Thoth Tarot Deck

Thoth Tarot Deck

Many consider Aleister Crowley to be the foremost and most impactful occultist of the 20th century. He devoted his life to combining the teachings of various religions, extracting their fundamental truths, and developing a system he named Scientific Illuminism. This system aimed to achieve God realization.
Crowley was influenced by the latest scientific, mathematical, philosophical, and anthropological discoveries in his approach to tarot. He became devoted to tarot after being initiated into the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, an English Rosicrucian society founded in 1888 that provided a structured path within the Western Mystery tradition. The tarot played a significant role in the order's rituals, meditations, and studies, and other members published decks based on the symbolism of the Tarot of the Golden Dawn. The order's deck was kept secret by its members until 1978, when Doctor Robert Wang's deck, created under the guidance of Dr. Israel Regardie, was published by US Games Systems, Inc.
The Tarot consists of 78 pictorial images that draw inspiration from the Kabbalah, a meditative route to higher levels of consciousness. The Kabbalah's Tree of Life, consisting of 10 spheres and 22 interconnected paths of consciousness, contains all knowledge. To employ the Tarot for divination, one must become familiar with the symbols and understand the aspects of consciousness that each card represents. With consistent effort, deeper meditative work, and study, one's psychic perception will develop and improve. Traditionally, before starting any divination, the reader would make an invocation to higher forces for greater understanding and higher consciousness through the cards. The Golden Dawn Invocation, used by Crowley, is as follows.

 

"I invoke the IAO, that thou will send HRU, the great Angel that is set over the operations of this secret Wisdom, to lay his hand invisibly on these consecrated cards of art, that thereby we may obtain true knowledge of hidden things to the glory of thine ineffable name Amen."
As an alternative one can invision a radiant white light that purifies and elevates consciousness.
The Thoth card pack's booklet suggests a 15-card spread that is simpler than the well-known Celtic Cross spread. The Golden Dawn approach to reading does not involve reversed meanings, but does take into account the relationships and influences between the cards. As the meanings of the cards can be influenced by neighboring cards, this spread identifies such resulting meanings. A link is provided with the pack to enable a download of the original instructions in PDF format. Please contact us at Pagan Art UK if you have any problems downloading the instructions and we will email you a copy.
The above is interpreted from the original text
HERNE of Pagan Art