Dr. Art Rosengarten

Summer 2009

Course text:

Tarot and Psychology by Art Rosengarten, Ph.D

Tarot and Psychology

Crossing the Sacred Divide

Long associated with psychics and fortune-tellers, Tarot cards are evocative, multi-layered in meaning, and remarkably rich psychologically.  Therapeutic use would seem a logical destination for a sacred tool so steeped in psychological meaning. With likely origins in the early Italian Renaissance, the Tarot is both a symbol map and sacred tool of timeless wisdom.  Its modern resurgence has seen an explosion of creative, spiritual, and popular interest. Though undeniably, over the past thirty years, the vast majority of individuals who have discovered the wonders and mysteries  of Tarot have done so through experiences of divination. Card reading, without a doubt, is Tarot’s most beguiling and potentially beneficial enterprise.

Yet for Tarot to continue its 21st century evolution, I believe it must have a stronger “application emphasis,” that is, it must be relevant, accessible, and meaningful to the changing contours of people’s lives and resonate with ALL who seek greater meaning, not simply small segments of the waning New Age.  Moreover, Tarot’s methodology must be expanded into a global approach, addressing more than just individual problems, but as well collective realities bearing potentially dire consequences to the entire planet,  particularly in view of their psychological and spiritual implications.  This is the challenge and the hope.

As such, my teaching style is a rather eclectic, non-affiliated, intuitive appraoch with respect to “correctness” in the divinatory arena, honoring multiple points of view, as indeed, all roads (eventually) lead to Rome, but also, in my role as teacher/facilitator will encourage certain crisp and grounded “parameters” through which we may productively channel our short time together here.

In this six week course, a psycho-spiritual/transpersonal orientation to Tarot will be defined, developed, and demonstrated through our primary text, selected readings,  various assignments, open dialogue, cyber-experiments in divination, Jungian “synchronicity,” and more. Designed specifically for those who are ready, whether tarot novice or initiate, to push beyond the sacred lines of separation that have fostered our troubled “psyche/spirit” split, but with awareness and respect for the historic realities that be.