Buddha Tarot - Parinirvana

I thought it would be interesting to study this card with others because it has no counterpart in the traditional deck.

The card depicts the physical death of the Buddha and his attainment of a state of oneness. He is lying on his right side and the trees are in flower.

Robert Place, in his Buddha Tarot Companion, says that this can be thought of as another version of the Judg[e]ment card. For divinatory purposes, he describes its most basic meaning as a move up or the receipt of a reward.

I think of this card as a Post-Judgement card. Yes, the Day of Judgment is a moment of high drama and often depicted in art, but what is supposed to happen after that?

Parinirvana is the ultimate Release. This isn't something ordinary beings get to experience. I agree with you that it's a post-Judgement card in the traditional Tarot scheme; it's the reward card for those who are Judged favorably. But I think within the context of the Buddha Tarot, the relationship to the Judgement card is more complicated. The Judgement card in this deck is the Buddha's First Sermon, which means that the being who attains Parinirvana is actually the "Judge" himself (although "non-Judge" might be a better Buddhist term ). I leave the word "himself" uncapitalized to remind us that the Buddha is a man, but he's also the vessel of the True Nature of Being, the One Who Knows the Truth, and it is this supreme human attainment that conduces to his release into Parinirvana.

So for divinatory purposes, the card surely indicates reward, but it's one reserved for beings who are wholly deserving of, completely mindful of, and unattached to this reward.

Yes, I agree with you. In fact I wonder if the message this card bears when drawn won't frequently emphasize nonattachment more than the reward itself. In contrast to the Master card added to the Osho Zen deck, BTW, the Parinirvana card doesn't seem to be a particularly controversial addition to the trumps.

What do you think it means to this deck that its major arcana is expanded by this particular card, added at the end? (I debated whether to post this question here or on the main study group thread.) The reason that Parinirvana was included is obvious (for non-Buddhists reading this thread, Robert Place explained in his Companion book that he wanted to include all of the four major major Buddhist icons in the trumps and Parinirvana comes after the point at which the trumps usually stop), But do you think adding Parinirvana has an effect on the deck and readings?

Now, suppose he had used The First Sermon for the Justice card (instead of Karma), Parinirvana for Judgment, and added a Karma card at the very end, or used Karma for The World instead of Tara? The four major icons would still be included in this deck, but I think the deck might "read" somewhat differently. ETA: I am not saying that the deck was done wrong, or that I want it to be different, just trying to understand what it is by way of contrast to what it isn't.

Reflectively,

Margarita

Master_Margarita said:

I wonder if the message this card bears when drawn won't frequently emphasize nonattachment more than the reward itself.

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Indeed. I'm intrigued by the depiction, too, because the release of energy is visible, which seems unusual; it doesn't exactly say "There is no self," you know? But it's just a vaporous cloud, it isn't obviously significant of a soul or anything like that, and there's no value judgment there, it's just a release. It makes me think of some of the more positive attributes of the classic Death card. Which makes me think of your next question...

Master_Margarita said:

What do you think it means to this deck that its major arcana is expanded by this particular card, added at the end? ...
Suppose he had used The First Sermon for the Justice card (instead of Karma), Parinirvana for Judgment, and added a Karma card at the very end, or used Karma for The World instead of Tara? The four major icons would still be included in this deck, but I think the deck might "read" somewhat differently. ETA: I am not saying that the deck was done wrong, or that I want it to be different, just trying to understand what it is by way of contrast to what it isn't.

Click to expand...

I think the Parinirvana card makes sense at the end. I like the schools of thought that consider the sequence of the Major Arcana to be a journey of a central character (The Fool, or in this case, the Future Buddha) to ultimate attainment (The World, or in this case, Parinirvana, which is beyond The World). I think this structure is what makes Tarot so naturally amenable to the vocabulary of so many spiritual narratives; nearly every culture has its own version of this story. When adapting the Fool's Journey for the Buddha, I think it's important to have Parinirvana as the absolute, final stage.

I feel like Karma belongs early in the sequence of Majors. It was an established part of life during the Buddha's journey, and his understanding of Karma evolved continuously. I think Karma fits better with Justice than Judgement, anyway. Karma exists a priori, and it operates automatically. The Buddha's First Sermon, though, is the implementation of Dharma, the moment at which the Buddha delivers the Truth. And I think The World fits as the penultimate card. The journey toward Awakening is about learning to see The World as it really is, a fitting penultimate stage. But for the truly Awakened One, there awaits a final release beyond Awakening.

I think the Death card should be considered here, as well. If you look at the Buddha Tarot's Death card, which is called The Corpse, you see a much simpler, more blatant meaning than, say, the RWS Death card conveys. There don't seem to be any of the connotations of sea change or positive transformation. This Death card is like the meditation on the corpse in the Mahasatipatthana Sutta. It's about the impermanence of the body, decomposition, finality. It's the dead body without any self; it's the death we fear. The Parinirvana card seems to contain the other half of the traditional Death card, the part that we learn about from the parable of the Buddha's death.

I agree with you, but it was fun to play around with the card order. Incidentally, I was looking up meanings in one of my conventional books and it lists "karma" as one of the meanings of the Justice card in the RWS.

I think the Corpse is an interesting card and one worthy of its own thread.

M.

JonMAblaze said:

I think the Parinirvana card makes sense at the end. I like the schools of thought that consider the sequence of the Major Arcana to be a journey of a central character (The Fool, or in this case, the Future Buddha) to ultimate attainment (The World, or in this case, Parinirvana, which is beyond The World). I think this structure is what makes Tarot so naturally amenable to the vocabulary of so many spiritual narratives; nearly every culture has its own version of this story. When adapting the Fool's Journey for the Buddha, I think it's important to have Parinirvana as the absolute, final stage.

I feel like Karma belongs early in the sequence of Majors. It was an established part of life during the Buddha's journey, and his understanding of Karma evolved continuously. I think Karma fits better with Justice than Judgement, anyway. Karma exists a priori, and it operates automatically. The Buddha's First Sermon, though, is the implementation of Dharma, the moment at which the Buddha delivers the Truth. And I think The World fits as the penultimate card. The journey toward Awakening is about learning to see The World as it really is, a fitting penultimate stage. But for the truly Awakened One, there awaits a final release beyond Awakening.

I think the Death card should be considered here, as well. If you look at the Buddha Tarot's Death card, which is called The Corpse, you see a much simpler, more blatant meaning than, say, the RWS Death card conveys. There don't seem to be any of the connotations of sea change or positive transformation. This Death card is like the meditation on the corpse in the Mahasatipatthana Sutta. It's about the impermanence of the body, decomposition, finality. It's the dead body without any self; it's the death we fear. The Parinirvana card seems to contain the other half of the traditional Death card, the part that we learn about from the parable of the Buddha's death.

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I'm a great admirer of Place's Buddha Tarot. Interesting that he has an extra trump after the World, Paranirvana, indicating perhaps that "we are not bound forever to the circles of this world".

Buddha Tarot -- Paranirvana

Yes, this is a great meditative Tarot, and its "end" befits its path towards ultimate Reality. Paranirvana means absolute Oneness and is the same as the Neoplatonic One and the Taoist Tao --- and it comes after or outside the Universe of all the prior arcana, including the Universe image itself. It is the Origin and the Essence and the Ultimate. To us, it may mean the deepest state of sleep, yet it is Wakefulness beyond mental comprehension, the dewdrop slipping into the shining sea.