by Marcus Katz
We will then begin to summon our Animal Spirit and learn about Animal Symbolism in the cards in our next Gate exercise tomorrow. You are encouraged to share your decisions, actions and experiences on the forum, but only if you wish to do so. We have found in previous gated spreads that sharing often reveals profound similarities and interesting differences in the lives of those sharing the experience.
The Tarot Shaman III
The symbolism of Tarot is populated with animals – birds, reptiles, fish, and mammals, real and imaginary. A wonderful example of how these are used as complex symbols is the exquisitely-named but hardly-known article here:
http://www.realmagick.com/articles/39/2039.html
This article, The Aviary at the Gates of Heaven discusses the birds used on the Empress Tarot card in the Thoth Tarot.
However, in the Shamanic traditions, animals are seen as messengers and guides – spirits in their own right. Whilst we will examine this symbolism more tomorrow, for today we are going to do a very simple exercise to start to summon our animal guide.
The Summoning
In this next gate, having proven ourselves and embarked on a journey, we will take our sacred place and begin to summon a spirit of an animal from our Tarot deck. First we must have the animal choose us – by consulting with what the Sufis call the “Counsel”.
This exercise is rather simple. Go through your deck and select out all the cards that have an animal on them. If you are using a pagan deck or animal oracle deck this may be all of the cards, of course! If your deck has no animals at all, you may wish to select an alternative deck.
Then shuffle, and place these cards FACE-DOWN about you, on the floor, in any pattern – perhaps a circle. Take any natural object, such as a crystal, stick or stone, and place it about the centre of the spread.
Begin to move the object around, feeling it respond to the cards.
When the sensation of calling or pulling is strongest, place it upon that card.
Leave the object there. DO NOT LOOK AT THE CARD. Put the other cards away.
Now spend the day wondering what the spirit of the card is – try and see its calling you or summoning in the activities of the day.
At the end of the day, you can write down your experiences and look at the card – comparing your feelings and the animal you see on the card.
The Tarot Shaman IV
Now we approach the last stages of our first experience of Tarot Shamanism, today we are going to create a special sigil – magical symbol – to focus the energy of our Animal. We are going to do this by performing a special type of one-card reading called a “drill-down” reading.
The Spirit Catcher
This Spirit Catcher is in some ways similar to a Veve in Voodoo traditions or a talisman in the Western esoteric traditions. In a sense it is also a mandala. It acts as a focus of the energies of the spirit. It can be used by placing it on one’s personal altar, hiding it somewhere of import, or carrying it about on ones person. You may wish to take this magical diagram to the place of power you discovered in your Journey Gate and ritually burn it or bury it.
Gate 4: Creating a Spirit Catcher
Take your deck and shuffle it whilst considering the guardian you have overcome and the journey you took, and the animal which was revealed at the last gate. Concentrate on that animal and ask “How May I honor your Spirit?” Take out one card.
Lay the card face-up and make a note of the key symbols, items, objects, colors even, in each of the following areas of the card:
So it might be that the upper-left section of the card contains just sky. You could write in that section of the box, “Blue” or “Sky”. Select the most prominent symbol in that area of the card for YOU, whilst also thinking of the animal.
Then imagine that this box represents a new Spread.
The top two sections are “How you Honor me in your spiritual life”, the middle two sections are “How you Honor me in your thoughts and feelings” and the bottom two sections are “How you Honor me in your daily activities”. These are the three levels of the world.
Take each of the two symbols and read them as if they were a pair of very simple Tarot or Oracle cards. What comes to mind? Write down your feelings and impressions.
In this manner of reading, each individual card becomes a Mandala. It is also a spirit catcher in that for the next two days you must live according to these divinations before completing the last Gate. These activities must honour your ANIMAL SPIRIT in all levels of your life. You should also record any dreams or events of note during this time.
You are encouraged to share your discoveries in the forum.
The Tarot Shaman V
We come now to the final Gate of this week-long Gated Spreads experience. We hope you have enjoyed learning about the Tarot through the animal symbolism of the cards and by engaging with your life in a Shamanistic approach. We have also looked at the concept of “drill-down” reading with one-card spreads.
In this final Gate we pull together our experience by embodying and being empowered by the animal spirit we have been called by and which we have caught by honoring it.
The Invocation of the Animal Spirit
We now invoke and embody the Animal Spirit. This step uses a variation of a magical practice taught by urban shaman and modern chaos magician Jan Fries, whose books we recommend, particularly Visual Magick.
Living the Animal
On a largish sheet of paper, draw a rough sketch of your Animal Spirit. This can be heavily stylistic, symbolic or realistic.
Place a cross on 5 places on your picture. These could be key features such as the eye, a wing, tail, etc. Write in each position, “This is the vision of my spirit”, “This is the spiritual power of my spirit”, “This is the balance of my spirit” or whatever may be appropriate to that part of the animal.
Now take your deck and shuffle whilst contemplating the journey that has brought you to this place, the fear you had to overcome, the calling and the catching, and the honoring of your animal spirit.
All the Gates have led to this divine moment.
Take out a card when you are ready for each of the place on the animal. These cards represent the animal’s response to you. They are the divination for how you can invoke these powers and qualities of your animal spirit. They tell you how to live the animal.
So for example, if I had a bat, and I had placed one of my crosses on its ear(s), writing, “This is the secret sense of the Bat, my spirit”, and then drawn the 7 of Disks (Thoth Tarot) in that position, I would read it as follows: “Failure and Sloth – the secret sense of my animal spirit is present and invoked when I give up trying and relax, surrender.”
You will now have five points of invocation of your Animal Spirit. As a Tarot Shaman you can use these cards to draw upon the power of your animal guide, perhaps leaving them visible in your sight before sleep and communing with your animal in dreams.
You may also create a montage of the cards chosen to represent your animal, or otherwise use the cards to remind you of all that you have learnt during this week.
There are many other shamanistic methods of exploring the Tarot, and many aspects of animal symbolism which can be pursued. We trust this week has given you a new angle on your Tarot, and look forward to welcoming you on other Gated Spreads in the future.
Please do feel free to continue discussion in the Tarot-Town.com forum for this experience! And remember that all change is done in our own workshop.
When a Navajo person wishes to renew or re-establish, in the world, the harmonious condition of well being and beauty expressed by the Navajo word ‘hozho’ he must first strive, through ritual, to create this harmony and peacefulness within his own being. Having established such ‘hozho’ within himself, he can that actively impart this state of well-being to the enveloping cosmos, through the transforming power of song or prayer, finally, according to Witherspoon.
After a person has projected ‘hozho’ into the air thro
ugh ritual form, he then, at the conclusion of the ritual, breathes that ‘hozho’ back into himself and makes himself a part of the order, harmony, and beauty he has projected into the world through the ritual of speech and song.
The Spell of the Sensuous (p. 236)
Tarot in the New World
I grew up with packet transmission, as did anyone reading this in 2012 who is in their 40’s. The impact of this concept, an electronic protocol designed to run on anything from “two cans and a piece of string” hardly needs stating. The mysterious method of ensuring a communication reaches its destination, and is confirmed as doing so, no matter what links in the connecting chain are broken – routing – is a de facto element of modern society. This TCP/IP protocol is the bedrock concept of the internet and all that operates upon that platform.
In 1988, IRC (Internet Relay Chat) was launched and just two years later Tim Berners-Lee created “the internet”, actually the http protocol linking “pages” together which sat on TCP/IP and in effect gave a larger audience a reason for viewing and connecting to the previous green-screen code.
In that same year, a group of Tarot authors, teachers and artists gathered in Los Angeles for the First International Newcastle Tarot Symposium, whose presentations are recorded in New Thoughts in Tarot: A Symposium Journal, ed. Mary K. Greer and Rachel Pollack. One of these was the late Nicholas Tereschenko (1916 - 2002), whose presentation was entitled ‘Arcanum XXIII: The Drowned Sleeping Titan’, upon the Hanged Man card.
In a neat synchronicity, I (Marcus) met Nick at the Golden Dawn Centenary Conference in London, 1987, and discussed this subject – which was to later be of great relevance to the Waite-Trinick Tarot project some 22 years later. I was, of course, 22 at the time – perhaps that number has some significance.
Tereschenko, a gifted teacher of esoteric traditions, and in particular the Gurdjieffian Fourth Way work, developed the existing term, Hapax Legomena, to refer to a word only used once in a written language. He produced a glossary of over 500 such words from the work of Gurdjieff.
One such neologism – new word – is being-Partkdolg-duty, which refers to the work of conscious labor and intentional suffering. It is this “partkdolg” that brings about transformation, through self-observation, self-remembering, active mentation and contemplation. This latter can also be translated as the more whimsical “pondering”. These practices generate what Gurdjieff called Zernofookalnian-friction, leading to new perception.
It occurs to us also that every Tarot reading is a Hapax Legomena, a unique statement or “word”. In the new world of amusement, instant gratification, and lack of connection, we should aim to write a Hapax with every reading – recognize that in that moment of divination, a divine moment is present.
In the Last Light of the World
There is not enough darkness in all the world to put out the light of even one small candle.
Robert Alden
As we have seen, the Tens of the Minors symbolize, Kabbalistically and numerologically, the very last descent of spirit into matter. We began this book with the Fool, and now we conclude with the Tens.
The Tens, according to Crowley, are the “end of all energy” (Book of Thoth, p. 187). They represent:
Pentacles: Wealth
Swords: Ruin
Cups: Satiety
Wands: Oppression
In each of these is the final extension of their Ace, the roots now grown of our cosmic tree, upside-down from the heavens. In our daily life, we seek wealth, yet there is nothing more we can do with it than spend; we fight, and all ends in violence; we crave, and our cravings are their own despair; we seek empowerment, and bring about tyranny. There is no escape from the Black Iron Prison, unless we transcend it totally and utterly. We are always one foolish step from freedom, and that step is here and now.
We leave this book with a thought about inspiration. As John Fowles wrote in his lesser-known book, but highly recommended, The Aristos, a collection of several hundred paragraph statements of his beliefs, “this book was first published against the advice of almost everyone who read it”. He went on to explain that rather than his damaging any reputation, it was “not just the matter of the book that offended. It was the manner as well – the dogmatic way in which I set out my views on life. But that too sprang from a desire to nourish individuality. By stating baldly what I believe I hope to force you to state baldly to yourself what you believe. I do not expect agreement.” (The Aristos, pp. 7-8).
We hope this book has inspired you to consider your own thoughts on Tarot, beyond the box. And it does seem fitting to complete this present work with those words, from the author of The Magus.
Marcus Katz & Tali Goodwin
Keswick, February 2012.
The closer you come to the end. The more there is to say. The end is only imaginary, a destination you invent to keep yourself going.
The Country of Last Things (p. 183)
The Tyldwick Tarot
The Tyldwick Tarot, whose images grace the covers of this Tarosophy Kickstart series, is a fully complete Tarot deck awaiting publishing by Neil Lovell. It can be viewed online on the comprehensive and beautifully designed site, http://www.malpertuis.co.uk/tyldwick.
The theme of the deck is that of an elegant house, through which one can wander without “being distracted by a cast of characters” as might be found in other Tarot decks. The cards are beautifully layered and suffused with tonal casts from the international travel that the designer has enjoyed – and not so enjoyed - as described in some fascinating cases which are revealed in the extensive interview on the site.
The deck reminds us very much of the film, Last Year in Marienbad (1961, dir. Alain Resnais) which is a dream-like excursion into an environment which may or may not be real, in which the characters not so much inhabit the place, but are extensions of the place itself. In the Tyldwick Tarot, the few characters we see are the Court Cards where faces are reflected in mirrors – or perhaps are even looking out from the other side of the mirrors themselves.
The deck is currently awaiting publishing and the designer has asked interested parties to reserve copies or express an interest to sufficient numbers before he commits to publishing. We would highly recommend this deck, and suggest you make that commitment – as we would love to see it in our own hands and use it for both reading and meditation work.
Schiffer Books & Bushwood Books (UK)
Schiffer Books publish a wide range of body, mind, & spirit titles:
Tarot & oracles • astrology • numerology • psychic skills • The Ra Series • paranormal & ghostly phenomena • spirits & spirituality • crystals • divining • demonology & exorcism • handwriting analysis • palmistry • health & lifestyle • gay & lesbian life • metaphysics • past & future lives • Christianity • voodoo • shamanism • kahuna • paganism • wicca
You can download their entire catalogue from the website at:
www.schifferbooks.com
Their UK Distributor is Bushwood Books at:
www.bushwoodbooks.co.uk
Innovative Tarot titles already from Schiffer Books include the Transparent Tarot and Transparent Oracle of Emily Carding, and the forthcoming TAROT GAME by Jude Alexander.
With striking decks including the Shadowfox Tarot (Richard & Jennifer Shadowfox), Silver Era Tarot (Aunia Kahn, text by Russel J.Moon) and the Otherworld Tarot (Alison Williams, artwork by Sarah Nowell), Schiffer Books are continuing to represent and publish innovative Tarot design and art.
And coming soon from Schiffer … Tarot in the Land of Mystereum by Jordan Hoggard, Nature’s Wisdom Oracle by Mindy Lighthipe and the Tarot of the Sidhe by Emily Carding.
Conclusion
We trust you will find many months of discovery and play with your decks in this second Tarosophy KickStart Guide. It has been a pleasure to produce it and play with the ideas to provide a fresh new look at Tarot.
It is hoped you will feel inspired to play with your deck as a livin
g and breathing oracle in engagement with the world around you. Our next Kickstart Guide, TAROT SWITCH explores how to further use Tarot in engaging change in your everyday life.
These Guides are a prompt for your own exploration, to discover your own voice in Tarot. We encourage the diversity of divination!
We have also provided in the final section a list of reading materials and website resources to discover more in the very best of Tarot and Tarosophy®.
Look out for more titles in this innovative series of Tarosophy KickStart Guides, to be released over 2012-2013:
Volume I.
Book I: Tarot Flip - Reading Tarot Straight from the Box
Book II: Tarot Twist - Finding a Spread for Every Question
Book III: Tarot Inspire – Tarot & Western Esotericism for a Spiritual Life
Volume II.
Book I: Tarot Switch – Methods of Engaging Tarot in Life
Book II: Tarot Solution – How to Read in Real Life Readings
Book III: Tarot Decode – Signs, Symbols & Portents in Tarot
Bibliography
Abram, David. The Spell of the Sensuous. New York: Vintage Press, 1996
Anonymous, Meditations on the Tarot. Rockport: Element Books Ltd, 1991
Auger, Emily E. (ed.), Tarot in Culture, Australia: ATS, forthcoming.
Auster, Paul. In the Country of Last Things. New York: Faber and Faber Ltd, 1987
