You’ve heard of Poker Without Cards, now try it using the Tarot deck. This website raises the interesting possibility that the tarot deck actually originated from an older system of divination using dice. From the website:
there is circumstantial evidence that the Tarot derives from an earlier system of divination using dice or astragali (knucklebones), both of which were used for divination in ancient times. Although there is no surviving set of correspondences between Tarot cards and dice or astragali, I have reconstructed a system that works quite well. The dice and astragali correspondences for the Major Arcana were given in the Introduction and in the commentaries on the trumps. The correspondences to the Minor Arcana are given in the following charts. In the remainder of the chapter I present a number of techniques for doing Tarot divination without Tarot cards by using dice, astragali, tokens and similar objects.
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June 1st, 2006 at 12:25 pm
kylark
What about internalizing the meanings of the cards and forgoing dice or whatnot altogether? Divination is often used for bringing forth what is already in one’s own mind, for bringing clarity out of murkiness. I’ve been reading as much as I can on Tarot. I also intend to start a journal or blog for writing about each card. Internalizing the tarot archetypes might help with clarifying different life situations, even if you don’t have a deck handy.
This could be done with other systems as well, such as the I Ching. As soon as I get a good translation I intend to just start reading the I Ching straight through, as it appears to be an elegant system of correspondences.