Thoth iconography - Art/Temperance

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Nemia
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Thoth iconography - Art/Temperance

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Crowley re-named and re-interpreted a number of major cards, most noticeably the three cardinal virtues that appear in the deck. Justice became Adjustment, Strength became Lust and Temperance Art, in an act that reminds strongly of Nietzsche's revaluation of values. By replacing these old cards with new ones, the old concepts with new one's, Crowley re-writes the ethical code for so many years defined by the seven virtues.

(One wonders what Crowley would have done to the three theological virtues, Fides, Spes and Caritas... :icon_lol: ... had they been in the deck, which they are not).

For Strength/Lust, Crowley/Harris could use the iconography of the Whore of Babylon and fill it with positive, affirmative content. For Temperance and Justice, this was more difficult since there is no easy-to-find negative Old-Aeon images that could be turned around.

We'll see some other day what they did for Justice to turn into Adjustment, but now let's look at Art. I always wonder why Crowley didn't call this card Alchemy since it's such an openly alchemical card.

Crowley talks about Diana, "who is also the Great Mother of Fertility, Diana of the Ephesians, Many-Breasted." How are Artemis/Diana and alchemy related? I have an idea it might be a visual detail that keeps the different concepts of this card together.

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This is one of the many versions of Artemis/Diana of Ephesus (more about her iconography here).

While we think about Artemis/Diana, let's notice that her name ARTemis contains the name Art. And let's also not forget that Christianity replaced this goddess with the Virgin Mary - and did so officially by a declaration made in the city of Ephesus, ancient center of the cult of Artemis/Diana.

Again, like with the Whore of Babylon in Lust, we can see how Crowley takes a figure denigrated by Christian morality and revaluates her as symbol of the New Aeon.

Now have a look at this depiction of the many-breasted Diana by Rubens:

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Do you notice something?

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Art's breasts in my AGM Urania Thoth...

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... and large greenie Thoth breasts.

So indeed, this is many-breasted Diana. Crowley/Harris have given her seven breasts. Now the original Ephesos statue has a large number of these breast-like additions, and Rubens' Diana has only five (although there's room for more). Seven breasts correspond with the seven planets - the number Seven nearly always has some affinity to the planet motif.

It is most likely that Crowley knew the writings of German alchimist Johann Georg Gichtel.

The most famous illustration from Gichtel's book Theosophia Practica from 1736:

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The completely earthly, natural, dark (=unenlightened) human being in stars and elements.

The seven planets are shown in the positions of the chakras. Each planet can be recognized. The person is dark (nigredo) because he/she has to reach enlightenment through alchemy and the influence of the seven planets. On the body of this unenlightened person, the names of five sins are inscribed: pride, arrogance, self love, avariciousness, and wrath.

The planets do have some visual similarity with breasts. If Crowley/Harris combine the motif of the many-breasted Diana with the motif of the planets as chakras on the body, the result you get is the chest are of the Art figure.

Looking at Gichtel's re-born human whose faults have been connected, again it's possible to see a connection to Crowley/Harris' Art.

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The two images have in common the dark-light arms, the separation of the figures into darkness and light. The rainbow drapery around Art's shoulders has a semicircular shape like the two separation lines of darkness and light on the Gichtel figure's body.

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In short, the breasts of Diana may be the visual bracket that holds the concepts ARTemis/Diana and Alchemy together.

(I wrote about this topic on AT in a discussion that was alchemical... and my contribution was off topic. When I'm more awake than right now, I'll make this text more coherent - I'll post this now as it is but there is more to say.)

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