This essay presumes acquaintance with the ideas presented in The Triadic Structure of the Tarot.
My treatment of the first triad of Fool, Juggler, and Papess is probably the most difficult one for modern tarot uses to accept. As Fool, Magician, and High Priestess, all three figures are described in the most elevated, profound terms by many tarot writers. They are taken to represent supreme principles: pure potentiality, consciousness, and spirituality. I will explain an alternative point of view, one that I think is more grounded in the history of these cards and also consistent with the overall picture of the tarot trumps as a progression from the mundane to the spiritual.
How many of us admire and envy the Fool? The carefree traveler, naive but full of hope, accompanied by his trusty pet and whistling as he prances along. Before the Waite-Smith deck was published in 1909, the Fool was something different. In the Tarot of Marseilles, his face is unshaven and perhaps even deformed. His expression is sometimes pained, or at least stupidly uncomprehending, not carefree and happy. The dog is not prancing along to keep him company, it is ripping his leggings, exposing him to embarrassment and ridicule, of which he seems pathetically unaware.
The tarot Fool is probably a composite of at least two older icons. Misero, the wretch, is a person living in squalid poverty, the bottom of the heap of humanity. This is the figure depicted in the Tarocchi of Mantegna. There is a dog at his side because he lives among the dogs, in the rubble of the city. He is homeless and helpless. Today, we are all expected to show a sense of social conscience toward those in poverty, to recognize their humanity despite their misfortune. When the tarot was created, it was not so. A person in this position was the object of contempt, ridicule, and abuse. Anyone with a roof over their heads could delight in the fact that their condition was elevated over that of the wretch. (The wretch is even below the servant in the social pecking order.) The other figure contributing to the Fool is, of course, the court jester, who entertains by appearing stupid. Although it is entertainment, the psychology is very similar to that which applies to the wretch. Here is a person whom the onlookers can feel superior to, laugh at, perhaps spit on. This is a very uncomfortable part of our cultural inheritance manifest in the tarot. No wonder we prefer a happy Fool.
So what does the Fool represent, given this background? I think he is someone who is despised because he is at the mercy of the physical world. He doesn't have mind enough to take control. When it rains, he gets wet. When it snows, he gets cold, and perhaps becomes ill and dies. He lives in squalor, and cannot raise himself out of it. He is worthless, he is a zero. This is consistent with the role of the card in the game of tarot. The Fool can be played at any time, but is not numbered and never wins a trick. He is so low he has no place at all. The Fool's passive acceptance of what life offers, so precious to modern tarot writers, must have been regarded with thorough contempt in previous centuries. Hence the Fool represents the most primitive way of relating to the physical world: becoming its victim.
One step up is the Juggler, who is also a composite of at least two earlier figures. In the Tarocchi of Mantegna, he appears as the artisan, perhaps a cobbler or jeweler. This is certainly an improvement over the state of the Fool! The artisan can shelter himself and support a family. He doesn't have to sleep in the open with the dogs. But he is not the object of any great respect, either. He appears below the merchant in the social order. In the stratified culture of the Middle Ages and Renaissance, a person who worked with their hands was considered hardly better than a servant. Both the Fool and the artisan are dirty--the former, because he lives in the dirt, the latter because he has to put his hands in it to make a living. He does not receive the jeers and abuse that the Fool does, but everyone would rather be a gentleman than an artisan.
Another figure contributing to the Juggler is, of course, the traveling entertainer, juggling, singing, doing tricks and collecting coins tossed his way by the crowd. Like the artisan, he makes his living with his hands and skills. He is dextrous, practiced, and probably charismatic. Skeptics suspect him of charlatanism, which is often true enough. He's not reputable. He's not a figure of any importance in society. Like the wretch, he lives by his own means, taking what he can get. The difference, of course, is that the juggler knows how to take charge, to manipulate his tools and materials (like the artisan does) to earn the money, if not the respect, of his patrons. As he manipulates the cups in a shell game, doesn't he simultaneously manipulate the minds of his onlookers? Manipulating the physical world may be a good alternative to being victimized by it, but neither carry any honor.
So the Juggler is the aggressive principle applied to the demands of physical, presocial existence. He sticks his hands in and makes things work. Our modern technology and engineering, so respected today, arise from this humble figure. (Few people appreciate the contempt with which "practical" pursuits, such as experimental science and engineering, were regarded among the educated classes in Europe until quite recent times.) It is possible (although I have some doubts) that the tarot Juggler also incoporates the image of a magician, perhaps the god Mercury/Hermes. Even if that is so, we should not be too quick to presume that his status is much elevated thereby. Hermes was the patron of thieves, and in any case the magician, like the artisan, is interested in remaking physical matter according to his will. This preoccupation with the physical is a mark of the lower classes of society; the elite involve themselves in more mental and spiritual pursuits.
The choice between victim and manipulator needs to be answered by a figure who can take us past the purely physical and open the way a more refined way of life.
The Papess card is an enigma for tarot historians. There was a legend of a female pope, Pope Joan. Was this story the model for the card? It has been conjectured that the Papess in the Visconti-Sforza cards represents Manfreda, a relation of that family who was elected pope (with, of course, no official recognition from Rome) by a deviant religious order. Or perhaps she is a modification of a pagan religious image, Isis or one of her priestesses. Perhaps she is a personification of the papacy as an abstraction. All of these ideas are interesting, but seem ultimately unsatisfying. The Pope in the Tarocchi of Mantegna appears to be a woman. Why? I don't think anyone knows.
If we take seriously the notion that the first six cards depict different social stations of humanity in the Renaissance, in order of increasing status, then we have to ask what this card could possibly represent, positioned between the juggler/artisan and the Empress. One possibility is that she is a nun, perhaps with papal regalia added to reinforce her importance as the third card of the first triad.
One does not need to be born into a wealthy family to join a religious order and become a nun. It is thus plausible to see this life as an alternative to that of the Fool and Juggler. What the choice permits is some degree of retreat from purely physical concerns. There is time for prayer, contemplation, and service; perhaps even some education. Nuns, of course, do not lead a life of leisure. Chores are a large part of the regimen in most orders. The nun is not beyond the demands of physical world, but she has a way to put it in perspective, to balance the dishonorable passivity of the Fool and the dishonorable manipulation of the Juggler. The result is an honorable type of engagement in the physical world, and one that can ultimately lead to higher things, if one so chooses.
If the religious order is dedicated to service, the nun can enter into the social world, where individual material needs take a back seat to relationships and community. In so doing, she points the way to the next triad of cards, which represent the problem of defining one's role within the human social structure.
For a more psychological slant on the Papess from within the triadic system, see Pope and Papess.
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Copyright © 1998 Tom Tadfor Little