The Winged Prophet: From Hermes to Quetzalcoatl [Paperback]

Carol Miller (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1, 2008

The Egyptian and Italian tarot decks carry the hermetic discipline in the 22 cards of the major arcana. Demonstrates that whether we look to European or Aztec archetypes for inspiration, the wisdom of the gods is available to us all.

Product Details

• Paperback: 216 pages
• Publisher: RedWheel / Weiser (January 1, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0877287996
• ISBN-13: 978-0877287995
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,616,676 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Faith as Metaphysical Vision, April 5, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: The Winged Prophet: From Hermes to Quetzalcoatl (Paperback)

This book is apparently complicated but in fact is quite simple: underneath the dogma and ceremony, all religions are the same. They have in common a need for answers but also a need for questions that lend themselves to lessons in morality, cautionary tales, structures of ethics that permit the fine fabric of law and society. And furthermore, the societies we think of as primitive are anything but that. Each culture devises a standard of values and behavior, that is essentially like every other culture. A valuable book, a fascinating and provocative one, as applicable as a textbook as a bedside reference source.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Tarot, Mesoamerican deities & classical European Mythology, February 6, 2007

By 

Dragan (Australia) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Winged Prophet: From Hermes to Quetzalcoatl (Paperback)

Essentially this book gives a chapter for each of the 22 cards of the major arcana of the tarot, similarities are then made with the 22 Lamatl's of `The Book of Days' or the `Tonalamatl' of the Aztecs; correspondence is further made with the deities of Mesoamerica and also with classical European Mythology.

"The tonalamatl is a divinatory almanac used in central Mexico in the decades, and perhaps centuries, leading up to the Spanish conquest. It is Nahuatl in origin, meaning "pages of days". The tonalamatl was structured around the sacred 260-day year, the tonalpohualli. This 260-day year consisted of 20 trecena of 13 days each. Each page of a tonalamatl represented one trecena, and was adorned with a painting of that trecena's reigning deity and decorated with the 13 day-signs and 13 other glyphs. These day-signs and glyphs were used to cast horoscopes and discern the future. The best surviving examples of tonalamatl are the Codex Borbonicus and the Codex Borgia." (From Wikipedia, the free online encyclopedia). It should be noted that there are apparently 2 additional trecena's reported by the author of this book; this then makes 22 trecena's, corresponding with the major arcana of the tarot.

I was glad for reading this book to further increase my knowledge of the tarot. My knowledge regarding Mesoamerican deities was fairly limited, so this information I also found very useful. On many occasions while reading this book, I wanted to put this book down and come up to speed via reading more about the Mesoamerican deities and the classical European Mythology (i.e. the Iliad and Odyssey etc); I would recommend doing this prior to reading this book, assuming you have the time. The connections that the author was trying to convey did not always match up for me; perhaps this was due to the gaps in knowledge on my part. Still I did learn a bunch of stuff even though I found this book a little hard going due to its dry nature. What made this book more difficult was trying to pronounce the Mesoamerican deity names and then trying to remember what these deities did in addition. I can't see why anyone would want to read a book like this but for a deep desire to know about spiritual matters. You've got to also wonder why this book is selling as low as it is on Amazon. Still I'm thankful to the author for all her hard work and for compiling all of this information; I have gained from reading this book.

I can't say that I'd use this book to say that all religions are essentially the same. I don't think that this was the intention of this book. I saw more that there is a deep esoteric undercurrent to be discovered.

4 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Winged Prophet, August 8, 2000

By 

Luca Penati (Sunnyvale, CA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Winged Prophet: From Hermes to Quetzalcoatl (Paperback)

This book is a fantastic read - it's passionate, poignant and well written. The research done to write it is obviously extensive and thorough - Carol Miller certainly did her homework! even though the subject is highly intellectual, it's an easy read - great for a flight or a trip to the beach.