The Majors as entities

[inomminate]

Each card is, in a sense, a living being; and its relations with its neighbours are what one might call diplomatic. It is for the student to build these living stones into his living.

The Book of Thoth.

Do we agree with this? Are the majors entities? Can we talk to them? Do they talk to each other?

[Charlie Brown]

I gather that Crowley's use of "in a sense" means that he's speaking metaphorically about the majors. However, I don't think it unreasonable to think that the the majors each reflect different aspects that each exist inside of us. In that sense, The Star, The Emperor, and Justice (for example) are talking to each other when we try and reconcile our hopes with the structural realities of our life. As an example.

[BlueStar]

I have tended to (so far) in my tarot exploration to treat majors as representing types of energy/influences. I haven't got to that part yet in the book (only got it this week), but I would guess from what I have read so far that he means entity in a more abstract way, rather than in the literal sense of a 'person' (if that's what you mean). But as energies can manifest, interact, and change, they can be considered 'alive' in that sense, so maybe that's why he uses the term 'entity'. That makes more sense to me based on what he says about the tree of life and what it represents. Just my thoughts so far, they may change...!:)

[qndynes]

Each card is, in a sense, a living being; and its relations with its neighbours are what one might call diplomatic. It is for the student to build these living stones into his living.

The Book of Thoth.

Do we agree with this? Are the majors entities? Can we talk to them? Do they talk to each other?

Hm, that is a good question but I think, and I've never read Crowley, that there is perhaps more here than is lead on by the quote. What is art and where does it come from? If these pieces of art on paper, which in this case refers to Thoth's tarot, came from an artist, where does that inspiration come from? Where does the artist pick the and string the cords to create this specific tune/work/art form.

Initially, one can say yes, Crowley speaks metaphorically, but there is something deeper than runs through art, and the creation of art, and by extension the imagination (the imaginal in jungian and a pre-jungian sense).
So, at one level, the tarot is just paint on paper. And what we make of that is what we make of that. But in a deeper sense we have to question the imaginal, the archetypal, the spirits, consciousness, and a whole slew of elements that really make for quite a heady mix.

I'd like to share an excellent essay by Henry Corbin called Mundus Imaginalis: https://www.amiscorbin.com/bibliographi ... -imaginal/

I'd also like to refer you to another excellent essay by fried and Shakespeare professor, Lines and Entanglement:
https://crowess.wordpress.com/2018/09/3 ... nglements/

[inomminate]

I will read the articals but in the mean time here is a comment from Racheal Pollack in an interview with Mary Greer

Above all, I would suggest that people treat the Tarot not just as printed cards and a set of instructions, but rather as a living being.

This is not the quite the same thing but it is interesting.

[Diana]

Crowley or no Crowley, I would assume that the Majors represent different states (and also stages) of consciousness. As all these states are within us, as there is actually only One consciousness, then these states are just aspects of this one consciousness, this one awareness. I would think it pretty obvious that they can interact with each other. In fact, I don't see how they CANNOT interact and communicate.

[qndynes]

Each card is, in a sense, a living being; and its relations with its neighbours are what one might call diplomatic. It is for the student to build these living stones into his living.

The Book of Thoth.

Do we agree with this? Are the majors entities? Can we talk to them? Do they talk to each other?

I'd like to share an excellent essay by Henry Corbin called Mundus Imaginalis: https://www.amiscorbin.com/bibliographi ... -imaginal/

I'd also like to refer you to another excellent essay by fried and Shakespeare professor, Lines and Entanglement:
https://crowess.wordpress.com/2018/09/3 ... nglements/

I was thinking yesterday that I should share a bit about where the links actually lead instead of just posting a link and leaving it at that. The first one is an essay by Henry Corbin. He was a French philosopher, theologian, and professor of Islamic Studies, more information on him can be found in his wikipedia. He wrote extensively on Islamic philosophy, writers, and topics. His Mundus Imaginalis is actually a transcribed lecture delivered at the Colloquium on Symbolism in Paris June 1964. It is relatively short but very deep. In it he explores the narratives of Persian mystics and the function of the imaginal within the mystical experience. It is an excellent essay that I find myself re-reading with frequency and relish. Here are a couple excerpts:

Firstly, on the choice of words Mundus Imaginalis:

The reason why I absolutely had to find another expression was that, for a good many years, my calling and my profession required me to interpret Arabic and Persian texts, whose meaning I would undoubtedly have betrayed had I simply contented myself [...] with the term imaginary. I had to find a new expression to avoid misleading the Western reader, who, on the contrary, has to be roused from his old engrained way of thinking in order to awaken him to another order of things. In other words, if in French (and in English) usage we equate the imaginary with the unreal, the Utopian, this is undoubtedly symptomatic of something that contrasts with an order of reality, which I call the mundus imaginalis, and which the theosophers of Islam designate as the "eighth clime."

These are toward the end of the essay:

We are no longer participants in a traditional culture. We are living in a scientific civilization, which is said to have gained mastery even over images. It is quite commonplace to refer to our present day civilization as the "civilization of the image" (magazines, motion pictures, and television [I insert cellphone & computer]). But one wonders whether- like all commonplaces- this one does not also harbor a radical misunderstanding, a complete misapprehension. For, instead of the image being raised to the level of the world to which it belongs, instead of being invested with a symbolic function that would lead to inner meaning, the image tends to be reduced simply to the level of sensible perception and thus to be definitely degraded. Might one not have to say then that the greater the success of this reduction, the more people lose their sense of the imaginal and the more they are condemned to producing nothing but fiction?

Is it not precisely the postulate of the imaginal world's objectivity, which is suggested to us, or imposed on us, by certain figures and certain symbolic emblems (Hermetists, Cabalists or the mandalas) that have magic effect on the mental images so that they acquire objective reality?

No more quotes, needless to say I highly recommend this essay.

[qndynes]

Lastly, the other link leads to an excellent blog a friend of mine writes. She is a Shakespeare Professor at the University of Texas. She very succinctly summarizes the article in the beginning. I will just past that here.

In this post, I’m going to begin by offering a gloss on anthropologist (and late career near-philosopher) Tim Ingold’s The Life of Lines.[1] In this text, Ingold comes at the world in terms of lines—focused on becoming—rather than what he calls “blobs” and object-oriented perspectives of the world—focused on being. From there, I’ll share with you some of my perspectives on how lining aligns with offerings in magical and religious practice.

I very much recommend Tim Ingold's work and this post.