Card Combo: Hierophant/Hermit

Card combos
1st combo...Hierophant/Hermit
I mentioned in my introduction that I wanted to post a series of card combos. I have no idea how often I'll do this, as I've never blogged before; I know one thing about myself and that is that if I commit to doing it every day, it won't happen. If I commit to doing it once a week, on Friday, it won't happen. If I commit do doing it on the first of the month, it won't happen. My *guess* is that it'll happen about once a week; I'd like to do it more often than that, but I often do physical work, and when I'm tired, my brain is too; and I have to "save myself" for the readings I do as well.

That being said, I feel that writing about card combos will help me extend my intuition (as it must stretch to effectively bridge the two cards and come up with a "consolidated meaning" for the two. This process includes 3 steps:
First, I must take into consideration the meanings of the cards individually; next, I must combine the two meanings intuitively to come up with that "third" meaning; and finally, I must ask myself "why did I pull this combo TODAY?" This series of three steps would have to take place in any card reading. So really, I'm not just examining card meanings, I'm doing a mini reading, and exposing the process for doing so.
As a fourth step, I suppose I'd want to come back on a week later, and write about how the combo played out during the week...because you can bet I'll be thinking about it as the week rolls, and further insight and sychronicities will be popping up.
So there's my reasons for wanting to do it this way. It's for myself, and it's for anyone interested in doing it with me. Feel free to comment and add anything you like. You may have completely different (and completely valid) takes on the cards. This will be our little workshop.
All this being said, here is the first combo I drew, and it's a "doozie" of a combo to start:
The Hierophant/The Hermit

Okay, step one is to sum up the cards individually.
Regarding the HIEROPHANT, the first thing out of peoples mouth is often something negative. I like to give him a fairer shake than that: He is tradition, knowledge, education and teaching, institution, religion (especially doctrine and theology). He is book learning, and head smarts. He is our beliefs. These are all positives. On the negative, he is dry, dusty dogma and institutionalized and codified ANYTHING. This could be religion that no longer serves to bring faith. It could be laws or rules that only hinder things. Meaningless structures that once were inhabited by light, but the light was lost, but still the institution lives on as a dusty relic, because some people just want to be told what to do, and the Hierophant would love to tell you how to live, under the guise of "shepherd". Could be a lifeless marriage, or schooling "by the book" or lawmaking/enforcing with no heart. These negative meanings would apply especially if the card came up upside down (although reversals are an art all by themselves...sometimes a reversal could mean a RELEASE from said dusty institution...)
The HERMIT is first-hand mystical experience of higher things...God, Nature, the Higher Self, Wisdom, Art. The Hermit goes and finds these things for her/himself. S/he knows that in order to find answers, s/he must withdraw from the normal mode of interacting with society, in order to hear inner guidance...the "still small voice" of intuition (which means inner teaching). This might entail sequestering one's self (hence the Hermit title) for a period of time--even a lifetime, if need be. The Hermit, withdrawn as s/he is, nevertheless is there to serve humanity as a "guiding light"; but it falls to us to go out and find him/her.
(Ok, can I drop the silly PC gender inclusive language? It is unfortunate that our language does not have a neutral term, not my fault...and how hard could it be to come up with one? Nothing ever sticks, though. But for the sake of discussion, our "sexist" card shows a male...)
...it falls to us to go out and find the hermit if we want his insight/wisdom...in this way, he is available to those of us who are seekers. On the Negative side, the Hermit is reclusive, unable to cope with society and withdraws out of phobias and fears. This hermit is really well depicted in the Deviant Moon Tarot:

Now, to combine the two images. Both of these cards are earth signs when we look at them astrologically, and in the interests of putting my limited astrologic knowledge to use, one is plodding and slow (Hierophant/Taurus) and one is quick and investigative (Hermit/Virgo). So this combo is really showing us, by way of compare/contrast two ways of apprehending higher wisdom. One is book learning (endeavoring to understand what others have said on a given subject) and one is direct intuitive experience. It's like a system of checks and balances. We filter our direct experience of the light with what we know from "books"; and we take what we "read in books" with a grain of salt, and hold it up to the light we have acquired from direct experience and see if it "passes snuff". All this reminds me very much of how we learn something like Tarot. I notice the when the cards are placed in the order they came up here, Hierophant/Hermit, the Hermit stands turned towards the Hierophant, casting his light upon him. This is as if to say, the Hierophant's symbols and dogma have a real wisdom when infused with light...if there is no light, they are just meaningless shells, and contain no power. It's like if we read a book about something that's over our heads...for me, for example, Physics...all just words...i don't get it. But if someday the "light went on", I know there'd be a powerful experience of wisdom and wonder. This is what my first experiences of Kabbalah were like. Religious ritual, without this light, is just a bunch of meaningless actions. But when someone takes the time to initiate us, and explain the symbols and the meaning behind them, suddenly a light goes on (not always, though) and the ceremony is full of meaning, like the stage lights suddenly flooding a set with evocative light.
And now, lastly, we come to the question "Why did I pull these particular cards...what do they have to do with my life now? Well, I can only speak to my personal life: there are a number of "legal issues" I'm dealing with that I've been "hiding from," wishing they'd just go away. They are beginning to be dealt with, in a very positive fashion, and I'm learning to trust the light I'm given. That's one reason. Another reason is that here at the beginning of this blog experience, this is a very positive omen, and meaningful pair to appear as teachers and guides...the two wise men of Tarot.
I'm going to revisit this combo in a few days and we'll see how the week went, and where these two wise guys put in an appearance for me.

Hierophant/Hermit revisited.

Well, as I mentioned, I wanted to come back 'round to these card combos after a few days and put in a few more comments about the impressions they have made upon me after a bit of time.

Here is what I got on these two fellas: They are the "left and right brain" of Tarot reading. I think to a card reader what I say will be immediately obvious...in fact, many who looked at the earlier posting probably said to themselves, "he missed the most obvious thing!" It's often the case that the cards will continue to reveal themselves to me for days/weeks after a particular reading. That was certainly so in this case, which is why I knew I wanted to come back and post further ruminations on them "after the fact".

In order to illustrate this i want to put forth now a little piece I wrote about a month ago over on the Aeclectic Tarot Forum, entitled "The Vision of the Rose Trellis". In this piece, the Hierophant is the Trellis and the Hermit is the Roses.

The Vision of the Rose Trellis

I saw the Tarot as a Rose Trellis. The Tarot itself has an underlying structure upon which it has grown over the centuries. It is this particular structure that distinguishes it from other forms of cards. But more than this, I mean the underlying structure of traditional meanings for the cards...they are there, they support, they provide a skeleton that props up. But covering the skeleton is the living substance...the roses themselves. This is where Tarot is a living book...I speak of intuition here...the connections, the spontaneous eruptions of fancy that grow forth from the structure, but are not the structure...these meanings for the cards erupt differently from garden to garden (different readers) and from day to day (different readings). They blossom and fade...we do not remember these; there is no need, for tomorrow there will be new buds, new blossoms, all hanging there on the classical arbor of tradition.

I never want to remember these spontaneous meanings that spring forth, because in so doing, I freeze them and they get added to the trellis itself...and I don't want that to get to "chunky" because it will detract from the growth of the roses.
While I was ruminating on the Hierophant/Hermit, an argument came to mind; "yes, but would the High Priestess be a better representative of the intuition side of the process?" Well, here's the difference. The High Priestess knows what she knows...she just knows it. She doesn't have to find it out, it's just wisdom full born in the head, sort of like when Athena was born and she just popped right out of Zeus's head, fully formed. The Hermit, however, has to "go after it"...he has to learn everything, shining his light into all the little nooks and crannies of experience in order to apprehend what he comes to understand as wisdom. The High Priestess also has other archetypes associated with her...but this is not really meant to be a High Priestess kind of post...

So there is our first card combo posting. I like doing it this way and will continue with another pair of cards shortly.

'Till then...