The Hierophant and Me

I've been working on my interpretation of the Hierophant card, the Teacher, for the past week. Yesterday I began laying down colored pencil on the piece, starting with the deep furrowed grooves of the cedar tree that centers him in the composition.

I've had a long, somewhat rocky, relationship with the Hierophant card. Back when I first began working with the Rider Waite Smith deck, the image of the Pope-like character put me off. It reminded me too much of my days in the boring, stifling church of my childhood and later the narrow confines of the fundamentalist church of my 20's. The Hierophant was definitely not one of my favorite cards.

The Motherpeace deck became my primary deck in the mid-80's. But I liked the Hierophant card in this deck even less than the RWS one. There was nothing redeemable about the character in that card. I thought of him alternately as Jerry Falwell or the Pope, neither man a friend to women. He also represented all the gurus of Eastern tradition, or cult leaders of both east and west, who presented themselves as spiritual leaders while they seduced young women in secret. While I agreed with deck creators Vicki Noble and Karen Vogel about the negative patriarchal experiences of most women in mainstream religions, it seemed to me that there was no room for a positive expression of spiritual teaching in the Hierophant card.

Two things changed my mind about this card . . .

Two things changed my mind about this card -- first, the discovery that the word "hierophant" actually means "revealer of the mysteries," or "teacher of the mysteries." It was the title of the high priest of the Eleusinian Mysteries. These rites of the pre-Christian Mediterranean world celebrated the story of Demeter and Persephone and revealed the mysteries of the cycle of death and rebirth. At the culmination of the rite, the Hierophant silently revealed a single ear of grain to the initiates. In their heightened state of awareness, brought on by days of ritual drama, fasting and mind-altering substances, they experienced a profound revelation. It is said that whoever participated in the Eleusinian Mysteries no longer feared death.

So, on top of the layer of soul-numbing, dominating religious teachers, I had the spin that the Hierophant is the Teacher of the Mysteries.

Then I discovered the depiction of the Hierophant in the Mythic Tarot (by Juliet Sharman-Burke and Liz Greene) as Chiron, the Wounded Healer, and that added another layer of depth to my understanding of this card. At one time, I calculated the placement of the asteroid Chiron (sign, house aspects) in the natal charts of everyone in my Tarot study group, to help make this card more personal and meaningful for each of them. Each of us has a core wound, and part of our life task is to find healing. Then, like Chiron, we are able to help others through their own healing crises.

So, for me, the Hierophant card came to represent a positive spiritual teacher, one who teaches from his or her own authentic experience, with the dominant power-over religious leader as the Teacher's shadow side.

I look up to many people, both those I have known personally and those I know only from books, as my Teachers. And I have stood in the shoes of being a Teacher to many, beginning with my first Goddess and Tarot classes in the early 90's.

So yes, this card is very personal for me.

Comments

[Sparrow]

You have a really beautiful deck in progress.

[Teri]

What an awesome card and interpretation!The Hieraphant is my year card and your insights are truly helpfull in looking at this symbol in a new way! Thank you for your spirit in this world!

[Michelle]

Thank you so much for this entry. I followed th elink to the Eleusinian Mysteries site, since that has strongly influenced my spirituality these past years. While reading it...I realized that I have been collecting BROOMS, made of broom CORN, for over 10 years now. I must have 50-60 of these handmade items -- and with recently finding 3 corn husk dolls in a thrift store to add to my 2 already owned I seem to be starting a new collection. People ask me WHY do I collect the brooms and I really don't have a good answer. Then I read the quote about how initiates would meditate on a simple ear of corn in silence. I realized this is what I do. I get a new broom and i stare at it, admire it, but I have no words for the thoughts that run through my head, for. Somehow I am meditating in silence. And somehow...my whole home has become a shrine to these symbols!

[Katrina]

What an amazing way to explain the energy of the Hierophant. I have only just begun to look at tarot in this lifetime and much of the desription of this card in other manuals did not ring true to the knowledge I seemed to carry about this card. Chiron , of course, that makes perfect sense. Chiron the wounded healer is what is see in the Hierophant-thanks so much for sharing........
Blessed Be,
Katrina

[JuJu]

I've just found your site and your wonderful Tarot deck in progress. I particularly like your interpretation of the Hierophant, and especially because, at least as I see it, the human figure here is so androgynous. It makes me happy to think of the teacher as a gender-spanning figure. Thanks for sharing your art!

[Brenda]

I just found your site and the hierophant keeps coming up for me as a teacher it makes more since after reading your comments, thank you for your insights and your cards are beautiful, I am in the process of making some for myself, I am attending the 2008 tarot conference and look forward to meeting you...Brenda Nickolaus Jupiter,Florida

[joanna]

Thanks Brenda! I look forward to meeting you in New York.