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Rating: 
Summary: Wonderful Vision of Spiritual life
Review: As a student of everything mystical, magical, religious, and mysterious, I am completely floored by the contents of this book, not only for the author's incredible scope of knowledge, but for the quantity and quality of Heart embedded in the transmission. Admittedly, at times I found his handling of Buddhism and other Eastern traditions a little biased, but for the light he shines onto the Western esoteric traditions, it is entirely forgivable!The author exposes magic that is will-driven and merely ceremonial for what it is, and points out that only sacred magic in alignment with the "Will of the Father" is ultimately of value. Purification, illumination, and union are the goals of a true mystic. Warning: this book is not easily digested! But beautiful, enlightening, complicated, and filled with divine light. At the risk of redundancy, reading this book is truly like sitting down with an enlightened master of the west. The book has perhaps more "presence" than any I have read. I have poured through a recently borrowed copy of this book and will not rest until I own my own. This isn't one to read and forget. Impossible!
Rating: 
Summary: Not enough about tarot
Review: Boring, wordy and not really about tarot. As a pagan, I bought this to see a different viewpoint on tarot. The book is really about Christian Hermeticism with a coating of tarot. If your primary interest is tarot, thi is not the book for you.
Rating:
Summary: Not enough about tarot
Review: Boring, wordy and not really about tarot. As a pagan, I bought this to see a different viewpoint on tarot. The book is really about Christian Hermeticism with a coating of tarot. If your primary interest is tarot, thi is not the book for you.
Rating:
Summary: 22 letters addressed "to the Unknown Friend"
Review: Boring, wordy and not really about tarot? Well, yeah, in the sense that it's a long, complex book about so much more that the Tarot that it's like a bomb going off inside you when you start to follow where it's going. It took me several abortive attempts over half a decade to get past the first couple of chapters. But eventually I took the time to sit down and read one a night for three weeks. I'm really glad I did. It's heady stuff, strong wine, but not deliberately intoxicating as so many "spiritual" books are. A date rape drug it's not. The anonymous author was once involved with Steiner but became a Catholic, and this is a deeply, devoutly Catholic book. It'll draw you, if you care to go, more deeply into the Christian-Hermetic tradition than anything else will, I think -- even Rene Guenon or Fulcanelli, who are not to be sniffed at themselves. "The purpose of these letters," according to the author, "will be to incarnate into this tradition, i.e. to become an organic part of it, and in this way to contribute support to it... Their aim is not only to revive the tradition in the twentieth century but also, and above all, to immerse the reader (or rather the Unknown Friend) in this current -- be it temporarily or for ever." It couldn't be less about divination or self-affirmation or transpersonal psychology. In fact, it sits far more comfortably alongside the work of such fine, authentic 20th century theologians as Henri de Lubac and von Balthasar (who wrote the preface to the German edition) or, say, Pavel Florensky than it does on the occult shelf where it's usually found. I love this book. It was worth writing and worth reading in a way that sets it apart from all but the tiniest few.
Rating:
Summary: Chew, Chew, Chew
Review: every word in this book. I've only just begun my path through this profound volume. This is NOT a fluffy book on using the tarot for divination / fortune telling, but rather a masterful exposition on the symbolism of Tarot from a Christian Hermetic perspective. It is good to have a sound understanding of Kabbalism before reading this book. I am simply amazed by the erudition of this man, who was so humble as to insist that it be published anonymously.
Rating:
Summary: A Revelation
Review: I am so grateful I found this book! I love the Tarot and Hermeticism. It is like having found a Master at last. I am not Catholic or French, and this book is both--but it gives me an appreciation for both cultures. Don't be put off by the fact that it is "Catholic". It is a distillation of wisdom that is rare and precious!
Rating:
Summary: Tarot Meditations
Review: I found this book in a public library six years ago, and have been studying it almost every day since.To say that it has changed my life is an understatement.In the final chapter the Dear Unknown Friend invites the reader to complete the book that he has started and continue with the minor cards - I have dedicated my life to doing this. The cards of the tarot are a little like an encrypted message from God. The message is to be found in the images on the cards, but we have to decode them to understand their meaning.In other words, we see the message but do not register its meaning in our brain. This is the wonderful mystery of the cards which this author suceeds in revealing. Any one who thinks that all Tarot books are the same, should read this one. They will be amazed to see how much depth can be found in seemingly simple picture cards.This work goes very deep, but not quite deep enough. I thoroughly recommend this book, despite some differences of opinion of the meanings of certain cards.This work is more than half way there I believe.I hope to bring the "other half" to light, with the Lord's help. 23/01/2001 H
Rating: 
Summary: Where was the Editor?
Review: I really want to write a positive review of this book. The author is a genius. His insights are profound and deep. His knowledge is wide ranging. His intentions are very genuine. But his thoughts ramble like a sand mandala maker on LSD. He takes a particular topic and goes off in 10 different directions. I've read this book, put it down, picked it up and read it again, tried different chapters to see if it was better in certain areas, etc. However, the same question pops up for me. Did the author have an editor? Did the editor ever say: your thoughts need taming, they need structure? Did the editor ever let the author know that he needs to start with a particular point, develop it and then come to some conclusion before starting with another thought. For those of you who enjoy dense and complicated language, this book will work for you. However, if clarity of language is something you require, think twice before buying this book.
Rating:
Summary: Simply sublime
Review: What a book... As I mention in my review of a couple of years ago on Aeclectic.net, 'this work ranks amongst the classics of mysticism, gnosis and magic - the three pathways into Hermeticism. In my opinion, it is the most masterful book which utilises the Major Arcana of the Tarot as tools to enter spiritual dimensions.' I write this new (and shorter) review having recently acquired the book in its French version - the language in which the Russian-born author decided to write the text. Apart from the different nuances of language, it again reminds me of both the sublimity of his penetrative thought, his engagement in the vivifying life of the Spirit, and how the Tarot - and especially in its Marseille version - is profound in both its applications and its assistance in accompanying the Spiritual seeker on his or her journey. Some anthroposophists have recognised and seen reflected in this work the same spiritual impulse working itself - though in a different form - as it did in the works of Rudolf Steiner. Others, unfortunately, seemed to have developed some antithetical views towards the author - somehow presuming that this author's spiritual authority undermined something of their own formed views. To my mind, this book, for the journeyer on the Path of the Spirit, is one of the brightest of modern signposts - along with Steiner's Philosophy of Freedom and but few other books. This is undoubtedly not a book for everyone. Some may find either the language, or indeed the firm Tradition in which the author writes, to be too solid. For those who wish to step deeply into the Occidental Hermetic tradition, however, and who wish to also take on board the awakening of the forces of the Imaginative faculties which the Tarot may deeply assist in unfolding, this book remains unsurpassed. Highly recommended...
Rating:
Summary: Simply sublime
Review: What a book... As I mention in my review of a couple of years ago on Aeclectic.net, 'this work ranks amongst the classics of mysticism, gnosis and magic - the three pathways into Hermeticism. In my opinion, it is the most masterful book which utilises the Major Arcana of the Tarot as tools to enter spiritual dimensions.' I write this new (and shorter) review having recently acquired the book in its French version - the language in which the Russian-born author decided to write the text. Apart from the different nuances of language, it again reminds me of both the sublimity of his penetrative thought, his engagement in the vivifying life of the Spirit, and how the Tarot - and especially in its Marseille version - is profound in both its applications and its assistance in accompanying the Spiritual seeker on his or her journey. Some anthroposophists have recognised and seen reflected in this work the same spiritual impulse working itself - though in a different form - as it did in the works of Rudolf Steiner. Others, unfortunately, seemed to have developed some antithetical views towards the author - somehow presuming that this author's spiritual authority undermined something of their own formed views. To my mind, this book, for the journeyer on the Path of the Spirit, is one of the brightest of modern signposts - along with Steiner's Philosophy of Freedom and but few other books. This is undoubtedly not a book for everyone. Some may find either the language, or indeed the firm Tradition in which the author writes, to be too solid. For those who wish to step deeply into the Occidental Hermetic tradition, however, and who wish to also take on board the awakening of the forces of the Imaginative faculties which the Tarot may deeply assist in unfolding, this book remains unsurpassed. Highly recommended...
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