Myth of Arrival

  

When the Priest of Isis at the Egyptian Lighthouse of Alexandria appears in your readings, a word of caution.¹ Ask yourself why are you following the path you are on? What is your goal and who will it help?

Unlike the Rider-Waite card where an old man leans upon his staff and holds a lantern before him, here we have activity; Isis was at one time protector of ocean travelers, "at Delos she, Anubus and Serapis are invoked as protectors of vessels from the dangers of the sea by merchants and sailors" (Leach, 383). Her priest stands at the edge of the sea, casting light out upon the darkening waves. Behind him the Lighthouse of Alexandria, one of the Eight Wonders of the World, burns its beacon, warning approaching ships of danger.

What do you do with the knowledge you gain? How can you use it to help others? Whereas the Hermit retreats to solitude to study the mysteries of the world, the Priest of the Lighthouse uses the intelligence gained to help others in trouble. This is the logical maturity of the shaman-magician, card II, for the shaman's work is not to simply communicate with the gods but to serve his or her deities on the community's behalf.

Those who gather knowledge simply for the sake of knowledge, neither using it aide others or themselves, are living in the reversed shadow of the Hermit. There is no question some of us need to go into isolation or segregation for periods of time to learn new things or renew our strength. But to cut yourself off from your community is a terrible thing. Fear, illogical caution, paranoia all come from the dark side of the Hermit. If the gift of your studies helps no one, why are you doing undertaking it?

1. In past entries as I labored over these cards I have written down all my thoughts not only on the ocean-based card but on the ideologies behind the Rider-Waite deck itself. I am done doing that right now. For one, as far as I can tell, no one is actually reading these posts and while it is nice to know I can still write essays when I need to, I am finding the whole thing a little tedious. To save time, I will skip the sonnets, skips the analysis of the Rider-Waite deck and jump into the L'Mer deck itself … much simpler! [back]

This entry was posted on Monday, August 7th, 2006 at 2:30 pm and is filed under Scantily Clad Info Dump. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.