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Topic: alchemy for beginners (Read 1064 times)
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David
Newbie
Posts: 14
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Thanks, Csaba I've bookmarked the website for Kabbalah info and will spend some time, when I can find an extra hour or so, to peruse the extensive list of reading material. I agree there are only so many hours in the day and we live different lives. Am going to work in my garden and will listen to Wald on my iPod. So take care, David  |
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Csaba
Newbie
Posts: 7
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Hi David, The first book I picked to get a better understanding of the Kabbalah was Will Parfitt's Complete Guide to the Kabbalah which also reversed the left and the right side. But as I came upon Gershom Sholem's quite scholarly Kabbalah, I found nothing in it on the pillars and was surprised. Then for a year or so I have clicked on the Bnei Baruch World Center's http://www.kabbalah.info/ a couple of times and got lost in its vast and fascinating material, but from a few video lectures I could clearly see that the line of Rav Michael Laitman, probably followed by all the articles and recordings in the website, distances itself from the history of human wisdom, concretely mentioning Tarot, meditation, religion just to name a few. I wondered how many different denominations there are within the Jewish Kabbalah and what would be a common denominator therein, which in its turn takes a distance from the Hermetic Qabalah. In other words, do some, most, or all Jewish Kabbalistic systems have such a restrictive approach like Rav Michael Laitman's? To me the opposite, all-inclusive approach of the Tarot in Wald's vision is more appealing, of course, but I'd also like to learn about the Kabbalistic roots of the Tarot. If teachers of these "roots" deny any connection with the extrapolations of the Hermetic Qabalah, how can I find coherent links between the two? So I am lost again and realising that I have only 24 hours a day to look up these things. Still, it's good to be lost every now and then.  Have a good day, Csaba |
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David
Newbie
Posts: 14
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Hi Csaba, I've been involved with a group of Kabbalists for several years and they, too, use the Jungian approach to the elements. I've had to flip between Wald's teachings and the teachings of my Kabbalah group which teaches that the world of Yetzirah is the world of water and Cups, and the world of Briah is the world of Air and Swords. Also, one Kabbalah teacher insists that if one imagines the Tree of Life imprinted up the body that you back into the Tree so that the left side of the body is the Pillar of Force and the present teacher I am involved with insists that one walks into the Tree so that the Pillar of Force is on the right side of the body! One needs to stay flexible!  Regards, David |
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Csaba
Newbie
Posts: 7
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Hi David,
Good to hear you liked the article. My only doubts were about the Jungian functions of "thinking (blue) = Water, intuition (yellow) = Air". Mainstream Tarotists seem to embrace these two attributions reversely. Otherwise the article is very useful for seeing how the elements can be seen in Tarot. It provides a good insight into the reason for their dignity, and the issue whether elementally neutral cards could be seen as friendly instead of neutral only might have good arguments here.
I'm still working on Lesson 4, so The Wheel of Fortune is still far ahead for me, and I decided not to have a peek into further lessons for the sake of a genuine intuitive interpretation and comparison of the cards, but in the meantime as I incorporate ideas from others and come up with my own, these to will be inserted from my Tarot diary in the intuitive interpretation as a second step and distinguished with italics and dates from the rather spontaneous first mode. I wonder if this issue came up with you and how you dealt with it.
Cheers, Csaba
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David
Newbie
Posts: 14
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Thank you Csaba for that very interesting link to the rotation of the elements in alchemy. The connection to the Wheel of Fortune was most fascinating. David  |
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Csaba
Newbie
Posts: 7
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Hi Everyone, At the beginning of this course I was so surprised how the system of the Tarot was built on a correlation of many other systems, including alchemy. As my knowledge of alchemy was zero I decided to read something intended for beginners and was fascinated to read Dennis William Hauck's Sorcerer's Stone - A Beginner's Guide to Alchemy. Since I had not been a good grade student even at its mundane version, chemistry, I was surprised to see ho much the book helped me to become further interested, even if that meant getting sidetracked in my Tarot studies. Then I equally got to love The Emerald Tablet of the same author, though the brief conclusions on alchemy's relationship to Tarot towards the end seemed lacking depth, but the rest of it was just another excellent reading on alchemy. Then I saw the huge forest of alchemy on the net and was happy to had had just a little helpful glimpse into the subject. I did and would still recommend the two books for those who would like to have a first idea on the subject and its relationship to Tarot. Then just recently I came upon a very good, short, and clear essay on the alchemical rotation of the elements at http://www.cs.utk.edu/~mclennan/BA/RE.html - (it's in the Biblioteca Arcana) and another gem that I would recommend for fellow beginners who would like to get an idea without being immediately lost in the forest. The essay does not treat the Tarot and for this reason it will be very interesting for you to discover in the RWS imagery alchemical traits of the Wheel of Fortune, the Two of Cups, the World, even perhaps even the Hermit and Ace of Cups, just a nice span over the whole of the deck to arouse your interest and start loving these ideas. Personally, I have just put aside the nagging question of what to do with all that information in practical readings of the Tarot and wait for a slow process to take its course. Cheers, Csaba |
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