9 of disks "Gain " and 2 of Wands "Dominion" THOTH TAROT CARD: READING/s. These cards were pulled as a double reading, as a card has already been read as a single in past tarot readings on chiasmus. The Order of this reading is from right to left. 2 of Wands "Dominion" analysis/reading

 

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After the heaviness of "The Universe" card, the Thoth tarot cards are slowly revealing an ebb and flow of Aleister Crowley's creative conjuring and clearly, at least to me, it shows the flux of Crowley's thinking, and I am being speculative here, could be of the altered states of mind via his intoxication.  And that has to be factored in, respectfully to understand further the intensity of the Thoth cards, their meanings and ultimately the readings, to be devised at the end of this study.

The 9 of Disks "Gain" card was actually pulled randomly after The Universe card, but since these are separate studies and readings, I won't read the cards as two.  Yet, "Gain" shows the flow of Crowley's input in creating a far more passive and relaxed meaning, even when reading the explanation from the Book of Thoth.  It feels laid back.  Crowley has fused the Qabalah and astrology symbolism into the card and his fondness for Jewish esoteric mysticism.  That being the Tree of life, The Nine of disks representing the 9th Sephirah, Yesod; which means foundation.  Also, equating to the sexual organs of the male and female, in further Qabalah theory Yesod is the foundation of the world. The astrological symbols atop of the card and below are Venus and Virgo, so the card has a very powerful implication, assimilating to feminine energy.  Venus (planet) passes from East to West and Virgo (constellation) is South East of the horizon, as the symbolism of the card tilts downward.   The lower the centre of gravity is, the more balanced it becomes, hence the feminine is more defiant under gravity.

Crowley from The Book of Thoth in relation to 9 of Disks symbolism as a feminine equivalence, says, "Balance of Force in fulfilment".  Which could indicate that this card is sexual in nature.

Reading:

Balanced from the Yesod, to which all matter rests.  Yet, Venus over Virgo points downward, South of the horizon over the Earthy plane.  Such is the flowing energy of the feminine, from its centre it sits lower than the masculine, thus allowing the elements of the human form to defy nature.  Momentary, despite its predicaments.   For this, there is much to learn from "Gain", where  luck may not have been that random.  Did you not conjure within the twilight?  The joining of two, to be one.  The mixing of energy.  And after, you felt that gravity had no effect on you.  The spirit lifted, the fulment of Gain and good fortune completed.  But, be aware that Gain will fade.  Ensure that you do not overstate the energy created, it will degrade very quickly.  And  be wary to not over serve the fulfillment, that has lead to this elation.  If taken for granted, it will become unnecessarily complicated in its renewal.

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2 of Wands "Dominion"

Analysis/Reading 

Aleister Crowley's  Proto-Fascist  influences resurface with the 2 of Wands "Dominion", as noted with my double reading of "The Emperor" and "Victory".   And as discussed with the simpler Thoth Tarot cards, when Crowley is less drug affected, and as a product of his time, his choice of drugs were mostly amphetamines, there appears to be a clarity of his mindset, particularly with the less dramatic Thoth cards.  Crowley passed away in 1947, at the cusp of the pragmatic consumption and hyper industrial 1950s, so was the warring and nationalistic fervor under a Cold War, with a thermonuclear arms race that had begun in earnest.  Crowley's own Thelema religion, which operated out of the Ordo Templi Orientis in California throughout the 1940s had drawn in two famous and infamous aherenets, Jack Parson the rocket engineer and L. Ron Hubbard, who stole money from Parson via his and Parson's investment idea (selling yachts to wealthy Americans in Miami) and thus he was able to begin his own religion Scientology, which was loosely based off Crowley's version of the Ordo Templi Orientis occult society that started in 1895.  All these secret societies and occult/cults had a Right Wing aura of order and control, pre the counter cultures that began in the late 1950s and throughout the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s which removed the rigidity and formality of these societies, yet they were all fueled, originally, by drug use.  Which shows the oxymoron element to the foundations of Crowley's Thelema religion, that did not stand the test of time after his passing in 1947, when alternatives in religion/spirituality in the decades that followed gained interest, of a society that was less patriarchal, less conservatively minded and more open. Two of Wands "Dominion" very much falls into the Strength through Power political and social manifesto, how significant Fascism was as a precursor to establishing order.  

To which Western society was flirting with its idealisms within the early part of the 1900s, until Benito Mussolini was able to implement it into Italian society in the 1920s.  Yet, it would be German Nationalist Werner Sombart, who further elaborated the Marxist term 'Creative Destruction' (capitalism destroys wealth), conjoining it to Western economic and social philosophy misinterpreting Eastern mysticism more so Hinduism and esoteric Buddhism, that destruction is necessary for creation.  Crowley has, as you would expect, muddied the waters further with the Two Tibetan Dorje's crossed, and the card representing the suit of Fire, being the Jewish Qabalah Chokmah, as a way of justifying the Fascist creed of physically destroying to create the new.   All mentioned with Crowley's own reading of the "Dominion" card, of destruction and domination as a necessity.   When "Destruction" in Eastern thought, is destroying the ego and ignorance, not as a physical action but a meditative metaphor.  The card is relevant to Israel's current Total War destruction, genocide of Gaza/Lebanon and their reshaping of the Middle East:  Destroy, Create and Dominate.      

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All Thoth Tarot card analysis and readings to date:  chiasmusmagazine.blogspot.com/search/label/Thoth%20Tarot%20reading

(A.Glass 2023, 2024)