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Dec 17 2006, 10:24 PM EST (current) DaanaMindon 516 words deleted, 1 photo deleted
Oct 15 2006, 10:32 AM EDT DaanaMindon 18 words added

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Regrettably, the limits set on size for images mounted on this website prohibit reproduction of the complete image.The concentric wheels show (outer to inner rings):* circuit of the world by reference to the 12 parts of the solar circuit.* circuit of manzil (lunar mansions), beginning as Arabic astrology did from the first mansion in Aries.* circuit of alphabetic letters, linked with the lunar mansions.* the status mundi - i.e. the order of all creation in its states or stages, and which includes the Ages of Man scheme as well as the planets further along this circuit. * the holy Names (or litany of epithets) of God. . The whole offers a coherent pattern for describing the world both figuratively (metaphorically) or literally and - equally - offers an intelligent ground-plan for all scholarly study. . In other papers we have already suggested that the western card-pack was first designed as a generic model of the world, principally to aid in education, and educational exercises or 'games'. . We have said how the smaller pack's 12 "Kings and Courts" are the cards more readily associated with the solar '12'. . The larger form of pack, the tarot, depicts a compass of fixed navigational stars in its oldest Atouts, its 16-fold division at the mid-level being that of the world's mid-level of winds and elements, in number equating with the divisions of the the mariner's wind-rose, while altogether the lower part of this pack (the arcana minor) contain a doubled-28 (56 cards) which suggest reference to the 28 lunar mansions, to the Arabic alphabet and to the individual study themes shown here in association with each letter /number/ manazil. A doubling of that factor permitted practical calculation of times and tides (among other things). We have thus spoken of the tarot as the shipman's deck. . The critical element in this diagram is not the '12' of the zodiac, but the (27 or 28) part division provided by the series of lunar mansion stars with their associated alpha-numeric letters. With the compass stars, the manzil formed the mariner's all-encompassing grid of the world, as is discussed in separate essays of this series. Ibn Arabi was a Muslim of Spain, known popularly as 'son of Plato' and perhaps for that reason is rarely mentioned in areas of Islam not influenced by the Abbasid culture. We believe that his 'wheels' are not his invention, but re-present the North African educational plan introduced by al 'Idrisi into North Africa after 15 years spent at the Norman-Sicilian court. The North African dialect has a plural prefix 'ta-' but whether 'rot' may come from the word for red, or for dates, or for 'wheel' cannot be determined. Moreover, a Hebrew imperative form offers such a word, 'tarot' with a meaning relevant to the idea of cutting segments or ascertaining a line of direction. While we believe the origin of the term tarot (and many aspects of traditional card-reading) to have developed in North Africa and the south-western Mediterreanean, as yet we have no definitive etymology for it.