Cartomancers, for example, lay the tarot cards out in various geometrical spreads for purposes of divination. its structure is geometrical rather than sequential. None the less if one were to start a commentary the best place to begin would be the middle rather than the beginning, since the work is itself organized around the principle of an unbound codex, or what we call a “deck of cards”…i.e. I have often thought of using this blog as a venue for an extended commentary on Mediataions on the Tarot, but the work is so massive and dense that any systematic treatment would take more time and energy than is available to yours truely. Indeed, Tomberg, who concealed his name in the work’s title but otherwise was quite forthcoming in his explanations of the arcana, states as much in the text. Bochenski on Max Scheler’s breakthrough in values and ethicsĪlthough I don’t claim to have understood all the myteries touched on by Valentin Tomberg’s masterpiece Meditations on the Tarot, and am unlikely ever to do so, it is sufficiently clear to me that its ninth chapter “The Hermit” contains the methodological key to the whole. Homage to Andalusia: The brightest Enlightenment.A word to the wise: Materialism as the clear cause of Totalitarianism, demonstrated (at least) 2400 years ago?.Libertarianism and its cultured despisers.Thirteen good reasons why Ayn Rand’s works are salutary reading for non-Randians, and especially for youths.The essay also draws attention to Tomberg's innovatively irenic approach to Christian anti-Gnosticism. Both authors maintain that authentic esotericism, by contrast, is marked by radical humility and non-violence it is biblical, ecclesial, and committed to the unity of metaphysical reason and prayerful faith.
Both Tomberg and von Balthasar believe that esotericism without prayer and institutional grounding can become narcissistic and self-righteous to the point of megalomania, and consequently it tends to become manipulative and coercive to the point of violence. The essay explains that both Tomberg and von Balthasar practice a rule-governed Christian esotericism whose goal is support for a fruitful ecclesial spirituality and resistance to non-ecclesial esoteric Gnosticism. It argues that von Balthasar respected and advocated this ostensibly occult text because he found its capacious understanding of Christian faith as true gnosis similar to his own. The essay examines Hans Urs von Balthasar's little-known Foreword to the Christian esoteric text, Meditations on the Tarot by Valentin Tomberg.
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