A continuation of the WhatsApp conversation from the past few days…
January 12
Natalia returns to Phillip’s questions about the presence of 2, with a strong 3 mediating. And the question of the connection of the Fish and the Cups. She feels a strong expectation on the part of the two Cups towards what is happening above, and Joel had pointed out earlier about the mouths of the fishes having the same shape as the openings of the Cups. It makes one think of that red part of the cups being kind of “plastic” i.e. flexible, like a mouth would be. Their roundness is not perfectly round, not totally stable. This Vesica Piscis that appears, and this yellow crescent below, it’s all a bit wobbly, shows a flexibility. The more she looks at these Cups, the more they express a kind of candle or lantern feeling as well. So again, she would say warmth is there strongly for her. It brings to mind the Hermit’s lamp. There is redness in his lamp as well. These have a more candle or chandelier feeling to them though.
The way you draw a candle as a child, the light as a hollow around the flame. It reminds Natalia of the Cups having this in the middle, this candle-flame like middle part, and then these spheres spreading around them, a bit in the same way. And then this element of warmth. Associated now for her very strongly in this direction.
Playing with the drawing…maybe there are six sides here again on these cups?
(An image of the Two with many questions from Natalia, and some answers came to her through Grail Bearer.)
Yesterday Natalia was reading Bill T’s article in Star Wisdom, “The Path from Pisces to Aquarius.” And that came back mind what Joel was bringing in the early messages about Pisces and Aquarius in connection with the Two of Cups. She started to put down some words and ideas from that line of approach. Not sure how much we can make sense of these notes…she will try to put something in words. Maybe we will find some other connections too, give us ideas. So…Pisces is ruled by Jupiter, the brow chakra. Aquarius connected with Poseiden/dolphin/sea horse/Neptune. Neptune is the ruler of Aquarius (in modern astrology).
The connection she finds with the Hermit, and Wheel of Fortune was that…well, what is interesting in earlier notes is the Sphinx as representative of Etheric Christ. So what is the connection with the Ace and Two of Cups—could it be in the line of this etheric realm we’re in? On the other hand, the Hermit with the lantern, and then the Cups began to remind her of him. In prior conversations, we had seen the Hermit as though when he looks into his lamp, what he sees within is the Wheel of Fortune. And then Phillip noticing that the fishes are looking into this flower, into this light. Then when she thought about this lamp, it became a question—is it day or night in this image? Can one ask that? We were wondering this in our conversation on the Hermit years ago. Then this night theme came up…Neptune is called the goddess of night, this kind of feminine of Poseidon.
And we had coming up strongly this tone aspect, which is also etheric, one of the ethers. And then again Joel brought up this dissonance for the awakening in the dream, or at night. Night appeared in the conversation again. From that to this Fisher King picture. After Bill T’s article, he spoke so beautifully about the two fishes. That the one is going horizontally, the direction of Eros, and the other going vertically, the direction of love. Aphrodite and Cupid or something was there. So we spoke of the Fisher King and the Lance, and the other of the fishes are connected to Eros in Pisces. Why is the Fisher King fishing? It’s the only thing he does, and he gets some consolation. It’s again connected to the Neptunian, watery element. He puts his hook in to catch the fish, and you can read from Estelle in the Grail Bearer, she has a vision when Parzival comes for the first time to the lake, and he sees Anfortas and another fellow in the boat who is always helping him. Why does he need this connection with water and fishes? And then Estelle saw the flash of the Communion of Fishes linked to this vision of the Fisher King by the lake for the first time when Parzival meets him. So from that I think she also mentions earlier somewhere that this other man in the boat is also connected with the Communion of Fishes, so he was not present for the Communion of Fishes at the time of Christ in a previous incarnation, but should or could have, but that is why he is humbling his I, with eyes cast down. He also had a connection to this. So that brings us to Anfortas as Nicodemus, as a Night Disciple of Christ. And she was thinking that in the night, we also fish at night, when we go to sleep, trying to catch something. All of this started to go round in her mind. So this night-time level and that came also in a way with the Hermit, because he is kind of Trevrizent to Natalia, he also was a disciple of the night (as Joseph of Arimathea).
Then to her question as to what good was coming out of the Lance Wound, or this process of Anfortas later on. It’s like she had never read that from Estelle before, the last chapter in Grail Bearer, Anfortas and Repanse learned to mourn together. And that was connected to the Philadelphia Epoch, the 6th cultural epoch, the Aquarian time, when we are all doing that. When that is more a natural state, this sharing of each other’s suffering. In that way, she connects that to Sacred Magic inasmuch as the wills become sacred…that it is a Sacred Magic happening that way in this…
There is actually Anfortas speaking through Estelle (she quotes): The force of will that is only gained when one truly mourns with another. Yields transformation, weaving of spirits (Sacred Magic), and miracles are born of this.
And of course Christ as Waterman…this image is around all of the others, bringing them together.
Natalia clarifies what she is mentioning about Are. In his latest book, The Lucifer Deception: The Yellow Emperor Unveiled—Secrets of Traditional Oriental Medicine, he explains out of his own experience how the five element treatment was developed and how it was used. And how he is trying to find a way out of it to a more Christ-centered 7- and 12-fold way of healing, especially trying to develop that the last five years or so. Meaning that healing would not just translocate but actually would lead to transformation of demonic disease entities. Only with Christ can we find that.
It is actually a really interesting book, one of his own incarnations after the Yellow Emperor’s incarnation in the Court. But this Luciferic Emperor still inspired other Emperors and Courts and Healers for a long time.
Natalia works with him as a healer of karmic imbalances, wounds, egregores, etc. She feels very much guided to Are, and can really relate to what he teaches in terms of translocation vs transformation of demons. It makes one feel more responsible for how one heals oneself.
When Natalia just wrote the title of this book to the chat, she felt inspired to look up an image of this Yellow Emperor, feeling there must be some connection to the imagery of the Two of Cups with this central flower and the Lucifer/Ahriman picture of the dolphins…and if you find the depictions of the Yellow Emperor, there is strongly this color yellow and he has this red cap on his head, very similar to this central flower. Then he is sitting in such a position, with a very large skirt under him, which this blue fans out as well…it’s like spreading out under him. That was very striking from this picture.
There are even five petals on this central flower in the Two of Cups, emphasising this healing with the five elements, the Yellow Emperor’s five-fold system. Are describes how he took the older twelvefold system, squeezed it down into five, so that he could control these Luciferic demonic beings, so he could manipulate people and healing. It’s a really strong description from Are of all he was observing what was going on. Are tells much in his books how he wanted to find out and work on a more Christ-centered way of healing with both animals and humans.
The flower has some connection to the Yellow Emperor, he often wore yellow and red on his head. He didn’t allow the transformation of demons, as they were his allies. For Natalia there is a strong inclination in the Two of Cups about the question of true healing. Also this Anfortas question, about what good can come about through the healing process.
– Natalia’s friend Joanna, with whom she does Tarot work, came to visit her and they spent some time with the Ace and Two of Cups.
It was interesting for Joanna also to just dive into the Cups a little bit. She actually found quite a few things similar to the way we’ve been talking about. Some things woven together from earlier days. What came strongly from Joanna was that she was connecting this middle part of the flower as a flame, and she felt these tongues of the dolphins having this same flame type of shape in them. That went on with this theme Natalia has had with more of the fire side of this card. They also came to experience this lower portion having this passionate side in it very strongly, and recognised this arrow or strong tension. There is definitely something about the genitals as well. This goes along with this passion side. On the other hand you go to the throat/ear area, which of course is the new reproduction area in the future. They actually make physiologically quite the same shaping. This struck them also, this fire vs water. Red vs. blue.
This tension with the upper part of blue and the lower portion of fiery reddish orange. Joanna brought up—this forming of the “T”, this heart force or shape, something which starts floating beautifully ends up with these tense red tongues in the expression of the dolphin-fish-dragons. That was bothering them a bit. This certain harmonious way of floating for these fishes, and then ending up with this strong unsolved question so to speak between the flower and the dolphin-fishes, that if something needs to be kept away from the flower? On the other hand, if the fishes are kind of going after something there. As if they would have fire in their tongues also. Hard to find out what is really going on there at the end. It keeps on changing somehow. Almost like at the end we came to talk about that there is something of the Christ, the strong middle portion of brow chakra, protecting or keeping away something. On the other hand with this fiery aspect, the yellow and red in connection with Yellow Emperor, something of Lucifer in the midst. So it’s hard to put it…a certain contradiction comes very close that we can’t really put into final words in that direction.
– Joel proposes that maybe as part of the chat process, we leave a space for other to share after we have given a few of our own impressions. If more impressions come to us, we could write them down so that we don’t forget them, but either wait to share them until others have shared, or send them by email. That will make it easier for him to transcribe, if one has a great deal of impressions, to write them down and email them.
– Phillip really loves this connection of Two of Cups to Wheel of Fortune. What an amazing explosion of that structure and that form! The connection of the two fish to the monkey and the dog, and the central flower to the Sphinx as Etheric Christ, or connecting it to this hidden moral question within the moral ether, or the ego. The white of the sword and the white of the stem. The white of the spokes. It’s amazing. Then Natalia had mentioned that perhaps the Hermit is looking at the Wheel of Fortune? Phillip doesn’t remember that coming up in a past conversation. But it sparks this strong idea, this question of is the night or day? Is he looking into the lantern or is it casting light? Is everything else dark, and that’s a little illuminated world that he can look into? And the six-sidedness of that lantern. This six-sidedness of these various things….cup on the Ace, cups on the Two. This connection of Nine to Ten. Numerologically it doesn’t seem to link in, he was trying to think where are we? The 51st Arcanum with Ace of Cups and 52nd with Two? Six (5+1) and Seven (5+2)? Doesn’t link in there exactly. Maybe Joel knows. But just the imagery is rich. It bears more looking at in that light. Free associations of astrological aspects with Neptune, Pisces ruled by Jupiter and 2 petalled lotus…the watery element there is very cool, Aquarius and Pisces—are they linked to Hermit and Wheel of Fortune? Like two consecutive signs of the Zodiac compared to two consecutive Arcana? He’ll have to go back and listen again. Didn’t yet read Estelle pages.
And then the question of what is the Fisher King doing and linking it to the Communion of Fishes? Maybe it’s the idea that part of this wound is like revisiting not having faith, not catching the fish (before Christ appears), stuck in the loop of the wound of that. That kind of mourning and suffering that goes with that failing, opening up the space for a new organ, a sense of beholding the other. Maybe that links into this mourning he took on with Repanse de Schoye. Did he even catch fish? It’s a good question.
– Natalia understands the recommendations in terms of how to structure the conversation, to keep it flowing but manageable. Natalia wasn’t feeling well, and happened to have a lot of time with this image, so it probably won’t happen this way for all of them! But a lot came to her through it.
But there is a very personal element to this card for Natalia in connection to Are, and goes very strongly into her dreams and into the next day in her processing and understanding. It is bit weird in a way, do the others experience that? It brings up new questions about the image. Not sure what to say about it or what to do with it, where that belongs. She seems to move from the upper part to the bottom in these three days, and the fiery element came, and this passionate realm with this lower red rising very much now, connecting to some of her memories with people. She came to the limit of feeling too personal. What to share? What to keep to herself?
There’s a certain point with intimacy, with how many people can you share?
She explains more deeply to Phillip the nature of what she is talking about, regarding her wound. It is a karmic wound and it has many sides on it, it needs to be transformed.
Out of her own experiences there, that’s why she brought up this question: if you have a very bad karmic wound, what can be the good that is coming out of it? So that’s a process, and looking around these things with Anfortas, and wondering. With other cards will this happen, that it brings up something personal so strongly? And it made her think about how the Etheric Christ is maybe working at this moment; are we asked to heal this karmic baggage at this moment? Now this card has given her the feeling of this Etheric Christ. It makes her wonder. His work at the moment is of course a transformation of the sub-earthly spheres. He’s working with the demons there, right? We also have these layers around our hearts. For Natalia today, this orange-red part feels very much like this passion, this Fire Earth, this six sub-earthly sphere. But this is probably just very personal for Natalia. In her dreams there is now a bit of this fire now going on. How it stirs her emotional life. Actually not just the image, but also what both Joel and Phillip brought up led her in this very personal dimension, to this healing work with Are for the past few years. Questions around true healing and transformation arose.
Could there be a Night Side and a Day Side to the Tarot? Like what the Grail has. The Night Side being more personal, karma, destiny?
– Phillip actually really enjoys everything that Natalia is offering, he doesn’t feel it inappropriate because it is so personal. It feels very original, all coming from Natalia. That’s what he loves about these conversations, is Joel will have these perceptions and perspectives that Phillip would never have, and they are very complementary to what he is seeing, but so different at the same time. They usually fit, or spark seeing something new, in a way that adds to what he’s already seeing, or something totally new. What she is offering also has that quality. It feels like solid, objective, meaningful perceptions. Don’t feel like it’s too off the beaten track or too personal or subjective.
He appreciates hearing Natalia’s story. Just in this perception of the Two and Joel bringing up the Fisher King, Phillip had pointed out if you turn the card upside down it could be the lure at the end of the fishing line with the hook, and the fish coming around it, with the flower being the lure. If you look at it as it is, it does have this kind of hole, that as it gets smaller it gets deeper—and the blue vase has that kind of appearance. There’s a pollination process, when the fish are like insects and the flower get pollinated. In the case of a wound becoming an organ, maybe there are these attacks from beings which actually maybe can mimic this process of pollination and fructification, if handled in the right way.
It’s funny to Phillip—the red section at the bottom being this reservoir of passionate substance, a realm of passions. Maybe the analogy here has something to do with reproduction and sexuality. It wasn’t so obvious initially, but saying it now it seems quite obvious. The polarity though—the red is so stark, so simply geometrical. There’s nothing elaborate about it. The blue of the vase is an abnormal form.
– Joel took some time to catch up to the conversation, transcribing all of what flowed out of the Two of Cups. It was decided they would try to focus their conversational sharing between Thursday evening to Sunday evening each week, deciding beforehand what Arcanum to focus on (i.e. whether to move to the next Arcanum or continue with the one from the prior week).
Joel shared over email many of the insights that came to him while listening to the sharing of Natalia and Phillip, in order to get caught up. The next conversation will focus on the Three of Cups:
1. The Seal of Solomon/Star of David/Chakra of Parzival — these two could be seen as two interlocking pyramids rather than triangles. Like the Egyptian Mysteries (one triangle) were half of the whole reality, and then the full reality comes with the addition of the New Jerusalem (“Holy City”). Like when Steiner speaks of chakras developing half their petals naturally, and that the other half have to be developed intentionally, with effort.
2. When we look at the karmic history of Mani/Parzival, we come to the Youth of Sais. He was initiated in the Ancient Egyptian Mysteries. But then in the conversation came this gesture of pulling back the curtain (“G”, Sagittarius), and having the courage (“T”, Leo) to cross the threshold. Well, Youth of Sais was the one who attempted to pull away the veil of Isis and died. Crossing the threshold, initiation, death are all tied up with this pulling away the curtain.
3. Coming to this focus on both light and sound. Perhaps the fish on the left is receiving light from the plant through his nose (smelling light?), and the fish on the right is giving sound to the plant through his tongue (tasting sound?)? A kind of circular transmission or pollination or procreation, as Phillip alluded to. Revolving exchange of light and sound.
4. This allusion to candles and the chandelier. This whole theme of candles has been there ever since the end of the Swords, with this coming very strongly in the Ace in terms of the lantern of Martinmas, the candle wreath of Advent, Christmas Tree, Candlemas, etc. But also the hexagon in relation to bees, beeswax. Then we also felt this musical element coming in, bringing in Advent songs, the musical notation on the throne of the King of Swords, then the Ace was like a handbell, but with a city of bell towers adorning it. A bell covered with miniature bells. And so this focus on sound and light has been very strong so far, and somehow wrapped up with the Christmas season (or rather, the time from Martinmas to Candlemas).
5. Steiner has lectures where he compares Saturn evolution to the Bee (Warmth); Sun evolution to the Butterfly (Air); Moon evolution to the Fish (Water) and Earth evolution to the Serpent (Earth). All four of these creatures seem to be present somehow in the Two of Cups. A picture of cosmic evolution, the ethers, the elements, etc all at once. The Cups might be like fat little bumblebees. This goes with this discovery of warmth dwelling in them, the flame inside the cups.
6. When we perceive that the Cup is representing the stone, the stone provided with warmth, this brings in the word “Graal” strongly. Because “Graal” means both stone and cup. And with it being a fusion of the physical and the warmth, it becomes the Philospher’s Stone, the Ego, which is warmth on the physical plane, but plays the role of “stone” or “mineral” for the spiritual world. This is in Tomberg’s meditations on the Foundation Stone Meditation. Page 52? Joel was actually just posting notes to the Ace of Coins or Two of Coins which reference this: https://the-unknown-friends.com/ace-of-coins-ii/
7. This might have some bearing on Natalia’s dream. To take in the dirt, the roots…that which seems lowest in the physical world becomes highest in the spiritual (Resurrection Body) and the Ego is the “dirt and roots” of the spiritual. “This is my body”—the Earth is Christ’s body. Joel remembers in his days on the farm, that a new calf will eat a lot of soil in a field it is put in for the first time. It needs to get its biome to match the biome of the soil. To unite with the Earth around it. Maybe this is connected to the stage of Entombment?
8. This brought up for Natalia this question in terms of the Cups: “Where are the roots?” We only see leaves and flowers.
When we were in the Coins, we saw them as seeds beginning to throw out roots. Like it was all happening underground. When you connect the Coins (like Dominoes), they make a column going downwards, ramifying and spreading.
Then when we moved to the Swords, they took on more of this rooting aspect, and the Coins started to look, in hindsight, more like a seed. But the Swords are maybe not so much seed/root, but more root/sprout. Leading into leaf and stem. The Vesica Piscis shape is very leaf like. And this circling or spiralling action of the Swords is like what the stem does as it grows towards the Sun, it moves in a bit of a whirling spiral.
So the roots are more there in the prior Suits. Now we are “above ground”; we have moved from the realm of Action (Coins, Seeds, Roots) to the Realm of Formation (Swords, Stems, Leaves) now to the Realm of Creation (Cups, Flowers). But maybe there is a gesture of “Fruit” in the Cups as well. In the Two of Cups it is like the Cups are what the “Fish” growing on the tree develop into when they are “ripe” and fall off. The Cup is a “ripe fish.”
But Since the Cups show leaves and stems, but not roots, have the Swords been retained and not the Coins? Maybe some kind of rooting is there in the blue skinny triangle above the Red Sea? Maybe the Coins are in the realm of memory only (subterranean)? Or maybe this flower in the Two is like a water lily and its roots are way down below the water’s surface.
9. Joel is realizing that he saw the eurythmy of Leo and Sagittarius, and in Robert’s system these two correspond to Wheel of Fortune and Hermit! A real confirmation. He did not have this correspondence in mind when he saw these eurythmy forms.
10. What would the good result from the lance wound be? Perhaps on one level, it expressed itself in Anfortas’s next incarnation as Paracelsus—he knew intuitively all the secrets of healing substances. He was able to heal others.
11. Both Leo and Sagittarius are Fire Signs. One can also see Aries here very clearly. Natalia’s focus on the crown and brow made Joel notice this. So a lot of fire here. This is in contrast to a strong watery element. Pisces. Maybe also Scorpio? Both Scorpio and the Moon have this two-fold connection—both to the brain/thinking but also to the reproductive organs. Do we see a gesture of “S” or “Ei” here?
But there is also something of Taurus here. Taurus has this connection to both speech and the metabolism, the will. We see a form in this image of both the Eustachian tubes (connecting hearing and speech) as well as the uterus. Do the fish have ears? Or miniature heads back there? Or are they little fists balled up instead of fins? Maybe the two cups could be seen as earrings if we see the fish as ears. Or they could be ova ready to travel through the Fallopian tubes. Definitely something that is bringing together speech and reproduction. Do we see an “R” gesture here? Perhaps a strong connection of the Taurus-Scorpio axis. I’m starting to think, to some degree, all the 12 signs of the Zodiac and 7 planets are here, again coming back to Are’s work to redeem Luciferic/Chinese medicine.
12. The fish have “Tongues of Fire”, like on Pentecost. The redemption of Lucifer took place at Pentecost. This leads to the speaking in tongues. Here Christ and Lucifer are united with Sophia and the Holy Spirit through Mary. The unredeemed Lucifer is the one who brought about the Tower of Babel, splitting up of languages. The other side of “speaking in tongues.” There Christ had to take up the center so that total confusion/conflict did not set in. Maybe the Two of Cups is expressing the whole mission of language—the Genius of Language. From the universal/original speech, to the dividing of tongues, to Pentecost, and eventually to procreative speech. Maybe all of that throughout is connected with procreation somehow? The brow chakra is related to the Vow of Chastity. Certainly the Anfortas wound and the Parzival question are entirely wrapped up in this.
13. The conversation in which we saw the Hermit as looking into his lamp and seeing the Wheel of Fortune was from about 4 years ago. It’s here: https://the-unknown-friends.com/wheel-of-fortune/
Similarly, the correspondence between the Wheel of Fortune and the Two of Cups, and the Hermit and the Three of Cups, is discussed here: https://the-unknown-friends.com/minor-arcana-study-guide/
14. Perhaps we could also see the Hermit as a kind of “Waterbearer” if the Light is the Water, and we could see the Wheel of Fortune as an image of Pisces. It has the ICHTHYS Cross form on it, with the six spokes of the wheel, the sign of the Fish in the early Church. So it has this Fish element to it.
15. Phillip’s question from a while back about the Grail Stream as a preserver of true religion, the true spirituality. Wondering if this was reflected somehow in the time of Ancient Egypt. Joel feels that back then it was more the Ancient Hebrew stream that had to preserve something, the authentic religion of YHVH. Weaving in and out of this Egyptian/Babylonian stream. Keeping a decadent stream on the right trajectory (towards Christ). But now it’s like an inverted picture. Back then it was a “stealing of the treasures of Egypt” and putting them into the form of monotheism. Taking an exoteric paganism and infusing it into esoteric monotheism. Nowadays for the Grail Stream (as analogous to the Hebrew religion), it is more like taking the esoteric paganism (Christian Occultism) and infusing it into the exoteric monotheistic (Exoteric Christianity/Orthodox/Catholic Church).
16. The Ace of Cups has 14 red dots—one of which is very large. Maybe the large one represents the Ace and the other 13 are the other 13 Cup cards?
17. Perhaps the Cups are like chess pieces—and the Ten of Cups shows “Checkmate” with the one Cup/Piece tipped over?
18. The Coins show plants growing. The Swords show the cutting of those plants. Perhaps the Cups are vases for displaying that which has been cut?
19. There is something of this bottom blue triangle of something being unzipped, or something running along a blade’s edge, almost like a table-saw. A cutting action. Or the prow of a mighty ship.
The Unknown Friends 