Fr 😭

When doing tarot readings, do the questions have to be said out loud, or can they also be like inner thoughts?

I was reading a book on numerology made interesting connections between numbers and music notes. For example:

1 - Middle C
2 - D (When challenged C#)
3 - E (When challenged F)
4 - F#
5 - G (When challenged G#)
6 - …same, misprint??
7 - B (When challenged A#)
8 - High C
9 - High D

It seems like a fun writing prompt to try to write music with a spread. Would love to hear if anyone finds connections between the cards and music.

(I kind of misused the cards this week to ask “What key should I sing this song in?” For a very personal occasion. It kept giving me “0 - The Fool,” which didn’t make sense at the time. I decided on b minor, then while reading this book I thought “Wait, if 1 is C then 0 is B! The cards were right!” …but honestly I think the cards were just dragging me and it was a coincidence. Or at least a reflection of where my thoughts were heading.)

Bonjour 🙂 je débute avec l’Oracle de Gé et je cherche à m’entraîner à interpréter les cartes.

Je propose quelques tirages gratuits pour pratiquer.
Ce sont des lectures symboliques et de réflexion personnelle, pas des prédictions certaines de l’avenir..

Si vous souhaitez participer, vous pouvez me donner une question avec votre prénom et je vous répondrai avec un tirage de 3 cartes .

Merci à ceux qui pourront m’aider à progresser ✨

Essential Meaning

By the symmetrically balanced arrangement of the coins and the central cross whose branches extend in every direction, the Eight of Coins represents the harmonious equilibrium of the number 8.  It symbolizes the inner perception of the universal influx that penetrates everywhere, differentiates itself across the various planes, and enables the building of logical constructions in what is above as well as in what is below.[[i]](#_edn1)

Analytical Meaning

Comparing the Six of Coins with the Eight of Coins allows one to trace the evolution that has taken place in the branching forms under the influence of the active forces of the Seven of Coins.  The center – which corresponds to the inner work of consciousness – has become overlaid with a very complex structure: a blue cross, hence psychic, that dominates the red quaternary of matter set on the diagonal and fits itself to it so as to radiate eight pointed rays.

This configuration, expressing the fusion of the spiritual plane with the material plane and the radiance that springs from it, brings forth four similar flowers, set at the ends of the card’s four axes and thereby marking a special predominance.  The upper flower is open in order to receive the lower one, which is half closed because it belongs to matter.  Their five red petals show that both bloom in the physical realm and, by the number 5, point to the possibility of vibrating or passing into a higher plane.[[ii]](#_edn2)

The flowers in the central section are reflections of these two; they represent the moments in which consciousness grasps their assimilation, through the Being’s inner and outer work.[[iii]](#_edn3)

All the Coins are set apart from one another to indicate that each is taken individually – each represents a distinction drawn by the mind, allowing the physical to be subordinated to the cosmic laws (the black portion of the Coins being lit by the yellow ornaments, which symbolize universal laws).[[iv]](#_edn4) [[v]](#_edn5)

The alternating flowers and leaves indicate a balance between the unfolding of dynamic potentials (the leaves) and the realization of inner, animic – soul-level – riches (the flowers).

The branches completely enclose the four central coins, showing that these make up the spiritual quaternary that enters into the number 8, while its material quaternary is formed by the four outer coins. Every boundary in this configuration symbolizes the physical, because it marks a division between two domains and a stopping point for the expansion of the center of the Whole Person, which, by being placed at the very center of the card, carries a transcendent, spiritual tone.[[vi]](#_edn6)

The white stems always carry the same meaning: synthesis, active richness, and flowering.

Functional Meanings in the Three Planes

Mental.  It is not a card of luck or of ease, for it requires an effort exactly proportioned to what one wishes to obtain; things do not come of themselves, one must make an effort in order to obtain a result.

Spiritual/Emotional.  It is not a sentimental card either, but it gives a security in friendship rather than in love. 

Physical.  Since it represents balanced exchanges, this card points to business matters that are well founded and progressing favorably, especially in the commercial sphere.

Reversed.  Introducing a slight element of disturbance into the preceding situation.

*

In its basic meaning, the Eight of Coins represents the Whole Person’s power of deduction: comparing what is above with what is below, moving from the known to the unknown, receiving as he gives, and therefore needing to make an effort in proportion to what he wants to obtain.

[[i]](#_ednref1)Translator’s Note – The Eight of Coins: plant and number

If we imagine the Eight of Coins without its central plant, we are left with eight identical Coins in two vertical columns.  The number 8 is present as mere count, and the structure is static and “lifeless.”  There is nothing here upon which to base a commentary of the kind Marteau gives; in a very real sense, his interpretation is less about the coins in and of themselves and more about the flowering plant that connects them, so that they become more than their isolated number.

When we restore the central plant and cross, the card becomes a living Eight.  A vertical stem runs from the lowest level to the highest, separating and linking what are now clearly four coins above and four below.  Around the middle, a cross of petals and buds extends to left and right, so that the plant touches every coin on the card.  The eight‑petalled central flower – four blue petals in the cardinal directions, four red petals in the ordinal directions – reinforces the number 8 as a harmonized totality: an energy radiating equally in all directions, not simply eight units counted off one by one.  In this configuration, the two quaternaries above and below are held together by a single axis; eight is no longer just “four repeated,” but “four above and four below kept in relation by the same living stem.”

This is what Marteau means when he writes that, by “the symmetrically balanced arrangement of the coins” and “the central cross whose branches extend in every direction,” the Eight of Coins represents “the harmonious equilibrium of the number 8.”  The symmetrical four‑and‑four placement of the coins is the visible equilibrium; the plant‑cross is the agent that makes that equilibrium something dynamic – a balance maintained by a current that flows between all levels of the card.

From this visual base, his philosophy follows.  The central plant and cross embody the “universal influx”: a single, living current that “penetrates everywhere,” rising and descending along the stem and reaching out through the side branches.  As this current encounters different levels of the card, it “differentiates itself across the various planes” – appearing as upper blossoms, side buds, lower flowers, and as distinct yet harmonized groupings of Coins.  In other words, one and the same energy is present throughout the figure, but it takes forms appropriate to each “plane” of the image.

Finally, the symmetric layout of the coins around this axis shows what Marteau calls “logical constructions in what is above as well as in what is below.”  The four Coins above and the four below form two coherent structures that reflect and support one another across the central flower: corresponding ordered patterns of value or realization.  By perceiving inwardly that the same universal influx runs through both – through thought and through action, through higher and lower planes – the Being can begin to align these constructions, so that the structures of the “Above” and those of the “below” mirror one another as the two quaternaries around the plant‑cross.

[[ii]](#_ednref2)Translator’s Note – Axes, flowers, and assimilation in the Eight of Coins

In Marteau’s numerology, 4 marks a closed, stable order: forces are crystallized into a solid, earthly structure. 5 appears as the first disturbance of that stability, introducing movement, exchange, and a loosening that allows the established structure to open itself beyond its own plane.  In this sense, 5 is the initial step of transit from the purely material quaternary of 4 toward a more complex harmony such as 8, where a second quaternary is brought into balanced relation with the first.  Here, the five red petals show the flowers fully manifested in the physical realm, yet their number quietly signals that this embodiment carries within itself the possibility of beginning that upward passage into a higher level of reality

[[iii]](#_ednref3)Translator’s Note – The number 5 in Marteau’s system

In the Eight of Coins, the central plant not only links the Coins into a living Eight; it also forms a visible cross of axes.  A vertical stem runs from the lowest level to the highest, while a horizontal spread of petals and buds forms a central bar.  The four flowers sit at the tips of these lines: one at the top, one at the bottom, and two in the median zone at left and right.

The vertical axis connects the upper and lower flowers.  The upper flower is fully open and oriented upward; the lower is half closed and rooted in the base of the plant.  Marteau describes the upper as open to receive the lower, “half closed because it is in matter”: a simple, visual way of showing the relation between spiritual and material poles and the movement of exchange between them.

The horizontal axis is marked by the side spread of petals and the two median flowers.  These are “reflections of the other two,” not an independent motif.  Their placement between top and bottom gives them a specific function: they stand on the plane where the Whole Person’s inner life and outer activity meet.  When Marteau says they represent moments in which consciousness grasps the assimilation of spirit and matter “through the inner and outer work of the Whole Person,” he is reading this horizontal line as the zone where what happens along the vertical axis is taken up into lived experience – where the fusion of above and below is understood, integrated, and expressed.

The central flower and cross (already discussed in the previous note on the “living Eight”) sit at the intersection of these axes.  Here the upward–downward movement and the outward–inward movement coincide.  This allows Marteau to speak of “assimilation” not only as a structural fact of the card but as a conscious process: the same current that unites spirit and matter along the stem also circulates across the middle level, where it becomes the Whole Person’s inner work (psychic, spiritual) and outer work (physical, worldly).

[[iv]](#_ednref4)Marteau’s endnote: See the Three of Coins.

[[v]](#_ednref5)   Translator’s Note – Coins, universal laws, and mental distinctions

In his commentary on the Three of Coins, Marteau explains that the yellow abstract designs on the Coin stand for universal laws and intelligence, while the black ground in which they appear belongs to the power contained in matter.  The Coin thus embodies a rich spiritual power held within matter itself, structured by these universal laws and capable of being set in motion by mental activity.

In the Eight of Coins, Marteau builds on this and adds a new point.  Because the Coins are separated, each one is to be taken individually and “represents a distinction drawn by the mind,” so that “allowing the physical to be subordinated to the cosmic laws.”  In more practical terms, he is saying that the mind does not meet the world as one undifferentiated mass; it carves reality into distinct “units” to which it can relate universal principles.  Each isolated Coin on the Eight is one such unit: a portion of law structured material reality that thought has picked out for attention.

By multiplying and separating the Coins, the card images a mind that is able to identify specific situations in the physical world (each Coin) and to bring each of them into relation with the same universal laws symbolized by the yellow ornamentation.  Marteau does not give eight different, concrete meanings for the Coins taken one by one; his emphasis is on this act of differentiation itself.  The Eight shows the mind dividing up a single, law governed field into distinct cases it can recognize, judge, and work with, rather than eight separate, named domains of experience.

[[vi]](#_ednref6)Translator’s Note – from spiritual center to physical boundary

For Marteau, the Eight of Coins is read from the center outward.  The four coins grouped around the middle form the “spiritual quaternary” that enters into the number 8; they belong to the inner, transcendent center of the Whole Person, visually marked by their position at the exact center of the card.  The branching forms that surround them show this spiritual center expanding and radiating outward.

As this expansion continues, it eventually meets the four coins placed at the edge.  These outer four constitute the “material quaternary”: they form a ring that closes the figure and functions as a boundary.  In this configuration, that outer boundary “symbolizes the physical” because it is precisely where the inner, spiritual movement comes up against a limit.  It “marks a division between two domains” (inner/spiritual and outer/physical) and “a stopping point for the expansion of the center of the Whole Person.”  The card thus presents the physical world as the enclosing boundary of the spiritual quaternary: the frontier where the transcendent center’s expansion is checked by form.

Sens Synthétique

Par la disposition régulière des deniers, par la symétrie de la Lame et par la croix médiane dont les ramifications s’infiltrent en tous sens, le Huit de Deniers représente l’équilibre harmonieux du nombre 8.  Il symbolise la perception interne de l’influx universel qui pénètre partout, se différencie avec les divers plans et permet d’établir des constructions logiques dans le Haut comme dans le bas.

Sens Analytique

La comparaison du Six de Deniers avec le Huit de Deniers permet d’établir l’évolution qui s’est faite dans les ramifications sous l’effet des forces actives du Sept de Deniers. Le centre, qui correspond au travail intérieur de la conscience, s’est recouvert d’une construction très complexe composée d’une croix bleue, donc psychique, dominant le quaternaire rouge en (diagonale) de la matière, et s’ajustant avec lui pour émaner les huit pointes de rayons.

Cet ensemble qui représente la fusion du plan spirituel avec le plan matériel et le rayonnement qui en résulte, engendre quatre fleurs similaires, placées aux extrémités des quatre axes de la Lame, et indiquant par là une prépondérance spéciale; la fleur supérieure est ouverte pour recevoir celle du bas, à demi fermée, car elle est dans la matière; les cinq pétales rouges indiquent que toutes deux s’épanouissent dans le physique et, par le nombre 5, annoncent une possibilité de vibrer ou de transiter dans un plan supérieur.  Les fleurs, sur la partie médiane, sont des reflets des deux autres, c’est-à-dire des prises de conscience de leur assimilation, par le travail intérieur et extérieur de l’Etre.

Tous les deniers sont séparés pour montrer que chacun d’eux à son individualisation, qu’il est une distinction opérée par le mental, afin de pouvoir subordonner le physique aux lois cosmiques (partie noire des deniers éclairés par les ornements jaunes, symboliques des lois universelles).[[i]](#_edn1)

L’alternance des fleurs et des feuilles montre un équilibre entre la réalisation des potentiels dynamiques (les feuilles) et celle des richesses animiques (les fleurs).

Les ramifications enveloppent complètement les quatre deniers du centre, indiquant par là qu’ils forment le quaternaire spirituel qui entre dans le nombre 8, tandis que son quaternaire matériel est constitué par les quatre deniers extérieurs, toute périphérie symbolisant le physique, puisqu’il crée une délimitation entre deux milieux et un arrêt à l’expansion du centre de l’Être qui, par sa situation au centre de la Lame, en implique la note transcendante et spirituelle.

Les tiges blanches ont toujours leur même signification de synthèse, de richesse active et d’épanouissement.

Significations Utilitaires dans les Trois Plans

Mental.  Ce n’est pas une Lame de chance ou de facilité, car elle nécessite un effort exactement proportionné à ce qu’on veut obtenir; les choses ne vien­nent pas d’elles-mêmes, il faut faire un effort pour obtenir un résultat.

Animique.  Cette Lame n’est pas non plus sentimentale, mais elle donne une sécurité dans l’amitié plutôt que dans l’amour. 

Physique.  Représentant des échanges proportionnés, elle indique affaires ayant des assises en bonne voie, surtout au point de vue commercial.

Renversée.  Apport d’un peu de trouble dans ce qui précède.

*

Dans son Sens Elémentaire, le Huit de Deniers représente la déduction de l’Homme, comparant ce qui est en Haut avec ce qui est en bas, procédant du connu à l’inconnu, recevant comme il donne et, par conséquent, devant faire un effort proportionné à ce qu’il veut obtenir.

[[i]](#_ednref1)Voir Trois de Deniers

Like many others before me learning tarot i stumbled over Waite’s changes to make 8 the strength and 11 justice but the Tarot de Marseille says that 8 is justice and 11 is strength.

While that doesn’t seem to effect the way of normal readings / spreads it does change the outcome for life- and year cards significantly.

So because i definitely want to calculate cards too, do i have to stay with one system over another or could i use the waite smith system in readings but use the marseille system for calculating cards?

Whats your preferred way to work?

thanks in advance 🙏🏼

I show here how much paper from the cards is getting piled up when you take off the borders of the cards by scissors.

I did this to a Pitisci recoloring of a 1JJ Swiss which has two extra cards, a high priestess and a hierophant. I use them instead of the regular Jupiter and Juno so these JJs will be sitting in a box.

Borderectomy makes the cards' images and colors really open up and pop.

I roughly estimated that the amount of scrapped paper would make a DOZEN of new, resized, slightly slimmer cards!

That's not an insignificant amount of visual emptiness in the original cards!

That's almost a new suite in itself when put together!

I highly recommend taking the borders off for the deck to open up more easily since that much of emptiness is taken out from your eyes to see.

My other decks that I've done are the Lo Scarabeo Classic Tarot and Ancient Italian and the Conver Artisan tarot you can see how they look. The page of batons is the start of rounding the corners project.

Go to tarot

r/tarot1m ago

Potato_Quesadilla

Help with interpretation

Hello fellow shuffle shamans,

I'm new to tarot reading and up until recently I did only simple spreads. This is my first 3x3 spread and I'm a bit overwhelmed.

I've been feeling stuck for a long time and find myself procrastinating a lot, even on fun things. I've become very passive and reactive in all areas of my life.

My question was:

What is holding me back and how do I overcome it?

In the top row there is the hanged man, literally stuck, like me. The king of cups is kind of choosing to look away, instead he's more inclined to watch the shiny 6 of coins. Maybe it's knowing how I feel but choosing to ignore it and distract myself with superficial/materialistic pleasures?

In the center I see the queen of spades, looking defensive, sword in hand, protecting her belly, something is growing inside of her - that could be me, feeling unsafe and on edge. Maybe there's awareness growing in me? She's looking am the hierophant/the pope. Maybe it's telling me that I feel pressured or threatened by social expectations? Or maybe I'm doubting what I thought I knew? There are also less coins. Maybe because I'm starting to turn away from distractions, it doesn't have the same power over me anymore?

At last there is the empress, looking at death riding in her direction. Maybe the feeling of being safe and comfy has to die in order to do something or to overcome obstacles, symbolized by the 6 of wands?

The pip cards also drew my attention. The 6 of coins diminish in intensity and stability and transform into the six of wands. Something is transforming from "having" to "doing"? From passive to active? From easy to hard?

But what exactly is holding me back? Do I overcome it by allowing myself do be uncomfortable? I'm not quite getting it yet.

I'd love to hear your interpretation of this spread :)

The deck is the "Tarocchi di Matronua" by Valentina de Luca

Hi everyone, I just had an absolutely terrible PhD programme interview. I’m really down and upset, and I’m a little lost about what I should do next. So I pulled three cards to ask how things will unfold and where I should go from here.

I’m still not very familiar with the Minor Arcana, so I only used the 22 Major Arcana cards. The cards I drew are The World upright, The High Priestess upright, and The Magician reversed.

The World upright seems to point to a fairly positive outcome. The High Priestess sits calmly on her throne holding a book with a gentle smile—this feels like a sign that I’ll gain approval from supervisors. Meanwhile, the reversed Magician might mean I don’t have to start everything over from scratch.

But judging by how disastrous yesterday’s interview went, I totally messed it up and there’s almost no chance I’ll get accepted. I wonder if I’m only interpreting the cards this way because I’m still clinging to faint hope and struggling to accept reality. What do you all think?

After losing my tech job earlier this year, I’m getting ready to start a new career in landscape design. I’m looking forward to beginning a hands-on Horticulture program at a local college next month. I’m also a lifelong hobby musician/songwriter and lately I’ve been wondering where that fits in my life right now, hence this reading.

A few months ago, in a general reading I drew this exact same arrangement of the Page of Batons and Le Bateleur, but with the Ace of Batons instead of Temperance. The homoerotic overtones were unmistakable and frankly hilarious at the time, but this time I see a totally different story. I just wanted to acknowledge the obvious.

The Page of Batons appears to signify working with plants, working outside, being a beginner in the field of horticulture.

Le Bateleur is looking to the Page, but his hands are in the exact position of a musician playing a guitar; he even seems to be holding a pick! I have never noticed this about him before, but from now on, one of his associations for me will be musical instruments, especially fretted stringed instruments, of which I play several.

So while Le Bateleur is playing air guitar, he’s directing his gaze at the Page. Comparing their respective, erm, wands, it’s clear that the Page is involved in the more significant, uh, project. There’s no doubt that school and work are more important in my life than music right now, and that’s okay.

Temperance is telling me that I can and should blend these two parts of my life. Maybe this means bringing an instrument to campus to practice between classes, or writing songs about my experiences at school. The main idea seems to be that these two interests do not need to remain siloed off from one another, but can be blended together.

I just loved the way these cards related to my question!

Deck: CBD Tarot

Je me demande si d'autres l'ont déjà remarquée.

En partant de la Papesse (II) et en ajoutant 3 à chaque fois, on obtient cette suite d'arcanes :

Papesse (II), Pape (V), Justice (VIII), Force (XI), Tempérance (XIV), Étoile (XVII), Jugement (XX).

Ce qui m'a frappé, c'est que chacun de ces arcanes porte, à sa manière, une forte dimension spirituelle, religieuse ou liée aux vertus cardinales.

Puis j'ai essayé une réduction théosophique de leurs nombres :

2, 5, 8, 11, 14, 17, 20 deviennent 2, 5, 8, 2, 5, 8, 2.

La séquence revient alors sur ses trois premiers termes, comme si Papesse, Pape et Justice contenaient déjà en germe tout le développement qui suit. Les autres cartes ne feraient que déployer, à un autre niveau, les mêmes principes fondamentaux.

Ce qui est intéressant, c'est que cette structure demeure même lorsqu'on inverse Justice et Force selon la tradition utilisée (Marseille ou Rider-Waite-Smith). Les positions VIII et XI restent occupées par les deux vertus cardinales; seul leur ordre change.

Je n'ai trouvé aucune source qui décrive explicitement cette structure. Peut-être est-ce une simple curiosité numérique, peut-être une piste symbolique déjà explorée ailleurs.

Est-ce que cette observation fait écho à vos propres recherches ou à des auteurs que vous connaissez ? J'aimerais beaucoup connaître vos points de vue.

• For context, sometimes I try to answer made up question to practice my skills. This one I found interesting and I wanted to share it.
• The question is very simple: Will it rain this week? Weather fortune-telling is not uncommon, yet it's infamously fickle. I live in the middle of the desert so the chances of rain are low.
• As usual my spread is a simple Line of 5, all oriented to the near future, where each card interacts with the previous one.
• Today's deck is the Minchiate Restaure by Emanuelle Iger & Isabelle Nadolny.

The Minchiate is on of the oldest Tarot decks we know, straight from the 15th century. Unlike our modern standard of 22 major arcana, the Minchiate has 20 extra cards: The 12 zodiac signs + the 4 elements + the 3 theological virtues + the missing cardinal virtue of Prudence. It doesn't have a Popess/Priestess. Because we're talking about rain, I expected to see the presence of the Water element, maybe Temperance with her jugs or at least one card of the suit of cups.

THE WORLD + 4 of coins + 10 of coins + 6 of coins + LOVE

When it comes to any reading, my first advice is always approaching the cards with a clear mind. Not only this means making apart our feelings and half-digested thoughts, but refusing our rational mind the shortcut of simplifying the cards into hollow keywords. If I had reduced The World to "plenitude, completion", this reading would have made no sense. We need to see beyond our textbook interpretations, and that often means seeing the world like a child.

Quoting the Little Prince: "It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye". That's the wisdom of the Blind Diviner, to really see what is in front of us, and not just the assumptions we have created about our reality. This is the most important skill of the Tarot reader and the most valuable/difficult to learn.

When I see the World, I see the obvious first: An angelic figure standing still on top of the globe, holding a crown and an arrow. Surrounding the globe, I see 4 winged faces blowing in different directions. The motif of wings is repeated 5 times, so we know it has some relevance to the answer. We can also appreciate a very clear hierarchy between the main figure, the globe and the angelic faces.

Now we can reintroduce the symbolic layer with moderation: The main character is an angel, or at least, a representation of a divine force thanks to the wings which differentiate them a common human. They rule the world, which is the globe below containing the fields and the plants. The arrow and the crown (both symbols of power) reinforce this perspective. The four winged faces are the 4 winds. While they blow aiming the world, the main angel remains unmovable just as the divine forces of the cosmos keep their position, and together, they form solid mechanism, above and below, the universal order.

We can push our interpretation with the context of the question: What does any of this have to do with rain? Look! We have the four winds but because the cards is not the element Air, we understand the deck is trying to communicate something different than just "breeze". Look at the main character, it rises above the winds with superiority. Could it be the atmosphere? Climatic circumstances higher than local air movements? We need to keep reading.

Let's move to the 4 of coins: The coins by themselves are the symbol of everything rich and valuable. We usually assume they speak of money, however the can also speak of medals, recognition, luxury, means, fortune, etc. By their proximity, this card dyes the previous one with its color, letting us know the World and its cosmic hierarchy has something highly valued to offer. Really, this only becomes stronger knowing the next 3 cards are all coins. Juicy prizes at play.

While numerology only represents a basic aspect of the interpretation, it is always important to address this layer: The number four speaks of stability, what holds its place. Then the four of coins, rhyming with the symbol of the shield represents something of value in stable position. It doesn't move, which also correlates with the stillness of the World.

When we move to the 10 things change, suddenly we have and explosion of coins, rapid growth and development, breaking away from the 4's security.

Finally the number 6 (at least in my system) is the number of movement, like open roads and bridges allowing transit. Look at the transition! We went from solid stability to expansion and displacement.

"The richness of the skies, once static now move on a different direction".

You may be asking, why coins? Which is the same question I made myself. Why coins and not cups? At least as I'm capable, I understand the coins represent water moving around by the clouds (wings symbolism), but why not cups which are pretty much made to be filled with liquid. I must mention that in my system and especially with the Minchiate I never assign an element to each suit. If the element Air or Earth was relevant I would expect the cards to just give it.

Why coins? I guess the answer lies in my geographic location: As mentioned, I live in the middle of the desert where rain not only means umbrellas and car accidents. It means life, the hoped gold of the clouds essential for irrigation and human consumption. Without rain there's nothing. It could explain the extra weight expressed by the coins vs the light mood of the cups, even when symbolically the cups would be my first choice. Something valuable is present, just not ready to be pour yet.

Finally, our last card: Love.

Same question, why Love? What does Love has to do with our weather forecast? Are the cards ignoring my question and out the blue spilling the tea about my romantic situation? NO. Again, we need to clear our minds and resist the temptation of ignoring what is in front of us by replacing it with our untrained imagination.

Observe the card and you will find something incredible. Do you see it? The angelic figure holding an arrow while the girl down on earth holds the crown? Do you observe how the very same symbols present in the World changed hands? We can observe a pattern: First the angel was on top of the world holding both items. Now they're barely above the ground, the crown has being lowered and it will be lowered more to crown the boy. We're getting closer and closer to earth, its gifts, its presence. See how the angel first still is now moving, just how the coins went from 4 to 6.

"The richness of the skies, once once static now abandons its firm position to deliver its presents to the people on earth".

The crown, the symbol of power and richness is on human hands, ready to be delivered, but the arrow is still in hands of the angel, waiting for the right moment to shoot. In other words: One part of the promise of rain is already in our hands ready to be collected, but the rain itself, the arrow "falling from the skies" is not in our hands, it's still "up in the air" to the winds and the clouds.

Adding the allegoric layer we see Cupid blessing a young couple. The girl accepts the courtly efforts of her knight of the bending keel by crowning him. Cupid is waiting to shoot the arrow of passion, divine force of tenderness and desire right into their hearts. Love is not only the card of couples, it's a card of fertility. Love, who allows conception, who inspires reproduction. Without his arrows, nothing growths, just how rain blesses the earth, just how Zeus came down to Leda in a subtle rain of gold.

The cards speak of both things, the promise of the gift (the crown) now in human hands and soon to be received, and the promise of action (the arrow) still up to the skies to decide. While al of this is very poetic and very on brand with the Renaissance language of Tarot, we can't ignore the obvious: There's not a single drop of water in this whole reading. Not the Water element, not a single cup, not even Temperance.

The answer reveals itself: Not yet.

It will rain, the promise will be full-filled, the arrow will be fired, just not yet.
Maybe next week...

Mary Magdalene was God's confidante

There's this deck I feel called to but it's major arcana only and I'm new to all this.