Essay:Tarot correspondences (Kabalah)
Since one of the first who wrote about esoteric/occult Tarot, tarot was seen as linked to some aspects of Kabbalah, especially the Tree of Life, the Hebrew letters, and their correspondences to astrology.
The Golden Dawn Tradition
The Golden Dawn tradition is the system devised by Mathers, and adopted by Arthur Edward Waite, the creator of the Rider Waite deck, as well as other Golden Dawn Members who created tarot decks, and many of their more recent followers. In this traditions, the hebrew letters are intended to represent the paths on the version of the Tree of Life that goes back to Athanasius Kircher. Generally, they draw on the tradition of Christian and Hermetic Kabbalah, not jewish kabbalah, although they did try to go back to hebrew texts, such as Sepher Yetzirah. They attribute the Fool to aleph and so on. The positions of Strength and Justice were shifted, because the astrological attributions fit better: This makes Strengh Leo and Justice Libra, with the old order and the Golden Dawn system of astrological attributions it would have been other way round.
Aleister Crowley's take on the matter
Aleister Crowley also was a Golden Dawn member for some time before he developed his own system, and his work does owe some things to the Golden Dawn. There seems to have been a certain influence on his tarot. He attributes the Fool to aleph and so on. He also attributes Strength to tet and Justice to Lamed like the Golden Dawn, but unlike them he doesn't change the order of the cards accordingly. Additionally He switches the attributions for the Star and the Emperor, so that the Emperor becomes tzaddi and the Star becomes Heh. Again, he only changes the attribution, not the order of the cards. In the following overview table the cards are given along with their position to show that. He renamed a few of the Major Arcana, that was omitted in the table for the sake of clarity. Interestingly, few followed Crowley on that. The various OTO branches of course still promote his system, but few in the Tarot community do. Even Decks that follow Crowley quite closely in other aspects (such as card titles, imagery and spiritual content) use the card order and attributions of the Golden Dawn.
The French Tradition
The French tradition represents the correspondences devised by Eliphas Levi, a 19th century french occultist. He was the not the first one to publish such correspondences, but other than the earlier Eteilla system, his was widely accepted. He links the Magician to aleph and so on, but then makes the Fool shin and the World Tau. He uses the Marseilles card order of old unchanged, It was often theorized that he knew the "right" (aka Golden Dawn) correspondences, but couldn't reveal them because he was a member of a mysterious secret society and had sworn secrecy. Modern scholars deem that highly unlikely, because the existence of such societies could not be proven, and there was no trace of the use of tarot in the extant older magical or kabbalistical texts. So most probably he made up these correspondences, either on his own or together with followers unknown today. This system still has followers, especially in continental Europe and among those preferring Marseilles style decks.
It has been claimed that some early tarot authors have worked with other versions than the Kircher one, but that would be hard to prove.
Overview Table
| Value | Name | GD trad. | Crowley | french trad. |
| 1 | aleph | The Fool | 0.The Fool | The Magician |
| 2 | bet | The Magician | 1.The Magician | The Popess |
| 3 | gimel | The High Priestess | 2.The High Priestess | The Empress |
| 4 | dalet | The Empress | 3.The Empress | The Emperor |
| 5 | heh | The Emperor | 17.The Star | The Pope |
| 6 | vau | The Hierophant | 5.The Hierophant | The Lovers |
| 7 | zayin | The Lovers | 6.The Lovers | The Chariot |
| 8 | chet | The Chariot | 7.The Chariot | Justice |
| 9 | tet | Strength | 11.Strength | The Hermit |
| 10 | Yod | The Hermit | 9.The Hermit | Wheel of Fortune |
| 20 | kaf (1) | Wheel of Fortune | 10.Wheel of Fortune | Strength |
| 30 | lamed | Justice | 8.Justice | The Hanged Man |
| 40 | mem | The Hanged Man | 12.The Hanged Man | Death |
| 50 | nun | Death | 13.Death | Temperance |
| 60 | samekh | Temperance | 14.Temperance | The Devil |
| 70 | ayin | The Devil | 15.The Devil | The Tower |
| 80 | peh | The Tower | 16.The Tower | The Star |
| 90 | tzaddi | The Star | 4.The Emperor | The Moon |
| 100 | qoph | The Moon | 18.The Moon | The Sun |
| 200 | resh | The Sun | 19.The Sun | Judgement |
| 300 | shin | Judgement | 20.Judgement | The Fool |
| 400 | Tau | The World | 21.The World | The World |
(1) final form of the letter, only on word endings.
Other Systems
Aside from these systems, some modern authors have developed their own correspondences systems, which may be also interesting to study.
Colin Low
Colin Low associates the major Arcana with the Sephiroth and paths below the Abyss, that is, below the first three sephiroth.
Leon Jacobowitz Efron
Leon Jacobowitz Efron attributes the major arcana to a Jewish version of the tree of life.
Frater Achad
Frater Achad has created his own version of the tree of life. He was a Thelemite, but apparently also studied Jewish Kabbalah. He kept the Golden Dawn attributions of Hebrew letters and the form of the Kircher Tree, but changed the attributions of Hebrew letters to the paths. His attributions work from Malkuth upwards. In that, he seems to be inspired by the Tree of Return of Isaak Luria. The influence of his system has been limited. While his works are held in high esteem by some ceremonial magicians, no current tarot deck follows his attributions.
References
- [1] Bill Heidricks Essay on magickal Korrespondences
- [2] Colin Low's homepage
- http://web.archive.org/web/20040408002123/http://pws.prserv.net/leon/ Leon Jacobowitz Efron's website
- [3] Frater Achad's works