From the Touchstone Tarot, the Lovers; from the John Waterhouse Oracle, Consulting the Oracle:
Divination is a means of telling ourselves what we already know.
― Joanne Harris
In Black's version of the Lovers, Eve holds a fruit from the Tree of Knowledge. Once they both ate the fruit, they became self-aware. No longer did they move about simply as instinctual animals, now they saw themselves clearly, able to discern how their thoughts and motives led to action and habits. Yet as Tchiki Davis explains, most of us run on autopilot: "Our minds are so busy with daily chatter that we usually only self-reflect when something goes awfully wrong." Waterhouse's painting shows a group of women raptly listening to an oracle. There's nothing wrong with using divination (or a therapist) to help with self-reflection and awareness, but neither can tell us something our gut doesn't already know.
Ah the original sin. I just had a conversation on this with one of my friends, who believes and I who do not. The stain blame. Always a reason to cast blame on another, in this case the Catholic Church on all women as a means to belittle and shame us.
ReplyDeleteI like the idea of the "sin" of self-awareness created by those who would like to lead us around with a choke collar.
DeleteI see eating the fruit as receiving the option of choice. They had no options of choice before. And humankind has been struggling with it ever since.
ReplyDeleteYes, I think for some, choice was the sin (as opposed to blind obedience).
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