From: spb0457@rigel.tamu.edu (SubGenius)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: The Lion For Real -or- All you never wanted to know about Leo
Date: 12 Nov 92 02:37:00 GMT
Article-I.D.: rigel.11NOV199220370051
Organization: Texas A&M University, Academic Computing Services
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41


[Pearl Jam deletia]

+-------------------------------------SubG-------------------------------------+
On the Pearl Jam bit:  I think it is all too easy to overestimate the
literary value of rock lyrics, as in most cases the decision schema for most
songwriters in the genre seems to revolve around two questions:  Does it rhyme?
-and- Will it make a cool soundbite in the eMpTyV advertisements?
+-------------------------------------SubG-------------------------------------+

>In listening to this song, I thought of a common version of the Tarot
>deck in which the eighth trump card is Strength, depicted as a woman
>taming a lion.

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I'd agree with you if you were right, but I think your interpretation is 
spurious.  Assuming that you're referring to the Waite-Rider deck (indeed the
most common deck), the image should not imply `taming' the lion, but rather
soothing it--the lion is already wearing a leash of flowers, which the Lady
Strength is presumably leading it.  The `action' implied in the image is her
closing the lion's mouth, but there is no evidence of force.
A.E. Waite himself notes, in his commentary on the deck, that perhaps a better
name for the Trump would be `Fortitude,' but the name was dictated by its
position in the Trumps (more on that below).

Of interest to your theory, Aliester Crowley re-locates the card to the 11th
position in the Trumps, and names it `Lust,' because (he says) this Trump
deals not just with strength, but with the joy of strength exercised (and
more on that below.)
+---------------------------------------SubG-----------------------------------+

>If you divide the 21 trumps (not counting the un-
>trump, the Fool) into three 7-card sequences of development, the cards
>1 to 7 can be seen as maturation in the outer world, cards 8 to 14 as
>an inner, psychological journey, and 15 to 21 as a spiritual
>awakening.  This view places the Strength card at the first step of
>gaining inner understanding, self-knowledge.  The woman taming the
>lion is supposed to convey an awareness of inner ("animal") qualities
>such as spontaneity and desire, coupled with an ability to harness
>these urges, to put the unconscious at the service of conscious
>intention.

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First, the division of the Trumps into three groups runs contrary to the
train of thought that went into their placement;  according to qabalistic
theory, each of the Trumps corresponds to a path between two of the ten
Sephiroth that compost the Tree of Life--and the character of these paths is
dictated by the character of the Sephira.
Further, the symbol of the lion goes with the card, and not with its
position in the deck, as the common attribution of the Trump of Strength (or
whatever) is to Leo.  THIS is in turn due to a great deal of other stuff,
which is all basically hand-waving in any case, so I won't go into it.

In short:  I think you're inventing correlations out of the luminous
aether and moon dust.
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[historical deletia]

>In alchemical lore, lions are
>identified with fire energy, and with the sun, sulphur, and gold.
>(The transformation of sulphur to gold is an alchemical metaphor for
>the transformation of the inner self.)

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As alchemy didn't really get rolling (as a science, anyway) until the Middle
Ages, I assume that the Alchemists (Doctor "I fart at thee!" Subtle u.s.w.)
were cribbing from the qabalists' notes (the qabalists had been in the
mythography business for centuries at this point).
The association with fire harks back to the position of Leo in the Zodiac
(in the Kerub of Fire, with the Sun being dominant), and in this instance
owes more to the concept of natural marriage than to the more Jonson-ian
persuit of mystical transmogrification of inerts.  Further, in the 
procession of the Aeons, the present (Horus) is linked with Aquarius (as
noted in vintage 60's music) and (no surprise here) Leo.

Sigh.

Further complicating things is the fact that the letter attributed to the
Strength (or Lust) Trump is Teth, meaning a snake or (in biblical
parlance [spell it yourself]) a serpent.

Which gives an image of a sort of creation or conception, with a woman
and a lion and a serpent.  You can play with these symbols and their
possible pervertations and convolutions.

See also:  Chapters 13, 17 and 18 of the Apokalypse of John (`Revelations')
           and Chapter 49 of _The Book of Lies_
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[deletia various]

>I note that in a
>recent review of Susan Sontag's _The_Volcano_Lover_, the author is
>described as a "black-clad high priestess."  Interesting how if you
>map this onto the Tarot card of Strength (although trump #2, the
>Papess, might be more appropriate), Sontag is not the lion, but the
>woman who controls the lion.

+--------------------------------------SubG-----------------------------------+
Actually, the Second Trump (The High Priestess, associated with the letter
Gimel, or `camel'--we're going to have quite a menagerie here if this keeps
up.  And headaches.  A menagerie, and headaches) is attributed to the moon, and
the path of Gimel (between Kether and Tiphareth) crosses the path of Teth
(between Chessed and Gevurah), so there's some justification for the
association you've made above.

I'll suppress the urge to blather further (on this subject, anyway).
+---------------------------------------SubG----------------------------------+

[further deletia]

>Hmmm...lions and fire.  Sex and rage.  Biting teeth and mellifluous
>speech.  Where I'm going with all of this, I don't yet know.  But I'd
>love to hear what you have to say about lions.
>                                                  --Fiona Webster

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I think that you'll find that two of the most common cultural references we
have to lions will explain most of their roljs in literature:
1)  The lion tamer at the circus (if only we knew, as chilluns, about
    tranquilizers and training and Pavlov and Barnum), and
2)  Throwing xians to the lions (and similar `The Giant Muscles of Herecles'
    gladiator-flick references on the coaxial Thought Vampire).

Also, there's the `King of the Jungle' schtick that the lion has to contend
with--probably deriving from the fact that in most climes inhabited by lions,
they're the top of the food pyramid.  Oh, and lions mate with bunches of
lionesses, don't they (I haven't been watching Mutual of Omaha's Wild
Kingdom lately)? 

To keep this all down-home and literary, though, I'll recommend Allen
Ginsberg's "The Lion For Real" mentioned in the title of this post, an
interesting bit of poetry from the guy what tried to levitated the
Pentagon (that's not the Alan Ginsburg that got nominated to the Supreme
Court--boy, there was a headline on the evenin' news that turned my head
first time I [mis]heard it) about confronting your inner side.  Also
available on a truly groovy album (of the same name), on which Mr. Ginsberg
reads some of his poetry with various (I guess you would call it jazz)
accompaniments.  


Now an irrelevant aside (`Ye bogs!,' I hear the cry, `Angels and ministers
of grace defend us if our esteemed colleague deems that his erstwhile {and,
I fear} continuing dissertation is anything, asides aside, but irrelevant!'):

Generally speaking, I don't catch the header of a post before I read it, so
I usually don't know who the writer is until I hit the bottom and the sig.
Usually the tone, calibre and style of the writing clues me in, so by the
time I reach the end of the text, I already know or have a damn good idea
of who I'm dealing with.  In this case, I had composed roughly half of my
reply before I caught the name, and couldn't have been further off base.

Is r.a.b. being ghostwritten these days?







Lyin's and tygers
and bares, O my,
Yours etc.,





SubGenius