The Emperor
The Emperor in the Tarot could be used as a meditation on male power. For obvious reasons, male power—or the patriarchy—has gotten a bad rap in the last half Century—we have seen an endless series of tyrannical, machiavellian, or just plain psychopathic would-be Emperors—some of whom have nearly drowned the world in blood.
However, archetypically speaking, a great Emperor or Patriarch rules not through domination and arbitrary cruelty but through wisdom and mercy. And a good Emperor brings peace to principalities and allows them to thrive. His power is unification.
Perhaps today, rather than ‘destroy the patriarchy’, the current mantra, we can think of a more constructive meditation on male power. What constitutes a positive male leader worthy of occupying the throne next to the Empress? Are the new tech giants the new emperors? On a material and literal level, yes. On an intrinsic level, it depends. The question is: what distinguishes a true emperor from an emperor of dirt, to quote the Johny Cash song?
The Napoleon-type Emperors of the world were restless for war and saw war as the only way to unify warring factions. But Tyrants like Napoleon have short and violent reigns—Alexander the Great also died young and disappointed. However, we can also find great spiritual Emperors. The key here is the vastness of the emperor's vision and the depth of the Emperor’s sacrifice.
What does the Emperor sacrifice? His whimsical desires and his dominating personality. The Chinese Taoist Emperor ruled by the ‘doing of non-doing’ or wu-wei-we and did nothing much but sit facing the south. He was defined as great through his presence and lack of ego.
The Emperor does not serve his whims and machinations—he serves heaven and earth. In other words, he serves the divine principles and the human community. Therefore a good Emperor is the opposite of a tyrannical patriarch caught in mirages of power and acquisition.
In general, we have lost the notion of a great empire or Emperor in our democratic world. That is because we view things quantitatively instead of qualitatively. Our leaders are elected because of a certain number of votes, and each vote is considered equal: the vote of the serial killer and the saint are the same. The shadow of democracy is this ultimate levelling of humanity, where—more often than not—the leader is the lowest common denominator of a human being. On the other hand, the virtue of democracy is the ability to depose a tyrant through popular will without cutting off his head
The birth of the Emperor—in other words, the birth of the great human being and leader—always has to do with the death of the personal ego. That is why it is tough to be an Emperor—most of us are in service of our egos most of the time. Martin Luther King was a real Emperor in a spiritual sense. That is not to say Martin Luther King was a perfect human being—he cheated on his wife regularly. However, it would be ridiculous to cancel MLK because his personal life is irrelevant to his achievements: King transformed—not just his local world but the entire Western world—the Western empire, in other words. The personal was subsumed by the archetypal, in other words.
On an inner level, the price for being an Emperor is sacrificing idiosyncratic space—everything has to be submitted to a higher principle. The Emperor’s robe, crown, and staff are transcendental symbols—not personal symbols expressing idiosyncrasies or tribal identification marks like tattoos. Furthermore, as Chogyam Trungpa said, the Emperor is equal to a grain of sand. And as Tomberg says, the Emperor's symbol is the rose/cross. It is the ultimate crucifixion and the ultimate blossoming of humanity simultaneously. The four wounds Tomberg describes: emptiness, renunciation, poverty, and death—are the Emperor's lot, the dessert that he rules over. At the same, his sacrifice allows The Empress to plant a seed in the wasteland.
The inner or arcane meaning of the Emperor is what is essential here. We need to be Emperors of our psychological and spiritual states, which are interdependent with the family, tribe or nation. Because we are so contradictory and “man is legion”, as says Gurdjieff says—we need a central principle. And the central leader shouldn’t be tyrannical or disrespectful to the different principalities and sub-personalities.
The Pope
As a male archetype, The Pope differs substantially from the Emperor. Of course, he represents the spiritual path, the path to transcendence, rather than the developmental path or the path of self-improvement. He is, therefore, the ultimate priest rather than the ultimate warrior—the head scholar rather than an uber-engineer—he is a man of contemplation and spiritual presence rather than a man of action. Making a stark decision and drawing boundaries is the emperor's power, while Empress allows for multiplicity.
The Pope represents obedience, according to Valentine Tomberg. Of course, we think of a Pope as someone of ultimate power—the first lieutenant of God on earth. The paradox here is that the supreme authority is also the ultimate servant. Perhaps nothing irks the modern mind more than this notion: obedience means blind faith and arbitrary submission to a tyrannical authority. Today we value wealth, sex, freedom of choice, and rights rather than responsibilities—anything but obedience. And wouldn’t you choose freedom over submission and poverty, not to mention chastity? So what is the point of Tomberg’s reversals here—why does he say that Emperor represents poverty and the Pope's obedience (not to mention the Lover, who he equates with chastity, like a good Catholic!)?
Early Twentieth Century occultists used the word Hierophant instead of Pope to liberate us from the Christian Pope. (Of course, Tomberg was dedicated to Catholicism, but the virtue of his book is the weaving of many different traditions. The Hierophant in the Greek world was the priest who initiated one into the mystery School.)
The Pope differs from the Emperor in that his job is not to rule the secular world so much as to provide a bridge between the material and the divine—he is also a Pontiff, which means a bridge builder. While the Emperor represents the political, economic, and social world, the Pope represents the divine or spiritual world. However, the shadow of the Pope can be easily seen in Papal hypocrisy over the last two thousand years: the shadow of the Pope is what we could call ‘two worlds’ mythology or gnostic dualism—or the separation of heaven and earth, this life and ‘the afterlife’.
The Tarot Pope is powerful through gestures—he may not even need to speak—like various Indian saints who enlightened through their mere presence. The Pope unifies opposites through the mudra or raised hand gesture where two fingers point to heaven, and two fingers point to the earth. Importantly, this is not a sterile unification of opposites a dynamic process. The card has several dynamic triads, such as three crosses, three gowns, and three figures. In spiritual symbolism, three is a dynamic number and triads are everywhere: think of father, son, and holy ghost; body, speech, and mind; inner, outer and secret—Et Cetera. While two symbolise division, three symbolise a dynamic interaction and transformation.
The two keys at The Pope's feet represent the keys to both heaven and earth; the two pillars, justice and mercy. His red gown symbolises mastery over the passions; his white gown mastery over the mind—blue represents mastery over the heart and emotions. I find many symbolic similarities to the Tantric Guru Padmasambhava, who is often depicted with three gowns, a staff, and a crown.
The Pope raises his hand as a symbol of power, which again Tomberg associates with renunciation of self-power and political association. He has fully transcended the political ego and operates as a bridge to the divine; he has given up his power to liberate sentient beings lost in the dark waters of samsara—to use Buddhist language. Furthermore, The Tarot Pope is a vivifying force of transmission and meaning, not a chaste, sexless priest. If one looks closely at the Camion card above, the Pope is sensual, with his long braids and disciples who seem almost to fondle him—a dangerous suggestion in provocatively pointing out the danger of the Pope’s position as well.
This article is part of a consideration of our study group on symbolism and Psychomagic. If you want to become a member and join one of our study groups, please write to me at andrewpgsweeny@gmail.com or check out the events calendar below for more details.
Good stuff Andrew! Yes, the Emperor has to become nothing, and only then does he become something. It's the death of the self with a little 's' and the birth of the Self with a big 'S'.
I'll be writing on Tomberg and the Emperor myself in my concluding Substack essay later this month - secret fire.substack.com.
All the best, John