Status
Call number
Collection
Publication
Description
In this updated edition of The Tarot Handbook, now with a new introduction by the author, Angeles Arrien takes tarot beyond the limits of the fortune-telling realm and shows us how this time-honored application is both a visual and symbolic map of consciousness, and a source of ancient wisdom. An exciting handbook for either a beginning or an ardent student of the tarot, it contains a multitude of charts, spreads, illustrations of the Thoth Deck, and other methodology tools for anyone looking for insights into personal and spiritual development.An anthropologist who specializes in cross-cultural myths, Arrien demonstrates how the seventy-eight figures of the tarot are portraitures and archetypes that are prevalent in the collective human experience. The author teaches us to use this realization to look beyond our cultural viewpoint or bias when we approach the tarot, and to rely instead on these more important universal principles, thereby deepening the quality and accuracy of our interpretations and expanding our awareness of the human psyche. A significant and classic piece of tarot literature, The Tarot Handbook is both a required manual for teachers and students of the subject, and an accessible and fascinating exploration of cultural anthropology.… (more)
User reviews
This book is based on the personal views and theories of yet another member of the celebrated Golden Dawn turn-of-the century sect crystallized on yet another fancy deck (Rider-Waite-Smith anyone?) this
These heavily altered decks follow biased interpretations roughly based on the traditional tarots but have little more in common with them. They may be valuable to followers and historians of those pseudo-ancient multicultural holistic metaphysical intellectual constructs typical of the non-scientific elites of the end of the 19th century and beginning of the 20th but that's all.
It's a pity people keep following these misguided recent "traditions" thinking they are all about the real tarot. However they are unknowingly just "playing in the secondary league" with no further evolution in sight.
When these deceiving "Thoth" and "Rider-Waite-Smith" decks were first invented allegedly "to correct and perfect" the tradition (as unashamedly claimed by their proud proponents) tarot had already more than 5 centuries of history and even now we are only beginning to fully understand its mysteries.
The book is well written and organized. For that, the two stars.
This book has
I'm literally head over heels for this book in all ways.