Episode 77: What a Fool Believes: On the Unnumbered Card in the Tarot

Weird Studies

Phil Ford and J. F. Martel

Society & Culture, Arts, Philosophy

4.8 • 688 Ratings

🗓️ 8 July 2020

⏱️ 69 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

"What a fool believes he sees, no wise man can reason away." This line from a Doobie Brothers song is probably one of the most profound in the history of rock-'n'-roll. It is profound for all the reasons (or unreasons) explored in this discussion, which lasers in on just one of the major trumps of the traditional tarot deck, that of the Fool. The Fool is integral to the world, yet stands outside it. The Fool is an idiot but also a sage. The Fool does not know; s/he intuits, improvises a path through the brambles of existence. We intend this episode on the Fool to be the first in an occasional series covering all twenty-two of the major trumps of the Tarot of Marseilles. REFERENCES The Fool in the tarot St. Paul's First Epistle to the Corinthians Meditations on the Tarot: A Journey Into Christian Hermeticism Aleister Crowley, The Book of Thoth Plato, Phaedrus Weird Studies episode 60 - Space is the Place: On Sun Ra, Gnosticism, and the Tarot Till Eulenspiegel, folk figure Aleister Crowley, Magick Without Tears Weird Studies episode 75 - Our Old Friend the Monolith: On Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey Weird Studies episode 76 - Below the Abyss: On Bergson's Metaphysics Rider-Waite Tarot Deck Richard Wagner, Parsifal G. W. F. Hegel, German philosopher Ramsey Dukes, Words Made Flesh: Information in Formation George Spencer Brown, Laws of Form Alain Badiou, Deleuze: The Clamor of Being Punch and Judy, British puppet show George P. Hansen, The Trickster and the Paranormal Lin Yutang, The Importance of Living Thomas Mann, Death in Venice Phil Ford's lecture on Death in Venice (Patreon exclusive!) Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Idiot Hal Ashby (dir.), Being There Alejandro Jodorowsky and Marianne Costa, The Way of the Tarot Frank Pavich (dir.), Jodorowsky’s Dune Tarot of Marseilles André Breton, French surrealist artist Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Spectrevision Radio
0:03.3	Welcome to Weird Studies, an arts and philosophy podcast with hosts Phil Ford and J.F. Martel.
0:23.3	For more episodes or to support the podcast, go to weird Studies. I'm Phil Ford. I'm sitting outside in my backyard recording this introduction because my wife is teaching cello inside the house, and I figured you wouldn't mind the sound of birds chirping in the background.
1:03.8	Anyway, from the very beginning, J.F. and I have been mentioning the tarot on route to discussing other things.
1:10.7	This week, we finally start talking about the tarot itself.
1:14.6	Now, that's such a vast topic.
1:16.9	It seems absurd to tackle it all at once.
1:19.5	So this episode is about only the first card of the tarot, the fool.
1:24.0	Though actually, it's not exactly the first card.
1:33.3	In the earliest version, still widely used, the fool is unnumbered, a fact whose significance we spend a lot of time unpacking in the conversation that follows.
1:37.3	We also talk about holy fools, fools in love, fools in literature, and what a fool believes,
1:43.3	the yacht rock hit by the Doobie Brothers.
1:46.4	But behind it all is the enigmatic figure we see in the taro, striding off on his unknown
1:52.4	adventure with a bindle on his shoulder, dressed in motley, and with an animal nipping at his
1:57.4	heels. Exactly what kind of animal it is varies according to which deck we're
2:02.1	talking about. There are thousands of variants. Variants of what you may well ask. What is the
2:09.5	taro, anyway? It's a deck of cards that emerged from obscure origins in the European Middle Ages.
2:16.2	The earliest decks date from the 15th century, though some
2:19.4	version of the cards were doubtless in use earlier. How much earlier no one has yet been able to say.
2:25.6	The cards were, and are, used for games, just like the modern 52 card deck, which developed
2:32.3	out of the tarot. Like modern playing cards, the tarot has four suits,
2:37.0	discs, staves, cups, and swords, numbered from ace to ten, along with court cards, kings, queens,
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Phil Ford and J. F. Martel, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Phil Ford and J. F. Martel and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.