A Tale of Two Wanderers
AUTHOR’S NOTE: I’ve always believed that — apart from their customary role in the “Fool’s Journey” pageant — there is more to be said about the visual similarities between the Waite-Smith Hermit and the Fool than I’ve come across in the literature. Here I explore one version of it in “storytelling” guise.
I’ve been bemused by Alejandro Jodorowsky’s notion that the Hermit is “backing into the future,” although I now think I understand him. The wise man’s vision isn’t fixed doggedly on the road ahead and instead allows his feet to carry him unerringly toward the goal while leaving his attention free to wander in more fruitful paths (such as guiding his numerous acolytes in their ascension). The Hermit is the “numerological counterpart” of the Moon (18 = 1+8 = 9) and this “blind” navigation might well carry him heedlessly across the forbidding lunar threshold. The similarly detached Fool, on the other hand, is entirely (and capriciously) solar — a warm vernal zephyr to the Hermit’s chilly autumnal draught. The turning-point in their separate ways along the road to enlightenment is the Wheel of Fortune for the Fool and Death for the Hermit, two cards indicative of “change.” The Wheel is the domain of Jupiter, the “Greater Benefic” of traditional astrology, while Death corresponds to Scorpio and its connection with the Underworld and the “Dark Night of the Soul,” contemplation of which is par-for-the-course for the misanthropic Hermit. (It should also be noted that the Hermit’s Virgo and Death’s Scorpio are both traditional “scientific” signs, so there is more than an elemental affinity between them.)
Here, then, is a fanciful allegory of two wanderers who are both standing on a precipice, one a callow neophyte and the other a seasoned adept; both have their backs turned toward the future — one because he doesn’t care and the other because he still has business in the present. The Fool has his “head in the clouds” and is oblivious to his surroundings, while the Hermit knows exactly where he stands, and also that he has nowhere to go but down. The Fool looks like he is about to fly since he has no comprehension of falling, while the Hermit is soberly calculating the risk of a tumble down the mountainside.
The Fool is prepared to trust in his luck (Wheel of Fortune) and is optimistic that he will “remain in the Light” until he achieves the Sun’s blessing upon reaching its safe haven. Jupiter is the Fool’s friend and I can envision the latter commandeering the Wheel like a “hot-air balloon” (hopefully with more skill than the Wizard of Oz); he alights at the far side virtually unchanged and still largely the innocent he was at the beginning (otherwise that white horse would refuse to bear him). He will arrive at Judgement riding joyously, not trudging along like the Hermit.
For his part, the Hermit is sure to be transfigured by his passage like Gandalf in Moria, and with any luck his fate is going to be similar (he will have to leave his hermitage behind and go into the West with the Archangels). But if he doesn’t watch where he’s going he may wind up riding the coattails of Death to the shores of the River Styx with nothing ahead but doubt and disillusionment (which, it could be argued, are really “second nature” for a querulous Virgo anyway).
Death is at least sympathetic to the Hermit’s grave attitude and may offer him a “soft landing.” But the Moon awaits and it is far too perversely mystical to tolerate much ontological hair-splitting; the Hermit will be lucky to get a clean hair shirt and fresh straw for his cell. There may, however, be a silver lining here. The Moon corresponds to the sign of Pisces, of which the traditional ruler is Jupiter, the same benevolent deity who aids the Fool. Granted that Jupiter is not as “pneumatic” a presence here, at least the Hermit will float instead of sink on his voyage to Judgement. On the down-side, Pisces is zodiacally opposite to the Hermit’s sign of Virgo, so there may be some rigorous interrogation at the gate. He’d better brush up on his verbal “tap-dancing” and have his archetype’s credentials up-to-date.
Originally published at http://parsifalswheeldivination.wordpress.com on March 7, 2022.
