Lee said:
Hi RedMaple,
You might be interested in the following thread (if you haven't already read it) which touched on some of the issues which you brought up in your post.
http://www.tarotforum.net/showthread.php?s=&threadid=22755
My personal opinion (and speaking as a Jewish person) is that your points are good ones to keep in mind. However, I think there's a danger of romanticizing some traditions and beliefs, and accepting them as monolithic and never-changing. All spiritual beliefs and traditions undergo evolution and development, and absorb influences from other traditions.
I think the ideal would be to aim for a middle ground between respecting people's traditions and conducting one's own tarot explorations creatively.
-- Lee
Hi Lee,
I think there is great room for respecting people's traditions and conducting one's tarot explorations creatively. It does require intellectual and spiritual integrity, as any real spiritual path would.
In regards to the earlier thread, thank you. I agree with most of what Lelandra says, ( Thank you, Joan) and think she was courageous to post the page and spend so much time explaining cultural appropriation to at least some people who simply want to hear that if their intentions are "good", then they can not be criticized. Interestingly, even in the western tradition it tells you what the streets of hell are paved with.....
It is important to the discussion of cultural appropriation to understand historical context -- as Lelandra points out in her posts. For example, here in the USA, it was illegal for Native people to practice their religions from the late 1800's through the mid-twentieth century. That's right. Here in the land of religious freedom, the only people who could be, and were, jailed for practicing their own religions, were Native peoples.
Now, the same traditions have been stereotyped, exoticized, misrepresented, and appropriated by non-Native people who feel they have a "right" to them because their "intentions" are good. This idea of being somehow entitled to any and all traditions is very foreign to tribal peoples. As an Abenaki, I would not feel it appropriate to do ritual from another Nation, nor even some from my own Nation, as I have not been properly trained. Also, some songs, ceremonies, etc. are passed down in families.
In Judaism, similarly there are certain prayers that are only done by members of certain tribes, and not the more general Israelite population. This has survived for 4000 years.
I am not romanticizing, nor do I think the Jewish tradition is monolithic -- far less so than the Christian tradition, in my experience, mostly because it is not about orthodoxy, or institutionalized belief. And of course, cultural exchange happens whenever cultures are brought together. Anything that isn't changing is dead.
My original post was just to say that a lot of nonsense gets talked about regarding Kaballah and the language, and that any attempt at syncretism is doomed to foolishness if it isn't grounded in real knowledge, not only of Kabbalah, but of Jewish history and customs to contextualize it, and with respect not only for the esoteric tradition, but for the Jewish community out of which it came.
One last note on the NA thread and cultural appropriation. I have always believed in the innate goodness of people, that if people have the knowledge, they will choose what is good. But it seems to me from reading the posts, that there is a kind of spiritual greed at work -- that if it "feels right for me" then it must be ok. Not all that glitters is gold, western tradition says.
Judaism is a religion of right action more than right belief, if I may generalize. I would say that it is important to consider what is right action in regards to peoples who have been/are oppressed and whose religious/intellectual/spiritual traditions seem attractive to us. We delude ourselves if we think that ignoring these things can further our own spiritual development, no matter how "good" it feels.
RedMaple