There is a very precious testament of the gods, who would have come to us through the Templars, and that the descendants of the journeymen image makers from the Middle Ages have concealed under the guise of a bar game, the famous Tarot of Marseilles.
The Tower means the opening of the last chakra, the Crown or fontanelle. Thus you are connected to the Spirit. You are awake.
The 22 major arcana of Tarot represent, in order, the twenty-two stages of human life. We have detailed the first fifteen steps, here is the sixteenth, the Tower.
People have already written a lot on this surprising arcane, and yet it has rarely been fundamentally understood.
Above all, remember the principle that must guide us in deciphering these images: they tell us, anyone of us, our own history.
Thus in every arcane, the central character is us. So in this picture, we are the Tower itself.
As you can see, the Tower is flesh-colored, which means human flesh and bones, i.e. our terestrial dimension.
In places, note the red and green bands representing the chakras, as we saw in the previous arcana XV – the Devil presiding over the opening of the first six chakras.
Note the presence of secondary chakras, like the knees, represented here by two eyes.
So, logically, the Tower would open the last chakra, the Crown, which is localized to the fontanel. This is exactly what is happening on the image.
The embattled top of the tower is beheaded: the crown of the ego falls, once and for all, and it is enlightenment. Suddenly, the being is connected to the universe. He is enthusiastic, which means “happy in God.” That is why the arcana XVI has such a name. The Tower, this is the human body suddenly transfigured by enlightenment, who recovers his lost powers; this is a free man, the new Adam finally similar to the gods who made him.
Ego Free
Note that in all the following arcanes, the free being no longer has crown. The Tower is the major turning point in human life. In all the following arcana the person no longer is crowned, bare-headed meaning free from ego. It is split, ie that he met his double, with whom trade is constant and fruitful. As soon as it happened in the white light of enlightenment, being is aware of his double.
This is why the image shows two characters who fall to earth after the outpouring of enlightenment. The following arcane will develop this duality to the final merger with Arcane the World, when being assembled his animus and anima in one glorious body, realizing on earth the heavenly androgyne.
Many authors continue to believe that this arcana is the worst, “the Tower is the house punished by God” can be read often. What nonsense! Carried away by this conviction, some naive esoteric people or charlatans will even rename this arcana the Tower of destruction, or the Tower struck by lightning.
You will not find any fortune teller who would tell you: “The Tower, how lucky you are, this is awakening!” In this sign of light, all fools see a threat. But it is just the opposite.
If the “Tower” that we are is actually struck by lightning, it is not a punishment but a reward. The one who gets hurt is not the being: it is the ego, the little king. He who had hitherto believed he was our master, and must give way to the true Master coming up.
And it is now.
Transcendence is reached, the illumination of the awakening goes through the being, this is passage into the white light that the Celts called Gwenwed, and the fools would want us to be scared!
Awakening for Dummies
The logic of Tarot is the path where each step is numbered, like the Stations of the Cross, whose invention dates the same time : the first Stations of the Cross were introduced to decorate the Romanesque churches. Besides, the images of the Tarot are found in the sacred statuary, as evidenced by the opposite photo.
The power of Tarot is the orientation it gives. Flying over the cards, you can feel the resonance of these intimate little pictures, reliving your own adventure. You reached a given level of the inner scale. Although the deeper meaning of Tarot is visible only to insiders, by dint of seeing these images, the players went forth in their path of enlightenment.
Tarot is the Awakening for Dummies. Everything is explained in detail to those who have eyes to see, a heart to feel and a mind to think. This detailed review gives you a good survey that you can develop by practise, head to head with any arcana.
White Light
Here is the scenario of the “passage in the white light“ (Gwenwed for the Celts) as the Arcana XVI image tells us step by step.
After the successive surges of energy which have forced the opening up of each of the bolts that are the first six chakras, as described in the arcana XV – the Devil, the candidate to awakening is about to know the ultimate liberation.
A final barrier will fall, that of the fontanel, the Sahasrara chakra, also called the Crown. Is it a lightning falling from the stormy sky? Is it a ray coming from the sun? Is it a smoke rising into the sky? In any case there is a light phenomenon that allows the disheveled tower to connect with transcendence.
For my part, I see a hidden intention to show that if lightning can destroy or kill, the same lightning may give awakening. The fact that the pseudo-flash came from the sun can only strengthen me in this interpretation: here I recognize Sol Invictus, and blessing that frees the mind in the form of small suns that are balls of lightning.
At this moment, the being feels sucked into this light ray, and after a real climb, like that of Jesus or like the Assumption of his mother Mary, he enters the white light. Ineffable sensation, a bliss which can not be solved in terms of happiness or unhappiness, feeling of beyond, of serenity, of omnipotence in all humility.
For the first time, the reassured traveler says to himself: “Put down your bags, buddy, you are at home.” Even if this refuge is another illusion. Since enlightenment itself participates in the illusion. In India, that kind of illusion is called Maya, who is the goddess of illusion for the Hindus.
“Beware of Maya” sang George Harrisson.
No sooner had the awaken tasted the ineffable bliss, beyond good and evil, in this white light of Celtic heaven, that he is spit like Jonah by the whale, and he falls in pirouette, reinstating the mantle of flesh which is his terrestrial vehicle.
On the opposite image, the white light is the background of the picture, smothered with multicolored balls of which we will talk later. And the fall is shown by these two little figures at the foot of the tower, who are a remake of the Magician, but in double version. After this step, the awakening, nothing like anything. Starting a new life in a light body, all perceptions have to be recalibrated.
Awakening is a new incarnation (disembodiment?) which has split the physical being into two. The enlightened knows his right side and his left side, his animus and his anima. He knows the difference and uses it wisely.
Much of the magic powers of man have taken their full place in him, without pressure or inflation of any kind. The way is not over so far, far away from it. The awake being is a Buddha, but “we always start by being an idiot Buddha” (source)Jean-Claude Flornoy, original
As a the driver’s license allows you to learn how to drive, the awakening entitles you to learn how to behave with the brand power you get. Mind: powers may disappear. Nothing is ever granted to man… Some other steps still mark his possible destiny, which, remember, can be interrupted at any time by the Fool, total freedom, purpose on this earth of all the celestial warriors.
That’s all for the presentation of the arcana XVI the Tower. Now please turn your gaze. Refer to this image as if you had never seen it. What does it tell you? 1 enlightenment is obtained by lightning. 2 by receiving lightning, thunderbolt, the candidate to awakening gets the Tower. This is precisely the lesson we can draw from the architectural realizations and spiritual aspirations of the former humanity. All preceding civilizations had only one goal: to achieve enlightenment and become gods.
Thus, the curious colored balls that are scattered across the sky of the arcane XVI may be balls of lightning.
People might object that in the drawing of Conver, the strange cloud that penetrates the tower does not really look like a flash. There are two answers: first, in the lightning plants, the awakening was not obtained from the deadly lightning, but from its mild form, the ball lightning; secondly, other representations of the arcane, such as the English version, clearly show a flash.
The hexagrams of the I Ching sometimes cut across the major arcana of the Tarot. In any case, the arcanum XVI The Tower get its strict equivalence: Chen, the Arousing Thunder. Walking through the lines that I have devoted to it, you might be struck by convergence. It shows the unity of a primitive human culture, from which all others are outputs. I said human culture? Or was it divine??