The cards of the tarot have traditionally been assigned to the nodes and paths of the Tree of Life; although there is the suggestion that this 'tradition' only goes back as far as the french 'occultists' Etteialla, Eliphas Levi, and Papus (18th/19th century France) who explicitly made the associations between the Major Arcana and the 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet and their correlation with the Qabalah.
In theory, the journey of Man is down the tree to Malkuth and then back up the tree to return to Kether. The path down is in the form of a lightning bolt (Arousing,Innocence). The path up in the form of a snake (Knowing(Return), has been to the dark side).
The tarot consists of two sets of cards, the Major Arcana (22) and the Minor Arcana (56), with the latter strongly associated with traditional card decks, and the former, explicitly discussed in Court de Geblin's "Monde Primitif" 1781, having roots in various card decks within Europe going back to the late 14th century.
In the I Ching material, we derived the concept that pure yin dealt with absolute trust, and pure yang with absolute confidence. Mapping this, the Tree of Life implies that Chokmah is symbolic of pure Confidence and Binah of Absolute trust. The text suggests an association of Wisdom to Chokmah and Understanding to Binah. The penetrating nature of one and the receptive nature of the other, seem to be in agreement with the fundamentals. What is striking is when we analyze the paths and their tarot associated cards, leading from Kether to Chokmah and Kether to Binah.
The tarot is divisible into two parts. The Major Arcana, the cards of which are associated with the paths, and the Minor Arcana, the cards of which are associated with the Nodes (Sephireth).
The two cards of the Major Arcana associated with the paths from Kether to Chokmah and Kether to Binah are, respectively, The Fool (Card 0) and The Magician (card 1).
NOTE: (The placing of The Fool as the first card explicitly derives from the work of Crowley. The most standard tarot deck, the Rider Tarot deck, places the Fool 2nd last. In the original deck described by Court de Gebelin the Fool has no number. Implicit in this is that it can be placed both at the beginning and at the end of the deck. This would conform to the Tree of Life concept where there are a number of trees, one for each possible level of understanding. The fool being symbolic of the first path and the last path just as, for the sephireth, Kether is in Malkuth and Malkuth in Kether.).
The path from Kether to Chokmah is also the path from Chokmah to Kether. ALL paths are bi-directional. From the I Ching analysis I suggested that for yang to be able to get back to T'ai Chi it must have TOTAL confidence in it's actions (the negative side is developing Arrogance). The image of the card The Fool is of a brightly dressed carefree individual about to walk off the edge of a cliff.
The image of the card The Magician is of an individual, apparently a Magus, with one hand raised and pointing to heaven and the other lowered and pointing to earth. The symbolism is that of a conduit for the powers of heaven and earth. To be able to do this requires absolute trust, absolute faith, in the powers that be. One is a catalyst, receptive but pure, never changing. (The negative side of trust, situations where one is 'foolishly'(aspect of the Yang?) being too trusting, leads to betrayal).
These apparent correlations are NOT explicitly emphasised in the associated texts describing the cards. For example, the handbook that comes with the Rider Tarot states:
"1. THE MAGICIAN - skill,diplomacy,address; sickness,
pain,loss,disaster; self-confidence,will. Reversed: Physician, Magus,
mental disease.disgrace.disquiet."
"0. THE FOOL - Folly, mania, extravagance, intoxication, delirium,
frenzy, bewrayment. Reversed: Negligence, absence,
distribution,carelessness, apathy, nullity, vanity"
This often mismatch of text to diagrams seems to be a common theme. We often find words that imply the 'truth' but never an explicit.
THE PATHS AND THE MAJOR ARCANA.
Path Card
11 0 The Fool
12 1 The Magician
13 2 The High Priestess
14 3 The Empress
15 4 The Emperor
16 5 The Hierophant
17 6 The Lovers
18 7 The Chariot
19 8 Strength
20 9 The Hermit
21 10 The Wheel of Fortune
22 11 Justice
23 12 The Hanged Man
24 13 Death
25 14 Temperance
26 15 The Devil
27 16 The Tower
28 17 The Star
29 18 The Moon
30 19 The Sun
31 20 Judgement
32 22 The World
THE PATHS AND THE HEXAGRAMS.
Path Hex
11 1
12 2
13 ALL trigram archetypes
14 11,12
15 1
16 10,14
17 2
18 7,8
19 63,64
20 30
21 38,49
22 29
23 4,39
24 58
25 51
26 52
27 31,41
28 17,54
29 28,61
30 27,62
31 18,53
32 32,42
The minor arcana forms a group of archetypes linked with the ancient system of typology using basic elements. In this system there are four basics - Earth , Air, Fire, and Water. To these basics are assigned symbols. To Earth is Cups, to Water is Coins, to Fire is Wands, and to air is Swords.
These associations spring from comments made by Court de Gebelin, a protestant theologian living in the south of France, in his book 'Monde Primitif', written in 1781:
"According to Court de Gebelin, 'the trumps[Major Arcana], numbering 22, represent in general the temporal and spriritual leaders of society, the principles of agriculture, the cardinal virtues, marriage, death and resurrection or the creation; the many tricks of fortune, the wise and the foolish, time which consumes all etc...' As for the suits, he decided that they represent the four classes into which Egyptian society had been divided: the king and the military nobility, symbolized by the sword; agriculture, symbolized by the club; the priesthood, symbolized by the cup; and commerce symbolized by the coin."p7 Innes,B.,(1977)"The Tarot: how to use and interpret the cards" Black Cat.
These suit assignments correlate well with the I Ching digrams (two line symbols - one step before creating a trigram; see below) where Earth and the Receptive/Keeping Still join, symbolic of religeon; Water and The Abysmal/The Gentle join, symbolic of commerce; Fire and The Arousing/The Clinging join, symbolic of agriculure in the metaphorical form of the seeds of new ideas and their development; Air and the The Joyous/The Creative join, symbolic of leadership.
The assignment of cups to earth and coins to water may, to some, appear contrary to the norm. My research suggests that these are the correct categorizations, reinforced by Gebelin.
Regardie states:-"The letters YHVH of the Tetragrammaton are used to imply the whole gamut of the four elements. Y as the creative function of the Archetypal Realm, is Fire the Chiah; the first H represents the Cup, the symbol of the passive character of the Creative World, and is Water the Neschamah; V is the Son, the active vice-regent of the Father, and is Air the Ruach; and the final H is the Nephesch; the passive receptive Earth, fructifying all things."p113 A Garden of Pomegranates.
Using this symbolism, Cups would map to the Contractive Bounding position (------ over -- --) which associates with water. Tarot symbolism makes the associations made with cups to map more to the pure Contractive position (-- -- / -- --).
CUPS -- -- Blend HE
-- --
DISKS ------ Bound HE
-- --
WANDS -- -- Bound VAU
------
SWORDS ------ Blend YOD
------
The suit of Swords has a bad reputation and this maps the the I Ching concept of '[God] battles in the sign of the Creative'.
Within Swords there is an emphasis on communication. The MBTI emphasis for the same 'area' is negotiation skills. The suit indicates 'wisdom wrestled from life often through painful experience."p144. other meanings are "strength acquired through pain or trial" and "will and intention tested by adversity". Swords is spiritual alchemy to the physical alchemy of Disks. Swords is called "The Mental Path" and accords well with artisans. e.g. "for [Shakespeare] is one of the foremost examples of the Mental Path".
The cup is a receptacle of everything, as is the earth. We therefore have a correlation with the I Ching digram of Greater Yin, an earth symbol that evolves into the trigrams of The Receptive(Earth) and Keeping Still(Mountain) and has an association with devotion.
The assignment of coins to water correlates with the attribute of commerce to coins (money is like water) and the correlation of the I Ching digram of Lesser Yang to commerce. This symbol evolves into the trigrams of The Abysmal(Water) and The Gentle(Wind).
There does not seem to be any argument about the other assignments, Wands to Fire and Fire to Lesser Yin; which evolves into the trigrams of The Arousing (Thunder) and The Clinging (Fire), and Swords to Air and Air to Greater Yang; which evolves into the trigrams of The Joyous (Lake) and The Creative (Heaven(Air)).
In the minor arcana, the court cards of king ,queen, knight, and page, are associated with specific personalities. Since there are four per suite, there are sixteen possible personality types represented. Through the ability to associate a psychological typology system with the I Ching, namely the MBTI (see "Jungean Typology and the I Ching"), it is possible to associate the court cards of the tarot to the MBTI and thus to the I Ching. This association takes place in the sixteen cells at row four of the template. It is here that the trigrams have developed into tetragrams (four lines). Their explicit nature is shown in the diagram of "The MBTI".
Attempts to get a one-to-one correspondence with the hexagrams will not succeed fully but the general ideas are common to both systems and there is a distinct commonality of meaning at the trigram level.
An interesting association is that with the the page cards of the minor arcana. These cards are supposed to symbolize messages,news, and information. Mapping them to the MBTI template, they map onto the MBTI personality groups of ESFP (Reveller,Entertainer,Performer), ENTP(Debator,Inventor), ENFP (Journalist,Revealer,Enthusiast), and ESFJ (Provider,Seller,SalesPerson). All these personality profiles describe an individual concerned with supplying information/messages.
The court card association to I Ching/MBTI symbolism is:
Court Cards Bottom two lines mixing model
King ----- (Blend (pure))
-----
Queen -- -- (Blend (pure))
-- --
Knight -- -- (Bound)
-----
Page ----- (Bound)
-- --
Some profiles:
King of Swords - Lord of Occult Power
King of Disks - Lord of Financial Power
"A person with power over your
finances or earning capacity.
Goal : to influence positively"
King of Cups - Lord of Religious Power
King of Wands - Lord of Higher Mind.
Queen of Disks - Urge to Make Money.
Prince(King) of Disks - Lord of the Money Tree
(Note that besides being 16 personality types there is also a
correlation here with the sixteen symbols of Geomancy).
In mapping the major arcana with the four elemental positions one finds a trinity principle that excludes Greater Yang (the Creative) as well as some positional changes:
------ -- -- -- -- ------
-- -- ------ -- -- ------
0 1 2
3 5(teacher) 4
7 6 8(karma)
10 9 11
13(completion) 12 14(x15)
15 16 17
20 19 18
21(completion)(x50)
N12 THE HANGED MAN - Mistake wrapping for present. (Hex 22 - Grace -
two base lines map to this column).
N13 Death and N21 The Universe seem to deal with completion. Hexagrams
that deal with completion map to the same two base lines and have a
source of The Abysmal(protection) and The Gentle(influence).
Continue with Numbered Cards, Suits and Trigram Orders