Trailer for the film Aleister Crowley In Search Of The Great Beast .
Aleister Crowley
The Mystery of Tarot Cards
Since ancient times, many people have utilized the Tarot for divination, fortune telling, and metaphysical applications of all sorts. The practitioners of the mystical have used the Tarot as a metaphysical toolbox with various uses.
For some individuals, who are only “lightly” into the more superficial practices of the occult, the Tarot is treated almost like a game. Gatherings of these pseudo occult enthusiasts may gather on weekends and “deal the tarot” in places and settings as innocuous as coffee shops and slumber parties. This is, it would seem, what the Tarot means to many high school age girls and certain hipster twenty-something’s.
Other individuals, who have invested more of their spiritual time and energy into the occult and the practice of metaphysics use the Tarot as a tool for reflections into one’s personal and “inner life” as well as an aid for meditation and contemplation. When used in the former respect, the Tarot serves as the diviner’s symbolic language structure for communicating with the invisible intelligence(s) on the metaphysical plane. When utilized in the latter respect, the Tarot’s symbolism is utilized in less direct ways, instead lending it’s symbolism to abstract thought processes and as a catalyst for the state of mind sought after by those who have experienced the transcendental mind states of self induced hypnotic and meditative trance.
If you would like to learn more about the Tarot and what it has meant to many different cultures, religions and pseudo religions, you should look into Aleister Crowley’s Thoth Tarot literature, as they present a lucid yet metaphysical introduction into the spiritual world that is explored and manipulated using the Tarot card deck as the catalyst or gateway. There are also numerous websites on the internet that go into greater detail into the explanation and description of the workings of the Tarot system.
Tarot as the Book of Thoth: The Power and Fascination With Ancient Egypt
Back in the late 1700s, a Freemason by the name of Court de Gebelin was shown for the first time a tarot pack. He studied the cards and a revelation hit him: they were living remnants of ancient Egyptian religion. He was so convinced of his intuition that he wrote an entire treatise on the Tarot and its Egyptian origins (1). He did not offer much in terms of evidence to uphold his conviction, but we must keep in mind that he was writing at a time when the so-called ‘scientific method’ was not part of the humanistic tradition. A friend of his, the Count of Mellet, wrote a supporting essay that went even further by claiming that Tarot was the surviving “book of Thoth” that contained divine Egyptian revelations (2). Gebelin and Mellet’s work gave birth to an entire esoteric tradition that maintained the Egyptian origin of the play pack. Following this tradition, a French cartomancer named Eteilla became famous by expanding on the Egyptian Tarot, and later in the 19th century, the physician Papus affirmed that the Tarot was the “Bible of Bibles”, the book of Hermes Trismegistus, kept alive by the Gypsies (3). It was only at the beginning of the 20th century, in the authoritative work of A.E.Waite, Pictorial Key to the Tarot that he remonstrated those that believed that the pack could have possibly originated from Egypt (4). However, remnants of the old esoteric belief can still be found in Aleister Crowley’s Book of Thoth tarot pack and modern tarot creations like the Ancient Egyptian Tarot (5, 6).
Waite’s deconstructionism was based on a rising modern concern with recorded history. In this sense, he was correct: apparently, the first tarot packs in a recognizable form rose in Italy in the 1400s, before spreading far and wide across Europe (7). In the 1600 and 1700s the tarot game was at its peak, being played in many intellectual salons throughout the continent (8). There is little evidence that any mystical or esoteric meaning was associated to the Tarot prior to Gebelin’s revelation: apparently it was only in the early 1700s that symbolism began to be associated with it (9). What is certain is that, after Gebelin and Mallet’s “manifestos”, Tarot became less and less of a game and more and more of an instrument of divination, meditation or esoteric philosophy, as it remains until today. You can hardly hear of anyone actually playing the Tarot, even though except for the 22 trumps, the others are very similar to the normal playing cards.
Leaving prosaic history aside, why did the two Frenchmen choose Egypt as the origin of Tarot? Some people point out, rightfully I would say, that “Egyptian Tarot” was the offspring of an Egyptomania craze in the 1700s (10) which culminated with Napoleon’s invasion of Egypt in 1799 and Champollion’s deciphering of the Rosetta Stone. Needless to say, Egyptomania is still with us today, witness Stargate, The Mummy trilogy, Indiana Jones or the Discovery Channel’s fascination with Tutankhamen. Perhaps Egyptomania makes me write this article today.
However, the Egyptian roots of Tarot cannot simply be attributed to a 1700 folly. Gebelin himself was the heir of a long Western esoteric tradition that traced its legacy to Egypt, Thoth / Hermes Trismegistus and the Corpus Hermeticum. By placing Tarot into Egyptian tradition, Gebelin was only trying to contribute to the long and laborious work of restoration that Renaissance scholars committed themselves to. They firmly believed that sometime in the past all religion had been one and the same, and they were in search of this ancient theological truth. A key piece of the puzzle was contained in Egyptian hieroglyphs, which were seen as hiding the most powerful mysteries of all, those that could not be betrayed in ordinary words.
Thus, Tarot more likely belongs to the ‘Hieroglyphomania’ that characterized Renaissance scholars. Yet if some books were written to convey the hidden message of the hieroglyphs (see for instance Athanasius Kircher’s outstanding Hieroglyphica), it was more customary in the period to imitate the hieroglyphs by creating similar mysterious images (11). Thus, an entire art of emblems, painting, statues portraying enigmatic figures arose. Enigmatic images were particularly pervasive in alchemical literature and emblem books. It was in this hieroglyph-crazed environment that the Italian Tarot was either born or grew. Thus it is possible that, whether or not the original Tarot consciously hid esoteric meaning, its roots may have harkened back to a fascination for Egypt. It is furthermore possible that Court de Gebelin, glancing at the enigmatic Tarot images, may have made an intuitive connection between these and the ‘hieroglyphic’ emblems of the 1500s and 1600s centuries.
Therefore, one may conclude that even though the Tarot may not come from Egypt in a historical sense, in the esoteric imagination, it did. The survival of the esoteric Tarot practice is in this sense a proof that recorded history is not as powerful as human imagination.
The Thoth Tarot Deck
The Thoth Tarot Deck was a tarot deck developed by the English occultist Aleister Crowley and illustrated on his instructions by Lady Frieda Harris. Aleister Crowley called the Thoth tarot deck, the book of Thoth and claimed that the deck reflected the wisdom of the ancient Egyptian book of Thoth. The tarot card descriptions found on the Thoth Tarot deck are different in symbolism and imagery compared to other standard tarot card decks.
Thoth is considered one of the most important deities of the ancient Egyptian pantheon. He is known as the God with the head of an ibis. He is the heart and tongue of the all-powerful Egyptian Sun God Ra. He translated the will of Ra into speech and is the divine communicator of Egyptian mythology. He was the scribe of the Gods and was called the God of Writing. The book of Thoth is used for divination through tarot cards. The tarot card descriptions on the Thoth deck are reflections of the great knowledge of the ancient Egyptians.
A cult of Thoth grew during the last years of the Egyptian civilization who claimed to predict the future through occult divination. Aleister Crowley claims that the Thoth tarot deck developed by him was based on the tarot card descriptions followed by the cult of Thoth. He developed the deck between 1938 and 1943. He commissioned Lady Frieda Harris to illustrate the deck based on his visions and based on the ancient Egyptian book of Thoth papyrus by Jasnow and Zauzich. It took five years to develop the deck because Crowley wanted the images to reflect different disciplines including science and philosophy.
The tarot card descriptions in the Crowley Thoth tarot deck are different from the Rider Waite and other standard tarot card decks. The Major Arcana or trump cards are 21 in number and consist of the fool, the Magician or Magus, the high Priestess, the Emperor, the Empress, the Hierophant, the lovers, the chariot, Adjustment, the hermit, the wheel of fortune, lust, the hanged man, death, art, devil, tower, star, moon, sun, aeon and the universe. Court cards in the Thoth minor Arcana deck are the prince, the princess, queen and the knight. While the suite of cups, disks, swords and wands remain the same, they are illustrated with an Egyptian hieroglyphic style. The pips of the minor Arcana in the Thoth deck relate to the signs of the zodiac with the aces depicting the root of the element they represent. Each pip card in each suite has an attribute.
The wand suite relates to the fire signs of the zodiac. The ace represents the root of the fire element 2 dominions, 3 virtues, 4 completion, 5 strife, 6 victory, 7valor, 8 swiftness, 9 strength and 10 oppression.
The cup suite represents the water signs of the zodiac. The ace represents the root of the water element, 2 love,3 abundance, 4 luxury, 5 disappointment, 6 pleasure, 7 debauchery, 8 indolence, 9 happiness and 10 safety.
The sword suite represents the air signs of the zodiac. The ace represents the root of the air element 2 peace, 3 sorrow, 4 truces, 5 defeats, 6 science, 7 futility, 8 interference, 9 cruelty and 10 ruin.
The disks suite represents the earth signs of the zodiac. The ace is the root of the earth element, 2 change, 3 work, 4 power, 5 worry, 6 success, 7 failure, 8 prudence, 9 gain and 10 wealth.
The Thoth tarot deck reflects the tarot card descriptions that formed the visions of Aleister Crowley on a visit to Egypt. Many diviners have found great merit in predicting the future using the Thoth Tarot deck.
CM is a writer for SpiritNow.com. Visit SpiritNow.com today, the online home of America’s Top Psychic, Sylvia Browne. Read Sylvia’s 2009 psychic predictions and the best spirituality content on the Internet on SpiritNow.com.
Tarot, Yoga, and Aleister Crowley
My own psychic abilities were best demonstrated in my practice of the Tarot. Also as regards Tarot, and Yoga, I was mostly influenced by a Tarot and Yoga expert named Aleister Crowley. I sought to purchase every book that I could find by Aleister Crowley on both Tarot and Yoga, and I also joined an Order that taught both Tarot and Yoga in accordance with the Western Tradition of Magick called the Hermetic Society of the Golden Dawn. (Aleister Crowley was once a member of the original version of this Order.) I also became a member of another Order that taught both Tarot and Yoga – Aleister Crowley’s own Magickal Order, the Astrum Argentum, A.A., or Order of the Silver Star. Aleister Crowley’s Order is still in existence today, and still maintains a great amount of secrecy in order to better preserve the heart of the Order’s teachings, especially as regards both Tarot and Yoga. I was also once scheduled to attend a feast and an initiation into the Order of Ordo Templi Orientis, or O.T.O. (Aleister Crowley later became a prominent figure head within this Order. I am not certain if this Order teaches Tarot and/or Yoga.)
In studying the works of Aleister Crowley, I learned a lot about Tarot and Yoga. From Aleister Crowley, I learned the initiated meanings of Tarot Card symbols, astrological symbols, and religious symbols. In Yoga, I learned how to heighten my awareness, focus, and concentration. I learned the art of Tarot par excellence, and how to read Tarot Cards. (I believe that I may have been born with a psychic gift, or I have a bizarre talent with the Tarot. My own personal experiences with the Tarot have remained to this day unexplainable, even to me; I am heavily influenced by Aleister Crowley’s writings on the Tarot. With the Tarot, I prefer to use the Tarot deck designed by Aleister Crowley. I always lay out an accurate Tarot reading, no matter what the object or subject of the Tarot divination is. I can only demonstrate this psychic ability with Tarot Cards – any deck of Tarot Cards, not just the Aleister Crowley deck.
My mother has had a couple of prophetic dreams that she shared with me once. She never practiced neither Yoga nor Tarot. I may have inherited her gift for prophecy. Her gift manifests in the form of a dream, and for me it is always demonstrated in the practice of reading Tarot Cards!
In accordance with Aleister Crowley’s guidelines for study and experimentation I also experimented with pendulum dowsing and obtained remarkably inaccurate results – so astonishingly incorrect as to suggest psychic ability, but at the same time so undependable that I left my studies with pendulum dowsing to pursue my practice with the Tarot.
Reading Tarot Cards takes years to learn how to do correctly because of the complexity of Tarot card symbolism; the individual meanings of each of the seventy-eight Tarot Cards, and the meanings of each of the positions, depending upon which layout method you are utilizing. With Tarot, Yoga, (and even Aleister Crowley), repetition, practice, and experience count for everything! The symbolism of the Tarot is deep and at times quite obscure – mastery also depends, theoretically, on a psychic gift. I can demonstrate extraordinary abilities with the Tarot, and I have done so for more than fifteen years. I want to write a small, practical book on how to learn and practice the Art of Tarot (and even Yoga) correctly, and how to gauge your own progress in a scientific manner! I will then make this book available through Green Planet Fantasy Malls!
Reading Tarot Cards, Yoga, and even Aleister Crowley are things that I know a lot about, and I am very well versed in other religious and mystical studies. Like Aleister Crowley, I do not personally believe in a Devil as some people believe, nor do I understand God to be as personal of a person as people sometimes portray Him, or think about Him. It is the same in Yoga. For the most part, occult practices (including Tarot and Yoga) have more to do with cultivating self-discipline, focus, concentration, self-healing, physical and emotional healing, and later even learning to heal and/or help others. Aleister Crowley outlines numerous exercises in Yoga, breathing, meditation, and Tarot. Also included in the works of Aleister Crowley there are practices of invoking and evoking forces, ritual, prayer, Yoga, working miracles, and Tarot divination. In some of these areas there is perhaps a lot of rubbish as far as writings and teachings go, but there also writings and practices that are gems; teachings and understandings in both Tarot and Yoga that anyone can benefit from. True practice of the occult sciences (including the practices of the Tarot and Yoga) is to initiate you to a path of self-understanding, self acceptance, and self-discipline! As Aleister Crowley pointed out, it is to place yourself onto the Path that eventually leads you to YOU – to Love, Peace, Strength, Honor, and Devotion; the One, True Path (as in Yoga) that brings us closer to ourselves, and to God, and teaches us to be more Christ like! This Path (which includes teachings from both Yoga and the Tarot) is as unique as each individual is, but the method of approach is very much the same for all of us!
At least some people have heard of the infamous Aleister Crowley, and perhaps even the infamous Aleister Crowley Castle. Aleister Crowley was a famous writer (on both Tarot and Yoga) who flourished around the turn of the century. Aleister Crowley was also a world record holder in the sport of mountain climbing, a world class chess player, and a big game hunter. Aleister Crowley traveled the world, wrote books on Yoga and Tarot, studied heavily in the occult sciences, and was often referred to as a genius (especially in Yoga and Tarot) and was once even kicked out of Italy by none other than Mussolini himself. Many know of Aleister Crowley only because he was once hailed to be the wickedest man in the world in the tabloids of the 1940′s!
The Aleister Crowley Castle is not really a castle at all…see my pic at the bottom of this page! Most people who have heard of the infamous Aleister Crowley Castle have heard about it because it is now owned by the famous rock guitar player for Led Zeppelin, Jimmy Page! Though I myself once possessed a rare collection of Aleister Crowley’s works, including his best works on Yoga and the Tarot, Jimmy Page of Led Zeppelin has collected an enormous amount of Aleister Crowley memorabilia. And, yes, he even bought Aleister Crowley’s flat on Loch Ness – the Aleister Crowley Castle! (Aleister Crowley only lived in the Aleister Crowley Castle himself for roughly six months! The Magickal Work, Yoga, and Tarot he practiced there supposedly made the place haunted, and so even Aleister Crowley himself eventually left the flat!!!)
So, what did Aleister Crowley do during his six month stay on Loch Ness? Well, Aleister Crowley obtained a book called “The Book of the Sacred Magic of Abramelin the Mage.” Aside from practicing in Yoga and Tarot, he was, at that time, aspiring to the Magickal Grade of Adeptus Minor. (Yoga and Tarot are both important aspects of this Grade.) Anyway, Aleister Crowley sought out and bought a place to retire for six months (sometimes referred to as a magickal retirement) while he carried out the instructions in the above mentioned book; a six month Ritual of Yoga and Magick in which the goal was to obtain to The Knowledge and Conversation of The Holy Guardian Angel.
I understand a thing or two about this particular Grade Work myself, and, if accomplished correctly, attainment in this Grade means simply that you now understand what God’s True Will is for you. (As I stated already, both Yoga and Tarot are important to this Grade.) In the next Magickal Grade of Work you set out to rearrange your life in accordance with your Divine understanding. Attainment in this Magickal Grade means that you finally understand your strengths and weaknesses in such a way as to know what God’s will is for you; it is like finally understanding who you are, and what your purpose is, especially from the Divine perspective. This is all a rather complicated subject, as Aleister Crowley would agree!
Whether or not Aleister Crowley succeeded in this Work or not was heavily debated within his own circles. But, the flat pictured below is where Aleister Crowley settled down to undertake this Magickal Work. The Aleister Crowley Castle is purportedly haunted as a direct result of Aleister Crowley’s Work there! I suppose we could all ask Jimmy Page of Led Zeppelin if the Aleister Crowley castle is really haunted, assuming he himself has ever been there!
Aleister Crowley, Book of Law & Pop Culture
Lest you think that Aleister Crowley (born Edward Alexander Crowley, 1875-1947) was just some crazy fool that no one took seriously, think again. Crowley has had a large influence upon modern rock music. Guitarist Jimmy Page of Zeppelin is a devout follower of Satanist, Aleister Crowley, who proclaimed himself as “The Beast 666″. Aleister Crowley was also a 33rd Degree Scottish Rite Freemason and 97th Degree Memphis Rite Freemason and is recognized as the master Satanist of the 20th century. In 1971, guitarist Jimmy Page bought Crowleys Boleskine House on the shore of Loch Ness where Crowley practiced his hellish, satanic sex-magick rituals, including human sacrifices. Guitarist Jimmy Page actually performed Crowley magical rituals during their concerts. Their song “Stairway to Heaven” carries the reference “May Queen,” which is purportedly the name of a hideous poem written by Crowley. Page had inscribed in the vinyl of their album Led Zeppelin III, Crowley’s famous “Do what thou wilt. So mete it Be. Page and Robert Plant claim some of Zeppelins’ songs came via occultic “automatic handwriting,” including their popular “Stairway to Heaven.” The cover of the Sergeant Pepper’s album by the Beatles showed a background of, according to Ringo Starr, people “we like and admire” (Hit Parade, Oct. 1976, p.14). Paul mccartney said of Sgt. Pepper’s cover, “. . . we were going to have photos on the wall of all our HEROES . . .” (Musician, Special Collectors Edition, – Beatles and …
Alex Jones and Freeman Discuss Nazi’s, the Occult , Crowley and Qabbalism
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2180440590807407661
Alex Jones and Freeman team up to “Shock and Awe” the mainstream media. A film crew from the Discovery Channel got more than they had intended as Alex and Freeman tag teamed the crew about the reality of “outrageous conspiracy theories”, high profile occult rituals, and the true nature of the world’s elite and their dirty deeds
Link: Alex Jones and Freeman discuss Nazi’s, the occult , Crowley and Qabbalism
