{"id":3943,"date":"2017-04-19T11:19:11","date_gmt":"2017-04-19T17:19:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jessemoynihan.com\/?p=3943"},"modified":"2017-04-19T11:49:35","modified_gmt":"2017-04-19T17:49:35","slug":"the-tower-notes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jessemoynihan.com\/?p=3943","title":{"rendered":"The Tower Notes"},"content":{"rendered":"

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I dig the 3D lightning bolts in the Golden Dawn’s “Blasted Tower” version of this card. So often this card is associated with the collective false memory of the story of Babel with God striking down the masons who attempted to reach the heavens by their material means. Partially or this reason we have the later occult revival decks depicting the tormented souls getting their asses handed to them. But in the Babel story, there is no lightning or fire that struck the tower. God just changed their languages so they had to disperse and start their lives over. So the origin of this image comes from several other possible sources rather than the Babel story: one being a mystery play from the 1500’s that depicted Limbo as a tower struck by God’s light(ning) to free the souls trapped inside. This certainly makes sense in my idea of the Tarot progression from the Devil card.<\/p>\n

**ALSO Gertrude Moakley makes the claim that this card was originally titled the Devil’s House (La Maison du Diable) and was so severely misspelled over time that is mutated into the House of God (La Maison Dieu. If anyone can find an example of an early tarot that said “The Devil’s House” PLEASE COMMENT<\/strong> and link me to it. I can’t find any examples.<\/p>\n

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Once again Richard Roberts swoops in to save the day and shed light on A.E. Waite’s purposeless beating around the bush. I connect with the Tower concept of liberation as opposed to punishment, and also how the figures in this card will transmute into the the following Sun and Moon cards, via the new fertile river bank tended to by The Star.<\/p>\n

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PFC makes a good observation about lightning as a symbol for truth\/revelation: “a flash of inspiration that breaks down structures of ignorance and false reasoning.” I don’t really understand why he thinks the tower should have 22 levels of brick. It seems contrary to the deck’s intentions to have the 22 majors represent the material cage of the tower. Unless I’m missing something?<\/p>\n

Eliphas Levi and Manly P Hall are pretty far off the mark on this one. Adam and Eve’s fall from the garden is not really applicable here especially considering how the two figures in the Marseille look to be tending to prosperous plant life. The Tower as a phallic symbol is something I gravitated toward a few years ago, and I guess towers will always come across as phallic. I don’t know how much that matters in this case, especially because of the androgynous aspect of the Devil’s domain from which I imagine these two are emerging; finding their healthy personal boundaries after completely losing themselves in their embrace of subconscious desire.<\/p>\n

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Aleister Crowley brings up some potent ideas that I commented on in an earlier post. Annihilation can be liberation. The seeker is always on the hunt for annihilation! The wandering samurai finds joy when he is finally defeated.<\/p>\n

Stuart Kaplan reveals another possible connection of the lightning struck tower with a Grail myth, and Yoav Ben-Dov connects the image to the story of Saint Barbara.<\/p>\n

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Both Jodo and Ben-Dov make claims about the literal interpretation of “La Maison Dieu” being “The House God” but I don’t know what they’re talking about. If anyone has insight into this, please let me know in the comments.<\/strong><\/p>\n

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The thunderbolt is Divine Love and revelation, saving us from the mental constructs we build and imprison ourselves with. It’s a Kundalini awakening, coming down from heaven and bursting through the crown chakra! Above merging with Below. This is somewhat connecting the to Tantra workshop I did last weekend with my girlfriend, and the immense breakthrough I had about the way I relate to other people. I had an insane weekend. I will hopefully have the energy to write about the experience soon.<\/p>\n

\"IMG_3847\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I dig the 3D lightning bolts in the Golden Dawn’s “Blasted Tower” version of this card. So often this card is associated with the collective false memory of the story of Babel with God striking down the masons who attempted to reach the heavens by their material means. Partially or this reason we have the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[14],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jessemoynihan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3943"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jessemoynihan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jessemoynihan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jessemoynihan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jessemoynihan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3943"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/jessemoynihan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3943\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3956,"href":"https:\/\/jessemoynihan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3943\/revisions\/3956"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jessemoynihan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3943"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jessemoynihan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3943"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jessemoynihan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3943"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}