The Hanged Man — XII

 

Hanging Copper and Amethyst Star Tetrahedron / Merkaba, by scredgeometryheals

Anything that is hanging could be said to be a type of pendant,

early 14c., pendaunt, "loose, hanging part of anything," whether ornamental or useful, from Anglo-French pendaunt (c. 1300), Old French pendant (13c.), noun uses of the present-participle adjective from pendre "to hang," from Latin pendere "to hang," from PIE *(s)pend-, extended form of root *(s)pen- "to draw, stretch, spin." [OE]

So, ornaments are pendants.

XII The Hanged One—Winter Wonderland Tarot, by Joshua Franklin and Aaron Franklin

Here is a pendulous man on a "pendant," hanging on a tree. Ornaments are like fruit in that they are hung from a tree, but what is the fruitfulness of the Hanged Man?

The Hanged Man is called Le Pendu in the Tarot de Marsellies.

The Hanged Man, Tarot de Marsilles: Life in suspension, transition, apathy and dullness, boredom, abandonment, sacrifice, repentance, readjustment, regeneration, improvement, surrender 

He is not just hanging, he is hanging upside-down. He isn't hanged by the neck dead, but he is stuck. He can't do much physically from this position and it isn't comfortable either.

From Norse mythology the hanged man is Odin. Odin, in his quest for knowledge, sacrificed one of his eyes to Mimir's Well, located beneath the World Tree, for a drink of its water of wisdom, he stabbed himself with a spear, and hung himself on the tree, Yggdrasil, where he remained for nine days until he gained the knowledge of the Runes.

Since the runes' native home is the well of Urd with the Norns, and since the runes do not reveal themselves to any but those who prove themselves worthy of such fearful insights and abilities, Odin hung himself from a branch of Yggdrasil, pierced himself with his spear, and peered downward into the shadowy waters below. He forbade any of the other gods to grant him the slightest aid, not even a sip of water. And he stared downward, and stared downward, and he called to the runes. —Odin's Discovery of the Runes - Norse Mythology for Smart People

137.

I trow hung on that windy Tree

nine whole days and nights,

stabbed with a spear, offered to Odin,

myself to mine own self given,

high on that Tree of which none hath heard

from what roots it rises to heaven.

138.

None refreshed me ever with food or drink,

I peered right down in the deep;

crying aloud I lifted the Runes

then back I fell from thence.  —Hávamál, The Words of Odin the High One from the Elder Edda, translated by Olive Bray

"Yggdrasil, the Mundane tree", Baxter's Patent Oil Painting, from a plate included in the English translation of the Prose Edda by Oluf Oulufsen Bagge (1847)

Because of this, the World Tree is called Yggdrasil, which some translate as meaning "Odin's horse," Ygg(r) meaning "the Terrible One[as in One who evokes Awe]" (a name for Odin) + drasill "horse, steed," metaphorically meaning "gallows," from the idea of the gallows being "the horse of the hanged," so let us say instead here that the "gallows," galgi in Old Norse, is the "drasill ["possibly" from PIE *dʰer- "to hold, support"] of the hanga [Old Norse hengja/hanga "to be suspended"]. And it would make even morse sense to translate drasill as steed, rather than "horse" and say "steed of the hanged," since steed is from the same root as Old English stod [and stud (n.2) is reconstructed to be from PIE root *sta- "to stand, make to be firm," with derivatives meaning "place or thing that is standing" like a stud (n.1) from

Middle English stode "pillar, prop, post, upright timber used as support," from Proto-Germanic *stud- (source also of Old Norse stoð "staff, stick"[OE]

and saying "pillar" of the hanged makes a lot of sense compared to horse, which is, rather, said to possibly be connected to a root meaning "to run." 

Therefore Odin is associated with the gallows, which in English is from Proto-Germanic *galgon- "pole," from PIE *ghalgh "branch, rod," used in plural for the cross of cruxifixction in Old English. Therefore we could say too, he could be associated with the "fork," as in a "forked stake or post (as a gallows)", crux, or stauros, which all have similar meaning, being wooden devices for the purpose of execution, as discussed in the previous trump Strength. The resolution to "carry one's cross" all the way to to crucifixion or to "hanging" is an act of mental strength or fortitude which leads to the ultimate sacrifice, that of one's own life, in exchange for the greater good. However, hanging in this sense is not specifically death, but rather the suffering endured before death. Death, which is the next card on the fool's/hero's journey, card XIII, can result from hanging for a prolonged period of time, but hanging itself (when not done with a noose around the neck), well, . . . it just leaves one hanging, and a lot can go on mentally in that state of suspension. 

We could say in a way that we come into this world, as the hanged man.

Artwork by Ailis O'Reilly, 2014

We enter the world pierced by the wound of separation from our god selves, from the moment the chord it cut we drop into discomfort, sickness, pain, and hardship, and begin learning the language of ruin, from late Old English "act of giving way and falling down," from Latin ruina "a collapse, a rushing down, a tumbling down," which is incarnation upon this Earth, trying to find meaning and make sense of it all before we inevitably die. We, like Odin, desire to know the secret of secrets, i.e., to understand the runes, from Proto-Germanic *runo "a secret, magic sign, runic character." If we purposefully commit ourselves to find meaning and are dedicated in our quest for the highest knowledge and wisdom, somehow in our suspended state of suffering, affixed to this place and time upon the gallows of the World Tree, we learn things that would remain otherwise elusive to both gods and angels. 

Some people associate our view from Earth of the band of the Milky Way in the sky with the concept of the World Tree.

In recent history this view is much less prominent in the human psyche due to light pollution and our modern life style of spending more time indoors, however, in the past this view would have been the cause of much wonder, contemplation, and meditation during its periods of visibility.

It can sometimes be seen as a vast arching dome intersecting with the horizon. It is suspending, or spanning (both from the same PIE root as pendulum and pendulous, *(s)pen "to draw, stretch, spin") the sky. Or we might say the dome is drawn out across the sky like a great dragon or a long long (i.e., Chinese Dragon).

Western Han dynasty tomb mural of a warrior on a (long)dragon, found in Luoyang

Draw being from a spelling alteration of Old English dragan "to draw, to drag, to protract,"with a number of related words in different languages having the meaning "to carry," such as, Old Saxon dragan, Old Frisian drega, draga, and Middle Dutch draghen. 

So there is a common similar meaning shared between something that is drawn and something that is suspended or spans; dragan = "to draw" = *(s)pen

So then, perhaps, we might say the Milky Way plane as seen from Earth is also like another thing that can carry(dragan), namely, a horse, but more specifically, a steed or stud, if the Old Norse etymological origin for drasil (horse), is PIE *dʰer- "to hold, support." So a drasil, which is a *dʰer- "hold" or "support" for a rider, is something that is used "to carry", i.e., dragan. In English we call the animal a "horse," which is of "unknown origin",  however by some it is said to be connected to *kers- meaning "to run"(also source of similar sounding course which is a "run"n.) which would make it similar in meaning to equus "horse"(as in equine), Latin, from PIE *ekwo- "horse," said to be "perhaps" related to *ōku- "swift." So in English the horse is called after being a swift running animal, rather than an animal that holds or carries. 

Neptune's Horses, Walter Crane 1910

Etymology speaking, then, the term "sawhorse" is a bit confusing since sawhorses are called after horses, presumably, due to their ability to hold and support (like a drasill), rather than for being like a horse in that they run or move swiftly.

For the same reason, the name for the World Tree being "Odin's Drasill," makes more sense when we consider the etymological origin of the Norse word, because trees(and gallows, crux and stauros) are like drasills in that they *dʰer- "hold, support and carry." And the word tree itself is from PIE *drew-o-, suffixed variant from root *deru- "be firm, solid, steadfast.

It is interesting, then, that one Old English word for "horse" is hengest, as in henchman (14th c. hengestman, later henshman) said to be probably from man + hengest,

Old English hengest "horse, stallion, gelding," from Proto-Germanic *hangistas (source also of Old Frisian hengst, Dutch hengest, German Hengst "stallion") [OE]

And being something that "holds" or "supports," *dʰer-, could be a way to describe the dome of the heavens, and therefore the great branches of the World Tree, the thing that is firm and solid so it can hold and support, is called "Odin's Horse[Drasill]," so in other words, that would be the "hengest / hengst of the hanged," or perhaps we could say the gallows is "Odin's hengst,"or the "hanger of the hanged."

In any case this tree is where the god is hanged in order to gain knowledge like the sagacious long "dragon." Dragon being from 

Greek drakon "serpent, giant seafish," apparently from drak-, strong aorist stem of derkesthai "to see clearly," from PIE *derk- "to see"

The whole point of being the hanged man is to become sagacious like the dragon or long, and one might need to hang for a long time, and long for the time of hanging to be over with.

Long is from a Germanic root said to possibly be from PIE *dlonghos-, which is also the source of such words as Old Persian darga-, Persian dirang, Sanskrit dirghah "long." 

Sometimes things that are long can be difficult, they are dur "difficult, hard," and things that are hard can be hard due to their denseness [like a tree(*deru-) is *deru- "be firm, solid, steadfast"]

It is interesting that Odin hangs from, Yggdrasil "Odin's Horse" and an Old English word for "horse, stallion, gelding" is hengest, From a Proto-Germanic root which is also the source of German word for "stallion" Hengst. Therefore, the translation of the tree, Yggdrasil, could be "Odin's Hengst" which is the gallows. And of course another way to describe something that is hanged is to say it is stalled in place (it can't move its place) like a stallion, from Frankish *stal, cognate with Old High German stal "stable." The stallion is placed in a stall to be stable in the stable. So "Odin's Hengst" is where he is stalled for nine days. And learning the runes hinged upon was being hung. A hinge, cognate with Middle Dutch henghe "hook, handle," Middle Low German henge "hinge," fixes a thing in place. Which brings us to the Hanged Man in the Spanish decks.

In Spanish the Hangged man is El Colgado, from colgar "to hang," which comes from Latin collocare "to place / put; station; post; position," from prefix com "with" + locare "to place." So El Colgado would be the person who is "with a place (specifically)" which would be similar in idea to Le Pendu in that something hanging is "suspended" in place (in loco) and able to be located.

Dalí Tarot

Being fixed in place can make a person a bit loco after a while. How did Odin fare for those nine days hanging? Did he appear completely sane or did he come off as a bit of a colgado (9.b. "a nutter;" another use of the word)? You know? How does someone with any brains do that? 

The Hanged Man (Scarecrow), Halloween Tarot, art by Kipling West, 

"Be patient with limbo, suspended judgment, and postponed plans. Turn yourself upside down to effect change. Follow your own beliefs." by Karin Lee

[Are those Odin's Ravens, Hugin and Munin there at the top?]

Who purposely injures and hangs himself for love of knowledge or wisdom? Odín estaba colgado para las Runas, that is, Odin must have been enamorado "crazy in love" with learning the secret of the Runes.

Lovers and madmen have such seething brains,

Such shaping fantasies, that apprehend

More than cool reason ever comprehends.

The lunatic, the lover and the poet

Are of imagination all compact:

One sees more devils than vast hell can hold,

That is, madman: the lover, all as frantic,

Sees Helen's beauty in a brow of Egypt:

The poet's eye, in fine frenzy rolling,

Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven;

And as imagination bodies forth 

The forms of things unknown, the poet's pen

Turns them to shapes and gives to airy nothing

A local habitation and a name. 

— Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night's Dream

 The Hangged Man XII, Shadowscapes Tarot, Stephanie Pui-Mun Law

And he would have appeared just plane colgado in his "Eureka" moment, as he said, "crying aloud [æpandi "shrieking"] I lifted the Runes then fell from thence." I don't want to name any names, but lots of people have been called "crazy" for being excited (Nudy-Butt Archimedes, Rebel Yell Howard Dead, Couch Jumping Tom Cruise). The latter of those were figuratively hanged for their antics, and the former was actually killed.

After the Romas successfully captured the city in 212 B.C., Archimedes was killed by a Roman soldier after he allegedly told the soldier, "Don't disturb my circles"—a reference to a series of figures Archemedes had outlined in the sand. Who was Archemedes, NOVA, pbs.org

So we could say Archimedes was literally killed for being loopy, i.e., drawing "loops." And that which is similar to a circle or loop is a bend. We might describe Odin as being a bit bent. He was bent on learning the secret of the Runes. The Hanged Man is traditionally shown bent or with one leg bent at and angle. And to be hanged is to be bent low or humbled, like another god man who hung on a gallows,

The Roman gallows was the cross, and, in the older translations of the Bible, gallows was used to describe the cross upon which Jesus was crucified (Ulfilas uses the term galga in his Gothic Testament. —gallows, Brittanica.com 

Cruxifixction - A Strasburgian painter possibly Hermann Schadeberg, [Some bent men on gallows]

When you are hanging you certainly have time to reflect "to think deeply or carefully,"or mirer "look at oneself," and one particular instrument of reflection (literally a "bending back") is a mirror. The word for mirror in ancient Egypt was [ˁnḫ ] ankh (a metal mirror), the same as the ankh hieroglyph which can be described as "a tau cross with an oval loop on top."

Egyptian Ankh Mirror Case, From Valley of the Kings, by Kenneth Garret

The top of the cross is bent like an anga "hook," PIE root *ang-/*ank- "to bend."

So we might say that another hung god(dess), Inanna, who was hung on a hook in the underworld, was hung on an "ang/ank" of sorts. [also discussed in Strength XI]

In Aleister Cowley's tarot deck the Hanged Man is literally hanging from (or hooked onto) an ankh and his foot is put in place (collocare ) at a very strict angle.

Alistar Cowley Thoth Tarot

The symbol that we know as an ankh was used both as a symbol and a hieroglyph in ancient Egypt. Ankh has the meaning of "life," but also, life, in a broad sense, such as the concept of eternal life, and the idea of a vivifying agent that causes one to be alive. It was often shown being held or carried in the had of gods/goddesses and pharaohs, sometimes being offered to another individual. 

Goddess Isis holding ankh to the nose of Queen Nefertari, tomb wall painting, Nefertari's tomb, Valley of the Queens

Therefore this concept of ankh it is similar in meaning to the meaning of the name of first woman in the book of Genesis, whom we know in English as, Eve, which is said to mean "life" or "living." Which name was transliterated to Latin as Eva, from the Hebrew name for the woman, חוה, transliterated to English as Havvah (hayyah) [among many other spellings], related to hayah "to live." To life! To life! L'chaim! So isnt it interesting if we spell Eve with an ankh [☥ = "life" = Eve], that the thing that the man is hung upon or affixed to is this "mother of the living"? or "mother of life, the woman♀︎? It is both the reason why we are here, i.e., life giving, generative, and at the same time, the implement of our crucifixion [being fixed to the World Tree in this time and space] and cause of [the experience of] death (because whoever is born is destined to die). But is also the reason why we truly see "weid" like God having "knowlege", דעת daath (from yada "to know").

"The Temptation and Fall [Ruin] of Eve", William Blake (Book IX, line 791, illustration Paradise Lost), 1808

"For God knows that when you eat it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing[i.e., having the lived experience of] good[what is pleasant] and evil[what is adverse]."Gen. 3:5

When Adam and Eve ate the fruit and gained daath "knowledge," they also gained death. But what if we say instead of "eating the fruit," that they"ingested" the "product/produce" hanging on The World Tree [incarnation] which is gnosis.

Pomegranate, photo by Julie O.

"You have eaten the sacred food of the underworld," said Ceres. Now you must return for half of every year to live with Pluto, your husband."

 

Suffering adversity isn't a punishment for receiving the "knowledge of evil" from the tree, suffering adversity is, rather, the consequence, because it IS the knowledge. Therefore it makes sense that suffering can lead towards wisdom (being like God), and so too, that entirely avoiding suffering can hold a person back (they remain in a state of innocence [not + harm/death] which is a type of ignorance "want of knowledge," like Adam and Eve before the fall). 

When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. Genesis 3:6

But why is it so important to be like God and to be wise? Is it worth it? 

Or is that entirely the wrong question? 

The fact is, as children of God we are destined to attain adulthood and be gods, that is, to be "like God," and not remain forever immature children. There is a time for being a child and a time for attaining or growing into adulthood. And when the child grows in wisdom and knowledge into their adult self, the child self necessarily has to die, which is a kind of evil, or at the very least it is bittersweet.  

The Hanged Chrysalis: caterpillar self dies, so that butterfly self can emerge, photo by Julie O.

But the combination of the adverse(bitter) with the good(sweet) makes life more rich, like dark chocolate and coffee with cream. It also makes one more rich or wealthy in knowledge.

Le Pendu, Le tarot dit de Charles VI, 15th c.

This hanged man looks as if he may be rich. But I'll be hanged if I know what he did to deserve his fate!