Ibn 'Arabi and the Tarot

The Occult Tradition of the Tarot in Tangency with Ibn 'Arabi's Life and Teachings

Jereer El-Moor

Most researchers today would probably agree that playing cards were introduced to Christian Europe as an importation from the Arab world, however, the details of this are not well-established. In the first part of this long article, the author reviews the known facts of the history of playing cards (and the related history of the Tarot). He sets out to present "a credible case for regarding the Tarot as of Near Eastern provenance", and gives a personal view of its interpretation through the centuries. In the second part he goes on to interpret one of the trumps in the light of Ibn 'Arabi's 'Anqa' mughrib. Both parts of this article are big pdf files of about 480kb, and each will take some time to download.

al Mandala

I found this interesting piece of evidence of the word mandala, in Arabic. David Pingree was such a great scholar. I wrote to him once, and he kindly answered. I was desperate to obtain a copy of an article that he was about to publish in the Journal of the Warburg Institute in London – but this did not take place, and the article has appeared in a very rare Journal – and I can only find ONE copy of it here in Italy in Venice . . . so I am sulking over this . . . but this article in MICROLOGOS . . . is also full or rich and fragrant fragments uncovering the hidden tradition . . .

"Finally, the three treatises at the end of the Florence manuscript are all representatives of Salomonic magic. The first two concern almandal of Salomon. This mandal is in shape and inscriptions completely conformable to an Indian mandala; it is remarkable to see the Sanskrit word transmitted so purely through Arabic, in which it is still used to refer to a magical object, to Latin. The figure is a square "wall" with a circle in the center and spokes pointing to the four cardinal directions (indicated by "gates") and to the four intermediate directions. On each of the four side walls are inscribed the names of angels. The whole al-mandal is engraved on a talismanic plate, which is suffumigated and ex­orcized. It then can be used for various magic acts including the ex­pulsion of demons from the possessed and four exorcisms of the jinn and the shaytān. Subsidiary sigils moulded from Toledan wax reveal the place where our versions of this text were concocted.

The first of these two versions is entitled Liber in figura almandal et eius opere; ^[1] it is perhaps the Almandal Salomonis of Albert, ^[2] and the al­mandal referred to by William. ^[3] The second book is the Liber de alman­dal which is called the table or altar of Salomon; this has the same incipit as Albert's De figura almandal. ^[4] Here the four exorcisms are attributed to Icmile (Ishmael) "Arhginemem". I have so far observed no mention of almandal by Michael Scot."

David Pingree, " Learned Magic in the time of Frederick II ", in Le Scienze alla corte di Federico II. Sciences at the Court of Frederick II. Micrologus, 2, 1994, p.48.

A basic introduction to the work of David Pingree is at WIKIPEDIA.

The Article mentioned above is published by:

International Journal of the Classical Tradition

David Pingree, "The Sabians of Harran and the Classical Tradition," IJCT 9 (2002-2003), pp. 8-35.

This article addresses questions concerning the characteristics of the paganism of Harran, its eclectic sources, and its development by examining the relationships — real, possible, and fictitious — of various personalities with the city of Harran from Assyrian times till the Mongol attack in 1271. It is suggested that the Sabians used Neoplatonism, which, if Tardieu's analysis is correct, they originally learned from Simplicius, to develop, explain, and justify their practise of astral magic, and that their interest in the Greek astronomy and astrology that astral magic required served to maintain the study and to preserve the texts of these sciences during the centuries in which they were ignored in Byzantium. It is further shown that the Greek philosophical and scientific material available to them was mingled with elements from ancient Mesopotamia, India, Iran, Judaism, and Egypt to form a syncretic system of belief that they could claim to be mankind's original and authentic religion.

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1. F ff. 74V-77.

2. Speculum XI 25, though this is more likely to be the next, derivative treatise.

3. Thorndike, History, II, 351.

4. Speculum XI 80-81.

Self and Selflessness

“For realizing one's inner divinity, Lord Krishna states in the Bhagavad-Gita, "The Supreme Reality is revealed in the consciousness of those who have conquered themselves." Thus, one's spiritual quest begins with cultivating self-control, detachment, truthfulness and nonviolence, and culminates in realizing the ultimate reality within oneself and in all of existence.”

The problem here, as usual . . is that they think they have a ‘self’ to conquer – and note the word: conquer - as in the war against cancer, the fight against aids &c. Not to mention the crap about where or where not the Supreme Reality is to be found, as if when discovered, it can then be rubber stamped, or cut and pasted into yet another trap . . Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche gives a few fresh words on the subject:

“Even when we speak of selflessness, the mind goes to “me?’ We think, “I’m selfless:’ but everything is selfless. Saying “everything is selfless” is like calling that stone “dogless?’ It might give the impression that a dog was there at some point, but it never was. It was our idea of a dog that was there. Similarly, we say that everything is selfless, but the self was never there. There was only our idea of a self. When we realize that we have always been selfless, what is missing? The conceptual mind that centralizes into “me” and then projects a world out there that is solid and separate. Who we think we are and what we think of the world is a concept that we are creating with our mind. We create a concept in our mind and we believe that concept. Our belief in a self is the most obvious example of this fundamental ignorance.”

Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche, The Mind of the Dragon, Shambhala Sun, November 2005, pp. 33 ff.

"No man from outside can make you free... No one holds the Key to the Kingdom of Happiness. No one has the authority to hold that key. That key is your own self, and in the development and the purification and in the incorruptibility of that self alone is the Kingdom of Eternity . . .".

-- J. Krishnamurti

Here it is again - the Self . . .yet from Aryadeva:

“Whatever arises by dependence

Can never be independent,

And as all are non-independent

The Self has no existence.” ^[1]

And back to Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche:

“We can start by contemplating what the Buddha said: the self we imagine to be solid and continuous is really just a gathering of ingredients—heaps. It is the conjunction of blood, bones, memories, emotions, thoughts, and perceptions. When we experience this conglomeration of elements, ignorance says, “I think I’ll call this ‘me.” We are creating an illusion and giving it a name. Not only is the illusion transparent and dreamlike, but the things we make it with are the same. It’s like watching clouds form into the shape of a dragon. We know it’s not a dragon. We know the clouds themselves are not really solid. But when we see that form, we give it a name—something recognizable.” ^[2]

One of the best lessons I have learnt in being a Buddhist is “Do not take your self too seriously.” But being a human being, or being sentient, is a serious business. But Life is not a business as yet. On the downward plunge into the material condition, we gather the seriousness, similar, as I always say, to dropping a lead anvil on a butterfly.

I think that this quote by Charles Asher decidedly adds to the discourse that I am trying to amplify - i.e. a deconstruction of views of the self - and it is interesting to see this happening within the Jungian matrix, albeit the James Hillman facet thereof.

"The theological foundations of Jung's self concept are sick unto death. I would hasten their death." [^[3]]

Like James Hillman, and his "Psyche as Big as the Earth' - [anima mundi] - Asher posits a "communitarian self":

"A communitarian self has important implications for psychotherapy, and more broadly for education and our life together. The social, communal images of our life together become worthy of cultivation and attention. I find such a vision critical to our survival as well as to the possibilities for our common life." ^[4]

Asher ends his discourse with a quote from Jung [no reference is given]:

"The phenomenology of the psyche," said Jung, "is so colorful, so variegated in form and meaning, we cannot possibly reflect all its riches in one mirror."

This quotation fulfills for me, a clear pointer to the new nature of our appreciation of consciousness. We do not want definitions of the self, the ego - the de-finite-imprisonings. We have had enough of those calcifications. The image of the mirror, with its Mercurial associations, the quicksilver, is in itself Hermetic. The Mind. Mind. Consciousness. Chit.

Samten

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^[1] Aryadeva in the Catuhsataka-sastra-karika.^[2] Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche, The Mind of the Dragon, Shambhala Sun, November 2005, pp. 33 ff. ^[3] Asher, Charles, The Communitarian Self as (God) Ultimate Reality, Spring 54, a Journal of Archetype and Culture, June 1993, ^[4] Asher, Charles, The Communitarian Self as (God) Ultimate Reality, Spring 54, a Journal of Archetype and Culture, June 1993, p.97.

Two Illuminations

CHAPLIN ON FATH –

“As I grow older I am becoming more preoccupied with faith. We live by it more than we think and achieve by it more than we realize. I believe that faith is a precursor of all our ideas. Without faith, there never could have evolved hypothesis, theory, science or mathematics. I believe that faith is an extension of the mind. It is the key that negates the impossible. To deny faith is to refute oneself and the spirit that generates all our creative forces.

“My faith is in the unknown, in all that we do not understand by reason; I believe that what is beyond our comprehension is a simple fact in other dimensions, and that in the realm of the unknown there is an infinite power of good.”

Charles Chaplin, My Autobiography, Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1966, p.287

ILLUMINATIONS BY RIMBAUD –

“The Illuminations are an attempt to blow up all appearances, all orders, all forms of the world, which make our happiness. They are an attempt to blow up all happiness and make a work of pure unhappiness out of the debris and fragments of the explosion. But how strange! These fragments are not pieces of dirt and ugliness. They are not disgusting like pieces of blown-up body. They have a strange, fascinating beauty. They are like precious stones and broken tender whispers . . . This heap of fragments from all possible orders, which should reveal to us what lies beyond all orders of the world, beyond all happiness, rises before us like a glorious rainbow speaking to us of the sweetness of pleasure . . . How they shine, how they sparkle before us, all these diamonds and this foam, these drops of sweat and these eyes, these rays and their floating hair, these flames and this herbage of steel and emerald, these white, burning tears and these ringing, flashing dream flowers, these swarms of gold leaves, these balls of sapphire and these angels of the Illuminations!

From an essay on Rimbaud’s Illuminations by the Greek poet Demetrios Capetanakis, in: John Lehmann, Three Literary Friendships, Quartet Books, London, 1983, p. 93.

W. B. Yeats on Magic

"I believe in the practice and philosophy of what we have agreed to call magic, in what I must call the evocation of spirits, though I do not know what they are, in the power of creating magical illusions, in the visions of truth in the depths of the mind when the eyes are closed; and I believe in three doctrines, which have, as I think, been handed down from early times, and have been the foundation of nearly all magical practices. These doctrines are

(1) That the borders of our minds are ever shifting, and that many minds can flow into one another, as it were, and create or reveal a single mind, a single energy.

(2) That the borders of our memories are as shifting, and that our memories are part of one great memory, the memory of Nature herself.

(3) That this great mind and great memory can be evoked by symbols.

W.B.Yeats: Ideas of Good and Evil, London 1903.

Samten comment: The third and last point of Yeats, describes in a nutshell, the functioning of the Tarot. And Yeats himself worked with the Tarot cards in his poems and other writings.