Pocket Guide to the Tarot, Revised by Alan Oken

Author:Alan Oken [Oken, Alan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Potter/Ten Speed/Harmony/Rodale
Published: 2020-06-02T00:00:00+00:00

There are fifty-six cards in the so-called lesser deck, or Minor Arcana. If the twenty-two Major cards represent the major life principles contained in the Tarot, these other cards have much more to do with the ordinary circumstances of our outer lives. They are divided into four suits: Swords, Cups, Wands, and Pentacles. These suits are known to us in playing cards, with which we are all familiar, as spades, hearts, clubs, and diamonds, respectively. Each suit is further divided into two parts: the ten numbered pip cards and the four face or court cards. The latter are the King, Queen, Knight, and Page of each suit. These last two have been combined in modern playing cards to create the Jack.

Each of the suits corresponds to one of the four major metaphysical elements: fire (creative impulses), earth (the physical realm), air (mental activity, communication), and water (feelings, desires). In the deck that we are using to illustrate the cards’ meaning, the Waite pack, each of the suits also corresponds to one of the four levels of society in the European Middle Ages: the aristocracy and the fighting nobles; the Church and its clergy; the middle class of merchants, artists, and artisans; and the people who work the earth—the farmers, peasants, and serfs. The suits also illustrate the four primary levels of human activity: spiritual (creative), mental, emotional, and physical.

THE FOLLOWING LIST PUTS ALL OF THE ABOVE IN THEIR PROPER CATEGORIES.

Swords: air, mind, nobility, spades

Cups: water, emotions, clergy, hearts

Wands: fire, creativity, artisans, clubs

Pentacles: earth, physical, farmers, diamonds

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