freemasonry and the tarot

8/3/2019 Freemasonry and the Tarot

1/37

FREEMASONRY AND THE TAROT

Kenneth W. Davis

Semiannual Meeting, The Masonic Society

Salt Lake City, Utah, July 16, 2011

Copyright 2011 by Kenneth W. Davis

Introduction

Hundreds, probably thousands, of books and articles have

been written

about supposed connections between Freemasonry and

the Tarot. A

Google search last week found more than a million pages

that include

both those terms. Libraries and archives surely include

many more.

Today I propose to briefly introduce the Tarot, to provide

an overview of

its supposed connections with Freemasonry, to dismiss

many of those


2/37

connections, to discuss a set of real but relatively

unimportant

connections, and to discuss one very important one.

Histories of the Tarot

First, the Tarot. Like Freemasonry, the Tarot has both a

legendary

history and a documented one.

The most discussed legendary history of Tarot traces it

back to ancient

Egyptperhaps to the god Thoth himself, perhaps in his

incarnation as

Hermes Trismegistus. For example, the astrologer DorisChase Doane

contended that

. . . underneath the Great Pyramid is a temple of initiation

on whose

walls hang tablets depicting the same images as theseventy-eight

tarot cards, plus another thirty that are more esoteric still

(Clifton,

114).


3/37

Some have suggested that the Tarot contains the secret

teachings of

ancient Egypt, coded to hide those teachings until theycould be

discovered by a more enlightened agepresumably ours.

Some of those who argue for an Egyptian origin claim that

the Tarot was

carried from Egypt in the Exodus. (Surprisingly, Ive found

no

speculation that it was contained in the Ark of the

Covenantalthough

1


4/37

there is speculation, of course, that the Templars

discovered the Tarot in

Jerusalem and brought it to Europe.)

Still others have suggested that the Tarot was brought out

of Egypt by

the Romani people,the Gypsies, so called because they

were believed by

many to be Egyptians. (As you may know, they actually

emerged from

India.)

Others have argued for origins in the Kabbalah, even

assigning Tarot

cards to the pathways in the Tree of Life. Albert Pike, in

what I believe is

his one mention of the Tarot in Morals and Dogma, wrote

He who desires to attain to the understanding of the

Grand Word

and the possession of the Great Secret, ought carefully to

read the

Hermetic philosophers, and will undoubtedly attain

initiation, as

others have done; but he must take, for the key of their

allegories,


5/37

the single dogma of Hermes, contained in his table of

Emerald, and

follow, to class his acquisitions of knowledge and direct

theoperation, the order indicated in the Kabalistic alphabet of

the Tarot

(777).

(Refreshingly, that was one of General Pikes shorter

sentences. And its

on page 777, which Im sure means something.)

Others trace the origin of the Tarot to early Islam,

especially in its Sufi

form.

And theres more. Chas Clifton, writes

In Tarot history, any connection is fair game. For instance,

because

there are fifty-six filled-in Aubrey Holes at Stonehenge andfifty-six

cards in the Minor Arcana [Ill define that term shortly], to

an occult


6/37

commentator such as Stephen Franklin the two not only

might be

but must be connected (114).

But of course, none of this legendary history is

documented.

What is documented is that in the early 1400s, Tarot

decks were being

used in Italy for playing games. (In many places they still

are.) By the

early 1500s they may have used for divinationfortune

tellingbut more

informed researchers generally argue that this use

occurred much later.

What is certain is that by the middle 1700s they werebeing seen as

having occult or esoteric meanings.

By way of background, a standard Tarot deck has four

suits of fourteen

cards each (the cards of a modern fifty-two-card deck plus

four Pages,

ranked just below the Jacks or Knights). Esotericists refer

to these fifty


7/37

2


8/37

six cards as the minor arcana. The suits are swords, cups,

coins (or

pentacles or disks), and wands (or rods or staves or

batons). As you canguess, esoteric users of the Tarot have established

correspondences

between these suits and the four traditional elements, four

classes of

medieval European society, the four seasons, the four

directions, the four

Gospels, the four levels of the cosmos, and so on. It

seems certain,

however, that the four Tarot suits led directly to the four

suits in our

familiar decks of playing cards.

To these minor arcana are added twenty-two trump

cards, called by

esotericists the major arcana. Each represents a category

of person (such

as the Magician or the Lovers); an object (such as the

Chariot or the

Moon); or an idea (such as Strength or Temperance).

Early esoteric users

of the Tarot established correspondences between these

cards and the


9/37

twenty-two letters of the Hebrew alphabetas well, as Ive

said, as the

twenty-two paths in the Kaballistic Tree of Life. Some

have credited themajor arcana with reflecting, or even inspiring, the twenty-

two chapters

of the Book of Revelations.

The cards of a Tarot deck have no established designs, so

hundredsif

not thousandsof artists and esotericists over the

centuries have

designed their own. For example, today you can find Tarot

decks themed

around baseball, cats, Christian saints, faeries,

Shakespeare, andwitches. One of the most-used decks today is the Tarot of

Marseilles,

which you have been seeing and which probably dates

from the sixteenth

century. P.C. Browne, an adherent of the Templar school

of Masonic

origins, makes much of Naomi Ozaniecs argument that

the Marseilles

Tarot was first published in 1718just one year after the

founding of the


10/37

Grand Lodge of England. Browne writes, It is interesting

that two

ancient forms of esoteric study and practice should

emerge to public viewthe same time (Browne).

For divination the cards are shuffled, then dealt into a

pattern, or

spread. The Tarot readerusing one or more of the many

systems of the

meanings of the cardsinterprets the spread, both as

individual cards

and as a whole. Sometimes the meaning of a card is

affected by whether

it is dealt with its picture right side up (to a viewer) or

upside down.

As Ive said, hundreds or thousands of articles and books

posit direct

reciprocal influences between the Tarot and Freemasonry.

But after

examining such arguments, Jean-Michel Davidconcludesas I dothat

Freemasonry and the Tarot remain on opposite faces of a

chasm, no


11/37

matter how much some may have worked at their union

(David).

My thesis today is that although the Tarot and Masonicritual have no

shared documented historical origin and no significant

historical

3


12/37

influence on each other, they do have several interesting

points of

historical contact.

Points of contact

The first documented point of contact between masonry

and the Tarot is

a relatively minor one, concerning the work of operative

masons. David

has pointed out that some of the images in buildings

designed and

constructed by medieval stonemasons have strong

similarities to the

images of the Tarot of Marseilles and other early decks.

For example, a

relief sculpture of the Flight to Egypt at Amiens Cathedral

bears a

striking resemblance to the design of Trump 16the

House of God,

usually called the Towerin the Marseilles Tarot (David).

However,

discovering the reasons for such pictorial similarities

belongs to the field

of art history.


13/37

The first significant documented point of contact between

the Tarot and

speculative Freemasonry occurred in the person of

Antoine Court deGebelin, born in France in 1719. He became a Freemason

in 1771 at the

Lodge of Les Amis Reunis, but transferred to the Lodge of

Les Neuf

Soeurs, where he became a lodge brother of Benjamin

Franklin. Court de

Gebelin had been a supporter of American independence,

and to my

knowledge, its possible that he sat in Lodge the evening

of April 7, 1778,

when Most Worshipful Brother Ben escorted Francois-

Marie Voltairea

giant of the Enlightenmentto Voltaires initiation.

In Volume 8 of his book Le Monde Primitif, published in

1781, Court de

Gebelin positedwith no historical evidencethe theory

that the Tarot is

a repository for the secret wisdom of Egypt, in fact the

secrets of the

legendary Book of Thoth. An essay in Le Monde Primitif

written by a


14/37

possible Mason, le Comte de Mellet, proposed the

correspondences

between the twenty-two trumps and the Hebrew alphabet,

and yetanother essay in the book laid out a method of using the

cards for

divination.

Mary K. Breer, seemingly one of the most through

historians of the Tarot,

writes

Court de Gebelin and probably le Comte de Mellet were

members of

Masonic, Rosicrucian, and other secret societies that were

then

rampant in France. Thus, there is a good chance that they

were

revealing information that had already been circulating

among these

secret societies (280).

4


15/37


16/37

However, Breer offers no evidence for this speculation.

And an

anonymous entry in Tarotpedia (a Tarot wiki) puts it this

way:

Freemasons have been involved since at least the 18th

century in

writing about, or in the design of, tarot. Court De Gebelin

and

Etteilla were two such Freemasons. . . .

Of course, this says no more about an intrinsic connection

between

freemasonry and tarot than a connection between tarot

and horse-

racing (which they likewise may have had an active

interest in)

(Tarotpedia).


17/37

A second important point of contact between Freemasonry

and the Tarot

occurred in the person of Arthur Edward Waite,

Freemason andesotericist. The 1909 Tarot deck he created along with

artist and fellow

Golden Dawn member Pamela Colman Smith joins the

Marseilles Tarot

as one of the three best-known decks today. Incidentally,

it is frequently

sold and referred to as the Rider-Waite Tarot, giving its

publisher top

billing and omitting any mention of Smith.

Burkle examines the twenty-two trumps of what I wish to

call the Waite-Smith Tarot, and despite Waites immersion in

Freemasonry, finds overt

Masonic association in only one card, the High Priestess,

seated

between the two familiar pillars of Solomons Temple.

The third Tarot in that trinity is the Thoth Tarot, devised by

Freemason

and esotericist Aleister Crowley and illustrated by fellow

occultist Lady


18/37

Frieda Harris. The Thoth desk was created between 1938

and 1943, but

not published in its entirety until 1969. Like the Waite-

Smith deck, theThoth Tarot has no significant Masonic symbolism.

Freemasonry and the Tarot as archetypal

I suggest that the most significant relationship between

Freemasonry

and the Tarot is, as I have said, that both are works of folk

art that give

expression to some of the same fundamental human

archetypes.

Why folk art? Folk artthink of the traditional folk song,

for example

is art that emerges from a folk, a community. Even if a

work was created

by a single artist, that artist may be long forgotten, as the

work spreads

and changes. This process can be called a kind of

Darwinism, in which

fit elements or changes survive and less fit elements or

changes

become extinct.


19/37

5


20/37

Just as we do not know who created the first Masonic

ritual, we do not

know who created the first Tarot deck. Both have

developed withinrelatively defined communities, and have changed by

addition and

subtraction. Anyone who has experienced Masonic ritual

in different

Grand Lodge jurisdictions will instantly note the

differencesdifferences

typical in folk art. (For example, the relatively minor

differences between

Indiana and New Mexico ritual continue to make my head

hurt; I now

speak a kind of creole and often find myself wrong in both

jurisdictions.)

And anyone who browses Tarot decks and books in a

bookstore will find

even more dissimilarities, even in fairly traditional decks.

But paradoxically, fundamental similarities remain, even

across cultures

and genres. It was these similarities that led Carl Jung to

develop his

theory of archetypes. Jung wrote, The archetype concept

derives from


21/37

the often repeated observation that myths and universal

literature stories

contain well defined themes which appear every time and

everywhere(Jung).

For Jung, archetypes are fundamental themes or motifs

that reside in

our collective unconscious and which are expressed in

myths, folktales,

visual arts, and personal dreams. If you believe in a reality

beyond the

material (a belief all of us confirmed as Entered

Apprentice candidates)

you can think of the collective unconscious as a great

underground poolof knowledge and wisdom that all men and women can

tap into. But even

if you are a strict materialist, you must agree that all

animals are born

with instincts shared with other members of their species,

and that for

humans, at least, archetypes may simply be instincts of

consciousness

instincts seen from inside instead of outside.


22/37

In the case of the Darwinism of folk art, the surviving forms

may be the

most fit in part because they are the most archetypal.

Jung was a student of the Tarot and even listed the

archetypes or other

concepts that he believed were expressed or embodied in

the twenty-two

major arcana. Jung saw the Empress, for example, as an

image of

fruitfulness; and the Hanged Man, an image of sacrifice.

Subsequent students of both Jung and the Tarot have

expanded on

Jungs work. Gerald Schueler is just one Jungian therapist

who uses the

Tarot in his work (Schueler). Any many people use the

Tarot for

meditation.

In fact, Jung had a huge influence on one of the most

profound works on

Tarot cards, a Russian mystics anonymously published

1984 book

Meditations on the Tarot. In that book, each of the major

arcana in the


23/37

Tarot of Marseilles becomes a focus for deep Christian

contemplation.

6


24/37

(Im honoring the authors desire for anonymity, although

his name is

widely available.)

Not surprisingly, these same archetypes and concepts are

expressed or

embodied in Masonic Ritual. Fruitfulness, for example, is

embodied both

in the Cornucopia and in the Wages of a Fellowcraft, and

sacrifice to a

higher principle is the chief quality of Hiram Abiff.

Surely the most interesting card in the Tarot is the Fool,

numbered zero.

In tarot games, this card generally has no value on its

own, but increases

the value of other cards played along with it.

In esoteric and psychological interpretations of the Tarot,

the Fool is

often seen as an initiate, who moves through the other

major arcana on

his path to enlightenment. Many students of Tarot have

pointed out that

the major arcana can represent stages in the life journey,

perhaps even


25/37

the steps outlined by Joseph Campbell in the heros

journey, his Junginspired

description of common elements of the worlds myths,

stories,and initiation rites (Campbell).

As a series of initiation rites, the rituals of Freemasonry

dramatically

embody the Fools journey. Like the Fool, the Masonic

candidate has no

value alonehe is symbolically divested of all metals, for

examplebut

both gains and gives value as he is inducted into the Craft.

As a side note on the Fool, the Marseille deck depicts him

in a way very

similar to Hieronymus Boschs 1510 depiction of the

Wayfarer. John J.

Robinson pointed out a number of similarities between

Boschs wayfarer

and a Masonic initiate: footwear, pants legs, cable tow,

and others (11718).

He uses these similarities to argue that Bosch must have

known

recognizable Masonic ritual much earlier than it is

otherwise known to


26/37

have existed. But I dont have the time or knowledge to

support or

oppose that argument.

One more slight digression, particularly meaningful to

those of us from

the Southwest. Six of the cards in the major arcana are

also cards in the

Loteria, the Mexican game of chance similar to Bingo.

One of those cards, of course, is La Muerte, Death. Clifton

suggests that

this way of portraying Death, echoed in the Tarot, is the

ancestor of the

semicomic skeleton creations that Mexicans buy for

November 1, El dia

de los muertos (117).

He continues:

This card has also been claimed as an ancestor of thefigure of

Death drawing a bow that is carved in wood and carried in

a cart by


27/37

7


28/37

the Penitentes, a Hispanic religious brotherhood of

northern New

Mexico and sourthern Colorado. Marta Weigle, author of a

comprehensive work on the Penitentes, argued that theTarot trump

of Death not only inspired the carven figure but was itself

taken

from Petrarchs I Trionfi, because in the poem and on the

cart Death

is a female figure (the New Mexicans sometimes referredto her as

Dona Sebastiana). I think this is an unlikely connection,

given the

cultural isolation of the area during the early nineteenth

century

when the Penitente brotherhoods had their major growth;it is more

likely that Petrarch, the Tarots designers, and the

founders of

Hispanic Catholic lay brotherhoods drew on a common

cultural

tradition (117).

Masonic Tarot decks


29/37

Before I conclude, Id like to briefly introduce you to

threepotentially

fourmodern Tarot decks labeled as Masonic.

The Tarot Maconnique, 1987, by Jean Beauchard, while

including a

number of general esoteric themes, has little that is

specifically Masonic,

at least in English-speaking Masonry.

Collin Browne, a South African Mason, created and

published The

Square and Compasses Tarot (2003). It does contain

extensive Masonic

symbolism.

And 2007 saw the publication of the Tarocchi Massonici,

by Morena

Poltroneiri and Ernesto Fazioli. Because I have not found

a copy of the

Fool card, I am instead showing you card number 1, the

Magician, which

fortuitously holds special meaning for me as the emblem

of my Mother

Lodge. The images I have seen from this pack are

incredibly beautiful. In


30/37

fact, this Tarot was created as fine art, not as a working

deck: it

comprises only the major arcana, and is printed in large

format and onlyon one side of the paper. Im saving my money to buy a

copy for framing.

I also want to be so presumptuous as to show you a work

in progress,

the Freemasonry Tarot, now being shopped around topublishers by

David Naughton-Shires and me. David, as some of you

know, is an Irish

artist and designer who is also a Mason and a former

member of the

board of The Masonic Society.

Our deck is designed to be used in all the ways other

Tarot decks are

usedbut also educationally, as an introduction to

Freemasonry. Our

major arcana are the chief degrees and symbols ofMasonry, numbered

8


31/37


32/37

to correspond with the major arcana of the traditional

Tarot and their

underlying archetypes.

Our minor arcana are prominent Masons, grouped into

suitsLodges

by the areas of their achievement: wands for artists and

entertainers,

cups for writers and philosophers, swords for warriors and

statesmen,

and coins for businessmen, scientists, explorers, and

athletes. We see

these Celestial Lodges as the Masonic equivalent of

fantasy baseball

and football teams.

Conclusion

In conclusion, what I suggest is that Freemasonry and the

Tarot emerged

from the same sourcesbut those sources were, of

course, not Ancient

Egypt or the Templars. Both the Tarot and Freemasonry

were born out of

the ferment of the European Renaissance, when mundane

objects and


33/37

practices began to be seen as symbolsnot as mere

signs with specific

defined meanings dictated by the Churchbut as true

symbols, withrich, multiple meanings. In the Renaissance, a great age

of symbolism,

both the workings of ordinary stonemasons and the

figures on ordinary

playing cards were invested with roughly the same sets of

universal

archetypal meanings. If the Tarot can help us see and

think archetypally,

perhaps we can become better at seeing our Craft in the

same way

9


34/37

Works cited

Browne, P.C. The Masonic Tarot (A History), presented

to the Lyceum

Lodge of Research No. 8682 E.C.

http://www.phoenixmasonry.org/masonicmuseum/Tarot_C

ards_Masoni

c.htm. April 11, 2011.

Campbell, Joseph. The Hero with a Thousand Faces,

Commemorative

Edition. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2004.

Clifton, Chas S. The Unexamined Tarot, in The InnerWest, Jay Kinney,

ed. New York: Jeremy P. Tarcher/Penguin, 2004, pp. 111-

23.

David, Jean-Michel. Tarot and Freemasonry: An Amorous

Chasm.

Association for Tarot Studies,

http://newsletter.tarotstudies.org/2008/11/tarot-and-

freemasonry/.

April 11, 2011.


35/37

Freemasonry and Tarot. Tarotpedia.

http://www.tarotpedia.com/wiki/Freemasonry_and_Tarot.

July 7, 2011.

Greer, Mary K. Tarot for Your Self. Pompton Plains, NJ:

Career Press,

2002.

Jung, Carl. Quoted at Carl Jung Resources,

http://www.carljung.

net/archetypes.html. July 11, 2011.

Meditations on the Tarot: A Journey into Christian

Hermeticism. Robert

Powell, translator. New York: Jeremy P. Tarcher/Penguin,

1985.

Pike, Albert. Morals and Dogma. Washington, D.C., 1960.

Robinson, John J. A Pilgrims Path. New York: M. Evans

and Company,

1993.


36/37

Schueler, Gerald. Chaos and the Psychological

Symbolism of the Tarot.

http://www.schuelers.com/chaos/chaos7.htm. July 6,

2011.

10


37/37

freemasonry and the tarot

Documents