I apologize for the lateness; I’ve been traveling a lot and getting ready to move, so things kind of got away from me this week.
Anyway, let’s get to Justice, an important card in the Major Arcana. Case begins the lesson quoting what he calls an occult maxim: “Equilibrium is the basis of the Great Work.” This is an important point in ceremonial magick, witchcraft, folk magick and any other work you might undertake to do. Balance is incredibly important in all things.
No, silly, not the game show!
So we’ve looped back around to the beginning numerologically: 10 = 1 + 0 = 1 again. More accurately, the combination of the qualities of 0 and 1. Therefore, the 10th Trump is the “embodiment of growth and the reciprocal action between opposites.” Case calls it the “eternal creativeness of Life Power whirling forth.”
Before we start to talk about Strength, I want to review some of what we’ve already covered. In the Number Symbolism post, I showed the cards arranged in a grid of three rows. We’ve finished covering the cards in the first row of that grid.
We’ll start this week again with a look at the numerological meanings attached to the Chariot, which is the eighth Trump but aligned to the number 7. This week’s lesson’s keyword is Will Power and the number 7’s keyword is Mastery. This mastery is the result of the discrimination we learned about last week. It is the equilibrium that results when the two opposites are brought into balance.
This week’s Tuesday Tarot is a big one for me. While you’re reading this, I’ll be at the birth of my first granddaughter. (I promise there’ll be cute baby pictures to follow!) It seems fitting that this is the week we’ll be discussing the mother card, the Empress. Continue reading
Now we’re getting to the good stuff: the study of the actual Tarot cards! We begin with the Fool. If you’re going to do the coloring exercises, this is the week to make sure you’ve at least colored this card. If you balk because the last time you did a coloring sheet was in nursery school, let me tell you that it’s a great way to study the Tarot. You really do get forced to notice the detail while you color in the card. It’s also strangely soothing, maybe because it’s such a vivid reminder of childhood.
Yeah, I know it’s not Tuesday, but I was stuck in the doctor’s office all day yesterday. I haven’t quite got the hang of scheduled publishing here on WordPress, so I hope you’ll let me hand my homework in a bit late!
This week’s lesson is on the symbolism of numbers. Numbers are important in magick, as well as any other discipline. Think of duality, triple goddess aspects, the eight slices the wheel of the year divides into. A basic working knowledge of numerology makes learning tarot much easier, since a lot of the time the number of the card is a hint as to the larger meaning behind it.
Paul Foster Case founded the Builders of the Adytum, a Western Mystery school, in 1922 after a disagreement with SL MacGregor Mathers’ widow over the propriety of teaching sex magick (he was for) led him to leave the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. It was (and still is) a correspondence course dealing with esoteric subjects such as Hermetic astrology, qabala and, of course, tarot.
Lucina's Cauldron 