The Three Vows

The three vows are, in essence, memories of paradise,
where man was united with God (obedience), where he
possessed everything at once (poverty), and where
his companion was at one and the same time his wife,
his friend, his sister and his mother (chastity). 
For the real presence of God necessarily entails the
action of prostrating oneself in the face of Him "who
is more me than I myself am" -- and here lies the
root and source of the vow of obedience; the vision
of the forces, substances and essences of the world
in the guise of the "garden of divine symbols" (the
garden of Eden) signifies the possession of everything
without choosing, without laying hold of, or without
appropriating any particular thing isolated from the
whole -- and here lies the root and source of the vow
of poverty; lastly, total communion between two, between
one and another, which comprises the entire range of
all possible relationships of spirit, soul and body
between two polarized beings necessarily constitutes
the absolute wholeness of spiritual, psychic and
physical being, in love -- and here lies the root and
source of the vow of chastity.

Meditations on the Tarot, Arcana VI, The Lover,
pg. 124