Thoth Deck
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@aum418 said
"The Gnana Yoga aspects of the Tarot? What in Horus' name are you talking about? What does Tarot have to do with Jnana Yoga at all, Jim?"
Tarot is Qabalah, and Qabalah is the Hebraic form of Gnana Yoga.
For example, it organizes a odel of the Universe. It articulates the root principles of consciousness and reality; and it provides means of meditation that eventually allow the transition from Yetziratic to Briatic expressions of "knowledge."
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@Jim Eshelman said
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@Redd Fezz said
"Why do cards tend to pop out when I begin shuffling and then after I've completed shuffling, I tend to pluck out those exact cards?"Too many drugs in your youth? Physical conditions of the cards? (Is this a new, crisp desk or a well-worn, time-honored one?)"
- definitely, but I don't see the correllation
- used a lot but I try to keep it like new, so very new, but not weirdly lackered and static clingy new.
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"While I'm on the subject, I have a question. Why isn't there a forum dedicated to this deck? Sort of like the astrology one but where people might want to comment on different spreads, etc.?"Tarot is an aspect of Qabalah (and I'm moving this thread there). It's really little more than a pictorial representation of the most important aspects of Qabalah. This is especially true for the Gnana Yoga aspects of Tarot. Divination, on the other hand, is an aspect of ceremonial magic
If enough Tarot questions appeared in the Qabalah forum to warrant an independent one, then I'd create it."
Yeah, you're right. I was thinking more for spreads and interpretations. Astrology is all Qabalah, too, ain't it???
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"Here's what I got a couple days ago:- ace of wands
- 4 of cups -luxury
- queen of cups
- prince of cups
- the priestess
- unicursive hexagram card
- 3 of disks - works
- the chariot
- 8 of wands"
What spread? What question? What did you do to prepare yourself and the space in advance? Do you have a question now?"
This one was related to my meditations on the Nature of Mind and structure of the Universe. After 9 months of intense study and practice, I drew 9 cards to represent "completion" and asked for an explication of where I'm at at this point in my understanding.
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@Jim Eshelman said
"Yeah, you're right. I was thinking more for spreads and interpretations. Astrology is all Qabalah, too, ain't it???"
That's why I differentiated the Gnana Yoga aspects from the divination.
No. Qabalah has adopted astrological symbols for different purposes - for usages sometimes like the usages in astrology and sometimes quite different. The best rule of thumb is not to assume that any use of astrological symbols in Qabalah is useful in astrology until independently verified astrologically.
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"Here's what I got a couple days ago:- ace of wands
- 4 of cups -luxury
- queen of cups
- prince of cups
- the priestess
- unicursive hexagram card
- 3 of disks - works
- the chariot
- 8 of wands"
What spread? What question? What did you do to prepare yourself and the space in advance? Do you have a question now?"
This one was related to my meditations on the Nature of Mind and structure of the Universe. After 9 months of intense study and practice, I drew 9 cards to represent "completion" and asked for an explication of where I'm at at this point in my understanding."
And what did you conclude? Seems nobody but you is likely to be able to read this.
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This had entered my mind! I just posted it here thinking, "Ah, maybe someone who uses the Thoth deck all the time will see something right off the bat I've missed." Because it was an important and surprising read for me at this time.
I concluded it was all about understanding the immaterial present awareness manifesting into the physical dimension, free from conceptual limitation.
Especially cool to see the Hexagram in there since I never draw that card. I know it's not supposed to be in there, but I leave it just in case it might want to present itself for some reason... and in this instance it made perfect sense for me.
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@Redd Fezz said
"Especially cool to see the Hexagram in there since I never draw that card. I know it's not supposed to be in there, but I leave it just in case it might want to present itself for some reason... and in this instance it made perfect sense for me."
Uh, I forgot to mention - I really think you should pull this (and any other advertising cards and multiple-version cards) out of the deck. A Tarot deck has 78 cards.
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Fortunately, it's never been an issue before. I don't think leaving it in throws the whole deck into kablooey, but I do understand it doesn't have a place on the Tree or a relationship with the other cards according to the original. If I got it in any other reading, I would probably think about it for a bit, disregard it and draw the next one. But, I don't think it's ever happened before. If I had the one with the 3 magicians, I would definitely remove those. With or without the hex, the reading worked for me, which is why I was pleased to see it. It magnified the importance of all the others for me. Maybe that's why I noticed things in the descriptions I hadn't caught before.
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If a tarot deck has only 78 cards, why did the Unicursal hexagram get included with a white border like all the others? (in the little manual it says specifically that the cards are white bordered) this would make me think that it was to be included.......... -
@Law said
":o If a tarot deck has only 78 cards, why did the Unicursal hexagram get included with a white border like all the others? (in the little manual it says specifically that the cards are white bordered) this would make me think that it was to be included.........."
Well, first of all, it's usually not white edged. I may not have a copy of the deck that has that card white edged.
So it's just a manufacturer's choice. It wasn't part of the original deck, but was put in by Llewellyn when Grady and Phyllis first got it printed. Llewellyn also added the "Caliph card," giving the contact address for O.T.O. - and, in case it isn't clear, that card isn't part of the actual Tarot deck either.
Your question kind of boils down to, "If Subway isn't a Scottish sandwich shop, why do they let Jared wear plaid?"
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Yeah well, WTF?
I would think that its a proper inference to assume that since Crowley didnt always state his exact purpose, and that in the small instruction manual that comes with the deck it does say that the deck consists of white bordered cards, a OTO card giving the adress for contact and a WHITE BORDERED Unicursal hexigram card, that perhaps it is a real card and should be included in the deck, thats all I was trying to get at, Jared and his plaid pants excluded. -
@Law said
"I would think that its a proper inference to assume that since Crowley didnt always state his exact purpose, and that in the small instruction manual that comes with the deck it does say that the deck consists of white bordered cards, a OTO card giving the adress for contact and a WHITE BORDERED Unicursal hexigram card, that perhaps it is a real card and should be included in the deck, thats all I was trying to get at, Jared and his plaid pants excluded."
So... are you more interested in justifying that you thought through this correctly, or more interested in having correct information?
Yes, I can see why your thought patterns went down that particular road. But they lead to a wrong conclusion.
In part, this is because you had incomplete information. For example, you seem to think that Crowley added this card to the deck - he did not - and yo useem to think that all publishers have always had the card white-trimmed - they have not. You seem to think that the "small instructional booklet" was a Crowley creation or had some official standing - it does not, it's somethng that the publisher pulled together (and these booklets vary from printing to printing of the deck over the decades).
This was a printer's decision, pure and simple.