Fortune Telling
(Chinese Fortune Telling):
Since ancient times man has strived to search out the unknown. His
pursuit of knowledge of the future has led to the creation of many
different methods of fortune telling such as astrology, numerology, I
- ching, crystallomancy (reading of a crystal ball), palmistry
(chiromancy), as well as psychic readings to mention but a few.
Fortune-telling is defined as the practice of predicting the future,
usually of an individual, through mystical or supernatural means.
How do the more popular forms of
fortune telling differ?
Astrology requires an accurate time, place and date of birth of the
concerned person, their name is also of help. From these details, the
horoscope chart prevalent at that exact point in time, at that
particular location is cast. Applying the laws of astrology, allows an
astrologer to make predictions about the future depending on the
position of different planets, their characteristics and the transits
that will pass. Tarot card readings, involve the user drawing his or
her choice of cards from the pack. The tarot reader is then required
to use their psychic ability to interpret card meanings and thus
divine the future. Even the most accomplished tarot card readers find
it difficult to objectively interpret their own cards and therefore
rely on others to make readings for them. Psychic readings are solely
reliant on the intuitive powers of the reader. Psychic ability is a
power that has to be developed through practice and is categorised as
an extra-sensory ability, also known as ESP (Extra Sensory
Perception). This also includes clairvoyance and precognition.
Discerning a genuine psychic from a fraud is the greatest limitation
of this method of fortune telling.
Fortune Telling from the Cards
It is impossible to trace the prehistoric beginnings of cardlore, as
divination by the cards is of great antiquity. One theory holds that
Europe obtained playing cards from the East, notably India and China
after the invention of paper. Indian cards have many distinctive
elements, such as being round, being generally hand painted with
intricate designs and comprising more than four suits (often as many
as twelve). Ancient Chinese "money cards" have four "suits": coins (or
cash), strings of coins (which may have been misinterpreted as sticks
from crude drawings), myriads of strings, and tens of myriads. These
were represented by ideograms, with numerals of 2-9 in the first three
suits and numerals 1-9 in the "tens of myriads". The first cards may
have been actual paper currency which were both the tools of gaming
and the stakes being played for. The designs on modern Mahjong tiles
and dominoes likely evolved from those earliest playing cards. The
Chinese word p'ai is used to describe both paper cards and gaming
tiles. Another theory separates the cards of the West entirely from
those of the East and holds that Western cards originated in northern
Italy early in the 15th century (1420-1440). While in medieval
Holland, the Dutch invented a game called "ik ben de meester van het
heelal" which means "I am the master of the Universe". This was
followed by the introduction of a similar Italian made a game called
"soro il padorone dell'universo" which means "Master of the Universe".
Tarot Cards & Divination
The earliest cards found in Europe were the Tarot. These symbolical
numerical cards forming a Pack of 78 are the immediate predecessors of
our own modern day playing cards. The first tarot cards were lavish
hand-painted decks from the courts of the nobility. Originally the
cards were called carte da trionfi (cards of the triumphs). Around
1530 (about 100 years after the origin of the cards), the word
tarocchi (singular tarocco) begins to be used to distinguish them from
a new game of triumphs or trumps then being played with ordinary
playing cards. The word Tarot is believed to have been derived from
tarotee, meaning cross, in reference to the diagonally crossed lines
on the rear of the early cards. Since the 1700s tarot cards have been
widely used for fortune telling and divination of the future, and it
is also linked by many occult and hermetic authors to a mystical
system of Hebrew Cabbala, (also Kaballah and Qabala) even ancient
Egyptian spiritual beliefs. Divination of the future from the tarot
deck is in fact, credited mainly to the Jewish astrologer and
cabbalist, Jacque Gringonneur. Just like contemporary playing cards,
the tarot deck also consists of four suits, namely Cups, Wands, Swords
and Pentacles.
The oldest surviving tarot cards are three mid-15th century sets all
made for members of the Visconti family, rulers of Milan. The oldest
existing tarot deck was painted to celebrate a mid-15th century
wedding joining the ruling Visconti and Sforza families of Milan,
probably painted by Bonifacio Bembo and other miniaturists of the
Ferrara school. 35 of the cards are now in the Pierpont Morgan
Library, New York. Of the original cards, 35 are in the
Pierpont-Morgan Library, 26 cards are at the Accademia Carrara, 13 are
at the Casa Colleoni, 4 cards being lost (the Devil, the Tower, the
Three of Swords, and the Knight of Coins). This "Visconti-Sforza"
deck, which has been widely reproduced in varying quality, combines
the Minor Arcana (the original suits of (Swords, Wands, Pentacles &
Cups, and face cards King, Queen, Knave and Page) with Major Arcana
that apparently combine already traditional iconography with
considerable artistic license, a sign that the original significance
of the designs was already lost. More simply-drawn decks survive from
Marseilles, France, from the early 16th century.
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