The conversation from January 9 continues…
– Joel plays a dissonant second interval (C+D):
Joel expresses how healthy it feels to have Natalia due to her having “young”, fresh eyes in a way. Phillip and Joel are almost too familiar with some of these images, and it gets harder to navigate. Sensory overload. So to have someone who is relatively speaking a “novice” is very helpful that way, she has clearer sight. Immediate perception of Ace of Coins with Ace and Two of Cups is brilliant. The two fish are exactly the way the plants are in the Ace of Coins.
The jarring piano notes are what came to Joel’s mind when Natalia described these two fish as divas singing opera with this flower between them. Like they are competing for the love of this flower, trying to sing over one another. And it’s like when you hear that interval of the second, it’s too close (sharp intake of breath). It’s got something both icy and too hot about it. That’s how Joel began to perceive this white stem. It’s either white hot, or icy cold, it’s in an extreme state due to the tension between these two.
It’s also reminiscent of an arrow being shot into something. If the fish are where the feathers are, and the arrow has gone into the many-petalled red flower below, and the blue beneath that is like something spraying out. But it could also be a white-hot poker, going into a fire. Maybe it’s like a spinal cord, and the upper part is the fore-brain.
Coming back to this Ace of Coins, Ace of Cups, and Two of Cups, Joel is remembering that from the get-go Phillip and Joel had two different perspectives on the Ace of Coins. Joel saw it as plants growing out of the Coin itself, Phillip saw it as the plants emerging from something behind the Coin, occluded by it. Is One? Or is it actually Two? And that’s what the Ace of Cups shows in a way. It was a One that became Two. It was a One that had the Two inside of it (the city with pyramid within), and then they separated and this tension between them has now brought about a third.
What Joel sees when he looks at Ace of Cups, Ace of Coins, Two of Cups, it woke him up to this wall—the flesh-coloured wall behind the Ace of Cups. And then there is this red panel in the Two of Cups which we were perceiving as a pool of wine or blood, but could also be a wall. The other side of the wall. So in the Ace of Cups we’re seeing one side of something. And the whole time in the earlier conversations on the Ace of Cups, we were wondering what the backside of the Ace of Cups looked like, and making all these assumptions that it looked the same as the front, and making conclusions (e.g. that it is a six-sided “city wall”, etc.). But what if now we’re seeing the back that we had always wanted to see, and now that we’re seeing it it’s a totally different arrangement, something vastly different behind the scenes vs what we saw in the Ace of Cups. So the Ace and the Two are a front and a back, and the red is the back of that flesh-coloured wall in the Ace of Cups.
And the last image that came to Joel…he appreciates that lecture that Phillip sent around….it makes him think of Alice in Wonderland, where everything is alive and has a personality. The doorknob, the floor, the flowers, everything is going to speak to you if you touch it. Whereas maybe the Swords were a realm where everything is alive, but not necessarily sensory or animated the way it is in the Cups. More like the Sorcerer’s Apprentice, where the apprentice makes this spell that the broomsticks will help him fill the well with water, but they can’t help just repeating themselves over and over again. It devolves into this destructive, mechanical repetition that he can’t get under control. The Swords have more of that gesture. Not so interactive and responsive, but alive and proliferating somewhat destructively.
Whereas the Suit of Coins is like…if the Suit of Cups is the realm where everything is conscious, and the Suit of Swords is the realm where everything is alive or animated, with the Suit of Coins it’s more like that which unites gemstones and stars, the highest and lowest, with both of them there’s something…not dead, but we perceive it as dead…this realm that we perceive as death is this realm of purity, of the essence of things, the foundation.
– Phillip considers this comparison of Ace of Coins and Two of Cups. The plant form in the Ace is so reflective of the fish in the Two, but it’s the negative space formed by the inward facing flower that really jumped out. That negative space is so reflective of the fish. Even the sepal leaf-forms around that look like the tail of the fish, they’re not in the same position, but all these shapes and forms are so reflective of the fish, it’s kind of amazing.
January 10, 2021
– Some of the earlier messages of Joel’s were addressing the Swords, and the two circles making the Vesica Piscis, and the triangles forming in the circles, and then he came to the Ace of Cups and brought in the Representative of Humanity, and this third element coming up. And Natalia was feeling if this certain aspect in these dolphins could also be a kind of Ahrimanic element, and maybe Christ in the middle.
So there’s a slight difference between the dolphins touching, one with the nose on the yellow-wing, the other with the tongue on the petal. And these blue petals are touching, or pushing. It reminds Natalia of the Representative of Humanity—keeping Ahriman and Lucifer separated, at a certain distance. Maybe that’s a stretch, but it seems there is something in the anger of the dolphins some kind of creatures having to do with the Double or so.
And what is being said about the white stem being a sword or arrow, and Natalia also really felt there was something upside-down happening…there is certainly a movement or gesture there…and this icy-cold…there comes in contradictions. Later in the evening, Natalia was reflecting on a conversation with Joel about Lord’s Prayer Course, about how animals are lacking the tone/the word. Do these creatures have the tone? Is this some kind of future state, like what Phillip brought up in terms of procreation with the word? So on one level, you know the fish can’t sing, but they are yelling, they are singing, they are in discord, but they are in discord and not able to bring out what they are feeling inside. On the other hand, their tongue is like the party favours at New Year’s Eve or something from when you’re a kid. It curls, but you blow it and it makes a whistling sound and out comes this kind of “tongue.” And your intention is to kind of scare or surprise the other person, like for Carnival.
Considering this lecture that Phillip shared. And this sphere where everything is alive and able to speak. And certainly, here in the physical realm, maybe dolphins are the closest thing to animals achieving tone or word. They can think to some degree, they are the most developed animal, maybe the first to speak at some point? But Natalia wonders, where exactly or when exactly is this level where the animals can speak and have voices? Some level other than physical?
That lecture certainly gives an impression of just how much the spiritual world is a bit “upside down” compared to our physical world, and maybe in the Two of Cups something similar is taking place.
And definitely in this image, with the dissonance, is this feeling of awakening, not a harmonious lulling, but a more awakening quality that is maybe caused by this strong dissonance. So this dissonance is needed, perhaps for this flower to more fully come into itself through that, brought about by the dolphins. They do something to bring this flower about, because Natalia assumed…this then becomes the third cup, correct?
Natalia is still fascinated by these dolphins. They are a common theme on heraldry, but the only example she could find with the tongues out were on Blason Imaginaire de Dalides de la Riviera.
In medieval churches and houses they used gargoyles, spouts for water. Rain water was lead through these figures’ mouths, often grotesque figures. Sometime these were also sort of fish/dolphin figures. But of course the grotesque had this purpose of keeping the evil away by showing it. Perhaps there is a double meaning to the dolphins, something maybe to do with scaring or clearing or so…
– Joel loves this picture of the discord being a shock, an awakening. What’s interesting is that Phillip brings in this being the world after death, or in the dream, the spiritual world. In a way it’s like waking up within the dream, waking up in the night—full consciousness in the spiritual world, maybe that’s what this is expressing. And this aspect of cleansing in a way, this exposing evil, and maybe the fountain’s way of cleansing the water as it flowed through these grotesque creatures. That encapsulates two different directions for Joel.
Maybe we have in the Ace of Cups something more like the Representative of Humanity with Lucifer above and Ahriman below, with Christ holding the center. But then it switches from being a vertical to a horizontal orientation with the Two of Cups, and that makes Joel think of the brow chakra. Christ is in the center, you have to make a space for Christ in the center, and Ahriman is attacking from the right and Lucifer to the left. And in order to carve out that space for Christ you have to expose, “run the water through” Lucifer and Ahriman, they have to fully form themselves, and it does feel as though they are screaming at you from both sides.
And maybe there is a movement in these Arcana, where the Ace is more of a Crown Chakra with the stage of Footwashing, and the Two more of a Brow Chakra, with a Scourging from left and right.
But the other thought Joel had before going to sleep went back to this image of the Ace of Cups as the front of the castle, and the Two of Cups the back. This contrast of what you see presented before you vs what’s actually going on inside. And also brought back to this icy cold yet white hot arrow or poker or sword in the center, and suddenly this image of the spear wound of Anfortas came to Joel, the lance wound, and it’s piercing his genitalia. This flower that is there, if this was the proportions of the human being, in that realm below the midline of the image—this is an image of the lance piercing, and giving Anfortas the wound. And he’s the Fisher King, he’s the Angler. And maybe that’s in there too, that these are fish caught on the hook and angry that they’re caught. But isn’t there something about his wound in the original tale, that it vacillates between icy cold and white hot? So maybe the Ace of Cups is the outside of the Grail Castle. Then you go to the Two of Cups, and you have this very strange ritual going on inside. And this display at the Grail Castle should have been, and on some level was, an awakening for Parzival—“What is going on here?”
And then this other piece was the theme of talking beasts. In a conversation a while back, Natalia and Joel were looking at this new Mother ritual of Footwashing, and how in this ritual we offer warmth to the stone through incense and oil, and offer light to the plant through milk and honey. But how do we offer the tone to the animal? Is there a proper song or music through which we could do that? And then here we have these animals that are intoning something, or at least attempting to. There is something there of the silent scream, “I’ve got to get this out, but I can’t.” All nature groaning for salvation, for reintegration, as Paul talks about. So these animals are right on the cusp, they’re almost there in the realm of speech.
The impression Joel gets from Tomberg is that these higher realms of nature will only come about in future Jupiter. That in Jupiter evolution, the stone approaches life, it’s full of warmth. And the plant approaches sentience, it bears its own light. Stone somewhere close to plant like; plant somewhere close to animal-like. And the animal is almost self-conscious, almost human. They have the word, they have speech. While the human being is almost angelic. Semi-angelic humanity. We have this moral ether at our disposal in order to be truly creative beings. And Joel always thought there’s something in CS Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia that there are intimations of this, with talking beasts and mobile trees, and there is even a part with gemstones that are edible. These fantasy stories seem to have tapped into this future Jupiter world, that right now only exists on the other side of the threshold in the realm of Imagination, but will someday become reality through our work.
And then Joel also feels that there is some kind of eurythmy gesture here. With the two fish, there is something of “T” the way they curl and meet the flower, and the “T” made Joel think of Leo. These fish look a bit like dragons or lions were represented in ancient China. In China, pugs were bred to look like dragons and lions, which were in a way identical for the Chinese. Dragons had lion’s faces. So there’s something of this attitude in these fish, they’re aggressive but a little yippy, and somehow royal at the same time.
But then with the pushing away gesture of the petals, Joel felt like the Representative of Humanity has a “G” gesture. Like getting to the elevator doors just as they’re closing and forcing them back open, pushing away on both sides (or above and below, depending on orientation). So then this has a relationship to Sagittarius, and we have this arrow shooting down between the two fish.
What’s nice about doing the conversations this way, Joel can just play the messages and type. He doesn’t have to be taking notes while trying to speak and listen, and then type up what he was writing down. Potentially saves time as well as allows Joel to engage better.
– Natalia sees this chakra connection. There is even a two-petaled gesture with the yellow fannish leaves up above. So to place the Ahriman-Lucifer activity to this chakra makes sense. And there is something in the red parts which have more of a lotus gesture to them.
Interesting with the “G” and “T” gesture. Joel brought up pulling up the curtain before. And the “G” gesture is really this looking into another world, pushing away the curtains. And then the “T” really collecting these forces of the heart and the lion strength. Interesting to have them both here at the same time.
– Phillip links this idea of pollination to this idea Natalia brought in in terms of the fish singing to the flower. For Phillip, these cards are typically expressing the whole archetype. For him it’s natural to think of the fish as animals still containing the tone and being expressive of that. Joel mentioning that the plant would be radiating its own light. For the material aspects, they would have their own warmth or life generating inside of them. But just with the animal and plant, fish and flower, you could imagine with the tongue and the petal reaching out—it’s strange that the petal is even reaching out. The ones in the front aren’t. Then you see the fish eye is kind of on a level with the yellow/leaf/fan part of the flower. And maybe that yellow part is the flower radiating its own light, being perceived by the eye of the animal, and then the sound or screaming or singing of the fish being transmitted through the tongue of the fish into the petal so that the flower can experience that vibration on some level. Phillip hadn’t thought of that, that there’s this kind of two-way pollinating going on. You think of a bee pollinating, it’s actually going in for nectar. It’s collecting pollen for food, and some gets left behind, it’s accidental or incidental. It isn’t like the bee says “oh, I need to get pollen on the plant.” It happens inadvertently. It’s a mutual back and forth. Food for the insect, reproduction for the plant. The plant isn’t receiving nourishment per se, it’s more about reproduction. Interesting to think of that analogy here: that the sound and the light as this mutual exchange happening within this higher dimension of these aspects.
The Two giving birth to the third, as Natalia pointed out. Phillip feels this is a common gesture in the Arcana, he certainly saw it that way, but it raises this question of this progression from Ace to Two to Three. Ace is always a kind of flash of the wholeness, the final cause, the goal, the ultimate, final product that motivates the whole process. So you see the end in the beginning, the completion in the beginning. And then the Two is the first transitional piece, no longer the completed project. But it is nonetheless highly expressive of the completed state. The later Numbered Arcana are more generic forms, not such individualised, extreme manifestations of this finished product. It’s kind of this question—is it producing this third term in between? How did the two cups get produced out of the first cup? Why do you jump to a state where there are suddenly two cups producing a third state? Is the inner flower, is the third term really just the first term, and it’s producing the two through its activity there? And the act of the first term having transformed itself in such a way to produce these two, does the remnant of that become the third term. That’s possible. But how do the two come about?
And the mirroring of this inner portion…with this sort of vase with the red flowery opening and the flower in the vase with the leaves, the fish, the bud with the leaves on top….that whole central portion is very reflective of the Ace, the city transformed, things turned upside down and inside out, but you still have this lower blue portion that corresponds to the pyramid, the red flower which is like the sphere, and then this upper portion which is like the city transformed. So what’s happening there?
The idea of the wound of the Fisher King. That made Phillip think that the red portion could be the surface of the lake upon which he’s boating and fishing. You turn the card upside down and suddenly that blue part becomes the wake left by the hook and its weight, the fishing implements, etc. It’s kind of like simultaneously a pictorial representation of his root chakra and the wounding that happens in it as well as this process of an attack from both sides in an unfolding and upside-down kind of way. What does the red signify? Why would that be the water? Maybe the black line is the surface, and the red is this kind of inside-out domain, and the blue is the water going down. And then the fish are kind of hooked, the bait is the flower and the fish are drawn to the flower as the bait and hooked onto the flower? It’s all so self-contained, so it’s kind of unusual to think about the image that way.
If you take the two cups—and the form of these cups in the two are the form they now stay in until the ten, and that tenth cup is a little more elaborate, and then they change in the court cards—if you take the top, the red circle…a little below that is the yellow portion of the opening of the cup, only the front crescent is seen. If you trace the lower portion of that crescent yellow circle, it would be a continuous oval that would create a Vesica Piscis in the opening—you see the shaded section of the opening, the very top of that shaded section is a continuous oval with that lower section of the crescent. So you take that circle with the red circle overlaid overtop, and you have this Vesica Piscis section in between, it is this premonition of the third, of the middle space. The Two of Cups has these three things—two indicating three so clearly. The two petaled chakra, the scourging, the assault from two sides, the way that highlights and emphasises the middle space. The mediating space between the two.
What stood out to Phillip about this eurythmy image is the connection to China. There is this kind of Chinese look a bit, the way the lions are depicted, this kind of ancient Mamluk feeling—because China is where the paper came from that the Muslims were getting their paper and making their cards on.
How does the city become flower and fish? In the Ace you have the three wings of water, flows of water coming out. They are a bit tail-like, fish-like in a way. A fish is kind of like a transformation of water. An animalisation of water (water considered as one of the four elements of the material realm) and life contained within those elements. The way the building composed of material has this kind of being, this blessing-being, this angel-being, this composite being that is more apparent as material object than it is as living, individualised creature. But then there’s something of the nature of decomposing this into its component parts, where each part becomes an intensified expression of that particular characteristic. The water becomes animal-like like fish, the vestibule or something in that space, that dagger becomes plant and flower. Dagger hanging from the building is almost like a chandelier, so there’s that light component as well. The flower and then the directional component of the dagger shape going into the white arrow-shaft leaf and stem kind of thing. The plant/vestibule correspondence, and the water/animal correspondence, there’s some kind of transformational quality there.
– Natalia is interested in this idea of the flower having its own light. She was wondering about these two yellow wings it has. Maybe that is its own light. Also this interaction with this animal and plant life. Really they seem to be in some other time or phase of development or something. That kind of makes one think then of—we have animal and the tone, and the plant and the light, then these cups rise…are they made of some kind of stony thing? And now that they seem to float in the air, and this redness, could there be something like warmth there? This red starts to come out more like fire or warmth if one thinks along those lines. Actually this lower portion—is it a bit more orange than the other red parts? If one goes along those lines, and there is some kind of connection between animals and cups. If the animal and plant have a connection…maybe that cup would somehow be representing the stony world. Warmth. Maybe that goes a bit far.
Interesting what Phillip said about the cups and the two ovals. The yellow part still there, and Vesica Piscis. So what is this chalice about?
Somehow she was thinking…when the Fisher King is having this wound, also the nature all around the castle is mourning. Estelle maybe talks about that. Something was happening for the nature. This close connection between the Fisher King and nature came to mind when Joel spoke about that theme. It was some Knight who began to re-cultivate or take care of the forest around the castle to somehow make it more ready for Parzival to come. There’s some kind of preparation, bringing some life back because everyone in the castle was so sad. That even the nature was influenced by it.
What Joel brought about two-petalled chakra. We had this thought of Ahriman and Lucifer. This horizontal stream—in Tomberg, he says if one succeeds in turning the stream from horizontal to vertical, it streams upward into the 8-petalled lotus and becomes spiritual cognition, which then flows down, creates a vertical stream through all the chakras. Maybe that red part of the flower in the middle, is this brow chakra awakening, the awakening we spoke of before, and that is somehow strengthening this vertical white portion, bringing this vertical stream all the way down to—what would that wounded chakra be for the Fisher King? Sacral Chakra, or even Root Chakra?
Could there be something that the Fisher King was wounded in one of his lower chakras and that had a negative influence on his brow chakra, or something like that?
Natalia opens the Grail Bearer randomly, and it’s the part where Anfortas is pierced in the place where the physical seed of creation is formed and thus he lost the spiritual gift he was granted through the sacred vow he took with his sister Repanse de Schoye…etc…(page 120)
Yes, there is a connection in the Grail Bearer, there is this gardener knight, whose mission becomes the healing of nature itself, which had become wounded also due to the wounding of Anfortas. The fields of Monsalvaeche had themselves become a damsel in distress.
And his work to make things better gives a lot of hope to Repanse de Schoye and it’s also making clear the path to Monsalvaeche of Parzival, so that he too is cleansed of old weeds that grow.
Dragons are connected to power, but especially to control over water, typhoons, etc.
Natalia also shares something more personal that has been there the whole day. This card is affecting her, not sure how to put it. It’s with these dolphins. This will get a bit personal. She had a dream of her friend Are. Somehow these fish-dolphins create some kind of inner angst, she awoke with a lot of angst. She’s been working with Are for a long time. Working on the double, egregores, etc. Hasn’t seen him for a long time. Feeling a strong connection with Are when she awoke that lasted through this day as well. And that made her look for the meaning for these two dolphins from the side of this church, these kind of egregores or gargoyles on the churches. They have them in Norway. She can’t help but feel something very personal in her emotional life here. When China and the dragon are brought up, again Are is brought up for her. Also this middle part between the dolphins has something of China in it as well. Are had an incarnation in China, which he describes in his latest book. He describes his later incarnations and healing work. And how Lucifer incarnated in China 5000 years ago and how healing methods changed from earlier times to something that was helping Lucifer to have more power over people. At the moment Are is creating something very interesting with his movement from a five-fold path of healing to seven- and twelve-fold. It’s really in Are`s destiny, and there is a strong connection there between Natalia and Are. Somehow this card brings this connection up, causes something to stir.
January 11
A part of Natalia’s dream last night—both Joel and Phillip were there, some connection to this working together. Just a short part of a busy dream. This part was quite calm, like normal everyday situation. Phillip brought up that Joel had something to share with Natalia. They went to meet Joel. There was nothing really around, just outside of Copake, but no real landscape. And Joel brought with him a mound of old roots, a little pile, and also there was this old soil, a bit dry, also a lot of this sandy soil. And Joel said “Could you eat this? Or otherwise I don’t know what to do, I think I have to throw them away.” And she wondered where has he gotten this? Does this have something to do with Camphill soil? She couldn’t think in that moment, but began to wonder…”I want to help him, but I can’t eat that stuff!” Thought maybe if she just takes it to her mouth and would just keep it in her mouth to moisten it and then spit it out. Would that do? Is it logical to eat that stuff?? It’s a weird question…just a short part of the dream. And she woke up and this picture hovered all the time there, what is this about? It was a real meeting feeling. Phillip didn’t say much! Very blasé, “You know, Joel has something there for you to do.” But she feels so different from yesterday, a bit released vs what she described in her last message in terms of angst and strong emotional reactions to this card. Is this connected to the dream? Much more joy today coming from the night.
That dream image also made her think, Joel was talking about the roots, somehow we felt that the Swords had this root quality, and now something is sprouting after a long period out through this Ace world in the Cups.
And at some point, Natalia has been thinking, where are the roots to this flower? Maybe it has very long roots? Or it goes all the way to the Swords. If one wants to think it has roots. Because it has flower, leaves, stem. Shouldn’t it have roots somewhere? Or have they become something else?
Of course, this dream image has a bit this quality of drinking the bitter cup. Natalia had this once before in a dream, asking from her two friends, “Do I really have to drink that to the very end??” And yes, she has to. And so again this quality of two men with her and she has to take in something bitter or difficult. Just an association.
This root theme in the Two of Cups. Is it like a water plant of some kind? What is this red below. Or orange stuff, somehow it seems to be liquid. But yesterday it had this face of fiery, some level of warmth. Another thing would be, Joel brought in the Two of Swords with the connection of the plant, and it has some similar things in it, but it’s like a look from above rather than the side. She wonders if Joel would like to give some ideas to this roots/Two of Swords with Two of Cups.
Natalia then noticed on The Unknown Friends, in the notes about the Minors, an association between the Wheel of Fortune and the Two of Cups. She notices the white of the sword of the Sphinx seems to come back in the white stem. And this motif of two animal figures in connection with a third being.
Natalia asked from her friend what comes to his mind from this dream. And his quick answer was to accept this old past and make it something new. What Joel offers through this roots and ground. Her friend sees it as something from the past which can now be…who knows? Maybe it was a question taken in, whether to eat it or how to do it in order to make it something new, a new ground or so. Maybe this card was touching something for Natalia of her karma. Especially when she finds today this connection with Wheel of Fortune. There is this connection with the karma of the individual? And the Leo Joel spoke of, the “T” and “D” are Leo, and Wheel of Fortune is also Leo.
And somehow what Joel brought in of the lance wound of Anfortas…so we’re all wounded as well…and then Joel described this right and left and making space for Christ in the middle. She just thought maybe those are all connected. That I-consciousness also rises when you are able to accept or heal something of the past wound or karma. That’s how she connects with what she working with in terms of the “lance” of Are’s perceptions and suggestions. Some of his suggestions she has been working with for a few years, and that actually for her was creating also this stronger I-consciousness to the third eye chakra, the brow chakra. That was the last thing she discussed with Are, about this theme. Strengthening the I-consciousness in healing the Crown—yet healing the wound is paradoxically deepening the wound at the moment, but something is possibly setting the stage for a new organ in future times. Are wonders about the ongoing process. Taking the past in such a way that you can take it so much in that you can create something new or it can heal to a new life. So personally, that’s how this card is speaking to this difficult process.
The upper part—could that be a new organ of perception somehow, in more general terms?
Did something good happen due to the wound of Anfortas? That was such a huge tragedy for such a long time. It made it possible for Parzival to come into the picture. Was there some kind of analogy to be seen in that story, what would be the good outcome or something new arising out of the wounding of Anfortas?
…to be continued…
The Unknown Friends 