IDENTIFICACIÓN Y DELIMITACIÓN DE LUGARES O ZONAS RIESGO

he seventh trump of the tarot, Il Carro or 'The Chariot', brings together classical Platonic iconology, number symbolism and astronomical lore. The card is an image of the chariot of the soul described by Plato in the

Phaedrus. In this text Plato teaches uses the metaphor of the chariot with it's

driver and two horses, one light and one dark, to represent the soul,

Of the nature of the soul, though her true form be ever a theme of large and more than mortal discourse, let me speak briefly, and in a figure. And let the figure be composite-a pair of winged horses and a charioteer. Now the winged horses and the charioteers of the gods are all of them noble and of noble descent, but those of other races are mixed; the human charioteer drives his in a pair; and one of them is noble and of noble breed, and the other is ignoble and of ignoble breed…

So the chariot is driven by the reasoning soul who holds in rein and steers the light horse of the tractable spirit and the dark horse of the rebellious appetites. This ancient symbol of the ochema, the 'vehicle' or 'chariot' is an ancient convention of the Pythagorean and Platonic traditions and has a special connection with the number 7. The ochema/chariot is described in Olympiodorus' Platonic commentaries and the philosopher Damascius says of it: "The soul possesses a certain shining vehicle which is called “star-like” and is eternal." The chariot of the soul is the subtle vehicle, the aetherial body, the true astral body of pure pneuma. The Neoplatonist Proclus states the doctrine that the astral vehicle belongs to heaven whereas the physical vehicle is of the sub-lunar realm. This subtle vehicle is envisaged as the original spiritual body, translucent in its pristine heavenly state and of perfect spherical form, the aethereum animae vehiculum (the ethereal vehicle of the soul). Boethius refers to the ochema as the leves currus (the lifting chariot) in his Consolations of Philosophy, III.9. This classical concept of the Neoplatonic 'vehicle' emerges from antiquity again in the thought of such representatives of the Byzantine Renaissance as Michael Psellus and Nicephorus Gregoras. We encounter it in the luminosi corporis amictus (bright cloak of the body) described by Macrobius. The concept of the diaphanous subtle vehicle is also expounded by Dante in Purgatorio xxv. 88. As E.R. Dodds remarks in the notes to Proclus' Elements of Theology, the astral 'vehicle' 'remains a familar idea throughout the Middle Ages.' Hence it is not too surprising to see it depicted on the 7th tarot trump in the Franco-Milanese order.

In classical numerology the number 7 was termed telesphoros - the 'far-

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bearer' and Plutarch says that it was the number of Apollo who is customarily depicted steering the solar chariot. Cornelius Agrippa says this of the number 7:

And the Pythagorians call it the Vehiculum of mans life, which it doth not receive from its parts so, as it perfects by its proper right of its whole, for it contains body, and soul, for the body consists of four Elements, and is endowed with four qualities: Also the number three respects the soul, by reason of its threefold power, viz.

rationall, irascible, and concupiscible.

The chariot card clearly presents us with an emblem of the Platonic

vehiculum animae (vehicle of the soul) and Agrippa's description of the four

elements of the body and three faculties of the soul in man chimes perfectly

with a gloss on this card made by the 15th _{century Italian friar who wrote the}

Steele Sermon for he tells us that around the 1450's 'The Chariot' (Lo caro triumphale) was also known as mundus parvus, the 'little world' or 'world in

miniature' - man the microcosm. Agrippa also mentions another vehiculum in relation to the number 7: "There are seven Stars about the Articke Pole, greater, and lesser, called Charls-Wain". 'Charles Wain' is the old medieval name for the circumpolar constellation of Ursa Major. Here we can trace another tarological parallel in Dante Alighieri's Divine Commedia. In cantos 29 and 30 of Purgatorio the poet beholds a vision of Beatrice in the heavenly triumphal chariot drawn by a winged griffin and surrounded by the six- winged 'Holy Living Creatures'. At the right wheel danced three maids in red, emerald-green and white robes who were the theological virtues Faith, Hope and Charity; at the left hand wheel four purple-robed maidens representing the cardinal virtues Justice, Prudence, Fortitude, Temperance. Dante uses the word settentrion for this heavenly chariot and makes a connection between this heavenly vehicle and the Septentrional stars, the 7 stars of Ursa Major. The translator Peter Dale suggests that by settentrion Dante Alighieri intended to convey the, "...idea of seven lights, which may allude to the seven gifts of the Spirit." No doubt it refers to the 7 Virtues too. The heavenly chariot of Dante's poetic vision represents the Church which was thought of as the Mystical Body of Christ in the Middle Ages.

Divinatory Meaning

Momentum. Success. Triumphal progress. Victory. Conquest. Motion. Vanquishing resistance. Efficiency and control. Overcoming. Greatness achieved.

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