The Egyptian civilization was exceptional in every way. Herodotus writes: “Everything there is different.” And indeed, Egypt has always been associated with mystery and enigma. The Egyptians were believed to have knowledge of hidden forces of nature and knowledge that surpasses our understanding today. Every form of magic (however we imagine it!) is connected to Egypt, and anything related to secret knowledge is still linked to this ancient land. Thus, in literature, we come across the idea that astrology, alchemy, theurgy, magical healing, knowledge of the hidden properties of minerals and plants, mathematics, divination, and many other forms of knowledge originated from Egypt. Truly, it is difficult to imagine anything that is not in some way connected to Egypt.
However, the keys to all this knowledge have been lost because our eyes look, but do not see, our ears listen, but do not hear… Perhaps many of this knowledge is right in front of us, but we are unable to integrate it into our own experience and life. While we measure tons of this or that stone, the size These or those pyramids, the weight of this or that obelisk, as new sciences are born that join archaeology, like archaeoastronomy, we find more and more elements of wonder. However, this wonder only tickles our reason, counting stones, stars, or years, seeking schemes that will make what we feel understandable. We forget that sometimes it is better to just feel and allow something to touch us, to awaken some forgotten memory, recognition, that perhaps there is a path that leads to our inner selves, that perhaps there are no limits of time and space that separate us from our ancestors, but that there are links that connect us to them.
Tarot cards are one of those links, precisely because they have survived through thousands of years because some unknown hand of fate wanted it that way.
Tarot Cards
Although today tarot cards are associated with “fortune-telling,” in the past they did not serve that purpose. They served only as reminders to people who had knowledge of the cosmos, nature, the meaning of life. Tojanja… Tarot cards were like a sort of mechanism for initiation, opening doors and entering into the depths of what is already known. The combination of elements that appear on them was not used for studying and interpreting, but was directed towards that deep, invisible world, the human ability of intuition that bypasses the play of reason. Tarot conveys hidden knowledge through symbols that are directly connected to the collective unconscious of humankind and are, moreover, an expression of the entire cosmic image of the world, traces of which can be found in most ancient civilizations and mythologies.
Tarot cards consist of twenty-two major arcana cards and fifty-six minor arcana cards. These minor cards are known today as playing cards. The major cards are always presented in the form of a cartouche that contains specific elements. The cartouche represents a sacred form, like a rounded life. The name “cartouche” comes from the French language and signifies a collection of hieroglyphs inscribed in a shape that actually represents the upper part of everything. from the Egyptian cross ankha.
Origin of Tarot
The origin of Tarot is unclear and will probably never be fully elucidated. Ancient traditions speak of painted halls in Egyptian temples where the Tarot cards were arranged in a specific way on the walls. To this day, no such hall has been found. This should not surprise us, as much of what Herodotus and Strabo wrote about during their visits to Egypt in ancient Greece has not been found either. Entire cities, some of them even capitals, have yet to be excavated. Similarly, it is possible that certain inscriptions, images, or reliefs contain Tarot symbols, but we are unable to locate or identify them. The question also arises whether they were in the same form as they are known today. Are we naive to expect that a picture identical to the one depicted on the card will suddenly appear on some wall? Another significant obstacle to researching the origin of Tarot are the ancient Egyptians themselves. Fearing misuse by the uninitiated, they deliberately concealed and sometimes even destroyed the evidence. they destroyed holy symbols, objects, writings, and places. Christian and Muslim conquerors continued to destroy what remained, and the Middle Ages did their part in bringing ignorance, superstition, and forgetting. Egypt was a completely unknown land until the French conquests.
Court de Gebelin
Og. Egyptology was a young scientific discipline, and the Rosetta Stone would not be discovered until 1799.
The Egyptian god Thoth.
The Major and Minor Arcana
The fifty-six cards of the Minor Arcana are like modern playing cards, which actually originated from the ancient tarot. They are divided into four “suits”.
The Major Arcana consists of twenty-two cards, also known as trumps, representing symbolic images, each with a specific name that is key to its interpretation. Although the order of the arcana may seem random at first glance, they follow the law of development and growth, and their symbolic language is connected to the cosmic image of the world.
In the inner structure of the Minor Arcana, the four elements of ancient alchemy are reflected in the four “suits”, as follows: wands for Fire, swords for Air, cups for Water, and coins or pentacles for Earth. Each element, or “suit”, develops through ten numbers, from ace to ten. Four cards are used to represent the court The cards of the so-called court, to which belong the King, Queen, Knight (Prince), and Lady (Princess), depict four elements: Fire, Water, Air, and Earth. (In playing cards, this is reduced to three cards).
Two of the cards are from the Major Arcana.
Next, we will attempt to provide a symbolic interpretation of one of the Major Arcana cards known as the Magician.
The Magician
This card depicts a man walking towards a square pedestal on which a cup, sword, and pentacle are placed. He holds a wand in his right hand, while a shooting star appears in the sky above him. On the side of the pedestal’s page, there is a representation of the ibis, the sacred bird of Thoth.
The Magician – a Major Arcana card.
There are two more elements worth mentioning: the ibis bird and the shooting star. The ibis is the bird of the god Thoth. He is the creator of all sciences, the father of all knowledge imparted to humans. He created hieroglyphs, is the guardian of sacred secrets, the messenger of the gods, the god of memory, a knower of the past, present, and future. Among other things, he created tarote.
The comet star is a symbol of the birth of a new quality, hope for humanity because one of its sons rose above human transience and reached eternity. At the same time, it is also a symbol of the beginning of a new era.