And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started,
And to know the place for the first time.1
When we open our eyes for the first time, we are in a state of bliss and at one with the World. All too soon, we have to come to terms with survival, disease, crime, poverty and riches, personal relationships, business, politics, life and death. How these concepts and conditions control our attitudes to personal responsibilities, towards other people, to society in general, to the planet Earth and to the invisible Universe depends on how we relate to ourselves. There will always be challenges that balance our natural instincts for survival and the desire for gratification with the need to have a deeper understanding of ‘Who am I?’, ‘Why am I here?’ and ‘What is my destiny?’ The Tarot tells us that to answer these questions each one of us must undertake a journey into the unknown psychospiritual realms of the unconscious mind. This demands courage, fortitude and someone or something to guide us on our way.
Throughout the history of humankind, every culture has recognized the need for both children and adults to be initiated in terms of their self-development and awareness of the invisible realms to enable them to take a responsible part in society. The ancient mystery schools evolved to provide initiates with ‘a map and compass’ to explore the phenomena of nature and the physical world as well as their own human nature and the inner worlds of the psyche and spirit. Vestiges of the mystery school teachings still exist covertly in the West.
Other forms of initiation are practised by the so-called ‘primitive’ tribes that still exist on every continent. For example, in the Australian bush a mother of a young boy must say ‘goodbye’ to her son as he leaves her side to go with the elders of the tribe into the bush. The initiation lasts a few days. First, he is hand-fed and treated as if he is still a baby in arms. Later, alone in the darkness, he believes the sound of the men whirling their whining bull-roarers is actually a frenzied monster. The terrified young neophyte is convinced he is about to be devoured by this hideous creature. Ritually, this near-death experience is essential for him to die as a child before he can be reborn as a man. His experience and survival of the ordeal that transforms his status from neophyte to initiate prepares him to receive the secret teachings of the tribe. When he is led back to the village his new status as a mature, initiated member of the society is acknowledged and confirmed when he is ‘introduced’ to his mother as if he were a stranger. As a young initiate, the first step he takes on his heroic journey has been to sever the psychological umbilical cord from his mother. These rites of passage – going into the wilderness, suffering death, resurrection and revelation – follow a recognizable and universal pattern throughout the World.
In his book, Rites and Symbols of Initiation, Mercia Eliade says, ‘Every man wants to experience certain perilous situations, to confront exceptional ordeals to make his way into the other World – and he experiences all this on the level of his imaginative life by hearing and reading fairy tales.’2
In other words, it is in our nature to want to experience some form of a rite of passage such as that symbolically expressed in the Tarot. Sadly, today, the classical myths and fairy tales have become expurgated, dumbed-down ‘adaptations’ served up by the cinema and TV as entertainment for children. In our intellectually-based, materialistic society there is an absence of sacred practices that leaves a gaping, unhealed wound in the collective unconsciousness of the Western World, which leads to teenage boys and girls finding their own, often highly dangerous, exceptional ordeals. Why do we ignore and suppress the wisdom of our ‘men/women of knowledge’? Why have we lost our sense of the divinity of the soul and the Cosmos?
Our Western civilization tends to ignore many of the fundamental elements of human nature. We no longer have any ritualized form of initiation that was so well understood and acknowledged by ancient traditions. Today, there is no respect for the wise men and women and there are thousands of households where the father is absent, leaving the children – especially the boys – to grow up knowing only their mother. The boys are desperate to break away – to cut the umbilical cord – to experience certain perilous situations and ordeals and many can only turn to crime and violence on the streets to test their courage and endurance. Government policies, political correctness and an overzealous Health and Safety Executive have even barred the opportunities for competitive sports in our schools!
The whole of society will increasingly suffer social dysfunctions whilst we, the elders of our respective ‘tribes’ – the parents, politicians, teachers and lawyers – persist in continuing this perverse disservice towards our young people. How can we bring about the necessary fundamental changes to improve the quality of life for us all?
A more readily available source today in the 21st century is the Tarot cards: these can also effectively guide us – the adult neophytes – along a path of initiation into the mysteries of Nature. The Tarot offers an enlightened guide to personal integrity and responsibility for all one’s actions and thoughts. On the pathway we come face to face with our illusions, experience intuitive, instinctive insights and discover the occult world where, ultimately, we will find our true Selves. This is the mythical journey that leads to fulfilment. In other words, The Fool within us all is transformed from naïve foolishness into becoming the ‘man/woman of wisdom and knowledge’.
As a serious Querant, each one of us needs to sense at which point or milestone we are now standing on our journey before we can understand what to do to take the next step forward. For just a minute or two, using intuitive introspection, carefully look at each of the Major cards in the layout in figure 23. Then close your eyes and hold the images in a visual meditation: you may find that you are drawn to one particular card which will most likely indicate the milestone marker where you are currently standing and what needs to be your next step to make progress along the path.
At the end of the Tarot’s journey we will have healed ourselves, discharged sorrow, become integrated with the Anima Mundi (the World Soul) and fulfilled our innate greatness, and then – finally – we realize that we have to begin yet again to summon up our strength to continue the climb higher up the infinite spiral of self-knowledge.