Sources of the Minor Arcana Doctrine

Luca della Robbia

This text is taken from my book Ideology of the Tarot. 

If you want to buy this book, write to dorijan.nuaj@gmail.com

In searching for the origins of tarot, I noticed that many authors trace the origins of the Minor Arcana to the so-called Mamluk deck, which came to Europe in the 14th century. Ronald Decker and Michael Dummett, in their book A History of the Occult Tarot, posited that the origins of the symbols of the Minor Arcana can be found in the heraldry of the Egyptian Mamluk Sultanate. However, author Paul Huson went a step further, suggesting Sufi and Persian origins for the basic symbols and structure of the cards, which, among other things, reflect the class hierarchy of ancient Iran. Nevertheless, to avoid getting lost in the ancient past of the Middle East, for the purpose of this book, I would use Huson's reference located in a closer space-time frame. He mentioned the Chapel of St. James in the Florentine church of San Miniato al Monte, whose vault was decorated by the 15th-century Florentine artist Luca della Robbia. On the vault are depicted the four cardinal virtues in the form of four angels, each carrying an object that represents its nature. Thus, Prudence carries a mirror and holds a snake; Temperance carries a cup; Fortitude has a staff; Justice carries a sword. The hierarchical order of the cardinal virtues considered by Plato is precisely such. The main virtue is Prudence, without which it is impossible to develop other virtues, leading up to Justice. This depiction is certainly indicative for our purposes, and in it, we can unequivocally recognize what interests us: Prudence = Hermit = disks/coins or polished plates; Temperance = Temperance = cups; Fortitude (Courage) = Fortitude = staffs; Justice = Justice = swords. Now we can already infer that the disks tell the story of the rise and fall of Prudence, the cups of Temperance, and so on. This story is most evident in the Sola Busca tarot, which does not follow the Eastern impersonal and geometric pattern similar to dominoes or geomantic figures. In fact, the Sola Busca deck, although it has 78 cards like standard tarots, is entirely hermetic and pagan, but that is a separate story.

In the Kabbalistic theory of tarot, followed by modern occult schools, the disks are at the bottom of the fourfold hierarchy as they represent the material world of Assiah, the realm of mixed and dense elements. Their plane of action is denoted by the Hebrew letter he, the last letter of the Tetragrammaton (yod-he-vav-he). Swords are next in this hierarchy, representing the world of Yetzirah, the element of air, and are denoted by the letter vav. Above them are the cups: the repeated letter he, the element of water, the world of Briah. At the top are the wands: the letter yod, fire, Atziluth. No matter how we align them, we cannot deny the five-layer structure of the tarot, consisting of four hierarchies of fourteen minor arcana each, representing one cardinal virtue (or Kabbalistic dimension), while the fifth hierarchy is made up of the major arcana.

In the Kabbalistic sense, interpreting the meaning of each minor card at first glance seems simple. For example, the Seven of Cups is the sefira Netzach in Briah, so we just need to look up what lies at that level in the fifty-decade Kabbalistic cosmological scheme. Immediately, we discover that it involves the archangel Haniel. But then, what do we do with that information? How can we know what exactly Haniel signifies and how it relates to the depiction of seven cups? We cannot truly know until we summon Haniel and ask him what we want to know. However, that isn't simple, so in such cases, we rely on general representations and hints about who and what Haniel is. Facing the enigma of Haniel and the infinity of his metaphysics, we realize it is more practical and prudent to follow the pattern of variations of the virtue and find out what happens with temperance when we project it into the number 7. The Sola Busca card Seven of Cups depicts a harmonious structure of cups firmly planted on a quadrangular base. The figure dominating this card is a naked young man in his full strength, so if that is Haniel, we must acknowledge that he is handsome, giving this card a positive tone. 

Table 3. Correspondences of four classes of minor arcana according to Eliphas Levi

Sign	Cherub	Zodiac	Element	Essence	YHVH
Wand	Lion	Lion	Fire	Sulfur	Yod
Cups	Man	Aquarius	Water	Mercury	He
Swords	Eagle	Scorpio	Air	Azoth	Vav
Disks	Bull	Taurus	Earth	Salt	He

Occultists have taken it a step further, as the Kabbalistic identification of cards is obviously not sufficient to serve the purpose. Paul Christian linked thirty-six minor arcana cards (excluding the aces) with thirty-six astrological decans. Similarly, MacGregor Mathers created a complex astrological scheme in which our Seven of Cups represents Venus in Scorpio, interpreted as illusory success. Each of these thirty-six minor arcana cards was assigned two Kabbalistic angelic entities of the Shemhamphorasch by occultists, each covering five degrees of the zodiacal circle (or one being a daytime and the other a nighttime angel). The Shemhamphorasch is the divided name of God, hidden in the biblical Book of Exodus 14:19, 20, 21. In Hebrew, each of these three verses consists of seventy-two letters (a total of 216, which is a solar number). If we write these three verses one above the other, the first line from right to left, the second from left to right, and the third again from right to left, we get seventy-two columns, each containing three letters. These three letters form one name to which we add the suffix el (aleph-lamed) or yah (yod-he) depending on whether it is a male or female entity. Each name has its angel with whom one can communicate in a special way using talismans. Each angel has its own specific specialty and jurisdiction. Additionally, there is a corresponding system of seventy-two demons that King Solomon supposedly summoned and bound. Occult-Kabbalistic speculation has gone further, connecting the court cards with invisible paths on the Kabbalistic diagram of the Tree of Life. These paths are invisible because they connect the sephirot that the arrangement of the twenty-two paths does not link. Thus, the entire tarot system can be embedded in the Tree of Life. This way, tarot has been Kabbalized, and Kabbalah has been tarotized.

Frances A. Yates, in her book The Art of Memory, mentions that the mnemonic technique of the philosopher Metrodorus of Scepsis (145 BCE – 70 BCE) was based on zodiacal signs. He connected memory with the stars. Metrodorus found or invented three hundred and sixty different places within the twelve zodiac signs and thirty-six decans. This allowed him to imaginatively move through the celestial sphere containing a total of four hundred and eight figures and use them for various mnemonic acrobatics. In Agrippa’s Second Book of Occult Philosophy, Chapter 37 is dedicated to describing thirty-six images that symbolize the nature and meaning of the astrological decans, supposedly of Babylonian origin and transmitted through the Arabs. These images, in their expression, facilitate the memory and interpretation of astrological principles, much like tarot arcana. Therefore, they represent a true astrological tarot, being entirely in the service of astrology and astromagic. I will not present each of them here, but only some that I have noticed have certain similarities with the appearance and interpretations of tarot cards.

For example, the description of the second decan of Aries depicts a powerful woman dressed in red (with a white interior), associated with the idea of domination and authority, reminding us of the Empress card. In the Arabic manual of talismanic astromagic, the Picatrix, this woman is dressed in green. Immediately following is the third decan of Aries, embodied by a male figure in a red robe. He wears a gold bracelet on one arm and holds a staff in the other, interpreted as restlessness due to the inability to achieve his ambitions. Here, we recognize the Emperor in a state of political impotence. In the Indian version of the first decan of Taurus, a farmer appears, as in Agrippa, but here the image also includes a book, while the second decan of Taurus in Agrippa's work features a key. Both the key and the book are symbols sometimes present on the High Priestess card. In the first decan of Leo, we see a man riding the beast, strongly reminiscent of the Strength card, particularly in Crowley's rendition, though in most tarots, it is a woman in relation to the lion. In the third decan of Virgo, we have an old man leaning on a staff, similar to the Misero card from the Mantegna Tarocchi or the Hermit. The first decan of Libra includes, among other things, a man reading a book, again recalling the High Priestess. The second decan of Libra depicts two furious and quarrelsome figures, above whom a third, well-dressed man sits on a chair, reminiscent of the motif of the Devil card. The second decan of Scorpio depicts a scene structurally similar to the Moon card: we see naked man and woman, and a man sitting on the ground, above whom two dogs are biting each other. On the Moon card, instead of the naked man and woman, we have two towers, and instead of the seated man, a figure of a crab. The third decan of Sagittarius shows an idle man playing with a stick, reminiscent of the Fool or Magician. The first decan of Pisces shows a man with a load on his back, but well-dressed, interpreted as a traveler, which connects this motif to the Fool card in the sense of a wanderer. The third decan of Pisces depicts two beautiful newlyweds, bearing a resemblance to the Lovers card.

I won't elaborate on theories here, but I must emphasize the significance of old astrological and astronomical iconography as one of the major sources of imaginative motifs for creating tarot images. In principle, asterism (a term I am using here outside of its usual sense) represents one of the powerful sources of imaginative images, given that humanity has always observed the starry sky, identified constellations and the regularities of celestial bodies, and shaped their abstraction into imaginative pictures connected with mythological facts. Thus, the ancient people encased their wisdom in the stars.

For the magical images that influenced Agrippa and, through Agrippa, the imagination of Giordano Bruno, Frances A. Yates states that they originate from ancient Egyptian teachings on stars and astral magic. She explains that Bruno, like Ficino, thinks in ways that are almost inaccessible to modern man. According to this worldview, imaginative images of stars are intermediaries between ideas in the supramundane world and the sublunary elemental world. By arranging, manipulating, or using star images, we handle forms that are one step closer to reality than objects in the world, although all are subject to stellar influences. The lower world can be influenced by changing stellar influences only if we know how to arrange and handle the images of the stars. In fact, the images of the stars are "shadows of ideas," shadows of reality that are closer to reality than physical shadows in the lower world. This is how Frances Yates interprets it. Furthermore, by imprinting imaginative images of higher forces into memory, we will understand lower things from a higher perspective. Also, lower things will be ordered in memory once we have arranged the images of higher things in it, which in a higher form contain the reality of lower things, a form that is closer to the ultimate reality. Keep this in mind when you open your tarot deck.

Aligning oneself with these astral images in imagination is one of the key aspects of magical work. Ultimately, Yates paraphrases Giordano Bruno, who says that different types of memory images have varying degrees of power, as not all images are equally close to reality. Those with the highest degree of power and that obscure reality the least, Bruno calls sigils. Sigils are used in memory systems of the occult art of memory as well as in specific magical operations. I am deeply convinced that the design of the minor arcana, although impersonal, represents an abstract variant of the concrete imaginative star images, similar to those described by Agrippa. Like geomancy or dominoes, they completely simplify the more complex imaginative forms originating from the ancient astro-magical imaginary. These images, in a less abstract form, are also expressed in the images of the major arcana of the tarot. Therefore, it is in these star sigils that one should seek the true sources of the tarot. At the same time, these sigils are also forms of encoding alchemical paradigms. To this end, it would be necessary to explore the connection between alchemy and astrology in the context of the genesis of the tarot, but this is currently beyond my expertise.