Description
“The traditional Zen attitude towards life is to laugh, live, enjoy, and celebrate. Zen is not the negation of life, it is the affirmation of life. It accepts everything that is.”
When life seems full of doubts and uncertainties, we tend to seek a source of inspiration: what will happen in the future? What about my health, the children? What will happen if I make this decision and not that one? This is how traditional Tarot decks are often used to satisfy the desire to know about the past and the future. The Osho Zen Tarot focuses on better understanding the here and now. It is a system based on wisdom that says that events in the external world simply reflect our own thoughts and feelings, even if we ourselves are not sure what those thoughts and feelings are. Therefore, it helps us to shift our attention away from external events so that we can find a new clarity of understanding about what is happening in our innermost hearts. The conditions and mental states depicted by the contemporary images on the cards are all shown as being essentially transient and transformative.
Based on Zen Buddhist philosophy, the Osho Zen Tarot is a non-traditional deck of 79 cards. There are many changes to suit the Zen theme, including an extra Major Arcana card for Osho and four suits of fire, clouds, water, and rainbow. The cards cover the full range of human experiences, from the incredibly beautiful to the ridiculous and mundane.
This Tarot was used as yet another tool to transmit the teachings of the late Zen Master, Osho. As such, the meanings of the cards are described in a way that makes us feel like speakers, and often the things said about certain concepts or actions seem like lengthy statements, statements with which many people would not agree. An example of one such statement can be found in the description of the Lovers card: “Sexuality is very animalistic.” But having said that, it is also safe to say that these statements are based solely on subjective belief, as are most statements like this. It is understandable, therefore, that not everyone accepts them.
For those who have difficulty with the Osho-Zen Tarot approach and the meanings of the cards, the book also includes very beautiful descriptions of the cards and their meanings in a more general sense. These descriptions serve to bring the reader into the world of the card, often explaining what the figures on the cards are feeling and thinking. In the book, you will find a story about the Buddha that perfectly illustrates the meaning of the cards and serves to provide more information about the Osho Zen tradition and the life of Buddha.
The deck itself deserves high praise, as each card is a beautiful work of art. You could easily sit and look at this deck repeatedly and not tire of it. The artwork varies, however, from delicate watercolor pieces to bold geometric designs and then to more cartoon-like images.
The Major Arcana, while retaining their traditional meanings, often use different images. Some are renamed: Magician | Existence; The High Priestess | Inner Voice; The Empress | Creativity; The Emperor | Rebel; The Hierophant | Nothingness; The Chariot | Consciousness; Strength | Courage; The Hermit | Solitude; Wheel of Fortune | Change; Justice | Advancement; The Hanged Man | New Vision; Death | Transformation; The Devil | Conditioned; The Tower | Lightning; The Star | Silence; The Moon | Past Lives; The Sun | Innocence; Judgment | Beyond Illusion; and The World | Conclusion
There is also an extra Major Arcana, the Master, which shows what one can become when one finally breaks free from the endless cycle of birth-death-rebirth, and finds Enlightenment. This master card is illustrated with a painting by Osho himself.
These images are very spiritual and often humorous, conveying meaning in a rather anecdotal way. For example, the Innocence (Sun) card shows a white-haired man, laughing joyfully, totally absorbed in the predatory-looking praying mantis perched on his index finger. These images touch the heart, and often the person finds themselves "amazed" by the cards!
The Minor Arcana are considerably altered. In the Minor Arcana, the card number can be found inside a small diamond the color of the suit: gray (clouds), red (fire), blue (water), or rainbow (rainbow). Like the Major Arcana, the images on the Minor Arcana convey the meaning very well. These images are often very funny, anecdotal, and sometimes very symbolic.
Court cards also don't have titles on the cards. Instead, inside the colored diamond that represents the suit, there is an arrow pointing in one of the cardinal directions. North is King, East is Knight, South is Queen, and West is Page.
It also contains a 198-page book (in Portuguese). Both are contained within a cardboard box.
Tarot Sizes
Some authors and publishers have chosen to offer various sizes of the same tarot deck. These include: pocket, medium or standard, and large or deluxe. They differ only in the size of the cards and the guidebook. There are also kits that are a more refined compilation of the same deck.
We can compare a Tarot Kit to a home computer and other sizes of tarot decks to a tablet or mobile phone. As the name suggests, a kit is much more complete. The boxes are stronger and more robust, it includes a larger and more complete book with images and even diagrams for laying out the cards, the history of tarot, and much more. The cards are usually the same size as medium or standard tarot decks, except for some authors. When you buy a Kit, you are buying a more sophisticated product of that tarot. It is suitable for those who want to understand that tarot in depth or for those who are starting out in the art of perceiving energy and messages through the cards.
Language: Portuguese
Card dimensions: 78 cm x 108 cm
Author: Osho & Ma Deva Padma
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