reconsidering a cathar connection

[foolish]

[QUOTE=
The differences with all of these, compared to the Cathar story is that the above analogies are common ones that are readily apparent to anyone who knows the subject (or local referents—as with the game of Troccas in east Switzerland). Likewise, the occult analogies tend to be obvious enough that they caught on immediately and spread rapidly. But, I propose that if a Cathar scholar like Anne Brenon were asked to independently draw analogies between the tarot trumps and Cathar history that, with a few exceptions (like the Tower and Montsegur), the analogies would be quite different than those made by Swiryn.[/QUOTE]

Given the Cathar or heretical context of the tarot, it is still difficult to identify all the pieces of the "puzzle" accurately, as it may have been viewed over 500 years ago. However, we should keep in mind that one of the main differences between the use of the tarot by "heretics" of the Middle Ages and those mentioned above is the fact that the heretics would have had an incentive to keep things "undercover", and less of a desire to allow them to be clearly recognized by the general public. Religious goups like the Cathars, who were persecuted for their beliefs, had secret ways of communicating - statements like "Is there a crooked stick in the house?" was meant to discover if it was safe from church athorities. O'Neill mentions the use of secret handshakes by the Spiritual Franciscans. Later groups like the Freemasons were notorious for their secret rituals. Therefore, IF the tarot was used by neo-Cathar groups, it is more likely that a level of secrecy was used in the form of "disguising" their messages within the traditional images of the cards. Once the "story" was told to another trusted person, it would not be difficult to perpetuate that interpretation of the cards.

[foolish]

In the article on confraternities which Namadev referred us to, http://www.tarot.com/about-tarot/li...Confraternities
O'Neill demonstrates how the images of the last part of the tarot, which may appear to reflect Revelation to the orthodox eye, would have been more clearly assoicated with the teachings of Jachim and Olivi by the Spiritual Franciscans.

[Teheuti]

Originally Posted by foolish

Later groups like the Freemasons were notorious for their secret rituals. Therefore, IF the tarot was used by neo-Cathar groups, it is more likely that a level of secrecy was used in the form of "disguising" their messages within the traditional images of the cards. Once the "story" was told to another trusted person, it would not be difficult to perpetuate that interpretation of the cards.

Yes, and Waite did weave quite a bit of Masonic symbolism into the deck illustrated by Pamela Colman Smith. However, once you start looking for it, most of that symbolism is both obvious and unquestionable, just as are the Kabbalistic symbols that he added. For instance, Paul Foster Case was able to write a book on the Rider-Waite-Smith Majors and very accurately delineates much of the symbolism that Waite decided not to mention in his Key to the Tarot.

[Namadev]

Finaly, about the Last Judment, my hypothesis is that someone aware of the Cathari believes would have seen there more the "wakening" of the Justs and their entering in the Celestial Jerusalem.

Matthieu XXVII, 52 53

About face-value and images being obvious ...

For whom?

I'm not sure that someone, for example a neo-cathari believer, aware of the teachongs of the Vision of Isaïe , the Interrogatio Johannis or familiar of the Book of the Two Principles would NOT have "necessarely" seen at least some of the trumps as an orthodox Christian would have ...
They were aware of their spiritual teachings ...

LET'S TAKE A LOOK AT THE LAST SEQUENCE IN A PYTHAGOREAN SEQUENCE /

i
ii=ii=iv+v
vi=vii=viii=ix=x=xi=xii+xiii

XIV+XV+XVI+XVII+XVIII+XIX+XX+XXI+XXII
The notion of Ange after Death is also a Cathari Teaching ; the Devil - Lucifer falling from above to below is also a Cathari Teaching. The Celestial triade thematic of Stars+Moon+Sun belong to their Judgment/Justice/Celestial Jerusalem


A hidden gnosis under the apparences (Deodat Roché) ... something similar to the Pistis Sophia

1)The word GNOSIS is specific of Irénée, Tertullien, Origene, Gregoire de Nysse, Manes ...Evraque le Pontique, Symeon the New Theologian
etc

2)About the Interrogatio Johannis, we know it was used by the Perfects non only in Italia (Cathari church of Concorezzo) but also in Languedoc : 'Tractatus de hereticis'
of Anselme of Alexandria 5archivum Fratrum Praedicatorum, vol XX, 1950, pp.234 à 329.
In this treaty, we discover that Nazarius the Cathari Bishop of Concorezzo, succesor of Garatus, had also written un secret writing ...This Secret of Concorezzo came initialy from Bulgaria ; the Interrogatio Johannis was in use in Languedoc and that's from where the Inquisitors made their copy...

So in final we have two copies in latin of the Interrogatio : one of Carcassone and one of Vienne.
Professor Jordan Ivanof (Ecrits et légendes bogomiles) sees the origin of the traductions in an original lost text in Bulgarian
Both shoud be the traduction of a more ancient writing, an apocryph bulgarian.
We also know that the two versions are partly falsified : a passage relative to Moise and John the Baptist is forgery and does not correspond to any of the teachings of the main Cathrsi Schools - this seems to be accepted by the Catholic polemists.
This is why , when one translates , one has to interpret with the coherence of the doctrine of the Cathari and their history.

[Namadev]

Did the Cathari made no contributions to the concepts of the trumps?

O'Neill answers in the chapter "Catharism and the Trumps" that " That contribution remains feasible, perhaps even probable. The circumstantial evidence remains strong. There are dualist symbols in the Tarot, even if they aren�t the symbols that the Cathari themselves would have used. The Elects of the Bogomils dressed like monks (Runciman, 1947) and might be represented as the Hermit--carrying the enlightenment over the mountains. In Provence, the Credentes were craftspersons. Lambert (1998) specifically mentions shoemakers (147)-- possibly hinted at in the Bateleur card. The Church was viewed as evil and was referred to as the whore of Babylon. So the Tower card, seen as the Tower of Babylon or the crumbling House of God, is also suggestive of heretical inputs. However, the route from the Cathari in the 12th/13th century to the Tarot designers in the 15th is circuitous--it�s a great historical detective story."

[foolish]

Originally Posted by Teheuti

Yes, and Waite did weave quite a bit of Masonic symbolism into the deck illustrated by Pamela Colman Smith. However, once you start looking for it, most of that symbolism is both obvious and unquestionable, just as are the Kabbalistic symbols that he added.

This makes sense, IF we are dealing with groups like the Masons, Egyptians, etc. who had their own set of distinct symbolism. However, I must stress again that the "symbology" of the Cathars would have been indistinct from that of the orthodox church, since they didn't claim to follow any relgious order other than that of Christianity. The Cathars believed themselves to be true Christians, while referring to the Roman Catholic Church as the false church. Therefore, although their interpretation of Christianity varied philosophically from that of the Roman church, they would have used traditional Christian imagery, just as they used and quoted from the gospels. It was only in how the gospels were interpreted that made them "heretics". But heresy in this case was only in the eyes of the Roman Church.

We have already presented, for example, how the Last Judgement could easily have been seen by the Cathars as consistent with their theology.
So, to look for or demand a separate set of symbols to identify Cathar influence is missing the mark.

In fact, this "overlapping" of symbology could have been the very quality which provided a disguise for heresy in the tarot - in the same fashion it seems to be working today.

[Teheuti]

If a Cathar deck was indistinguishable from a Christian deck such that the Cathar story could only be told by a person who had memorized the specifics—because no particularly Cathar visual connection existed—then the connection could only exist in a person's head and could only be passed on by words. And, there is no knowing for sure what existed in that original person's head (unless we discover a letter or document from the time).

All we have is a modern made-up version of Cathar analogies based on the same kinds of "archetypal" symbols and themes found in any of the mythic tarot decks like the Celtic, Norse, Mayan, Arthurian, Egyptian, Shakespearean, William Blake, Fairytale, Alchemical, Baseball, etc. At least they aren't trying to be the one-true-source.

This is not history and should not be put about as history! Until there's some evidence, it's a set of modern correspondences, even if intriguing ones.

If anyone can show us differently, please do. I hope there are those who will continue to look for real historical connections. BTW, I think the archetypal ones are great—another reason why the tarot is so amazing!

[Namadev]

Well, I thionk that I should be changed of Forum : if researches ot hypothesis are to be dismissed by a simple wave of hands , then ...

There is a thing that I must tell you.
Studies on theologie of Christian heretics linked to the imaginary and the medieval mentality are not so numerous.
The lack of culture isn't a valid historical attitude.
The point was a doctribal refutation of a possible Last judment Cathari vision, remember ...
It's like coming to write that even if the Tarot trumps had a heretical impact at first, men of the Middle Ages would have spoken.
It's like saying that if they had been designed tarot according to an order Neo-Pythagoreanism, they would have written on it.
It 's like saying that Dante Alighieri would have to explain his symbolism to the people when he wrote the Divine Comedy.
The problem of this limited vison is that it is completely lacking in their the philosophical and doctrinal knowledge of middle age.
The dates and events will not reconstruct the history if you do not know the mentality of men lived in that world.
However….

[Huck]

Originally Posted by Namadev

... However, the route from the Cathari in the 12th/13th century to the Tarot designers in the 15th is circuitous--it�s a great historical detective story."

Come on, Alain ... in a detective story, which usually starts around a specific activity with a probable date, may it be murder, theft, smuggling, the detective starts with matters around this date and activity.

So we've c. 1425, Milan, production of a Trionfi deck with Greek gods, and we have as very suspicious in this case Filippo Maria Visconti as commissioner, Michelino da Besozzo as painter and Martian da Tortona as painter. The motifs of the cards have very much distance to the usual Tarot cards. None of the participating persons looks especially catharic or politically suppressed, actually they present the peak of the society in the Milanese state.

No detective with some sense in his mind would search in circumstances 200 years ago for card producing evildoers, which are 200 years dead, especially not, as there is not a smallest detail known, that the possibly responsible people in Languedoc or around Milan did know anything about playing cards 200 years ago.

If their was a sort of catharic belief in 1425, the pope would have searched it in Bohemia, where papal christianity had trouble with the Hussites. Or between the Valdenser, which still survived. Or in Filippo Maria Visconti himself, who took around 1438 the side of the anti-pope Felix, who was his father-in-law. The 1st half of 15th century had simply own religious conflicts with the pope, they wouldn't have searched them in very old traditions from other places.

We know, that all motifs of the Tarot cards were already known and used already in 14th century. But we've no evidence, that these motifs were already collected as a group of 22 pictures somewhere.

In context of playing card productions we have no evidence, that "22 additional trump cards inclusive fool" were used before the date of the Boiardo Tarocchi poem (which plausibly would or could be 1487).

For the first surviving type of "Tarot de Marseille" deck we have, that a card maker from Belgium, Vievil, who worked in Paris, produced them c. 1650.

If somebody would have produced later playing cards with a sort of political-religious program against the common establishment in France, he would have been a Huguenot (persecuted by Louis XIV during his reign), not a Cathar.
But we have no indication, that the Tarot de Marseilles was attacked. In the contrary, it seems to have been chosen as the general pattern of French Tarot card production in agreement with the reigning monarchy.

... :-) ... So, what's the result of a usual "detective research"? Just, it's NEGATIVE.
The Cathars might have done a lot of harm to the church or catholic believe or to other persons or whatever, but they can't be called responsible for Tarot cards especially. They are simply INNOCENT ... as long not some real relation is presented.

The usual detective would search for the activists in an operation persons "near to time and action" ... not 200 years ago. Also he would look for persons, which are already proven to have had some relations to playing card production. All this is not done.

Somehow this Cathar hypothesis operates in the manner, that "the Tarot origin is unknown", and "so the origin might be done by Cathars" and then jumping to "the Cathars must have done it", just forgetting, that the Cathars are not the only interesting group of people in the world and surely weren't the only one who had ideas about the final judgment.

The Relevation was in the library of the Visconti (ca. 1000 books, so not "really big") the most focussed topic. I remember to have read, that the library had more than 20 versions of it. It's hard to believe, that all the versions were from Cathars.

[Namadev]

History shall say ...
For the moment, I go on with my detective inquiry -even though I should go go on alone on my path...


We'll may have the opportunity to re examin all this stuff in some time ...

You know, I see a "patarine" or should I say "gibeline" motive in Tarot ...
Emperor /Pope ...
I do not reject the Bohemia path : Guglielma is linked to this path...
My researches are more on the side of the ancestors of Prince Fibbia...

I do not see a myth about him as the inventor of Tarot...