THROUGH THE MAJOR ARCANA OF NINA BUNJEVAC
THE TAROT
AN ALCHEMICAL JOURNEY
Alchemy is a discipline, accessible to all who wish to practice it. Its aim is to purify the mind and spirit, and bring the inner states into balance with the external realities. Threefold in nature, Alchemy is concerned with all three aspects of the human being: physical, mental, and spiritual. The work, broadly speaking, entails turning our prima materia into gold. Metaphorically, the prima materia represents any impurity that is to be operated on, whether it be a character trait, a situation, or a problem to be solved; gold, in this manner of interpretation, stands for the philosopher’s stone, or the wisdom extracted from adverse states and experiences. Its value is of educational and experiential nature, not the material kind.
The symbolism and metaphorical language of Alchemy is part universal, part unique to each individual; as such, it could be likened to Jungian dream analysis, with its archetypes at the core, surrounded by the ever-shifting environment of personal associations; C. J. Jung himself was fascinated by Alchemy, and found the similarity between the Alchemical
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INTRODUCTION
stages and the stages of psychological development particularly meaningful.
That said, Alchemy is perhaps best described as a user manual for our personal development, and each opus, or each Alchemical document, a unique documentation of the author’s, or the Alchemist’s participation in the great work. This could explain the difference in symbolism and content from one manuscript to another. By that logic, this book, and the deck that comes with it, could be considered an interactive Alchemical document. My sincerest hope is that the reader will experience it that way.
I would like to say a few words about dreamwork, which is suggested throughout this book. Whether or not the reader is involved in Jungian or any other analytic psychology, keeping a dream journal can be an essential tool for establishing a rapport with one’s soul, or one’s unconscious. Everything we learn in life, everything we experience, hear, taste, smell, and touch, registers somewhere in our psyche, creating an internal database, unique to ourselves alone. Dreams are communicated to us in code and with symbols, drawing from this internal repository of information. By recording our dreams, meditating on their content, and engaging in the process of free association, we begin to unravel this code, which can lead to greater self-understanding. We can look at each person in our dream as an aspect of ourselves, and each environment as a metaphor for our own state of being. In my own personal journey with dreamwork, I have found Jung’s approach to dream analysis and interpretation to be profoundly valuable, and highly recommend his book Man and His Symbols
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as a comprehensive introduction to his concepts and body of work.
These cards, and this book, are not meant to tell the future, but encourage introspection, and offer gentle nudges toward one’s psychic interior; they may be used individually or in a small group setting, for the purposes of meditation, contemplation, self-exploration, journaling, or play. This book calls for an immersive experience, and a stroll through the imaginal space; it does not require the reader to believe in one thing or the other, but simply to approach the tarot with an open heart and a playful spirit.
