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Tarot of the Bohemians

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Gerard Encausse (July 13, 1865 - 25 October 1916), whose esoteric pseudonym was Papus, was the Spanish-born French physician, hypnotist, and popularizer of occultism, who founded the modern Martinist Order. In Tarot of the Bohemians¸Papus discusses advanced topics of the tarot deck, and espouses theories of its ancient origins.This edition is specially formatted and includes a Table of Contents.

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First published January 1, 1888

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About the author

Papus

247 books38 followers
Gerard Encausse, whose esoteric pseudonym was Papus, was born at Corunna (La Coruña) in Spain on July 13, 1865, of a Spanish mother and a French father, Louis Encausse, a chemist. His family moved to Paris when he was four years old, and he received his education there.
As a young man, Encausse spent a great deal of time at the Bibliothèque Nationale studying the Kabbalah, occult tarot, the sciences of magic and alchemy, and the writings of Eliphas Lévi. He joined the French Theosophical Society shortly after it was founded by Madame Blavatsky in 1884 - 1885, but he resigned soon after joining because he disliked the Society's emphasis on Eastern occultism.

In 1888, he co-founded his own group, the Kabbalistic Order of the Rose-Croix. That same year, he and his friend Lucien Chamuel founded the Librarie du Merveilleux and its monthly revue L'Initiation, which remained in publication until 1914.
Encausse was also a member of the Hermetic Brotherhood of Light and the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn temple in Paris, as well as Memphis-Misraim and probably other esoteric or paramasonic organizations, as well as being an author of several occult books. Outside of his paramasonic and Martinist activities he was also a spiritual student of the French spiritualist healer, Anthelme Nizier Philippe, "Maître Philippe de Lyon".
Despite his heavy involvement in occultism and occultist groups, Encausse managed to find time to pursue more conventional academic studies at the University of Paris. He received his Doctor of Medicine degree in 1894 upon submitting a dissertation on Philosophical Anatomy. He opened a clinic in the rue Rodin which was quite successful.

When World War I broke out, Encausse joined the French army medical corps. While working in a military hospital, he contracted tuberculosis and died on October 25, 1916, at the age of 51.

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Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews
Profile Image for Zoe.
43 reviews8 followers
March 8, 2015
A treasure trove of occult wisdom. I came upon this book 45 years ago during a very difficult time in my life. It was way beyond my comprehension at the time, but I was very intuitive. I kept reading. And as I read, I found chapters that related to things I had read earlier so I'd go back and find the original reference and write in the margins the pages of additional references. There was a dark force that had crossed my path, and this book gave me the ammunition I needed not only to understand, but to fight this dark energy.

It is a book for an initiate, and it is a book that set me upon a path for a search of more occult knowledge. I would highly recommend this book to any true seeker. Don't be discouraged. If you don't understand immediately (and now we have the internet!) just keep reading, things will eventually fall into place. It is this way for all beginners. Persevere, seek and you will find answers.
Profile Image for Fiona.
299 reviews8 followers
December 23, 2021
4/5 Stars: A timeless contribution to philosophy, confused by misconceptions of its time.

Papus has devised a language of symbols, taken from the designs of the Tarot and mixed with philosophical principles. This book is not concerned with divination, though a single chapter is put aside for this topic.

"Therefore you must open the book and carefully weigh the statements made in it. Then you will know that the drug within is of very different value from the promise of the box, that is to say, that the subjects treated in it are not so frivolous as the title may imply." - Rabelais


What is the Tarot?
The Tarot is a set of 78 cards, divided into two decks, the Major and Minor Arcana. The Minor Arcana is very much like our modern decks of playing cards, which are indeed the progeny of Tarot decks. The Major Arcana is made up of 22 figures or symbols, which in most cases illustrate the story of human life.

The Tarot of the Bohemians was based on the Tarot of Marseilles. Éliphas Levi extensively researched this and other decks, making suggestions about how to improve the design of the Major Arcana, mostly through minor alterations. Oswald Wirth created the design, following Levi's suggestions and aided by the advice of Stanislas de Guaita. The designs were then printed by M. Poirel.

Uses of the Tarot
These cards can be used for playing games, fortune-telling and reading. For this purpose a general system, the infamous 'Key', will be explained at length. The majority of the book then educates how to read the symbology of the Tarot as a whole. A smaller part at the end elaborates the methods of divination for the lady readers (please excuse the customs of their time, male readers are just as welcome to read that part and to participate as fortune-tellers). A variation of the Tarot as a game is briefly detailed, too.

About the author
Papus (his true name is M. Gérard Encausse), at the time of the first publication of this book, was the head of the school of Martinism and a member of the (then) modern Kabalistic Order of the Rose-Cross. He put "indefatigable" research into the Tarot, and is utterly convinced of having discovered the science of the ancient Egyptians. There has been no proof of this hypothesis in his time, and he supports his claims only by referring to other authors, some of which have never heard of the Tarot. Because of this conviction, he sees all known mythologies, theologies, philosophies, sciences, methods of divination and even all games to be mere variations of the Tarot, which he sometimes calls The Book of Thoth.

Where historical facts and credibility of Papus' "contributing" authors are concerned, I advise strongly to read the Preface to the English Translation by A. E. Waite, given in the second Edition, 1914.

Whatever the true reason, Papus did not recognize the Tarot of the Bohemians as his own creation. As such, however, it is outstanding. Borrowing extensively from Kabalistic mythology, a moderate amount of numerology, hermetic philosophies and Christian symbology, he bequeathed to the world this book of moving pages, which can be read in so many configurations. On top of all the possible interpretations, I most enjoyed his so-called septenaries in the Major Arcana, by which he demonstrates the aggregation of the Trinity Principle (see below) upon itself.

"The work of Papus will appeal only to serious students, and it will be worth their while to take up his elements and seek to construct them independently." - A. E. Waite


This can be said about anyone interested in the symbolic language for philosophical and occult studies, as well as students of cartomancy and fortune-telling. If nothing else, Papus' innovations in the Tarot system raised the foundation for modern techniques of Tarot divination, combining the Major and Minor Arcana.

The Key
"Each man contains in himself an Adam, source of the Will, i.e. the Brain; an Eve, source of the [Intuition], i.e. the Heart, and he should balance the heart by the brain, and the brain by the heart, if he would become a center of divine love." - Papus, on Androgony ('creation of humans')


The Key. Tetragrammaton. Yod-He-Vau-He. The Trinity Principle. As above, so below. IEVE. ROTA. Etc.

It all comes down to the base philosophical principle which is also present in the Conservation Law of physics. Synthetic sciences (meaning sciences pursuing synthesis of physics and metaphysics, of social, religious and natural systems) are all working with the idea that there is a cause, a reaction and an effect. The effect in return will become the cause of the next reaction, and so the cycle continues - transition between stages; the light as a whole, the light in the prism, the light as a rainbow.

Cause - Reaction - Effect - Repeat
Thesis - Antithesis - Synthesis - Repeat
Osiris - Isis - Horus - Repeat
God - Son - Holy Spirit - Repeat
1 - 2 - 3 - 4

Papus illustrates this same principle in numbers, or numerology, in a straight forward manner.

Thus armed in his left hand, he took in his right hand the work of Fabre d'Olivet, who in his La Langue Hébraïque Restituée studies the Hebrew alphabet and the symbology of each individual letter, thus providing the theory for the Yod, the He, the Vau and the 2nd He which are indeed the kabalistic representation of the Trinity Principle.

The reading can be laborious at times, but all in all everything Papus devised in his Tarot can be practiced with this Key.

Since the Tarot of the Bohemians is, in fact, not the Book of all Books, not the foundation from which all sciences were derived, I am sorry to say this is merely the Ultimate Key to reading Tarot of the Bohemians.

Reading the language of the Tarot
After explaining the Key, Papus defines its application. During that he references other authors and points to different mythologies, stating functions and facts of his system without any explanation where they came from or how he came up with them. Previous knowledge in mythology of the Bible and the Kabalah will help a great deal. I would strongly caution against reading this as your first book in occultism.

Papus teaches the system of his Key and the Tarot without any context at first, like a modern book of algebra will first explain the function and demonstrate its usefulness much later. Here numbers and letters do not represent quantities and objects, but transcendence and abstractions. He is thus giving the mere tools required for the work ahead, before demonstrating their application to the Tarot.

The symbolical meaning of each card is explained in similar isolation. But while going through the Major Arcana, step by step, he keeps pointing to the previously acquired tools, beginning to make use of them, thus explaining his system as a whole.

His extensive demonstrations of reading the Tarot, synthesized with various mythologies and sciences, are of diverse quality and hard to summarize. By them, he tries and fails to proof the origin of the Tarot in ancient Egypt and its predominance over other sciences. But the true value of these demonstrations is the art of reading the Tarot, its many illuminating facets, which are as numerous and diverse as the highs and lows of human life.

At the end we are also given theories and methods about the Tarot from Ch. Barlet. Though it looks intimidating at first, the text accomplishes in teaching how to set up the whole deck of Tarot on the table, according to the diagram shown below, and then read the cards along the many curves and axes of the layout, as indicated by the lines on the globe.
The Divine Name in the Tarot

Divination
I am sorry to say that, in comparison, there is only very little said about the art of divination. Papus suggests his own systems, which work by dealing three, seven or nineteen cards. To offer a choice, he also quotes methods from "The Book of Thoth" by Ettaila, which are explained even less and require to deal between seventeen cards and up to the whole deck.

He stresses that divination is really an art of intuition, which is why in his opinion women are generally better at this art than men. Unfortunately, the sexism of his time becomes very evident in this part of the text. If this is an issue for you, please avoid reading Chapter XX. Despite all that, women and men both evidently participated in the creation of divination systems, as much as in practicing the art of fortune-telling.

Games
Sadly, this book conveys only one variation of playing Tarot. It boils down to the players receiving seven cards trying to make of them a proper divination for anyone present, receiving rewards or penalties depending on how well the divination was received.

A personal note
Physics is the general, metaphysics is the individual. Even Papus himself was more or less aware of this fact.

"We must not forget that during this analysis we destroy the reality of the being thus divided into fractions." - Papus, about the application of the Trinity Principle


What you make of any science is up to you. Men can explain the world, but Humanity can not explain itself. Summarizing the context of the book forced me to reduce it to the key components of the Tarot system. But this analysis, too, destroyed the reality of the thing. The reality is:

The Tarot is a living machine, empowered by the people who read it. Seek for yourself, and you will be rewarded.
Profile Image for John.
192 reviews
May 5, 2016
Remarkably insightful (despite the silly cover) and more a work of philosophy and western esoteric thought than a how to manual in Tarot. It isn't a light read and won't sit well with those who are not interested in the psychological and historical aspects of the craft; but remains regardless a fundamental work. Highly recommended.
Profile Image for Ashleigh.
125 reviews2 followers
August 2, 2017
One of the first books on Tarot I ever read, still one of the best.
Profile Image for Ashleigh.
125 reviews2 followers
August 15, 2020
Papus is a dense read. I've read this book several times since first purchasing it back in the 1970s, and it doesn't get any easier.
Bit for the esotericist reading Tarot, I find it more useful than some of the newer titles.
Papus also gives credence to the Roma travelers for the importation of Tarot, as do several other authors of his era. It's a nice myth.
I reread the book this year as I'm in search of a particular spread I learned from a New York Witch I knew many years ago, which she called "The Bohemian". I'm still searching for its origin, as it wasn't from Papus.
Profile Image for Teleri.
132 reviews9 followers
February 29, 2012
Papus is a turgid writer & his concepts antiquated & sometimes in conflict with other contemporary occultists. Mostly of historical interest.
Profile Image for Mathew.
45 reviews1 follower
November 19, 2022
This was a pretty interesting read. I had never really delved into the history of the Golden Dawn... I thought that I had, and I've read Israel Regardie's stuff, but I hadn't paid much attention to A.E. Waite. This is one of the books that he cites. Of course A.E. Waite asserts that he's actually the one who is right. That's the way that it went for all those guys back then. Crowley being the most notable individual from that group. Or, at least the more infamous. I have his deck even.

This book is clearly the inspiration for a lot of the Golden Dawn attributions to the cards for sure. I think embellishing on the history about how the cards stretch back into antiquity is a nice tool for drawing interest. It isn't about the cards though, it's about understanding humanity and the things that we do, and how we reside in this world.

The reason that people are scared of the tarot is because it teaches us to look inward and to question things about ourselves. It's the same as meditating on a mandala or scripture from the Bible. It's a tool for the quiet moments in our lives that we attempt to re-calibrate our existence.

I would highly recommend this book for anyone who is interested in researching tarot from the 19th century through to the mid-20th century. Definitely offers some nice context to the modern attributions.
Profile Image for Erato Lilith.
2 reviews
February 13, 2024
Da una guía básica e introductoria de los lenguajes y formas alegóricas, simbólicas y metafóricas en las que la ciencia oculta opera, para aquellas partes reservadas a partes de la historia el autor propone una visión difícil de comprobar, omitiendo eso es un buen libro.
Los errores de traducción pueden generar interpretaciones equivocadas especialmente en la aprehensión de conceptos básicos que se exponen aquí, como lo es la necesaria diferenciación de lo esoterico y lo exoterico.
Profile Image for Neen.
66 reviews
Read
October 16, 2022
Listen, it's a classic and all, but extremely European in a Not Great Way

Ignore everything that messes with religion and keep the faith (different things) and you should be okay
Profile Image for aegruam.
51 reviews1 follower
March 10, 2023
Wow what a read. Threading its way through so many aspects of history, lore, and the occult, this text enriched my understanding of Tarot in ways I was not expecting whatsoever. Though I believe some of his points to be erroneous, you can tell that the author was doing his very best to explain his thoughts clearly, making note of that which he believed to truly be fact and that which needs intuition to fully form. Overall, I will always view my reading of this text to be the beginning of my dive into attempting to understand ancient knowledge that has been lost or suppressed.
Profile Image for Annarella.
14k reviews155 followers
June 9, 2019
I had some issues with the Kindle version so I switched to the PDF and was more than happy to read this book.
It's one of the best book I read about Tarots and I read quite a lot. It's detailed, full of explanations and the old fashioned style of writing add to its charm.
A very good book, highly recommended!
Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC, all opinions are mine.
388 reviews15 followers
March 8, 2011
Light cardstock, simple number and suite for minor arcana and odd to unpleasant drawings. But, I was in Brazil and hadn't seen this deck (still never do except for the 2 obscure links in Description). Like it for it's oddity more than beauty.
Profile Image for Andrea Attilio Grilli.
Author 5 books1 follower
April 12, 2015
Il libro è editato male, con diversi errori e una traduzione spesso confusa. Il libro è un classico per gli amanti dei Tarocchi, ma contiene errori storici, letterari, vi è un pastrocchio di pseudo conoscenze e science, idee bislacche e ridicole.
Profile Image for Bad Tim.
85 reviews8 followers
April 19, 2008
a good reference for those looking for the spiritual meaning of the tarot.
1 review3 followers
August 5, 2009
Wonderful book reccomended by TruNaturschild.
It is rather complex but still entertaining.
Be warned though, it is most certainly NOT a
beginner tarot book!
Profile Image for Royce.
148 reviews
February 8, 2019
On the surface, one might say this is complete garbage. But I find the mathematical tricks and the universalist ideas fascinating. Also an interesting way to view the tarot.
Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews

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