ESOTERIC TAROT

Since 1781, when Antoine Court de Gebelin published his "Le Monde Primatif," in which he claimed Tarot cards held the "secrets of the Egyptians," without producing any evidence to sustain his claims, Tarot cards have been written about by many esoterians who have advanced speculative views on the history of Tarot cards. From this mystical vantage-point, the origin and history of the Tarot is unclear and often idealized.

Naturally the playing card research conditions of the year 1781 were not remotely comparable to the much better research situation of today, Gebelin's errors and partly wild speculations, which proved nonetheless of some importance for the development of Western Esotericism, were natural in his time because of missing information. A good and informative timeline of the development short before and after Gebelin is given by the book author Mary Greer.

The Hermetics were quick to point out that in a cabalistic analysis, Tarot is equivalent to Rota (Wheel) or Torah (Law) indicating they were a representation of the 'Wheel of the Law.' (Note that this theory, which tries to explain the name "Tarot," loses its value when one considers that "Tarot" is only the French variant on the original Italian name "tarocchi.")

In less obtuse terms, the Tarot would then be a series of metaphysical 'facts' after the manner of the Zen Ox Paintings. From the first to the last of the Major Arcana ("Big Secrets") they are arranged as a series of lessons, or a parable of the passage of the soul. From the "Fool" 0, the tabula rasa, naive and artless child-mind, a quest is laid out which is meant for the spiritual edification of the student.

A number of scholars of the western Hermetic or Magical traditions have made such claims of the Tarot having ancient roots and lessons. Look to the works of Robert Fludd or Albertus Magnus for deeper inspections. Another school of thought believes that the Roma people, travelling through many cultures, picked up this pictorial wisdom, and being inventive by nature, created a form of divination (and perhaps of card games) from it. The idea is that they understood and kept the knowledge of the mystery-lessons of the picture-cards in private, while in public they used the cards for profit through divination and card games.