I prayed to Her, taking a flower in my hands:
“Mother, here is Thy knowledge and here is Thy ignorance.
Take them both, and give me only pure love.
Here is Thy holiness and here is Thy unholiness.
Take them both, Mother, and give me pure love.
Here is Thy righteousness and here is Thy unrighteousness.
Take them both, Mother, and give me pure love.”
I spoke of all these, but I could not say: “Mother,
here is Thy truth and here is Thy falsehood, take them both.”
I gave up everything at Her feet but could not bring myself to give up truth.
~ from the Prayer of Ramakrishna (translated by A. Mookerjee)
Tarot’s Lady Justice, with her direct gaze and formidable countenance, doesn’t just represent an institution, but is the embodiment of truth, and the natural sense of order and harmony that permeates the cosmos. For this reason, she has is often been equated with the Egyptian Goddess Maat.
We’ve all seen images of the Weighing of the Heart ceremony, wherein the deceased person’s heart (seat of the mind, to the Egyptians) is weighed against her feather in the ‘Hall of Two Maats’ (two truths), but Maat was also a set of principals for the living:
“The ancient Egyptians deeply believed in the inherent grace and unity of the entire universe. They understood that cosmic harmony could be achieved through the most righteous ritual and public life, and any kind of disruption in this divine harmony would have many severe consequences, such as earthquakes or famine, which are caused by an impious king…”
[Egypt Tours Portal, Ancient Egyptian Principals of Maat]
Similarly, to Renaissance humanists, Justice as Cardinal Virtue was a guiding principal to live by – particularly for princes – in order to maintain personal and collective, moral standards. In the ‘Mantegna Tarocchi‘, which depicts the hierarchy of stations from the lowly beggar ‘Misero’ all the way to ‘First Cause,’ Heavenly Virtues are exceeded only by the gods themselves. Note how the stork familiar of Justice harkens back to Thoth, Maat’s Ibis-headed scribe consort – perhaps indicating that virtues need to be taught and developed (the stork was also a symbol for rhetoric).
Tarot de Marseille’s Lady Justice, seated upon her throne, sword and scale in hand, seems straightforwardly emblematic. But, as with all TdM cards, might the particulars of her design reveal a more layered persona? Let’s investigate, beginning at the dawn of the Italian Renaissance…
[As always, please click on images to enlarge and for more details.]
The Allegory
Justice, still a figurehead of courthouses today, is the longest-surviving Cardinal Virtue. Her blindfold, supposed to indicate impartiality, makes her seem a bit benign, like she can’t actually witness what we’ve been up to. But prior to the 16th century, this was not the case, as we see in Ambrogio Lorenzetti’s exquisite, mid 14th c fresco, ‘Allegory of Good and Bad Government’ in the Palazzo Pubblico (town hall) of Sienna. Painted at a time when city states of Italy were becoming more secular, allegorical artworks like this in civic buildings were an attempt to incorporate the ancient virtues; to “legitimate and elevate secular activities by suggesting an association with the sacred.” By placing Justice and Judgement scenes in public places, “city states in Italy sought spiritual affirmation that their urban way of life was just as god-annointed as the old, feudal vision of society.” [Images of Justice, Curtis and Resnik, Yale Law Journal]
Justice appears in the mural a few times, in different forms; most prominently she’s seated on a throne (‘Distributive’ and ‘Commutative’ Justice), a hand resting on either scale, whereupon two angels dish out punishment or reward. She looks upward toward the higher power, Wisdom, who looks up to God. A cord runs from each scale (one is worn away) to the hand of Concordia, symbolizing a balanced state of society. Everything is connected in perfect equilibrium, everyone knows their place and responsibility as citizens.
On the adjacent wall to her right/our left, the Satanic figure of ‘Bad Government’ is seated on a throne, the scales of Justice lie on the ground broken, and she sits in despair beneath him, possibly with hands bound. The relationship between the Supreme Court Justice and the Devil is established.
Watch this video for a more intricate tour of the mural. For our purposes, let it serve as an introduction to how the Virtue of Justice was “propagandized” at the time, and to some of the details that will carry over into the Tarot card.
The Pillared Throne
Type II TdM differs from type I, in that Justice’s ‘wings’ are absorbed into her throne’s concave and cylindrical shape. It features two, gold-coloured columns, one which is being ‘split’ by her sword. Emblemata books tell us that, unblindfolded, with sword held erect, she is ‘Divine Justice’. This is further indicated by her crown – more on that a bit later.
It’s important to compare decks for clues, and sometimes they’re found in unlikely places. In this earliest French Tarot, below, the Empress’ hand on the covered arm of her throne could also be seen as lifting her robe to reveal a leonine leg. Though it’s likely a skin she’s seated on, the gesture evokes a legend of the Queen of Sheba, where she lifts her skirt to step over water, revealing a hairy (sometimes exaggerated as bestial) leg.
If this connection was the artist’s intention, might the Emperor then show some hint of Solomon? I think yes – he is seated in columned throne, exactly like the one in TdM Justice, and holds not a sceptre, but a sword erect. “Remember, after all, the tale of Solomon, who offered to use the sword to cut the child in half, to give each claimant her share.” Ouch.
“The earliest Jewish post-biblical account is of Romano-Jewish historian Flavius Josephus (Antiquities 8:165-9), who reframes the Queen of Sheba’s story for a Greek and Roman audience. He speaks of a philosopher Queen of Ethiopia and Egypt who, much like in the Hebrew Bible, travels to meet Solomon to subject him to a trial of wisdom. Josephus’ legend wasn’t picked up further in medieval Jewish and Islamic legends, but had a great influence on the further development of Christian tradition.” [The Collector]
In Greco-Roman tradition, the pomegranate is associated with fertility, death, changing seasons and immortality, its seeds resembling jewel-like blood droplets (often the blood of Dionysus). Persephone, by breaching the conditions of her spouse and eating six pomegranate seeds in Hades, is destined to remain underground for half the year and only return (be reborn) for the other half.
In a similar and related tale, Eurydice is destined to remain in Hades after her beloved Orpheus breaks the one condition, that he mustn’t turn to look at her, en route back to the world of the living. “The story of Eurydice may be a late addition to the Orpheus myths. In particular, the name Eurudike (‘she whose justice extends widely’) recalls cult-titles attached to Persephone. ” [wikipedia]
“Eurydice’s name means wide ruling Justice. She is the prototype of Dike, one of the Horea, born to Themis and Zeus. Dike stood for the All Way, The Way, The Truth, and The Light. As Dike’s prototype, Eurydice is a mythical goddess and archetype present in the underworld before the cloaking of the myth in the traditional romantic versions during the creation of the Classics by male authors.” [intro to Emily Miller, ‘Euridice’s Bones’]
(Similarly, Persephone was the ‘Iron Queen’ of the Underworld, prior to the Pluto abduction myth).
Brass signifies God’s judgement, ie, these are not merely ‘functional’ pillars. Passing between the two brass pillars represents entry into another world, eternity or another sphere. The card is divided not just vertically, but horizontally, by the bar of her scales; there is equilibrium between Heaven above and Earth below, just like in the Sienna mural. The curved back of Justice’s throne serves a dual design purpose, suggesting wings as well as heavenly spheres. Her sword traverses both realms and we notice the ball in its handle is threefold; the trinity of philosophical elements.
Wisdom Pillars
The two pillars of wisdom also can be likened to the two maxims inscribed at the entrance (possibly on columns) of the Temple of Apollo at Delphi. According to Pliney the Elder, these were written in letters of gold:
Know thyself
and
Nothing in excess
Know Thyself [sword]
The first application of the phrase to self-knowledge in the modern sense occurs in Plato’s Phaedrus, in which Socrates says that he has no leisure to investigate the truth behind common mythological beliefs while he has not yet discovered the truth about his own nature.
Nothing in Excess/Nothing too much [scales]
The maxim has been said to have received its ‘ultimate expression’ in Aristotle’s theory of ethics, according to which every classical virtue occupies a middle place between the two extremes of excess and deficiency.
There was also a third maxim inscribed:
Give a pledge and trouble is at hand
The Greek word ἐγγύα, here translated “pledge”, can mean either (a) surety given for a loan; (b) a binding oath given during a marriage ceremony; or (c) a strong affirmation of any kind. Accordingly, the maxim may be a warning against any one of these things.
In Plutarch’s Septem sapientium convivium, the ambiguity of the phrase is said to have “kept many from marrying, and many from trusting, and some even from speaking.” [Wikipedia]
Among other things, which I’ll get to, the cord around Justice’s neck may indeed have to do with being bound to one’s word – or to one’s silence – especially in monetary and matrimonial matters (Libra).
Lady Have Mercy
Inside Solomon’s temple was something called a ‘Mercy Seat (hilasterion, “that which makes expiation” or “propitiation” for the removal of sin), which, according to the Hebrew Bible, was “the gold lid placed on the Ark of the Covenant with two cherubim at the ends to cover and create the space where Yahweh appeared and dwelled. This was connected with the rituals of the Day of Atonement.” (Yom Kippur, occurring in Libra season).
Oh my heart which I had from my mother! O heart of my different ages! Do not stand up as a witness against me, do not be opposed to me in the tribunal, do not be hostile to me in the presence of the Keeper of the Balance!
~ Egyptian Heart Prayer
Here the lines between Justice and Judgement start to blur, and the two often get conjoined when deciphering the meaning of this card, as was the intent of Italian civic hall murals. The difference is that Judgement (or Last Judgement) is a final verdict, whether it’s pronounced in a court of law or standing before a supreme being. Justice is about honing an inner sense of self-regulating equilibrium, guided by the understanding that we will ultimately face some kind of ‘judgement’ by the god(s) of our higher conscience – maybe not hellfire or pearly gates but ‘damned’ or ‘blessed’ to live in the kind of world we helped create. They are closely intertwined, but differing concepts.
In the ancient Greco-Roman world, supplication – begging for the sparing of one’s life, on the battlefield, for example – involved a specific set of gestures; the supplicant, on their knees (submissive stance), would clasp the dominant’s knees (they can’t walk away), reach up to clasp their chin (they can’t look away) and beg for mercy.
It’s been suggested that the scales rest on Lady Justice’s knee and are being tipped slightly. As well, the collar of her wimple, which again harkens back to our Sienna mural, has started to look a bit like hands. These are the type of details people often write off as ‘printing mistakes’, but might they have had a mnemonic function? In fact, during the Renaissance, Justice was sometimes depicted in a more gruesome way – as judges with severed hands.
We can back up this notion of ‘having mercy’ with another Justice card, the Visconti-Sforza. It’s an anomaly in the deck (unless the original other two Virtues were also illustrated thus), in that the gold background does not go all the way up, but instead creates a throne back or triptych shape, while over her head leaps a knight on a white horse. Likely this figure represents the chivalric code of the Arthurian knights, who, while charged with enforcing justice, were also required to ‘be just,’ ie, to act from their higher consciousness and show mercy whenever possible, rather than give in to brutish impulses. This is in keeping with the idea of Temperance, also. We know that the Arthurian legends were extremely popular in Italy (some having been illustrated by Bonafacio Bembo, who painted the cards).
That this ‘hero rider’ – the solar hero – is situated above the Virtue’s head brings to mind Athena (wisdom and strategy, with violence only as last resort) who was conceived in and born from Zeus’ head (intellect). The virtuous knight here takes the role of divine wisdom, by which lady Justice is guided, as in the Sienna mural.
The Bull of Heaven
Let’s turn now to TdM Justice’s turbaned crown, up above the spheres. Although upside down, there is no mistaking the symbol for Taurus the bull, its horns cleverly formed by the interruption of her hair. The bull is a vehicle and/or attribute of any god or goddess worth their salt, particularly when they are acting as supreme judge. The two horns of the bull serve the same function as two pillars, maintaining stability and equilibrium.
Central and level with the ‘sun and moon’ pillar bulges is the all-seeing, monadic eye in Justice’s bull crown. We are reminded of the ‘Bull’s Eye’ (aka ‘God’s Eye’) in the constellation of Taurus, Aldebaran, the watcher in the East. This royal star was once connected to the Spring Equinox (opposite Autumnal Antares, Heart of the Scorpion) and rises with the Pleiades aka ‘Seven Sisters.’ Aldebaran is associated with St. Michael, whose name is the rhetorical question he posed to Satan: ‘Who is like unto God?’ Might this be what Justice is asking? Could the rider of the V-S card also be a stand-in for St. George, chivalric incarnation of Michael the dragon-slayer?
After 7 steps (or stages, or planetary spheres) we arrive at Justice, and 7 steps from Justice is the Devil. “If then you do not make yourself equal to God, you cannot apprehend God; for like is known by like.” If Justice is to be impartial in her judgement, she’s going to need that third eye.
The following is an excerpt from a fictitious 1490 dialogue by Italian doctor and humanist, Battista Fiera, between the painter Mantegna and the allegorical figure ‘Momus,’ on how to depict Justice. Mantegna, having heard conflicting accounts, has ‘consulted a series of philosophers’:
Mantegna: I began with Saxus Hippolytus. He said Justice should be represented with one eye; the eye being rather large and in the middle of the forehead; the eyeball, for sharper discernment, deep-set under a raised eyelid.
Momus: Suppose something happened behind her back? Might she not be taken in the rear? Will she be safe enough with only one eye in front?
. . . If she had an eye at the back as well, she’d be still more queenly and majestic.
Mantegna: Erasmus the Stoic [said] . . . that she ought to be shown seated, and holding scales in her hand.
“But . . . make her one-handed.”
“So that she couldn’t throw in a makeweight, of course.”
[Marianus] instructed me to depict her standing, and with eyes all over her as Argus was of old. . . And brandishing a sword in her hand to ward off robbers, and to protect the innocent and the unfortunate . . .
Astallius said she should be depicted sitting on a square marble chair with a slightly curved back, such as there was once at Lesbos, and measuring with a leaden rule.
Momus: To be sure, his was a milder image of Justice, since he left out the menacing sword; and he had good reason to fear she might have a fall. But why the leaden rule? Did he mean that Justice is sometimes twisted? For is not the common herd, remembering her waxen nose, loud in proclaiming that she is?
Mantegna: No, he didn’t mean that she is twisted; but he said she was to govern with equity – now and then to slacken the reins.
Momus: What did Fiera say?
Mantegna: [H]e enjoined me to depict her covered with ears as well.
Momus: Why? Was he afraid that she might become deaf?
Mantegna: He was . . . [and Astallius and Fiera also said] that Justice was to put on the habit of a penitent . . .
Momus: So, they want her to be mortified! But didn’t it occur to them to give her wings?
Mantegna: No one thought of that.
[excerpted with from ‘Images of Justice’ by Dennis E. Curtis and Judith Resnik, Yale Law Journal]
The dividing line created by the bar of her scales can also be viewed as the horizon itself, where the cusp of Libra begins the Sun’s descent. The Pierre Madenié card provides another interesting detail; the handle of the scales is shaped like a divider compass (see Star post).
In the Bolognese card, below, Justice’s scales hang from a globus she’s holding, similar to the Empress. This detail is consistent with emblems of Divine Justice, where her foot rests upon a globe. Like the TdM version, her lower half is weighty, grounded on Terra Firma, but in this case, she is Nature, ie, natural law, natural order, as above, so below. If we zoom in closely, there is what appears to be a little, bull head shape on her collar. Remember that Taurus is the sign of FIXED EARTH.
In the Rosicrucian image below, we can identify some similar components to the TdM Justice card, such as the two pillars of Wisdom (solar/father/fire/air and lunar/mother/water/earth). The above is as below, and the heavenly bodies shine onto a (directional) compass. In its centre is a globus cruciger, symbol for antimony (see Empress card) which is used in the purification of gold and silver, a material and spiritual process. At the very top is the symbol for Taurus, with Aries on the left, Gemini on the right. May, high Taurus season, when the Earth is most fecund, is when alchemists collect their dew, (again, Empress/Nature).
Mithras
There is also a connection of these three Spring signs (Aries, Taurus, Gemini) to the Mithras Mystery Cult. Personally, I’ve never really jived with the brutal Tauroctony image – symbolic though it may be – central to every mithraeum in this exclusively male cult of Ancient Rome (2nd-3rd c). However, it is relevant to our topic. Originally, the Iranian god, Mithra was not associated with bull-slaying. Mithra is initially ‘an ancient Iranian deity of covenants, light, oaths, justice, the Sun, contracts, and friendship. In addition to being the divinity of contracts, Mithra is also a judicial figure, an all-seeing protector of Truth…’As the god of contract, Mithra is indeceivable, infallible, eternally watchful, and never-resting.’ [Wikipedia]
Mithras is always accompanied by a pair of torch-bearing attendants, the Dadophori, a pair of ‘mini Mithras’ resembling the Dioscuri (Gemini). One holds his torch upwards, the other downwards, interpreted as the rising and setting Sun (life and death), creating a triad with the central solar god at the height of his power (noon) in the middle. They may also have symbolized the equinoxes. The slaying of the bull has been interpreted as the procession of Spring Equinox from Taurus to Aries (ca 2000 BC).
Interestingly, if we zoom in on the Visconti-Sforza Justice card, we can see the solar knight is also situated between two luminaries or suns. [Corner ‘suns’ were often just decorative, for example in the Bolognese tradition, but that was more than a couple of centuries later, and as noted, the background of this card is an anomaly.] And while we’re on the subject, does the TdM Justice’s hair not resemble torch flames?
“Within the Christianised zodiac, Taurus the bull was seen as an image of Christ in his role as the incarnating god, sacrificed in the redemptive act. Having rulership over the throat and vocals, Taurus was used in the secret zodiacal symbolism of Christianity as a symbol of the incarnate word ‘the Logos.” [Fred Gettings, The Secret Zodiac: The Hidden Art in Mediaeval Astrology]
Taurus was the word descending into matter/flesh, Pisces the ascent of the spirit back to the heavens.
“Thus the death of the bull was the birth of life, and for this reason took its high place in the ceremony and art of the Mithraic cultus.” [ccel.org]
Some say that the Roman cult of Mithras, a ‘cult of the Sun that began as a personal process in the darkness of a sacred cave’ was assimilated into Masonic traditions of the Middle Ages, or at least influenced them (he was born from a stone, after all). This purification ritual involved traversing 7 steps of his mystical staircase (possibly while on bended knee and blindfolded), corresponding to the 7 planetary spheres, in order to reach the Phrygian cap, a sword and a crown. Mithras, in the 8th sphere, represented cosmic order.
Curiously, Ripa later includes the dog and snake in his emblem of ‘Inviolable Justice,’ to symbolize how friendship and hatred can both corrupt good judgement.
The Cord that Binds and Measures
Lastly we come to the golden rope or chain around TdM Justice’s neck. There are a few possible meanings for it. The most obvious explanation is that it’s to gently remind would-be criminals with, lest they should end up swinging like Le Pendu. However…
The English word ‘noose’ comes from the Old French ‘no(u)s’, from the Latin word ‘nodus’, meaning knot. But ‘nous’ was also the Ancient Greek concept for the higher, divine intellect, the mind’s eye that is the God’s eye. According to Aristotle, nous is the intelligence ‘which apprehends fundamental truths (such as definitions, self-evident principles).’
‘Each intellectual virtue is a mental skill or habit by which the mind arrives at truth, affirming what is or denying what is not.’
[The cord connecting the two, Pisces fishes is called a ‘Nodus’, or ’Nodus Coelestis’, the Heavenly thread.]
Returning to the ‘Allegory of Good Government’, recall it is also the cord (or a portion of it) that binds Justice to Concordia.
There is an unseen cord that binds
The whole wide world together;
Through every human life it winds,
This one mysterious tether.
There are no separate lives; the chain
Too subtle for our seeing,
Unites us all upon the plane of universal being.
~ Small Talks on Freemasonry, Joseph Fort Newton, Masonic Service Association of the United States, 1928
If it’s the golden chain she wears round her neck (no reason it can’t represent both), it is probably the one by which Heaven and Earth are connected. To alchemists, this chain represented a series of transformations ‘from elemental chaos to quintessence’:
“Since all things follow one another in continuous succession, descending in order to the lowest, it will be found, by one who observes closely, that from the highest God to the lowest, all are bound together by mutual links, and the connection is nowhere broken. This is Homer’s golden chain, which he says God commanded to hang from heaven to earth.” – Macrobius, Commentary on the Dream of Scipio.
Finale (finally!)
Perhaps my favourite Justice painting is another very fine Italian Renaissance depiction, where her divine and civic forms meet:
“Justice is the primary virtue claimed by the Venetian state, and the lions allude to the justice and wisdom of Solomon. The female figure of Justice had even come to represent the personification of Venice herself. This identity is confirmed by the presence of Saint Michael in the left panel, minister of justice at the Last Judgment, who is shown in the act of unsheathing his sword to strike the final blow to the dragon beneath his feet and asks the enthroned Justice to “reward and punish according to merit and to commend the purged souls to the benign scales.
The Archangel Gabriel, bringer of peace, is depicted in the right panel, holding a lily in his left hand as he raises his right hand toward Justice in a gesture of benediction. Venetian legend professes that on the feast day of the Annunciation, when Christ was conceived for the spiritual salvation of humanity, God decreed the foundation of the city that was to offer political salvation to the Christian world following the fall of the pagan Roman Empire. In the allusive complexity of its self-representation Venice came to celebrate itself as a virgin city, never having been conquered, never violated. Jacobello’s figure thus acquires a complex persona, at once Justice, Venice, and the Virgin Mary.” [savevenice.org]
For a Tarot analogy, we could say she is at once Justice, the World and the Empress (and throw in Strength, too). As with many paintings of the time, it can also be interpreted in alchemical terms; Michael on Justice’s right, sword in his right hand, slays a black dragon, ‘fixing’ the volatile Mercury or breaking down prima materia, while a feminine Gabriel on Justice’s left wears a white cape and holds the white lily of purification in his/her left, the ‘white queen.’ The inside of his/her wings are even lined with peacock feathers.
All the colours of the alchemical stages are represented; black, white, [peacock], gold and red (see Michael’s wings, also). The complete and balanced Virtue wears a five-pointed crown (quintessence), the gold sun of wisdom and enlightenment on her chest (echoes of Athena’s aegis), and a red cape to match Gabriel’s white, signifying the union of opposites, integration of the soul, marriage of heaven and earth; the perfected work. ~rb
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