Excerpt from Foreword to Meditations on the Tarot

Cardinal Hans Urs von Balthasar

(The following is the first part of the Foreword in the German Edition, Herder, Freiburg, 1983; trsl. R.A. Powell. The complete text by Cardinal Balthasar is included as an Afterword in the current, 2002, edition of Meditations on the Tarot).

Firstly, it may be recalled that such an attempt is to be found nowhere in the history of philosophical, theological and Catholic thought. The Church Fathers understood the myths born from pagan thought and imagination in a quite general way as veiled presentiments of the Logos, Who became fully revealed in Jesus Christ (which once again Schelling undertook to show at length in his later philosophical work). Origen in particular, completing this line of thought, undertook as a Christian to elucidate not only the pagan philosophical wisdom in the light of Biblical revelation, but also the "wisdom of the rulers of this world" (I Cor.ii,6), by which he meant the so-called "secret wisdom of the Egyptians" (especially the Hermetic writings supposedly written by "Hermes Trismegistus". the Egyptian god Thoth). He also had in mind the "astrology of the Chaldeans and Indians...which purports to impart knowledge concerning supersensible matters" and nothing less than the "manifold teachings of the Greeks concerning the Divine". He believed it possible that the cosmic powers ("rulers of this world") do not bring their wisdom to human beings "in order to harm them, but because they themselves hold these things to be true". [1]. Similar ideas are to be found in the work of Eusebius (cf. Praeparation evangelica).

It is known how Christian philosophy was widely influenced during the Middle Ages, from Arabic sources and elsewhere, by the beliefs concerning cosmic powers or "intelligences" (conceived of partly as thoughts of God, partly as Angels). Above all during the Renaissance, through the continuing influence of these conceptions, the best minds were occupied with accomIIK)dating the Jewish magical-mystical Cabbala into the Christian faith. As has now been observed [2], many of the Church Fathers had already attributed a place of honour among the heathen prophets and wise men to the mysterious Hermes Trismegistus. Hermetic books had already circulated in the early and high Middle Ages [3]. Later, during the Renaissance, Hermes Trismegistus was celebrated as the great contemporary of Moses, and as the father of the wisdom of the Greeks (one may call to mind the portrayal honouring him at Siena Cathedral, inset in the cathedral floor). Poets, painters and theologians drew enthusiastically and reverently from the teachings of Hermes, and from other sources of pagan wisdom, the scattered rays of divine illumination, bringing it to a focus in the Christian faith. Yet the other source from which enlightenment was gathered, the Cabbala, was, if anything, still more important (the secret, oral tradition of the Cabbala is likewise dated back to the time of Moses).

The first discussions for or against the secret teachings of the Cabbala go back to the converted or non-converted Spanish Jews of the twelfth century. Among those who later endeavored to understand these teachings were Reuchlin in Germany, Ficino and especially Pico della Mirandola in Italy,[4] whilst the extraordinary Cardinal Giles of Viterbo (1469-1552) wanted to explain the Holy Scripture with the help of the Cabbala "with a method that is not foreign, but which is intrinsic (to it)" (non peregrina sed domestica methodo).[5]. Enjoined by Pope Clement VII, this zealous, reform-hungry Cardinal wrote his ebullient dissertation on the "Shekinah", dedicated to Emperor Charles V.[6]. Alongside these few names resounding from the past, a multitude of lesser predecessors and imitators could be mentioned.

Here the important point is that although this penetration into the secret teachings of pagan and Jewish origin was pursued in the spirit of humanism, in the hope of bringing new life into rigidified Christian theology through collecting such scattered revelation and illumination, no one for a moment doubted that despite the disparities everything could be accommodated into the true Christian faith. That Pico, in particular, did not aim at syncretism, he himself made quite clear: "I bear on my brow the name Jesus Christ and would die gladly for the faith in him. I am neither a magician nor a Jew, nor an Ishmaelite nor a heretic. It is Jesus whom I worship and his cross I bear upon my body."[7]. The author of these Meditations' could also have affirmed this oath of allegiance.

There are other historical examples analogous to that of the gathering and accommodation of Hermetic and Cabbalistic wisdom into Biblical and Christian thought: above all, the transposition of Chassidism to a modern horizon of thclught by Martin Buber (Chassidism is deeply influenced by the Cabbala). However, just as strong in its creative power of transformation is the incorporation of Jacob Boehme's Christosophy into the Catholic world-conception by the philosopher Franz von Baader. A third, less clear-cut transposition will be referred to briefly: that of the ancient magic/alchemy into the realm of depth psychology by C.G. Jung. The author's "Meditations on the Major Arcana of the Tarot" are in the tradition of the great accomplishments of Pico della Mirandola and Franz von Baader, but are independent of them. The mystical, magical, occult tributaries which flow into the stream of his meditations are much more encompassing; yet the confluence of their waters within him, full of movement, becomes inwardly a unity of Christian contemplation.

Note 1. Origen, Peri Archon III, 3, 1-3. So-called "magi and magicians" are also spoken of in this text, as well as "daimons", from whom human beings "purified through much abstinence" are able to receive inspired communications.

Note 2. S. Gasparra, "L'ermetismo nelle testimonianze dei Padri", Studia Patristica, vol II (Berlin, 1972), pp.58-64.

Note 3. L. Thorndike, "A History of Magic and Experimental Science", vol.2 (New York,1947), pp.214-218.

Note 4. F. Secret, "Les Kabballstes chretiens de la Renaissance" (Paris, 1964).

Note 5. J.W. O'Malley , "Giles of Viterbo on Church and Reform", Studies in Medieval and Reformation Thought, vol.5 (Leiden, 1968); G. Signorelli, "Il Cardinale Egidio da Viterbo, Agostiniano, umanista e riformatore", (Florence,1929); J. Blau, "The Christian Interpretation of the Cabala in the Renaissance" (New York, 1944).

Note 6. Published in 1559; critical edition by F. Secret, "Edizione nazionale dei Classici del Pensiero Italiano", Series II (Rome, 1959), pp. lOff.

Note 7. H. de Lubac, "Pic de la Mirandole" (Paris, 1974), pp.90-1l3. Quote (p.100) from "Apologia" (Opp. 1572, p.116). There is of course another stream, deriving strongly from Joachim of Fiore, active from the Middle Ages through the Renaissance into modern times, which aspires to elevate the dogmatic faith of the Church in the direction of a "third kingdom of the Spirit". Henri de Lubac follows this step by step in his work "La posterite spirituelle de Joachim de Flore" (Paris,1979), but as this is irrelevant to the work of our author, we do not need to discuss it further.

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