Book T and the Astrological Signs

Lillie

elvenstar said:
It may be an idea to look at them in groups of three first, so that we slowly progress from general to specific? That way I guess we can examine what e.g. the 2, 3 and 4 of wands would have in common due to being ruled by Aries. If ruled is the right word. Or what all the 'cardinal' cards have in common. Don't know if that's useful, this is what I've been wondering about since yesterday.

Yeah!

Do that!
 

Grigori

fluffy said:
I have been wondering about the cardinal things relating to the "signs". Why isn't it in order of how the "signs" appear to run starting with Aries eg

Aries is 1st of signs and is cardinal (start of the element)
Cancer is 1st of water signs (following on from aries) and is cardinal (start of element)

yet.........

Gemini which is first of air signs is mutable and taurus first of earth signs is fixed? why aren't they both cardinal?

In a way it is the first of each section, but not organised in the way your looking at it. The trick is divide the circle into quarters.

If you look at the astrology wheel I linked to earlier in the thread, you'll see the different modes are spaced evenly around the wheel. They kind of line up in crosses. The Cardinal signs for example make a sort of (+) shape in the wheel. The wheel divides into 4 sections, like a pie cut into 4 slices. For each section, the order goes Cardinal, Fixed, Mutable.

e.g. If we start with Aries as the common beginning point. We have Cardinal Aries, Fixed Taurus, Mutable Gemini. So the order Cardinal, Fixed, Mutable is still retained, but each has a different element (in this case Fire, Earth, Air).

It works like this for each quarter. The first section of each quater is a Cardinal sign (the beginning, Aries, Cancer, Libra and Capricorn).
The second section of each quarter is a Fixed sign (the middle, Taurus, Leo, Scorpio, Aquarius). These are the 4 Kerubs you see on the World card, in each corner, just like in each corner of the Zodiac.
The third section of each quarter is the Mutable sign (the end, Gemini, Virgo, Sagittarius, Pisces).

It helps to have the chart in front of you to follow that.
 

Always Wondering

mosaica said:
Thanks for starting this great thread. My problem is that I'm trying to learn all this when I don't know much about astrology to begin with. But the signs are slowly beginning to have meaning for me.

It's the same for me.
Some of the symbols make sense to me, Aries, Scorpio and Sagittarius. Virgo is hard for me to memorize because it doesn't make pictorial sense to me. I've looked for info on why the symbols are designed the way they are but haven't found anything yet.

AW
 

Grigori

Moderating Note

I've split of the posts regarding the Courts, and moved them to their own thread here.
 

elvenstar

Always Wondering said:
It's the same for me.
Some of the symbols make sense to me, Aries, Scorpio and Sagittarius. Virgo is hard for me to memorize because it doesn't make pictorial sense to me. I've looked for info on why the symbols are designed the way they are but haven't found anything yet.

AW

Not sure how accurate this is, but may help at least to remember them :)
http://www.novareinna.com/constellation/virgo.html
 

Scion

Here are a couple useful graphics that might help to visualize when looking at a GD deck...

The first image is something Fulgour did a while back. The 2nd is from Wang's (indispensible) Qabalistic Tarot.
 

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Aeon418

I don't want to sound like a kill-joy, but does anyone else think that the current exclusive focus on astrology is, or can be, a little misleading. The meanings of the minor cards are not derived from the astrology alone. They are a mixture of suit, number, and astrology. Any one of those three ingredients is always modified by the other two. Sometimes the astrology compliments the overall meaning of the cards, but that's not always the case. The 5 of Swords and the 10 of Cups are good examples of cards where the astrology is weak and the Sephirotic attribution is the dominant factor. With those kinds of cards, studying the astrology in isolation is bound to lead to confusion.

The way I look at the minors, the Sephiroth/number and the suit are the primary ingredients in the meaning. The astrology is more like seasoning. It can either enhance or be in contrast to the rest of the card but can't be eaten alone.
 

Scion

Not a killjoy, but the other side of the coin. And I'm assuming that by "current" you mean this thread... because I don't know of anyone looking at this stuff in the lit... and believe me, I've looked. It's how I started doing this book thing after all that time digging on the LIber T. The material just isn't covered anywhere that's readily acessible. I'm actually in the position of translating a depression-era book out of German myself just to get my hands on the material.

And frankly, the more I look and learn, the more I think that the astrology is the starting point for the entire structure of the GD minors and that the Qabalah is the flavoring. Truth be told, I think that the Qabalistic structure gets a LOT of airtime but most people know next to nothing about the astromagical underpinnings.

I think the reason so many people are excited by this as a topic of exploration is that the same qabalistic material gets trotted out whenever the minors are discussed, even though it doesn't actually explain a lot of the system. The Qabalistic stuff doesn't explain thetitles of the cards or many of the images created by Harris or Smith. I can go to any library or bookstrore and find several books that ascribe cards to the Tree of LIfe but essentially none that do the same for astrology.

Of course, as you point out, there are certain cards where the Qabalistic attribution is dominant, but the entire fabric of the 2s-9s seems (to me) to be overwhelmingly based on the astrology.

Tomayto - tomahto, but in this case we've had about 100 years on the Tree. So I'm wanting to look at the Stars. :D

Scion
 

rachelcat

Scion said:
Here are a couple useful graphics that might help to visualize when looking at a GD deck...

The first image is something Fulgour did a while back. The 2nd is from Wang's (indispensible) Qabalistic Tarot.

A few years ago, I was at a resort that had a BIG ROUND table for playing cards upon, and I laid out my mini LS Universal in the order as shown in these zodiac circles. It's great for studying, and you get extra points for remembering which decans are for which minors! (I cheated. I used DeQuette's book for his Tarot of Ceremonial Magick as a cheat-sheet!)

Maybe we should have a challenge thread, and everyone can post pictures of their card circles! (Note to self to dig out disposable camera when I get home . . .)