘sunwise’ depends on the earth’s motion, not the sun’s, we run the signs counterclockwise (following whirlpools, drains, tornados, dust-devils, hurricanes, and storms generally), making the capricorn triad point east (towards self, the Master of the Lodge, put in Masonic terms). The diurnal cycle then yields (by relative light): east-dawn-air-capricorn (increasing light), south-noon-fire-libra, west-dusk-water-cancer (decreasing light), north-night-earth-aries. This arrangement has come about because of the Fall (fall, if you’re a shaman rather than an overcapitalizing Judeo-Xian) into temporal decay. It is in this wise: fire or creative force falls from head (aries) to loins (libra) to become procreative force... water or form is perceived only outwardly and thus points forward or out (cancer)... and earth or sensation has taken over the head (aries).

The astrological arrangement is in some way a compensation for, or counteracting of, the Fall. Let us consider its possible rationale (a work in progress). It leaves nature (straight out) alone, meaning it cannot immediately change the fact that the fallen Adam perceives form only in its external or ‘nature’ guise. But it coaxes libra back towards water by calling it ‘air’. Hmm. It also points out the correct (original) direction for fire or light: the head. But the exact significance of earth’s pointing towards self (capricorn) eludes me, unless it is to show the fallen doer (alef) that by placing sensation or earth in the ruling position, in place of Light or fire, it has defined self as what it senses (a body, etc.) and thus mistakenly thinks itself mortal, like the body. This is the lie each of us must learn anew as we grow up, for we enter the body (at 1 ½ or 2) quite aware we are distinct from it.

When the old Semitic alef-bet was constructed out of the letters, the original (‘bard-friendly’) order of the simples was rearranged into phonetic nonsense, but with simple coded content. For the three methods of element-application were shown in very orderly fashion: the primordial is related to the upper-back (inner) quarter-circle, the astrological to the upper-front (outer) quarter-circle – these two share the same fire – and the remaining five signs (on the round’s underbelly) assign elements to their diurnal stations, doing earth twice to spoof (underside being satiric) man’s tendency to think of smell and touch as two different senses, instead of relative refinements of one (surface contact).

Now as to planets and elements, my classification – the stars fiery, the sun-and-outer-planets airy, the moon-and-inner-planets watery, the earth earthy – is scientific, not astrological. These are what they are, I feel certain. The elements fire-air-water-earth are, by nature, active, more-active-than-passive, more-passive-than-active, and passive, respectively. The existence of the planetary cycles, then, is determined by function: the moon’s is to respond to light (fire), Mercury’s to respond to heat-generated turbulence (air), Venus’s to respond to the active aspect of the fluid layer itself (year, earth’s orbit), and that of Mars to act on earth. Moving on to the airy layer: Jupiter’s is to act on earth (its hobby being arranging asteroids into harmonies), Saturn’s is to act on water or form (which it does partly by setting the limit of those planets that are not retrograde relative to the solar system’s own frame of reference), and the sun’s is to receive fire (light), which it focuses.

Picture fire as omnipresent (which it is, being at the heart of all matter) and the sun as the center of a turbulent ‘eddy’ applying fire’s omnipresent activity to ‘our neck of the woods’. Jupiter and Saturn are the main bodies of that eddy, the former its inward-tending, the latter its outward-tending, portion (you’re going to love the way these two meet up again). The inward-tendency continues (through Jupiter’s ‘orchard’ of asteroids) to Mars, transfering it thus to water, the form within the airy or turbulent, both tending in towards, and thus in a deeper way acting on, the earth or diurnal cycle. Earth’s orbit, the year, is continuation of that inward tendency within the watery layer itself – water, unlike air (which merely dissipates), can act on itself – the year acting on Venus, which carries the inward tendency to Mercury (bolstering it from ‘behind’ or without), which is the container or vessel that meets the more localized outward tendency of the portion of the eddy near the sun or center, namely solar wind, which is simply the Saturn or outward-tending aspect of the air in that region. Since the airy layer extends all the way (in) to the sun, it pervades water’s layer (each element pervades those following it).

Now it occurs to me that here is possible explanation for exaltations. I notice that Jupiter, air’s or thinker’s power over earth, is at cancer with primordial earth. But Mars, water’s or doer’s power over earth, is at capricorn with astrological earth. This appears to mean that Jupiter wields power over external reality in order to force Mars (who cannot compete with Jupiter there) to work on the earth that is the internal image of self projected by its thinking strictly in terms of externals. It acts on astrological earth at capricorn. Exaltation of luna in taurus may be so it can be acted on by the preceding sign, aries or fire. Passive watery planets at signs in the unmanifested are acted on by the signs preceding them – fire at aries acting on luna at taurus, water at aquarius on Venus at pisces – whereas in the manifested, Mercury is acted on by the triad it is on (air’s triad) at virgo. So water has its functions mostly torn away from the primordial triads with whose elements they interact, Mercury being the exception. The principle warping water’s passive functions in the unmanifest is consecutiveness (sequence), while that warping its active function Mars is the astrological arrangement of elements. Hmm.

The airy planets all occupy the triads they are concerned with: sol is acted on by fire’s triad at aries, Saturn acts on water’s triad at libra, and Jupiter acts on earth’s triad at cancer.

I’ll repeat here that, except for luna, exaltations take on a coherent pattern in relation to the commonly known Tree in Cups, as long as we apply sol to the great year, 2 (in Coins), rather than the year, 6. This puts the 2nd and 3rd emanations – first male-female pairing in Cups – at up (sun’s apex, gold) and down (saturnine, lead), the 4th and 5th – second male-female pairing in Cups – at out (jovial tin, ‘letting it all hang out’) and in (martial iron, discipline, ‘drawing oneself in’), and the 7th and 8th – third male-female pairing in Cups (Venus the beauty sought by the male, Mercury the power-messenger sought by the female) – at approaching up (aphrodisiac, copper) and approaching down (mercurial, quicksilver). This nears the sexes’ original position (male up, female down), but with a twist: male approaches the above seeking the female (on a pedestal?), and female approaches the below seeking the male (in the gutter?). And judging from Troubadour poetry and modern feminism, this is not far off the mark.

All this is very complex, compared to rulership. One reason I place such confidence in the above coded reordering of the simples is that the original bardic numbers applied to them, and to the doubles the radius of the Cauldron points to as it sweeps through them, show by their valences as atomic numbers the origin and meaning of planetary rulership.

Happy further cogitations.
 

Fulgour

venicebard said:
All this is very complex, compared to rulership. One reason I place such confidence in the above coded reordering of the simples is that the original bardic numbers applied to them, and to the doubles the radius of the Cauldron points to as it sweeps through them, show by their valences as atomic numbers the origin and meaning of planetary rulership.

The Houses of the Zodiac can be simplified in such a way
that illustrates more of their essence rather than element.

If you take a blank chart and colour in the segements so:

Red-Orange: 1 5 7 11
Blue-Green: 2 4 8 10

Pale Pink: 6 12
Baby Blue: 3 9

And then stand back and simply feel the combined energy,
what I see is like a Grand Cross of The Moon and The Sun.
Sandwiched between there are the internal mutable signs,
a kind of shared inner quality that "unifies" their essences.

After a while the differences become much less significant,
and it can be seen how the Zodiac is more of single theme.
 

Fulgour

Zodiac Houses: Moon & Sun

click on image to view
 

Fulgour

The Average Daily Motion of the planets Mercury,
Venus, and the Sun from a geocentric viewpoint:

Sun........... 0d 59m 08s
Mercury..... 0d 59m 08s (same as the Sun)
Venus........ 0d 59m 08s (same as the Sun)

This shows how with the exaltations of Venus and Mercury
in Earth & Water signs (Virgo and Pisces) they are still very
much the Companions of the Sun, and sandwiched between.

*

The exaltations of the Lunar Nodes being in Air & Fire signs,
Gemini and Sagittarius, so links them mightily to The Moon.
 

Fulgour

Complementary Exaltations ~ Planetary Harmonies

The Moon's exaltation in Taurus is complemented in Scorpio
The Moon's rulership in Cancer is complemented in Capricorn

The Sun's exaltation in Aries is complemented in Libra
The Sun's rulership in Leo is complemented in Aquarius

*

The 4 Mutable signs are significantly ruled by Jupiter & Mercury,
a very special match-up not seen in either Cardinal or Fixed signs.
This is like a Big Arrow pointing right at the heart of the mystery.

*

I do not see dignities creating Falls, Detriments, or Descensions.
Complementary harmonies are to me the overall central aspects.
 

venicebard

Fulgour said:
The exaltations of the Lunar Nodes being in Air & Fire signs,
Gemini and Sagittarius, so links them mightily to The Moon.
How? I don't get it. I thought even you would tend to agree that luna is water (it rules the tides, being 2/3 of the pull)

And while I would understand it if you (or anyone) just skimmed some of my longer posts, I would be interested in your reaction to the logic of its being water, originally, that points down (towards libra). Would you agree, at least, that the label 'air' is a development astrology imposes on it? We may presume some very good reason for this and search for it (unless you know it), but I'd like to know if we at least agree that this is an issue. (It's okay to disagree, I just prefer clarity.) Certainly the triangles pointed up and down in the Jewish hexagram have traditionally always been identified with fire and water (and the latter with Torah, since both flow from higher to lower), so it’s not as if I’m pulling something out of the air.

And while we're at it, also riddle me this, M. le F., by which I mean: what is the relationship of the houses to the signs? And can we agree that the true zodiac is not the one the astrologers turn on its side facing down, but the one applied to the human body, with aries-the-head pointing up, since this is the one relating to the seasons (spring up, fall down, etc.)? The one ‘on its side facing down’ is assuming the position of an animal-on-all-fours, with aries off to the left (ahead): is this shamanic? I'm quite okay with the order running counterclockwise: this puts 'forward' left, and 'back' right, thus aligning the left (symbolizing evil in the Zohar) with nature, with the senses—what approaches from without—since it is the outer horizon that obscures the inner in man's thinking.

Also, if anyone comes across the precise angle between ecliptic and milky way, please inform me. It may be very important (in working out "proto-Hermetic celestial mechanics")

One last thing (in interests of full disclosure): it is somewhat interesting, with regard to explaining the single seeming anomaly of luna amongst the exaltations, to note that in the primordial arrangement of elements luna rules earth and is exalted in air (the two elements to either side of luna/water), whereas in the astrological luna rules water (its own element) and is exalted in earth (the remaining element). For luna would appear to be water's ‘border’ with earth (beginning of water-without-earth, since water-air-and-fire pervade earth). I will agree (and begin thinking in these terms) that the astrological would appear more germane here, yet the underlying primordial arrangement is at least relevant, since luna stands for water and water is the step between air and earth. Its being ‘exalted’ in air means air (thought) is forced to put water or form—the fallen doer—at the forefront of its concerns, since that is the problem at hand (created by the Fall), and water or form of course rules earth or physicality.

Here the astrological seems to relate more to the heavenly position of the cycle itself in the greater celestial structure—external circumstance—while the primordial relates more to its symbolic import—internal circumstance. Hmm. Follows the distribution of these two arrangements to outer and inner halves, respectively, of the round’s upper half, in the reordering of the simples (see previous post).

(Back when I have more.)
 

Fulgour

venicebard said:
How? I don't get it. I thought even you would tend to agree that luna is water (it rules the tides, being 2/3 of the pull).
"Mutable" is a difficult term to find a good definition for.
The better books use "Common" and I think that's what
we're seeing: Location! Location! Location! a la La Lune.

venicebard said:
And while we're at it, also riddle me this, M. le F., by which I mean: what is the relationship of the houses to the signs?
I've never been satisfied that the "Houses" really work as such,
and usually only rely on them as handy numbers for the Signs.
PS: I draw my own Charts, with Aries East, Cancer North, etc.

venicebard said:
...since luna stands for water and water is the step between air and earth. Its being ‘exalted’ in air means air (thought) is forced to put water or form...
Surely you intended Earth (Taurus) for the exaltation of the Moon,
but then you elaborate the identification. Saturn alone is in the Air.


M. le F. :) Who is not a Kabbalist,
but enjoys the mystical ramblings.
 

venicebard

Say what?

Fulgour said:
"Mutable" is a difficult term to find a good definition for...
The question did not regard their mutability but rather how you saw the nodes’ being fire and air as relating them to the moon. And the reason mutable is difficult of definition is that it is a distortion of the tetrad's original significance as female tetrad: cardinal, male, and female, not cardinal-fixed-mutable. But this is based on analysis (by Harold W. Percival), not rote.

PS: I draw my own Charts, with Aries East, Cancer North, etc.
Where do you get aries E, cancer N, etc. (to me up is north)

One could make a case for 1st house E, 4th S, 7th W, and 10th N, based on spring being like morn, summer like day, autumn like dusk, and winter like night... but you take this and twist it to put cancer N because the sun is farthest north there? Makes some sense I guess. All depends on whether one sees it (the sun) or us (man) as center of the universe.

Surely you intended Earth (Taurus) for the exaltation of the Moon,
but then you elaborate the identification. Saturn alone is in the Air.
Didn’t you catch that I was examining two different applications of elements? I guess you’re not as interested in origins as in building something out of the scraps, which is okay, disappointing but okay...

By the way, I’m not a ‘Kabbalist’ in the conventional sense either, rather a Gnostic who studies modern Kabbalah as a broken relic of Qabbalah and Merkavah, which were profound teachings mostly lost to Judaism and the world, unfortunately (unless I can trigger a ‘revival’).
 

Fulgour

Aries is East, it always has been...

venicebard said:
Where do you get aries E, cancer N, etc. (to me up is north)
From the ever reliable "World Atlas" ...check respectively,
Tropic of Cancer (North) and Tropic of Capricorn (South).