Oztological Addenda

Tarot part 1

According to Blavatsky Jewish Ebionites are forbidden any practices of Magic, Spiritism, Astrology, Sorcery etc. They are to be recusive as a people and as Nazirites to be actively recusive as individuals. Keeping 613 injunctions makes them very recusive and thus recursive to themselves and others. Since any real or fake magical activity would cause recursive displacement then the use of such magic would cause recursive displacement to themselves. Bummer.

Gentile Ebionites on the other hand, keep only ten injunctions. Thus they are far less recusive. So they may, in addition to Recusion as Nazirites, also practice sorcery which is the specific opposite of magic.

As defined by Blavatsky, this sort of sorcery is the practice of reading meaning from chance. The fall of dice or coins in geomancy, the alignment of the planets in astrology, the draw of cards in the tarot.

Jung proposed the notion of synchronicity to explain the curious accuracy of the I Ching. That everything that happens at the same time affects everything else that happens at the same time. An all over field effect.

Blavatsky would specifically disagree. She explained the sorcerial relationship as the opposite of apparent causality. As the specific absence of apparent causality therefore especially causative of knowledge.

Apparent Causality defines from Black to White and acts from White to Black. Which is the response to activity with structured actions producing probabilistic effects. If we are no more, or less, than careening rocks in space generated by a Quantum Singularity then of course all the sorcery stuff is utter bumf. On the other hand...

The specific absence of Apparent Causality - sorcery - defines from White to Black and acts from Black to White. Which is definition proceeding from the underlying structure in the definition of the cards to the random fall of the cards producing meaning. If we are coagulations of Recursion then the sorcery stuff should work just fine. 

If entities are defined that reflect the specific absence of the structure of existence and then chosen at random, the random choice will be meaningful to the chooser. But it must be totally at random and a complete, but not more than complete, reflection of the structure of existence.

If the position of the planets had any actual effect on peoples lives, astrology would not work. If the relationships of astrology are less than accurate to the underlying pattern of existence, astrology would work less well. Ptolemy's relationships being partially wrong means traditional astrology would be only sort of useful.

The underlying pattern of the I Ching being only partial to existence means it would be accurate but limited.

The pattern of the Tarot being precise to existence means it would work very well indeed. If the querier knows the meanings of the cards and the reasons for the meanings. Less knowledge - less accuracy.

Also, if four cards are used in a spread, four different decks must be used so that any card can occur in any position. If one deck is used the results will be less accurate.

The 22 cards of the major trumps of the Tarot are each representative of a letter of the 22 letter Alephbet. But if they were in the order of the Alephbet they would have a degree of recusive causality. They would have to be in no order that defines a meaningful structure. On the other hand they would also have to not be in a random order either or they would define chaos. The order would have to be regular and balanced without being meaningful. Quite a trick.

Their order is defined by taking the letters around the circle of the Alephbet, giving one half of the circle a twist to make a figure eight and then folding the figure eight back on itself to make a double circle. Then reading the order starting from E in the east and zigzagging back and forth from bottom to top to bottom of the double circle as below.

This order is entirely regular but also entirely without meaning, thus no causative meaning is defined to interfere with the required randomness.

The fit of the traditional meanings of the cards to this umfustulation of the Alephbet is precise so it is obviously original. On the other hand this is not the sort of thing that is in the least bit obvious, so this also suggests that Blavatsky got her info from someplace real. Maybe even real Ebionites.

Thus the order of the major trumps is

1 E  2 Ba  3 Loo  4 Ri  5 Ze  6 We  7 I  8 Mee  9 Hho

10 Gee  11 Tho  12 Da  13 O  14 Si  15 To  16 Koo

17 Nee  18 Sho  19 A  20 Pa  -- Qoo  21 Tsa

Where the "Q" is not numbered. I'll begin at the beginning and explain each letter in detail, and when I come to the end I'll stop.