Non-Tarot books that help with Tarot

[Pretzel]

Which non-tarot books have you read which help with Tarot? e.g.

 

History

Mythology

Symbology

Numerology
Animal totem
 

Anything else or specific books you recommend or found useful?

 

Edited to clarify: this is to add layers to a reading as we would with astrology. For example, the story of Persephone in Greek mythology might come to mind my eye is caught on the image of a pomegranate on a card.

Edited December 3, 2021 by Pretzel

[katrinka]

Everything helps with Tarot. Anything you read, any life experience you get. Even fiction will open up concepts sometimes.
Technique-wise, though, I get the most out of books that discuss old cartomantic methods.
But animal totems - not for me. Most of what's out there seems new age and inauthentic.

[Ziev]

I always liked "Helping Yourself with Numerology" by Helen Hitchcock. Its an older book but still great. 

 

I also agree with Katrinka too. Everything helps with Tarot. Even Star Trek has some profound wisdom. Just saying. 

Edited December 3, 2021 by Ziev

[Pretzel]

5 hours ago, katrinka said:

Everything helps with Tarot. Anything you read, any life experience you get. Even fiction will open up concepts sometimes.
Technique-wise, though, I get the most out of books that discuss old cartomantic methods.
But animal totems - not for me. Most of what's out there seems new age and inauthentic.

 

1 hour ago, Ziev said:

I always liked "Helping Yourself with Numerology" by Helen Hitchcock. Its an older book but still great. 

 

I also agree with Katrinka too. Everything helps with Tarot. Even Star Trek has some profound wisdom. Just saying. 

Yep, totally get that and notice it in the world around me etc. I've edited my original quote to clarify.

Re: animal totems. Maybe totem wasn't the best word to use. For example, the other day I was doing a reading for myself and my eye was magnetized to a yellow bird on the card. My intuition told me to look it up and I was amazed at the added information that brought to the reading. It was really perfect.

[katrinka]

A lot of things like the pomegranates on the High Priestess and the rabbit on the Queen of Pentacles were intentional, and they do fit.

 

But another interesting one is the dog and wolf on the Moon. You won't see it on the really early ones like the Visconti, I think it started with TdM. I've read that it's from an old French idiom that translates to "between dog and wolf". It's referring to twilight, when the low light levels make it hard to tell a dog and a wolf apart. So it fits the Moon. Looking up dogs and wolves probably wouldn't be beneficial. One attribute I've seen applied to both is "loyalty," but the Moon is not a loyalty card.

[Pretzel]

True. Although I wouldn't look at the image of a dog and think 'loyalty' straight off - I would read it in context, just as I'd read a card in context.

But "between dog and wolf" is a great example of knowledge that adds a layer. I love learning this sort of stuff.

 

I just looked it up and found this extra information about the low light levels: But it’s not just about the dim light: it carries a slightly sinister undertone of mystery, presenting dusk as a time when nothing is quite what it seems and the ordinary can become the unknown.

[fire cat pickles]

10 hours ago, Pretzel said:

Which non-tarot books have you read which help with Tarot? e.g.

.

.

.

Numerology
.

.

.
 

Any [...] specific books

 

I don't know how much "heavy" reading you get into, but there are two numerology books you may be interested in:

The Theology of Arithmetic by Iambilichus

A Study of Numbers by R. A. Schwaller de Lubicz 

 

 

Edited December 3, 2021 by fire cat pickles

[DanielJUK]

I haven't found one non-tarot book that has helped me but art has helped me! I love to look at art and analysis the symbolism. Since I started divination I am always analysis symbols in life, even if I don't mean to! I am that nightmare person in an art gallery giving my analysis of the pictures. I was in one recently saying out loud that the horse in the huge painting represented the artists desperate need for a companion to support them. It's greatly helped me with symbolism but I found it very hard now to not think of the intuitive meaning 🤣

[Pretzel]

@fire cat pickles both those books look super interesting. Thank you!

[Pretzel]

5 minutes ago, DanielJUK said:

I haven't found one non-tarot book that has helped me but art has helped me! I love to look at art and analysis the symbolism. Since I started divination I am always analysis symbols in life, even if I don't mean to! I am that nightmare person in an art gallery giving my analysis of the pictures. I was in one recently saying out loud that the horse in the huge painting represented the artists desperate need for a companion to support them. It's greatly helped me with symbolism but I found it very hard now to not think of the intuitive meaning 🤣

Oh yes! So happy you mentioned this Daniel. I do the same, looking at all symbols and analyzing them. I had to laugh about the horse and need for a companion - love it.
I do the same - Pre-Raphaelite art is awesome for this.

 

[katrinka]

4 hours ago, DanielJUK said:

I am that nightmare person in an art gallery giving my analysis of the pictures.

 

It's only a nightmare when someone's not good at it. We all loved Sister Wendy!
 

 

[Cher]

Map Of The Soul by Murray Stein as introduction and Jung's Red Book later on. Also the Zohar and every Hebrew text😂

[RunningWild]

32 minutes ago, Cher said:

Map Of The Soul by Murray Stein as introduction and Jung's Red Book later on. Also the Zohar and every Hebrew text😂

Every Jewish text?  How many lifetimes does a person have? 

 

These two books are good for explaining the Hebrew letters:

https://www.amazon.com/Book-Letters-Mystical-Alphabet-Kushner/dp/1683363442/ref=sr_1_3?keywords=the+book+of+letters&qid=1638552338&sr=8-3

https://www.amazon.com/Wisdom-Alphabet-ArtScroll-Mesorah-English/dp/0899061931/ref=sr_1_1?crid=G0LJ5MP0AFH6&keywords=wisdom+of+the+hebrew+alphabet&qid=1638552456&sprefix=wisdom+of+the+hebrew%2Caps%2C200&sr=8-1

 

(I wish I knew how to shorten those links)

[Aoife]

The Penguin Dictionary of Symbols _ Chevalier & Gheerbrant

[katrinka]

1 hour ago, RunningWild said:

(I wish I knew how to shorten those links)

There's a couple of ways.
One is to click the little chain links above the reply box (between the eraser and the quotation mark.) You get a popup that lets you paste the link and name it what you want. So those would look like this:

The Book of Letters

 

and 

The Wisdom in the Hebrew Alphabet

 

The issue with doing that is people thinking it's just underlined text and not realizing it's a link. It happens.
So you can always just get a short url here:

https://tinyurl.com/app/

This is the tiny url for the second book:

https://tinyurl.com/dx3cbhnn

Hope this helps.

[fire cat pickles]

1 hour ago, RunningWild said:

Every Jewish text?  How many lifetimes does a person have?

 

Here are three of my favorites,  to narrow it down a bit:

 

Jewish Literacy: The Most Important Things to Know About the Jewish Religion, Its People and Its History

 

Meditation and Kabbalah

 

A Kabbalistic Universe

 

 

[RunningWild]

1 hour ago, katrinka said:

There's a couple of ways.
One is to click the little chain links above the reply box (between the eraser and the quotation mark.) You get a popup that lets you paste the link and name it what you want. So those would look like this:

The Book of Letters

 

and 

The Wisdom in the Hebrew Alphabet

 

The issue with doing that is people thinking it's just underlined text and not realizing it's a link. It happens.
So you can always just get a short url here:

https://tinyurl.com/app/

This is the tiny url for the second book:

https://tinyurl.com/dx3cbhnn

Hope this helps.

Thank You!!

1 hour ago, fire cat pickles said:

 

Here are three of my favorites,  to narrow it down a bit:

 

Jewish Literacy: The Most Important Things to Know About the Jewish Religion, Its People and Its History

 

Meditation and Kabbalah

 

A Kabbalistic Universe

 

 

Anything by Telushkin (Jewish Literacy) is good in my opinion.  Personally, I avoid anything that uses 'meditation' in the title (hey, I have to draw the line somewhere!).  The third book might be good and I might even have that one somewhere around here.  No doubt easier to read and comprehend than the Zohar.

 

Mythology by Edith Hamilton is a timeless classic. 

 

And any number of Joseph Campbell's books would be good.

[chongjasmine]

The bible helps with tarot, as it gives meaning to me for the four figures in the card, the world. The four figures are actually the four faces of cherubim in the bible, and refers for me, to the four gospels.

[Pretzel]

17 hours ago, Cher said:

Map Of The Soul by Murray Stein as introduction and Jung's Red Book later on. Also the Zohar and every Hebrew text😂

😂 As enthusiastic as I am, I probably won't be diving that deep into Hebrew text.

Thanks re: Map of the Soul and Red Book. Red book has been on my list. I'm currently reading Jung's autobiography, so I'l add both those books to my list.

[Pretzel]

2 hours ago, chongjasmine said:

The bible helps with tarot, as it gives meaning to me for the four figures in the card, the world. The four figures are actually the four faces of cherubim in the bible, and refers for me, to the four gospels.

Thanks! I read the bible for years, but way before I started Tarot. Thank you for your insight. I recently heard those figures are Archangel Michael, Raphael, Uriel and... I forget the other. But that's interesting about your thoughts re: the four gospels - I'll have to look into that too.

[Pretzel]

14 hours ago, RunningWild said:

Thank You!!

Anything by Telushkin (Jewish Literacy) is good in my opinion.  Personally, I avoid anything that uses 'meditation' in the title (hey, I have to draw the line somewhere!).  The third book might be good and I might even have that one somewhere around here.  No doubt easier to read and comprehend than the Zohar.

 

Mythology by Edith Hamilton is a timeless classic. 

 

And any number of Joseph Campbell's books would be good.

I forgot about Joseph Campbell... thanks!

I just finished reading Mythos by Stephen Fry. But I'll definitely add Mythology to my list - I always love reading about Greek Mythology. Thank you!

[Pretzel]

17 hours ago, Aoife said:

The Penguin Dictionary of Symbols _ Chevalier & Gheerbrant

Awesome! Thank you. I've been looking at a number of books on symbols but I must have been on the wrong track. While they all had photos of the symbols, the info seemed a little basic. I can see from the sample on Amazon that this has the depth I'm looking for. Thanks!

[Pretzel]

18 hours ago, RunningWild said:

Every Jewish text?  How many lifetimes does a person have? 

 

These two books are good for explaining the Hebrew letters:

https://www.amazon.com/Book-Letters-Mystical-Alphabet-Kushner/dp/1683363442/ref=sr_1_3?keywords=the+book+of+letters&qid=1638552338&sr=8-3

https://www.amazon.com/Wisdom-Alphabet-ArtScroll-Mesorah-English/dp/0899061931/ref=sr_1_1?crid=G0LJ5MP0AFH6&keywords=wisdom+of+the+hebrew+alphabet&qid=1638552456&sprefix=wisdom+of+the+hebrew%2Caps%2C200&sr=8-1

 

(I wish I knew how to shorten those links)

Very interesting. Thank you!

[katrinka]

Emblem books predate RWS, and though the images won't be identical to Tarot, you can find some commonalities. There's a lot of stuff free online. Some of them push the Church, others don't. They can give you a window into how people thought when the early decks were being designed. Lots of links here:

https://www.tarotforum.net/showthread.php?t=75008&page=2

 

[Ziev]

8 hours ago, katrinka said:

Emblem books predate RWS, and though the images won't be identical to Tarot, you can find some commonalities. There's a lot of stuff free online. Some of them push the Church, others don't. They can give you a window into how people thought when the early decks were being designed. Lots of links here:

https://www.tarotforum.net/showthread.php?t=75008&page=2

RAD! Thanks for posting this.