Meditations on the Tarot
A Journey in to Christian Hermeticism
Anonymous.
Translated by Robert A. Powell. Amity House, Inc.
1985
"In his foreword to the German edition, Hans Urs von Balthasar writes: "A thinking, praying Christian of unmistakable purity reveals to us to symbols of Christian Hermeticism in its various levels of mysticism, gnosis, and magic, taking in also the Cabbala and certain elements of astrology and alchemy. These symbols are summarized in the twenty-two so-called "Major Arcana" of the Tarot cards. By way of the Major Arcana the author seeks to lead meditatively into the deeper, all-embracing wisdom of the Catholic Mystery."
This may be regarded as one of the great spiritual classics of this century. In the hands of this author of immense erudition and deep contemplation, the Tarot cards of ancient Egypt reveal their universal archetypal symbolic nature and become a school of objective insight. The meditations are, in the truest sense, a school of lectio divina requiring an activity more profound than that of study and intellectual explanation. The author gathers us into his own spiritual journey to the authentic Source of all true knowledge and compassion. This book in my view is the greatest contribution to date toward the rediscovery and renewal of the Christian contemplative tradition of the Fathers of the Church and the high Middle Ages. With its firm grasp of tradition, its balance, wisdom, profundity, openness to truth, and comprehensive approach to reality, it deserves to be the basis of a course in spirituality in every Christian institution of higher learning and what would be even better, the point of departure and unifying vision of the whole curriculum."
Fr. Thomas Keating, OCSO
(Hans Urs von Balthasar was one of the foremost theologians of the 20th century, who died shortly before his investiture as a Cardinal in 1988)
A Journey in to Christian Hermeticism
Anonymous.
Translated by Robert A. Powell. Amity House, Inc.
1985
"In his foreword to the German edition, Hans Urs von Balthasar writes: "A thinking, praying Christian of unmistakable purity reveals to us to symbols of Christian Hermeticism in its various levels of mysticism, gnosis, and magic, taking in also the Cabbala and certain elements of astrology and alchemy. These symbols are summarized in the twenty-two so-called "Major Arcana" of the Tarot cards. By way of the Major Arcana the author seeks to lead meditatively into the deeper, all-embracing wisdom of the Catholic Mystery."
This may be regarded as one of the great spiritual classics of this century. In the hands of this author of immense erudition and deep contemplation, the Tarot cards of ancient Egypt reveal their universal archetypal symbolic nature and become a school of objective insight. The meditations are, in the truest sense, a school of lectio divina requiring an activity more profound than that of study and intellectual explanation. The author gathers us into his own spiritual journey to the authentic Source of all true knowledge and compassion. This book in my view is the greatest contribution to date toward the rediscovery and renewal of the Christian contemplative tradition of the Fathers of the Church and the high Middle Ages. With its firm grasp of tradition, its balance, wisdom, profundity, openness to truth, and comprehensive approach to reality, it deserves to be the basis of a course in spirituality in every Christian institution of higher learning and what would be even better, the point of departure and unifying vision of the whole curriculum."
Fr. Thomas Keating, OCSO
(Hans Urs von Balthasar was one of the foremost theologians of the 20th century, who died shortly before his investiture as a Cardinal in 1988)
