6
The High Priest (Hierophant)

6: Waw forms Taurus/Shaur .

Keyword: Impregnation/copulation/union

Formative Symbolism: High Priest as intermediary or copulative agent. Deeper significance in the heirosgamos of Taurus/Shaur (Sheen-Waw-Raysh). The duality will become explicit in the Lovers, where Shaur becomes the Angel.

Expresses the fertilizing agent, that which impregnates. It is the direct result of Hay upon Dallet.

[Tarot Index]

This trump is properly attributed to Vav/Waw, the sixth letter of the Hebrew alphabet. The ecclesiastical symbolism obscures the fertile power of Waw, and only hints at the hierosgamos of Shaur/Taurus. To summarize Case: Now, the central thought here is "union..."    Paul Case (The Tarot, 1949, p.75) Waw, male copulative fertility, or union, is symbolized by the High Priest, or Hierophant, mediator between heaven and earth. Taurus is traditionally an earth sign, but the Hebrew letters, Sheen-Waw-Raysh, show the cosmic breath in union with the universe. The duality implicit in the High Priest (union of two worlds: the two attendent priests) will become explicit when this Tarot card transmutes into the Lovers with the same three figures. Gemini is the first fully dual sign, spelled Teomaim: Tav-Aleph-Waw-Mem-Yod-Mem, where Aleph and Yod, the two partners, are explicit for the first time, although they were already implied and contained in the Sheen (Aleph) and Raysh (Raysh-Yod-Sheen) of Shaur, Taurus. This is the second of twelve active environments structuring the impersonal energy of the planets. In Taurus, Venus is Hhan, unstructured, undetermined possibility, and the 700 of Noun again foreshadows the 7 of Zayn/Zain in the Lovers.