#tarotthothqabalahelitarotstrickingly.com

• THE PATH OF NUN:
• Color: Green blue
• Musical note: G
• Sign: Scorpio (fixed water)
• Meaning: Fish
• Simple letter: movement

Esoteric title:

The Child of the Great Transformers; The Lord of the Gate of Death.

1st law of thermodynamics (physics) "There is only one energy that cannot be created nor destroyed- only transformed." And I might add, also transmitted.

What we should understand is that alive and dead are two aspects of the same state of Intelligence we call Life. Being Alive is a life-death cycle of recycling. Here, Life/Self simulates itself as an "Aliveness" and transforms itself as a "Death". Since form is time-space, there are no divisions between alpha and omega and/or beginning and end. In fact, recent studies in genetics have proven that the time of gestation of a fetus can determine how long it lives, but they think this is based on nutritional crop growing times. However, as a Spirit- Soul, I know that I design the death of a body at the time I design its life.

Therefore, this card represents the Universal Principle of Letting Go and Moving On. As Crowley stated: " The Universe is Change; every Change is the effect of an Act of Love: all Acts of Love contain Pure Joy. Die Daily. Death is the apex of one curve of the snake Life: behold all opposites as necessary compliments and rejoice." The ATU 12- The Hanged Man, shows the soul as a baffled or hung Anthropomorphic individual, whose head/Psyche is in the world of the Serpent of Life and Death.

The Thoth Tarot card -Death is assigned the Scorpio symbol. There are three symbolic images of Scorpio in the Thoth key which represent three stages of transformation and/ or death and rebirth stages:

1. The scorpion represents that part of us that is willing to protect and move away from conditions which cause pain and hurt. Letting go.
2. The snake sheds old skin to rebuild anew and grow. This reminds us that to transform old identities, we must be willing to let go of the old and move on. This is the driving force behind sexual union.
3. The Eagle or Phoenix is about vital force, of immortality and regeneration. The bird in our nature is a vital free spirit who is irrepressible and ever changing.
4. The skeleton represents the inherent body structure that allows movement and change within our self-expression as well as, it is the bones of who we are and represents our ancestral lineage and our commitment to grow and evolve through birth/death cycles.
5. The Crown represents expanded consciousness, where one has conquered the survival mind of the animal. To be honest all of us know we don't survive this manifestation. We, as infinite Creator Souls, move on to expand and liberate Life!

There are many esoteric aspects of the Death card, also known as The Path of Nun. The Hebrew word, Nun, means Fish, which is the symbol for the First Matter, i.e. Thought. There is also an alchemical symbol of this Path as putrefaction, which is the decaying black mass in the crucible that eventually transforms into gold and is considered a purifying trans-formative process of turning death into new life. Therefore, the symbol for death is usually colored black, or wears black clothing.

The Thoth Tarot card symbolize this trans formative process as a scythe, a harvesting tool that is also a symbol for Time. Time is under the control of Saturn-Binah, the giver and destroyer of Life Illustrated in the Thoth card is the sweeping scythe, harvesting souls, and the trans-formative bubbles of new life in its wake. The Thoth Tarot depicts a skeleton that can be the symbol of Samhiel -the death god or the Death Goddess, Samothea, both of which, support this analogy of life giving and life destroying.

The skeleton is the framework that holds the organs and can be seen as a seed of the body as the minerals that are attributed to bone are the "seeds" of organic forms.

As stated, the astrological sign attributed to Death- ATU/key 13 is Scorpio, a trans-formative sign of three symbolic images, the Scorpion, the Serpent, and the Eagle. Thus, we have the transformation of a dangerous earth-crawling creature, to a serpent which symbolizes the Astral Light, weaving its way upward to become an Eagle which is shown behind and above the Thoth Skeleton's head. Often the symbols of Death are shown dancing. A dance which represents in the Death Tarot Card as movement. Movement being seen as change/transformation, which is the skeletal pattern of the Universe. For it is only by constant change can entropy be overcome.

Change pushes life forward.

Here is a card that first invites terror, until understood by the initiate. First, it is important to understand that this is not a "physical death" card. The Path of Nun connects Tiphareth (Beauty) with Netzach (victory) and is about the flow of Personality from the Higher Self (Tiphareth is the Energy Intelligence of the Christos) into the Imaginative Intelligence which is the seed of all thought-form. What many of us forget is that all form is comprised of the First material---Thought, which begins a disturbance in the electromagnetic paradigm!

The fish, besides being the meaning of the Hebrew letter-Nun, is also the traditional symbol that represents the first matter. Which is appropriate since all the thought-forms come from Binah, the 3rd Sephiroth on the Qabalistic Tree of Life. She is the Great Mother Ocean of The Collective Unconscious. The Fish is also the ancient symbol for the Vesica Pisces.

In this Crowley card, we see a serpent wrapped around the fish, this is because the Activating Principle of Vibration---The Father Fire/Electric force is shown as serpentine and because the serpent is another symbol for the Astrological sign of Scorpio and the sexuality of the Scorpio sign. The Scorpion, another of the 3 symbols for the sign of Scorpio, is shown at the bottom of the Thoth Card. The serpentine forces activate thought-form into living form.

In the Thoth Tarot deck, the Death card’s symbolism goes beyond the mundane concept of “death” and instead emphasizes transformation and evolution, particularly through Scorpio's three symbolic aspects: the Scorpion, the Serpent, and the Eagle. Each aspect represents a stage in Scorpio’s intense journey of personal and spiritual growth. Let’s delve into each one and how they align with Scorpio’s nature.

1. The Scorpion – Self-Destruction and the Dark Night of the Soul

• Symbolism: The Scorpion represents the beginning phase of Scorpio’s journey, tied to primal fears, instincts, and self-destructive tendencies. Known for its venomous sting, the Scorpion is often associated with behaviors that can "sting" or harm oneself or others—like revenge, obsession, and mistrust.
• Interpretation: This aspect reveals Scorpio’s capacity for going through trials where their own fears and impulses threaten to overwhelm them. In occult terms, the Scorpion represents the "death" of the ego or the beginning of transformative work where Scorpio confronts the shadow. It highlights the internal battles where lower impulses are faced head-on. This is often seen as Scorpio’s “dark night of the soul,” a necessary but challenging phase.

2. The Serpent – Transformation and Inner Wisdom

• Symbolism: The Serpent represents wisdom, transformation, and the capacity to shed one's old skin for renewal. The serpent sheds its skin to grow, symbolizing Scorpio’s power to let go of past attachments and reinvent itself. This phase marks a deep dive into the mysteries of life, death, and rebirth.
• Interpretation: As Scorpio moves through its darkness, it begins to unlock hidden knowledge and embrace inner wisdom. This stage is where the sign gains insight, healing, and the courage to transform. Occult practitioners see the serpent as a symbol of initiation—moving past the ego-driven Scorpion stage and embracing a new identity, freed from the past’s restraints.

3. The Eagle – Ascension and Spiritual Mastery

• Symbolism: The Eagle represents Scorpio's highest potential: the ability to rise above the earthly realm and achieve a perspective aligned with the soul’s higher purpose. The eagle soars at great heights, symbolizing insight, vision, and transcendence.
• Interpretation: In this final stage, Scorpio reaches spiritual maturity and mastery, having overcome lower desires and fears. The Eagle sees beyond illusions and integrates past experiences into wisdom, using its vision to guide itself and others. This aspect is deeply connected to Scorpio’s rulership over transformation and its ability to become a healer, guide, or leader who uplifts others through the wisdom gained from its own transformative journey.

Bringing It All Together

In the Thoth Tarot’s Death card, these three aspects are often shown to remind the querent of the necessity of embracing change and transformation. Each stage leads to a new level of understanding, reflecting Scorpio’s depth and complexity as a sign deeply attuned to occult mysteries and spiritual evolution.

The Thoth Card depicts a Skeleton, gaily galloping about, swinging its Scythe of death; a scythe that represents the Transformational aspect of the first law of thermodynamics," One energy that cannot be created nor destroyed, only transformed" that is a segue into the 2nd law of Thermodynamics which is, that "all things proceed from order to disorder". So rather than an "end", this card is about the Transformation of the Real Person as it proceeds downward from the Higher Self into the illusion of the World of Matter, which is "order" and back into chaos.

The Death-Key 13-The Path of Nun, is not easily understood by the survival bases self-conscious of the body, who's foundation of self-identity is based on a child's fear of rejection. To the self-conscious, death is the ultimate rejection: However, to the Soul, death is but a reboot and to organic matter; death is "life eating itself to stay alive" and/ or a way to conquer entropy/chaos and continue to order.

The Esoteric title of this Death card is, the Lord of the Gate of Death. Pointing out that this card isn't the Transformation process itself but directs the personality "downward" into incarnation. It is the Path of the Flaming or Lightning Sword, meaning that this is the path of emanation of the Lower Creator-Energy of the Sun into matter which was shown in Genesis, as the Archangel Michael herding Adam and Eve out of the Garden of Eden, with his flaming sword, often errantly depicted as punishment for sin. This Is more like an early Christian fear fear-based propaganda ploy used to discourage the worshipping of the original Moon God-Sin of Mount Sinai.

Sin was born of the Queen of Heaven- Inanna and ruled the Land of Sinim (Isaiah 49:12), which meant "land of the lunar mountain" and was an older form of Zion. The Moon was always associated with life and death, as it was both light and dark, as well as being thought to "killing" the Sun at night and then resurrecting the Sun in the morning. This belief led to the many dying sun god (son of God) religions.

To further expand its meaning, the Qabalist know this Path of Nun as the path of which the Solar Energy Psyche of the Son (Sun) of God is transformed into the Netzach sphere, or pattern of intelligent energy that is the realm of the Conscious Creative Mind. This part of the Great Work involves psychological re-orientation where there is a perceptual change about the nature of reality and about what constitutes Self. This is yet another aspect of our Transformational psychosomatic nature that points out that how we see the outside world is merely Self viewing itself. The Solar Soul and/or Psyche using the soma, to examine identity. Therefore, how we mentally/emotionally identify ourselves, becomes our psychosomatic "outer image"!

What we must remember here is that all eyesight is an aspect of "I" sight and we cannot see what we don't see as ourselves! I AM is the power that creates our "reality". How I identify myself ---is what I see as an assumed perspective!

Netzach, the 7th Sephiroth on the Qabalistic Tree of Life, is the progenitor of Desire Nature, as the name Victory, if examined, will reveal. The path upward from Netzach to Tiphareth (Beauty) is when the Real Person's very will to live and/or function in the sensory condition of the body, is abrogated on the Path of Death where the temporary nature of the sensory illusion that the personality thinks it is, is correctly self-perceived.

On the upward trek on the Path of Nun, the personality undergoes a "willful" death, surrendering everything that it perceives itself to be to the "Great Unknown" of the Psyche/Soul who then shares this data with the Universal Collective Unconscious. This is the Most difficult surrender --the total surrender of life to the unseen Creator of Life, and then to "The Great Dark Ocean Womb of Binah" but it must be done to achieve cosmic awareness and/or to receive Your Divine inheritance.

Body death begins the process that is often called "Born again" and is a rebirth of the Personality in an expanded and liberated state that some would call "Saved" but really is just a "rebooting". For in truth, when one lets go of the possessive sensual self....they step out of the Karmic wheel of Personality death, into the Real Persona- one of incarnations remembered, and Cosmic Inheritance accepted as an Expanded Self-expression; A Real Person, who was meant to operate the body, before it was told not to be itself by the society egregore, parents, the false authority of rulers or academia and indoctrinated through the media hypnosis of the senses as" pleasure/pain training (Brain washing)."

However, do not make the error of thinking sensation is a bad or lesser thing, for to know its purpose in the Great Work, is to "Know Thyself" and sensuality is "magick" to the Soul, who has no such combination of senses, as does the human body (33 senses according to the Tantric Yogis and now "discovered" by medical science). Yes, we have inherited many more senses than the 5 senses of taste, touch, hear and see.

In medical science, the concept of human senses goes well beyond the traditional five (sight, hearing, taste, touch, and smell). Research has identified up to 33 distinct senses, which are specific systems or types of sensory perception, allowing humans to experience and interpret the world in complex ways. These senses include various specialized receptors and processes that help us maintain balance, perceive temperature, sense pain, and more. Here’s a breakdown of these categories:

1. The Traditional Five Senses

• Sight (Vision): Detection of light and color through the eyes.
• Hearing (Audition): Perception of sound through vibrations in the inner ear.
• Taste (Gustation): Detection of chemicals through taste buds on the tongue (sweet, salty, sour, bitter, umami).
• Smell (Olfaction): Detection of airborne chemicals through olfactory receptors.
• Touch (Tactile): Sensing pressure, vibration, and texture through receptors in the skin.

2. Additional Specialized Senses

Beyond the classic five, there are additional senses focused on different types of perception:

• Temperature Sensing (Thermoception): Specialized receptors that detect temperature changes on the skin.
• Pain Sensing (Nociception): Detection of potential harm or damage to tissues, with receptors for physical, thermal, and chemical pain.
• Balance (Equilibrioception): Managed by the vestibular system in the inner ear, allowing us to detect body position and maintain balance.
• Proprioception (Body Position Awareness): Awareness of where body parts are in relation to each other, enabling movement coordination.
• Chronoception (Time Perception): Our sense of the passage of time, regulated by complex neural processes.
• Interoception: Sensing internal states, including hunger, thirst, and the need to breathe.

3. Internal Sensations (Interoceptive Senses)

These senses keep us aware of various physiological states, often functioning below conscious awareness but critical for homeostasis:

• Hunger and Thirst: Internal cues from hormones and cellular signals.
• Breathing Regulation (Chemoreception): Sensing levels of carbon dioxide and oxygen in the blood.
• Bladder Fullness: Detection of bladder distension signaling the need to urinate.
• Stretch Receptors: Detecting stretching in muscles, tendons, and joints.
• Heart Rate Awareness (Cardioception): Subconscious awareness of heartbeat, which can come to conscious attention.

4. Skin and Surface Senses

The skin contains a variety of receptors that detect specific stimuli:

• Vibration Sense: Specialized receptors in the skin for detecting vibrations.
• Itch: Receptors specifically activated by histamines and other itch-inducing chemicals.
• Light Touch (Mechanoreception): Sensitivity to light pressure, often associated with tickling sensations.
• Pressure: Deeper skin receptors sense sustained pressure on the skin.
• Pain (Nociception): Different from touch, this involves specific pain receptors.

5. Chemical Senses

• Taste Beyond the Basic Five: Researchers have found receptors for fat and potentially for carbonation, beyond the traditional taste categories.
• Internal Chemoreception: Detects levels of chemicals in the blood, such as glucose, influencing feelings of energy or lethargy.

6. Other Less-Known Senses

These senses are specialized and may overlap or work in conjunction with the more prominent senses:

• Electroreception: While not fully developed in humans, our nervous system has a minimal response to electrical fields.
• Magnetoreception: Some research suggests humans might have a residual ability to sense magnetic fields, although this is still a topic of study.

Each of these senses allows us to gather unique information about our internal and external environments, contributing to a comprehensive understanding of reality and supporting a vast array of biological processes crucial for survival. This extended view of human senses highlights the incredible complexity of sensory systems and helps explain how we can interpret a world that’s rich in varied stimuli.

When we Know that Imagination is our "Mother of Conscious", and that we Imagine our frequency of energy into Self (Psyche into Soma), we know longer seek blame for our inner pain, emotional dysfunctions, i.e., our "Feelings". Instead, we know that we think of a "feeling" and then the body enacts it. If we think ill thoughts, we get ill feelings, and the body becomes the manifestation of that illness!

How we feel is no one's fault but the Personality Program within the body. Our reaction to another's actions is our own feeling and is not a creation of another. We also learn that Malkuth, is the Kingdom of the I-Magi-Nation, where we are the Master of our Masterpiece; A masterpiece made of both the Quantum Universe of the Psyche, and the Atomic Universe of the World, but never limited to the rules of Organic Nature. Hence, a magic (k) palace of intimacy.

This part of enjoying the senses fully, rather than dividing them into "good and bad" categories, is a form of "enlightenment" that is most difficult to realize. Not because we are stupid, but because of our survival mind fulcrum built out of "fear of rejection" that rules our sensual personality and believes in victory over enemies (those who reject us), as a character positive and wishes to be permanent master of our brains.

Lucky for us, "Old Sam" (Samhiel) or the female version, Samothea, Death, intervenes, and frees us from the self- inflicted tyranny of survival thinking and we realize that the enemy we seek to conquer has always been our indoctrinated false selves! Our personalities (some errantly call ego) are not permanent, they are recyclable masks, and we can recycle them best by giving them directly to the Higher Self who created the "Beautiful Person" before they became "ugly in their own feelings". This is the Willful death of the ego, and the way to go about achieving it is "enlightenment" ...The Gnostic way of traveling.

The terms ego and personality are often used interchangeably, but they represent distinct aspects of human psychology and identity. Here’s a breakdown of their differences:

1. Ego: The Sense of Self

• Core Function: In psychology, particularly in Freudian theory, the ego is the part of the psyche that mediates between our basic desires (id), moral values (superego), and the external world. It acts as the “self” that navigates our thoughts, emotions, and behaviors in a way that makes sense in our social context.
• Role: The ego helps maintain our sense of identity, continuity, and self-preservation. It is focused on reality and uses logic to mediate between our inner needs and external demands.
• Key Characteristics:
  • It’s more internal and based on self-perception, rather than external attributes.
  • It influences self-esteem, confidence, and personal boundaries.
  • It’s the “I” or “self” that forms our subjective sense of identity.

In essence, the ego can be thought of as the internal self-concept that helps us identify "who we are" in a subjective, often protective, sense.

2. Personality: The External Expression of Self

• Core Function: Personality is the sum of behavioral traits, habits, attitudes, and patterns that we exhibit. It's the “outer layer” through which others perceive us and is shaped by both innate tendencies and external influences.
• Role: Personality expresses the way our ego, beliefs, values, and experiences come across in our interactions with others. It’s more about “how we are” than “who we are.”
• Key Characteristics:
  • It includes traits such as extraversion, introversion, agreeableness, openness, and conscientiousness.
  • Personality is often described in terms of patterns that are relatively stable but can evolve over time.
  • It’s observable, measurable, and affects how we relate to the world.

Therefore, personality is how we externally present ourselves and interact with others, shaped by internal factors (like the ego) but also by social, environmental, and cultural influences.

3. Interplay Between Ego and Personality

• Ego Influencing Personality: Our ego shapes certain aspects of our personality by defining our sense of self-worth, defense mechanisms, and how we respond to validation or criticism.
• Personality Reflecting Ego: Our personality can reflect the state of our ego—for example, a secure ego might exhibit confident and open personality traits, whereas an insecure ego may result in defensive or introverted behavior.
• Adaptability: Personality can adapt or change based on experiences, while the ego is more fixed, rooted in maintaining identity and self-consistency. The ego thus acts as a stabilizing force for our personality, which might adapt to new social contexts.

Summary

• Ego: Internal, focused on “who I am,” balancing inner drives and reality, self-preserving.
• Personality: External, observable, a combination of traits and behaviors, expressing “how I am” in the world.

Together, the ego and personality form a complex interplay, with the ego providing a stable core of self-identity while personality offers the adaptable “outer shell” through which we engage with others and the world.

Johann Jakob Bachofen said," Maternal life moves between two poles. Its realm is not that of being but that of becoming and passing away, the eternal alternation of two colors, the white of life and the black of death. Only through equal mixture of the two is the survival of the material world assured. Without death no rejuvenation is possible... the positive power cannot for one moment exist without the negative power. Death, then, is not the opposite but the helper of Life". 

Like I said, death pushes Life along, as does Dark Energy push the seen Universe.

For those who don't know who Johann Jakob Bachofen was or is (22 December 1815 – 25 November 1887) he was a Swissantiquarian, jurist, philologist, and anthropologist, professor for Roman law at the University of Basel from 1841 to 1845.

Bachofen is most often connected with his theories surrounding prehistoric matriarchy, or Das Mutterrecht, the title of his seminal 1861 book Mother Right: an investigation of the religious and juridical character of matriarchy in the Ancient World. Bachofen assembled documentation demonstrating that motherhood is the source of human society, religion, morality, and decorum. He postulated an archaic "mother-right" within the context of a primeval Matriarchal religion or Urreligion.

Bachofen became an important precursor of 20th century theories of matriarchy, such as the Old European culture postulated by Marija Gimbutas from the 1950s, and the field of feminist theology and "Matriarchal Studies" in 1970s feminism.

[From Wikipedia the free encyclopedia]

The Hermetic Qabalah is one of those journeys up the paths of Enlightenment, back to our Divine Family Inheritance of "I AM". If you examine the Thoth Death card, you will notice that at the end of the Scythe swing, bubbles of new life are forming showing us that The Transformation is not an end, it is a beginning into a new and greater adventure!

The Thoth Death Tarot card has many Alchemical, Spiritual, and psychological meanings, and requires a great deal of study before you can willingly die as an ego/ personality falsehood and be reconstructed by the "Sun of God" as It's Persona. We must know that as a personality, we cannot know the full extent of the "Soul within"----but the Solar Self knows us!

To "Throw thyself into the Abyss" (often called the "Dark Night of the Soul") is to trust your creator absolutely. After all, I Am made Me manifest, which could only mean that Originally I was a Loving Expression of the Greater Self Awareness...but the constant manipulation of my definition by culture, religion, propaganda-media, social egregore and fear-based misinterpretation of sensations, has made the personality lose sight of itself, becoming lost in the Forest of babble were it blames the trees for its fear of being rejected. The Trees in the Hermetic Qabalah's Forest are the many reflections of the Tree of Life, whose leaves are the Tarot Cards and upon understanding both, we Know ourselves and never again shall we experience bafflement.

The term "Dark night of the Soul" refers to the darkness of the passage from known to the unknown, where the psyche is striped of the desire nature and of the personal identity. This leaves a dreadful emptiness in the consciousness, a complete disinterest in everything. Personally, upon experiencing these 3 Paths of the Dark Night, The Devil, Art and Death, there was left only a thought of despair repeating repeatedly, an abject surrender of self, abolishing any other desire or thought. For me, it was, " I can't be YOU, you must be me." The Higher Self responded to that by sending my " skeletal awareness" directly to the Great Mother Binah, who then broke down and reassembled the Personality into that of the Divine Child, and I awoke as the "Will to Be" and/or the Desire of the Great Mother of Form to "become".

This inner falling into the abyss is an extremely hard journey to explain but is well known to aspirants of this initiation. It requires one not to be concerned with living or dying. One becomes a mechanical motion, pushing ahead with great faith, as Life's processes have no value, one still mechanically crawls towards the hope of Self. Moving forward in a total darkness, where reason and nightmare dance together, my psyche moving inch by inch, the Soul (Psyche) begins the process of "putrefaction", believing, but not always so sure, that there will be light that will eventually appear and lead the way.

It was a red dot of light that appeared to me out of indescribable darkness.... The Great Red Binah, "Mother's blood" the purifying Force of resurrection, as the Red Star bathed me and loved me (indescribable ecstasy) and sent me back down the Tree into Tiphareth and the Fiery Light of the Higher Self. Once a Divine Child always a Divine Child....somehow, we've forgotten that and have thus disinherited ourselves by giving our personality up and becoming a cultural personality, a perversion created out of fear of punishment, i.e., fear of rejection all of which are "off shoots" of Fear of Death.

This journey into self-deconstruction and reconstruction is easily seen in the Sumerian myth of Inanna and her journey into the underworld ruled by her dark sister Ereshkigal.

The Sumerian myth of Inanna’s Descent into the Underworld is one of the oldest known myths and tells the powerful story of the goddess Inanna, Queen of Heaven and Earth, and her journey to the Underworld, ruled by her sister Ereshkigal. This myth explores themes of death, rebirth, and the balance of power between life and death.

Key Points of the Myth

1. Inanna’s Decision to Descend

   • Inanna, the goddess of love, beauty, fertility, and war, decides to descend into the Underworld, the realm of her sister Ereshkigal, who represents death and the shadow aspects of existence. The reason for Inanna’s descent is ambiguous in the myth, though some interpretations suggest she may have wanted to expand her powers by claiming the Underworld or was motivated by curiosity, ambition, or a desire to mourn the death of Ereshkigal's husband.

2. Preparation for the Descent

   • Before entering, Inanna takes precautions. She tells her handmaiden Ninshubur that if she does not return within three days, Ninshubur should seek help from the gods to rescue her. Inanna adorns herself in seven divine garments and items of power, including her crown, jewelry, and robes, symbolizing her status and authority.

3. The Seven Gates of the Underworld

   • Upon entering the Underworld, Inanna is stopped by the gatekeeper, Neti, who informs Ereshkigal of her arrival. Ereshkigal orders that Inanna must pass through seven gates, and at each gate, Inanna is required to remove one item of her clothing or adornments. By the time she reaches Ereshkigal’s throne room, she is stripped of all her symbols of power, left vulnerable and bare.

4. Confrontation and Death in the Underworld

   • When she arrives in the presence of Ereshkigal, Inanna is met with anger. Ereshkigal, feeling threatened by Inanna’s presence, has her struck down and killed by the "eye of death." Inanna’s lifeless body is hung on a hook, symbolizing her death and complete submission to the powers of the Underworld.

5. Rescue and Revival

   • After three days, when Inanna does not return, Ninshubur follows her instructions and appeals to several gods for help. Eventually, Enki, the god of wisdom and water, creates two creatures, galla (sexless beings), to descend into the Underworld. They find Ereshkigal in intense suffering and mourning, and by empathizing with her pain, they soften her enough to negotiate Inanna’s release. Ereshkigal allows Inanna to be revived and brought back to life.

6. The Law of Substitution

   • Inanna’s release comes with a condition: someone must take her place in the Underworld. Upon her return to the world above, she discovers that her husband, Dumuzi, has not mourned her absence and has assumed her throne in her absence. Angered by his disregard, Inanna chooses him as her substitute. Dumuzi is condemned to the Underworld, though later myths tell of his sister Geshtinanna offering to share his fate, so they alternate time in the Underworld, echoing the seasonal cycle of death and rebirth in agriculture.

Themes and Symbolism

1. Death and Rebirth: Inanna’s death and subsequent resurrection symbolize the cyclical nature of life, akin to the seasonal cycles of fertility, growth, and decay. Her descent can be seen as an allegory for the sun's journey through darkness and return.

2. The Balance of Power and Duality: The myth reflects the balance of life and death, power and vulnerability, and light and darkness. Inanna represents the life-giving aspects of existence, while Ereshkigal embodies the inevitable decay and darkness. Together, they complete the cosmic balance.

3. The Role of Compassion and Empathy: The galla who empathize with Ereshkigal’s pain offer a path to reconciliation and understanding, showcasing the importance of compassion and connection, even with what we fear or find difficult to face.

4. Transformation and Initiation: Inanna’s journey serves as a form of spiritual initiation. She must shed her ego and power, face death, and be reborn, emerging transformed. The descent and return mirror the transformative experiences that are often part of mystical and initiatory traditions.

The myth of Inanna’s descent is a profound exploration of human experience, the inevitability of mortality, and the possibility of renewal. It reminds us that life and death are intertwined, and through cycles of loss and transformation, we emerge with deeper wisdom and resilience.

St. John of the Cross first coined the term "Dark Night of the Soul" where he said."...although this happy night brings darkness to the spirit, it does so only to give it light in everything; and that, although it humbles it and makes it miserable, it does so only to exalt it and to raise it up; although it impoverishes it and empties it of all natural affection and attachment, it does so only that it may enable it to stretch forward, divinely, and thus to have fruition and experience all things, both above and below".

Upon conquering the Path of Nun, the Soul built personality is reconstructed as the Person of the Higher Self, and the emptied brain is filled with the Primary Imagination...The will to form and the Understanding of the Great "Womb with a view".

Mars rules Scorpio. Scorpio rules the sex organs. Thus, this Death Card, of the Thoth, represent a Sexual energy, a reproductive energy which is consciously directed in a physical exercise such as that of Tantra, or that of Crowley's Middle Pillar. The initiate is now following, from the below up, the "Path of the Flaming Sword", which is both destructive and constructive and not for the weak of character, or for those who fear life's rejection.

The Death Card, during a reading, suggests Time, Age and transformation. Rarely does it symbolize physical death and only if borne out by the accompanying cards can it warn of one. For the Querent, this is the principle of letting go and moving on. A rebirth out of old conditions. A type of transitional metamorphosis which destroys something old to build something new. The Realization of Life Power as it is released from past confines and revitalized by change and regeneration.

Nun: Fish. Key 13-Death Tarot Card of Thoth and traditional tarot.

The Story of NUN is best shown in the Story of Noah (Noach):

There are generations of Noah---Noah was a righteous man, perfect in his generations. Noah walked with God.

                        Genesis 6:9

One "being righteous in his generation", is a relative statement. After all the ten generations between Adam & Eve and Noah, were a steady stream of immorality, greed, corruption---mankind was a nasty being at the time and imperfect G.M.O., dependent only the survival mind. So, the genetically pure G.M.O.- Noah, who secluded himself from the culture and kept his morality---looked good. Like comparing copper to silver, silver looks better. But when comparing silver to gold, gold is more valuable. Comparing Noah to a modern man of goodness, well...Noah would lose.

For example, years later when God said he would destroy Sodom, Abraham bargained with God --always trying to save at least a few people. Noah didn't even consider it, he just followed orders. His silence showed that he didn't consider others very often, if at all. This story points out that what we call morality, righteousness, and goodness, even what is considered" good or bad" action, is all relative to the times and cultural egregore of the observer. What we think is right and wrong changes with culture and evolution. So being the "Best you" that you can be today, will most often change to an even "better you" in time; just do the best you that you can today.

We were never built "perfect", not because the Divine Creative couldn't build us perfect but because Perfection is a state of stasis; Carbon in its "perfect state", is a diamond and is useless as organic matter. Stasis, meaning "non-motion", which is not how Energy Moves! Our Perfection is a state of motion driven by change. Hence, we are always "creating-seeing error in that creation-and correcting it." And we all know, that unless you do it--you are unable to sense the error in thought and thus never correct an errant creation. And all creation has error---because of the Law of Entropy! (.... everything proceeds from order, into disorder. --Second Law of Thermodynamics). So, by being what we know best today----we'll be able to know more in the future. This is the Story line of Nun. It is about Spiritual Relativity, i.e., Everything is relative.

Everyone has relative perspectives based on their life experiences. Often that is why one believes one thing, and another believes the opposite to be true. I've personally learned not to believe everything-I think. Do it---Know it by the constructing and operating of it---not by just taking my own or everyone's word for it. Lazy minds are from sleeping Souls who let others tell them what is right and what is wrong. These Souls experience a Dreamless sleep that is known as death.

My Soul is the Skeleton with the Scythe, who continually transforms my personality by "trimming off the wasteful thought" and recycling it into greater action (The fish is a symbol of the First Matter). This "Soul psycho-dynamic Surgery" of constantly evolving thought by self-experience, is frightful to a self-conscious personality that sees change as an enemy. In truth, Transformation is change, and it is the only constant in this Universe.

Therefore, I trust the Soul as I know that "me" is not in-charge of this rodeo we call life----My Soul is my ego and constructs a persona to represent it in the "kingdom". Therefore, I respect my "I AM" mentor and do the best I can---at the moment.

I Find that the best surgical device for errant thought is the Qabalistic Tarot, as it is a step by step procedure into our Great Work, where we come to Know Ourselves and the how and the why the Divine Masculine and Divine Feminine (both are States of Energy Conscious-God "Electric State" and Goddess "Magnetic State") spent untold trillions of years coming to a "conclusion of probabilities" but not of "possibilities", that is the fractal of identities created by I AM that is our "me". Being a dancer, whose rhythm is "Alpha and Omega" which intercourses into Form, I now know that Paradox has a personality, and it is Human!

This is the Twenty-Fourth Path of the Tree of Life and is called the Imaginative Intelligence because it gives likeness to all similarities which are created in like manner---from thought into form. Our Psyche is an exact copy of this principle called Imaginative Intelligence, therefore behooving us to "do unto another as we would have done to ourselves." But this is an idea generated from knowledge that everyone you see is another way of being you; Generated from Knowledge, not belief. For belief, is subject to exceptions caused by peer pressure/i.e., fear of rejection and is a passive mind rather than an active one, as it isn't "doing" in fact it is a "non-doing" who fears change. We must act on knowledge that we have, it may not be the best, but the best you know and that promises to get better by learning from doing, i.e. experience.

Once again Trust Your Inner Self-(Soul) it built you for Life's purpose. As I like to say, " You were loved into being, praised into Manifestation and Adored as a Self-Presence".... from True Parents--the Divine Feminine and the Divine Masculine! So, it's okay to be you, and remember that "you" is a continual progressive cycle of renewal. To change is exactly why you were built! It helps to see yourself as a Fish in an Ocean of Energy Conscious; this Ocean built a fish of Itself, so that it could flow through that "person" and Be Itself. Oceans can't see, taste, touch, smell or hear themselves, unless they are "within" themselves as a fish. Self-Awareness requires Energy Conscious to become conscious (Personal Conscious) to be intimately aware of its actions. The Divine Creative built itself (us) so it could "Above All Things Know Thy Self".

Again, it is to be noted here, that the Sweeping Scythe, is producing bubbles that represent the dancing new life forms produced by the putrefaction of the old forms. Their dance is the new motion of life that arises, as if gas bubbles freeing themselves from the putrefaction of the old forms, who reside in stasis at the bottom of the Amniotic fluid of the Sea. This conceptualization is continued in the Fish symbol, which is a paramount illustration on this card.

The attentive student will note that the serpent and the fish are the two principal objects of worship in cults that taught the doctrines of resurrection or reincarnation (Oannaes and Dagon, fish gods of Western Asia). Even in Christianity, the Fish represents the Christ. Even such esteemed scholars as Browning, reminded us that the Greek word, IXThUS,"...means fish and very aptly symbolizes Christ." IXThUS, was supposed to be a notariqon; the initials of a sentence meaning, "Jesus Christ Son of God, Savior". Also, The Gospels are full of miracles involving fish, and the fish is sacred to Mercury, because of their swiftness, silvered brilliance and cold bloodiness. This again recalls the function of Mercury, the god, who is the guide of the dead, a messenger of divine will and as the continuing lasting elastic element of Nature, which is what the Soul wishes to create as a personality. This is a card of significant importance, which must be understood if we wish to translate the compendium of Universal Self.

When the Death-Key 13, Major Arcana Tarot card is thrown during a reading:

• It is about a trans-formative moment in one's own Personality. Not a death in the family or their own. That is the paradigm of the 10 of Swords, Ruin.
• Giving up your sense of self to a feeling of merging with another or The Greater Self who is both life-death.
• We are pruning and composing.

The Death Card represents, time, age, and transformation.

• Rarely does it represent physical death, it is the death of the old personality by the enlightened process of Spiritual growth.
• Physical death is only shown by this card if the accompanying cards support the concept. (Such as the 10 of Swords-Ruin,)
• Mostly, it is the principle of letting go and moving on, re-birthing out of old stasis conditions.
• Realization of Life power, which comes from change. 

Thank you for your interest, comments, and supportive donations. May you live long and prosper!