THE ELEMENTAL TAROT OF THE KABALLAH
Part Two
This is a continuation of the outline and synopsis of the course and audio files for the Elemental Tarot of the Kaballah developed by Dr. John Gilbert from the Zohar and other ancient texts of the Kaballah. If you have not studied the materials in the first part of this series, we suggest you do so now.
Elemental Tarot of the Kaballah - Part One
People are very complex. Each of us wears many masks. One mask is for our parents. Another for our children and others are for our friends, acquaintances, our boss, fellow employees or fellow students, teachers, salespeople and people we want to impress like lovers.
Each of these masks we wear is called a persona. A persona is defined by some as being a figment of our imagination that we invent to act like something we are not or to pretend to be something we dont think we are. However we define it, a persona is not the true us. Its the real us acting like something or somebody else.
A persona is a mask our ego wears, but it is not our ego. Personae are not the real us. Personae are the masks the real us wears to cope with the world and everything in the world, to get what we need or what we think we need, to protect ourselves from pain and suffering.
To me, personae express the Element of Earth precisely. We are not our body. We are not our possessions. We are not our job, our finances or our health. We use all of these to express who and what we are, who and what we desire, who and what we feel and who and what we think; but we are not any of them.
Therefore, our personae are an expression of the Element of Earth in our personal being. My personae are an expression of the Element of Earth in my being. Your personae are an expression of the Element of Earth in your being.
My persona at any given time is always in the Earth Element and never moves into any other Element. It lives and dies in the Earth Element. One way of looking at this is to say all of the Earth Element cards in the Tarot speak about things relating to my particular persona or personae. My personae are an expression of the Earth Element. My health, possessions and finances are other expressions of the Earth Element.
My ego is who I am in this physical body. My ego is the sum total of everything I am inside myself. My ego is not my body but it resides inside me someplace. Everything I am or pretend to be is an expression of my ego. My ego appears to be in complete command of my personae. In fact, my ego appears to be the real me that wears these false masks called personae.
My ego does not reside in the World of Earth but it does control my personae that do. My ego resides in the World of Fire, the World of Passions and Desire. In this world I automatically express all of my lower nature, because my ego is my lower nature. The Great Secret of Esoteric Masons, the Magical Golden Dawn and Spiritual Alchemy is that I have the free will to decide to rise above my ego.
And, I have the free will to do exactly what I decide to do. I can decide to become addicted to the things of this physical world and place all of my efforts in collecting as much of what I want as I can. Or I can decide to improve myself and become a more accepting, more forgiving, more loving and more spiritual person.
All it takes is a little belief in myself and the Divine, a little emotional power to make it happen and a desire to do it. If I lack any of these, I dont fail, Im just not ready. If I keep working, I will succeed. If I stop working, I will stop growing and stay where I am. Thats called procrastination and thats O.K. After all, I have an eternity to change my ways. Besides, I wouldnt even be here if I didnt have the desire to be born here in this reality for some reason.
The problem is, once people get a glimpse of the other side of the Veil of Ignorance, they dont want to spend any more time in this World of Pain and Suffering than they absolutely need to spend here. So, they go to work. Here are a few of the techniques they use:
Alchemy - Essene Healing Breath- Intentional Prayer - Kriya Power Meditation - Magic and Ritual -Masonry -
If my ego resides in the World of Fire, then its possible all of the Tarot cards assigned to the World of Fire speak about my ego, the issues of my ego, the weaknesses and faults of my ego and the things my ego needs to do to become more accepting, more forgiving, more loving and more spiritual.
More About the Element of Water
If our personae are of the Earth and our ego is of the World of Fire, then our ego must be the parent of our personae because the World of Fire is the parent of the World of Earth. My question is: If I change the parent, do I change the child?
If I change my needs, wants, desires, passions, cravings, addictions, energy, drive and striving, do I change whats happening to me in the physical reality? Everything I know about the Tree of Life tells me YES! Everything I intuitively feel tells me YES! Everything I hear about The Secret and read in my metaphysical and esoteric books also says YES! Everything I know about healing tells me YES!
It must be so. Change my inner self and I change my world. Change my ego and I change my personae. Change my ego and I change my world. Change my World of Fire and I change my World of Earth. Change my ego and I change me.
The other question I have is that if my ego is the parent of my personae, who is the parent of my ego?
According to the Kaballah, the parent of the World of Fire is the World of Water. Fire is born in Water. Passions, desires and all the other attributes of Fire are born in our emotions. The World of Water is our emotions. The World of Water is also the home of our soul. Therefore our soul is the parent of our ego. Most of the mystics and spiritual masters of all ages that I read agree with that statement.
We already know that the World of Water is the complete gamut of all the emotions we can ever experience and all of the relationships we can ever enjoy. Out of all these emotions and all of these relationships are born all of our wants, needs, desires, passions, cravings, additions, energy, drive and striving. Out of our Water is born our Fire; and out of our Fire is born our Earth.
If the Earth cards speak about my personae and the Fire cards speak about my ego, then its logical to assume the Water cards speak to and about my soul. If I can change my life in the World of Earth by changing my World of Fire, I must be able to change my World of Fire by changing my World of Water.
Change my emotions and my relationships with other people and I change my needs, wants, desires, passions and more. Change my Water and I change my Fire. Change my soul and I change my ego. Change my ego and I change my personae. The essence is that I need to pay attention to my emotions, identify the ones that serve me and those that dont. Then go to work on the emotions that dont serve me well.
Sounds easy. I wonder if Tarot can help me do that.
Theres no doubt in my mind that it will. I just have to admit I need to work on my anger, fear, resentfulness, sadness, greed, lust, blame, blaming, shame, guilt, non-acceptance, non-forgiveness, non-compassion and a few other emotions that dont nurture me or others.
Sounds like work. It is. But there are a couple of tools that can help you resolve these kinds of emotional issues. The first is an easier path but I recommend them both:
To review: We know our body and personae are of the World of Earth. We know the World of Earth is the Child of the World of Fire and our personae are the children of our ego. We know our World of Fire is the Child of our World of Water and our soul is the parent of our ego. To this we now add the World of Air is the parent of the World of Water and our True Self, our spirit, is the parent of our soul. Most of the mystics talk about the Worlds of these four Elements like this:
Earth = Physical Body + Personae Fire = Astral Body + ego Water = Ethereal Body + Soul Air = Mental Body + Spirit
The World of Air is the world of our thoughts and ideas, intentions, beliefs, imagination, memory and attitudes. The fact the World of Air is the parent of the World of Water means our thoughts are the parent of our emotions. What we think causes us to feel. The more we think, the more we feel.
Take a simple thing like somebody saying something we dont like. If we think about it, we start to feel upset about it. The more we think about it, the more upset we become and we start to feel frustrated or irritated about the words that were spoken. The more we think about it the angrier we become. Our feelings are the children of our thoughts.
Is it possible that by changing our thinking we can change our feelings? Is is possible that by changing our feelings we can change our wants, needs and desires? Is it possible that by changing our World of Air we change our World of Water and our World of Fire? Yes, it appears all of these things are possible.
The Modern Essenes teach that if we want to heal our body of any physical condition (World of Earth) all we need to do is resolve our emotional issues (World of Water). If we want to resolve our emotional issues, all we have to do is change our thinking (World of Air). They believe that to change our thinking we need to pay more attention to our intuitive insights and reconnect to the Divine. In their paradigm, all healing comes from the Divine. http://ModernEssenes.com
Their healing techniques are probably the most powerful energy healing techniques available to us. This is probably because they address issues in all four worlds of Air, Water, Fire and Earth as well as our Spiritual World. We are, after all, a whole person operating in all of the Elements all the time.
Our mind is our ego, our Lower Self in the World of Fire as expressed through our Personae in the World of Earth. Our intuition is our Higher Self, our Soul in the World of Water. Our Soul speaks to our ego, to us, intuitively. Our intuitive insights are messages from our Higher Self.
Our Spirit is our True Self in the World of Air and it usually speaks to our Soul. Occassionally, our Spirit speaks directly with our ego and we call this Divine Inspiration because our Spirit is in direct contact with the Divine all the time.
Heres another way of looking at it. As humans (Personae) we travel in the World of Earth as fast as our feet and animals or vehicles of transportation can carry us. In our astral body (ego) we travel in the Worlds of Fire and Earth at any speed up to the speed of light. In our ethereal body (Soul) we travel at any speed up to the speed of thought in the Worlds of Water, Fire and Earth. But in our mental body (Spirit) we think and we are there in the Worlds of Earth, Fire, Water and Air, and we have no need to travel. Think and were already there.
To learn more about astral, ethereal and spirit travel see the lessons about astral travel on the Universal Gnostic website.
In the World of Air we learn that Tarot is part of everything. Hidden in the cards are the lessons of the Elements, Kaballah, Spiritual Alchemy, Golden Dawn, Masonry, healing and life. In the next few weeks well learn more about these things as we study the interactions of the Four Worlds and the Four Elements.
This concludes Part Two of the Elemental Tarot of the Kaballah. It's important to understand the concepts presented here before proceeding further. When you're ready, continue your studies with Part Three.
Elemental Tarot of the Kaballah - Part Three
|
[ Home][ Reviews][ Articles][ Short Courses][ Newsletter ] Copyright 1994 - 2008 Tarot Institute, all right reserved |