God of Tarot Page 13

  Brother Paul concentrated, and the figure materialized. He sat upon a throne, both hands upraised, the right palm out, two fingers elevated in benediction, the left hand holding a scepter topped with a triple cross. He wore a great red robe and an ornate golden headdress. Before him knelt two tonsured monks; behind him rose two ornate columns.

  Brother Paul found himself shaking. He had conjured the leading figure of the Roman Catholic Church, by whatever name a Protestant deck might bestow. Had he the right?

  Yes, he decided. This was not the real Pope, but a representation drawn from a card. Probably a mindless thing, a mere statue. That mindlessness needed to be verified, so Brother Paul could be assured that there was no intellect behind the Animation effect.

  "Your Excellency," he murmured, inclining his head with the respect he gave to dignitaries of any faith. One did not need to share a person's philosophy to respect his dedication to that philosophy. "May I have an audience?"

  The figure's head tilted. The left arm lowered. The eyes focused on Brother Paul. The lips moved. "You may," the Hierophant said.

  It had spoken!

  Well, his recorder-bracelet would verify later whether or not this was true. Voice analysis might reveal that Brother Paul was talking to himself. That did not matter; it was his mission to make the observations, evoking whatever effects could be evoked, so that the record was complete. He could not afford to hold back merely because he personally might not like what manifested. He was already sorry he had Animated the Hierophant; now he had to talk with the apparition, and that seemed to commit him intellectually, legitimizing a creation he felt to be illegitimate. Well, onward.

  "I seek information," he said, meekly enough.

  The holy head inclined. "Ask, and it shall be given."

  Brother Paul thought of asking whether God was behind the Animation effect, and if so, what was His true nature? But he remembered an event of his college days, when a friend had teased the three-year-old child of a married student by asking her, "Little girl, what is the nature of ultimate reality?" The child had promptly replied, "Lollipops." That answer had been the talk of the campus for days; the consensus of opinion had been that it was accurate. But Brother Paul was not eager for that sort of reply from this figure. First he had to verify the Hierophant's nature. So he asked it a challenging but not really critical question, a test question. "What is the purpose of religion?"

  "The purpose of religion is to pacify men's minds and make them socially and politically docile," the Hierophant replied.

  This caught Brother Paul by surprise. It was certainly no reflection of his own view of religion! Did this mean the figure did possess a mind of its own? "But what of the progress of man's spirit?" he asked. "What happens to it after it passes from this world?"

  "Spirit? Another world? Superstitions fostered by the political authorities," the Hierophant said. "No one in his right mind would put up with the corruption and cruelty of those in power, if he believed this were the only world he would experience. So they promise him a mythical life hereafter, where the wrongs of this life will be compensated. Only a fool would believe that, which shows how many fools there are. Barnum was wrong; a fool is not born every minute. A fool is born every second."

  "Lord have mercy on me, a fool," Brother Paul murmured.

  "Eh?" the Hierophant demanded querulously.

  "I merely thought there was more to religion than this," Brother Paul clarified. "A person needs some solace in the face of the inevitable death of the body."

  "Without death, there would be no religion!" the Hierophant asserted, waving his scepter for emphasis, It almost struck the pate of one of the monks. The Hierophant frowned in annoyance, and both monks disappeared. "Religion started with the nature spirits—the forest fire, flood, thunder, earthquake and the like. Primitive savages tried to use magic to pacify the demons of the environment, and made blood sacrifices to the elements of fire, water, air, and earth, hoping to flatter these savage powers into benign behavior. Read the Good Book of Tarot and you will find these spooks lurking yet, in the form of the four suits. Formal religion is but an amplification of these concepts."

  Brother Paul's amazement was giving way to ire. "This is an idiot's view of religion," he said. "You can't claim—"

  "You have been brainwashed into conformity with intellectual nonsense," the Hierophant said with paternal regret. "Your whole existence has been steeped in religious propaganda. Your memory is imprinted with the face of Caesar and the message 'In God We Trust.' Your pledge of allegiance to your totemic flag says 'One nation under God indivisible.' Why not say 'In Satan We Trust,' for Satan has far more constancy than God. Or 'One nation, embracing a crackpot occult spook, indivisible except by lust for power—'"

  "Stop!" Brother Paul cried. "I cannot listen to this sacrilege!"

  The Hierophant nodded knowingly. "So you admit to being the dupe of the organized worldwide conspiracy of religion. Your objectivity exists only so long as the truth does not conflict with the tenets of your cult."

  Brother Paul was angry, but not so angry that he missed the kernel of truth within the religious mockery. This cardboard entity was baiting him, pushing his buttons, forcing him to react as it chose. The Animation was in control, not he himself. He had to recover his objectivity, to observe rather than proselytize, or his mission was doomed.

  Brother Paul calmed himself by an effort of will that became minimal once he realized what was happening. "I apologize, Hierophant," he said, with a fair semblance of calmness. "Maybe I have been misinformed. I will hear you out." After all, freedom of speech applied to everyone, even those with cardboard minds.

  The figure smiled. "Excellent. Ask what you will."

  This was now more difficult than before. Instead of a question, Brother Paul decided to try a statement. Maybe he could gain the initiative and make the Animation react instead; that should be more productive. Obviously there was a mind of some kind behind the facade; the question was, what mind?

  "You say I can tolerate only that truth which does not conflict with the tenets of my personal religion," he said carefully. "I'm sure that is correct. But I regard my religion as Truth, and I do my best to ascertain the truth of every situation. I support freedom of speech for every person, including those who disagree with me, and I endorse every man's right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. This is part of what I mean when I salute my country's flag, and when I invoke God's name in routine matters."

  "Few nations support these things," the Hierophant said. "Certainly not the monolithic Church. A heretic is entitled to neither life nor liberty, and no one is entitled to happiness."

  "But happiness is the natural goal of man!" Brother Paul protested, privately intrigued. Now he was baiting the figure! He considered happiness only a part of the natural goal of man; he himself did not crave selfish happiness. Once, perhaps, he had; but he had matured. Or so he hoped.

  "The salvation of his immortal soul is the proper goal of man," the Hierophant said firmly. "Happiness has no part of it."

  "But you said man's immortal soul was superstition, a mere invention spawned by political—"

  "Precisely," the figure agreed, smiling.

  "But then it is all for nothing! All man's deeds, man's suffering, unrewarded."

  "You are an apt student."

  Brother Paul shook his head, clearing it. This thing was not going to mousetrap him! "So the destiny of man is—"

  "Man must eschew joy, in favor of perpetual mortification."

  "But all basic instincts of man are tied to pleasure. The satisfaction of abating hunger, the comfort of rest after hard labor, the acute rapture of sexual union—"

  "These are temptations sponsored by Satan! The ascetic way of life is the only way. The way of least pleasure. A man should feed on bread and water, sleep on a hard cot, and have contact with the inferior sex only for the limited purpose of propagating the species, if at all."

  "Oh, come now!" Brother
Paul protested, laughing. "Sex has been recognized as a dual-function drive. Not only does it foster reproduction, it enhances the pleasure of a continuing interpersonal relationship that solidifies a family."

  "Absolutely not!" the Hierophant insisted. "The pleasures of fornication are the handiwork of Satan, and the begetting of a child is God's punishment for that sin, a lifelong penance."

  "Punishment!" Brother Paul exclaimed incredulously. "If I had a child, I would cherish it forever!" But he wondered whether this were mere rhetoric; he had no experience with children.

  The Hierophant frowned. "You are well on the way to eternal damnation!"

  "But you said there was no afterlife! How can there be eternal damnation?"

  "Repent! Mortify yourself, throw yourself upon the tender mercy of the Lord in the hope that He will not torture you too long. Perhaps after suitably horrendous chastisement, your soul will be purged of its abysmal burden of guilt."

  Brother Paul shook his head. "I am trying very hard to be open and objective, but I find I just can't take you seriously. And so you are wasting my time. Begone!" He turned away, knowing the figure would dissipate. Maybe he had lost this engagement by calling it off, but he didn't regret it.

  These Animations were fascinating. There was a tremendous potential for physical, intellectual, and spiritual good here, if only it could be properly understood. So far he had not succeeded in doing that. The Hierophant Animation had spoken only a pseudo-philosophy, as shallow as that of a cardboard figure might be expected to be. If he had Animated a lovely woman, would she have been as bad?

  A lovely woman. That intrigued him on another plane. Some men considered intellect a liability in a woman, and indeed some supposedly stupid women I had made excellent careers for themselves by keeping their legs open and their mouths closed. This was not really what Brother Paul was looking for, yet the interest was there. Would an Animation woman be touchable, kissable, seducible?—a construct of air, like a demon, a succubus?

  He wrenched his speculation away. It was too intriguing; maybe he was too far on the road to damnation! To utilize a phenomenon like Animation merely to gratify a passing lust! Of course there was nothing wrong with lust; it was God's way of reminding man that the species needed to be replicated, and it provided women of lesser physical strength with a means to manage otherwise unmanageable men. But lust directed at a construct of air and imagination could hardly serve those purposes. "Get thee behind me, Satan," he murmured. But even that prayer was useless, for Satan was also the master of buggery: not the type of entity a man would care to have standing near his posterior.

  Brother Paul looked at his watch. His time was up; in fact he was already overdue. Why hadn't the watchers notified him? He must return to the non-Animation area.

  But which way was out? Clouds were swirling close; a storm was in the neighborhood. Why hadn't he noticed it coming? This too should have caused the watchers to—

  Suddenly he remembered. They had called him— and he had been too preoccupied to notice it consciously. The pastor must have assumed that the signal wasn't getting through. Still, he might have sent someone in...

  The hoodwinked girl, representing the Eight of Swords! Had Amaranth come in to warn him, after the transceiver contact had failed, and been incorporated into that mute image? There was some evidence that Animations were ordinary things, transformed perceptually, so maybe an Animation person was a real person, playing a part But that didn't make sense either; why would a person play such a part? No one claimed that Animation affected the inner workings of the mind; it only changed perceptions of external things.

  Maybe Amaranth had come in, and been deceived by the various images he had conjured, and lost her way. Now he and she—and probably the various hidden watchers—were stranded in the Animation region, in a storm, unless he got out in a hurry, and brought them out with him.

  How to do it? He should call out, of course! Establish contact with those outside, obtain geographic directions. "Pastor Runford!" he said to his transceiver.

  There was static, but no answer. This was not surprising; the range of the tiny wand was limited, and terrain and weather could interfere. Probably the watchers had been forced to retreat before the storm, lest they be caught in the spreading Animation region.

  His predicament was his own fault. He had been careless, when he should have been alert. He was only sorry that he had involved others in it, assuming they had not gotten out safely. What next?

  Well, the Tarot deck had gotten him into this, to a certain extent; maybe it could get him out. He brought out the deck again and sorted through it.

  Maybe one of the fives—

  The first five he encountered was the Five of Cups, pictured by three spilled and two standing cups. Symbolic of loss, disappointment, and vain regret.

  Precisely.

  He studied the card, uncertain as to what to do now. And the picture formed before him. A man stood in a black cloak, his head bowed in the direction of the spilled cups, ignoring the two that remained standing. In the background a river flowed by—the stream of the unconscious, symbolically—and across it stretched a bridge leading to a small castle. Could that be the same castle he had seen in the Animation of the Ace of Wands? If so, he could use it for orientation. It was probably just the background, like a painted setting, representing no more than the orientation of the painting. Still, if he held the scene in mind, maintaining its reality, the others caught in this region might be able to orient on it, and then they all could find their way out together. The colonists would know the real landscape better than he did.

  Was this crazy? Probably, but it was still worth a try. If he could approach that distant castle, so could they. Maybe they knew their way out, and were trying to locate him, to guide him out too, and the castle could serve as a rendezvous. At least he could test that hypothesis.

  First, he would check with the black-cloaked figure. Maybe it was just the Hierophant, in a new role. On the other hand, it could be a watcher, impressed into this role, if that were possible.

  Brother Paul stepped forward. And suddenly he was inside the picture, advancing toward the bridge. The cloaked figure heard him and began to turn. The face came into full view. And there was no face, just a smooth expanse of flesh, like the face of an incomplete store-window mannequin.

  6

  Choice

  There seems to be a human fascination with secrets. Secrets and secret societies have abounded throughout history, some relating to entire classes of people, as with initiation rites for young men; some relating to religion, as with the "mystery" cults of the Hellenic world; and some relating to specialized interests, such as deviant sexual practices, fraternities, and the occult. The arcana of the Tarot reflect this interest: the word "arcanum" means a secret. The Major Arcana are "Big Secrets," the Minor Arcana "Little Secrets" So it is not surprising that the Tarot has been the subject of exploration by some "secret societies." The most significant of these was conducted by the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, founded in 1887 as an offshoot of the English Rosicrucian ("Rosey Cross") Society, itself created twenty years before as a kind of spinoff from Freemasonry, which in turn originated with the Masons, or builder's guild. The Golden Dawn had 144 members—a significant number in arcane lore—and was formed for the acquisition of initiatory knowledge and powers, and for the practice of ceremonial magic. Many leading figures of the day were members, such as Bram Stoker (the author of the novel Dracula) and Sax Rohmer (the creator of Fu Manchu). One of its "grand masters" was the prominent poet William Butler Yeats. He presided over meetings dressed in a kilt, wearing a black mask, and with a golden dagger in his belt. But the Golden Dawn is remembered today for the impact some of its members had on Tarot. Arthur Edward Waite, creator of the prominent Rider-Waite Tarot deck, was a member; so was Paul Foster Case, a leading Tarot scholar; and so was Aleister Crowley, said to be the wickedest man in the world, who created the Thoth Tarot deck under the name Master Therion
. Crowley was a highly intelligent and literate man, the author of a number of thoughtful books, but he had strong passions, indulged in drugs like cocaine and heroin, practiced black magic (one episode left one man dead and Crowley in a mental hospital for several months; they had summoned Satan), and had homosexual tendencies that led him to degrade women. He set up a retreat in Italy called the Abbey of Thelema where his darker urges were exercised, and this became notorious. Yet for all the faults of the author, Crowley's Thoth Tarot remains perhaps the most beautiful and relevant of contemporary decks, well worth the attention of anyone seriously interested in the subject.

  The picture about him wavered and faded. Brother Paul hesitated, but immediately realized the problem: his entry into the Animation had changed it. Maybe the legendary Chinese artist—what was his name?—had been able to enter his own realistic painting and disappear from the mundane world, but very few others had acquired such status! Brother Paul could only look, not participate.

  Yet why not? These Animations were governed by his own mind. If he wanted to paint a picture with himself in it, who was there to say he could not? He dealt the Six of Swords.

  The picture formed. The stream of the unconscious had grown to the river of consciousness. The bridge was gone; this water was too broad for it. He could not see the castle at all. Of course this was a different picture, for a different card; the Five of Cups had stood for loss, while the Six of Swords represented a journey by water. He had lost the Five, appropriately, but gained the Six.

  He spied a small craft on the water. It was a flat-bottomed boat, containing a woman and a child, and a man who was poling the boat across the river. "Wait!" Brother Paul cried, suddenly anxious, but also conscious of the possible pun: wait—Waite, the author of this deck. "I want to go, too!" But they did not heed him; probably they were out of earshot, if they existed at all as people. They were, literally, of a different world, one he could not enter.