Richard1
Well, I just finished reading it the other night, and found it be (for the most part) lucid, entertaining, and informative. The only things that I found rather disturbing about it were A) the fact that many of the cards (like the Four and Ten of Cups, and the Ten of Disks) that had seemed positive to me were described in negative terms, and B) the readings of certain cards that were available only to high-ranking adepts of the O.T.O. (Although I have to say that it was much better than Waite's "Pictorial Key" in that sense, since Waite just hints at most of the esoteric significance without revealing even that the Fool comes first in the deck).
So, my questions: How locked should we be into Crowley's reading of the cards? I disagreed with a lot of the Banzhof/Akron book (notaby the sexism in the description of the Princess of Swords), but they're just commentators...Crowley's the designer...if he says the Ten of Cups is sinister, should we take that as written in stone? I'm inclined to say no, since each of us must create our own relationship with the cards, and I've already dispensed with some of the more Thelemic meanings of the cards, but I'm wondering what everyone else thinks.
Second, have the "secret" meanings ever been made public, or does one still need to work one's way up the heirarchy of the O.T.O. (which, weirdly, is only about an hour or two away from my house) in order to find them out?
If they haven't, I suppose it doesn't matter...The Book of the Law leaves me cold, and I'm guessing that the secret meanings tie into it more deeply.
So, my questions: How locked should we be into Crowley's reading of the cards? I disagreed with a lot of the Banzhof/Akron book (notaby the sexism in the description of the Princess of Swords), but they're just commentators...Crowley's the designer...if he says the Ten of Cups is sinister, should we take that as written in stone? I'm inclined to say no, since each of us must create our own relationship with the cards, and I've already dispensed with some of the more Thelemic meanings of the cards, but I'm wondering what everyone else thinks.
Second, have the "secret" meanings ever been made public, or does one still need to work one's way up the heirarchy of the O.T.O. (which, weirdly, is only about an hour or two away from my house) in order to find them out?
If they haven't, I suppose it doesn't matter...The Book of the Law leaves me cold, and I'm guessing that the secret meanings tie into it more deeply.