Turning Things Around: The Inner Tarot Revolution Week 17

Up, up, and away!

What a cool week for this series! I’ve certainly been looking forward to it, and those who have followed my exploits since Hermekate will see why in short order. My absolute favorite tarot card makes an appearance (yes, I have replaced the Tower with a new favorite card, and the card in question will shock anyone familiar with my reverence for the Tower because it kind of has the opposite meaning).

If I had to sum this week’s theme up in one word, it might be “convergence.” Three major themes in my posting activity this week have been thresholds, clearing, and the idea of many “plot threads” or streams of meaning that are coming together lately. This week’s set of cards in Inner Tarot Revolution carries this theme on: In the co-appearance of these two cards I can perceive the entire “symbolic DNA” of Dark Twins, Hermekate, and everything I am here on Earth to do. I’m not even remotely kidding. I love the way this has all fallen into place, because one of this week’s cards is so central to Hermekate that last year about this time, I was trying desperately to rein in the very same forces that are now synchronizing very nicely, writing grasping, meandering posts about the connections between Hermekate and Atu VII: The Chariot that I knew were applicable, but didn’t fully understand. I still don’t, and I have considerable study and meditation to do before my understanding will be complete; that being said, my current understanding is complete enough that I can see the basic contour of it all.

I have so much to say about one of these cards and such a simple, basic approach to the other one that this week, instead of a lengthy intro section, I’m going to launch right into the cards.

Top/Sun Card

Pow-pow-Power Wheels: Now you’re drivin’ for real!

You bet your ass this card showed up in my Sun Stack! My closer friends who read this will probably be laughing, maybe lovingly rolling their eyes right about now like, “HERE we go…” because in the past, I’ve been almost obnoxious about how deeply I connect with this card, and also how I connect the card with Hermekate. As one of a handful of Major Arcana cards corresponding with Paths on the Qabalistic Tree of Life that cross Da’ath, the Abyss, this card is extremely dense with many layers of meaning, which only makes sense if you think about what those cards and their positions on the Tree of Life are symbolizing metaphysically and/or philosophically: The entire phenomenal world, meaning not only everything in all of physical existence but also, insofar as such things do in fact exist in and of themselves, more abstract things like spirits, gods and goddesses, feelings, symbols, and ideas, is considered to be limited and boundaried. On the Tree of Life, all of that corresponds with the bottom 7 Sephiroth. In terms of Platonic philosophy, those 7 Sephiroth, or 7 “planes of existence,” which is another way of thinking of the same thing, are a way of dividing up the World of Becoming. The top three Sephiroth, above the Abyss, comprise the Platonic World of Being and are so close to the root essence of all things that, realistically, differentiating them from one another at all is a difficult thing to do while comprehending the situation accurately; and, as might be expected, much the same is true for all of the cards and Paths that cross the Abyss: They’re each focused on a particular “segment” of the Tree of Life, but each is looking at it from a different angle, comprehending an entirely unique aspect of the Abyss itself.

And each one, by itself, expresses very deep Mysteries; without question, the deepest.

The various personal associations I have with this card run through my entire spiritual path, weaving the parts of my life together, and they come full circle as they do so. As such, it’s hard to decide where to begin my explorations of Atu VII: The Chariot. I think I’ll start with Hermekate, because the most interesting thing to me about the whole story is how the initial associations were made so quickly and intuitively as to almost seem foolish, flippant, and childishly simplistic; and yet, as I studied more and followed all the threads, my findings only reinforced and vindicated the deeper meaning and the rightness of the connections I had made.

It all really started when, while living with The Priestess, I had been reading Gordon White’s The Chaos Protocols (the method he described for charging sigils is now my go-to, and was used in the early Hermekate workings); there’s a section covering syncretism and compound deities, discussing the history of Hermanubis, and later that day while reflecting on the ideas, the name “Hermekate” flashed into my mind. I thought it was a flight of fancy on my part and nothing more, although from the very first time it flashed into my mind, I also began associating it with the concept of Hieros Gamos, which has always been an interest of mine; if you know about Rose and her role in my life as an anima figure and/or spirit guide who also said she would incarnate to be with me, you might understand why a concept like “sacred marriage” would interest me. From Rose’s angle, it has always been central to my work here in many ways.

Still, I treated it all as something I was making up, an idea I was playing with, a creative work. And I’m still not saying it wasn’t that also. But let’s keep going, shall we?

Out of curiosity, I did look the word “Hermekate” up, and I found several links of possible relevance, though the one I have focused on the most is this post at the blog Singing for Her; evidently the name appeared once in the Greek Magical Papyri, and a lot of my initial ideas surrounding Hermekate were influenced by Neheti’s thoughts here. Anyway, the association of the name Hermekate with the Chariot card is not, in fact, as simple as the fact that the purpose of the spell is for a chariot race to go in favor of the magus. I resisted that association at first. I’ve had a few moments in my life when I had to put a book down to keep from having a heart attack, and one of them was when I read Lon Milo DuQuette’s coverage on this card in his book Understanding Aleister Crowley’s Thoth Tarot. Why? Because not only did it remind me of my Self-Initiatory working which resulted in the VSigil, (see Ten Years Gone) but parts of the chapter rendered this card much more applicable to my understanding of Hermekate and Hieros Gamos than the more superficial connection via the PGM spell’s objective of winning a literal chariot race. The way it all fit together was a whole new kind of mindfuck at the time, of a sort that I’ve since grown much more accustomed to, and it left my mind racing for days after I first read the chapter about the card.

See, I wrote in a recent post, Cornerstones, that my decision to replace the original Hermekate logo with the VSigil was mostly a matter of “legal CYA,” and that’s not wrong, but it’s also not the whole story. It explains why I decided to discard a symbol I had been perfectly content with otherwise, sure, but from there, I could have used (or created) any other sigil or symbol, and my reasons for choosing the VSigil run deep, and they run through the Chariot.

We all connect with some tarot cards more readily than others and we all have our favorites, right? Well, back in Norway, when I was first doing B.O.T.A. tarot practice, I remember the Chariot being one of my favorite cards and one that left the strongest impression on me (and so I pulled out my B.O.T.A. lessons to refer to this week), to such an extent that its ideas were pretty influential in the Self-Initiation ceremony in Leirfjorden.

And of course they would be; Why? Because among the Chariot’s strongest symbolic meanings is its connection with Merkabah mysticism, which forms the backbone of the Golden Dawn work I had been doing for months. I don’t like to use the term because what the Golden Dawn is doing is related, but not equivalent to, actual Merkabah mysticism, and I don’t want to appropriate the cultural form; however, the concept itself is a deep esoteric one that shows up in many esoteric traditions all over the world: The “Chariot” is, in the simplest way of putting it, the “vehicle” for the soul, most especially in the afterlife. Remember, we’re situated in the Abyss? The Chariot is the “vehicle” that keeps the Self from dissolving in that dark sea I was writing about in the post Ground.

And why would that work in particular interest me? My recent posts have been referencing the work I’m here to do and the role my spirit guides have played in helping me understand it and carry it out; in When They Talk Back, I talked about Ilyas and how his name (as he dictated it to me) is the English transliteration of the Arabic version of the prophet known better by English-speaking people as “Elijah” or “Elias.” That’s relevant because of the connections Elijah has back to this card.

In the Thoth version of this card, the Chariot in question is none other than the thing being described in the story of Ezekiel’s vision, which loyal readers will know comes up as an important theme in my seemingly-separate work with Zelda (see The World Is Yours). There’s fairly wide consensus among Western occultists that Ezekiel’s wheel, the better-known story of Enoch being transformed into the archangel Metatron and sent to heaven, and the lesser-known story of Elijah’s ascending to heaven in a fiery chariot, are all separate descriptions of the same phenomenon: Merkabah mysticism.

To put it simply, it’s the building of the “body of light” that allows us to remain conscious between lifetimes and thus travel the universe as an immortal.

That body is, essentially, the Chariot (at least on one level of understanding the card). As I wrote in When They Talk Back, Ilyas told me I chose willingly to incarnate here and now in order to do work that is “uniquely attainable” in this time and place; the work I am doing with Breath of the Wild (see the entire Gogo’s World of Ruin tag) certainly qualifies and it resonates powerfully here, because the Thoth version of this card has not two, but four beasts pulling its chariot, and they are none other than the Four Living Creatures, which correspond directly with the Divine Beasts in the game, even down to their function: Each Divine Beast is a mobile temple/assault vehicle; a war chariot! And what have I been doing lately? Connecting the game with real-world systems of Initiatory occultism that hold the objective of “building the chariot” in common. It all really does fit together so well it squeaks, doesn’t it?

As a matter of fact, I have an entire post, The Royal Road, that basically explains how Breath of the Wild and my understanding of the Chariot come together. Coolest of all: That post features the memory in which Zelda tells Link how she’s going to climb Mount Lanayru on her 17th birthday, and this is the 17th post in this series; what’s more, this card in particular expresses the phase of alchemy that this entire series is meant to help along: The Union of Opposites, involving Shadow integration. The symbolic representation of this in the game is the relationship between Link and Zelda; they are the “bride and groom” of the Hieros Gamos in the Zelda mythos. In Breath of the Wild, they spend most of the game apart, coming together at the end to face Calamity Ganon together. Incidentally, this also answers the question I once asked myself of, “Why ‘Hermekate?’ Why is such a figure necessary when we already have ‘Hermaphrodite’ to express androgyny?” And the answer I’ve come up with is that Hekate represents the liminal and darker aspects of our psyche, such that the union of Hekate and Hermes particularly expresses Shadow work.

In the card itself, the chariot car, the armor worn by the central figure, the knight-king, and the crab atop the knight’s head all represent the same thing: That “spiritual armor” that maintains the integrity of our soul on its long journey. The crab also signifies the rulership of this card by the sign of Cancer, which has all sorts of its own deep ties to the building of the light body and the immortality of the soul. This meaning of the sign of Cancer (ruled by the Moon) also ties to the Egyptian god Khepri, which is why Crowley uses a scarab as the bearer of the sun below the threshold of the waters in the Thoth version of the Moon card. As such, via this rulership, the Chariot has deep ties to Atu XVIII: The Moon, which was also built intentionally into the symbolism of the VSigil (see? This all really does fit together). The Moon rules Atu II: The Priestess, which is interesting considering how the subjects covered in the entry of this series dealing with The Priestess all end up tying back to this week’s work and to this card again; and while that’s true for me personally, a reminder that the more universal themes of the cards overlap with one another in parallel ways. Again, both cards cross the Abyss.

The Lovers, another card crossing the Abyss, came up a few weeks back and it has an interesting relationship with the Chariot. Since the Chariot follows the Lovers, the two are natural opposites and ironically, while people tend to associate the Lovers with romance, suggesting union, its correspondence with the sign of Gemini and the Hebrew letter Zain, “sword,” both highlight how the card is actually depicting the stage of separation. By contrast, the letter associated with the Chariot, Cheth, means “fence” or “enclosure,” and it is in fact the Chariot which signifies the actual coming together or union of these opposites.

It all gets far more literal than it seems, since this card corresponds with a sex magic(k) operation (which does tie it in another way to the VSigil since sex magic(k) was employed in its creation and is implied in its symbolism, which even pictographically illustrates the union of opposites):

The Hebrew letter associated with the Chariot is Cheth, which, when spelled in full, enumerates to 418, the same number as ABRAHADABRA, the magical word that expresses the formula of the marriage of the microcosm with the macrocosm (or the aspirant to his or her Holy Guardian Angel). This word (with a slight Lady Harris typo) can be seen embroidered in the canopy of The Chariot. ABRAHADABRA is also indicative of the uniting of male and female that we see expressed in other trumps as alchemical images such as the red/white lion and white/red eagle.
The Chariot represents the zodiac sign of Cancer, whose symbol is a not-too-subtle glyph for a particular technique of tantric yoga in which male and female energies and essences are perfectly prepared, balanced, and exchanged to create the Two-in-One elixir of life. The elixir is then conveyed in a particular manner to serve as a eucharistic talisman of unlimited creative potential.

Understanding Aleister Crowley’s Thoth Tarot, p. 116

For those who missed it:

69.

Nice.

But anyway, yeah; my associations seemed like fleeting intuitions to me when I first made them, but the connections between my Self-Initiatory working in Norway, the VSigil it produced, the word Hermekate as I understand it, the Chariot card, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and the Self-Initiatory work I’m doing in-game are all connected at deep levels of esoteric meaning.

All of the above details were, at one time, the basic “skeleton” of my case for asserting that Hermekate might be my Word, in the sense that Xeper was Michael Aquino’s Word, Indulgence was Anton LaVey’s Word, Runa was Stephen Flower’s Word, and Thelema was Aleister Crowley’s Word.

I still think it probably applies, but just don’t really care that much anymore what anyone else thinks.

Incidentally, the planet Jupiter is exalted in Cancer; the big whirling disk being carried here by the rider in the Chariot is, in fact, the Holy Grail, which in this depiction is said to be carved of amethyst, and these are all symbols and attributions of the Grade of Magus as described by Don Webb in the book Overthrowing The Old Gods. I regard myself as the Magus of the Word Hermekate, which in turn heralds the Song.

I ride in my Chariot all. Day. Long.

Given the specific Path it occupies on the Tree of Life, the Chariot embodies a unique convergence of energies. It rests entirely on the Pillar of Severity, the highest Path on that Pillar, and links Geburah, the martial (Mars-based) energies of destruction, with Binah, the Saturnian energies of the Great Mother. I feel strong feminine energy here; the rider bears the Holy Grail, and Geburah’s redness is associated among other things with the blood of menses; Binah’s blackness is the darkness of the watery womb from which all are born. The “red and black” of Geburah and Binah are also the “red and black” of Minora which I’ve written about recently. They are the red and black so often associated with the Left Hand Path, with Satanism and related currents. Geburah is Durga, fierce and conquering, bearing many mighty weapons and riding upon her lion; Binah is Kali, Great Mother of lolling tongue who births all and consumes all, through whom everyone enters and leaves this world. Between the two, bearing and expressing the energies of each, is the Chariot; the knight riding the Chariot and bearing the Grail is a servant and soldier of the Goddess. This resonates so strongly with me and my relationship with Hekate as expressed in the poem Luna Mater. However, since the Sephirah of Chesed technically stands between Binah and Geburah in terms of order of emanation, it follows that the Chariot sort of “hops over” Chesed and thus picks up its Jupiterian influence.

Shadow Card

Under the sea…

What an interesting little card, and what a cool card to pair up with the Chariot, especially (but not solely) in terms of personal associations! As I mentioned above, I don’t have a ton to say about this card, but it does nonetheless hold a special place in the deck for certain reasons.

Again, the Court Cards are usually said in a tarot reading to represent specific people, or people with certain characteristics, and that’s where I tend to get into trouble trying to interpret them; I typically end up going a bit more abstract instead. The type of person this card is said to describe makes sense and aligns well with this card’s placement in my Shadow stack. The Princesses in the Thoth deck represent the Earth aspect of their respective elements, so the Princess of Cups is the Earthy aspect of the element of Water. According to The Book of Thoth:

The character of the Princess is infinitely gracious. All sweetness, all voluptuousness, gentleness, kindness and tenderness are in her character. She lives in the world of Romance, in the perpetual dream of rapture.

p. 159

That’s so not me.

I’ll lay out an interesting pattern, though:

I do remember, when I first began studying this deck, which was right after I had left my first wife, I had come to associate this card with her for some reason, even though I wouldn’t anymore.

Soon after that, my second wife, The Priestess, would tell me that she always felt this card’s appearance (it was actually a traditional deck, so it would have been this card’s traditional counterpart, the Page of Cups) in a reading at the Bristol Ren Faire shortly before we got together was a sign telling her about me.

And the Page of Cups is also one of Veronica’s absolute favorite cards. She calls it “Fish Cup” because the Colman version shows a kid with a fish in a little cup. That card, and the undersea symbolism of this card, resonates strongly with Veronica, who is a Pisces and who is very drawn to aquatic motifs; in fact, in recent months, symbols and synchronicities involving the ocean have very often felt to me as though they were pointing toward her.

What do all of those people have in common?

Rose.

I know Rose is a wind spirit, and wind is neither water nor earth; nonetheless, the character description does very much fit Rose.

This card goes well as a counterpart to the Chariot because, according to DuQuette:

I cannot overemphasize the importance of the relationship between the ace of each suit and its Princess. The ace may be beautiful to look at, but, because it is the root—the hidden germ—of its suit and element, it is impossible to understand. The Princess, on the other hand, represents the end product, the crystallization and materialization of what was purely potential in the ace. In the language of religion, the ace may be worshipped, but the Princess can be adored.
p. 188

This relationship between the ace and Princess of a given suit is relevant because again, the Holy Grail being borne by the rider of the Chariot is in fact the Ace of Cups itself; thus, the Princess of Cups is the most material embodiment, the “Throne,” of the Grail that is borne by the Chariot’s rider. These two cards go together like peas and carrots!

Furthermore, I have already in many places made the association between Veronica and the Wheel of Fortune card; this Grail also symbolizes the Wheel of Fortune and the Goddess Fortuna, both symbols speaking to me of Veronica. Perhaps that Grail could be said to represent V’s Holy Guardian Angel? Now, if Ilyas is my Holy Guardian Angel, and he’s also associated with the Chariot card as described above, and, as Rose claimed, she really did incarnate to be with me, then maybe I am the rider in the Chariot card; and if the rider is bearing the Grail, and the Grail represents Rose, then in this string of association, the Princess of Cups, the ace’s Throne, could stand in for Rose’s physical representative in the flesh…

…no?

That’s one hell of a Hieros Gamos scenario. At any rate, I have a lot of studying and reflection to do; it was every bit as rewarding writing this post and revealing this all as I thought it would be, and I learned a thing or two in the process of writing it, as well; however, the leads I’ve uncovered come with far more questions.

More will be revealed.