Hi all,
I finished memorising the Trumps of the Thoth Tarot and I came up with a nice little 'story' that I think represents the Order of the Work, which is why/how AC and others before came up with the order in the first place. This helped me to keep all the cards in mind and I thought I would share briefly (hopefully).
0 The Fool - starts out on his journey from a state of nothingness. Empty headed and eventually gains knowledge to become the
1 Magus who is beginning his Path, and is wedded/linked to his consort the
2 High Priestess who represents the female mysteries . The 'royal' counterpart of her, is the
3 Empress who rules and is wedded to the
4 Emperor. He employs a heavy handed Lord or lesser ruler who is the
5 Hierophant who disagrees with these 2
6 Lovers and so tramples them with a
7 Chariot. There is thus an
8 Adjustment being made and meanwhile in the lonely mountains sits a
9 Hermit. UN-fortunately, it is his
10 Fortune, to
11 Lust. As A Hermit, he was meant to be on loftier matters. So as punishment he becomes the
12 Hanged Man and thus suffers
13 Death. From Death comes new life, represented in the Alchemical sense as
14 Art. The Art Magickal brings about an explosion of new life on Earth, represented as
15 The Devil, the all-begetter, the always fornicating. The explosion of Nature. His phallus is unto
16 The Tower. It reaches up to the Heavens and touches upon
17 The Star, and
18 The Moon, and
19 The Sun. All of these Heavenly Bodies are tools by which we may measure
20 The Aeon. And all of the afore-mentioned things are naught when compared to the greater whole,
21 The Universe. It is the fate of the Universe to grow, to beget, and to grow and grow. But eventually, in creating too much , the state of life requires a cease, a rest. Thus all matter coalesces yet again into a Black Hole, a nothingness, which is represented by..... The Fool, who creates the initial impetus towards explosion again and outward motion. However blind it may be.
Feel free to chime in if you want. I am now digging further into the Zodiacal and Qaballistic connections of each one.
AHA and an edit to say
I wouldn't have come this far without Lon DuQuette's ultimately excellent Understanding AC's Thoth Tarot book
When I worked in a statue factory we had sheets that contained the code numbers of all the different statue, fountain, planter etc concrete parts but nothing else. When you first start you see the number on the sheet then have to look in the catalogue to see what the corresponding concrete part looks like. Like learning a new language if you lived in a new country, after a few weeks or a couple months of this you start to remember what the code number of the concrete part is and you don't need to look it up in the catalogue. You can do this with the tables of 777 by generating random numbers with a calculator (1 - 10, 1 - 32, 11- 32, 31bis, 32bis etc) then simply writing them down, after long hours of repetition they will all start to sink in and you won't need to look at the tables in 777, I hope this makes sense!
It does make sense. As my tutor says, just keep writing them down over and over. But for me, a more 'creative' approach helps. Like making stories.
I just hope this helps someone.
My Mnemonic device for the Hebrew alphabet is even 'sillier' 😀
A
Big
Girl
Does
Her
Von
Zos
Clothes
Totally
Yellow.
Karl
Loves
Mary's
New
Stereo
And
Plays
To
Queen
Really
Swell.
Tau. lol
a couple months of this you start to remember what the code number of the concrete part is and you don't need to look it up in the catalogue.
Exactly. And you did this without "working at" memorizing. Well, maybe you noticed that number ending in "44" corresponded to that concrete block of a dog house, and you made a conscious "click." That click probably cemented the linkage into long-term memory.
This is the function of the limbic brain. An outstanding example is a new taxi driver. He needs to look up addresses on the map. Then, a bit later on down the many roads, he rarely needs to look up anything on a map ... or to recognize a concrete fountain with a pan-like AC statue urinating from a dais. Uh-oh. A three part association (fountain, Pan-AC, Dais - all concrete. Water and pump and tubing sold separately.
This part of the brain is found (left and right) on our Tree at Hod-Netzach. Hod is concrete statues and street locations (and 777 lists) Further expounding and imparting would be redundant.
Here is a practical way to avoid all this conjecture and uncertainty, not to mention ... incredulity: It is called The Rule of Ate
It is: If you simply casually read some material 8 times, you will retain 80% of that material. Oh, yeah - this is called "simple repetition."
What Chris has presented is his version of "making up a story," which is also known as a form of "working at" memorization. I resorted to this when I had to commit (to memory) the intricate pathways of The Dragon the twelve Chinese meridians.
I finished memorising the Trumps of the Thoth Tarot and I came up with a nice little 'story' that I think represents the Order of the Work, which is why/how AC and others before came up with the order in the first place. This helped me to keep all the cards in mind and I thought I would share briefly (hopefully).
Very cool! I like how you arranged it so that each part segues in to the next! Great creative work and great for mnemonics too!