Antoine Court de Gébelin
Antoine Court de Gébelin (* 1719 in Geneva or 1725 in Nîmes ; † May 12, 1784 in Paris ) was a theologian , pastor of the Huguenots , member of the Masonic lodge Les Amis Réunis and is considered the father of the esoteric tarot .
Life
Due to the Huguenot religion, Antoine Court de Gébelin's parents had to flee from southern France to Geneva. His father, Antoine Court , is considered to be the rebuilder of Protestantism in France. His date and place of birth are unclear: born in Geneva or Nîmes in 1719, 1724, 1725 or 1728. With the baptismal name Antoine Corteiz he was registered in Geneva in 1724. Growing up in Geneva, Antoine Court de Gébelin studied theology at the French seminary, received his doctorate on De prophetiis (On the Prophets) in 1754 and was ordained pastor of the Huguenots in the same year.
From 1754 to 1763 he taught philosophy, Christian moral theory and apologetics at this seminar. With his father, he supported the Church of the Desert, the then hidden congregations of the Huguenots in France by means of correspondence and travel. In addition, he dealt with ancient cultures and languages and was convinced of an original language to which every language can be traced back. Court de Gébelin went to Paris around 1763, but was less concerned with his pastoral work than with the study of history, languages, myths and religions. In 1771 he was admitted to the Masonic lodge Les amis réunis .
In 1773 he founded the Divine Order of the Philaletes , which endeavored to rediscover ancient wisdom and to study the Kabbalah . In the years 1773 to 1782 he published the first nine volumes of the unfinished, 30-volume work Le Monde primitif, analyzé et comparé avec le monde modern […] , which was awarded twice by the French Academy of Sciences. In 1781 he was appointed royal censor and elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences . In the spring of 1783, Antoine Court de Gébelin fell ill and was treated by the doctor Franz Anton Mesmer , who was then in Paris . Only partially cured of this, Court de Gébelin fell ill again and died on May 12, 1784.
Antoine Court de Gébelin was also the founder and president of the Societé Apollonienne , which later became the Musée de Paris.
De Gébelin and Tarot
Court de Gébelin first came into contact with the tarot in a parlor in Paris when he saw some women playing with him. He was immediately fascinated by the game, but mainly by the 22 cards of the major arcana , and began to study them intensively and to draw cards himself, which were later depicted in Papus ' book The Tarot of the Gypsies .
According to Court de Gébelin's view, the tarot comes from Egypt and is supposed to convey the secret knowledge of the ancient Egyptians in symbolic language. He interpreted the French name tarot as the "royal path". Court de Gébelin was also of the opinion that the 22 trump cards corresponded to the Hebrew alphabet.
Cout de Gébelin presented his views on the Tarot in the eighth volume of le monde primitif .
Even if his theory of the Egyptian origin of the tarot has been refuted today, his studies established the esoteric interest in the tarot, the kabbalistic interpretation of the tarot and the exploration of the symbolic language of the tarot.
Fonts (selection)
- Les Toulousaines ou lettres historiques et apologétiques en faveur de la religion réformée et de divers protestants condamnés dans ces derniers temps par le parlement de Toulouse , 1763
- Le Monde primitif analysé et comparé avec le monde moderne , 11 volumes, 1773–1782
- Devoirs du prince et du citoyen , Paris 1789
literature
- Stuart R. Kaplan: The Tarot. History, interpretation, laying systems. Original: Tarot Classic . 1972. From the American by Burkhardt Kiegeland. 5th edition 1988 (1st edition 1984), Hugendubel, Munich 1988, ISBN 3-88034-224-5 .
- Eckhard Graf: The magicians of the tarot. A. Court de Gébelin, Etteilla, E. Lévi, P. Christian, Papus, Golden Dawn, AE Waite, A. Crowley, O. Wirth. Unchanged text of the original edition, which appeared in 1989 as “Mythos Tarot” by Param, Alberstedt. Königsburg Verlag, Kl. Königsförde / Krummwisch, 2000. ISBN 3-933939-15-1
- Antoine Court de Gebelin: Monde primitif analyze et comparé avec le monde moderne (new edition) Paris 2001 (Elibron Classics), vol. 1: 715 p., Vol. 2: 830 p. (Paperback)
Web links
- Antoine Court de Gébelin (1724 or 1728-1784) , Musée virtuel du protestantisme
- Court de Gébelin at tarotwelten.de ( Memento from December 26, 2010 in the Internet Archive )
Individual evidence
- ↑ z. B. Alexandre Delalieu: Court de Gébelin Antoine. In: Mayeur-Hilaire: Diction. you moons relig. Volume 9, 1996.
- ^ Antoine Court de Gébelin (1724 or 1728-1784) , Musée virtuel du protestantisme
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Court de Gébelin, Antoine |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Antoine Corteiz (baptismal name) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Theologian, pastor of the Huguenots, member of the Masonic Lodge "Les Amis Réunis" |
| DATE OF BIRTH | 1719 or 1725 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Geneva or Nîmes |
| DATE OF DEATH | May 12, 1784 |
| Place of death | Paris |