The Danse Macabre (or Dance of Death) is a late medieval motif that illustrates the universality of death. The constant famines, wars, and especially the Black Death in Europe showed how fragile and fleeting life truly was. Death was not a distant fate but a sudden, ever-present companion. This grim reality intensified the religious desire for repentance and salvation, but it also stirred a desperate craving for amusement and indulgence while life lasted, a final dance before the inevitable end.

Memento Mori

A living skeleton, the personification of Death, leads people from all walks of life—pope, king, clergy, peasant, merchant, old and young alike—in one great chain dance towards the grave. Death is the great equaliser, for no one can escape its grasp. It strips away all power, wealth, and status. This image serves as a memento mori, which means, “remember that you must die.” It is a meditation on mortality, reminding us of the fragility of life and the vanity of earthly pursuits.

Shakespeare writes:

“For within the hollow crown

That rounds the mortal temples of a king,

Keeps Death his watch, and there the antic [the court fool] sits,

Scoffing at his state and grinning at his pomp;

Allowing him a little time

To monarchise, be feared, and kill with looks;

And then at last comes death, and with a little pin

Bores through his castle wall, and farewell king!”

Shakespeare, Richard II

Death is compared to the court fool; there seems to be a kind of jest in death. Monks used to keep skulls in their cells to remind them of mortality. Though the skull is commonly seen as grim, it can also appear to be grinning. It is all that remains of a human being, a single bone, and it laughs.

Nowadays, many consider this morbid because we prefer to deny the reality of death. But as a natural part of human existence, death should not be feared. Philosophy, as Plato writes in the Phaedo, is a preparation for death. The foolish believe they will never die; the wise live as though they die a little each day.

“The premeditation of death is the premeditation of liberty; he who has learned to die has unlearned to serve.”

Michel Montaigne, That to Study Philosophy is to Learn to Die

In Somerset Maugham’s short story Appointment in Samarra, a retelling of an ancient tale, a servant meets the black-robed crone Death. The servant sees her make what appears to be a threatening gesture. Terrified, he borrows his master’s horse and flees to Samarra. That afternoon, the master confronts the crone in the marketplace and asks, “Why did you make a threatening gesture to my servant this morning?” Death replies, “That was not a threatening gesture; it was only a start of surprise. I was astonished to see your servant in Baghdad, for I had an appointment with him tonight in Samarra.”

By wasting precious time and energy trying to avoid Death, one ultimately fails to truly live. In the end, it is oneself who betrays life. Until we learn to entrust ourselves to death, we cannot fully entrust ourselves to life.

The World is a Theatre

While Death may appear at times terrifying and at other times playful, those he summons almost always tremble with fear. All except one: the Fool.

He joins the dance with a smile, laughing at the absurdity of it all. To him, the world is a theatre, and all men and women merely actors, each wearing different social masks to play their roles in society. He sees that people live only to make money, and that the highest goal is to land a respectable job. That people buy things they don’t need with money they don’t have to impress people they don’t like. That what matters are what others think of one and how well one fulfils social expectations. That love is reduced to marrying someone financially secure. That friendship is only useful when money is needed. That wisdom is just believing what most people say. That passion means speaking with great energy, but saying nothing of real value. That kindness is little more than saying something polite. And that piety means attending church every Sunday without any true, heartfelt belief.

Seeing all this—how shallow, hollow, and absurd it truly is—the Fool cannot help but to laugh. In this context, Kierkegaard writes:

“[W]hen I became older, when I opened my eyes and saw reality, I started to laugh and haven’t stopped since.”

Søren Kierkegaard, Either/Or

Laughter and Tragedy

The fool laughs at how seriously we take our lives, for in the end, no one gets out alive. Laughter and tragedy are often intertwined.

Nietzsche writes:

“Perhaps I know best why man is the only animal that laughs: he alone suffers so excruciatingly that he was compelled to invent laughter. The unhappiest and most melancholy animal is, as might have been expected, the most cheerful.”

Friedrich Nietzsche, The Will to Power

Till Eulenspiegel is a popular 14^th-century trickster figure in German folklore. In one story, he laughed and sang happily while labouring uphill, but when going downhill—where it was pleasant and easy—he wept and grew gloomy. When asked why, he replied, “When I go uphill, I think of going downhill, and when I go downhill, I think of going uphill.” In other words, he found joy when walking uphill in anticipation of the coming descent.

Laughter becomes more than a simple expression of happiness; it is a way to cope with and even transcend suffering. A cheerful heart is good medicine, and lightens the weight of our burdens.

We might shed tears not only from grief but also from overwhelming happiness. Laughter and tears are not always straightforward signals of joy and sadness. In fact, extreme emotions can flip our usual responses. As William Blake writes:

“Excess of sorrow laughs. Excess of joy weeps.”

William Blake, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell

Our modern age, dominated by relentless productivity and constant busyness, is indeed a tragicomic reality. We convince ourselves that our daily pursuits of money, prestige, and status are serious and meaningful. Yet, this frantic chase is often little more than a distraction from the true Great Work: the journey of knowing oneself.

Many of us fill our days with endless activity to mask our anxiety. This busyness becomes a way of running away from ourselves. By replacing deep emotional experiences with constant chatter, work, or ceaseless activity, we tend to grow emptier and lonelier.

Kierkegaard writes:

“Of all ridiculous things in the world what strikes me as the most ridiculous of all is being busy in the world, to be a man quick to his meals and quick to his work. So when, at the crucial moment, I see a fly settle on such a businessman’s nose, or he is bespattered by a carriage which passes him by in even greater haste, or the drawbridge is raised, or a tile falls from the roof and strikes him dead, I laugh from the bottom of my heart. And who could help laughing? For what do they achieve, these busy botchers? Are they not like the housewife who, in confusion at the fire in her house, saved the fire-tongs? What else do they salvage from the great fire of life?”

Søren Kierkegaard, Either/Or

A random event, like a falling roof tile, can end everything, showing that all our rushing was for nothing. People caught in this frenzy fail to build anything meaningful or of lasting value. Like the panicked housewife who saved a small metal tool while her home burned down, they cling to the trivial and lose the essential. In the end, they are left with nothing of true value.

Regrets of the Dying, Unlived Life, Persona

It is easy to become lost in the routines of daily life, striving to please others and perform the roles expected of us. Only when we face death do our social masks shatter, revealing who we truly are for, perhaps, the first time. But often there is nothing but a void. By then, it is too late to embark on the journey of self-discovery, for the Grim Reaper has come to claim us.

In her book The Top Five Regrets of The Dying, Bronnie Ware writes that the most common regret expressed by those nearing death is: “I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.” As people approach the end of their lives, they often speak not of deep regret over what they did, but of what they failed to do—of dreams left unpursued and potential unrealised. Psychologically, this can be understood as an expression of the unlived life. It reflects a life overly identified with the persona, the mask one wears to meet collective expectations, at the expense of the Self, the totality of who one truly is. Carl Jung writes:

“One could say, with a little exaggeration, that the persona is that which in reality one is not, but which oneself as well as others think one is.”

Carl Jung, C.W. Vol 9.1: Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious

When we ask the question, “Who are you?” people tend to respond in two distinct ways. One replies by naming his name, family background, profession, or hobbies—thus identifying himself through his social roles. The other falls silent, slightly unsettled by the realisation of just how profound the question really is.

As the end-of-life approaches, the illusion of outer success fades. What remains is the clear realisation of a missed chance to know oneself. If you stayed true to yourself, you remain at peace; if not, deep regret sets in.

We must cultivate an authentic relationship with our own mortality. Rather than seeing death as something distant, we should recognise it as an essential part of our being—always present, shaping our very existence. To deny death, to treat it as something that happens only to others, leads to inauthenticity, conformity, and distraction. But if we face our mortality, we can focus on what truly matters.

Change is difficult because we are creatures of habit. Even changes we have consciously planned in daily life are often resisted. Though we may understand that birth and death are two sides of the same coin, the real challenge lies in accepting our personal mortality. To accept death like birth, as part of life, is to become truly alive.

Archetypal Images of the Fool

Before exploring the relationship between Death and the Fool, let us first look at the different types of fools. While the archetype of the Fool—like any archetype—is in itself unrepresentable, we come to know its patterns and behaviours through its various archetypal images: buffoon, court jester, trickster, clown, joker, wise fool, natural fool, and holy fool.

Buffoon

We usually use the word “fool” as an insult to refer to a simpleton or stupid person. However, one should not curse the fool, but rather learn to live by his rule. Sometimes we only play the fool, just to make others laugh.

We may view the buffoon as the most outwardly ridiculous of the fool figures. He offers no insight but performs slapstick comedy—pies in the face, slipping on banana peels, and the like. He dances absurdly, pulls silly faces, tickles or plays peekaboo. This is humour without reflection. Even infants laugh at it, suggesting it is among the most primal forms of comedy. The playful art of buffoonery is found across all cultures.

Court Jester

The greatest fools, however, are often cleverer than those who laugh at them. These professional or licensed fools—such as the court jester—stand with one foot in entertainment and the other in dangerous truth. Because he was considered a fool, the jester was allowed to speak truths that no one else dared voice to the king. To achieve this, he used humour, satire, riddles, and songs to make harsh realities palatable, skilfully disguising them with wit.

Since his words were deemed “foolish”, he was safe. But often, these were the most intelligent or honest words spoken at the royal court. He was granted legal license by the king to act as a fool, giving him a special protected status. To make this privilege known, the court jester imitated the king’s crown and sceptre with a cap ‘n’ bells and a fool’s sceptre. This freedom allowed him to operate outside the usual rules of hierarchy. Wrapped in performance, he could mock nobility, challenge the king, and expose hypocrisy—effectively reversing the roles in society.

The jester is a liminal entity: both an insider and an outsider. As the cultural anthropologist Victor Turner states:

“Liminal entities are neither here nor there, they are betwixt and between the positions assigned and arrayed by law, custom, convention, and ceremonial.”

Victor Turner, The Ritual Process: Structure and Anti-Structure

The jester is neither a servant nor fully a noble—he is both and neither. This paradoxical nature aligns him closely with the Trickster archetype. While not exactly the same, they belong to the same species.

Trickster

The trickster and social outsider Eulenspiegel represents the cunning peasant who outsmarts townsfolk and tradesmen. His name means “owl mirror.” While owls often symbolise wisdom, in medieval Europe they were seen as bad omens. His wisdom lies in holding up a mirror to society, exposing hypocrisy by reflecting people’s foolishness, and forcing them, willy-nilly, to confront their shadow: the unknown or neglected parts of themselves. The best way to see your shadow is when someone else reflects it back to you.

“The trickster is a collective shadow figure, a summation of all the inferior traits of character in individuals.”

Carl Jung, C.W. Vol. 9.1: Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious

Clown

Another professional fool is the clown, whose origin was influenced by 16^th century Italian Commedia dell’arte. Harlequin, a clever servant and trickster figure, takes his name from a demon in French folklore associated with the Wild Hunt. He is contrasted with Pierrot, the melancholic, sensitive figure who became the original white-faced sad clown archetype.

The colourful circus clown emerged in 18^th-century England, known for physical comedy and acrobatics. Clowns often blend humour and tragedy, highlighting the paradox of the human condition. Like Kierkegaard’s clown, who warns the audience that a fire has broken out backstage but is mistaken for a joke and met with applause—so the world ends, amid the laughter of those who confuse tragedy with comedy.

The exaggerated smile of the clown masks deep inner pain. This is known as the sad clown paradox: those who make others laugh often struggle with sadness, depression or trauma. Humour becomes a defence mechanism, concealing emotional wounds. This tension is reflected in the clown’s dual image—at times endearing, at others terrifying—as seen in the rise of the “evil clown” in horror and literature.

There are also sacred clowns, such as the Heyoka of the Sioux people of North America, who are always doing the opposite of those around them: saying “goodbye” when greeting someone, laughing in moments of sorrow, or riding a horse backwards. These contrarian behaviours are meant to challenge social norms, reflecting the community’s shadow side. The Heyoka are both feared and respected, for their role is sacred. They are similar to shamans or medicine-men. Only those who had a dream or vision of the “thunder beings” can become Heyoka, granting them great power but also great responsibility, for if they neglect their duties, they risk being struck down by the thunder beings.

Joker

A joker is someone who tells jokes or amuses others. But the joker is more than a comic figure. Introduced into playing cards in the United States during the mid-19^th century, he serves as a wild card, able to become any card in the deck. He exists outside of any fixed social role, capable of disrupting the natural order of the game, much like the court jester, who could invert hierarchies, mock the powerful and challenge the king.

The joker pops up unexpectedly, here and there, always elusive, as if he were saying, “Now you see me, now you don’t!” He is always making us wonder, “Where is the joker?” The joker lives in a liminal realm between the magical and the physical, being both playful and dangerous.

Over time, the Joker evolved into the villain archetype, embodying humour and chaotic fun, albeit in a maniacal way. He is tricksterish and has the wit of the court jester. His key trait is hyper-sanity, a heightened awareness of reality that is nevertheless perceived as madness. The Joker exists to solve what he deems a wide-spread social problem—the lack of awareness of the grand joke of life, and he thereby turns reality upside down and challenges the conventional notions of good and evil.

Wise Fool

The great secret of the fool is that he is no fool at all, for he sees the truth that no one else dares to face, and thereby becomes wise. This paradox is seen in the figure of the “wise fool.” Socrates, for example, claimed that his wisdom arose from the awareness of his own ignorance. The wise fool hides wisdom behind a façade of madness. Such a person, identified as a fool by others, ultimately proves to be the true bearer of wisdom. Foolishness is the necessary compensation for wisdom; there is no true wisdom without folly.

Shakespeare’s professional fool Feste reflects on this role when he says to himself:

“Come on, wit, give me something good to say now! Those people who think they’re witty often prove to be fools. And I’m sure that I’m not witty, so I might pass for a wise man… Better a witty fool, than a foolish wit.”

Shakespeare, Feste from Twelfth Night

Madness, Wisdom, Folly

The fool figure seems to combine madness, wisdom, and folly. In Nietzsche’s Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Zarathustra visits a crowded marketplace, where a tightrope walker is about to perform. Addressing the crowd, he proclaims, “Man is a rope tied between beast and Übermensch—a rope over an abyss.” But the people fail to understand him and think he is mad. Meanwhile, the tightrope walker begins his work. At the midpoint, a buffoon appears, teasing and chasing him. The buffoon then leaps over the man, causing him to lose his balance and fall to his death.

Just as Zarathustra, Nietzsche’s inner wise old man, appears as an unannounced attraction, so does the buffoon. The tightrope walker moves between life and death, wisdom and folly, Übermensch and animal. But in the end, foolishness and death win, because there is no harmony between the opposites. This imbalance is reflected in the proclamation of the man-God which causes ego-inflation that leads to a fall; it aligns with the natural law of enantiodromia, where a one-sided attitude in consciousness eventually triggers its unconscious opposite to restore psychic balance.

Physical Deformity as Divine Gift

Those with physical deformities were often not regarded as cursed, but rather as touched by God, a belief that can be traced back to ancient Egypt, where dwarfs were revered as bearers of divine gifts. Owing to this sacred status, individuals with physical anomalies were often chosen to be professional fools in royal houses. Court dwarfs, for instance, made the king appear much larger and hence more powerful. Their appearance provoked both amusement and awe, evoking mythological beings such as the dwarfs of Germanic folklore (earth-dwelling spirits and master blacksmiths), as well as elves, kobolds, gnomes, and leprechauns from across European traditions.

Natural Fool

It was thought that those with physical deformities were also mentally deficient, which was often not the case. This confusion led to their association with the natural fool, a person who is naïve, childlike, or mentally impaired.

The word fool derives from the Latin follis, meaning “bellows” or “windbag”. The idea is that a fool is an empty-headed person whose words carry little weight, like air. Hence the association with terms like airhead, halfwit, or blockhead. But just as bellows feed a fire with oxygen to keep it alive and burning, the fool has a way of igniting something in us.

If there isn’t some fire in our life, we feel absolutely empty. It is what gives us thumos, the inner fire that drives us to do what is right. Only such fire can free us from our massa confusa, the tangled inner chaos that keeps us anxious, paralysed and oblivious of our inner conflicts. This darkness must be burned in order for new life to emerge, for out of the darkest depths arises the brightest light.

“Who in this mortal life would see

The Light that is beyond all light,

Beholds it best by faring forth

Into the darkness of the Night.”

Angelus Silesius, The Cherubinic Wanderer

The phoenix is reborn through fire. From the harshest reality, from senseless situations, from the deepest pain, resurrection is born. We know that life always finds a way through every situation. Although it is hard to recognise the light, it can come when everything is dark. To rise again is to not let hope fade.

The natural fool typically follows his instincts rather than social norms or rules. What makes him unique is that he is unconscious of his folly; he does not pretend to be foolish, but is perceived as such by society, often because of his unconventional behaviour or failure to conform to social expectations. Since he is considered too “simple” to lie, he often speaks uncomfortable or dangerous truths that many dare not utter. The professional fool imports the natural fool’s behaviour into his performance.

Fairy tales often portray the natural fool as someone dismissed as a good-for-nothing, laughed at, and ridiculed; yet he is the one who, against all odds, marries the princess and inherits the kingdom. He has complete faith in the process of life and throws himself wholeheartedly into everything he encounters. In doing so, he redeems not only himself but all those he meets. The fool dares to look where no one else will, rushing in where angels fear to tread. He follows the alchemical maxim, “in filth it will be found”, for it is in the most neglected places that the philosophers’ stone lies hidden. What you need most is found where you least want to look.

In the German fairy tale, The Story of the Youth Who Went Forth to Learn What Fear Was, the archetypal fool appears as young man who cannot feel fear. Determined to understand what it means to shudder, he sets out on a journey. He spends three nights in a haunted castle, facing ghosts, evil spirits, and supernatural challenges, yet he remains unfazed. He finds the treasure, redeems the castle, and marries the princess. “That is all very well”, says the fool, “but I still do not know how to shudder.” In the end, his wife, tired of his complaining, pours a bucket of cold water and fish over him—the fish wriggle on his body, and at last, he shudders.

Holy Fool

The purity and honesty of the natural fool shows something holy about him. This leads us to another type: the holy fool, well portrayed in Dostoevsky’s novel The Idiot. The protagonist, Prince Myshkin, returns to Russia after spending time in a sanatorium receiving treatment for epilepsy and “idiocy” (a historical medical term for neurological disorders). His honesty, innocence, and open-heartedness lead many to mistake him for a fool, sharply contrasting with the corrupt, egocentric, and materialistic society around him. Yet when people start to talk to him, they realise that he possesses deep wisdom and represents the Christian ideal of love.

In Eastern Orthodox Christianity, the yurodivy are figures of divine madness. They represent what St. Paul called “fools for Christ”, willingly enduring humiliation, radical poverty, suffering and even death in order to follow the path of truth and love, regardless of what the others say. Rejecting worldly possessions in favour of a spiritual and ascetic life, the holy fool becomes unstoppable, and thus profoundly threatening to the powers and authorities of this world. The holy fool “dies to this world” and gives birth to divine truth.

The holy fool, natural fool and wise fool seem to be the closest expressions of the original pattern and behaviour of the archetype, the Fool as precursor to salvation, transformation and individuation (the soul’s journey towards wholeness, in which the ego aligns itself with the Self).

Jung writes:

“There is a mystical fool in me that proved to be stronger than all my science.”

Carl Jung, Unpublished Letter (1936). From Gerhard Adler’s Dynamics of the Self

Self-Transforming Machine Elves

Numerous studies, anecdotal accounts and works—such as Rick Strassman’s DMT: The Spirit Molecule—have documented consistent encounters with entities during DMT experiences. Among these are beings that appear as clowns, jesters, imps, or elves—often described as childish, mischievous, toy-like, mechanical, or cartoonish. Terrence McKenna famously described them as “self-transforming machine elves.” They embody a combination of archetypes, such as the trickster, the fool, and the eternal child. The entities are often perceived as “more real than real”, and one frequently receives messages or insights from them.

These altered states of consciousness may induce ego death, where the sense of “I” dissolves and one merges with a larger whole, allowing contact with the archetypes of the collective unconscious. This experience can lead either to enlightenment or to “bad trips.” There is no shortcut to self-realisation.

The Purpose of the Fool

The fool is part of us, part of the unconscious. When we ignore him, we neglect something essential in ourselves. The purpose of the fool’s existence seems to be tied to the psychological well-being of a culture. Foolish behaviour, in all its forms across the world, is often marked by shocking or astonishing antics. Through this, the fool draws attention to what has been forgotten or cast aside. By exposing what society represses, he helps restore our one-sidedness and moves us towards psychic wholeness. In this way, the fool appears as an organic response to the psychological needs of the community.

On a more earthy level, perhaps it is simply necessary to poke fun at ourselves and our established social structures. Mankind has often become overly absorbed in the lofty pursuits of intellect, power, and status, while neglecting the humble, daily, earthy side of life. Dostoevsky writes in Notes from Underground: “To be too conscious is an illness—a real thorough-going illness.” This excessive introspection paralyses action and breeds self-loathing.

When we are too detached from reality, the fool comes to our rescue, grounding us again. The word human comes from the Latin humus, which means earth. To be human is to be humble, and down-to-earth. Within this lies a rich source of nourishment that heals us. This forgotten element must be restored. The fool does not ponder about the meaning or purpose of life; he simply lives it.

Don Quixote and Sancho Panza are the classic duo of ego and shadow in Western literature. One is lofty, stuck in the world of imagination which he mistakes for reality; the other is earthy and grounds him. The two are opposites, yet they need each other, for together they become whole.

The Fool Dances with Death

The Dance of Death was originally shown as a chain of people from all walks of life dancing with Death. But in the 16^th century, the artist Hans Holbein the Younger reimagined it as Death visiting each person individually—king, peasant, and everyone in between—dragging them away in a dance accompanied by music. This came to define the whole genre, inspiring many later artists to create their own versions.

Here, the fool holds a special place among Death’s victims. Death takes up the fool’s own instrument, the bagpipe, a wind-filled instrument. There is something in the fool that Death appears to admire, something he seeks to imitate. Death, too, likes to play tricks. He does not always come as grim and serious, but often laughing, and dancing, mimicking the fool. The fool dances with Death while holding a deflated windbag, as if about to strike him with it. His finger pressed to his lips hints at mischief or empty-mindedness. It is as though he mocks Death, challenging fate.

In another version of Holbein’s Dance of Death, Death not only leads the dance but also wears the fool’s costume, complete with cap ‘n’ bells. Death himself becomes the fool. The fool appears half-reluctant, half-entranced.

The relationship of death and the fool is ambiguous and paradoxical, based both upon their similarities and their opposition. At times, Death plays the fool and sometimes seizes him; they are alternately allies and enemies. Both laugh at human pretensions and the illusion of control over life, bringing down the proud and powerful whenever possible. Just as the fool often outwits wiser men, Death ultimately claims all living beings. Death’s unsettling grin mirrors the fool’s vacant smile or raucous laughter. Together, they embody two universal conditions that many prefer to ignore: mortality and folly. As “truth-tellers”, they show the hard truths hiding beneath everyday life.

In the first of two images by the 16^th century painter Sebald Beham, the fool stands beside a lady, symbolising attachment to worldly beauty. In the second image, the fool is replaced by death. The inscription above reads, “Death abolishes all beauty in man.” This contrast shows that death and folly are intertwined, perhaps even indistinguishable.

The fool’s joy in life dares to challenge Death’s dominion. Though Death always triumphs, it is never without a fierce struggle to overcome one of his most stubborn victims. For the fool embodies life, not death. He laughs at Death, and Death laughs back, but the fool still dances along the track.

Union of Opposites and Eternal Now

The fool dancing with death represents the union of opposites, life and death, wisdom and folly—a characteristic of the Self. Like music, prayer, and meditation, a dance has no destination. It does not aim at a goal in time; it is done purely for its own sake. In the art of dancing, you are dancing to dance. This is genuine play, something done just for the joy of it, and not for some ulterior motive.  

We need not constantly “kill time” or feel we have “wasted time”, treating it as an enemy in our insatiable striving for progress. Until we acknowledge this restlessness, the root of our anxiety, we will never learn what it means to be alive, to really live. To stop doing, and just be.

The truth is that the present moment is the only reality. We should focus on being with existence, and doing our duty, day by day. For we suffer more in imagination than in reality. The fool lives in the eternal now, for the past has passed and the future is yet to come. Rather than wishing things were different, he accepts them as they are. In this way, life will flow well. As Christ says, “Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.”

Dance of Bliss and Maya

In the image of Nataraja, Shiva as the cosmic dancer performs the Dance of Bliss. Here, once again, we encounter the paradox of the union of opposites. The dance is full of dynamic movement, and his hair flows wildly, yet his face remains serene and calm—capturing stillness in motion, order within chaos.

In one hand he holds a drum, by whose spiritual sounds the universe is created; in another, he holds fire, which destroys everything. A third hand makes the “fear-not” pose, offering protection, while the fourth hand signifies concealment and points towards his raised foot, symbolising the path to moksha or liberation from samsara, the cycle of birth and rebirth.  His other foot crushes the demon of avidyā (“not seeing” or ignorance), a manifestation of maya, the magical veil of illusion that casts a spell over the world, making the transient world appear ultimately real.

The word illusion derives from the Latin ludere, meaning “to play.” The world is like a play in which all things dance between appearance and truth, an eternal game of hide-and-seek.

Like someone who thinks a play on stage is real, we too are caught in maya when we see the physical world as ultimate reality, forgetting the deeper spiritual truth that we are souls having human experiences. Awakening means seeing through the play, realising that the actor is God in disguise, and choosing to play along consciously.

Lila (Divine Play)

The fool lives in lila, a Sanskrit word meaning “divine play.” In Hinduism, Brahman is the ultimate, infinite and unchanging reality underlying all existence, beyond form and comprehension. Since God is complete and lacks nothing, there is no purpose or necessity for creation. Instead, the universe arises spontaneously out of joy and freedom. The world becomes the stage on which this divine play unfolds, with life’s ups and downs woven into the cosmic drama.

This spontaneous joyful playfulness is embodied in Krishna as the divine child, who is engaged in charming and mischievous acts, enchanting everyone with his flute and performing miracles. His actions have no fixed goals or purposes; they arise purely from lila. These acts transcend conventional morality, existing beyond good and evil. Nietzsche writes:

“Gods delight in making fun: even where sacred actions are concerned, it seems they cannot stop laughing.”

Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil

This is no mockery, but an expression of divine play. Even in the most serious or sacred moments, the gods may laugh and remain playful.

We may find sacredness in everyday human interactions, for each person, in his own way, reflects the divine. Chesterton writes:

“And now a great thing in the street

Seems any human nod,

Where move in strange democracy

The million masks of God.”

G.K. Chesterton, Gold Leaves

The Great Cosmic Joke

Life is like a game, and we shouldn’t take it too seriously. The first rule of the social game is: it is serious. Or, this game is not a game.  Consequently, society tends to resist any suggestion that what we do might not be entirely serious. Alan Watts states:

“The standpoint of the fool is that all social institutions are games. He sees the whole world as game-playing, and that’s why when people take their games seriously and put on stern and pious expressions, the fool gets the giggles. Because he knows it’s all a game.”

Alan Watts, Lecture: The Joker

The art of the fool is paradoxical. He reveals that life is a game—of play, masks and illusion—yet he keeps the show going. He unveils just enough not to ruin the game. Conscious of playing within the illusion, he still plays along. Why this is remains a mystery. This is the great cosmic joke.

A game is not merely a trivial pastime, for it is, in essence, life itself. Just like the artist becomes wholly absorbed in the act of creation, or the actor loses himself in the unfolding of a role, so too do we become immersed in the drama of existence. The play of the supreme Self is like a passing illusion, as if God dreamt reality into being, and like a great actor, makes you forget it’s all a show, persuading you that it’s real and keeping you on the edge of your seat.

It is natural for people to take life seriously at times. But when the fool sees someone acting too serious, thinking himself extremely important, he can’t help but laugh. He knows that the more serious one is, the bigger the surprise—and the louder the laughter—when he realises it wasn’t serious after all. Then he shouts, “The joke’s on you!” implying that you never even realised you were the target of the joke all along.

Lovecraft writes:

“I cannot help seeing beyond the tinsel of humour, and recognising the pitiful basis of jest—the world is indeed comic, but the joke is on mankind.”

H.P. Lovecraft, In Defence of Dagon

In one of his most enigmatic sayings, Heraclitus wrote, “Aiōn is a child at play, playing a game with stones; the kingdom belongs to a child.” The term aiōn originally meant “vital force” or “life breath”, later came to mean “lifespan”, and eventually evolved into a dynamic or cosmic principle—Aiōn becoming a deity associated with eternal and cyclical time.

Human life, in its entirety, is like a child at play, and the divine authority ultimately belongs to this child. This echoes the saying in the Book of Matthew, “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”

While playing a game is unpredictable, and ever-changing, it is still guided by certain rules, strategies, and logic. Similarly, although life may sometimes feel chaotic, it unfolds according to an underlying order, reflecting Heraclitus’s view of the union of opposites in nature.

The Fool’s Journey

In Tarot, which is also known as the Fool’s journey, the fool is the first of the twenty-two Major Arcana cards, and is assigned the number zero. The journey to self-knowledge begins not with wisdom, but with folly. In the Red Book, Jung states, “The soul demands your folly; not your wisdom.”

The fool initiates us into the great mystery of life. Throughout this journey, he encounters different archetypes that are reflections of our inner world. By recognising the images that we project onto outer reality as mirror reflections of our own psyche, we come to know ourselves.

The fool walks happily, carrying no heavy burden. He has only a few belongings in his bindle, a simple sack tied to a stick, associated with the vagabond, wanderer, or pilgrim. Earlier cards depict the fool alternately as a beggar, madman, wild-man of the woods, or court jester. The fool marks the start of a new beginning, full of potential. The sun is shining brightly. Symbolically, day represents consciousness. Just as the rooster signals the coming dawn, the fool expresses a new awareness that is still hidden in the darkness of the unconscious.

The fool also holds a white rose, symbolising purity and innocence—qualities of the puer aeternus or eternal youth. The wind blows on his clothes, making him as light as a feather. He is lost in his thoughts of all the fantasies and wonderful adventures ahead and has his head above the clouds. A dog, representing his instinct, tries to warn him that he is about to fall off a cliff into the water.

When the fool falls, he does not die; instead, he begins his journey into the unknown, descending into the depths of the unconscious. The fall serves as a necessary compensation for the fool’s one-sidedness; he must become earthier, more anchored in reality.

Falling is a common motif in dreams, often expressing a compensation for ego inflation, which causes one to overestimate one’s importance and power. Pride comes before a fall. In an ancient Greek fable, Thales of Miletus was said to have been so absorbed in observing the stars that he fell into a well. One cannot truly comprehend the heavens above without first understanding what lies beneath one’s feet. As above, so below.

The Fool as Paradox

Earlier we said that the fool helps to ground us in reality, but now he himself must be grounded. This is the paradox. The fool represents both the elements of air and earth.

We might say that the professional fool—who pretends to be foolish, but is in fact clever, spontaneous and quick—embodies air. Conversely, the natural fool, foolish by nature, is more instinctual and rooted in the earth.

But we could just as easily reverse this: the professional fool, tasked with bringing lofty people down to earth, takes on a practical, grounding role, while the natural fool drifts through life, oblivious and unburdened, light as air and detached from worldly concerns.

Paradox is the vital water of life our modern world desperately needs. We will go to almost any length to avoid its painful tension, but in doing so, we trap ourselves in meaningless contradiction. While suffering with meaning can be endured, meaningless suffering is unbearable. Contradiction is barren and destructive, yet paradox is fertile and creative. It is a powerful embracing of reality. Moving from opposition, which breeds conflict, to paradox, which is sacred and unites, requires a leap in consciousness.

The Transcendent Experience

To find peace one must recognise the conflict of opposites as part of life’s natural rhythm. Life is a river that simply flows. Like waves, we rise and fall. The awakened mind becomes detached, like a non-judgmental observer, understanding that neither happiness nor sadness will last. Like the turning of the wheel of fortune, life moves in cycles—at times you rise, and at others you fall.

Suffering begins when we cling to certainty, always seeking clear answers and rejecting opposing views. But when we stop seeing contradiction and start recognising paradox, something within us begins to heal. When the opposites are united, bliss arises. This is the true transcendent experience. Western traditions tend to emphasise unity (all is one), while Eastern traditions incline towards emptiness. Both are valid; they express the same transcendent truth, seen from different angles. The alchemists called it the unus mundus—the one world. The Gnostics, the pleroma—the fullness of being. It is the reality that unites all opposites, the ultimate sacred marriage.

The Fool Meets Death

A little more than halfway through his journey, the Fool meets Death, shown as a skeleton, what remains when we die and our body decays. Death wears black armour. Black, the absence of light, evokes night, which in nature brings darkness, danger, and fear of the unknown. Likewise, death is perceived as a passage into darkness, the end of visible life. The card bears the number 13, long considered unlucky in Western culture. Yet Death also rides a white horse and carries a black banner adorned with a white lotus. In alchemy, the nigredo or blackness, leads to the albedo or whiteness. Mortification gives way to purification; darkness transforms into light.

In Irish mythology and Arthurian tales, a knight is often confronted by an unknown warrior who demands he lay his neck on the block. If the young man has the courage to obey this fateful command, the mysterious figure casts down his axe and lifts his visor, revealing himself as a saviour of shining countenance. If one can withstand the trial of initiation, one is transformed and reborn.

Death is not an end, but a transition into another existence. The death of the old self and birth of a new one occur when we overcome a major trial in life and acquire the “treasure hard to attain” in the form of a higher level of consciousness. Only that which can destroy itself is truly alive. As the saying goes, “If you die before you die, then when you die, you don’t die.”

In the presence of Death, there are four figures with different postures, each reflecting a different response to death within ourselves. Lying on the ground is the fallen king—a common motif in alchemy, where the king is ritually killed, because he has grown old, sick or impotent. The kingdom (a symbol of the Self) cannot flourish under stagnant rule. As the saying goes, “The king is dead, long live the king!”—the old must die for new life to rise.

In contrast, the bishop stands before death with his hands clasped in prayer, representing faith, humility, and spiritual acceptance. The young maiden, however, collapses or faints, and has her head turned away. She symbolises grief or denial, and is unable to look at Death directly. Meanwhile, the child stares with awe and innocence, seemingly unafraid. He represents the puer aeternus, pointing towards vitality, renewal, and growth.

Conclusion

There is much to learn from the image of the fool dancing with death. It reminds us to remember our mortality and not take our persona too seriously, but instead to seek our true self. To be like the fool who redeems everything he touches, and thus becomes the precursor to the saviour. To recognise the wisdom that comes from admitting our own folly; to understand that what we most need is hidden where we least want to look; to live in the eternal now and to see that life is lila—a mystery, a divine play, a great cosmic joke—and yet to play along and see the beauty in it. And finally, to embrace paradox over contradiction: life and death, wisdom and folly, play and seriousness. For it is through holding the tension of these opposites, on the journey of self-realisation, that we become aligned with the Self, complete the Great Work, and attain bliss.

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The Fool Dances with Death

While Death may appear at times terrifying and at other times playful, those he summons almost always tremble with fear. All except one: the Fool. He joins the dance with a smile, laughing at the absurdity of it all. To him, the world is a theatre, and all men and women merely actors, each wearing different social masks to play their roles in society.

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