Dumb Question: do Different Decks Elicit Different Interpretations?

[Guest]

Absolutely. Cartomancy is the practice of semiotics; we’re reading the images. If the image is different then so is the interpretation.  

 

For me, image also trumps symbol - so I focus on the entire image, seeing the symbols as akin to letters that build a whole statement (think Icon). But the whole is the focus. So it’s important to really study the images and why, at least for me, I have a “primary” deck (Noblet for Tarot). 

[devin]

On 6/28/2019 at 1:00 AM, Barleywine said:

And the TdM pips are silent on almost everything.

If anyone's interested, another great way to read TdM pips is, imo, to use a playing card system.... like the one found on https://cardseer.wordpress.com/

 

Seeming as Marseille pips are essentially a pack of playing cards with the addition of knights, this makes a certain intuitive sense to me. Of course, this is actually the number and suite method as mentioned by @katrinka.

Edited June 29, 2019 by devin

[Barleywine]

16 minutes ago, devin said:

If anyone's interested, another great way to read TdM pips is, imo, to use a playing card system.... like the one found on https://cardseer.wordpress.com/

 

Seeming as Marseille pips are essentially a pack of playing cards with the addition of knights, this makes a certain intuitive sense to me. Of course, this is actually the number and suite method as mentioned by @katrinka.

I'm very early in my exploration of playing-card divination, but I hope to eventually bring it together with my TdM pip studies where the convergence makes sense. As I see it, anything that helps sharpen the focus is a good thing. I guess I have more of a surgeon's sensibilities than a stone-mason's, preferring the scalpel to the hammer-and-chisel as I try to carve out meaning from the pip cards. The danger I'm trying to avoid is getting overly analytical about it when what I'm striving for is "story-telling" flair.

Edited June 29, 2019 by Barleywine

[Barleywine]

1 hour ago, leroidetrèfle said:

Absolutely. Cartomancy is the practice of semiotics; we’re reading the images. If the image is different then so is the interpretation.  

 

For me, image also trumps symbol - so I focus on the entire image, seeing the symbols as akin to letters that build a whole statement (think Icon). But the whole is the focus. So it’s important to really study the images and why, at least for me, I have a “primary” deck (Noblet for Tarot). 

I think you've put your finger on it right there, at least for me. The RWS images (and what I call their "narrative vignettes") encourage us to bore in on the details and pick them apart for meaning. The Thoth deck has semi-scenic "glorified pip" cards that rely more on color and mood, and (except where Crowley insisted on inserting his occult trappings) they closely follow their TdM inspiration in design (I posted an essay on that a while back). With the Tarot de Marseille, I'm trying to achieve the same kind of "gestalt" impressions that I've acquired for the Thoth, which (although I didn't realize it when I started out) turned out to be a good springboard for approaching the TdM pips (as long as I leave the esoterica at the door). Maybe there is something akin to Einstein's "unified field theory" with tarot after all.

Edited June 29, 2019 by Barleywine

[Marigold]

17 hours ago, Raggydoll said:

 There is a structure and a definition to what tarot is and isn’t, as far as card numbers, order, suits and titles. 

Your whole post was a treat to read. 

 

But as this is a discussion form, I will continue the discussion and may be accused of splitting hairs, but that's really not my intention. If there is a structure as far as card number, order, suits and titles are concerned.... then what do we do about Justice 8 and Strength 11, or Strength 8 and Justice 11. When the Golden Dawn decided that the Tarot had to fit somehow in their beliefs and ideology, they switched the two numbers around. Their decision to do so actually created a schism in the world of Tarot. Which I liken, in the Tarot world, to the East-West schism of Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodox Christianity. The two systems are in my mind are irreconcilable due to this fact. If Justice is suddenly 11 (what a crazy idea!!! - but then people who prance around in white robes doing ceremonies before their leader, the "Imperator", is pretty much evidence of the craziness of the whole movement) then the whole structure of the two systems is different. (There are other examples in this schism, but am just mentioning the most obvious here.)

 

If both systems are Tarot, then Tarot has no inherent structure. And therefore we can play around with it as we want, as long as it fits in with our own particular belief system or spiritual ideology or what not. 

 

 

 

 

Edited June 29, 2019 by Marigold

[katrinka]

Minor variations in structure aren't the same thing as "no inherent structure". 

 

[Marigold]

1 minute ago, katrinka said:

Minor variations in structure aren't the same thing as "no inherent structure". 

 

Changing Justice 8 to Justice 11 is not a minor change. This is a radical change. It's not like playing the same piece of music in a G scale or a D scale. This is changing the whole melody.

[katrinka]

2 minutes ago, Marigold said:

Changing Justice 8 to Justice 11 is not a minor change. This is a radical change. It's not like playing the same piece of music in a G scale or a D scale. This is changing the whole melody.

It's swapping the positions of two cards out of 78, with everything else remaining intact. Roughly 2.5% of the card positions have been changed.

[Barleywine]

11 minutes ago, Marigold said:

Changing Justice 8 to Justice 11 is not a minor change. This is a radical change. It's not like playing the same piece of music in a G scale or a D scale. This is changing the whole melody.

I agree on symbolic grounds, and I was happy to see that in the Thoth deck Crowley reverted to the old order, although I found his esoteric reasoning for doing so not overly convincing. The placement of the Fool is another flash point. It never had a number, and in her book Tarot Triumphs Cherry Gilchrist made a compelling case for it being able to pop up anywhere in the procession of trumps. I happen to like it at the beginning, but that's a personal preference. Waite put it between Judgement and the World, but I'm not so sure that wasn't one of his intentional "blinds."

Edited June 29, 2019 by Barleywine

[Raggydoll]

I agree that it was not a minor change to swap those cards, not when you consider the process that lead to that decision. But I would argue that it still does not change the fact that tarot has a structure. No matter if two cards are swapped in order, each pack of tarot cards will contain 22 trumps with the same 22 archetypes that has been utilized for several hundred years. Sometimes the titles are changed and on a few occasions the numbering is changed, but the archetypes presented remain the same. And that, combined with their total number (and the addition of the minor arcana) is what makes it tarot. In my opinion. 

[Marigold]

5 minutes ago, katrinka said:

It's swapping the positions of two cards out of 78, with everything else remaining intact. Roughly 2.5% of the card positions have been changed.

Yes. 2.5 % as you say. No-one can argue with that.

 

But the order of the cards is important ! They relate to each other in a specific sequence and influence each other. If you have Justice following a Wheel of Fortune, that's a WHOLE different kettle of fish than Justice following The Chariot. Numbers are hugely important in the Tarot. 

 

If I write a book and switch my chapters 8 and 11 around, the whole plot changes and the heroes go on a different journey as they meet different people at different times and the experience they bring with them also affects how they will behave and interact with each other.

[Marigold]

Another major irreconcilable change. Card 6. The GD called it The Lovers (plural). In the older tradition, the card was L'Amoureux "The Lover" (singular). Again, another one of the GD's ideas (I would assume). They really did have some interesting nectars to drink. I wonder what they put in them. Can't have been LSD - that wasn't invented at the time. But they'd probably have come up with a lot more interesting stuff if they had taken a little trip to psychedelia land. (I'm going to stop my arguments now in this thread because I sense that I'm going to start getting really pissed off with the Golden Dawn and it wouldn't be fair to to share my bad mood with you all.)

[Barleywine]

I have the same quarrel with renaming trump cards to make them more "palatable." Is Death really "Transformation" and not "endings?" Is the Devil "Materialism" and not manipulation and deception? They apply, of course, but it's like the tail wagging the dog.

[devin]

1 hour ago, Barleywine said:

Maybe there is something akin to Einstein's "unified field theory" with tarot after all.

True enough, but if physics is anything to go by, developing a tarot theory of everything is an endeavor that shall probably never reach its conclusion. That being said, as with physics, the chase may prove to be an exceptionally fruitful one.

Edited June 29, 2019 by devin

[Raggydoll]

While I do understand everyone’s pet peeves around Golden Dawn etc., things are still heading pretty off topic right now. Let’s not split hairs and debate card name changes, but stay on the original topic 🙂

[Barleywine]

2 minutes ago, devin said:

True enough, but if physics is anything to go by, developing a tarot theory of everything is an endeavor that shall probably never reach its conclusion. That being said, as with physics, the chase may prove to be an exceptionally fruitful one.

And endlessly entertaining and stimulating (irritating?), as this thread demonstrates. I use some of the Golden Dawn correspondences where they suit my purpose (after all, I've been involved with them since 1972), but I don't buy into all of them by any means. Jim Eshelman did some good work in trying to find reason in them in Liber Theta, his Thoth-based rewrite of Liber T.

[Raggydoll]

3 minutes ago, Barleywine said:

And endlessly entertaining and stimulating (irritating?), as this thread demonstrates. I use some of the Golden Dawn correspondences where they suit my purpose (after all, I've been involved with them since 1972), but I don't buy into all of them by any means. Jim Eshelman did some good work in trying to find reason in them in Liber Theta, his Thoth-based rewrite of Liber T.

I find this a really interesting topic and I would love to see a separate thread where you dive into it! (Yes, this is me saying ‘please get back on topic’ in the nicest possible way 😉)

[Barleywine]

26 minutes ago, Raggydoll said:

I find this a really interesting topic and I would love to see a separate thread where you dive into it! (Yes, this is me saying ‘please get back on topic’ in the nicest possible way 😉)

Sure. It looks like we cross-posted before I saw your previous request.

[Guest]

2 hours ago, Barleywine said:

I think you've put your finger on it right there, at least for me. The RWS images (and what I call their "narrative vignettes") encourage us to bore in on the details and pick them apart for meaning. The Thoth deck has semi-scenic "glorified pip" cards that rely more on color and mood, and (except where Crowley insisted on inserting his occult trappings) they closely follow their TdM inspiration in design (I posted an essay on that a while back). With the Tarot de Marseille, I'm trying to achieve the same kind of "gestalt" impressions that I've acquired for the Thoth, which (although I didn't realize it when I started out) turned out to be a good springboard for approaching the TdM pips (as long as I leave the esoterica at the door). Maybe there is something akin to Einstein's "unified field theory" with tarot after all.

Yes; I have found in the Harris-Crowley pattern a beautiful composition and structure that I can read much as I do (technique, e.g. image, increment, et cetera) with the Marseille. I do use dignities, too. 

 

The Smith-Waite tarot came into my life very late; I didn’t own an actual copy until nine years ago. Over time I have begun to develop a fondness for Smith’s artwork and have collected some of her book illustrations. I have written in the past that there is some evidence in the pips to certain late XVIIII / early XX century cartomancy, as can be seen in Minetta. 

 

Generally speaking, I’ve never quite understood the Anglo-Saxon pip quest. I have always found it easier to read without illustrative vignettes. But that might just be exposure, et cetera. 

[katrinka]

45 minutes ago, Marigold said:

They really did have some interesting nectars to drink. I wonder what they put in them. Can't have been LSD - that wasn't invented at the time. But they'd probably have come up with a lot more interesting stuff if they had taken a little trip to psychedelia land. (I'm going to stop my arguments now in this thread because I sense that I'm going to start getting really pissed off with the Golden Dawn and it wouldn't be fair to to share my bad mood with you all.)

 

Crowley did more drugs than any of them and he switched Justice back to VIII.

[Raggydoll]

1 minute ago, Barleywine said:

Sure. It looks like we cross-posted before I saw your previous request.

I figured as much 😀 But I do hope you will speak more about your methods/thoughts of trying to consolidate different traditions. It’s very fascinating! I believe we haven’t had such a topic started yet *hint hint* 😊 And our ‘Tarot beyond the basics’ forum (and its esoteric subforum) could definitely do with some fresh thoughts! I’ll just leave a little link for your convenience ☺️

 

https://www.thetarotforum.com/forums/forum/95-tarot-beyond-the-basics/

[Eric13]

@Raggydoll Have you ever done a reading in which you felt one particular deck would work for the question at hand, set down the spread, took a good long look at it, then realized or felt that another deck would actually work better for that question and started all over again? 

[Raggydoll]

3 minutes ago, katrinka said:

 

Crowley did more drugs than any of them and he switched Justice back to VIII.

True true. Now sweetie, please allow us to get back on topic 😘

[katrinka]

One more bit and back to the matter at hand, I promise!

46 minutes ago, Barleywine said:

I have the same quarrel with renaming trump cards to make them more "palatable." Is Death really "Transformation" and not "endings?" Is the Devil "Materialism" and not manipulation and deception? They apply, of course, but it's like the tail wagging the dog.

Andy said once that if one were to look inside a coffin, we would indeed see a transformation, but not the kind we like.
 

[Barleywine]

1 minute ago, Joe said:

@Raggydoll Have you ever done a reading in which you felt one particular deck would work for the question at hand, set down the spread, took a good long look at it, then realized or felt that another deck would actually work better for that question and started all over again? 

Interesting question, so I hope you don't mind if I chime in. In recent years I've found that the Thoth deck may be a little "rarefied" for some of my readings, so I use the RWS instead. After this happening a couple of times, I can now head it off before I actually start a reading. Some of my spread designs (quite a few, actually) are more suited to the RWS because I'm after "situational awareness and developmental insight." (And I never thought I'd say that!)