Ah, The Lovers.
What can be said about The Lovers?
The word love was discussed in depth in this post, If You Love Someone. . . (2014). The word "love" has connection to words having to do with freedom(liberty, liber), and friend(from PIE *priy-ont "loving," *pri- "to love"), the heart(lev/leb), also growth(leaf, life, lobe) in that love amplifies(amour/amore).
The Lovers can definitely be said to contain these themes, because what comes from the lovers is love, however specifically The Lovers card is about the two, opposites or counterparts coming together as one with the divine; the three in one unity, union, partnership, relationship, balance, complementary energies, choices/commiting(choosing), love. . .
The Lovers is the sixth 6 card in the Major Arcana, therefore it is card number sex "six" in Latin. The English six meaning "one more than five; twice three," is from Old English siex, six, sex, from Proto-Germanic *seks.
In certain portrayals of The Lovers(such as in the Universal Waite[below]), the biblical creation story found in Genesis is used for its symbolism. In Hebrew the word "six" is made with two shins שש (f.) shesh / ששה (m.)shisha. Six is sometimes called the number of man because it was on the sixth (shishi השש׳) day that God, created "man" adam(not just a single man[Adam], but mankind, i.e. the beings made from the adamah "ground, earth" Gen 2:7. [Therefore this word translated in English as "man," adam אדם, is literally taken out of the word "earth/ground" adamah אדמה. Therefore we could say that Adam means something like "earthling." The word "earth" being from Old English earþe "ground, soil, dirt, dry land"]).
So God created [the] man[ha-adam "the adam"] in his own image[tselem צלם], in the image of God he created him["eth" את]; male[zakar] and female[u-neqebah] he created them. Genesis 1:27
So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them[eth]; male and female he created them. Genesis 1:27 NIV
Male[zakar] and female[neqebah] he created them, and he blessed them and named [eth] them Man[adam] when they were created. Genesis 5:2 ESV
Male and female created he them; and blessed them, and called their name Adam, in the day when they were created. Genesis 5:2 KJV
So these humans/adam/men/earthlings were all made in God's image, perhaps we could say(given the difficulty in translating the meaning of eth an "untranslatable mark of the accusative case"), adam was specifically with[eth] this image made male and female, or literally [eth] were made in God's image male and female. So it is clear that there is a duality to this singular image of God, and therefore also a duality to the image of the human made in the image of God.
The shin ש on its own is sometimes used to stand for Shadday, which is a name of God, El Shadday אל שד׳, "God Almighty." The shin can also represent God's presence as flame 🔥, the word for "fire/flame/flaming" being esh אש, as in Ex 13:12 when the LORD[YHWH] went before the Israelites by night beammud esh "in a pillar of fire," and at the temple dedication,
When Solomon finished praying, fire[אש] came down from heaven and consumed the burnt offering and the sacrifices, and the glory of the LORD filled the temple. 2 Chronicles 7:1
Notice how a Hebrew ש shin and the Phonecian shin 𐤔 (if they were turned to the side), and the Greek Σ sigma, all look similar to the number 3, and 6 is 3 + 3, so two shins(shesh) actually look representitive of six. Three is the only other number name in Hebrew, besides six that contains two shins. For the number "three" there is a lamed between the shins, שלש (f.)shalosh / שלשה (m.)shlosha "three".
If a shin ש is representative of God, that is ש Shadday, the Almighty, then God with an image of God could be represented as שש = six(sex) = 6 = 3 + 3, and the two physical forms manifested of the one image are called sex [2.] , i.e.,
either of the two categories (male and female) into which humans and most other living things are divided on the basis of their reproductive functions.
שש
In the creation story of Genesis it states that God took one tsela צלע "rib, side" from the man / the adam [the being created in the image of God],
So the LORD God[YHWH Elohim] caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man [ha adam], and while he slept took one of his ribs[mistsalotaw(form of tsela)] and closed up its place with flesh. Genesis 2:21
And the rib[tsela] that the LORD God had taken from the man[ha adam] he made into a woman[isha אשה] and brought her to the man[ha adam]. Genesis 2:22
שש
If you consider that a shin ש kind of looks like one side of a ribcage, two shins could be said to represent a man/person. And two ribcages could be called two "ribs" [tselaim], in that the two "sides"[tselaim] of ribs are similar to two leaves/sides [tselaim צלעים ] of a door(which is the same word used, "ribs" = "sides" = "leaves").
He also made two doors out of [*boards of] juniper wood, each having two leaves[tselaim] that turned in sockets. 1 Kings 6:34 NIV
Also, here, the side of the tabernacle is called tsela "rib" of the tabernacle.
Also make crossbars of acacia wood: five for the frames on one side[tsela] of the tabernacle. Exodus 26:26
If you take the "ribs" individually from six שש, the number of man, you get two shins which are found in the words used for אשה isha "woman, wife, female" and א׳ש ish "man, husband, male" as in this cryptic passage from Genesis.
The man[ha adam] said, "This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called 'woman[isha אשה ],' for she was taken out of man[me ish איש] Genesis 2:23
So these particular words for man(איש ish) and woman(אשה isha) contain in them the word for six, namely two shins (שש) = shesh = six when combined. Therefore if man(adam) = six שש, it makes some sense to say one "side" or "rib" taken out of man is ש (and is therefore left with the other rib ש), and these two sides(ש and ש) describe the two sexes and are both contained in an individual image of God(a man/a woman/a Man/a human/שש), an image(ש) of the Almight(ש), and also together(when two are together as a couple/marriage/one side/flame/image of the eternal light "esh"🔥+🔥"esh" the other flame/image of the eternal light) = an image of the Almighty(ש).
שש/🔥🔥
All things in our universe are constantly in motion, vibrating. Even objects that appear to be stationary are in fact vibrating, oscillating, resonating, at various frequencies. Resonance is a type of motion, characterized by oscillation between two states. And ultimately all matter is just vibrations of various underlying fields. As such, at every scale, all of nature vibrates. earthsky.org/human word/consciousness
It is true that we get an idea of the nature of these polarities, or two states, the masculine and the feminine, through the expression of sex and gender, because the majority of people(also many animals) called male or female at birth look and act a certain way typical of that sex's gender, and the commonly accepted gender roles further emphasize the differences, but the concept of masculine and feminine is not confined to, nor created by a person's physical sex. This is clear when people say that a person(who identifies as male in gender) with male sexual organs is not acting like a man. If masculinity was necessarily tied to sexual organs and chromosomes, then a "male" with these attributes would necessarily be acting as male and could not do otherwise. Therefore to be male or female is a larger or more universal concept than a person's(man's/the adam's) biological/physical sex.
Aristotle points out this idea of the universal being more knowable relative to us(in contrast to what is more knowable "by nature" or "without qualification") in his Physics 184a17-184a21, a child might say "father" to indicate any man(whomever they perceive to be male like their father). A child might say, "There is a father," instead of "There is a man," because the particular man they know is called "father." It's not that the child thinks all men are their father(this is obvious in that most small children are afraid of being held by another random man, but love their own dad) instead, they mistakenly think that "father" is more of a universal term than it actually is(and "mother" conversely). In Aristotle's example, a small child(in Ancient Greece) only knows about what a man is because of their first/primary example of a man which is their father(this would be most true of a child who has not been out and about much, around a lot of people and places, who has only been in the home environment[as would be more common in Ancient Greece where young children were brought up in the Gynaikon "women's quarters"("In most city-states, boys lived in the Gynaikon and were trained by their fathers to master different crafts until they were around the age of six"History for Kids)].
Now what is to us plain and clear at first is rather confused masses, the elements and principles of which become known to us later by analysis. Thus we must advance from universals to particulars[*man/woman in this example is more universal, and father/mother more particular, i.e. a father is "a man in relation to his child", a man is not necessarily a father]; for it is a whole that is more knowable to sense-perception, and a universal is a kind of a whole, comprehending many things within it, like parts. Much the same thing happens in the relation of the name to the formula. A name, e.g. 'circle', means vaguely a sort of a whole: its definition analyses this into particulars[you can name something as a circle, but you aren't saying what kind of circle it is]. Similarly a child begins by calling all men father, and all women mother, but later on distinguish each. Aristotle, Physics Book I, 184a22-184b14
*a funny story: as a small child, I thought we would need to bring a towel to a shower, but I was informed that we didn't need to bring one for the "baby" shower", and I felt completely humiliated. Apparently, not all showers involve water. Apparently we can "shower" a person with things other than water. 🤷♀️
So as humans we more readily know the "confused masses" of what is "the masculine" and what is "the feminine," but in growing in our understanding we can more precisely name and categorize without making unnecessary presumptions about, or being offended by any particular "images of God" which display both, the fullness, of the "eternal light," so to speak, and also emphasize or highlight different aspects and peculiarities. We all know that light is, in fact, not just "white" light, but can be divided into a vast spectrum of colors both visible and invisible. The nature of light does not change when we are seeing it as red, or blue, or yellow, or any color in-between, and the nature of white does not change when we are seeing it mixed with black as different shades of gray.
In the larger picture(or "image" of God) we could say that the masculine and feminine principles are what create when working together. Any creative action is brought about through the interaction of the masculine and feminine. One clear image of this interaction of the feminine and masculine working together to create is when an egg(receptive) is fertilized by a sperm(active) and a human embryo is formed. In human reproduction, without an egg(feminine principle) and a sperm(masculine principle) there is no baby, even if we say two women or two men are the parents, even biological parents, of this child. A human with a uterus can identify as male in gender and have a biological child with another male person, therefore it is possible for two men(or two women) to be the biological parents of a baby in this respect, but it is not possible for two men who are born with male sexual organs or two women who are born with female sexual organs to create a new human being together through sexual reproduction. The biological process of creating life still operates through the combination of a sperm and an egg. Two sperms or two eggs do not combine to make a new human being.
Out of 23 pair of chromosomes, just 1 pair is sex chromosomes, XX or XY.
There are exceptions, however. Among humans, some men have two Xs and a Y ("XXY", Klinefelter syndrome), or one X and two Ys (XYY syndrome), and some women have three Xs or a single X instead of a double X ("X0", Turner syndrome). There are other exceptions in which SRY is damaged (leading to an XY female), or copied to the X (leading to an XX male). wikipedia/ Y chromosomes /variations
Being and movement(life[and therefore love]) only occur through the interaction of polarity or duality(yang and the yin).
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.
And God said, "Let there be light," and there was light. God saw that the light was good, and he separated the light from the darkness. God called the light "day," and the darkness he called "night." And there was evening, and there was morning—the first day. Genesis 1:1-4
Whatever was/is prior to creation was/is God. What was God? Not only was God the hovering Spirit(fire)/Mind/Consciousness(air), divine light(yang) . . . God was also the formless, empty "earth[land/foundation/throne]"(feminine), and darkness(yin)/water, or we could say, "sea of infinite potential with contained some sort of preexisting template("earth")/Wisdom." When God spoke(active/yang/light) upon the space(passive/yin/darkness), there was a "baby", i.e., the Light/Creation/Logos. But the created light was an image of the eternal light שש/🔥🔥 . . . which "light" happens to be composed from both God the Father/Light(Yang) and Mother/Wisdom(Yin), masculine ש + ש feminine.
Wisdom is the darkness that is not darkness, or the darkness that is reflective or full of light . . . even said to be "superior to the light".
For wisdom is more mobile than any motion; because of her pureness she pervades and penetrates all things. For she is a breath of the power of God, and a pure emanation of the glory of the Almighty[Shadday ש]; therefore nothing defiled gains entrance into her. For she is a reflection of eternal light, a spotless mirror of the working of God, and an image of his goodness. Although she is but one, she can do all things . . .
She is more beautiful than the sun, and excels every constellation of the stars. Compared with the light she is found to be superior, for it is succeeded by the night, but against wisdom evil does not prevail. Wisdom 7:24-27, 29-30
Even though there are two distinct polarities that are present in order to create, there is in actuality, always yin in the yang and yang in the yin(as is illustrated in the image of the Yinyang[above]). For example, a night is one half or "side" of the day(24hrs/one rotation of the Earth), and a night, though dark, contains light(such as moon and stars), and an entire day(24hrs) still contains night, and the part of the day that is light still contains darkness(such as shadow). And even to say night is half of a day is only really true at the equator. Think of the poles during summer/winter solstice which get a "night" with no darkness(24 hrs of sunlight), or a "day" with no light(24 hrs darkness).
So what does it mean to say "day" and "night" exactly?
God saw that the light was good, and he separated the light from the darkness. God called the light "day," and the darkness he called "night." And there was evening, and there was morning—the first day. Genesis 1:4-5 NIV
Sometimes "day" can mean 24 hrs, other times it means during the usual hours of light(daytime), or it can even just mean usual hours of daytime even though it is dark.
So too there are equivocations and exceptions when it comes to the labeling of sex. Some "men"(meaning the human species) are men/male, and some "men" are women/female, and of those men and women, some labeled male due to physical sex are female in their gender identity, and some labeled female due to physical sex are male in their gender identity, or could even be "male" chromosomaly, but are born as female due to how they developed in the womb. These exceptions do not negate or change what these concepts "male" and "female" mean, rather they point to different levels of understanding. So we either say there is a day with no night at the summer solstice at the north pole, or we say there is a night, but the night is all light / not dark. But whatever we call something does not change the nature of light and dark. If the day is without sunlight, we could say the light is the time our "light is on," or we are awake(= light). . . although this would be further confused by a person who works a night shift, or only sleeps during the day by choice. . . like a vampire. A vampire might say "night is my day, the light is my darkness," and they would be within their right to say so.
With respect to people it is appropriate to let them decide how they want to be referred to (he/him, she/her, they/them, etc.), or defined (male, female, neither gender) because gender is not the same thing as specific physicality or appearances. We might say that males who express very masculine behavior, or females who express very feminine behavior are like the day and night at the equator, but the earth is a globe and what is "day" and "night" varies all the way to the extremes at the poles. So it is the same with people and gender. The image of God is not black and white or two dimensional, it is rounded, abundant and full of all variety of life and experience, like the Earth. Creation reveals to us God's "hands" and makes him known.
The heavens proclaim the glory of God. The skies display his craftsmanship[yadaw "his hands"]. Day after day they continue to speak; night after night they make him known. They speak without a sound or word; their voice is never heard. . . Psalm 19:1-4 NLT
So it is just in a certain sense, or particular sense, that each sex is a "side"of a whole man, i.e., adam(just as it is just in a certain sense that night is half of or a "side" of the day, or wisdom is a "side" reflection / image of the eternal light/God), yet also, each individual generally/usually presents or identifies as one particular side or the other, of either masculinity or femininity, in physical appearance or identity. In this way each sex is sex "six," that is, the image of (Shadday)God Almighty, שש = image of God that is a "man"/a human/person.
Each individual is a whole/complete image of God(which image contains the masculine and feminine), but are also (usually) presenting as prominently half or one "side" in the expression of their sex. A complete image of God is both masculine and feminine or a marriage of the two halves or sides, and so each sex (male and female) is half of sex "six" שש.
Then God said, "Let us make man[adam] in our image[betsalme nu (form of tselem צלם)], after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth. Genesis 1:26
So God created "man" with two sexes, from the two "ribs" tselaim, after his/their "image" tselem["image; likeness; phantom("shade")"]. The two "sides" tselaim were, "light" and its image (tselem) / shade. The Almighty(ש) and his/their "pure emanation"/ image (ש). Quite the mystery.
Sex(n.),
from late 14c., "males or females collectively," from Latin sexus "a sex, state of being either male or female, gender," of uncertain origin. "Commonly taken with seco as division or 'half' of the race"[Tucker], which would connect it to secare "to divide or cut"
In this way the The Lovers, the two halves, the duo, reveals the sacred mystery of the divine nature of mankind/humans, the creatures that God made in his/their image. An individual is both singularly this image(just as we are each one individual with two distinct hemispheres of our brains[left and right] that need to work together), but can also be one half or side of a couple which together again reflect the singular image of God(two heads are better than one). So this image of God is continually being reflected outward and inward on infinite levels of creation.
For attraction(movement toward) to occur, at a certain scale[such as the scale of people and things], there has to be some creative interplay between masculine and feminine qualities. Opposites attract. Equality of polarity repels. Without polarity there is stagnancy/stasis/no life; all light/all dark, eternal flame/eternal frozenness.
This concept makes it clear that if two people of the same sex or gender are romantically attracted to each other, they cannot simply be both entirely feminine/female or entirely masculine/male in all respects of their being. There is a spectrum of gender identity in cognitive style, style (looks), mannerism, emotional nature, etc, so one person may identify, act, or look very traditionally masculine in one area and be very traditionally feminine in another, and this is completely natural and normal. It is also natural and normal for certain people to fall towards the middle and not strongly identify with either masculine or feminine gender roles.
Each person is a complete image of God on their own, and on their own are able creators in their own right, creators of movement, art, thought, music, dance, agriculture, industry, etc[think about how the two hemispheres of the brain, the right and left, work together in an individual person], but also, most people have the desire for relationship, partnership, and particularly the intimacy of another compatible human lover whom they can create with(in many and various ways, not just biologically) and make love with/together.
Then the LORD God said, "It is not good that the man[ha adam] should be a lone; I will make him a helper[ezer] fit[neged "suitable; opposite; counterpart to"] for him." Genesis 2:18 ESV
Here in this psalm the LORD is named "our help" using the same word, ezer.
Our soul waits for the LORD[YHWH]; he is our help[ezre-nu] and our shield. Psalm 33:20 ESV
Our help[ezre-nu] is the name of the LORD[YHWH], who made heaven and earth. Psalm 124:8 ESV
So this is "help" ezer with a meaning more along the lines of savior than servant. Yet we also know that a savior is a servant, but this is a free choice and done out of love.
Sitting down, Jesus called the Twelve and said, "If anyone wants to be first, he must be the last of all and the servant of all." Mark 9:35
So a savior/help/ezer may also serve, and this is indeed what a husband is directed to do for his wife, his counterpart,
Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, Ephesians 5:25
So this being a helper goes both ways.
However, neged can also take on the meaning of "against; ex adverso," and it is true that a suitable counterpart is also a worthy adversary if need be. We are only pushed to be better and our best when we meet our match. When you are on the same team you can help each other to go far, and then also, in the bad times, in the times of adversity, you can push each other to go even farther.
Who better to nag you than your ezer neged, your opposite, your shadow, your mirror, your equal who knows everything about you(sees you naked) and can hold you accountable? If you serve your counterpart and let it be your savior in this way, even when it feels like it is against you, you will truly know yourself, and not merely yourself as you wish to be or an illusion.
The Lovers can be about finding the balance within one's own self, it is about wholeness within, as well as outside partnership.
Whole(adj.) is from Old English hal "entire, whole; unhurt, uninjured, safe; healthy, sound; genuine, straightforward," from Proto-Germanic *haila- "undamaged"(source also of Old Saxon hel. . .German heil "salvation, welfare"), from PIE *kailo- "whole, uninjured, of good omen."
There is something lacking in the created image without the two forms. It is true that the being was a creature made from the earth, i.e. an adam, however when God made them adam, also,
. . . the LORD God formed [eth] man[ha-adam] from the dust of the ground[ha-adamah] and breathed the breath of life[hayyim/chayim(m. pl.)] into his nostrils, and the man[ha-adam] became a living[hayyah/chaya(f. s.)] being[nephesh(f.)]. Genesis 2:7 BSB/
In other words, we could say that God formed Adam[earthling/material being made from the dust of the ground/matter] from the adamah[earth/ground] and God/Elohim(pl.) breathed life[chaim, from chay] into his nostrils and he became a living[chavah = Eva = Eve] being. So, this being was created in two parts. First, the matter = adam, then the breath of life = eve, given to the form of the matter. So, God created the Adam to be Eve, or he created the human as Adam-Eve, that is a being living, and it is therefore not possible to separate the two or have one without thew other. Either you have the image of God in matter(Adam) with no life(Eve), or the image in spirit(Eve) but with no physical form(Adam), however every human is in fact an image of God of both body and soul. Yet since God is infinite; God is both the known and the unknown, the knowable and the unknowable, we can only express in part, each and everyone of us, different and various facets and colors of this one LIGHT.
And I'll see your true colors shining through. I see your true colors, and that's why I love you. So don't be afraid to let it show. Your true colors. Your true colors are beautiful, like a rainbow. True Colors, by Cyndi Lauper
When a person is embracing this whole, yet unique, image of God that they are, they are honoring both the masculine and the feminine as THE image, and not overly identifying with one sex or gender, as if one side, expression, role, or starting point is better or worse than another, or that who they are (sex, gender, identity) makes them better or a better/more important image than another. Every image is equally the image, but the image is more fully known by us through each and every individual expression, the multitude of individual expressions, because being creatures, i.e. created, we can never experience God(the uncreated) as God(the uncreated), but we can experience God(God's image) as God(God's image).
And the image is so: two people can be The Lovers reflecting the image of God above, and each person attains to be The Lovers reflecting God within, but primarily and ultimately God IS and is The Lovers. So God, the infinite wholeness which expresses duality, is expressed as a single Light that is triune(God[Unity] + God[Light/Active/Father/Creator])+ God[Dark/Passive/mother/Mirror/Wisdom]), and this unmanifest trinity is expressed as the manifest trinity, Father + Son + Holy Spirit, that is the Light 🔥 , and the person is then made to be an image of this Light 🔥(trinity), which is 3 +3 = six = שש, which is sex, which is the story of creation.
Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. 1 John 4:8
Ultimately the story of creation is a love story.
