I have been meditating on the 8 of Swords, as I mentioned in a previous article. While also reading about the question of Will, in spiritual, magical, and theological contexts, I keep finding the same rule. Will requires the reduction of options and possibilities. In the Spiritual Exercises of Loyola, in the Rule of Saint…
The word fetish enters modern European languages through the French fétiche, derived from the Portuguese feitiço, which in turn comes from the Latin facticius, meaning something made, fabricated, artificially produced. In the Portuguese colonial encounters along the African coast, feitiço designated objects believed to be charged with symbolic and magical power, capable of acting upon…
Yesterday, by chance, I caught a UFC fight between Alexander Volkanovski and Diego Lopes. I had not watched a martial arts bout for many years. Martial arts. Arts of Mars, obviously. Strife, contest, dispute, the imposition of bodily force, brute strength, the cult of the body itself as a machine for self-defence and for the…
Over the last two days, the cards that I drew as daily meditation were the 8 of Swords and the 4 of Swords. They are both cards of the rational and mental plane, the intermediate sphere of Yetzirah, and are also associated with Jupiter. This is relevant because. in any context, what does Jupiter enjoy?…
As I have said recently, I’ve been interested in the war-related individuals, and the symbols operating behind them. This Tarot reading is about Richard E. Winters, commander of Easy Company in World War II, and has a very clear objective. To understand who he was in the real context of war, as a man commanding…
The most common reading of the Six of Cups associates the card with nostalgia. That interpretation almost always comes from the usual iconography. Children, flowers, simple gestures, “innocent” scenes. Let’s see what nostalgia actually means. Nostalgia comes from the Greek nóstos (return) and álgos (pain). Literally: the pain of an impossible return. The impossibility of…
After doing a reading for William Stoner, I decided to do another one for another stoic figure in American literature: Don Gately from Infinite Jest. Now Don Gately is one of the main staff members at Ennet House, the halfway house for recovering addicts in Infinite Jest. He is a former burglar and addict who…
This is a cardinal reading to analyse the relationship between Tony Soprano and his mother, the one that runs through the entire series and, in the end, structures almost everything he is. The Ascendant is Tony, because I wanted to see the relationship through his eyes. The Descendant is Livia, as the Other. The Imum…
I was meditating on the Knight of Wands. He is Air of Fire. That combination alone says almost everything. The rational, mercurial, mental element applied to direct and immediate action on the world. It’s the moment when plans are acted upon, when the mind gives direction to the flame. He is the conqueror who brings…
I decided to analyse William Stoner through the symbolism of the Tarot, since he is one of my favourite literary characters. Stoner, by John Williams, is a novel about an entire Stoic life lived without heroic gestures or visible conquests, but with a strong inner coherence. My cardinal reading uses the cards as a way…
