Cards and Quotes: Judgement

It's Easter Sunday! Today's Cards and Quotes features Judgement from The Celtic Tarot by Helena Paterson, Illustrated by Courney Davis (Aquarian).

The Celtic Tarot (Paterson/Davis - Aquarian)

"On Easter Day the veil between time and eternity thins to gossamer."
~ Douglas Horton (1891-1968)
American Protestant clergyman and academic leader

Click HERE to see photos of Christians celebrating Easter around the world.

Take a Number: Six!

 

I am working my way through the numbers, comparing the ways in which I have used them in Tarot readings with observations and comments from numerologists and occultists. I welcome your comments and observations about this fascinating subject!

My key words for the number Six: reconciliation, integration, reciprocity, communication, resolution of tensions, social responsibilities

Tarot Cards: The Lovers, Sixes of all suits

SIXES

Writing about the occult meaning of numbers, Paul Foster Case gives the following keywords for Six: "balance, equilibration, symmetry, beauty; harmony of opposites, reciprocity; complementary activities, polarity, love." Case also writes, "[Six] is named Intelligence of Mediating Influence, or Intelligence of the Separated Emanations." (The Tarot: A Key to the Wisdom of the Ages, Macoy Publishing Company)

In his book Numerology: Key to the Tarot (Whitford Press), Sandor Konraad gives the Keywords "Affectionate, Stable, Conservative" for the number Six.

Quoting from Numerology and The Divine Triangle by Faith Javane and Dusty Bunker (Whitford Press): "Six is conscientious; it desires to bring harmony, truth, justice and a sense of balance into its environment. Love and compassion are uppermost in its mind." Key words for Six: "family and social responsibility, service, love, compassion, counseling, healing, creativity."

Gary Meister, CTM offers the key words "Peace, Harmony" for the number Six. He writes: "Numbers were considered sacred in the distant past. . . Six held a special place as it is considered a 'perfect number.' The sum of its divisors, other than itself, add up to itself. Esoterically, this was considered to be a very harmonious interaction. So, six is a number of peace and harmony." He adds that Six suggests a period of emotional rest -- the crises have passed; things are back under control.

The web site Numberquest.com provides the following key words for the number Six: "Harmony, beauty, nurturing, love, marriage, family, responsibility, understanding, sympathy, healing, empathic, perfectionist, order, duty, comfort, service."

In Anna Burroughs Cook's Tarot Dynamics system (based in large part on Javane and Bunker): "Subject Card Six represents your level of commitment."

THE LOVERS (Trump 6): Konraad writes, "In Arcanum VI of the Tarot, a man must choose between two women, an older and a younger one. In the case of 6, the younger one could be said to represent adventure in the form of a creative calling and the older one, security in an established company or job in commerce."

Concerning The Lovers (Card 6), Cook writes: "Card Six means an opportunity to repair whatever needs to be repaired or clarified in the hope that matters will run more efficiently and harmoniously." Cook's key word for The Lovers is "Harmony."

According to Javane and Bunker: "The Lovers is an obvious reference to partnership and marriage, the union of opposite but complementary components. The keyword is discrimination. When we discriminate we set apart and separate in order to see the innate differences between two categories. In this manner, we can tell the true from the false."

In astrology, the Sixth House is known as the House of Work, Service, and Health. It is ruled by the zodiac sign Virgo, known as a discriminating, logical, analytical, and critical sign.

It is clear to me that Six does suggest peace and harmony, but often this is coming after a time of conflict and disturbance. I especially like Anna Cook's comment about Six representing "level of commitment."




I hope you enjoy these quotations I found that include the number Six:

"Sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast."
~ Lewis Carroll

"The natural term of the affection of the human animal for its offspring is six years."
~ George Bernard Shaw

You can only fall in love six times in your life. Choose wisely.
~ Doug Coupland

"I keep six honest serving-men
(They taught me all I knew);
Their names are What and Why and When
And How and Where and Who."
~ Rudyard Kipling

REVIEW: Stalked by Spirits

R E V I E W

Stalked by Spirits: True Tales of a Ghost Magnet
by Vivian Campbell
288 pages;  5 x 8 IN
Trade Paperback
Llewellyn Worldwide / April 2012
ISBN:  9780738727318 

FROM THE PUBLISHER'S PRODUCT SUMMARY

"Shadowed by the supernatural since childhood, Vivian Campbell has encountered angry wraiths, mischievous child spirits, terrorizing demons, and all sorts of bizarre, unearthly beings. In Stalked by Spirits, Vivian relives these thrilling experiences."

To see a videotaped interview with Vivian Campbell, click HERE.

BASIC INFORMATION / APPEARANCE, SIZE, QUALITY / ART

The 288-page book is a standard trade paperback measuring 5 x 8 inches, with text separated  into an Introduction, seven Chapters, and an Epilogue. The author is a paranormal investigator and sensitive whose life in several different haunted houses has been chronicled in several books and a television documentary.

The text of Stalked by Spirits is arranged in rough chronological order, one story after another, with flashbacks along the way. Each chapter is divided by subtitles. Chapter titles and many of the subtitles are provocative and encourage the reader to continue. Beneath each Chapter title Campbell provides a place and range of time covered by the chapter. Examples of Chapter titles: "Spook Central (Lookout Mountain, Tennessee: 1970-1979)," "Honeymoon with the Shadow Man (Atlanta, Georgia: 1991-1993)," and "Unexpected Guests (Orlando, Florida: 1993-1995)." Subtitles include teasers such as "The Cat with Nine Lives" and "Mr. Creepy" as well as those that simply identify the date that an incident took place.

DETAILS / COMMENTS

I love a good ghost story -- whether it is fictional (like Stephen King's The Shining) or just might be true. For example, I thoroughly enjoyed the Weird & Haunted Tour I took a couple of years ago in Chicago (conducted by Weird Chicago), and I loved the tales I recently heard about haunted buildings in the South Carolina town where I currently live. I listened with fascination as one woman described her family's encounters with three different spirits or ghosts in her house. So far, that woman's experiences have been non-threatening. The same cannot be said for the experiences Vivian Campbell writes about in this book.

Our first clue is the title: Stalked by Spirits. Being stalked by anyone or anything is not usually pleasant, and Campbell shares quite a few ghostly encounters of the distinctly disturbing kind. She also discusses a variety of prankish, friendly, or harmless spirits.

Campbell's experiences are not limited to one house or even one town. A self-described "ghost magnet," Campbell has known spirits in Tennessee, Georgia, and Florida. At various times over the years, her encounters with these phantoms have been shared by members of her family as well as friends and acquaintances. 

In Chapter One, we are introduced to Campbell's great-grandmother, Janet Rattray Thompson Hosie of Scotland, who warned her fiancé not to go to work one day in 1893 because she had dreamed he would die there. He ignored her warning, and as the story goes, he was killed in an explosion three hours later at the factory where he worked.

Campbell's ancestors and other member of her family are known for having "second sight." Campbell herself does not claim that talent. Instead, she attracts ghosts. She is also sensitive to paranormal "energies" in the places she visits, and senses a difference in the air when demonic or evil entities are present. Over time, she has learned that earnest prayer is the most successful weapon against such forces.

As a Tarot reader, I took note of the few references Campbell makes to Tarot in this book. Of her ancestors, she writes: "The Hosies were conservative, God-fearing Presbyterians who would literally cut off a hand before touching a tarot card." Campbell, however, does not share that view. She gave her former stepson a pack of Tarot for his 18th birthday to help guide him as he began his adult life. [Edited based on direct communication with Vivian Campbell.]

BOTTOM LINE

In general, I enjoyed Campbell's prose style, which varies from matter-of-fact to descriptive bordering on lyrical. I do feel she goes a bit overboard with descriptions from time to time. For example: "The full moon spilled rays of silver over spider webs of Spanish moss hanging from ancient live oaks like corpses."  One particularly sensational passage describes an empty baby carrier tipped upside down as "...like the body of a battered child that had been viciously and silently kicked to death." I wanted to edit down many of her sentences to make them more effective. However, there are plenty of beautifully crafted, evocative lines in this book to more than make up for that.

If you are interested only in scientific approaches to paranormal investigation, this book won't work for you. It seems designed more for those who, like me, enjoy a good ghost story and find it fascinating to imagine what it might be like to experience the kinds of things Campbell describes. If you have encountered ghosts or spirits in your personal life, you might enjoy comparing your encounters with Campbell's.

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In accordance with the FTC Guidelines for blogging and endorsements, I hereby disclose that this product was provided by the publisher for free. Other than the occasional review copy, I receive no monetary or in-kind compensation for my reviews.  The substance of my reviews is not influenced by whether I do or do not receive a review copy.

Cards and Quotes: THE FOOL

It's April Fool's Day here in the U.S.! Today's Cards and Quotes features The Fool from Tarot of the Animal Lords by Angelo Giannini (Lo Scarabeo).

"The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool."
~ William Shakespeare (1564 - 1616)
As You Like It, Act 5 scene 1