I Ching Trigrams - Astrology - The Tarot

[rosada]

I thought this topic deserved a thread of it's own.

My astrological associations with The Tarot are not the same as the ones suggested by the website Martin posted, but ya know, whatever floats your boat...

The Fool - Mars -Thunder - Chen

The Magician - Mercury - Wood - Sun

The High Priestess - Moon - Water - K'an

The Empress - Venus - Lake -Tui

The Emperor - Aries

The Hierophant - Taurus

The Lovers - Gemini

The Chariot - Cancer

Strength - Leo

The Hermit - Virgo

The Wheel of Fortune - Jupiter - Fire - Li

Justice - Libra

The Hanged Man - Neptune - Earth - K'un

Death - Scorpio

Temperance - Sagittarius

The Devil - Capricorn

The Tower - Uranus - Heaven - Ch'ien

The Star - Aquarius

The Moon - Pisces

The Sun - Sun - Fire - Li

Judgement - Pluto

The World - Saturn - Mountain - Ken

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I have made some slight adjustments here after reading Martin's ideas posted below.

 

[martin]

I associate the heaven trigram with Uranus and wind/wood with Mercury. The complete list, including the corresponding Jungean functions and Platonic Ideas, is:

= Intuition (Spirit, Plato: the Real)
Earth - Neptune
Heaven - Uranus

= Thinking (Mind, the True)
Wood - Mercury
Mountain - Saturn

= Feeling (Soul, the Good)
Fire - Jupiter or the sun (*)
Water - Moon

= Sensation (Body, the Beautiful)
Lake - Venus
Thunder - Mars


* I hesitate to associate the Sun with one of the trigrams because the Sun stands strictly speaking for the life energy (prana, ki) that manifests in all trigrams.
In the Jungean scheme it corresponds to the Self archetype and not to one of the psychological functions.
But the association makes sense because the fire trigram is indeed very 'sunny'. The authors of the IC also saw the Sun in it (and the Moon in the water trigram).

According to old more or less esoteric theories the energy of the Sun reaches us through Jupiter. Solar energy is too raw for living organisms and Jupiter acts as a mediator that transforms it and then distributes it through the solar system.
So in a sense, when we look at the Sun, we look at it through the filter of Jupiter and when we have a sunbath we in fact have a Jupiterbath. But even then we can get burned.

Less esoteric: Jupiter is associated with the liver and one of the functions of the liver is synthesis, storage and release of glucose, the main fuel of the body.
We see here the same principle: the liver acts as a mediator and releases fuel that the body can easily use.

 

[martin]

My knowledge of the Tarot is very limited so I think I better leave that to you, Rosada.
The book of Thierens about the Tarot (on that site) is very interesting, by the way. I have a reprint of it that was published under a different title. "The astrology of the Tarot", I believe. Can't find it at the moment ...

 

[martin]

Perhaps it's a good idea to repeat the theory about the lines that I mentioned in the hexagram 16 thread here, for easy reference.
It links the lines with pairs of opposing signs (or houses, I think that also makes sense), as follows:

6 = Virgo and Pisces (6 and 12)
5 = Leo and Aquarius (5 and 11)
4 = Cancer and Capricorn (4 and 10)
3 = Gemini and Sagittarius (3 and 9)
2 = Taurus and Scorpio (2 and 8)
1 = Aries and Libra (1 and 7)

Thanks to a creative misunderstanding of what I meant, Rosada refined this idea by placing the planet that corresponds to the bottom trigram in the first sign (Aries to Virgo) and the top planet in the last (Libra to Pisces).

Example:
Hexagram 16 = Mars (thunder) on top of Neptune (earth).
Line 1 links to Aries and Libra. The bottom planet is placed in Aries and the top planet in Libra: Neptune in Aries and Mars in Libra.

In terms of houses instead of signs this means that the bottom planet is in every line placed below the horizon while the top planet is always placed above the horizon. (for line 1 Neptune in house 1 and Mars in house 7).
This fits nicely with the notion in the IC that the bottom trigram is 'inside' and the top trigram 'outside'. Below the horizon we are 'inside', in our own world or territory. Above the horizon we are 'outside', in the world at large where we have relationships with others and their worlds.
We may think of hexagram 16 (for example) in general as 'Mars above the horizon, Neptune below the horizon'. In hexagram 24 (same trigrams, swapped) it is reversed. Neptune is above and Mars below the horizon.
The changing lines, if there are any, specify this further.

 

[rosada]

Well this is terrific, thanks Martin. Your explanation of the Jupiter/Sun connection is something I hadn't heard before.

The neat thing about making the Tarot connections is that you can then select these cards and have a strong visual as you are considering the hexagrams. For example, with Hex 16.1 you have Neptune in Aries/ Mars in Libra. When you look at The Hanged Man (the card for Neptune, indicating surrendering the individual mind to The One Mind) next to The Emperor (The card for Aries, representing Individual Expression) you can get an added sence of what 16.1 means in saying "Enthusiasm that expresses itself brings misfortune" Obviously, the Emperor next to The Hanged Man is not in touch with what is best for himself! And sure enough, The Fool (Mars, Random Energy, The Unexpected) next to Justice ( Libra, Balanced Responce) illustrates just how such Thoughtless Expression will attract an Unexpected Responce.

Even if they wont always fit, attempting to make correlations between the cards and the hexagrams works as a memory exercise.

 

[rosada]

Chris,
I just dipped into your writings on the tarot. If along with your daily postings of what the individual lines mean, you would feel to include the tarot card you have found to be associated with the line, I would be interested. I find being presented with all the information at once just too much to digest, but one card at a time would be just right.