Tarot Decoded: Understanding and Using Dignities and Correspondences - Softcover

Hazel, Elizabeth

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1578633028 ISBN 13: 9781578633029

Verlag: WEISER BOOKS, 2004

Inhaltsangabe

Most readers interested in tarot own a couple of different decks as well as some tarot "cookbooks" that explain the meaning of the cards and their symbolismlike Cliff Notes for tarot. These tarot tools result in fairly standard, mundane readings. But there is another level to tarota level that can turn an ordinary tarot reader into a true adept.

Tarot Decoded transforms ordinary tarot readings into readings that are profound and even surprising by explaining the use and significance of tarot dignitaries. Tarot dignitaries are the interaction of the cards with each other in a spread and within a range of correspondences. Tarot author Elizabeth Hazel presents a concise, useable system for working with tarot dignities to add incredible depth to readings. One card placed next to another might not have a readily apparent connectionbut interpreting tarot dignities could make it very clear that one card enhances, or hinders, the meaning of another. The same is true for tarot neighborhoods within a spread as well as the entire reading.

Using the Tarot Decoded system for working with tarot dignities can take anyone to the next level of tarot reading. The book offers a progressive look at the cards, their dignities, and their correspondences.

With Hazel's advice and clear examplesand a little practicereadings take on a new depth, integration, and power.

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Judith Valente is a former staff writer for the Washington Post and the Wall Street Journal and a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in journalism. She is a former correspondent for PBS's Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly and senior correspondent for investigative reporting and long features at the NPR affiliate in central Illinois. She was also a special correspondent covering faith and values and arts and culture for Chicago Public Radio. Valente contributes articles to US Catholic magazine and National Catholic Reporter. She lives in Normal, Illinois. Learn more at www.judithvalente.com.
Brother Paul Quenon, OCSO, entered the Trappist Abbey of Gethsemani in 1958 at the age of 17. Thomas Merton was his novice master and spiritual director. Quenon is the author of 9 collections of poetry. His memoir, In Praise of the Useless Life, was praised by Sue Monk Kidd, Pico Iyer, and Kathleen Norris.

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TAROT DECODED

Understanding and Using Dignities and Correspondences

By ELIZABETH HAZEL

Red Wheel/Weiser, LLC

Copyright © 2004 Elizabeth Hazel
All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-1-57863-302-9

Contents

List of Illustrations, 
Foreword, 
Chapter 1: Forms of Dignity, 
Chapter 2: Elementary Elements, 
Chapter 3: Elemental Court Cards, 
Chapter 4: Modal Dignities, 
Chapter 5: Numeric Dignities, 
Chapter 6: Planetary Trumps as Free Agents, 
Chapter 7: Elemental Trumps and the Outer Planets, 
Chapter 8: Planetary and Zodiacal Dignities, 
Chapter 9: The Cosmic Axis and Other Spreads, 
Chapter 10: Locational Dignities, 
Chapter 11: Directional Scanning, 
Chapter 12: Demonstrations, 
Appendix A: Golden Dawn Card Attributions, 
Appendix B: Pip Cards by Element, 
Appendix C: Planetary Dignities, 
Appendix D: Zodiacal Dignities, 
Appendix E: Dignities of the Twelve Houses and Four Elements, 
Appendix F: Locational Dignities Horoscope-Form Diagram, 
Bibliography, 
Index, 
About the Author, 

CHAPTER 1

FORMS OF DIGNITY

Dignity is the relationship between cards in a spread, and its analysis is afundamental technique of tarot interpretation. A relationship betweenneighboring cards may be good, neutral, or bad, and it is determined bycomparing attributions, elements, and numeric components and by analyzing forstrength or weakness, assistance or frustration. A card that enjoys friendlyneighbors or is placed in a location suitable to its attributes is in gooddignity, well-placed, or well-dignified, and occasionally may gain the status ofperfect dignity. Cards placed near neighbors that are neither friendly norunfriendly may be considered in neutral dignity. If a card is surrounded byhostile neighbors, it is called ill-dignified, debilitated, in detriment, orbadly placed.

Western occult tradition is built upon the philosophical ideas of the earlyGreeks, who devised a dignity system to judge and classify relationships betweenplanets and zodiac signs. Many of the tarot terms that are used to describedignity, therefore, are borrowed from identical or similar terms in astrology.

There are also forms of dignity specific to the tarot, generated by the numericstructure of the seventy-eight-card deck and the geometric dynamics of thespread form into which the cards are placed. The fifty-six cards of the MinorArcana consist of four suits divided into four sets of Ace through Ten (fortypip cards); four sets of court cards (sixteen cards); and the twenty-two cardsof the Major Arcana, usually numbered O-XXI. The symbolism of tarot art has alsobeen supplemented with attribution systems that usually include astrologicalrelationships, elemental assignments, and alphabet and numeric associations.These attributions form a background that enriches meaning by inferringspecialized relationships between particular cards.

Reversals—cards appearing upside-down in a spread—change the meaning of a card,but the attribution remains the same. In a reversed position, some card meaningsmay become less favorable, while others are improved. Since dignities expressthe nature of card relationships through attributions, a tarotist may viewreversals as a peculiar or muted form of attribution, adapting the improved ordeteriorated implications of a reversed card to the surrounding card dignities.Some tarotists who specialize in analyzing dignities do not use reversals atall, and the demonstrations in this book show all cards in an upright position.

European mystics like Falconnier, Papus, Wirth, Etteilla, and Levi createdseparate and unique sets of attributions to the tarot between 1780 and the late1880s. These early systems are focused mostly on the trump cards. In the 1890s,a group called the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn taught a new group of tarotcorrespondences to their members, and this system is the one associated with theWaite-Smith deck and the Thoth deck. One advantage of the Golden Dawnattribution system is the detailed planetary and zodiacal assignments to the pipand court cards. This system is common to American and British tarotists(although certainly not unanimous), while Europeans often use the Continentalattribution system, particularly with antique tarots like the Tarot deMarseilles. Various modern authors have created further original systems thatare usually unique to a single deck. The Golden Dawn attribution system is usedin this book as the basis for elemental and zodiacal dignity; the complete listof attributions is in appendix A.

TYPES OF DIGNITY

There are several types of dignity that add to the spectrum of advanced forms ofinterpretation.

Elemental dignity is the most frequently mentioned usage and is based onassignments of the four elements, fire, water, air, and earth, to the four suitsand trump cards. Elemental relationships provide basic clues to the interactionsbetween neighboring cards. The elemental trumps—Fool, Hanged Man, Judgment,World—along with Aces and Pages (also called Princesses) have the virtues ofpure elements, while the zodiacal trumps and pip cards share the element oftheir zodiacal attribution. Each level of status of the court cards (King,Queen, Knight, and Page or Princess)is also attributed to an element. Only theplanetary trumps are free of elemental association, but they do experienceaffinities to certain elements. A significator card, the card that representsthe querent in a reading, may be chosen by determining the querent's elementaltraits.

Modal dignity may be conferred by any card with a zodiacal attribution. Modesare the triplicity of the zodiac; that is, the twelve signs are divided intothree modes: cardinal, fixed, and mutable. A preponderance of a single mode in aspread gives emphasis to the specific energy type of that mode. Modes may alsoform sequences that suggest the direction of the energy flow between the cardpositions in a spread.

Shared Status is a specialized form of dignity for court cards, the sixteencards designated by ascending royal titles. Court cards are assigned bothelement and mode. Shared status applies when sets (mode) or sequences (element)of court cards appear in a reading. For example, a set is a pair of Knights in alayout, and a small sequence the King and Queen of a single suit.

Numeric dignity occurs when sets and sequences appear in a spread. This form ofanalysis is specific to card reading and draws upon rules from poker and rummy,where points (or tricks) are dependent on matching number or suit groups. A setincreases the influence of the numeric vibration, and one may use numerology orthe rules of cartomancy (divining with playing cards) to interpret these groups.Sequences are comparable to a straight in poker—for example, Five, Six, Seven(regardless of suit). Sequences suggest a progression, or a process ofdevelopment or deterioration that is occurring in the layout. Sets and sequencesin tarot are more generalized than in card games—trumps and pips may be blendedin sets; and cards of various suits may form numeric sequences. Cards may alsoshare numeric dignity by being in a spread position of the same number, a formof dignity more properly belonging to the next category.

Locational dignity is related to an astrological concept called "accidentaldignity," but is actually specific to tarot reading. It occurs when a cardoccupies a position in the spread that assists or undermines its...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: WEISER BOOKS
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2004
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 1578633028
• ISBN 13: 9781578633029
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 224
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: Nicht verfügbar