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To: alt.magick.tyagi,alt.tarot,alt.magick,alt.divination,alt.pagan.magick From: nagasivaSubject: Occultist Card Meanings (e.g. G-LOVE-GEMINI) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2003 01:57:00 GMT 50031024 viii om re "Lovers" (/CHOICE/LOVE)" # I'm having a hard time attaching a meaning to this card # that sticks {for me}. not too surprising. trumps that have multiple names through time (in the case of G, Choice, Lovers, Love, etc.), are prone to receive a diversity or larger envelope of aggregate meaning. there are many ways to get meaning from a Tarot card without being provided one ready-made definition for someone's deck: a) look at the symbolism in the card and project some dynamics or story around any pictures featured therein. in many Lovers cards there are *three* figures, sometimes the third is Eros/Cupid, fostering a love-smittenness between the featured pair below. it seems easy enough to fabricate a meaning using this method: we're talking about an emotion, some event or personally and significan interaction, whereby what is called 'love' is discovered, established, or enhanced; it may be a metaphor 'falling in love'; or maybe the significant part is that figure above the mated pair. b) read, ask questions, and compare different people's interpretations of cards as they present them. accumulating a library of tarot interpretations both makes this possible and makes it more evident to the reader that there are some common interps, some more convincing than others -- some based on traditional assignment or very little elaboration as to what the actual symbols in the *card* mean, or the history of the card as it developed through time. asking in forums such as these for feedback can increase one's resident database of possibilities. c) study the history of the card's meaning oneself and select what seems most convincing. this may result from choosing a favourite authority, or from one or more favourite method from those presented here, supplemented by the historical usage. d) examine the way that the card falls in the LAYOUT and tweak its meaning based on intuition. this may be associated with the classic 'fortune- telling method' where the event and configuration of the cards is much more important than what the card has on its face or how it has been seen through time. e) consider carefully the overall context of the card in symbolic instructional layouts or deck composition. as with Oswald Wirth's instructional trump layout, or a consideration of septenaries in trump progression, there are many many ways that Tarot cards can be presented in association with the rest of the deck or with some prefabricated configuration. placement within these configurations (contrasted or compared with any way the card falls in the reading) can inform the reader of the overall meaning. it may also include such things as numerology and relations inferred by the card's sequential assignment. f) comprehension of how the card fits into a symbolic attribution scheme or mystical diagrams. selecting the diagram for the cards (trumps are often associated with sefirotic trees but the trees vary in structure and composition so the placement of the card will vary outside rigid institutional traditions), locating the particular card upon it, and understanding its overall symbolic attribution (whether assigned to other occult ideas, or given a special relation to other cards by virtue of placement and what might be considered 'ordinary symbols' like numbers, roman numerals, or letters), can pinpoint a card's meaning without regard for what is actually painted on the face or said about the card by traditional sources. there are probably more (add them in reply posts!), but you can see with just this spectrum that in some cases what is on the card is most important, in others what is traditional, and in still others how one *feels* about the cards is paramount. # It could be because the "perspective" of this card seems so # different than the other cards. I'm not sure I'm explaining # that well. See, with the Magician [for example] I can imagine # myself as the character. some suggest that the Magician isn't a role but a FORCE. B - MAGE - MERCURY path between 1 and 3; formative; activating; bridging between origination (1) and restriction (3) there are many ways to interpret the trumps that the Lesser Cards never touch. # Not so with the Lovers. you could be one of the two figures, or perhaps even that third figure in the clouds just there. :> # Now, if the card was "Love" or the "Lover," then I would be # able to. in the Plebeian Tarot the card is G - LOVE - GEMINI path between 3 and 4; conducive; aggregating; selection of options, as an extension of the D-QUEEN and E-KING extended from 2; forming part of a trio balancing Agape (G-LOVE) with THelema (I-WILL) via the H-CART; keyed to the VENUSian doubling in 2=>4 and offering parity with the F-GUIDE, both of which are unusual in their status as transtetraktyl paths (along with C-WITCH, N-DEATH, O-ART, T-CLOUD, U-STAR, and Y-UNIVERSE). some tradition gives this card the numeral VI. historically the assigned name "Choice" is described as including a man's choice between two women. perhaps this was a contrivance to integrate the dualism of Gemini's character, or perhaps as you mention the symbolic notion of vice/virtue applies. # Still, is that what the Lovers card is about? # Being in "love"? What kind of "love"? I hope I've given some reason above to now assert that this is a somewhat difficult question to answer. this is not so much because the card itself is difficult to interpret (though at times it surely is) or because there are no prescriptions for meaning in Tarot writers' expression (there are many): it is because the question contains the premise that trumps or indeed any Tarot card *are about something*. 'the Lovers card' without reference to any particular deck is a *constellation* of expression, art, interpretation, and text, which CANNOT be resolved easily into any concise, nailed-down answer as to "what it means". one or more of the above-detailed methods is seleted, and typically a specific DECK is being discussed, the artist's or occultist's interests or intentions considered for the resolution of any single interpretation. most *generic* Tarot interpreters (i.e. "This card means...." without specifying a deck) pretend this is not the case, try to give the impression that their espoused meaning for the card is authoritative, and establish a doctrinal significance to what is an variable set of images, themes, and history. personal reflections are just what they are, but their detail is informative when it includes data on what decks the person is talking about in their observation and sharing. # Waite's Pictorial Key says of his Lovers card: now we're getting somewhere. :> # "It replaces, by recourse to first principles, the old # card of marriage, that is an interesting tracking of the card. Marriage *also* would have a threesome depicted (the couple and the officiant). the first question I would ask is who called it Marriage and why? was this a left-over from gaming decks? # which I have described previously, and the later follies # which depicted man between vice and virtue." lovely, that's an elaboration on the symbolism of CHOICE. # {Yeah, I know he says a lot more, but I wanted to explore # that sentence a bit more.} Was this card considered a # card of "marriage" because it depicted lovers and the # assumption was/is that the lovers would then go on to get # married [if so, why not just call the card Marriage?]. now you're asking a historical question about the meaning of the card over time and how and why it was changed. while I'm not prepared to answer that, I think in this card's exploration it becomes very easy to see the extreme variation of meaning involved and why it is that there may be a greater envelope surrounding it: not only has its name and theme changed, but its content and social import have completely shifted. if this is true for *occultists* is the next valuable query. # Is it possible that the card was considered a card of # marriage because it depicts on affair [a man and his # mistress, perhaps?] my guess is that it was considered Marriage because people liked the institution of Marriage and sought to put it on playing cards. :> I'd have to do a survey of *occultists* who described their motivations to give your question its due from an occult perspective. differentiating between the intentions of gaming card designers and those of magicians and diviners will of course require that we specific the names of the cards with the person or tradition that named them, plus it will include what may have been published or taught by the specific sources arcane. getting game-playing interests mixed in with occultism is part of the problem of fabricationalists who want to paint a picture of consistent esoteric significance and design. # and one can't have an affair unless one is already # married? I doubt that this was the intent, but am ignorant. # The concept of an "affair" would certainly fit in with # being stuck between "vice and virtue." if it was related to some popular symbolism or play this would allow the virtue/vice CHOICE. # Anyways, would appreciate some thoughts on how/what # others have in mind for the Lovers card. that's likely a wide variety. if I have a moment or two tonight I'll cite some prominent occultist contentions. nagasiva
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