From: arrakis@cs.ucr.edu (gary shook)
Newsgroups: alt.pagan
Subject: Fool (Was: Blank Rune/Card)
Date: 3 Mar 1995 08:38:51 GMT

Esoteric symbology of the Rider-Waite Tarot - Part 1
By Gary Shook

   Esoteric means hidden or secret knowledge.  When it is applied to
the Tarot it refers to the symbology that has been woven into the
images by the decks creators.  The focus of this article is the hidden
symbology of Dr. Arthur Edward Waite.

   Dr. Waite was a true scholar of the occult who painstakingly
researched and wrote several texts including The key to the Tarot and
The Holy Kabbalah.  Waite based his symbolic system on this research.
Waite was a member of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. This was
an English Rosicrucian society that was formed in 1888.

   Under the supervision of Dr. Waite the deck was created by Miss
Pamela Colman Smith. Miss Smith was an American and a fellow member of
the Golden Dawn.

   It is far beyond the scope of this article to cover all of the
hidden symbology of the Rider-Waite deck.  In each issue I will cover
a small portion of the key elements in the major arcana to try and
give a representitive overview. What this esoteric symbology means is
best stated in Dr. Waite's own words: "The true Tarot is symbolism; it
speaks no other language and offers no other signs. 

Given the inward meaning of its emblems, they do become a kind of
alphabet which is capabble of indefinite combinations and makes true
sense in all. On the highest plane it offers a key to the Mysteries,
in a manner which is not arbitrary and has not been read in. But the
wrong symbolical stories have been told concerning it, and the wrong
history has been given in every published work which so far has dealt
with the subject. 

The Tarot embodies symbolical presentations of universal ideas. Behind
which lie all the implicits of the human mind, and it is in this sense
that they contain secret doctrine, which is the realization by the few
truths embedded in the consciousness of all, though they have not
passed into express recognition by ordinary men. The theory is that
this doctrine has always existed-that is to say, has been excogiated
in the consciousness of an elect minority; that it has been
perpetuated in secrecy from one to another and has been recorded in
secret literatures, like those of Alchemy and Kabbalism; and behind
the Secret Doctrine it is held that there is an experience or practice
by which the Doctrine is justified."

  Waite speaks of a "Secret Doctrine" and "Mystery".  In the most
simplified terms this mystery is that of mans fall from the divine
state of existance to that of the physical, mortal man and his
reassention back to the state of the spirit.  Each card is a stage of
that journey.  One of the main themes that we find along this journey
is that of dualism, female-male, good-evil, yin-yang, positive-
negative, light-dark, etc. Man's movement is from a spiritual,
integrated oneness that contains both aspects of the opposites, down
through a separation of the duality on the material plane. Then the
progress is one of reintegration and the return to the spiritual body.

The Fool

   The Fool, card 0, is both the first and last of the major
arcana. It is the starting point of the circular wheel of events that
is man's Tarot journey as well as his final goal. The Fool and the
Magician are the same being, with a very important difference. The
Fool combines both polar opposites of duality and does so on the
astral or spiritual level. The Fool has reached the level of Godhood
but is not yet a God.  What still seperates him from that final goal
is the attraction of the journey itself, the fall back to mortality.
This is represented by the cliff the Fool is approaching. This is the
edge of the abyss, the abyss of the material plane. He blindly walks
toward the fall of the spirit into the material and the start of the
cycle yet again.

  There are several symbols that represent the Fools spiritual
attainment. Among them are the twelve zodiacal stars that make up his
belt. Another is the single white rose he carries. It is, in essence,
a symbol of completion, consummate achievement and perfection. And,
finally the Masonic All-Seeing Eye on his wallet is akin to the
Egyptian Eye of Horus, enlightened vision trancending the material
plane and opening into the light of eternity.

Magician

   As stated before the Magician and the Fool are the same being. In
both cases the being contains both elements of the duality. The
difference between the two is the Fool is pure spirit and the Magician
is the spirit decended into matter.  The Fool has stepped off the edge
and once again fallen into the world of matter, into the form of the
Magician. In the Waite Tarot the Fool-Magician is
Hermes-Mercury-Thoth.

   The Magician is one of the richest cards in the Tarot for hidden
symbolism.  The spirit decended is symbolized several ways. First is
the most obvious, the wand of transformation that the Magician holds
above his head. The symbology most people identify this with is 'As
above, so below'.  They connect this meaning with the working of
magick, in that true magick is first manifested in the astral plane,
then repeated for the desired affect here on the material.  This is a
valid interpretation, but there is a deeper esoteric meaning as well.
The real meaning is the statement that the Fool and Magician are one,
or what was above is now below. The wand the Magician holds aloft is
in itself a blind.  It is not the true staff of transformation, that
is within the Magician himself.  The wand decends from the lemniscate
above his head down the path of the spine.  When I say it is a blind
what I mean is the message for the general audience is the 'As above,
so below' is an external thing, but for the initiate of the hidden
knowledge it is contained within the Magician himself.

Hope this helps!
BB
Gary Shook