This is a great old documentary from 1970 on various occult groups. There are interviews with Alex Sanders, Selena Fox, Olivia Robertson, Micheal and Lilith Aquino, H.R. Giger and many others. Warning: NSFW.
(via Google Video. Thanks Dedroidify!)
TagSuperstition
In parts one and two of our interview we discussed the history of the Koldun and their relationship to the Tarot. In this third installment we discuss how to find one’s Tarot Constellation, which form the basis for other Kolduny practices.
TiamatsVision– You mentioned that you use the Tarot Constellation for assistance in helping someone. How does one go about finding their Tarot Constellation?
NATALIA– The process of finding a person’s Tarot Constellation consists of first reducing the birth date down to a single digit. This is the Soul Number. Then find the Tarot card within the major arcana that is associated with that number. Next, you have to find the Persona and Will cards and then the Fate and Path cards. From there you look for the Hidden Influence, Visible Influence and the Inner Teacher cards.
NATALIA– To determine one’s Tarot Constellation you must first determine the Soul Number. To do this you add all the numbers of the birthdate up. Let’s say someone was born on 6-12-1955. Add 6+1+2+1+9+5+5=29. Now take and reduce 29 to its lowest single number which is 2+9=11, 1+1= 2. The person of this birthday has the soul of a 2. The second card of the major arcana is The Priestess. So you pull The Priestess card and the 2’s of all the suits. These twos are the Fates and Path cards. Next you find the Inner Teacher card. The easiest way to do this is to ask The Hermit card, which is a card that portrays one holding either a lantern or hourglass and is the 9th card of the major arcana. If a person has a Soul of a 2, you add 9 and you get 11, 1+1=2. The reason you ask The Hermit is because no matter what the Soul Number is, by adding 9 you get the Inner Teacher number which adds up to the Soul Number. Work it out and see. A soul number of 5? Add 9 you get 14, 1+4=5, The Temperance card. A Soul Number of 7? Ask the Hermit; add 9+7 and its 16, (1+6=7) The Tower.
The Soul Number, the numbers of the suits, and the major arcana numbers that add up to the Soul Number form the skeleton of the Tarot Constellation.
ANTON– This is important to understand, and it is the basis of the constellation. A soul of 2? 2 plus 9=11. 1+1=2, the original Soul Number. A soul of 3? 3 plus 9 =12, 1+2=3, and so on. If you know a Soul Number and ask The Hermit, you will not fail finding the Inner Teacher.
The point is that the Soul card, no matter what the number is, has an Inner Teacher card that when broken down and added up, matches the Soul Number. In every circumstance The Hermit card stands lighting the way.
TiamatsVision– What is the significance of the different cards (i.e. the Soul card, the Inner Teacher, etc.)?
NATALIA– The Soul card reflects what will please and perplex the individual. The Inner Teacher card is the card of the inner teacher. When this card comes up it means that the inner teacher has a message or lesson for you. This card should be trumped by placing a card over it sideways and then considering the card in both a positive and negative manner. Fate and Path cards are cards that show how a person will view the issues raised by the suits. Cups are interpersonal relationships and romance. Swords are conflicts and lusts. Wands are creativity and intellect. Pentacles are work, money, home and survival. Influence cards reflect what will influence the person, both visible and hidden. The Hidden Teacher is the reflection of the hidden lessons that one’s past has taught them. The Will and Destiny cards reflect how one will behave in a struggle and how they routinely respond to certain situations.
It seems very complicated and in some ways it is. But the constellation is the beginning of understanding what makes the individual tick.
The next three cards that you need for a person’s Tarot Constellation are the Persona cards. These cards are the Personal Potential Card, The Hidden Teacher Card and the Manner of Expression Card. These cards are based upon your Sun Sign, your Moon Sign and your Ascendant. Your Sun sign will be the Personal Potential card, your Moon Sign is your Hidden Teacher card and your Manner of Expression card will be the sign of your Ascendant.
The signs and cards align like this:
Aries– Queen of Wands
Taurus– King of Pentacles
Gemini– Knight of Swords
Cancer– Queen of Cups
Leo– King of Wands
Virgo– Knight of Pentacles
Libra– Queen of Swords
Scorpio– King of Cups
Sagittarius– Knight of Wands
Capricorn– Queen of Pentacles
Aquarius– King of Swords
Pisces– Knight of Cups
So if your Sun was in Libra then your Personal Potential Card would be the Queen of Swords. If your Moon was in Leo then your Hidden Teacher would be the King of Wands. If your Ascendant sign is Virgo then your Manner of Expression card would be the Knight of Pentacles.
The next cards to consider in the Tarot Constellation are the Visible and Hidden Influence cards. These are based upon planets that were either in the Midheaven or on the Ascendant at the time of birth. Planets in the Midheaven would be reflected by Visible Influence cards, while planets on the Ascendant would be reflected by Hidden Influence cards.
The planet and card associations are:
Mercury– The Magician
Venus– The Empress
Jupiter– The Wheel
Neptune– The Hanged Man
Mars– The Tower
Pluto– Judgment
Saturn– The World
Uranus– The Fool
The Sun– The Sun
The Moon– The Moon
If a person was born at noon with the Sun in the Midheaven, then the Sun card would represent a Visible Influence. Let’s say Jupiter was also in the Midheaven, then The Wheel would also be a Visible Influence card. Now let’s imagine that Pluto was ascending at the time of the person’s birth. Their Hidden Influence card would be The Judgment card. There are only 3 cards left to determine that will complete the Tarot Constellation.
The last three cards to determine in the Tarot Constellation are the Will cards of which one is the Destiny card. The Will cards are minor arcana cards that are associated with the Sun sign, and the time involved in the Sun sign. Each Sun sign in astrology is broken down into three deaconates. Each deaconate is represented by a minor arcana card. The minor arcana card that represents the actual date of birth is the Destiny card.
They break down like this:
Aries:
March 21-30: 2 of Wands
March 31- April 10: 3 of Wands
April 11-20: 4 of Wands
Taurus:
April 21-30: 5 of Pentacles
May 1-10: 6 of Pentacles
May 11- 20: 7 of Pentacles
Gemini:
May 21-31: 8 of Swords
June 1-10: 9 of Swords
June 11-20: 10 of Swords
Cancer:
June 21-July 1: 2 of Cups
July 2-11: 3 of Cups
July 12-21: 4 of Cups
Leo:
July 22-Aug. 1: 5 of Wands
Aug. 2-11: 6 of Wands
Aug. 12-22: 7 of Wands
Virgo:
Aug. 23-Sept. 1: 8 of Pentacles
Sept. 2-11: 9 of Pentacles
Sept. 12-22: 10 of Pentacles
Libra:
Sept. 23-Oct. 2: 2 of Swords
Oct. 3-12: 3 of Swords
Oct. 13-22: 4 of Swords
Scorpio:
Oct. 23-Nov. 1: 5 of Cups
Nov. 2-12: 6 of Cups
Nov. 13-22: 7 of Cups
Sagittarius:
Nov. 23-Dec.2: 8 of Wands
Dec. 3-12: 9 of Wands
Dec. 13-21: 10 of Wands
Capricorn:
Dec. 22-30: 2 of Pentacles
Dec. 31-Jan. 9: 3 of Pentacles
Jan. 10-19: 4 of Pentacles
Aquarius:
Jan. 20-29: 5 of Swords
Jan. 30-Feb.8: 6 of Swords
Feb. 9-18: 7 of Swords
Pisces:
Feb. 19-29: 8 of Cups
March 1-10: 9 of Cups
March 11-20: 10 of Cups.
To determine your Will cards go to your Sun Sign. To determine your Destiny card, go to the deaconate of your birth. This completes the Tarot Constellation. Each person has one which is totally unique to them alone. Some come close, but no two are exactly alike. It is like a fingerprint. The uses of the Tarot Constellation are numerous. Everything from Tarot readings, to herbal prescriptions, to talisman for spells; they all come back to the individual’s Tarot Constellation.
(Next: Part 4- The different tarot spreads)
GSPOT: Wes Unruh interviews Taylor Ellwood.
GSPOT: Joseph Matheny and Chandra Shukla Interview Andrew Liles.
Viking Youth: Erik Davis on Scientology.
Viking Youth: The Knee Deep Slumber of the American Buffet.
Point of Inquiry: Norm Allen – African American Religiosity, Humanism, and Politics.
Point of Inquiry: Robert M. Price – The Paperback Apocalypse.
Adam Gorightly: Dr. Edgar Mitchell.
Adam Gorightly: Kentroversy Returns.
Occult of Personality: Bishop T Allen Greenfield on gnosticism.
Key 64 is back with a new format. From editor Nick Pell:
Key64 is returning to a rolling format. Anyone can sign up and submit articles, they just have to be approved by me and Szul before anyone can see them on the site. Check the site regularly for updates, or add our MySpace page for updates.
In addition, I’m putting together a PDF journal type thing for the long anticipated Key64: Dope, Guns, and Fucking in the Streets We want the usual stuff. But we also want… ART. Cover art, interior art, whatever. Just send me the scans. Also, we prefer articles in word format now as we won’t be dealing with the XHTML weirdness in the PDF format.
Get ahold of me if you want to throw something in the DGFITS issue.
Nick’s gmail address is nicholasjpell.
Some recent content from the new format:
Ohne Garantien: Memories of Dr. Christopher S. Hyatt by Mobius Frame.
At Edges by Samuel 23.
Nine Inch Nails’ Ghosts I-IV review by Michael Szul.
The Occult Secrets of Lost by me.
I came across this very interesting piece by xiaoJ on the design site COLOURlovers yesterday. Anyone interested in sigil magic would do well to read over this.
Many outsiders think that modern Chinese remains a purely pictographic language, similar to ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics. While it is true that Chinese script began as a pictographic system, pictures do not make for a particular efficient writing system. Some pictograms do still exist (e.g., ? ?mountain’, ? ?person’), but 90% of modern Chinese characters are phono-semantic compounds: they are part semantic (a portion of the character, called a radical, provides the general meaning) and part phonetic (the other portion of the character tells you how it is pronounced).
The characters for red, green, blue, and purple in Chinese are phono-semantic (all bearing the radical for silk, ?), but a few color characters are associative compounds: two or more ideographic elements combined to create another meaning.
I find the phono-semantic description very intriguing. It reminds me of the utteral and inutteral elements of magic as espoused in R. Scott Bakker’s The Prince of Nothing books. Albeit fiction, his understanding of philosophy has given him some great insight into how human will and the universe can coalesce.
While I am not too familiar with the works of Michael Bertiaux, I was led to believe him and the Cult of the Black Snake (I think that was their name) were constructing ever larger sigils out of carefully constructed smaller ones. Careful consideration may be placed unto the original sigils, to be wed together on a dreamscape of a sort by the members of the Cult. What they were accomplishing with this stuff, I dunno.
Anyhow, just an interesting read for anyone that works with sigil magic. Let me know if anyone is doing any interesting or experimental work with sigils or chaos magic these days. =]
“Evidence of pagan rituals involving swans and other birds in the Cornish countryside in the 17th century has been uncovered by archaeologists. Since 2003, 35 pits at the site in a valley near Truro have been excavated containing swan pelts, dead magpies, unhatched eggs, quartz pebbles, human hair, fingernails and part of an iron cauldron.
The finds have been dated to the 1640s, a period of turmoil in England when Cromwellian Puritans destroyed any links to pre-Christian pagan England. It was also a period when witchcraft attracted the death sentence. Jacqui Woods, leading the excavations, has not traced any written or anecdotal evidence of the rituals, which would have involved a significant number of people over a long period. There are no records of similar practices anywhere else in the world.”
(via Times Online)
“What people have to remember is that Wicca; man and woman, God and Goddess is a fertility cult – a heterosexual fertility cult.”
Wiccan author Keith Morgan, interviewed at Autumn Link-Up ’89
“The Wiccan cult stands for fertility and re-creation and not the sexual union between two ‘spiritual’ members of the same sex as some groups like to believe.”
Kevin Carlyon, Hastings & St. Leonards Observer, 1985.
“Thus the blasphemy of the homosexual formula, for it denies Babalon and breeds devils in chaos.”
Kenneth Grant, Nightside of Eden.
Many more at Phil Hine’s web site.
(via Lupa).
As promised, the latest of the Ten Towers audio ritual:
In our first interview with Natalia and Anton we discussed the history and superstitions surrounding the Koldun. In this segment we discuss the history and relationship of the Tarot that form the center of their tradition.
ANTON– I think it’s important before discussing the tarot constellation that we should first review the history of the relationship between the Tarot and the Kolduny. The last time I checked Tarot scholars are totally undivided as to the origins of the Tarot. Stuart Kaplan, Mary Greer, and Rachel Pollack as well as other Tarot historians all seem at a loss concerning the origins of the Tarot. The Kolduny are not at this loss. It is our beliefs concerning the origins of the Tarot that set us aside from other “Tarot” readers. It is our beliefs concerning the origins of Tarot, which creates the pathology that makes Kolduny Tarot both unique and incredibly powerful.
The Kolduny, believe heart and soul that the Tarot is theirs. Even today when people think of the Tarot, the most common mental image is an Eastern European woman laying cards down. There is a reason for this collective mental image.
As far as I can find? Our tradition is the only tradition that has an explanation for the origins of the Tarot. It is what makes Kolduny Tarot what it is. Natalia recently did an online reading with someone on a Pagan/Wiccan forum that caused that person to state during the reading that they were “blown away by the accuracy”. This is not so much due to intuitive reading as it is with understanding how the Tarot came to be. Bottom line, if you don’t know the history and origin of Tarot then you don’t know jack. This is how the Tarot came to be:
Years ago, the Tartars invaded the
The
The child was born a male, shocking all of the wise women, but a vow is a vow. All of the wise women put their knowledge on pieces of birch bark and taught the child using the birch bark. Except for one woman, who was the child’s mother. She died at child birth. The lesson she was supposed to give was “Mercy.” This is why there is no card symbolizing mercy in the Tarot, and why the Tarot is merciless in its truths.
According to our legends this leaves 77 cards of birch bark which this child, Nicholi Popvich Issakov, was sent out to the Tartars with. When Nicholi Popovich finally met the Tartar leader, he showed him using these birch barks the world that was being created by him, and was able to steal a small piece of his soul that he placed in a crystal and threw in to the
After Nicholi completed his mission, he realized he was a man with no mission and no mercy so he stepped off of a cliff, after having made his own birch bark symbol representing his mother’s innocence, which is the only card in the major arcana not numbered. The Fool.
Books could be written on this, but you must know this story to understand Kolduny Tarot.
NATALIA– This is why also all males who are taught by their mothers have a crystal that is blemished in the center, to reflect that small evil that was thrown into the
TiamatsVision– What happened to the Tartar leader whose soul was captured in the crystal and thrown into the
ANTON– It was just a small piece of the evil in the soul of the Tartar leader’s soul. He continued to live but was just not as evil, so that the Kolduny was spared and allowed to exist. When Nicholi stepped off the cliff he left behind the wisdom of the wise women that was given to him with the card of innocence that he had made depicting The Fool. Birch bark was used because it was a common thing to use for communicating. Even today in
T.V– Along with The Fool, are there any other cards that stand out or hold more relevance to the Kolduny in the major arcana?
NATALIA– The 8th card of the major arcana, we view it as Justice and the 11th card as Strength. Some of the later year decks have this backwards. But the Kolduny views the first 9 cards starting with the Magi, as soul cards, and the 8th card is Justice.
(Next: Part 3- The Tarot Constellation)
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