I grew up in a family of artists. It was the norm to hear my father typing away on his 1942 Royal, early in the morning. He only begrudgingly switched to a computer after four or five novels had been published. My mother worked alone at her giant artist’s table, often with tv in the background. They were both very social people, but the idea that solitude was necessary to create art was ingrained in me from the beginning. As an only child I was sometimes lonely, but I understood that aloneness was necessary for their work. So it is with this personal background I consider The Hermit.
Each card in the major arcana of the tarot is associated with a Hebrew letter, and in the case of The Hermit, the letter is “yod,” the smallest letter upon which all the other letters are built. A common interpretation of “yod” is “open hand.” The connection between tarot and Hebrew letters is long and deep, most notably the parallel of twenty-two major arcana and twenty-two connecting paths to wisdom in the Kabbalah. The word Kabbalah means “to receive,” and this card raises so many questions about what it means to be alone, how we receive our inspiration, the dichotomy between solitude and togetherness with people, our requirements for contemplation, and how we interpret the symbolic art of the tarot.
When I think of The Hermit, I think of someone who chooses to be alone, who is reclusive for a reason, but is also available to shed light if he is needed. He has an open hand. He connects the physical and spiritual world, and in order to do this he requires solitude. How much solitude do you require? I’ve been considering this lately. As I age I seem to want more and more time alone. I have to carve out this time in order to remain balanced. Last week I did an experiement, counting how many people I interact with on a daily basis, and it averaged around fifty. Between family, friends, customers, vendors, people at the grocery store, groomer for the dogs, dentist, hairdresser on and on, I talk to a lot of people every day. That is a lot of energy exchanged in my world. The need to process it, in some sense to flush it out becomes necessary. Some might call it the need to decompress after a long day. We can all relate to the feeling of arriving home and wanting to just sit quietly with no interaction.
To me The Hermit is just that, the yod, the getting back to the essential, the necessary, the contemplative soul, the basis from which all else is derived. The Hermit’s lantern encloses a star which sheds light on what is truth, some might say wisdom. Now this is not the place for me to analyze the purpose of art, and I will also acknoledge the power of groups to create art together, and the beautiful interplay of teachers and students. But ultimately, I think, the creation of art, of anything which comes directly from the soul, requires solitude, the energy of The Hermit. My fellow traveller Jessica told me the other day that she thinks of The Hermit as a contextualizer, as one who helps us interpret our world. I thought of therapy and how the therapist listens and helps us interpret what is happening in our lives. I thought of how the artist interprets her world, and in turn helps others contextualize theirs.
So The Hermit is alone much of the time, is a solitary soul, but has the ability, perhaps even the requirement, to help us when we need him, to connect the physical with the spiritual. I think of the Greek derivation of the word hermit, eremita, which means “desert dweller,” one who lives in an uninhabitable place. All the major religions embrace a form of monastic life which indicates there is some kind of universal need, artistic or not, for solitude, to be alone with one’s thoughts. The Major Arcana of the tarot represents the cycle of life, the hero’s journey, and the tenth card, number nine (remember The Fool is zero) reminds us of the necessity for solitude, contemplation, the clearing of thoughts, the contextualization of all we feel and think. We can only be of this world if we come to it from our own world first.
The Hermit resonates deeply for me. I have 5 x 7 framed art print with a candle below that features in my personal meditations.