More on the U.S. presidency in 2022

What fascinates me about Tarot reading is not that what the cards say always comes true, but rather the simple, astonishing fact that they always do say something. Whatever question I put to them, they always address it. It is not the accuracy that impresses so much as the sheer responsiveness. In theory, it can all be dismissed as coincidence and apophenia; in practice, this becomes harder and harder to do with a straight face.

Sometimes I think people like me shouldn't be allowed to play with Tarot cards. You take a tool designed to turn synchronicity up to 11 and put it in the hands of someone like me, and -- well, isn't that a bit reckless?

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My January 4 Reading for 2022 involved drawing "before" and "after" cards showing how various people and things would change or develop over the course of the coming year. Included were "before" and "after" cards for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.

On January 6, wanting further clarification, I drew "before" and "after" cards for the presidency as a whole. Below are the two cards from the January 6 reading, with the corresponding Biden and Harris cards from the January 4 reading below.

The Two of Cups, for the start of 2022, clearly matches up with the Biden and Harris cards from the earlier reading.  It has precisely the same layout as the Devil card: a woman on the left, a man on the right, and a central non-human figure looming in the background. The man on the Two of Cups is wearing practically the same tunic as the Page of Wands, confirming that he is Biden, the woman is Harris, and the lion/devil is the shadowy power behind the throne.

At the end of 2022, the Queen of Cups shows a woman alone on the throne, dressed similarly to the woman on the Two of Cups (blue and white clothes, laurel wreath). Strength shows a woman with a lion. In my earlier reading, I was unsure as to which of the figures on the Devil card this lion represented, the man or the devil. In the Two of Cups, though, the lion clearly corresponds to the devil. It appears, then, that the year begins with Biden and Harris sharing nominal power but in fact controlled by a hidden "devil." By the end of the year, Biden is out of the picture and Harris is in control, in partnership with the "devil."

Leaving aside the Five of Wands, in which the five figures are not readily identifiable as individuals, we have the following mappings:

• the Devil = the lion-headed caduceus on the Two of Cups = the lion on Strength
• the Page of Wands = the Devil's male captive = the man on the Two of Cups = Joe Biden
• the Queen of Cups = the Devil's female captive = the woman on the Two of Cups = the woman on Strength = Kamala Harris

Let us look at each of these in turn.

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The Devil

Looking at the Two of Cups in isolation, I would never have thought to connect it with the Devil. Once the connection has been made, though, another image immediately comes to mind as the "missing link" between the two: Éliphas Lévi's famous drawing of "Baphomet" or "the Sabbatic Goat," first published in 1856 in his Dogme et Rituel de la Haute Magie, and since coopted by self-styled Satanists. 

There is no question that Waite was very extensively influenced by Lévi, and his Devil is very clearly patterned after Lévi's Goat. We see the horns, the pentagram, the torch, the position of the arms, etc. -- all rather different from the way the Devil is typically portrayed in the Marseille tradition. However, Lévi's drawing also features feathered wings and a caduceus -- which appear not on Waite's Devil card but on his Two of Cups.

There is no lion's head on Lévi's Baphomet, though. For that, we need to look at another image: the myterious "Leontocephaline" (lion-headed) figure associated with Mithraism.

Notice the lion's head, the feathered wings, and the caduceus -- all the elements that feature in the Two of Cups. The exact identity of this figure is a matter of speculation and scholarly debate, but it has become conventional to refer to it as Arimanius -- that is to say, Ahriman, the "devil" of Zoroastrianism, whose name would later be used by Rudolf Steiner (and later still by my own circle of Romantic Christians) to refer to the materialistic, bureaucratic, "lawful evil" aspect of the demonic.

Are the two people on the Two of Cups drinking a toast to the devil, then? Ah, but the cups combined with the caduceus give an added meaning.

The cup and serpent is the Bowl of Hygieia, symbol of pharmacy. Here we have two cups and two serpents -- but the serpents are combined to form a caduceus, symbol of commerce. Isn't such an unholy combination precisely what we have in mind when we say "Big Pharma"? And isn't Big Pharma one of the primary manifestations of Ahriman in the modern world?

In this context, another detail of Lévi's Baphomet image becomes interesting: The monster's raised right arm is labeled "Solve," and his lowered left arm is labeled "Coagula." These have an alchemical meaning in their original context, but in the context of Big Pharma in 2022, it is impossible not to notice the resonance with a particular medical intervention, being pushed relentlessly by the Ahrimanic establishment, which is supposed to "solve" a supposed crisis but is actually causing a real crisis having to do with hematological "coagulation."

In addition to whatever Mithraic meaning it may have, the winged lion also appears in the Bible (Daniel 7) as a symbol of Nebuchadnezzar's Babylon. The "guardian of peace and security" statue that was briefly installed at the UN headquarters at the end of last year was connected by many with this beast, as well as with the Beast of Revelation -- which also represents "Babylon," meaning Rome.

Babylon, Rome, 666, the UN, Big Pharma -- Ahriman. The devil figure on these cards represents not some particular person who is the real power behind the throne, but rather the Ahrimanic System which is the power behind all thrones -- at least "till the thrones are cast down" (Dan. 7:9).

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The Page of Wands (Biden)

There is little to add to my discussion of Biden in "Reading for 2022." However, the addition of Baphomet to the mix suggests a possible interpretation of the Devil setting fire to the Biden figure's tail with the torch he holds in his left hand. The corresponding arm on Lévi's Baphomet is labeled coagula -- could this be a hint that Biden could be removed from action by pharmacologically induced thrombosis? That would be a very plausibly deniable way of offing him wouldn't it -- Alec Baldwinning him next time he does a fake peck photo op? The effect needn't be immediate, either. The Devil card shows his tail being lit as if it were a fuse, which makes me think of these lines from the They Might Be Giants song "Hide Away Folk Family."

Tippy-toe to the front door, Mother,

'Cause there's a guy with a long, long fuse

And the one thing you can't hide is all the fear you feel inside

As the fuse is spelling out these words

Chorus:

Hide away folk family

Or else someone's gonna get ya (Someone's gonna get ya)

Someone's gonna get ya

Hide away folk family

Better hide away

Better hide away

Tippy-toe to the flat-bed, Father,

Because they're pouring out our gasoline

And sadly the cross-eyed bear's been put to sleep behind the stairs

And his shoes are laced with irony

Chorus

Hello. This is Lesley Down with the daily home astrology report.

Taurus: Contemplate domestic turmoil.

Aquarius: Abandon hope for future plans.

I'm not sure if the Taurus and Aquarius references mean anything, but it's interesting to note that Inauguration Day is often the day the Sun enters Aquarius.

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The Queen of Cups (Harris)

Looking at all of the cards we are considering, we find Harris represented four times: twice as a woman with a cup, once as a woman with grapes growing from her tail, and once as a woman with a lion. This theme of cups and grapes reminds me that in Aleister Crowley's version of the Strength card (renamed Lust; in order to maintain his cred as the Wickedest Man in the World, Crowley renamed all three virtue trumps), the woman is portrayed as the biblical Whore of Babylon and is holding a cup.

Crowley himself characterizes this cup as "the Holy Grail burned with love and death," but in the Bible it is "a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication" (Rev. 17:17), and "the inhabitants of the earth have been made drunk with the wine of her fornication" (Rev. 17:2). 

The identification (divinatory, not literal!) is clinched by the way this character is introduced in Revelation: "I will shew unto thee the judgment of the great whore that sitteth upon many waters" (Rev. 17:1). If you look at the Queen of Cups, you will see that she, too, sits upon many waters, her throne being on a tiny island or promontory, with water all around. Note also that Biden and Harris are often disparagingly referred to as "Joe and the Hoe" -- the latter title being nothing but a dialect version of the word used in Revelation.

Oh, and did I mention that "Crowley's" cards were actually painted by a woman named Harris?