Has anyone done Kris Hadar's course?

[tmgrl2]

I would check tarotgarden.com again tomorrow...Some difficulty bringing up page today here as well...but I got my Rodes-Sanches there.

(sorry, I went off-topic, but wanted to respond to interest in this TdM style deck)....

It's interesting...though. I expected to love Hadar's course and his book because I love the deck...not so.
terri

[venicebard]

Originally Posted by Helvetica

Mind you, I don't agree with all their conclusions - in their attempt at reconstituting the lines, I think they made some mistakes - but they did cast their net very wide, and came up with some inspired choices.

I hope you mean they drew from certain Italian and perhaps Spanish offshoots, not Vieville or Noblet, but I guess I’ll find out. (I suppose if a booklet is included outlining their method, it would be in Spanish—fortunately I have friends fluent in this.)

As for the cardmakers-cathedral builders connection, from my readings it seems to have happened through the imagiers (the stone-cutters & painters) - in that the corporations of stone-cutters & painters eventually evolved and somewhere along the line the printers and cardmakers grew out of them (not quite sure how - I need to do some more studying) - building on the ancient traditions & spiritual teachings (remember that the corporations were spiritual entities, not just professional bodies - and in some cases, very politically religious - e.g. linked to the Templars: that was the case of many Cathedral builders). You might be interested to know that after the fall of the Templars, many imagiers took the road of exile - some for the East, and some for Italy & Spain.

I had read this last. Stone-cutters & painters: of course! I hadn’t thought of that. Yeah, and freemasons were of course the ones that made the detailed images and sculptures. It all makes sense now (I just hadn’t put 2 & 2 together).

It is clear from the images of the TdM that many of them look like those on the Cathedrals & in religious paintings and illustrations (for the latter, Ross Caldwell & Kenji on this forum has done some valuable research).

I had read some of Ross’s and I guess Kenji’s discussion and looked at images, but did not see it as quite as close in composition as they seemed to, but of course I’m usually comparing with TdM, which I consider the original type, if not design (I know, you think I’m nuts for this).

Historians have only recognised in the past 20 years how much modern Europe still owes the Middle Ages; and how the so-called Renaissance was more a continuity than a break. In fact, the real break came much later, with the Scientific Revolution, which radically changed the world [(]view).

(Did I put the begin-parenthesis in the right place? oh, sorry, just found yours: it was two sentences back! interesting, somehow it makes sense, even though I would never do this.) Certainly there was continuity within the change. But what disturbs me about the Renaissance is that where certain traditions had been handed down along continuous lines up to-and-including the Middle Ages, these continuous lines were mostly left broken and bleeding after the medieval Church and its reign of terror got through with them (and the French king’s destruction of the Templars helped too, perhaps even being the decisive coup in this regard). So what you see in the Renaissance (I’m thinking of the Italian of course) is great enthusiasm, but working in a plenum-vacuum, so to speak, where there was lots of flotsam but no coherent vessel... except TdM (with which I’m sure you disagree). And it amazes me that the ‘Kabbalah rabbis’ seldom-if-ever admit the same thing happened with their inner traditions, although in their case, it was more the fault of their own over-secrecy, methinks, as much of it I don’t think even made it out of Provence into Spain! the Zohar, for example, having moments of great insight and relevance to Qabbalah but largely being filled with the silly superstitions of exoteric Judaism (the notion history only last a few thousand years, for example). I have found it largely disappointing, having gotten between a quarter and a third of the way through the truncated Soncino version.

Way off thread here: apologies to all offended parties, but here is where the conversation cropped up, and anyway, I don't know what the thread would be called: "Well-read member of Helvetii tribe discusses art with one of Odin's wolves," I guess (though my name is Gary, not Geri, and it's a rather old wolf by now, though not quite so old a human)

[mythos]

This discussion is actually fascinating ... in spite of being off the original topic. I have read much history of the Dark & Middle ages, and some Renaissance. I think that it can be too easy, for we who are not living during the period, to forget that such titles as 'Dark Ages', 'Middle Ages', 'Renaissance', 'Enlightenment' and so on, are actually arbitrary divisions more (or less) agreed upon my historians, to break up history into smaller, more manageable chunks.

The people living in those periods never used those terms or thought of themselves as belonging to any particular age ... anymore than we do. One wonders what label our own times will accrue in half a millenia?

There just aren't, in actual lived experience, nice neat cut off points. "Oh, just checked the calendar. I'd forgotten that we are going into the Renaissance today. Drats, I'd better through out my Dantéian world view and take up a Galileo Galiliean one" ... not reality. Some 'periods' appear to have more importance, more meaningful implications for the future development of human life, but these decisions about the 'value' of them is based hindsight-built categories of what is deemed to be 'good' or 'vibrant' or 'productive' or 'paradigmatic' ....in the now.

One only needs to compare a history book written in the 1950's and one written now, on any given topic, and one can see the tides of change flowing and receding, resculpting the known 'facts' into new interpretations acceptable in the current zeitgeist.

Oh ... and at the Tarot Conference, jmd gave a lecture on Church Masonary (French) and the Tarot (TdM, of course) ... suitably punctuated with slides which showed the various tarot figures. Fascinating stuff!

mythos

[venicebard]

Originally Posted by mythos

I think that it can be too easy, for we who are not living during the period, to forget that such titles as 'Dark Ages', 'Middle Ages', 'Renaissance', 'Enlightenment' and so on, are actually arbitrary divisions more (or less) agreed upon my historians, to break up history into smaller, more manageable chunks.

Well put (and the little burlesque that follows utterly delightful).

Oh ... and at the Tarot Conference, jmd gave a lecture on Church Masonary (French) and the Tarot (TdM, of course) ... suitably punctuated with slides which showed the various tarot figures. Fascinating stuff!

Would love to have caught that.

[Sophie]

Originally Posted by mythos

The people living in those periods never used those terms or thought of themselves as belonging to any particular age ... anymore than we do. One wonders what label our own times will accrue in half a millenia?

The Mad Age? The Earth-Killer Age, most likely! (EKA)

In 500 years time, should nothing but Hello Kitty Tarot remain - will our descendents decide it contains the secrets of all learning or say - "nah, it was a just a game" ? Some new Kris Hadar might be running a course called "Hello Kitty, Dynamic Quantum Spirituality and Tang Poetry". His theory will of course depend on Tang Poetry being secretely encrypted in Hello Kitty (and he will hold hammer and tongs that Hello Kitty was born in Norway, the true birthplace of Tang Poetry). And AT descendents will moan about how dogmatic it all is, and lacking in feedback. "I always felt Hello Kitty to be important & worth exploring. I was hoping to learn more about it & about EKA zeitgeist, but instead, I am bombarded with bombastic half-baked thinking". And one lone Odin wolf will come along to say - "ah, he is right about Norway - but for all the wrong reasons." A sensible Mythos descendent will tell us all - "EKA is just a name we give an arbitrarily-designed period - you know, something like - let's put on our EKA hat today. We understand what it is to be worried about cloning & terrorism, and to be interested in Higher Elves. Or is it Selves?"

Ah, yes

[mythos]

We must remember too, that in 500 years, 1500 years, or more, that archeologists will dig up these small gnome-like figures. They will be white ... because of course the paint will have worn off them ... unbeknownst to the archeologists. They will hypothesise that city dwellers at end of the 2nd millenium and the beginning of the 3rd Millenium (The Egozoic Period?) worshipped these creatures as 'gods', and made altars to them in their gardens. Hmmm! Garden Gnomes ... the god's of futures' past.

nythos

[Abrac]

Personally, I like Hadar's deck. I think he's a fabulous artist, but I didn't learn much from his tutorial. I'm fairly new to the TdM myself and here are some sites that have helped me a lot:

http://www.tarothermit.com/
http://a_pollett.tripod.com/cardpgal.htm
http://www.geocities.com/cartedatrionfi/

These are all fairly heavy sites, but the TdM itself can be pretty heavy at times. If you read everything on all of them you'll come away with a lot better understanding. I don't agree with everything on any of them, but I know a lot more now than when I started.

Take Care

fools_fool

[mythos]

Thanks fools_fools,

It all helps, and heavy is something I don't mind in the least. I am rather fond of the KH deck ... though the course is, as Umbrae described it, tedious. Nonetheless, a little here, a little there, and it will begin to fall into place no doubt.

mythos

[Paul]

Hi all -- I decided to renew my active subscription to the Hadar programme with an interesting conundrum. I paid my fee (69.95!) and this Friday went to check for course # 41 (I have up to 41 courses in the Tarot category), but no new course, either in Tarot, Numerology, or Bocher's stuff. I emailed them. To their credit they emailed back immediately.

But get this: After Tarot course 41, the others have not been translated into English yet. So, now I'm wondering how long translation will take and whether an active membership (course each week) is foolish because they won't translate them fast enough. I think I need to go back to a passive membership.

To their credit once again, they acknowledged all of this and offered to refund my fee.

Here's a review of my experience with his site:

- I found Hadar very useful. He basically is taking the TdM and teaching you its language like you would learn Latin/Greek. Once you know the "Latin" roots and principles of TdM you can piece together cards and series of cards into logical/sensible meanings. So, to clarify, by "Latin" I mean he teaches you how the TdM has a iconographic linguistic system (sometimes quite literal) that suggest certain interpretations for cards and card combinations. However, it took me quite a few slowly released lessons for me to get his point and have that aha! moment.
He goes about this process of examining the cards and reading them painfully slow, and many lessons spend too much time reviewing the prior lessons (if I want to review last week's lesson I'll simply read it again!) So, this is annoying, because you feel that you are getting much less bang for your buck under the "smoke and mirrors" of accruing lessons.
Notwithstanding these criticisms, Hadar's actual insights have been very helpful to me. Despite his sometimes authoritative tone, he does in fact encourage the reader quite often to understand the principles behind how meanings are derived from cards & card combinations and then follow their own nose, so to speak. Finally, although plodding, he is a Teacher, and offers clear examples and exercises to get the point.

- Didn't follow his Numerology category too closely. He uses a numerological system that is internal to the TdM only (not Pythagorean, etc). He seems quite enamored with Numerology.

- Bocher's stuff was interesting, but eccentric. Sometimes, I read his interpretation of a symbol (or his identification of a symbol) and thought Bocher was smokin' something.

So, after that review, I would say join up as a Passive Member and use Hadar as one source to inform your Tarot Study.

I am a tad annoyed with the site creators who should update the site and let the English speakers know that only a certain # of courses have been translated for better informed consent.

[mythos]

Thanks Paul. I decided to continue as a passive member. It means that I can pop in and out as the mood takes me, and I don't have to feel that I must keep up to get my dollar's worth. Yes, they should have made mention of the translation difficulties, but it is good to know that they were quick to contact and offer a refund.

mythos