Good morning and Welcome! to the Scales of Ma’at for 10Jul2016 : today my Heart is striving mightily alongside the 9 of Wands to establish peace and justice under the Black Sun, and the Feather of Truth has flown for succor to II the Priestess. (Today’s deck is the *Tabula Mundi Tarot* by M. M. Meleen, whose color version of this deck is soon to appear. Hurray! The deck is astounding, simply stunning in its array of disciplines and systems symbolized and displayed, and in the “divinatory sense,” [divining what you are trying to say to yourself!] they are as “slick as snot and twice as nice!” as my great-grandfather would have said. All joking aside, this is one of three or four decks that you really must have if you consider yourself a serious magus and/or tarologue – this does incredibly deep work. Not for the faint of heart.) Yesterday Ms. Meleen opened her Kickstarter campaign to have this deck issued in its color version, and it was completely backed in less than 7 or 8 hours; that must be a record! I am so delighted to be awaiting, finally, the colorized version that I have pulled the original for today’s reading. My Heart in the 9 of Wands is okay, but to be quite honest with you, I’m not thrilled. AKA the Lord of Strength, this 9 sits in Yesod through the Fires of Atziluth, and in astrology is the Moon in Sagittarius. The Moon? Yes – the Moon, and thus our link to the Feather today, but more about that later. I have a contented working card here; I would say “happy,” but that sounds too frivolous for this card. In Yesod there is imagination and self-reflection in the middle of the Tree of Life. The 9 is about the power to be derived from movement, as in the power of the tides; the Moon exerts a mighty influence on the waters of pour world, and the 9, a Jupiterian number, is present in Sagittarius as its ruler, as well. This is a wonderful card to receive IF you are a motivated individual who has a spiritual project in hand. “The 9 of Wands remembers the own qualities, showing the full powers of the fiery element rising again. So the card shows strength, determination and discipline, preparing itself for the final step to completion.” (Raven) We “should” use our spiritual consciousness to concentrate on our inner strength and master our will, and make it effective in the world we live in. The 9 is asking a lot from us, but not more than we are capable of giving, and giving without pain, if we approach it in a positive frame of mind.
Today’s draw feels like a Cosmic setup, as I have drawn as the Feather of Truth one of two Major Arcana that are linked to the 9; II the Priestess. The Feather of Truth ADORES the Priestess; it is the only place in the Universe where she can play games a bit, dress up in costumes, and generally escape from the brutal reality of being herself “ALL the fucking time!” The Priestess allows her to hide herself, to disguise herself, even to refuse herself to others if the time seems unpropitious for her presence. It is her only refuge in a deterministic Cosmos, as she sees it. The Priestess is, of course, Wisdom, “Sophia.” There are a million and one things I could say about Her Grace, but most of them are known and the ones that are not she reveals herself; I will comment, however, on the fact that she IS the associated MA trump for today’s Heart card, the 9 of Wands, so I have drawn a “Unity” today, a reading which expresses itself quite clearly in the presentation of the 2 cards ensemble, and not considered separately or one after the other. I believe that what these TWO cards are telling me, in diamond-bright letters two miles high is “Go forward with your spiritual project; with your conception of progress on the Path; for the time being, you are aligned with the Cosmos’ intent.” I am in love with II the Priestess, but I fear it is for a self-serving reason and not entirely emotionally pure & sincere; I want her knowledge. I love her, true, and she is a constantly fascinating and mesmerizing woman, the incarnation of feminine mystique, the ultimate femme fatale, and I want her. But having got her, would I know what to do with & for her? “Ah ha! There’s the rub, Oglethorpe, that’s why you’re journeying . . . .” The card itself is a multi-colored delight, and I especially like the pomegranate-chambered heart, don’t you? SO damn evocative of SO much! Symbol after symbol and all there to tell me that knowledge is available, but must be WON; it is not given away, it is not a devalued currency. You must pass the veil of the Temple, the goddess herself, in order to roam her halls. She is the Moon in Scorpio in the 12thHouse; she walks the path between Kether and Tiphareth and of course she issues from the Water. She IS Duality. She is our inner voice by which we recognize our spiritual power. “Most people never rest like this, as our society supports the total suppression of the subconscious, but without it we will never understand ourselves. The High Priestess is inner wisdom at its deepest, a wisdom that cannot be expressed in rational terms. Trying so, we would already falsify and restrict it.” (Raven) She is the woman we all ultimately desire. Today I ask the Cosmos to grant us all the good sense to invite the Priestess to walk with us today. Be Well!